Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2010 iii Paper 17 1 c Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
The torus map acts on byIts determinant is one, so it is an orientation-preserving homeomorphism and acts as the identity on both and .
To calculate the homology of its mapping torus, cover the time circle by two arcs. Each inverse image has the homotopy type of , while their intersection has two components of that homotopy type. The map in the Mayer–Vietoris sequence can be writtenAdding the output coordinates and using the input coordinate separates an identity map from . Canceling the identity summands gives the Wang sequence, and henceIn degree one,Its image and kernel are both generated by ; its cokernel is since this image is primitive. Its Smith normal form is , so its torsion subgroup is zero. On the other two nonzero homology groups of the torus, . The displayed short exact sequences split because their right-hand groups are free. ThereforeIn particular, the mapping torus contributes an additional degree-one class from the time circle, as well as the invariant degree-one class in the fiber.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2012 iii Paper 16 5 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-07
Replace the open knot complement by the compact knot exterior ; they have the same homotopy type. The abelianizationsends an oriented meridian of a knot to . The connected covering space corresponding to its kernel is the infinite cyclic cover of a knot exterior . Choose a generator of its deck transformation group. Thenis the Alexander module of a knot over . It is a finitely presented torsion module, and its order, equivalently the greatest common divisor of the appropriate maximal matrix minors of an Alexander matrix, is the Alexander polynomial of a knot, up to a unit .
For a fibered knot, the infinite cyclic cover of a knot exterior is . Write the mapping torus with the gluing convention in the question. The deck transformationhas exactly that quotient: and are identified. Choose . Its action on is . If one instead chooses the generator projecting in the positive circle direction, its action is ; this replaces by and produces an associate for a knot.
Choose an integral basis for and let be the matrix of . The Alexander module of a knot has the finite free module presentationThere are no further relations: using and the invertibility of , every Laurent combination reduces uniquely to an integral combination of the chosen basis elements. Taking the order of this square presentation gives the monodromy formulaFor a disk fiber both sides are , using the empty determinant convention.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2014 iii Paper 14 2 2 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
The second assertion is true. Separate the points in the circle direction by a small isotopy if necessary. Cutting at fibers just before and after exposes two copies of . The surface framing is precisely the stated push-off : the two normal directions give homotopic nonzero normal fields along the curve.
For a single fiber-curve surgery, a cut and regluing of these copies by a Dehn twist changes the curve identified with the transverse meridian by one copy of the surface longitude. In the usual convention that negative surface-framed surgery produces a positive Dehn twist, the filling slope implements . One can see the coefficient locally by tracing a transverse arc across the twist annulus: it acquires one reverse turn along , and reversing this cut-and-glue identifies the compressible slope as . Reversing the circle parameter reverses the monodromy convention, without changing the existence of the fiber bundle.
Every filled block is therefore a product of with an interval, with a modified endpoint identification. Their cyclic assembly is the mapping torus of the product of these inverse Dehn twists, in the order of the along the oriented circle. It has the original closed topological surface as fiber, hence fibers over the circle. Intersections between the do not obstruct this argument: their twists occur in different fibers, and their ordered product need not commute.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2015 iii Paper 15 3 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
Integral groups for . Put . The space is the inversion mapping torus of a torus, fibred over with fiber . The cohomology ring of a torus is the exterior algebra on degree-one generators. Inversion acts as on each such generator, hence as on .
The Wang sequence therefore givesThe right-hand term is free, so this short exact sequence splits as a sequence of groups. In even fiber degree, ; in odd fiber degree it is multiplication by . For this computes the integral cohomology of an inversion mapping torus:The top torsion group is consistent with being nonorientable: inversion of its three-dimensional fiber reverses orientation.
Mod-two groups. Over , inversion acts as the identity on the fiber cohomology. The Wang sequence givesThuswith out-of-range binomial coefficients interpreted as zero. These are exactly the dimensions of the graded groups .
