French bowline French bowline Some consider that a French bowline is the same as a Portuguese bowline, i.e. a bowline with two loops that can be used as a bosun's chair. A different knot is however also known as a French bowline. This form of bowline is similar to a standard bowline but there are several loops so that there is less likelihood of damage to a delicate object secured by the bowline. As with a standard bowline, the knot cannot tighten. Pressure is distributed over a wider area than in the case of a standard bowline. The main advantage of this
Arf invariant of a knot Arf invariant of a knot In the mathematical field of knot theory, the Arf invariant of a knot, named after Cahit Arf, is a knot invariant obtained from a quadratic form associated to a Seifert surface. If "F" is a Seifert surface of a knot, then the homology group H("F", Z/2Z) has a quadratic form whose value is the number of full twists mod 2 in a neighborhood of an imbedded circle representing an element of the homology group. The Arf invariant of this quadratic form is the Arf invariant of the knot. Let formula_1 be a Seifert matrix of