Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 October 2011
The general problem can be stated as follows. Take a Brownian motion Bt started at − x < 0, and consider the additive functional At = ∫L(a,t)m(da), where L(a, t) is the Brownian local time. We suppose that m = m+ — m−, where these are positive measures supported respectively on (0, ∞) and (— ∞, 0). Then, with the equalization time defined by T = inf {t > 0: At = 0}, we ask for an explicit evaluation of the law π (x,dy) = P−x[BT∈dy]. In [8, 9] we showed how π (x,dy) can be obtained by solving an integral convolution equation of Wiener-Hopf type. The method used there exploits a technique of Ray [10].