Canonical Lagrangian for relativistic adiabatic fluid dynamics (Q1121741)

Nonrelativistic adiabatic fluid dynamics is a noncanonical Hamiltonian system. As with any system of equations, it can be represented through a constrained variational principle when a few extra variables are thrown in as Lagrange multipliers. Since extra variables are allowed in, there exists an unlimited number of different Lagrangians each of which results in the original system of equations (and then some). Most of these Lagrangians, however, will be of no particular use unless the corresponding variational (Euler-Lagrange) equations possess some additional structure. There are not much indications available of the ingredients such a structure ought to consist of. However, analysing possible Lagrangians, one may postulate the following three properties that will define the unique canonical Lagrangian \({\mathcal L}\) (when it exists): 1) The new variables in \({\mathcal L}\) are Lagrange multipliers for all motion equations except for the fluid momentum density; 2) The Euler-Lagrange equations for the Lagrangian \({\mathcal L}\) can be put into a canonical Hamiltonian form for the dynamical equations for all the pairs of conjugate variables (quantity which is not a component of velocity; its Lagrange multiplier), with the remaining nondynamical equations being inerpreted as describing some map \(\Phi\) which expresses the momentum density in terms of the canonical variables, and with the Hamiltonian function h being precisely the pull-back under \(\Phi^*\) of the Hamiltonian function H of the original dynamical system in the physical space one starts with (in the case under discussion, the nonrelativistic fluid dynamics); 3) The map \(\Phi\) is Hamiltonian \((=canonical)\) between the canonical Hamiltonian structure in the space of dynamical Lagrange variables on one hand, and the Hamiltonian structure in the space of physical variables on the other hand. A check of the Lagrangians for the three basic nonrelativistic continuous Hamiltonian systems: Magnetohydrodynamics, Multifluid Plasma, and Elasticity, shows that the three empirically found axioms which I laid down above, can be satisfied in each case. It is, thus, natural to suppose that canonical Lagrangians exist, for some deep reasons, for all natural systems one deals with in classical continuum mechanics. This is true for nonrelativistic systems, and the goal of this paper is to find a canonical Lagrangian \({\mathcal L}\) for the most basic relativistic continuous mechanical system: (special) relativistic adiabatic fluid dynamics, given that its noncanonical Hamiltonian structure is known. It turns out that such Lagrangian exists, and, as a bonus, we derive a formula for \({\mathcal L}\) which is new even in the nonrelativistic case. Also, quite unexpectedly, the form of the computed Lagrangian \({\mathcal L}\) is much more simpler than the form of the corresponding Hamiltonian H.