Horizon Geometry Research Articles

Complement to thermodynamics of dyonic Taub-NUT-AdS spacetime

We examine the thermodynamics of Euclidean dyonic Taub-Nut/Bolt-AdS4 black holes for a variety of horizon geometries to understand how gauge field regularity conditions influence the thermodynamic relations. We find several distinct features that distinguish the NUT-charged case from its dyonic Reissner-Nordstrom counterpart. For the Nut solution, the gauge field vanishes at the horizon and so regularity is ensured. For the Bolt solution we find that the norm of the gauge field is required to vanish at the horizon in order to satisfy both regularity and the first law of thermodynamics. This regularity condition yields a constraint on the electric and magnetic charges and so reduces cohomogeneity of the system; for spherical horizons, the regularity condition removing the Misner string singularity further reduces cohomogeneity. We observe that bolt solutions with increasing electric charge have positive heat capacity, but upon turning on the magnetic charge to make the solution dyonic, we find that the properties of the uncharged one are retained, having both positive and negative heat capacity. We also study the extremal Bolt solution, finding that Misner string disappears at the horizon in the zero temperature limit. We find that the extremal solution has finite-temperature-like behaviour, with the electric potential playing a role similar to temperature.

Fractional black p-branes on orbifold \u2102n/\u2124n

The recent discovery of an explicit solution of a black hole on the resolved orbifold ℂn/ℤn makes it possible to investigate the existence of p-branes on the orbifold. In particular, it is possible with reasonable precision to verify the prediction that an M2-brane on ℂ4/ℤ4 in eleven dimensions and a D3-brane on ℂ3/ℤ3 in ten dimensions have a family of black p-branes on the orbifold ℂn/ℤn. These solutions are extremal and have regular horizons S2n−1/ℤn without any naked singularity, with near horizon geometries AdSp+2 × S2n−1/ℤn.

Aspects of the dyonic Kerr-Sen- AdS4 black hole and its ultraspinning version

We explore some (especially, thermodynamical) properties of the dyonic Kerr-Sen-AdS$_4$ black hole and its ultraspinning counterpart, and check whether or not both black holes satisfy the first law and Bekenstein-Smarr mass formulas. To this end, new Christodoulou-Ruffini-like squared-mass formulae for the usual dyonic Kerr-Sen-AdS$_4$ solution and its ultraspinning cousin are deduced. Similar to the ultraspinning Kerr-Sen-AdS$_4$ black hole case, we demonstrate that the ultraspinning dyonic Kerr-Sen-AdS$_4$ black hole does not always violate the reverse isoperimetric inequality (RII) since the value of the isoperimetric ratio can either be larger/smaller than, or equal to unity, depending upon the range of the solution parameters, as is the case only with an electric charge. This property is apparently distinct from that of the superentropic dyonic Kerr-Newman-AdS$_4$ black hole, which always strictly violates the RII, although both of them have some similar properties in other aspects, such as the horizon geometry and conformal boundary.

The Arithmetic Geometry of AdS<sub>2</sub> and its Continuum Limit

According to the 't Hooft-Susskind holography, the black hole entropy,$S_\mathrm{BH}$, is carried by the chaotic microscopic degrees of freedom, which live in the near horizon region and have a Hilbert space of states of finite dimension $d=\exp(S_\mathrm{BH})$. In previous work we have proposed that the near horizon geometry, when the microscopic degrees of freedom can be resolved, can be described by the AdS$_2[\mathbb{Z}_N]$ discrete, finite and random geometry, where $N\propto S_\mathrm{BH}$. It has been constructed by purely arithmetic and group theoretical methods in order to explain, in a direct way, the finiteness of the entropy, $S_\mathrm{BH}$. What has been left as an open problem is how the smooth AdS$_2$ geometry can be recovered, in the limit when $N\to\infty$. In the present article we solve this problem, by showing that the discrete and finite AdS$_2[\mathbb{Z}_N]$ geometry can be embedded in a family of finite geometries, AdS$_2^M[\mathbb{Z}_N]$, where $M$ is another integer. This family can be constructed by an appropriate toroidal compactification and discretization of the ambient $(2+1)$-dimensional Minkowski space-time. In this construction $N$ and $M$ can be understood as "infrared" and "ultraviolet" cutoffs respectively. The above construction enables us to obtain the continuum limit of the AdS$_2^M[\mathbb{Z}_N]$ discrete and finite geometry, by taking both $N$ and $M$ to infinity in a specific correlated way, following a reverse process: Firstly, by recovering the continuous, toroidally compactified, AdS$_2[\mathbb{Z}_N]$ geometry by removing the ultraviolet cutoff; secondly, by removing the infrared cutoff in a specific decompactification limit, while keeping the radius of AdS$_2$ finite. It is in this way that we recover the standard non-compact AdS$_2$ continuum space-time. This method can be applied directly to higher-dimensional AdS spacetimes.

