Answering the Parity Question for Gravitational Wave Memory

Abstract

Memory of gravitational waves in asymptotically-flat spacetimes that are solutions of the Einstein vacuum equations is of purely electric parity, no magnetic parity memory can occur. We show this by investigating what happens for various classes of asymptotically-flat Einstein-vacuum-spacetimes. This is understood within such spacetimes that have been shown to be stable in the fully nonlinear regime under perturbations away from Minkwoski space. We also lay open the structures at the transition from spacetimes that have a well-defined memory to those for which the memory formula cannot be retrieved due to their specific asymptotic behavior and the divergence of crucial integrals. Moreover, for the Einstein equations coupled to other fields with a common stress-energy as well as in the cosmological setting, we find that gravitational memory is of electric parity only.

References in corpus (5)

• The gravitational-wave memory effect
• Detecting gravitational-wave memory with LIGO: implications of GW150914
• The Cosmological Memory Effect
• Global aspects of radiation memory
• Gravitational wave memory in $\Lambda$CDM cosmology

Cited by in corpus (5)

• The Asymptotic Behavior of Massless Fields and the Memory Effect
• Conservation of asymptotic charges from past to future null infinity: Supermomentum in general relativity
• Conservation of asymptotic charges from past to future null infinity: Lorentz charges in general relativity
• New Effects in Gravitational Waves and Memory
• On the Definition of the Spin Charge in Asymptotically-Flat Spacetimes