Twisted Milnor torsion for finite group actionsMPIM

by Pedram Hekmati (University of Auckland)

Wednesday Apr 16, 2025, 10:30 AM → 12:00 PM Europe/Berlin

MPIM, Vivatsgasse, 7 - Lecture Hall (Max Planck Institute for Mathematics)

Higher Differential Geometry Seminar

The Milnor torsion is an invariant of unitary flat vector bundles on closed odd-dimensional manifolds. Its analytic counterpart was introduced by Ray and Singer and the equality of these torsions is the celebrated Cheeger-Müller theorem. In this talk, I will discuss how to extend the Milnor torsion to certain equivariant flat superconnections (or representations up to homotopy) for finite group actions and its relation to analytic torsion of the twisted de Rham complex.