Gravitation

Description

This book suitable for post graduates in Physics and Astrophysics aims at introducing the theory of general relativity as an important background for doing astrophysics. Starting from a detailed discussion of the various mathematical concepts for doing general relativity, the book introduces the geometric description of gravity. It gives a brief historical perspective to classical mechanics and electrodynamics making an attempt to establish the necessity of special relativity as propounded by Einstein extending to General Relativity. This book is a good starting point for post graduates wanting to pursue the modern topics of Cosmology, High energy astrophysics and related areas. Content: Mathematical preliminaries -- Pre relativity physics -- Special relativity -- General relativity -- Exact solutions and applications -- Astrophysical applications -- Accretion dynamics -- Inertial forces in general relativity -- Gravity as a gauge theory.