On oscillation of half-linear functional differential equations with deviating arguments (Q1894982)

This paper is devoted to the study of the oscillatory behavior of semilinear functional differential equations of the type \[ \biggl( \bigl |x'(t) \bigr |^\alpha \text{sign} x'(t) \biggr)' = \sum^n_{i = 1} p_i (t) \biggl |x \bigl( g_i(t) \bigr) \biggr |^\alpha \text{sgn} x \bigl( g_i(t) \bigr), \tag{A} \] where \(\alpha > 0\), \(p_i : [0, \infty) \to [0, \infty)\) is a continuous function, \(\sup \{p_i(t) : t > T\} > 0\) for any \(T \geq a\), \(i = 1,2, \dots, n\); \(g_i : [0, \infty) \to \mathbb{R}\) is a continuously differentiable function satisfying \(g_i'(t) \geq 0\) for \(t \geq a\), \(\lim_{t \to \infty} g_i(t) = \infty\). It is shown that all bounded (respectively unbounded) solutions of (A) oscillate if one of the \(g_i (t)\) is retarded (respectively advanced) and the deviation \(|g_i (t) - t |\) is large enough; all solutions of (A) oscillate if both retarded and advanced arguments with sufficiently large deviations are present. The authors establish criteria for the existence of both bounded and unbounded nonoscillatory solutions with specified asymptotic properties of the equation (A). It is shown that basic aspects of the existence of nonoscillatory solutions of the functional differential equation (A) are shared with the corresponding ordinary differential equation without deviating arguments.