Exact Parallel Waves in General Relativity

Abstract

We conduct a review of the basic definitions and the principal results in the study of wavelike spacetimes, that is spacetimes whose metric models massless radiation moving at the speed of light, focusing in particular on those geometries with parallel rays. In particular, we motivate and connect their various definitions, outline their coordinate descriptions and present some classical results in their study in a language more accessible to modern readers, including the existence of "null coordinates" and the construction of Penrose limits. We also present a thorough summary of recent work on causality in pp-waves, and describe progress in addressing an open question in the field - the Ehlers-Kundt conjecture.

66 pages; review; updated version with explicit nomenclature summary and additional references

References in corpus (3)

• Algebraic classification of higher dimensional spacetimes based on null alignment
• General Kundt spacetimes in higher dimensions
• Gyratonic pp-waves and their impulsive limit

Cited by in corpus (6)

• Wave Metrics in the Cotton and Conformal Killing Gravity Theories
• Gravitational wave memory and its effects on particles and fields
• Waves and strings in an interacting conformal chiral 2-form theory in six dimensions
• Elliptically Polarized Plane Gravitational Waves
• Interaction of exact gravitational waves with matter
• Exact pp-wave solutions in shift-symmetric higher-order scalar-tensor theories