Disformal invariance of Maxwell's field equations

Abstract: We show that Maxwell's electrodynamics in vacuum is invariant under active transformations of the metric. These metrics are related by disformal mappings induced by derivatives of the gauge vector $A_{\mu}$ such that the gauge symmetry is preserved. Our results generalize the well known conformal invariance of electrodynamics and characterize a new type of internal symmetry of the theory. The group structure associated with these transformations is also investigated in details.