A conformal representation for linear Weingarten surfaces in the de Sitter space (Q2373637)

The global study of constant mean curvature and constant Gaussian curvature surfaces in space forms has been of special relevance in the geometry of submanifolds especially those, whose structure equations are integrable in terms of holomorphic data. This is due to the fact that, in this case, there are a great deal of global results from complex analysis which can be applied to such a study. Some representative examples are the Enneper-Weierstrass representation for minimal surfaces in \(\mathbb R^3\) and the McNertney-Kobayashi one for maximal surfaces in the three-dimensional Lorentz-Minkowski space \(\mathbb L^3\). In this paper, the authors deal with space-like surfaces in the de Sitter space \(\mathbb S^3_1\) whose mean curvature \(H\) and Gauss-Kronecker curvature \(K\) verify the relationship \(2a(H - 1)+ b(K - 1)=0\), with \(a + b \neq 0\), that is, surfaces of elliptic type, known also as linear Weingarten surfaces of Bianchi type, in short BLW-surfaces. The authors find a special Riemannian metric \(\sigma\) on any BLW-surface and prove that its hyperbolic Gauss map is conformal for the conformal structure induced by \(\sigma\). This fact is the key to obtaining a Weierstrass representation for such a surface in terms of meromorphic data which generalizes the one given by Aiyama and Akutagawa for \(H = 1\). By using this representation, the authors classify the complete BLW-surfaces with non-negative Gaussian curvature.