General Relativity (445-2-1)

Instructors

Elena Murchikova

Meeting Info

Technological Institute L168: Mon, Wed 12:30PM - 1:50PM

Overview of class

First quarter:
Review of special relativity and Newtonian gravity; Gravity as geometry of curved spacetime; Geodesics and conservation laws; Schwarzschild geometry; Tests of GR and the PPN formalism; Gravitational collapse and black holes; Rotating black holes and the Kerr geometry; Linearized gravity and gravitational waves; Cosmological models for the expanding Universe.

Second quarter:
Mathematical foundations of General Relativity. Manifolds, vectors, forms, tensors, covariant derivatives, Riemann curvature. Energy-momentum tensor. We will construct General Relativity from scratch, and then discuss several fundamental applications.

Class Materials (Required)

A First Course in General Relativity 3rd Edition
by Bernard Schutz (Author)

https://www.amazon.com/First-Course-General-Relativity/dp/1108492673/ref=pd_sbs_d_sccl_2_1/142-7130070-7130025?pd_rd_w=c5ipd&content-id=amzn1.sym.96663f56-0cde-4800-b15e-f8f10264cc95&pf_rd_p=96663f56-0cde-4800-b15e-f8f10264cc95&pf_rd_r=G1G3W5FDZ4JZ3G1PFJH2&pd_rd_wg=VN0fS&pd_rd_r=98d19846-fce0-4a92-a555-df7eb3e8d19c&pd_rd_i=1108492673&psc=1