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We prove that for "most" closed 3-dimensional manifolds $M$, the existence of a closed non singular one-form in a given cohomology class $u\in H^1 (M,\bf R)$ is equivalent to the fact that every twisted Alexander polynomial $\Delta^H(M,u) \in {\bf Z}[G/\ker u]$ associated to a normal subgroup with finite index $H < \pi_1(M)$ has a unitary $u$-minimal term., Comment: The statement of the main theorem has been corrected. This version has been accepted for publication in Annales de l'Institut Fourier

We study irrational pencils with isolated critical points on compact aspherical complex manifolds. We prove that if the set of critical points is nonempty, the homology of the kernel of the morphism induced by the pencil on fundamental groups is not finitely generated. This generalizes a result by Dimca, Papadima and Suciu. By considering self-products of the Cartwright-Steger surface, this allows us to build new examples of smooth projective varieties whose fundamental group has a non-finitely generated homology., Comment: 10 pages, 1 figure, v3: this is the final version, accepted in Annales de la Facult\'e des Sciences de Toulouse

We prove the first polynomial bound on the number of monotonic homotopy moves required to tighten a collection of closed curves on any compact orientable surface, where the number of crossings in the curve is not allowed to increase at any time during the process. The best known upper bound before was exponential, which can be obtained by combining the algorithm of De Graaf and Schrijver [ J. Comb. Theory Ser. B , 1997] together with an exponential upper bound on the number of possible surface maps. To obtain the new upper bound, we apply tools from hyperbolic geometry, as well as operations in graph drawing algorithms—the cluster and pipe expansions—to the study of curves on surfaces. As corollaries, we present two efficient algorithms for curves and graphs on surfaces. First, we provide a polynomial-time algorithm to convert any given multicurve on a surface into minimal position. Such an algorithm only existed for single closed curves, and it is known that previous techniques do not generalize to the multicurve case. Second, we provide a polynomial-time algorithm to reduce any k -terminal plane graph (and more generally, surface graph) using degree-1 reductions, series-parallel reductions, and Δ Y -transformations for arbitrary integer k . Previous algorithms only existed in the planar setting when k ≤ 4, and all of them rely on extensive case-by-case analysis based on different values of k . Our algorithm makes use of the connection between electrical transformations and homotopy moves and thus solves the problem in a unified fashion.

The puzzle method was introduced by Choi and Park as an effective method for finding non-singular characteristic maps over wedged simplicial complexes $K(J)$ obtained from a given simplicial complex $K$. We study further the mod 2 case of the puzzle method. We firstly describe it completely in terms of linear algebraic language which allows us to develop a constructive puzzle algorithm. We also analyze our algorithm and compare its performances with other known algorithms including the Garrison and Scott algorithm., Comment: 24 pages, 3 tables

We show that a hyperbolic $3$-manifold can be the cyclic branched cover of at most fifteen knots in $\mathbf{S}^3$. This is a consequence of a general result about finite groups of orientation preserving diffeomorphisms acting on $3$-manifolds. A similar, although weaker, result holds for arbitrary irreducible $3$-manifolds: an irreducible $3$-manifold can be the cyclic branched cover of odd prime order of at most six knots in $\mathbf{S}^3$., 31 pages, 1 figure. Changes from v2: The paper has been substantially reorganized, in particular the proof of Theorem 2 was considerably shortened. Accepted for publication by the Journal of Topology

