Reducible and toroidal Dehn fillings with distance 3 (Q1012373)

Let \(M\) be a compact, connected, orientable 3-manifold with a torus boundary component \(T\). Suppose that \(M\) is simple, i.e., it contains no essential \(2\)-sphere, torus, disk or annulus. Let \(r\) be a slope on \(T\) (i.e., the isotopy class of an essential unoriented simple closed curve on \(T\)) and \(M(r)\) the manifold obtained from \(M\) by \(r\)-Dehn filling along \(T\), that is, by attaching a solid torus \(V\) to \(M\) along \(T\) so that \(r\) bounds a meridian disk in \(V\). In the paper under review, the author focuses on a situation where \(M(r_1)\) contains an essential \(2\)-sphere (i.e., \(r_1\) is a reducible Dehn filling slope) and \(M(r_2)\) contains an essential torus (i.e., \(r_2\) is a toroidal Dehn filling slope). For such a pair of slopes \(r_1\) and \(r_2\), as a leading result, \textit{S. Oh} [Topology Appl. 75, No.~1, 93--104 (1997; Zbl 0870.57008)] and independently \textit{Y.-Q. Wu} [Topology 37, No.~1, 95--108 (1998; Zbl 0886.57012)] showed that the geometric intersection number \(\Delta(r_1, r_2)\), called the distance, is less than or equal to \(3\). \textit{M. Eudave-Muñoz} and \textit{Y.-Q. Wu} [Pac. J. Math. 190, No.~2, 261--275 (1999; Zbl 1011.57005)] gave explicitly an infinite one parameter family of simple \(3\)-manifolds \(M_p\) \((p \geq 2)\) having two slopes \(r_1\) and \(r_2\) such that \(M_p(r_1)\) is a connected sum of two lens spaces and \(M_p(r_2)\) is a toroidal, non-Seifert fibered, graph manifold which is a union of two Seifert fibered manifolds each of which has a Seifert fibration over the disk with two exceptional fibers. (Originally Eudave-Muñoz and Wu restricted \(p \geq 3\), but as the author mentions in the paper under review, \(p\) can be extended so that \(p \geq 2\).) As the main result, the author proves that the \(3\)-manifolds described by Eudave-Muñoz and Wu are the only examples of simple \(3\)-manifolds admitting a reducible Dehn filling slope \(r_1\) and a toroidal Dehn filling slope \(r_2\) with \(\Delta(r_1, r_2) = 3\). Thus all simple \(3\)-manifolds which admit a reducible Dehn filling slope and a toroidal Dehn filling slope with distance \(3\) are completely classified. Since the toroidal Dehn filling in the above family yields a toroidal, non-Seifert fibered manifold, as a corollary to the main theorem, the author proves that if \(M(r_1)\) is a reducible manifold and \(M(r_2)\) is a toroidal Seifert fibered manifold for a simple \(3\)-manifold \(M\), then \(\Delta(r_1, r_2) = 2\). To prove the main result, the author investigates a pair of intersection graphs \(G_1\) and \(G_2\), where \(G_1\) lies in an essential \(2\)-sphere in \(M(r_1)\) and \(G_2\) lies in an essential torus in \(M(r_2)\) (\(\Delta(r_1, r_2) = 3\)). As the main result of the combinatorial arguments, he shows the existence of two nice disk faces in \(G_1\) which enables us to conclude that both sides of the essential torus in \(M(r_2)\) are Seifert fibered manifolds over the disk with exactly two exceptional fibers. Then the author follows the argument in [\textit{C. McA. Gordon} and \textit{J. Luecke}, Commun. Anal. Geom. 12, No. 1--2, 417--485 (2004; Zbl 1062.57006)] to assert that \(M\) is obtained from the exterior \(E\) of the minimally twisted \(5\)-chain by Dehn fillings along four boundary components. Since \(E\) is the double branched cover of the ``pentangle'', these Dehn fillings correspond to tangle fillings of the pentangle. Then the author determines the manifolds \(M\) by a series of computations describing the double branched covers of certain tangle fillings of the pentangle.