Related papers: Braid representatives minimizing the number of sim…
A well-known algorithm for unknotting knots involves traversing a knot diagram and changing each crossing that is first encountered from below. The minimal number of crossings changed in this way across all diagrams for a knot is called the…
A method to obtain explicit and complete topological solution of SU(2) Chern-Simons theory on $S^3$ is developed. To this effect the necessary aspects of the theory of coloured-oriented braids and duality properties of conformal blocks for…
For a knot K, let b_n(K) be the minimum length of an n-stranded braid representative of K. Examples of knots exist for which b_n(K) is a non-increasing function. We investigate the behavior of b_n(K). We develop bounds on the function in…
Minimum braids are a complete invariant of knots and links. This paper defines minimum braids, describes how they can be generated, presents tables for knots up to ten crossings and oriented links up to nine crossings, and uses minimum…
For a knot $K$ in $S^3$, the $sl_2$-colored Jones function $J_K(n)$ is a sequence of Laurent polynomials in the variable $t$, which is known to satisfy non-trivial linear recurrence relations. The operator corresponding to the minimal…
We analyze relationships between quantum computation and a family of generalizations of the Jones polynomial. Extending recent work by Aharonov et al., we give efficient quantum circuits for implementing the unitary Jones-Wenzl…
We describe an alternative way of computing Alexander polynomials of knots/links, based on the Artin representation of the corresponding braids by automorphisms of a free group. Then we apply the same method to other representations of…
We use the relation between the quantum su(2) R-matrix and the Burau representation of the braid group in order to study the structure of the colored Jones polynomial of links. We show that similarly to the case of a knot, the colored Jones…
We construct a quantum algorithm to approximate efficiently the colored Jones polynomial of the plat presentation of any oriented link L at a fixed root of unity q. Our construction is based on SU(2) Chern-Simons topological quantum field…
Using a simple recurrence relation we give a new method to compute Jones polynomials of closed braids: we find a general expansion formula and a rational generating function for Jones polynomials. The method is used to estimate degree of…
A model of random walk on knot diagrams is used to study the Alexander polynomial and the colored Jones polynomial of knots. In this context, the inverse of the Alexander polynomial of a knot plays the role of an Ihara-Selberg zeta function…
We calculate Jones polynomials $V(H_r,t)$ for a family of alternating knots and links $H_r$ with arbitrarily many crossings $r$, by computing the Tutte polynomials $T(G_+(H_r),x,y)$ for the associated graphs $G_+(H_r)$ and evaluating these…
The colored HOMFLY polynomials, which describe Wilson loop averages in Chern-Simons theory, possess an especially simple representation for torus knots, which begins from quantum R-matrix and ends up with a trivially-looking split W…
Unknotting numbers for torus knots and links are well known. In this paper, we present a method for determining the position of unknotting number crossing changes in a toric braid B(p, q) such that the closure of the resultant braid is…
The purpose of the paper is two-fold: to introduce a multivariable creative telescoping method, and to apply it in a problem of Quantum Topology: namely the computation of the non-commutative $A$-polynomial of twist knots. Our multivariable…
We present experimental results approximating the Jones polynomial using 4 qubits in a liquid state nuclear magnetic resonance quantum information processor. This is the first experimental implementation of a complete problem for the…
We study the head and tail of the colored Jones polynomial while focusing mainly on alternating links. Various ways to compute the colored Jones polynomial for a given link give rise to combinatorial identities for those power series. We…
A special class of braids, called woven, is introduced and it is shown that every conjugation class of the braid group contains woven braids. In consequence, links can be presented as plats or closures of woven braids. Restricting on knots,…
We propose a new non-commutative generalization of the representation variety and the character variety of a knot group. Our strategy is to reformulate the construction of the algebra of functions on the space of representations in terms of…
In these notes we review the calculation of Jones polynomials using a matrix representation of the braid group and Temperley-Lieb algebra. The pseudounitary representation that we consider allows constructing ``states'' from the…