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We show that only finitely many links in a closed 3-manifold share the same complement, up to twists along discs and annuli. Using the same techniques, we prove that by adding 2-handles on the same link we get only finitely many smooth…
We show that $\mathbb{C}^2$ contains pairs of properly embedded, smooth complex curves that are isotopic through homeomorphisms but not diffeomorphisms of $\mathbb{C}^2$. The construction is based on realizing corks as branched covers of…
In this article we show that some of the recent results of Marino, Moore, and Peradze (math.DG/9812042, hep-th/9812055) -- in particular their conjecture that all closed, smooth four-manifolds with b_2^+ > 1 (and Seiberg-Witten simple type)…
The recent result of Strominger, Yau and Zaslow relating mirror symmetry to the quantum field theory notion of T-duality is reinterpreted as providing a way of geometrically characterizing which Calabi-Yau manifolds have mirror partners.…
We consider several differential-topological invariants of compact 4-manifolds which directly arise from Riemannian variational problems. Using recent results of Bauer and Furuta, we compute these invariants in many cases that were…
We study the six-dimensional solvmanifolds that admit complex structures of splitting type classifying the underlying solvable Lie algebras. In particular, many complex structures of this type exist on the Nakamura manifold $X$, and they…
Torus manifolds are topological generalization of smooth projective toric manifolds. We compute the rational cohomology ring of a class of smooth locally standard torus manifolds whose orbit space is a connected sum of simple polytopes.
We identify the twisted sectors of a compact simplicial toric variety. We do the same for a generic nondegenerate Calabi-Yau hypersurface of an $n$-dimensional simplicial Fano toric variety and then explicitly compute $h^{1,1}_{orb}$ and…
We show that any topological, closed, oriented, non-spin $4$-manifold with fundamental group $\mathbb{Z}_{4k}$ and $\min(b_2^+, b_2^-)\geq 15$, has either none or infinitely many distinct smooth structures. Furthermore, we construct…
We construct simply connected, minimal, symplectic 4-manifolds with exotic smooth structures and each with one Seiberg-Witten basic class up to sign, on the Noether line and between the Noether and half Noether lines by star surgeries…
We construct closed $(k-1)$-connected manifolds of dimensions $\ge 4k-1$ that possess non-trivial rational Massey triple products. We also construct examples of manifolds $M$ such that all the cup-products of elements of $H^k(M)$ vanish,…
Generic polyhedra are interesting mathematical objects to study in their own right. In this paper, we initialize a systematic study of two-dimensional generic polyhedra with an eye towards applications to low-dimensional topology,…
We obtain new invariants of topological link concordance and homology cobordism of 3-manifolds from Hirzebruch-type intersection form defects of towers of iterated p-covers. Our invariants can extract geometric information from an arbitrary…
A couple of complex projective plane curves are said to make a Zariski pair if they have the same degree and the same type of singularities, but their embeddings in the projective plane are topologically different. In this paper, we present…
We prove the following special case of Mazur's conjecture on the topology of rational points. Let $E$ be an elliptic curve over $\mathbb{Q}$ with $j$-invariant $1728$. For a class of elliptic pencils which are quadratic twists of $E$ by…
We develop a method for constructing standard complexes which turns easy the calculation of their algebraic invariants and, as well, the precise evaluation of whether these complexes are embeddable or not in a 3-manifold. This method…
The moduli dependence of $(2,2)$ superstring compactifications based on Calabi--Yau hypersurfaces in weighted projective space has so far only been investigated for Fermat-type polynomial constraints. These correspond to Landau-Ginzburg…
We construct smooth 4-manifolds that are homeomorphic but not diffeomorphic to the "cusp" and the "fishtail", which are certain thickened singular 2-spheres.
Given two compact n-dimensional manifolds in the smooth, piecewise linear or topological categories, basic results of B. Mazur and others give simple criteria for determining whether their products with Euclidean spaces of sufficiently…
A complex $b$-structure on a manifold $\M$ with boundary is an involutive subbundle $\bT^{0,1}\M$ of the complexification of $\bT\M$ with the property that $\C\bT\M = \bT^{0,1}\M + \bar{\bT^{0,1}\M}$ as a direct sum; the interior of $\M$ is…