Tau invariants for balanced spatial graphs

Abstract

In 2003, Ozsváth and Szabó defined the concordance invariant $τ$ for knots in oriented 3-manifolds as part of the Heegaard Floer homology package. In 2011, Sarkar gave a combinatorial definition of $τ$ for knots in $S^3$ and a combinatorial proof that $τ$ gives a lower bound for the slice genus of a knot. Recently, Harvey and O'Donnol defined a relatively bigraded combinatorial Heegaard Floer homology theory for transverse spatial graphs in $S^3$ which extends knot Floer homology. We define a $\mathbb{Z}$-filtered chain complex for balanced spatial graphs whose associated graded chain complex has homology determined by Harvey and O'Donnol's graph Floer homology. We use this to show that there is a well-defined $τ$ invariant for balanced spatial graphs generalizing the $τ$ knot concordance invariant. In particular, this defines a $τ$ invariant for links in $S^3$. Using techniques similar to those of Sarkar, we show that our $τ$ invariant gives an obstruction to a link being slice.