On the regularity theory of fully nonlinear parabolic equations: III (Q4036076)

[For parts I, II see Bull. Am. Math. Soc., New Ser. 22, No. 1, 107-114 (1990; Zbl 0709.35019) and Commun. Pure Appl. Math. 45, No. 2, 141-178 (1992; Zbl 0774.35042)]. \textit{J. J. Kohn} and \textit{L. Nirenberg} [(*) Commun. Pure Appl. Math. 20, 797-872 (1967; Zbl 0153.145)] proved the following result: Let \(u\) be a solution of \(u_ t-\Delta u=0\) in the domain \(\{t\geq\varphi(x)\}\), \(D\varphi(0)=0\) with boundary value \(u=u_ 0\) for \(t=\varphi(x)\). Then \(u\) is \(C^ \infty\) at 0 if \(u_ 0\) is \(C^ \infty\) and the curvatures of \(\{t=\varphi(x)\}\) are positive. They conjectured that the above theorem holds for domains \(\{t\geq\varphi(x)\}\) with nonnegative curvature at 0. In this paper, we settle the conjecture. More generally, we prove such a theorem for fully nonlinear equations. We show that the solution is \(C^{k+\alpha}\) if the curvature is larger than a small negative constant \(-s_ k\) with \(s_ k\to 0\) as \(k\to+\infty\). For the case when the domain is convex, we have regularity of any order. The compatibility conditions discussed in (*) imply that this condition is optimal.