This paper studies positive solutions and eigenvalue intervals of a nonlinear third-order two-point boundary value problem. The nonlinear term is allowed to be singular with respect to both the time and space variables. By constructing a proper cone and applying the Guo-Krasnosel'skii fixed point theorem, the eigenvalue intervals for which there exist one, two, three or infinitely many positive solutions are obtained.

This paper concerns the following system of nonlinear third-order boundary value problem: $$u_i^{\text{'}\text{'}\text{'}}\left(t\right)+f_i(t,u_1\left(t\right),\cdots ,u_n\left(t\right),u_1^{\text{'}}\left(t\right),\cdots ,u_n^{\text{'}}\left(t\right))=0,0<t<1,i\in \{1,\cdots ,n\}$$ with the following multi-point and integral boundary conditions: $$\left\{\begin{array}{c}{u}_i\left(0\right)=0u_i^{\text{'}}\left(0\right)=0u_i^{\text{'}}\left(1\right)=\sum _{j=1}^p{\beta }_{j,i}{u}_i^{\text{'}}\left({\eta }_{j,i}\right)+{\int }_0^1{h}_i(u_1\left(s\right),\cdots ,u_n\left(s\right))ds\hfill \end{array}\right.$$ where ${\beta }_{j,i}>0$, $0<{\eta }_{1,i}<\cdots <{\eta }_{p,i}<\frac{1}{2}$, $f_i:[0,1]\times {ℝ}^n\times {ℝ}^n\to ℝ$ and $h_i:[0,1]\times {ℝ}^n\to ℝ$ are continuous functions for all $i\in \{1,\cdots ,n\}$ and $j\in \{1,\cdots ,p\}$. Using Guo-Krasnosel’skii fixed point theorem in cone, we discuss the existence of positive solutions of this problem. We also prove nonexistence of positive solutions and we give some examples to illustrate our results.