The helicoidal surfaces as Bonnet surfaces (Q1100734)

A Bonnet surface in three-dimensional Euclidean space is a surface that admits at least one nontrivial mean-curvature-preserving isometry. These surfaces have been classified into three types. (1) The surfaces of constant mean curvature other than the plane and the sphere. Bonnet showed first that these surfaces can in fact be isometrically deformed under preservation of the mean curvature. (2) Certain surfaces of nonconstant mean curvature that admit a one-parameter family of geometrically distinct mean-curvature-preserving isometries. (3) Certain surfaces of nonconstant mean curvature that admit a single nontrivial mean-curvature-preserving isometry, unique up to rigid motions. In this paper it is shown that the helicoidal surfaces, i.e. the surfaces which are invariant under helicoidal motions, are necessarily Bonnet surfaces and they represent all three types. The methodology used reveals several other facts about the helicoidal surfaces, e.g., a helicoidal surface has constant mean curvature if and only if its principal directions make an angle constant with the orbits of the helicoidal motion which foliate the surface.