Lens Surgeries along the n-twisted Whitehead Link

Abstract

We determine lens surgeries (i.e.\ Dehn surgery yielding a lens space) along the $n$-twisted Whitehead link. To do so, we first give necessary conditions to yield a lens space from the Alexander polynomial of the link as: (1) $n=1$ (i.e. the Whitehead link), and (2) one of surgery coefficients is 1, 2 or 3. Our interests are not only lens surgery itself but also how to apply the Alexander polynomial for this kind of problems.