arXiv research

We define a laminar branched surface to be a branched surface satisfying the following conditions: (1) Its horizontal boundary is incompressible; (2) there is no monogon; (3) there is no Reeb component; (4) there is no sink disk (after eliminating trivial bubbles in the branched surface). The first three conditions are…

A branched covering surface-knot is a surface-knot in the form of a branched covering over a surface-knot. For a branched covering surface-knot, we have a numerical invariant called the simplifying number. We show that branched covering surface-knots with degree three have the simplifying numbers less than three.

A branched covering surface-knot is a surface-knot in the form of a branched covering over an oriented surface-knot $F$, where we include the case when the covering has no branch points. A branched covering surface-knot is presented by a graph called a chart on a surface diagram of $F$. We can simplify a branched cover…

Veering branched surfaces help construct geodesic flows on curved surfaces.

A branched covering surface-knot over an oriented surface-knot $F$ is a surface-knot in the form of a branched covering over $F$. A branched covering surface-knot over $F$ is presented by a graph called a chart on a surface diagram of $F$. For a branched covering surface-knot, an addition of 1-handles equipped with cha…

The branched virtual fibering theorem by Sakuma states that every closed orientable $3$-manifold with a Heegaard surface of genus $g$ has a branched double cover which is a genus $g$ surface bundle over the circle. It is proved by Brooks that such a surface bundle can be chosen to be hyperbolic. We prove that the minim…

We define sink marks for branched complexes and find conditions for them to determine a branched surface structure. These will be used to construct branched surfaces in knot and tangle complements. We will extend Delman's theorem and prove that a Montesinos knot $K$ of length at least 3 has a persistently laminar branc…

Quantized Coulomb branches linked to skein algebras.

The paper studies branched surfaces and their properties.

A branched affine structure on a compact topological surface with marked points is a complex affine structure outside the marked points. We give a proof of an unpublished foundational theorem of Veech, stating that any branched affine surface can be decomposed into affine triangles and some annulus-shaped cylinders. Th…

The study investigates how branch points affect the shape and mechanics of hyperbolic surfaces.

Every open Riemann surface can be triangulated with equilateral triangles.

Given a branched covering of degree d between closed surfaces, it determines a collection of partitions of d, the branch data. In this work we show that any branch data are realized by an indecomposable primitive branched covering on a connected close surface N with Euler's characteristic less than or equal to 0. This …

Minimal Lagrangian diffeomorphisms between spherical surfaces are rigid.

New method finds unique branched surfaces in 3-manifolds.

We introduce and analyze the characteristic foliation induced by a contact structure on a branched surface, in particular a branched standard spine of a 3-manifold. We extend to (fairly general) singular foliations of branched surfaces the local existence and uniqueness results which hold for genuine surfaces. Moreover…

Study on minimal surfaces with constraints on index and branching order.

Holomorphic projective structures and bundles are studied on surfaces, revealing affine spaces of parameters.

Solve arc diagrams on surfaces via branched covers.

Characterizes representations for complex projective structures with specific branch data.

We propose in this paper a method for studying contact structures in 3-manifolds by means of branched surfaces. We explain what it means for a contact structure to be carried by a branched surface embedded in a 3-manifold. To make the transition from contact structures to branched surfaces, we first define auxiliary ob…

We prove that Stein surfaces with boundary coincide up to orientation preserving diffeomorphisms with simple branched coverings of $\B^4$ whose branch set is a positive braided surface. As a consequence, we have that a smooth oriented 3-manifold is Stein fillable iff it has a positive open-book decomposition.

Study on moduli spaces of branched projective structures on surfaces.

For a given branched covering between closed connected surfaces, there are several easy relations one can establish between the Euler characteristics of the surfaces, their orientability, the total degree, and the local degrees at the branching points, including the classical Riemann-Hurwitz formula. These necessary re…

We continue our computation, using a combinatorial method based on Gronthendieck's dessins d'enfant, of the number of (weak) equivalence classes of surface branched covers matching certain specific branch data. In this note we concentrate on data with the surface of genus g as source surface, the sphere as target surfa…

The paper introduces branched α-flows on surfaces with negative Euler characteristic and proves their long-term existence and convergence.

