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General Relativity and Relativistic Astrophysics


Affiliations
1 Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru 560 012, India
 

Einstein established the theory of general relativity and the corresponding field equation in 1915 and its vacuum solutions were obtained by Schwarzschild and Kerr for, respectively, static and rotating black holes, in 1916 and 1963, respectively. They are, however, still playing an indispensable role, even after 100 years of their original discovery, to explain high energy astrophysical phenomena. Application of the solutions of Einstein's equation to resolve astrophysical phenomena has formed an important branch, namely relativistic astrophysics. I devote this article to enlightening some of the current astrophysical problems based on general relativity. However, there seem to be some issues with regard to explaining certain astrophysical phenomena based on Einstein's theory alone. I show that Einstein's theory and its modified form, both are necessary to explain modern astrophysical processes, in particular, those related to compact objects.

Keywords

Accretion Disks, Black Holes, Einstein’s Field Equation and its Modification, White Dwarfs and Neutron Stars, Supernovae.
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  • General Relativity and Relativistic Astrophysics

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Authors

Banibrata Mukhopadhyay
Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru 560 012, India

Abstract


Einstein established the theory of general relativity and the corresponding field equation in 1915 and its vacuum solutions were obtained by Schwarzschild and Kerr for, respectively, static and rotating black holes, in 1916 and 1963, respectively. They are, however, still playing an indispensable role, even after 100 years of their original discovery, to explain high energy astrophysical phenomena. Application of the solutions of Einstein's equation to resolve astrophysical phenomena has formed an important branch, namely relativistic astrophysics. I devote this article to enlightening some of the current astrophysical problems based on general relativity. However, there seem to be some issues with regard to explaining certain astrophysical phenomena based on Einstein's theory alone. I show that Einstein's theory and its modified form, both are necessary to explain modern astrophysical processes, in particular, those related to compact objects.

Keywords


Accretion Disks, Black Holes, Einstein’s Field Equation and its Modification, White Dwarfs and Neutron Stars, Supernovae.

References





DOI: https://doi.org/10.18520/cs%2Fv109%2Fi12%2F2250-2257