A Family of Inertial Observers
The frame field
represents the local Lorentz frame defined by a family of nonspinning inertial observers. That is,
which means that the integral curves of the timelike unit vector field are timelike geodesics, and also
which means that the spacelike unit vector fields are nonspinning. (They are Fermi-Walker transported.) Here, is a timelike unit vector field, while are spacelike unit vector fields.
Nonspinning inertial frames are as close as we can come in curved spacetimes to the usual Lorentz frames known from special relativity, where Lorentz transformations are simply changes from one Lorentz frame to another.
Read more about this topic: Monochromatic Electromagnetic Plane Wave
Famous quotes containing the words family and/or observers:
“O how terrible it must be for a young man
seated before a family and the family thinking
We never saw him before! He wants our Mary Lou!
After tea and homemade cookies they ask What do you do for a living”
—Gregory Corso (b. 1930)
“An ... important antidote to American democracy is American gerontocracy. The positions of eminence and authority in Congress are allotted in accordance with length of service, regardless of quality. Superficial observers have long criticized the United States for making a fetish of youth. This is unfair. Uniquely among modern organs of public and private administration, its national legislature rewards senility.”
—John Kenneth Galbraith (b. 1908)