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the linear operator A. To be more precise, it is proved in [1] that when L ∈ N, (0.2) admits a
family of non-trivial solutions of the form y
0
(x)e
λt
for some λ ∈ iR, where y
0
(x) satisfies
λy
0
(x) + y
′
0
(x) + y
′′′
0
(x) = 0,
y
0
(0) = y
0
(L) = y
′
0
(0) = y
′
0
(L) = 0.
In this case, the origin of (0.2) is not asymptotically stable, and thus the linearization analysis
fails. Still, as proposed in [3, 4], it remains very interesting to study the asymptotic properties
of the nonlinear system (0.1) in this critical case.
In [5], we prove the existence and smoothness of the center manifold of (0.1) when L = 2kπ,
(i.e., taking j = l = k in N), where k is a positive integer such that (see [3, Theorem 8.1 and
Remark 8.2])
j
2
+ l
2
+ jl = 3k
2
and j, l ∈ N
∗
⇒ (j = l = k) . (0.4)
In this case, the center manifold is of dimension 1. By analyzing the reduced equation on
the center manifold, we show that the nonlinear system (0.1) is asymptotically stable around
the origin with a polynomial decay rate. Using the same method, we prove in [6] the local
asymptotic stability for a special critical length L = 2π
7/3 corresponding to j = 1 and l = 2
in the following critical case [7]
N
′
:=
2π
j
2
+ l
2
+ jl
3
; j, l ∈ N
∗
satisfying j > l and
j
2
+ jl + l
2
= m
2
+ mn + n
2
, ∀m, n ∈ N
∗
\{j}
, (0.5)
where the center manifold is of dimension 2.
While studying the existence of the center manifold, it is noticed that the linear operator A
does not generate an analytic semigroup, but a semigroup of Gevrey class. The Gevrey class of
semigroups have a behavior somewhat “between” that of differentiable semigroups and analytic
semigroups. For the convenience of readers, we first give the definition of Gevrey class δ > 1
(see [8, 9]).
Definition 0.1. Let T (t) be a strongly continuous semigroup on a Banach space X and let
δ > 1. We say that T (t) is of Gevrey class δ for t > t
0
if T (t) is infinitely differentiable for
t ∈ (t
0
, ∞) and, for every compact subset K ⊂ (t
0
, ∞) and each θ > 0, there exists a constant
C = C(θ, K) such that
∥T
(n)
(t)∥ 6 Cθ
n
(n!)
δ
, ∀t ∈ K and n = 1, 2, ··· .
When δ = 1, T (t) is analytic [10].
With the definition of Gevrey class δ, we give the main result of this article.
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