Neeraj Kumar Mishra.

2020, 8:5 International Journal of Science,

ISSN (Online): 2348-4098 Engineering and Technology
ISSN (Print): 2395-4752
An Open Access Journal

A Study of Structure and Properties of Black Hole

Neeraj Kumar Mishra Priyanka Vaidya
Department of Physics, National Institute of Department of Physics, Magadh University, Bodh
Technology, Patna 800005, Bihar, India Gaya 824234, Bihar, India

‘’
Abstract- The structure of a black hole consists of Event horizon, Singularity, Photon sphere, Ergo sphere
and ISCO. Event horizon is a boundary in spacetime through which matter and light can pass only inward
towards the mass of the black hole. Gravitational singularity is a region where the spacetime curvature
becomes infinite. The photon sphere is a spherical boundary of zero thickness in which photons that
move on tangents to that sphere would be trapped in a circular orbit about the black hole. Rotating black
holes are surrounded by a region of spacetime in which it is impossible to stand still, called the
ergosphere. In general relativity there exist an innermost stable circular orbit (often called the ISCO)
inside of which any infinitesimal perturbations to a circular orbit will lead to inspiral into the black hole.
As far as properties of the black hole are concerned, a black hole has only three independent physical
properties: mass, charge, and angular momentum, the black hole is otherwise featureless.

Keywords- Event horizon, Singularity, Photon sphere, Ergo sphere, ISCO.

I. INTRODUCTION to its mass. This temperature is on the order of

Billionths of a kelvin for black holes of stellar mass,
making it essentially impossible to observe. Black
A black hole is a region of space-time where gravity
holes of stellar mass are expected to form when very
is so strong that nothing (no particles or even
massive stars collapse at the end of their life cycle.
electromagnetic radiation such as light) can escape
After a black hole has formed, it can continue to
from it. Albert Einstein first predicted the existence of
grow by absorbing mass from its surroundings. By
black holes in 1916, with his general theory of
absorbing other stars and merging with other black
relativity. The term black hole was coined many years
holes, supermassive black holes of millions of solar
later in 1967 by American astronomer John Wheeler.
masses (M☉) may form. There is consensus that
After decades of black holes being known only as
supermassive black holes exist in the centers of most
theoretical objects, the first physical black hole ever
galaxies.
discovered was spotted in 1971.

The presence of a black hole can be inferred through

The theory of general relativity predicts that a
its interaction with other matter and with
sufficiently compact mass can deform space time to
electromagnetic radiation such as visible light. Matter
form a black hole. The boundary of the region from
that falls onto a black hole can form an external
which no escape is possible is called the event
accretion disk heated by friction, forming quasars,
horizon. Although the event horizon has an
some of the brightest objects in the universe. Stars
enormous effect on the fate and circumstances of an
passing too close to a supermassive black hole can
object crossing it, according to general relativity it
be shred into streamers that shine very brightly
has no locally detectable features. In many ways, a
before being "swallowed." If there are other stars
black hole acts like an ideal black body, as it reflects
orbiting a black hole, their orbits can be used to
no light. Moreover, quantum field theory in curved
determine the black hole's mass and location. Such
space-time predicts that event horizons emit
observations can be used to exclude possible
Hawking radiation, with the same spectrum as a
alternatives such as neutron stars. In this way,
black body of a temperature inversely proportional
astronomers have identified numerous stellar black
hole candidates in binary systems, and established

© 2020 Neeraj Kumar Mishra. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License
([Link] which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, p rovided the
original work is properly credited.
Neeraj Kumar Mishra. International Journal of Science, Engineering and Technology, 2020, 8:5 International Journal of Science,
Engineering and Technology
An Open Access Journal

that the radio source known as Sagittarius A*, at the appear redder and dimmer, an effect known as
core of the Milky Way galaxy, contains a gravitational redshift. Eventually, the falling object
supermassive black hole of about 4.3 million solar fades away until it can no longer be seen. Typically
masses. this process happens very rapidly with an object
disappearing from view within less than a second.
II. STRUCTURE OF THE BLACK HOLE
On the other hand, indestructible observers falling
The structure of a black hole consists of Event into a black hole do not notice any of these effects as
horizon, Singularity, Photon sphere, Ergo sphere and they cross the event horizon. According to their own
ISCO. clocks, which appear to them to tick normally, they
cross the event horizon after a finite time without
noting any singular behaviour; in classical general
relativity, it is impossible to determine the location of
the event horizon from local observations, due to
Einstein's equivalence principle.

