This paper concerns a fully nonlinear version of the Yamabe problem on manifolds with boundary. We establish some existence results and estimates of solutions.
We study the Yamabe flow on asymptotically flat manifolds with non-positive Yamabe constant $Y\leq 0$. Previous work by the second and third named authors \cite{ChenWang} showed that while the Yamabe flow always converges in a global weighted sense when $Y>0$, the flow must diverge when $Y\leq 0$. We show here in the $Y\leq 0$ case however that after suitable rescalings, the Yamabe flow starting from any asymptotically flat manifold must converge to the unique positive function which solves the Yamabe problem on a compactification of the original manifold.
On a smooth closed Riemannian manifold, we show short time existence of smooth solutions to the $(α,β)$-Ricci-Yamabe flow, which is a natural generalization of the Ricci flow and the Yamabe flow. We also establish some long time existence theorems for the closed $(α,β)$-Ricci-Yamabe flow by estimating its curvatures.
In this paper we establish existence and compactness of solutions to a general fully nonlinear version of the Yamabe problem on locally conformally flat Riemannian manifolds with umbilic boundary.
We build blowing-up solutions for linear perturbation of the Yamabe problem on manifolds with umbilic boundary, provided the Weyl tensor is nonzero everywhere on the boundary and the dimension of the manifold is n>10.
We build blowing-up solutions for linear perturbation of the Yamabe problem on manifolds with boundary, provided the dimension of the manifold is n>6 and the trace-free part of the second fundamental form is non-zero everywhere on the boundary.
We build blowing-up solutions for a supercritical perturbation of the Yamabe problem on manifolds with umbilic boundary provided the dimension of the manifold is n>7 and that the Weyl tensor W(x) is not vanishing on the boundary of M.
A complete solution to the quaternionic contact Yamabe equation on the qc sphere of dimension $4n+3$ as well as on the quaternionic Heisenberg group is given. A uniqueness theorem for the qc Yamabe problem in a compact locally 3-Sasakian manifold is shown.
Let (V,g) and (W,h) be compact Riemannian manifolds of dimension at least 3. We derive a lower bound for the conformal Yamabe constant of the product manifold (V x W, g+h) in terms of the conformal Yamabe constants of (V,g) and (W,h).
We build blowing-up solutions for a supercritical perturbation of the Yamabe problem on manifolds with boundary, provided the dimension of the manifold is n>6 and the trace-free part of the second fundamental form is non-zero everywhere on the boundary.
We present some results on a fully nonlinear version of the Yamabe problem and a Harnack type inequality for general conformally invariant fully nonlinear second order elliptic equations.
We prove global existence of Yamabe flows on non-compact manifolds $M$ of dimension $m\geq3$ under the assumption that the initial metric $g_0=u_0g_M$ is conformally equivalent to a complete background metric $g_M$ of bounded, non-positive scalar curvature and positive Yamabe invariant with conformal factor $u_0$ bounded from above and below. We do not require initial curvature bounds. In particular, the scalar curvature of $(M,g_0)$ can be unbounded from above and below without growth condition.
The Yamabe problem concerns finding a conformal metric on a given closed Riemannian manifold so that it has constant scalar curvature. This paper concerns mainly a fully nonlinear version of the Yamabe problem and the corresponding Liouville type problem.
The goal of this paper is to study Yamabe flow on a complete Riemannian manifold of bounded geometry with possibly infinite volume. In the case of infinite volume, standard volume normalization of the Yamabe flow fails and the flow may not converge. Instead, we consider a curvature normalized Yamabe flow, and assuming negative scalar curvature, prove its long-time existence and convergence. This extends the results of Suárez-Serrato and Tapie to a non-compact setting. In the appendix, we specify our analysis of a particular example of manifolds with bounded geometry, namely manifolds with fibe…
Let (M,g) be a compact oriented Riemannian manifold with an incomplete edge singularity. This article shows that it is possible to evolve g by the Yamabe flow within a class of singular edge metrics. As the main analytic step we establish parabolic Schauder-type estimates for the heat operator on certain Hölder spaces adapted to the singular edge geometry. We apply these estimates to obtain local existence for a variety of quasilinear equations, including the Yamabe flow. This provides a setup for a subsequent discussion of the Yamabe problem using flow techniques in the singular setting.
