Inductive Rectilinear Frame Dragging and Local Coupling to the Gravitational Field of the Universe

Abstract

There is a drag force on objects moving in the background cosmological metric, known from galaxy cluster dynamics. The force is quite small over laboratory timescales, yet it applies in principle to all moving bodies in the universe. The drag force can be understood as inductive rectilinear frame dragging because it also exists in the rest frame of a moving object, and it arises in that frame from the off-diagonal components induced in the boosted-frame metric. Unlike the Kerr metric or other typical frame-dragging geometries, cosmological inductive dragging occurs at uniform velocity, along the direction of motion, and dissipates energy. Proposed gravito-magnetic invariants formed from contractions of the Riemann tensor do not capture inductive dragging effects, and this might be the first identification of inductive rectilinear dragging. The existence of this drag force proves it is possible for matter in motion through a finite region to exchange momentum and energy with the gravitational field of the universe. The cosmological metric can in principle be determined through this force from local measurements on moving bodies, at resolutions similar to that of the Pound–Rebka experiment.