Biharmonic submanifolds with parallel mean curvature in \(\mathbb{S}^{n}\times\mathbb{R}\) (Q375744)

A biharmonic map between Riemannian manifolds is a critical point of the bienergy functional given by the \(L^2\) norm of the tension field. From the Euler-Lagrange equation, it is easy to see that any harmonic map is biharmonic, and non-harmonic biharmonic maps are called proper-biharmonic. A biharmonic submanifold in a Riemannian manifold is a submanifold for which the inclusion map is biharmonic. It is well-known that there are no proper-biharmonic curves and surfaces in a \(3\)-dimensional space with non-positive constant sectional curvature, and there are examples of such submanifolds in \(S^3\). In this paper, the authors consider proper-biharmonic submanifolds of parallel mean curvature in \(S^n \times {\mathbb R}\). They first obtain a Simons type equation for parallel mean curvature submanifolds in the product space \(S^n \times {\mathbb R}\). Then using this, they prove a gap phenomenon for the mean curvature of a proper-biharmonic parallel mean curvature submanifold. More precisely, they show that if \(\Sigma^m\) is a complete proper-biharmonic parallel mean curvature submanifold in \(S^n \times {\mathbb R}\), with \(m \geq 2\), such that its mean curvature satisfies \[ |H|^2 \geq \frac{(m-1)(m^2+4)+(m-2)\sqrt{(m-1)(m-2)(m^2+m+2)}}{2m^3}, \] and the norm of its second fundamental form is bounded, then \(m <n\), \(|H| <1\) and \(\Sigma^m\) is a minimal submanifold of a small hypersphere \(S^{n-1}(2)\subset S^n\). They also prove that if \(\Sigma^2\) is a proper-biharmonic parallel mean curvature surface in \(S^n \times {\mathbb R}\), then either \(\Sigma^2\) is a minimal surface of a small hypersphere \(S^{n-1}(2) \subset S^n\); or \(\Sigma^2\) is a vertical cylinder \(\pi^{-1}(\gamma)\), where \(\gamma\) is a greater circle in \(S^2\) and \(\pi : S^n \times {\mathbb R} \to S^n\) is the projection.