Existence of a knot with distinct minimum and maximum thin-position heights

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Let KK be a knot. For a thin position γ\gamma of KK, let ht(γ)ht(\gamma) be the number of thick level spheres, and define ht(K)ht(K) and htmin⁡(K)ht_{\min}(K) to be the maximum and minimum, respectively, of ht(γ)ht(\gamma) over all thin positions of KK.

Height variation conjecture. There is a knot KK such that

htmin⁡(K)<ht(K).ht_{\min}(K)<ht(K).

This conjecture asks whether a knot can have thin positions with different numbers of thick level spheres. The source provides no resolution, so the problem remains open.

References

Primary source

Ricky Lee, Puttipong Pongtanapaisan and Hanh Vo, “Widths of links via diagram colorings”, arXiv:2401.17193 (2024).

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