Few sewings of certain crumpled \(n\)-cubes yield \(S^n\) (Q2408350)

The objects of interest here are crumpled \(n\)-cubes, i.e., any union \(C\) of an \((n-1)\)-sphere \(\Sigma\) in \(S^n\) and one of its complementary domains; the sphere \(\Sigma\) is called the \(boundary\) of \(C\), denoted Bd \(C\). Here we usually think of the sphere \(\Sigma\) as wildy embedded in \(S^n\). A famous example is the Alexander horned sphere. The highlight of this paper is a construction of a crumpled \(n\)-cube (\(n>4\)) \(C\) and homeomorphism \(h\) of Bd \(C\) to itself such that, for any homeomorphism \(H: \mathrm{Bd }C \to \mathrm{Bd }C\) sufficiently close to \(h\), the sewing space \(C \cup_H C\) is not a manifold. This surprisingly contrasts with a classical 3-dimensional result saying that a dense collection of sewings of an arbitrary pair of crumpled 3-cubes yields the 3-sphere. The key idea is the utilization of a sticky Cantor set recently discovered by \textit{V. Krushkal} [J. Topol. Anal. 10, No. 2, 477--482 (2018; Zbl 1395.54029)], providing a Cantor set in the \(d\)-sphere (\(d>3\)), that cannot be slipped off itself with a small ambient adjustment. In addition, the proof heavily relies on results and techniques developed in [\textit{R. J. Daverman}, Fundam. Math. 79, 63--77 (1973; Zbl 0257.57005)] and standard arguments based on the disjoint disks property.