On a class of integral inequalities of Hardy-Littlewood type (Q1087661)

Let \(\tau\in {\mathbb{R}}\) and \(\Delta \subset L^ 2(0,\infty)\) defined by \(\Delta =\{f| \quad f: [0,\infty)\to {\mathbb{C}},\) f and f' locally absolutely continuous on \([0,\infty),\quad f,-f''+(x^ 2-\tau)f\in L^ 2(0,\infty)\}.\) The authors solve the problem to find the least value K(\(\tau)\) such that \[ (\int^{\infty}_{0}(| f'(x)|^ 2+(x^ 2-\tau)| f(x)|^ 2)dx)^ 2\leq \] \[ K(\tau)(\int^{\infty}_{0}| f(x)|^ 2dx)(\int^{\infty}_{0}| f''(x)-(x^ 2-\tau)f(x)|^ 2dx) \] holds for all \(f\in \Delta\). It was proved by \textit{W. N. Everitt} [Proc. R. Soc. Edinb., Sect. A 69(1970/72), 295-333 (1972; Zbl 0268.26013)] that the validity of such inequalities is determined by the properties of the Titchmarsh-Weyl m-coefficient of the associated differential equation \(- f''(x)+(x^ 2-\tau)f(x)=\lambda f\) and that a finite constant K(\(\tau)\) as above exists if and only if \(\tau =2n+1,\quad n\in {\mathbb{N}}\cup \{0\}.\) In this paper it is proved that the least value of the constant is \(K(2n+1)=4\) if n is even. For n odd the least value of \(K(2n+1)\) is characterized and an asymptotic expansion is derived. In any case all functions f for which equality occurs are given. The proof consists in a detailed discussion of the m-coefficient which is based in this case on a lot of interesting Lemmata on the behaviour of the gamma function.