On Kirby calculus for null-homotopic framed links in 3-manifolds (Q384646)

Given two framed links in the \(3\)-sphere, a well-known result of Kirby says that they give rise to homeomorphic manifolds by Dehn surgery if and only if they are related by a finite sequence of two types of modifications, known as \textsl{Kirby moves}, namely stabilisations and handle-slides. The analogous characterisation for framed links in arbitrary closed \(3\)-manifolds was obtained by \textit{R. Fenn} and \textit{C. Rourke} in [Topology 18, 1--15 (1979; Zbl 0413.57006)]: They showed that in this case an extra modification must be taken into account. They also provided a necessary and sufficient condition for two framed links to be related by a finite sequence of Kirby moves: In this case, the manifolds obtained by surgery on the framed links are of course homeomorphic, and some extra conditions are also fulfilled. This latter result by Fenn and Rourke is generalised here for framed links contained in \(3\)-manifolds with boundary. The authors show that the characterisation can be restated in a simplified form when the framed links are null-homotopic. Finally, to each null-homotopic framed link in a solid torus satisfying some extra requirements the authors associate a subgroup in \({\mathbb Z}\), and prove that the function thus defined is invariant under Kirby moves.