Integral representations and Liouville theorems for solutions of periodic elliptic equations (Q5933456)

This paper is concerned with the structure of certain spaces of solutions of linear homogeneous uniformly elliptic equations of second order with periodic coefficients in \(\mathbb{R}^n\). First, the authors obtain integral representations for certain classes of exponentially growing solutions, which are analogous to those previously obtained by S. Agmon, S. Helgason, and other authors for solutions of the Helmholtz equation. Secondly, they obtain Liouville type theorems describing the structure and dimension of the spaces of polynomially growing solutions, which extend those previously proved by \textit{M. Avellaneda} and \textit{F.-H. Lin} [C. R. Acad. Sci., Paris 309, 245-250 (1989; Zbl 0961.35022)], and by \textit{J. Moser} and \textit{M. Struwe} [Bol. Soc. Bras. Mat., Nova Sér. 23, 1-20 (1992; Zbl 0787.35028)] for second order elliptic equations in divergence form with periodic coefficients. Relations of these theorems with the analytic structure of the Fermi and Bloch surfaces are explained. The proofs of the results of this paper depend on the techniques of the Floquet theory developed in \textit{P. Kuchment} [Floquet theory for partial differential equations, Birkhäuser, Basel (1993; Zbl 0789.35002)].