TITLE: Curvature of complete conformal metrics on the open unit disk
QUESTION [7 upvotes]: Let $D$ be the unit disk in the complex plane, and assume that $g$ is a Riemannian metric on $D$ which is complete and conformal to the standard Euclidean metric. Can it be the case that the Gaussian curvature of $g$ approaches zero as we approach $\partial D$?

REPLY [6 votes]: Yes. Take the metric with length element $\rho(z)|dz|$ where $\rho(z)=(1-|z|)^{-2}$.
It is complete since $\int^1\rho(t)dt=\infty$, and the curvature
$$-\rho^{-2}\Delta\log\rho=\rho^{-4}({\rho'}^2-\rho\rho'')=-2(1-r)^2\to 0,$$
where $r=|z|$ and the primes indicate differentiation with respect to $r$.