Unknotting unknots

DOI10.4169/AMER.MATH.MONTHLY.121.05.379zbMATH Open1302.57019arXiv1006.4176OpenAlexW3037841979WikidataQ58187717 ScholiaQ58187717MaRDI QIDQ2928634FDOQ2928634

Authors: Allison Henrich, Louis Kauffman 

Publication date: 10 November 2014

Published in: American Mathematical Monthly (Search for Journal in Brave)

Abstract: A knot is an an embedding of a circle into three-dimensional space. We say that a knot is unknotted if there is an ambient isotopy of the embedding to a standard circle. By representing knots via planar diagrams, we discuss the problem of unknotting a knot diagram when we know that it is unknotted. This problem is surprisingly difficult, since it has been shown that knot diagrams may need to be made more complicated before they may be simplified. We do not yet know, however, how much more complicated they must get. We give an introduction to the work of Dynnikov who discovered the key use of arc--presentations to solve the problem of finding a way to detect the unknot directly from a diagram of the knot. Using Dynnikov's work, we show how to obtain a quadratic upper bound for the number of crossings that must be introduced into a sequence of unknotting moves. We also apply Dynnikov's results to find an upper bound for the number of moves required in an unknotting sequence.

Full work available at URL: https://arxiv.org/abs/1006.4176

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Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Cited In (13)

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• Unknots with highly knotted control polygons
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• On the unknotting problem
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• Hard Diagrams of the Unknot
• Arc-presentations of links: Monotonic simplification
• Local and algorithmic moves of knots according to Lackenby
• Connected sum and crossing numbers of flat virtual knots
• The Unknotting Problem
• A polynomial upper bound on Reidemeister moves
• Complexity of unknotting of trivial \(2\)-knots
• Unknot diagrams requiring a quadratic number of Reidemeister moves to untangle

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