Catalog

General Relativity

Physics MIT CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 23 lectures

8.962 is MIT's graduate course in general relativity, which covers the basic principles of Einstein's general theory of relativity, differential geometry, experimental tests of general relativity, black holes, and cosmology.

Syllabus

  1. 1 Lecture 1: Introduction and The Geometric Viewpoint on Physics
  2. 2 Lecture 2: Introduction to Tensors
  3. 3 Lecture 3: Tensors Continued
  4. 4 Lecture 4: Volumes and Volume Elements; Conservation Laws
  5. 5 Lecture 5: The Stress Energy Tensor and the Christoffel Symbol
  6. 6 Lecture 6: The Principle of Equivalence
  7. 7 Lecture 7: The Principle of Equivalence Continued; Parallel Transport
  8. 8 Lecture 8: Lie Transport, Killing Vectors, Tensor Densities
  9. 9 Lecture 9: Geodesics
  10. 10 Lecture 10: Spacetime Curvature
  11. 11 Lecture 11: More on Spacetime Curvature
  12. 12 Lecture 12: The Einstein Field Equation
  13. 13 Lecture 13: The Einstein Field Equation (Variant Derivation)
  14. 14 Lecture 14: Linearized Gravity I: Principles and Static Limit
  15. 15 Lecture 15: Linearized Gravity II: Dynamic Sources
  16. 16 Lecture 16: Gravitational Radiation I
  17. 17 Lecture 17: Gravitational Radiation II
  18. 18 Lecture 18: Cosmology I
  19. 19 Lecture 19: Cosmology II
  20. 20 Lecture 20: Spherical Compact Sources I
  21. 21 Lecture 21: Spherical Compact Sources II
  22. 22 Lecture 22: Black Holes I
  23. 23 Lecture 23: Black Holes II

Course materials