The intersection pairing for . The mapping torus of reflection of the circle is the Klein bottle. Let be the section loop through a fixed point of the reflection and a fiber circle. They form a basis of . The section has a normal neighborhood homeomorphic to a Möbius band, so it is one-sided and a transverse displacement meets it once modulo two. The fiber is two-sided and can be displaced disjointly. The two loops meet once. The mod-two intersection pairing of the Klein bottle therefore has matrixTake the evaluation-dual basis , with and . By Poincare duality, the cup product matrix in this dual basis is , not :Writing for the nonzero top class gives , and . Hence the cohomology ring isThese relations already force all degrees above two to vanish.
The ring for general . For each of the fiber coordinates, projection induces . Pull back the classes above, calling the common base class and the fiber-coordinate classes . Naturality of the cup product gives and . The square-free products restrict to the exterior algebra basis of the fiber cohomology. The Leray-Hirsch theorem then says that and form an additive basis. This proves the full mod-two cohomology ring of an inversion mapping torus:For , is nonzero by this basis description. In the cohomology ring of a torus every degree-one class squares to zero: the generators square to zero and the cross terms occur twice in characteristic two. The degree-one cup-square obstruction to ring isomorphism therefore proves that the rings are not isomorphic for any , despite their isomorphic graded groups. For , both spaces are circles and the rings are isomorphic. Even if grading is forgotten, the rings differ for : every element of the torus ring has square either zero or one, whereas is nonzero and is not the unit.
Integral cup products in . To specify also as a ring, let be the pullback of the positive generator of . Let denote reduction modulo two and set using the integral Bockstein homomorphism. The degree-one Bockstein square identity gives , so the are the three independent order-two classes in degree two. Choose free classes which restrict to the corresponding two-fold fiber products and have reductions . Such choices exist: reduction in degree two is surjective because is free, and adding the removes any terms from an initial lift.
The Wang sequence identifies as a free basis of . Let generate , with . Reduction in degree four is an isomorphism. The integral cup products in the four-dimensional inversion mapping torus are consequently determined byTogether with the unit, graded commutativity and vanishing above degree four, these give every product. For example, , whereas . The products vanish because they are torsion in the free group .
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2017 iii Paper 114 1 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Use integer coefficients. The mapping-torus homology from Mayer–Vietoris works for every continuous map , without assuming that the mapping torus is a fiber bundle. Project to the time circle and choose two open arcs, one containing the seam and one away from it. The inverse image of the seam arc is a mapping cylinder neighborhood with a deformation retraction to its target copy of ; the inverse image of the other arc is a product with a deformation retraction to . Their intersection has two components, each with a deformation retraction to . Label the upper component first. With the convention that the second inclusion in the Mayer–Vietoris sequence has a minus sign, its homology map isIndeed, the upper component includes into the seam neighborhood by the identity, while retracting the lower component across the seam applies . Put and , and replace target coordinates by . The map becomes . Negating gives a direct sum of and an isomorphism. Canceling the latter summands in the long exact sequence yieldsIn particular, there is a short exact sequenceNo splitting of this short exact sequence is assumed at this stage.
For the torus, take the coordinate loops and as the basis of . Their lifts to have endpoint displacements . Applying changes those displacements to its columns, soThis also follows from the identification of the first homology group with the abelianization of the fundamental group. The Künneth theorem gives , with generator the product orientation class. If are the dual degree-one cohomology classes, then evaluates to one on this generator, andThus the degree-two homology map is multiplication by , as in homology of an integer torus endomorphism. The claim that the torus map is a homeomorphism requires to be a unimodular matrix, equivalently an integer inverse or ; nonsingularity over alone would only give a covering map of finite degree. The particular matrix here is unimodular.
