Hyperboloidal slicing approach to quasi-normal mode expansions: the Reissner-Nordstr\"om case

TL;DR

This paper develops a geometric approach using hyperboloidal slices and conformal compactifications to analyze quasi-normal modes of Reissner-Nordström black holes, extending previous Schwarzschild results and providing insights into mode regularization and extremal limits.

Contribution

It generalizes the hyperboloidal slicing method for quasi-normal mode expansions from Schwarzschild to Reissner-Nordström black holes, addressing technical challenges and offering geometric insights.

Findings

Extended the hyperboloidal approach to Reissner-Nordström black holes.

Provided a geometric understanding of regularization factors in mode expansions.

Analyzed quasi-normal modes in the extremal black hole limit.

Abstract

We study quasi-normal modes of black holes, with a focus on resonant (or quasi-normal mode) expansions, in a geometric frame based on the use of conformal compactifications together with hyperboloidal foliations of spacetime. Specifically, this work extends the previous study of Schwarzschild in this geometric approach to spherically symmetric asymptotically flat black hole spacetimes, in particular Reissner-Nordstr\"om. The discussion involves, first, the non-trivial technical developments needed to address the choice of appropriate hyperboloidal slices in the extended setting as well as the generalization of the algorithm determining the coefficients in the expansion of the solution in terms of the quasi-normal modes. In a second stage, we discuss how the adopted framework provides a geometric insight into the origin of regularization factors needed in Leaver's Cauchy based foliations, as well as into the discussion of quasi-normal modes in the extremal black hole limit.