1. Introduction
In this paper, we present the Gronwall–Bellman (G–B) inequality and some of its successive forms, which have been discussed and proved by many mathematicians since 1919. No new results are presented in this paper. We have selected some of the G–B inequalities presented in continuous forms, which are reported in this section, and we have found their corresponding forms on time scale theory, which are presented in the third and main part of this paper. The aim of this work is to highlight the link between this two forms of G–B inequalities, in order to show that inequalities presented on a time scale could be seen as a generalization of the inequalities in continuous form. We have chosen a small number of G–B inequalities, compared with the number of results available, in fact, we have decided to concentrate our attention only on inequalities in which bounded function, indicated in this paper by “u”, is a function with one variable. In addition, we have chosen to present some forms of G–B inequality that B.G. Pachpatte discussed in 1975, which we call Gronwall–Bellman–Pachpatte inequalities. Therefore, in this paper, Bihari’s inequalities and others generalizations of the G–B inequalities are not reported.
To emphasize the inequalities presented in this section, we have decided to present them in Theorems and named every result.
Before the presentation of the Grownwall inequality, we need to specify some notations we are going to use in this paper.
Notation 1. ,, ⌀ denotes the empty set, I is an interval inof the form,.
In 1919, T.H. Gronwall [
1] discussed and proved that if
and if
is satisfied, then
where
are real nonnegative constants and
.
This result is called Gronwall inequality. All integrals that will appear below (and the one in Gronwall inequality) are Riemann integrals.
In past years, a great number of mathematicians have studied and generalized this type of inequality as well as T.H. Gronwall. In 1943, R.E. Bellman considered a new version of this inequality and presented it in an integral form, the following theorem is about this result.
Theorem 1. (Gronwall–Bellman inequality) ([
2], Lemma 1)
Let u, and let c be a real positive constant, ifis satisfied, then In 1958, a generalization of this result was given by himself with L.C. Kenneth [
3], even if R.E. Bellman and L.C. Kenneth proved their result in the case of function
u is defined on
I finite interval of
; therefore, we decided to present a much more general version, where
u is defined on
. B.G. Pachpatte presented this general version in 2001 as follows.
Theorem 2. (Gronwall–Bellman inequality’s general form) ([
4], Lemma 2.1)
Let u, andletbe a nondecreasing function, ifis satisfied, then letbe a nonincreasing function, ifis satisfied, then
We can also have a discrete form of G–B inequality presented in Theorem 2 as follow.
Theorem 3. (Gronwall–Bellman inequality’s discrete general form) ([
4], Lemma 2.5)
Let u,f, defined for n ∈ , α is a nondecreasing function, ifis satisfied, then From now on, we will consider only the G–B inequality type as the one in Theorem 2(1), because this is the form that R.E. Bellman and L.C. Kenneth proposed and proved and then B.G. Pachpatte generalized. In 1975 and in the subsequent years, B.G. Pachpatte employed the G–B inequality and proved various generalizations of it, we explicitly report only two of them in the following theorems that the author himself discussed in 1998.
Theorem 4. (Gronwall–Bellman–Pachpatte inequality) ([
5], Theorem 1.3.3)
Let u,g,, let α be a positive, continuous and nondecreasing function defined on I, ifis satisfied, then Theorem 5. (Gronwall–Bellman–Pachpatte inequality) ([
5], Theorem 1.3.4)
Let u,g,f,α,, ifis satisfied, then After only two years, B.G. Pachpatte reported some inequalities in nonlinear form, we present one of them in the next result.
Theorem 6. (Bellman–Pachpatte nonlinear inequality) ([
6], Theorem 1.
)
Let u,α,β,g, and
be a real constant, ifis satisfied, then In 2007, S.K. Choi, B. Kang and N. Koo [
7] discussed and proved a particular type of G–B inequality, we are going to present the form that S.K. Choi and N. Koo proposed in 2010 as follows.
Theorem 7. (Choi–Koo inequality) ([
8], Corollary 3.10)
Let u,, let c be a real and nonnegative constant, let κ,; ifis satisfied, then In 2014, new important generalization of the Bellman–Pachpatte inequality were given and proved by S.D. Kendre, S.G. Latpate and S.S. Ranmal, who replaced the linear term by nonlinear term p as follows.
