We show that both the interior region $r<M-\sqrt{M^2-a^2}$ of a Kerr black hole and the $a^2>M^2$ Kerr naked singularity admit unstable solutions of the Teukolsky equation for any value of the spin weight. For every harmonic number there is at least one axially symmetric mode that grows exponentially in time and decays properly in the radial directions. These can be used as Debye potentials to generate solutions for the scalar, Weyl spinor, Maxwell and linearized gravity field equations on these backgrounds, satisfying appropriate spatial boundary conditions and growing exponentially in time, as shown in detail for the Maxwell case. It is suggested that the existence of the unstable modes is related to the so called "time machine" region, where the axial Killing vector field is time-like, and the Teukolsky equation, restricted to axially symmetric fields, changes its character from hyperbolic to elliptic.
We present a new solution in Einstein-Maxwell theory which can be considered as the magnetized version of Kerr-Taub-NUT solution. Some properties of the spacetime are discussed. We also compute the entropy of extremal black hole in the spacetime by using the Kerr/CFT correspondence approach.
An exact expression derived in the literature for the rate of dragging of inertial frames (Lense-Thirring (LT) precession) in a general stationary spacetime, is reviewed. The exact LT precession frequencies for Kerr, Kerr-Taub-NUT and Taub-NUT spacetimes are explicitly derived. Remarkably, in the case of the zero angular momentum Taub-NUT spacetime, the frame-dragging effect is shown {\it not} to vanish, when considered for spinning test gyroscopes. The result becomes sharper for the case of vanishing ADM mass of that spacetime. We clarify how our results are consistent with claims in the rece…
It is not currently known how to put the Kerr spacetime metric into the so-called Gordon form, although the closely related Kerr-Schild form of the Kerr metric is well known. A Gordon form for the Kerr geometry, if it could be found, would be particularly useful in developing analogue models for the Kerr spacetime, since the Gordon form is explicitly given in terms of the 4-velocity and "refractive index" of an effective medium. In the current article we report progress toward this goal. First we present the Gordon form for an approximation to Kerr spacetime in the slow-rotation limit, obtaine…
Equatorial motion of test particles in the Kerr-de Sitter spacetimes is considered. Circular orbits are determined, their properties are discussed for both the black-hole and naked-singularity spacetimes, and their relevance for thin accretion discs is established.
The static Kottler metric is the Schwarzschild vacuum metric extended to include a cosmological constant. Angular momentum is added to the Kottler metric by using Newman and Janis' complexifying algorithm. The new metric is the Lambda generalization of the Kerr spacetime. It is stationary, axially symmetric, Petrov type II, and has Kerr-Schild form.
The astrophysical importance of the Kerr spacetime cannot be overstated. Of the currently known exact solutions to the Einstein field equations, the Kerr spacetime stands out in terms of its direct applicability to describing astronomical black hole candidates. In counterpoint, purely mathematically, there is an old classical result of differential geometry, due to Darboux, that all 3-manifolds can have their metrics recast into diagonal form. In the case of the Kerr spacetime the Boyer-Lindquist coordinates provide an explicit example of a diagonal spatial 3-metric. Unfortunately, as we demon…
Using the energy momentum complex given by Møller in 1978 based on the absolute parallelism, the energy distribution in Kerr spacetime is evaluated. The energy with this spacetime is found to be the same as it was earlier evaluated using different definitions mainly based on the metric tensor.
We provide a prescription to solve the metric completion problem in gravitational self-force calculations on a Kerr spacetime by fixing the remaining gauge freedom. We discuss the explicit example of eccentric equatorial orbits, recovering all limiting cases already studied in the literature of eccentric orbits in Schwarzschild as well as circular orbits in both Schwarzschild and Kerr spacetimes.
