Related papers: A pair of Jones polynomial positivity obstructions
We prove that any pair of bivariate trinomials has at most 5 isolated roots in the positive quadrant. The best previous upper bounds independent of the polynomial degrees were much larger, e.g., 248832 (for just the non-degenerate roots)…
Recently, the properties of a binomial sum related to the multi-link inverted pendulum enumeration problem have been studied. In this note, we establish bounds for this binomial sum.
New positivity bounds are derived for generalized (off-forward) parton distributions using the impact parameter representation. These inequalities are stable under the evolution to higher normalization points. The full set of inequalities…
We establish upper bounds for the complexity of Seifert fibered manifolds with nonempty boundary. In particular, we obtain potentially sharp bounds on the complexity of torus knot complements.
A set L of links is introduced, containing positive braid links as well as arborescent positive Hopf plumbings. It is shown that for links in P, the leading and the second coefficient of the Alexander polynomial have opposite sign. It…
A long standing open conjecture states that if a link $\mathcal{K}$ is alternating, then its ropelength $L(\mathcal{K})$ is at least of the order $O(Cr(\mathcal{K}))$. A recent result shows that the maximum braid index of a link bounds the…
We study the equivariant concordance classes of two-bridge knots, providing an easy formula to compute their butterfly polynomial, and we give two different proofs that no two-bridge knot is equivariantly slice. Finally, we introduce a new…
An oriented compact 4-manifold $V$ with boundary $S^3$ is called a positon (resp. negaton) if its intersection form is positive definite (resp. negative definite) and it is simply connected. In this paper, we prove that there exist…
For $\ell >1$, we develop $L^{(2)}$-signature obstructions for $(4\ell-3)$-dimensional knots with metabelian knot groups to be doubly slice. For each $\ell>1$, we construct an infinite family of knots on which our obstructions are non-zero,…
The theory of the Kauffman bracket, which describes the Jones polynomial as a sum over closed circles formed by the planar resolution of vertices in a knot diagram, can be straightforwardly lifted from sl(2) to sl(N) at arbitrary N -- but…
It is a well known result from Thistlethwaite that the Jones polynomial of a non-split alternating link is alternating. We find the right generalization of this result to the case of non-split alternating tangles. More specifically: the…
We prove an upper bound of the form $2^{O(d^2 \mathrm{polylog}\,d)}$ on the number of affine (resp. linear) equivalence classes of, by increasing order of generality, 2-level d-polytopes, d-cones and d-configurations. This in particular…
We prove that many pretzel knots of the form $P(2n,m,-2n\pm1,-m)$ are not topologically slice, even though their positive mutants $P(2n, -2n\pm1, m, -m)$ are ribbon. We use the sliceness obstruction of Kirk and Livingston related to the…
We prove an upper bound on the trace of any 2-positive, trace-preserving map in terms of its smallest eigenvalue. We show that this spectral bound is tight, and that 2-positivity is necessary for this inequality to hold in general.…
A partial order on prime knots can be defined by declaring $J\ge K$ if there exists an epimorphism from the knot group of $J$ onto the knot group of $K$. Suppose that $J$ is a 2-bridge knot that is strictly greater than $m$ distinct,…
We give exponential upper bounds for $P(S \le k)$, in particular $P(S=0)$, where $S$ is a sum of indicator random variables that are positively associated. These bounds allow, in particular, a comparison with the independent case. We give…
It has been conjectured that the algebraic crossing number of a link is uniquely determined in minimal braid representation. This conjecture is true for many classes of knots and links. The Morton-Franks-Williams inequality gives a lower…
The slope conjecture proposed by Garoufalidis asserts that the Jones slopes given by the sequence of degrees of the colored Jones polynomials are boundary slopes. We verify the slope conjecture for graph knots, i.e. knots whose Gromov…
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…
We classify 3-braid knots whose topological 4-genus coincides with their Seifert genus, using McCoy's twisting method and the Xu normal form. In addition, we give upper bounds for the topological 4-genus of positive and strongly…