A solution to an open problem on Mathieu series posed by Hoorfar and Qi (Q2248791)

The author studies Mathieu's series \[ S(r)=\sum_{n\geq 1}\,{2n\over (n^2+r^2)^2},\;r>0, \] introduced by Mathieu in his 1890 work on elasticity of solid bodies. Several authors have given bounds for this sum. In [\textit{H. Alzer} et al., J. Math. Anal. Appl. 218, No. 2, 607--610, Art. No. AY975768 (1998; Zbl 0904.26010)] for instance, it is shown that \[ {1\over r^2+\alpha}<S(r)<{1\over r^2+\beta},\;r>0, \] where \(\alpha={1\over 2\zeta(3)}\) and \(\beta={1\over 6}\). \textit{A. Hoorfar} and \textit{F. Qi} [Abstr. Appl. Anal. 2007, Article ID 94854, 10 p. (2007; Zbl 1156.26007)] posed the following inequality problem: \[ \text{Find best possible constants \(a\) and \(b\) such that for all \(r>0\)} \] \[ {1\over r^2+{1\over 2}-{4r^2+1\over 12}\,(r^2+a^2)^{-1}}<S(r)<{1\over r^2+{1\over 2}-{4r^2+1\over 12}\,(r^2+b^2)^{-1}},\eqno{(\ast)} \] giving as a first estimate \(a\leq {3\over 2},\;b\geq {1\over 4}\). The author gives the complete solution to this problem in his Theorem 1.1. For any real number \(r>0\), the inequality \((\ast)\) holds with best possible constants given by \[ a={\zeta(3)\over 6\zeta(3)-6}\equiv 0.9915168156,\;b={13\over 30}. \] The proof is given with the aid of four lemmas.