Periodic solutions for functional differential equations with multiple state-dependent time lags (Q1333763)

The authors obtain sufficient conditions for the existence of a slowly oscillating periodic solution of \((*)\) \(x'(t) = f(x_ t)\), where \(f:X_ M \to\mathbb{R}\) is continuous and \(X_ M : = C([-M,0])\) such that \(f\) satisfies a negative feedback condition, that is, if \(\varphi \in X_ M\) and \(\varphi (s) > 0\) for \(-M \leq s \leq 0\), then \(f(\varphi) < 0\) and if \(\varphi (s) < 0\) for \(-M \leq s \leq 0\), then \(f(\varphi) > 0\). Further, \(f(\varphi) = g(\varphi (-\tau_ 0))\) for \(\varphi \in X_ M\) with \(\varphi (0) = 0\), where \(\tau_ 0 > 0\) and \(g:\mathbb{R}\to\mathbb{R}\) is locally Lipschitzian with \(ug(u) < 0\) for all \(u \neq 0\). A periodic solution \(x(t)\) of \((*)\) is called a slowly oscillating periodic solution if there exists numbers \(z_ 0\), \(z_ 1\) and \(z_ 2\) with \(z_ 1 - z_ 0 > \tau_ 0\) and \(z_ 2 - z_ 1 > \tau_ 0\) such that \(x(t) < 0\) for \(t \in (z_ 0, z_ 1)\) and \(x(t) > 0\) for \(t \in (z_ 1, z_ 2)\) and such that \(x(t + z_ 2 - z_ 0) = x(t)\) for all \(t\).