The topology of the event horizon of a black hole at

equilibrium is always spherical. For non-rotating
(static) black holes the geometry of the event
horizon is precisely spherical, while for rotating black
holes the event horizon is oblate.

Fig no. 1. Structure of the black hole. 2. Singularity

At the center of a black hole, as described by general
relativity, may lie a gravitational singularity, a region
1. Event horizon
where the spacetime curvature becomes infinite. For
The defining feature of a black hole is the
appearance of an event horizon—a boundary in a non-rotating black hole, this region takes the shape
spacetime through which matter and light can pass of a single point and for a rotating black hole, it is
smeared out to form a ring singularity that lies in the
only inward towards the mass of the black hole.
plane of rotation. In both cases, the singular region
Nothing, not even light, can escape from inside the
event horizon. The event horizon is referred to as has zero volume. It can also be shown that the
such because if an event occurs within the boundary, singular region contains all the mass of the black
hole solution. The singular region can thus be
information from that event cannot reach an outside
thought of as having infinite density.
observer, making it impossible to determine whether
such an event occurred.
Observers falling into a Schwarzschild black hole (i.e.,
As predicted by general relativity, the presence of a non-rotating and not charged) cannot avoid being
mass deforms spacetime in such a way that the paths carried into the singularity once they cross the event
horizon. They can prolong the experience by
taken by particles bend towards the mass. At the
accelerating away to slow their descent, but only up
event horizon of a black hole, this deformation
becomes so strong that there are no paths that lead to a limit. When they reach the singularity, they are
away from the black hole. crushed to infinite density and their mass is added to
the total of the black hole. Before that happens, they
will have been torn apart by the growing tidal forces
To a distant observer, clocks near a black hole would
in a process sometimes referred to as
appear to tick more slowly than those further away
from the black hole. Due to this effect, known as spaghettification or the "noodle effect".
gravitational time dilation, an object falling into a
In the case of a charged (Reissner–Nordström) or
black hole appears to slow as it approaches the
event horizon, taking an infinite time to reach it. At rotating (Kerr) black hole, it is possible to avoid the
the same time, all processes on this object slow singularity. Extending these solutions as far as
possible reveals the hypothetical possibility of exiting
down, from the view point of a fixed outside
observer, causing any light emitted by the object to the black hole into a different spacetime with the

Page 2 of 5
Neeraj Kumar Mishra. International Journal of Science, Engineering and Technology, 2020, 8:5 International Journal of Science,
Engineering and Technology
An Open Access Journal

black hole acting as a wormhole. The possibility of called the ergosphere. This is the result of a process
traveling to another universe is, however, only known as frame-dragging; general relativity predicts
theoretical since any perturbation would destroy this that any rotating mass will tend to slightly "drag"
possibility. It also appears to be possible to follow along the spacetime immediately surrounding it. Any
closed timelike curves (returning to one's own past) object near the rotating mass will tend to start
around the Kerr singularity, which leads to problems moving in the direction of rotation. For a rotating
with causality like the grandfather paradox. It is black hole, this effect is so strong near the event
expected that none of these peculiar effects would horizon that an object would have to move faster
survive in a proper quantum treatment of rotating than the speed of light in the opposite direction to
and charged black holes. just stand still.

