840 research outputs found
Causality Violation and Naked Time Machines in AdS_5
We study supersymmetric charged rotating black holes in AdS, and show
that closed timelike curves occur outside the event horizon. Also upon lifting
to rotating D3 brane solutions of type IIB supergravity in ten dimensions,
closed timelike curves are still present. We believe that these causal
anomalies correspond to loss of unitarity in the dual , D=4 super
Yang-Mills theory, i.e. the chronology protection conjecture in the AdS bulk is
related to unitarity bounds in the boundary CFT. We show that no charged or
uncharged geodesic can penetrate the horizon, so that the exterior region is
geodesically complete. These results still hold true in the quantum case,
i.~e.~the total absorption cross section for Klein-Gordon scalars propagating
in the black hole background is zero. This suggests that the effective
temperature is zero instead of assuming the naively found imaginary value.Comment: 22 pages, Latex, uses JHEP.cls, 1 figure. v3: comments on unitarity
in CFT and 2 references added. v4: changes in final remarks, final version to
appear in JHE
Mass in anti-de Sitter spaces
The boundary stress tensor approach has proven extremely useful in defining
mass and angular momentum in asymptotically anti-de Sitter spaces with CFT
duals. An integral part of this method is the use of boundary counterterms to
regulate the gravitational action and stress tensor. In addition to the
standard gravitational counterterms, in the presence of matter we advocate the
use of a finite counterterm proportional to phi^2 (in five dimensions). We
demonstrate that this finite shift is necessary to properly reproduce the
expected mass/charge relation for R-charged black holes in AdS_5.Comment: 15 pages, late
Variability of the soft X-ray excess in IRAS 13224-3809
We study the soft excess variability of the narrow line Seyfert 1 galaxy IRAS
13224-3809. We considered all five archival XMM-Newton observations, and we
applied the 'flux-flux plot' (FFP) method. We found that the flux-flux plots
were highly affected by the choice of the light curves' time bin size, most
probably because of the fast and large amplitude variations, and the intrinsic
non-linear flux--flux relations in this source. Therefore, we recommend that
the smallest bin-size should be used in such cases. Hence, We constructed FFPs
in 11 energy bands below 1.7 keV, and we considered the 1.7-3 keV band, as
being representative of the primary emission. The FFPs are reasonably well
fitted by a 'power-law plus a constant' model. We detected significant positive
constants in three out of five observations. The best-fit slopes are flatter
than unity at energies below keV, where the soft excess is
strongest. This suggests the presence of intrinsic spectral variability. A
power-law-like primary component, which is variable in flux and spectral slope
(as ) and a soft-excess component, which varies
with the primary continuum (as ),
can broadly explain the FFPs. In fact, this can create positive `constants',
even when a stable spectral component does not exist. Nevertheless, the
possibility of a stable, soft--band constant component cannot be ruled out, but
its contribution to the observed 0.2-1 keV band flux should be less than %. The model constants in the FFPs were consistent with zero in one
observation, and negative at energies below 1 keV in another. It is hard to
explain these results in the context of any spectral variability scenario, but
they may signify the presence of a variable, warm absorber in the source.Comment: Accepted for publication in A&A, 10 pages, 7 figure
The Blackhole-Dark Matter Halo Connection
We explore the connection between the central supermassive blackholes (SMBH)
in galaxies and the dark matter halo through the relation between the masses of
the SMBHs and the maximum circular velocities of the host galaxies, as well as
the relationship between stellar velocity dispersion of the spheroidal
component and the circular velocity. Our assumption here is that the circular
velocity is a proxy for the mass of the dark matter halo. We rely on a
heterogeneous sample containing galaxies of all types. The only requirement is
that the galaxy has a direct measurement of the mass of its SMBH and a direct
measurement of its circular velocity and its velocity dispersion. Previous
studies have analyzed the connection between the SMBH and dark matter halo
through the relationship between the circular velocity and the bulge velocity
dispersion, with the assumption that the bulge velocity dispersion stands in
for the mass of the SMBH, via the well{}-established SMBH mass{}-bulge velocity
dispersion relation. Using intermediate relations may be misleading when one is
studying them to decipher the active ingredients of galaxy formation and
evolution. We believe that our approach will provide a more direct probe of the
SMBH and the dark matter halo connection. We find that the correlation between
the mass of supermassive blackholes and the circular velocities of the host
galaxies is extremely weak, leading us to state the dark matter halo may not
play a major role in regulating the blackhole growth in the present Universe.Comment: Accepted for publication in the Ap
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