The strong slope conjecture for cablings and connected sums (Q2045866)

Let \(K\) be a knot in \(S^3\). A slope in \(K\) is the isotopy class of a simple closed curve in \(\partial E(K)\), where \(E(K)\) is the exterior of \(K\). Slopes can be identified with elements of \(\mathbb{Q}\cup \{ \infty\}\), where a curve is represented by \(p/q\) if its homology class is \(p[\mu] + q[\lambda]\) in \( H_1(\partial E(K))\), with respect to a standard meridian-longitude pair \((\mu,\lambda)\). Let \(S\) be an essential surface properly embedded in \(E(K)\) (that is, \(S\) is incompressible, boundary incompressible and non-boundary parallel), then a boundary component of \(S\) determines a slope in \(\partial E(K)\). Let \(bs(K)\) be the set of boundary slopes of \(K\), that is, the slopes determined by all essential surfaces in \(E(K)\). The colored Jones function of \(K\), \(J_{K,n}(q)\), determines certain slopes in \(K\), called the Jones slopes and denoted by \(js(K)\). The slope conjecture, due to \textit{S. Garoufalidis} [Quantum Topol. 2, No. 1, 43--69 (2011; Zbl 1228.57004)], claims that \(js(K) \subset bs(K)\), that is, every Jones slope is also a boundary slope. The strong slope conjecture, due to \textit{E. Kalfagianni} and \textit{A. T. Tran} [New York J. Math. 21, 905--941 (2015; Zbl 1331.57022)], asserts that every Jones slope \(p/q\) is a boundary slope of an essential surface \(S\) and furthermore that the Jones function determines the value \(\chi(S)/\vert \partial S\vert q\). The strong slope conjecture has been verified for several classes of knots, namely torus knots and their cables, \(B\)-adequate knots and their cables, certain families of pretzel and Montesinos knots, 8-, 9-crossing non-alternating knots, and twisted generalized Whitehead doubles of torus knots. The main result of this paper shows that a set of knots, consisting of knots that satisfy the strong slope conjecture and some other technical conditions, is closed under the operations of connected sum and cabling. As a corollary the strong slope conjecture is proved for the class of graph knots, that is, knots obtained from the unknot by a finite sequence of operations of cabling and connected sum. This is also the class of knots whose exterior is a graph manifold.