We study the algebraic and geometric properties of stated skein algebras of surfaces with punctured boundary. We prove that the skein algebra of the bigon is isomorphic to the quantum group ${\mathcal O}_{q^2}(\mathrm{SL}(2))$ providing a topological interpretation for its structure morphisms. We also show that its stated skein algebra lifts in a suitable sense the Reshetikhin-Turaev functor and in particular we recover the dual $R$-matrix for ${\mathcal O}_{q^2}(\mathrm{SL}(2))$ in a topological way. We deduce that the skein algebra of a surface with $n$ boundary components is an algebra-comodule over ${\mathcal O}_{q^2}(\mathrm{SL}(2))^{\otimes{n}}$ and prove that cutting along an ideal arc corresponds to Hochshild cohomology of bicomodules. We give a topological interpretation of braided tensor product of stated skein algebras of surfaces as "glueing on a triangle"; then we recover topologically some braided bialgebras in the category of ${\mathcal O}_{q^2}(\mathrm{SL}(2))$-comodules, among which the "transmutation" of ${\mathcal O}_{q^2}(\mathrm{SL}(2))$. We also provide an operadic interpretation of stated skein algebras as an example of a "geometric non symmetric modular operad". In the last part of the paper we define a reduced version of stated skein algebras and prove that it allows to recover Bonahon-Wong's quantum trace map and interpret skein algebras in the classical limit when $q\to 1$ as regular functions over a suitable version of moduli spaces of twisted bundles., Comment: 74 pages, 33 figures. In version 2 : strengthened Theorem 4.17. To be published in the Journal of the European Mathematical Society

We establish a correspondence between the dimer model on a bipartite graph and a circle pattern with the combinatorics of that graph, which holds for graphs that are either planar or embedded on the torus. The set of positive face weights on the graph gives a set of global coordinates on the space of circle patterns with embedded dual. Under this correspondence, which extends the previously known isoradial case, the urban renewal (local move for dimer models) is equivalent to the Miquel move (local move for circle patterns). As a consequence the Miquel dynamics on circle patterns is governed by the octahedron recurrence. As special cases of these circle pattern embeddings, we recover harmonic embeddings for resistor networks and s-embeddings for the Ising model., Comment: 39 pages, 13 figures. To appear in Annales scientifiques de l'\'Ecole normale sup\'erieure

Motivated by the algorithmic study of 3-dimensional manifolds, we explore the structural relationship between the JSJ decomposition of a given 3-manifold and its triangulations. Building on work of Bachman, Derby-Talbot and Sedgwick, we show that a "sufficiently complicated" JSJ decomposition of a 3-manifold enforces a "complicated structure" for all of its triangulations. More concretely, we show that, under certain conditions, the treewidth (resp. pathwidth) of the graph that captures the incidences between the pieces of the JSJ decomposition of an irreducible, closed, orientable 3-manifold M yields a linear lower bound on its treewidth tw (M) (resp. pathwidth pw(M)), defined as the smallest treewidth (resp. pathwidth) of the dual graph of any triangulation of M. We present several applications of this result. We give the first example of an infinite family of bounded-treewidth 3-manifolds with unbounded pathwidth. We construct Haken 3-manifolds with arbitrarily large treewidth - previously the existence of such 3-manifolds was only known in the non-Haken case. We also show that the problem of providing a constant-factor approximation for the treewidth (resp. pathwidth) of bounded-degree graphs efficiently reduces to computing a constant-factor approximation for the treewidth (resp. pathwidth) of 3-manifolds., LIPIcs, Vol. 258, 39th International Symposium on Computational Geometry (SoCG 2023), pages 42:1-42:18

Using skein theory very much in the spirit of the Reshetikhin--Turaev constructions, we define a $(3+1)$-TQFT associated with possibly non-semisimple finite unimodular ribbon tensor categories. State spaces are given by admissible skein modules, and we prescribe the TQFT on handle attachments. We give some explicit algebraic conditions on the category to define this TQFT, namely to be "chromatic non-degenerate". As a by-product, we obtain an invariant of 4-manifolds equipped with a ribbon graph in their boundary, and in the "twist non-degenerate" case, an invariant of 3-manifolds. Our construction generalizes the Crane--Yetter--Kauffman TQFTs in the semi-simple case, and the Lyubashenko (hence also Hennings and WRT) invariants of 3-manifolds. The whole construction is very elementary, and we can easily characterize invertibility of the TQFTs, study their behavior under connected sum and provide some examples., 30 pages

We prove a general counting result for arcs of the same type in compact surfaces. Wealso count infinite arcs in cusped surfaces and arcs in orbifolds. These theorems are derived from aresult that guarantees the convergence of certain measures on the space of geodesic currents.

