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Originally published in Science Express on 27 February 2003
Science 21 March 2003:
Vol. 299. no. 5614, pp. 1865 - 1869
DOI: 10.1126/science.1081406
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Research Articles

Swimming in Spacetime: Motion by Cyclic Changes in Body Shape

Jack Wisdom

Cyclic changes in the shape of a quasi-rigid body on a curved manifold can lead to net translation and/or rotation of the body. The amount of translation depends on the intrinsic curvature of the manifold. Presuming spacetime is a curved manifold as portrayed by general relativity, translation in space can be accomplished simply by cyclic changes in the shape of a body, without any external forces.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA. E-mail: wisdom{at}mit.edu

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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)