Strongly Focused Gravitational Waves

Abstract

This paper contains a new proof of the formation of trapped spheres, in vacuum spacetimes, by the focusing of gravitational waves, from generic data. The first such result was obtained by Christodoulou [Chr]. We exploit the same physical mechanism, but give a logically independent construction of these spacetimes.

36 pages; v2 is mathematically identical to v1, only the exposition has changed; Section 9 of v1 contains results that are absent in v2

References in corpus (1)

• Quiescent cosmological singularities

Cited by in corpus (13)

• A fully anisotropic mechanism for formation of trapped surfaces in vacuum
• A critical appraisal of the singularity theorems
• Examples of naked singularity formation in higher-dimensional Einstein-vacuum spacetimes
• Energy Estimates and Gravitational Collapse
• Emergence of Apparent Horizon in Gravitational Collapse
• Dynamical formation of black holes due to the condensation of matter field
• Formation of Trapped Surfaces from Past Null Infinity
• Trapped surfaces in vacuum arising dynamically from mild incoming radiation
• On emerging scarred surfaces for the Einstein vacuum equations
• A Scale-Critical Trapped Surface Formation Criterion: A New Proof via Signature for Decay Rates
• Construction of Cauchy Data of Vacuum Einstein field equations Evolving to Black Holes
• A scale-critical trapped surface formation criterion for the Einstein-Maxwell system
• Semiglobal non-oscillatory big bang singular spacetimes for the Einstein-scalar field system