Variations of Dirichlet-to-Neumann map and deformation boundary rigidity of simple 2-manifolds (Q881451)

Let \((M^n,g)\) be a compact Riemannian manifold with boundary \(\partial M\). Given a function \(h\) on \(\partial M\) take the solution of the Dirichlet problem \(\Delta u = 0\), \(u_{| \partial M} = h\) and assign to \(h\) the normal derivative \(\partial u/\partial \nu_{|\partial M}\). This assignment \(\Lambda_g: C^{\infty}(\partial M) \to C^{\infty}(\partial M)\) is called the Dirichlet-to-Neumann map. Let \(\dot \Lambda_f\) denote the derivative of \(\Lambda_g\) with respect to changing \(g\) in the direction of the symmetric bilinear tensor field \(f\). Using global isothermal coordinates the author determines all tensor fields \(f\) with \(\dot \Lambda_f = 0\) on simply connected \(2\)-manifolds. This result is applied to show that simple \(2\)-manifolds (i.e., simply connected \(2\)-manifolds with stricly convex boundary for which no pair of points are conjugate along any geodesic) are deformation boundary rigid. The author compares this to the result of \textit{L. Pestov}\ and \textit{G. Uhlmann} [Ann. Math. (2) 161, 1093--1110 (2005; Zbl 1076.53044)] that simple \(2\)-manifolds are boundary rigid.