Annular and boundary reducing Dehn fillings (Q1972334)

A compact, orientable \(3\)-manifold \(X\) is called simple if it contains no nontrivial (incompressible and boundary-compressible) \(2\)-sphere, \(2\)-disc, annulus, or torus. A Dehn filling \(M(\alpha)\) of the simple \(3\)-manifold \(X\) means the \(3\)-manifold obtained from \(X\) by gluing on a solid torus so that the boundary of a meridian disc of the solid torus is attached along a loop \(\alpha\) in a torus boundary component \(T\) of \(X\). While it is difficult to make a general statement about the result of Dehn filling, one can consider bounds on the distance between the slopes \(\alpha\) and \(\beta\) in \(T\) for which the resulting manifolds are not simple. The distance between slopes, in this context, means the minimal number \(\Delta(\alpha,\beta)\) of intersection points of any loops in \(T\) isotopic to \(\alpha\) and \(\beta\). Using methodology originated by the first author, J. Luecke, M. Scharlemann, and others, this question has been extensively investigated. There are \(10\) cases, according to the (unordered) pair of forbidden surfaces appearing in \(M(\alpha)\) and \(M(\beta)\). In this paper, the authors complete the last unknown case, in which the surfaces are the annulus and the \(2\)-disc. For this case the previous best upper bound of \(\Delta(\alpha,\beta)=3\) was due to \textit{R. Qiu} and \textit{Y. Zhang} [Topology Appl. 92, No. 1, 79-84 (1999; Zbl 0926.57034)], while examples having \(\Delta(\alpha,\beta)=2\) were given by \textit{K. Miyazaki} and \textit{K. Motegi} [ibid. 93, No. 2, 173-178 (1999; Zbl 0930.57014)]. The authors show that \(\Delta(\alpha,\beta)=2\) is in fact the maximum distance between the slopes. A key ingredient is a result of \textit{M. Eudave-Muñoz} [ibid. 55, No. 2, 131-152 (1994; Zbl 0816.57014)].