Density-preserving core-Einasto black holes with Event Horizon Telescope bounds

Abstract

A Newtonian halo density does not uniquely determine a relativistic spacetime, and the resulting completion ambiguity can dominate predicted horizon-scale signals. We make this dependence explicit for the feedback-cored Einasto profile calibrated on FIRE-2 simulations. In Schwarzschild gauge, the Einstein equations give an asymptotically flat, density-preserving geometry supported by an effective anisotropic fluid; no microscopic description of collisionless dark matter is assumed. By contrast, a commonly used rotation-curve completion replaces the finite seed core by an inverse-square source cusp. For the density-preserving solution we derive the enclosed mass in closed form, obtain a sharp one-horizon criterion and the extremal boundaries of a three-horizon phase, and establish the fixed-halo first law. More generally, the leading fractional shift of a spherical black-hole shadow is the environmental mass enclosed within the vacuum photon sphere divided by the central black-hole mass. Applying this result to published Event Horizon Telescope shadow-deviation summaries gives illustrative one-sided 95\% credible limits of $4.8\times10^{23}\,\Msun\,{\rm pc}^{-3}$ for $\sgr$ and $4.1\times10^{17}\,\Msun\,{\rm pc}^{-3}$ for $\mseven$, far above realistic smooth-halo densities. A Milky-Way calibration predicts a fractional shadow shift of $1.7\times10^{-25}$, whereas the rotation-curve completion gives a shift 19 orders of magnitude larger for the same galactic inputs. A covariant polarized thin-disk calculation shows the same weak-core suppression. Thus current horizon-scale images do not constrain a smooth kiloparsec-scale core-Einasto halo; an observable environmental signal would instead require a compact inner component or a physically different relativistic source.