On the additivity of the Thurston-Bennequin invariant of Legendrian knots. (Q1880064)

For a topological knot type \(K\subset \mathbb R^3,\) put \(mtb(K)\) to be the maximal value of the Thurston-Bennequin invariant of a Legendrian knot that topologically represents \(K\) in the standard contact \(\mathbb R^3\). The author proves that \(mtb (K_1\#K_2)=mtb (K_1)+mtb(K_2)+1,\) for the connected sum \(K_1\#K_2\) of topological knots in \(\mathbb R^3\). After writing this paper the author was informed that \textit{J.~Etnyre} and \textit{K.~Honda} proved this result for zero homologous knots in tight contact \(3\)-manifolds, see [Adv. Math. 179, No. 1, 59--74 (2003; Zbl 1047.57006)]; and that this result was also partially proved by \textit{T. Tanaka} [see ``On invariants of Legendrian knots'', preprint].