Evaluating $\int_0^1 \frac{\ln (1 – x) \operatorname{Li}_2 (-x)}{1 + x} \, dx$

closed-formdefinite integralseuler-sumsharmonic-numbersintegration

In an answer to a question found here @user97357329 implies the following integral
$$\int_0^1 \frac{\ln (1 – x) \operatorname{Li}_2 (-x)}{1 + x} \, dx,$$
can be found relatively easily.

So far what I have managed to come up with is the following. Since
$$\sum_{n = 1}^\infty H^{(2)}_n x^n = \frac{\operatorname{Li}_2 (x)}{1 – x},$$
where $H^{(2)}_n = \sum_{k = 1}^n \frac{1}{k^2}$ denotes the 2nd order generalised harmonic number, replacing $x$ with $-x$ gives
$$\sum_{n = 1}^\infty (-1)^n H^{(2)}_n x^n = \frac{\operatorname{Li}_2 (-x)}{1 + x}.$$
So the integral becomes
\begin{align}
\int_0^1 \frac{\ln (1 – x) \operatorname{Li}_2 (-x)}{1 + x} \, dx &= \sum_{n = 1}^\infty (-1)^n H^{(2)}_n \int_0^1 x^n \ln (1 – x) \, dx\\
&= \sum_{n = 2}^\infty (-1)^{n – 1} H^{(2)}_{n – 1} \int_0^1 x^{n – 1} \ln (1 – x) \, dx\\
&= \sum_{n = 2}^\infty (-1)^n \frac{H^{(2)}_{n – 1} H_n}{n},
\end{align}

where the result $\int_0^1 x^{n – 1} \ln (1 – x) \, dx = -\frac{H_n}{n}$ has been used. This gives a difficult non-linear Euler sum.

How can one find the value of the integral without using the value for the Euler sum just found or other difficult non-linear Euler sums (linear ones are fine)?

Best Answer

A solution by Cornel Ioan Valean

Apart from the strategy described in comments, what about if for the last series we combine the following two known identities?

$$\int_0^1 x^{n-1} \log^3(1-x)\textrm{d}x=-\frac{H_n^3+3H_n H_n^{(2)}+2H_n^{(3)}}{n}$$ and $$ \sum_{n=1}^{\infty} x^n(H_n^3-3H_nH_n^{(2)}+2 H_n^{(3)}) = -\frac{\log^3(1-x)}{1-x},$$

which both appear in (Almost) Impossible Integrals, Sums, and Series, pages 2 and 355.

It's easy to see that using the identities above, we have that

$$\sum _{n=1}^{\infty } (-1)^{n-1}\frac{ H_n H_n^{(2)}}{n}=-\frac{1}{6} \left(\int_0^1 \frac{\log ^3(1-x)}{1+x} \textrm{d}x+\int_0^1 \frac{\log ^3(1+x)}{x (1+x)} \textrm{d}x\right),$$

where both integrals are straightforward and the desired result follows.

Many thanks to Cornel for this strategy.


UPDATE (July 24, 2022): It is obvious that with the strategy above we can also immediately extract the generating function, $$\sum_{n=1}^{\infty} x^n \frac{H_n H_n^{(2)}}{n}$$ $$=-\zeta(4)+\frac{1}{6}\log(x)\log^3(1-x)-\frac{1}{24}\log^4(1-x)+\frac{1}{2}\log^2(1-x)\operatorname{Li}_2(1-x)$$ $$-\log(1-x)\operatorname{Li}_3(1-x)+\operatorname{Li}_4(1-x)-\operatorname{Li}_4\left(\frac{x}{x-1}\right), \ |x|\le1 \land \ x\neq1.$$