Related papers: Comparing 4-Manifolds in the Pants Complex via Tri…
A trisection of a smooth, closed, oriented 4-manifold is a decomposition into three 4-dimensional 1-handlebodies meeting pairwise in 3-dimensional 1-handlebodies, with triple intersection a closed surface. The fundamental groups of the…
We introduce a coarse perspective on relations of the $SU(2)$-Witten-Reshetikhin-Turaev TQFT, the Weil-Petersson geometry of the Teichm\"uller space, and volumes of hyperbolic 3-manifolds. Using data from the asymptotic expansions of the…
We apply mapping class group techniques and trisections to study intersection forms of smooth 4-manifolds. Johnson defined a well-known homomorphism from the Torelli group of a compact surface. Morita later showed that every homology…
We define a $\mathbb{Z}_2$-valued invariant for transversely-intersecting coassociative $4$-folds equipped with spin structures. Our main result shows this invariant provides an obstruction to separating two such coassociatives through a…
The goal of this paper is to construct distinct trisections of the same genus on a fixed 4-manifold. For every $k \geq 2$, we construct $2^{k}-1$ non-diffeomorphic $(3k,k)$-trisections on infinitely many 4-manifolds. Here, the manifolds are…
The Jones-Witten invariants can be generalized for non-singular smooth vector fields with invariant probability measure on 3-manifolds, giving rise to new invariants of dynamical systems [22]. After a short survey of cohomological field…
In this paper, we introduce the relative $\mathcal{L}$-invariant $r\mathcal{L}(X)$ of a smooth, orientable, compact 4-manifold $X$ with boundary. This invariant is defined by measuring the lengths of certain paths in the cut complex of a…
J.H.C. Whitehead introduced the concept of crossed modules in the early 20th century. These crossed modules are crucial for algebraic models of 2-type homotopy, which involve connected spaces with no higher than second-degree homotopy…
We show that any smooth, closed, oriented, connected 4--manifold can be trisected into three copies of $\natural^k (S^1 \times B^3)$, intersecting pairwise in 3--dimensional handlebodies, with triple intersection a closed 2--dimensional…
A Heegaard diagram for a 3-manifold is regarded as a pair of simplexes in the complex of curves on a surface and a Heegaard splitting as a pair of subcomplexes generated by the equivalent diagrams. We relate geometric and combinatorial…
A correspondence, by way of Heegaard splittings, between closed oriented 3-manifolds and pairs of surjections from a surface group to a free group has been studied by Stallings, Jaco, and Hempel. This correspondence, by way of trisections,…
This article surveys invariants of four-manifolds and their relation to Donaldson-Witten theory, and other topologically twisted Yang-Mills theories. The article is written for the second edition of the Encyclopedia of Mathematical Physics,…
This article analyzes the interplay between symplectic geometry in dimension four and the invariants for smooth four-manifolds constructed using holomorphic triangles introduced in math.SG/0110169. Specifically, we establish a non-vanishing…
We use Gay and Kirby's description of 4-manifolds in terms of trisections and trisection diagrams to define a new 4-manifold invariant. The algebraic data are an indecomposable finite semisimple bimodule category over a pair of spherical…
The goal of this book is to characterize algebraically the closed 4-manifolds that fibre nontrivially or admit geometries in the sense of Thurston, or which are obtained by surgery on 2-knots, and to provide a reference for the topology of…
Invariants for framed links in $S^3$ obtained from Chern-Simons gauge field theory based on an arbitrary gauge group (semi-simple) have been used to construct a three-manifold invariant. This is a generalization of a similar construction…
This paper is the second part of our work on 4-dimensional 2-handlebodies. In the first part (arXiv:math.GT/0407032) it is shown that up to certain set of local moves, connected simple coverings of B^4 branched over ribbon surfaces,…
Generalizing Heegaard splittings of 3-manifolds and trisections of 4-manifolds, we consider multisections of higher-dimensional smooth (or PL) closed orientable manifolds, namely decompositions into 1-handlebodies whose subcollections…
Trisections of closed 4-manifolds, first defined and studied by Gay and Kirby, have proved to be a useful tool in the systematic analysis of 4-manifolds via handlebodies. Subsequent work of Abrams, Gay, and Kirby established a connection…
We modify an approach of Johnson to define the distance of a bridge splitting of a knot in a 3-manifold using the dual curve complex and pants complex of the bridge surface. This distance can be used to determine a complexity, which becomes…