We show that any exceptional non-trivial Dehn surgery on a twist knot, except the trefoil, yields a $3$-manifold whose fundamental group is left-orderable. This is a generalization of a result of Clay, Lidman and Watson, and also gives a new supporting evidence for a conjecture of Boyer, Gordon and Watson.

For a manifold with boundary, the restriction of Chern's transgression form of the Euler curvature form over the boundary is closed. Its cohomology class is called the secondary Chern-Euler class and was used by Sha to formulate a relative Poincaré-Hopf theorem under the condition that the metric on the manifold is locally product near the boundary. We show that the secondary Chern-Euler form is exact away from the outward and inward unit normal vectors of the boundary by explicitly constructing a transgression form. Using Stokes' theorem, this evaluates the boundary term in Sha's relative Poincaré-Hopf theorem in terms of more classical indices of the tangential projection of a vector field. This evaluation in particular shows that Sha's relative Poincaré-Hopf theorem is equivalent to the more classical law of vector fields.

We define and study the secondary Chern-Euler class for a general submanifold of a Riemannian manifold. Using this class, we define and study the index for a vector field with non-isolated singularities on a submanifold. As an application, we give conceptual proofs of a result of Chern.

Let $M^m$ be an $m$-dimensional, closed and smooth manifold, equipped with a smooth involution $T\colon M^m \to M^m$ whose fixed point set has the form $F^n \cup F^j$, where $F^n$ and $F^j$ are submanifolds with dimensions $n$ and $j$, $F^j$ is indecomposable and $ n >j$. Write $n-j=2^pq$, where $q \ge 1$ is odd and $p \geq 0$, and set $m(n-j) = 2n+p-q+1$ if $p \leq q + 1$ and $m(n-j)= 2n + 2^{p-q}$ if $p \geq q$. In this paper we show that $m \le m(n-j) + 2j+1$. Further, we show that this bound is \emph{almost} best possible, by exhibiting examples $(M^{m(n-j) +2j},T)$ where the fixed point set of $T$ has the form $F^n \cup F^j$ described above, for every $2 \le j
Keywords:involution, projective space bundle, indecomposable manifold, splitting principle, Stiefel-Whitney class, characteristic number
Category:57R85

We show that if the family $\mathcal{O}$ of orbits of all vector fields on a subcartesian space $P$ is locally finite and each orbit in $\mathcal{O}$ is locally closed, then $\mathcal{O}$ defines a smooth Whitney A stratification of $P$. We also show that the stratification by orbit type of the space of orbits $M/G$ of a proper action of a Lie group $G$ on a smooth manifold $M$ is given by orbits of the family of all vector fields on $M/G$.

We show that closed $\widetilde{\mathbb{SL}} \times \mathbb{E}^n$-manifolds are topologically rigid if $n\geq 2$, and are rigid up to $s$-cobordism, if $n=1$.

We show that there is an infinite family of hyperbolic knots such that each knot admits a cyclic surgery $m$ whose adjacent surgeries $m-1$ and $m+1$ are toroidal. This gives an affirmative answer to a question asked by Boyer and Zhang.

We define a family of generalizations of the two-variable quandle polynomial. These polynomial invariants generalize in a natural way to eight-variable polynomial invariants of finite biquandles. We use these polynomials to define a family of link invariants that further generalize the quandle counting invariant.

We exhibit infinitely many hyperbolic $3$-manifold groups that are not right-orderable.

In this paper we provide lower bounds for the dimension of various critical sets, and we point out some differential maps with high dimensional critical sets.

An irreducible graph manifold $M$ contains an essential torus if it is not a special Seifert manifold. Whether $M$ contains a closed essential surface of negative Euler characteristic or not depends on the difference of Seifert fibrations from the two sides of a torus system which splits $M$ into Seifert manifolds. However, it is not easy to characterize geometrically the class of irreducible graph manifolds which contain such surfaces. This article studies this problem in the case of graph link exteriors.

We study the topological $4$-dimensional surgery problem for a closed connected orientable topological $4$-manifold $X$ with vanishing second homotopy and $\pi_1(X)\cong A * F(r)$, where $A$ has one end and $F(r)$ is the free group of rank $r\ge 1$. Our result is related to a theorem of Krushkal and Lee, and depends on the validity of the Novikov conjecture for such fundamental groups.

