Thick Hyperbolic 3-Manifolds with Bounded Rank

We construct a geometric decomposition of the convex cores of <inline-formula content-type="math/mathml"> <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" alttext="epsilon"> <mml:semantics> <mml:mi> ϵ </mml:mi> <mml:annotation encoding="application/x-tex">\epsilon</mml:annotation> </mml:semantics> </mml:math> </inline-formula> -thick hyperbolic <inline-formula content-type="math/mathml"> <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" alttext="3"> <mml:semantics> <mml:mn>3</mml:mn> <mml:annotation encoding="application/x-tex">3</mml:annotation> </mml:semantics> </mml:math> </inline-formula> -manifolds <inline-formula content-type="math/mathml"> <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" alttext="upper M"> <mml:semantics> <mml:mi>M</mml:mi> <mml:annotation encoding="application/x-tex">M</mml:annotation> </mml:semantics> </mml:math> </inline-formula> with bounded rank. Corollaries include upper bounds in terms of rank and injectivity radius on the Heegaard genus of <inline-formula content-type="math/mathml"> <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" alttext="upper M"> <mml:semantics> <mml:mi>M</mml:mi> <mml:annotation encoding="application/x-tex">M</mml:annotation> </mml:semantics> </mml:math> </inline-formula> and on the radius of any embedded ball in the convex core of <inline-formula content-type="math/mathml"> <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" alttext="upper M"> <mml:semantics> <mml:mi>M</mml:mi> <mml:annotation encoding="application/x-tex">M</mml:annotation> </mml:semantics> </mml:math> </inline-formula> .