A new characteristic of Möbius transformations in hyperbolic geometry (Q2491683)

Möbius transformations are the automorphisms of the extended complex plane \(\mathbb{C}_{\infty }=\mathbb{C}\cup \{\infty \}\), that is, the meromorphic bijections \(T:\mathbb{C}_{\infty }\rightarrow \mathbb{C}_{\infty }\). It is well-known that Möbius transformations map circles to circles (where straight lines are considered to be circles through \(\infty \)). Conversely, that any circle preserving meromorphic map of the extended complex plane onto itself is a Möbius transformation [see \textit{H. Haruki}, Enseign. Math., II. Sér. 18, 145--146 (1972; Zbl 0241.30017)]. Therefore the principle of circle transformation is an invariant characteristic property of Möbius transformations. Recently, several new invariant characteristic properties of Möbius transformations have been given [see \textit{H. Haruki} and \textit{T. M. Rassias}, J. Math. Anal. Appl. 181, No. 2, 320--327 (1994; Zbl 0796.39008), J. Math. Anal. Appl. 197, No. 1, 14--22 (1996; Zbl 0857.39012), Proc. Am. Math. Soc. 126, No. 10, 2857--2861 (1998; Zbl 0902.30006), Proc. Am. Math. Soc. 128, No. 7, 2105--2109 (2000; Zbl 0943.30007), \textit{P. Niamsup}, J. Math. Anal. Appl. 248, No. 1, 203--215 (2000; Zbl 0960.30015), J. Math. Anal. Appl. 261, No. 1, 151--158 (2001; Zbl 0990.30005), \textit{A. F. Beardon} and \textit{D. Minda}, Proc. Am. Math. Soc. 130, No. 4, 987--998 (2002; Zbl 0988.30005), \textit{N. Samaris}, J. Nat. Geom. 22, No. 1--2, 35--38 (2002; Zbl 1021.39012), \textit{S. Bulut} and \textit{N. Y. Özgur}, Turk. J. Math. 28, No. 3, 299--305 (2004; Zbl 1076.30015), Acta Math. Sin., Engl. Ser. 21, No. 3, 667--672 (2005; Zbl 1082.30004) and Rad. Mat. 12, No. 2, 129--133 (2004; Zbl 1074.30008)]. \textit{H. Haruki} and \textit{T. M. Rassias} [Proc. Am. Math. Soc. 126, No. 10, 2857--2861 (1998; Zbl 0902.30006)] introduced the concept of \textit{Apollonius quadrilaterals} to give a new characterization of Möbius transformations. They proved that \(f\) is Möbius if and only if it preserves Apollonius quadrilaterals. In 2000, \textit{P. Niamsup} [J. Math. Anal. Appl. 248, No. 1, 203--215 (2000; Zbl 0960.30015)] generalized the notion of Apollonius quadrilateral to the notion of \(k\)-\textit{Apollonius quadrilateral} where \(k>0\), and proved that \(f\) is Möbius if and only if it preserves \(k\)-Apollonius quadrilaterals. \textit{A. F. Beardon} and \textit{D. Minda} [Proc. Am. Math. Soc. 130, No. 4, 987--998 (2002; Zbl 0988.30005)] studied sphere-preserving maps defined on subdomains of the Euclidean space of any dimension \(n\). In the present paper, the authors give a new characterization of Möbius transformations on the hyperbolic plane \(B^{2}=\{ z\mid | z| <1\} \) by using two classes of hyperbolic geometric objects: Lambert quadrilaterals and Saccheri quadrilaterals. The main theorem of the paper is the following: Theorem. Suppose \(f:B^{2}\rightarrow B^{2}\) is a continuous bijection. Then \(f\) is Möbius if and only if \(f\) preserves Lambert quadrilaterals in \(B^{2}\). As a corollary, the following result is also proved: Corollary. Suppose \(f:B^{2}\rightarrow B^{2}\) is a continuous bijection. Then the following propositions are equivalent: (a) \(f\) is Möbius, (b) \(f\) preserves quadrilaterals with exactly two adjacent angles, (c) \(f\) preserves Saccheri quadrilaterals.