Minimal surface representations of virtual knots and links
Abstract
Kuperberg [Algebr. Geom. Topol. 3 (2003) 587-591] has shown that a virtual knot corresponds (up to generalized Reidemeister moves) to a unique embedding in a thichened surface of minimal genus. If a virtual knot diagram is equivalent to a classical knot diagram then this minimal surface is a sphere. Using this result and a generalised bracket polynomial, we develop methods that may determine whether a virtual knot diagram is non-classical (and hence non-trivial). As examples we show that, except for special cases, link diagrams with a single virtualization and link diagrams with a single virtual crossing are non-classical.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.math/0401035,
title = {Minimal surface representations of virtual knots and links},
author = {H. A. Dye and Louis H. Kauffman},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:math/0401035},
year = {2014}
}
Comments
Published by Algebraic and Geometric Topology at http://www.maths.warwick.ac.uk/agt/AGTVol5/agt-5-22.abs.html Version 5: a minor correction and a citation added