Existence Theorem about Triple Positive Solutions for a Boundary Value Problem with p-Laplacian ()
1. Introduction
In this paper, we will consider the positive solutions to the following three-point boundary value problem with p-Laplacian
(1)
(2)
where
,
,
is a constant and
.
The study of positive solutions on second-order boundary value problems for ordinary differential equations has aroused extensive interest, one may see [1]-[10] and references therein.
Among the substantial number of works dealing with nonlinear differential equations we mention the boundary value problem (1) and (2). One thing to be mentioned is that nonlinear ter f is involved with the first-order derivative explicitly.
2. Preliminaries
Firstly, we present here some necessary definitions and background material of the theory of cones in ordered Banach spaces.
Definition 2.1. Let
be a real Banach space. A nonempty closed set
is said to be a cone provided that
1)
for all
and all
,
, and
2)
implies
.
Definition 2.2. The map
is said to be a nonnegative continuous concave functional on
provided that
is continuous and
for all
and
. Similarly, we say the map
is a nonnegative continuous convex functional on
provided that
is continuous and
for all
and
.
Definition 2.3. Let
,
be constants,
is a nonnegative continuous concave functional and
are nonnegative continuous convex functionals on the cone
. Define the following convex sets
The following assumptions as regards the nonnegative continuous convex functions
are used
: there exists
such that
, for all
;
:
, for any
,
.
Next, we present a fixed point theorem established in [10], in which Bai and Ge generalized the Leggett-Williams’ fixed point theorem. The generalization is achieved by introducing on cone of continuous functionals satisfying certain properties. The technique using functionals to replace norms has been proved very useful in generalizing some fixed point theorems.
Theorem 2.1. [10] Let
be a Banach space,
is a cone and
,
. Assume the
are nonnegative continuous convex functionals satisfying
and
,
is a nonnegative concave functional on
, such that
for all
and
is a completely continuous operator. Suppose that
:
,
for all
,
:
,
, for all
,
:
for all
with
.
Then
has at least three fixed points
with
3. Multiple Positive Solutions for (1) and (2)
Let the Banach space
be endowed with the norm
and define the cone
by
Choose a natural number
. For notational convenience,
we denote
Define functionals
Then
are nonnegative continuous convex functionals satisfying
and
, and
is nonnegative continuous concave functional on
, it is also clear that
for all
.
Lemma 3.1. For
then the boundary value problem
has a unique solution
where
is the solution of the equation
Proof. The proof can be obtained by regular calculation, so we omit it here.
We define an operator
by
(3)
where
is the solution of the equation
by Lemma 3.1, we know that boundary value problem (1) and (2) has a solution
if and only if
is a fixed point of
.
Lemma 3.2.
defined by (3) is completely continuous.
Proof. From the definition of
, we deduce that for each
, there is
is nonnegative and satisfies (2).
Moreover,
is the maximum value of
on [0,1], since
(4)
is continuous and nonincreasing in [0,1] and
. As
is nonincreasing on [0,1], we have
.
Hence, we get that
.
Then according to Arzela-Ascoli theorem,
is completely continuous if and only if
is continuous about
and maps a bounded subset of
into a relatively compact set.
Let
as
on
.
For
, according to (3) and (4), we have
and
Hence, we obtain that
is continuous.
Now, let
be a bounded set, i.e., there exists a positive constant
such that
, for all
,
from the expression of
and
we can obtain that
is uniformly bounded according to the properties of
. And it is also easy to get that, for any
,
, we have
which shows that
is equicontinuous.
Then the Arzela-Ascoli theorem guarantees that
is relatively compact, which means
is compact. Then, we obtain that
is completely continuous.
Thus, from what has been discussed above, we can draw the conclusion that
is completely continuous.
We are now ready to apply the fixed point theorem due to Avery and Peterson to the operator
in order to get sufficient conditions for the existence of multiple positive solutions to the problems (1) and (2).
Our main result is as follows.
Theorem 3.1. Assume that there exist constants
,
, such that
. If the following assumptions hold
Then the boundary value problem (1) and (2) has at least three positive solutions
,
and
such that
Proof. From we discussed earlier,
is well defined. Problem (1) and (2) has a solution
if and only if
is a fixed point of
.
We have already showed that
is completely continuous.
In what following, we will prove the results step by step according to the Theorem 2.1.
The proof is divided into some steps.
Firstly, we will show that condition
implies that
In fact, for
, we have
,
and assumption
implies
Consequently,
And by Lemma 3.1 and (4), we have
Then,
holds.
Secondly, we show that condition
in Theorem 2.1 holds.
In order to check condition
in Theorem 2.1, we choose
.
It is easy to see that
and
, consequently,
.
If
, then
for
.
From assumption
, we have
Then we have
Then, we can get that
Consequently, condition
in Theorem 2.1 holds.
Thirdly, We now show
in Theorem 2.1 is satisfied.
If
, then assumption
yields
In the same way as in the first step, we can obtain that
. Hence, condition
in Theorem 2.1 is aslo satisfied.
Finally, we show
in Theorem 2.1 is also satisfied.
Suppose that
with
. Then, by the definition of
and
, we have
Thus, condition
in Theorem 2.1 is also satisfied.
Then, Theorem 3.1 is proved by Theorem 2.1.
Consequently, Theorem 3.1 is proved by Theorem 2.1. We obtain that the boundary value problem (1) and (2) has at least three positive solutions
,
and
such that
Acknowledgements
The author thanks the referees for their valuable comments and suggestions. This work was supported by the Discipline Construction Fund of Central University of Finance and Economics.