TAUBS PLANE-SYMMETRICAL VACUUM SPACETIME REEXAMINED

The gravitational properties of the only static plane-symmetric vacuum solution of Einstein's field equations without a cosmological term (T aub's solution, for brevity) are presented: some already known propert ies (geodesics, weak field limit, and pertainment to the Schwarzschild family of spacetimes) are reviewed in a physically much more transpar ent way, as well as new results about its asymptotic structure, possib le matchings, and the nature of the source are furnished. The main res ults point to the fact that the solution must be interpreted as repres enting the exterior gravitational field due to a negative mass distrib ution, confirming previous statements to that effect in the literature . Some analogies to Kasner's spatially homogeneous cosmological model are also mentioned.