Related papers: One stabilization is not enough for contractible 4…

We prove that many simply connected symplectic four-manifolds dissolve after connected sum with only one copy of $S^{2}\times S^{2}$. For any finite group G that acts freely on the three-sphere we construct closed smooth four-manifolds with…

For any finitely presentable group $G$, we show the existence of an isolated complex surface singularity link which admits infinitely many exotic Stein fillings such that the fundamental group of each filling is isomorphic to $G$. We also…

This paper investigates the exotic phenomena exhibited by links of disconnected surfaces with boundary that are properly embedded in the 4-ball. Our main results provide two different constructions of exotic pairs of surface links that are…

Lickorish has constructed large families of contractible 4--manifolds that have knotted embeddings in the 4--sphere and has also shown that every finitely presented perfect group with balanced presentation occurs as the fundamental group of…

For every $k \geq 2$ and $n \geq 2$ we construct $n$ pairwise homotopically inequivalent simply-connected, closed $4k$-dimensional manifolds, all of which are stably diffeomorphic to one another. Each of these manifolds has hyperbolic…

We construct $G$-corks for any extension $G$ of $\mathbb Z^m$ by any finite subgroup of $\mathrm{SO}(4)$ and weakly equivariant $G$-corks for any extension $G$ of $\mathbb Z^m$ by any finite solvable group. In particular, this is the first…

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…

Kreck's modified surgery theory reduces the classification of closed, connected 4-manifolds, up to connect sum with some number of copies of $S^2\times S^2$, to a series of bordism questions. We implement this in the case of unorientable…

For 5 <= k <= 8 we show that the infinite family of exotic smooth structures on CP^2# k(-CP^2) can be achieved by 1/n - surgeries on a single embedded nullhomologous torus in a manifold R_k which is homeomorphic to CP^2# k(-CP^2).

For the purposes of this paper, Dehn surgery along a curve K in a 3-manifold M with slope r is `exceptional' if the resulting 3-manifold M_K(r) is reducible or a solid torus, or the core of the surgery solid torus has finite order in the…

Kreck proved that two $2q$-manifolds are stably diffeomorphic if and only if they admit normally bordant normal $(q-1)$-smoothings over the same normal $(q-1)$-type $(B,\xi)$. We show that stable diffeomorphism can be replaced by…

Let $p^k m^2$ be an odd perfect number with special prime $p$. In this article, we provide an alternative proof for the biconditional that $\sigma(m^2) \equiv 1 \pmod 4$ holds if and only if $p \equiv k \pmod 8$. We then give an application…

We describe a construction procedure of infinite sets of $2$-links in closed simply connected 4-manifolds that are topologically isotopic, smoothly inequivalent and componentwise topologically unknotted. These 2-links are the first examples…

We show that any simply connected topological closed $4$-manifold punctured along any compact, totally disconnected tame subset $\Lambda$ admits a continuum of smoothings which are not diffeomorphic to any leaf of a $C^{1,0}$ codimension…

We show that the group of homeomorphisms of a compact contractible $d$-manifold which fix the boundary is contractible, as long as $d \geq 6$. We deduce this from a strong uniqueness statement for one-sided $h$-cobordisms.

On a 4-dimensional compact symplectic manifold, we study how suitable perturbations of a toric system to a family of completely integrable systems with $\mathbb{S}^1$-symmetry lead to various hyperbolic-regular singularities. We compute and…

We consider a family of corks, denoted $W_n$, constructed by Akbulut and Yasui. Each cork gives rise to an exotic structure on a smooth 4-manifold via a twist $\tau$ on its boundary $\Sigma_n = \partial W_n$. We compute the instanton Floer…

In 2014 the author showed that in the three-dimensional spherical space, alongside with three classical types of flexible octahedra constructed by Bricard, there exists a new type of flexible octahedra, which was called exotic. In the…

In this paper we prove that if S is a smooth, irreducible, projective, rational, complex surface and D an effective, connected, reduced divisor on S, then the pair (S,D) is contractible if the log-Kodaira dimension of the pair is $-\infty$.…

We prove that any two smooth h-cobordant simply-connected 4-manifolds can be obtained by taking two manifolds with boundary, one of which is contractible, and gluing them along the boundary via two different attaching maps.