We study the Yamabe flow starting from an asymptotically flat manifold $(M^n,g_0)$. We show that the flow converges to an asymptotically flat, scalar flat metric in a weighted global sense if $Y(M,[g_0])>0$, and show that the flow does not converge otherwise. If the scalar curvature is nonnegative and integrable, then the ADM mass at time infinity drops by the limit of the total scalar curvature along the flow.
In this paper,we prove the following Myers-type theorem: if $(M^n,g)$, $n\geq 3$, is an n-dimensional complete locally conformally flat Riemannian manifold with bounded Ricci curvature satisfying the Ricci pinching condition $Rc\geq εRg>0$, where $ε>0$ is an uniform constant, then $M^n$ must be compact.
We consider a closed cohomogeneity one Riemannian manifold $(M^n,g) $ of dimension $n\geq 3$. If the Ricci curvature of $M$ is positive, we prove the existence of infinite nodal solutions for equations of the form $-Δ_g u + λu = λu^q$ with $λ>0$, $q>1$. In particular for a positive Einstein manifold which is of cohomogeneity one or fibers over a cohomogeniety one Einstein manifold we prove the existence of infinite nodal solutions for the Yamabe equation, with a prescribed number of connected components of its nodal domain.
We consider asymptotically hyperbolic manifolds whose metrics have Sobolev-class regularity, and introduce several technical tools for studying PDEs on such manifolds. Our results employ two novel families of function spaces suitable for metrics potentially having a large amount of interior differentiability, but whose Sobolev regularity implies only a Hölder continuous conformal structure at infinity. We establish Fredholm theorems for elliptic operators arising from metrics in these families. To demonstrate the utility of our methods, we solve the Yamabe problem in this category. As a specia…
Given a compact Riemannian manifold with umbilic boundary, the Yamabe boundary problem studies if there exist conformal scalar-flat metrics such that the boundary has constant mean curvature. In this paper we address to the stability of this problem with respect of perturbation of mean curvature of the boundary and scalar curvature of the manifold. In particular we prove that the Yamabe boundary problem is stable under perturbation of the mean curvature and the scalar curvature from below, while it is not stable if one of the two curvatures is perturbed from above.
We prove a necessary and sufficient condition for an asymptotically Euclidean manifold to be conformally related to one with specified nonpositive scalar curvature: the zero set of the desired scalar curvature must have a positive Yamabe invariant, as defined in the article. We show additionally how the sign of the Yamabe invariant of a measurable set can be computed from the sign of certain generalized "weighted" eigenvalues of the conformal Laplacian. Using the prescribed scalar curvature result we give a characterization of the Yamabe classes of asymptotically Euclidean manifolds. We also s…
We report on some aspects and recent progress in certain problems in the sub-Riemannian CR and quaternionic contact (QC) geometries. The focus are the corresponding Yamabe problems on the round spheres, the Lichnerowicz-Obata first eigenvalue estimates, and the relation between these two problems. A motivation from the Riemannian case highlights new and old ideas which are then developed in the settings of Iwasawa sub-Riemannian geometries.
Let (M,g) be a compact Riemannian manifold with boundary. We consider the problem (first studied by Escobar in 1992) of finding a conformal metric with constant scalar curvature in the interior and zero mean curvature on the boundary. Using a local test function construction, we are able to settle most cases left open by Escobar's work. Moreover, we reduce the remaining cases to the positive mass theorem.
We study the existence of conformal metrics on non-compact Riemannian manifolds with non-compact boundary, which are complete as metric spaces and have negative constant scalar curvature in the interior and negative constant mean curvature on the boundary. These metrics are constructed on smooth manifolds obtained by removing d-dimensional submanifolds from certain n-dimensional compact spaces locally modelled on generalized solid cones. We prove the existence of such metrics if and only if d>(n-2)/2. Our main theorem is inspired by the classical results by Aviles-McOwen and Loewner-Nirenberg …
We prove compactness of solutions of a fully nonlinear Yamabe problem satisfying a lower Ricci curvature bound, when the manifold is not conformally diffeomorphic to the standard sphere. This allows us to prove the existence of solutions when the associated cone $Γ$ satisfies $μ^+_Γ\le 1$, which includes the $σ_k-$Yamabe problem for $k$ not smaller than half of the dimension of the manifold.
