Optical activity induced by curvature in a gravitational pp-wave background

TL;DR

This paper investigates how curvature in a gravitational pp-wave background causes optical activity, leading to Faraday rotation, using phenomenological models and short wavelength approximations.

Contribution

It introduces a model with two gyration parameters to analyze optical activity induced by curvature in gravitational waves, including exact and approximate solutions.

Findings

Curvature induces optical activity resulting in Faraday rotation.

The model provides exact and approximate solutions for different cases.

Optical activity depends on the phenomenological gyration parameters.

Abstract

We study optical activity induced by curvature. The optical activity model we present has two phenomenological gyration parameters, within which we analyze three model cases, namely, an exactly integrable model, the Landau-Lifshitz model and the Fedorov model, these latter two are solved in the short wavelength approximation. The model background is a gravitational pp-wave. The solutions show that the optical activity induced by curvature leads to Faraday rotation.