Published December 21, 2008 | Version v1
Journal article

The gravitational field of a radiating electromagnetic dipole

  • 1. Department of Mathematics, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15260 (United States)
  • 2. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15260 (United States)

Description

The principle purpose of this paper is to analyze in the context of general relativity the effects of electromagnetic radiation on a gravitational field. The basic outline is that we start from flat-space with a time-dependent electric and magnetic dipole solution of Maxwell's equations. This field, treated as first order, then acts as the source for a gravitational perturbation. First, from the flat-space version of the Bianchi identities, with the Maxwell stress tensor as the (second-order) source, the Weyl tensor is found as a field on the Minkowski background. From this Weyl tensor, we go on and find the spin coefficients and the full metric in this second-order approximation. The physical interpretation and meaning of many of the derived relations are discussed. In particular, we can identify the Bondi energy-momentum-given in terms of the Maxwell field-and their evolution. Of particular attractiveness is the observation of an angular momentum conservation law that comes directly from the asymptotic terms in the Bianchi identities. This law contains a flux term that is a confirmation of a classical E and M result but obtained directly from GR

Availability note (English)

Available from http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/0264-9381/25/24/245005

Additional details

Identifiers

DOI
10.1088/0264-9381/25/24/245005;
PII
S0264-9381(08)83689-1;

Publishing Information

Journal Title
Classical and Quantum Gravity
Journal Volume
25
Journal Issue
24
Journal Page Range
[12 p.]
ISSN
0264-9381
CODEN
CQGRDG