Magnus pairs in,and free conjugacy separability of,limit groups

We study the \(\mathbb {Z}\)-module of first order local Vassiliev type invariants of stable maps of oriented 3-manifolds into \(\mathbb {R}^4\). As a previous step, we determine a complete classification of the codimension two germs and multigerms as well as their corresponding bifurcation diagrams. This allows us to show the existence of 4 generators for this module. In particular, we see that the number of pairs of quadruple point, the number of transversal intersections of the crosscap suspension with immersive branches and the Euler number of the image are first order local Vassiliev type invariants for these maps. We also prove that the total number of connected components of the triple point curve is a non local Vassiliev type invariant.     

Finite type invariants for knotoids

We extend the theory of Vassiliev (or finite type) invariants for knots to knotoids using two different approaches. Firstly, we take closures on knotoids to obtain knots and we use the Vassiliev invariants for knots, proving that these are knotoid isotopy invariant. Secondly, we define finite type invariants directly on knotoids, by extending knotoid invariants to singular knotoid invariants via the Vassiliev skein relation. Then, for spherical knotoids we show that there are non-trivial type-1 invariants, in contrast with classical knot theory where type-1 invariants vanish. We give a complete theory of type-1 invariants for spherical knotoids, by classifying linear chord diagrams of order one, and we present examples arising from the affine index polynomial and the extended bracket polynomial.     

Black and white local invariants of mappings from surfaces into three-space

Goryunov proved that the space of local invariants of Vassiliev type for generic maps from surfaces to three-space is three-dimensional. The basic invariants were the number of pinch points, the number of triple points and one linked to a Rokhlin type invariant. In this paper we show that, by colouring the complement of the image of the map with a chess board pattern, we can produce a six-dimensional space of local invariants. These are essentially black and white versions of the above. Simple examples show how these are more effective. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

INVARIANT FIELDS AND LOCALIZED INVARIANT RINGS OF p-GROUPS

It is well known that for a p-group, the invariant field ispurely transcendental (T. Miyata, Invariants of certain groupsI, Nagoya Math. J. 41 (1971), 69–73). In this note, weshow that a minimal generating set of this field can be chosenas homogeneous invariants from the invariant ring. As a result,we show that the invariant ring localized at one suitable invariantis the localization of a polynomial subring at this same invariant.This second result is a generalization of a recent result ofthe first author for cyclic groups of order p (H. E. A. Campbell,Rings of invariants of representations of C_p in characteristicp, preprint, 2006). As well, we specialize these results tothis latter case.     

Link Polynomials of Higher Order

In this paper, we study certain polynomial invariants of links(singular or non-singular) that are related to the Homfly polynomialand Vassiliev's invariants. The Homfly polynomial H_L [3] (alsoknown as the Flypmoth polynomial) satisfies the well-known skeinrelation The Vassiliev invariants [1, 2] (of order 1) satisfy the relations and The invariants that we study satisfy the skein relations      

Vassiliev invariants for braids on surfaces

We show that Vassiliev invariants separate braids on a closed oriented surface, and we exhibit a universal Vassiliev invariant for these braids in terms of chord diagrams labeled by elements of the fundamental group of the surface.

     

Some applications of Tristram-Levine signatures and relation to Vassiliev invariants

Tristram and Levine introduced a continuous family of signature invariants for knots. We show that any possible value of such an invariant is realized by a knot with given Vassiliev invariants of bounded degree. We also show that one can make a knot prime preserving Alexander polynomial and Vassiliev invariants of bounded degree. Finally, the Tristram-Levine signatures are applied to obtain a condition on (signed) unknotting number.     

Topological invariants of stable immersions of oriented 3-manifolds in R4

We show that the $\mathbb{Z}$-module of first order local Vassiliev type invariants of stable immersions of oriented 3-manifolds into ${\mathbb{R}}^4$ is generated by 3 topological invariants: The number of pairs of quadruple points and the positive and negative linking invariants ${?}^{+}$ and ${?}^{?}$ introduced by V. Goryunov (1997) [7]. We obtain the expression for the Euler characteristic of the immersed 3-manifold in terms of these invariants. We also prove that the total number of connected components of the triple points curve is a non-local Vassiliev type invariant.     

