arXiv research

Proves cosmetic crossing conjecture for certain knots.

Study knots with genus one, finds Gordian distance and cosmetic crossing constraints.

Alexander polynomial condition blocks crossing changes in some knots.

Proves special alternating knots can't have cosmetic crossings.

We prove that the property of admitting no cosmetic crossing changes is preserved under the operation of forming certain satellites of winding number zero. We also define strongly cosmetic crossing changes and we discuss their behavior under the operation of inserting full twists in the strings of closed braids.

Let K' be a knot that admits no cosmetic crossing changes and let C be a non-trivial, prime, non-cable knot. Then any knot that is a satellite of C with winding number zero and pattern K' admits no cosmetic crossing changes. As a consequence we prove the nugatory crossing conjecture for Whitehead doubles of prime, non-…

Formula for Casson-Walker invariant; applies to knot complements and cosmetic crossing conjecture.

We show that if K is a satellite knot which admits a generalized cosmetic crossing change of order q with |q| \geq 6, then K admits a pattern knot with a generalized cosmetic crossing change of the same order. As a consequence of this, we find that any prime satellite knot which admits a pattern knot that is fibered ca…

We study cosmetic crossings in knots of genus one and obtain obstructions to such crossings in terms of knot invariants determined by Seifert matrices. In particular, we prove that for genus one knots the Alexander polynomial and the homology of the double cover branching over the knot provide obstructions to cosmetic …

Study finds new knot distances and chirally cosmetic bands using grid diagrams.

The paper verifies no cosmetic surgeries on knots and 3-manifolds using hyperbolic geometry.

Pseudo links have two crossing types: classical crossings and indeterminate crossings. They were first introduced by Ryo Hanaki as a possible tool for analyzing images produced by electron microscopy of DNA. A normalized bracket polynomial is defined for pseudo links and then used to construct and obstruction to cosmet…

Study shows most knots up to 10 crossings can't be chirally cosmetic.

The cosmetic crossing conjecture (also known as the "nugatory crossing conjecture") asserts that the only crossing changes that preserve the oriented isotopy class of a knot in the 3-sphere are nugatory. We use the Dehn surgery characterization of the unknot to prove this conjecture for knots in integer homology sphere…

We show that two Dehn surgeries on a knot $K$ never yield manifolds that are homeomorphic as oriented manifolds if $V_K''(1)\neq 0$ or $V_K'''(1)\neq 0$. As an application, we verify the cosmetic surgery conjecture for all knots with no more than $11$ crossings except for three $10$-crossing knots and five $11$-crossin…

We show that for genus one knots the Alexander polynomial and the homology of the double cover branching over the knot provide obstructions to cosmetic crossings. As an application we prove the nugatory crossing conjecture for the negatively twisted, positive Whitehead doubles of all knots. We also verify the conjectur…

Study shows alternating knots can't have similar crossings.

The study confirms that most positive 2-bridge knots up to 31 crossings do not have chirally cosmetic surgeries.

Proves cosmetic surgery conjecture for strongly invertible knots.

A symmetric union of two knots is a classical construction in knot theory which generalizes connected sum, introduced by Kinoshita and Terasaka in the 1950s. We study this construction for the purpose of finding an infinite family of hyperbolic non-fibered three-bridge knots of constant determinant which satisfy the we…

Knots from a specific band sum have similar homologies but are distinct.

We consider the cosmetic surgery problem for two-bridge knots in the 3-sphere. It is seen that all the two-bridge knots at most 9 crossings other than $9_{27} = S(49,19)=C[2,2,-2,2,2,-2]$ admits no purely cosmetic surgery pairs. Then we show that any two-bridge knot of the Conway form $[2x,2,-2x,2x,2,-2x]$ with $x \ge …

Let $K$ be a knot in a rational homology sphere $M$. This paper investigates the question of when modifying $K$ by adding $m>0$ half-twists to two oppositely-oriented strands, while keeping the rest of $K$ fixed, produces a knot isotopic to $K$. Such a two-strand twist of order $m$, as we define it, is a generalized cr…

New quantum obstructions prevent purely cosmetic surgeries on knots.

