Dai
Nagoya Math. J.
Vol. 194 (2009), 149167
C
in C with the
combinatoric of Q
: V
R
3
dened on the
vertex set V
of the graph of Q
: V
R
3
, which converges in C
() to the minimal
surface F : R
3
as 0.
1. Introduction
The theory of discrete dierential geometry is presently emerging on the
border of dierential and discrete geometry, which studies geometric shapes
with a nite number of elements (polyhedra) and aims at a development of
discrete equivalents of the geometric notions and methods of surface theory
(see [1], [2], [3], [4], [8], [12], etc.). A smooth geometric shape (such as
surface) appears then as a limit of the renement of the discretization. One
of the central problems of discrete dierential geometry is to nd proper
discrete analogues of special classes of surfaces, such as minimal, constant
mean curvature, isothermic, etc. In [2], a new discrete model was intro-
duced to investigate conformal discretizations of minimal surface, i.e., the
analogous discrete minimal surfaces consisting of touching spheres, and of
circles which intersect the spheres orthogonally in their points of touch. It is
proved that the discrete minimal surfaces converge to the smooth ones. The
advantages of the discretizations are that they respect conformal properties
of surfaces, possess a maximum principle, etc. Here, we are concerned with
the C
-convergence.
For each > 0, let SG
that is contained
in , and let SG
be the sub-complex of SG
is denoted by V
. Suppose that
F : R
3
is a minimal immersion without umbilic points in conformal
curvature line coordinates. First, by the Weierstrass representation of F and
the local theory of SG circle patterns (see [12, 6]), there is an associated
SG circle pattern P
. In the meantime,
one gets a discrete minimal surface F
: V
R
3
corresponding to F, which
consists of spheres and circles. Secondly, in terms of Mobius invariants of
circle pattern P
converges in C
-
convergence of T
: V
R
3
, obtained by scaling appropriately the centers of spheres and
circles in F
, which converges in C
, the cor-
responding discrete minimal surfaces F
-convergence and
C
converges in C
()
to some Mobius transformation T as 0. In Section 5, by the relation
between the discrete minimal surface F
, we will
CONVERGENCE OF CIRCLE PATTERNS TO MINIMAL SURFACE 151
show that there exists a family of discrete minimal surface
: V
R
3
which converges in C
() to F : R
3
as 0.
2. Circle patterns and discrete minimal surfaces
In this section, for any smooth minimal surface, we apply its Weierstrass
representation to yield associated circle patterns with the combinatorics of
square grid and dene corresponding discrete minimal surfaces. Moreover,
we give the relationship between the circle patterns and the discrete minimal
surfaces (also see [12], [2] for more details).
For each positive number > 0, let SG
= Z + iZ = {v = n + im : (n, m)
ZZ}, whose edges are the pair [v, v
] such that |v v
| = and v, v
V
,
and whose 2-cells are the squares {v +x +iy : x, y [0, ]}, v V
.
An indexed collection P
= {P
(v) : v V
are neighbors in SG
(v), P
(v
) intersect orthogonally.
(b) If v
1
, v
2
are neighbors of a vertex v in SG
(v
1
), P
(v
2
) are distinct and
tangent.
(c) Whenever the situation is as in (b) and v
2
is neighbor of v, which is
one step counterclockwise from v
1
, the circular order of the triplet of points
P
(v) P
(v
1
) P
(v
2
), P
(v
1
) P
(v
2
), P
(v) P
(v
2
) P
(v
1
) agrees
with the orientation of P
(v).
Clearly, the 1-skeleton of SG
2.
Suppose that is a simply connected domain in the complex plane C.
Without loss of generality, we may assume 0 . Let
Q
is denoted by V
, and
the set of centers of squares of SG
by
V
.
A smooth immersed surface in R
3
is said to be isothermic if it admits a
conformal curvature line parametrization in a neighborhood of every non-
umbilic. An isothermic immersion is a minimal surface if and only if the
dual immersion is contained in a sphere. In that case the dual immersion is
152 S.-Y. LAN AND D.-Q. DAI
in fact the Gauss map of the minimal surface, up to scale and translation.