We study the stability of compactness of solutions for the Yamabe boundary problem on a compact Riemannian manifold with non umbilic boundary. We prove that the set of solutions of Yamabe boundary problem is a compact set when perturbing the mean curvature of the boundary from below and the scalar curvature with a function whose maximum is not too positive. In addition, we prove the counterpart of the stability result: there exists a blowing up sequence of solutions when we perturb the mean curvature from above or the mean curvature from below and the scalar curvature with a function with a la…
Let M,g a compact Riemannian n-dimensional manifold. It is well know that, under certain hypothesis, in the conformal class of g there are scalar-flat metrics that have the boundary of M as a constant mean curvature hypersurface. Also, under certain hypothesis, it is known that these metrics are a compact set. In this paper we prove that, both in the case of umbilic and non-umbilic boundary, if we linearly perturb the mean curvature term with a negative smooth function, the set of solutions of Yamabe problem is still a compact set.
We introduce the notion of pseudohermitian k-curvature, which is a natural extension of the Webster scalar curvature, on an orientable manifold endowed with a strictly pseudoconvex pseudohermitian structure (referred here as a CR manifold) and raise the k-Yamabe problem on a compact CR manifold. When k=1, the problem was proposed and partially solved by Jerison and Lee for CR manifolds non-locally CR-equivalent to the CR sphere. For k > 1, the problem can be translated in terms of the study of a fully nonlinear equation of type complex k-Hessian. We provide some partial answers related to the …
On a closed balanced manifold, we show that if the Chern scalar curvature is small enough in a certain Sobolev norm then a slightly modified version of the Chern-Yamabe flow~\cite{Angella:2015aa} converges to a solution of the Chern-Yamabe problem. We also prove that if the Chern scalar curvature, on closed almost-Hermitian manifolds, is close enough to a constant function in a Hölder norm then the Chern-Yamabe problem has a solution for generic values of the fundamental constant.
We consider a closed Riemannian manifold $(M^n ,g)$ of dimension $n\geq 3$ and study positive solutions of the equation $-Δ_g u + λu = λu^q$, with $λ>0$, $q>1$. If $M$ supports a proper isoparametric function with focal varieties $M_1$, $M_2$ of dimension $d_1 \geq d_2 $ we show that for any $q<\frac{ n-d_2+2 }{n - d_2 -2}$ the number of positive solutions of the equation $-Δ_g u + λu = λu^q$ tends to $\infty$ as $λ\rightarrow +\infty$. We apply this result to prove multiplicity results for positive solutions of critical and supercritical equations. In particular we prove multiplicity results …
We define a new formal Riemannian metric on a conformal classes of four-manifolds in the context of the $σ_2$-Yamabe problem. Exploiting this new variational structure we show that solutions are unique unless the manifold is conformally equivalent to the round sphere.
We obtain some estimates on the area of the boundary and on the volume of a certain free boundary hypersurface $Σ$ with nonpositive Yamabe invariant in a Riemannian $n$-manifold with bounds for the scalar curvature and the mean curvature of the boundary. Assuming further that $Σ$ is locally volume-minimizing in a manifold $M^n$ with scalar curvature bounded below by a nonpositive constant and mean convex boundary, we conclude that locally $M$ splits along $Σ$. In the case that the scalar curvature of $M$ is at least $-n(n-1)$ and $Σ$ locally minimizes a certain functional inspired by [30], a n…
Let $(M^n,g),~n\ge 3$ be a noncompact complete Riemannian manifold with compact boundary and $f$ a smooth function on $\partial M$. In this paper we show that for a large class of such manifolds, there exists a metric within the conformal class of $g$ that is complete, has zero scalar curvature on $M$ and has mean curvature $f$ on the boundary. The problem is equivalent to finding a positive solution to an elliptic equation with a non-linear boundary condition with critical Sobolev exponent.
