https://doi.org/10.1140/epjc/s10052-017-5205-y
Regular Article - Theoretical Physics
Massive gravity and Fierz–Pauli theory
1
Dipartimento di Fisica, Università di Genova, via Dodecaneso 33, 16146, Genova, Italy
2
I.N.F.N.-Sezione di Genova, Genoa, Italy
* e-mail: nicola.maggiore@ge.infn.it
Received:
3
July
2017
Accepted:
5
September
2017
Published online:
16
September
2017
Linearized gravity is considered as an ordinary gauge field theory. This implies the need for gauge fixing in order to have well-defined propagators. Only after having achieved this, the most general mass term is added. The aim of this paper is to study of the degrees of freedom of the gauge fixed theory of linearized gravity with mass term. The main result is that, even outside the usual Fierz–Pauli constraint on the mass term, it is possible to choose a gauge fixing belonging to the Landau class, which leads to a massive theory of gravity with the five degrees of freedom of a spin-2 massive particle.
© The Author(s), 2017
