Nonlinear degenerate curvature flows for weakly convex hypersurfaces (Q1763138)

The author considers the flow of weakly convex hypersurfaces in \(\mathbb R^{n+1}\), which evolve in the normal direction with speed equal to the quotient of successive elementary symmetric polynomials of the principal curvatures. More precisely, let \(F_0: M^n \rightarrow \mathbb R^{n+1}\) be a smooth immersion of a closed \(n\)-dimensional hypersurface, \(n \geq 2\), and consider the one-parameter family of smooth immersions \(F\) that satisfy \[ {\partial \over \partial t}F(p,t)=-Q_k(p,t)\nu(p,t),\quad t\geq 0 \] \[ F(\;,0) =F_{0}. \] Here \(\nu\) is the outer unit normal, and \(Q_k (\lambda) = S_k(\lambda)/S_{k-1}(\lambda)\), where \(S_k (\lambda)\) is the \(k\)th symmetric polynomial of the principal curvatures of \(F(M^n ,t)\). When \(k=1\), this is the standard mean curvature flow. The author proves short term existence of the flow for weakly convex hypersurfaces if the polynomial in the denominator is positive, and convergence to a point when the hypersurface is strictly convex. In the proof, cylindrically symmetric barriers are established, which are used to derive an explicit positive lower bound on \(Q_k\) for short times. See also [\textit{B. Andrews}, ``Pinching estimates and motion of hypersurfaces by curvature functions'', arXiv.org math.DG/0402311] for a proof that in the strictly convex case the hypersurfaces become round.