Transverse knots and Khovanov homology

We define an invariant of transverse links in (S 3 , ξ std ) as a distinguished element of the Khovanov homology of the link.The quantum grading of this invariant is the self-linking number of the link.For knots, this gives a bound on the self-linking number in terms of Rasmussen's invariant s(K).We prove that our invariant vanishes for transverse knot stabilizations, and that it is non-zero for quasipositive braids.We also discuss a connection to Heegaard Floer invariants.