Nonlinear Geometric PDE’s

Pierpaolo Esposito (Universitá di Roma Tre),

Monica Musso (University of Bath),
Angela Pistoia (Universitá di Roma La Sapienza)
5 May 2019–10 May 2019

1 Overview of the Field

The study of geometric PDEs has been fundamental to solve very classical problems in geometry, and has
given rise to new challenging ones. This area of mathematics mixes together different ideas and tools coming
from geometry and from analysis. On one side, the geometric structure of these PDEs often translates into
technical difficulties related to the presence of some intrinsic geometric invariance of the problem, like con-
formal invariance, gauge invariance, etc, that is reflected in a possible lack of compactness of the functional
embeddings for the natural spaces of functions associated with the problems. Technical tools coming from
analysis are often crucial to overcome this type of difficulties, among others related to regularity or a priori
estimates on solutions. On the other hand, the geometric intuition of the problem always contributes to the
identification for the natural quantities to keep track of, and suggests the correct result to pursue. This two-
fold aspect of the study of geometric PDEs makes it both challenging and complex, and require the use of
several refined techniques to overcome the major difficulties encountered. These are the main reasons why
Geometric PDEs are a field of research which is currently very active.
The use of nonlinear PDEs arguments in geometric problems has progressed very rapidly in recent years.
Thus it is timely to have a new BIRS workshop on Nonlinear Geometric PDEs which covers different topics
of the field. Actually, a periodic workshop on these themes would be expected after a couple of years, to see
much further developments, with a lot of interesting new results and directions to discuss.

2 Outcome of the meeting

The workshop gathered international researchers in the areas of geometric analysis and geometric and non-
linear partial differential equations (PDEs).
In particular the following topics have been addressed.
1. Local and non-local elliptic equations from conformal geometry.

The general aim is to deform the metric of a given manifold in a conformal way so that the new one
possesses special properties. Classical examples are the uniformization problem of two dimensional surfaces
and the Yamabe problem in dimension greater or equal to three. In particular, the problem of prescribing
the Q-curvature discovered by Branson has been intensely studied by analysts as a generalization of scalar

1
 2

curvature in Yamabe-type problems. The sigma(k)-Yamabe problem is a generalization of the Yamabe prob-
lem introduced by Viaclovsky and it has spawned vast activity and progress in the analysis of fully nonlinear
partial differential equations.
The classical example of the Yamabe problem in dimension greater or equal to three has a variational
structure and it can be expressed in the form of a non-linear PDEs on the ambient manifold for the conformal
factor. Existence and qualitative properties of positive solutions to such equations are by now considerably
well understood. Much less is known on the existence of sign-changing solutions.
Some of the results presented in the conference are:

• Juan Carlos Fernández Supercritical problems on the round sphere and the Yamabe problem in pro-
jective spaces. Given an isoparametric function f on the round sphere and considering the space of
functions w ◦ f , the Yamabe-type problem can be reduced to

