Univalence criteria for lifts of harmonic mappings to minimal surfaces (Q881444)

A very well-known criterion of univalence in the complex unit disc \(\mathbb D\) is the criterion obtained and improved by Z. Nehari, by using the Schwarzian derivative of a function defined in \(\mathbb D\). The authors give a general criterion for global univalence of the Weierstrass-Enneper lift of a planar harmonic mapping, the result of Nehari being a particular case of the a theorem ({Theorm 1 below}) proved in the article. Let \(\widetilde{f}\) be the Weierstrass-Enneper lift, i.e. \(\widetilde{f}=(U(z),V(z),W(z))\), where \[ U(z)=\mathrm{Re}\{f(z)\},\quad V(z)=\mathrm{Im}\{f(z)\},\quad W(z)=2\,\mathrm{Im}\left\{\int_{z_0}^zh'(\zeta)q(\zeta)\,d\zeta\right\} \] for a harmonic mapping \(f=h+\overline{g}\;\) (\(|h'(z)|+|g'(z)|\neq 0\)). This function (according to the Weierstrass-Enneper formulas) lifts locally to map into a minimal surface \(\sigma\), described by conformal parameters if and only if its dilatation \(\omega=q^2\) is the square of a meromorphic function \(q\). The results obtained by the authors in the paper are: Theorem 1: Let \(f=h+\overline{g}\) be a harmonic mapping of the unit disc, with \(\mathrm{e}^{\sigma(z)}=|h'(z|+|g'(z)|\neq 0\) and dilatation \(g'/h'=q^2\) for some holomorphic function \(q\). Let \(\widetilde{f}\) denote the Weierstrass-Enneper lift of \(f\) into a minimal surface \(\sum\) with Gauss curvature \(K=K(\widetilde{f}(z))\) at the point \(\widetilde{f}(z)\). Suppose that \[ |\mathcal S f(z)|+\mathrm{e}^{2\sigma(z)}|K(\widetilde{f}(z))|\leq 2p(|z|),\quad z\in\mathbb D \] for some Nehari function \(p\). Then \(\widetilde{f}\) is univalent. (By \(\mathcal S\) we denote the Schwarzian derivative: \(\mathcal Sf:=(f''/f')'-\frac{1}{2}(f''/f')^2\) and a function is called Nehari function if it satisfies the generalized criterion for univalence of Nehari). The authors also prove that the result in {Theorem 1} is sharp. For this reason the authors had to prove another result, important also in itself: Theorem 2: Under the hypotheses of Theorem 1, the Weierstrass-Enneper lift \(\widetilde{f}\) has an extension to \(\overline{\mathbb D}\) that is continuous with respect to the spherical metric. Theorem 3: Under the hypotheses of {Theorem 1} suppose the closed curve \(\Gamma=\widetilde{f}(\delta\mathbb D)\) is not simple and let \(P\) be a cut point. Then there exists a Euclidean circle or line \(C\) such that \(C\setminus\{P\}\) is a line curvature of \(widetilde{f}(\mathbb D)\) on the surface \(\sum\). Furthermore, equality holds in \[ |\mathcal S f(z)|+\mathrm{e}^{2\sigma(z)}|K(\widetilde{f}(z))|\leq 2p(|z|),\quad z\in\mathbb D \] along \(\widetilde{f}^{-1}(C\setminus P)\). In the last section of the article, the authors give some examples of extremal mappings illustrating the phenomenon in {Theorem 3} and showing that the result in {Theorem 1} is sharp and best possible in some particular cases. They prove also that such extremal maps must map the disc into either a catenoid or a plane as consequence of {Theorem 3}.