Special Session 121: Recent developments on nonlinear geometric PDEs

A mountain pass Theorem and moduli space of minimal immersions

Marcello Lucia
City University of New York
USA
Co-Author(s):    
Abstract:
We consider a class of functionals that depends on two arguments, whose partial map with respect to one of the arguments achieves its minimum, and for which the Palais-Smale condition is only partially satisfied in the other variable. Under some mild further assumption, we show existence of a global minimizer and uniqueness of critical points by using a new mountain pass theorem. This abstract functional framework can be applied to the geometric question of parametrizing the moduli space of minimal immersions in $3$-hyperbolic manifolds by using suitable data arising from the second fundamental forms of the immersion.