Regularity and quantification for harmonic maps with free boundary (Q528926)

Let \((M, g)\) be a smooth Riemann surface with a smooth nonempty boundary of a finite number of connected components, and let \(B^{n+1}\) be the unit ball in \({\mathbb R}^{n+1}\) with \(n \geq 2\). In this paper, the authors prove a quantification result for harmonic maps with free boundary and finite energy from \((M, g)\) into \(B^{n+1}\). A map \(u: (M, g) \to B^{n+1}\) is a smooth harmonic map with free boundary if it is harmonic and smooth up to the boundary, \(u(\partial M) \subset {\mathbb S}^n\) and \(\partial_{\nu}u\) is parallel to \(u\). They prove that if \(u_m : (M, g) \to B^{n+1}\) is a sequence of harmonic maps with free boundary such that \[ \limsup_{m\to \infty}\int_M |\nabla u_m|_g^2\, dv_g <\infty, \] then there is a harmonic map with free boundary \(u_\infty: (M, g) \to B^{n+1}\) and {\parindent=0.7cm \begin{itemize}\item[--] a family \(\omega^1, \cdots, \omega^l\) of \(1/2\)-harmonic maps \({\mathbb R}\to {\mathbb S}^n\), \item[--] a family \(a_m^1, \cdots, a_m^l\) of converging sequences of points on \(\partial M\), \item a family \(\lambda_m^1, \cdots, \lambda_m^l\) of sequences of positive numbers all converging to \(0\), \end{itemize}} such that up to the extraction of a subsequence, \[ u_m \to u_\infty \quad \text{in \(C^\infty_{\text{loc}}(M\setminus \{a_m^1, \cdots, a_m^l\})\)} \] and \[ \int_{\partial M} R_m \cdot \partial_{\nu}R_m \to 0, \] where \(R_m = u_m-u_\infty - \sum \omega^i \left(\frac{\cdot-a^i_m}{\lambda_m^i}\right)\). The proof of this theorem relies classically on an \(\epsilon\)-regularity property. And the proof also allows to prove a regularity result on weakly harmonic maps with free boundary.