Spectral order for contact manifolds with convex boundary (Q1631697)

A smooth plane field \(\xi\) on a 3-manifold \(M\) which is locally defined by a 1-form \(\alpha\) such that \(\alpha\wedge d\alpha\neq 0\) is called a contact structure. An embedded disc \(D\to M\) in a contact manifold \((M,\xi)\) is called overtwisted if \(T_pD=\xi(p)\) for all points \(p\in\partial D\). A contact structure \(\xi\) which has an overtwisted disc \(D\) is called an overtwisted contact structure, and it is called tight if it is not overtwisted. For a closed contact 3-manifold \((M,\xi)\) the structure \(\xi\) is said to be supported by some open book decomposition \((S,\varphi)\) of \(M\) if \(M\) is identified with \(S\times I/\sim\), where \((x,1)\sim(\varphi(x),0)\) for every \(x\in S\), and \((x,t)\sim(x,t')\) for every \(x\in\partial S\) and \(t,t'\in I\). If \(\mathbf{a}\) is a collection of pairwise disjoint arcs on \(S\), then \(E^k(S,\varphi,\mathbf{a})=H_*(E^{k-1}(S,\varphi,\mathbf{a}),d^{k-1})\) is a spectral sequence. For a closed contact 3-manifold \((M,\xi)\), it is said that \(\mathbf{o}(S,\varphi,\mathbf{a})=k\) if the distinguished generator \(x_\xi\in\widehat{CF}(\Sigma,\boldsymbol\beta,\boldsymbol\alpha,z)_0\) viewed in degree zero, is nonzero in \(E^k(S,\varphi,\mathbf{a})\), and zero in \(E^{k+1}(S,\varphi,\mathbf{a})\). Then, the spectral order of \((M,\xi)\) is defined as \(\mathbf{o}(M,\xi)=\min\{\mathbf{o}(S,\varphi,\mathbf{a})\}\) where \((S,\varphi)\) supports \(\xi\) and \(\mathbf{a}\subset S\) contains an arc basis. In this paper, the authors extend the Heegaard-Floer homological definition of spectral order for closed contact 3-manifolds to contact 3-manifolds with convex boundary. They show that if \((M,\xi)\) is a contact 3-manifold with convex boundary and \((N,\xi|_{N})\) is a codimension-zero submanifold of \(\text{Int}(M)\) with convex boundary, then \(\mathbf{o}(N,\xi|_{N})\geq\mathbf{o}(M,\xi)\). Also, it is shown that overtwisted contact structures have order zero since the neighborhood of an overtwisted disk has order zero. Finally, the authors prove that if a contact 3-manifold \((M,\xi)\) with convex boundary has Giroux \(2\pi\)-torsion, then \(\mathbf{o}(M,\xi)\leq 2\).