Persistence, contractivity and global stability in logistic equations with piecewise constant delays (Q1614711)

For the differential equation with piece-wise constant arguments \[ \frac{d N(t)}{dt} =r(t)N(t) \left\{1-aN(t)-\sum_{i=0}^m b_i N(n-i)\right\},\quad n\leq t<n+1,\;n\in\mathbb{N}\cup\{0\}, \] sufficient conditions for the persistence and contractivity of all solutions, and for the global asymptotic stability of the unique positive equilibrium \(N^*=1/(a+\sum_{i=0}^m b_i)\) are established. Here, a solution \(N(t)\) is called persistent if \({\lim\inf}_{n\to\infty}N(n)>0\), and it is said to have the contractivity if \(|N(n+1)-N^*|\leq\max_{0\leq i\leq m}|N(n-i)-N^*|\). The conditions improve some of the earlier known results; they are also applied to study the same properties of the equation \[ \frac{d x(t)}{dt} =r(t)x(t)\{1-ax(t)-g(x([t],x([t-1],\dots,x([t-m]))\}, \] where \([\cdot]\) stands for the integer part of a real number.