Conserved Quantities in Lemaitre-Tolman-Bondi Cosmology

Abstract: We study linear perturbations to a Lema{^\i}tre-Tolman-Bondi (LTB) background spacetime. Studying the transformation behaviour of the perturbations under gauge transformations, we construct gauge invariant quantities. We show, using the perturbed energy conservation equation, that there are conserved quantities in LTB, in particular a spatial metric trace perturbation, \zeta_{SMTP}, which is conserved on all scales. We then briefly extend our discussion to the Lema{^\i}tre spacetime, and construct gauge-invariant perturbations in this extension of LTB spacetime.