Eternal forced mean curvature flows. I: A compactness result (Q2349863)

Motivated by Morse/Floer-theoretic considerations, the author studies eternal solutions of the negative gradient flow corresponding to the prescribed mean curvature equation, i.e., the mean curvature flow equation with forcing term \[ \left<\partial_{t}F,\nu\right> = -H(F) + h\circ F, \] for immersions \(F:S^{n}\rightarrow M\) with a compact \((n+1)\)-dimensional hyperbolic manifold \(M\), where \(\nu\) denotes the outer unit normal of \(F\), \(H\) the mean curvature, here taken to be the average of the principal curvatures of \(F\). The forcing term \(h\in C^{\infty}(M)\) and its first two derivatives are assumed to satisfy certain boundedness conditions and the immersions \(F\), considered equivalent modulo reparametrisation, a pinching condition, viz. that the principal curvatures \(\kappa_{i}\) are all positive and \(\kappa_{1}>\frac{1}{2}H\), as well as a suitable bound on the radius of the smallest geodesic ball containing its lifting into hyperbolic space. The main result is then a compactness theorem stating that whenever the solution set of the prescribed mean curvature equation \(H(F)=h_{0}\circ F\) is discrete, a sequence of solutions \(\{F_{n}\}_{n\in\mathbb{N}}\) to the mean curvature flow equations corresponding to forcing terms \(\{h_{n}\}_{n\in\mathbb{N}}\) satisfying \(\lim_{n\rightarrow\infty}h_{n}=h_{0}\) admits a subsequence converging (in an appropriate sense) to a broken trajectory of the mean curvature flow with forcing term \(h_{0}\).