A simple approach for determining the eigenvalues of the fourth-order Sturm–Liouville problem with variable coefficients

Abstract In this paper, a simple and efficient approach is presented to compute the eigenvalues of the fourth-order Sturm–Liouville equations with variable coefficients. By transforming the governing differential equation to a system of algebraic equation, we can get the corresponding polynomial characteristic equations for kinds of boundary conditions based on the polynomial expansion and integral technique. Moreover, the lower and higher-order eigenvalues can be determined simultaneously from the multi-roots. Several examples for estimating eigenvalues are given. The convergence and effectiveness of the method are confirmed by comparing numerical results with the exact and other existing numerical results.