Self-adjoint extensions for second-order symmetric linear difference equations (Q624347)

Characterizations of self-adjoint extensions are fundamental in the study of spectral problems for symmetric linear differential and difference equations. In this paper the authors consider self-adjoint extensions for the following second-order symmetric linear difference equation: \[ -\nabla(p(t)\Delta x(t))+q(t)x(t)=\lambda w(t)x(t),\quad t\in I, \tag{1} \] where \(I\) is the integer set \(\{t\}_{t=a}^b\), \(a\) is a finite integer or \(-\infty\) and \(b\) is a finite integer or \(+\infty\) with \(b-a\geq 3\); \(\Delta\) and \(\nabla\) are the forward and backward difference operators, respectively; \(p(t)\) and \(q(t)\) are all real-valued with \(p(t)\neq 0\) for \(t\in I\), \(p(a-1)\neq 0\) if \(a\) is finite, and \(p(b+1)\neq 0\) if \(b\) is finite; \(w(t)>0\) for \(t\in I\); and \(\lambda\) is a complex spectral parameter. The main tool used by the authors is based on the Glazman-Krein-Naimark theory for Hermitian subspaces. The authors study self-adjoint subspaces extensions and self-adjoint operator extensions of the minimal operators corresponding to equations (1), and they give a complete characterization of them in terms of boundary conditions, where the endpoints may be finite or infinite.