The deformation problem for pseudoholomorphic curves and related geometrical properties of the total moduli space of pseudoholomorphic curves are studied. A sufficient condition for the saddle point property of the total moduli space is established. The local symplectic isotopy problem is formulated and solved for the case of imbedded pseudoholomorphic curves. It is shown that any two symplectically imbedded surfaces Sigma_0, Sigma_1 in CP^2 of the same degree d\le 6 are symplectically isotopic.
The symplectic isotopy conjecture states that every smooth symplectic surface in $CP^2$ is symplectically isotopic to a complex algebraic curve. Progress began with Gromov's pseudoholomorphic curves [Gro85], and progressed further culminating in Siebert and Tian's proof of the conjecture up to degree 17 [ST05], but further progress has stalled. In this article we provide a new direction of attack on this problem. Using a solution to a nodal symplectic isotopy problem we guide model symplectic isotopies of smooth surfaces. This results in an equivalence between the smooth symplectic isotopy pro…
We classify rational cuspidal curves of degrees 6 and 7 in the complex projective plane, up to symplectic isotopy. The proof uses topological tools, pseudoholomorphic techniques, and birational transformations.
The main purpose of this paper is to summarize the basic ingredients, illustrated with examples, of a pseudoholomorphic curve theory for symplectic 4-orbifolds. These are extensions of relevant work of Gromov, McDuff and Taubes on symplectic 4-manifolds concerning pseudoholomorphic curves and Seiberg-Witten theory. They form the technical backbone of the proof that a symplectic s-cobordism of elliptic 3-manifolds (with a canonical contact structure on the boundary) is smoothly a product. One interesting feature of the theory is that existence of pseudoholomorphic curves gives certain restricti…
For a closed oriented smooth 4-manifold X with $b^2_+(X)>0$, the Seiberg-Witten invariants are well-defined. Taubes' "SW=Gr" theorem asserts that if X carries a symplectic form then these invariants are equal to well-defined counts of pseudoholomorphic curves, Taubes' Gromov invariants. In the absence of a symplectic form there are still nontrivial closed self-dual 2-forms which vanish along a disjoint union of circles and are symplectic elsewhere. This paper and its sequel describes well-defined counts of pseudoholomorphic curves in the complement of the zero-set of such "near-symplectic" for…
We develop the theory of $J$-holomorphic discs in Hilbert spaces with almost complex structures. As an aplication, we prove a version of Gromov's symplectic non-squeezing theorem for Hilbert spaces. It can be applied to short-time symplectic flows of a wide class of Hamiltonian PDEs.
For a given singularity of a plane curve we consider the locus of nodal deformations of the singularity with the given number of nodes and describe possible components of the locus. As applications, we solve the local symplectic isotopy for nodal curves in a neighborhood of a given pseudoholomorphic curve without multiple components and prove the uniqueness of the symplectic isotopy class for nodal pseudoholomorphic curves of low genus in $\CP^2$ and $\CP^2 # \bar\CP^2$.
The Kodaira-Thurston manifold is a quotient of a nilpotent Lie group by a cocompact lattice. We compute the family Gromov-Witten invariants which count pseudoholomorphic tori in the Kodaira-Thurston manifold. For a fixed symplectic form the Gromov-Witten invariant is trivial so we consider the twistor family of left-invariant symplectic forms which are orthogonal for some fixed metric on the Lie algebra. This family defines a loop in the space of symplectic forms. This is the first example of a genus one family Gromov-Witten computation for a non-Kähler manifold.
We discuss the properties of a certain type of Dehn surgery along a Lagrangian torus in a symplectic 4-manifold, known as Luttinger's surgery, and use this construction to provide a purely topological interpretation of a non-isotopy result for symplectic plane curves with cusp and node singularities due to Moishezon.
The purpose of this paper is to present some results on the existence of homologous, nonisotopic symplectic or lagrangian surfaces embedded in a simply connected symplectic 4-dimensional manifold.
We give an overview of various recent results concerning the topology of symplectic 4-manifolds and singular plane curves, using branched covers and isotopy problems as a unifying theme. While this paper does not contain any new results, we hope that it can serve as an introduction to the subject, and will stimulate interest in some of the open questions mentioned in the final section.
