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Use the extended-value convention for a normal family, which is essential here: every sequence in the holomorphic family has a subsequence converging uniformly on compact subsets either to a finite holomorphic function or to infinity. Convergence to infinity means ${\inf }_K|f_n|\to \infty$ for every compact $K\subset D$. Equivalently one uses local uniform convergence in the chordal metric. For holomorphic functions a nonconstant meromorphic limit cannot acquire a pole: near a supposed pole, the reciprocals of sufficiently large-index functions are holomorphic and nowhere zero, and converge to a holomorphic function with a zero. Hurwitz's theorem would force that reciprocal limit to vanish identically, giving the constant infinite limit instead.

Restriction proves that global normality implies normality near each point. For the converse, choose a countable cover by connected discs $U_j$ on which the family is normal, with smaller discs covering $D$ and having compact closure inside the corresponding $U_j$. Such a cover exists from the countable rational-disc basis and local normality. Starting with any sequence, extract a subsequence converging on $U_1$, then a further subsequence converging on $U_2$, and so on. The diagonal sequence converges on each $U_j$. On an overlap the limits agree; a finite holomorphic limit and infinity cannot both occur there. The overlap graph of this cover is connected, since otherwise its components would partition the connected domain into disjoint open subsets. Therefore all local limits are of the same type and patch to one holomorphic function or to infinity throughout $D$. Every compact set has a finite cover by the smaller discs, so convergence on their compact closures gives uniform convergence on that compact set. This proves that normality is a local property.

For the counterexample take the unit disc and the family $f_n(z)=n(1+z^2/2)$. Since $|1+z^2/2|\ge 1-|z{|}^2/2>1/2$, $f_n$ tends uniformly to infinity. Any sequence from this family either has a constant subsequence or has indices tending to infinity, so the family is normal. Its derivatives are $nz$. No subsequence of these derivatives can have a finite locally uniform limit, because their values at any fixed nonzero point grow without bound; nor can they tend locally uniformly to infinity, since every derivative vanishes at zero. Thus a holomorphic normal family need not have a normal derivative family.

Now impose the point bound at $z_0$. For any sequence of derivatives choose corresponding functions from the original family. Normality supplies a locally uniformly convergent subsequence, and the point bound excludes the infinite limit. Let its finite holomorphic limit be $f$. The Cauchy integral formula gives convergence of derivatives uniformly on compact subsets. Explicitly, for compact $K\subset D$ choose $\rho >0$ so its closed $\rho$-neighborhood lies in a compact $L\subset D$; thenEvery sequence of derivatives therefore has a locally uniform subsequential limit. This pointwise anchoring of a holomorphic normal family proves the derivative family is normal under the stated bound.

For a plane domain, the following are equivalent descriptions of a simply connected domain: every based loop contracts in the domain with its basepoint fixed; any two paths with the same endpoints are homotopic while those endpoints stay fixed; its complement in the Riemann sphere is connected; every holomorphic function has a single-valued primitive; and every nowhere-zero holomorphic function has a holomorphic logarithm. The complement must be taken in the extended plane, including infinity. An equivalent winding number formulation is that every closed curve has index zero about every point outside the domain.

Here is a direct equivalence proof for the first two topological formulations. If all paths with given endpoints are homotopic relative to those endpoints, apply this to a loop based at $a$ and the constant path at $a$, obtaining a contraction. Conversely, let ${\gamma }_0,{\gamma }_1$ join $a$ to $b$. The loop ${\gamma }_0\ast {\gamma }_1^{-1}$ contracts with basepoint fixed. Concatenating this contraction with ${\gamma }_1$ produces a homotopy from ${\gamma }_0\ast {\gamma }_1^{-1}\ast {\gamma }_1$ to ${\gamma }_1$, relative to $a,b$. The middle retracing excursion contracts by shortening its traversal in both directions, giving a homotopy from that first path to ${\gamma }_0$. Hence ${\gamma }_0$ and ${\gamma }_1$ are homotopic relative to their endpoints. Planar domains are path-connected, so no extra path-component condition is needed.