(1) − ∆g0 + λu = λ|u|p−1 u on S n

with λ > 0 and p > 1, into a second order singular ODE of the form

h(r) 0
w00 + w + λ |w|p−1 w − w = 0,


sin r
with boundary conditions w0 (0) = 0 and w0 (π) = 0, and where h is a monotone function with exactly
 for any k ∈
one zero on [0, π]. Using a double shooting method,  N , if n1 ≤ n2 are the dimensions of
n−n1 +2
the focal submanifolds determined by f and if p ∈ 1, n−n 1 −2
, this problem admits a nodal solution
having at least k zeroes. This yields a solution to problem (1) having as nodal set a disjoint union of
at least k connected isoparametric hypersurfaces. As an application and using that the Hopf fibrations
are Riemannian submersions with minimal fibers, we give a multiplicity result of nodal solutions to the
Yamabe problem on CP m and on HP m , the complex and quaternionic projective spaces respectively,
with m odd.
• Bruno Premoselli Compactness of sign-changing solutions to scalar curvature-type equations with
bounded negative part.
∗
Given the equation 4g u + hu = |u|2 −2 u in a closed Riemannian manifold (M, g), where h is some
Holder continuous function in M and 2∗ = n−2 2n
, n := dimM , he is interested in a sharp compactness
result on the sets of sign-changing solutions whose negative part is a priori bounded. The result is
obtained under the conditions that n ≥ 7 and h < (n − 2)/(4(n − 1))Sg in M , where Sg is the
Scalar curvature of the manifold. These conditions are optimal by constructing examples of blowing-
up solutions, with arbitrarily large energy, in the case of the round sphere with a constant potential
function h.
• Jérôme Vétois Influence of the scalar curvature and the mass on blowing-up solutions to low-dimensional
conformally invariant equations.
A result of Olivier Druet provides necessary conditions for the existence of blowing-up solutions to
a class of conformally invariant elliptic equations of second order on a closed Riemannian manifold
whose energy is a priori bounded. Essentially, these conditions say that for such solutions to exist, the
potential function in the limit equation must coincide, up to a constant factor, at least at one point, with
the scalar curvature of the manifold and moreover, in low dimensions, the weak limit of the solutions
must be identically zero. New existence results show the optimality of these conditions, in particular
in the case of low dimensions.

A new recent notion of fractional curvature leads to a non-local Yamabe problem, namely the existence
of a metric, conformally equivalent to the given one, whose fractional scalar curvature is constant.

• Maria del Mar Gonzalez Nonlocal ODE, conformal geometry and applications.
We study radially symmetric solutions for a semilinear equation with fractional Laplacian. Contrary to
the local case, where we can give a solution to an ODE by simply looking at its phase portrait, in the
 3

nonlocal case we develop several new methods. We will give some applications, in particular to the
existence of solutions of the singular fractional Yamabe problem, and the uniqueness of steady states
of aggregation-diffusion equations.
• Seunghyeok Kim A compactness theorem of the fractional Yamabe problem.
Since Schoen raised the question of compactness of the full set of solutions of the Yamabe problem in
the C 0 topology (in 1988), it had been generally expected that the solution set must be C 0 -compact
unless the underlying manifold is conformally equivalent to the standard sphere. In 2008-09, Khuri,
Marques, Schoen himself and Brendle gave the surprising answer that the expectation holds whenever
the dimension of the manifold is less than 25 (under the validity of the positive mass theorem whose
proof is recently announced by Schoen and Yau) but does not if the dimension is 25 or greater. On the
other hand, concerning the fractional Yamabe problem on a conformal infinity of an asymptotically hy-
perbolic manifold, Kim, Musso, and Wei considered an analogous question and constructed manifolds
of high dimensions whose solution sets are C 0 -noncompact (in 2017). In this talk, we show that the
solution set is C 0 -compact if the conformal infinity is non-umbilic and its dimension is 7 or greater.
Our proof provides a general scheme toward other possible compactness theorems for the fractional
Yamabe problem.

Some related problems has been studied by

• Gabriella Tarantello Minimal immersions of closed surfaces in hyperbolic 3- manifold.
Motivated by the the work of K. Uhlenbeck, we discuss minimal immersions of closed surfaces of
genus larger than 1 on hyperbolic 3-manifold. In this respect we establish multiple existence for
the Gauss-Codazzi equations and describe the asymptotic behaviour of the solutions in terms of the
prescribed conformal structure and holomorphic quadratic differential whose real part identifies the
corresponding second fundamental form.
• Pierpaolo Esposito Log-determinants in conformal geometry.
I will report on a recent result concerning a four-dimensional PDE of Liouville type arising in the theory
of log-determinants in conformal geometry. The differential operator combines a linear fourth-order
part with a quasi-linear second-order one. Since both have the same scaling behavior, compactness
issues are very delicate and even the “linear theory” is problematic. For the log-determinant of the
conformal laplacian and of the spin laplacian we succeed to show existence and logarithmic behavior
of fundamental solutions, quantization property for non-compact solutions and existence results via
critical point theory.
• Andrea Malchiodi On the Sobolev quotient in sub-Riemannian geometry.
We consider a class of three-dimensional “CR manifolds” which are modelled on the Heisenberg group.
We introduce a natural concept of “mass” and prove its positivity under the conditions that the Webster
curvature is positive and in relation to their (holomorphic) embeddability properties. We apply this
result to the CR Yamabe problem, and we discuss the properties of Sobolev-type quotients, giving
some counterexamples to the existence of minimisers for “Rossi spheres”, in sharp contrast to the
Riemannian case.
2. Properties of solutions to PDE’s on manifolds.

