Past exam of the symmetry and relativity course of the University of Oxford / 2019 / 3 / a

An invariant has the same value when the same physical event or state is described in different inertial frames. A conserved quantity has the same value as the physical system evolves, subject to its equations and isolation conditions. These are different comparisons. The invariant mass of a heated object can change with time, while an isolated system's conserved energy has different numerical values in boosted frames.

Under a Lorentz transformation $x^{\prime \mu }={\Lambda }^{\mu }{}_{\nu }{x}^{\nu }$, a Lorentz four-vector transforms asA covector transforms by the inverse matrix, $W_{\mu }^{\prime }=({\Lambda }^{-1}{)}^{\nu }{}_{\mu }{W}_{\nu }$. A general tensor has one corresponding factor for each index; for example,Contraction with the Minkowski metric produces Lorentz scalars; it does not by itself make those scalars conserved.