Violation of the Third Law of Black Hole Mechanics in Vacuum Gravity

Physical Review Letters 2026 Open access

Read full text
Authors: John A. Crump, Maxime Gadioux, Harvey S. Reall, Jorge E. Santos
DOI: 10.1103/gbg1-pjgq
Cited by: 6
References: 25

Abstract

We demonstrate numerically the existence of solutions of five-dimensional vacuum gravity describing the formation, in finite time, of an extremal rotating black hole from a preexisting Schwarzschild black hole. This is the first example of a violation of the third law of black hole mechanics in vacuum gravity and demonstrates that the third law is false independently of any matter model. We also demonstrate the existence of solutions describing the formation, in finite time, of an extremal rotating black hole from vacuum initial data that do not contain a black hole.

Fields of Study & Subjects

Black Holes and Theoretical Physics Noncommutative and Quantum Gravity Theories Relativity and Gravitational Theory

Publication details

Journal / source
Physical Review Letters
Publisher
American Physical Society (APS)
Volume
136
Issue
17
Pages
171405–171405
Publication date
2 April 2026
Language
EN