Energy and angular momentum densities of stationary gravitational fields
- Institute of Astronomy, The Observatories, Cambridge CB3 0HA (United Kingdom)
We give physical explanations of explicit invariant expressions for the energy and angular momentum densities of gravitational fields in stationary spacetimes. These expressions involve nonlocally defined conformal factors. In certain coordinates these become locally defined in terms of the metric. These results are derived via expressions for total gravitational potential energy from the difference between the total energy and the mechanical energy. The latter involves kinetic energy seen in the frame of static observers. When in the axially symmetric case we consider zero angular momentum observers (who move orthogonally to surfaces of constant time), we find that the angular momentum they attribute to the gravitational field is solely due to their motion.
- OSTI ID:
- 21010910
- Journal Information:
- Physical Review. D, Particles Fields, Vol. 75, Issue 2; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.75.024040; (c) 2007 The American Physical Society; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0556-2821
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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