We further study the symplectic Khovanov homology of Seidel and Smith and its generalization to even tangles. This homology theory is a conjectural geometric model for Khovanov homology. In this paper we uncover structures on symplectic Khovanov homology which have analogues in Khovanov homology. To each elementary (as well as minimal) cobordism between two tangles we associate a homomorphism between the symplectic Khovanov homology groups of the two tangles. We define the symplectic analogues $H_{s}^m$ of Khovanov's arc algebras and equip the symplectic Khovanov homology of an $(m,n)$-tangle …
The main theorem of this paper asserts that the inclusion of the space of projective Lagrangian planes into the space of Lagrangian submanifolds of complex projective space induces an injective homomorphism of fundamental groups. We introduce three invariants of exact loops of Lagrangian submanifolds that are modelled on invariants introduced by Polterovich for loops of Hamiltonian symplectomorphisms. One of these is the minimal Hofer length in a given Hamiltonian isotopy class. We determine the exact values of these invariants for loops of projective Lagrangian planes. The proof uses the Grom…
We define a suitably tame class of singular symplectic curves in 4-manifolds, namely those whose singularities are modeled on complex curve singularities. We study the corresponding symplectic isotopy problem, with a focus on rational curves with irreducible singularities (rational cuspidal curves) in the complex projective plane. We prove that every such curve is isotopic to a complex curve in degrees up to 5, and for curves with one singularity whose link is a torus knot. Classification results of symplectic isotopy classes rely on pseudo-holomorphic curves together with a symplectic version…
We define new Hamiltonian isotopy invariants for a monotone Lagrangian torus embedded in a symplectic 4-manifold. We show that, in the standard symplectic 4-space, these invariants distinguish a monotone Clifford torus from a Chekanov torus.
This is the second of two articles that describe the moduli spaces of pseudoholomorphic, multiply punctured spheres in R x (S^1 x S^2) as defined by a certain natural pair of almost complex structure and symplectic form. The first article in this series described the local structure of the moduli spaces and gave existence theorems. This article describes a stratification of the moduli spaces and gives explicit parametrizations for the various strata.
Let $Σ$ be a surface with a symplectic form, let $ϕ$ be a symplectomorphism of $Σ$, and let $Y$ be the mapping torus of $ϕ$. We show that the dimensions of moduli spaces of embedded pseudoholomorphic curves in $\R\times Y$, with cylindrical ends asymptotic to periodic orbits of $ϕ$ or multiple covers thereof, are bounded from above by an additive relative index. We deduce some compactness results for these moduli spaces. This paper establishes some of the foundations for a program with Michael Thaddeus, to understand the Seiberg-Witten Floer homology of $Y$ in terms of such pseudoholomorphic c…
This is the first of at least two articles that describe the moduli spaces of pseudoholomorphic, multiply punctured spheres in R x (S^1 x S^2) as defined by a certain natural pair of almost complex structure and symplectic form. This article proves that all moduli space components are smooth manifolds. Necessary and sufficient conditions are also given for a collection of closed curves in S^1 x S^2 to appear as the set of |s| --> infinity limits of the constant s in R slices of a pseudoholomorphic, multiply punctured sphere.
This article describes various moduli spaces of pseudoholomorphic curves on the symplectization of a particular overtwisted contact structure on S^1 x S^2. This contact structure appears when one considers a closed self dual form on a 4-manifold as a symplectic form on the complement of its zero locus. The article is focussed mainly on disks, cylinders and three-holed spheres, but it also supplies groundwork for a description of moduli spaces of curves with more punctures and non-zero genus.
This survey article, in honor of G. Tian's 60th birthday, is inspired by R. Pandharipande's 2002 note highlighting research directions central to Gromov-Witten theory in algebraic geometry and by G. Tian's complex-geometric perspective on pseudoholomorphic curves that lies behind many important developments in symplectic topology since the early 1990s.
