Related papers: Ellipsoid embeddings and symplectic packing stabil…
McDuff and Schlenk determined when a four-dimensional ellipsoid can be symplectically embedded into a four-dimensional ball, and found that when the ellipsoid is close to round, the answer is given by an "infinite staircase" determined by…
We consider the embedding function $c_b(a)$ describing the problem of symplectically embedding an ellipsoid $E(1,a)$ into the smallest possible scaling by $\lambda>1$ of the polydisc $P(1,b)$. In particular, we calculate rigid-flexible…
In this paper we study whether symplectic toric manifolds are symplectically cohomologically rigid. Here we say that symplectic cohomological rigidity holds for some family of symplectic manifolds if the members of that family can be…
Given two four-dimensional symplectic manifolds, together with knots in their boundaries, we define an ``anchored symplectic embedding'' to be a symplectic embedding, together with a two-dimensional symplectic cobordism between the knots…
In any dimension $2n \ge 6$ we show that certain spaces of symplectic embeddings of a polydisk into a product $B^4 \times \Bbb R^{2(n-2)}$ of a $4$-ball and Euclidean space, are not path connected. We also show that any pair of such…
We prove some contact analogs of smooth embedding theorems for closed $\pi$-manifolds. We show that a closed, $k$-connected, $\pi$-manifold of dimension (2n + 1) that bounds a $\pi$-manifold, contact embeds in the $(4n-2k+3)$-dimensional…
We apply Zhang's almost K\"ahler Nakai-Moishezon theorem and Li-Zhang's comparison of $J$-symplectic cones to establish a stability result for the symplectomorphism group of a rational $4$-manifold $M$ with Euler number up to $12$. As a…
We prove that some of the classical homological stability results for configuration spaces of points in manifolds can be lifted to motivic cohomology.
We show that many toric domains $X$ in $R^4$ admit symplectic embeddings $\phi$ into dilates of themselves which are knotted in the strong sense that there is no symplectomorphism of the target that takes $\phi(X)$ to $X$. For instance $X$…
Define a "Liouville domain" to be a compact exact symplectic manifold with contact-type boundary. We use embedded contact homology to assign to each four-dimensional Liouville domain (or subset thereof) a sequence of real numbers, which we…
A complete embedding is a symplectic embedding $\iota:Y\to M$ of a geometrically bounded symplectic manifold $Y$ into another geometrically bounded symplectic manifold $M$ of the same dimension. When $Y$ satisfies an additional finiteness…
We prove a homological stability theorem for certain complements of symmetric spaces. This is a variant of a conjecture by Vakil and Matchett Wood for subspaces of $\mathrm{Sym}^n(X)$ where $X$ is an open manifold admitting a boundary. To…
In this note we show that one open four dimensional ellipsoid embeds symplectically into another if and only the ECH capacities of the first are no larger than those of the second. This proves a conjecture due to Hofer. The argument uses…
We use algebraic arc complexes to prove a homological stability result for symplectic groups with slope 2/3 for rings with finite unitary stable rank. Symplectic groups are here interpreted as the automorphism groups of formed spaces with…
This paper calculates the function $c(a)$ whose value at $a$ is the infimum of the size of a ball that contains a symplectic image of the ellipsoid $E(1,a)$. (Here $a \ge 1$ is the ratio of the area of the large axis to that of the smaller…
We present a handlebody construction of small symplectic caps, and hence of small closed symplectic 4-manifolds. We use this to construct handlebody descriptions of symplectic embeddings of rational homology balls in…
We prove that homological stability holds for configuration spaces of orbifolds. This builds on the work of Bailes' thesis where he proves that the stabilisation maps are injective.
An influential result of McDuff and Schlenk asserts that the function that encodes when a four-dimensional symplectic ellipsoid can be embedded into a four-dimensional ball has a remarkable structure: the function has infinitely many…
We present recursive formulas which compute the recently defined "higher symplectic capacities" for all convex toric domains. In the special case of four-dimensional ellipsoids, we apply homological perturbation theory to the associated…
Given a manifold with boundary, one can consider the space of subsurfaces of this manifold meeting the boundary in a prescribed fashion. It is known that these spaces of subsurfaces satisfy homological stability if the manifold has at least…