In this paper we study the topology of the space of Riemann surfaces in a simply connected space X, S_{g,n} (X, γ). This is the space consisting of triples, (F_{g,n}, ϕ, f), where F_{g,n} is a Riemann surface of genus g and n-boundary components, ϕis a parameterization of the boundary, and f : F_{g,n} \to X is a continuous map that satisfies a boundary condition γ. We prove three theorems about these spaces. Our main theorem is the identification of the stable homology type of the space S_{\infty, n}(X; γ), defined to be the limit as the genus g gets large, of the spaces S_{g,n} (X; γ). Our result about this stable topology is a parameterized version of the theorem of Madsen and Weiss proving a generalization of the Mumford conjecture on the stable cohomology of mapping class groups. Our second result describes a stable range in which the homology of S_{g,n} (X; γ) is isomorphic to the stable homology. Finally we prove a stability theorem about the homology of mapping class groups with certain families of twisted coefficients. The second and third theorems are generalizations of stability theorems of Harer and Ivanov.
We construct a graph complex calculating the integral ho- mology of the bordered mapping class groups. We compute the ho- mology of the bordered mapping class groups of various surfaces. Using the circle action on this graph complex, we build a double complex and a spectral sequence converging to the homology of the unbordered mapping class groups. We compute the homology of the punctured mapping class groups associated to certain surfaces. Finally, we use Miller's operad to get the first Kudo-Araki and Browder operations on our graph complex. We also consider an unstable version of the higher…
We construct several families of embeddings of braid groups into mapping class groups of orientable and non-orientable surfaces and prove that they induce the trivial map in stable homology in the orientable case, but not so in the non-orientable case. We show that these embeddings are non-geometric in the sense that the standard generators of the braid group are not mapped to Dehn twists.
We report on the computation of the integral homology of the mapping class group of genus g surfaces with one boundary curve and m punctures, when 2g + m is smaller than 6. In particular, it includes the genus 2 case with no or one puncture.
We give definitions of moduli spaces of framed, r-Spin and Pin surfaces. We apply earlier work of the author to show that each of these moduli spaces exhibits homological stability, and we identify the stable integral homology with that of certain infinite loop spaces in each case. We further show that these moduli spaces each have path components which are Eilenberg--MacLane spaces for the framed, r-Spin and Pin mapping class groups respectively, and hence we also identify the stable group homology of these groups. In particular: the stable framed mapping class group has trivial rational homo…
Let Map(K,X) denote the space of pointed continuous maps from a finite cell complex K to a space X. Let E_* be a generalized homology theory. We use Goodwillie calculus methods to prove that under suitable conditions on K and X, Map(K, X) will send a E_*--isomorphism in either variable to a map that is monic in E_* homology. Interesting examples arise by letting E_* be K--theory, K be a sphere, and the map in the X variable be an exotic unstable Adams map between Moore spaces.
For any smooth compact manifold $W$ of dimension at least two we prove that the classifying spaces of its group of diffeomorphisms which fix a set of $k$ points or $k$ embedded disks (up to permutation) satisfy homology stability. The same is true for so-called symmetric diffeomorphisms of $W$ connected sum with $k$ copies of an arbitrary compact smooth manifold $Q$ of the same dimension. The analogues for mapping class groups as well as other generalisations will also be proved.
Let $H_{g}$ be a 3-dimensional handlebody of genus $g$. We determine the twisted first homology group of the mapping class group of $H_{g}$ with coefficients in the first integral homology group of the boundary surface $\partial H_{g}$ for $g\geq 2$.
We focus on two kinds of infinite index subgroups of the mapping class group of a surface associated with a Lagrangian submodule of the first homology of a surface. These subgroups, called Lagrangian mapping class groups, are known to play important roles in the interaction between the mapping class group and finite-type invariants of 3-manifolds. In this paper, we discuss these groups from a group (co)homological point of view. The results include the determination of their abelianizations, lower bounds of the second homology and remarks on the (co)homology of higher degrees. As a by-product …
In this survey paper, we give a complete list of known results on the first and the second homology groups of surface mapping class groups. Some known results on higher (co)homology are also mentioned.
We obtain representations of the f-based Mapping Class Group of oriented punctured surfaces from an action of mapping classes on Heisenberg homologies of a circle bundle over surface configurations.
