Type: Article
Publication Date: 1998-01-01
Citations: 57
DOI: https://doi.org/10.4310/cag.1998.v6.n2.a2
Analytic surgery, as defined in [9] and [6], is a one-parameter metric deformation of a Riemannian manifold M, which stretches M across a separating hypersurface if in a cylindrical fashion; the singular limit is a complete manifold with asymptotically cylindrical ends, M. In this paper, the analysis of [9] and [6] is used to study the behaviour of analytic torsion of unitary representations under analytic surgery.A gluing formula is obtained relating the analytic torsion of M to the 'b-analytic torsion' h T (a regularized analytic torsion on manifolds with boundary) of M. This is then used to prove the Cheeger-Miiller theorem, asserting the equality of analytic and Reidemeister torsion r on closed manifolds, and to prove the following combinatorial formula for b-analytic torsion on odd dimensional manifolds with boundary:As a step in the proof, a Hodge-theoretic description of the Mayer-Vietoris sequence for cohomology under analytic surgery is developed.