Related papers: Closed manifold surgery obstructions and the Oozin…

In this paper we prove several related results concerning smooth $\Z_p$ or $\s^1$ actions on 4-manifolds. We show that there exists an infinite sequence of smooth 4-manifolds $X_n$, $n\geq 2$, which have the same integral homology and…

We use homotopy operators for the $L_\infty$-algebra associated with an equivariant deformation problem in order to describe a smooth parametrization of the space of structures around a given one. Along the way we give new algebraic and…

We develop an obstruction theory for Hirsch extensions of cbba's with twisted coefficients. This leads to a variety of applications, including a structural theorem for minimal cbba's, a construction of relative minimal models with twisted…

This paper initiates the study of circular orderability of $3$-manifold groups, motivated by the L-space conjecture. We show that a compact, connected, $\mathbb{P}^2$-irreducible $3$-manifold has a circularly orderable fundamental group if…

The purpose of this note is to clarify some details in McDuff and Segal's proof of the group-completion theorem and to generalize both this and the homology fibration criterion of McDuff to homology with twisted coefficients. This will be…

The Arnold conjecture states that a Hamiltonian diffeomorphism of a closed and connected symplectic manifold must have at least as many fixed points as the minimal number of critical points of a smooth function on the manifold. It is well…

By work of Kirby-Siebenmann \cite{KirbySiebenmann} and Kervaire-Milnor \cite{KervaireMilnor}, there are only finitely many smooth manifolds homeomorphic to a given closed topological manifold. A construction involving Whitehead torsion…

We give a new elementary proof of the parallelizability of closed orientable 3-manifolds. We use as the main tool the fact that any such manifold admits a Heegaard splitting.

Let $f$ be a real- or circle-valued Morse function on a compact surface M having exactly $n>0$ critical points. Denote by $O$ the orbit of $f$ with respect to the right action of the group of diffeomorphisms of $M$. We show that the…

We produce the first examples of closed, tight contact 3-manifolds which become overtwisted after performing admissible transverse surgeries. Along the way, we clarify the relationship between admissible transverse surgery and Legendrian…

We produce infinitely many examples of Anosov flows in closed 3-manifolds where the set of periodic orbits is partitioned into two infinite subsets. In one subset every closed orbit is freely homotopic to infinitely other closed orbits of…

We prove a transformation formula for the Goresky-Hingston loop coproduct in string topology under homotopy equivalences of manifolds. The formula involves the trace of the Whitehead torsion of the homotopy equivalence. In particular, it…

Motivated by the $L$-space conjecture, we prove left-orderability of certain Dehn fillings on integral homology solid tori with techniques first appearing in the work of Culler-Dunfield. First, we use the author's previous results to…

Any smooth, closed oriented 4-manifold has a surface diagram of arbitrarily high genus g>2 that specifies it up to diffeomorphism. The goal of this paper is to prove the following statement: For any smooth, closed oriented 4-manifold M,…

We study the topology of compact manifolds with a Lie group action for which there are only finitely many non-principal orbits, and describe the possible orbit spaces which can occur. If some non-principal orbit is singular, we show that…

Small codimensional embedded manifolds defined byequations of small degree are Fano and covered by lines. They are complete intersections exactly when the variety of lines through a general point is so and has the right codimension. This…

We introduce a geometric invariant, called finite decomposition complexity (FDC), to study topological rigidity of manifolds. We prove for instance that if the fundamental group of a compact aspherical manifold M has FDC, and if N is…

O-minimal geometry generalizes both semialgebraic and subanalytic geometries, and has been very successful in solving special cases of some problems in arithmetic geometry, such as Andr\'e-Oort conjecture. Among the many tools developed in…

We construct a compact PL 5-manifold $M$ (with boundary) which is homotopy equivalent to the wedge of eleven 2-spheres, $\vee^{}_{1 1}S^2$, which is "spineless", meaning $M$ is not the regular neighborhood of any 2-complex PL embedded in…

The Cabling Conjecture states that surgery on hyperbolic knots in $S^3$ never produces reducible manifolds. In contrast, there do exist hyperbolic knots in some lens spaces with non-prime surgeries. Baker constructed a family of such…