On the Heegaard Floer homology of branched double-covers

Abstract: Let be a link. We study the Heegaard Floer homology of the branched double-cover of , branched along L. When L is an alternating link, of its branched double-cover has a particularly simple form, determined entirely by the determinant of the link. For the general case, we derive a spectral sequence whose term is a suitable variant of Khovanov''s homology for the link L, converging to the Heegaard Floer homology of . [Copyright &y& Elsevier]