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Title: Exotic Mazur manifolds and knot trace invariants
From a handle-theoretic perspective, the simplest contractible 4-manifolds, other than the 4-ball, are Mazur manifolds. We produce the first pairs of Mazur manifolds that are homeomorphic but not diffeomorphic. Our diffeomorphism obstruction comes from our proof that the knot Floer homology concordance invariant ν is an invariant of the trace of a knot, i.e. the smooth 4-manifold obtained by attaching a 2-handle to the 4-ball along K. This provides a computable, integer-valued diffeomorphism invariant that is effective at distinguishing exotic smooth structures on knot traces and other simple 4-manifolds, including when other adjunction-type obstructions are ineffective. We also show that the concordance invariants τ and ϵ are not knot trace invariants. As a corollary to the existence of exotic Mazur manifolds, we produce integer homology 3-spheres admitting two distinct surgeries to $$S^1 \times S^2$$, resolving a question from Problem 1.16 in Kirby's list.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
1803584
PAR ID:
10594334
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ;
Publisher / Repository:
Elsevier
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Advances in Mathematics
Volume:
391
Issue:
C
ISSN:
0001-8708
Page Range / eLocation ID:
107994
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
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