Homological thickness and stability of torus knots

In this thesis we work with Khovanov homology of links and its generalizations, as well as with the homology of graphs. Khovanov homology of links consists of graded chain complexes which are link invariants, up to chain homotopy, with graded Euler characteristic equal to the Jones polynomial of the link. Hence, it can be regarded as the "categorif\mbox{}ication" of the Jones polynomial. \indent We prove that the f\mbox{}irst homology group of positive braid knots is trivial....

We show that perturbing the definition of sl(n) Khovanov-Rozansky link homology gives a lower bound on the slice genus of a knot. As a corollary this yields another proof of Milnor's conjecture on the slice genus of torus knots.

X.S. Lin and O. Dasbach proved that the sum of the absolute value of the second and penultimate coefficients of the Jones polynomial of an alternating knot is equal to the twist number of the knot. In this paper we give a new proof of their result using Khovanov homology. The proof is by induction on the number of crossings using the long exact sequence in Khovanov homology corresponding to the Kauffman bracket skein relation.

Given a knot, we ask how its Khovanov and Khovanov-Rozansky homologies change under the operation of introducing twists in a pair of strands. We obtain long exact sequences in homology and further algebraic structure which is then used to derive topological and computational results. Two of our applications include giving a new way to generate arbitrary numbers of knots with isomorphic homologies and finding an infinite number of mutant knot pairs with isomorphic reduced homo...

We conjecturally extract the triply graded Khovanov-Rozansky homology of the (m, n) torus knot from the unique finite dimensional simple representation of the rational DAHA of type A, rank n - 1, and central character m/n. The conjectural differentials of Gukov, Dunfield and the third author receive an explicit algebraic expression in this picture, yielding a prescription for the doubly graded Khovanov-Rozansky homologies. We match our conjecture to previous conjectures of th...

We determine an $\mathfrak{sl}_2$ module structure on the equivariant Khovanov-Rozanksy homology of T(2,k)-torus links following the framework defined in arXiv:2306.10729.

Using the method of Elias-Hogancamp and combinatorics of toric braids we give an explicit formula for the triply graded Khovanov-Rozansky homology of an arbitrary torus knot, thereby proving some of the conjectures of Aganagic-Shakirov, Cherednik, Gorsky-Negut and Oblomkov-Rasmussen-Shende.

The structure of the Khovanov homology of $(n,m)$ torus links has been extensively studied. In particular, Marko Stosic proved that the homology groups stabilize as $m\rightarrow\infty$. We show that the Khovanov homotopy types of $(n,m)$ torus links, as constructed by Robert Lipshitz and Sucharit Sarkar, also become stably homotopy equivalent as $m\rightarrow\infty$. We provide an explicit bound on values of $m$ beyond which the stabilization begins. As an application, we gi...

We investigate properties of the odd Khovanov homology, compare and contrast them with those of the original (even) Khovanov homology, and discuss applications of the odd Khovanov homology to other areas of knot theory and low-dimensional topology. We show that it provides an effective upper bound on the Thurston-Bennequin number of Legendrian links and can be used to detect quasi-alternating knots. A potential application to detecting transversely non-simple knots is also me...

We introduce an sl(n) homology theory for knots and links in the thickened annulus. To do so, we first give a fresh perspective on sutured annular Khovanov homology, showing that its definition follows naturally from trace decategorifications of enhanced sl(2) foams and categorified quantum gl(m), via classical skew Howe duality. This framework then extends to give our annular sl(n) link homology theory, which we call sutured annular Khovanov-Rozansky homology. We show that t...