There are examples of branched surfaces that do not fully carry laminations, but their preimage in a finite cover does fully carry a lamination

Classifies branched Willmore spheres using conformal Gauss maps.

Harmonic maps from surfaces to CAT(k) spheres are branched coverings.

A contamination in a 3-manifold is an object interpolating between the contact structure and the lamination. Contaminations seem to provide a link between 3-dimensional contact geometry and the classical topology of 3-manifolds, as described in a separate paper. In this paper we deal with contaminations carried by bran…

The paper calculates homology and intersection pairing of branched covers using disoriented homology.

Minimal surfaces in a Riemannian manifold $M^n$ are surfaces which are stationary for area: the first variation of area vanishes. In this paper we focus on surfaces of the topological type of the real projective plane $\R P^2$. We show that a minimal surface $f:\R P^2\to M^3$ which has the smallest area, among those ma…

To a branched cover between closed, connected and orientable surfaces one associates a "branch datum", which consists of the two surfaces, the total degree d, and the partitions of d given by the collections of local degrees over the branching points. This datum must satisfy the Riemann-Hurwitz formula. A "candidate su…

The paper studies entropy in branched covers of 3-manifolds.

Techniques for constructing codimension 2 embeddings and immersions of the 2 and 3-fold branched covers of the 3 and 4-dimensional spheres are presented. These covers are in braided form, and it is in this sense that they are folded. More precisely the composition of the embedding (or immersion) and the canonical proje…

Racks do not give us invariants of surface-knots in general. For example, if a surface-knot diagram has branch points (and a rack which we use satisfies some mild condition), then it admits no rack colorings. In this paper, we investigate rack colorings for surface-knot diagrams without branch points and prove that rac…

Let M be a smooth 4-manifold which admits a relatively minimal hyperelliptic genus h Lefschetz fibration over the 2-sphere. If all of the vanishing cycles for this fibration are nonseparating curves, then we show that M is a 2-fold cover of a 2-sphere bundle over the 2-sphere, branched over an embedded surface. If the …

We introduce the concept of a branched holomorphic Cartan geometry. It generalizes to higher dimension the definition of branched (flat) complex projective structure on a Riemann surface introduced by Mandelbaum. This new framework is much more flexible than that of the usual holomorphic Cartan geometries. We show that…

Minimal surfaces with complex branching structures constructed using various methods.

\noindent Given a Riemann surface $M$, the \emph{complexity} of a branched cover of $M$ to the Riemann sphere $S^2$, of degree $d$ and with branching set of cardinality $n \geq 3$, is defined as $d$ times the hyperbolic area of the complement of its branching set in $S^2$. A branched cover $p \colon M \to S^2$ of degre…

Branch points of a real 2-surface S in a 4-manifold M generalize the branch points of complex curves in complex surfaces: for example, they can occur as singularities of minimal surfaces. We investigate such a branch point p when S is topologically embedded in M. It defines a link L(p), the components of which are clos…

Loi and Piergallini showed that a smooth compact, connected $4$-manifold $X$ with boundary admits a Stein structure if and only if $X$ is a simple branched cover of a $4$-disk $D^4$ branched along a positive braided surface $S$ in a bidisk $D_{1}^{2} \times D_{2}^{2} \approx D^4$. For each integer $N \geq 2$, we constr…

We give a sufficient condition for a branched surface in a 3 dimensional manifold to fully carry a lamination, giving a piece of answer to a classical question of D. Gabai.

New partial solution to Hurwitz problem for surface branched covers.

New examples show strong Kato limits can be branching and not satisfy known conditions.

We show that any homologically non-trivial Dehn twist of a compact surface F with boundary is the lifting of a half-twist in the braid group B_n, with respect to a suitable branched covering p : F -> B^2. In particular, we allow the surface to have disconnected boundary. As a consequence, any allowable Lefschetz fibrat…

Minimal surfaces and curves can have singularities removed by isotopy.

We give a topological interpretation of the core group invariant of a surface embedded in S^4. We show that the group is isomorphic to the free product of the fundamental group of the double branch cover of S^4 with the surface as a branched set, and the infinite cyclic group. We present a generalization for unoriented…