High multiplicity of positive solutions for superlinear indefinite problems with homogeneous Neumann boundary conditions

We prove that a class of superlinear indefinite problems with homogeneous Neumann boundary conditions admits an arbitrarily high number of positive solutions, provided that the parameters of the problem are adequately chosen. The sign-changing weight in front of the nonlinearity is taken to be piecewise constant, which allows us to perform a sharp phase-plane analysis, firstly to study the sets of points reached at the end of the regions where the weight is negative, and then to connect such sets through the flow in the positive part. Moreover, we study how the number of solutions depends on the amplitude of the region in which the weight is positive, using the latter as the main bifurcation parameter and constructing the corresponding global bifurcation diagrams. (C) 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.