Contraction of convex surfaces by nonsmooth functions of curvature

We consider the motion of convex surfaces with normal speed given by arbitrary strictly monotone, homogeneous degree one functions of the principal curvatures (with no further smoothness assumptions). We prove that such processes deform arbitrary uniformly convex initial surfaces to points in finite time, with spherical limiting shape. This result was known previously only for smooth speeds. The crucial new ingredient in the argument, used to prove convergence of the rescaled surfaces to a sphere without requiring smoothness of the speed, is a surprising hidden divergence form structure in the evolution of certain curvature quantities.     

Deforming convex hypersurfaces to a hypersurface with prescribed harmonic mean curvature

A heat flow method is used to deform convex hypersulfaces in a ring domain to a hypersurface whose harmonic mean curvature is a prescribed function.     

Rigidity and mean curvature flow via harmonic Gauss maps

We investigate properties of harmonic Gauss maps and their applications to Lawson-Osserman’s problem, to the rigidity of space-like submanifolds in a pseudo-Euclidean space and to the mean curvature flow.     

Highly degenerate harmonic mean curvature flow

We study the evolution of a weakly convex surface in with flat sides by the Harmonic Mean Curvature flow. We establish the short time existence as well as the optimal regularity of the surface and we show that the boundaries of the flat sides evolve by the curve shortening flow. It follows from our results that a weakly convex surface with flat sides of class C ^k,γ , for some and 0  <  γ ≤ 1, remains in the same class under the flow. This distinguishes this flow from other, previously studied, degenerate parabolic equations, including the porous medium equation and the Gauss curvature flow with flat sides, where the regularity of the solution for t  >  0 does not depend on the regularity of the initial data. M. C. Caputo partially supported by the NSF grant DMS-03-54639. P. Daskalopoulos partially supported by the NSF grants DMS-01-02252, DMS-03-54639 and the EPSRC in the UK.     

Anisotropic mean curvature flow in higher codimension

We present recent progress in the study of the anisotropic mean curvature flow in higher codimension. (© 2008 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

Surfaces with harmonic inverse mean curvature in space forms

We define surfaces with harmonic inverse mean curvature in space forms and generalize a theorem due to Lawson by which surfaces of constant mean curvature in one space form isometrically correspond to those in another. We also obtain an immersion formula, which gives a deformation family for these surfaces.

     

A modified phase field approximation for mean curvature flow with conservation of the volume

This paper is concerned with the motion of a time‐dependent hypersurface ?Ω(t) in ?^d that evolves with a normal velocity where κ is the mean curvature of ?Ω(t), and g is an external forcing term. Phase field approximation of this motion leads to the Allen–Cahn equation where ε is an approximation parameter, W a double well potential and c_W a constant that depends only on W. We study here a modified version of this equation and we prove its convergence to the same geometric motion. We then make use of this modified equation in the context of mean curvature flow with conservation of the volume, and we show that it has better volume‐preserving properties than the traditional nonlocal Allen–Cahn equation. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Evolution of noncompact hypersurfaces by mean curvature minus a kind of external force field

In this paper, we study the evolution of a noncompact hypersurface moving by mean curvature minus an external force field. We prove that the flow has a long-time smooth solution for a kind of special external force fields if the initial hypersurface is a Lipschitz entire graph with linear growth.     

Constant mean curvature surfaces and mean curvature flow with non-zero Neumann boundary conditions on strictly convex domains

In this paper, we study nonparametric surfaces over strictly convex bounded domains in ${\mathbb{R}}^n$, which are evolving by the mean curvature flow with Neumann boundary value. We prove that solutions converge to the ones moving only by translation. And we will prove the existence and uniqueness of the constant mean curvature equation with Neumann boundary value on strictly convex bounded domains.     

A note on inverse mean curvature flow in cosmological spacetimes

In 12 Gerhardt proves longtime existence for the inverse mean curvature flow in globally hyperbolic Lorentzian manifolds with compact Cauchy hypersurface, which satisfy three main structural assumptions: a strong volume decay condition, a mean curvature barrier condition and the timelike convergence condition. Furthermore, it is shown in 12 that the leaves of the inverse mean curvature flow provide a foliation of the future of the initial hypersurface.We show that this result persists, if we generalize the setting by leaving the mean curvature barrier assumption out. For initial hypersurfaces with sufficiently large mean curvature we can weaken the timelike convergence condition to a physically relevant energy condition.     

