A short introduction to shadows of 4-manifolds
Volume 188 / 2005
Fundamenta Mathematicae 188 (2005), 271-291
MSC: 52B70, 57N13.
DOI: 10.4064/fm188-0-12
Abstract
We give a self-contained introduction to the theory of shadows as a tool to study smooth $3$-manifolds and $4$-manifolds. The goal of the present paper is twofold: on the one hand, it is intended to be a shortcut to a basic use of the theory of shadows, on the other hand it gives a sketchy overview of some of the most recent results on shadows. No original result is proved here and most of the details of the proofs are left out.
