Related papers: When does a satellite knot fiber?

We conjecture that satellite operations are either constant or have infinite rank in the concordance group. We reduce this to the difficult case of winding number zero satellites, and use $SO(3)$ gauge theory to provide a general criterion…

Let $K$ be a knot in a rational homology sphere $M$. This paper investigates the question of when modifying $K$ by adding $m>0$ half-twists to two oppositely-oriented strands, while keeping the rest of $K$ fixed, produces a knot isotopic to…

We establish upper bounds for the complexity of Seifert fibered manifolds with nonempty boundary. In particular, we obtain potentially sharp bounds on the complexity of torus knot complements.

Numerical simulations indicate that there exist conformations of the unknot, tied on a finite piece of rope, entangled in such a manner, that they cannot be disentangled to the torus conformation without cutting the rope. The simplest…

We compute the next-to-top term of knot Floer homology for positive braid links. The rank is 1 for any prime positive braid knot. We give some examples of fibered positive links that are not positive braids.

We compute explicitly the Khovanov polynomials (using the computer program from katlas.org) for the two simplest families of the satellite knots, which are the twisted Whitehead doubles and the two-strand cables. We find that a quantum…

Let $u(K)$ and $g(K)$ denote the unknotting number and the genus of a knot $K$, respectively. For a 3-braid knot $K$, we show that $u(K)\le g(K)$ holds, and that if $u(K)=g(K)$ then $K$ is either a 2-braid knot, a connected sum of two…

In this paper, we give some necessary and sufficient conditions for a normal subgroup of an amalgamated product of groups to be finitely generated. We apply these conditions together with Stallings' fibering theorem to prove that an…

We prove that the class of topological knot types that are both Legendrian simple and satisfy the uniform thickness property (UTP) is closed under cabling. An immediate application is that all iterated cabling knot types that begin with…

We prove that an iterated torus knot type fails the uniform thickness property (UTP) if and only if all of its iterations are positive cablings, which is precisely when an iterated torus knot type supports the standard contact structure. We…

The first and third authors recently proved that for each knot $K\subset S^3$ there are only finitely many hyperbolic fibered knots which are ribbon concordant to $K$. In this paper, we remove the hyperbolic constraint, proving that every…

We give necessary conditions of a surface-knot to be ribbon concordant to another, by introducing a new variant of the cocycle invariant of surface-knots in addition to using the invariant already known. We demonstrate that twist-spins of…

A knot in $S^3$ is topologically slice if it bounds a locally flat disk in $B^4$. A knot in $S^3$ is rationally slice if it bounds a smooth disk in a rational homology ball. We prove that the smooth concordance group of topologically and…

Entanglement in the spatial degrees of freedom of photons is an interesting resource for quantum information. For practical distribution of such entangled photons it is desireable to use an optical fiber, which in this case has to support…

We give a complete characterization of the topological slice status of odd 3-strand pretzel knots, proving that an odd 3-strand pretzel knot is topologically slice if and only if either it is ribbon or has trivial Alexander polynomial. (By…

We present a systematic classification of uncolored bonded knots with singularity number at most seven. Bonded knots provide a topological model for closed protein chains with intramolecular bridges, such as disulfide bonds. Following the…

We show that for many classical knots one can find generalized torsion in the fundamental group of its complement, commonly called the knot group. It follows that such a group is not bi-orderable. Examples include all torus knots, the…

The unknotting number of a positive braid with n strands and k intersections is known to be equal to (k-n+1)/2. We consider Lorenz knots (which are positive braids) and, using a different method, find their unknotting numbers in terms of…

In this note, we show that if there is a knot in $S^3$ having $\mathbb{Z}_m$ torsion in its Khovanov homology, then there are infinitely many hyperbolic knots and infinitely many prime satellite knots having $\mathbb{Z}_m$ torsion in their…

The ribbonlength Rib$(K)$ of a knot $K$ is the infimum of the ratio of the length of any flat knotted ribbon with core $K$ to its width. A twisted torus knot $T_{p,q;r,s}$ is obtained from the torus knot $T_{p,q}$ by twisting $r$ adjacent…