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oye ean mine “
Fp2urty) ao
tr, yw yb byl + YDS 21D y
ee 120. Hence by Bernstein's theorem, there CKisty Ane
2yl20.
i a r
ints with distinct abscissac, ,
that a= P= a
so J, it can be shown that it is not possible, ty draw an
J
0
rough any (wo pi
m On the other han
of the functional
aya
aco f fy? + fly? Ide
any two points of a plane having distinct abscissac,
ju oints of ig
through jus 0
tern
1.4 Functionals Dependent on Higher-Order Derivatives
Let us now consider the extremum of a functional of the form
tus
f * Fux, HOY) YO) de, (135,
times with Fespect to aff its
a F to be differentiable n + 2
where we assume eae
arguments. The boundary conditions are taken in f
ns
HO) = Yr CO) = Hh op Marg) = yD, (40a)
HOD = WY = yer cy Mory = yf, (1.408)
This isaplies that at the boundary points the values of y together with at) their
derivatives upto the order n 1 (inclusive) are prescribed. We further assume
that the extremum of the functional | is attained of 4 curve y = y(z) which is
differentiable 2n times, and any admissible comparison curve Y= HX) is also 2n
limes differentiable, 1 is clear that both y= y(x) and y = JG) can be included in
4 one-parameter family of curves
WB) = Ax) + lx ~ xy]
Such that Yr, 00) = yx) for oy = O and yr, a = a) for a =}. Variational Problems with Fixed Boundaries 21
Now on the curves of the above family, the functional (1,39) reduces to a
function oF @ say, YOO, Since the extremizing curve corresponds to @ = 0, we
nnust have YC) = O at are O. This gives, as in Section 1,2, for an extremum,
the relation
ar
[i fromm.
vi") (a) an]
ano
.
“ff CES Fo +t Bey HM de = 0 (al)
tegrate by parts the second term on the right-hand side once and the third term
uvice, yielding
. Mra
J F. Srav= teat ~ f (a5 vac
d a
i Fede" dv = [R81 ~ [(é 6] + +f (Gajow
rn J, Md
and so on. The last term on the right-hand side of (1.41) can be written by
successive integration by parts as
. ' *
j Foe) 69 de = [Fyn 618 (é Fw] ae
+ cof (SF) oy dv
By virtue of the boundary conditions (1.40a) and (1.40b), the integrated parts in
all the above expressions on the right side vanish. Thus from (1.41), we find that
on the extremizing curve
* 2 "
d d ad
44 p. ~...4y Fy Sp de=
(5 ae hy toa +(D fF bya 0
for an arbitrary choice of dy. Due to conditions of continuity imposed on F, the
first factor in the foregoing integral is a continuous function of x in [a, b}. Thus
invoking the fundamental lemma of Section 1.2, the function y = y(x), which
extremizes I satisfies
5 -4n, tae rey Fim =0 (1.42)
a
which is known as the Euler-Poisson equation.
Clearly this is a differential equation of the order 2n and hence its solution
involves 2n arbitrary constants. These are found b 2
conditions (1.40a) and (1.40b). es eae ene!
