New results are proved on the maximum number of isolated $T$-periodic solutions (limit cycles) of a first order polynomial differential equation with periodic coefficients. The exponents of the polynomial may be negative. The results are compared with the available literature and applied to a class of polynomial systems on the cylinder.

For a generalized pendulum equation we estimate the number of periodic solutions from below using lower and upper solutions and from above using a complex equation and Jensen’s inequality.

The higher-order nonlinear ordinary differential equation $$x^{\left(n\right)}+\lambda p\left(t\right)f\left(x\right)=0,t\ge a,$$ is considered and the problem of counting the number of zeros of bounded nonoscillatory solutions $x(t;\lambda )$ satisfying ${lim}_{t\to \infty }x(t;\lambda )=1$ is studied. The results can be applied to a singular eigenvalue problem.

We provide an effective uniform upper bound for the number of zeros of the first non-vanishing Melnikov function of a polynomial perturbations of a planar polynomial Hamiltonian vector field. The bound depends on degrees of the field and of the perturbation, and on the order $k$ of the Melnikov function. The generic case $k=1$ was considered by Binyamini, Novikov and Yakovenko [BNY10]. The bound follows from an effective construction of the Gauss-Manin connection for iterated integrals.

In this paper we have considered completely the equation $$y^{\text{'}\text{'}\text{'}}+a\left(t\right)y^{\text{'}\text{'}}+b\left(t\right)y^{\text{'}}+c\left(t\right)y=0,(*)$$ where $a\in C^2([\sigma ,\infty ),R)$, $b\in C^1([\sigma ,\infty ),R)$, $c\in C\left(\right[\sigma ,\infty ),R)$ and $\sigma \in R$ such that $a\left(t\right)\le 0$, $b\left(t\right)\le 0$ and $c\left(t\right)\le 0$. It has been shown that the set of all oscillatory solutions of (*) forms a two-dimensional subspace of the solution space of (*) provided that (*) has an oscillatory solution. This answers a question raised by S. Ahmad and A.  C. Lazer earlier.

In this paper we consider the third-order nonlinear delay differential equation (*) $${\left(a\left(t\right){\left(x^{\text{'}\text{'}}\left(t\right)\right)}^{\gamma }\right)}^{\text{'}}+q\left(t\right)x^{\gamma }\left(\tau \left(t\right)\right)=0,t\ge t_0,$$ where $a\left(t\right)$, $q\left(t\right)$ are positive functions, $\gamma >0$ is a quotient of odd positive integers and the delay function $\tau \left(t\right)\le t$ satisfies ${lim}_{t\to infty}\tau \left(t\right)=infty$. We establish some sufficient conditions which ensure that (*) is oscillatory or the solutions converge to zero. Our results in the nondelay case extend and improve some known results and in the delay case the results can be applied to new classes of equations which are not covered by the known criteria....