arXiv research

We investigate some algebraic structures called quasi-trivial quandles and we use them to study link-homotopy of pretzel links. Precisely, a necessary and sufficient condition for a pretzel link with at least two components being trivial under link-homotopy is given. We also generalize the quasi-trivial quandle idea to…

This note proves properties of surface-links with trivial components.

We show that if a split link is obtained from a split link $L$ in $S^3$ by $1/n$-Dehn surgery along a trivial knot $C$, then the link $L\cup C$ is splittable. That is to say, it is impossible to obtain a split link from a split link via a non-trivial twisting. As its corollary, we completely determine when a trivial li…

This paper improves bounds on how many Delta-moves are needed to trivialize a link.

There is a question asking whether a handle-irreducible summand of every stable-ribbon surface-link is a unique ribbon surface-link. This question for the case of a trivial surface-link is affirmatively answered. That is, a handle-irreducible summand of every stably trivial surface-link is only a trivial 2-link. By com…

New concept of quasi-ribbon surface-links simplifies complex surface-links.

Trivial links are unique up to number of link components, but they can be hard to recognize from arbitrary diagrams. We define a new measure of the complexity of a link embedding, the crumple, and show how this may be used to measure progress toward a trivial embedding. In conjunction with a modified form of arc presen…

We introduce the notion of quasi-triviality of quandles and define homology of quasi-trivial quandles. Quandle cocycle invariants are invariant under link-homotopy if they are associated with 2-cocycles of quasi-trivial quandles. We thus obtain a lot of numerical link-homotopy invariants.

Link-homotopy and self Delta-equivalence are equivalence relations on links. It was shown by J. Milnor (resp. the last author) that Milnor invariants determine whether or not a link is link-homotopic (resp. self Delta-equivalent) to a trivial link. We study link-homotopy and self Delta-equivalence on a certain componen…

Let $n$ be a positive integer. M. K. Dabkowski and J. H. Przytycki introduced the $n$th Burnside group of links which is preserved by $n$-moves, and proved that for any odd prime $p$ there exist links which are not equivalent to trivial links up to $p$-moves by using their $p$th Burnside groups. This gives counterexamp…

Jones polynomial for twisted torus knots is trivial if and only if the knot is trivial.

We say that a graph is intrinsically non-trivial if every spatial embedding of the graph contains a non-trivial spatial subgraph. We prove that an intrinsically non-trivial graph is intrinsically linked, namely every spatial embedding of the graph contains a non-splittable 2-component link. We also show that there exis…

The paper studies hyperbolic geometry of links formed by adding trivial components to knots.

Proves links can be simplified to trivial form in few changes, limiting Milnor's invariants.

The paper verifies stable handleslide triviality of some R-links and shows many are stably equivalent.

Paper provides a condition to distinguish links up to 4-moves.

This paper studies quandles with one non-trivial column and their properties.

We use a simple geometric argument and small cancellation properties of link groups to prove that alternating links are non-trivial. This proof uses only classic results in topology and combinatorial group theory.

It is proved that every disconnected surface-link with meridian-based free fundamental group is a trivial (i.e., an unknotted-unlinked) surface-link. This result is a surface-link version of the author's recent announcement result on smooth unknotting of a surface-knot.

We prove a conjecture of Rozansky's concerning his categorification of the tail of the colored Jones polynomial for an $A$-adequate link. We show that the tail homology groups he constructs are trivial for non $A$-adequate links.

Study Khovanov homology of Turaev genus one links, finding a trivial summand.

Augmented alternating links are links obtained by adding trivial components that bound twice-punctured disks to non-split reduced non-2-braid prime alternating projections. These links are known to be hyperbolic. Here, we extend to show that generalized augmented alternating links, which allow for new trivial component…

It follows from earlier work of Silver-Williams and the authors that twisted Alexander polynomials detect the unknot and the Hopf link. We now show that twisted Alexander polynomials also detect the trefoil and the figure-8 knot, that twisted Alexander polynomials detect whether a link is split and that twisted Alexand…

For a link with zero determinants, a Z-coloring is defined as a generalization of Fox coloring. We call a link having a diagram which admits a non-trivial Z-coloring a Z-colorable link. The minimal coloring number of a Z-colorable link is the minimal number of colors for non-trivial Z-colorings on diagrams of the link.…

A C_n-move is a local move on links defined by Habiro and Goussarov, which can be regarded as a `higher order crossing change'. We use Milnor invariants with repeating indices to provide several classification results for links up to C_n-moves, under certain restrictions. Namely, we give a classification up to C_4-move…

For each odd prime p, and for each non-split link admitting non-trivial p-colorings, we prove that the maximum number of Fox colors is p. We also prove that we can assemble a non-trivial p-coloring with any number of colors, from the minimum to the maximum number of colors. Furthermore, for any rational link, we prove …

The paper studies knitted surfaces and surface-links, showing their isotopy and closure properties.