Theorem 8. (Kendre–Latpate–Ranmal nonlinear inequality) ([
9], Theorem 2.1)
Let u,g,f,, let p be a real constant such that , ifis satisfied, thenwhere , , and All of these inequalities are even now an important instrument for the theory of differential equations on time scales; therefore, in our work, we concentrate our attention on the way the G–B inequality and the successive forms we introduce could be presented in this theory; to show it, we decided to present some of the most important versions of G–B inequality on time scales, with a bigger focus on results that have been discussed and proved in the last four years. We will focus on these inequalities in the third and last section of our treatment. Stefan Hilger was the first to discover the theory of time scales and presented it in 1988 in his PhD. thesis [
10]; dynamic equations on time scales received a lot of attention after their introduction by S. Hilger, and the study of equations and inequalities on time scales became an interesting part of mathematics. The purpose of this theory is to unify continuous and discrete analysis; therefore, the domain of the function we called previously
u is a particular set indicated by
and called time scale. We will definite it better in the next paragraph.
2. Preliminaries on Time Scales
A
time scale, denoted by
, is an arbitrary nonempty closed subset of the real numbers. We have that
,
,
,
are examples of time scales, while
,
,
,
are not time scales. When not specified,
denotes an arbitrary time scale. We are now going to give some definitions and results on time scales (for a much more complete discussion, see [
11,
12]).
Definition 1. (Forward and backward jump operator) [
11]
Let be a time scale. For t∈, we define the forward jump operator and the backward jump operator by Remark 1. We can observe that if, we have that, , while if, we have that,.
Definition 2. (Graininess) [
11]
The graininess
function is defined by .Hence, the grainininess function is constant 0 if, while it is constant 1 if; however, a time scalecould have non-constant graininess.
Definition 3. [
11]
A point is said to be- 1.
left-dense ifand;
- 2.
right-dense ifand;
- 3.
left-scattered if;
- 4.
right-scattered if.
Points that are simultaneously right-dense and left-dense are said to be dense, while points that are simultaneously right-scattered and left-scattered are said to be isolated.
Definition 4. - 1.
is a set defined as follows: ifhas a left-scattered maximum M,; otherwise.
- 2.
is a set defined as follows: ifhas a right-scattered minimum m,; otherwise.
Definition 5. (Regulated function) [
11]
A function is called regulated provided its right-sided limits exist (finite) at all right-dense points in and its left-sided limits exist(finite) at all left-dense points in . Definition 6. (Delta derivative and delta differentiable) [
11]
Let be a function and let . Then, we define to be the number (provided it exists) with the property that given any , there is a neighborhood U of t (i.e., , for some ) such thatWe callthe delta derivative of f at t.
Moreover, we say that f is delta differentiable (or differentiable) on, providedexists. Functionis then called the delta derivative of f on.
Remark 2. If, thenbecomes the usual derivative; if, then.
Definition 7. (Rd-continuous function) [
11]
A function is called right-dense continuous (rd-continuous) provided it is continuous at right-dense points in and its left-sided limits exist (finite) at left-dense points in .The set of rd-continuous functions of the typeis denoted byand the set of rd-continuous functions of the typeis denoted by. The set of functions of the typethat are differentiable and whose derivative is rd-continuous is denoted byand the set of functions of the typethat are differentiable and whose derivative is rd-continuous is denoted by.
We want to cite an important result that S. Hilger reported in his work in 1990 and that connected rd-continuous functions to regulated functions as follows.
Remark 3. [
12]
continuous ⟹ rd-continuous ⟹ regulated. Definition 8. (Antiderivative) [
11]
If , , then F is called an antiderivative of f, and in this case, we define the integral of f on bywhere .
Lemma 1. ([
11], Theorem 2.2)
Every rd-continuous function possesses an antiderivative. Definition 9. (Regressive) [
11]
A function is called regressive ifconcerning initial value problemdenotes the set of all regressive and right-dense continuous functionsand;denotes the set of all regressive and right-dense continuous functionsand. Lemma 2. ([
11], Theorem 3.1)
If then (1) has an unique solution. Definition 10. (Cylinder transformation) [
11,
12]
For the function is called cylinder transformation and is defined bywhere is the principal logarithm function. Definition 11. (Exponential function) [
11]
The unique solution of (1)
is called exponential function and is denoted by . An explicit formula for iswhere . Remark 4. ([
11], Example 4.1)
We note that- 1.
if, thenwhere,,; - 2.
if, thenwhere,,.
Lemma 3. ([
13], Theorem 5.2; [
14], Lemma 3.2)
Let then- 1.
and
- 2.
ifthen;
- 3.
- 4.
- 5.
- 6.
We report a useful result for the introduction of the last inequalities in the next paragraph.
Lemma 4. Letandbe a function continuous at, where,with. Assume thatis rd-continuous on. If for any, there exists a neighborhood U of t, independent of, such thatwheredenotes the delta derivative of κ with respect to the first variable, thenimplies For a better simplification, we put our notations in
Table 1.
We have to point out the following result to clarify Theorems and Remarks we are going to present in the third and main part of this paper.
