Related papers: Stein trisections and homotopy 4-balls

In this note we prove that, for any integer n, there exist a smooth 4-manifold, homotopic to a K3 surface, defined by applying the link surgery method of Fintushel-Stern to a certain 2-component graph link, which admits n inequivalent…

It is shown that the unit ball in ${\mathbb C}^n$ is the only complex manifold that can universally cover both Stein and non-Stein strictly pseudoconvex domains.

In relation to the 4-dimensional smooth Poincar\'e conjecture we construct a tentative invariant of homotopy 4-spheres using embedded contact homology (ECH) and Seiberg-Witten theory (SWF). But for good reason it is a constant value…

We construct infinitely many smooth 4-manifolds which are homotopy equivalent to $S^2$ but do not admit a spine, i.e., a piecewise-linear embedding of $S^2$ which realizes the homotopy equivalence. This is the remaining case in the…

We prove that a Weinstein domain symplectically embedded in a closed symplectic manifold always admits symplectic hypersurfaces in its complement, possibly after a deformation. As a consequence, we obtain an obstruction for a closed…

We give an explicit construction of special strongly pseudoconvex domains in C^n of handlebody type, i.e., domains which are small tubes surrounding the union of a quadratic strongly pseudoconvex domain with an attached totally real handle.…

The topology of Stein surfaces and contact 3-manifolds is studied by means of handle decompositions. A simple characterization of homeomorphism types of Stein surfaces is obtained --- they correspond to open handlebodies with all handles of…

We study exotic smoothings of open 4-manifolds using the minimal genus function and its analog for end homology. While traditional techniques in open 4-manifold smoothing theory give no control of minimal genera, we make progress by using…

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…

From any 4-dimensional oriented handlebody X without 3- and 4-handles and with b_2>0, we construct arbitrary many compact Stein 4-manifolds which are mutually homeomorphic but not diffeomorphic to each other, so that their topological…

We generalise theorems of Khodorovskiy and Park-Park-Shin, and give new topological proofs of those theorems, using embedded surfaces in the 4-ball and branched double covers. These theorems exhibit smooth codimension-zero embeddings of…

Any two homologous surfaces of the same genus embedded in a smooth 4-manifold X with simply-connected complements are shown to be smoothly isotopic in the connected sum of X and the product of a 2-sphere with itself, if the surfaces are…

The stable Andrews-Curtis conjecture in combinatorial group theory is the statement that every balanced presentation of the trivial group can be simplified to the trivial form by elementary moves corresponding to "handle-slides" together…

Let $X$ be any rational ruled symplectic four-manifold. Given a symplectic embedding $\iota:B_{c}\into X$ of the standard ball of capacity $c$ into $X$, consider the corresponding symplectic blow-up $\tX_{\iota}$. In this paper, we study…

This paper provides a diffeomorphism classification of smooth manifolds homeomorphic to the complex projective space $\mathbb{C}P^m$ for $m \in \{5, 6, 7, 8\}$. The classification is obtained by computing the group of concordance classes of…

An odd-dimensional differentiable manifold is called \emph{holomorphically fillable} if it is diffeomorphic to the boundary of a compact strongly pseudoconvex complex manifold, \emph{Stein fillable} if this last manifold may be chosen to be…

We provide sufficient conditions assuring that a suitably decorated 2-polyhedron can be thickened to a compact 4-dimensional Stein domain. We also study a class of flat polyhedra in 4-manifolds and find conditions assuring that they admit…

We prove that every locally conformally flat metric on a closed, oriented hyperbolic 4-manifold with scalar curvature bounded below by -12 satisfies Schoen's conjecture. We also classify all closed Riemannian 4-manifolds of positive scalar…

Weinstein trisection is a trisection of a symplectic 4-manifold whose 1-handlebodies are the Weinstein domain for the symplectic structure induced from an ambient manifold. Lambert-Cole, Meier, and Starkston showed that every closed…

The aim of this article is to introduce invariants of oriented, smooth, closed four-manifolds, built using the Floer homology theories defined in two earlier papers (math.SG/0101206 and math.SG/0105202). This four-dimensional theory also…