Related papers: Property G and the $4$--genus

We prove that, like the Seiberg-Witten monopole homology, the Heegaard Floer homology for a three-manifold determines its Thurston norm. As a consequence, we show that knot Floer homology detects the genus of a knot. This leads to new…

We construct examples of smooth 4-dimensional manifolds M supporting a locally CAT(0)-metric, whose universal cover X satisfy Hruska's isolated flats condition, and contain 2-dimensional flats F with the property that the boundary at…

Let $T$ be a torus of dimension $n>1$ and $M$ a compact $T-$manifold. $M$ is a GKM manifold if the set of zero dimensional orbits in the orbit space $M/T$ is zero dimensional and the set of one dimensional orbits in $M/T$ is one…

We consider the question of when the operation of contact surgery with positive surgery coefficient, along a knot $K$ in a contact 3-manifold $Y$, gives rise to a weakly fillable contact structure. We show that this happens if and only if…

For a knot $K$ in the 3-sphere and a simply connected closed 4-manifold $X$, we define the $X$-double slice genus of $K$, extending the notion from the case when $X$ is the 4-sphere. We show that for each integer $n$, there exists an…

We compare N=2 string and N=4 topological string within the framework of the sigma model approach. Being classically equivalent on a flat background, the theories are shown to lead to different geometries when put in a curved space. In…

By considering negative surgeries on a knot $K$ in $S^3$, we derive a lower bound to the non-orientable slice genus $\gamma_4(K)$ in terms of the signature $\sigma(K)$ and the concordance invariants $V_i(\overline{K})$, which strengthens a…

We prove that for arbitrary g, there is a surface K of genus g embedded in S4, which has finitely many extendable self-homeomorphisms' action on H1(K,Z), by defining a norm on H1(K,Z) and proving its additivity.

Let $S \subset \mathbb{P}^g$ be a smooth $K3$ surface of degree $2g-2$, $g \geq 3$. We classify all the cases for which $h^0(\mathcal{N}_{S/\mathbb{P}^g}(-2)) \neq 0$ and the cases for which $h^0(\mathcal{N}_{S/\mathbb{P}^g}(-2)) <…

Let $k_0$ be a field of characteristic $0$ with algebraic closure $k$. Let $G$ be a connected reductive $k$-group, and let $Y$ be a spherical variety over $k$ (a spherical homogeneous space or a spherical embedding). Let $G_0$ be a…

Let K be a non-trivial knot in the 3-sphere and let Y(r) be the 3-manifold obtained by surgery on K with surgery-coefficient a rational number r. We show that there is a homomorphism from the fundamental group of Y(r) to SU(2) with…

Any smooth, closed oriented 4-manifold has a surface diagram of arbitrarily high genus g>2 that specifies it up to diffeomorphism. The goal of this paper is to prove the following statement: For any smooth, closed oriented 4-manifold M,…

We study the structure underlying Ng's conjecture, which relates the degree $0$ abelian knot contact homology of a knot $K$ to the coordinate ring of the $SL_2(\mathbf{C})$-character variety $X(\Sigma_2 K)$ of the $2$-fold branched cover of…

Given a link L in the 3-sphere, we ask whether the components of L bound disjoint, nullhomologous disks properly embedded in a simply-connected positive-definite smooth 4-manifold; the knot case has been studied extensively in work of…

Turaev defined a function on the first homology of a rational homology 3-sphere $Y$ as the minimal rational Seifert genus of all knots in this homology class. Ni and the first author discovered a lower bound of this function using the…

We provide three 3-dimensional characterizations of the Z-slice genus of a knot, the minimal genus of a locally-flat surface in 4-space cobounding the knot whose complement has cyclic fundamental group: in terms of balanced algebraic…

We produce a rational homology 3-sphere that does not smoothly bound either a positive or negative definite 4-manifold. Such a 3-manifold necessarily cannot be rational homology cobordant to a Seifert fibered space or any 3-manifold…

Numerous structural findings of homology manifolds have been derived in various ways in relation to $g_2$-values. The homology $4$-manifolds with $g_2\leq 5$ are characterized combinatorially in this article. It is well-known that all…

We outline the current state of knowledge regarding geometric inequalities of systolic type, and prove new results, including systolic freedom in dimension 4. Namely, every compact, orientable, smooth 4-manifold X admits metrics of…

We investigate the computational complexity of some problems in three-dimensional topology and geometry. We show that the problem of determining a bound on the genus of a knot in a 3-manifold, is NP-complete. Using similar ideas, we show…