We prove, outside the influence region of a ball of radius $R_0$ centered in the origin of the initial data hypersurface, the existence of global solutions near to Kerr spacetime, provided that the initial data are sufficiently near to those of Kerr; This external region is the "far" part of the outer region of the perturbed Kerr spacetime. Moreover if we assume that the corrections to the Kerr metric decay sufficiently fast, $o(r^{-3})$, we prove that the various null components of the Riemann tensor decay in agreement with the "Peeling theorem".
We will show that the Nariai metric, i.e. the static spherically symmetric vacuum spacetime with a cosmological constant, admits a conformally Kerr-Schild spacetime representation. We find the vacuum solutions of the Einstein-Maxwell equations for the Nariai metric using the Horsky-Mitskievich generating conjecture.
The Kerr spacetime is perhaps the most astrophysically important of the currently known exact solutions to the Einstein field equations. Whenever spacetimes can be put in unit-lapse form it becomes possible to identify some very straightforward timelike geodesics, (the "rain" geodesics), making the physical interpretation of these spacetimes particularly clean and elegant. The most well-known of these unit-lapse formulations is the Painleve-Gullstrand form of the Schwarzschild spacetime, though there is also a Painleve-Gullstrand form of the Lense-Thirring (slow rotation) spacetime. More radic…
We consider the Maxwell field in the exterior of a Kerr black hole. For this system, we propose a geometric construction of generalized Klein-Gordon equation called Fackerell-Ipser equation. Our model is based on conformal Yano-Kiling tensor (CYK tensor). We present non-standard properties of CYK tensors in the Kerr spacetime which are useful in electrodynamics.
We obtain a characterization of the Kerr metric among stationary, asymptotically flat, vacuum spacetimes, which extends the characterization in terms of the Simon tensor (defined only in the manifold of trajectories) to the whole spacetime. More precisely, we define a three index tensor on any spacetime with a Killing field, which vanishes identically for Kerr and which coincides in the strictly stationary region with the Simon tensor when projected down into the manifold of trajectories. We prove that a stationary asymptotically flat vacuum spacetime with vanishing spacetime Simon tensor is l…
In this work we study the quasilocal energy as in [11] for a constant radius surface in Kerr spacetime in Boyer-Lindquist coordinates. We show that under suitable conditions for isometric embedding, for a stationary observer the quasilocal energy defined in [11] for constant radius in a Kerr like spacetime is exactly equal to the Brown-York quasilocal energy [2]. By some careful estimations, we show that for a constant radius surface in the Kerr spacetime which is outside the ergosphere the embedding conditions for the previous result are satisfied. We discuss extremal solutions as described i…
In this article we study the innermost stable circular orbit (ISCO) of electrically charged particles in the electrically charged Reissner-Nordström spacetime, the Kerr-Newman spacetime and the Kerr-Sen spacetime. We find that the radius of the ISCO increases with an increasing particle-black hole charge product $|qQ|$ in the case of attractive Coulomb interaction $qQ<0$. For repulsive Coulomb interaction, the ISCO radius first decreases to a minimum and then increases again, until it diverges as the charge product approaches one. If the charge $Q$ of the black hole is very small, the minimum …
We determine all spacetime flows which lead to a Hamiltonian dynamics in the space of general relativistic initial data sets with asymptotically Kerr-de Sitter ends. The corresponding Hamiltonians are calculated. Some implications for black-hole thermodynamics are pointed out.
We show that the~braneworld rotating Kerr--Newman black hole and naked singularity spacetimes with both positive and negative braneworld tidal charge parameter can be separated into fourteen classes according to properties of circular geodesics governing the~Keplerian accretion. We determine efficiency of the~Keplerian accretion disks for all braneworld Kerr--Newman spacetimes. We demonstrate occurrence of an~infinitely deep gravitational potential in Kerr--Newman naked singularity spacetimes having the~braneworld dimensionless tidal charge $b \in (1/4,1)$ and the~dimensionless spin $a \in (2\…
In this paper, we investigate Hawking radiation of massive spin-1 particles from 5-dimensional Kerr-Gödel spacetime. By applying the WKB approximation and the Hamilton-Jacobi ansatz to the relativistic Proca equation, we obtain the quantum tunneling rate of the massive vector particles. Using the obtained tunneling rate, we show how one impeccably computes the Hawking temperature of the 5-dimensional Kerr-Gödel spacetime.
