Analytic surface germs with minimal Pythagoras number

We determine all complete intersection surface germs whose Pythagoras number is 2, and find that they are all embedded in ³ and have the property that every positive semidefinite analytic function germ is a sum of squares of analytic function germs. In addition, we discuss completely these properties for mixed surface germs in ³. Finally, we find in higher embedding dimension three different families with these same properties. Partially supported by DGICYT, BFM2002-04797 and HPRN-CT-2001-00271 Mathematical Subject Classification (2000): 11E25, 14P15.An erratum to this article can be found at