Supersymmetric black holes and the SJT/nSCFT1 correspondence

We consider 1/4 BPS black hole solutions of mathcal{N} = 2 gauged supergravity in AdS4. The near horizon geometry is AdS2 × S2 and supersymmetry is enhanced. In the first part of the paper we choose a moment map, which allows the embedding of this supergravity solution into a sugra theory with a hypermultiplet. We then perform the s-wave reduction of this theory at the horizon and determine the dilaton multiplet, which couples to both metric and gravitino fluctuations. In the second part we work with Euclidean axial mathcal{N} = (2, 2) JT supergravity and show how to add gauged matter in form of covariantly twisted chiral and anti-chiral multiplets. We demonstrate how to reduce the on-shell action to boundary superspace. We compare both theories and calculate the fourpoint function by integrating out gravitons, gravitini and photons for the s-wave setting and by use of the Super-Schwarzian modes in the JT theory.

Lie point symmetries of near-horizon geometry equation

All the Lie point symmetries of the near extremal horizon geometry equation, in the case of 4-dimensional Einstein vacuum spacetime with cosmological constant, are the diffeomorphisms of the space of the null generators of the horizon. This result is also generalised to the Maxwell-Einstein spacetime.

Large D limit of Einstein’s equations

We review recent progress in taking the large dimension limit of Einstein's equations. Most of our analysis is classical in nature and concerns situations where there is a black hole horizon although we briefly discuss various extensions that include quantum gravitational effects. The review consists of two main parts: the first a discussion of general aspects of black holes and effective membrane theories in this large dimension limit, and the second a series of applications of this limit to interesting physical problems. The first part includes a discussion of quasinormal modes which leads naturally into a description of effective hydrodynamic-like equations that describe the near horizon geometry. There are two main approaches to these effective theories -- a fully covariant approach and a partially gauge-fixed one -- which we discuss in relation to each other. In the second part we divide the applications up into three main categories: the Gregory-Laflamme instability, black hole collisions and mergers, and the anti-de Sitter/conformal field theory correspondence (AdS/CFT). AdS/CFT posits an equivalence between a gravitational theory and a strongly interacting field theory, allowing us to extend our spectrum of applications to problems in hydrodynamics, condensed matter physics, and nuclear physics. A final, shorter part of the review describes further promising directions where there have been, as yet, few published research articles.

Geometric properties of a certain class of compact dynamical horizons in locally rotationally symmetric class II spacetimes

In this paper, we study the geometry of a certain class of compact dynamical horizons with a time-dependent induced metric in locally rotationally symmetric class II spacetimes. We first obtain a compactness condition for embedded [Formula: see text]-manifolds in these spacetimes, satisfying the weak energy condition, with non-negative isotropic pressure [Formula: see text]. General conditions for a [Formula: see text]-manifold to be a dynamical horizon are imposed, as well as certain genericity conditions, which in the case of locally rotationally symmetric class II spacetimes reduces to the statement that “the weak energy condition is strictly satisfied or otherwise violated”. The compactness condition is presented as a spatial first-order partial differential equation in the sheet expansion [Formula: see text], in the form [Formula: see text], where [Formula: see text] is the Gaussian curvature of [Formula: see text]-surfaces in the spacetime and [Formula: see text] is a real number parametrizing the differential equation, where [Formula: see text] can take on only two values, [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text]. Using geometric arguments, it is shown that the case [Formula: see text] can be ruled out and the [Formula: see text] ([Formula: see text]-dimensional sphere) geometry of compact dynamical horizons for the case [Formula: see text] is established. Finally, an invariant characterization of this class of compact dynamical horizons is also presented.

