This book is an extended version of the notes of my lecture course given at ETH in spring 1999. The course was intended as an introduction to combinatorial torsions and their relations to the famous Seiberg-Witten invariants. Torsions were introduced originally in the 3-dimensional setting by K. Rei- demeister (1935) who used them to give a homeomorphism classification of 3-dimensional lens spaces. The Reidemeister torsions are defined using simple linear algebra and standard notions of combinatorial topology: triangulations (or, more generally, CW-decompositions), coverings, cellular chain complexes, etc. The Reidemeister torsions were generalized to arbitrary dimensions by W. Franz (1935) and later studied by many authors. In 1962, J. Milnor observed 3 that the classical Alexander polynomial of a link in the 3-sphere 8 can be interpreted as a torsion of the link exterior. Milnor's arguments work for an arbitrary compact 3-manifold M whose boundary is non-void and consists of tori: The Alexander polynomial of M and the Milnor torsion of M essentially coincide.
Product Identifiers
Publisher
Birkhauser Verlag Ag
ISBN-13
9783764364038
eBay Product ID (ePID)
94582425
Product Key Features
Author
Vladimir Turaev
Publication Name
Introduction to Combinatorial Torsions
Format
Paperback
Language
English
Subject
Mathematics
Publication Year
2001
Type
Textbook
Number of Pages
124 Pages
Dimensions
Item Height
244mm
Item Width
170mm
Item Weight
318g
Additional Product Features
Title_Author
Vladimir Turaev
Series Title
Lectures in Mathematics. Eth Zurich
Country/Region of Manufacture
Switzerland
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