arXiv subjects

Pedro F. Ramirez

Publications and source records attributed to Pedro F. Ramirez.

16 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2020

A systematic construction of microstate geometries with low angular momentum

We outline a systematic procedure to obtain horizonless microstate geometries that have the same charges as three-charge five-dimensional black holes with a macroscopically-large horizon area and an arbitrarily-small angular momentum. There are two routes through which such solutions can be constructed: using multi-center Gibbons-Hawking (GH) spaces or using superstratum technology. So far the only solutions corresponding to microstate geometries for black holes with no angular momentum have been obtained via superstrata, and multi-center Gibbons-Hawking spaces have been believed to give rise only to microstate geometries of BMPV black holes with a large angular momentum. We perform a thorough search throughout the parameter space of smooth horizonless solutions with four GH centers and find that these have an angular momentum that is generally larger than 80% of the cosmic censorship bound. However, we find that solutions with three GH centers and one supertube (which are smooth in six-dimensional supergravity) can have an arbitrarily-low angular momentum. Our construction thus gives a recipe to build large classes of microstate geometries for zero-angular-momentum black holes without resorting to superstratum technology.

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arXiv2019

$α'$ corrections of Reissner-Nordström black holes

We study the first-order in $α'$ corrections to non-extremal 4-dimensional dyonic Reissner-Nordström (RN) black holes with equal electric and magnetic charges in the context of Heterotic Superstring effective field theory (HST) compactified on a $T^{6}$. The particular embedding of the dyonic RN black hole in HST considered here is not supersymmetric in the extremal limit. We show that, at first order in $α'$, consistency with the equations of motion of the HST demands additional scalar and vector fields become active, and we provide explicit expressions for all of them. We determine analytically the position of the event horizon of the black hole, as well as the corrections to the extremality bound, to the temperature and to the entropy, checking that they are related by the first law of black-hole thermodynamics, so that $\partial S/\partial M=1/T$. We discuss the implications of our results in the context of the Weak Gravity Conjecture, clarifying that entropy corrections for fixed mass and charge at extremality do not necessarily imply corrections to the extremal charge-to-mass ratio.

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arXiv2019

Exact charges from heterotic black holes

We derive exact relations to all orders in the $α'$ expansion for the charges of a bound system of heterotic strings, solitonic 5-branes and, optionally, a Kaluza-Klein monopole. The expressions, which differ from those of the zeroth-order supergravity approximation, coincide with the values obtained when only the corrections of quadratic order in curvature are included. Our computation relies on the consistency of string theory as a quantum theory of gravity; the relations follow from the matching of the Wald entropy with the microscopic degeneracy. In the heterotic frame, the higher-curvature terms behave as delocalized sources that introduce a shift between near-horizon and asymptotic charges. On the other hand, when described in terms of lower-dimensional effective fields, the solution carries constant charges over space which coincide with those of the asymptotic heterotic fields. In addition, we describe why the Gauss-Bonnet term, which only captures a subset of the relevant corrections of quadratic order in curvature, in some cases succeeds to reproduce the correct value for the Wald entropy, while fails in others.

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arXiv2019

On the extremality bound of stringy black holes

A mild version of the weak gravity conjecture (WGC) states that extremal black holes have charge-to-mass ratio larger or equal than one when higher-curvature interactions are taken into account. Since these corrections become more relevant in the low-mass regime, this would allow the decay of extremal black holes in terms of energy and charge conservation. Evidence in this direction has been mainly given in the context of corrections to Einstein-Maxwell theory. Here we compute corrections to the charge-to-mass ratio of some dyonic extremal black holes explicitly embedded in the heterotic string effective theory. We find that modifications of the extremality bound depend on the solution considered, with the charge-to-mass ratio remaining unchanged or deviating positively from one. Additionally, we observe that the introduction of the higher-curvature terms increases the Wald entropy in all cases considered, whose variation does not seem to be correlated with the charge-to-mass ratio, contrary to the situation in Einstein-Maxwell theory.

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arXiv2019

The small black hole illusion

Small black holes in string theory are characterized by a classically singular horizon with vanishing Bekenstein-Hawking entropy. It has been argued that higher-curvature corrections resolve the horizon and that the associated Wald entropy is in agreement with the microscopic degeneracy. In this note we study the heterotic two-charge small black hole and question this result, which we claim is caused by a misidentification of the fundamental constituents of the system studied when higher-curvature interactions are present. On the one hand, we show that quadratic curvature corrections do not solve the singular horizon of small black holes. On the other, we argue that the resolution of the heterotic small black hole reported in the literature involves the introduction of solitonic 5-branes, whose asymptotic charge vanishes due to a screening effect induced by the higher-curvature interactions, and a Kaluza-Klein monopole, whose charge remains unscreened.