We quantise Whitney’s construction to prove the existence of a triangulation for any$$C^2$$C2manifold, so that we get an algorithm with explicit bounds. We also give a new elementary proof, which is completely geometric.

Recall that two geodesics in a negatively curved surface $S$ are of the same type if their free homotopy classes differ by a homeomorphism of the surface. In this note we study the distribution in the unit tangent bundle of the geodesics of fixed type, proving that they are asymptotically equidistributed with respect to a certain measure $\mathfrak{m}^S$ on $T^1S$. We study a few properties of this measure, showing for example that it distinguishes between hyperbolic surfaces., 18 pages

We prove that $Out(F_N)$ is boundary amenable. This also holds more generally for $Out(G)$, where $G$ is either a toral relatively hyperbolic group or a finitely generated right-angled Artin group. As a consequence, all these groups satisfy the Novikov conjecture on higher signatures., Comment: v2: Final version. Accepted in Annales scientifiques de l'\'Ecole normale sup\'erieure

For a hyperbolic knot and a natural number n, we consider the Alexander polynomial twisted by the n-th symmetric power of a lift of the holonomy. We establish the asymptotic behavior of these twisted Alexander polynomials evaluated at unit complex numbers, yielding the volume of the knot exterior. More generally, we prove the asymptotic behavior for cusped hyperbolic manifolds of finite volume. The proof relies on results of M\"uller, and Menal-Ferrer and the last author. Using the uniformity of the convergence, we also deduce a similar asymptotic result for the Mahler measures of those polynomials., Comment: 51 pages, comments welcome

In this article we explore the relationship between the systole and the diameter of closed hyperbolic orientable surfaces. We show that they satisfy a certain inequality, which can be used to deduce that their ratio has a (genus dependent) upper bound., 13 pages, 9 figures

We study random walks on relatively hyperbolic groups whose law is convergent, in the sense that the derivative of its Green function is finite at the spectral radius.When parabolic subgroups are virtually abelian, we prove that for such a random walk satisfies a local limit theorem of the form $p_n(e, e)\sim CR^{-n}n^{-d/2}$, where $p_n(e, e)$ is the probability of returning to the origin at time $n$, $R$ is the inverse of the spectral radius of the random walk and $d$ is the minimal rank of a parabolic subgroup along which the random walk is spectrally degenerate.This concludes the classification all possible behaviour for $p_n(e, e)$ on such groups.; Nous étudions les marches aléatoires sur des groupes relativement hyperboliques dont la loi est convergente, au sens où la dérivée de sa fonction de Green est finie au rayon spectral.Lorsque les sous-groupes paraboliques sont virtuellement abéliens, nous montrons qu'une telle marche vérifie un théorème de la limite locale de la forme $p_n(e, e)\sim CR^{-n}n^{-d/2}$, où $p_n(e, e)$ est la probabilité de retour à l'origine au temps $n$, $R$est l'inverse du rayon spectral de la marche et $d$ est le rang minimal d'un sous-groupe parabolique le long duquel la marche aléatoire est spectralement dégénérée.

In this article we lay out the details of Fukaya's A ∞-structure of the Morse com-plexe of a manifold possibily with boundary. We show that this A ∞-structure is homotopically independent of the made choices. We emphasize the transversality arguments that some fiber product constructions make valid.

Every brain is unique, having its structural and functional organisation shaped by both genetic and environmental factors over the course of its development. Brain image studies tend to produce results by averaging across a group of subjects, under a common assumption that it is possible to subdivide the cortex into homogeneous areas while maintaining a correspondence across subjects. This paper questions such assumption: can the structural and functional properties of a specific region of an atlas be assumed to be the same across subjects? This question is addressed by looking at the network representation of the brain, with nodes corresponding to brain regions and edges to their structural relationships. We perform graph matching on a set of control patients and on parcellations of different granularity to understand which is the connectivity misalignment between regions. The graph matching is unsupervised andreveals interesting insight on local misalignment of brain regions across subjects.