The appearance of singularities in general relativity is The ergosphere of a black hole is a volume whose
commonly perceived as signaling the breakdown of inner boundary is the black hole's event horizon and
the theory. This breakdown, however, is expected; it an outer boundary called the ergo surface, which
occurs in a situation where quantum effects should coincides with the event horizon at the poles but
describe these actions, due to the extremely high noticeably wider around the equator. Objects and
density and therefore particle interactions. To date, it radiation can escape normally from the ergosphere.
has not been possible to combine quantum and Through the Penrose process, objects can emerge
gravitational effects into a single theory, although from the ergosphere with more energy than they
there exist attempts to formulate such a theory of entered with. The extra energy is taken from the
quantum gravity. It is generally expected that such a rotational energy of the black hole. Thereby the
theory will not feature any singularities. rotation of the black hole slows down. A variation of
the Penrose process in the presence of strong
3. Photon sphere magnetic fields, the Blandford Znajek process is
The photon sphere is a spherical boundary of zero considered a likely mechanism for the enormous
thickness in which photons that move on tangents to luminosity and relativistic jets of quasars and other
that sphere would be trapped in a circular orbit active galactic nuclei.
about the black hole. For non-rotating black holes,
the photon sphere has a radius 1.5 times the 5. Innermost stable circular orbit (ISCO)
Schwarzschild radius. Their orbits would be In Newtonian gravity, test particles can stably orbit at
dynamically unstable, hence any small perturbation, arbitrary distances from a central object. In general
such as a particle of infalling matter, would cause an relativity, however, there exists an innermost stable
instability that would grow over time, either setting circular orbit (often called the ISCO), inside of which,
the photon on an outward trajectory causing it to any infinitesimal perturbations to a circular orbit will
escape the black hole, or on an inward spiral where it lead to inspiral into the black hole. The location of
would eventually cross the event horizon. the ISCO depends on the spin of the black hole, in
the case of a Schwarzschild black hole (spin zero)
While light can still escape from the photon sphere, and decreases with increasing black hole spin for
any light that crosses the photon sphere on an particles orbiting in the same direction as the spin.
inbound trajectory will be captured by the black hole.
Hence any light that reaches an outside observer III. PROPERTIES OF BLACK HOLE
from the photon sphere must have been emitted by
objects between the photon sphere and the event The no-hair conjecture postulates that, once it
horizon. For a Kerr black hole the radius of the achieves a stable condition after formation, a black
photon sphere depends on the spin parameter and hole has only three independent physical properties:
on the details of the photon orbit, which can be mass, charge, and angular momentum; the black
prograde (the photon rotates in the same sense of hole is otherwise featureless. If the conjecture is true,
the black hole spin) or retrograde. any two black holes that share the same values for
these properties, or parameters, are indistinguishable
4. Ergosphere from one another. The degree, to which the
Rotating black holes are surrounded by a region of conjecture is true for real black holes under the laws
spacetime in which it is impossible to stand still, of modern physics, is currently an unsolved problem.

Page 3 of 5
Neeraj Kumar Mishra. International Journal of Science, Engineering and Technology, 2020, 8:5 International Journal of Science,
Engineering and Technology
An Open Access Journal

These properties are special because they are visible Solutions describing more general black holes also
from outside a black hole. For example, a charged exist. Non-rotating charged black holes are
black hole repels other like charges just like any described by the Reissner–Nordström metric, while
other charged object. Similarly, the total mass inside the Kerr metric describes a non-charged rotating
a sphere containing a black hole can be found by black hole. The most general stationary black hole
using the gravitational analog of Gauss's law solution known is the Kerr–Newman metric, which
(through the ADM mass), far away from the black describes a black hole with both charge and angular
hole. Likewise, the angular momentum (or spin) can momentum.
be measured from far away using frame dragging by
the gravitomagnetic field, through for example the While the mass of a black hole can take any positive
Lense-Thirring effect. value, the charge and angular momentum are
constrained by the mass. In Planck units, the total
When an object falls into a black hole, any electric charge Q and the total angular momentum J
information about the shape of the object or are expected to satisfy for a black hole of mass M.
distribution of charge on it is evenly distributed Black holes with the minimum possible mass
along the horizon of the black hole, and is lost to satisfying this inequality are called extremal.
outside observers. The behavior of the horizon in this Solutions of Einstein's equations that violate this
situation is a dissipative system that is closely inequality exist, but they do not possess an event
analogous to that of a conductive stretchy horizon. These solutions have so-called naked
membrane with friction and electrical resistance—the singularities that can be observed from the outside,
membrane paradigm. This is different from other and hence are deemed unphysical. The cosmic
field theories such as electromagnetism, which do censorship hypothesis rules out the formation of
not have any friction or resistivity at the microscopic such singularities, when they are created through the
level, because they are time-reversible. Because a gravitational collapse of realistic matter. This is
black hole eventually achieves a stable state with supported by numerical simulations.
only three parameters, there is no way to avoid
losing information about the initial conditions: the Due to the relatively large strength of the
gravitational and electric fields of a black hole give electromagnetic force, black holes forming from the
very little information about what went in. The collapse of stars are expected to retain the nearly
information that is lost includes every quantity that neutral charge of the star. Rotation, however, is
cannot be measured far away from the black hole expected to be a universal feature of compact
horizon, including approximately conserved quantum astrophysical objects. The black-hole candidate
numbers such as the total baryon number and lepton binary X-ray source GRS 1915+105 appears to have
number. This behavior is so puzzling that it has been an angular momentum near the maximum allowed
called the black hole information loss paradox. value. That uncharged limit is allowing definition of a
dimensionless spin parameter such that Black holes
The simplest static black holes have mass but neither are commonly classified according to their mass,
electric charge nor angular momentum. These black independent of angular momentum, J. The size of a
holes are often referred to as Schwarzschild black black hole, as determined by the radius of the event
holes after Karl Schwarzschild who discovered this horizon, or Schwarzschild radius, is proportional to
solution in 1916. According to Birkhoff's theorem, it the mass, M, through where rs is the Schwarzschild
is the only vacuum solution that is spherically radius and MSun is the mass of the Sun. For a black
symmetric. This means there is no observable hole with nonzero spin and/or electric charge, the
difference at a distance between the gravitational radius is smaller until an extremal black hole could
field of such a black hole and that of any other have an event horizon close to it.
spherical object of the same mass. The popular
notion of a black hole "sucking in everything" in its IV. CONCLUSION
surroundings is therefore correct only near a black
hole's horizon; far away, the external gravitational Because a black hole has only a few internal
field is identical to that of any other body of the parameters, most of the information about the
same mass. matter that went into forming the black hole is lost.
Regardless of the type of matter which goes into a

