  There are many fundamental algorithmic problems on triangulated 3-manifolds
whose complexities are unknown. Here we study the problem of finding a taut
angle structure on a 3-manifold triangulation, whose existence has implications
for both the geometry and combinatorics of the triangulation. We prove that
detecting taut angle structures is NP-complete, but also fixed-parameter
tractable in the treewidth of the face pairing graph of the triangulation.
These results have deeper implications: the core techniques can serve as a
launching point for approaching decision problems such as unknot recognition
and prime decomposition of 3-manifolds.
