About the Lorentzian Yamabe problem (Q2256266)

The Yamabe problem is to find a metric conformal to a given one with constant scalar curvature. Let \((M^n,g)\) be an \(n\)-dimensional Lorentzian manifold with metric signature \((-+\cdots +)\). Denote by \(\square :=\delta_g\circ d=-\text{tr}(\nabla\circ d)\) the scalar d'Alembert operator on \((M^n,g)\) and by \(S_g\) the scalar curvature of \((M^n,g)\). Then the transformation formulas under conformal changes of the metric \(\bar g:=e^{2u}g\) for \(n=2\) and \(\bar g:=\phi^{\frac{4}{n-2}}g\) for \(n\geqslant 3\) are the following \[ e^{2u}S_{\bar g}=S_g+2\square u , \tag{1} \] \[ \frac{n-2}{4(n-1)}S_{\bar g}\phi^{\frac{n+2}{n-2}}=\square\phi+\frac{n-2}{4(n-1)}S_g\phi , \tag{2} \] respectively. The author concentrates his considerations on so-called globally hyperbolic spacetimes, which are diffeomorphic to the product of a space-like hypersurface (called Cauchy hypersurface) with an interval. The author shows that for 2-dimensional globally hyperbolic spacetimes the equation (1) always has a global solution only for \(S_{\bar g}=0\). In higher dimensions the author investigates the case when a Cauchy hypersurface of \(M\) is closed. He proves that for given initial data \((\phi_0,\phi_1)\) on some Cauchy hypersurface \(\Sigma\), there exists in \(M\) a maximal globally subdomain of existence for the solution \(\phi\) of the corresponding Cauchy problem with \(\phi_{|\Sigma}=\phi_0\) and \(\frac{\delta\phi}{\delta t}_{|\Sigma}=\phi_1\). The next part of the paper is devoted to standard static spacetimes which are the simplest globally hyperbolic spacetimes and the question of uniqueness of solutions is also considered. The author proves the existence of global solutions of the Yamabe problem on standard static spacetimes and gives examples showing that uniqueness does not hold in general.