No label defined (Q4263295)

The famous Alexander, Artin, and Markov theorems have given us a method for studying classical knots and links. They are a source of ideas for studying 2-dimensional knots and links. In particular, 2-dimensional braids have been introduced and Markov moves generalized to dimension four. The author of the paper under review has already proved that if 2-dimensional braids \(S\) and \(S'\) represent the same surface link type, then there exists a sequence of 2-dimensional braids \(S=S_0\), \(S_1,\dots,S_s=S'\) such that for each \(i\) \((i=1, \dots, s)\), \(S_i\) is obtained from \(S_{i-1}\) by a braid ambient isotopy, a conjugation, a stabilization or the inverse operation of a stabilization. In this paper he proves that one can arrange the above mentioned Markov moves in such a way that there is an integer \(k\) such that \(S_i\) is obtained from \(S_{i-1}\) by the following arrangement of Markov moves: (1) a conjugation or a stabilization if \(i<k\); (2) a braid ambient isotopy if \(i=k\); (3) a conjugation or the inverse of a stabilization if \(i>k\). In addition, this result gives a series of improvements of some previous results. As a kind of the by-product, an arrangement of 1-dimensional Markov moves have the following arrangement: (1) a conjugation or a stabilization if \(i\leq k\); (2) a conjugation or the inverse of a stabilization if \(i>k\). For the entire collection see [Zbl 0919.00057].