Black Hole 'Firewalls' Pits Einstein's Theory Against Quantum Mechanics

Can anything escape black holes? In a new study by scientists from around the world, including the University of Alberta and Kyoto University, there is an attempt to answer the question by examining black hole "firewalls."

These refer to the barriers in black holes, which can immediately incinerate anything that falls into them.

The issue over black hole firewalls is that they do not fit with the earlier black hole theories. To describe a black hole, Einstein's theory of general relativity as well as quantum mechanics are required. Both theories conflict with each other, even as the firewall theory pits both the opposing theories against each another.

Raphael Bousso, a string theorist, said in 2013 that the black hole firewall "shakes the foundations of what most of us believed about black holes. It essentially pits quantum mechanics against general relativity, without giving us any clues as to which direction to go next."

Even as quantum mechanics suggests that black hole firewalls exist, they violate Einstein's theory of relativity. Einstein's theory says that free-falling in a black hole is like floating in empty space. But how would that be possible if the object going through it gets incinerated?

Scientists posit in a new theory that firewalls, if they exist, are not limited to just one place inside them. But they have the ability to go beyond their edges into areas that can be seen outside the black hole.

"If a firewall exists, not only would an in-falling object be destroyed by it, but the destruction could be visible, even from the outside," said  Misao Sasaki, a researcher from Kyoto University and co-author of the paper.

However, currently, research on their existence is not conclusive.

The findings were published on April 7, 2016 on the pre-print server.