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On the energy–momentum density of gravitational plane waves

T Dereli1 and R W Tucker2

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By embedding Einstein's original formulation of general relativity into a broader context, we show that a dynamic covariant description of gravitational stress–energy emerges naturally from a variational principle. A tensor TG is constructed from a contraction of the Bel tensor with a symmetric covariant second degree tensor field Φ and has a form analogous to the stress–energy tensor of the Maxwell field in an arbitrary spacetime. For plane-fronted gravitational waves helicity-2 polarized (graviton) states can be identified carrying non-zero energy and momentum.


PACS

04.30.-w Gravitational waves

04.40.-b Self-gravitating systems; continuous media and classical fields in curved spacetime

04.20.Fy Canonical formalism, Lagrangians, and variational principles

MSC

83C35 Gravitational waves

83C05 Einstein's equations (general structure, canonical formalism, Cauchy problems)

Subjects

Gravitation and cosmology

Dates

Issue 6 (21 March 2004)

Received 22 October 2003

Published 23 February 2004



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