Some remarks on special conformal and special projective symmetries in general relativity (Q1368711)

The authors consider conformal and projective symmetries in spacetimes. They call a vector field \(X\) conformal if there exists a 2-form \(F\) and a function \(\phi\) such that \(\nabla X=\phi g+F\). Similarly, a vector field \(Y\) is called projective if there are a 1-form \(\theta\) and a 2-form \(G\) such that \(\nabla Y= {\mathfrak L}_Y g+G\) and \(\nabla_ch_{ab} =2g_{ab} \theta_c+g_{ac} \theta_b+g_{bc} \theta_a\). They show that the set of simply connected spacetimes admitting a conformal vector field with \(d\phi\) non-null and covariantly constant is identical to the set of simply connected spacetimes admitting a projective vector field with \(\theta\) non-null and covariantly constant.