Universal p-form black holes in generalized theories of gravity

We explore how far one can go in constructing d-dimensional static black holes coupled to p-form and scalar fields before actually specifying the gravity and electrodynamics theory one wants to solve. At the same time, we study to what extent one can enlarge the space of black hole solutions by allowing for horizon geometries more general than spaces of constant curvature. We prove that a generalized Schwarzschild-like ansatz with an arbitrary isotropy-irreducible homogeneous base space (IHS) provides an answer to both questions, up to naturally adapting the gauge fields to the spacetime geometry. In particular, an IHS–Kähler base space enables one to construct magnetic and dyonic 2-form solutions in a large class of theories, including non-minimally couplings. We exemplify our results by constructing simple solutions to particular theories such as R^2, Gauss–Bonnet and (a sector of) Einstein–Horndeski gravity coupled to certain p-form and conformally invariant electrodynamics.

News from Horizons in Binary Black Hole Mergers.

In a binary black hole merger, it is known that the inspiral portion of the waveform corresponds to two distinct horizons orbiting each other and that the merger and ringdown signals correspond to the final horizon being formed and settling down to equilibrium. However, we still lack a detailed understanding of the relation between the horizon geometry in these three regimes and the observed waveform. Here we show that the well-known inspiral chirp waveform has a clear counterpart on black hole horizons, namely, the shear of the outgoing null rays at the horizon. We demonstrate that the shear behaves very much like a compact binary coalescence waveform with increasing frequency and amplitude. Furthermore, the parameters of the system estimated from the horizon agree with those estimated from the waveform. This implies that even though black hole horizons are causally disconnected from us, assuming general relativity to be true, we can potentially infer some of their detailed properties from gravitational wave observations.

Higher-derivative corrections to entropy and the weak gravity conjecture in Anti-de Sitter space

We compute the four-derivative corrections to the geometry, extremality bound, and thermodynamic quantities of AdS-Reissner-Nordström black holes for general dimensions and horizon geometries. We confirm the universal relationship between the extremality shift at fixed charge and the shift of the microcanonical entropy, and discuss the consequences of this relation for the Weak Gravity Conjecture in AdS. The thermodynamic corrections are calculated using two different methods: first by explicitly solving the higher-derivative equations of motion and second, by evaluating the higher-derivative Euclidean on-shell action on the leading-order solution. In both cases we find agreement, up to the addition of a Casimir energy in odd dimensions. We derive the bounds on the four-derivative Wilson coefficients implied by the conjectured positivity of the leading corrections to the microcanonical entropy of thermodynamically stable black holes. These include the requirement that the coefficient of Riemann-squared is positive, meaning that the positivity of the entropy shift is related to the condition that c − a is positive in the dual CFT. We discuss implications for the deviation of η/s from its universal value and a potential lower bound.

Uptunneling to de Sitter

We propose a Euclidean preparation of an asymptotically AdS2 spacetime that contains an inflating dS2 bubble. The setup can be embedded in a four dimensional theory with a Minkowski vacuum and a false vacuum. AdS2 approximates the near horizon geometry of a two-sided near-extremal Reissner-Nordström black hole, and the two sides can connect to the same Minkowski asymptotics to form a topologically nontrivial worm- hole geometry. Likewise, in the false vacuum the near-horizon geometry of near-extremal black holes is approximately dS2 times 2-sphere. We interpret the Euclidean solution as describing the decay of an excitation inside the wormhole to a false vacuum bubble. The result is an inflating region inside a non-traversable asymptotically Minkowski wormhole.

