Surprises in the Evaporation of 2-Dimensional Black Holes

TL;DR

This paper investigates the quantum evaporation process of 2D black holes within a semi-classical framework, revealing universal behaviors and challenging some assumptions of the standard paradigm, with implications for quantum gravity theories.

Contribution

It provides detailed analytical and numerical analysis of CGHS black hole evaporation, uncovering universal properties and clarifying features previously missed due to limited numerical precision.

Findings

Some assumptions of the standard evaporation paradigm are not supported.

Macroscopic black holes exhibit universal evaporation properties.

Results support the quantum gravity scenario by Ashtekar, Taveras, and Varadarajan.

Abstract

Quantum evaporation of Callan-Giddings-Harvey-Strominger (CGHS) black holes is analyzed in the mean field approximation. This semi-classical theory incorporates back reaction. Detailed analytical and numerical calculations show that, while some of the assumptions underlying the standard evaporation paradigm are borne out, several are not. Furthermore, if the black hole is initially macroscopic, the evaporation process exhibits remarkable universal properties (which are distinct from the features observed in the simplified, exactly soluble models). Although the literature on CGHS black holes is quite rich, these features had escaped previous analyses, in part because of lack of required numerical precision, and in part because certain properties and symmetries of the model were not fully recognized. Finally, our results provide support for the full quantum gravity scenario recently developed by Ashtekar, Taveras and Varadarajan.