English
Related papers

Related papers: Invertible knot concordances and prime knots

200 papers

A knot K in the 3-sphere is superslice if there is a slice disk D in the 4-ball such that the double of D along K is the unknotted 2-sphere S in $S^4$. Answering a question of Livingston-Meier, we find smoothly slice (in fact doubly slice)…

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2016-10-14 Daniel Ruberman

There is an infinitely generated free subgroup of the smooth knot concordance group with the property that no nontrivial element in this subgroup can be represented by an alternating knot. This subgroup has the further property that every…

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2017-07-21 Stefan Friedl , Charles Livingston , Raphael Zentner

We prove a folklore theorem of W. Thurston which provides necessary and sufficient conditions for primality of a certain class of theta-curves. Namely, a theta-curve in the 3-sphere with an unknotted constituent knot U is prime if and only…

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2016-03-01 Jack S. Calcut , Jules R. Metcalf-Burton

Conjecturally, a knot in the 3-sphere has only finitely many non-integer non-characterizing slopes. We verify this conjecture for all knots with knot Floer homology satisfying certain simplicity conditions. The class of knots satisfying our…

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2025-02-11 Duncan McCoy

We investigate commensurability classes of hyperbolic knot complements in the generic case of knots without hidden symmetries. We show that such knot complements which are commensurable are cyclically commensurable, and that there are at…

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2014-11-11 Michel Boileau , Steven Boyer , Radu Cebanu , Genevieve S. Walsh

In this paper, we study topological concordance modulo local knotting, or almost-concordance, of knots in 3-manifolds $M\neq S^3$. A. Levine, Celoria (arXiv:1602.05476v4), and Friedl-Nagel-Orson-Powell (arXiv:1611.09114v2) conjecture that,…

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2025-08-21 Ryan Stees

If a knot K has Seifert matrix V_K and has a prime power cyclic branched cover that is not a homology sphere, then there is an infinite family of non-concordant knots having Seifert matrix V_K.

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2014-11-11 Charles Livingston

For each sequence of polynomials, P=(p_1(t),p_2(t),...), we define a characteristic series of groups, called the derived series localized at P. Given a knot K in S^3, such a sequence of polynomials arises naturally as the orders of certain…

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2011-10-18 Tim D. Cochran , Shelly Harvey , Constance Leidy

Given a 3-manifold $Y$ and a free homotopy class in $[S^1,Y]$, we investigate the set of topological concordance classes of knots in $Y \times [0,1]$ representing the given homotopy class. The concordance group of knots in the 3-sphere acts…

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2017-06-21 Stefan Friedl , Matthias Nagel , Patrick Orson , Mark Powell

This paper proves that every oriented non-disk Seifert surface $F$ for a knot $K$ in $S^3$ is smoothly concordant to a Seifert surface $F^{\prime}$ for a hyperbolic knot $K^{\prime}$ of arbitrarily large volume. This gives a new and simpler…

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2019-04-10 Robert Myers

We show the existence of infinitely many prime knots each of which having in their complements meridional essential surfaces with two boundary components and arbitrarily high genus.

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2017-06-13 João Miguel Nogueira

An essential goal in the study of finite type invariants of some objects (knots, manifolds) is the construction of a universal finite type invariant, universal in the sense that it contains all finite type invariants of the given objects.…

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2025-09-16 Benjamin Audoux , Delphine Moussard

We show that, for any positive real number, there exists a knot in the 3-sphere admitting a pair of boundary slopes whose difference is at most the given number.

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2014-03-11 Kazuhiro Ichihara

We consider the space of all smooth knots in the 3-sphere isotopic to a given knot, with the aim of finding a small subspace onto which this large space deformation retracts. For torus knots and many hyperbolic knots we show the subspace…

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2007-05-23 Allen Hatcher

We prove that positive knots and knots with braid index three in the 3-sphere satisfy the Property P conjecture.

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2007-05-23 William W. Menasco , Xingru Zhang

Any knot in $S^3$ may be reduced to a slice knot by crossing changes. Indeed, this slice knot can be taken to be the unknot. In this paper we study the question of when the same holds for knots in homology spheres. We show that a knot in a…

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2020-02-19 Christopher W. Davis

Given a knot in a closed connected orientable 3-manifold we prove that if the exterior of the knot admits an aperiodic contact form that is Euclidean near the boundary, then the 3-manifold is diffeomorphic to the 3-sphere and the knot is…

Symplectic Geometry · Mathematics 2026-02-10 Marc Kegel , Jay Schneider , Kai Zehmisch

We describe four hyperbolic knot complements in $\mathbb{S}^3$, each of which covers a prism orbifold: the quotient of $\mathbb{H}^3$ by the action of a discrete group generated by reflections in the faces of a polyhedron that has the…

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2026-03-27 Jason DeBlois , Arshia Gharagozlou , Neil R Hoffman

R. F. Williams showed that all knots in the Lorenz template are prime. His proof included the cases where any number of positive twists were added to one of the template's branches. However, Williams does give an example of a composite knot…

Dynamical Systems · Mathematics 2007-05-23 Mike Sullivan

We investigate great circle links in the three-sphere, the class of links where each component is a great circle. Using the geometry of their complements, we classify such links up to five components. For any two-bridge knot complement,…

Geometric Topology · Mathematics 2007-05-23 Genevieve Walsh