Non-existence and multiplicity of positive solutions for Choquard equations with critical combined nonlinearities

Abstract: We study the non-existence and multiplicity of positive solutions of the nonlinear Choquard type equation $$ -\Delta u+ \varepsilon u=(I_\alpha \ast |u|^{p})|u|^{p-2}u+ |u|^{q-2}u, \quad {\rm in} \ \mathbb R^N, \qquad (P_\varepsilon)$$ where $N\ge 3$ is an integer, $p\in [\frac{N+\alpha}{N}, \frac{N+\alpha}{N-2}]$, $q\in (2,\frac{2N}{N-2}]$, $I_\alpha$ is the Riesz potential of order $\alpha\in (0,N)$ and $\varepsilon>0$ is a parameter. We fix one of $p,q$ as a critical exponent (in the sense of Hardy-Littlewood-Sobolev and Sobolev inequalities ) and view the others in $p,q,\varepsilon, \alpha$ as parameters, we find regions in the $(p,q,\alpha, \varepsilon)$-parameter space, such that the corresponding equation has no positive ground state or admits multiple positive solutions. This is a counterpart of the Brezis-Nirenberg Conjecture (Brezis-Nirenberg, CPAM, 1983) for nonlocal elliptic equation in the whole space. Particularly, some threshold results for the existence of ground states and some conditions which insure two positive solutions are obtained. These results are quite different in nature from the corresponding local equation with combined powers nonlinearity and reveal the special influence of the nonlocal term. To the best of our knowledge, the only two papers concerning the multiplicity of positive solutions of elliptic equations with critical growth nonlinearity are given by Atkinson, Peletier (Nonlinear Anal, 1986) for elliptic equation on a ball and Juncheng Wei, Yuanze Wu (Proc. Royal Soc. Edinburgh, 2022) for elliptic equation with a combined powers nonlinearity in the whole space. The ODE technique is main ingredient in the proofs of the above mentioned papers, however, ODE technique does not work any more in our model equation due to the presence of the nonlocal term.