Spacelike surfaces in Minkowski 4-space with a canonical normal null direction

Abstract

A canonical normal null direction on a spacelike surface in the four dimensional Minkowski space $\mathbb{R}^{3,1}$ is a parallel vector field $Z$ on $\mathbb{R}^{3,1}$ such that the normal component of $Z$ on the surface is a lightlike vector field. We describe the geometric properties of a spacelike surface endowed with a canonical normal null direction and we obtain some characterizations of these surfaces. Moreover, using their Gauss map we study other properties of these surface: the associated ellipse of curvature and their asymptotic directions. Finally, we give two different ways to create these surfaces, one of them involves a nonlinear partial differential equation.