Related papers: Representing Dehn twists with branched coverings

We discuss how the fractional Dehn twist coefficient behaves under a fully ramified branched covering of an open book, and give applications to both topological and contact 3-manifolds. Among them, we show that non-right-veering closed…

Dehn twists around simple closed curves in oriented surfaces satisfy the braid relations. This gives rise to a group theoretic from the braid group to the mapping class group. We prove here that this map is trivial in stable homology with…

We construct a relation among right-handed Dehn twists in the mapping class group of a compact oriented surface of genus g with 4g+4 boundary components. This relation gives an explicit topological description of 4g+4 disjoint (-1)-sections…

Let $N_g^k$ be a nonorientable surface of genus \ $g\geq 5$ \ with \ $k$-punctures. In this note, we will give an algebraic characterization of a Dehn twist about a simple closed curve on $N_g^k$. Along the way, we will fill some little…

For an open book decomposition $(S,\phi)$, the fractional Dehn twist coefficients are rational numbers measuring the amount that the monodromy $\phi$ twists the surface $S$ near each boundary component. In general, the twist coefficients do…

Let M be a smooth 4-manifold which admits a relatively minimal hyperelliptic genus h Lefschetz fibration over the 2-sphere. If all of the vanishing cycles for this fibration are nonseparating curves, then we show that M is a 2-fold cover of…

By the work of Baraglia-Konno and Kronheimer-Mrowka, the boundary Dehn twist on punctured $K3$ surfaces is nontrivial in the smooth mapping class group relative to boundary. In this short note, we prove that it becomes trivial after…

The purpose of this note is to explain a combinatorial description of closed smooth oriented 4-manifolds in terms of positive Dehn twist factorizations of surface mapping classes, and further explore these connections. This is obtained via…

Let a and b be two simple closed curves on an orientable surface S such that their geometric intersection number is greater than 1. It is known that the group generated by corresponding Dehn twists t_a and t_b is isomorphic to the free…

We prove that the boundary Dehn twist on $K3\#K3\setminus B^4$ is nontrivial in the smooth mapping class group, providing another example of an exotic diffeomorphism on a simply-connected spin four-manifold. We do so by finding an algebraic…

For any unoriented loop on a compact connected oriented surface with one boundary component, the generalized Dehn twist along the loop is defined as an automorphism of the completed group ring of the fundamental group of the surface. If the…

We show that isotopy classes of simple closed curves in any oriented surface admit a quandle structure with operations induced by Dehn twists, the Dehn quandle of the surface. We further show that the monodromy of a Lefschetz fibration can…

We show that branched coverings of surfaces of large enough genus arise as characteristic maps of braided surfaces that is, lift to embeddings in the product of the surface with $\mathbb R^2$. This result is nontrivial already for…

A complete description of the global monodromy of a Lefschetz fibration arising from the Fermat surface of degree 4 is given. As a by-product we get a positive relation among right hand Dehn twists in the mapping class group of a closed…

We construct nontrivial roots of Dehn twists about nonseparating curves.

There exists a (relatively minimal) genus g Lefschetz fibration with only one singular fiber over a closed (Riemann) surface of genus h iff g>2 and h>1. The singular fiber can be chosen to be reducible or irreducible. Other results are that…

Let t_a be the Dehn twist about a circle a on an orientable surface. It is well known that for each circle b and an integer n, I(t_a^n(b),b)=|n|I(a,b)^2, where I(,) is the geometric intersection number. We prove a similar formula for…

A branched affine structure on a compact topological surface with marked points is a complex affine structure outside the marked points. We give a proof of an unpublished foundational theorem of Veech, stating that any branched affine…

In this paper we study the homeomorphisms of the disk that are liftable with respect to a simple branched covering. Since any such homeomorphism maps the branch set of the covering onto itself and liftability is invariant up to isotopy…

We classify homomorphisms from the braid group on $n$ strands to the pure mapping class group of a nonoriantable surface of genus $g$. For $n\ge 14$ and $g\le 2\lfloor{n/2}\rfloor+1$ every such homomorphism is either cyclic, or it maps…