String-theoretic breakdown of effective field theory near black hole horizons

Abstract

We investigate the validity of the equivalence principle near horizons in string theory, analyzing the breakdown of effective field theory caused by longitudinal string spreading effects. An experiment is set up where a detector is thrown into a black hole a long time after an early infalling string. Light cone gauge calculations, taken at face value, indicate a detectable level of root-mean-square longitudinal spreading of the initial string as measured by the late infaller. This results from the large relative boost between the string and detector in the near horizon region, which develops automatically despite their modest initial energies outside the black hole and the weak curvature in the geometry. We subject this scenario to basic consistency checks, using these to obtain a relatively conservative criterion for its detectability. In a companion paper, we exhibit longitudinal nonlocality in well-defined gauge-invariant S-matrix calculations, obtaining results consistent with the predicted spreading albeit not in a direct analogue of the black hole process. We discuss applications of this effect to the firewall paradox, and estimate the time and distance scales it predicts for new physics near black hole and cosmological horizons.

33 pages, 6 figures

References in corpus (9)

• A bound on chaos
• The Pomeron and Gauge/String Duality
• Black hole information, unitarity, and nonlocality
• Trapped Inflation
• Gravitational effects in ultrahigh-energy string scattering
• Possible observational windows for quantum effects from black holes
• Insightful D-branes
• Stringy effects in scrambling
• Longitudinal nonlocality in the string S-matrix

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• LLM Magnons
• Stringy Horizons and UV/IR Mixing
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• Revisiting noninteracting string partition functions in Rindler space
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• Planckian Physics Comes Into Play At Planckian Distance From Horizon
• Varying dilaton as a tracer of classical string interactions
• Long-Range Nonlocality in Six-Point String Scattering: simulation of black hole infallers
• Firewall From Effective Field Theory
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• A Stringy Effect on Hawking Radiation
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• Hyperbolic Black Holes and Open String Production
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• UV Effects and Short-Lived Hawking Radiation: Alternative Resolution of Information Paradox