Classical and Virtual Pseudodiagram Theory and New Bounds on Unknotting Numbers and Genus

A pseudodiagram is a diagram of a knot with some crossing information missing. We review and expand the theory of pseudodiagrams introduced by R. Hanaki. We then extend this theory to the realm of virtual knots, a generalization of knots. In particular, we investigate how much crossing information must be known to conclude that a diagram is a diagram of the unknot (the trivializing number). We also consider how much information is necessary to identify a non-trivial knot, a classical knot, or a non-classical knot. We then apply pseudodiagram theory to develop new upper bounds on unknotting number, virtual unknotting number, and genus.

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