Normal families and shared functions of meromorphic functions (Q616514)

This paper shows some properties of normal families and shared functions of meromorphic functions. Here is the main result: Let \(k\) be a positive integer, let \(M\) be a positive number, let \(\mathcal F\) be a family of meromorphic functions in a domain \(D\) all zeros of which are of multiplicity at least \(k\), and let \(h\) be a holomorphic function in \(D\), \(h \not\equiv 0\). If, for every \(f \in \mathcal F\), \(f\) and \(f^{(k)}\) share \(0\), and \(|f(z)| \geq M\) whenever \(f^{(k)}(z) = h(z)\), then \(\mathcal F\) is normal in \(D\). The authors also give some examples to confirm that the condition that \(f\) and \(f^{(k)}\) share \(0\) cannot be weakened, and the condition that \(|f(z)| \geq M\) whenever \(f^{(k)}(z) = h(z)\) cannot be replaced by the condition that \(|f(z)| \geq 0\) whenever \(f^{(k)}(z) = h(z)\). This improves some results due to \textit{M. L. Fang} and \textit{L. Zalcman} [Ann. Pol. Math. 80, 133--141 (2003; Zbl 1030.30029)].