A quadratic Bolza-type problem in a Riemannian manifold

A classical nonlinear equation on a complete Riemannian manifold is considered. The existence of solutions connecting any two points is studied, i.e., for T>0 the critical points of the functional with x(0)=x₀,x(T)=x₁. When the potential V has a subquadratic growth with respect to x, J_T admits a minimum critical point for any T>0 (infinitely many critical points if the topology of is not trivial). When V has an at most quadratic growth, i.e., , this property does not hold, but an optimal arrival time T(λ)>0 exists such that, if 0<T<T(λ), any pair of points in can be joined by a critical point of the corresponding functional. For the existence and multiplicity results, variational methods and Ljusternik-Schnirelman theory are used. The optimal value is fulfilled by the harmonic oscillator. These ideas work for other related problems.