Gaussian curvature of the two-surface r=0, t=const is calculated for the Kerr-de Sitter and Kerr-Newman-de Sitter solutions, yielding non-zero analytical expressions for both the cases. The results obtained, on the one hand, exclude the possibility for that surface to be a disk and, on the other hand, permit one to establish a correct geometrical interpretation of that surface for each of the two solutions.
We find a new class of exact solutions in the Einstein-Maxwell theory by employing the Ernst magnetization process to the Kerr-Newman-Taub-NUT spacetimes. We study the solutions and find that they are regular everywhere. We also find the quasilocal conserved quantities for the spacetimes, the corresponding Smarr formula and the first law of thermodynamics.
The causal properties of the family of Kerr-de Sitter spacetimes are analyzed and compared to those of the Kerr family. At first we show that a Kerr-de Sitter spacetime can be viewed as an assembly of Carter's blocks i.e. four dimensional spacetime regions contained within Killing horizons or a Killing horizon and the asymptotic de Sitter region. From this perspective and leaving aside topological identifications, the causal properties of a Kerr de Sitter spacetime are determined by the causal properties of the individual Carter's blocks viewed as spacetimes in their own right. We show that an…
We analyze the stability of circular geodesics for timelike as well as null geodesics of the Kerr BH spacetime with rotation parameter on the equatorial plane by Lyapunov stability analysis. Also, we verify the results of stability by presenting the phase portrait for both timelike and null geodesics. Further, by reviewing the Kosambi-Cartan-Chern (KCC) theory, we analyze the Jacobi stability for Kerr spacetime and present a comparative study of the methods used for stability analysis of geodesics.
The second-order post-Newtonian solution for the light propagation in the field of Kerr-Newman black hole is achieved via an iterative method. Based on this result, we further obtain the second-order post-Newtonian light deflection in Kerr-Newman spacetime, which is formulated in an united form for any arbitrarily incident directions. All results are exhibited in the coordinate system constituted by the initial light-direction vector, the impact vector, and their cross-product.
We study the absorption probability and Hawking radiation spectra of a phantom scalar field in the Kerr black hole spacetime. We find that the presence of the negative kinetic energy terms modifies the standard results in the greybody factor, super-radiance and Hawking radiation. Comparing with the usual scalar particle, the phantom scalar emission is enhanced in the black hole spacetime.
It was recently discovered that Killing horizons in the generic Kerr-NUT-(anti) de Sitter spacetimes are projectively singular, i.e. their spaces of the null generators have singular geometry. Only if the cosmological constant takes the special value determined by the Kerr and NUT parameters, and the radius of the horizon, then the corresponding horizon does not suffer that problem. In the current paper, the projectively non-singular horizons are investigated. They are found to be cosmological and non-extremal. Every projectively non-singular horizon can be used to define a global completion o…
We generalize to Kerr spacetime previous gravitational self-force results on gyroscope precession along circular orbits in the Schwarzschild spacetime. In particular we present high order post- Newtonian expansions for the gauge invariant precession function along circular geodesics valid for arbitrary Kerr spin parameter and show agreement between these results and those derived from the full post-Newtonian conservative dynamics. Finally we present strong field numerical data for a range of the Kerr spin parameter, showing agreement with the GSF-PN results, and the expected lightring divergen…
We describe the hyperboloidal compactification for Teukolsky equations in Kerr spacetime. We include null infinity on the numerical grid by attaching a hyperboloidal layer to a compact domain surrounding the rotating black hole and the orbit of an inspiralling point particle. This technique allows us to study, for the first time, gravitational waveforms from large- and extreme-mass-ratio inspirals in Kerr spacetime extracted at null infinity. Tests and comparisons of our results with previous calculations establish the accuracy and efficiency of the hyperboloidal layer method.
