Related papers: Handle decompositions for a class of closed orient…

We show that there exists an algorithm that takes as input two closed, simply connected, topological 4-manifolds and decides whether or not these 4-manifolds are homeomorphic. In particular, we explain in detail how closed, simply…

For oriented manifolds of dimension at least 4 that are simply connected at infinity, it is known that end summing is a uniquely defined operation. Calcut and Haggerty showed that more complicated fundamental group behavior at infinity can…

Let $M$ be a smooth, orientable, closed, connected $4$-manifold and suppose that $H_1(M;\mathbb{Z})$ is finitely generated and has no $2$-torsion. We give a homotopy decomposition of the suspension of $M$ in terms of spheres, Moore spaces…

Two constructions of contact manifolds are presented: (i) products of S^1 with manifolds admitting a suitable decomposition into two exact symplectic pieces and (ii) fibre connected sums along isotropic circles. Baykur has found a…

A double pants decomposition of a 2-dimensional surface is a collection of two pants decomposition of this surface introduced in arXiv:1005.0073v2. There are two natural operations acting on double pants decompositions: flips and handle…

We consider finite group-actions on closed, orientable and nonorientable 3-manifolds; such a finite group-action leaves invariant the two handlebodies of a Heegaard splitting of M of some genus g. The maximal possible order of a finite…

We prove that a type II$_1$ factor $M$ can have at most one Cartan subalgebra $A$ satisfying a combination of rigidity and compact approximation properties. We use this result to show that within the class $\Cal H \Cal T$ of factors $M$…

According to seminal work of Kontsevich, the unstable homology of the mapping class group of a surface can be computed via the homology of a certain lie algebra. In a recent paper, S. Morita analyzed the abelianization of this lie algebra,…

We provide new branched covering representations for bounded and/or non-compact 4-manifolds, which extend the known ones for closed 4-manifolds. Assuming $M$ to be a connected oriented PL 4-manifold, our main results are the following: (1)…

We present several structural results on closed, nonorientable, smooth $4$--manifolds, extending analogous results and machinery for the orientable case. We prove the existence of simplified broken Lefschetz fibrations and simplified…

We show that every positive definite closed 4-manifold with $b_2^+>1$ and without 1-handles has a vanishing stable cohomotopy Seiberg-Witten invariant, and thus admits no symplectic structure. We also show that every closed oriented…

We classify topological $4$-manifolds with boundary and fundamental group $\mathbb{Z}$, under some assumptions on the boundary. We apply this to classify surfaces in simply-connected $4$-manifolds with $S^3$ boundary, where the fundamental…

We show that the homotopy type of a finite oriented Poincar\'{e} 4-complex is determined by its quadratic 2-type provided its fundamental group is finite and has a dihedral Sylow 2-subgroup. By combining with results of Hambleton-Kreck and…

We consider the homotopy types of $PD_4$-complexes $X$ with fundamental group $\pi$ such that $c.d.\pi=2$ and $\pi$ has one end. Let $\beta=\beta_2(\pi;F_2)$ and $w=w_1(X)$. Our main result is that (modulo two technical conditions on…

We introduce the concept of a handlebody decomposition of a 3-manifold, a generalization of a Heegaard splitting, or a trisection. We show that two handlebody decompositions of a closed orientable 3-manifold are stably equivalent. As an…

We classify projective terminalizations of quotients of Fano varieties of lines on smooth cubic fourfolds by finite groups of symplectic automorphisms of the underlying cubic. We compute the second Betti number and the fundamental group of…

The purpose of this paper is to produce restrictions on fundamental groups of manifolds admitting good complexifications by proving the following Cheeger-Gromoll type splitting theorem: Any closed manifold $M$ admitting a good…

Internal stabilization adds a trivial handle to an embedded surface in a coordinate chart. It is known that any pair of smoothly knotted surfaces in a simply-connected $4$-manifold become smoothly isotopic after sufficiently many internal…

We introduce the $2$-nodal spherical deformation of certain singular fibers of genus $2$ fibrations, and use such deformations to construct various examples of simply connected minimal symplectic $4$-manifolds with small topology. More…

We call a closed, connected, orientable manifold in one of the categories TOP, PL or DIFF chiral if it does not admit an orientation-reversing automorphism and amphicheiral otherwise. Moreover, we call a manifold strongly chiral if it does…