Black holes with synchronised Proca hair: linear clouds and fundamental non-linear solutions (Q2215319): Difference between revisions

Wheeler's adage that ``black holes have no hair'' has been a central tenet of general relativity for the past half-century. There is now a plethora of black hole no-hair theorems, proving that black holes in certain matter models are characterized by just three physical quantities, namely their mass, angular momentum and charge. Over the past seven years, one exciting development has been the discovery of rotating Kerr black holes with hair that evades the well-known theorems. Such hairy black holes (and corresponding solitonic solutions) in the Einstein-scalar system have been extensively studied. This paper is concerned with an alternative system, the Einstein-Proca system (a Proca field is a massive vector field). This system is motivated physically by the possible existence of ultra-light bosonic fields in extensions of the standard model. A further motivation for studying the Einstein-Proca system is that spinning stars with a nontrivial Proca field are dynamically stable [\textit{N. Sanchis-Gual} et al., ``Nonlinear dynamics of spinning bosonic stars: formation and stability'', Phys. Rev. Lett.123, No. 22, Article ID 221101, 6 p. (2019; \url{doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.123.221101})], in contrast to the corresponding unstable stars in the Einstein-scalar system. The aim of this paper is to revisit black holes with Proca hair and the corresponding Proca stars, building on the initial studies in [\textit{C. Herdeiro} et al., Classical Quantum Gravity 33, No. 15, Article ID 154001, 34 p. (2016; Zbl 1344.83032)], where further analytic details of the model can be found (for further information on the numerical methods employed, see [\textit{C. Herdeiro} and \textit{E. Radu}, Classical Quantum Gravity 32, No. 14, Article ID 144001, 45 p. (2015; Zbl 1323.83001)]). The current paper includes a very detailed analysis of the Einstein-Proca system and its star-like and black hole solutions. To start, the recent proof of the separability of the Proca equation Kerr black holes [\textit{V. P. Frolov} et al., ``Massive vector fields in rotating black-hole spacetimes: separability and quasinormal modes'', Phys. Rev. Lett. 120, No. 23, Article ID 231103, 6 p. (2018; \url{doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.120.231103})] enables the authors to comprehensively study Kerr black holes surrounded by Proca field clouds. These solutions are characterized by a set of quantum numbers in a manner analogous to the scalar case. The domain of existence of Kerr black holes with such synchronized Proca hair is constructed explicitly and contains fundamental states for which the Proca field has no nodes. The main focus of the paper is self-gravitating Proca stars and black holes with Proca field hair. Building on the work in [\textit{C. Herdeiro} and \textit{E. Radu}, ``Dynamical formation of Kerr black holes with synchronized hair: an analytic model'', Phys. Rev. Lett. 119, No. 26, Article ID 261101, 6 p. (2017; \url{doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.119.261101})], the domain of existence of solutions for which the temporal part of the Proca field has zero or one node is constructed, with the fundamental (zero node) solutions being of particular interest. Four indicative solutions are explored in detail; two black holes and two Proca stars. For each, the metric functions, Proca field potentials and physical quantities such as the Proca energy density, the Ricci scalar curvature and Noether charge density are plotted. The fundamental Proca stars have a spheroidal morphology, in contrast to their scalar field cousins, which are toroidal. Of the sample hairy black holes, one is Kerr-like and the other non-Kerr-like. The former has properties similar to a Kerr black hole surrounded by a Proca cloud; the latter is more accurately depicted as a Proca star with a black hole at its centre.