Variational methods for indefinite superlinear homogeneous elliptic problems (Q1902877)

The authors study the existence of positive solutions to the semilinear elliptic problem \[ - \Delta u+ (q(x)- \tau) u= a(x) u^p\quad\text{in }\Omega,\quad Bu= 0\quad\text{on }\partial \Omega,\tag{1} \] where \(\Omega\subset \mathbb{R}^N\), is a bounded domain, \(1< p< (N+ 2)/(N- 2)\) (if \(N\geq 3\)), \(1< p\) (if \(N= 1,2\)), \(q\) and \(a\) are continuous functions, \(\tau\in \mathbb{R}\), and \(B\) is either the Dirichlet, Neumann, or Robin boundary operator. The function \(a\) is not assumed to be positive, so that classical methods cannot be applied directly to prove existence of a nontrivial solution of (1). The authors show that there exists a positive solution in the following cases: (i) if \((q(x)- \tau)= 0\), then it is necessary and sufficient that \(a\) changes sign and \(\int_\Omega a(x)dx< 0\). (ii) if both sets \(\{x\mid a(x)> 0\}\) and \(\{x\mid a(x)< 0\}\) are not empty and \(\int_\Omega a(x) \phi^{p+ 1} dx< 0\) (where \(\phi> 0\) is a solution of \(-\Delta \phi+ q(x) \phi= 0\), \(B\phi= 0\)), then there exists \(\tau^*> 0\), such that for \(0\leq \tau< \tau^*\) there is a solution of (1), while for \(\tau> \tau^*\) no solution exists. The also prove other necessary conditions which are based on a generalized Picone identity. The existence proofs rely on a constrained maximization procedure, but (i) can also be obtained by an application of the mountain pass theorem.