In the previous work, we introduced a method for constructing invariant probability measures of a large class of non-singular volume-preserving flows on closed, oriented odd-dimensional smooth manifolds with pseudoholomorphic curve techniques from symplectic geometry. The technique requires existence of certain pseudoholomorphic curves satisfying some weak assumptions. In this work, we appeal to Gromov-Witten theory and Seiberg-Witten theory to construct large classes of examples where these pseudoholomorphic curves exist. Our argument uses neck stretching along with new analytical tools from …
We introduce a method for constructing invariant probability measures of a large class of non-singular volume-preserving flows on closed, oriented odd-dimensional smooth manifolds using pseudoholomorphic curve techniques from symplectic geometry. These flows include any non-singular volume preserving flow in dimension three, and autonomous Hamiltonian flows on closed, regular energy levels in symplectic manifolds of any dimension. As an application, we use our method to prove the existence of obstructions to unique ergodicity for this class of flows, generalizing results of Taubes and Ginzburg…
According to Taubes, the Gromov invariants of a symplectic four-manifold X with b_+ > 1 satisfy the duality Gr(A) = +/- Gr(K-A), where K is Poincare dual to the canonical class. Extending joint work with Simon Donaldson in math.SG/0012067, we interpret this result in terms of Serre duality on the fibres of a Lefschetz pencil, by proving an analogous symmetry for invariants counting sections of associated bundles of symmetric products. Using similar methods we give a new proof of an existence theorem for symplectic surfaces in four-manifolds with b_+ = 1 and b_1 = 0. This reproves another theor…
In any dimension $2n \ge 6$ we show that certain spaces of symplectic embeddings of a polydisk into a product $B^4 \times \Bbb R^{2(n-2)}$ of a $4$-ball and Euclidean space, are not path connected. We also show that any pair of such nonisotopic embeddings can never be extended to the same ellipsoid.
We prove that every $C^\infty$-smooth, area preserving diffeomorphism of the closed 2-disk having not more than one periodic point is the uniform limit of periodic $C^\infty$-smooth diffeomorphisms. In particular every smooth irrational pseudo-rotation can be $C^0$-approximated by integrable systems. This partially answers a long standing question of A. Katok regarding zero entropy Hamiltonian systems in low dimensions. Our approach uses pseudoholomorphic curve techniques from symplectic geometry.
We develop a new algebraic theory of positive braids and conjugacy classes in the braid group $B_3$. We use our theory to establish a complete classification of isotopy classes of degree three symplectic curves in $\mathbb{CP}^2$ with only $A_n$-singularities for $n\geq 1$ (an $A_n$-singularity is locally modelled by the equation $z^2 = w^n$) independent of Gromov's theory of pseudoholomorphic curves. We show that if $C$ and $C'$ are degree three symplectic curves in $\mathbb{CP}^2$ with the same numbers of $A_n$-singularities for each $n\geq 1$, then $C$ is isotopic to $C'$. Furthermore, our …
The complex manifold CP^n x CP^{n+1} with symplectic form σ_μ=σ_{CP^n}+μσ_{CP^{n+1}}, where σ_{CP^n} and σ_{CP^{n+1}} are normalized Fubini-Study forms, n a natural number and μ>1 a real number, contains a natural Lagrangian sphere L^μ. We prove that the Dehn twist along L^μ is symplectically isotopic to the identity for all μ>1. This isotopy can be chosen so that it pointwise fixes a complex hypersurface in CP^n x CP^{n+1} and lifts to the blow-up of CP^n x CP^{n+1} along a complex n-dimensional submanifold.
We show that, up to Lagrangian isotopy, there is a unique Lagrangian torus inside each of the following uniruled symplectic four-manifolds: the symplectic vector space $\mathbb{R}^4$, the projective plane $\mathbb{C}P^2$, and the monotone $S^2 \times S^2$. The result is proven by studying pseudoholomorphic foliations while performing the splitting construction from symplectic field theory along the Lagrangian torus. A number of other related results are also shown. Notably, the nearby Lagrangian conjecture is established for $T^*\mathbb{T}^2$, i.e.~it is shown that every closed exact Lagrangia…
We investigate the failure of Bézout's Theorem for two symplectic surfaces in $\mathbb{C}\mathrm{P}^2$ (and more generally on an algebraic surface), by proving that every plane algebraic curve $C$ can be perturbed in the $\mathscr{C}^1$-topology to an arbitrarily close smooth symplectic surface $C_ε$ with the property that the cardinality $\#C_ε\cap Z_d$ of the transversal intersection of $C_ε$ with an algebraic plane curve $Z_d$ of degree $d$, as a function of $d$ can grow arbitrarily fast. As a consequence we obtain that, although Bézout's Theorem is true for pseudoholomorphic curves with re…
We give detailed descriptions of gluing pseudoholomorphic maps in symplectic geometry, especially in the presence of an obstruction bundle. The main motivation is to try to compare the symplectic and enumerative invariants of algebraic manifolds. These descriptions can also be used to enumerate rational curves with high-order degeneracies of local nature in projective spaces.
