The math of General Relativity

bcvdbgfs

Hello,

As a soon-to-be Astro grad student, I was wondering if taking classes such as Vector & Tensor analysis as an undergrad, or any form of tensor analysis is necessary for studying GR in graduate school. It's pretty high on the math list here as it has a couple of prereqs (Real analysis, which I'd figure..) but I heard GR's math consists of a lot of tensor analysis.

Thanks

Morbert

GR relies heavily on differential geometry and tensor analysis. It is very very important.

Anonymo

bcvdbgfs wrote: »

Hello,

As a soon-to-be Astro grad student, I was wondering if taking classes such as Vector & Tensor analysis as an undergrad, or any form of tensor analysis is necessary for studying GR in graduate school. It's pretty high on the math list here as it has a couple of prereqs (Real analysis, which I'd figure..) but I heard GR's math consists of a lot of tensor analysis.

Thanks

Differential geometry would certainly help. As regards tensor analysis - you are possibly talking about a pure maths course which will lay the mathematical basis of tensors but a lot of it will be unnecessary for doing a GR course. GR makes use of tensors but tensor analysis is a different thing. You don't need to do a pure maths course on tensor analysis to do GR.

Podge_irl

GR is very, very maths heavy and a fundamental understanding of differential geometry is vital to understand it properly. You can get a working knowledge of it without doing a course in tensor analysis, though you need to be very comfortable with working with them.