On possible skewon effects on light propagation

Abstract

We start from a local and linear spacetime relation between the electromagnetic excitation and the field strength. Then we study the generally covariant Fresnel surfaces for light rays and light waves. The metric and the connection of spacetime are left unspecified. Accordingly, our framework is ideally suited for a search of possible violations of the Lorentz symmetry in the photon sector of the extended standard model. We discuss how the skewon part of the constitutive tensor, if suitably parametrized, influences the Fresnel surfaces and disturbs the light cones of vacuum electrodynamics. Conditions are specified that yield the reduction of the original quartic Fresnel surface to the double light cone structure (birefringence) and to the single light cone. Qualitatively, the effects of the real skewon field can be compared to those in absorbing material media. In contrast, the imaginary skewon field can be interpreted in terms of non-absorbing media with natural optical activity and Faraday effects. The astrophysical data on gamma-ray bursts are used for deriving an upper limit for the magnitude of the skewon field.

Revtex, 29 pages, 10 figures, references added, text as in the published version

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• On a possible new type of a T odd skewon field linked to electromagnetism

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• Spacetime structure and asymmetric metric from the premetric formulation of electromagnetism
• Maxwell's equations in Minkowski's world: their premetric generalization and the electromagnetic energy-momentum tensor
• Skewon field and cosmic wave propagation
• The Kummer tensor density in electrodynamics and in gravity
• Dilaton field and cosmic wave propagation
• Skewon no-go theorem
• Electrodynamics of a Cosmic Dark Fluid
• Equivalence principle and electromagnetic field: no birefringence, no dilaton, and no axion
• Equivalence Principles, Spacetime Structure and the Cosmic Connection
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• Non-minimal Einstein-Maxwell theory: the Fresnel equation and the Petrov classification of a trace-free susceptibility tensor
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• Characterisation and representation of non-dissipative electromagnetic medium with a double light cone
• Recent developments in premetric classical electrodynamics
• Electromagnetic media with Higgs-type spontaneously broken transparency
• Axiomatics of classical electrodynamics and its relation to gauge field theory
• Photon propagator in skewon electrodynamics
• Axion and dilaton + metric emerge from local and linear electrodynamics
• Symmetries of the equations of pre-metric electromagnetism