The theorem of the complement for nested subpfaffian sets

Let R be an o-minimal expansion of the real field, and let L(R) be the language consisting of all nested Rolle leaves over R. We call a set nested subpfaffian over R if it is the projection of a boolean combination of definable sets and nested Rolle leaves over R. Assuming that R admits analytic cell decomposition, we prove that the complement of a nested subpfaffian set over R is again a nested subpfaffian set over R. As a corollary, we obtain that if R admits analytic cell decomposition, then the pfaffian closure P(R) of R is obtained by adding to R all nested Rolle leaves over R, a one-stage process, and that P(R) is model complete in the language L(R).Comment: final version before publicatio

Contact handles, duality, and sutured Floer homology

We give an explicit construction of the Honda--Kazez--Mati\'c gluing maps in terms of contact handles. We use this to prove a duality result for turning a sutured manifold cobordism around, and to compute the trace in the sutured Floer TQFT. We also show that the decorated link cobordism maps on the hat version of link Floer homology defined by the first author via sutured manifold cobordisms and by the second author via elementary cobordisms agree.Comment: 86 pages, 54 figures, to appear in Geometry and Topolog