Classification and stability of penalized pinned elasticae (Q6876785)

The paper studies planar curves \(\gamma\) corresponding to extremal values of the modified bending energy\N\[\N\mathcal{E}_\lambda[\gamma] = B[\gamma] + \lambda \cdot L[\gamma],\N\]\Nwhere \(\lambda > 0\) is a parameter, \(B[\gamma] = \int_\gamma k^2 \, ds\) is the bending energy, \(L[\gamma] = \int_\gamma \, ds\) is the length. The curves \(\gamma\) also satisfy \(\gamma(0) = (0,0)\), \(\gamma(1) = (l,0)\), where \(l > 0\). The paper classifies the curves which are critical points of \(\mathcal{E}_\lambda\) and discusses other properties such as stability, energy, and elastic flow.