Infinite dimensional families of locally nonsolvable partial differential operators (Q1815694)

The local solvability and nonsolvability for a family of degenerate elliptic operators of the form \[ L_m(a(x))=\partial^2_x+x^{2(m-1)}\partial^2_t+ia(x)(m-1)x^{m-2}\partial_t \] is studied, where \(a=a(x)\in C^\infty\) is real valued. The sharp Levi condition of \(C^\infty\)-type is satisfied. Concerning the question for local solvability the family \(L_m(b)\), \(b\in \mathbb{R}\), shows a discrete phenomenon in the following sense: There exists a discrete and unbounded set \(\Sigma_m\) of real values for which \(L_m(b)\) is locally nonsolvable. An interesting question is how the behaviour of the variable coefficient \(a=a(x)\) in \(x=0\) takes influence on the local solvability or nonsolvability of \(L_m(a(x))\). Especially, there arises the following conjecture: \(a(0)\in \Sigma_m\Leftrightarrow L_m(a(x))\) is locally nonsolvable. The direction ``\(\Leftarrow\)'' holds. More interesting is the other one. In general it is false. Using the Taylor coefficients of \(a=a(x)\) the authors describe the set of functions \(a=a(x)\) for which \(L_m(a(x))\) is locally nonsolvable. As an important tool they determine the asymptotic behaviour of the eigenvalues of a one parameter family of ordinary differential operators. An interesting problem could be how to transfer these results to operators with degeneracy of infinite order.