Related papers: Characterizations of contracting Hurwitz bisets

We show that, for any prime p, a knot K in the 3-sphere is determined by its p-fold cyclic unbranched covering. We also investigate when the m-fold cyclic unbranched covering of a knot coincides with the n-fold cyclic unbranched covering of…

The main theorem shows that if M is an irreducible compact connected orientable 3-manifold with non-empty boundary, then the classifying space BDiff(M rel dM) of the space of diffeomorphisms of M which restrict to the identity map on…

Hurwitz numbers count covers of curves satisfying fixed ramification data. Via monodromy representation, this counting problem can be transformed to a problem of counting factorizations in the symmetric group. This and other beautiful…

Let Y be an infinite covering space of a projective manifold M in P^N of dimension n geq 2. Let C be the intersection with M of at most n-1 generic hypersurfaces of degree d in P^N. The preimage X of C in Y is a connected submanifold. Let…

In this paper we compute the homotopy groups of the symplectomorphism groups of the 3-, 4- and 5-point blow-ups of the projective plane (considered as monotone symplectic Del Pezzo surfaces). Along the way, we need to compute the homotopy…

We develop the theory of Thurston maps that are defined everywhere on the topological sphere $S^2$ with a possible exception of a single essential singularity. We establish an analog of the celebrated W. Thurston's characterization theorem…

In this paper we study embeddings of oriented connected closed surfaces in $\mathbb S^3$. We define a complete invariant, the fundamental span, for such embeddings, generalizing the notion of the peripheral system of a knot group. From the…

We examine two questions regarding Fourier frequencies for a class of iterated function systems (IFS). These are iteration limits arising from a fixed finite families of affine and contractive mappings in $\br^d$, and the ``IFS'' refers to…

Finite topological spaces are in bijective correspondence with preorders on finite sets. We undertake their study using combinatorial tools that have been developed to investigate general discrete structures. A particular emphasis will be…

We determine the possible finite groups $G$ of symplectic automorphisms of hyperk\"ahler manifolds which are deformation equivalent to the second Hilbert scheme of a K3 surface. We prove that $G$ has such an action if, and only if, it is…

Multiparametric families of hypergeometric $\tau$-functions of KP or Toda type serve as generating functions for weighted Hurwitz numbers, providing weighted enumerations of branched covers of the Riemann sphere. A graphical interpretation…

The KP hierarchy is a completely integrable system of quadratic, partial differential equations that generalizes the KdV hierarchy. A linear combination of Schur functions is a solution to the KP hierarchy if and only if its coefficients…

Given a closed manifold N and a self-indexing Morse function f: N --> R with up to four distinct Morse indices, we construct a symplectic Lefschetz fibration pi: E --> C which models the complexification of f on the disk cotangent bundle,…

A necessary condition for uniqueness of factorizations of elements of a finite group $G$ with factors belonging to a union of some conjugacy classes of $G$ is given. This condition is sufficient if the number of factors belonging to each…

Let $M$ be a closed, orientable hyperbolic 3-manifold and $\phi$ a homomorphism of its fundamental group onto $\mathbb{Z}$ that is not induced by a fibration over the circle. For each natural number $n$ we give an explicit lower bound,…

We prove a lifting theorem for odd Frattini covers of finite groups. Using this, we characterize solvable groups and more generally p-solvable groups in terms of containing a triple of elements of distinct prime power orders with product 1.…

In a 1983 paper with Frank Warner, we proved that the space of all great circle fibrations of the 3-sphere S^3 deformation retracts to the subspace of Hopf fibrations, and so has the homotopy type of a pair of disjoint two-spheres. Since…

We show that any set of quotients with fixed Chern classes of a given coherent sheaf on a compact Kaehler manifold is bounded in a sense which we define. The result is proved by adapting Grothendieck's boundedness criterium expressed via…

Barnette and Edelson have shown that there are finitely many minimal triangulations of a connected compact 2-manifold M. Similar finiteness results are obtained for cellular partial triangulations that satisfy various girth inequality…

We prove quantitative upper bounds for the number of quadratic twists of a given elliptic curve $E/\Fp_q(C)$ over a function field over a finite field that have rank $\geq 2$, and for their average rank. The main tools are constructions and…