By the work of Harer, the reduced homology of the complex of curves is a fundamental cohomological object associated to all torsion free finite index subgroups of the mapping class group. We call this homology group the Steinberg module of the mapping class group. It was previously known that the curve complex has the homotopy type of a bouquet of spheres. Here, we give the first explicit homologically nontrivial sphere in the curve complex and show that under the action of the mapping class group, the orbit of this homology class generates the reduced homology of the curve complex.
We determine the first homology group with coefficients in $H_1(N;\mathbb{Z})$ for the mapping class group of a non-orientable surface $N$ of genus three with two boundary components.
Let S be a compact oriented surface. A homology cobordism of S is a cobordism C between two copies of S, such that both the "top" inclusion and the "bottom" inclusion of S in C induce isomorphisms in homology. Homology cobordisms of S form a monoid, into which the mapping class group of S embeds by the mapping cylinder construction. In this paper, we survey recent works on the structure of the monoid of homology cobordisms, and we outline their relations with the study of the mapping class group. We are mainly interested in the cases where the boundary of S is empty or connected.
We show that the graph TQFT for Heegaard Floer homology satisfies a strong version of Atiyah's duality axiom for a TQFT. As an application, we compute some Heegaard Floer mixed invariants of 4-dimensional mapping tori in terms of Lefschetz numbers on $HF^+$.
According to seminal work of Kontsevich, the unstable homology of the mapping class group of a surface can be computed via the homology of a certain lie algebra. In a recent paper, S. Morita analyzed the abelianization of this lie algebra, thereby constructing a series of candidates for unstable classes in the homology of the mapping class group. In the current paper, we show that these cycles are all nontrivial, representing degree 4k+1 homology classes in the homology of the mapping class group of a genus one surface with 4k+1 punctures.
We compute the rational stable homology of the automorphism groups of free nilpotent groups. These groups interpolate between the general linear groups over the ring of integers and the automorphism groups of free groups, and we employ functor homology to reduce to the abelian case. As an application, we also compute the rational stable homology of the outer automorphism groups and of the mapping class groups of the associated aspherical nil-manifolds in the TOP, PL, and DIFF categories.
We consider symplectic Floer homology in the lowest nontrivial dimension, that is to say, for area-preserving diffeomorphisms of surfaces. Particular attention is paid to the quantum cap product; we show that it distinguishes the trivial element of the mapping class group from any nontrivial one.
A homology cylinder over a surface consists of a homology cobordism between two copies of the surface and markings of its boundary. The set of isomorphism classes of homology cylinders over a fixed surface has a natural monoid structure and it is known that this monoid can be seen as an enlargement of the mapping class group of the surface. We now focus on abelian quotients of this monoid. We show that both the monoid of all homology cylinders and that of irreducible homology cylinders are not finitely generated and moreover they have big abelian quotients. These properties contrast with the f…
We investigate the relation between the topological entropy of pseudo-Anosov maps on surfaces with punctures and the rank of the first homology of their mapping tori. On the surface $S$ of genus $g$ with $n$ punctures, we show that the entropy of a pseudo-Anosov map is bounded from above by $\dfrac{(k+1)\log(k+3)}{|χ(S)|}$ up to a constant multiple when the rank of the first homology of the mapping torus is $k+1$ and $k, g, n$ satisfy a certain assumption. This is a partial generalization of precedent works of Tsai and Agol-Leininger-Margalit.
This is a survey of Magnus representations with particular emphasis on their applications to mapping class groups and monoids (groups) of homology cobordisms of surfaces. In the first half, we begin by recalling the basics of the Fox calculus and overview Magnus representations for automorphism groups of free groups and mapping class groups of surfaces with related topics. In the latter half, we discuss in detail how the theory in the first half extends to homology cobordisms of surfaces and present a number of applications from recent researches.
In a previous paper [Homology cylinders: an enlargement of the mapping class group, Algebr. Geom. Topol. 1 (2001) 243--270, arXiv:math.GT/0010247], a group H_g of homology cylinders over the oriented surface of genus g is defined. A filtration of H_g is defined, using the Goussarov-Habiro notion of finite-type. It is erroneously claimed that this filtration essentially coincides with the relative weight filtration. The present note corrects this error and studies the actual relation between the two filtrations.
