Scribd
Upload
65 views5 pages

Lecture Notes in Relativity For PHYF241 EMT2: by Sunilkumar V

This document discusses key concepts in special relativity including: 1. The special theory of relativity is based on the postulates that the laws of physics are the same in all inertial frames and that the speed of light is constant. 2. The Lorentz transformation describes how space and time coordinates are transformed between inertial frames in motion relative to each other. 3. Proper time is the time measured by a clock that is at rest in a frame, and it is invariant under Lorentz transformations.

Uploaded by

Anonymous lfwCkQ
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
65 views5 pages

Lecture Notes in Relativity For PHYF241 EMT2: by Sunilkumar V

This document discusses key concepts in special relativity including: 1. The special theory of relativity is based on the postulates that the laws of physics are the same in all inertial frames and that the speed of light is constant. 2. The Lorentz transformation describes how space and time coordinates are transformed between inertial frames in motion relative to each other. 3. Proper time is the time measured by a clock that is at rest in a frame, and it is invariant under Lorentz transformations.

Uploaded by

Anonymous lfwCkQ
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 5

Lecture notes in relativity for

PHYF241 EMT2
by Sunilkumar V

The special relativity is based on the following assumptions

• Laws of physics are same in its form in all inertial frames

• Speed of light is constant in all inertial frames

Form of Maxwell’s equations are not preserved under Galilean transformations,


which is the relativistic transformations rule under which Newtonian mechanics is
invariant.

Exercise: For a Galilean transformation along x-axis check the invariance of the
form of Maxwells equation. Take x′ = x − vt, t′ = t, y′ = y, z′ = z . Assume that
electric field is along z direction and magnetic field is along y direction.

Speed of light is same for all observers immediately assumes the mathematical
form c 2 dt 2 − d x 2 − dy 2 − dz 2 = 0 which is invariant for light in any inertial
frames. For any material particle whose velocity is always less than that of light ,

c 2 dt 2 − d x 2 − dy 2 − dz 2 > 0 = ds 2(some positive quantit y)

dt /γ is called the proper time which is the time measured in clock attached to the
moving particle which is an invariant irrespective of the velocity of the particle
since in the frame of the particle, the clock is always at rest. So ds 2 /c 2 is an
invariant which implies that ds 2 is an invariant.

Lorentz transformation between two inertial frames

The correct reLativistic transformation is the one that leaves ds 2 invariant. Also it
should be symmetric between time and space since ds 2 is symmetric in time and
space except the negative sign between them. Also it should have a smooth limit
to Newtonian relativity where the material particle moves with much smaller
velocities. Keeping this in mind we assume a transformation,

v
x′ = A(x − vt), t′ = A(t − x), y′ = y, z′ = z

c2
for a frame moving along +x direction. Invariance of ds 2 will fix the value of A to be
γ. Note that if we use the notation x0 = ct we get above in a symmetrical form

v
x′ = A(x − βx0), x′0 = A(x0 − βx), y′ = y, z′ = z where β =

c
Exercise: From the invariance of c 2 dt 2 − d x 2 for the above proposed
transformation show that A = γ.

The relativistic Lorentz transformation is given by

x′ = A(x − βx0)
x′0 = A(x0 − βx),

y′ = y,
z′ = z
One can immediately see some consequences of Lorentz transformation. From the
above transformation one can see the time dilation and space contraction
properties.

Exercise: From the Lorentz transformation show the time dilation (moving clocks
runs slow) and space contraction(length of moving objects will get contracted as
seen by a lab observer.

Notion of a distance in 4-D space-time

The invariant interval ds 2 is the distance between two space time events. One can
now define a dot product to describe the distance. For this we are going to
introduce two types of vector components which in index notation are described
as given below.

d x μ = (cdt, d x, dy, dz) This we call as the contravariant component


d xμ = (cdt, − d x, − dy, − dz) covariant component

The distance now can be expressed as ,

ds 2 = d x μd xμ = cdt 2 − d x 2 − dy 2 − dz 2

Whenever a contra-variant vector component is contracted with a covariant


quantity we get a scalar, which is a invariant quantity in 4-D space-time.

Now we will see how we can generalise vectors to 4D space-time. A 4D vector is


expressed as, x ⃗ = x μ eμ ⃗ , where eμ ⃗ is a unit vector along the respective
coordinate. Here note that the unit vector should be a covariant quantity so that
vector is invariant under coordinate transformation. We will prove it shortly.

A vector can also be expressed in terms of a contravariant unit vector as follows


x ⃗ = xμe μ⃗. Here the coordinate are covariant quantities.

Covariant and contravariant quantities can be changed to each other with the help
of the appropriate metric tensor.

There also emerge a mix tensor as follows,

With the help of the metric tensor one can immediately verify that the
transformation law for covariant quantities are obtained by changing the sign of β
in Lorentz transformation. See the below exercise

Exercise: Starting with the Lorentz transformation for contravariant vector find the
transformation rule for covariant vector.

We can now use the tensor notation to express Lorentz transformations in a


compact form. All the 4 transformations can now be expressed in a single equation
as

You might also like