Related papers: Exotic $\mathbb{R}^4$'s and positive isotropic cur…
We obtain topological obstructions to the existence of a complete Riemannian metric with uniformly positive scalar curvature on certain (non-compact) $4$-manifolds. In particular, such a metric on the interior of a compact contractible…
We prove that there exist infinitely many contractible compact smooth $4$-manifolds $C$ that admit absolutely exotic diffeomorphisms of infinite order in $\pi_0(\mathrm{Diff}(C))$. By ``absolutely", we mean that isotopies are not required…
We prove the following result: Let $(X,g_0)$ be a complete, connected 4-manifold with uniformly positive isotropic curvature and with bounded geometry. Then there is a finite collection $\mathcal{F}$ of manifolds of the form $\mathbb{S}^3…
There are many theorems in the differential geometry literature of the following sort. Let M be a complete Riemannian manifold with some conditions on various curvatures, diameters, volumes, etc. Then M is homotopy equivalent to a finite CW…
We address Gromov's band width inequality and Rosenberg's $S^1$-stability conjecture for simply connected smooth four manifolds. Both results are known to be false in dimension 4 due to counterexamples based on Seiberg-Witten invariants.…
Our main result asserts that for any given numbers C and D the class of simply connected closed smooth manifolds of dimension m<7 which admit a Riemannian metric with sectional curvature bounded in absolute value by C and diameter uniformly…
We prove that a variety of examples of minimal complex surfaces admit exotic diffeomorphisms, providing the first known instances of exotic diffeomorphisms of irreducible 4-manifolds. We also give sufficient conditions for the boundary Dehn…
We prove the following result: Let $(X,g_0)$ be a complete, connected 4-manifold with uniformly positive isotropic curvature and with bounded geometry. Then there is a finite collection $\mathcal{F}$ of manifolds of the form $\mathbb{S}^3…
Ruberman in the 90's showed that the group of exotic diffeomorphisms of closed 4-manifolds can be infinitely generated. We provide various results on the question of when such infinite generation can localize to a smaller embedded…
We prove that any compact four-manifold admits a Riemannian metric with negative isotropic curvature in the sense of Micallef and Moore.
We prove a localization theorem for exotic diffeomorphisms, showing that every diffeomorphism of a compact simply-connected 4-manifold that is isotopic to the identity after stabilizing with one copy of $S^2 \times S^2$, is smoothly…
In this paper, we completely classify all compact 4-manifolds with positive isotropic curvature. We show that they are diffeomorphic to $\mathbb{S}^4,$ or $\mathbb{R}\mathbb{P}^4$ or quotients of $\mathbb{S}^3\times \mathbb{R}$ by a…
Attaching a Casson handle to a slice disk complement yields a smooth 4-manifold that is homeomorphic to $\mathbb{R}^4$. We show that if two slice knots have sufficiently different knot Floer homology, then the resulting exotic…
In this note we prove the following result: Let $X$ be a complete, connected 4-manifold with uniformly positive isotropic curvature, with bounded geometry and with no essential incompressible space form. Then $X$ is diffeomorphic to…
We show that any simply connected topological closed $4$-manifold punctured along any compact, totally disconnected tame subset $\Lambda$ admits a continuum of smoothings which are not diffeomorphic to any leaf of a $C^{1,0}$ codimension…
We show that any Riemannian metric conformal to the round metric on $S^n$, for $n\geq 4$, arises as a limit of a sequence of Riemannian metrics of positive scalar curvature on $S^n$ in the sense of uniform convergence of Riemannian…
We prove that there are only finitely many isoparametrically foliated closed connected Riemannian manifolds with bounded geometry, fixed dimension $n\neq5$, and finite fundamental group, up to foliated diffeomorphism. In addition, we…
We study the possibility of realizing exotic smooth structures on punctured simply connected $4$-manifolds as leaves of a codimension one foliation on a compact manifold. In particular, we show the existence of uncountably many smooth open…
We produce infinitely many distinct irreducible smooth 4-manifolds homeomorphic to #(2m+1)(CP^2 # -CP^2) and #(2n+1)(S^2 x S^2), respectively, for each m>3 and n>4. These provide the smallest exotic closed simply connected 4-manifolds with…
In this paper, we establish the existence of conformal deformations that uniformize fourth order curvature on 4-dimensional Riemannian manifolds with positive conformal invariants. Specifically, we prove that any closed, compact Riemannian…