English

Refocusing spacetimes need not be strongly refocusing

Differential Geometry 2026-05-22 v1 General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology Mathematical Physics math.MP

Abstract

We prove that there are globally hyperbolic spacetimes (X,g)(X,g) which are refocusing but not strongly refocusing. In fact, every globally hyperbolic strongly refocusing spacetime of dimension at least 33 admits globally hyperbolic metrics which are refocusing but not strongly refocusing. This answers a question by Chernov, Kinlaw, and Sadykov. We then prove that globally hyperbolic spacetimes which are Legendrian refocusing (a notion introduced in this paper) admit globally hyperbolic strongly refocusing metrics.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2605.21871,
  title  = {Refocusing spacetimes need not be strongly refocusing},
  author = {Friedrich Bauermeister},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2605.21871},
  year   = {2026}
}

Comments

31 pages, no figures. comments welcome