Duality and conformal structure

Abstract

In four dimensions, two metrics that are conformally related define the same Hodge dual operator on the space of two-forms. The converse, namely, that two metrics that have the same Hodge dual are conformally related, is established. This is true for metrics of arbitrary (nondegenerate) signature. For Euclidean signature a stronger result, namely, that the conformal class of the metric is completely determined by choosing a dual operator on two-forms satisfying certain conditions, is proved.