Related papers: Getting a handle on the Conway knot

In this paper, we standardize a homotopy $4$-sphere constructed by Dunfield and Gong. As a corollary, we show that the $18$-crossing knot $18_{\text{nh}00000601}$, which is not known to be ribbon, is slice in the standard $4$-ball. Thus,…

This paper, to be regularly updated, lists those prime knots with the fewest possible number of crossings for which values of basic knot invariants, such as the unknotting number or the smooth 4-genus, are unknown. This list is being…

Define a ``slice'' curve as the intersection of a plane with the surface of a polytope, i.e., a convex polyhedron in three dimensions. We prove that a slice curve develops on a plane without self-intersection. The key tool used is a…

In 1979, Hartley and Kawauchi proved that the Conway polynomial of a strongly negative amphichiral knot factors as $f(z)f(-z)$. In this paper, we normalize the factor $f(z)$ to define the half-Conway polynomial. First, we prove that the…

Any knot in $S^3$ may be reduced to a slice knot by crossing changes. Indeed, this slice knot can be taken to be the unknot. In this paper we study the question of when the same holds for knots in homology spheres. We show that a knot in a…

We prove that the $(2,1)$-cable of the figure-eight knot is not smoothly slice by showing that its branched double cover bounds no equivariant homology ball.

The alternating knots, links and twists projected on the $S_2$ sphere were identified with the phase space of a Hamiltonian dynamic system of one degree of freedom. The saddles of the system correspond to the crossings, the edges correspond…

According to work of Hartley and Kawauchi in 1979 and 1980, the Conway Polynomial of all negative amphicheiral knots and strongly positive amphicheiral knots factors as $\phi(z)\phi(-z)$ for some $\phi(z)\in\mathbb Z[z]$. Moreover, a 2012…

A quadrisecant line is one which intersects a curve in at least four points, while an essential secant captures something about the knottedness of a knot. This survey article gives a brief history of these ideas, and shows how they may be…

We apply Bayesian optimization and reinforcement learning to a problem in topology: the question of when a knot bounds a ribbon disk. This question is relevant in an approach to disproving the four-dimensional smooth Poincar\'e conjecture;…

We show that perturbing the definition of sl(n) Khovanov-Rozansky link homology gives a lower bound on the slice genus of a knot. As a corollary this yields another proof of Milnor's conjecture on the slice genus of torus knots.

The topological underpinnings are presented for a new algorithm which answers the question: `Is a given knot the unknot?' The algorithm uses the braid foliation technology of Bennequin and of Birman and Menasco. The approach is to consider…

Frame-spun knots are constructed by spinning a knot of lower dimension about a framed submanifold of S^n. We show that all frame-spun knots are slice (null-cobordant).

The existence of topologically slice knots that are of infinite order in the knot concordance group followed from Freedman's work on topological surgery and Donaldson's gauge theoretic approach to 4-manifolds. Here, as an application of…

The lattice stick number of a knot type is defined to be the minimal number of straight line segments required to construct a polygon presentation of the knot type in the cubic lattice. In this paper, we mathematically prove that the…

We show that the difference between the topological 4-genus of a knot and the minimal genus of a surface bounded by that knot that can be decomposed into a smooth concordance followed by an algebraically simple locally flat surface can be…

We prove the existence of a smoothly doubly slice, amphicheiral knot with Alexander polynomial 1 and unknotting number 5.

The slicing degree of a knot $K$ is defined as the smallest integer $k$ such that $K$ is $k$-slice in $\#^n \overline{\mathbb{CP}^2}$ for some $n$. In this paper, we establish bounds for the slicing degrees of knots using Rasmussen's…

We introduce and study the notion of equivariant $\mathbb{Q}$-sliceness for strongly invertible knots. On the constructive side, we prove that every Klein amphichiral knot, which is a strongly invertible knot admitting a compatible negative…

We study the double slice genus of a knot, a natural generalization of slice genus. We define a notion called band number, a natural generalization of band unknotting number, and prove it is an upper bound on double slice genus. Our bound…