A radial deformation of the Kerr metric is studied which leads to the appearance of wormholes in certain cases. {\bf These wormholes can be thought of as being formed by two distinct but identical asymptotically non-flat spacetimes joined at the throat}. The status of energy conditions are discussed in details. The components of the energy-momentum tensor of the spacetime and its eigenvalues are explicitly given. It is shown that the resulting spacetime, represents a family of exact anisotropic fluid solutions.
We have investigated the acceleration of the unbound high energy particles moving along the rotation axis in the Kerr-Taub-NUT spacetime, and then study the dependence of the repulsive effects on the NUT charge for the particles in the spacetime. Whether the repulsive effects with the NUT charge become stronger depends on the Carter constant, the position and velocity of the particles themselves. We also present numerically the changes of the observable velocity and acceleration with the NUT charge for the unbound particles in the Kerr-Taub-NUT spacetime.
We study causal geodesics in the equatorial plane of the extremal Kerr-Taub-NUT spacetime, focusing on the Innermost Stable Circular Orbit (ISCO),and compare its behaviour with extant results for the ISCO in the extremal Kerr spacetime. Calculation of the radii of the direct ISCO, its Kepler frequency, and rotational velocity show that the ISCO coincides with the horizon in the exactly extremal situation. We also study geodesics in the strong {\it non}-extremal limit, i.e., in the limit of vanishing Kerr parameter (i.e., for Taub-NUT and massless Taub-NUT spacetimes as special cases of this sp…
We discuss the tension between the possible existence of Painleve-Gullstrand coordinate systems versus the explicit geometrical features of the Kerr spacetime; a subject of interest to Professor Thanu Padmanabhan in the weeks immediately preceding his unexpected death. We shall carefully distinguish strong and weak Painleve-Gullstrand coordinate systems, and conformal variants thereof, cataloguing what we know can and cannot be done -- sometimes we can make explicit global statements, sometimes we must resort to implicit local statements. For the Kerr spacetime the best that seems to be achiev…
We analyze the behavior of causal geodesics on a Kerr-de Sitter spacetime with particular emphasis on their completeness property. We set up an initial value problem (IVP) whose solutions lead to a global understanding of causal geodesics on these spacetime. Causal geodesics that avoid the rotation axis are complete except the ones that hit the ring-like curvature singularity and those that encounter the ring singularity are necessary equatorial ones. We also show the existence of geodesics that cross or lie on the rotation axis. The equations governing the latter family show the repulsive nat…
General relativistic tidal equations are formulated with respect to the rest frame of a central gravitational source described by the Kerr gravitational field. Specifically, observers that are spatially at rest in the exterior Kerr spacetime are considered in detail; in effect, these fiducial observers define the rest frame of the Kerr source. The generalized Jacobi equation for the free motion of a test particle is worked out within the Fermi coordinate system established along the world line of a fiducial observer at rest on the symmetry axis of the exterior Kerr background. The nature of th…
We present a novel solution obeying classical equation of motion in the low energy limit of heterotic string theory. The solution represents a rotating mass with electric charge and gravitomagnetic monopole moment. The corresponding conserved charges are discussed. We also study the test body circular equatorial motions in the spacetime.
