An artist depiction of two black holes merging,

a process in which the laws of

thermodynamics are upheld.
Black hole thermodynamics
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
In physics, black hole thermodynamics is the area of study that seeks to reconcile the laws of
thermodynamics with the existence of black hole event horizons. uch as the study of the statistical mechanics
of black body radiation led to the advent of the theory of !uantum mechanics, the effort to understand the
statistical mechanics of black holes has had a deep impact upon the understanding of !uantum gravity, leading to
the formulation of the holographic principle.
"#$
Contents
# %lack hole entropy
& 'he laws of black hole mechanics
&.# (tatement of the laws
&.#.# 'he )eroth *aw
&.#.& 'he First *aw
&.#.+ 'he (econd *aw
&.#., 'he 'hird *aw
&.& -iscussion of the laws
&.&.# 'he )eroth *aw
&.&.& 'he First *aw
&.&.+ 'he (econd *aw
&.&., 'he 'hird *aw
&.+ Interpretation of the laws
+ %eyond black holes
, (ee also
. /otes
0 1eferences
2 3xternal links
Black hole entropy
'he only way to satisfy the second law of thermodynamics is to admit that black holes have entropy. If black
holes carried no entropy, it would be possible to violate the second law by throwing mass into the black hole.
'he increase of the entropy of the black hole more than compensates for the decrease of the entropy carried by
the ob4ect that was swallowed.
(tarting from theorems proved by (tephen 5awking, 6acob %ekenstein con4ectured that the black hole entropy
was proportional to the area of its event horizon divided by the 7lanck area. %ekenstein suggested 89 ln &:;,<
as the constant of proportionality, asserting that if the constant was not exactly this, it must be very close to it.
'he next year, 5awking showed that black holes emit thermal 5awking radiation
"&$"+$
corresponding to a
certain temperature 85awking temperature:.
",$".$
=sing the thermodynamic relationship between energy,
temperature and entropy, 5awking was able to confirm %ekenstein>s con4ecture and fix the constant of
proportionality at #;,
"0$
?
where A is the area of the event horizon, calculated at 4R
2
, k is %oltzmann>s constant, and
is the 7lanck length. 'he subscript %5 either stands for @black hole@ or @%ekensteinA
5awking@. 'he black hole entropy is proportional to the area of its event horizon . 'he fact that the black hole
entropy is also the maximal entropy that can be obtained by the %ekenstein bound 8wherein the %ekenstein
bound becomes an e!uality: was the main observation that led to the holographic principle.
"#$
Although 5awking>s calculations gave further thermodynamic evidence for black hole entropy, until #BB. no one
was able to make a controlled calculation of black hole entropy based on statistical mechanics, which associates
entropy with a large number of microstates. In fact, so called @no hair@
"2$
theorems appeared to suggest that
black holes could have only a single microstate. 'he situation changed in #BB. when Andrew (trominger and
Cumrun Dafa calculated
"E$
the right %ekensteinA5awking entropy of a supersymmetric black hole in string
theory, using methods based on -Abranes. 'heir calculation was followed by many similar computations of
entropy of large classes of other extremal and nearAextremal black holes, and the result always agreed with the
%ekensteinA5awking formula.
In *oop !uantum gravity 8*FG:
"B$
it is possible to associate a geometrical interpretation to the microstates?
these are the !uantum geometries of the horizon. *FG offers a geometric explanation of the finiteness of the
entropy and of the proportionality of the area of the horizon.
"#H$"##$
It is possible to derive, from the covariant
formulation of full !uantum theory 8(pinfoam: the correct relation between energy and area 8#st law:, the =nruh
temperature and the distribution that yields 5awking entropy.
"#&$
'he calculation makes use of the notion of
dynamical horizon and is done for nonAextremal black holes.
The laws of black hole mechanics
'he four laws of black hole mechanics are physical properties that black holes are believed to satisfy. 'he
laws, analogous to the laws of thermodynamics, were discovered by %randon Carter, (tephen 5awking and
6ames %ardeen.
Statement of the laws
'he laws of black hole mechanics are expressed in geometrized units.
