Finding conformal and isometric immersions of surfaces (Q2065850)

The authors consider the following conjecture: Given a Riemannian surface, there exists a piecewise smooth isometric immersion of it into \( {\mathbb R}^3\), in each regular homotopy class. Numerical experiments and particular examples support this conjecture. The paper indicates a method of constructing conformal immersions of a compact Riemann surface first, by using a family of variational functionals. Secondly, the minimization these functionals might lead to piecewise smooth isometric immersions, as computer simulations indicate. For the entire collection see [Zbl 1473.53006].