Surfaces in finite covers of 3-manifolds: the virtual Haken conjecture- Nathan Dunfield

Conference Title: GEAR Retreat 2012 Theme: Hyperbolic 3-manifolds (2 of 5) Title: Surfaces in finite covers of 3-manifolds: the virtual Haken conjecture Speaker: Nathan Dunfield, Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Date and Time: Wednesday August 8, 11:00 Description: I will sketch the recent breakthrough result of Agol that every irreducible 3-manifold with infinite fundamental group has a finite cover which is Haken, that is, contains an embedded incompressible surface. This work builds on critical contributions of Wise, Kahn-Markovic, and Agol-Groves-Manning, which will also be discussed. Sponsor: GEAR Network Local host: UIUC Department of Mathematics Funding provided by: National Science Foundation Research Networks in Mathematical Sciences programAbstract: Prof. Nathan Dunfield, in this GEAR Retreat 2012 session on Hyperbolic 3-manifolds, will sketch the recent discovery that every irreducible 3-manifold with infinite fundamental group has a finite cover which is Haken.