We rst give the following lemma about the Weierstrass representation of
minimal surfaces, which follows from [2].
Lemma 1. Suppose that F : R
3
is a minimal immersion without
umbilic points in conformal curvature line coordinates. Then
(1) F =
_
Re
_
1 f(z)
2
f
(z)
dz, Re
_
i(1 +f(z)
2
)
f
(z)
dz, Re
_
2f(z)
f
(z)
dz
_
,
where f : C is a locally injective meromorphic function.
For the locally injective meromorphic function f in Lemma 1, set
(2)
(1)
(v) = 1 +
2
Re S
f
(v)
for each boundary vertex v V
, where S
f
denotes the Schwarzian deriva-
tive of f. Then SG
-Dirichlet problem on SG
. Let
(2)
be
the companion of
(1)
(v +
0
)
(2)
(v +
1
)
=
_
(1)
(v +i)
1
+ 1
(1)
(v)
1
+ 1
_
2
and
(4)
(2)
(v +
0
)
(2)
(v +
3
)
=
_
(1)
(v +) + 1
(1)
(v) + 1
_
2
for any v V
, such that
(5)
(2)
(
0
) = 1 +
2
ImS
f
(
0
),
where
j
= i
j
(/2 +i/2) (j = 0, 1, 2, 3).
Based on the local theory of SG circle patterns [12, Theorem 6.1], there
exists an SG circle pattern P
= {P
(v) : v V
} for SG
in the com-
plex C that has
(1)
and
(2)
(v) =
cr[q
0
(v), q
2
(v); q
3
(v), q
1
(v)] for any v V
and
(2)
(u) = cr[q
j
(v +
), q
j
(v ); q
j
(v i), q
j
(v + i) for any u = v +
j
V
, where q
j
(v)
CONVERGENCE OF CIRCLE PATTERNS TO MINIMAL SURFACE 153
(j = 0, 1, 2, 3) denotes the point of contact with circles P
(v) and P
(v+2
j
)
and cr[q
1
, q
2
, q
3
, q
4
] denotes the cross ratio of the four points q
1
, q
2
, q
3
, q
4
C.
On the other hand, we further suppose that there are two kinds of
vertices v
s
and v
c
in V
: V
R
3
such that images F
(v
s
) and F
(v
c
) of v
s
and v
c
are spheres and circles
respectively. Spheres F
(v
s
) and circles F
(v
c
) intersect orthogonally if v
s
and v
c
belong to the same edge of SG
, and spheres F
(v
(1)
s
) and F
(v
(2)
s
)
(respectively, the circles F
(v
(1)
c
) and F
(v
(2)
c
)) are distinct and tangent if
v
(1)
s
and v
(2)
s
(respectively, v
(1)
c
and v
(2)
c
) belong to the same face of SG
.
Let
F
,
p
j
(v
s
) be the intersection points of spheres F
(v
s
) and F
(v
s
+
j
) (j =
0, 1, 2, 3), and let p
j
(v
s
) =
F
(w
s
) + b
j
. Then a discrete isothermic surface
F
: V
R
3
is called a discrete minimal surface if it satises any one of
the equivalent conditions below.
(a) The points
F
(v
s
) + (1)
j
b
j
lie on a circle.
(b) There is a d R
3
such that (1)
j
(b
j
, d) is the same for j = 0, 1, 2, 3.
(c) There is a plane through
F
(v
s
) such that the points {p
j
(v
s
) | j =
0, 2} and the points {p
j
(v
s
) | j = 1, 3} lie in planes which are parallel to it
at the same distance on opposite sides.
From the denition above, it is easy to see that a discrete isothermic
surface is a discrete minimal surface, if and only if the dual discrete isother-
mic surface corresponds to a Koebe polyhedron (see [2, 4]). Let A
(v)
denote the center of circle P
for each v V
.
Then the following lemma, which can follow from [2, 5], gives the relation
between the discrete minimal surfaces F
.
