On the spectral analysis of some differential operators selfadjoint in a space with indefinite metric. (Q1809975)

The present paper deals with the spectral analysis of the operator \(L_0\) generated by the differential expression \(l(u)=(1-\cos t)u''(t)+b\sin t u'(t)+c\cos t u(t)\) with real \(b, c\) in an indefinite inner product space \({\mathcal D}\) of \(2\pi\)-periodic \(C^\infty\) functions endowed with the inner product \([u,v]=\int_{-\pi}^{\pi}\int_{-\pi}^{\pi}q(t-s)u(t)\bar v(s) \,dt\,ds\) \((u,v\in{\mathcal D})\), where \(q\) is a distribution. The set \(E\) of parameters \(b,c\), for which there exists a continuous \(q\) such that the closure of \({\mathcal D}\) is a Pontrjagin space \(\Pi_1\) and \(L_0\) is a symmetric operator in \(\Pi_1\), is specified. The authors show that for \(\{b,c\}\in E\) the closure \(L\) of \(L_0\) is a selfadjoint operator in \(\Pi_1\), investigate the point spectrum of \(L\), determine the type of its critical point, and compute the spectral measure of \(L\). The investigations are based on the method of regularization of divergent integrals. A similar idea for other classes of differential operators has been used in the papers: \textit{A. M. Krall} [J. Math. Anal. Appl. 70, 267--279 (1979; Zbl 0416.46012)], \textit{V. A. Derkach} [Math. Notes, 63, 449--459 (1998; Zbl 0923.47018)], \textit{A. Dijksma} and \textit{Yu. Shondin} [J. Differ. Equations 164, 49--91 (2000; Zbl 0960.47021)].