Relaxation of the curve shortening flow via the parabolic Ginzburg-Landau equation (Q2471731)

The parabolic Ginzburg-Landau equation \(\frac{\partial u_\varepsilon}{\partial t}-\Delta u_\varepsilon+\frac{W^\prime(u_\varepsilon)}{2\varepsilon^2}=0\) and its elliptic reduction \(-\Delta u_\varepsilon+\frac{W^\prime(u_\varepsilon)}{2\varepsilon^2}=0\) are considered. It is known that certain minimal hypersurfaces, which correspond to stationary points of the mean curvature flow, can be realized as interface sets of solutions to the elliptic Ginzburg-Landau equation [see \textit{F. Pacard} and \textit{M. Ritoré}, J. Differ. Geom. 64, No. 3, 359--423 (2003; Zbl 1070.58014), \textit{M. Paolini}, Math. Comput. 66, No. 217, 45--67 (1997; Zbl 0854.35008), \textit{J. E. Hutchinson} and \textit{Y. Tonegawa}, Calc. Var. Partial Differ. Equ. 10, No. 1, 49--84 (2000; Zbl 1070.49026)]. Now, similar results are obtained for the parabolic Ginzburg-Landau equation. Namely, it is demonstrated that any embedded plane curve \(\Gamma\) evolving under curve shortening flow \(\frac{\partial\Gamma}{\partial t}=k\cdot \nu\) can be attained, before its collapsing time, as an interface of some solution to the parabolic Ginzburg-Landau equation. Moreover, the author suggests that the same is true when \(\Gamma\) is a compact embedded hypersurface in \(\mathbb R^n\) evolving under mean curvature flow. Besides, it is expected that the proposed approach may be generalized to more general settings of shortening flow, such as networks [see \textit{C. Mantegazza, M. Novaga} and \textit{V. M. Tortorelli}, Variational problems in Riemannian geometry. Bubbles, scans and geometric flows. Basel: Birkhäuser. Progress in Nonlinear Differential Equations and their Applications 59, 95--109 (2004; Zbl 1073.53085), \textit{L. Bronsard} and \textit{F. Reitich}, Arch. Ration. Mech. Anal. 124, No. 4, 355--379 (1993; Zbl 0785.76085)].