Branched surfaces and the simplest foliations of 3-manifolds (Q1816556)

The set of foliations carried by the same branched surface as a foliation \(f\) includes, but is not restricted to, the set of foliations sufficiently close to \(f\). We show that a branched surface may be constructed to ensure that no foliation carried by it has more dead-end components than \(f\). In particular, if \(f\) is taut, all foliations carried by the branched surface will be taut. We use the result to classify the foliations of closed 3-manifolds having the fewest number of dead-end components. We then develop an algorithm to determine a lower bound on the depth of a foliation in a given class.