Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gbm5v Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-25T08:01:25.452Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Immersed surfaces and pencils of planes in 3-space

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 May 2009

F. J.Craveiro de Carvalho
Affiliation:
Departamento de Matemática, Universidade de Coimbra, Portugal
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

Let M be a compact connected boundaryless surface and f: M → ℝ3 a smooth immersion transverse to a straight line L. Thus there is an even number p of points xεM such that f(x)εL. Under further transversality assumptions on f (see §3) there is a finite number q of points x of M such that the plane containing f(x) and L touches f(M) at f(x). These assumptions are mild in the sense that they hold for any f in an open dense subset of the space of smooth immersions under consideration. Suppose that the Gaussian curvature of f(M) is positive at q+ of these points and negative at q, with q = q++ q. Then

where e(M) denotes the Euler number of M.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Glasgow Mathematical Journal Trust 1981

References

REFERENCES

1.Alexandroff, P. and Hopf, H., Topologie I (Springer, 1935).Google Scholar
2.Milnor, J., Topology from the differentiable viewpoint (The University of Virginia Press 1965).Google Scholar
3.Robertson, S. A., The dual of a height function, J. London Math. Soc. (2) 8 (1974), 187192.Google Scholar