Related papers: Delaying the Inevitable: Tidal Disruption in Micro…
We compute the dynamics of particles and strings falling into smooth horizonless spacetimes that match the Schwarzschild black hole but replace its horizon with a smooth cap in supergravity. The cap consists of a regular topological…
In string theory, black-hole backgrounds are far from unique and there are large families of completely smooth, horizonless geometries with the same structure as a black hole from infinity down to the neighborhood of the black-hole horizon.…
We give a broad conceptual review of what we have learned about black holes and their microstate structure from the study of microstate geometries and their string theory limits. We draw upon general relativity, supergravity, string theory…
Collapsing shells form horizons, and when the curvature is small classical general relativity is believed to describe this process arbitrarily well. On the other hand, quantum information theory based (fuzzball/firewall) arguments suggest…
Tidal effects in capped geometries computed in previous literature display no dynamics along internal (toroidal) directions. However, the dual CFT picture suggests otherwise. To resolve this tension, we consider a set of infalling null…
The advent of gravitational waves and black hole imaging has opened a new window into probing the horizon scale of black holes. An important question is whether string theory results for black holes can predict interesting and observable…
Geodesic probes in certain horizonless microstate geometries experience extreme tidal forces long before reaching the region where these geometries differ significantly from the extremal BTZ black hole. The purpose of this paper is to show…
Gravitational wave observations of the near-horizon region of black holes lend insight into the quantum nature of gravity. In particular, gravitational wave echoes have been identified as a potential signature of quantum gravity-inspired…
We study microstates of the three dimensional black hole obtained by quantizing topologically non-trivial geometries behind the event horizon. In chiral gravity these states are found by quantizing the moduli space of bordered Riemann…
We study the possible black string-black hole transition by analyzing the structure of the apparent horizon for a large family of time-symmetric initial data. We observe that, as judged by the apparent horizon, it is possible to generate…
We give a survey of the present status of the microstate geometries called superstrata. Superstrata are smooth, horizonless solutions of six-dimensional supergravity that represent some of the microstates of the D1-D5-P black hole in string…
The claim that the microstates of Schwarzschild black holes in perturbative string theory amount to the modes of long folded strings in the vicinity of its horizon is supported by more evidence.
Black holes in general relativity are characterized by their trapping horizon, a one-way membrane that can be crossed only inwards. The existence of trapping horizons in astrophysical black holes can be tested observationally using a…
We study the physical properties of four-dimensional, string-theoretical, horizonless "fuzzball" geometries by imaging their shadows. Their microstructure traps light rays straying near the would-be horizon on long-lived, highly redshifted…
Tidal effects on clumps of material during random non-stationary accretion onto a black hole produce phenomena with distinct temporal characteristics in observed light-curves. During such non-stationary accretion events, the shape of the…
Tidal effects have long ago locked the Moon in synchronous rotation with the Earth and progressively increase the Earth-Moon distance. This "tidal acceleration" hinges on dissipation. Binaries containing black holes may also be tidally…
Tidal disruption by massive black holes is a phenomenon, during which a large part of gravitational energy can be released on a very short time-scale. The time-scales and energies involved during X-ray and IR flares observed in Galactic…
To ask a question about a black hole in quantum gravity, one must restrict initial or boundary data to ensure that a black hole is actually present. For two-dimensional dilaton gravity, and probably a much wider class of theories as well,…
The existence of light, fundamental bosonic fields is an attractive possibility that can be tested via black hole observations. We study the effect of a tidal field -- caused by a companion star or black hole -- on the evolution of…
Microstate geometries are proposed microstates of black holes which can be described within supergravity. Even though their number may not reproduce the full entropy of black holes with finite-sized horizons, they still offer a glimpse into…