Properties of Poisson kernel for a degenerate elliptic equation (Q4944241)

The authors consider the equation \[ LU(x)=\sum^n_{i=1}\left[(1-|x|^2)\;\frac{\partial^2U}{\partial x^2_i} + \tau x_i\;\frac{\partial U}{\partial x_i}\right]=0 \] where \(\tau > 2\) is an arbitrary real constant. The equation is elliptic inside and outside the unit sphere \(S^{n-1} = \{x\in \mathbb{R}^n:|x|=1\}\) and reduces to the Laplace-Beltrami equation for \(\tau = 2 (n-2)\). It is proven that the Poisson kernel of the associated Dirichlet problem is of the form \[ P(\rho u,v) =\sum^\infty_{k=0} \frac{2k+n-2}{n-2} \rho^k\tau_k(\rho)G^{\frac n2-1}_k(u\cdot v), \] \(|u|=|v|=1\), \(0\leq\rho <1\), where \(\tau_k(\rho)\) are appropriate coefficients which can be computed explicitly, and \(G_k^\mu\) is the Gegenbauer polynomial of degree \(k\) associated with \(\mu\). In other words: Let \(f\) be continuous on \(S^{n-1}\). Then \(U\) defined by \[ U(x) = \frac{1}{\omega_n}\int_{S^{n-1}} P(x,v)f(v)d\omega,\;|x|<1,\quad U(x) = f(x)\text{ on }|x|= 1 \] is continuous in \(|x|\leq 1\) and satisfies \(LU(x) = 0\).