Consider a closed surface $M$ with negative Euler characteristic, and an admissible probability measure on the fundamental group of $M$ with finite first moment. Corresponding to each point in the Teichm\"uller space of $M$, there is an associated random walk on the hyperbolic plane. We show that the speed of this random walk is a proper function on the Teichm\"uller space of $M$, and we relate the growth of the speed to the Teichm\"uller distance to a basepoint. One key argument is an adaptation of Gou\"ezel's pivoting techniques to actions of a fixed group on a sequence of hyperbolic metric spaces., Comment: 14 pages. Comments welcome!

The goal of this paper is to exhibit and analyze an algorithm that takes a given closed orientable hyperbolic surface and outputs an explicit Dirichlet domain. The input is a fundamental polygon with side pairings. While grounded in topological considerations, the algorithm makes key use of the geometry of the surface. We introduce data structures that reflect this interplay between geometry and topology and show that the algorithm finishes in polynomial time, in terms of the initial perimeter and the genus of the surface., Comment: 15 pages, 5 figures

The aim of this article is to study the SL(2,C)-character scheme of a finitely generated group. Given a presentation of a finitely generated group $\Gamma$, we give equations defining the coordinate ring of the scheme of SL(2,C)-characters of $\Gamma$ (finitely many equations when $\Gamma$ is finitely presented). We also study the scheme of abelian and nonsimple representations and characters. Finally we apply our results to study the SL(2,C)-character scheme of the Borromean rings., Comment: Accepted for publication in the Transactions of the American Mathematical Society

Combining McShane's identity on a hyperbolic punctured torus with Schmutz's work on the Markov Uniqueness Conjecture (MUC), we find that MUC is equivalent to the identity \begin{equation} \sum_{n=1}^\infty \, \left( 3- L_n \right) \, = \, 4 - \varphi - \sqrt 2 \end{equation} where $L_n$ is the $n$th Lagrange number and $\varphi=\frac{1+\sqrt5}2$ is the golden ratio., Comment: 5 pages, 2 figures, comments welcome!

Let $n\ge 3$, and let $\mathrm{Out}(W_n)$ be the outer automorphism group of a free Coxeter group $W_n$ of rank $n$. We study the growth of the dimension of the homology groups (with coefficients in any field $\mathbb{K}$) along Farber sequences of finite-index subgroups of $\mathrm{Out}(W_n)$. We show that, in all degrees up to $\lfloor\frac{n}{2}\rfloor-1$, these Betti numbers grow sublinearly in the index of the subgroup. When $\mathbb{K}=\mathbb{Q}$, through L\"uck's approximation theorem, this implies that all $\ell^2$-Betti numbers of $\mathrm{Out}(W_n)$ vanish up to degree $\lfloor\frac{n}{2}\rfloor-1$. In contrast, in top dimension equal to $n-2$, an argument of Gaboriau and No\^us implies that the $\ell^2$-Betti number does not vanish. We also prove that the torsion growth of the integral homology is sublinear. Our proof of these results relies on a recent method introduced by Ab\'ert, Bergeron, Fr\k{a}czyk and Gaboriau. A key ingredient is to show that a version of the complex of partial bases of $W_n$ has the homotopy type of a bouquet of spheres of dimension $\lfloor\frac{n}{2}\rfloor-1$.

We show that, for $\varepsilon=\dfrac{1}{4000}$, any action of a finite cyclic group by $(1+\varepsilon)$-bilipschitz homeomorphisms on a closed 3-manifold is conjugated to a smooth action., 22 pages, 6 figures

In [Bon88], Bonahon gave a construction of Thurston's compactification of Teichm{\"u}ller space using geodesic currents. His argument only applies in the case of closed surfaces, and there are good reasons for that. We present a variant which applies to surfaces of finite area.

