Subdominant behavior in positive semigroups. The case of a class of delay differential equations (Q675969)

It is shown that a class of delay systems generates a positive irreducible semigroup. An extension for higher order systems is discussed. Some examples are given. For a particular class of equations, namely, \[ \frac{d^nx}{dt^n}= \rho x(t-\tau), \] it is shown that the set of eigenvalues can be splitted into two parts. One is the set of the eigenvalues obtained as continuous extensions of eigenvalues of the ordinary equation \((\tau=0)\); the other part is the set of eigenvalues produced by the delay. It is proved that a necessary and sufficient condition for the latter part to be on the left hand side of the imaginary axis is that \[ \begin{cases} \rho^{1/n}\tau< \frac{n\pi}{2} &\text{ for \(n\) even},\\ \rho^{1/n}\tau< \frac{\pi(n+4)}{2} &\text{ for \(n\) odd}. \end{cases} \] {}.