Chapter 5. Hidden Symmetry and Exact Solutions in Einstein Gravity

Abstract

Conformal Killing-Yano tensors are introduced as a generalization of Killing vectors. They describe symmetries of higher-dimensional rotating black holes. In particular, a rank-2 closed conformal Killing-Yano tensor generates the tower of both hidden symmetries and isometries. We review a classification of higher-dimensional spacetimes admitting such a tensor, and present exact solutions to the Einstein equations for these spacetimes.