We address the question of determining which mapping class groups of infinite-type surfaces admit nonelementary continuous actions on hyperbolic spaces. More precisely, let $\Sigma$ be a connected, orientable surface of infinite type with tame endspace whose mapping class group is generated by a coarsely bounded subset. We prove that $\mathrm{Map}(\Sigma)$ admits a continuous nonelementary action on a hyperbolic space if and only if $\Sigma$ contains a finite-type subsurface which intersects all its homeomorphic translates. When $\Sigma$ contains such a nondisplaceable subsurface $K$ of finite type, the hyperbolic space we build is constructed from the curve graphs of $K$ and its homeomorphic translates via a construction of Bestvina, Bromberg and Fujiwara. Our construction has several applications: first, the second bounded cohomology of $\mathrm{Map}(\Sigma)$ contains an embedded $\ell^1$; second, using work of Dahmani, Guirardel and Osin, we deduce that $\mathrm{Map}(\Sigma)$ contains nontrivial normal free subgroups (while it does not if $\Sigma$ has no nondisplaceable subsurface of finite type), has uncountably many quotients and is SQ-universal., Comment: v2: New title, updated references

In this paper we consider the Voronoi diagram of a finite family of parallel half-lines, with the same orientation, constrained to a compact domain $${\mathscr {D}}_{0} \subset {\mathbb {R}}^3$$ , with respect to the Euclidean distance. We present an efficient approximation algorithm for computing such VD, using a subdivision process, which produces a mesh representing the topology of the VD in $${\mathscr {D}}_{0}$$ . The computed topology may not be correct for degenerate configurations or configurations close to degenerate. In this case, the output is a valid partition, which is close to the exact partition in Voronoi cells if the input data were given with no error. We also present the result of an implementation in Julia language with visualization using Axl software (axl.inria.fr) of the algorithm. Some examples and analysis are shown.

Generalising previous results on classical braid groups by Artin and Lin, we determine the values of m, n ∈ $\mathbb N$ for which there exists a surjection between the n- and m-string braid groups of an orientable surface without boundary. This result is essentially based on specific properties of their lower central series, and the proof is completely combinatorial. We provide similar but partial results in the case of orientable surfaces with boundary components and of non-orientable surfaces without boundary. We give also several results about the classification of different representations of surface braid groups in symmetric groups.

International audience; Electroencephalogram (EEG) signals is recorded as a multidimensional dataset, which can be interpreted using autoregressive (AR) models. These models are based on the hypothesis that the signal can be explained by its past values and an additional random component called innovation. In this way, it is possible to extract relevant information about the signal, which can be used for a BCI classification. From the AR equation can be derived the Yule-Walker equations, which show the emergence of a symmetric positive definite matrices (SPD) matrix i.e. the autocorrelation matrix with lags. The state-of the art for classifying SPD matrices is based on Riemann Geometry, so a fairly natural idea is therefore to extend the standard approach using these autocorrelation matrices with lags. In order to validate the results, we test our approach both with a classification on the Riemann surface using the Minimum Distance to Mean and also with a classification on the Tangent Space using Support Vector Machine. To compute the hyper-parameters of the model, we use a Grid Search algorithm. The problem can also be formulated from another point of view: since the AR Yule-Walker matrix is a matrix of delayed correlations, we can obtain the same result by creating an embedding of the original system in a high dimensional space. Hence, it is natural to connect our approach with the delay embedding theorem proposed by Takens in the context of dynamical systems. Such an embedding method is based on the knowledge of two parameters: the delay parameter and the embedding dimension, respectively the lag and the order in the context of the AR model. This approach can be used as a new method to compute the hyper-parameters. We will test our approach on several dataset and on several subjects using the MOABB framework, using both within-session and cross-session evaluation.

