Whitney towers and abelian invariants of knots

DOI10.1007/S00209-019-02293-XMaRDI QIDQ2287995zbMATH OpenOpenAlexFDO

Authors Jae Choon Cha, Mark Powell, Kent E. Orr

Publication date 16 January 2020

Published in Mathematische Zeitschrift (Search for Journal in Brave)

Copyright license Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International

Full work available at URL https://arxiv.org/abs/1606.03608

zbMATH Keywords

Alexander polynomial Arf invariant Blanchfield form knot second homotopy group Whitney towers

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Knot theory (57K10) Knot polynomials (57K14) General topology of 4-manifolds (57K40) General geometric structures on low-dimensional manifolds (57M50) Immersions in differential topology (57R42) Singularities of differentiable mappings in differential topology (57R45)

Abstract: We relate certain abelian invariants of a knot, namely the Alexander polynomial, the Blanchfield form, and the Arf invariant, to intersection data of a Whitney tower in the 4-ball bounded by the knot. We also give a new 3-dimensional algorithm for computing these invariants.

Review text

Since its introduction in 1935, the Seifert Surface, and associated Seifert Matrix of a knot \(k\) in \(S^3\) have played an important role in developing an understanding of both geometric and algebraic properties of \(k\). The authors show here how a number of classical (abelian) invariants of \(k\) may be obtained by a method using as starting point an alternative to the Seifert Surface. The structure they utilize is a \textit {Whitney Tower}. (Explanation of Whitney Towers may be found for example in an expository paper by \textit{R. Schneiderman} [``Introduction to Whitney Towers, Preprint, \url{arXiv: 2012.01475}] They begin with a \(4\)-ball \(D^4\) whose boundary \(S^3\) contains \(k\). The knot \(k\) will bound an immersed disc \(D_0\) in \(D^4\). It may be assumed that the fundamental group of \(W = (D^4-\nu(D_0))\), the complement of a neighborhood of \(D_0\), is infinite cyclic, and that the singularities of the immersion are a finite number of pairs of points \((p_i, q_i), i=1,\dots,d\), and these pairs of self intersections of \(D_0\) have opposite signs. Associated with each such pair are a pair of immersed discs, \(A_i\) and (a \textit{Whitney Disc}) \(D_i, i = 1,\dots,d\), both obtained from push outs of certain loops on \(D_0\), homotopically trivial in the complement of \(D_0\) and passing through \(p_i\) and \(q_i\). From the points of intersection (and self-intersection) of all these associated immersed discs a matrix with entries from the integral group ring of \(\pi_1(W)\) may be constructed, from which the Alexander Polynomial, Arf invariant and the Blanchfield pairing may be obtained. (Consideration of self-intersections of the discs requires framing). The Blanchfield pairing follows from the intersections of disc pairs, and a clever construction (attributed to Peter Teichner) of a basis of \(2\)-spheres for \(\pi_{2}(W)\otimes_{Z[Z]}Z\), the second homotopy group of \(W\) as a module over the integral group ring of \(Z\), the fundamental group of \(W\). Each \(2\)-sphere of the basis is made up of \(4\) copies of a disc \(A_i\), \(2\) copies of a piece of the torus which is the normal circle bundle of a curve on \(D_0\), and a split open copy of the Clifford torus in the boundary of a neighborhood of the singularity \(p_i\). There are a number of helpful pictures, and the practicality of the approach is confirmed by the inclusion of two instructive examples. There is some positive speculation as to the applicability of the methods to the extraction of invariants corresponding to nilpotent and solvable covers.

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