We study a class of (conservative) low regularity solutions to the Camassa-Holm equation on the line by exploiting the classical moment problem (in the framework of generalized indefinite strings) to develop the inverse spectral transform method. In particular, we identify explicitly the solutions that are amenable to this approach, which include solutions made up of infinitely many peaked solitons (peakons). We determine which part of the solution can be recovered from the moments of the underlying spectral measure and provide explicit formulas. We show that the solution can be recovered completely if the corresponding moment problem is determinate, in which case the solution is a (potentially infinite) superposition of peakons. However, we also explore the situation when the underlying moment problem is indeterminate. As an application, our results are then used to investigate the long-time behavior of solutions. We will demonstrate this on three exemplary cases of solutions with: (i) discrete underlying spectrum (one may choose for this initial data corresponding to Al-Salam-Carlitz II polynomials; notice that they correspond to an indeterminate moment problem); (ii) step-like initial data associated with the Laguerre polynomials, and (iii) asymptotically eventually periodic initial data associated with the Jacobi polynomials.

We extend the inverse spectral transform for the conservative Camassa-Holm flow on the line to a class of initial data that requires strong decay at one endpoint but only mild boundedness-type conditions at the other endpoint. The latter condition appears to be close to optimal in a certain sense for the well-posedness of the conservative Camassa-Holm flow. As a byproduct of our approach, we also find a family of new (almost) conservation laws for the Camassa-Holm equation, which could not be deduced from its bi-Hamiltonian structure before and which are connected to certain Besov-type norms (however, in a rather involved way). These results appear to be new even under positivity assumptions on the corresponding momentum, in which case the conservative Camassa-Holm flow coincides with the classical Camassa-Holm flow and no blow-ups occur.

Generalized indefinite strings provide a canonical model for self-adjoint operators with simple spectrum (other classical models are Jacobi matrices, Krein strings and 2x2 canonical systems). We prove a number of Szegő-type theorems for generalized indefinite strings and related spectral problems (including Krein strings, canonical systems and Dirac operators). More specifically, for several classes of coefficients (that can be regarded as Hilbert-Schmidt perturbations of model problems), we provide a complete characterization of the corresponding set of spectral measures. In particular, our results also apply to the isospectral Lax operator for the conservative Camassa-Holm flow and allow us to establish existence of global weak solutions with various step-like initial conditions of low regularity via the inverse spectral transform.

We establish criteria for the spectrum of a generalized indefinite string to be purely discrete and to satisfy Schatten-von Neumann properties. The results can be applied to the isospectral problem associated with the conservative Camassa-Holm flow and to Schrödinger operators with $δ'$-interactions.

We show that solutions of the Korteweg-de Vries equation with reflectionless integrable initial data decompose into a (in general infinite) linear superposition of solitons after long enough time. The proof is based on a representation of reflectionless integrable potentials in terms of solutions to symmetric coupling problems for entire functions.

We employ some results about continued fraction expansions of Herglotz-Nevanlinna functions to characterize the spectral data of generalized indefinite strings of Stieltjes type. In particular, this solves the corresponding inverse spectral problem through explicit formulas.

We continue to investigate absolutely continuous spectrum of generalized indefinite strings. By following an approach of Deift and Killip, we establish stability of the absolutely continuous spectra of two more model examples of generalized indefinite strings under rather wide perturbations. In particular, one of these results allows us to prove that the absolutely continuous spectrum of the isospectral problem associated with the two-component Camassa-Holm system in a certain dispersive regime is essentially supported on the set $(-\infty,-1/2]\cup [1/2,\infty)$.

This article is concerned with the isospectral problem -f '' + 1/4 f = z omega f + z(2)nu f for the periodic conservative Camassa-Holm flow, where omega is a periodic real distribution in H-l(oc)-1(R) and nu is a periodic non-negative Borel measure on R. We develop basic Floquet theory for this problem, derive trace formulas for the associated spectra and establish continuous dependence of these spectra on the coefficients with respect to a weak* topology. (C) 2019 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

We solve the inverse spectral problem associated with periodic conservative multi-peakon solutions of the Camassa-Holm equation. The corresponding isospectral sets can be identified with finite dimensional tori.

