Meromorphic \(p\)-valent starlike functions with negative coefficients. (Q699626)

The author considers the special class of functions \(\sigma_p(n,\alpha)\) consisting of those functions \(f(z)\) analytic in the punctured unit disc \(\{z:0<| z| <1\}\) of the form \(a_{-p}/z^p - \sum_{k=3D1}^\infty a_k z^k\) where \(a_{-p} > 0\), \(a_k \geq 0\), \(n \geq 0\), \(0 \leq \alpha < p,n\), and Re \(\{(D^{n+1}f(z)/ D^n f(z)) - (p+1) \} < -\alpha\) for all \(z\) in the punctured disc. Here \(D^n\) is the Ruscheweyh type differential operator defined by \(Df(z) =3D D^1f(z) =3D a_{-p}/z^p - \sum_{k=3D1}^\infty (p+k+1)a_k z^k\) and \(D^{n+1}f(z) =3D D(D^n f(z))\). It is shown that a function \(f(z)\) of the given form is in \(\sigma_p(n,\alpha)\) if and only if \(\sum_{k=3D1}^\infty (p+k+1)^n (k+\alpha) a_k \leq (p-\alpha) a_{-p}\). A distortion theorem is proved, and it is shown that \(\sigma_p(n,\alpha)\) is closed under convex linear combinations. From this it is shown that if one defines \(f_0(z) =3D a_{-p}/z^p\) and \(f_k(z) =3D a_{-p}/z^p - ((p-\alpha) a_{-p} z^k)/((p+k+1)^n (k+\alpha))\) for all \(k > 0\), then \(f(z) \in \sigma_p(n,\alpha)\) if and only if \(f(z) =3D \sum_{k=3D0}^\infty \lambda_k f_k(z)\) where all \(\lambda_k \geq 0\) and \(\sum_{k=3D0}^\infty \lambda_k =3D 1\).