Remark 5. We can note that if, then.
3. Main Results on Time Scales
In this section, we are going to present some of the most important forms of the Gronwall–Bellman (G–B) inequality on time scales, in particular, we will put a bigger focus on new forms that are presented and proved in the past four years. We decided to select forms of G–B inequality type on time scale that are more simple than others, because we think this choice could better shown the link between this inequalities and inequalities we presented in our introduction.
We will always assume that . First of all, we would like to present the G–B inequality on time scale, which B.G. Pachpatte reported in his paper in 2006.
Theorem 9. ([
15], Theorem 3.1)
Let u,f, and let α be a nondecreasing function, ifis satisfied, thenwhere is a solution of the problem (1) in Definition 9
(in fact, ). Remark 6. If, in Theorem 9, we can observe (using Remark 4(1) and others results we presented in previous section) that the inequality on time scale obtained in Theorem 9 is reduced to the continuous inequality we have in Theorem 2(1) (even if we have a result much more general than in Theorem 2, in fact the functions u,f,, instead in Theorem 2 the functions u,f,).
In 2001, an important form of G–B inequality was presented by R.P. Agarwal, M. Bohner and A. Peterson, whom proved the following result on time scale.
Theorem 10. ([
13], Theorem 5.6)
Let u, and , thenimplies In 2005, E. Akin-Bohner, M. Bohner and F. Akin discussed and proved the Gronwall–Bellman–Pachpatte inequality, presented in Theorem 4, on a time scale as follows.
Theorem 11. ([
16], Theorem 3.1)
Let u,α, , let g,
, ifis satisfied, thenwhere is a solution of initial value problem (
1) in Definition 9 with f replaced by
(in fact, ). Corollary 1. ([
16], Remark 3.3(ii))
Let u, , let g,, α be a nondecreasing function, ifis satisfied, thenwhere is a solution of the initial value problem (1) in Definition 9 with f replaced by . Remark 7. Ifin Corollary 1, we can observe (using Remarks 1 and 4(1) and others results we presented in the previous section) that the inequality on the time scale obtained in Corollary 1 is reduced to the continuous inequality we have in Theorem 4 (even if we have a result much more general than in Theorem 4). In fact, the functions u,and f,, instead in Theorem 4 the functions u,f,and α is a positive function defined on I.
In 2007, W.N. Li and W. Sheng proposed, as the first of their main results, the following theorem.
Theorem 12. ([
17], Theorem 3.2)
Let u,α,β,g,f∈, let p,q be real constants, ifis satisfied, thenwhere and Remark 8. If,,andin Theorem 12, we can observe (using Remarks 1 and 4(1) and others results we presented in previous section) that the inequality on the time scale obtained in Theorem 12 is reduced to the continuous inequality we have in Theorem 6 (even if we have a result much more general than in Theorem 6, in fact the functions u,f,, instead in Theorem 6 the functions u,f,).
After two years, W.N. Li and M. Han presented and discussed a similar result to the one just reported as follows.
Theorem 13. ([
18], Theorem 2.4)
Let u,α,β,g,f∈, let p,q be real constants, ifis satisfied, thenwhere and Remark 9. If, ,andin Theorem 12, we observe (using Remarks 1 and 4(1) and others results we presented in previous section) that the inequality on the time scale obtained in Theorem 12 is reduced to the continuous inequality we have in Theorem 6 (even if we have a result much more general than in Theorem 6, in fact the functions u,f,, instead in Theorem 6 the functions u,f,).
In 2010, S.K. Choi and N. Koo unified previous results and discussed a particular form of the G–B inequality on time scales, we present it in the following Theorem. Before giving it, we consider that denotes the delta derivative of with respect to the first variable.
Theorem 14. ([
8], Theorem 3.4)
Let , let u,, let c be a real and nonnegative constant, let be defined as in Lemma 4 such that , for with ; ifis satisfied, thenwhere Remark 10. Ifin the Theorem 14 and we assume in Theorem 9 thatwith, then we have that Theorem 14 is reduced to Theorem 9.
Remark 11. Ifin Theorem 14, we can observe (using Remarks 1, 2 and 4(1) and other results we presented in previous section) that the inequality on the time scale obtained in Theorem 14 is reduced to the continuous inequality we have in Theorem 7 (even if we have a result much more general than in Theorem 7. In fact, the functions in Theorem 14 are defined on, instead in Theorem 7 the functions are defined on I interval in.
In 2013, the authors themselves proposed a different form of the G–B inequality on time scale as follows.
