Black hole entropy and thermodynamics from symmetries

Given a boundary of spacetime preserved by a Diff(S-1) sub-algebra, we propose a systematic method to compute the zero mode and the central extension of the associated Virasoro algebra of charges. Using these values in the Cardy formula, we may derive an associated statistical entropy to be compared with the Bekenstein-Hawking result. To illustrate our method, we study in detail the BTZ and the rotating, Kerr-adS(4) black holes (at spatial infinity and on the horizon). In both cases, we are able to reproduce the area law with the correct factor of 1/4 for the entropy. We also recover within our framework the first law of black-hole thermodynamics. We compare our results with the analogous derivations proposed by Carlip and others. Although similar, our method differs in the computation of the zero mode. In particular, the normalization of the ground state is automatically fixed by our constructio

Currents and Superpotentials in classical gauge theories: II. Global aspects and the example of Affine gravity

The conserved charges associated with gauge symmetries are defined at a boundary component of spacetime because the corresponding Noether current can be rewritten on-shell as the divergence of a superpotential. However, the latter is afflicted by ambiguities. Regge and Teitelboim found a procedure to lift the arbitrariness in the Hamiltonian framework. An alternative covariant formula was proposed by one of us for an arbitrary variation of the superpotential, it depends only on the equations of motion and on the gauge symmetry under consideration. Here we emphasize that in order to compute the charges, it is enough to stay at a boundary of spacetime, without requiring any hypothesis about the bulk or about other boundary components, so one may speak of holographic charges. It is well known that the asymptotic symmetries that lead to conserved charges are really defined at infinity, but the choice of boundary conditions and surface terms in the action and in the charges is usually determined through integration by parts, whereas each component of the boundary should be considered separately. We treat the example of gravity (for any spacetime dimension, with or without cosmological constant), formulated as an affine theory which is a natural generalization of the Palatini and Cartan-Weyl (vielbein) first-order formulations. We then show that the superpotential associated with a Dirichlet boundary condition on the metric (the one needed to treat asymptotically flat or AdS spacetimes) is the one proposed by Katz et al and not that of Komar. We finally discuss the KBL superpotential at null infinity

Brane bounce-type configurations in a string-like scenario

Brane world six dimensional scenarios with string like metric has been proposed to alleviate the problem of field localization. However, these models have been suffering from some drawbacks related with energy conditions as well as from difficulties to find analytical solutions. In this work, we propose a model where a brane is made of a scalar field with bounce-type configurations and embedded in a bulk with a string-like metric. This model produces a sound AdS scenario where none of the important physical quantities is infinite. Among these quantities are the components of the energy momentum tensor, which have its positivity ensured by a suitable choice of the bounce configurations. Another advantage of this model is that the warp factor can be obtained analytically from the equations of motion for the scalar field, obtaining as a result a thick brane configuration, in a six dimensional context. Moreover, the study of the scalar field localization in these scenario is done.Comment: 15 pages, 5 figures. To appear in Physics Letters