| We consider two natural problems arising in geometry which are equivalent to the local solvability of specific equations of Monge-Ampere type. These two problems are: the local isometric embedding problem for two-dimensional Riemannian manifolds, and the problem of locally prescribed Gaussian curvature for surfaces in R3 . We prove a general local existence result for a large class of Monge-Ampere equations in the plane, and obtain as corollaries the existence of regular solutions to both problems, in the case that the Gaussian curvature vanishes to arbitrary finite order on a single smooth curve. |
