TASI lectures on black holes in string theory
Amanda W. Peet
TL;DR
<3-5 sentence high-level summary>Peet surveys black holes in string theory, building a bridge between classical GR and brane constructions by using harmonic-function solutions, dualities, and D-brane microstate counting to reproduce Bekenstein–Hawking entropy for BPS black holes (notably the Strominger–Vafa result). The work develops the black hole–string correspondence, analyzes when supergravity breaks down and how string/brane degrees of freedom take over, and extends to non-extremal cases with Hawking radiation and universal absorption cross-sections. It also demonstrates the BTZ connection in near-horizon geometries and highlights the holographic underpinnings via AdS/CFT-type ideas, illustrating a coherent framework where gravity and gauge theories describe the same microscopic physics. Overall, the lectures underscore entropy counting, information retention, and the unifying power of brane dynamics for understanding black hole thermodynamics in string theory.
Abstract
This is a write-up of introductory lectures on black holes in string theory given at TASI-99. Topics discussed include: Black holes, thermodynamics and the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy, the information problem; supergravity actions, conserved quantum numbers, supersymmetry and BPS states, units and duality, dimensional reduction, solution-generating; extremal M-branes and D-branes, smearing, probe actions, nonextremal branes, the Gregory-Laflamme instability; breakdown of supergravity and the Correspondence Principle, limits in parameter space, singularity resolution; making black holes with branes, intersection-ology, explicit d=5,4 examples; string/brane computations of extremal black hole entropy in d=5,4, rotation, fractionation; non-extremality and entropy, the link to BTZ black holes, Hawking radiation and absorption cross-sections in the string/brane and supergravity pictures.