Complete hypersurfaces with bounded mean curvature in \({\mathbb R}^{n+1}\) (Q2469081)

Since its introduction by Hans Freudenthal in 1931, the notion of end of a topological space has been studied most notably for surfaces \(M\) in Euclidean space. One of the central questions in these investigations is which geometrical or analytical properties of \(M\) control the number of ends. The authors choose to consider \(n\)-dimensional, complete, non-compact immersed hypersurfaces \(M\hookrightarrow\mathbb{R}^{n+1}\) with mean curvature \(H\) satisfying \(H_1 < | H| < H_2\) for some positive constants \(H_1\), \(H_2\). Their main object of study on \(M\) is the operator \(L=\Delta+| A| ^2\), where \(\Delta\) denotes the Laplacian operator acting on functions, and \(A\) is the second fundamental form. Analyzing the index \(\mathrm{Ind}(L)\) of \(L\) the authors obtain two results: Firstly, if \(3\leq n\leq 5\) and \(\mathrm{Ind}(L)<\infty\) the surface \(M\) has at most finitely many ends. Secondly, if \(2\leq n\leq 5\) and \(\mathrm{Ind}(L)=0\), then \(M\) has an unique end.