Are ultraspinning Kerr-Sen- AdS4 black holes always superentropic?

We study thermodynamics of the four-dimensional Kerr-Sen-AdS black hole and its ultra-spinning counterpart, and verify that both black holes fullfil the first law and Bekenstein-Smarr mass formulae of black hole thermodynamics. Furthermore, we derive new Christodoulou-Ruffini-like squared-mass formulae for the usual and ultra-spinning Kerr-Sen-AdS$_4$ solutions. We show that this ultra-spinning Kerr-Sen-AdS$_4$ black hole does not always violate the Reverse Isoperimetric Inequality (RII) since the value of the isoperimetric ratio can be larger/smaller than, or equal to unity, depending upon where the solution parameters lie in the parameters space. This property is obviously different from that of the Kerr-Newman-AdS$_4$ super-entropic black hole, which always strictly violates the RII, although both of them have some similar properties in other aspects, such as horizon geometry and conformal boundary. In addition, it is found that while there exists the same lower bound on mass ($m_e \geqslant 8l/\sqrt{27}$ with $l$ being the cosmological scale) both for the extremal ultra-spinning Kerr-Sen-AdS$_4$ black hole and for the extremal super-entropic Kerr-Newman-AdS$_4$ case, the former has a maximal horizon radius: $r_{\rm\, HP} = l/\sqrt{3}$ which is the minimum of the latter. Therefore, these two different kinds of four-dimensional ultra-spinning charged AdS black holes exhibit some significant physical differences .

The area of a rough black hole

We investigate the consequences for the black hole area of introducing fractal structure for the horizon geometry. We create a three-dimensional spherical analogue of a ‘Koch Snowflake’ using a infinite diminishing hierarchy of touching spheres around the Schwarzschild event horizon. We can create a fractal structure for the horizon with finite volume and infinite (or finite) area. This is a toy model for the possible effects of quantum gravitational spacetime foam, with significant implications for assessments of the entropy of black holes and the universe, which is generally larger than in standard picture of black hole structure and thermodynamics, potentially by very considerable factors. The entropy of the observable universe today becomes S≈10120(1+Δ/2), where 0≤Δ≤1, with Δ=0 for a smooth spacetime structure and Δ=1 for the most intricate. The Hawking lifetime of black holes is also reduced.

Deforming charged black holes with dipolar differential rotation boundary

Motivated by the recent studies of the novel asymptotically global hbox {AdS}_4 black hole with deformed horizon, we consider the action of Einstein–Maxwell gravity in AdS spacetime and construct the charged deforming AdS black holes with differential boundary. In contrast to deforming black hole without charge, there exists at least one value of horizon for an arbitrary temperature. The extremum of temperature is determined by charge q and divides the range of temperature into several parts. Moreover, we use an isometric embedding in the three-dimensional space to investigate the horizon geometry. The entropy and quasinormal modes of deforming charged AdS black hole are also studied in this paper. Due to the existence of charge q, the phase diagram of entropy is more complicated. We consider two cases of solutions: (1) fixing the chemical potential mu ; (2) changing the value of mu according to the values of horizon radius and charge. In the first case, it is interesting to find there exist two families of black hole solutions with different horizon radii for a fixed temperature, but these two black holes have same horizon geometry and entropy. The second case ensures that deforming charged AdS black hole solutions can reduce to standard RN–AdS black holes.

Achronal averaged null energy condition for extremal horizons and (A)dS

We prove the achronal averaged null energy condition for general quantum field theories in the near horizon geometry of spherical extremal black holes (i.e. AdS2× Sd−2), de Sitter and anti-de Sitter. The derivation follows from monotonicity of relative entropy after computing the modular hamiltonian of a null deformed region. For incomplete (but maximally extended) achronal null geodesics in AdS2× Sd−2, we prove the positivity of a different light-ray operator for arbitrary CFTs. This agrees with a constraint recently derived for the Lorentzian cylinder.