The goal is to investigate some properties, such as rigidity, regularity, stability, of solutions of nonlinear
PDEs on manifolds.
• Virginia Agostiniani Monotonicity formulas in linear and nonlinear potential theory.
In this talk, we first recall how some monotonicity formulas can be derived along the level set flow
of the capacitary potential associated with a given bounded domain Ω. A careful analysis is required
in order to preserve the monotonicity across the singular times, leading in turn to a new quantitative
version of the Willmore inequality. Remarkably, such analysis can be carried out without any a priori
knowledge of the size of the singular set. Hence, the same order of ideas applies to the p-capacitary
potential of Ω, whose critical set, for p 6= 2, is not necessarily negligible. In this context, a generalised
version of the Minkowski inequality is deduced.
 4

• Giovanni Catino Some canonical Riemannian metrics: rigidity and existence.

In this talk, which is the second part of a joint seminar with P. Mastrolia (Universit degli Studi di
Milano), I will present some results concerning rigidity and existence of canonical metrics on closed
(compact without boundary) four manifolds. In particular I will consider Einstein metrics, Harmonic
Weyl metrics and some generalizations.
• Paolo Mastrolia Generalizations of some canonical Riemannian metrics.
In this talk, which is the first part of a joint seminar with G. Catino (Politecnico di Milano), I will intro-
duce some generalization of certain canonical Riemannian metrics, presenting two possible approaches
(curvature conditions with potential and critical metrics of Riemannian functionals). The main result is
related to the existence of a new canonical metric, which generalizes the condition of harmonic Weyl
curvature, on every 4-dimensional closed manifold.

• Lorenzo Mazzieri Sharp Geometric Inequalities on manifolds with nonnegative Ricci curvature.
Given a complete Riemannian manifold with nonnegative Ricci curvature and Euclidean volume growth,
we characterize the Asymptotic Volume Ratio as the infimum of the Willmore Energy over smooth
closed hypersurfaces. An optimal version of Huisken’s Isoperimetric Inequality for 3-manifolds is
obtained as a consequence of this result.

• Dario Monticelli The Poisson equation on Riemannian manifolds with a weighted Poincaré inequality
at infinity.
We prove an existence result for the Poisson equation on non-compact Riemannian manifolds satisfying
a weighted Poincaré inequality outside a compact set. Our result applies to a large class of manifolds
including, for instance, all non-parabolic manifolds with minimal positive Green’s function vanishing at
infinity. On the source function we assume a sharp pointwise decay depending on the weight appearing
in the Poincaré inequality and on the behavior of the Ricci curvature at infinity. We do not require any
curvature or spectral assumptions on the manifold.
• Roger Moser On a type of second order variational problem in L-infinity.
Let K be an elliptic (not necessarily linear) second order differential operator. Suppose that we want
to minimise the L-infinity norm of K(u) for functions u satisfying suitable boundary conditions. Here
K may represent, e.g., the curvature of a curve in the plane or the scalar curvature of a Riemannian
manifold in a fixed conformal class, but the problem is not restricted to questions with a geometric
background. If the operator and the boundary conditions are such that the equation K(u) = 0 has a
solution, then the problem is of course trivial. But since this is a second order variational problem, it
may be appropriate to prescribe u as well as its first derivative on the boundary of its domain, which
in general rules out this situation. In the cases studied so far, the solution, while not trivial, still has a
nice structure, and one feature is that —K(u)— is always constant. The sign of K(u) may jump, but we
have a characterisation of the jump set in terms of a linear PDE. Furthermore, in some cases we have a
unique solution, even though the underlying functional is not strictly convex.
• Susanna Terracini Liouville type theorems and local behaviour of solutions to degenerate or singular
problems.
We consider an equation in divergence form with a singular/degenerate weight

