Symbolic analysis of differential equations (Q4238965)

This paper is an expository account of algorithms for differential algebraic solutions of differential equations of orders one and two over the field of rational functions in a single variable. For the equations of order two, differential Galois theory is an essential tool. Aurelio Carboni has quipped that ordinary polynomial Galois theory is about not solving equations (that is, demonstrating unsolvability) rather than solving equations. In the differential case, however, the low order equations are sufficiently complicated so that the Galois theory comes into play. The paper considers the differential field \(F=C(x)\), where \(C\) is of characteristic zero with trivial derivation and \(x^\prime=1\), and he considers elements in differential field extensions of it, elements which satisfy differential equations with coefficients in \(F\). The order one equations considered are \(y^\prime=f\), \(f \in F\), and \(y^\prime=fy\) with \(f \in F\), \(f \neq 0\). Algorithms based on elementary algebra are given for these. Next, he uses differential Galois theory to provide algorithms for the order two equations \(y''=ry\), \(r \in F\). The algorithms find the differential Galois group as well as the form of the solutions of the equation. Interesting special cases are when \(r\) is a polynomial in \(x\), or a Laurent polynomial in \(x\), and special algorithms are given for these cases. The paper includes a summary, without proofs, of the basic results of differential Galois theory (the author does not refer to the reviewer's 1994 book \textit{Lectures on Differential Galois Theory} (see Zbl 0855.12001) which only deals with the case where \(C\) is algebraically closed), and a section on the solutions in \(F\) of equations over \(F\) of arbitrary order. For the entire collection see [Zbl 0924.13021].