The Zeroth aw
'he horizon has constant surface gravity for a stationary black hole.
The !irst aw
Change of mass is related to change of area, angular momentum, and electric charge by?
where is the mass, is the surface gravity, is the horizon area, is the angular velocity, is the angular
momentum, is the electrostatic potential and is the electric charge.
The Second aw
'he horizon area is, assuming the weak energy condition, a nonAdecreasing function of time,
'his @law@ was superseded by 5awking>s discovery that black holes radiate, which causes both the black hole>s
mass and the area of its horizon to decrease over time.
The Third aw
It is not possible to form a black hole with vanishing surface gravity. I H is not possible to achieve.
"isc#ssion of the laws
The Zeroth aw
'he zeroth law is analogous to the zeroth law of thermodynamics which states that the temperature is constant
throughout a body in thermal e!uilibrium. It suggests that the surface gravity is analogous to temperature. T
constant for thermal e!uilibrium for a normal system is analogous to constant over the horizon of a stationary
black hole.
The !irst aw
'he left hand side, dM, is the change in mass;energy. Although the first term does not have an immediately
obvious physical interpretation, the second and third terms on the right hand side represent changes in energy
due to rotation and electromagnetism. Analogously, the first law of thermodynamics is a statement of energy
conservation, which contains on its right hand side the term T dS.
The Second aw
'he second law is the statement of 5awking>s area theorem. Analogously, the second law of thermodynamics
states that the change in entropy an isolated system will be greater than or e!ual to H for a spontaneous process,
suggesting a link between entropy and the area of a black hole horizon. 5owever, this version violates the
second law of thermodynamics by matter losing 8its: entropy as it falls in, giving a decrease in entropy.
Generalized second law introduced as total entropy I black hole entropy J outside entropy.
The Third aw
3xtremal black holes
"#+$
have vanishing surface gravity. (tating that cannot go to zero is analogous to the third
law of thermodynamics which states, the entropy of a system at absolute zero is a wellAdefined constant. 'his is
because a system at zero temperature exists in its ground state. Furthermore, K( will reach zero at H kelvins, but
( itself will also reach zero, at least for perfect crystalline substances. /o experimentally verified violations of the
laws of thermodynamics are known.
$nterpretation of the laws
'he four laws of black hole mechanics suggest that one should identify the surface gravity of a black hole with
temperature and the area of the event horizon with entropy, at least up to some multiplicative constants. If one
only considers black holes classically, then they have zero temperature and, by the no hair theorem,
"2$
zero
entropy, and the laws of black hole mechanics remain an analogy. 5owever, when !uantum mechanical effects
are taken into account, one finds that black holes emit thermal radiation 85awking radiation: at temperature
From the first law of black hole mechanics, this determines the multiplicative constant of the %ekensteinA
5awking entropy which is
Beyond black holes
5awking and 7age have shown that black hole thermodynamics is more general than black holes, that
cosmological event horizons also have an entropy and temperature.
ore fundamentally, >t 5ooft and (usskind used the laws of black hole thermodynamics to argue for a general
5olographic 7rinciple of nature, which asserts that consistent theories of gravity and !uantum mechanics must
be lower dimensional. 'hough not yet fully understood in general, the holographic principle is central to theories
like the Ad(;CF' correspondence.
"#,$
See also
(tephen 5awking
6acob %ekenstein
5awking radiation
%otes
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/0ternal links
%ekensteinA5awking entropy on (cholarpedia 8http?;;www.scholarpedia.org;article;%ekensteinA
5awkingYentropy:
%lack 5ole 'hermodynamics 8http?;;nrumiano.free.fr;3stars;bhYthermo.html:
%lack hole entropy on arxiv.org 8http?;;xstructure.inr.ac.ru;xAbin;theme&.pyQarxivIhepA
thRlevelI#Rindex#I+&E#+0#:
1etrieved from @http?;;en.wikipedia.org;w;index.phpQtitleI%lackYholeYthermodynamicsRoldidI.#..&+0HH@
Categories? %lack holes 'hermodynamics
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