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arXiv2018

Beyond the near-horizon limit: Stringy corrections to Heterotic Black Holes

We study the first-order in $α'$ corrections to 4-charge black holes (with the Reissner-Nordström black hole as a particular example) beyond the near-horizon limit in the Heterotic Superstring effective action framework. The higher-curvature terms behave as delocalized sources in the equations of motion and in the Bianchi identity of the 3-form. For some charges, this introduces a shift between their values measured at the horizon and asymptotically. Some of these corrections and their associated charge shifts, but not all of them, can be canceled using appropriate SU$(2)$ instantons for the heterotic gauge fields. The entropy, computed using Wald's formula, is in agreement with the result obtained via microstate counting when the delocalized sources are properly taken into account.

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arXiv2018

$α'$-corrected black holes in String Theory

We consider the well-known solution of the Heterotic Superstring effective action to zeroth order in $α'$ that describes the intersection of a fundamental string with momentum and a solitonic 5-brane and which gives a 3-charge, static, extremal, supersymmetric black hole in 5 dimensions upon dimensional reduction on $\mathrm{T}^{5}$. We compute explicitly the first-order in $α'$ corrections to this solution, including $\mathrm{SU}(2)$ Yang-Mills fields which can be used to cancel some of these corrections and we study the main properties of this $α'$-corrected solution: supersymmetry, values of the near-horizon and asymptotic charges, behavior under $α'$-corrected T-duality, value of the entropy (using Wald formula directly in 10 dimensions), existence of small black holes etc. The value obtained for the entropy agrees, within the limits of approximation, with that obtained by microscopic methods. The $α'$ corrections coming from Wald's formula prove crucial for this result.

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arXiv2018

On a family of $α'$-corrected solutions of the Heterotic Superstring effective action

We compute explicitly the first-order in $α'$ corrections to a family of solutions of the Heterotic Superstring effective action that describes fundamental strings with momentum along themselves, parallel to solitonic 5-branes with Kaluza-Klein monopoles (Gibbons-Hawking metrics) in their transverse space. These solutions correspond to 4-charge extremal black holes in 4 dimensions upon dimensional reduction on $\mathrm{T}^{6}$. We show that some of the $α'$ corrections can be cancelled by introducing solitonic $\mathrm{SU}(2)\times \mathrm{SU}(2)$ Yang-Mills fields, and that this family of $α'$-corrected solutions is invariant under $α'$-corrected T-duality transformations. We study in detail the mechanism that allows us to compute explicitly these $α'$ corrections for the ansatz considered here, based on a generalization of the 't Hooft ansatz to hyperKähler spaces.

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arXiv2017

Non-Abelian black holes in string theory

We study a family of 5-dimensional non-Abelian black holes that can be obtained by adding an instanton field to the well-known D1D5W Abelian black holes. Naively, the non-Abelian fields seem to contribute to the black-hole entropy but not to the mass due to their rapid fall-off at spatial infinity. By uplifting the 5-dimensional supergravity solution to 10-dimensional Heterotic Supergravity first and then dualizing it into a Type-I Supergravity solution, we show that the non-Abelian fields are associated to D5-branes dissolved into the D9-branes (dual to the Heterotic "gauge 5-branes") and that their associated RR charge does not, in fact, contribute to the entropy, which only depends on the number16 pages of D-strings and D5 branes and the momentum along the D-strings, as in the Abelian case. These "dissolved" or "gauge" D5-branes do contribute to the mass in the expected form. The correct interpretation of the 5-dimensional charges in terms of the string-theory objects solves the non-Abelian hair puzzle, allowing for the microscopic accounting of the entropy. We discuss the validity of the solution when alpha prime corrections are taken into account.

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arXiv2017

One Thousand and One Bubbles

We propose a novel strategy that permits the construction of completely general five-dimensional microstate geometries on a Gibbons-Hawking space. Our scheme is based on two steps. First, we rewrite the bubble equations as a system of linear equations that can be easily solved. Second, we conjecture that the presence or absence of closed timelike curves in the solution can be detected through the evaluation of an algebraic relation. The construction we propose is systematic and covers the whole space of parameters, so it can be applied to find all five-dimensional BPS microstate geometries on a Gibbons-Hawking base. As a first result of this approach, we find that the spectrum of scaling solutions becomes much larger when non-Abelian fields are present. We use our method to describe several smooth horizonless multicenter solutions with the asymptotic charges of three-charge (Abelian and non-Abelian) black holes. In particular, we describe solutions with the centers lying on lines and circles that can be specified with exact precision. We show the power of our method by explicitly constructing a 50-center solution. Moreover, we use it to find the first smooth five-dimensional microstate geometries with arbitrarily small angular momentum.