We study the behaviour of the Kauffman bracket skein modules of 3-manifolds under gluing along surfaces. For this purpose we extend the notion of Kauffman bracket skein modules to $3$-manifolds with marking consisting of open intervals and circles in the boundary. The new module is called the stated skein module. The first main results concern non-injectivity of certain natural maps defined when forming connected sums along a sphere or along a closed disk. These maps are injective for surfaces, or for generic quantum parameter, but we show that in general they are not injective when the quantum parameter is a root of 1. The result applies to the classical skein modules as well. A particular interesting result is that when the quantum parameter is a root of 1, the empty skein is zero in a connected sum where each constituent manifold has non-empty marking. We also prove various non injectivity results for the Chebyshev-Frobenius map and the natural map induced by the deletion of marked balls. We then consider the general case of gluing along a surface, showing that the stated skein module can be interpreted as a monoidal symmetric functor from a category of "decorated cobordisms" to a Morita category of algebras and their bimodules. We apply this result to deduce several properties of stated skein modules as a Van-Kampen like theorem as well as a computation through Heegaard decompositions and a relation to Hochshild homology for trivial circle bundles over surfaces., 37 pages

We give an explicit correspondence between stated skein algebras, which are defined via explicit relations on stated tangles in [Costantino F., L\^e T.T.Q., arXiv:1907.11400], and internal skein algebras, which are defined as internal endomorphism algebras in free cocompletions of skein categories in [Ben-Zvi D., Brochier A., Jordan D., J. Topol. 11 (2018), 874-917, arXiv:1501.04652] or in [Gunningham S., Jordan D., Safronov P., arXiv:1908.05233]. Stated skein algebras are defined on surfaces with multiple boundary edges and we generalise internal skein algebras in this context. Now, one needs to distinguish between left and right boundary edges, and we explain this phenomenon on stated skein algebras using a half-twist. We prove excision properties of multi-edges internal skein algebras using excision properties of skein categories, and agreeing with excision properties of stated skein algebras when $\mathcal{V} = \mathcal{U}_{q^2}(\mathfrak{sl}_2)\text{-}{\rm mod}^{\rm fin}$. Our proofs are mostly based on skein theory and we do not require the reader to be familiar with the formalism of higher categories.

This paper studies the geometric rigidity of the universal Coxeter group of rank $n$, which is the free product $W_n$ of $n$ copies of $\mathbb{Z}/2\mathbb{Z}$. We prove that for $n\geq 4$ the group of symmetries of the spine of the Guirardel-Levitt outer space of $W_n$ is reduced to the outer automorphism group $\mathrm{Out}(W_n)$., Comment: 42 pages, 14 figures

We consider here the $3$-sphere $\mathbf S^3$ seen as the boundary at infinity of the complex hyperbolic plane $\mathbf{H}^2_{\mathbf C}$. It comes equipped with a contact structure and two classes of special curves. First $\mathbf R$-circles are boundaries at infinity of totally real totally geodesic subspaces and are tangent to the contact distribution. Second, $\mathbf C$-circles, which are boundaries of complex totally geodesic subspaces and are transverse to the contact distribution. We define a quantitative notion, called slimness, that measures to what extent a continuous path in the sphere $\mathbf S^3$ is near to be an $\mathbf R$-circle. We analyze the classical foliation of the complement of an $\mathbf R$-circle by arcs of $\mathbf C$-circles. Next, we consider deformations of this situation where the $\mathbf R$-circle becomes a slim curve. We apply these concepts to the particular case where the slim curve is the limit set of a quasi-Fuchsian subgroup of $\mathrm{PU}(2,1)$. As a consequence, we describe a class of spherical CR uniformizations of certain cusped $3$-manifolds.

Gay and Kirby introduced trisections which describe any closed oriented smooth 4-manifold $X$ as a union of three four-dimensional handlebodies. A trisection is encoded in a diagram, namely three collections of curves in a closed oriented surface $\Sigma$, guiding the gluing of the handlebodies. Any morphism $\varphi$ from $\pi_1(X)$ to a finitely generated free abelian group induces a morphism on $\pi_1(\Sigma)$. We express the twisted homology and Reidemeister torsion of $(X;\varphi)$ in terms of the first homology of $(\Sigma;\varphi)$ and the three subspaces generated by the collections of curves. We also express the intersection form of $(X;\varphi)$ in terms of the intersection form of $(\Sigma;\varphi)$., Comment: The homological computations have been slightly modified, switching from Mayer-Vietoris sequences to long exact sequences of pairs. Examples have been added