Lemma 2. For any vertices v
(1)
s
and v
(2)
s
that belong to the same square
of SG
, let
F
(v
(1)
s
) and
F
(v
(2)
s
) denote the centers of spheres F
(v
(1)
s
) and
F
(v
(2)
s
) in the discrete minimal surface F
, respectively. Then
(v
(1)
s
)
F
(v
(2)
s
) (6)
= Re
_
R(v
(1)
s
) +R(v
(2)
s
)
1 +|q|
2
A(v
(1)
s
) A(v
(2)
s
)
|A(v
(1)
s
) A(v
(2)
s
)|
(1 q
2
, i(1 +q
2
), 2q)
_
,
154 S.-Y. LAN AND D.-Q. DAI
where q denotes the point of contact with circles P
(v
(1)
s
) and P
(v
(2)
s
) in
the circle pattern P
(v
(j)
s
) (j = 1, 2)
are
R(v
(j)
s
) =
1 +|A(v
(j)
s
)|
2
|A(v
(j)
s
q|
2
2|A(v
(j)
s
q|
. (7)
For the discrete minimal surface F
:
V
R
3
by
F
(v) =
F
. Then
F is called a dis-
crete minimal surface comprised of points and F
converges in C
() to F : R
3
.
3. The C
and
(2)
().
Let W be a subset of V
j
(v) = ((v +i
j
) (v))/,
for each j Z
4
. The discrete Laplacian of a function : W R is a
function in int W dened by the formula
(v) = 1/(4
2
)
3
j=0
((v +i
j
) (v)).
For any dierentiable function H : R, let
j
H denote the direc-
tional derivate
j
H(z) = lim
s0
H(z +i
j
s) H(z)
s
,
where j = 0, 1, 2, 3. Let f : C
d
be a function dened in . For each
> 0, let f
, with
CONVERGENCE OF CIRCLE PATTERNS TO MINIMAL SURFACE 155
values in C
d
. Assume that for each z , there are some
1
,
2
> 0 such
that {v V
: |v z| <
2
}
V
whenever (0,
1
).
If for every z and every > 0, there are some
1
,
2
> 0 such that
|f(z) f
with |v z| <
2
,
then we say f
j
k
j
k1
j
1
f
j
k
j
k1
j
1
f
locally uniformly in , then we say that f
converges to f in C
n
(). If that
holds for all n N, then the convergence is C
. The functions f
are said
to be uniformly bounded in C
n
() provided that for every compact K
there is some constant C(K, n) such that
j
k
j
k1
j
1
f
KV
< C(K, n)
whenever k n, and is suciently small, where denotes the L
-norm.
The functions f
: V
R
3
, it is said that F
converges in C
() to F if every component
of F
converges in C
are
uniformly bounded in C
() if all components of F
().
For
(1)
and
(2)
as follows: let
(8) h
(1)
(v) =
2
(
(1)
(v) 1)
for each vertex v V
and let
(9) h
(2)
(u) =
2
(
(2)
(u) 1)
for every u
V
= h
(2)
0 if P
is a regular SG
circle pattern, because
(1)
=
(2)
h
denote (1/2)SG
h
is denoted by V
h
. For any w V
h
, let v V
h
. Write e
j
(v) = [v +
j
/2, v +
j+1
/2]
for any v V
(u) + 1)
1/2
z, (10)
M
e
1
(u)
(z) = M
e
3
(u)
(z) = 1 i(1/)(h
(2)
(u) + 1)
1/2
z (11)
for each u
V
and
M
e
0
(v)
(z) = M
e
2
(v)
(z) = (
2
(h
(1)
(v) + 1)
1
+ 1)
1
/(1 z), (12)
M
e
1
(v)
(z) = M
e
3
(v)
(z) = (
2
(h
(1)
(v) + 1) + 1)
1
/(1 z) (13)
for every v V
.