We construct a covering of Culler-Vogtmann Outer space by the Teichmuller spaces of punctured surfaces. By considering the equivariant homology for the action of Out(F_n) on this covering, we construct a spectral sequence converging to the homology of Out(F_n) that has E^1 terms given by the homology of mapping class groups and groups that are, up to finite index, subgroups of mapping class groups. This spectral sequence can be seen as encoding all of the information of how the homology of Out(F_n) is related to the homology of mapping class groups and their subgroups.
We consider the pseudo-Anosov elements of the mapping class group of a surface of genus g that fix a rank k subgroup of the first homology of the surface. We show that the smallest entropy among these is comparable to (k+1)/g. This interpolates between results of Penner and of Farb and the second and third authors, who treated the cases of k=0 and k=2g, respectively, and answers a question of Ellenberg. We also show that the number of conjugacy classes of pseudo-Anosov mapping classes as above grows (as a function of g) like a polynomial of degree k.
In this article, using combinatorial techniques of mapping class groups, we show that a Stein fillable integral homology $3$-sphere supported by an open book decomposition with page a $4$-holed sphere admits a unique Stein filling up to diffeomorphism. Furthermore, according to a property of deforming symplectic fillings of a rational homology $3$-spheres into strongly symplectic fillings, we also show that a symplectically fillable integral homology $3$-sphere supported by an open book decomposition with page a $4$-holed sphere admits a unique symplectic filling up to diffeomorphism and blow-…
We extend the techniques in a previous paper to calculate the Heegaard Floer homology groups for fibered 3-manifolds M whose monodromy is a power of a Dehn twist about a genus-1 separating circle on a surface of genus g > 1. We only consider non-torsion Spin^c-structures on M.
We consider a homological enlargement of the mapping class group, defined by homology cylinders over a closed oriented surface (up to homology cobordism). These are important model objects in the recent Goussarov-Habiro theory of finite-type invariants of 3-manifolds. We study the structure of this group from several directions: the relative weight filtration of Dennis Johnson, the finite-type filtration of Goussarov-Habiro, and the relation to string link concordance. We also consider a new Lagrangian filtration of both the mapping class group and the group of homology cylinders.
We show that all versions of Heegaard Floer homology, link Floer homology, and sutured Floer homology are natural. That is, they assign concrete groups to each based 3-manifold, based link, and balanced sutured manifold, respectively. Furthermore, we functorially assign isomorphisms to (based) diffeomorphisms, and show that this assignment is isotopy invariant. The proof relies on finding a simple generating set for the fundamental group of the "space of Heegaard diagrams," and then showing that Heegaard Floer homology has no monodromy around these generators. In fact, this allows us to give s…
Let K \subset Y be a knot in a three manifold which admits a longitude-framed surgery such that the surgered manifold has first Betti number greater than that of Y. We find a formula which computes the twisted Floer homology of the surgered manifold, in terms of twisted knot Floer homology. Using this, we compute the twisted Heegaard Floer homology \underline{HF}^+ of the mapping torus of a diffeomorphism of a closed Riemann surface whose mapping class is periodic, giving an almost complete description of the structure of these groups. When the mapping class is nontrivial, we find in particula…
We exhibit a finitely generated group $\M$ whose rational homology is isomorphic to the rational stable homology of the mapping class group. It is defined as a mapping class group associated to a surface $\su$ of infinite genus, and contains all the pure mapping class groups of compact surfaces of genus $g$ with $n$ boundary components, for any $g\geq 0$ and $n>0$. We construct a representation of $\M$ into the restricted symplectic group ${\rm Sp_{res}}({\cal H}_r)$ of the real Hilbert space generated by the homology classes of non-separating circles on $\su$, which generalizes the classical …
We calculate the first homology group of the mapping class group with coefficients in the first rational homology group of the universal abelian $\Z / L \Z$-cover of the surface. If the surface has one marked point, then the answer is $\Q^{τ(L)}$, where $τ(L)$ is the number of positive divisors of $L$. If the surface instead has one boundary component, then the answer is $\Q$. We also perform the same calculation for the level $L$ subgroup of the mapping class group. Set $H_L = H_1(Σ_g;\Z/L\Z)$. If the surface has one marked point, then the answer is $\Q[H_L]$, the rational group ring of $H_L$…
