The \(n\)-dimensional analogue of the catenary: Existence and non-existence (Q1107104)

We study heavy n-dimensional surfaces suspended from some prescribed (n- 1)-dimensional boundary data. This leads to a mean curvature type equation with a non-monotone right hand side. We show that the equation has no solution if the boundary data are too small, and, using a fixed point argument, that the problem always has a smooth solution for sufficiently large boundary data. In the case \(n=2\) several existence theorems had previously been established, see the first author [A geometric maximum principle, Plateau's problem for surfaces of prescribed mean curvature, and the two- dimensional analogue of the catenary, Lect. Notes Math. 1357, 116-141 (1988)] by employing the results on the corresponding parametric problem, see \textit{R. Böhme, S. Hildebrandt} and \textit{E. Tausch} [Pac. J. Math. 88, 247-278 (1980; Zbl 0483.49038)].