Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Hermann Minkowski (1864–1909) found that the theory of special relativity could be best understood as a four-dimensional space, since known as the Minkowski spacetime. In physics, Minkowski space (or Minkowski spacetime) (/ m ɪ ŋ ˈ k ɔː f s k i,-ˈ k ɒ f-/ [1]) is the main mathematical description of spacetime in the absence of gravitation.
The most well-known class of spacetime diagrams are known as Minkowski diagrams, developed by Hermann Minkowski in 1908. Minkowski diagrams are two-dimensional graphs that depict events as happening in a universe consisting of one space dimension and one time dimension. Unlike a regular distance-time graph, the distance is displayed on the ...
The Poincaré group, named after Henri Poincaré (1905), [1] was first defined by Hermann Minkowski (1908) as the isometry group of Minkowski spacetime. [2] [3] It is a ten-dimensional non-abelian Lie group that is of importance as a model in our understanding of the most basic fundamentals of physics.
The reason is that unlike distances in Euclidean geometry, intervals in Minkowski spacetime can be negative. Rather than deal with square roots of negative numbers, physicists customarily regard s 2 {\displaystyle s^{2}} as a distinct symbol in itself, rather than the square of something.
The metric captures all the geometric and causal structure of spacetime, being used to define notions such as time, distance, volume, curvature, angle, and separation of the future and the past. In general relativity, the metric tensor plays the role of the gravitational potential in the classical theory of gravitation, although the physical ...
Spacetime algebra is a type of geometric algebra that is closely related to Minkowski space, and is equivalent to other formalisms of special relativity. It uses mathematical objects such as bivectors to replace tensors in traditional formalisms of Minkowski spacetime, leading to much simpler equations than in matrix mechanics or vector calculus.
The (identity component of the) Euclidean group SE(2) is the stabilizer of a null vector, so the homogeneous space SO + (1, 3) / SE(2) is the momentum space of a massless particle; geometrically, this Kleinian geometry represents the degenerate geometry of the light cone in Minkowski spacetime.
The causal relationships between points in Minkowski spacetime take a particularly simple form because the ... J. Math. Phys. 17 2:174-181 (1976); (Geometry, ...