Apollonian isometries of planar domains are Möbius mappings (Q2577088)

\(D\) is an open nonempty subset of the Riemann sphere \(\overline{\mathbb R}^2\), with \(D\not=\overline{\mathbb R}^2\). The Apollonian metric on \(D\) is defined by \[ \alpha_D(x,y)=\sup_{a,b\in\partial D} | a,y,x,b| \] where \(| a,y,x,b|\) denotes cross product. \(\alpha_D\) is in general a semi-metric, and it is a metric if and only if the complement of \(D\) is not contained in a circle. The Apollonian metric was discovered by \textit{D. Barbilian} in his paper [``Einordnung von Lobatschewskys Massbestimmung in gewisse allgemeine Metrik der Jordanschen Bereiche'', Casopis Praha 64, 182--183 (1935; JFM 61.0601.02)], and later on rediscovered independently by \textit{A. Beardon} (who coined the name ``Apollonoan'') in his paper [``The Apollonian metric of a domain in \(\mathbb{R}^n\)'', P. Duren et al. (ed.), Quasiconformal mappings and analysis, Proceedings of an international symposium, Ann Arbor, 1995, Springer, 91--108 (1998; Zbl 0890.30030)]. In fact, the Apollonian metric is defined more generally for all proper domains in \(\overline{\mathbb R}^n\). It follows immediately from the definition that \(\alpha_D\) is invariant by Möbius transformations, and Beardon asked in the same paper whether every isometry of \(\alpha_D\) is a Möbius transformation. In the paper under review, the authors give an affirmative answer to Beardon's question in the case of all open subsets of the plane which have at least three points on their boundary. The authors note, by giving an example, that the result is false if one removes the condition that the boundary of the domains contains at least three points.