We explicitly construct small triangulations for a number of well-known 3-dimensional manifolds and give a brief outline of some aspects of the underlying theory of 3-manifolds and its historical development.
In this survey on combinatorial properties of triangulated manifolds we discuss various lower bounds on the number of vertices of simplicial and combinatorial manifolds. Moreover, we give a list of all known examples of vertex-minimal triangulations.
We describe an algorithm for the enumeration of (candidates of) vertex-transitive combinatorial $d$-manifolds. With an implementation of our algorithm, we determine, up to combinatorial equivalence, all combinatorial manifolds with a vertex-transitive automorphism group on $n\leq 13$ vertices. With the exception of actions of groups of small order, the enumeration is extended to 14 and 15 vertices.
We construct 2^{Ω(n^{5/4})} combinatorial types of triangulated 3-spheres on n vertices. Since by a result of Goodman and Pollack (1986) there are no more than 2^{O(n log n)} combinatorial types of simplicial 4-polytopes, this proves that asymptotically, there are far more combinatorial types of triangulated 3-spheres than of simplicial 4-polytopes on n vertices. This complements results of Kalai (1988), who had proved a similar statement about d-spheres and (d+1)-polytopes for fixed d >= 4.
This article presents an improvement and extension of the heuristic first presented by Hougardy, Lutz, and Zelke in 2010 for realizing triangulated orientable surfaces with few vertices by a simplex-wise linear embedding. The improvement consists in the applicability to non-orientable surfaces (simplex-wise linear immersions) as well as symmetric realizations. With the help of our algorithm, numerous - often symmetric - realizations of non-orientable surfaces with the minimal number or few vertices have been obtained for the first time. These examples include the the Projective Plane with one …
If all but two vertices of a triangulated sphere have degrees divisible by $k$, then the exceptional vertices are not adjacent. This theorem is proved for $k=2$ with the help of the coloring monodromy. For $k = 3, 4, 5$ colorings by the vertices of platonic solids have to be used. With a coloring monodromy one can associate a branched cover. This generalizes to a space of germs between two triangulated surfaces. We also discuss relations with Belyi surfaces and with cone-metrics of constant curvature.
We investigate triangulations of the two-dimensional sphere and torus with the faces properly colored white and black. We focus on matchings between white triangles and incident vertices. On the torus our objects are perfect pairings, whereas on the sphere this is only true after removing one triangle and its vertices. In the latter case, such matchings (first studied by Tutte) extend the notion of state in Kauffman's formal knot theory and we show that his Clock Theorem, in its form due to Gilmer and Litherland, also extends: the set of matchings naturally forms a distributive lattice. Here t…
A triangulation of a surface is called $q$-equivelar if each of its vertices is incident with exactly $q$ triangles. In 1972 Altshuler had shown that an equivelar triangulation of torus has a Hamiltonian Circuit. Here we present a necessary and sufficient condition for existence of a contractible Hamiltonian Cycle in equivelar triangulation of a surface.
In this paper we characterize a function defined on the set of edges of a triangulated surface such that there is a spherical angle structure having the function as the edge invariant (or Delaunay invariant). We also characterize a function such that there is a hyperbolic angle structure having the function as the edge invariant.
We give a complete enumeration of all combinatorial 3-manifolds with 10 vertices: There are precisely 247882 triangulated 3-spheres with 10 vertices as well as 518 vertex-minimal triangulations of the sphere product $S^2\times S^1$ and 615 triangulations of the twisted sphere product $S^2_\times_S^1$. All the 3-spheres with up to 10 vertices are shellable, but there are 29 vertex-minimal non-shellable 3-balls with 9 vertices.
