Vanishing structure set of 3-manifolds

In this short note we update a result proved in [16]. This will complete our program of [12] showing that the structure set vanishes for compact aspherical 3-manifolds.Comment: 5 pages, referee's suggestions and comments include

The isomorphism conjecture in L-theory

This is the first of three articles on the Fibered Isomorphism Conjecture of Farrell and Jones for L-theory. We apply the general techniques developed in [15] and [16] to the L-theory case of the conjecture and prove several results. Here we prove the conjecture, after inverting 2, for poly-free groups. In particular, it follows for braid groups. We also prove the conjecture for some classes of groups without inverting 2. In fact we consider a general class of groups satisfying certain conditions which includes the above groups and some other important classes of groups. We check that the properties we defined in [15] are satisfied in several instances of the conjecture.Comment: 14 pages, AMSLATEX file, the title is revised. item 3 in theorem 1.3 is removed as the proof of this item was found incorrec

The Farrell-Jones isomorphism conjecture for 3-manifold groups

We show that the Fibered Isomorphism Conjecture (FIC) of Farrell and Jones corresponding to the stable topological pseudoisotopy functor is true for the fundamental groups of a large class of 3-manifolds. We also prove that if the FIC is true for irreducible 3-manifold groups then it is true for all 3-manifold groups. In fact, this follows from a more general result we prove here, namely we show that if the FIC is true for each vertex group of a graph of groups with trivial edge groups then the FIC is true for the fundamental group of the graph of groups. This result is part of a program to prove FIC for the fundamental group of a graph of groups where all the vertex and edge groups satisfy FIC. A consequence of the first result gives a partial solution to a problem in the problem list of R. Kirby. We also deduce that the FIC is true for a class of virtually PD_3-groups. Another main aspect of this article is to prove the FIC for all Haken 3-manifold groups assuming that the FIC is true for B-groups. By definition a B-group contains a finite index subgroup isomorphic to the fundamental group of a compact irreducible 3-manifold with incompressible nonempty boundary so that each boundary component is of genus \geq 2. We also prove the FIC for a large class of B-groups and moreover, using a recent result of L.E. Jones we show that the surjective part of the FIC is true for any B-group.Comment: 35 pages, 1 figure (.eps file), AMS Latex file, final version. accepted for publication in K-theor

Surgery groups of the fundamental groups of hyperplane arrangement complements

Using a recent result of Bartels and Lueck (arXiv:0901.0442) we deduce that the Farrell-Jones Fibered Isomorphism conjecture in L-theory is true for any group which contains a finite index strongly poly-free normal subgroup, in particular, for the Artin full braid groups. As a consequence we explicitly compute the surgery groups of the Artin pure braid groups. This is obtained as a corollary to a computation of the surgery groups of a more general class of groups, namely for the fundamental group of the complement of any fiber-type hyperplane arrangement in the complex n-space.Comment: 11 pages, AMSLATEX file, revised following referee's comments and suggestions, to appear in Archiv der Mathemati