Criteria for univalence and quasiconformal extension of harmonic mappings in terms of the Schwarzian derivative (Q2514374)

For a locally univalent analytic function \(\phi\) in the unit disk \(\mathbb{D}\), it was shown by Nehari that if its Schwarzian norm \(\|S(\phi)\|\) is not bigger than 2, then this function is globally univalent in \(\mathbb{D}\). Here \(S(\phi)=(\phi''/\phi')'-\frac{1}{2}(\phi''/\phi')^2\), and \(\|S(\phi)\|=\sup_{|z|<1}|S(\phi)(z)|(1-|z|^2)^2\). Moreover, Ahlfors and Weil proved that if \(\|S(\phi)\|\leq 2t\) for some \(t<1\), then \(\phi\) is not only univalent in \(\mathbb{D}\), but also can be extended to a \(K\)-quasiconformal mapping in \(\hat{\mathbb{C}}\), where \(K=(1+t)/(1-t)\). This paper generalizes these theorems to complex-valued locally univalent harmonic functions in \(\mathbb{D}\). Here the Schwarzian derivative \(S_f\) of a locally univalent harmonic mapping \(f=h+\bar{g}\) is defined by \[ S_f=S(h)+\frac{\bar{\omega}\big(\frac{h''}{h'}\omega'-\omega''\big)}{1-|\omega|^2}-\frac{3}{2}\Big(\frac{\bar{\omega}\omega'}{1-|\omega|^2}\Big)^2, \] where \(h\) is a locally univalent analytic function, \(g\) is analytic, \(S(h)\) is the classical Schwarzian derivative for analytic functions, and \(\omega=g'/f'\). When \(f\) is assumed to be sense-preserving, we have \(|\omega|<1\). In this paper, the authors show that there exists a constant \(\delta_0>0\) such that if \(\|S_f\|=\sup_{|z|<1}|S_f(z)|(1-|z|^2)^2\leq \delta_0\), then \(f\) is univalent in \(\mathbb{D}\). Moreover if \(\|S_f\|\leq \delta_0 t\) for some \(t<1\), then \(f\) can be extended quasiconformally to \(\hat{\mathbb{C}}\). In the proof, they show that \(\|S(h)\|\) is bounded by a constant related to \(\|S_f\|\) and \(R_{\lambda}=\sup_{\omega\in \mathcal {A}_{\lambda}}\|\omega^*\|\), where \[ \mathcal{A}_{\lambda}=\Big\{\omega\;:\; \omega(z)=\frac{g'(z)}{h'(z)}\in \mathbb{D},\quad h(0)=g(0)=0,\quad h'(0)=1,\quad f=h+\bar{g},\quad \|S_f\|\leq \lambda\Big\} \] and \[ \|\omega^*\|=\sup_{|z|<1}\frac{|\omega'(z)|(1-|z|^2)}{1-|\omega(z)|^2}. \] By showing that \(\lim_{\lambda \rightarrow 0^+}R_{\lambda}=0\), they prove that when \(\|S_f\|\) is small enough and \(\|S(h)\|\) is not bigger than 2, then \(h\) is univalent. By the affine invariance of harmonic functions and their Schwarzian norm, \(\|S_{f+a\bar{f}}\|\) is also small enough for any \(|a|<1\), so \(h+\bar{a}g\) is univalent. By the theorem of Hurwitz, \(h+\bar{a}g\) is univalent in \(\mathbb{D}\) for any \(|a|\leq 1\). Then it is not difficult to show that \(f=h+\bar{g}\) is univalent. The authors also use this method in the proof of the theorem on quasiconformal extension.