Second order Lagrangian and symplectic current for gravitationally perturbed Dirac-Goto-Nambu strings and branes

Abstract

We extend a recent analysis of gravitational perturbations on Dirac-Nambu-Goto strings, membranes and higher dimensional branes. In an arbitrary gauge, it is shown that the relevant first order equations governing the displacement vector of the worldsheet and metric perturbation are obtainable from a variational principle whose Lagrangian is constructed as a second order perturbation of the standard Dirac-Goto-Nambu action density. A symplectic current functional is obtained as a by-product that is potentially useful for the derivation of conservation laws in particular circumstances.