Timelike surfaces into 4-dimensional Minkowski space via spinors

Abstract: We prove that an isometric immersion of a timelike surface in four-dimensional Minkowski space is equivalent to a normalized spinor field which is a solution of a Dirac equation on the surface. Using the quaternions and the complex numbers, we obtain a spinor representation formula that relates the spinor field and the isometric immersion. Applying the representation formula, we deduce a new spinor representation of a timelike surface in three-dimensional De Sitter space; we give a formula for the Laplacian of the Gauss map of a minimal timelike surface in four-dimensional Minkowski space in terms of the curvatures of the surface; we obtain a local description of a flat timelike surface with flat normal bundle and regular Gauss map in four-dimensional Minkowski space, and we also give a conformal description of a flat timelike surface in three-dimensional De Sitter space.