ArticleOriginal scientific text

Title

Ordinary differential equations and descriptive set theory: uniqueness and globality of solutions of Cauchy problems in one dimension

Authors 1, 2

Affiliations

  1. Dipartimento di Matematica, Università di Torino, via Carlo Alberto 10, 10123 Torino, Italy
  2. Dipartimento di Matematica, Università di Torino, via Carlo Alberto 10, 10123 Torino

Abstract

We study some natural sets arising in the theory of ordinary differential equations in one variable from the point of view of descriptive set theory and in particular classify them within the Borel hierarchy. We prove that the set of Cauchy problems for ordinary differential equations which have a unique solution is 0_2-complete and that the set of Cauchy problems which locally have a unique solution is 0_3-complete. We prove that the set of Cauchy problems which have a global solution is 04-complete and that the set of ordinary differential equations which have a global solution for every initial condition is 0_3-complete. We prove that the set of Cauchy problems for which both uniqueness and globality hold is 0_2-complete.

Bibliography

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Pages:
157-190
Main language of publication
English
Received
1996-09-15
Accepted
1997-01-15
Published
1997
Exact and natural sciences