Foliation-based quantization and black hole information

Abstract

We extend the foliation-based quantization scheme of Park (2015 Eur. Phys. J. C 75 459) to arbitrary asymptotically flat backgrounds including those that are time- and position- dependent. One of the ingredients to accomplishing the extension is imposition of a Neumann-type boundary condition. The quantization procedure, especially the gauge-fixing-induced reduction, provides a new insight into the black hole information paradox. The hypersurface degrees of freedom in the asymptotic region—whose dynamics should be responsible for part of the ‘hair’—as well as transitions among various excitations play a central role in the global formulation of the information and proposed solution of the information paradox. In retrospect, the quantization scheme reveals the origin of the difficulty of the information problem: the problem’s ties with the quantization of gravity and subtle boundary dynamics as well as the multilayered techniques required for its setup and study. We also comment on the implications of the asymptotic symmetries for the present quantization framework.