If a knot $K$ in $S^3$ admits a pair of truly cosmetic surgeries, we show that the surgery slopes are either $\pm 2$ or $\pm 1/q$ for some value of $q$ that is explicitly determined by the knot Floer homology of $K$. Moreover, in the former case the genus of $K$ must be two, and in the latter case there is bound relati…

We prove the nugatory crossing conjecture for fibered knots. We also show that if a knot $K$ is $n$-adjacent to a fibered knot $K'$, for some $n>1$, then either the genus of $K$ is larger than that of $K'$ or $K$ is isotopic to $K'$.

Study finds chirally cosmetic surgeries on knots and manifolds, contradicting previous conjectures.

Two knot families meet cosmetic surgery conjecture.

Paper restricts chirally cosmetic surgeries on knots.

Study confirms contact cosmetic surgery for most knots, with exceptions.

New findings on cosmetic surgeries for satellite knots.

This paper concerns the truly or purely cosmetic surgery conjecture. We give a survey on exceptional surgeries and cosmetic surgeries. We prove that the slope of an exceptional truly cosmetic surgery on a hyperbolic knot in $S^3$ must be $\pm 1$ and the surgery must be toroidal but not Seifert fibred. As consequence we…

Cosmetic surgeries on pretzel knots are unique.

3-braid knots can't have purely cosmetic surgeries.

Study shows most odd pretzel knots don't allow chirally cosmetic surgeries.

The paper proves finiteness of cosmetic fillings on a specific type of 3-manifold.

The cosmetic surgery conjecture is a longstanding conjecture in 3-manifold theory. We present a theorem about exceptional cosmetic surgery for homology spheres. Along the way we prove that if the surgery is not a small seifert $\mathbb{Z}/2\mathbb{Z}$-homology sphere or a toroidal irreducible non-Seifert surgery then t…

Study proves nontrivial knots can't undergo cosmetic surgeries.

The study shows a limit on cosmetic surgeries for certain knots.

The study proves large alternating Montesinos knots cannot have purely cosmetic surgeries.

New Heegaard Floer homology findings block chirally cosmetic surgeries.

Paper proves knots satisfy a conjecture using Jones polynomial.

Study cosmetic surgeries on knots in homology spheres using Casson-Walker invariant.

Two Dehn surgeries on a knot are called cosmetic if they yield homeomorphic manifolds. For a null-homologous knot with certain conditions on the Thurston norm of the ambient manifold, if the knot admits cosmetic surgeries, then the surgery coefficients are equal up to sign.

Two Dehn surgeries on a knot are called purely cosmetic if their surgered manifolds are homeomorphic as oriented manifolds. Gordon conjectured that non-trivial knots in $S^3$ do not admit purely cosmetic surgeries. In this article, we confirm this conjecture for cable knots.

In this paper, we prove that there are no truly cosmetic surgeries on genus one classical knots. If the two surgery slopes have the same sign, we give the only possibilities of reflectively cosmetic surgeries. The result is an application of Heegaard Floer theory and number theory.

We show that a $(p,q)$-cable of a non-trivial knot $K$ does not admit chirally cosmetic surgery for $q\neq 2$, or $q=2$ with additional assumptions. In particular, we show that $(p,q)$-cable of non-trivial knot $K$ does not admit chirally cosmetic surgery as long as the JSJ piece of knot exterior does not contain $(2,r…

We present various examples of cosmetic bandings on knots and links, that is, bandings on knots and links leaving their types unchanged. As a byproduct, we give a hyperbolic knot which admits exotic chirally cosmetic surgeries yielding hyperbolic manifolds. This gives a counterexample to a conjecture raised by Bleiler,…