Wednesday, July 30, 2014

special relativity - Energy-Momentum Tensor under Lorentz Transformation


In relativity, the symmetric energy-momentum tensor is given by $$ T^{ij}, $$ where $T^{00}$ is the energy density and $\frac{1}{c}T^{10}$ is the momentum density. Thus: $$ \left(\frac{1}{c}T^{00}dV, \frac{1}{c}T^{10}dV\right)^{T}$$ is the 4-momentum. Under a Lorentz transformation, this should transform like 4-vectors where $$ \frac{1}{c}T^{00}dV= \left[\frac{1}{c}T'^{00}dV'+\frac{v}{c^2}T'^{10}dV'\right] \left( 1-\frac{v^2}{c^2}\right)^{-1/2}\\dV=dV'\sqrt{1-\frac{v^2}{c^2}}.$$ After simplifications, we have: $$ T^{00}= \left[T'^{00}+\frac{v}{c}T'^{10} \right] \left( 1-\frac{v^2}{c^2}\right)^{-1}$$ But if we apply the Lorentz transformation to the tensor directly we get $$ T^{00}= \left[T'^{00}+\frac{v}{c}T'^{10}+\frac{v^2}{c^2}T\ ^{11} \right]\left( 1-\frac{v^2}{c^2}\right)^{-1}$$ What accounts for the difference? I think the first is wrong but have no idea why.




No comments:

Post a Comment

classical mechanics - Moment of a force about a given axis (Torque) - Scalar or vectorial?

I am studying Statics and saw that: The moment of a force about a given axis (or Torque) is defined by the equation: $M_X = (\vec r \times \...