Static Dark Fluid Thin Shells in Schwarzschild-de Sitter Spacetimes: Stability and Black Hole Shadows
We study the existence and radial stability of static, spherically symmetric thin shells joining two Schwarzschild-de Sitter (SdS) spacetimes $(m_\pm,Λ_\pm)$. Near the equilibrium radius $R_0$ the shell's surface density $σ$ and pressure $p$ obey the linearized barotropic law $p=p_0+c_s^2(σ-σ_0)$, with sound speed $c_s^2=λc^2$. Since $c_s^2$ is independent of the equilibrium ratio $w_0\equiv p_0/(σ_0 c^2)$, tension shells ($w_0<0$) stay radially stable with real $c_s$. Fixing $Λ_+$ so that its vacuum energy density equals the critical density (Planck~2018), and taking $m_-$ representative of astrophysical black holes, we systematically map the stable equilibria $(R_0,σ_0)$ over $(m_\pm,Λ_\pm,λ,w_0)$ and find that stable shells with $σ_0>0$ and $0<λ\leq 1$ exist only for $m_+/m_->1$, at three scales---the photon sphere, the SdS static radius, and the cosmological horizon. At $λ=1$ the numerical windows, checked against the analytic test-shell bounds, are $(1-\sqrt{13})/6\lesssim w_0\lesssim 1/2$ ($Λ_+=Λ_-$), $-2/3\lesssim w_0\lesssim 1/2$ ($Λ_+>Λ_-$), and $0\lesssim w_0$ ($Λ_+<Λ_-$). Positive-pressure shells ($0\lesssim w_0\lesssim 1/2$) may sit near the photon sphere for any ordering of $Λ_+/Λ_-$. Additionally, when $Λ_+<Λ_-$ with $w_0\gtrsim0$, they may also sit at the static-radius scale. Tension shells are absent for $Λ_+<Λ_-$; for $Λ_+=Λ_-$, they reach the cosmological horizon scale; for $Λ_+>Λ_-$, they are confined to the static-radius scale. Finally, we compute the dark fluid shell's imprint on the SdS black-hole shadow seen by a static observer at varying radial distance.