31 August 2025 to 5 September 2025
Oberwölz, Austria
Europe/Vienna timezone

No black holes from light

5 Sept 2025, 17:00
45m
Kulturhaus

Kulturhaus

Stadt 15, Oberwölz
Talk Talks

Speaker

Dr Álvaro Álvarez Domínguez (Universidad Complutense de Madrid & IPARCOS)

Description

General Relativity theoretically allows the formation of black holes through the gravitational collapse of purely electromagnetic radiation. However, this scenario would involve electromagnetic strengths surpassing the critical Schwinger limit, resulting in the generation of electron-positron pairs. This quantum phenomenon counteracts the collapse, with the created particles scattering out of the collapsing region, carrying their energy. Here, we show that this dissipative effect alone is enough to prevent the formation of black holes from light in the non-classical regime.

Authors

Prof. Eduardo Martín-Martínez (University of Waterloo) Dr José Polo-Gómez (University of Waterloo) Prof. Luis J. Garay (Universidad Complutense de Madrid) Dr Álvaro Álvarez Domínguez (Universidad Complutense de Madrid & IPARCOS)

Presentation materials