Quantum Field Theory of Black Hole Perturbations with Backreaction: I. General framework

Abstract

In a seminal work, Hawking showed that natural states for free quantum matter fields on classical spacetimes that solve the spherically symmetric vacuum Einstein equations are KMS states of non-vanishing temperature. Although Hawking's calculation does not include backreaction of matter on geometry, it is more than plausible that the corresponding Hawking radiation leads to black hole evaporation which is in principle observable. Obviously, an improvement of Hawking's calculation including backreaction is a problem of quantum gravity. Since no commonly accepted quantum field theory of general relativity is available yet, it has been difficult to reliably derive the backreaction effect. An obvious approach is to use black hole perturbation theory of a Schwarzschild black hole of fixed mass and to quantise those perturbations. But it is not clear how to reconcile perturbation theory with gauge invariance beyond linear perturbations. In a recent work we proposed a new approach to this problem that applies when the physical situation has an approximate symmetry, such as homogeneity (cosmology), spherical symmetry (Schwarzschild) or axial symmetry (Kerr). The idea, which is surprisingly feasible, is to first construct the non-perturbative physical (reduced) Hamiltonian of the reduced phase space of fully gauge invariant observables and only then to apply perturbation theory directly in terms of observables. The task to construct observables is then disentangled from perturbation theory, thus allowing to unambiguosly develop perturbation theory to arbitrary orders. In this first paper of the the series we outline and showcase this approach for spherical symmetry and second order in the perturbations for Einstein-Klein-Gordon-Maxwell theory. Details and generalisation to other matter and symmetry and higher orders will appear in subsequent companion papers.