Willmore flow of complete surfaces

Abstract

We consider the Willmore flow equation for complete, properly immersed surfaces in Rn. Given bounded geometry on the initial surface, we extend the result in [5] and prove short time existence and uniqueness of the Willmore flow. We also show that a complete Willmore surface with low Willmore energy must be a plane, and that a Willmore flow with low initial energy and Euclidean volume growth must converge smoothly to a plane.