English

Payne-Philippin's overdetermined problems on compact surfaces

Differential Geometry 2026-05-06 v3

Abstract

We investigate the overdetermined problem given by \begin{equation*} \Delta u=0 \text{ in } \Omega,\quad \frac{\partial u}{\partial\nu} =\sigma_1 u \text{ on } \partial \Omega, \quad |\nabla u|=\text{constant on } \partial \Omega, \end{equation*} where Ω\Omega is a connected compact Riemannian surface with smooth boundary Ω\partial \Omega, and σ1\sigma_1 is the first nonzero Steklov eigenvalue of Ω\Omega. We prove that this overdetermined problem admits a nontrivial solution if and only if Ω\Omega is σ\sigma-homothetic to either the flat unit disk or a flat cylinder [T,T]×S1[-T,T]\times S^1 for some TT1T\ge T_1. This gives a complete answer to the question raised by Payne and Philippin in [Z. Angew. Math. Phys. 42(6), 864-873, 1991] for σ=σ1\sigma=\sigma_1 and arbitrary surfaces. In particular, we completely characterize compact domains in 2-dimensional space forms for which the overdetermined problem is solvable.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2512.06740,
  title  = {Payne-Philippin's overdetermined problems on compact surfaces},
  author = {Hang Chen and Bohan Wu},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2512.06740},
  year   = {2026}
}

Comments

16 pages

R2 v1 2026-07-01T08:13:31.357Z