The analytic descriptions follow from path independence of the holomorphic integral. Local primitives exist on discs by integrating power series; a homotopy can be subdivided into pieces lying in such discs, and local path integrals cancel along its common edges. Thus integrals over homotopic paths agree, giving a global primitive. Applied to $h^{\prime }/h$ for a nowhere-zero function, a primitive $H$ makes $h{e}^{-H}$ constant and hence supplies a holomorphic logarithm. These observations are also the tools used in the mapping proof below.

The Riemann mapping theorem states that every nonempty simply connected proper domain $D⊊\mathbb{C}$ admits a conformal bijection onto the unit disc. Given $z_0\in D$, there is exactly one such map with $f(z_0)=0$ and $f^{\prime }(z_0)>0$. The exclusion of the whole plane is necessary: an entire map into the disc would be constant by Liouville's theorem.

An extremal proof has the following concrete steps. First construct an injective bounded holomorphic map. Choose $a\notin D$ and a holomorphic square root $h$ of $z-a$. It is injective, since equality of its values implies equality of their squares. Its image is disjoint from its negative: $h(z)=-h(w)$ would imply $z=w$ and then $h(z)=0$, impossible. If $b=h(z_0)$, choose $r>0$ with $B(b,r)\subset h(D)$; the disc $B(-b,r)$ is omitted. Therefore $1/(h+b)$ is injective and bounded. Scaling it and applying an automorphism of the unit disk gives a map into the disc taking $z_0$ to zero; a rotation makes its derivative positive.

Let $\mathcal{U}$ consist of all injective maps $D\to \mathbb{D}$ with this normalization. It is nonempty. The derivative at $z_0$ is bounded above by the Cauchy integral formula on a small disc compactly contained in $D$. Choose $f_n\in \mathcal{U}$ with derivatives tending to their positive supremum $L$. Boundedness, the Cauchy estimates and a diagonal Arzelà-Ascoli theorem argument give a subsequence converging locally uniformly to $f$; this is the bounded-family form of the Montel theorem. Then $f(z_0)=0$, $f^{\prime }(z_0)=L>0$, and the maximum modulus principle puts its image in the open disc. The limit is injective: if distinct $z,w$ had $f(z)=f(w)$, apply Hurwitz's theorem near $w$ to $f_n(\cdot )-f_n(z)$, which has no zero there; the limit would vanish identically, contradicting $f^{\prime }(z_0)>0$.

Finally suppose $a\in \mathbb{D}$ is omitted by $f$. It is nonzero since $f(z_0)=0$. Let $T_a(w)=(w-a)/(1-\overline{a}w)$ and choose a holomorphic square root $h$ of $T_a\circ f$. It is injective and takes values in the disc. Put $b=h(z_0)$, so $|b|=\sqrt{|a|}$, and normalize $T_b\circ h$ by a rotation. The new map's derivative magnitude at $z_0$ isThis square-root improvement of a normalized conformal map contradicts extremality. Thus $f$ is onto. Two normalized bijections differ by a disc automorphism fixing zero; Schwarz lemma applied to it and its inverse makes it a rotation, and positivity of the normalized derivatives forces that rotation to be the identity. This completes the requested proof outline.

A hyperbolic Riemann surface in potential theory is a noncompact Riemann surface admitting a positive Green function on a Riemann surface. With pole $p$, this is a positive function harmonic off $p$, having local form $-\log |\zeta |$ plus a harmonic function in a coordinate $\zeta (p)=0$, and obtained as the minimal such positive function by exhaustion. This is a noncircular definition for the present proof. For a simply connected surface it is equivalent to disk conformal type; for arbitrary surfaces potential-theoretic hyperbolicity and disk universal-cover type should be distinguished.

The unit disk is an example. At pole zero its function is $G(z,0)=-\log |z|$: it is positive in the punctured disk, harmonic there, has the correct logarithmic singularity, and tends to zero at the boundary. If another positive function has the same singularity and is harmonic elsewhere, subtract $G$ and apply the maximum principle for harmonic functions on disks of radius $r<1$; the boundary lower bound is $\log r$. Letting $r\uparrow 1$ shows that the other function dominates $G$. Thus $G$ is indeed the positive Green function on a Riemann surface. At a general pole it is

Here is a Green-function exhaustion proof of disk uniformization. The main analytic idea is to build conformal maps on bordered disks from their Green functions and pass to an extremal limit. The positive global Green function prevents that limit from becoming constant.

