Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-mlc7c Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-06T06:11:30.224Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Prime knots and concordance

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 October 2008

Robion C. Kirby
Affiliation:
University of California, Berkeley
W. B. Raymond Lickorish
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge

Extract

This paper proves that any knot is concordant to a prime knot; it thus solves Problem 13 of (3). In doing so it makes an exploration of a fairly general method of proving that a knot is a prime. Throughout, the word ‘knot’ means a knot of S1 in S3 (orientations being here irrelevant); occasionally reference will be made to the idea of a knotted arc spanning a 3-ball.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge Philosophical Society 1979

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

(1)Conway, J. H.An enumeration of knots and links. Computational problems in Abstract Algebra (Pergamon Press, 1969), pp. 329358.Google Scholar
(2)Goodrick, R. E.Non-simplicially collapsible triangulations on In. Proc. Cambridge Philos. Soc. 64 (1968), 3136.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
(3)Gordon, C. McA. Problems in knot theory. Lecture Notes in Mathematics Vol. 685, Knot theory proceedings (Plans-sur-Bex) (Springer-Verlag (1978)), pp. 309311.Google Scholar
(4)Litherland, R. A. Topics in knot theory. Cambridge University thesis (1978).Google Scholar
(5)Rolfsen, D.Knots and links. (Publish or Perish Inc. (1976)).Google Scholar