Triple point cancelling numbers of surface links and quandle cocycle invariants

The unknotting or triple point cancelling number of a surface link F is the least number of 1-handles for F such that the 2-knot obtained from F by surgery along them is unknotted or pseudo-ribbon, respectively. These numbers have been often studied by knot groups and Alexander invariants. On the other hand, quandle colorings and quandle cocycle invariants of surface links were introduced and applied to other aspects, including non-invertibility and triple point numbers. In this paper, we give lower bounds of the unknotting or triple point cancelling numbers of surface links by using quandle colorings and quandle cocycle invariants.