Invariants of Closed Braids via Counting Surfaces

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Date
2012MFO Scientific Program
OWLF 2012Series
Oberwolfach Preprints;2012,15Author
Brandenbursky, Michael
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Show full item recordOWP-2012-15
Abstract
A Gauss diagram is a simple, combinatorial way to present a link. It is known that any Vassiliev invariant may be obtained from a Gauss diagram formula that involves counting subdiagrams of certain combinatorial types. In this paper we present simple formulas for an infinite family of invariants in terms of counting surfaces of a certain genus and number of boundary components in a Gauss diagram associated with a closed braid. We then identify the resulting invariants with partial derivatives of the HOMFLY-PT polynomial.