Massive spin-2 fields on black hole spacetimes: Instability of the Schwarzschild and Kerr solutions and bounds on the graviton mass

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Massive bosonic fields of arbitrary spin are predicted by general extensions of the standard model. It has been recently shown that there exists a family of bimetric theories of gravity-including massive gravity-which are free of Boulware-Deser ghosts at the nonlinear level. This opens up the possibility to describe consistently the dynamics of massive spin-2 particles in a gravitational field. Within this context, we develop the study of massive spin-2 fluctuations-including massive gravitons-around Schwarzschild and slowly rotating Kerr black holes. Our work has two important outcomes. First, we show that the Schwarzschild geometry is linearly unstable for small tensor masses, against a spherically symmetric mode. Second, we provide solid evidence that the Kerr geometry is also generically unstable, both against the spherical mode and against long-lived superradiant modes. In the absence of nonlinear effects, the observation of spinning black holes bounds the graviton mass mu to be mu less than or similar to 5 x 10(-23) eV.

Original languageEnglish
Article number023514
JournalPhysical Review D
Volume88
Issue number2
Number of pages24
ISSN1550-7998
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 10 Jul 2013
Externally publishedYes

    Research areas

  • QUASI-NORMAL MODES, EQUATIONS, GRAVITATION, PERTURBATIONS, RADIATION

ID: 300164535