For this matrix, andIts kernel is zero and its Smith normal form is , so its cokernel is . The maps on and are zero. Substituting into the short exact sequences, and splitting the degree-one extension because its quotient is free, gives
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2018 iii Paper 141 4 c Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-05
The fiber monodromy is periodic when isotopy is allowed to move the boundary, in the sense of a periodic surface homeomorphism. Here is a justification from the Seifert fibered space structure, rather than a special formula about torus knots. Its base is a disk with cone-point orders . The fiber Seifert surface is an incompressible surface because its inclusion in the mapping torus is injective on fundamental groups. It is also a boundary-incompressible surface: lift a proposed boundary-compressing disk to the infinite cyclic cover and project to . This would homotope an essential arc of into , contradicting its essentiality. The classification of incompressible surfaces in Seifert fibered spaces therefore applies. A vertical surface in a Seifert fibered space has zero intersection with a regular Seifert fiber, whereas the fibration class evaluates on as . Thus the Seifert surface is isotopic to a horizontal surface in a Seifert fibered space, with intersections per regular orbit.
Following the oriented Seifert fibers from one intersection to the next gives a first-return homeomorphism of the horizontal topological surface. It is a representative of the fiber monodromy, and its -th power is the identity. It has order : a regular orbit meets the connected horizontal surface in a Seifert fibered space in cyclically ordered points. This realizes the periodic case of the Nielsen–Thurston classification theorem. It is neither an Anosov homeomorphism nor a pseudo-Anosov homeomorphism.
There is a boundary convention here. A representative fixed pointwise on the boundary is not periodic relative to the boundary: its -th power is a boundary Dehn twist (with sign determined by the return-map convention). Capping the boundary, or allowing it to rotate during isotopy, gives the finite-order representative intended by “periodic”. This distinguishes periodic surface type from literal finite order in the mapping class group relative to the boundary.
For any fibered knot, its Alexander module is with the deck transformation given by homological monodromy, so its Alexander polynomial of a knot is up to a unit. The general Turaev torsion relation and part (b) therefore giveThis rational expression is a polynomial: in its factorization into cyclotomic polynomials, cancels all denominator factors. It is monic, has constant coefficient one, and has polynomial degree . The characteristic polynomial has polynomial degree , is monic, and has constant coefficient , because homological monodromy preserves the intersection form. These facts remove the unit ambiguity and giveThe sign change between and is trivial because is even. As a separate geometric check, the orbifold Euler characteristic of the base is , and its -sheeted horizontal surface in a Seifert fibered space has Euler characteristic .
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2018 iii Paper 141 4 d Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-05
Choose a fiber monodromy representative fixing the boundary of the fiber Seifert surface pointwise. The boundary of each fiber is the Seifert longitude, precisely the slope used by zero Dehn filling. Attach the filling solid torus as , matching with the boundary of the fiber at . The fibers cap off to closed topological surfaces of the same genus ; extend the fiber monodromy across the disk by the identity. ThusThis is a foliation by fibers of a bundle over , and every leaf is compact with genus .
Choose a point in the interior of the capping disk, which fixes. Its suspension is an embedded closed curve in the mapping torus. It is transverse to the foliation and meets every fiber once. Hence every leaf meets a closed transversal to a foliation, which is the defining criterion for a taut foliation. Therefore the fiber foliation is taut.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2018 iii Paper 142 4 Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-05
Use the standard complex K-theory Thom class convention. For a rank- complex vector bundle, its K-theory Euler class is the pullback of the K-theory Thom class along the zero section, namelyHere denotes an exterior power, and a Hermitian metric identifies the dual bundle with the conjugate vector bundle. Choosing instead changes the K-theory Euler class by the unit , so its kernel and cokernel computations are unchanged.
For the disk bundle and sphere bundle , the K-theory Thom class identifies with . The exact sequence of this pair becomes the K-theory Gysin sequence of a sphere bundle:The groups are two-periodic by Bott periodicity.
View Real projective space as the circle bundle of over Complex projective space, where is the tautological bundle. Indeed, maps to by ; in each fiber squaring identifies exactly and .
Use Complex K-theory of complex projective space in the formThe K-theory Euler class of is . Multiplying it by the unit gives . The K-theory Gysin sequence of a sphere bundle therefore givesUnder the projection , the pullback vector bundle is the complexification of a real vector bundle of the tautological bundle of Real projective space: the fiber map sends to . Thus pulls back to . Put . The relation gives , and gives . HenceFor completeness, these relations give precisely the abelian group . In the basis , the image of multiplication by is generated by ; its relation matrix is triangular with determinant , and the relations express every as . Thus there is exactly one cyclic torsion subgroup of order .
