Related papers: The Weak Gravity Conjecture and the Axionic Black …
We study charged scalar perturbations of charged extremal black holes in Einstein-Born-Infeld theory. Our numerical results indicate that these black holes all suffer from superradiant instability by the unstable quasi-bound states,…
The initial idea underlying the Weak Gravity Conjecture is that extremal black holes must always be "unstable", in the sense that they should slowly decay by emitting either particles or smaller black holes. Here we show that, when this…
The weak gravity conjecture states that quantum gravity theories have to contain a charged state with a charge-to-mass ratio bigger than unity. By studying unitarity and causality constraints on higher derivative corrections to the…
Ultralight bosonic fields are compelling dark-matter candidates and arise in a variety of beyond-Standard-Model scenarios. These fields can tap energy and angular momentum from spinning black holes through superradiant instabilities, during…
We study gravitational collapse of the axion/dilaton field in classical low energy string theory, at the threshold for black hole formation. A new critical solution is derived that is spherically symmetric and continuously self-similar. The…
In General Relativity black hole evaporation leads to sudden bursts of energy and loss of information. It can be argued that these phenomena happen in the final stages of evaporation, where the semiclassical approximation needs to be…
The evolution of evaporating charged black holes is complicated to model in general, but is nevertheless important since the hints to the Information Loss Paradox and its recent firewall incarnation may lie in understanding more generic…
For a large enough Schwarzschild black hole, the horizon is a region of space where gravitational forces are weak; yet it is also a region leading to numerous puzzles connected to stringy physics. In this work, we analyze the process of…
It is shown that black holes in a quark gluon plasma (QGP) obeying minimum viscosity bounds, exhibit a Schwarzschild radius in close match with the range of the strong force. For such black holes, an evaporation time of about 1016 secs is…
In this Chapter we would like to review a "~phenomenological~" approach taking into account the most fundamental feature of string theory or, more in general, of quantum gravity, whatever its origin, which is the existence of a minimal…
We investigate how a spherically symmetric fluid modifies the Schwarzschild vacuum solution when there is no exchange of energy-momentum between the fluid and the central source of the Schwarzschild metric. This system is described by means…
The charge of an electron is vastly larger than its mass. We found that black hole evolution under Hawking evaporation is very sensitive to the value of electron charge. If the electron charge is weakened by a mere one order of magnitude,…
A weak-field solution of Einstein's equations is constructed. It is generated by a circular cosmic string revolving in its plane about the centre of the circle. (The revolution is introduced to prevent the string from collapsing.) This…
In this short note we clarify some aspects of the impact that the Weak Gravity Conjecture has on models of (generalized) natural inflation. We address in particular certain technical and conceptual concerns recently raised regarding the…
We provide the first black hole solutions with Lifshitz asymptotics found in string theory. These are expected to be dual to models enjoying anisotropic scale invariance with dynamical exponent z=2 at finite temperature. We employ a…
In a previous work an approximate static metric was found of a test black string that stretches from the boundary to the horizon of the planar Schwarzschild-AdS_5 geometry. This is the gravity dual of the Unruh state for \mathcal{N}=4,…
The literature features many instances of spacetimes containing two black holes held apart by a thin distribution of matter on the axis joining the holes. For all such spacetimes, the Einstein field equations are integrated with an…
Axions with broken discrete shift symmetry (axion monodromy) have recently played a central role both in the discussion of inflation and the `relaxion' approach to the hierarchy problem. We suggest a very minimalist way to constrain such…
Schwarzschild black holes evolve toward their static configuration by emitting gravitational waves, which decay over time following a power law at fixed spatial positions. We derive this power law analytically for the second-order even…
The Weak Gravity Conjecture (WGC) demands the existence of superextremal particles in any consistent quantum theory of gravity. The standard lore is that these particles are introduced to ensure that extremal black holes are either unstable…