Speaker
Dr
Emil Mottola
(Los Alamos National Laboratory)
Description
Classical General Relativity (GR) together with conventional equations of state suggest that in complete gravitational collapse a singular state of matter with infinite density could be reached finally, to what is popularly called a "black hole." In addition to its interior singularities, the characteristic feature of a black hole is its apparent horizon, the surface of finite area at which outwardly directed light rays are first trapped. The loss of information to the outside world this implies gives rise to additional difficulties with well-established principles of quantum mechanics and statistical physics. I will overview the historical and most recent approaches to these problems, as well as the status of the gravitational vacuum condensate star proposal we have made in 2001, with a p= - rho interior is actually realized in Schwarzschild's second paper over a century ago. The redshifted surface tension of the condensate star surface is given by $\tau_s = \Delta \kappa/8 \pi G$, where $\Delta \kappa= 1/R_s$ is the difference of equal and opposite surface gravities between the exterior and interior Schwarzschild solutions. The First Law, $dM = dE_v + \tau_s\, dA$ is recognized as a purely mechanical classical relation at zero temperature and zero entropy, describing the volume energy and surface energy change respectively. Since there is no event horizon, the Schwarzschild time $t$ of such a non-singular gravitational condensate star is a global time, fully consistent with unitary time evolution in quantum theory. The $p=-\bar\rho$ interior acts as a defocusing lens for light passing through the condensate, leading to imaging characteristics distinguishable from a classical black hole. Further observational test of gravitational condensate stars vs. black holes is the {\it discrete} surface modes of oscillation and echoes which should be detectable by their gravitational wave signatures.
| Overview or Regular Talk? | Overview: 75 min. |
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Primary author
Dr
Emil Mottola
(Los Alamos National Laboratory)
