Eigenvalue comparisons for boundary value problems for second order difference equations (Q2493032)

The authors consider the following eigenvalue problems for boundary value problems of second order difference equations: \[ \Delta (r_{i-1}\Delta y_{i-1})+\lambda a_iy_i=0, \quad 1 \leq i \leq n, \quad y_0=y_{n+1}-\delta\, y_n=0\text{ and} \] \[ \Delta (r_{i-1}\Delta y_{i-1})+\mu b_iy_i=0, \quad 1 \leq i \leq n, \quad y_0=y_{n+1}-\delta\, y_n=0. \] Here \(\lambda\) and \(\mu\) are real or complex parameters, \(n \geq 1\) is a fixed integer, \(a_i; \; b_i \geq 0\), \(r_i >0\) for \(1 \leq i \leq n\), \(\sum_{i=1}^n{a_i}; \sum_{i=1}^n{b_i} >0\) and \(\delta \in [0,1]\) is a constant. They prove that if \(j\) is the number of positive \(a_i\) and \(k\) is the number of positive \(b_i\), \(1 \leq i \leq n\), then the eigenvalues of both problems are real and satisfy \(0<\lambda_1 < \ldots < \lambda _j\) for the first case and \(0<\mu_1 < \ldots < \mu_k\) in the second one. Moreover if \(a_i \geq b_i\) for \(1 \leq i \leq n\) then \(\lambda _i \leq \mu_i\) for \(1 \leq i \leq k\).