Proof. For any u
V
h
. By the denition of M
[w
1
,w
2
]
, we get that
M
[w
1
,w
2
]
does not change if we apply a Mobius transformation to P
. So we
may assume that M
u+
2
/2
is the identity. It follows from the denition of
M
w
that
q
1
(v) = , q
1
(v ) = 0, q
1
(v i) = 1,
where v V
that is closest to u+
3
/2. Hence
we deduce that the four points q
1
(v ), q
1
(v i) form the vertices of a
rectangle. From the denition of
(2)
in Section 2, we get
(2)
(u) =
_
q
1
(v +) q
1
(v i)
q
1
(v i) q
1
(v )
_
2
,
which implies
q
1
(v +) = q
1
(v i) i(
(2)
)
1/2
(q
1
(v i) q
1
(v )) = 1 i(
(2)
)
1/2
.
Since M
e
2
(u)
takes , 0, 1 to q
1
(v), q
1
(v i), q
1
(v + i), respectively, we
conclude from (9) that
M
e
2
(u)
(z) = 1 i(
(2)
)
1/2
z = 1 i(h
(2)
(u) + 1)
1/2
z.
Similarly, we deduce that M
e
0
(u)
(z) = 1i(h
(2)
(u) +1)
1/2
z. So (10) holds.
Identical to the above arguments, we conclude that (11) holds.
Next, we consider the directed edge e
0
(v) = [v +
0
/2, v +
1
/2] SG
h
for any v V
, we get q
2
(v) = 1/(
(1)
(v))
1
+ 1)
1
/(1 z)
= (
2
(h
(1)
(v) + 1)
1
+ 1)
1
/(1 z).
Similarly, we get
M
e
2
(v)
(z) = (
2
(h
(1)
(v) + 1)
1
+ 1)
1
/(1 z).
Thus (12) holds. With the same arguments as above, we get that (13) holds.
Lemma 4. (i) The equality
(14) h
(1)
(v) = Re S
f
(v) +
2
O(1)
holds for each v V
.
(ii) The equality
(15) h
(2)
(u) = ImS
f
(u) +
(u)
2
O(1)
holds for each u
V
, where
from u to
0
, i.e., the least l such that there is a sequence {u
1
, u
2
, . . . ,
u
l
= u}
V
such that u
1
=
0
and |u
j+1
u
j
| = for j = 1, 2, . . . , l 1.
Proof. First, for any v int V
, expending S
f
in power series about v
and noting that
3
k=0
i
jk
= 0 for j = 1, 2, 3, we obtain
Re S
f
= Re
_
1/(4
2
)
3
j=0
[S
f
(v +i
j
) S
f
(v)]
_
= O(
2
).
Consider the function
g
1
(v) = h
(1)
(v) Re S
f
+|v|
2
,
where (0,
2
) is some function of . Similar to the proof of [12, Lemma
9.2], we deduce from the Taylors formula and the properties of Mobius
invariant h
(1)
that g
1
has no maxima in int V
if is chosen as = C
2
with C > 0 a suciently large constant. By the assumption (2), it follows
158 S.-Y. LAN AND D.-Q. DAI
that g
1
(v) = |v|
2
= O(
2
) on V
. Hence we obtain g
1
(z) O(
2
) in V
,
which implies
h
(1)
(v) Re S
f
(v) +O(
2
).
On the other hand, if we let g
2
(v) = h
(1)
(v) Re S
f
(v) |v|
2
, then similar
to the above arguments, we conclude that
h
(1)
(v) Re S
f
(v) +O(
2
).
So it follows that
h
(1)
(v) = Re S
f
(v) +O(
2
),
which implies (i).
Next, by (3), the relationship between
(1)
and h
(1)
(v +
0
) log
(2)
(v +
1
)
= 2 log(
(1)
(v +i)
1
+ 1) 2 log(
(1)
(v)
1
+ 1)
= 2 log((1 +
2
h
(1)
(v +i))
1
+ 1) 2 log((1 +
2
h
(1)
(v))
1
+ 1)
= 2 log(2
2
h
(1)
(v +i)) 2 log(2
2
h
(1)
(v)) +O(
4
)
=
2
h
(1)
(v)
2
h
(1)
(v +i) +O(
4
).
Hence it follows from (14) and Taylors formula
log
(2)
(v +
0
) log
(2)
(v +
1
) (16)
=
2
Re(S
f
(v) S
f
(v +i)) +O(
4
)
=
2
Re(iS
f
(v)) +O(
4
)
=
3
ImS
f
(v) +O(
4
)
=
2
ImS
f
(v +i)
2
ImS
f
(v) +O(
4
).