Isomorphism of the Groups of Vassiliev Invariants of Legendrian and Pseudo-Legendrian Knots

The study of the Vassiliev invariants of Legendrian knots was started by D. Fuchs and S. Tabachnikov who showed that the groups of C-valued Vassiliev invariants of Legendrian and of framed knots in the standard contact R³ are canonically isomorphic. Recently we constructed the first examples of contact 3-manifolds where Vassiliev invariants of Legendrian and of framed knots are different. Moreover in these examples Vassiliev invariants of Legendrian knots distinguish Legendrian knots that are isotopic as framed knots and homotopic as Legendrian immersions. This raised the question what information about Legendrian knots can be captured using Vassiliev invariants. Here we answer this question by showing that for any contact 3-manifold with a cooriented contact structure the groups of Vassiliev invariants of Legendrian knots and of knots that are nowhere tangent to a vector field that coorients the contact structure are canonically isomorphic.     

Finite-order invariants of ornaments

Anornament is a collection of oriented closed curves in a plane, no three of which intersect at the same point. We consider homotopy invariants of ornaments. Thefinite-order invariants of ornaments are a natural analog of the Vassiliev invariants of links. The calculation of them is based on the homological study of the corresponding space of singular objects. We perform the “local” part of these calculations and a part of the “global” one, which allows us to estimate the dimensions of the spaces of invariants of any order. We also construct explicity two large series of such invariants and establish some new algebraic structures in the space of invariants. Translated from Itogi Nauki i Tekhniki, Seriya Sovremennaya Matematika i Ee Prilozheniya. Tematicheskie Obzory. Vol. 35, Algebraicheskaya Geometriya-6, 1996.     

Vassiliev invariants of Legendrian, transverse, and framed knots in contact three-manifolds

We show that for a large class of contact three-manifolds the groups of Vassiliev invariants of Legendrian and of framed knots are canonically isomorphic. As a corollary, we obtain that the group of finite order Arnold's J⁺-type invariants of wave fronts on a surface F is isomorphic to the group of Vassiliev invariants of framed knots in the spherical cotangent bundle ST∗F of F.On the other hand, we construct the first examples of contact manifolds for which Vassiliev invariants of Legendrian knots can distinguish Legendrian knots that realize isotopic framed knots and are homotopic as Legendrian immersions.     

For a fixed Turaev shadow Jones-Vassiliev invariants depend polynomially on the gleams

We use Turaev's technique of shadows and gleams to parametrize the set of all knots in S ³ with the same Hopf projection. We show that the Vassiliev invariants arising from the Jones polynomial J _t (K) are polynomials in the gleams, i.e., for , the n-th order Vassiliev invariant u _n , defined by , is a polynomial of degree 2n in the gleams. Received: April 30, 1996     

Structure stability of maps with snap-back repellers in Banach spaces

In this paper, we study small perturbations of a class of chaotic discrete systems in Banach spaces induced by snap-back repellers. If a map has a regular and non-degenerate snap-back repeller, then it still has a regular and non-degenerate snap-back repeller under a sufficiently small perturbation. Consequently, the perturbed system is still chaotic in the sense of both Devaney and Li–Yorke as the original one. Furthermore, in order to study structural stability of maps with regular and non-degenerate snap-back repellers, we first discuss structural stability of strictly A-coupled-expanding maps in Banach spaces. Applying this result, we show that a map with a regular and non-degenerate snap-back repeller in a Banach space is C ¹ structurally stable on its chaotic invariant set.     

