Virtually embedded boundary slopes (Q1296302)

Let \(M\) be a compact 3-manifold whose boundary is a single torus \(T\). An essential simple closed curve \(\alpha\) in \(T\) is called an embedded resp. immersed boundary slope if there is an embedded resp. immersed compact surface in \(M\) whose boundary components are loops in \(T\) parallel to \(\alpha\). An immersed boundary slope is virtually embedded if the immersion of the surface is covered by an embedding into some finite cover of \(M\). It is known that (the exterior of) a knot can have only finitely many embedded boundary slopes. In the present paper it is shown that for hyperbolic punctured torus bundles, hyperbolic 2-bridge knots and for most hyperbolic knots in \(S^2\times S^1\), every boundary slope is a virtually embedded boundary slope. These results depend on a more general result stating that every slope of a hyperbolic manifold \(M\) as above is a virtually embedded boundary slope if there exists a finite cover of \(M\) satisfying certain conditions. Reducing the proof to a result of \textit{M. Baker} and \textit{D. Cooper} [Immersed, virtually-embedded, boundary slopes, Topology Appl. 102, No. 3, 239-252 (2000)], it suffices to find a connected embedded surface \(S\) in some finite cover \(\widetilde M\) of \(M\) which is not a fiber of a fibration over the circle, and such that \(S\) has the required boundary slope on some boundary torus \(\widetilde T\) of \(\widetilde M\) which is a 1-fold covering of \(T\); for this the Thurston norm is used.