Similarly, we conclude from (4) that
log
(2)
(v +
0
) log
(2)
(v +
3
) (17)
=
2
ImS
f
(v +)
2
ImS
f
(v) +O(
4
).
By (5) and Taylors formula, we deduce that
log
(2)
(/2 +i/2) =
2
ImS
f
(/2 +i/2) +O(
4
). (18)
CONVERGENCE OF CIRCLE PATTERNS TO MINIMAL SURFACE 159
So we conclude from (16), (17) and (18) that
log
(2)
(u) =
2
ImS
f
(u) +
(u)O(
2
),
By the relationship between
(2)
and h
(2)
(u) = ImS
f
(u) +
(u)
2
O(1),
which implies (ii). This completes the proof of the lemma.
Lemma 5. Let v V
, u
V
(v) C, h
(2)
(u) C
for some constant C = C(, f) which depends only on and f.
Proof. Note that Re S
f
and ImS
f
are bounded on compact subset
K and
(or
V
); (ii) u int W;
(iii) is the distance from u to V
W (or
V
W). If : W R is any
function, then the inequality
(19) |
j
(u)| < 5 + (1/2)
2
int W
holds for any j = 0, 1, 2, 3.
Proof. The proof of the Lemma is similar to that of [8, Lemma 7.1]
where regular hexagonal lattices were investigated.
Theorem 1. Let n be an integer, and let V
(respectively,
V
) be the
set of vertices of V
(respectively,
V
j
n
j
n1
j
1
h
(1)
< C,
j
n
j
n1
j
1
h
(2)
< C (20)
hold for each < , and j
0
, j
1
, . . . , j
n
Z
4
.
160 S.-Y. LAN AND D.-Q. DAI
Proof. The proof proceeds by induction on n. In the case n = 0, by
Lemma 5, we get that (20) holds. So we suppose that n > 0, and that (20)
holds for n = 0, 1, 2, . . . , n 1. Let
1
=
j
n1
j
1
h
(1)
,
2
=
j
n1
j
1
h
(2)
.
Note that the operators
and
j
can commute with each other, so we
have
1
=
j
n1
j
1
h
(1)
=
j
n1
j
1
h
(1)
,
and
2
=
j
n1
j
1
h
(2)
=
j
n1
j
1
h
(2)
.
By Lemma 4, it follows that
h
(1)
Re S
f
+
(
2
O(1)),
h
(2)
ImS
f
+
2
O(1)).
Since
S
f
= O(
2
) and
h
(1)
= O(
2
) +O(1),
h
(2)
= O(
2
) +
(O(1))
on compact subset K . Note that O(1) C
1
(v)
V
C
1
,
2
(v)
C
1
.
Since |
1
| and |
2
| are bounded on V
and
V
and
V
, respectively,
which completes the induction step. So (20) holds for any integer n and
any j
0
, j
1
, . . . , j
n
Z
4
.
4. The Mobius transformations of circle patterns
In this section, we construct the Mobius transformations T
through cir-
cle pattern P
and h
(2)
. By the boundedness of h
(1)
and h
(2)
converges in C
is normalized by Mobius
transformations so that
(21) q
0
(0) = f(
0
), q
1
(0) = f(
1
), q
3
(0) = f(
3
),
where
j
= i
j
(1 +i)/2 (j = 0, 1, 2, 3). Then we have
CONVERGENCE OF CIRCLE PATTERNS TO MINIMAL SURFACE 161
Theorem 2. For each v int V
, let T
= T
(v)
exists for any 0, and the convergence is in C
().
(ii) T(z)(0) = f(z).
Proof. (i) Let B = B
(v) B = M
v+(1+i)/4
.
and
T
(v)
1
T
(v +) = B M
[v+
0
/2,v+
0
/2+/2]
M
[v+
0
+/2,v+
0
+]
B
1
.
