On a weakly unknotted 2-sphere in a simply-connected 4-manifold (Q760693)

The following theorem is proved: Given a 2-sphere \(S^ 2\) smoothly embedded in a simply connected 4-manifold M, such that \(S^ 2\) is null- homotopic in M and \(\pi_ 1(M-S^ 2)\) is infinite cyclic, then \(S^ 2\) is unknotted in a suitable connected sum of M and a number of copies of \(S^ 2\times S^ 2\). The idea of the proof runs as follows: the conditions on \(S^ 2\) ensure that it bounds a 3-manifold N in M which is cobordant to a 3-ball. The cobordism can be then pushed into M modulo the 2- and 3-handles, which require the copies of \(S^ 2\times S^ 2\). The result is then used to prove the theorem of \textit{A. Kawauchi} [Q. J. Math., Oxf. II. Ser. 26, 437-458 (1975; Zbl 0314.55008)] that under the above conditions on a 2-sphere in \(M=S^ 4\), the complement of the 2- sphere has the homotopy type of a circle (but the original proof seems both more natural and more direct).