A Counterexample to the Holomorphic Cancellation Problem

Gaofeng Huang

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arXiv · 2610.12581

A Counterexample to the Holomorphic Cancellation Problem

Gaofeng Huang

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Abstract

We show that if a contractible Stein manifold $X$ with the density property admits a proper holomorphic embedding into $\mathbb{C}^k$, then $X \times \mathbb{C}^k$ is biholomorphic to $\mathbb{C}^{n+k}$ with $n=\dim X$. We also prove that McLean's exotic affine variety $K_n$, $n\ge4$, a smooth contractible affine variety which is not biholomorphic to $\mathbb{C}^n$, has the density property. Hence for $n \ge 4$ there exist an integer $m \in \{ n, \dots, 2n\}$ and an affine variety $X$ such that $X \times \mathbb{C}$ is biholomorphic to $\mathbb{C}^{m+1}$ and $X$ is not biholomorphic to $\mathbb{C}^m$. This settles the Holomorphic Cancellation Problem in the negative.

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Gaofeng Huang. 2026-10-22. A Counterexample to the Holomorphic Cancellation Problem. https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.12581

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