Concordance maps in knot Floer homology (Q511603)

This article discusses decorated concordances between two decorated knots in \(S^3\). This is a link cobordism \((X, F)\) from \((S^3, K_0)\) to \((S^3, K_1)\), where \(H_1(X) = H_2(X) = 0\) and \(F \cong S^1 \times I\), provided with a decoration: a set \(P_i \subset K_i\) of two points separating \(K_i\) into \(R_+(K_i)\) and \(R_-(K_i)\), and two arcs on \(F\), one connecting \(R_+(K_0)\) to \(R_+(K_1)\) and one connecting \(R_-(K_0)\) to \(R_-(K_1)\). The authors' main result is that such a decorated concordance \(\mathcal C\) induces a homomorphism \(F_{\mathcal C}:\widehat{HFK}(K_0,P_0) \to \widehat{HFK}(K_1,P_2)\) on the knot Heegaard Floer groups that respects the Alexander and Maslov gradings. Moreover, \(\mathcal C\) induces a map of the spectral sequences from the knot-filtered complexes to \(\widehat{HF}(S^3)\) that agrees with \(F_{\mathcal C}\) on the \(E^1\)-page, and is the identity on the \(E^{\infty}\)-page. This latter fact is used to obtain an invariant of slice disks in homology 4-balls with boundary \(S^3\). The authors leave open the question of whether this invariant can distinguish slice disks. When \(X = S^3 \times I\), the authors discuss invertible concordances, that is, concordances from \(K_0\) to \(K_1\) such that there exists another concordance \(K_1\) to \(K_0\) whose composition with the original concordance gives the trivial concordance from \(K_0\) to itself. The authors prove that the map \(F_{\mathcal C}\) arising from an invertible concordance is injective. They use this to show that the 3-genus is non-decreasing with respect to invertible concordances, and that if \(K_1\) is fibered, then \(K_0\) is also fibered.