On the absolutely continuous spectrum of generalized indefinite strings. II (Q2089814)

A generalized indefinite string is a triple \((L, \omega, v)\), where \(L \in(0, \infty ]\), \(\omega \) is a real distribution in \(H_{\mathrm{loc}}^{-1} [0, L)\) and \(v\) is a non-negative Borel measure on the interval \([0, L)\). Associated with this string is the differential equation \(-f''= z \omega f + z ^2 vf \), where \(z\) is the complex spectral parameter. This differential equation gives rise to a self-adjoint linear relation \(T\) on the Hilbert space \(\mathcal{H} = \dot H_0^1 [0, L) \times L^2 ([0, L); v)\), where a pair \((f,g)\in \mathcal{H}\times \mathcal{H}\) belongs to \(T\) if and only if \(-f_1 '' = \omega g_1 + vg_2\) and \(vf_2 = vg_1\). The main result is as follows: Let \(\alpha \) and \(\eta \) be real numbers such that \(\alpha \ge0\) and \(\eta >0\). Let \(\rho \) be the square root of the Radon-Nikodým derivative of \(v\) and let \(v_s\) be the singular part of \(v\). Put \(\beta =\mathrm{sgn}\,\alpha \). If \[ \int_0^\infty |\mathsf{w}(x) - c|^2 x^\beta \, dx+\int_0^\infty \left| \rho (x) - \frac \eta { 1+2\alpha x}\right| x^\beta \, dx + \int_{ [0,\infty )} x^\beta \, dv_s (x) < \infty \] for some real number \(c\), where \(\mathsf{w}\) is the normalized anti-derivative of the distribution \(\omega \), then the essential spectrum of the linear relation \(T\) associated with the string \((\infty,\omega ,v)\) is the set \((-\infty , -\alpha /\eta ] \cup [\alpha /\eta , \infty )\), and the absolutely continuous spectrum is essentially supported on this set. The Weyl-Titchmarsh function is employed for the proofs, and the general case is considered as a perturbation of the case \(\omega =0\) and \(v=(1+2\alpha x)^{-2}\), for which a fundamental system can be found explicitely. As an example, the isospectral conservative Camassa-Holm flow is considered. This flow is described by the differential equation \( -g'' + \frac 14 g = z \omega g + z^2 v g\), where \(\omega = u - u''\) in the distributional sense for some real valued function \(u\in H^1_{\mathrm{loc}}[0,\infty )\). This problem can be transformed into a string problem, and under the assumptions that \(u\in H^1[0,\infty )\), \(v_s\) is finite and \(\rho -1\in L^2[0,\infty)\) the assumptions of the general theorem are satified, and the essential spectrum is \((-\infty , -1 /2 ] \cup [1 /2 , \infty )\).