A three-dimensional light-like foliation of a spacetime geometry is one particular way of studying its light cone structure and has important applications in numerical relativity. In this paper, we execute such a foliation for the Kerr-Newman-AdS black hole geometry and compare it with the lightlike foliations of the Kerr-AdS and Kerr-Newman black holes. We derive the equations that govern this slicing and study their properties. In particular, we find that these null hypersurfaces develop caustics inside the inner horizon of the Kerr-Newman-AdS black hole, in strong contrast to the Kerr-AdS c…
We describe the construction of a geometric invariant characterising initial data for the Kerr-Newman spacetime. This geometric invariant vanishes if and only if the initial data set corresponds to exact Kerr-Newman initial data, and so characterises this type of data. We first illustrate the characterisation of the Kerr-Newman spacetime in terms of Killing spinors. The space spinor formalism is then used to obtain a set of four independent conditions on an initial Cauchy hypersurface that guarantee the existence of a Killing spinor on the development of the initial data. Following a similar a…
Discussion of the equatorial photon motion in Kerr-Newman black-hole and naked-singularity spacetimes with a non-zero cosmological constant is presented. Both repulsive and attractive cosmological constants are considered. Circular photon orbits are determined, and their stability is established. The spacetimes are divided into separated classes according to the properties of the `effective potential'. There is a special class of Kerr-Newman-de Sitter black-hole spacetimes with so-called `restricted repulsive barrier'. Further, the azimuthal motion is discussed and photon trajectories are give…
We present two complex scalar gauge invariants for perturbations of the Kerr spacetime defined covariantly in terms of the Killing vectors and the conformal Killing-Yano tensor of the background together with the linearized curvature and its first derivatives. These invariants are in particular sensitive to variations of the Kerr parameters. Together with the Teukolsky scalars and the linearized Ricci tensor they form a minimal set that generates all local gauge invariants. We also present curvature invariants that reduce to the gauge invariants in linearized theory.
In this paper we have applied the generalized Kerr-Schild transformation finding a new family of stationary perfect-fluid solutions of the Einstein field equations. The procedure used combines some well-known techniques of null and timelike vector fields, from which some properties of the solutions are studied in a coordinate-free way. These spacetimes are algebraically special being their Petrov types II and D. This family includes all the classical vacuum Kerr-Schild spacetimes, excepting the plane-fronted gravitational waves, and some other interesting solutions as, for instance, the Kerr m…
In this work, we study the relation of the eikonal quasinormal modes (EQNMs) and the unstable fundamental photon orbits (UFPOs) in the Kerr-Newman spacetime. We find that in the eikonal limit the gravitational and electromagnetic perturbations of the Kerr-Newman black hole are naturally decoupled, and a single one-dimensional Schrödinger-like equation encoding the QNM spectrum can be derived. We then show that the decoupled Teukolsky master equation and the Klein-Gordon equation for the massless scalar field in the Kerr-Newman spacetime are of the same form in the eikonal limit. As a direct co…
In the context of the teleparallel equivalent of general relativity, we obtain the tetrad and the torsion fields of the stationary axisymmetric Kerr spacetime. It is shown that, in the slow rotation and weak field approximations, the axial-vector torsion plays the role of the gravitomagnetic component of the gravitational field, and is thus the responsible for the Lense-Thirring effect.
Astrometric observations of S-stars provide a unique opportunity to probe the nature of Sagittarius-A* (Sgr-A*). In view of this, it has become important to understand the nature and behavior of timelike bound trajectories of particles around a massive central object. It is known now that whereas the Schwarzschild black hole does not allow the negative precession for the S-stars, the naked singularity spacetimes can admit the positive as well as negative precession for the bound timelike orbits. In this context, we study the perihelion precession of a test particle in the Kerr spacetime geomet…
We present our derivations for Kerr-deSitter metric in a proper comoving coordinate system.It asymptotically approaches to the deSitter metric in Robertson-walker form.This has been done by considring the stationary axially-symmetric spacetime in which motion of particle is integrable.That is the Hamilton-Jacobi and Klein-Gordon equations are separable.In this form it is asymptotically consistent with comoving frame.
