arXiv · 2603.02559
The Routh of the Attractor Mechanism
Abstract
We investigate and clarify various aspects of the effective dynamics of Maxwell-Einstein-scalar theories in the background of static, spherically symmetric and asymptotically flat extremal black holes in four space-time dimensions. This rigorously places the one-dimensional effective radial dynamics governed by the Attractor Mechanism, through the critical points of the Ferrara-Gibbons-Kallosh effective black hole potential $V_{BH}$, into the Routhian formalism, a framework which is intermediate between the Lagrange and Hamilton ones, based on a partial Legendre transform, and especially relevant in presence of cyclic variables. We elucidate and analyze the interplay of a trio of effective functionals: the aforementioned $V_{BH}$, Sen's entropy functional $\mathcal{E}$, and the relevant effective Routhian functional $\mathcal{R}$. Through their critical values at the event horizon, such functionals determine the Bekenstein-Hawking and the Wald entropy of the extremal black hole.
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Arghya Chattopadhyay, Alessio Marrani, Sourav Roychowdhury. 2026-03-03. The Routh of the Attractor Mechanism. https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.02559
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