Paper 2, Section II, D
Part II, 2019
Consider the spacetime metric
where and are constants.
(a) Write down the Lagrangian for geodesics in this spacetime, determine three independent constants of motion and show that geodesics obey the equation
where is constant, the overdot denotes differentiation with respect to an affine parameter and is a potential function to be determined.
(b) Sketch the potential for the case of null geodesics, find any circular null geodesics of this spacetime, and determine whether they are stable or unstable.
(c) Show that has two positive roots and if and that these satisfy the relation .
(d) Describe in one sentence the physical significance of those points where .