High frequency back reaction for the Einstein equations

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Cécile Huneau, Grenoble
Fine Hall 314

It has been observed by physicists (Isaacson, Burnett, Green-Wald) that metric perturbations of a background solution, which are small amplitude but with high frequency, yield at the limit to a non trivial contribution which corresponds to the presence of a stress-energy tensor in the equation for the background metric. This non trivial contribution is due to the nonlinearities in Einstein equations, which involve products of derivatives of the metric. It has been conjectured by Burnett that the only tensors which can be obtained this way are massless Vlasov, and it has been proved by Green and Wald that the limit tensor must be traceless and satisfy the dominant energy condition. The known exemples of this phenomena are constructed under symmetry reductions which involve two Killing fields and lead to a stress-energy tensor which consists in at most two dust fields propagating in null directions. In this talk, I will explain our construction, under a symmetry reduction involving one Killing field, which leads to a stress-energy tensor consisting in N dust fields propagating in arbitrary null directions. This is a joint work with Jonathan Luk (Stanford).