Let $(M,g)$ be a $n-$dimensional compact Riemannian manifold with boundary. We consider the Yamabe type problem \begin{equation} \left\{ \begin{array}{ll} -Δ_{g}u+au=0 & \text{ on }M \\ \partial_νu+\frac{n-2}{2}bu= u^{{n\over n-2}\pm\varepsilon} & \text{ on }\partial M \end{array}\right. \end{equation} where $a\in C^1(M),$ $b\in C^1(\partial M)$, $ν$ is the outward pointing unit normal to $\partial M $ and $\varepsilon$ is a small positive parameter. We build solutions which blow-up at a point of the boundary as $\varepsilon$ goes to zero. The blowing-up behavior is ruled by the function $b-H_…
We give some a priori estimates of type sup*inf for Yamabe and prescribed scalar curvature type equations on Riemannian manifolds of dimension >2. The product sup*inf is caracteristic of those equations, like the usual Harnack inequalities for non negative harmonic functions. First, we have a lower bound for sup*inf for some classes of PDE on compact manifolds (like prescribed scalar cuvature). We also have an upper bound for the same product but on any Riemannian manifold not necessarily compact. An application of those result is an uniqueness solution for some PDE.
In this paper, we investigate the behavior of ADM mass and Einstein-Hilbert functional under the Yamabe flow. Through studying the Yamabe flow by weighted spaces, we show that ADM mass and Einstein-Hilbert functional are well-defined and monotone non-increasing under the Yamabe flow on $n$-dimensional, $n\geq 3$, asymptotically flat manifolds. In the case of dimension $n=3$ or 4, we obtain that the ADM mass is invariant under the Yamabe flow and the Yamabe flow is the gradient flow of Einstein-Hilbert functional on asymptotically flat manifolds
This work is devoted to the analysis of the Yamabe problem on Spin manifolds and some applications to CMC immersions. Despite the efforts of many authors, very little is known on the existence of Yamabe metrics on general Spin manifolds. Motivated to bubbling phenomena for the Riemannian problem and recent multiplicity results in this setting, we investigate special spinorial Yamabe metrics on product manifolds developing a bubbling analysis which has independent interest in the present setting.
Let $(M,g)$ be a compact connected spin manifold of dimension $n\geq 3$ whose Yamabe invariant is positive. We assume that $(M,g)$ is locally conformally flat or that $n \in \{3,4,5\}$. According to a positive mass theorem of Witten, the constant term in the asymptotic development of the Green's function of the conformal Laplacian is positive if $(M,g)$ is not conformally equivalent to the sphere. In the present article, we will give a proof for this fact which is considerably shorter than previous proofs. Our proof is a modification of Witten's argument, but no analysis on asymtotically flat …
We introduce a double iterative scheme and local variational method to solve the Yamabe-type equation $ - \frac{4(n - 1)}{n - 2}Δ_{g} u + (S_{g} + β) u = λu^{\frac{n + 2}{n - 2}} $ for some constant $ β\leqslant 0 $, locally on Riemannian domain $ (Ω, g) $ with trivial Dirichlet condition and globally on closed manifolds $ (M, g) $; the dimensions of $ Ω$ and $ M $ are at least 3. In contrast to the traditional global variational method, these Yamabe-type equations on closed manifolds are analyzed by local analysis and monotone iteration scheme. In particular, we do not need to use the Weyl te…
We study a conformal flow for compact Riemannian manifolds of dimension greater than two with boundary. Convergence to a scalar-flat metric with constant mean curvature on the boundary is established in dimensions up to seven, and in any dimensions if the manifold is spin or if it satisfies a generic condition.
For a sequence of blow up solutions of the Yamabe equation on non-locally confonformally flat compact Riemannian manifolds of dimension 10 or 11, we establish sharp estimates on its asymptotic profile near blow up points as well as sharp decay estimates of the Weyl tensor and its covariant derivatives at blow up points. If the Positive Mass Theorem held in dimensions 10 and 11, these estimates would imply the compactness of the set of solutions of the Yamabe equation on such manifolds.
We show that solutions of the Yamabe equation on certain n-dimensional non-compact Riemannian manifolds which are bounded and L^p for p=2n/(n-2) are also L^2. This L^p-L^2-implication provides explicit constants in the surgery-monotonicity formula for the smooth Yamabe invariant in a previous article of the authors. As an application we see that the smooth Yamabe invariant of any 2-connected compact 7-dimensional manifold is at least 74.5. Similar conclusions follow in dimension 8 and in dimensions at least 11.