Supersymmetric solutions from N=5 gauged supergravity

We study a large class of supersymmetric solutions in four-dimensional $N=5$ gauged supergravity with $SO(5)$ gauge group. There is only one $N=5$ supersymmetric $AdS_4$ vacuum preserving the full $SO(5)$ symmetry dual to an $N=5$ SCFT in three dimensions. We give a number of domain walls interpolating between this $AdS_4$ fixed point and singular geometries in the IR with $SO(4)$ and $SO(3)$ symmetries. These solutions describe RG flows from the $N=5$ SCFT to non-conformal field theories driven by mass deformations. The $SO(4)$ solutions are precisely in agreement with the previously known mass deformations within the dual $N=5$ SCFT. We also find supersymmetric Janus solutions describing two-dimensional conformal defects in the $N=5$ SCFT with $N=(4,1)$ and $N=(1,1)$ supersymmetries on the defects. Finally, we study supersymmetric solutions of the form $AdS_2\times \Sigma^2$, with $\Sigma^2=S^2,H^2$ being a Riemann surface, corresponding to near horizon geometries of $AdS_4$ black holes. We consider both magnetic and dyonic solutions and find that there exists a class of magnetic $AdS_2\times H^2$ solutions with $SO(2)$ symmetry. It is rather remarkable that a complete analytic solution interpolating between $AdS_4$ and $AdS_2\times H^2$ with a running scalar can be obtained. The solution corresponds to a twisted compactification of $N=5$ SCFT to superconformal quantum mechanics. We also show that no purely magnetic or dyonic black holes with $AdS_2\times \Sigma^2$ horizon from $SO(2)\times SO(2)$ twist exist in $N=5$, $SO(5)$ gauged supergravity.

Gravitational anomalies in nAdS2/nCFT1

We revisit the holographic description of the near horizon geometry of the BTZ black hole in AdS3 gravity, with a gravitational Chern–Simons term included. After a dimensional reduction of the three dimensional theory, we use the framework of nAdS2/nCFT1 to describe the near horizon physics. This setup allows us to contrast the role of the gravitational and conformal anomaly inherited from AdS3/CFT2 in the symmetry breaking mechanism of nAdS2/nCFT1. Our results display how boundary conditions in the 3D spacetime, combined with the gravitational anomaly, affect the holographic description of the near horizon of the black hole relative to the physics near the AdS3 boundary.

Universal black holes

We prove that a generalized Schwarzschild-like ansatz can be consistently employed to construct d-dimensional static vacuum black hole solutions in any metric theory of gravity for which the Lagrangian is a scalar invariant constructed from the Riemann tensor and its covariant derivatives of arbitrary order. Namely, we show that, apart from containing two arbitrary functions a(r) and f (r) (essentially, the gtt and grr components), in any such theory the line-element may admit as a base space any isotropy-irreducible homogeneous space. Technically, this ensures that the field equations generically reduce to two ODEs for a(r) and f (r), and dramatically enlarges the space of black hole solutions and permitted horizon geometries for the considered theories. We then exemplify our results in concrete contexts by constructing solutions in particular theories such as Gauss-Bonnet, quadratic, F(R) and F(Lovelock) gravity, and certain conformal gravities.

Multiple Killing horizons: the initial value formulation for -vacuum

In Mars et al (2018 Class. Quantum Grav. 35 155015) we have introduced the notion of ‘multiple Killing horizon’ and analyzed some of its general properties. Multiple Killing horizons are Killing horizons for two or more linearly independent Killing vectors simultaneously. In this paper we focus on the vacuum case, possibly with cosmological constant, and study the emergence of multiple Killing horizons in terms of characteristic initial value problems for two transversally intersecting null hypersurfaces. As a relevant outcome, a more general definition of near horizon geometry is put forward. This new definition avoids the use of Gaussian null coordinates associated to the corresponding degenerate Killing vector and thereby allows for inclusion of its fixed points.