Spectral problems with mixed Dirichlet-Neumann boundary conditions: isospectrality and beyond (Q2493969)

The main result of this paper is Theorem 2.1.3. Let \[ \Omega:=\{z\in \mathbb C: | z| <1,\;\operatorname{Im} z>0\} \] be an upper half of a disc centered at the point \(O\). Consider the following boundary decomposition: \[ \begin{aligned} \partial_1\Omega &=\{ \operatorname{Re} z\in (-1,0),\;\operatorname{Im} z=0\}\cup\{| z| =1, |\text{arg}\, z-\pi/2| <\pi/4\},\\ \partial_2\Omega &=\{ \operatorname{Re} z\in (0,1),\;\operatorname{Im} z=0\}\cup\{| z| =1, \pi/4<| \arg z-\pi/2| <\pi/2\}.\end{aligned} \] Consider the following boundary value spectral problems on \(\Omega\): Problem I. \[ -\Delta u=\lambda u\quad \text{in }\Omega,\qquad u| _{\partial_1\Omega}=0,\;{\partial u}/{\partial n}| _{\partial_2\Omega}=0. \] Problem II. \[ -\Delta u=\lambda u\quad \text{in }\Omega,\quad u| _{\partial_2\Omega}=0,\;{\partial u}/{\partial n}| _{\partial_1\Omega}=0. \] Theorem 2.1.3. Let \(\sigma_I\) denote the spectrum of Problem I and \(\sigma_{II}\) the spectrum of Problem II. With account of multiplicities, \(\sigma_I=\sigma_{II}\). The authors provide three methods to prove the main result. More precisely, the authors construct two different kinds of Dirichlet-Neumann boundary conditions on a half-disk, and prove that they have the same spectrum. In the second part of the paper, some extensions, generalizations, and open questions are discussed. In particular, the isospectral problem is related to a result of the third author [\textit{N. Nadirashvili}, Geom. Funct. Anal. 6, No. 5, 877--897 (1996; Zbl 0868.58079)]. Although this paper is published in an applied math journal, it should be considered as an interesting pure math paper.