On a quasilinear elliptic boundary value problem of nonlocal type with an application in combustion theory (Q1072003)

A nonlinear boundary value problem of the form \[ Lu=\lambda f(x,u,\nabla u,\| u\|,\| \nabla u\|)\quad in\quad \Omega,\quad Bu=0\quad on\quad \partial \Omega \] is considered, where \(\Omega\) is a bounded domain in \(R^ N\), L is a linear elliptic second order operator, B a linear boundary operator, \(\lambda\) is a real parameter, \(\| \cdot \|\) denotes the supremum norm. It is proved that under certain general assumptions about f there exists a classical solution for any \(\lambda\in R\). This solution is positive provided \(f\geq 0\), \(\lambda >0\). Further, the unicity of the solution is proved for any \(\lambda\) from a certain interval. The assumptions considered are fulfilled e.g. for the problems \[ -\Delta u=\lambda \exp (u/(1+\epsilon)\| u\|)\quad in\quad \Omega,\quad u=0\quad on\quad \partial \Omega \quad or \] \[ -\Delta u=\lambda \exp (u/(1+\epsilon u))\quad in\quad \Omega,\quad u=0\quad on\quad \partial \Omega. \]