Fourth-order Schr\"odinger type operator with unbounded coefficients in $L^2(\mathbb{R}^N)$

Abstract

In this paper we study generation results in $L^2(\mathbb{R}^N)$ for the fourth order Schr\"odinger type operator with unbounded coefficients of the form $$A=a^{2} \Delta ^2+V^{2}$$ where $a(x)=1+|x|^{\alpha}$ and $V=|x|^{\beta}$ with $\alpha>0$ and $\beta >(\alpha-2)^+$. We obtain that $(-A,D(A))$ generates an analytic strongly continuous semigroup in $L^2(\mathbb{R}^N)$ for $N\geq5$. Moreover, the maximal domain $D(A)$ can be characterized for $N>8$ by the weighted Sobolev space \[ D_2(A)=\{u\in H^{4}(\mathbb{R}^N)\,:\,V^{2}u\in L^{2}(\mathbb{R}^N), |x|^{2\alpha-h}D^{4-h}u\in L^{2}(\mathbb{R}^N) \text{ for } h=0,1,2,3,4\}. \]