Second-order derivations of functions spaces -- a characterization of second-order differential operators

Abstract: Let $\Omega \subset \mathbb{R}$ be a nonempty and open set, then for all $f, g, h\in \mathscr{C}^{2}(\Omega)$ we have \begin{multline*} \frac{\mathrm{d}^{2}}{\mathrm{d} x^{2}}(f\cdot g\cdot h) - f\frac{\mathrm{d}^{2}}{\mathrm{d} x^{2}}(g\cdot h)-g\frac{\mathrm{d}^{2}}{\mathrm{d} x^{2}}(f\cdot h)-h\frac{\mathrm{d}^{2}}{\mathrm{d} x^{2}}(f\cdot g) + f\cdot g\frac{\mathrm{d}^{2}}{\mathrm{d} x^{2}} h+f\cdot h\frac{\mathrm{d}^{2}}{\mathrm{d} x^{2}} g+g\cdot h \frac{\mathrm{d}^{2}}{\mathrm{d} x^{2}}f=0 \end{multline*} The aim of this paper is to consider the corresponding operator equation [D(f\cdot g \cdot h) - fD(g\cdot h) - gD(f\cdot h) - hD(f \cdot g) + f\cdot g D(h) + f\cdot h D(g) +g\cdot h D(f) = 0] for operators $D\colon \mathscr{C}^{k}(\Omega)\to \mathscr{C}(\Omega)$, where $k$ is a given nonnegative integer and the above identity is supposed to hold for all $f, g, h \in \mathscr{C}^{k}(\Omega)$. We show that besides the operators of first and second derivative, there are more solutions to this equation. Some special cases characterizing differential operators are also studied.