Related papers: Non-realizability of some big mapping class groups

We prove a well known conjecture of Nikolai Ivanov which states that if $X$ is a surface of genus $\geq 3$ (with any number of punctures and boundary components), $\rm{Mod}(X)$ is the mapping class group of $X$, and $K < \rm{Mod}(X)$ is a…

We prove that if a normal subgroup of the extended mapping class group of a closed surface has an element of sufficiently small support then its automorphism group and abstract commensurator group are both isomorphic to the extended mapping…

The Nielsen Realization problem asks when the group homomorphism from Diff(M) to pi_0 Diff(M) admits a section. For M a closed surface, Kerckhoff proved that a section exists over any finite subgroup, but Morita proved that if the genus is…

We show that mapping class groups of surfaces of genus at least two contain elements of infinite order that are not conjugate to their inverses, but whose powers have bounded torsion lengths. In particular every homogeneous…

A complex of incompressible surfaces in a handlebody is constructed so that it contains, as a subcomplex, the complex of curves of the boundary of the handlebody. For genus 2 handlebodies, the group of automorphisms of this complex is used…

For $\Sigma$ an orientable surface of finite topological type having genus at least 3 (possibly closed or possibly with any number of punctures or boundary components), we show that the mapping class group $Mod(\Sigma)$ has no faithful…

We show that no minimal vertex triangulation of a closed, connected, orientable 2-manifold of genus 6 admits a polyhedral embedding in R^3. We also provide examples of minimal vertex triangulations of closed, connected, orientable…

A crosscap transposition is an element of the mapping class group of a nonorientable surface represented by a homeomorphism supported on a one-holed Klein bottle and swapping two crosscaps. We prove that the mapping class group of a compact…

Finite presentations for the mapping class group M(F) are known for arbitrary orientable compact surface F. If F is non-orientable, then such presentations are known only when F has genus at most 3 and few boundary components. In this paper…

Given a finite subgroup G of the mapping class group of a surface S, the Nielsen realization problem asks whether G can be realized as a finite group of homeomorphisms of S. In 1983, Kerckhoff showed that for S a finite-type surface, any…

By recognizing them as fundamental groups of developable complexes of groups we prove that mapping class groups of compact orientable surfaces have finite asymptotic dimension.

We study smooth proper embeddings of compact orientable surfaces in compact orientable $4$-manifolds and elements in the mapping class group of that surface which are induced by diffeomorphisms of the ambient $4$-manifolds. We call such…

We prove that rationally essential manifolds with suitably large fundamental groups do not admit any maps of non-zero degree from products of closed manifolds of positive dimension. Particular examples include all manifolds of non-positive…

In this article, we study the smooth mapping class group of a surface S relative to a given Cantor set, that is the group of isotopy classes of orientation-preserving smooth diffeomorphisms of S which preserve this Cantor set. When the…

We explicitly construct new subgroups of the mapping class groups of an uncountable collection of infinite-type surfaces, including, but not limited to, free groups, Baumslag-Solitar groups, mapping class groups of other surfaces, and a…

We prove that the first integral cohomology of pure mapping class groups of infinite type genus one surfaces is trivial. For genus zero surfaces we prove that not every homomorphism to $\mathbb{Z}$ factors through a sphere with finitely…

We prove the existence of finite groups of orientation-preserving homeomorphisms of some closed orientable surface $S$ that act freely and which extends as a group of homeomorphisms of some compact orientable $3$-manifold with boundary $S$,…

We show that the closure of the compactly supported mapping class group of an infinite type surface is not perfect and that its abelianization contains a direct summand isomorphic to an uncountable direct sum of rationals. We also extend…

In arXiv:1008.3825, Totaro gave examples of a K3 surface such that its automorphism group is not commensurable with an arithmetic group, answering a question of Mazur. We give examples of rational surfaces with the same property. Our…

We produce for each natural number $n \geq 3$ two 1--parameter families of Riemann surfaces admitting automorphism groups with two cyclic subgroups $H_{1}$ and $H_{2}$ of orden $2^{n}$, that are conjugate in the group of…