Toroidal surgeries and the genus of a knot (Q2272802)

We say that an \(r\)-surgery on a knot \(K\) in \(S^3\) is a toroidal surgery, if the result \(K(r)\) of the surgery is toroidal (i.e. \(K(r)\) contains an incompressible torus). Suppose that \(r\)-surgery on \(K\) is toroidal. Then \textit{C. McA. Gordon} and \textit{J. Luecke} proved that \(r\) is either integral or half-integral [Commun. Anal. Geom. 3, No. 4, 597--644 (1995; Zbl 0865.57015)]. Furthermore, in [ibid. 12, No. 1--2, 417--485 (2004; Zbl 1062.57006)] the same authors proved that if \(r\) is half-integral, then \(K\) belongs to an infinite family of hyperbolic knots given by \textit{M. Eudave-Muñoz} [AMS/IP Stud. Adv. Math. 2, 35--61 (1997; Zbl 0889.57023)]. In terms of the genus \(g(K)\) of \(K\), \textit{M. Teragaito} [Asian J. Math. 7, No. 1, 139--146 (2003; Zbl 1075.57009)] proposed a conjecture: \(|r| \leq 4g(K)\) for hyperbolic knots \(K\). In the paper under review the authors give an upper bound of \(|r|\) for toroidal surgery slopes \(r\) on a hyperbolic knot. To state the main result precisely, let \(t\) be the hitting number of a toroidal surgery, i.e. the minimal intersection number between a core of the attached solid torus and all incompressible tori in \(K(r)\). Then the main result asserts that if a hyperbolic knot \(K\) has a toroidal surgery slope \(r\), then \(|r| \le 4g(K)- 3/2\) if \(r\) is half-integral, \(|r| \le 4g(K)\) if \(r\) is integral and \(t \ge 6\), \(|r| \le 6g(K)-3\) if \(r\) is integral and \(t = 4\), and \(|r| \le 4g(K) + 8\) if \(r\) is integral and \(t = 2\). The proof is divided into two cases depending on whether a toroidal surgery slope is integral or half-integral. In the former case the authors apply graph theoretical analysis. In the latter case, since such surgeries are completely classified, the authors compute genera of knots with half-integral toroidal surgeries and then establish the desired results by comparing toroidal surgery slopes and genera of knots.