We study the intersection theory of punctured pseudoholomorphic curves in $4$-dimensional symplectic cobordisms. We first study the local intersection properties of such curves at the punctures. We then use this to develop topological controls on the intersection number of two curves. We also prove an adjunction formula which gives a topological condition that will guarantee a curve in a given homotopy class is embedded, extending previous work of Hutchings. We then turn our attention to curves in the symplectization $\mathbb{R}\times M$ of a $3$-manifold $M$ admitting a stable Hamiltonian str…
Inspired by the log Gromov-Witten (or GW) theory of Gross-Siebert/Abramovich-Chen, we introduce a geometric notion of log J-holomorphic curve relative to a simple normal crossings symplectic divisor defined in [FMZ1]. Every such moduli space is characterized by a second homology class, genus, and contact data. For certain almost complex structures, we show that the moduli space of stable log J-holomorphic curves of any fixed type is compact and metrizable with respect to an enhancement of the Gromov topology. In the case of smooth symplectic divisors, our compactification is often smaller than…
Let $(X,ω)$ be a compact symplectic manifold, $L$ be a Lagrangian submanifold and $V$ be a codimension 2 symplectic submanifold of $X$, we consider the pseudoholomorphic maps from a Riemann surface with boundary $(Σ,\partialΣ)$ to the pair $(X,L)$ satisfying Lagrangian boundary conditions and intersecting $V$. In some special cases, for instance, under the semi-positivity condition, we study the stable moduli space of such open pseudoholomorphic maps involving the intersection data. If $L\cap V=\emptyset$, we study the problem of orientability of the moduli space. Moreover, assume that there e…
We prove that in closed almost complex manifolds of any dimension, generic perturbations of the almost complex structure suffice to achieve transversality for all unbranched multiple covers of simple pseudoholomorphic curves with deformation index zero. A corollary is that the Gromov-Witten invariants (without descendants) of symplectic 4-manifolds can always be computed as a signed and weighted count of honest J-holomorphic curves for generic tame J: in particular, each such invariant is an integer divided by a weighting factor that depends only on the divisibility of the corresponding homolo…
Continuing the program of math.SG/0012067 and math.SG/0310450, we introduce refinements of the Donaldson-Smith standard surface count which are designed to count nodal pseudoholomorphic curves and curves with a prescribed decomposition into reducible components. In cases where a corresponding analogue of the Gromov-Taubes invariant is easy to define, our invariants agree with those analogues. We also prove a vanishing result for some of the invariants that count nodal curves.
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the following problem: For a fixed 2-dimensional homology class K in a simply connected symplectic 4-manifold, up to smooth isotopy, how many connected smoothly embedded symplectic submanifolds represent K? We show that when K can be represented by a symplectic torus, there are many instances when K can be representated by infinitely many non-isotopic symplectic tori.
We prove that the moduli space of gauge equivalence classes of symplectic vortices with uniformly bounded energy in a compact Hamiltonian manifold admits a Gromov compactification by polystable vortices. This extends results of Mundet i Riera and Tian for circle actions to the case of arbitrary compact Lie groups. Our argument relies on an a priori estimate for vortices that allows us to apply techniques used by McDuff and Salamon in their proof of Gromov compactness for pseudoholomorphic curves. As an intermediate result we prove a removable singularity theorem for vortices.
We present recursive formulas which compute the recently defined "higher symplectic capacities" for all convex toric domains. In the special case of four-dimensional ellipsoids, we apply homological perturbation theory to the associated filtered L-infinity algebras and prove that the resulting structure coefficients count punctured pseudoholomorphic curves in cobordisms between ellipsoids. As sample applications, we produce new previously inaccessible obstructions for stabilized embeddings of ellipsoids and polydisks, and we give new counts of curves with tangency constraints.