We prove that the neighborhood complex $\N(G)$, the box complex $\B(G)$, the homomorphism complex $\Hom(K_2,G)$and the Lov\'{a}sz complex $\L(G)$ have the same simple $\Z_2$-homotopy type in the sense of Whitehead. We show that these graph complexes are simple $\Z_2$-universal.

We prove that for a simply connected closed $4$-dimensional manifold, its embeddings into the sphere of dimension $6$ are all concordant to each other.

Let $M$ be a symplectic $4$-dimensional manifold equipped with a Hamiltonian circle action with isolated fixed points. We describe a method for computing its integral equivariant cohomology in terms of fixed point data. We give some examples of these computations.

We extend the notion of linking number of an ordinary link of two components to that of a singular link with transverse intersections in which case the linking number is a half-integer. We then apply it to simplify the construction of the Seifert matrix, and therefore the Alexander polynomial, in a natural way.

Let $G=({\mathbb Z}/a\rtimes{\mathbb Z}/b) \times \SL_2(\mathbb{F}_p)$, and let $X(n)$ be an $n$-dimensional $CW$-complex of the homotopy type of an $n$-sphere. We study the automorphism group $\Aut (G)$ in order to compute the number of distinct homotopy types of spherical space forms with respect to free and cellular $G$-actions on all $CW$-complexes $X(2dn-1)$, where $2d$ is the period of $G$. The groups ${\mathcal E}(X(2dn-1)/\mu)$ of self homotopy equivalences of space forms $X(2dn-1)/\mu$ associated with free and cellular $G$-actions $\mu$ on $X(2dn-1)$ are determined as well.

For a non-trivial knot in the $3$-sphere, only integral Dehn surgery can create a closed $3$-manifold containing a projective plane. If we restrict ourselves to hyperbolic knots, the corresponding claim for a Klein bottle is still true. In contrast to these, we show that non-integral surgery on a hyperbolic knot can create a closed non-orientable surface of any genus greater than two.

It is shown that the group of compactly supported, measure-preserving homeomorphisms of a connected, second countable manifold is locally contractible in the direct limit topology. Furthermore, this group is weakly homotopically equivalent to the more general group of compactly supported homeomorphisms.

In this article, we give an explicit formula to compute the non abelian twisted sign-deter\-mined Reidemeister torsion of the exterior of a fibered knot in terms of its monodromy. As an application, we give explicit formulae for the non abelian Reidemeister torsion of torus knots and of the figure eight knot.

Using a modification of Webster's proof of the Newlander--Nirenberg theorem, it is shown that, for a weakly convergent sequence of integrable unitary connections on a complex vector bundle over a complex manifold, there is a subsequence of local holomorphic frames that converges strongly in an appropriate Holder class.

We study some global aspects of differential complex 2-forms and 3-forms on complex manifolds. We compute the cohomology classes represented by the sets of points on a manifold where such a form degenerates in various senses, together with other similar cohomological obstructions. Based on these results and a formula for projective representations, we calculate the degree of the projectivization of certain orbits of the representation $\Lambda^k\C^n$.

We show that several torsion free 3-manifold groups are not left-orderable. Our examples are groups of cyclic branched coverings of $S^3$ branched along links. The figure eight knot provides simple nontrivial examples. The groups arising in these examples are known as Fibonacci groups which we show not to be left-orderable. Many other examples of non-orderable groups are obtained by taking 3-fold branched covers of $S^3$ branched along various hyperbolic 2-bridge knots. %with various hyperbolic 2-bridge knots as branched sets. The manifold obtained in such a way from the $5_2$ knot is of special interest as it is conjectured to be the hyperbolic 3-manifold with the smallest volume.

Let $M$ be a complete flat Lorentz $3$-manifold $M$ with purely hyperbolic holonomy $\Gamma$. Recurrent geodesic rays are completely classified when $\Gamma$ is cyclic. This implies that for any pair of periodic geodesics $\gamma_1$, $\gamma_2$, a unique geodesic forward spirals towards $\gamma_1$ and backward spirals towards $\gamma_2$.

The stable basin theorem was introduced by Basmajian and Miner as a key step in their necessary condition for the discreteness of a non-elementary group of complex hyperbolic isometries. In this paper we improve several of Basmajian and Miner's key estimates and so give a substantial improvement on the main inequality in the stable basin theorem.