We prove the following well known conjecture: let $Σ$ be an oriented surface of finite type whose fundamental group is a nonabelian free group. Let $ϕ\in \textup{Mod}(Σ)$ be a an infinite order mapping class. Then there exists a finite solvable cover $\widehatΣ \to Σ$, and a lift $\widehatϕ$ of $ϕ$ such that the action of $\widehatϕ$ on $H_1(\widehatΣ, \mathbb{Z})$ has infinite order. Our main tools are the theory of homological shadows, which was previously developed by the author, and Fourier analysis
Let S be an orientable surface with negative Euler characteristic, let ψ\in\Mod(S) be a mapping class of S, and let T_ψ be the mapping torus of ψ. We study the action of lifts of ψon the homology of finite covers of S via the torsion homology growth of towers of finite covers of T_ψ. We show that ψadmits a lift to a finite cover with a homological eigenvalue of length greater than one if and only if the mapping torus T_ψ admits a finite cover X and a certain tower of abelian covers which have exponential torsion homology growth. We show that the existence of such a lift of ψis intrinsic to T_ψ…
We prove that the homology of the mapping class groups of non-orientable surfaces stabilizes with the genus of the surface. Combining our result with recent work of Madsen and Weiss, we obtain that the classifying space of the stable mapping class group of non-orientable surfaces, up to homology isomorphism, is the infinite loop space of a Thom spectrum build from the canonical bundle over the Grassmannians of 2-planes in R^{n+2}. In particular, we show that the stable rational cohomology is a polynomial algebra on generators in degrees 4i--this is the non-oriented analogue of the Mumford conj…
For a given bundle $ξ\colon E \to M$ over a manifold, configuration-section spaces on $ξ$ parametrise finite subsets $z \subseteq M$ equipped with a section of $ξ$ defined on $M \smallsetminus z$, with prescribed "charge" in a neighbourhood of the points $z$. These spaces may be interpreted physically as spaces of fields that are permitted to be singular at finitely many points, with constrained behaviour near the singularities. As a special case, they include the Hurwitz spaces, which parametrise branched covering spaces of the $2$-disc with specified deck transformation group. We prove that …
In a recent paper we defined a new filtration of the mapping class group--the "Lagrangian" filtration. We here determine the successive quotients of this filtration, up to finite index. As an application we show that, for any additive invariant of finite-type (e.g. the Casson invariant), and any level of the Lagrangian filtration, there is a homology 3-sphere which has a Heegaard decomposition whose gluing diffeomorphism lies at that level, on which this invariant is non-zero. In a final section we examine the relationship between the Johnson and Lagrangian filtrations.
The homology cobordism group of homology cylinders is a generalization of both the mapping class group of surfaces and the string link concordance group. We consider extensions of Johnson homomorphisms of a mapping class group, Milnor invariants and Orr invariants of links to homology cylinders, all of which are related to free nilpotent groups. We establish a combined filtration via kernels of extended Johnson homomorphisms and extended Milnor invariants. We determine its image under the three invariants, and investigate relations among the invariants, and relations of the filtration to autom…
We define families of invariants for elements of the mapping class group of S, a compact orientable surface. Fix any characteristic subgroup H of pi_1(S) and restrict to J(H), any subgroup of mapping classes that induce the identity modulo H. To any unitary representation, r of pi_1(S)/H we associate a higher-order rho_r-invariant and a signature 2-cocycle sigma_r. These signature cocycles are shown to be generalizations of the Meyer cocycle. In particular each rho_r is a quasimorphism and each sigma_r is a bounded 2-cocycle on J(H). In one of the simplest non-trivial cases, by varying r, we e…
In these lecture notes, we combine recent homological methods of Kevin Whyte with older dynamical methods developed by Benson Farb and myself, to obtain a new quasi-isometric rigidity theorem for the mapping class group MCG(S) of a once punctured surface S of genus at least 2: if K is a finitely generated group quasi-isometric to MCG(S) then there is a homomorphism K -> MCG(S) with finite kernel and finite index image. This theorem is joint with Kevin Whyte.
