Related papers: Knots and links without parallel tangents
It is well-known that no knot can be cancelled in a connected sum with another knot, whereas every link can be cancelled up to link homotopy in a (componentwise) connected sum with another link. In this paper we address the question whether…
Freedman and Krushkal showed that if the surgery conjecture and the $s$-cobordism conjecture hold for all topological 4-manifolds, then every link with pairwise zero linking numbers is topologically round handle slice. Kim, Powell, and…
We construct an enhanced version of knot contact homology, and show that we can deduce from it the group ring of the knot group together with the peripheral subgroup. In particular, it completely determines a knot up to smooth isotopy. The…
We classify nonnegatively curved simply connected 4-manifolds with circle symmetry up to equivariant diffeomorphisms. The main problem is rule out knotted curves in the singular set of the orbit space. As an extension of this work we…
This paper contains linear systems of equations which can distinguish knots without knot invariants. Let $M_n$ be the topological moduli space of all n-component string links and such that a fixed projection into the plane is an immersion.…
In this article, we consider alternating knots on a closed surface in the 3-sphere, and show that these are not parallel to any closed surface disjoint from the prescribed one.
A 1-tangle is a properly embedded arc $\psi$ in an unknotted solid torus $V$ in $S^3$. Attaching an arc $\phi$ in the complementary solid torus $W$ to its endpoints creates a knot $K(\phi)$ called the closure of $\psi$. We show that for a…
Continuing the work of Zemke, Livingston and Allen, we consider when linear combinations of torus knots are concordant to $L$-space knots. We begin by proving Allen's conjecture for alternating torus knots. That is, we prove that a linear…
The number $|K|$ of non-isotopic framed knots that correspond to a given unframed knot $K\subset S^3$ is infinite. This follows from the existence of the self-linking number $\slk$ of a zerohomologous framed knot. We use the approach of…
In a groundbreaking work A. Levine proved the surprising result that there exist knots in homology spheres which are not smoothly concordant to any knot in $S^3$, even if one allows for concordances in homology cobordisms. Since then…
We use classical techniques to answer some questions raised by Daniele Celoria about almost-concordance of knots in arbitrary closed $3$-manifolds. We first prove that, given $Y^3 \neq S^3$, for any non-trivial element $g\in \pi_1(Y)$ there…
We show that every non-trivial tame knot or link in R^3 has a quadrisecant, i.e. four collinear points. The quadrisecant must be topologically non-trivial in a precise sense. As an application, we show that a nonsingular, algebraic surface…
Recent advances in Quantum Topology assign $q$-series to knots in at least three different ways. The $q$-series are given by generalized Nahm sums (i.e., special $q$-hypergeometric sums) and have unknown modular and asymptotic properties.…
It is proved that the Wedderburn Theorem on finite division rings implies that all knots and links in the smooth 4-dimensional manifolds are trivial.
In this paper we show that the non-alternating torus knots are homologically thick, i.e. that their Khovanov homology occupies at least three diagonals. Furthermore, we show that we can reduce the number of full twists of the torus knot…
In 1976, Rudolph asked whether algebraic knots are linearly independent in the knot concordance group. This paper uses twisted Blanchfield pairings to answer this question in the affirmative for new large families of algebraic knots.
Given an $m$-component link $L$ in $S^3$ ($m \ge 2$), we construct a family of links which are link homotopic, but not link isotopic, to $L$. Every proper sublink of such a link is link isotopic to the corresponding sublink of $L$.…
In 1974, D. Rolfsen asked: Is every knot in $S^3$ isotopic (=homotopic through embeddings) to a PL knot or, equivalently, to the unknot? In particular, is the Bing sling isotopic to a PL knot? We show that the Bing sling is not isotopic to…
Final revision. To appear in the Journal of Differential Geometry. This paper studies knots that are transversal to the standard contact structure in $\reals^3$, bringing techniques from topological knot theory to bear on their transversal…
The energy minimization problem associated to uniform, isotropic, linearly elastic rods leads to a geometric variational problem for the rod centerline, whose solutions include closed, knotted curves. We give a complete description of the…