First exhaust the noncompact simply connected surface $R$ by relatively compact domains $R_n$ containing $p$, each with a smooth Jordan boundary. This topological step does not use conformal uniformization: take regular neighborhoods of finitely many coordinate disks covering successive compact sets and fill bounded complementary components. Simple connectedness and the Jordan curve theorem make the filled neighborhoods topological disks; enlarge them to be nested.

Each $R_n$ has a zero-boundary Green function on a Riemann surface $G_n(\cdot ,p)$. One analytic construction, independent of conformal uniformization, is as follows. Equip the compact bordered domain with a smooth conformal metric. Multiply $-\log |\zeta |$ by a smooth cutoff function equal to one near $p$ and zero near the boundary; call the result $s$. Distributionallywhere $k$ is smooth and supported away from $p$. Solve $\Delta v=k$ with zero boundary data. This auxiliary Dirichlet problem can be obtained by minimizing $\frac{1}{2}\int |\nabla v{|}^2+\int kv$ over functions with zero boundary trace: the Poincaré inequality gives coercivity, minimization in a Hilbert space gives a weak solution, and interior and smooth-boundary elliptic regularity give a smooth solution. Then $G_n=s+v$ is harmonic away from $p$, has the logarithmic pole, and vanishes at the boundary. It is positive by the maximum principle for harmonic functions, applied after removing a sufficiently small circle around its positive pole. This construction uses ordinary linear elliptic existence, not the desired uniformization theorem. Equivalently, the same bordered-domain Green functions can be constructed by the Perron method for the Dirichlet problem using local logarithmic barriers.

On $R_n\setminus \{p\}$ choose local harmonic conjugates $G_n^{\ast }$. Their period around the pole is $-2\pi$, and every closed loop is homologous to an integer multiple of that loop. Thereforeis a single-valued holomorphic function. It extends across $p$ with one simple zero and has no others. Since $G_n>0$, $|f_n|<1$; since $G_n=0$ on the boundary, $|f_n|\to 1$ there. Thus $f_n:R_n\to \mathbb{D}$ is proper. For any $a\in \mathbb{D}$, choose a smooth interior contour sufficiently close to the boundary that $|f_n|>|a|$ everywhere on it. The contour surrounds $p$ and all possible preimages of $a$, because $|f_n|>|a|$ throughout a thin boundary collar. By Rouché's theorem, $f_n-a$ has the same number of zeros inside as $f_n$, namely one. Hence $f_n$ is onto and one-to-one, with nonzero derivative: it is a biholomorphism from $R_n$ to the disk.

Write near $p$Multiply $f_n$ by a unit constant so that, in the fixed coordinate, $f_n^{\prime }(p)=e^{-c_n}>0$. Domain monotonicity gives $G_n\le G_{n+1}$: their difference is harmonic even at $p$ and nonnegative on $\partial R_n$. The global positive Green function on a Riemann surface $G_R$ similarly majorizes every $G_n$. Comparing the regular parts shows that $c_n$ increases and is bounded above by the finite regular part of $G_R$ at $p$. Consequently

On each fixed compact subdomain, the $f_n$ are eventually bounded holomorphic functions. Montel theorem and a diagonal subsequence therefore give a locally uniform convergence limit $F:R\to \mathbb{D}$ with $F(p)=0$ and $F^{\prime }(p)=d>0$. The maximum modulus principle keeps its values strictly inside the disk. It is injective: for fixed $q$, the functions $f_n-f_n(q)$ have no zeros away from $q$; Hurwitz's theorem implies that their nonconstant limit has no other zeros. This is the locally uniform limit of univalent functions argument.

There is also an extremality property. For any holomorphic function $g:R\to \mathbb{D}$ with $g(p)=0$, the function $g\circ f_n^{-1}$ is a disk self-map fixing zero. The Schwarz lemma gives $|g^{\prime }(p)|\le f_n^{\prime }(p)$. Passing to the limit yields $|g^{\prime }(p)|\le d=F^{\prime }(p)$.

