Thermodynamic Black Holes

Black holes pose great difficulties for theory since gravity and quantum theory must be combined in some as yet unknown way. An additional difficulty is that detailed black hole observational data to guide theorists is lacking. In this paper, I sidestep the difficulties of combining gravity and quantum theory by employing black hole thermodynamics augmented by ideas from the information geometry of thermodynamics. I propose a purely thermodynamic agenda for choosing correct candidate black hole thermodynamic scaled equations of state, parameterized by two exponents. These two adjustable exponents may be set to accommodate additional black hole information, either from astrophysical observations or from some microscopic theory, such as string theory. My approach assumes implicitly that the as yet unknown microscopic black hole constituents have strong effective interactions between them, of a type found in critical phenomena. In this picture, the details of the microscopic interaction forces are not important, and the essential macroscopic picture emerges from general assumptions about the number of independent thermodynamic variables, types of critical points, boundary conditions, and analyticity. I use the simple Kerr and Reissner-Nordstrom black holes for guidance, and find candidate equations of state that embody a number of the features of these purely gravitational models. My approach may offer a productive new way to select black hole thermodynamic equations of state representing both gravitational and quantum properties.Comment: 37 pages, 21 figure

New type of phase transition in Reissner Nordstr\"om - AdS black hole and its thermodynamic geometry

The phase transition of a RN-AdS black hole is studied in details using Ehrenfest's equations. There is no discontinuity in entropy which signals a lack of any first order phase transition. We then show that although Ehrenfest's first equation is satisfied, the second is not, so that a true second order phase transition is also ruled out. However this deviation from the second Ehrenfest's equation, for a certain range of the black hole charge, indicates the existence of a new glassy type transition. We finally study the thermodynamic behaviour using state space geometry and find that the scalar curvature diverges exactly at those points where the heat capacity diverges.Comment: Major revisions in Sec. 3. New results and interpretations. 2 new references. To appear in Phys. Lett.