Geometric torsions are torsions of acyclic complexes of vector spaces which consist of differentials of geometric quantities assigned to the elements of a manifold triangulation. We use geometric torsions to construct invariants for a manifold with a triangulated boundary. These invariants can be naturally united in a vector, and a change of the boundary triangulation corresponds to a linear transformation of this vector. Moreover, when two manifolds are glued by their common boundary, these vectors undergo scalar multiplication, i.e., they work according to M. Atiyah's axioms for a topologica…
It is known that the $(2k-1)$-sphere has at most $2^{O(n^k \log n)}$ combinatorially distinct triangulations with $n$ vertices, for every $k\ge 2$. Here we construct at least $2^{Ω(n^k)}$ such triangulations, improving on the previous constructions which gave $2^{Ω(n^{k-1})}$ in the general case (Kalai) and $2^{Ω(n^{5/4})}$ for $k=2$ (Pfeifle-Ziegler). We also construct $2^{Ω\left(n^{k-1+\frac{1}{k}}\right)}$ geodesic (a.k.a. star-convex) $n$-vertex triangualtions of the $(2k-1)$-sphere. As a step for this (in the case $k=2$) we construct $n$-vertex $4$-polytopes containing $Ω(n^{3/2})$ facets…
Principal circle bundle over a PL polyhedron can be triangulated and thus obtains combinatorics. The triangulation is assembled from triangulated circle bundles over simplices. To every triangulated circle bundle over a simplex we associate a necklace (in combinatorial sense). We express rational local formulas for all powers of first Chern class in the terms of mathematical expectations of parities of the associated necklaces. This rational parity is a combinatorial isomorphism invariant of triangulated circle bundle over simplex, measuring mixing by triangulation of the circular graphs over …
We give an explicit construction of vertex-transitive tight triangulations of $d$-manifolds for $d\geq 2$. More explicitly, for each $d\geq 2$, we construct two $(d^2+5d+5)$-vertex neighborly triangulated $d$-manifolds whose vertex-links are stacked spheres. The only other non-trivial series of such tight triangulated manifolds currently known is the series of non-simply connected triangulated $d$-manifolds with $2d+3$ vertices constructed by Kühnel. The manifolds we construct are strongly minimal. For $d\geq 3$, they are also tight neighborly as defined by Lutz, Sulanke and Swartz. Like Kühne…
In this paper, we describe geometrical constructions to obtain triangulations of connected sums of closed orientable triangulated 3-manifolds. Using these constructions, we show that it takes time polynomial in the number of tetrahedra to check if a closed orientable 3-manifold, equipped with a minimal triangulation, is reducible or not. This result can easily be generalized to compact orientable 3-manifolds with non-empty boundary.
We study a variation of Bagchi and Datta's $σ$-vector of a simplicial complex $C$, whose entries are defined as weighted averages of Betti numbers of induced subcomplexes of $C$. We show that these invariants satisfy an Alexander-Dehn-Sommerville type identity, and behave nicely under natural operations on triangulated manifolds and spheres such as connected sums and bistellar flips. In the language of commutative algebra, the invariants are weighted sums of graded Betti numbers of the Stanley-Reisner ring of $C$. This interpretation implies, by a result of Adiprasito, that the Billera-Lee sph…
We construct geometric realization for non-exceptional mutation-finite cluster algebras by extending the theory of Fomin and Thurston to skew-symmetrizable case. Cluster variables for these algebras are renormalized lambda lengths on certain hyperbolic orbifolds. We also compute growth rate of these cluster algebras, provide positivity of Laurent expansions of cluster variables, and prove sign-coherence of c-vectors.
