Criterion for the positiveness of the Green function of a many-point boundary value problem for a fourth-order equation (Q2352623)

The authors study the positivity of the Green's function related to the fourth order problem \[ (p(x)\, u''(x))''-(q(x)\, u'(x))'=f(x), \quad x \in (a,b)\backslash \{a_i\}_{i=1}^n, \] where \(a<a_1 < \ldots <a_n<b\), coupled with the boundary conditions at \(a\) and \(b\): \[ \begin{aligned} u(a)+\alpha(a)\,D^3u(a)=u(b)-\alpha(b)\,D^3u(b)=0,\\ \beta(a)\, u''(a)- \theta (a) \, u'(a)=\beta(a)\, u''(b)+ \theta (b) \, u'(b)=0,\end{aligned} \] and at the internal points \[ \begin{aligned} u(a_i-0)-u(a_i+0)=u'(a_i-0)-u'(a_i+0)=0, \\ (p\, u'')(a_i-0)-(p\, u'')(a_i+0)=D^3(a_i-0)-D^3u(a_i+0)-\delta_i\, u(a_i)=0.\end{aligned} \] Here, \(D^3u(x)=(p(x) u''(x))'-q(x) u'(x)\) and \(\alpha\), \(\beta\), \(\theta\) and \(\delta_i\) are non negative and satisfy suitable additional properties.