WKB method for nonlinear equations of Emden-Fowler type (Q2145757)

The authors investigate the asymptotic behavior at infinity of oscillating solutions to the so-called Emden-Fowler type equations: \[ u''(t)+q(t)|u(t)|^{\lambda-1}u(t)=0,\tag{1} \] where \(q(t)>0\) for \(t>0\), while \(\lambda>0\) is a parameter. Specifically, the class of Eqs. (1) is considered for which \[ \lim_{t\rightarrow +\infty}\alpha(t)=0,\quad \int_{0}^{+\infty}|\mathrm{d}\alpha(t)|<\infty,\tag{2} \] where \[ \alpha(t)\equiv q'(t)(q(t))^{-(\lambda+5)/(\lambda+3)}.\tag{3} \] Asymptotic representations of solutions to Eqs. (1) are obtained by using the generalized Prüfer transformation \begin{align*} u(t)&=(q(t))^{-1/(\lambda+3)}\rho(t)w(\theta(t)),\tag{4}\\ u'(t)&=(q(t))^{1/(\lambda+3)}(\rho(t))^{(\lambda+1)/2}w'(\theta(t)),\tag{5} \end{align*} where \(\rho(t)\) and \(\theta(t)\) are new action-angle variables, while \(w(x)\) is a solution to the reference initial value problem \[ w''(x)+|w(x)|^{\lambda-1}w(x)=0,\quad w(0)=0,\quad w'(0)=1.\tag{6} \] Connections of the solutions with two-scale expansion methods are also established.