A Ricci inequality for hypersurfaces in the sphere

Let Mⁿ be a complete Riemannian manifold immersed isometrically in the unity Euclidean sphere In [9], B. Smyth proved that if Mⁿ, n ≧ 3, has sectional curvature K and Ricci curvature Ric, with inf K > −∞, then sup Ric ≧ (n − 2) unless the universal covering of Mⁿ is homeomorphic to Rn or homeomorphic to an odd-dimensional sphere. In this paper, we improve the result of Smyth. Moreover, we obtain the classification of complete hypersurfaces of with nonnegative sectional curvature.Received: 11 November 2003