Thermal nature of a generic null surface

Abstract

Dynamical properties of a generic null surface are known to have a thermodynamic interpretation. Such an interpretation is completely based on an analogy between the usual law of thermodynamics and structure of gravitational field equation on the surface. Here we materialise this analogy and show that assigning a temperature on the null surface for a local observer is indeed physically relevant. We find that for a local frame, chosen as outgoing massless chargeless particle (or field mode), perceives a "{\it local unstable Hamiltonian}" very near to the surface. Due to this it has finite quantum probability to escape through acausal null path which is given by Maxwell-Boltzmann like distribution, thereby providing a temperature on the surface.

Minor modifications. This work is a tribute to Prof. T. Padmanabhan (1957-2021), a co-author of this paper, and it carries the fond memory of our last collaboration with him. To appear in Phys. Rev. D

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Cited by in corpus (3)

• Hawking-Like Radiation as Tunneling from a Cosmological Black Hole in Modified Gravity: Semiclassical Approximation and Beyond
• Kinematics and dynamics of null hypersurfaces in the Einstein-Cartan spacetime and related thermodynamic interpretation
• Possible fluid interpretation and tidal force equation on a generic null hypersurface in Einstein-Cartan theory