English

Khovanov homology detects the trefoils

Geometric Topology 2022-03-17 v2 Symplectic Geometry

Abstract

We prove that Khovanov homology detects the trefoils. Our proof incorporates an array of ideas in Floer homology and contact geometry. It uses open books; the contact invariants we defined in the instanton Floer setting; a bypass exact triangle in sutured instanton homology, proven here; and Kronheimer and Mrowka's spectral sequence relating Khovanov homology with singular instanton knot homology. As a byproduct, we also strengthen a result of Kronheimer and Mrowka on SU(2)SU(2) representations of the knot group.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1801.07634,
  title  = {Khovanov homology detects the trefoils},
  author = {John A. Baldwin and Steven Sivek},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1801.07634},
  year   = {2022}
}

Comments

54 pages, 23 figures; v2: accepted version

R2 v1 2026-06-22T23:53:17.757Z