It is sometimes desirable to know in what circumstances a measurable set valued function admits a measurable selector; this problem occurs regularly in the theory of optimal control (see for example (3) and (7)). In this paper we demonstrate the existence of measurable selectors in two particular cases where the choice of selector has a simple geometrical interpretation, namely that of being a “ nearest-point ” selector, as is explained in detail below. This work derives in part from that of C. Castaing, particularly from Théorème 3.4 of (2), of which this is an extension.

Suppose G is a p-solvable group, where p is odd. We explore the connection between lifts of Brauer characters of G and certain local objects in G, called vertex pairs. We show that if χ is a lift, then the vertex pairs of χ form a single conjugacy class. We use this to prove a sufficient condition for a given pair to be a vertex pair of a lift and to study the behaviour of lifts with respect to normal subgroups.

Let $K$ be a field of characteristic $p$ and let $G$ be a finite group of order divisible by $p$. The regularity conjecture states that the Castelnuovo–Mumford regularity of the cohomology ring $H^*(G,K)$ is always equal to 0. We prove that if the regularity conjecture holds for a finite group $H$, then it holds for the wreath product $H\wr\mathbb{Z}/p$. As a corollary, we prove the regularity conjecture for the symmetric groups $\varSigma_n$. The significance of this is that it is the first set of examples for which the regularity conjecture has been checked, where the difference between the Krull dimension and the depth of the cohomology ring is large. If this difference is at most 2, the regularity conjecture is already known to hold by previous work.

For more general wreath products, we have not managed to prove the regularity conjecture. Instead we prove a weaker statement: namely, that the dimensions of the cohomology groups are polynomial on residue classes (PORC) in the sense of Higman.

Let $c_{kl} \in W^{1,\infty }(\Omega , \mathbb{C})$ for all $k,l \in \{1, \ldots , d\};$ and $\Omega \subset \mathbb{R}^{d}$ be open with uniformly $C^{2}$ boundary. We consider the divergence form operator $A_p = - \sum \nolimits _{k,l=1}^{d} \partial _l (c_{kl} \partial _k)$ in $L_p(\Omega )$ when the coefficient matrix satisfies $(C(x) \xi , \xi ) \in \Sigma _\theta$ for all $x \in \Omega$ and $\xi \in \mathbb{C}^{d}$, where $\Sigma _\theta$ be the sector with vertex 0 and semi-angle $\theta$ in the complex plane. We show that a sectorial estimate holds for $A_p$ for all $p$ in a suitable range. We then apply these estimates to prove that the closure of $-A_p$ generates a holomorphic semigroup under further assumptions on the coefficients. The contractivity and consistency properties of these holomorphic semigroups are also considered.

We extend the notions of μ*-sequences and Tjurina numbers of functions to the framework of Bruce–Roberts numbers, that is, to pairs formed by the germ at 0 of a complex analytic variety X ⊆ ℂn and a finitely ${\mathcal R}(X)$-determined analytic function germ f : (ℂn, 0) → (ℂ, 0). We analyze some fundamental properties of these numbers.

In this paper we study near-rings of functions on Ω-groups which are compatible with all congruence relations. Polynomial functions, for instance, are of this type. We employ the structure theory for near-rings to get results for the theory of compatible and polynomial functions (affine completeness, etc.). For notations and results concerning near-rings see e.g. (10). However, we review briefly some terminology from there. (N, +,.) is a near-ring if (N, +) is a group and . is associative and right distributive over +. For instance, M(A): = (AA, +, °) is a near-ring for any group (A, +) (° is composition). If N is a near-ring then N0: = {n ∈ N/n0 = 0}. A group (Γ, +) is an N-group (we write NΓ) if a “product” ny is defined with (n + n‛)γ = nγ + n‛γ and (nn‛)γ = n(n‛γ). Ideals of near-rings and N-groups are kernels of (N-) homomorphisms. If Γ is a vector-space, Maff (Γ) is the near-ring of all affine transformations on Γ. N is 2-primitive on NΓ if NΓ is non-trivial, faithful and without proper N-subgroups. The (2-) radical and (2-) semisimplicity are defined similarly to the ring case.

We study conditions under which every delta-convex (d.c.) mapping is the difference of two continuous convex operators, and vice versa. In particular, we prove that each d.c. mapping $F:(a,b)\to Y$ is the difference of two continuous convex operators whenever $Y$ belongs to a large class of Banach lattices which includes all $L^{p}(\mu)$ spaces ($1\leq p\leq\infty$). The proof is based on a result about Jordan decomposition of vector-valued functions. New observations on Jordan decomposition of finitely additive vector-valued measures are also presented.

In this paper we consider the problem of explicitly finding canonical ideals of one-dimensional Cohen–Macaulay local rings. We show that Gorenstein ideals contained in a high power of the maximal ideal are canonical ideals. In the codimension 2 case, from a Hilbert–Burch resolution, we show how to construct canonical ideals of curve singularities. Finally, we translate the problem of the analytic classification of curve singularities to the classification of local Artin Gorenstein rings with suitable length.

