Forced hyperbolic mean curvature flow

Abstract

In this paper, we investigate two hyperbolic flows obtained by adding forcing terms in direction of the position vector to the hyperbolic mean curvature flows in [5, 8]. For the first hyperbolic flow, as in [8], by using support function, we reduce it to a hyperbolic Monge-Ampère equation successfully, leading to the short-time existence of the flow by the standard theory of hyperbolic partial differential equation. If the initial velocity is non-negative and the coefficient function of the forcing term is non-positive, we also show that there exists a class of initial velocities such that the solution of the flow exists only on a finite time interval [0,T_max), and the solution converges to a point or shocks and other propagating discontinuities are generated when t → T_max. These generalize the corresponding results in [8]. For the second hyperbolic flow, as in [5], we can prove the system of partial differential equations related to the flow is strictly hyperbolic, which leads to the short-time existence of the smooth solution of the flow, and also the uniqueness. We also derive nonlinear wave equations satisfied by some intrinsic geometric quantities of the evolving hypersurface under this hyperbolic flow. These generalize the corresponding results in [5].