Related papers: Algebraic Mapping Class Group Rigidity

Let G be a connected, compact, semisimple Lie group. It is known that for a compact closed orientable surface $\Sigma$ of genus $l >1$, the order of the group $H^2(\Sigma,\pi_1(G))$ is equal to the number of connected components of the…

We describe the isometry group of $L^2(\Omega, M)$ for Riemannian manifolds $M$ of dimension at least two with irreducible universal cover. We establish a rigidity result for the isometries of these spaces: any isometry arises from an…

Let $S$ be a closed oriented surface and $G$ a finite group of orientation preserving automorphisms of $S$ whose orbit space has genus at least $2$. There is a natural group homomorphism from the $G$-centralizer in $Diff^+(S)$ to the…

The odd character variety of a Riemann surface is a moduli space of SO(3) representations of the fundamental group which can be interpreted as the moduli space of stable holomorphic rank 2 bundles of odd degree and fixed determinant. This…

Let $g$ be a non-negative integer, $\Sigma _g$ a closed orientable surface of genus $g$, and $\mathcal{M}_g$ its mapping class group. We classify all the group homomorphisms $\pi _1(\Sigma _g)\to G$ up to the action of $\mathcal{M}_g$ on…

In this paper we study characters on special linear groups SL_n(R), where R is either an infinite field or the localization of an order in a number field. We give several applications to the theory of measure preserving actions,…

Let S be a compact orientable surface with genus g and n boundary components d_1,...,d_n. Let b = (b_1, ..., b_n) where b_n lies in [-2,2]. Then the mapping class group of S acts on the relative SU(2)-character variety X comprising…

We prove a topological rigidity result for simple, thick, hyperbolic P-manifolds of dimension 2: isomorphism of the fundamental groups implies homeomorphism of the P-manifolds. An immediate application is a diagram rigidity theorem for…

We define a family of groups that include the mapping class group of a genus g surface with one boundary component and the integral symplectic group Sp(2g,Z). We then prove that these groups are finitely generated. These groups, which we…

For a locally finite, connected graph $\Gamma$, let $\operatorname{Map}(\Gamma)$ denote the group of proper homotopy equivalences of $\Gamma$ up to proper homotopy. Excluding sporadic cases, we show $\operatorname{Aut}(S(M_\Gamma)) \cong…

We introduce a natural stratification of the space of projective classes of measured laminations on a complete hyperbolic surface of finite area. We prove a rigidity result, namely, the group of self-homeomorphisms of the space of…

We consider a surface $\Sigma$ of genus $g \geq 3$, either closed or with exactly one puncture. The mapping class group $\Gamma$ of $\Sigma$ acts symplectically on the abelian moduli space $M = \Hom(\pi_1(\Sigma), U(1)) =…

The closure of a braid in a closed orientable surface $\Sigma$ is a link in $\Sigma\times S^1$. We classify such closed surface braids up to isotopy and homeomorphism (with a small indeterminacy for isotopy of closed sphere braids),…

The homology groups of the automorphism group of a free group are known to stabilize as the number of generators of the free group goes to infinity, and this paper relativizes this result to a family of groups that can be defined in terms…

We describe the topological behavior of the conjugacy action of the mapping class group of an orientable infinite-type surface $\Sigma$ on itself. Our main results are: (1) All conjugacy classes of $MCG(\Sigma)$ are meager for every…

The strong symmetric genus of a finite group is the minimum genus of a compact Riemann surface on which the group acts as a group of automorphisms preserving orientation. A characterization of the infinite number of groups with strong…

The focus of this paper is the study of the moduli space of representations of fundamental groupoids of surfaces $\Sigma$ with boundaries with values in $G:=GL_n(\mathbb C)$. In absence of marked points on the boundary, this moduli space is…

We consider orientation-preserving actions of finite groups $G$ on pairs $(S^3, \Sigma)$, where $\Sigma$ denotes a compact connected surface embedded in $S^3$. In a previous paper, we considered the case of closed, necessarily orientable…

The group of 2-by-2 matrices with integer entries and determinant $\pm > 1$ can be identified either with the group of outer automorphisms of a rank two free group or with the group of isotopy classes of homeomorphisms of a 2-dimensional…

In this paper, we survey recent works on the structure of the mapping class groups of surfaces mainly from the point of view of topology. We then discuss several possible directions for future research. These include the relation between…