Influence of gravitation on the propagation of electromagnetic radiation

The existence of a general helicity-rotation coupling is demonstrated for electromagnetic waves propagating in the field of a slowly rotating body and in the Goedel universe. This coupling leads to differential focusing of circularly polarized radiation by a gravitational field which is detectable for a rapidly rotating collapsed body. The electromagnetic perturbations and their frequency spectrum are given for the Goedel universe. The spectrum of frequencies is bounded from below by the characteristic rotation frequency of the Goedel universe. If the universe were rotating, the differential focusing effect would be extremely small due to the present upper limit on the anisotropy of the microwave background radiation.