Hidden symmetries and commensurability of 2-bridge link complements (Q346705)

The only arithmetic hyperbolic \(2\)-bridge links are the figure-eight knot, the Whitehead link, the \(6_2^2\) link and the \(6_3^2\) link. \textit{A. W. Reid} and \textit{G. S. Walsh} [Algebr. Geom. Topol. 8, No. 2, 1031--1057 (2008; Zbl 1154.57001)] showed by algebraic methods that hyperbolic \(2\)-bridge knot complements other than the figure-eight knot have no hidden symmetries. Their techniques do not apply to hyperbolic \(2\)-bridge links. The main result of the paper under review is to show that any non-arithmetic hyperbolic \(2\)-bridge link complement admits no hidden symmetries, either orientation-preserving or orientation-reversing. A hyperbolic \(3\)-manifold \(M=\mathbb{H}^3/\Gamma\) admits a hidden symmetry if there exists a symmetry of a finite cover of \(M\) that is not a lift of an isometry of \(M\). In other words, a symmetry of \(M\) corresponds to an element of \(N(\Gamma)/\Gamma\), where \(N(\Gamma)\) is the normalizer of \(\Gamma\) in \(\mathrm{Isom}(\mathbb{H}^3)\), and a hidden symmetry of \(M\) corresponds to an element of \(C(\Gamma)\) that is not in \(\Gamma\), where \(C(\Gamma)=\{g\in\mathrm{Isom}(\mathbb{H}^3) \mid |\Gamma: \Gamma\cap g\Gamma g^{-1}|<\infty\}\) is the commensurator of \(\Gamma\). In general, \(\Gamma\subset N(\Gamma)\subset C(\Gamma)\) holds. The main result is proved by using the canonical triangulation of the link complement. For any non-arithmetic hyperbolic \(2\)-bridge link complement \(M\), \(C(\Gamma)\) is identified with the group of isometries of the tiling \(\tilde{\mathcal{T}}\) of \(\mathbb{H}^3\) obtained by lifting the canonical triangulation of \(M\), and it is shown that any symmetry of \(\tilde{\mathcal{T}}\) corresponds to a composition of symmetries of \(M\) and deck transformations of \(M\). This implies that \(C(\Gamma)=N(\Gamma)\). In fact, the canonical triangulation of the cusps induced by \(\tilde{\mathcal{T}}\) is examined. As a corollary, if a hyperbolic \(2\)-bridge link complement \(M\) is non-arithmetic, then it does not irregularly cover any orientable or non-orientable hyperbolic \(3\)-orbifold. If \(M\) is arithmetic, then it does not irregularly cover any orientable hyperbolic \(3\)-manifold. By combining with the work of \textit{M. Boileau} and \textit{R. Weidmann} [Topology 44, No. 2, 283--320 (2005; Zbl 1082.57014)], the characterization of \(3\)-manifolds with non-trivial JSJ-decomposition and rank-two fundamental groups is obtained. If a compact, orientable, irreducible \(3\)-manifold \(M\) has a non-trivial JSJ-decomposition and rank-two fundamental group, then either \(M\) has Heegaard genus two, \(M\) decomposes into a Seifert fibered \(3\)-manifold and a hyperbolic \(3\)-manifold, or \(M\) decomposes into two Seifert fibered \(3\)-manifolds. This improves the original characterization by Boileau and Weidmann. The final result claims that the only pair of commensurable hyperbolic \(2\)-bridge link complements are the figure-eight knot complement and the \(6_2^2\) link complement.