We give upper bounds, linear in rank, to the topological dimensions of the Gromov boundaries of the intersection graph, the free factor graph and the cyclic splitting graph of a finitely generated free group., Comment: 34 pages, 5 figures. Accepted version for the Pacific Journal of Mathematics

We prove the unrolled superalgebra $\mathcal{U}_{\xi}^{H}\mathfrak{sl}(2|1)$ has a completion which is a ribbon superalgebra in a topological sense where $\xi$ is a root of unity of odd order. Using this ribbon superalgebra we construct its universal invariant of links. We use it to construct an invariant of $3$-manifolds of Hennings type.

We construct a topological invariant of algebraic plane curves, which is in some sense an adaptation of the linking number of knot theory. This invariant is shown to be a generalization of the I-invariant of line arrangements developed by the first author with Artal and Florens. We give two practical tools for computing this invariant, using a modification of the usual braid monodromy or using the connected numbers introduced by Shirane. As an application, we show that this invariant distinguishes several Zariski pairs, i.e. pairs of curves having same combinatorics, yet different topologies. The former is the well known Zariski pair found by Artal, composed of a smooth cubic with 3 tangent lines at its inflexion points. The latter is formed by a smooth quartic and 3 bitangents., Comment: Entirely new version. Exposition revised and simplified; new application added. (10 pages and 2 figures)

Given a vector field on a 3D rational homology sphere, we give a formula for the Euler characteristic of its transverse surfaces, in terms of boundary data only. This provides a formula for the genus of a transverse surface, and in particular, of a Birkhoff section. As an application, we show that for a right-handed flow with an ergodic invariant measure, the genus is an asymptotic invariant of order 2 proportional to helicity.

We provide criteria ensuring that a tunnel number one knot K is not determined by its double branched cover, in the sense that the double branched cover is also the double branched cover of a knot $$K'$$ not equivalent to K.

International audience; These notes were written to be distributed to the audience of the first author's Takagi lectures delivered June 23, 2018. These are based on a work-in-progress that is part of a collaborative project that also involves Akshay Venkatesh. In this work-in-progress we give a new construction of some Eisenstein classes for GL N (Z) that were first considered by Nori [41] and Sczech [44]. The starting point of this construction is a theorem of Sullivan on the vanishing of the Euler class of SL N (Z) vector bundles and the explicit transgression of this Euler class by Bismut and Cheeger. Their proof indeed produces a universal form that can be thought of as a kernel for a regularized theta lift for the reductive dual pair (GL N , GL 1). This suggests looking to reductive dual pairs (GL N , GL k) with k ≥ 1 for possible generalizations of the Eisenstein cocycle. This leads to fascinating lifts that relate the geometry/topology world of real arithmetic locally symmetric spaces to the arithmetic world of modular forms. In these notes we don't deal with the most general cases and put a lot of emphasis on various examples that are often classical.

Kricker defined an invariant of knots in homology 3-spheres which is a rational lift of the Kontsevich integral, and proved with Garoufalidis that this invariant satisfies splitting formulas with respect to a surgery move called null-move. We define a functorial extension of the Kricker invariant and prove splitting formulas for this functorial invariant with respect to null Lagrangian-preserving surgery, a generalization of the null-move. We apply these splitting formulas to the Kricker invariant., Minor corrections. References updated. To appear in Algebraic & Geometric Topology

International audience; This note gives an elementary proof that the strata of abelian differentials do not contain complete algebraic varieties.; Cette note donne une preuve élémentaire que les strates des différentiels abéliens ne contiennent pas de variétés algébriques complètes.

