Abstract
The energy-momentum tensor for quasiplane and quasimonochromatic waves in homogeneous anisotropic dispersive media and an action fourvector in a conservation theorem are calculated in relativistic covariant way. The obtained form of the energy-momentum tensor is similar to that for a homogeneous particle flow in classical mechanics but with a much greater variety of possible dispersion laws for momentum in dependence on group velocity. A relation to quantization is obtained in a very natural way. The nonsymmetry of the obtained energy-momentum tensor and its nonuniqueness create some problems for Einstein’s gravitation equations.
Article PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
Avoid common mistakes on your manuscript.
References
A. Einstein, Ist die Trägheit eines Körpers von seinem Energieinhalt abhängig?, Annalen d. Phys. (Leipzig) 18 (1905) 639. This together with other articles of Einstein are reprinted in many collections of articles and in translations to different languages.
V.P. Silin and A.A. Rukhadze, Electromagnetic Properties of Plasma and Plasma-like Media, Gosatomizdat, Moskva, 1961 (in Russian).
V.M. Agranovich and V.L. Ginzburg, Spatial Dispersion in Crystal Optics and the Theory of Excitons, Wiley-Interscience, London, 1966; New edition: Springer-Verlag. New York, 1984.
V.L. Ginzburg Theoretical Physics and Astrophysics, Pergamon Press, Oxford, 1970.
L.D. Landau and E.M. Lifshitz, Electrodynamics of Continuous Media, 2nd ed., Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA. 1987. The 1st edition from 1960 does not yet contain the Chapter about “Spatial dispersion”.
L.D. Landau and E.M. Lifshitz, The Classical Theory of Fields, 4th revised ed., Pergamon Press, Oxford, 1987.
M. Born and E. Wolf, Principles of Optics, 7th ed., Cambridge University Press, 1999.
A. Einstein, Die Grundlage der allgemeinen Relativitätstheorie, Annalen d. Phys. (Leipzig) 49 (1916) 769.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Additional information
Based on the talk held at the 11th Central European Workshop on Quantum Optics (CEWQO011), 18–20 July 2004, Trieste, Italy
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Wünsche, A. Energy-momentum tensor for quasimonochromatic and quasiplane waves in dispersive media and its equivalence to a homogeneous particle flow. Acta Phys. Hung. B 23, 151–162 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1556/APH.23.2005.3-4.5
Received:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1556/APH.23.2005.3-4.5
Keywords
- spatial dispersion
- action flow density and action density
- conservation law
- group velocity
- quantization
- Einstein’s gravitation equations