Existence theorems for the Dirichlet problem without growth restrictions (Q1121419)

The authors consider the Dirichlet problem (1) \(x''=f(t,x,x')\), \(x(0)=x(1)=0\), \(0\leq t\leq 1\). If one wants to use the topological transversality theorem it is necessary to assure that the homotopic problem \((2)\quad x''=\lambda f(t,x,x'),\) \(x(0)=x(1)=0\) has no solution in the boundary of some open and bounded neighborhood U of \(0\in C^ 1\) for \(0<\lambda <1\). To this aim it is usually assumed a growth restriction on f of Bernstein-Nagumo type. Instead of this assumption the authors use a condition concerning the localization of zeros of f(t,x,.). They prove the following theorem: Suppose that there are \(r_ 1<0<r_ 0\) such that \(f(t,x,r_ i)\geq 0\) for \(i=0,1\) and \(0\leq x\leq r_ 0r_ 1(r_ 1-r_ 0)^{-1}.\) If f(t,0,0)\(\leq 0\) then the problem (1) has at least one solution v such that \(0\leq v\leq r_ 0r_ 1(r_ 1-r_ 0)^{-1}.\) Some generalizations of this theorem are also given. The paper contains some misprints.