Obstructing Reducible Surgeries: Slice Genus and Thickness Bounds

Abstract

In this paper, we study reducible surgeries on knots in $S^3$. We develop thickness bounds for L-space knots that admit reducible surgeries, and lower bounds on the slice genus for general knots that admit reducible surgeries. The L-space knot thickness bounds allow us to finish off the verification of the Cabling Conjecture for thin knots, which was mostly worked out in \cite{DeY21b}. We also provide a new upper bound on reducing slopes for fibered, hyperbolic slice knots and on multiple reducing slopes for slice knots. Our techniques involve the $d$-invariants and mapping cone formula from Heegaard Floer homology.