Schrödinger equations with singular potentials: linear and nonlinear boundary value problems

Abstract

Let $Ω\subset {\mathbb R}^N$ ($N \geq 3$) be a $C^2$ bounded domain and $F \subset \partial Ω$ be a $C^2$ submanifold of dimension $0 \leq k \leq N-2$. Put $δ_F(x)=dist(x,F)$, $V=δ_F^{-2}$ in $Ω$ and $L_{γV}=Δ+ γV$. Denote by $C_H(V)$ the Hardy constant relative to $V$ in $Ω$. We study positive solutions of equations (LE) $-L_{γV} u = 0$ and (NE) $-L_{γV} u+ f(u) = 0$ in $Ω$ when $γ< C_H(V)$ and $f \in C({\mathbb R})$ is an odd, monotone increasing function. We establish the existence of a normalized boundary trace for positive solutions of (LE) - first studied by Marcus and Nguyen for the case $F=\partial Ω$ - and employ it to investigate the behavior of subsolutions and super solutions of (LE) at the boundary. Using these results we study boundary value problems for (NE) and derive a-priori estimates. Finally we discuss subcriticality of (NE) at boundary points of $Ω$ and establish existence and stability results when the data is concentrated on the set of subcritical points.