Abstract:
Sutured manifold hierarchy is a powerful tool introduced by Gabai to study the topology of 3-manifolds. The length of a sutured manifold hierarchy gives us a measurement of how complicated the sutured manifold is. Also, using this tool, Gabai proved the existence of finite depth taut foliations. However, he didn’t discuss how finite the depth could be.
Sutured Instanton Floer homology was introduced by Kronheimer and Mrowka and is defined on balanced sutured manifolds. In this talk, I will explain how sutured instanton Floer homology could offer us bounds for the minimal length of a sutured hierarchy and the minimal depth of a foliation on a fixed balanced sutured manifold.