The blow-up locus of heat flows for harmonic maps (Q1569953)

Let \(M\) and \(N\) be two compact Riemannian manifolds, \(u_k:M \times\mathbb{R}^+\to N\) a sequence of smooth heat flows for harmonic maps with bounded energies. Assume that \(u_k\to u\) weakly in \(H^{1,2} (M\times\mathbb{R}^+,N)\) and that \(\Sigma^t\) is the blow-up set for a fixed \(t>0\), i.e., \[ \Sigma^t= \bigcap_{r> 0}\left\{x\in M\mid \lim_{k\to \infty}\inf r^{-m} \int^{t+r^2}_{t-r^2} \int_{B_r (x)} |\nabla u_k|^2 dV dt\geq \varepsilon_0 \right\}. \] In this paper, the authors consider whether the blow-up set \(\Sigma= \bigcup_t \Sigma^t \times \{t\}\) has a geometric structure. First of all, the authors prove that \(\Sigma^t \) is an \(H^{m-2}\)-rectifiable set for almost all \(t\in R^+\); for simplicity one may consider it as an \((m-2)\)-dimensional submanifold of \(M\). Furthermore, it is proved that \(\Sigma^t\) is a curvature flow if \(u\) is smooth. The flow is similar to a Brakke motion [cf. \textit{K. A. Brakke}, The motion of a surface by its mean curvature, Princeton University Press (1978; Zbl 0386.53047)], and it is a distance solution of the \((m-2)\)-dimensional mean curvature flow [\textit{L. Ambrosio} and \textit{H. M. Soner}, J. Differ. Geom. 43, No. 4, 693-737 (1996; Zbl 0868.35046)]. It it is a smooth family of submanifolds in \(M\), it is only a mean curvature flow. So the authors find an interesting relation between heat flow for harmonic maps and mean curvature flows; they are both important flows in geometric evolution problems. If \(M\) is a Riemman surface, then \(\Sigma^t\) is a finite set of points. In general, the blow-up locus \(\Sigma^t\) in the space \(M \times\mathbb{R}^+\) consists of segments of lines. Next, the authors show that if a smooth heat flow \(u(x,t)\) blow up at a finite time, then \(u\) is either a tangent map or a weakly quasi-harmonic sphere and it is stationary if and only if the blow-up locus is a Brakke motion. The authors also consider the blow-up locus of the heat flow for the penalized functional (1.8) in the paper of \textit{Y. Chen} and \textit{M. Struwe} [Math. Z. 201, No. 1, 83-103 (1989; Zbl 0652.58024)] and prove that the blow-up locus is also a blow-up flow if the weakly limiting map \(u\) is strong stationary. It provides an approach to the existence of blow-up flow.