We establish the unique solvability of a coupling problem for entire functions that arises in inverse spectral theory for singular second-order ordinary differential equations/two-dimensional first-order systems and is also of relevance for the integration of certain nonlinear wave equations.

Based on continuity properties of the de Branges correspondence, we develop a new approach to study the high-energy behavior of Weyl-Titchmarsh and spectral functions of $2\times2$ first order canonical systems. Our results improve several classical results and solve open problems posed by previous authors. Furthermore, they are applied to radial Dirac and radial Schr\"odinger operators as well as to Krein strings and generalized indefinite strings.

We show that the classical Hamburger moment problem can be included in the spectral theory of generalized indefinite strings. Namely, we introduce the class of Krein-Langer strings and show that there is a bijective correspondence between moment sequences and this class of generalized indefinite strings. This result can be viewed as a complement to the classical results of M. G. Krein on the connection between the Stieltjes moment problem and Krein-Stieltjes strings and I. S. Kac on the connection between the Hamburger moment problem and 2x2 canonical systems with Hamburger Hamiltonians.

We discuss direct and inverse spectral theory for a Sturm-Liouville type problem with a quadratic dependence on the eigenvalue parameter, which arises as the isospectral problem for the conservative Camassa-Holm flow.

We show how the change from Eulerian to Lagrangian coordinates for the two-component Camassa–Holm system can be understood in terms of certain reparametrizations of the underlying isospectral problem. The respective coordinates correspond to different normalizations of an associated first order system. In particular, we will see that the two-component Camassa–Holm system in Lagrangian variables is completely integrable as well.

In this paper we review the recent progress in the (indefinite) string density problem and its applications to the Camassa--Holm equation.

We establish the inverse spectral transform for the conservative Camassa–Holm flow with decaying initial data. In particular, it is employed to prove the existence of weak solutions for the corresponding Cauchy problem.

Motivated by the study of certain nonlinear wave equations (in particular, the Camassa–Holm equation), we introduce a new class of generalized indefinite strings associated with differential equations of the form - u” = z u ω + z^2 u υ on an interval [0, L ), where ω is a real-valued distribution in H^-1_loc[0,L) , υ is a non-negative Borel measure on [0, L ) and z is a complex spectral parameter. Apart from developing basic spectral theory for these kinds of spectral problems, our main result is an indefinite analogue of M. G. Krein’s celebrated solution of the inverse spectral problem for inhomogeneous vibrating strings.

We propose a novel technique for analysing the long-time asymptotics of integrable wave equations in the case when the underlying isospectral problem has a purely discrete spectrum. To this end, we introduce a natural coupling problem for entire functions, which serves as a replacement for the usual Riemann–Hilbert problem, which does not apply in these cases. As a prototypical example, we investigate the long-time asymptotics of the dispersionless Camassa–Holm equation.

We solve an inverse spectral problem for a star graph of Krein strings, where the known spectral data comprises the spectrum associated with the whole graph, the spectra associated with the individual edges as well as so-called coupling matrices. In particular, we show that these spectral quantities uniquely determine the weight within the class of Borel measures on the graph, which give rise to trace class resolvents. Furthermore, we obtain a concise characterization of all possible spectral data for this class of weights.

We investigate the connection between singular Weyl–Titchmarsh–Kodaira theory and the double commutation method for one-dimensional Dirac operators. In particular, we compute the singular Weyl function of the commuted operator in terms of the data from the original operator. These results are then applied to radial Dirac operators in order to show that the singular Weyl function of such an operator belongs to a generalized Nevanlinna class Nκ0 with κ0=κ+12, where κ ∈ ℝ is the corresponding angular momentum.