Using the usual matrix notation for Mobius transformations and the fact
that M
[w
1
,w
2
]
= M
1
[w
2
,w
1
]
, we obtain from (10), (12) and (23) that
T
(v)
1
T
(v +)
=
_
(1 +i)/2
1 i i
_
_
i(h
(2)
(v +
0
) + 1)
1/2
1
0 1
_
_
0 (
2
(h
(1)
(v +) + 1)
1
+ 1)
1
1 1
_
1
_
(1 +i)/2
1 i 1
_
1
.
By Lemma 4 and noting that S
f
is Lipschitz, we deduce that
T
(v)
1
T
(v +) =
_
1
S
f
(v)/2 1
_
+O(
2
) = I +C(v) +O(
2
),
where I denotes the identity matrix and
C(v) =
_
0 1
S
f
(v)/2 0
_
.
162 S.-Y. LAN AND D.-Q. DAI
This implies
(24) T
(v +) = T
(v) +T
(v)C(v) +T
(v)O(
2
).
Similarly, we have
(25) T
(v +i
j
) = T
(v) +i
j
T
(v)C(v) +T
(v)O(
2
)
for j = 1, 2, 3. We assume, without loss of generality, that
f(0) = 0, f
(0) = 1, f
(0) = 0,
because the statement of Theorem 2 is Mobius invariant. Thus we get from
Taylors formula that
f(i
j
(1 +i)/2) = i
j
(1 +i)/2 +O(
3
)
for j = 0, 1, 2, 3. From (21) and the denition of T
(0)(i
j
(1 +i)/2) = i
j
(1 +i)/2 +O(
3
)
for j = 0, 1, 3, which implies
T
(0) = I +O().
By (24) and (25), we deduce that the matrices T
(v) (v int V
) are
bounded in compact subsets of , independently of . On the other hand,
(24) and (25) imply
(26)
j
T
(v) = i
j
T
(v) C(v) +T
(v) O() = T
(v) O(1)
for j = 0, 1, 2, 3, where O(1) = i
j
C(v) + O(). It follows from Theorem 1
that h
(1)
and h
(2)
are C
(). By re-
peating dierentiation of (26), we conclude that T
(v) is bounded in C
()
uniformly in . By the properties of C
().
In the following we will show that (22) is also valid for every sequence of
0. Indeed, let D(v) be the matrix solution of the dierential equation
(27) D
(v) = D(v)C(v)
CONVERGENCE OF CIRCLE PATTERNS TO MINIMAL SURFACE 163
with initial condition D(0) = I, then we have
D(v +i
j
) = D(v) +i
j
D(v)C(v) +O(
2
)
for j = 0, 1, 2, 3. From (24) and (25), we obtain
|T
(v +i
j
) D(v +i
j
)|
|T
(v)|)O(
2
)
|T
(v)|)O(
2
).
Note that T
. Hence we
deduce
|T
(v) =
D(v) +O(), which implies that (22) holds for every 0.
In equation (26), taking a limit as 0, we obtain
(28)
j
T(z) = i
j
T(z)C(z).
Hence, we get
j
T(z) =
j+2
T(z),
which implies that T(z) is a matrix-valued analytic function of z. In addi-
tion, it follows from (28) that the determinant of T(z) is constant in . Note
that at z = 0 this determinant is 1. So T(z) is a Mobius transformation for
each z .
(ii) Let
T(z) =
_
a(v) b(v)
c(v) d(v)
_
.
Then T(z) satises the dierential equation (27). By the denitions of
Schwarzian derivative and C(v), we deduce that
S
b/d
= S
f
.
Note that b/d(0) = f(0) = 0, (b/d)
(0) = f
(0) = 1, (b/d)
(0) = f
(0) = 0.
So we conclude that T(z)(0) = b(z)/d(z) = f(z).
164 S.-Y. LAN AND D.-Q. DAI
5. C
: V
R
3
which converges in C
, g
converge in C
() to functions f, g :
C, respectively. Then the following statements hold in C
(): (i)
f
+ g
f + g; (ii) f
1/f if f = 0 in ; (iv)
f if f
> 0; (v) |f
| |f|.
