A stability criterion for nonparametric minimal submanifolds (Q1416707)

An \(n\)-dimensional minimal submanifold \(\Sigma\) of Euclidean space \(E^{n+p}\) is called nonparametric if \(\Sigma\) can be represented as a graph of a vector-valued function \(f:D\subset \mathbb{R}^n\mapsto \mathbb{R}^p\). If \(p=1\) then such a \(\Sigma\) is always stable, i.e., the second derivative of the volume functional with respect to any compactly supported normal variational field is nonnegative. For \(n=p=2\) a nonstable such \(\Sigma\) was constructed by \textit{H. B. Lawson jun.} and \textit{R. Osserman} [Acta Math. 139, 1--17 (1977; Zbl 0376.49016)]. Now for arbitrary \(n\) and \(p\) the authors have proved that if such a \(\Sigma\) satisfies \(*\Omega\geq \frac{40}{43}\), then \(\Sigma\) is stable; here \(*\Omega= [\det (I+ (df)^T\, df)]^{-\frac12}\).