We give alternative computations of the Schur multiplier of $Sp(2g,\mathbb Z/D\mathbb Z)$, when $D$ is divisible by 4 and $g\geq 4$: a first one using $K$-theory arguments based on the work of Barge and Lannes and a second one based on the Weil representations of symplectic groups arising in abelian Chern-Simons theory. We can also retrieve this way Deligne's non-residual finiteness of the universal central extension $\widetilde{Sp(2g,\mathbb Z)}$. We prove then that the image of the second homology into finite quotients of symplectic groups over a Dedekind domain of arithmetic type are torsion groups of uniformly bounded size. In contrast, quantum representations produce for every prime $p$, finite quotients of the mapping class group of genus $g\geq 3$ whose second homology image has $p$-torsion. We further derive that all central extensions of the mapping class group are residually finite and deduce that mapping class groups have Serre's property $A_2$ for trivial modules, contrary to symplectic groups. Eventually we compute the module of coinvariants $H_2(\mathfrak{sp}_{2g}(2))_{Sp(2g,\mathbb Z/2^k\mathbb Z)}=\mathbb Z/2\mathbb Z$., revised version, 44p. arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:1103.1855

In 2010, Kerckhoff and Storm discovered a path of hyperbolic 4-polytopes eventually collapsing to an ideal right-angled cuboctahedron. This is expressed by a deformation of the inclusion of a discrete reflection group (a right-angled Coxeter group) in the isometry group of hyperbolic 4-space. More recently, we have shown that the path of polytopes can be extended to Anti-de Sitter geometry so as to have geometric transition on a naturally associated 4-orbifold, via a transitional half-pipe structure. In this paper, we study the hyperbolic, Anti-de Sitter, and half-pipe character varieties of Kerckhoff and Storm's right-angled Coxeter group near each of the found holonomy representations, including a description of the singularity that appears at the collapse. An essential tool is the study of some rigidity properties of right-angled cusp groups in dimension four., Comment: 52 pages, 7 figures, 4 tables. The content overlaps with Part 3 of arXiv:1908.05112v1, of which this paper constitutes a self-contained and enlarged version. To appear in GGD. (Main theorem restated, exposition and structure revised, no substantial changes in proofs)

We construct a universal finite type invariant for knots in homology 3-spheres, refining Kricker's lift of the Kontsevich integral. This provides a full diagrammatic description of the graded space of finite type invariants of knots in homology 3-spheres., Comment: Comments welcome!

International audience; This article in memory of Patrick Dehornoy (1952-2019) is an invitation to Garside theory for mainstream geometric group theorists interested in mapping class groups, curve complexes, and the geometry of Artin-Tits groups.

A closed quasigeodesic on a convex polyhedron is a closed curve that is locally straight outside of the vertices, where it forms an angle at most $\pi$ on both sides. While the existence of a simple closed quasigeodesic on a convex polyhedron has been proved by Pogorelov in 1949, finding a polynomial-time algorithm to compute such a simple closed quasigeodesic has been repeatedly posed as an open problem. Our first contribution is to propose an extended definition of quasigeodesics in the intrinsic setting of (not necessarily convex) polyhedral spheres, and to prove the existence of a weakly simple closed quasigeodesic in such a setting. Our proof does not proceed via an approximation by smooth surfaces, but relies on an adapation of the disk flow of Hass and Scott to the context of polyhedral surfaces. Our second result is to leverage this existence theorem to provide a finite algorithm to compute a weakly simple closed quasigeodesic on a polyhedral sphere. On a convex polyhedron, our algorithm computes a simple closed quasigeodesic, solving an open problem of Demaine, Hersterberg and Ku., Comment: Revised arguments in Lemmas 3.3 and 4.1, results unchanged

We characterize, in an algebraic and in a diagrammatic way, Milnor string link invariants indexed by sequences where any index appears at most $k$ times, for any fixed $k\ge 1$. The algebraic characterization is given in terms of an Artin-like action on the so-called $k$-reduced free groups; the diagrammatic characterization uses the langage of welded knot theory. The link case is also addressed., Comment: 18 pages

Using Patterson-Sullivan measures we investigate growth problems for groups acting on a metric space with a strongly contracting element., Comment: 59 pages, 2 figures