If and is in the kernel, successive coefficients of give , , and so on, up to . Hence , with arbitrary. For the multiplier is zero on . In all cases,
Finally let with , over . Since , multiplicativity of the K-theory Euler class givesOn , the image of multiplication by this K-theory Euler class is the subgroup generated by : multiplication by an integer produces every such multiple, while multiplication by only adds multiples of . ThereforeMultiplication by is zero on , since and this abelian group has no nonzero torsion elements. Thus the K-theory Gysin sequence of a sphere bundle gives a short exact sequenceIt splits as an exact sequence of abelian groups because its quotient is a free abelian group. ConsequentlyThe convention covers and . For example, when the sphere bundle is , a mapping torus of the antipodal map; its Topological K-theory has no nonzero torsion elements, agreeing with the formula. If is allowed, the rank-zero vector bundle has an empty unit sphere bundle, so instead.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2023 iii Paper 114 1 iii Solution 2026-09-28
The quotient is the mapping torus ofA mapping torus of a cellular map has a finite CW structure. On integral homology, is on and and is on . The Wang sequence therefore givesOver , the map is the identity. The Wang sequence splits as vector spaces into one copy of and one copy of , yielding
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2023 iii Paper 114 1 ii Solution 2026-09-28
The involution is free. Taking the first circle modulo the half-turn exhibits the quotient as the mapping torus of a reflection of , hence as the Klein bottle. It has a finite CW structure with one zero-cell, two one-cells, and one two-cell. With suitable generators its integral cellular differential isThereforewhereas reduction modulo two kills the only nonzero boundary and gives
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2023 iii Paper 142 2 Solution Created 2026-09-28 Updated 2026-10-03
The Bott isomorphism is multiplication by the Bott element :Together with the suspension isomorphism andit gives the Complex K-theory of a sphere
Letbe a CW filtration in which each quotient is a wedge of even-dimensional spheres. The six-term exact sequence in Topological K-theory, the sphere calculation, and induction giveand a short exact sequence whose new summand in is free abelian on the newly attached cells. Every such extension splits as an extension of free abelian groups, so is free, with one generator for each cell. This proves the Complex K-theory of an even-cell complex result.
The exterior product definesFor a point it is the identity. Attaching one layer of even cells gives corresponding exact sequences on the source and target; the sphere case is the suspension isomorphism, and induction with the Five lemma proves that the product map remains an isomorphism. This is the Künneth theorem for complex K-theory with an even-cell factor.
For , the Complex K-theory of complex projective space and the K-theory Künneth isomorphism giveThe factor swap interchanges and . Its invariant subgroup has the basisIt follows that the K-theory of the mapping torus of the factor swap on two complex projective planes is
Sixth-turn flat three-manifold 2026-10-14
The mapping torus of an order-six rotation of a hexagonal flat torus is a closed orientable flat Riemannian manifold with holonomy . The screw rotation has angle and axial displacement . Its first Betti number is one.
Suspension flow 2026-10-14
A suspension flow moves vertically in the mapping torus of a diffeomorphism, applying that diffeomorphism whenever an orbit crosses the identifying section. A hyperbolic toral automorphism with constant roof gives a three-dimensional Anosov flow: after crossings its transverse derivative is , while the remaining fractional time contributes a uniformly bounded factor.
Third-turn flat three-manifold 2026-10-14
The mapping torus of an order-three rotation of a hexagonal flat torus is a closed orientable flat Riemannian manifold with holonomy . A screw rotation through with axial displacement , together with the planar lattice, describes its deck group. Its first Betti number is one.
Unipotent torus-bundle group 2026-10-14
The mapping torus of a torus map with this monodromy has fundamental group generated by with central and . Normal forms multiply byThis proves torsion-freeness and nilpotence of class at most two. For its center is and commutator subgroup ; for it is . These realize all noncyclic torsion-free nilpotent closed orientable three-manifold groups.