Revised proof shows ribbonness of surface-links in 4-sphere.

Brunnian links have been known for a long time in knot theory, whereas the idea of n-triviality is a recent innovation. We illustrate the relationship between the two concepts with four short theorems.

It is an open problem whether Kirk's $σ$ invariant is the complete obstruction to a link map $S^2\cup S^2\to S^4$ being link homotopically trivial. With the objective of constructing counterexamples, Li proposed a link homotopy invariant $ω$ that is defined on the kernel of $σ$ and also obstructs link nullhomotopy. We …

We study surface links whose link groups are free abelian, and construct various stimulating and highly non-trivial examples of such surface links.

There is a nonribbon 2-link all of whose components are trivial 2-knots and one of whose band-sums is a nonribbon 2-knot.

New tribrackets defined to count link homotopy invariants.

New method shows certain group presentations are trivial.

In this paper, we study the colorability of link diagrams by the Alexander quandles. We show that if the reduced Alexander polynomial $Δ_{L}(t)$ is vanishing, then $L$ admits a non-trivial coloring by any non-trivial Alexander quandle $Q$, and that if $Δ_{L}(t)=1$, then $L$ admits only the trivial coloring by any Alexa…

We study the effect of Nielsen moves and their geometric counterparts, handle slides, on good boundary links. A collection of links, universal for 4-dimensional surgery, is shown to admit Seifert surfaces with trivial Lagrangian. They are good boundary links, with Seifert matrices of a more general form than in known c…

A virtual link can be understood as a link in a trivial I-bundle over an orientable compact surface with genus. A twisted virtual link is a link in a trivial I-bundle over a not-necessarily orientable compact surface. A twisted virtual birack is an algebraic structure with axioms derived from the twisted virtual Reidem…

A link L in the 3-sphere is called Brunnian if every proper sublink of L is trivial. In a previous paper, the first author proved that the restriction to Brunnian links of any Goussarov-Vassiliev finite type invariant of (n+1)-component links of degree<2n is trivial. The purpose of this paper is to study the first nont…

Minor typographical errors fixed. Cochran constructed many links with Alexander module that of the unlink and some nonvanishing Milnor invariants, using as input commutators in a free group and as an invariant the longitudes of the links. We present a different and conjecturally complete construction, that uses element…

This paper is a continuation on the 2012 paper on "Cutting Twisted Solid Tori (TSTs)", in which we considered twisted solid torus links (tst links). We generalize the notion of tst links to "surgerized tst links": recall that when performing $Φ^μ(n(τ), d(τ), M)$ on a tst $\langle τ\rangle$ where $M$ is odd, we obtain t…

In this paper, a link diagram is said to be minimal if no Reidemeister move I or II can be applied to it to reduce the number of crossings. We show that for an arbitrary diagram D of a link without a trivial split component, a minimal diagram obtained by applying Reidemeister moves I and II to D is unique. The proof al…

The Witten-Reshetikhin-Turaev invariant of classical link diagrams is generalized to virtual link diagrams. This invariant is unchanged by the framed Reidemeister moves and the Kirby calculus. As a result, it is also an invariant of the 3-manifolds represented by the classical link diagrams. This generalization is used…

The paper explores orderability in link quandles and provides various results.

We show that every non-trivial tame knot or link in R^3 has a quadrisecant, i.e. four collinear points. The quadrisecant must be topologically non-trivial in a precise sense. As an application, we show that a nonsingular, algebraic surface in R^3 which is a knotted torus must have degree at least eight.

We give a classification of $n$-component links up to $C_n$-move. In order to prove this classification, we characterize Brunnian links, and have that a Brunnian link is ambient isotopic to a band sum of trivial link and Milnor's links.

We analyze properties of links which have diagrams with a small number of negative crossings. We show that if a nontrivial link has a diagram with all crossings positive except possibly one, then the signature of the link is negative. If a link diagram has two negative crossings, we show that the signature of the link …

Proves Montesinos-Nakanishi 3-move conjecture for links up to 20 crossings.

We give infinitely many $2$-component links with unknotted components which are topologically concordant to the Hopf link, but not smoothly concordant to any $2$-component link with trivial Alexander polynomial. Our examples are pairwise non-concordant.