Page 4 of 5
 Neeraj Kumar Mishra. International Journal of Science, Engineering and Technology, 2020, 8:5 International Journal of Science,
Engineering and Technology
An Open Access Journal

black hole, it appears that only information [10] Carroll, Sean M. (2004). Spacetime and
concerning the total mass, charge, and angular Geometry. Addison Wesley.
momentum are conserved. As long as black holes [11] Carter, B. (1973). "Black hole equilibrium
were thought to persist forever this information loss states". In DeWitt, B. S.; DeWitt, C. (eds.).
is not that problematic, as the information can be [12] Chandrasekhar, Subrahmanyan (1999).
thought of as existing inside the black hole, Mathematical Theory of Black Holes. Oxford
inaccessible from the outside, but represented on the University Press.
event horizon in accordance with the holographic [13] Frolov, V. P.; Novikov, I. D. (1998). "Black hole
principle. However, black holes slowly evaporate by physics".
emitting Hawking radiation. This radiation does not [14] Frolov, Valeri P.; Zelnikov, Andrei (2011).
appear to carry any additional information about the Introduction to Black Hole Physics. Oxford:
matter that formed the black hole, meaning that this Oxford University Press.
information appears to be gone forever. [15] Hawking, S. W.; Ellis, G. F. R. (1973). Large Scale
Structure of space time. Cambridge University
The question whether information is truly lost in Press.
black holes (the black hole information paradox) has [16] Melia, Fulvio (2007). The Galactic Supermassive
divided the theoretical physics community. In Black Hole. Princeton U Press.
quantum mechanics, loss of information corresponds [17] Misner, Charles; Thorne, Kip S.; Wheeler, John
to the violation of a property called unitarity, and it (1973). Gravitation. W. H. Freeman and
has been argued that loss of unitarity would also Company.
imply violation of conservation of energy, though [18] Taylor, Edwin F.; Wheeler, John Archibald
this has also been disputed. Over recent years (2000). Exploring Black Holes. Addison Wesley
evidence has been building that indeed information Longman.
and unitarity are preserved in a full quantum [19] Wald, Robert M. (1984). General Relativity.
gravitational treatment of the problem. University of Chicago Press.
[20] Wald, Robert M. (1992). Space, Time, and
REFERENCES Gravity: The Theory of the Big Bang and Black
Holes. University of Chicago Press.
[1] Ferguson, Kitty (1991). Black Holes in Space-Time. [21] Price, Richard; Creighton, Teviet (2008). "Black
Watts Franklin. holes". Scholarpedia. 3 (1): 4277.
[2] Hawking, Stephen (1988). A Brief History of Time.
Bantam Books, Inc.
[3] Hawking, Stephen; Penrose, Roger (1996). The
Nature of Space and Time. Princeton University
Press.
[4] Melia, Fulvio (2003). The Black Hole at the Center
of Our Galaxy. Princeton U Press.
[5] Melia, Fulvio (2003). The Edge of Infinity.
Supermassive Black Holes in the Universe.
Cambridge U Press.
[6] Pickover, Clifford (1998). Black Holes: A Traveler's
Guide. Wiley, John & Sons, Inc.
[7] Thorne, Kip S. (1994). Black Holes and Time
Warps. Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc. ISBN 978-
0-393-31276-8.
[8] Susskind, Leonard (2008). The Black Hole War: My
Battle with Stephen Hawking to Make the World
Safe for Quantum Mechanics. Little, Brown and
Company.
[9] Wheeler, J. Craig (2007). Cosmic Catastrophes
(2nd ed.). Cambridge University Press.

Page 5 of 5