Proof. Using the denition of discrete directional derivative as well as
the denition of C
, let f
(v) and r
(v) and P
(v + 2
0
) in P
. Then we
have
Lemma 8. The discrete functions f
(v) and g
(v) converge in C
()
to the locally injective meromorphic function f : C, and r
(v)/ con-
verges in C
() to |f
| as 0.
Proof. First, we write T
(v) =
_
a
(v) b
(v)
c
(v) d
(v)
_
, T(z) =
_
a(z) b(z)
c(z) d(z)
_
.
Then it follows from Theorem 2(i) that
0
c
+d
and
0
a
+b
converge to d
and b in C
+ b
)/(
0
c
+d
) b/d in C
(v) = T
(v)(
0
), so we conclude that the discrete function g
f in
C
() as 0.
Next, let c be the circle that contains the three points
0
,
1
,
3
. Since
T
(v),
CONVERGENCE OF CIRCLE PATTERNS TO MINIMAL SURFACE 165
it follows that T
(v)(0) = f
(v) =
T
(v)(0) converges in C
() to f as 0.
Lastly, note that
_
r
(v) +r
(v +) = |f
(v) f
(v + )| = |
0
f
|,
r
(v) + r
(v + 2
0
) = |f
(v) f
(v + 2
0
)| = |
0
f
(v) +
1
f
(v + )|, and
_
r
(v +) +r
(v + 2
0
) = |f
(v +) f
(v +2
0
)| = |
1
f
(v +)|. So we
deduce
2r
(v)/ = |
0
f
(v) +
1
f
(v +)| +(|
0
f
|
2
|
1
f
(v +)|
2
).
Because
j
f
converges in C
() to f
j
f| converges in C
() to |f
/ converges
C
() to |f
|.
Now we give the following C
: V
R
3
that converges in C
() to F as
0.
Proof. It follows from Lemma 1 that the smooth minimal surface F :
R
3
is expressed by (1). Thus, to prove that there is a discrete minimal
surface
that converges in C
converges in C
: V
R
3
be the discrete minimal surface
corresponding to F, which consists of spheres and circles, and
F
: V
R
3
be the discrete minimal surface which is comprised of the centers of spheres
and circles in F
(v
(1)
s
)
F
(v
(2)
s
)
(29)
= Re
_
R(v
(1)
s
) +R(v
(2)
s
)
1 +|g
|
2
|f
(v
(1)
s
) f
(v
(2)
s
)|
f
(v
(1)
s
) f
(v
(2)
s
)
(1 (g
)
2
, i(1 + (g
)
2
), 2g
)
_
Re(
1
,
2
,
3
)
166 S.-Y. LAN AND D.-Q. DAI
for any v
(1)
s
, v
(2)
s
lying in the same square of SG
, where
1
=
R(v
(1)
s
) +R(v
(2)
s
)
1 +|g
|
2
|f
(v
(1)
s
) f
(v
(2)
s
)|
f
(v
(1)
s
) f
(v
(2)
s
)
(1 (g
)
2
),
2
=
R(v
(1)
s
) +R(v
(2)
s
)
1 +|g
|
2
|f
(v
(1)
s
) f
(v
(2)
s
)|
f
(v
(1)
s
) f
(v
(2)
s
)
i(1 + (g
)
2
),
3
=
R(v
(1)
s
) +R(v
(2)
s
)
1 +|g
|
2
|f
(v
(1)
s
) f
(v
(2)
s
)|
f
(v
(1)
s
) f
(v
(2)
s
)
(2g
).
By Lemma 8, we get that f
and g
converge in C
() to f, and that
r
(v)/ converges in C
() to |f
(v
(1)
s
) f
(v
(2)
s
))/ converges in C
() to 2f
1 +|f
(v
(k)
s
)|
2
|f
(v
(k)
s
) g
|
2
2|f
(v
(k)
s
) g
l
(l = 1, 2, 3) and Lemma
7 that
1
,
2
and
3
converge in C
() to (1f
2
)/f
, i(1+f
2
)/f
and
2f/f
, respectively.
Set
(v) = 2
2
F
converges in C