Conformal deformations to scalar-flat metrics with constant mean curvature on the boundary (Q2466703): Difference between revisions

One of the most famous theorems in mathematics is the Riemann mapping theorem. It says that any open, simply connected and proper subset of the plane is conformally diffeomorphic to a disc. In higher dimensions the only bounded open subsets of \(\mathbb R^{n}\), \(n\geq 3\), that are conformally diffeomorphic to Euclidean balls are the Euclidean balls themselves. However, in a sense, the following question is relevant: Let \(\left( M^{n},g\right) \) be an \(n\)-dimensional compact Riemannian manifold with boundary \(\partial M\), \(n\geq 3\). Is there a conformally related metric \( \overline{g}\) with zero scalar curvature and boundary \(\partial M\) of constant curvature? That question was addressed by \textit{J. F. Escobar} in [Ann. Math. 136, No. 1, 1--50 (1992; Zbl 0766.53033) and Calc. Var. Partial Differ. Equ. 4, No. 6, 559--592 (1996; Zbl 0867.53034)], where he gave, among others, the following interesting result: Let \(\Omega \subset\mathbb R^{n}\), \(n\neq 4,5,\) be a bounded domain with smooth boundary. There exists a smooth metric \( \overline{g}\) conformally related to the Euclidean metric such that the scalar curvature of \(\overline{g}\) is zero and the mean curvature of the boundary with respect to the metric \(\overline{g}\) is constant. In the paper under review the author shows the validity of this result for the remaining cases \(n=4,5\).