On the harmonic characterization of the spheres: a sharp stability inequality and some of its consequences

Abstract

Let $D$ be a bounded open subset of ${\mathbb{R}}^n$ with $|\partial D|<\infty$ and let $x_0$ be a point of $D$. We introduce a new parameter, that we call Kuran gap of $\partial D$ w.r.t. $x_0$. Roughly speaking, this parameter, denoted by $\mathcal{K}(\partial D,x_0)$, measures the gap between $u(x_0)$ and the average of $u$ on $\partial D$ for a particular family of functions $u$ harmonic in $\overline{D}$, in terms of the Poisson kernel of the biggest ball $B$ centered at $x_0$ and contained in $D$. To do that, we need the domain $D$ Lyapunov-Dini regular in at least one of the points of $\partial D$ nearest to $x_0$. Our main stability result can be described as follows: $\mathcal{K}(\partial D,x_0)$ is bounded from below by a kind of isoperimetric index, precisely the normalized difference beetween $|\partial D|$ and $|\partial B|$. This extends a stability result by Preiss and Toro, and a more recent theorem by Agostiniani and Magnanini. Moreover, from our stability inequality we obtain a new sufficient condition for a harmonic pseudosphere to be a Euclidean sphere, a result which partially improves a rigidity theorem by Lewis and Vogel. Finally, we give a new solution of the surface version of a solid ``potato'' problem by Aharonov, Schiffer and Zalcman.

29 pages, 2 figures