Evolution of hypersurfaces by the mean curvature minus an external force field

In this paper, we study the evolution of hypersurface moving by the mean curvature minus an external force field. It is shown that the flow will blow up in a finite time if the mean curvature of the initial surface is larger than some constant depending on the boundness of derivatives of the external force field. For a linear force, we prove that the convexity of the hypersurface is preserved during the evolution and the flow has a unique smooth solution in any finite time and expands to infinity as the time tends to infinity if the initial curvature is smaller than the slope of the force.     

A homotopy approach to solving the inverse mean curvature flow

In , n < 7, we treat the quasilinear, degenerate parabolic initial and boundary value problem which is the natural parabolic extension of Huisken and Ilmanen’s weak inverse mean curvature flow (IMCF). We prove long time existence and partial uniqueness of Lipschitz continuous weak solutions u(x,t) and show C ^1,α-regularity for the sets ∂{x| u(x,t) <  z }. Our approach offers a new approximation for weak solutions of the IMCF starting from a class of interesting and easily obtainable initial values; for these, the above sets are shown to converge against corresponding surfaces of the IMCF as t → ∞ globally in Hausdorff distance and locally uniformly with respect to the C ^1,α-norm.Research partially supported by the DFG, SFB 382 at Tübingen University     

On mean curvature flow with forcing

Abstract

This paper investigates geometric properties and well-posedness of a mean curvature flow with volume-dependent forcing. With the class of forcing which bounds the volume of the evolving set away from zero and infinity, we show that a strong version of star-shapedness is preserved over time. More precisely, it is shown that the flow preserves the ρ-reflection property, which corresponds to a quantitative Lipschitz property of the set with respect to the nearest ball. Based on this property we show that the problem is well-posed and its solutions starting with ρ-reflection property become instantly smooth. Lastly, for a model problem, we will discuss the flow’s exponential convergence to the unique equilibrium in Hausdorff topology. For the analysis, we adopt the approach developed by Feldman-Kim to combine viscosity solutions approach and variational method. The main challenge lies in the lack of comparison principle, which accompanies forcing terms that penalize small volume.     

Length‐preserving evolution of non‐simple symmetric plane curves

The length‐preserving nonlocal flow in the plane is investigated for locally convex closed curves, which may be non‐simple. It turns out that for certain classes of symmetric curves, the flows converge to m‐fold circles. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Convex mean curvature flow with a forcing term in direction of the position vector

A smooth, compact and strictly convex hypersurface evolving in ℝ ⁿ⁺¹ along its mean curvature vector plus a forcing term in the direction of its position vector is studied in this paper. We show that the convexity is preserving as the case of mean curvature flow, and the evolving convex hypersurfaces may shrink to a point in finite time if the forcing term is small, or exist for all time and expand to infinity if it is large enough. The flow can converge to a round sphere if the forcing term satisfies suitable conditions which will be given in the paper. Long-time existence and convergence of normalization of the flow are also investigated.     

EXISTENCE AND ASYMPTOTIC BEHAVIOR OF SOLUTIONS TO A SINGULAR PARABOLIC EQUATION

In this paper,we study the initial-boundary value problem for a class of singular parabolic equations.Under some conditions,we obtain the existence and asymptotic behavior of solutions to the problem by parabolic regularization method and the sub-super solutions method.As a byproduct,we prove the existence of solutions to some problems with gradient terms,which blow up on the boundary.     

Large time behavior of solutions to a class of doubly nonlinear parabolic equations

We study the large time asymptotic behavior of solutions of the doubly degenerate parabolic equation u _t = div(u ^m−1|Du| ^p−2 Du) − u ^q with an initial condition u(x, 0) = u ₀(x). Here the exponents m, p and q satisfy m + p ⩾ 3, p > 1 and q > m + p − 2. The paper was supported by NSF of China (10571144), NSF for youth of Fujian province in China (2005J037) and NSF of Jimei University in China.     

Existence and asymptotic behavior of solutions to a singular parabolic equation

In this paper, we study the initial-boundary value problem for a class of singular parabolic equations. Under some conditions, we obtain the existence and asymptotic behavior of solutions to the problem by parabolic regularization method and the sub-super solutions method. As a byproduct, we prove the existence of solutions to some problems with gradient terms, which blow up on the boundary.