Width is an invariant of knots closely related to the notion of bridge number. Width minimizing embeddings of knots carry useful information about the topology of the knot complement. Although width has been an integral tool in several celebrated results in 3-manifold topology, some of its most basic properties are still unknown. In this talk we will discuss how width behaves with respect to connected sum.
Geometry-Topology Seminar
Thursday, September 23, 2010 - 4:30pm
Ryan Blair
University of Pennsylvania