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Referee report of the text “Contact surgery”

Eddy Santiago Achig Andrango

December 6, 2018

Jonathan’s text is about Contact Surgery; he begins explaining about topological co-
bordism (section 1), then the relation between cobordism and topological surgery (section
2), with this he introduces symplectic cobordism (section 3) and symplectic normal bundle
(section 5), in order to finally talk about contact surgery (section 5 and 6).

The abstract is not written. Section 1 begins with the definition of a cobordism and
then relates it with Morse theory. The relation follows since every cobordism posses a
Morse function (Theorem 1.1 in the text). The proofs of Proposition 1.1 and Theorem 1.1
are missing. Definition 1.2 is not clear, since he never gave a name to the function that
satisfies those properties; I guess he is defining a Morse function in the cobordism. Defini-
tion 1.4 contains a typo, he is defining an “elementary cobordism” and not an “elemental
cobordism”,

Section 2 begins with the definition of a surgery of type k. Then he proves the relation
between an elementary cobordism between two manifolds M and N ; and the fact that N
can be obtained from M by surgery. This section finishes with a result about 3-manifolds
and surgery. In Definition 2.1 there is a typo, it must be M \ ϕ(S k−1 × 0) instead of
M × ϕ(S k−1 × 0). Example 2.1 is missing. In Theorem 2.1 he needs to clarify that N can
be obtained from M by surgery. In the proof of Theorem 2.1, the disjoint union must
be (M \ ϕ(S k−1 × 0)) × D1 t H instead of (M \ ϕ(S k−1 × 0)) × D1 t B k × S n−k−1 , this
mistake happens twice in the proof. In the same proof, ×D1 is missing in (ϕ(u, θv), c) ∈
ϕ(S k−1 × (B n−k \ 0)). In the same proof, he defines two different functions f , one at the
beginning and one at the end. In Theorem 2.3 the conditions: connected and orientable
are missing, and also, it must be S 3 instead of S 2 . There is a final incomplete Remark at
the end of this section.

Section 3 begins with the definition of a symplectic cobordism and then he proves
that being symplectically cobordant is a transitive relation. In Proposition 3.1, it must be
“(W1 , ω1 )” instead of “(W1 , ξ1 )”, and “(M1 , ξ1 )” instead of “(M1 , ξ)”. Also, the proofs of
Lemma 3.1 and Proposition 3.1 are missing.

Section 4 begins with the definition of the conformal normal bundle of an isotropic
submanifold L of a contact manifold (M, ξ). Then he shows how the normal bundle splits
in subspaces that can be described using only the Reeb field, T L, and a compatible almost
complex structure J. This is made in order to prove that a diffeomorphism between
conformal symplectic normal bundles can be extended to a contactomorphism between
neighborhoods of the isotropic manifolds. The same result is proved at the end of the
section for strict contact manifolds and symplectic normal bundles. In the first line of this
section, it must be “Let (M, ξ) a contact manifold” instead of “Let (M, ξ) a contact
structure.” In the second line, it must be “If α is a locally defining 1-form for ξ”
 2

instead of “If α is a cooriented structure of ξ”. In equation (1) it must be:

T M |L ξ|L
NL ∼
= ⊕ ⊕ CSNM (L)
ξ|L T L⊥

instead of:
T M |L ξ|L T M |L
NL ∼
= ⊕ ⊕
ξ|L T L⊥ ξ|L
All the proofs of theorems, lemmas and propositions are missing. I suggest to include
the definition of an isotropic submanifold of a contact manifold, and the definition of a
strict contact manifold. In addition, I suggest to change the notation SN (L) for SNM (L),
specifying the strict contact manifold M .

Section 5 explains how to perform a contact surgery by changing two properties of The-
orem 2.1. The main result of this section is Theorem 5.1, that gives conditions in order
to have an elementary symplectic cobordism. This section finishes with an application:
Martinet’s theorem. The proof of Theorem 5.1 is missing. In Theorem 5.2 conditions:
closed and orientable are missing.

Section 6 (The generality of this construction) is empty.

In general, there are some mistakes that make this paper hard to read. This paper
achieve its goal, and present the main ideas of how to perform contact surgery. I suggest
to include a paragraph about the importance of the background given in sections 1, 2,
3, and 4. In addition, I suggest to specify in general where the manifolds are compact.
Another important recommendation is to be careful about the numeration of theorems, it
is confusing when you have Definition 2.1, Theorem 2.1, and you refer only by (2.1).

Other typos

• In definition 5.1, there are some repeated words.

• “possesses” instead of “posseses” in Theorem 2.1.

• “construct” instead of “contruct” in line 1 Section 3.

• “embedding” instead of “embbeding” in Definition 3.1, Theorem 3.1.

• “Furthermore” instead of “Futhermore” in Theorem 3.1.

• “defined” instead of “define” in line 2 page 3, in line 4 page 4.

• “trajectories defined as” instead of “trayectories define as” in line 10 of the proof of
Theorem 3.1.

• “is well defined” instead of “is a well defined” in line 7 page 4.

• “accomplish” instead of “acomplish” in line 14 page 3.

• “It can be verified” instead of “It can be verify” in line 22 page 3.

• “application” instead of “aplication” in line 16 page 4.

• ... and other grammar and spelling mistakes, I suggest to use an orthographic
corrector .