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Published October 7, 1991 | public
Journal Article Open

Growing hair on black holes

Abstract

A black hole can carry quantum numbers that are not associated with massless gauge fields, contrary to the spirit of the "no-hair" theorems. In the Higgs phase of a gauge theory, electric charge on a black hole generates a nonzero electric field outside the event horizon. This field is nonperturbative in ħ and is exponentially screened far from the hole. It arises from the cloud of virtual cosmic strings that surround the black hole. In the confinement phase, a magnetic charge on a black hole generates a classical field that is screened at long range by nonperturbative effects. Despite the sharp difference in their formal descriptions, the electric and magnetic cases are closely similar physically.

Additional Information

©1991 The American Physical Society. Received 24 June 1991. We thank Gary Gibbons and Stephen Hawking for helpful discussions. S.C. was supported in part by NSF Grant No. PHY-87-14654, J.P. by DOE Grant No. DE-AC03-81-ER40050, and F.W. by DOE Grant No. DE-FG02-90ER40542.

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