An introduction to the abelian Reidemeister torsion of three-dimensional manifolds
These notes accompany some lectures given at the autumn school “Tresses in Pau” in October 2009. The abelian Reidemeister torsion for -manifolds, and its refinements by Turaev, are introduced. Some applications, including relations between the Reidemeister torsion and other classical invariants, are surveyed.