On the negative squares of indefinite Sturm--Liouville operators (Q996968)

Sturm--Liouville operators on the half-line \(x>0\) are studied. The number of negative squares of all self-adjoint extensions of a simple symmetric operator of defect one with finitely many negative squares is characterized in terms of the behaviour of an abstract Titchmarsh--Weyl function near \(0\) and \(\infty\). The results are applied to a class of symmetric and selfadjoint indefinite Sturm--Liouville operators with indefinite weight functions.