The gradient flow of infinity-harmonic potentials (Q2219331)

This paper investigates certain solutions to the two-dimensional equation \[ \Delta_{\infty}u=\left(\frac{\partial u}{\partial x_{1}}\right)^{2} \frac{\partial^{2} u}{\partial x_{1}^{2}}+2 \frac{\partial u}{\partial x_{1}} \frac{\partial u}{\partial x_{2}} \frac{\partial^{2} u}{\partial x_{1} \partial x_{2}}+\left(\frac{\partial u}{\partial x_{2}}\right)^{2} \frac{\partial^{2} u}{\partial x_{2}^{2}}=0 \] in so-called convex ring domains \(G=\Omega \backslash K\). Here \(\Omega\) is a bounded convex domain in \(\mathbb{R}^{2}\) and \(K \in \Omega\) is a closed convex set. Consider the \(\infty\)-potential \(u_{\infty}\), which is the unique solution in \(C(\bar{G})\) of the boundary value problem \[ \left\{\begin{aligned} \Delta_{\infty} u &=0 & & \text { in } & G, \\ u &=0 & & \text { on } & \partial \Omega, \\ u &=1 & & \text { on } & \partial K . \end{aligned}\right. \] One of the main results of the paper is that: Let \(\boldsymbol{\alpha}_{\infty}=\boldsymbol{\alpha}_{\infty}(t)\), \(0 \leq t \leq T\), be a streamline of \(u_{\infty}\), i.e., \[ \frac{d \boldsymbol{\alpha}_{\infty}(t)}{d t}=\nabla u_{\infty}\left(\boldsymbol{\alpha}_{\infty}(t)\right), \quad 0 \leq t<T \] and \(\boldsymbol{\alpha}_{\infty}(0) \in \partial \Omega, \boldsymbol{\alpha}_{\infty}(T) \in \partial K .\) Then the function \(u_{\infty}\left(\boldsymbol{\alpha}_{\infty}(t)\right)\) is convex when \(0 \leq t \leq\) T. In particular, the speed \(\left|\nabla u_{\infty}\left(\boldsymbol{\alpha}_{\infty}(t)\right)\right|\), is a non-decreasing function of \(t \).