On the first Steklov-Dirichlet eigenvalue for eccentric annuli (Q2118041)

The authors consider the following Steklov-Dirichlet eigenvalue problem \[ \begin{cases} -\Delta u=0, & \text{in }B_2\setminus\overline{B_1^t},\\ u=0, & \text{on }\partial B_1^t,\\ \frac{\partial u}{\partial\nu}=\sigma^t u, & \text{on }\partial B_2, \end{cases} \] where \(B_1^t,B_2\) are balls in \(\mathbb R^n\) (\(n\ge 2\)) such that \[ B_1^t=B(t e_1,r_1),\quad B_2=B(0,r_2),\quad 0\le t<r_2-r_1. \] The paper aims to study the behaviour of the first Steklov-Dirichlet eigenvalue \(\sigma_1^t\) with respect to \(t\), and in particular the focus is on the conjecture that \(\sigma_1^t\) is monotone decreasing in \(t\). To this end, the authors prove that the map \(t\mapsto \sigma_1^t\) is differentiable and compute its derivative, which in turn allows to prove the lower bound \[ \liminf_{t\to (r_2-r_1)^-}\sigma_1^t\ge \frac{r_1}{2r_2(r_2-r_1)}. \] As for the monotonicity, the authors provide numerical evidence in dimension 2 that support the conjecture.