Analytic torsion and closed geodesics on hyperbolic manifolds (Q1089932)

In this paper, the author discusses the Reidemeister torsion \(\tau_{\rho}(sM)\) associated to acyclic representations \(\rho:\,\pi_ 1(SM)\to O(m)\). Here \(M\) is a closed hyperbolic manifold of dimension \(d\) and \(SM\) is the unit tangent bundle of \(M\). Let \(\Gamma\) be the set of prime closed geodesics in \(M\). Then \(\det (I-\rho (\gamma)\alpha p(- sl(\gamma))\) is well-defined for all \(\gamma\in\Gamma\) and \(s\in\mathbb C\), where \(l(\gamma)\) is the length of \(\gamma\). The author shows that the function \[ R_{\rho}(s)=\prod_{\gamma \in \Gamma}\det (I- \rho (\gamma)\exp (-sl(\gamma))), \] defined if \(\text{Re}(s)\) is large, extends meromorphically to \(\mathbb C\) and that \(| R_{\rho}(0)| =\tau_{\rho}(SM)\) if \(d\) is odd and respectively \(| R_{\rho}(0)|^{-1}=\tau_{\rho}(SM)\) if \(d=2.\) Recall that \(\pi_ 1(SM)\cong \pi_ 1(M)\) if \(d>2\) and that in this case \(\tau_{\rho}(SM)\) is equal to the analytic torsion of Ray-Singer, as proved by Cheeger and Müller. This result as well as the theory of determinants of Laplacians is used in the proof of the above formulas.