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Phys. Rev. D 51, 5732–5741 (1995)

Microcanonical functional integral and entropy for eternal black holes

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Erik A. Martinez
Theoretical Physics Insitute, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada T6G 2J1

Received 19 December 1994; published in the issue dated 15 May 1995

The microcanonical functional integral for an eternal black hole system is considered. This requires computing the microcanonical action for a spatially bounded spacetime region when its two disconnected timelike boundary surfaces are located in different wedges of the Kruskal diagram. The path integral is a sum over Lorentzian geometries and is evaluated semiclassically when its boundary data are chosen such that the system is approximated by any Lorentzian, stationary, eternal black hole. This approach opens the possibility of including explicitly the internal degrees of freedom of a physical black hole in path integral descriptions of its thermodynamical properties. If the functional integral is interpreted as the density of states of the system, the corresponding entropy equals scrS=AH/4-AH/4=0 in the semiclassical approximation, where AH is the area of the black hole horizon. The functional integral reflects the properties of a pure state. The description of the black hole density of states in terms of the eternal black hole functional integral is also discussed.

© 1995 The American Physical Society

URL:
http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevD.51.5732
DOI:
10.1103/PhysRevD.51.5732
PACS:
04.70.Dy, 04.20.Cv, 97.60.Lf