Symplectic fillings of lens spaces as Lefschetz fibrations (Q726756)

The lens space \(L(p,q)\) is orientation preserving diffeomorphic to the link of the cyclic quotient singularity whose minimal resolution is given by a linear plumbing graph with vertices having weights \(-a_i,\dots,-a_l\), where \(p/q=[a_1,\dots,a_l]\) the Hirzebruch-Jung continued fraction. It is known that any tight contact structure on \(L(p,q)\), in particular the canonical contact structure \(\xi_{\text{can}}\), is supported by a planar open book. If a contact 3-manifold \((Y,\xi)\) is supported by a planar open book \({\mathcal{OB}}_\xi\), then any strong symplectic filling of \((Y,\xi)\) is symplectic deformation equivalent to a blowup of a positive allowable Lefschetz fibration whose boundary is \({\mathcal{OB}}_\xi\). On the other hand, it is also known that every weak symplectic filling of a rational homology sphere can be modified into a strong symplectic filling, and that any minimal symplectic filling of \((L(p,q),\xi_{\text{can}})\) admits a genus-zero positive allowable Lefschetz fibration over \(D_2\). In this paper, the authors give an algorithm to present each minimal symplectic filling of the canonical contact structure on a lens space as an explicit genus-zero positive allowable Lefschetz fibration over the disk. They prove that any minimal symplectic filling of the canonical contact structure on a lens space is obtained by a sequence of rational blowdowns along linear plumbing graphs starting from the minimal resolution of the corresponding cyclic quotient singularity.