A variational principle for light rays in a general-relativistic plasma

✍ Scribed by Volker Perlick

• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 2001
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 626 KB
• Volume: 47
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0362-546X
• DOI: 10.1016/s0362-546x(01)00422-9

✦ Synopsis

We consider ray optics in a non-magnetized plasma on an arbitrary general-relativistic spacetime. We discuss a variational principle for light rays traveling, under the influence of the plasma, from a point (x) to a timelike curve (\gamma) and arriving at (\gamma) with a prescribed frequency. The necessity to prescribe an arrival frequency reffects the fact that a plasma is a dispersive medium.