A Proof of the Generalized Second Law for Two-Dimensional Black Holes

We investigate the generalized second law for two-dimensional black holes in equilibrium (Hartle-Hawking) and nonequilibrium (Unruh) with the heat bath surrounding the black holes. We obtain a simple expression for the change of total entropy in terms of covariant thermodynamic variables, which is valid not only for the Hartle-Hawking state but also for the Unruh state up to leading order, without assuming a quasi-stationary evolution of the black holes. Using this expression, it is shown that the rate of local entropy production is non-negative in the two-dimensional black hole systems.Comment: 15 pages, boundary condition of static black hole is added to clarify the situation, abstract and section 4 (concluding remarks) is rewritten, and minor corrections, references adde

Trends in sexually transmitted infections in general practice 1990-2000: population based study using data from the UK general practice research database

Objective: To describe the contribution of primary care to the diagnosis and management of sexually transmitted infections in the United Kingdom, 1990-2000, in the context of increasing incidence of infections in genitourinary medicine clinics. Design: Population based study. Setting: UK primary care. Participants: Patients registered in the UK general practice research database. Main outcome measures: Incidence of diagnosed sexually transmitted infections in primary care and estimation of the proportion of major such infections diagnosed in primary care. Results: An estimated 23.0% of chlamydia cases in women but only 5.3% in men were diagnosed and treated in primary care during 1998-2000, along with 49.2% cases of non-specific urethritis and urethral discharge in men and 5.7% cases of gonorrhoea in women and 2.9% in men. Rates of diagnosis in primary care rose substantially in the late 1990s. Conclusions: A substantial and increasing number of sexually transmitted infections are diagnosed and treated in primary care in the United Kingdom, with sex ratios differing from those in genitourinary medicine clinics. Large numbers of men are treated in primary care for presumptive sexually transmitted infections

Could biodiversity loss have increased Australia’s bushfire threat

Ecosystem engineers directly or indirectly affect the availability of resources through changing the physical state of biotic and/or abiotic materials. Fossorial ecosystem engineers have been hypothesized as affecting fire behaviour through altering litter accumulation and breakdown, however, little evidence of this has been shown to date. Fire is one of the major ecological processes affecting biodiversity globally. Australia has seen the extinction of 29 of 315 terrestrial mammal species in the last 200 years and several of these species were ecosystem engineers whose fossorial actions may increase the rate of leaf litter breakdown. Thus, their extinction may have altered the rate of litter accumulation and therefore fire ignition potential and rate of spread. We tested whether a reduction in leaf litter was associated with sites where mammalian ecosystem engineers had been reintroduced using a pair-wise, cross-fence comparison at sites spanning the Australian continent. At Scotia (New South Wales), Karakamia (Western Australia) and Yookamurra (South Australia) sanctuaries, leaf litter mass ( 24%) and percentage cover of leaf litter ( 3%) were significantly lower where reintroduced ecosystem engineers occurred compared to where they were absent, and fire behaviour modelling illustrated this has substantial impacts on flame height and rate of spread. This result has major implications for fire behaviour and management globally wherever ecosystem engineers are now absent as the reduced leaf litter volumes where they occur will lead to decreased flame height and rate of fire spread. This illustrates the need to restore the full suite of biodiversity globally.http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1469-17952017-12-31hb2016Centre for Wildlife Managemen