Finally suppose $F$ omits $a\in \mathbb{D}$. Necessarily $a\ne 0$. Apply the disk Möbius transformation ${\varphi }_a(w)=(w-a)/(1-\overline{a}w)$. The nowhere-zero function ${\varphi }_a\circ F$ has a global holomorphic logarithm because $R$ is simply connected, hence a holomorphic square root $h$. It maps into the disk and $|h(p)|=\sqrt{|a|}$. Normalize it by setting $g={\varphi }_{h(p)}\circ h$, so $g(p)=0$. Direct differentiation givesThe strict inequality follows from $(1-\sqrt{|a|}{)}^2>0$. This contradicts extremality. Therefore $F$ omits no point, and we conclude

Fix $z_0\in \mathcal{U}$. We prove the Riemann mapping theorem in this case by maximizing a normalized derivative. Choose $a\notin \mathcal{U}$. Since $\mathcal{U}$ is a simply connected domain and $z-a$ never vanishes, it has a holomorphic square root $g$. This $g$ is injective, and $g(\mathcal{U})$ is disjoint from $-g(\mathcal{U})$: equality up to sign would first force the original points to coincide. Choose $b\in g(\mathcal{U})$ and $r>0$ with $B(b,r)\subset g(\mathcal{U})$. The ball $B(-b,r)$ is omitted, so $1/(g+b)$ is a bounded univalent function. Scaling and composing with an automorphism of the unit disk produces an injective holomorphic function $\varphi :\mathcal{U}\to \mathbb{D}$ with $\varphi (z_0)=0$ and ${\varphi }^{\prime }(z_0)>0$.

Let $\mathcal{F}$ be the family of all such normalized univalent functions. A Cauchy estimate in a small disk about $z_0$ bounds their derivatives, so $M={\sup }_{\varphi \in \mathcal{F}}{\varphi }^{\prime }(z_0)$ is finite and positive. Choose a maximizing sequence in this normal family. Montel theorem gives a subsequence converging uniformly on compact subsets to $\varphi$. Its derivative at $z_0$ is $M>0$. The maximum modulus principle puts its image in $\mathbb{D}$, and Hurwitz's theorem implies that a nonconstant limit of injective holomorphic functions is injective. Thus the maximum is attained.

If $a_1\in \mathbb{D}$ is omitted, then $a_1\ne 0$. Put $T_a(w)=(w-a)/(1-\overline{a}w)$. A holomorphic square root $v$ of $T_{a_1}\circ \varphi$ exists, is injective, and takes values in $\mathbb{D}$. Compose $v$ with $T_{v(z_0)}$ and a rotation to normalize it. Writing $s=|a_1|\in (0,1)$, the new derivative has magnitudea contradiction. Therefore $\varphi$ maps onto $\mathbb{D}$. The Cayley transform between the half-plane and disk now givesIts inverse is holomorphic by the holomorphic inverse function theorem, so this is a biholomorphism. The proper-subset hypothesis was used to choose $a\notin \mathcal{U}$; the whole complex plane cannot be mapped this way, by Liouville theorem.

Uniform convergence on compact subsets makes $f$ continuous. For every triangle whose closure lies in $U$, uniform convergence on its boundary permits passage through the contour integral:Morera's theorem implies that $f$ is holomorphic. If a compact set $K⋐U$ is surrounded by a finite union of contours at positive distance from $K$, the Cauchy integral formula for derivatives givesThe uniform bound on the surrounding compact set proves that $f_n^{\prime }\to f^{\prime }$ uniformly on $K$.

If $f$ had distinct zeros $c$ and $d$, choose disjoint small closed discs around them whose boundary contains no zero of $f$. Uniform convergence and Rouché's theorem imply that, for large $n$, $f_n$ has a zero in each disc, contradicting uniqueness of $c_n$. Thus $f$ has at most one zero.

For an example on the unit disc, takeThen $f_n\to f(z)=z-1$, which has no zero in the open disc. In general, Hurwitz's theorem shows that $f$ is zero-free exactly when the unique zeros escape every compact subset of $U$:Indeed, an interior accumulation point of $c_n$ is a zero of $f$, while a zero of $f$ forces the unique $c_n$ into each of its sufficiently small neighbourhoods.