−div(|y|a A(x, y)∇u) = |y|a f (x, y) or div(|y|a F (x, y)) ,

Under suitable regularity assumptions for the matrix A and f (resp. F ) we prove Hölder continuity of
solutions and possibly of their derivatives up to order two or more (Schauder estimates). In addition,
we show stability of the C 0,α and C 1,α a priori bounds for approximating problems in the form

−div((ε2 + y 2 )a A(x, y)∇u) = (ε2 + y 2 )a f (x, y) or div((ε2 + y 2 )a F (x, y))

as ε → 0. Finally, we derive C 0,α and C 1,α bounds for inhomogenous Neumann boundary problems
as well. Our method is based upon blow-up and appropriate Liouville type theorems.
 5

3. Geometric evolution equations

Many geometric variational problems can be approached via evolutionary methods. The Yamabe flow in
conformal geometry and the mean curvature flow are two examples with connections to problems in differ-
ential geometry and mathematical physics.
Results on the analysis of possible blow-up phenomena for several non-linear flows have been presented.
• Monica Musso Singularity formation in critical parabolic equations.
In this talk I will discuss some recent constructions of blow-up solutions for a Fujita type problem for
powers p related to the critical Sobolev exponent. Both finite type blow-up (of type II) and infinite time
blow-up are considered.
• Mariel Saez On the uniqueness of graphical mean curvature flow.
In this talk I will discuss on sufficient conditions to prove uniqueness of complete graphs evolving by
mean curvature flow. It is interesting to remark that the behaviour of solutions to mean curvature flow
differs from the heat equation, where non-uniqueness may occur even for smooth initial conditions if
the behaviour at infinity is not prescribed for all times.
• Juan Davila Helicoidal vortex filaments in the 3-dimensional Ginzburg-Landau equation.
We construct a family of entire solutions of the 3D Ginzburg-Landau equation with vortex lines given
by interacting helices, with degree one around each filament and total degree an arbitrary positive
integer. Existence of these solutions was conjectured by del Pino and Kowalczyk (2008), and answers
negatively a question of Brezis analogous to the the Gibbons conjecture for the Allen-Cahn equation.
• Manuel del Pino Singularity for the Keller-Segel system in R2 .
We construct solutions of the Keller-Segel system which blow-up in infinite time in the form of asymp-
totic aggregation in the critical mass case, with a method that does not rely on radial symmetry, and
applies to establish stability of the phenomenon.
4. Concentration phenomena in local and non-local problems.

The geometric invariances often lead to the existence of solutions which blows-up at single points or at
higher dimensional sets. The localization of the blowing-up sets strongly depends on the geometric properties
of the problem. It is an active field in nonlinear analysis to constructs solutions to PDEs exhibiting this kind
of phenomena.
Problems in 2D have been treated in
• Weiwei Ao On the bubbling solutions of the Maxwell-Chern-Simons model on flat torus
We consider the periodic solutions of a nonlinear elliptic system derived from the Maxwell-Chern-
Simons model on a flat torus Ω:
Pn
∆u = µ(λeu − N ) + 4π i=1 mi δpi ,

in Ω,
∆N = µ(µ + λeu )N − λµ(λ + µ)eu
where λ, µ > 0 are positive parameters. We obtain a Brezis-Merle type classification result for this
system when λ, µ → ∞ and λ << µ. We also construct blow up solutions to this system.
• Luca Battaglia A double mean field approach for a curvature prescription problem.
I will consider a double mean field-type Liouville PDE on a compact surface with boundary, with a
nonlinear Neumann condition. This equation is related to the problem of prescribing both the Gaus-
sian curvature and the geodesic curvature on the boundary. I will discuss blow-up analysis, a sharp
Moser-Trudinger inequality for the energy functional, existence of minmax solution when the energy
functional is not coercive.
• Teresa D’Aprile Non simple blow-up phenomena for the singular Liouville equation.
Let Ω be a smooth bounded domain in R2 containing the origin. We are concerned with the following
Liouville equation with Dirac mass measure
−∆u = λeu − 4πNλ δ0 in Ω,
 6

