Existence of positive solutions for a class of singular boundary value problem of fourth order (Q705052)

Using a variational method the author proves a result guaranteeing a positive \(C[0,1]\cap C^4(0,1)\)-solution to the boundary value problem \[ u^{(4)}(t)=f(t,u(t)),\quad t\in(0,1), \] \[ u(0)=u(1)=0,\quad u'(0)=u'(1)=0, \] where \(f\) may be singular at \(t=0\) and \(t=1\). The bassic assumption is \[ f\in C((0,1)\times[0,\infty),[0,\infty))\;\text{ and }\;p(t)f_1(x)\leq f(t,x)\leq p(t)f_2(x), \] where \(p\in C(0,1)\) is positive and may be singular at \(t=0\) or \(t=1\), and \(f_1,f_2\in C[0,\infty)\) are such that \(f_1,f_2\geq0\;\) and \(\;\lim_{s\to0}s^3\int_s^{1-s}p(t)\,dt=0\).