Reduction of the electromagnetic vector potential to the irreducible representations of the inhomogeneous Lorentz group

1967 ◽  
Vol 48 (1) ◽  
pp. 43-57 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. E. Moses

The global forms of the unitary irreducible representations of the inhomogeneous Lorentz group corresponding to zero mass and finite or continuous spin are constructed by means of the little-group technique from those of the two-dimensional Euclidean group, and it is shown that these representations may be derived from the helicity representation for positive mass by taking suitable limits.


2006 ◽  
Vol 15 (04) ◽  
pp. 505-519 ◽  
Author(s):  
JAIRZINHO RAMOS ◽  
ROBERT GILMORE

We derive source-free Maxwell-like equations in flat space–time for any helicity j by comparing the transformation properties of the 2(2j+1) states that carry the manifestly covariant representations of the inhomogeneous Lorentz group with the transformation properties of the two helicity j states that carry the irreducible representations of this group. The set of constraints so derived involves a pair of curl equations and a pair of divergence equations. These reduce to the free-field Maxwell equations for j = 1 and the analogous equations coupling the gravito-electric and the gravito-magnetic fields for j = 2.


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