Some spaces of polynomial knots (Q505383)

A knot \(\varphi\) is called a polynomial knot if it is given by \(t\mapsto \varphi (t)=(f(t),g(t),h(t))\) for three real coefficients polynomials \(f(z),g(z),h(z)\in \mathbb{R}[z]\), and we denote this knot by \(\varphi =(f,g,h)\). Let \(\mathcal{P}\) denote the space of all polynomial knots. For a positive integer \(d\geq 2\), let \(\mathcal{O}_d\) denote the space of all polynomial knots \((f,g,h)\in \mathcal{P}\) with \(\deg (f)\leq d-2\), \(\deg (g)\leq d-1\) and \(\deg (h)\leq d\). Similarly, let \(\mathcal{P}_d\) (resp. \(\mathcal{Q}_d)\) denote the space of all polynomial knots \((f,g,h)\in \mathcal{P}\) with \(\deg(f)<\deg (g)< \deg (h)\leq d\) (resp. \((\deg (f),\deg (g),\deg (h))=(d-2,d-1,d))\). In this paper, the authors study the topology of these three spaces \(\mathcal{O}_d\), \(\mathcal{P}_d\) and \(\mathcal{Q}_d\), and they prove the following results by using several basic facts concerning real semialgebraic sets.{\parindent=0.7cm\begin{itemize}\item[--] If \(d\geq 3\), \(\mathcal{P}_d\) is path connected and \(\mathcal{Q}_d\) is homotopy equivalent to \(S^2\). \item[--] If two polynomial knots are path connected in \(\mathcal{Q}_d\), they are topologically equivalent. \item[--] Every polynomial knot is isotopic to some trivial polynomial knot by a smooth isotopy of polynomial knots. \item[--] The path components of \(\mathcal{Q}_4\) are contractible and the space \(\mathcal{Q}_5\) has exactly eight contractible path components corresponding to the trefoil knot and its mirror images. \end{itemize}} As an application they also obtain that \(\mathcal{P}\) is homotopy equivalent to \(S^2\) and that the numbers of path components of the spaces \(\mathcal{Q}_d\) are in multiples of eight.