For any cluster algebra whose underlying combinatorial data can be encoded by a bordered surface with marked points, we construct a geometric realization in terms of suitable decorated Teichmueller space of the surface. On the geometric side, this requires opening the surface at each interior marked point into an additional geodesic boundary component. On the algebraic side, it relies on the notion of a non-normalized cluster algebra and the machinery of tropical lambda lengths. Our model allows for an arbitrary choice of coefficients which translates into a choice of a family of integral lami…
A triangulated $d$-manifold $K$, satisfies the inequality $\binom{f_0(K)-d-1}{2}\geq \binom{d+2}{2}β_1(K;\mathbb{Z}_2)$ for $d\geq 3$. The triangulated $d$-manifolds that meet the bound with equality are called {\em tight neighborly}. In this paper, we present tight neighborly triangulations of 4-manifolds on 15 vertices with $\mathbb{Z}_3$ as automorphism group. One such example wasconstructed by Bagchi and Datta in 2011. We show that there are exactly 12 such triangulations up to isomorphism, 10 of which are orientable.
We show that any two geometric triangulations of a closed hyperbolic, spherical or Euclidean manifold are related by a sequence of Pachner moves and barycentric subdivisions of bounded length. This bound is in terms of the dimension of the manifold, the number of top dimensional simplexes and bound on the lengths of edges of the triangulation. This leads to an algorithm to check from the combinatorics of the triangulation and bounds on lengths of edges, if two geometrically triangulated closed hyperbolic or low dimensional spherical manifolds are isometric or not.
We give three constructions of a vertex-minimal triangulation of $4$-dimensional real projective space $\mathbb{R}P^4$. The first construction describes a $4$-dimensional sphere on $32$ vertices, which is a double cover of a triangulated $\mathbb{R}P^4$ and has a large amount of symmetry. The second and third constructions illustrate approaches to improving the known number of vertices needed to triangulate $n$-dimensional real projective space. All three constructions deliver the same combinatorial manifold, which is also the same as the only known $16$-vertex triangulation of $\mathbb{R}P^4$…
The search for universality in random triangulations of manifolds, like those featuring in (Euclidean) Dynamical Triangulations, is central to the random geometry approach to quantum gravity. In case of the 3-sphere, or any other manifold of dimension greater than two for that matter, the pursuit is held back by serious challenges, including the wide open problem of enumerating triangulations. In an attempt to bypass the toughest challenges we identify a restricted family of triangulations, of which the enumeration appears less daunting. In a nutshell, the family consists of triangulated 3-sph…
This paper deals with triangulations of the 2-torus with the vertex labeled general octahedral graph $O_4$ which is isomorphic to the complete four-partite graph $K_{2,2,2,2}$; it is known that there exist precisely twelve such triangulations. We find all the 12 triangulations in a Schlegel diagram of the hyperoctahedron and realize all of them geometrically with the same 1-skeleton in 3-space. In particular, we identify two geometric polyhedral tori (both without self-intersections) with the same 1-skeleton in 3-space, but without a single common face, or in other words their intersection (as…
In this paper we study the difference between algebraic and geometric solutions of the hyperbolic Dehn filling equations for ideally triangulated 3-manifolds. We show that any geometric solution is an algebraic one, and we prove the uniqueness of the geometric solutions. Then we do explicit calculations for three interesting examples. With the first two examples we see that not all algebraic solutions are geometric and that the algebraic solutions are not unique. The third example is a non-hyperbolic manifold that admits a positive, partially flat solution of the compatibility and completeness…
The construction of invariants of three-dimensional manifolds with a triangulated boundary, proposed earlier by the author for the case when the boundary consists of not more than one connected component, is generalized to any number of components. These invariants are based on the torsion of acyclic complexes of geometric origin. The relevant tool for studying our invariants turns out to be F.A. Berezin's calculus of anti-commuting variables; in particular, they are used in the formulation of the main theorem of the paper, concerning the composition of invariants under a gluing of manifolds. …
In this paper we develop several algebraic structures on the simplicial cochains of a triangulated manifold that are analogues of objects in differential geometry. We study a cochain product and prove several statements about its convergence to the wedge product on differential forms. Also, for cochains with an inner product, we define a combinatorial Hodge star operator, and describe some applications, including a combinatorial period matrix for surfaces. We show that for a particularly nice cochain inner product, these combinatorial structures converge to their continuum analogues as the mes…