On the Penrose inequality for null shells in the n-dimensional Minkowski spacetime

摘要

The Penrose inequality for null shells propagating in the Minkowski spacetime is rewritten in terms of the geometry of the surface obtained by intersecting the past null cone of the original surface S with a constant time hyperplane. We work in arbitrary spacetime dimension n ≥ 4. We specialize to the case when S lies in the past null cone of a point. In four dimensions this inequality was proved by Tod [1]. Here we show the validity of the corresponding inequality in any dimension.