Spectral determinant for the damped wave equation on an interval

Abstract

We evaluate the spectral determinant for the damped wave equation on an interval of length $T$ with Dirichlet boundary conditions, proving that it does not depend on the damping. This is achieved by analysing the square of the damped wave operator using the general result by Burghelea, Friedlander, and Kappeler on the determinant for a differential operator with matrix coefficients.