English

Constant rank theorems for curvature problems via a viscosity approach

Analysis of PDEs 2023-02-20 v2 Differential Geometry

Abstract

An important set of theorems in geometric analysis consists of constant rank theorems for a wide variety of curvature problems. In this paper, for geometric curvature problems in compact and non-compact settings, we provide new proofs which are both elementary and short. Moreover, we employ our method to obtain constant rank theorems for homogeneous and non-homogeneous curvature equations in new geometric settings. One of the essential ingredients for our method is a generalization of a differential inequality in a viscosity sense satisfied by the smallest eigenvalue of a linear map (Brendle-Choi-Daskalopoulos, Acta Math. 219(2017): 1-16) to the one for the subtrace. The viscosity approach provides a concise way to work around the well known technical hurdle that eigenvalues are only Lipschitz in general. This paves the way for a simple induction argument.

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Cite

@article{arxiv.2012.03867,
  title  = {Constant rank theorems for curvature problems via a viscosity approach},
  author = {Paul Bryan and Mohammad N. Ivaki and Julian Scheuer},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2012.03867},
  year   = {2023}
}

Comments

22 pages

R2 v1 2026-06-23T20:47:22.997Z