Related papers: Lefschetz fibration structures on knot surgery 4-m…
For a knot $K$ in a homology $3$-sphere $\Sigma$, let $M$ be the result of $2/q$-surgery on $K$, and let $X$ be the universal abelian covering of $M$. Our first theorem is that if the first homology of $X$ is finite cyclic and $M$ is a…
In this article we show that every closed oriented smooth 4-manifold can be decomposed into two codimension zero submanifolds (one with reversed orientation) so that both pieces are exact Kahler manifolds with strictly pseudoconvex…
We prove that for any integer $n$ there exist infinitely many different knots in $S^3$ such that $n$-surgery on those knots yields the same 3-manifold. In particular, when $|n|=1$ homology spheres arise from these surgeries. This answers…
In this article, we demonstrate that for any positive integer $n$, the knot surgery $4$-manifold $E(n)_K$ has a handle decomposition without $1$- and $3$-handles. Here, $K$ represents either a fibered two-bridge knot $C(2\epsilon_1,…
We construct using Lefschetz fibrations a large family of contact manifolds with the following properties: Any bounding contact embedding into an exact symplectic manifold satisfying a mild topological assumption is non-displaceable and…
We prove that for any non-trivial knot K, infinitely many r-surgeries K(r) along K have a unique surgery description along a knot. Moreover, we show that for any hyperbolic L-space knot K and infinitely many integer slopes n, the manifold…
In this paper, we prove Lefschetz fibration embeddings of achiral as well as simplified broken (achiral) Lefschetz fibrations of compact, connected, orientable $4$-manifolds over $D^2$ into the trivial Lefschetz fibration of $\mathbb…
Shapes of four dimensional spaces can be studied effectively via maps to standard surfaces. We explain, and illustrate by quintessential examples, how to simplify such generic maps on 4-manifolds topologically, in order to derive simple…
Questions of geography of various classes of $4$-manifolds have been a central motivating question in $4$-manifold topology. Baykur and Korkmaz asked which small, simply connected, minimal $4$-manifolds admit a genus $2$ Lefschetz…
We construct two infinite families of knots each of which admits a Seifert fibered surgery with none of these surgeries coming from Dean's primitive/Seifert-fibered construction. This disproves a conjecture that all Seifert fibered…
It is known that an arbitrary smooth, oriented 4-manifold admits the structure of what is called a broken Lefschetz fibration. Given a broken fibration, there are certain modifications, realized as homotopies of the fibration map, that…
Suppose $K$ is a knot in a 3-manifold $Y$, and that $Y$ admits a pair of distinct contact structures. Assume that $K$ has Legendrian representatives in each of these contact structures, such that the corresponding Thurston-Bennequin…
We compute the effect of concordance surgery, a generalization of knot surgery defined using a self-concordance of a knot, on the Ozsv\'ath-Szab\'o 4-manifold invariant. The formula involves the graded Lefschetz number of the concordance…
The construction of knots via annular twisting has been used to create families of knots yielding the same manifold via Dehn surgery. Prior examples have all involved Dehn surgery where the surgery slope is an integral multiple of 2. In…
Let M be a smooth 4-manifold which admits a genus g Lefschetz fibration over D^2 or S^2. We develop a technique to compute the signature of M using the global monodromy of this fibration.
We introduce hyperelliptic simplified (more generally, directed) broken Lefschetz fibrations, which is a generalization of hyperelliptic Lefschetz fibrations. We construct involutions on the total spaces of such fibrations of genus $g\geq…
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…
One strategy for distinguishing smooth structures on closed $4$-manifolds is to produce a knot $K$ in $S^3$ that is slice in one smooth filling $W$ of $S^3$ but not slice in some homeomorphic smooth filling $W'$. In this paper we explore…
We establish constraints on the topology of smooth Lefschetz fibrations with $4$-dimensional fibers, by studying the family Bauer-Furuta invariant. To compute this invariant, we analyze the framed bordism class of 1-dimensional…
We show that hyperelliptic symplectic Lefschetz fibrations are symplectically birational to two-fold covers of rational ruled surfaces, branched in a symplectically embedded surface. This reduces the classification of genus 2 fibrations to…