Grope cobordism of classical knots

Motivated by the lower central series of a group, we define the notion of a grope cobordism between two knots in a 3-manifold. Just like an iterated group commutator, each grope cobordism has a type that can be described by a rooted unitrivalent tree. By filtering these trees in different ways, we show how the Goussarov-Habiro approach to finite type invariants of knots is closely related to our notion of grope cobordism. Thus our results can be viewed as a geometric interpretation of finite type invariants.The derived commutator series of a group also has a three-dimensional analogy, namely knots modulo symmetric grope cobordism. On one hand this theory maps onto the usual Vassiliev theory and on the other hand it maps onto the Cochran-Orr-Teichner filtration of the knot concordance group, via symmetric grope cobordism in 4-space. In particular, the graded theory contains information on finite type invariants (with degree h terms mapping to Vassiliev degree 2^h), Blanchfield forms or S-equivalence at h=2, Casson-Gordon invariants at h=3, and for h=4 one finds the new von Neumann signatures of a knot.     

The Kontsevich Integral

The paper contains a detailed exposition of the construction and properties of the Kontsevich integral invariant, crucial in the study of Vassiliev knot invariants.     

CR singular images of generic submanifolds under holomorphic maps

The purpose of this paper is to organize some results on the local geometry of CR singular real-analytic manifolds that are images of CR manifolds via a CR map that is a diffeomorphism onto its image. We find a necessary (sufficient in dimension 2) condition for the diffeomorphism to extend to a finite holomorphic map. The multiplicity of this map is a biholomorphic invariant that is precisely the Moser invariant of the image, when it is a Bishop surface with vanishing Bishop invariant. In higher dimensions, we study Levi-flat CR singular images and we prove that the set of CR singular points must be large, and in the case of codimension 2, necessarily Levi-flat or complex. We also show that there exist real-analytic CR functions on such images that satisfy the tangential CR conditions at the singular points, yet fail to extend to holomorphic functions in a neighborhood. We provide many examples to illustrate the phenomena that arise.     

Goussarov-Habiro theory for string links and the Milnor-Johnson correspondence

We study the Goussarov-Habiro finite type invariants theory for framed string links in homology balls. Their degree 1 invariants are computed: they are given by Milnor's triple linking numbers, the mod 2 reduction of the Sato-Levine invariant, Arf and Rochlin's μ invariant. These invariants are seen to be naturally related to invariants of homology cylinders through the Milnor-Johnson correspondence: in particular, an analogue of the Birman-Craggs homomorphism for string links is computed. The relation with Vassiliev theory is studied.     

Jacobi Fields Along Harmonic 2-Spheres in CP2 are Integrable

The paper shows that any Jacobi field along a harmonic map fromthe 2-sphere to the complex projective plane is integrable (thatis, is tangent to a smooth variation through harmonic maps).This provides one of the few known answers to the problem ofintegrability, which was raised in different contexts of geometryand analysis. It implies that the Jacobi fields form the tangentbundle to each component of the manifold of harmonic maps fromS² to CP² thus giving the nullity of any such harmonic map;it also has a bearing on the behaviour of weakly harmonic E-minimizingmaps from a 3-manifold to CP² near a singularity and the structureof the singular set of such maps from any manifold to CP².     

An algorithm for the determination of graphs associated to fold maps between closed surfaces

The aim of this paper is to introduce a computational tool that checks theoretical conditions in order to determine whether a weighted graph, as a topological invariant of stable maps, can be associated to stable maps without cusps (ie, fold maps) from closed surfaces to the projective plan.     

Stable Maps between 4-Manifolds and Elimination of their Singularities

Let f:MN be a stable map between orientable 4-manifolds, whereM is closed and N is stably parallelisable. It is shown thatthe signature of M vanishes if and only if there exists a stablemap g:MN homotopic to f which has only fold and cusp singularities.This together with results of Ando and Èliaberg showsthat, in this situation, the Thom polynomials are the only obstructionsto the elimination of the singularities except for the foldsingularity. Also studied are some topological properties (includingthose of the discriminant set) of stable maps between 4-manifoldswith only A_k-type singularities.