Related papers: Vacuum gravitational fields with a null Killing ve…
Non-vacuum exact gravitational waves invariant for a non Abelian two-dimensional Lie algebra generated by two Killing fields whose commutator is of light type, are described. The polarization of these waves, already known from previous…
In general relativity (GR), linearized gravitational waves propagating in empty Minkowski spacetime along a fixed spatial direction have the property that the wave front is the Euclidean plane. Beyond the linear regime, exact plane waves in…
Twisted gravitational waves (TGWs) are nonplanar waves with twisted rays that move along a fixed direction in space. We study further the physical characteristics of a recent class of Ricci-flat solutions of general relativity representing…
Gravitational waves with parallel rays are known to have remarkable properties: Their orbit space of null rays possesses the structure of a non-relativistic spacetime of codimension-one. Their geodesics are in one-to-one correspondence with…
Vacuum gravitational fields invariant for a non Abelian Lie algebra generated by two Killing fields whose commutator is light-like are analyzed. It is shown that they represent nonlinear gravitational waves obeying to two nonlinear…
We find exact nonlinear solutions of general relativity that represent twisted gravitational waves (TGWs) in the presence of a cosmological constant. A TGW is a nonplanar wave propagating along a fixed spatial direction with a null Killing…
Refractive gravitational waves are a generalisation of impulsive waves on a null hypersurface in which the metric is discontinuous but a weaker continuity condition for areas holds. A simple example of a plane wave is examined in detail and…
Pure gravitational plane waves are considered as a special case of spacetimes with two commuting spacelike Killing vector fields. Starting with a midisuperspace that describes this kind of spacetimes, we introduce gauge-fixing and symmetry…
We study gravitational waves with torsion as exact vacuum solutions of three-dimensional gravity with propagating torsion. The new solutions are a natural generalization of the plane-fronted gravitational waves in general relativity with a…
Twisted gravitational waves (TGWs) are nonplanar unidirectional Ricci-flat solutions of general relativity. Thus far only TGWs of Petrov type \emph{II} are implicitly known that depend on a solution of a partial differential equation and…
As an example of the unification of gravitation and particle physics, an exact solution of the five-dimensional field equations is studied which describes waves in the classical Einstein vacuum. While the solution is essentially 5D in…
The motion of a classical spinning test particle in the field of a weak plane gravitational wave is studied. It is found that the characteristic dimensions of the particle's orbit is sensitive to the ratio of the spin to the mass of the…
Some years ago Dray and 't Hooft found the necessary and sufficient conditions to introduce a gravitational shock wave in a particular class of vacuum solutions to Einstein's equations. We extend this work to cover cases where non-vanishing…
The dynamics of a gravitational wave propagating through a cosmic gauge field are dramatically different than in vacuum. We show that a gravitational wave acquires an effective mass, is birefringent, and its normal modes are a linear…
Propagation of weak gravitational waves, when a dynamical four-form is around, has been investigated. Exact, self-consistent solutions corresponding to plane, monochromatic gravitational waves have been studied.
The gravitational field of a laser pulse of finite lifetime, is investigated in the framework of linearized gravity. Although the effects are very small, they may be of fundamental physical interest. It is shown that the gravitational field…
Exact solutions of Einstein field equations invariant for a non-Abelian 2-dimensional Lie algebra of Killing fields are described. Physical properties of these gravitational fields are studied, their wave character is checked by making use…
Gravitational waves provide a novel and powerful way to test astrophysical models of compact objects, early universe processes, beyond the Standard Model particle physics, dark matter candidates, Einstein's theory of General Relativity and…
Observations of a merging neutron star binary in both gravitational waves, by the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO), and across the spectrum of electromagnetic radiation, by myriad telescopes, have been used to show…
Vacuum gravitational fields invariant for a bidimensional non Abelian Lie algebra of Killing fields, are explicitly described. They are parameterized either by solutions of a transcendental equation (the tortoise equation) or by solutions…