with u = 0 on ∂Ω. Here λ is a positive small parameter, δ0 denotes Dirac mass supported at 0 and
Nλ is a positive number close to an integer N (N ≥ 2) from the right side. We assume that Ω is
(N + 1)-symmetric and the regular part of the Green’s function satisfies a nondegeneracy condition
(both assumptions are verified if Ω is the unit ball) and we provide an example of non-simple blow-up
as λ → 0+ exhibiting a non-symmetric scenario. More precisely we construct a family of solutions
split in a combination of N + 1 bubbles concentrating at 0 arranged on a tiny polygonal configuration
centered at 0.
• Massimo Grossi Non-uniqueness of blowing-up solutions to the Gelfand problem.
I will consider blowing-up solution for the Gelfand problem on planar domains. It is well known
that blow up at a single point must occur at a critical point x of a “reduced functional” F, whereas
uniqueness of blowing up families has been recently shown provided x is a non-degenerate critical
point of F. We showed that, if x is a degenerate critical point of F and satisfies some additional generic
condition, then one may have two solutions blowing up at the same point. Solutions are constructed
using a Lyapunov-Schmidt reduction.
• Gabriele Mancini Bubbling nodal solutions for a large perturbation of the Moser-Trudinger equation
on planar domains.
I will discuss some results obtained in collaboration with Massimo Grossi, Angela Pistoia and Daisuke
2 p
Naimen concerning the existence of nodal solutions for the problem −∆u = λueu +|u| in Ω, u = 0
on ∂Ω, where Ω ⊆ R2 is a bounded smooth domain and p → 1+ . If Ω is ball, it is known that the case
p = 1 defines a critical threshold between the existence and the non-existence of radially symmetric
sign-changing solutions with λ close to 0. In our work we construct a blowing-up family of nodal
solutions to such problem as p → 1+ , when Ω is an arbitrary domain and λ is small enough. To our
knowledge this is the first construction of sign-changing solutions for a Moser-Trudinger type critical
equation on a non-symmetric domain.
• Luca Martinazzi Topological and variational methods for the supercritical Moser-Trudinger equa-
tion.
We discuss the existence of critical points of the Moser-Trudinger functional in dimension 2 with arbi-
trarily prescribed Dirichlet energy using degree theory. If time permits, we will also sketch an approach
on Riemann surfaces using a min-max method á la Djadli-Malchiodi.
• Aleks Jevnikar Uniqueness and non-degeneracy of bubbling solutions for Liouville equations.
We prove uniqueness and non-degeneracy of solutions for the mean field equation blowing-up on a
non-degenerate blow-up set. Analogous results are derived for the Gelfand equation. The argument is
based on sharp estimates for bubbling solutions and suitably defined Pohozaev-type identities.
A non-local version of these kind of problems has been studied in
• Azahara DelaTorre The non-local mean-field equation on an interval.
We study the quantization properties for a non-local mean-field equation and give a necessary and
sufficient condition for the existence of solution for a “Mean Field”-type equation in an interval with
Dirichlet-type boundary condition. We restrict the study to the 1-dimensional case and consider the
fractional mean-field equation on the interval I = (−1, 1)
1 eu
(−∆) 2 u = ρ R ,
I
eu dx
subject to Dirichlet boundary conditions. As in the 2−dimensional case, it is expected that for a
sequence of solutions to our equation, either we get a C ∞ limiting solution or, after a suitable rescaling,
we obtain convergence to the Liouville equation. Then, we can reduce the problem to the study of the
non-local Liouville’s equation. One of the key points here is to find an appropriate Pohozaev identity.
We prove that existence holds if and only if ρ < 2π. This requires the study of blowing-up sequences of
solutions. In particular, we provide a series of tools which can be used (and extended) to higher-order
mean field equations of non-local type. We provide a completely non-local method for this study, since
we do not use the localization through the extension method. Instead, we use the study of blowing-up
sequences of solutions.
 7

