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A disintegrating cosmic string
preprint
posted on 2005-08-25, 13:12 authored by Jerry Griffiths, Peter DochertyWe present a simple sandwich gravitational wave of the Robinson–Trautman family. This is
interpreted as representing a shock wave with a spherical wavefront which propagates into a
Minkowski background minus a wedge. (i.e. the background contains a cosmic string.) The
deficit angle (the tension) of the string decreases through the gravitational wave, which then
ceases. This leaves an expanding spherical region of Minkowski space behind it. The decay
of the cosmic string over a finite interval of retarded time may be considered to generate the
gravitational wave.
History
School
- Science
Department
- Mathematical Sciences
Pages
80516 bytesPublication date
2002Notes
This pre-print has been submitted, and accepted, to the journal, Classical and Quantum Gravity [© Institute of Physics]. The definitive version: GRIFFITHS, J.B. and DOCHERTY, P., 2002. A disintegrating cosmic string. Classical and Quantum Gravity, 19(11), pp. L109-L112, is available at: http://www.iop.org/EJ/journal/CQG.Language
- en