  Renormalization group (RG) smoothing is employed on the lattice to
investigate and to compare the monopole structure of the SU(2) vacuum as seen
in different gauges (maximally Abelian (MAG), Polyakov loop (PG) and Laplacian
gauge (LG)). Physically relevant types of monopoles (LG and MAG) are
distinguished by their behavior near the deconfining phase transition. For the
LG, Abelian projection reproduces well the gauge independent monopole structure
encoded in an auxiliary Higgs field. Density and localization properties of
monopoles, their non-Abelian action and topological charge are studied. Results
are presented confirming the Abelian dominance with respect to the
non-perturbative static potential for all gauges considered.