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arXiv2017

A gravitating Yang-Mills instanton

We present an asymptotically flat, spherically symmetric, static, globally regular and horizonless solution of SU$(2)$-gauged $\mathcal{N}=1,d=5$ supergravity. The SU$(2)$ gauge field is that of the BPST instanton. We argue that this solution, analogous to the global monopoles found in $d=4$ $\mathcal{N}=2$ and $\mathcal{N}=4$ gauged supergravities, describes the field of a single string-theory object which does not contribute to the entropy of black holes when we add it to them and show that it is, indeed, the dimensional reduction on T$^{5}$ of the gauge 5-brane. We investigate how the energy of the solution is concentrated as a function of the instanton's scale showing that it never violates the hoop conjecture although the curvature grows unboundedly in the zero scale limit.

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arXiv2016

Non-Abelian bubbles in microstate geometries

We find the first smooth microstate geometries with non-Abelian fields. The solutions constitute an extension of the BPS three-charge smooth microstates. These consist in general families of regular supersymmetric solutions with non-trivial topology, i.e. bubbles, of $\mathcal{N}=1$, $d=5$ Super-Einstein-Yang-Mills theory, having the asymptotic charges of a black hole or black ring but with no horizon. The non-Abelian fields make their presence at the very heart of the microstate structure: the physical size of the bubbles is affected by the non-Abelian topological charge they carry, which combines with the Abelian flux threading the bubbles to hold them up. Interestingly the non-Abelian fields carry a set of adjustable continuous parameters that do not alter the asymptotics of the solutions but modify the local geometry. This feature can be used to obtain a classically infinite number of microstate solutions with the asymptotics of a single black hole or black ring.

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arXiv2016

A non-Abelian Black Ring

We construct a supersymmetric black ring solution of SU(2) N=1, d=5 Super-Einstein-Yang-Mills (SEYM) theory by adding a distorted BPST instanton to an Abelian black ring solution of the same theory. The change cannot be observed from spatial infinity: neither the mass, nor the angular momenta or the values of the scalars at infinity differ from those of the Abelian ring. The entropy is, however, sensitive to the presence of the non-Abelian instanton, and it is smaller than that of the Abelian ring, in analogy to what happens in the supersymmetric coloured black holes recently constructed in the same theory and in N=2, d=4 SEYM. By taking the limit in which the two angular momenta become equal we derive a non-Abelian generalization of the BMPV rotating black-hole solution.

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arXiv2016

f(Lovelock) theories of gravity

f(Lovelock) gravities are simple generalizations of the usual f(R) and Lovelock theories in which the gravitational action depends on some arbitrary function of the corresponding dimensionally-extended Euler densities. In this paper we study several aspects of these theories in general dimensions. We start by identifying the generalized boundary term which makes the gravitational variational problem well-posed. Then, we show that these theories are equivalent to certain scalar-tensor theories and how this relation is characterized by the Hessian of f. We also study the linearized equations of the theory on general maximally symmetric backgrounds. Remarkably, we find that these theories do not propagate the usual ghost-like massive gravitons characteristic of higher-derivative gravities on such backgrounds. In some non-trivial cases, the additional scalar associated to the trace of the metric perturbation is also absent, being the usual graviton the only dynamical field. In those cases, the linearized equations are exactly the same as in Einstein gravity up to an overall factor, making them appealing as holographic toy models. We also find constraints on the couplings of a broad family of five-dimensional f(Lovelock) theories using holographic entanglement entropy. Finally, we construct new analytic asymptotically flat and AdS/dS black hole solutions for some classes of f(Lovelock) gravities in various dimensions.

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arXiv2014

Higher-curvature corrections to holographic entanglement entropy in geometries with hyperscaling violation

We study the effects of including higher-curvature corrections to the Einstein gravity bulk action on the holographic entanglement entropy (HEE) expression for geometries with hyperscaling violation (hvLf). For $θ< 0$ we show that one single new divergence arises for general curvature-squared gravities, which allows us to conjecture the general expression of HEE for any higher-order gravity action. For $0<θ<d$, we assume the hvLf geometry to arise above some intermediate scale $r_F$, becoming AdS in the UV and perform a similar analysis for $R^n$ gravities. For negative values of $θ$ we find that new logarithmic contributions show up in the HEE formula for any $n$th-order gravity when $θ=d(d-1)/(d-2(n-1))$ and $d<2(n-1)$. In the range $0\leq θ<d$ we do not find additional logarithmic contributions appearing at any order except for $n=1$, which corresponds to the famous case $θ=d-1$ encountered in Einstein gravity.

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arXiv2014

N=2 Einstein-Yang-Mills' static two-center solutions

We construct bona fide one- and two-center supersymmetric solutions to N=2, d=4 supergravity coupled to SU(2) non-Abelian vector multiplets. The solutions describe black holes and global monopoles alone or in equilibrium with each other and exhibit non-Abelian hairs of different kinds.

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