A symplectic rational cuspidal curve with positive self-intersection number admits a concave neighborhood, and thus a corresponding contact manifold on the boundary. In this article, we study symplectic fillings of such contact manifolds, providing a complementary perspective to our earlier article on symplectic isotopy classes of rational cuspidal curves. We explore aspects of these symplectic fillings through Stein handlebodies and rational blow-downs. We give examples of such contact manifolds which are identifiable as links of normal surface singularities, other examples which admit no sym…
Moduli spaces of stable pseudoholomorphic curves can be defined parametrically, i.e. over total spaces of symplectic fibrations. This imposes several restrictions on the spectral sequence of a symplectic fibration. We prove that, under certain assumptions, a Hamiltonian fibration c-splits, i.e. the spectral sequence associated to the fibration collapses at E_2. Moreover, we obtain a new estimate of the rank of flux groups. In the appendix, we provide examples of nonzero Gromov-Witten invariants for blow-ups. As an application, we prove that any Hamiltonian fibration with fibre being projective…
We determine the Lagrangian monodromy group L(T) and the smooth monodromy group S(T) of a Clifford torus T in the symplectic 4-space. We show that L(T) is isomorphic to the infinite dihedral group, and S(T) is generated by three reflections. We give explicit formulas for both groups. We also show that if a Lagrangian torus is smoothly isotopic to a Clifford torus then the smooth isotopy can be chosen to be Lagrangian outside of a disc.
We define a new family of open Gromov-Witten type invariants based on intersection theory on the moduli space of pseudoholomorphic curves of arbitrary genus with boundary in a Lagrangian submanifold. We assume the Lagrangian submanifold arises as the fixed points of an anti-symplectic involution and has dimension 2 or 3. In the strongly semi-positive genus 0 case, the new invariants coincide with Welschinger's invariant counts of real pseudoholomorphic curves. Furthermore, we calculate the new invariant for the real quintic threefold in genus 0 and degree 1 to be 30.
The paper is devoted to the study of the orientability of the moduli spaces of real pseudoholomorphic curves in real symplectic manifolds. We begin by extending the results we obtained in \cite{article1}. Namely, we consider a complex vector bundle $(N,c_N)$ equipped with a real structure over a real curve $(Σ_g,c_Σ)$ of genus $g \in \NN$, and we give a description of the action of an automorphism of $(N,c_N)$ on the orientations of the determinant bundle over the space of all Cauchy-Riemann operators on $(N,c_N)$. In the second part, we use the previous decription to compute the first Stiefel…
In this article, we modify the classical Floer complex $CF(L_0,L_1)$ of a pair of two compact exact Lagrangian submanifolds $L_0,L_1$ of an exact symplectic 2-manifold $M$ into a $\mathbb{Z}_2[T]$-complex $CF_h(L_0,L_1)$, whose differential keeps track of how many times a pseudo-holomorphic strip passes through a distinguished point $h\in M$. We show that this complex is invariant under Hamiltonian isotopy, and we prove that its barcode, if it exists, is the same as both barcodes $\mathcal{B}(CF(L_0,L_1;M))$ and $\mathcal{B}(CF(L_0,L_1;M\setminus \{h \}))$. This allows us to extend a conjectur…
Ramanujam's surface M is a contractible affine algebraic surface which is not homeomorphic to the affine plane. For any m>1 the product M^m is diffeomorphic to Euclidean space R^{4m}. We show that, for every m>0, M^m cannot be symplectically embedded into a subcritical Stein manifold. This gives the first examples of exotic symplectic structures on Euclidean space which are convex at infinity. It follows that any exhausting plurisubharmonic Morse function on M^m has at least three critical points, answering a question of Eliashberg. The heart of the argument involves showing a particular Lagra…
This note on the flux homomorphism for strictly contact isotopies complements the recent paper [MS11a] by P. Spaeth and the author. We determine the volume flux restricted to symplectic and volume-preserving contact isotopies and their C^0-limits for some classes of symplectic and contact manifolds and for a number of examples. In particular, we see that the restriction of the flux may fail to be surjective. It vanishes for an isotopy preserving a regular contact form, but can be nontrivial for non-regular contact forms. Applications are discussed in the article cited above. We also find obstr…