In this paper, we set up a new Yamabe type flow on a compact Riemannian manifold $(M,g)$ of dimension $n\geq 3$. Let $ψ(x)$ be any smooth function on $M$. Let $p=\frac{n+2}{n-2}$ and $c_n=\frac{4(n-1)}{n-2}$. We study the Yamabe-type flow $u=u(t)$ satisfying {u_t}=u^{1-p}(c_nΔu-ψ(x)u)+r(t)u, \ \ in \ M\times (0,T),\ T>0 with r(t)=\int_M(c_n|\nabla u|^2+ψ(x)u^2)dv/ \int_Mu^{p+1}, which preserves the $L^{p+1}(M)$-norm and we can show that for any initial metric $u_0>0$, the flow exists globally. We also show that in some cases, the global solution converges to a smooth solution to the equation c…
We study the problem of conformal deformation of Riemannian structure to constant scalar curvature with zero mean curvature on the boundary. We prove compactness for the full set of solutions when the boundary is umbilic and the dimension $n \leq 24$. The Weyl Vanishing Theorem is also established under these hypotheses, and we provide counter-examples to compactness when $n \geq 25$. Lastly, our methods point towards a vanishing theorem for the umbilicity tensor, which is anticipated to be fundamental for a study of the nonumbilic case.
This article is concerned with developing an analytic theory for second order nonlinear parabolic equations on singular manifolds. Existence and uniqueness of solutions in an Lp-framework is established by maximal regularity tools. These techniques are applied to the Yamabe flow. It is proven that the Yamabe flow admits a unique local solution within a class of incomplete initial metrics.
We study a particular class of open manifolds. In the category of Riemannian manifolds these are complete manifolds with cylindrical ends. We give a natural setting for the conformal geometry on such manifolds including an appropriate notion of the cylindrical Yamabe constant/invariant. This leads to a corresponding version of the Yamabe problem on cylindrical manifolds. We affirmatively solve this Yamabe problem: we prove the existence of minimizing metrics and analyze their singularities near infinity. These singularities turn out to be of very particular type: either almost conical or almos…
As a counterpart of the classical Yamabe problem, a fractional Yamabe flow has been introduced by Jin and Xiong (2014) on the sphere. Here we pursue its study in the context of general compact smooth manifolds with positive fractional curvature. First, we prove that the flow is locally well posed in the weak sense on any compact manifold. If the manifold is locally conformally flat with positive Yamabe invariant, we also prove that the flow is smooth and converges to a constant scalar curvature metric. We provide different proofs using extension properties introduced by Chang and González (201…
One way to generalize the boundary Yamabe problem posed by Escobar is to ask if a given metric on a compact manifold with boundary can be conformally deformed to have vanishing $σ_k$-curvature in the interior and constant $H_k$-curvature on the boundary. When restricting to the closure of the positive $k$-cone, this is a fully nonlinear degenerate elliptic boundary value problem with fully nonlinear Robin-type boundary condition. We prove a general bifurcation theorem which allows us to construct examples of compact Riemannian manifolds $(X,g)$ for which this problem admits multiple non-homoth…
We consider the unnormalized Yamabe flow on manifolds with conical singularities. Under certain geometric assumption on the initial cross-section we show well posedness of the short time solution in the $L^q$-setting. Moreover, we give a picture of the deformation of the conical tips under the flow by providing an asymptotic expansion of the evolving metric close to the boundary in terms of the initial local geometry. Due to the blow up of the scalar curvature close to the singularities we use maximal $L^q$-regularity theory for conically degenerate operators.
Under the validity of the positive mass theorem, the Yamabe flow on a smooth compact Riemannian manifold of dimension $N \ge 3$ is known to exist for all time $t$ and converges to a solution to the Yamabe problem as $t \to \infty$. We prove that if a suitable perturbation, which may be smooth and arbitrarily small, is imposed on the Yamabe flow on any given Riemannian manifold $M$ of dimension $N \ge 5$, the resulting flow may blow up at multiple points on $M$ in the infinite time. Our proof is constructive, and indeed we construct such a flow by using solutions of the Yamabe problem on the un…