Topological invariants and the definition of energy in quadratic gravity theory

Understand

We provide a simple method to compute the energy in higher curvature gravity in asymptotically AdS spacetimes in even dimensions.

• It follows from the combined use of topological terms added to the gravity action, and the Wald charges derived from the augmented action functional.
• No additional boundary terms are needed.
• As a consistency check, we show that the formula for the conserved quantities derived in this way yields the correct result for the mass of asymptotically AdS black holes.