Spring 2026 Topology Reading Group

We meet in Fine Hall 601. This term's topic is Watanabe's disproof of the Smale conjecture.

Time Speaker Topic References
2:40-4:30 PM, February 18, 2026 Evan An exotic loop of diffeomorphisms of S4 [Wa1], [KL, Lectures 1, 2, and 4]
3:00-5:00 PM, March 18, 2026 Gheehyun Configuration spaces and finite type invariants [BT], [Th]
TBD TBD TBD
TBD TBD TBD




References

[Wa1] Tadayuki Watanabe, Exotic elements of the rational homotopy groups of Diff(S2n)

[KL] Danica Kosanović, Jianfeng Lin, Kontsevich invariants from configuration spaces (Lectures 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5)

[Le] Christine Lescop, Knot Invariants and Configuration Space Integrals

[LX] Jianfeng Lin, Yi Xie, Configuration space integrals and formal smooth structures

[Wa2] Tadayuki Watanabe, Some exotic nontrivial elements of the rational homotopy groups of Diff(S4)

[Wa3] Tadayuki Watanabe, Addendum to: Some exotic nontrivial elements of the rational homotopy groups of Diff(S4) (homological interpretation)

[BT] Raoul Bott, Clifford Taubes, On the self‐linking of knots

[Th] Dylan P. Thurston, Integral Expressions for the Vassiliev Knot Invariants

[BCSS] Ryan Budney, James Conant, Kevin P. Scannell, Dev Sinha, New perspectives on self-linking





















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