The jumping nonlinearity problem revisited: an abstract approach (Q1411259)

In this interesting paper, the authors establish the existence for every \(f \in L^2\) of a solution to the nonlinear problem \[ L(u) + g(x,u) = f, a.e. x \in \Omega, \] where \(L\) is an unbounded self-adjoint operator on \(L^2(\Omega)\) with \(\Omega\) an arbitrary domain of \(\mathbb R^n\) and \(g\) is a Carathéodory function having a jumping nonlinearity \[ a = \lim_{s \to -\infty}\frac{g(x,s)}{s} < \lim_{s \to +\infty}\frac{g(x,s)}{s} = b, \] such that \([a,b] \cap \sigma(-L) = \{\hat\lambda\}\), with \(\hat\lambda\) an eigenvalue having finite multiplicity and not egal to a principal eigenvalue, and such that \((b,\hat\lambda)\) does not belong to the Fučik spectrum of \(-L\). The proof of the existence theorem relies on a saddle-point type theorem under a Palais-Smale-star \((PS)_c^*\) condition and obtained by \textit{E. A. Silva} in his Ph.D. thesis. Applications to the beam equation, the wave equation, and the Schrödinger equation in \(\mathbb{R}^n\) are presented.