This workshop constitutes a weeklong retreat with talks, given by workshop participants, and organized discussions in the mornings and evenings; afternoons will be kept clear for informal discussions and collaboration. In 2019, Morrison-Walker-Wedrich introduced skein invariants for 4-manifolds by leveraging the functoriality of gl(N) Khovanov-Rozansky homology.

In this workshop, students will work through background material and conclude by understanding Ren-Willis' application of these skein modules to the detection of exotics pairs of 4-manifolds. Major background topics include Bar-Natan's interpretation of Khovanov homology, Lee homology, Rasmussen's s-invariant, and Manolescu-Neithalath's 2-handle formula.
The workshop will be led by Qiuyu Ren and Mike Willis.
The organizers are Jennifer Brown, Benjamin Haïoun, David Jordan, Patrick Kinnear and Iordanis Romaidis.