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Overview of the scientific project
Black holes (BHs) are an essential prediction of general relativity (GR), one which was confirmed by the recent direct detections of gravitational waves from BH binary mergers. These objects exhibit the strongest gravitational fields in the universe, and therefore constitute ideal laboratories to test GR (or alternative gravity theories) in the strong field regime. As for the majority of astrophysical bodies, BHs are typically spinning. However, addressing rotation in GR is notoriously difficult. Moreover, BHs are dirty: they are accompanied by clouds of gas or accretion disks, which introduce deviations from known vacuum solutions. The complexity of the Einstein equations—taking into account the presence of matter and the rotation of spacetime—hampers attempts to model realistic BHs.
The prime goal of this project is to deepen our understanding of BH dynamics in the presence of matter, and in particular the interplay between matter and the rotation of spacetime. This line of research also intends to advance our knowledge regarding the stability of more realistic (non-vacuum, non-spherically symmetric) BHs, as well as on outstanding issues, such as cosmic censorship. The essential element of the approach that makes such study tractable is the consideration of matter concentrated along infinitely thin shells that, even though rotating, have a high degree of angular symmetry.
In addition, this programme is naturally extended to higher dimensional asymptotically anti-de Sitter (AdS) spacetimes. In this context, our investigation of the dynamics of (rotating) AdS BHs is connected to (anisotropic) thermalization in strongly coupled quantum theories via the gauge/gravity duality. Moreover, the approach employing thin shells allows us to address the recently uncovered turbulent instability of AdS in a very clean—and easily solvable—setup. This clarifies the main mechanism supporting the instability toward black hole formation in AdS.
Description of the work performed and main results
Follow the links below for information about the output of the project's work packages, including figures and movies:
Gravitational collapse of rotating shells and cosmic censorship
Dynamics of interacting multiple shells in confined spaces
Project administrative details
This project was led by Dr. Jorge V. Rocha and developed at the Institute of Cosmos Sciences, University of Barcelona, under the supervision of Prof. Roberto Emparan. Funding from a Marie Sklodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship within the Horizon 2020 programme, is gratefully acknowledged.
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