On the boundaries of highly connected, almost closed manifolds

Building on work of Stolz, we prove for integers $0 \leqslant d \leqslant 3$ and $k \gt 232$ that the boundaries of $(k-1)$-connected, almost closed $(2k+d)$-manifolds also bound parallelizable manifolds. Away from finitely many dimensions, this settles longstanding questions of C.T.C. Wall, determines all Stein fillable homotopy spheres, and proves a conjecture of Galatius and Randal–Williams. Implications are drawn for both the classification of highly connected manifolds and, via work of Kreck and Krannich, the calculation of their mapping class groups.

Our technique is to recast the Galatius and Randal–Williams conjecture in terms of the vanishing of a certain Toda bracket, and then to analyze this Toda bracket by bounding its $\mathrm{H}\mathbb{F}_p$-Adams filtrations for all primes $p$. We additionally prove new vanishing lines in the $\mathrm{H}\mathbb{F}_p$-Adams spectral sequences of spheres and Moore spectra, which are likely to be of independent interest. Several of these vanishing lines rely on an Appendix by Robert Burklund, which answers a question of Mathew about vanishing curves in $\mathrm{BP}{\langle n \rangle}$-based Adams spectral sequences.

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Received 22 January 2020

Received revised 11 March 2022

Accepted 8 May 2022

Published 19 December 2023