Black Hole Horizons in Quantum Gravity

Introduction

The project "Black Hole Horizons in Quantum Gravity" aims for an in-depth investigation of black holes and the information paradox in the context of quantum gravity. Due to the recent breakthroughs in astronomy, these exotic objects have moved from the purely theoretical realm to being abundant in our physical universe.

Theoretical Understanding

Surprisingly, our theoretical understanding of them is insufficient to even in principle understand their horizons and what happens behind them. Our approach to tackle these questions is to combine a lower-dimensional approach with holography as a guide. Within this framework, substantial breakthroughs were made in the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev models, and their low-energy gravitational description in terms of Jackiw-Teitelboim gravity. This model is exactly solvable to a large degree, and many important lessons on black hole physics and quantum gravity can be studied quantitatively and exactly.

Project Goals

Our goals within this project span across two lines:

1. Addressing the Information Puzzle
   Firstly, we will apply quantum gravitational results on the Jackiw-Teitelboim gravity model to address aspects of the black hole information puzzle in a quantitative way and probe the deep questions on black hole horizons largely building on our detailed knowledge of this model. In particular, we will calculate correlation functions of local infalling bulk observables, and assess the effect of quantum gravitational corrections to evaporation.

2. Investigating Universality
   Secondly, it is vital to investigate the universality of the set of techniques and methods we use in Jackiw-Teitelboim gravity. We will do this by pursuing several roads simultaneously:

   • Dilaton gravity models
   • 2D string theory
   • The original Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev model
   • Supersymmetric models
   • 3D pure gravity

Armed with these results, we will extrapolate to higher dimensions and in particular to our physical universe, making contact with the first objective.