Related papers: An Unexpected Rational Blowdown

For a smoothing Y of a 2-dimensional cyclic quotient singularity X, we construct a simple handle decomposition of Y by using a particular birational map from Y to the projective plane. The manifold Y is built up from the product of an…

The main result is that an s-cobordism (topological or smooth) of 4-manifolds has a product structure outside a ``core'' sub s-cobordism. These cores are arranged to have quite a bit of structure, for example they are smooth and abstractly…

Real blow-ups and more refined "zooms" play a key role in the analysis of singularities of complex-analytic differential modules. They do not change the underlying topology, but the uniform structure. This suggests to revisit the cohomology…

We construct the first smooth bubbling geometries using the Weyl formalism. The solutions are obtained from Einstein theory coupled to a two-form gauge field in six dimensions with two compact directions. We classify the charged Weyl…

We construct a generalization of the Dolbeault-Grothendieck resolution on a singular complex space. The same construction yields, for each morphism of analytic spaces, a pullback mapping between the respective Dolbeault-Grothendieck…

We show that every smooth, closed, orientable 4-manifold X admits a special kind of handlebody decomposition that we call horizontal. We classify the closed 4-manifolds with the simplest horizontal decompositions and we describe all such…

Silicene consists of a monolayer of silicon atoms in a buckled honeycomb structure. It was recently discovered that the symmetry of such a system allows for interesting Rashba spin-orbit effects. A perpendicular electric field is able to…

We establish that Hitchin's connection exist for any rigid holomorphic family of Kahler structures on any compact pre-quantizable symplectic manifold which satisfies certain simple topological constraints. Using Toeplitz operators we prove…

We give new rational blowdown constructions of exotic CP^2#n(-CP^2) (5\leq n\leq 9) without using elliptic fibrations. We also show that our 4-manifolds admit handle decompositions without 1- and 3-handles, for 7\leq n\leq 9. A strategy for…

We compare heterotic string models on orbifolds with supergravity models on smooth compact spaces, obtained by resolving the orbifold singularities. Our main focus is on heterotic E8xE8 models on the resolution of the compact T^6/Z_3…

A smooth compactification X<n> of the configuration space of n distinct labeled points in a smooth algebraic variety X is constructed by a natural sequence of blowups, with the full symmetry of the permutation group S_n manifest at each…

We consider a generalisation of the Seiberg-Witten invariant to the families Seiberg-Witten invariants of a smooth family of 4-manifolds with fibres diffeomorphic to a 4-manifold $X$. Of particular interest is the special case when the…

We show rational homological stability for the homotopy automorphisms and block diffeomorphims of iterated connected sums of products of spheres. The spheres can have different dimension, but need to satisfy a certain connectivity…

We exhibit two three-parameter families of locally conformal symplectic forms on the solvmanifold $M_{n,k}$ considered in [1], and show, using the Hodge-de Rham theory for the Lichnerowicz cohomology that that they are not $d_{\omega}$…

We construct a mathematical framework for twisted N=2 supersymmetric topological quantum field theory on a 4-manifold. Supersymmetry in flat space is defined and the twist homomorphism is constructed, giving us a supermanifold that is the…

We prove an existence theorem for gauge invariant $L^2$-normal neighborhoods of the reduction loci in the space ${\cal A}_a(E)$ of oriented connections on a fixed Hermitian 2-bundle $E$. We use this to obtain results on the topology of the…

We prove a contact non-squeezing phenomenon on homotopy spheres that are fillable by Liouville domains with infinite dimensional symplectic homology: there exists a smoothly embedded ball in such a sphere that cannot be made arbitrarily…

We use hyperbolic geometry to construct simply-connected symplectic or complex manifolds with trivial canonical bundle and with no compatible Kahler structure. We start with the desingularisations of the quadric cone in C^4: the smoothing…

We investigate random complex dynamics of rational or polynomial maps on the Riemann sphere. We show that regarding random complex dynamics of polynomials, generically, the chaos of the averaged system disappears at any point in the Riemann…

The topology of broken Lefschetz fibrations is studied by means of handle decompositions. We consider a slight generalization of round handles, and describe the handle diagrams for all that appear in dimension four. We establish simplified…