We present a generic criterion which can be used in gravitational-wave data analysis to distinguish an extreme-mass-ratio inspiral into a Kerr background spacetime from one into a non-Kerr background spacetime. The criterion exploits the fact that when an integrable system, such as the system that describes geodesic orbits in a Kerr spacetime, is perturbed, the tori in phase space which initially corresponded to resonances disintegrate so as to form the so called Birkhoff chains on a surface of section, according to the Poincaré-Birkhoff theorem. The KAM curves of these islands in such a chain…
In this communication we discuss two distinct Zeeman-type gravitomagnetic effects deserving attention since they can be easily characterized in their exact form, not via approximation procedures. Some observations are also made on gravitoelectric effects.
For many purposes, a three-dimensional foliation of spacetime is more advantageous to understanding its light cone structure. We derive the equations describing such foliations for the Kerr geometry with non-zero cosmological constant, and show that they reduce to null hypersurfaces in vacuum (anti-)de Sitter spacetime in the limit of zero mass. Furthermore, we find that these null hypersurfaces are free of caustics everywhere for $r>0$. Our construction has applications in numerical studies of rotating black holes, and in defining Kruskal coordinates for rotating black holes with non-zero cos…
Initial data for black hole collisions are commonly generated using the Bowen-York approach based on conformally flat 3-geometries. The standard (constant Boyer-Lindquist time) spatial slices of the Kerr spacetime are not conformally flat, so that use of the Bowen-York approach is limited in dealing with rotating holes. We investigate here whether there exist foliations of the Kerr spacetime that are conformally flat. We limit our considerations to foliations that are axisymmetric and that smoothly reduce in the Schwarzschild limit to slices of constant Schwarzschild time. With these restricti…
We investigate the light propagation by means of simulations of wavefronts and light cones for Kerr spacetimes. Simulations of this kind give us a new insight to better understand the light propagation in presence of massive rotating black holes. A relevant result is that wavefronts are back scattered with winding around the black hole. To generate these visualizations, an interactive computer program with a graphical user interface, called JWFront, was written in Java.
We provide a classification of $Λ>0$-vacuum spacetimes which admit a Killing vector field with respect to which the associated "Mars-Simon tensor" (MST) vanishes and having a conformally flat $\mathcal{J}^-$ (or $\mathcal{J}^+$). To that end, we also give a complete classification of conformal Killing vector fields on the $3$-sphere $\mathbb{S}^3$ up to Möbius transformations shedding light on the two fundamental constants that characterize the family of Kerr-de Sitter-like spacetimes, which turn out to be well-defined geometrical invariants. The topology of $\mathcal{J}$ is determined in ever…
We present a novel formulation of the Kerr spacetime solution, based on the Lemaître coordinates. Such an approach allows one to avoid the coordinate singularities of the Boyer-Lindquist metric, thus offering the possibility to explore in some detail the Kerr physics near and beyond the event horizon, adopting the point of view of a freely falling observer, whose adapted tetrad is moreover proven to be Fermi-Walker transported. We use the Lemaître form of the Kerr metric discussing the motion of radial photons close to the Cauchy horizon, also showing that their behaviour fairly agrees with ot…
We derive the Teukolsky equation for perturbations of a Kerr spacetime when the spacetime metric is written in either ingoing or outgoing Kerr-Schild form. We also write explicit formulae for setting up the initial data for the Teukolsky equation in the time domain in terms of a three metric and an extrinsic curvature. The motivation of this work is to have in place a formalism to study the evolution in the ``close limit'' of two recently proposed solutions to the initial value problem in general relativity that are based on Kerr-Schild slicings. A perturbative formalism in horizon penetrating…
We describe a method to analyze causal geodesics in static and spherically symmetric spacetimes of Kerr-Schild form which, in particular, allows for a detailed study of the geodesics in the vicinity of the central singularity by means of a regularization procedure based on a generalization of the McGehee regularization for the motion of Newtonian point particles moving in a power-law potential. The McGehee regularization was used by Belbruno and Pretorius to perform a dynamical system regularization of the central singularity of the motion of massless test particles in the Schwarzschild spacet…
