Intrinsic rigidity of extremal horizons

Abstract

We prove that the intrinsic geometry of compact cross-sections of any vacuum extremal horizon must admit a Killing vector field. If the cross-sections are two-dimensional spheres, this implies that the most general solution is the extremal Kerr horizon and completes the classification of the associated near-horizon geometries. The same results hold with a cosmological constant. Furthermore, we also deduce that any non-trivial vacuum near-horizon geometry, with a non-positive cosmological constant, must have a Lie algebra of Killing vector fields that contains $\mathfrak{sl}(2)\times \mathfrak{u}(1)$ in all dimensions under no symmetry assumptions. We also show that, if the cross-sections are two-dimensional, the horizon Einstein equation is equivalent to a single fourth order PDE for the Kähler potential, and that this equation is explicitly solvable on the sphere if the corresponding metric admits a Killing vector.

v2: 16 pages, corrected statement and proof of Theorem 1.3, added Appendix with more details of the proof of the main identities, minor improvements. To appear in the Journal of Differential Geometry