Obstructions to trivializing a knot (Q1881738): Difference between revisions

J. Birman and W. Menasco showed that a closed braid representing the unknot can be reduced to a 1-braid by a finite sequence of ``exchange moves'' and ``reducing moves''. Using the work of Krammer-Lawrence and Bigelow on faithful matrix representations of the braid group \(B_n\) the authors prove algebraic criteria for the detection of such moves. The tool is an intersection pairing defined with the help of the above mentioned representations of \(B_n\). The criteria imply so-called ``simple'' homology classes represented by simple loops. It remains an unsolved question how to give an algebraic description of these simple homology classes. This would suffice to make this approach into an algorithm to recognize the unknot.