Introduction to 3-Manifolds

Download or read book Introduction to 3-Manifolds written by Jennifer Schultens and published by American Mathematical Soc.. This book was released on 2014-05-21 with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book grew out of a graduate course on 3-manifolds and is intended for a mathematically experienced audience that is new to low-dimensional topology. The exposition begins with the definition of a manifold, explores possible additional structures on manifolds, discusses the classification of surfaces, introduces key foundational results for 3-manifolds, and provides an overview of knot theory. It then continues with more specialized topics by briefly considering triangulations of 3-manifolds, normal surface theory, and Heegaard splittings. The book finishes with a discussion of topics relevant to viewing 3-manifolds via the curve complex. With about 250 figures and more than 200 exercises, this book can serve as an excellent overview and starting point for the study of 3-manifolds.