Interferência de campos gravitacionais de corpos massivos na formação de imagens: uma abordagem didática para o ensino superior

Abstract

The confirmation of light deflection due to gravitational effects, observed during the total solar eclipse of May 29, 1919, stands as one of the foundational milestones of modern physics, giving rise to the optical phenomenon known as gravitational lensing, which has since contributed significantly to important scientific and cosmological discoveries. Despite its theoretical and observational relevance, General Relativity — and gravitational lensing in particular — remains considerably neglected in undergraduate physics curricula in Brazil, largely due to the absence of adequate and accessible pedagogical approaches. This article aims to present a didactic approach to the interference of gravitational fields of massive bodies in the formation of astronomical images, articulating the historical, algebraic, and geometric foundations of Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity. The research adopted a qualitative methodology of descriptive and exploratory nature, with a bibliographic review conducted in the CAPES Journals Portal, the Brazilian Journal of Physics Teaching, the Brazilian Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations, and arXiv, supplemented by a systematic survey and analysis of 70 curricula from 48 Federal Higher Education Institutions distributed across all five regions of Brazil. Results indicate that 62.5% of the analyzed institutions offer some content on General Relativity; however, only 6.25% do so in a mandatory and exclusive discipline, and only one institution - the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul - explicitly addresses gravitational lensing in its curriculum. Based on this diagnosis, a didactic sequence structured in three modules — historical, algebraic-geometric, and computational — is proposed, targeting students from the seventh semester of undergraduate Physics programs, designed as a guiding framework for teaching this relativistic phenomenon in an accessible and contextualized manner. The empirical validation of the sequence constitutes a direction for future research.