Acylindrical hyperbolicity and Artin-Tits groups of spherical type

We prove that, for any irreducible Artin-Tits group of spherical type $G$, the quotient of $G$ by its center is acylindrically hyperbolic. This is achieved by studying the additional length graph associated to the classical Garside structure on $G$, and constructing a specific element $x_G$ of $G/Z(G)$ whose action on the graph is loxodromic and WPD in the sense of Bestvina-Fujiwara; following Osin, this implies acylindrical hyperbolicity. Finally, we prove that "generic" elements of $G$ act loxodromically, where the word "generic" can be understood in either of the two common usages: as a result of a long random walk or as a random element in a large ball in the Cayley graph.Comment: Proof in Section 4 has been simplifie

Lawrence-Krammer-Bigelow representations and dual Garside length of braids

We show that the span of the variable $q$ in the Lawrence-Krammer-Bigelow representation matrix of a braid is equal to the twice of the dual Garside length of the braid, as was conjectured by Krammer. Our proof is close in spirit to Bigelow's geometric approach. The key observation is that the dual Garside length of a braid can be read off a certain labeling of its curve diagram

Fast algorithmic Nielsen-Thurston classification of four-strand braids

We give an algorithm which decides the Nielsen-Thurston type of a given four-strand braid. The complexity of our algorithm is quadratic with respect to word length. The proof of its validity is based on a result which states that for a reducible 4-braid which is as short as possible within its conjugacy class (short in the sense of Garside), reducing curves surrounding three punctures must be round or almost round.Comment: One minor error corrected (Example 4.2 was wrong

On the complexity of braids

We define a measure of "complexity" of a braid which is natural with respect to both an algebraic and a geometric point of view. Algebraically, we modify the standard notion of the length of a braid by introducing generators $\Delta\_{ij}$, which are Garside-like half-twists involving strings $i$ through $j$, and by counting powered generators $\Delta\_{ij}^k$ as $\log(|k|+1)$ instead of simply $|k|$. The geometrical complexity is some natural measure of the amount of distortion of the $n$ times punctured disk caused by a homeomorphism. Our main result is that the two notions of complexity are comparable. This gives rise to a new combinatorial model for the Teichmueller space of an $n+1$ times punctured sphere. We also show how to recover a braid from its curve diagram in polynomial time. The key r\^ole in the proofs is played by a technique introduced by Agol, Hass, and Thurston.Comment: Version 2: added section on Teichmueller geometry, removed section on train track