A comparison result for perturbed radial \(p\)-Laplacians. (Q1426059)

Let \(B\) be the unit ball in \(\mathbb{R}^N\). The authors investigate radial solutions of the Dirichlet boundary value problem \[ -\Delta_p u+\lambda V_p(u)=f(| x| )\quad \text{in }B, \qquad u=0\quad \text{on }\partial B, \] where \(p>2\) is a real number, \(\Delta_p\) is the usual \(p\)-Laplacian, \(\lambda>0\) is a small parameter, \(f\) is a positive function, \(V_p\) is an operator having the same homogeneity as the \(p\)-Laplacian and satisfying suitable conditions. The main result is the following theorem. There exists \(\lambda_p>0\) such that for all \(\lambda\in [0,\lambda_p]\) and all \(f\in C[0,1]\) with \(f>0\) the following holds: (i) there exists a (radial) solution \(u\in C^{1,\frac{1}{p-1}}[0,1]\) with \(| u'| ^{p-2}u'\in C^1[0,1]\); (ii) every solution satisfies \(\frac{1}{2}G_pf(r)\leq u(r)\leq \frac{3}{2}G_pf(r)\), \(r=| x| \). Here \(G_p\) is the solution operator for the radial \(p\)-Laplacian with Dirichlet boundary conditions. Note that the positivity of \(f\) is preserved by the solution. In particular, a sign preserving result is found for a system of \(p\)-Laplace operators which are coupled in a non cooperative way.