Related papers: Nonsmooth manifold decompositions

We introduce a simple cut-and-paste mechanism to construct both orientable and nonorientable four-manifolds from a given initial one. This mechanism alters the fundamental group while preserving other essential topological invariants. It…

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 study the structure of the smooth manifold which is defined as the intersection of a stable manifold and an unstable manifold for an invariant Morse-Smale function.

Some generalizations and variations of the Fintushel-Stern rim surgery are known to produce smoothly knotted surfaces. We show that if the fundamental groups of their complements are cyclic, then these surfaces are topologically unknotted.…

We study scaling function geometry. We show the existence of the scaling function of a geometrically finite one-dimensional mapping. This scaling function is discontinuous. We prove that the scaling function and the asymmetries at the…

We introduce a new generalization of Gompf nuclei and give applications. We construct infinitely many exotic smooth structures for a large class of compact 4-manifolds with boundary, regarding topological invariants. We prove that a large…

We construct smooth manifolds with order two $\pi_1$ and even intersection forms which are irreducible, meaning they do not decompose into non-trivial connected sums. Their intersection forms being even implies that their universal covers…

We introduce an information-theoretic framework for smooth structures on topological manifolds, replacing coordinate charts with small-scale entropy data of local probability probes. A concise set of axioms identifies admissible coordinate…

We describe an extension of Morse theory to smooth functions on compact Riemannian manifolds, without any nondegeneracy assumptions except that the critical locus must have only finitely many connected components.

We define a diffeomorphism invariant of smooth 4-manifolds which we can estimate for many smoothings of R^4 and other smooth 4-manifolds. Using this invariant we can show that uncountably many smoothings of R^4 support no Stein structure.…

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…

We give a survey of geometric approaches to the topological 4-dimensional surgery and 5-dimensional s-cobordism conjectures, with a focus on the study of surfaces in 4-manifolds. The geometric lemma underlying these conjectures is a…

An invariant of orientable 3-manifolds is defined by taking the minimum $n$ such that a given 3-manifold embeds in the connected sum of $n$ copies of $S^2 \times S^2$, and we call this $n$ the embedding number of the 3-manifold. We give…

It is proved that any smooth manifold $\mathcal M$ of dimension $m$ admits a smooth polynomially convex embedding into $\mathbb C^n$ when $n\geq \lfloor 5m/4\rfloor$. Further, such embeddings are dense in the space of smooth maps from…

We present several structural results on closed, nonorientable, smooth $4$--manifolds, extending analogous results and machinery for the orientable case. We prove the existence of simplified broken Lefschetz fibrations and simplified…

The present paper mainly presents, for example, explicit classifications of compact smooth manifolds having non-empty boundaries and simple structures where the dimensions are general. Studies of this type is fundamental and important. They…

We use Furuta's result, usually referred to as ``10/8-conjecture'', to show that for any compact 3-manifold $M$ the open manifold $M\times\r$ has infinitely many different smooth structures. Another consequence of Furuta's result is…

Given an injective amalgam at the level of fundamental groups and a specific 3-manifold, is there a corresponding geometric-topological decomposition of a given 4-manifold, in a stable sense? We find an algebraic-topological splitting…

This article is the third part of the series of articles where the theory of valuations on manifolds is constructed. In math.MG/0503399 the notion of a smooth valuation on a manifold was introduced. The goal of this article is to put a…

This survey aims to provide a guide to the literature on topological 4-manifolds. Foundational theorems on 4-manifolds are stated, especially in the topological category. Precise references are given, with indications of the strategies…