In algebraic topology, we work to classify objects. My research aims to build a better understanding of one important notion of classification of differentiable manifolds called cobordism. Cobordism is an equivalence relation, and the equivalence classes in cobordism form a graded ring, with operations disjoint union and Cartesian product. My dissertation studies this graded ring in two ways:
1. by attempting to find preferred class representatives for each class in the ring.
2. by computing the image of the ring under an interesting ring homomorphism called the Witten Genus
