In 1976, the author (see the open problem section in [3]) asked the following question: if p is a function defined on i? 3, what is the condition on p so that there is a sphere in R3 whose mean curvature is given by p. There were important works by Treibergs-Wei [2] and others on this question. Recently in a lecture that I gave in the Chinese University of Hong Kong, I realized that my work with R. Schoen on the existence of black hole can be used to settle the prescribed mean curvature question for a large class of p.