Interlacing theorems for interface Sturm-Liouville systems (Q1123303)

In this paper interface Sturm-Liouville systems are considered. The main result is Theorem 1 of Section 6 which states that the characteristic values (the spectrum) of the system interlace the characteristic values of certain subsystems. Hence information about the spectrum can be obtained by considering systems of lower complexity. Theorem 1 of Section 8 states that any two auxiliary functions (characteristic determinants) can be written in the form D(\(\lambda)\) and D(\(\lambda)\)F(\(\lambda)\), respectively, where F(\(\lambda)\) has no zeros. But this is immediately clear if we write D(\(\lambda)\) as the determinant of the characteristic matrix which is the boundary operator applied to a direct product of fundamental systems on the subintervals. The results of Section 9 are immediate consequences of the spectral theorem for semi-bounded self- adjoint operators.