Holographic Dual of Extended Black Hole Thermodynamics.

By respecting the conformal symmetry of the dual conformal field theory, and treating the conformal factor of the Anti-de Sitter boundary as a thermodynamic parameter, we formulate the holographic first law that is exactly dual to the first law of extended black hole thermodynamics with variable cosmological constant but fixed Newton's constant.

Thermodynamics of AdS Black Holes: Critical Behavior of the Central Charge.

We reconsider the thermodynamics of anti-de Sitter black holes in the context of gauge-gravity duality. In this new setting, where both the cosmological constant Λ and the gravitational Newton's constant G are varied in the bulk, we rewrite the first law in a new form containing both Λ (associated with thermodynamic pressure) and the central charge C of the dual conformal field theory and their conjugate variables. We obtain a novel thermodynamic volume, in turn leading to a new understanding of the Van der Waals behavior of charged anti-de Sitter black holes in which phase changes are governed by the degrees of freedom in the conformal field theory. Compared to the "old" P-V criticality, this new criticality is "universal" (independent of the bulk pressure) and directly relates to the thermodynamics of the dual field theory and its central charge.

Massive Vector Fields in Rotating Black-Hole Spacetimes: Separability and Quasinormal Modes.

We demonstrate the separability of the massive vector (Proca) field equation in general Kerr-NUT-AdS black-hole spacetimes in any number of dimensions, filling a long-standing gap in the literature. The obtained separated equations are studied in more detail for the four-dimensional Kerr geometry and the corresponding quasinormal modes are calculated. Two of the three independent polarizations of the Proca field are shown to emerge from the separation ansatz and the results are found in an excellent agreement with those of the recent numerical study where the full coupled partial differential equations were tackled without using the separability property.

Black holes, hidden symmetries, and complete integrability.

The study of higher-dimensional black holes is a subject which has recently attracted vast interest. Perhaps one of the most surprising discoveries is a realization that the properties of higher-dimensional black holes with the spherical horizon topology and described by the Kerr-NUT-(A)dS metrics are very similar to the properties of the well known four-dimensional Kerr metric. This remarkable result stems from the existence of a single object called the principal tensor. In our review we discuss explicit and hidden symmetries of higher-dimensional Kerr-NUT-(A)dS black hole spacetimes. We start with discussion of the Killing and Killing-Yano objects representing explicit and hidden symmetries. We demonstrate that the principal tensor can be used as a "seed object" which generates all these symmetries. It determines the form of the geometry, as well as guarantees its remarkable properties, such as special algebraic type of the spacetime, complete integrability of geodesic motion, and separability of the Hamilton-Jacobi, Klein-Gordon, and Dirac equations. The review also contains a discussion of different applications of the developed formalism and its possible generalizations.

Thermodynamics of Accelerating Black Holes.

We address a long-standing problem of describing the thermodynamics of an accelerating black hole. We derive a standard first law of black hole thermodynamics, with the usual identification of entropy proportional to the area of the event horizon-even though the event horizon contains a conical singularity. This result not only extends the applicability of black hole thermodynamics to realms previously not anticipated, it also opens a possibility for studying novel properties of an important class of exact radiative solutions of Einstein equations describing accelerated objects. We discuss the thermodynamic volume, stability, and phase structure of these black holes.

Entropy Inequality Violations from Ultraspinning Black Holes.

We construct a new class of rotating anti-de Sitter (AdS) black hole solutions with noncompact event horizons of finite area in any dimension and study their thermodynamics. In four dimensions these black holes are solutions to gauged supergravity. We find that their entropy exceeds the maximum implied from the conjectured reverse isoperimetric inequality, which states that for a given thermodynamic volume, the black hole entropy is maximized for Schwarzschild-AdS space. We use this result to suggest more stringent conditions under which this conjecture may hold.

Integrability of spinning particle motion in higher-dimensional rotating black hole spacetimes.

We study the motion of a classical spinning particle (with spin degrees of freedom described by a vector of Grassmann variables) in higher-dimensional general rotating black hole spacetimes with a cosmological constant. In all dimensions n we exhibit n bosonic functionally independent integrals of spinning particle motion, corresponding to explicit and hidden symmetries generated from the principal conformal Killing-Yano tensor. Moreover, we demonstrate that in 4-, 5-, 6-, and 7-dimensional black hole spacetimes such integrals are in involution, proving the bosonic part of the motion integrable. We conjecture that the same conclusion remains valid in all higher dimensions. Our result generalizes the result of Page et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 98, 061102 (2007)] on complete integrability of geodesic motion in these spacetimes.

Hidden symmetries of higher-dimensional rotating black holes.

We demonstrate that the rotating black holes in an arbitrary number of dimensions and without any restrictions on their rotation parameters possess the same hidden symmetry as the four-dimensional Kerr metric. Namely, besides the spacetime symmetries generated by the Killing vectors they also admit the (antisymmetric) Killing-Yano and symmetric Killing tensors.

Complete integrability of geodesic motion in general higher-dimensional rotating black-hole spacetimes.

We explicitly exhibit n-1=[D/2]-1 constants of motion for geodesics in the general D-dimensional Kerr-NUT-AdS rotating black hole spacetime, arising from contractions of even powers of the 2-form obtained by contracting the geodesic velocity with the dual of the contraction of the velocity with the (D-2)-dimensional Killing-Yano tensor. These constants of motion are functionally independent of each other and of the D-n+1 constants of motion that arise from the metric and the D-n=[(D+1)/2] Killing vectors, making a total of D independent constants of motion in all dimensions D. The Poisson brackets of all pairs of these D constants are zero, so geodesic motion in these spacetimes is completely integrable.