Dive into a mind-bending exploration of the physics of black holes Black holes, predicted by Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity more than a century ago, have long intrigued scientists and the public with their bizarre and fantastical properties. Although Einstein understood that black holes were mathematical solutions to his equations, he never accepted their physical reality—a viewpoint many shared. This all changed in the 1960s and 1970s, when a deeper conceptual understanding of black holes developed just as new observations revealed the existence of quasars and X-ray binary star systems, whose mysterious properties could be explained by the presence of black holes. Black holes have since been the subject of intense research—and the physics governing how they behave and affect their surroundings is stranger and more mind-bending than any fiction. After introducing the basics of the special and general theories of relativity, this book describes black holes both as astrophysical objects and theoretical “laboratories” in which physicists can test their understanding of gravitational, quantum, and thermal physics. From Schwarzschild black holes to rotating and colliding black holes, and from gravitational radiation to Hawking radiation and information loss, Steven Gubser and Frans Pretorius use creative thought experiments and analogies to explain their subject accessibly. They also describe the decades-long quest to observe the universe in gravitational waves, which recently resulted in the LIGO observatories’ detection of the distinctive gravitational wave “chirp” of two colliding black holes—the first direct observation of black holes’ existence. The Little Book of Black Holes takes readers deep into the mysterious heart of the subject, offering rare clarity of insight into the physics that makes black holes simple yet destructive manifestations of geometric destiny.
About the Author
Steven Scott Gubser (May 4, 1972 – August 3, 2019) was a professor of physics at Princeton University.His research focused on theoretical particle physics, especially string theory, and the AdS/CFT correspondence. He was a widely cited scholar in these and other related areas.Gubser did foundational work in the AdS/CFT correspondence as a graduate student. In particular, his 1998 paper Gauge Theory Correlators from Non-Critical String Theory with his advisor Igor Klebanov and another Princeton physics professor Alexander Markovich Polyakov, made a precise statement of the AdS/CFT duality. It is one of the all-time top cited papers in theoretical high-energy physics, and is commonly known, along with Edward Witten's 1998 work Anti De Sitter Space And Holography, as the GKPW dictionary. After receiving a Ph.D. in 1998 from Princeton, Gubser became a Junior Fellow at Harvard University before taking a position as an assistant professor at Princeton. In 2001, he moved to the California Institute of Technology but returned to Princeton in 2002.
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