Dear Topologists and Friends of Topology: Trent will give the topology seminar this afternoon at 3:30 in MSCS 514. Sorry for the late notice - I just posted this on announce and in the lounge yesterday. Also, because of the MAA meeting tomorrow, I'm not sure if the reading group should still meet at the usual time. If you've been attending the group, but there is an MAA event you plan to attend instead tomorrow, let me know. If there are enough people planning to miss it, I will send an e-mail to cancel the reading group meeting. (If you DON'T hear from me, we will still meet Friday afternoon at 2:30.)

Title: High Distance Free Decompositions

Abstract: Free decompositions were introduced by Kobayashi about a decade or so ago to construct pairs of knots whose tunnel number degenerates under connected sum. I inject some curve complex juices into them to construct knots with "High Distance Free Decompositions." Such knots have many interesting properties relating to their Heegaard structure, dehn surgery, and yes, the behavior of tunnel number under connected sum. This is joint work with Jesse.