Regularity of minimal surfaces with lower-dimensional obstacles

DOI10.1515/CRELLE-2019-0035MaRDI QIDQ2209449zbMATH OpenOpenAlexFDO

Authors Xavier Fernández-Real, Joaquim Serra

Publication date 2 November 2020

Published in Journal für die Reine und Angewandte Mathematik (Search for Journal in Brave)

Full work available at URL https://arxiv.org/abs/1802.07607

zbMATH Keywords

Plateau problemthin obstacleregularity for minimal surfaces

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Minimal surfaces and optimization (49Q05) Minimal surfaces in differential geometry, surfaces with prescribed mean curvature (53A10) Variational problems concerning minimal surfaces (problems in two independent variables) (58E12)

Abstract: We study the Plateau problem with a lower dimensional obstacle in $mathbb{R}^n$. Intuitively, in $mathbb{R}^3$ this corresponds to a soap film (spanning a given contour) that is pushed from below by a "vertical" 2D half-space (or some smooth deformation of it). We establish almost optimal $C^{1,1/2-}$ estimates for the solutions near points on the free boundary of the contact set, in any dimension $nge2$. The $C^{1,1/2-}$ estimates follow from an $varepsilon$-regularity result for minimal surfaces with thin obstacles in the spirit of the De Giorgi's improvement of flatness. To prove it, we follow Savin's small perturbations method. A nontrivial difficulty in using Savin's approach for minimal surfaces with thin obstacles is that near a typical contact point the solution consists of two smooth surfaces that intersect transversally, and hence it is not very flat at small scales. Via a new "dichotomy approach" based on barrier arguments we are able to overcome this difficulty and prove the desired result.

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Cited in

(6)

• Local \(C^{1,\beta }\)-regularity at the boundary of two dimensional sliding almost minimal sets in \(\mathbb{R}^3 \)
• Regularity of solutions to nonlinear thin and boundary obstacle problems
• The regularity of minimal surfaces in higher codimension
• The thin obstacle problem: a survey
• How a minimal surface leaves a thin obstacle
• Regularity of capillarity droplets with obstacle

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