A related problem

• Michal Kowalczyk New multiple end solutions in the Allen-Cahn and the generalized second Painlevé
equation.
In this talk I will discuss two new constructions of the multiple end solutions. In the case of the
Allen-Cahn equation the ends are asymptotic to the Simons cone in R8 . The case of the generalized
second Painlevé equation in R2 is somehow different since there is no apparent underlying geometric
problem. Yet we can interpret the behavior of the solution as being asymptotic along the axis to: two
one dimensional Hastings-McLeod solution, the heteroclinic solution of the Allen-Cahn equation and
the trivial solution.
• Bob Jerrard Some Ginzburg-Landau problems for vector fields on manifolds.
Motivated in part by problems arising in micromagnetics, we study several variational models of
Ginzburg-Landau type, depending on a small parameter  > 0, for (tangent) vector fields on a 2-
dimensional compact Riemannian surface. As  → 0, the vector fields tend to be of unit length and
develop singular points of a (non-zero) index, called vortices. Our main result determines the interac-
tion energy between these vortices as  → 0, allowing us to characterize the asymptotic behaviour of
minimizing sequence.
Critical problems in higher dimension where a concentration phenomena naturally appears.

• Thomas Bartsch A spinorial analogue of the Brezis-Nirenberg theorem.

Let (M, g, σ) be a compact Riemannian spin manifold of dimension m ≥ 2, let S(M ) denote the spinor
bundle on M , and let D be the Atiyah-Singer Dirac operator acting on spinors Ψ : M → S(M ).
We present recent results on the existence of solutions of the nonlinear Dirac equation with critical
exponent
2
DΨ = λΨ + f (|Ψ|)Ψ + |Ψ| m−1 Ψ
 2 
where λ ∈ R and f (|Ψ|)Ψ is a subcritical nonlinearity in the sense that f (s) = o s m−1 as s → ∞.

• Riccardo Molle Nonexistence results for elliptic problems in contractible domains.

In this talk I will consider nonlinear elliptic equations involving the Laplace or the p-Laplace operator
and nonlinearities with supercritical growth, from the viewpoint of the Sobolev embedding. I’ll present
some new nonexistence results in contractible and non starshaped domains. The domains that are
considered can be arbitrarily close to non contractible domains and their geometry can be very complex.
• Frédéric Robert Hardy-Sobolev critical equation with boundary singularity: multiplicity and stability
of the Pohozaev obstruction.
Let Ω be a smooth bounded domain in Rn (n ≥ 3) such that 0 ∈ ∂Ω. In this talk, we consider issues of
non-existence, existence, and multiplicity of variational solutions for the borderline Dirichlet problem,
2? (s)−2
(
−∆u − γ |x|u
2 − h(x)u = |u| |x|s u in Ω, (E)
u = 0 on ∂Ω,

where 0 < s < 2, 2? (s) := 2(n−s) 0

n−2 , γ ∈ R and h ∈ C (Ω). We use sharp blow-up analysis on –
possibly high energy– solutions of corresponding subcritical problems to establish, for example, that if
2
γ < n4 − 1 and the principal curvatures of ∂Ω at 0 are non-positive but not all of them vanishing, then
Equation (E) has an infinite number of (possibly sign-changing) solutions. This complements results
2
of the first and third authors, who showed in that if γ ≤ n4 − 14 and the mean curvature of ∂Ω at 0 is
negative, then (E) has a positive solution. On the other hand, our blow-up analysis also allows us to
prove that if the mean curvature at 0 is positive, then there is a surprising stability of regimes where
there are no variational positive solutions under C 1 -perturbations of the potential h. In particular, we
show non-existence of such solutions for (E) whenever Ω is star-shaped and h is close to 0, which
include situations not covered by the classical Pohozaev obstruction.