Origami World

We paste together patches of $AdS_6$ to find solutions which describe two 4-branes intersecting on a 3-brane with non-zero tension. We construct explicitly brane arrays with Minkowski, de Sitter and Anti-de Sitter geometries intrinsic to the 3-brane, and describe how to generalize these solutions to the case of $AdS_{4+n}$, $n>2$, where $n$ $n+2$-branes intersect on a 3-brane. The Minkowski and de Sitter solutions localize gravity to the intersection, leading to 4D Newtonian gravity at large distances. We show this explicitly in the case of Minkowski origami by finding the zero-mode graviton, and computing the couplings of the bulk gravitons to the matter on the intersection. In de Sitter case, this follows from the finiteness of the bulk volume. The effective 4D Planck scale depends on the square of the fundamental 6D Planck scale, the $AdS_6$ radius and the angles between the 4-branes and the radial $AdS$ direction, and for the Minkowski origami it is $M_4{}^2 = {2/3} \Bigl(\tan \alpha_1 + \tan \alpha_2 \Bigr) M_*{}^4 L^2$. If $M_* \sim {\rm few} \times TeV$ this may account for the Planck-electroweak hierarchy even if $L \sim 10^{-4} {\rm m}$, with a possibility for sub-millimeter corrections to the Newton's law. We comment on the early universe cosmology of such models.Comment: plain LaTeX, 23 pages + 2 .eps figure

Non-linear instability of Kerr-type Cauchy horizons

Using the general solution to the Einstein equations on intersecting null surfaces developed by Hayward, we investigate the non-linear instability of the Cauchy horizon inside a realistic black hole. Making a minimal assumption about the free gravitational data allows us to solve the field equations along a null surface crossing the Cauchy Horizon. As in the spherical case, the results indicate that a diverging influx of gravitational energy, in concert with an outflux across the CH, is responsible for the singularity. The spacetime is asymptotically Petrov type N, the same algebraic type as a gravitational shock wave. Implications for the continuation of spacetime through the singularity are briefly discussed.Comment: 11 pages RevTeX, two postscript figures included using epsf.st

Thermodynamics of charged and rotating black strings

We study thermodynamics of cylindrically symmetric black holes. Uncharged as well as charged and rotating objects have been discussed. We derive surface gravity and hence the Hawking temperature and entropy for all these cases. We correct some results in the literature and present new ones. It is seen that thermodynamically these black configurations behave differently from spherically symmetric objects

Corrections to Hawking-like Radiation for a Friedmann-Robertson-Walker Universe

Recently, a Hamilton-Jacobi method beyond semiclassical approximation in black hole physics was developed by \emph{Banerjee} and \emph{Majhi}\cite{beyond0}. In this paper, we generalize their analysis of black holes to the case of Friedmann-Robertson-Walker (FRW) universe. It is shown that all the higher order quantum corrections in the single particle action are proportional to the usual semiclassical contribution. The corrections to the Hawking-like temperature and entropy of apparent horizon for FRW universe are also obtained. In the corrected entropy, the area law involves logarithmic area correction together with the standard inverse power of area term.Comment: 10 pages, no figures, comments are welcome; v2: references added and some typoes corrected, to appear in Euro.Phys.J.C; v3:a defect corrected. We thank Dr.Elias Vagenas for pointing out a defect of our pape

Wormholes in AdS

We construct a few Euclidean supergravity solutions with multiple boundaries. We consider examples where the corresponding boundary field theory is well defined on each boundary. We point out that these configurations are puzzling from the AdS/CFT point of view. A proper understanding of the AdS/CFT dictionary for these cases might yield some information about the physics of closed universes.Comment: 38 pages, 2 figures, harvmac. v2: minor typos corrected and references adde

Equatorial circular orbits in the Kerr-de Sitter spacetimes

Equatorial motion of test particles in the Kerr-de Sitter spacetimes is considered. Circular orbits are determined, their properties are discussed for both the black-hole and naked-singularity spacetimes, and their relevance for thin accretion discs is established.Comment: 24 pages, 19 figures, REVTeX

Energy Distribution associated with Static Axisymmetric Solutions

This paper has been addressed to a very old but burning problem of energy in General Relativity. We evaluate energy and momentum densities for the static and axisymmetric solutions. This specializes to two metrics, i.e., Erez-Rosen and the gamma metrics, belonging to the Weyl class. We apply four well-known prescriptions of Einstein, Landau-Lifshitz, Papaterou and M$\ddot{o}$ller to compute energy-momentum density components. We obtain that these prescriptions do not provide similar energy density, however momentum becomes constant in each case. The results can be matched under particular boundary conditions.Comment: 18 pages, accepted for publication in Astrophysics and SpaceScienc