The conformal plate buckling equation

The linear equation Δ²u = 1 for the infinitesimal buckling under uniform unit load of a thin elastic plate over ?² has the particularly interesting nonlinear generalization Δ_g²u = 1, where Δ_g = e^?2u Δ is the Laplace‐Beltrami operator for the metric g = e^2ug₀, with g₀ the standard Euclidean metric on ?². This conformal elliptic PDE of fourth order is equivalent to the nonlinear system of elliptic PDEs of second order Δu(x)+K_g(x) exp(2u(x)) = 0 and Δ K_g(x) + exp(2u(x)) = 0, with x ∈ ?², describing a conformally flat surface with a Gauss curvature function K_g that is generated self‐consistently through the metric's conformal factor. We study this conformal plate buckling equation under the hypotheses of finite integral curvature ∫ K_g exp(2u)dx = κ, finite area ∫ exp(2u)dx = α, and the mild compactness condition K₊ ∈ L¹(B₁(y)), uniformly w.r.t. y ∈ ?². We show that asymptotically for |x|→∞ all solutions behave like u(x) = ?(κ/2π)ln |x| + C + o(1) and K(x) = ?(α/2π) ln|x| + C + o(1), with κ ∈ (2π, 4π) and . We also show that for each κ ∈ (2π, 4π) there exists a K^* and a radially symmetric solution pair u, K, satisfying K(u) = κ and maxK = K^*, which is unique modulo translation of the origin, and scaling of x coupled with a translation of u. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.