The Newman鈥揚enrose formalism, which has been extremely useful
in general relativity, is extended to include the possibility
of space鈥搕imes with torsion. Initially Riemann鈥揅artan geometry
is discussed and the torsion and contortion tensors are defined.
The possible alternative but equivalent approaches in developing
the formalism are given in Chapters 3 and 4. These involve the
use of tetrads and spinor dyads. In the definition of the spin
coefficients, the components of the contortion tensor appear as
correction terms to the spin coefficients defined in the associated
Riemannian space鈥搕ime. [Continues.