Asymptotic black hole quasinormal frequencies

Abstract

We give a new derivation of the quasinormal frequencies of Schwarzschild black holes in d>=4 and Reissner-Nordstrom black holes in d=4, in the limit of infinite damping. For Schwarzschild in d>=4 we find that the asymptotic real part is T_Hawking.log(3) for scalar perturbations and for some gravitational perturbations; this confirms a result previously obtained by other means in the case d=4. For Reissner-Nordstrom in d=4 we find a specific generally aperiodic behavior for the quasinormal frequencies, both for scalar perturbations and for electromagnetic-gravitational perturbations. The formulae are obtained by studying the monodromy of the perturbation analytically continued to the complex plane; the analysis depends essentially on the behavior of the potential in the "unphysical" region near the black hole singularity.