On the use of T-coercivity to study the interior transmission eigenvalue problem

In this Note, we investigate the so-called interior transmission problem using the T-coercivity approach. In particular, we prove that this problem, which appears when one is interested in the reconstruction of the support of an inclusion embedded in a homogeneous medium, is of Fredholm type and that so-called transmission eigenvalues form at most a discrete set. Our approach treats cases where the difference between the inclusion index and the background index can change sign, which are not covered by other techniques that can be found in the literature. We also provide Faber-Krahn type inequalities associated with this general case. (C) 2011 Academie des sciences. Published by Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.