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Lorentz transformation

In physics, the Lorentz transformation converts between two different observers' measurements of space and time, where one observer is in constant motion with respect to the other. In classical physics (Galilean relativity), the only conversion believed necessary was x′ = x − vt, describing how the origin of one observer's coordinate system slides through space with respect to the other's, at speed v and along the x-axis of each frame. According to special relativity, this is only a good approximation at much smaller speeds than the speed of light, and in general the result is not just an offsetting of the x coordinates; lengths and times are distorted as well. If space is homogeneous, then the Lorentz transformation must be a linear transformation. Also, since relativity postulates that the speed of light is the same for all observers, it must preserve the spacetime interval between any two events in Minkowski space. The Lorentz transformations describe only the transformations in which the event at x = 0, t = 0 is left fixed, so they can be considered as a rotation of Minkowski space. The more general set of transformations that also includes translations is known as the Poincaré group. Henri Poincaré named the Lorentz transformations after the Dutch physicist and mathematician Hendrik Lorentz (1853–1928) in 1905. They form the mathematical basis for Albert Einstein's theory of special relativity. They were derived by Joseph Larmor in 1897, and Lorentz (1899, 1904) . In 1905 Einstein derived them under the assumptions of the principle of relativity and the constancy of the speed of light in any inertial reference frame. (more)

Genres: physics, mathematics, science

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