Theorem 15. ([
19], Lemma 2.2)
Let u,f,, , let c be a real nonnegative constant, let p be a real positive constant, , and ifis satisfied, thenwhere In 2017, B. Ben Nasser, K. Boukerrioua, M. Defoort, M. Djemai and M. A. Hammami investigated Bellman–Pachpatte-type inequalities on time scales and proposed an interesting result as follows.
Theorem 16. ([
20], Theorem 8)
Let u,, let c be a real nonnegative constant, let ω be a positive and continuous function defined on and be functions satisfyingfor , , andfor ; let be defined as in Lemma 4 such that and for with ; ifis satisfied, thenwhere Remark 12. If we assume that,,in Theorem 16, we have thatand Theorem 16 is reduced to Theorem 14 with. Therefore, Theorem 16 is a generalization of Theorem 14.
Remark 13. Ifin Theorem 16 and we assume all conditions in Remark 12, we can observe (using Remarks 1, 2 and 4(1) and others results we presented in the previous section) that the inequality on the time scale obtained in Theorem 16 is reduced to the continuous inequality we have in Theorem 7, and if we assume all conditions in Remark 10 too, we have that Theorem 16 is reduced to the continuous inequality in Theorem 9.
In 2018, A.A. El-Deeb discussed G–B inequality with nonlinearity on a time scale and proved the following results.
Theorem 17. ([
21], Theorem 3.1)
Let with , let u,g,f,, α be delta-differentiable on with and let p be a real constant such that ; ifis satisfied, thenwhere ,
, , Remark 14. Ifin Theorem 17, we can observe (using Remarks 1, 2 and 4(1) and other results we presented in previous section) that the inequality on time scale obtained in Theorem 17 is reduced to the continuous inequality we have in Theorem 8 (even if we have a result much more general than in Theorem 8, in fact the functions u,f,g,, instead in Theorem 8 the functions u,f,g,).
Theorem 18. ([
21], Theorem 3.2)
Let with and u,g,f,, α be delta-differentiable on with and , for and let p be a real constant such that ; ifis satisfied, thenwhere,,, Theorem 19. ([
21], Theorem 3.3)
Let u,α be defined as in Theorem 18, , , and for , let with and let p be a real constant such that ; ifis satisfied, thenwhere,,, In 2019, A.A. El-Deeb discussed and proved other inequalities on time scale; we decided to propose the one that can have a link with the Bellman–Pachpatte inequality we enunciated in the introduction of this paper.
Theorem 20. ([
14], Theorem 3.4)
Let , let u,g,f,α, and , and let p be a real constant such that ; ifis satisfied, thenwhere Remark 15. Ifandin Theorem 20, we can observe (using Remarks 1, 2 and 4(1) and other results we presented in the previous section) that the inequality on time scale obtained in Theorem 20 is reduced to the continuous inequality we have in Theorem 6.
4. Conclusions
The purpose of this paper is to present some of the most studied Gronwall–Bellman (G-B) type inequalities and show the connection between them and G–B inequalities on time scales, as we have said. Therefore, in our work, we do not prove new results but present some inequalities of the G–B type that have been discussed and proved since 1919. We have decided to choose inequalities on time scales that could better show this link in an immediate way, in particular A.A. El-Deeb discussed in [
14,
16] inequalities that are useful in this regard. Additionally, we have decided to focus our attention only on function “
u” of one variable (where
u are the bounded function appears in inequalities), even if there are a lot of interesting works regarding functions of two variables, two of them are [
22,
23]. During our work, we have tried to present a clear paper that not only could collect G–B inequalities on
I,
and
, but even present some of the most important results on time scales.
We can not hide that there were some difficulties to select the right results, first of all, the fact that we have analyzed only open access journals; therefore, a lot of results and interesting works are not taken into account and this fact has limited the possibility to report inequalities that could better fit our aim. Another problem was finding results on a time scale that could have a connection with G–B inequalities presented in continuous forms and at the same time that could have different forms with each other. In addition to this, this paper is supposed to be a small survey; therefore, we have tried to select results on time scales, which were published after just a few years. We have tried to present results on a time scale in forms which better fit with the G–B inequalities we presented in our introduction. Obviously, with simple operations, our results can be returned to their original form.
The purpose of the theory on time scale was to unify the continuous forms of equations and inequalities with results defined on the time scale; therefore, in this paper, we have tried to emphasize this aim. Additionally, we have tried to mention that finding the generalized form of G–B inequality on a time scale is a very interesting part of mathematics and constitutes another reason for investigating further (we decided to present Theorem 14 and the following remark to report this aspect).
We think that could be useful to conduct other surveys on G–B inequalities with a bounded function with two or more variables, or analyze Gronwall–Belman–Bihari results on a time scale and presented them in a similar way as we have done. Furthermore, we think that complete this survey with sophisticated results on time scales could be an interesting and useful work to present.