Related papers: Augmentations, annuli, and Alexander polynomials
The volume conjecture and its generalizations say that the colored Jones polynomial corresponding to the N-dimensional irreducible representation of sl(2;C) of a (hyperbolic) knot evaluated at exp(c/N) grows exponentially with respect to N…
A quandle is an algebra whose axioms are motivated from knot theory. A linear extension of a quandle can be described by using a pair of maps called an Alexander pair. In this paper, we show that a linear extension of a multiple conjugation…
We give two formulae which express the Alexander polynomial $\Delta^C$ of several variables of a plane curve singularity $C$ in terms of the ring ${\cal O}_{C}$ of germs of analytic functions on the curve. One of them expresses $\Delta^C$…
In an earlier paper, we used the absolute grading on Heegaard Floer homology to give restrictions on knots in $S^3$ which admit lens space surgeries. The aim of the present article is to exhibit stronger restrictions on such knots, arising…
Suppose the knot group G(K) of a knot K has a non-abelian representation \rho on A_4 \subset GL(4,Z). We conjecture that the twisted Alexander polynomial of K associated to \rho is of the form: \Delta_K(t)/(1-t) \phi(t^3), where \Delta_K…
We define three different types of spanning surfaces for knots in thickened surfaces. We use these to introduce new Seifert matrices, Alexander-type polynomials, genera, and a signature invariant. One of these Alexander polynomials extends…
We look into computational aspects of two classical knot invariants. We look for ways of simplifying the computation of the coloring invariant and of the Alexander module. We support our ideas with explicit computations on pretzel knots.
We use the 2-loop term of the Kontsevich integral to show that there are (many) knots with trivial Alexander polynomial which don't have a Seifert surface whose genus equals the rank of the Seifert form. This is one of the first…
If a knot has the Alexander polynomial not equal to 1, then it is linear $n$-colorable. By means of such a coloring, such a knot is given an upper bound for the minimal quandle order, i.e., the minimal order of a quandle with which the knot…
We study torsion properties of the twisted Alexander modules of the affine complement $M$ of a complex essential hyperplane arrangement, as well as those of punctured stratified tubular neighborhoods of complex essential hyperplane…
The cohomology jump loci of a space $X$ are of two basic types: the characteristic varieties, defined in terms of homology with coefficients in rank one local systems, and the resonance varieties, constructed from information encoded in…
We study 3-dimensional BF theories and define observables related to knots and links. The quantum expectation values of these observables give the coefficients of the Alexander-Conway polynomial.
Inspired by the combinatorial constructions in earlier work of the authors that generalized the classical Alexander polynomial to a large class of spatial graphs with a balanced weight on edges, we show that the value of the Alexander…
We define and study twisted Alexander-type invariants of complex hypersurface complements. We investigate torsion properties for the twisted Alexander modules and extend classical local-to-global divisibility results to the twisted setting.…
It is known that a knot complement (minus two points) decomposes into ideal octahedra with respect to a given knot diagram. In this paper, we study the Ptolemy variety for such an octahedral decomposition in perspective of Thurston's gluing…
Given a virtual knot $K$, we construct a group $VG_K$ called the virtual knot group, and we use the elementary ideals of $VG_K$ to define invariants of $K$ called the virtual Alexander invariants. For instance, associated to the $k=0$ ideal…
We complete the enumeration of the possible roots of the Alexander polynomial (both conventional and over finite fields) of a trigonal curve. The curves are not assumed proper or irreducible.
We present a reduced Burau-like representation for the mixed braid group on one strand representing links in lens spaces and show how to calculate the Alexander polynomial of a link directly from the mixed braid.
A virtual link diagram is called {\em (mod $m$) almost classical} if it admits a (mod $m$) Alexander numbering. In \cite{BodenGaudreauHarperNicasWhite}, it is shown that Alexander polynomial for almost classical links can be defined by…
Similar to knots in S^3, any knot in a lens space has a grid diagram from which one can combinatorially compute all of its knot Floer homology invariants. We give an explicit description of the generators, differentials, and rational Maslov…