On the Evaporation of Black Holes in String Theory

Abstract

We show that, in string theory, the quantum evaporation and decay of black holes in two-dimensional target space is related to imaginary parts in higher-genus string amplitudes. These arise from the regularisation of modular infinities due to the sum over world-sheet configurations, that are known to express the instabilities of massive string states in general, and are not thermal in character. The absence of such imaginary parts in the matrix model limit confirms that the latter constitutes the final stage of the evaporation process, at least in perturbation theory. Our arguments appear to be quite generic, related only to the summation over world-sheet surfaces, and hence should also apply to higher-dimensional target spaces.

17 pages

References in corpus (1)

• On the connection between Quantum Mechanics and the geometry of two-dimensional strings

Cited by in corpus (15)

• String Theory Modifies Quantum Mechanics
• Generalized Second Law of Thermodynamics in $f(T)$ Gravity with Entropy Corrections
• Aspects of hairy black holes in spontaneously-broken Einstein-Yang-Mills systems: Stability analysis and Entropy considerations
• A Note on Background (In)dependence
• Decoherent Scattering of Light Particles in a D-Brane Background
• String Theory, Black Holes, and SL(2,R) Current Algebra
• Thermodynamics of a Schwarzschild Black Hole in Phantom Cosmology with Entropy Corrections
• Measuring the $W$-hair of String Black Holes
• The Origin of Space-Time as $W$ Symmetry Breaking in String Theory
• Perturbations of a Stringy Black Hole
• Time-dependent perturbations in two-dimensional String Black Holes
• World-Sheet Duality, Space-Time Foam, and the Quantum Fate of a Stringy Black Hole
• On the KP Hierarchy, ${\hat{W}}_{\infty }$ Algebra, and Conformal SL(2,R)/U(1) Model: I. The Classical Case
• Spacetime Diffeomorphisms and Topological W-Infinity Symmetry in Two Dimensional Topological String Theory
• As time goes by