Equivariant Casson invariant for knots and the Neumann-Wahl formula (Q1568362)

For odd primes \(n\), Cappell, Lee and Miller defined an equivariant Casson invariant for closed 3-manifolds with a semi-free \(\mathbb Z_n\)-action, for example the \(n\)-fold cyclic branched covering of a knot in the 3-sphere. In parallel, the author and Steer developped a Floer homology for knots in \(S^3\) which may be seen as a generalization of the equivariant Casson invariant of cyclic branched coverings of knots. In the present article, both points of view are combined to define an equivariant Casson invariant for 4-fold cyclic branched coverings of knots; in fact a motivation of the paper was to generalize the equivariant Casson invariant for even branching indices where the original construction does not apply. The resulting invariant can be expressed in terms of the Jones polynomial of the knot, and brings new light to the Neumann-Wahl formula relating Casson's invariant of a 3-dimensional link of a complex singularity to the signature of its Milnor fiber. A generalization to other even branching indices is discussed.