Asymptotic circularity of immortal area-preserving curvature flows

Abstract

For a class of area-preserving curvature flows of closed planar curves, we prove that every immortal solution becomes asymptotically circular without any additional assumptions on initial data. As a particular corollary, every solution of zero enclosed area blows up in finite time. This settles an open problem posed by Escher--Ito in 2005 for Gage's area-preserving curve shortening flow, and moreover extends it to the surface diffusion flow of arbitrary order. We also establish a general existence theorem for nontrivial immortal solutions under almost circularity and rotational symmetry.

16 pages, 2 figures, v2: proof of exponential decay corrected