Testing local Lorentz invariance of gravity with binary-pulsar data
Abstract
As gravity is a long-range force, one might a priori expect the Universe's global matter distribution to select a preferred rest frame for local gravitational physics. Two parameters α1 and α2 suffice to describe the phenomenology of preferred-frame effects on post-Newtonian gravity. One of them has already been very tightly constrained (||α2||<2.4×10-7). We show here that binary-pulsar data provide a bound on the other one (||α1||<5.0×10-4, 90% C.L.) which is quantitatively comparable to previous solar-system limits, but qualitatively more powerful because it is derived for systems comprising strong-gravitational-field regions. Our results correct a previous claim that α1 could be very tightly constrained via a purported semisecular effect in the orbital period of binary pulsars.
- Publication:
-
Physical Review D
- Pub Date:
- November 1992
- DOI:
- 10.1103/PhysRevD.46.4128
- Bibcode:
- 1992PhRvD..46.4128D
- Keywords:
-
- 04.80.+z;
- 03.30.+p;
- 97.60.Gb;
- Special relativity;
- Pulsars