Excluding four exceptional cases, we determine the asphericity of the relative presentation for m ⩾ 2. If H = ⟨g, h⟩ ⩽ G, then the exceptional cases occur when H is isomorphic to C5 or C6.

Let $G$ be a periodic residually finite group containing a nilpotent subgroup $A$ such that $C_G(A)$ is finite. We show that if $\langle A,A^g\rangle$ is finite for any $g\in G$, then $G$ is locally finite.

AMS 2000 Mathematics subject classification: Primary 20F50

We investigate whether differential polynomials in real transcendental meromorphic functions have non-real zeros. For example, we show that if $g$ is a real transcendental meromorphic function, $c\in\mathbb{R}\setminus\{0\}$ and $n\geq3$ is an integer, then $g'g^n-c$ has infinitely many non-real zeros. If $g$ has only finitely many poles, then this holds for $n\geq2$. Related results for rational functions $g$ are also considered.

Let Bnf; x) denote the Bernstein polynomial of degree n on [0,1] for a function f(x) defined on this interval. Among the many properties of Bernstein polynomials, we recall in particular that if f(x) is convex in [0,1] then (i) Bn(f;x) is convex in [0,1] and (ii) Bn(f;x)≧Bn+1(f;x), (n = l,2,…). Recently these properties have been the subject of study for Bernstein polynomials over triangles [1].

We introduce and study Hankel operators defined on the Hardy space of regular functions of a quaternionic variable. Theorems analogous to those of Nehari and Fefferman are proved.

We prove the existence of a family of slow-decay positive solutions of a supercritical elliptic equation with Hardy potential

and study the stability and oscillation properties of these solutions. We also show that if the equation on ℝN has a stable slow-decay positive solution, then for any smooth compact K ⊂ ℝN a family of the exterior Dirichlet problems in ℝN \ K admits a continuum of stable slow-decay infinite-energy solutions.

For a non-negative and non-trivial real-valued continuous function hΩ × [0, ∞) such that h(x, 0) = 0 for all x ∈ Ω, we study the boundary-value problem

where Ω ⊆ ℝN, N ⩾ 2, is a bounded smooth domain and Δp:= div(|Du|p–2DDu) is the p-Laplacian. This work investigates growth conditions on h(x, t) that would lead to the existence or non-existence of distributional solutions to (BVP). In a major departure from past works on similar problems, in this paper we do not impose any special structure on the inhomogeneous term h(x, t), nor do we require any monotonicity condition on h in the second variable. Furthermore, h(x, t) is allowed to vanish in either of the variables.

A weak form of faithfulness, depending on Green’s equivalence $\mathcal{D}$, is introduced for a ring $R$ graded by a semigroup $S$. Suppose that $R$ satisfies this condition. It is shown that if $e$ and $f$ are $\mathcal{D}$-equivalent idempotents of $S$ and $R_e$ is semiprime (respectively, prime, semiprimitive, right primitive), then $R_f$ is semiprime (respectively, prime, semiprimitive, right primitive). In addition, it is shown that if $G$ and $H$ are maximal subgroups of $S$ lying in the same $\mathcal{D}$-class and $R_G$ is semiprime (respectively, prime, semiprimitive, right primitive), then $R_H$ is semiprime (respectively, prime, semiprimitive, right primitive).

AMS 2000 Mathematics subject classification: Primary 16W50. Secondary 20M25

By the work of Taskinen (see [4, 5]), we know that there is a Fréchet space E such that Lb(E, l2) is not a (DF)-space. Moreover there is a Fréchet–Montel space F such that is not (DF). In this second example, the duality theorem of Buchwalter (cf. [2, §45.3]) can be applied to obtain that and hence is a (gDF)-space (cf. [1, Ch. 12 or 3, Ch. 8]). The (gDF)-spaces were introduced by several authors to extend the (DF)-spaces of Grothendieck and to provide an adequate frame to consider strict topologies.

On est amené à résoudre l'équation aux différences mêlées

lorsqu'on cherche, en coordonnées rectangulaires, une courbe telle que: M et M′ étant deux de ses points dont les abscisses différent d'une constante, la tangente de l'angle que fait avec OX la tangente en M soit en raison inverse de la sous-tangente en M′.

There are only finitely many non-constant holomorphic mappings between two fixed compact Riemann surfaces of genus greater than 1. This result goes under the name of the de Franchis theorem. Having seen that the set of such holomorphic mappings is finite, we naturally want to obtain a bound on its cardinality. It has been known for some time that there exist various bounds depending only on the genera of the surfaces. Here we obtain ‘better’ bounds of the above type, using arguments based on the rigidity of holomorphic mappings and the hyperbolic geometry of surfaces.

In the present paper by means of the Schauder-Tychonoff principle sufficient conditions are obtained for Lp-equivalence of a linear and a nonlinear impulsive differential equations.