In this paper, we briefly review some of the known results concerning the cohomological structures of the mapping class group of surfaces, the outer automorphism group of free groups, the diffeomorphism group of surfaces as well as various subgroups of them such as the Torelli group, the IA outer automorphism group of free groups, the symplectomorphism group of surfaces. Based on these, we present several conjectures and problems concerning the cohomology of these groups. We are particularly interested in the possible interplays between these cohomology groups rather than merely the structures…
We write down an explicit formula for the $+$ version of the Heegaard Floer homology (as an absolutely graded vector space over an arbitrary field) of the results of Dehn surgery on a knot $K$ in $S^3$ in terms of homological data derived from $CFK^{\infty}(K)$. This allows us to prove some results about Dehn surgery on knots in $S^3$. In particular, we show that for a fixed manifold there are only finitely many alternating knots that can produce it by surgery. This is an improvement on a recent result by Lackenby and Purcell. We also derive a lower bound on the genus of knots depending on the…
The symplectic Floer homology HF_*(f) of a symplectomorphism f:S->S encodes data about the fixed points of f using counts of holomorphic cylinders in R x M_f, where M_f is the mapping torus of f. We give an algorithm to compute HF_*(f) for f a surface symplectomorphism in a pseudo-Anosov or reducible mapping class, completing the computation of Seidel's HF_*(h) for h any orientation-preserving mapping class.
This is the second in a series of papers studying the relationship between Rohlin's theorem and gauge theory. We discuss an invariant of a homology S^1 cross S^3 defined by Furuta and Ohta as an analogue of Casson's invariant for homology 3-spheres. Our main result is a calculation of the Furuta-Ohta invariant for the mapping torus of a finite-order diffeomorphism of a homology sphere. The answer is the equivariant Casson invariant (Collin-Saveliev 2001) if the action has fixed points, and a version of the Boyer-Nicas (1990) invariant if the action is free. We deduce, for finite-order mapping …
We compare two different types of mapping class invariants: the Hochschild homology of an $A_\infty$ bimodule coming from bordered Heegaard Floer homology, and fixed point Floer cohomology. We first compute the bimodule invariants and their Hochschild homology in the genus two case. We then compare the resulting computations to fixed point Floer cohomology, and make a conjecture that the two invariants are isomorphic. We also discuss a construction of a map potentially giving the isomorphism. It comes as an open-closed map in the context of a surface being viewed as a $0$-dimensional Lefschetz…
We calculate the Heegaard Floer homologies$HF^+(M,s) for mapping tori M associated to certain surface diffeomorphisms, where s is any Spin^c structure on M whose first Chern class is non-torsion. Let gamma and delta be a pair of geometrically dual nonseparating curves on a genus g Riemann surface Sigma_g, and let sigma be a curve separating Sigma_g into components of genus 1 and g-1. Write t-gamma, t_delta, and t_sigma for the right-handed Dehn twists about each of these curves. The examples we consider are the mapping tori of the diffeomorphisms t_gamma^m circ t_delta^n for m,n in Z and that …
The periodic Floer homology of a surface symplectomorphism, defined by the first author and M. Thaddeus, is the homology of a chain complex which is generated by certain unions of periodic orbits, and whose differential counts certain embedded pseudoholomorphic curves in R cross the mapping torus. It is conjectured to recover the Seiberg-Witten Floer homology of the mapping torus for most spin-c structures, and is related to a variant of contact homology. In this paper we compute the periodic Floer homology of some Dehn twists.
Let $Σ$ be a surface whose interior admits a hyperbolic structure of finite volume. In this paper, we show that any infinite order mapping class acts with infinite order on the homology of some universal $k$--step nilpotent cover of $Σ$. We show that a Torelli mapping class either acts with infinite order on the homology of a finite abelian cover, or the suspension of the mapping class is a 3--manifold whose fundamental group has positive homology gradient. In the latter case, it follows that the suspended 3--manifold has a large fundamental group. It follows that every element of the Magnus k…
Let $Γ$ be a finite-index subgroup of the mapping class group of a closed genus $g$ surface that contains the Torelli group. For instance, $Γ$ can be the level $L$ subgroup or the spin mapping class group. We show that $H_2(Γ;\Q) \cong \Q$ for $g \geq 5$. A corollary of this is that the rational Picard groups of the associated finite covers of the moduli space of curves are equal to $\Q$. We also prove analogous results for surface with punctures and boundary components.
