Free boundary space-like graphs with prescribed mean curvature

Abstract

We address the prescribed Lorentzian mean curvature problem over a convex bounded domain $\Omega$ of $\mathbb R^m$ with bounded right-hand side and homogeneous capillary boundary condition. We prove that the problem has a unique $W^{2,2}$-regular weak solution $u$ with zero mean and that $|Du| \leq 1 - \theta$ for some $\theta\in(0,1)$ only depending on the data. Such $u$ is also the unique maximizer of an associated functional. A key step in proving that the maximizer is a weak solution consists in showing that it has no light segments, i.e. segments along which $|Du| = 1$. This holds for arbitrary bounded capillary boundary data and can thus be an interesting result on its own.