Satellite knots and L-space surgeries (Q2830650)

A knot is called an L-space knot if it admits a positive L-space surgery. The paper under review studies satellite L-space knots. In the literature, amongst others, necessary and sufficient conditions for cable knots to be L-space knots are known. The main result in the present paper is a new sufficient condition for a satellite knot to be an L-space knot.NEWLINENEWLINELet \(P(K,n)\) be an \(n\)-twisted satellite knot with companion knot \(K\) and pattern \(P\) in a solid torus. In particular, \(P(K,0)\) is denoted by \(P(K)\). Then the satellite knot \(P(K)\) is an L-space knot if the following four conditions are satisfied: (1) the companion \(K\) is an L-space knot; (2) the winding number \(w(P)\) of \(P\) is at least \(2\) and there exists a meridian disk of the solid torus which meets \(P\) in exactly \(w(P)\) points; (3) the knot \(P(U,-2g)\) is an L-space knot, where \(U\) is the unknot and \(g\) is the genus of \(K\); (4) the knot \(P(U,-n)\) is a negative L-space knot for all sufficiently large \(n\). Here, a negative L-space knot is a knot with a negative L-space surgery. Also, several infinite families of patterns satisfying the last three conditions are given.NEWLINENEWLINEThe proof is based on a result of \textit{J. Hanselman} et al. [``Taut foliations on graph manifolds'', Preprint, \url{arXiv:1508.05911}] showing that the union of two \(3\)-manifolds with torus boundary is an L-space. Unfortunately, the above condition is not necessary for a satellite knot to be an L-space knot.