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# Formation and Evaporation of Charged Black Holes

## I Introduction

Extremal black holes (EBHs) play an important role in black hole thermodynamics. The vanishing of the surface gravity of such black holes implies zero Hawking-Bekenstein temperature. This suggests on the tight connection of EBH in black hole physics with zero temperature states in thermodynamics. The zero temperature EBH is, however, unattainable in a finite sequence of physical processes . This means that the dynamical evolution of a non extremal black hole towards the EBH state continues an infinite (advanced) time. The full non linear evolution towards an EBH presents a step towards understanding the status of EBHs in the black hole thermodynamics. The solution provides the entire dynamical spacetime which emerges in this case.

A generic black hole carries an angular momentum and an electric charge. The formation and evaporation of such a black hole is a challenging and extremely difficult problem both analytically and numerically. That is because the problem is necessary three dimensional. Therefore, we consider here a simpler spherically symmetric problem of a formation and a decay of a charged black hole. The EBHs in this simple model have all the features of a more general Kerr-Newman black hole. In earlier studies  of the evaporation of Reissner-Nordström (RN) black holes an initially singular spacetime–the static extremal RN black hole–was considered. This extremal black hole was exited above the extremality by an infalling matter and then allowed to decay back toward the $`Q=M`$ state by emitting Hawking radiation. Here we pose the problem of the evaporation of a RN black hole in somewhat different fashion. We formulate the problem of the formation and the evaporation of a spherically symmetric charged black hole beggining with the collapse of an initially regular self-gravitating charged matter distribution. We include quantum effects, which are considered here in the one loop order, in a self-consistent manner. To do so, we introduce the expectation value of a scalar field stress-energy tensor, which acts as an additional source in the semiclassical Einstein equations (see e.g. ). We regard the charge as stable, not allowing it to be radiated away ***This can be realized in practice when the charged particles are sufficiently massive and there is no significant creation of them in the Hawking or Schwinger processes. . The semiclassical equations are integrated numerically to give the structure of the spacetime for this configuration. We find that the evaporation proceed to a stable end-point corresponding to the extremal, $`M=Q`$, charged black hole.

In the next stage we relax the assumption of a stable charge, allowing the black hole to discharge via the Schwinger pair creation process in addition to Hawking evaporation. The characteristic quantity governing the Schwinger process is the critical pair-creating field, $`E_c\pi m^2c^3/e\mathrm{}`$, with $`e`$ and $`m`$ are the charge and the mass of the produced particles. Suppose that the critical field is reached below the maximal radius of the outer apparent horizon (i.e. the apparent radius of a non-evaporating black hole), but before the EBH state is approached. In this arrangement the black hole evaporates, radiating away its mass, the outer apparent horizon shrinks until the electric field upon this horizon reaches the critical pair-creating value. Then electrically charged pairs are produced intensively. Particles having the same polarity as a black hole are repulsed to infinity. Particles with the opposite polarity are captured by the black hole reducing its charge. Therefore, instead of reaching the stable EBH state the black hole evaporates and discharges simultaneously. The black hole looses its mass and the charge, disappearing completely (until it reaches scales where the the semiclassical approximation breaks down). It is of interest to note that the life-time of such decaying black hole is longer than that of a neutral evaporating black hole of the same mass.

The article is organized as follows. In section II we introduce the physical model of and write down the evolutionary equations. The characteristic problem and the numerical scheme are described in section III. Section IV is devoted to our numerical and analytical results and in section V we summarize our findings. We use units in which $`c=G=\mathrm{}=1`$.

## II The Model

We introduce a simple spherically-symmetric four dimensional model which captures the essence of the realistic behavior of the system. The semiclassical back-reaction is included in one loop order by introducing the expectation value of the stress-energy tensor, which arises from the quantization of a $`2D`$ massless scalar field in $`2D`$ curved spacetime . To mimic the $`4D`$ radial dependence we divide this tensor by $`4\pi r^2`$. This stress-energy tensor offers a good approximation to the full four dimensional theory since (i) most of the energy is carried away in $`S`$waves , and (ii) the inclusion of higher angular modes does not change significantly the behavior derived from the $`S`$wave approximation , see, however . Even though the tensor, which we utilize, arises in a $`2D`$ theory and not from the spherical reduction  of the full $`4D`$ theory, it gives a feeling of what the back-reaction would be, and, indeed, this tensor engenders the evaporation of black holes (see e.g. Ref. ).

Our final aim is the numerical integration of the evolution equations. To simplify the numerical procedure we apply several convenient tools. The charged collapsing matter is simulated by a complex massless scalar field. The “massless” nature of the fields makes it very convenient to use the double-null coordinates. The line element is taken to be of the form:

$$ds^2=\alpha (u,v)^2dudv+r(u,v)^2d\mathrm{\Omega }^2,$$
(1)
where $`d\mathrm{\Omega }^2`$ is the unit two-sphere. There is a coordinates gauge freedom. For the time being $`u,v`$ are just general light-cone coordinates which would be specified by fixing a gauge (see section III).

We formulate the set of coupled Einstein-Maxwell-Klein-Gordon equations as a first order system of PDEs. The numerical integration of the first order system functions very well both for the neutral , and for the charged  situations. It is convenient to define the auxiliary variables:

$$d\frac{\alpha _v}{\alpha },h\frac{\alpha _u}{\alpha },fr_u,gr_v,ws_u,zs_v,$$
(2)
wherein $`s`$ is the complex scalar field divided by $`\sqrt{4\pi }`$. We have adopted the notation $`W_xW/x`$ for partial derivatives of any function $`W=W(x,y)`$.

The Hawking radiation is modeled by the expectation value of the quantum stress-energy tensor of a $`2D`$ massless scalar field. In the light-cone coordinates (1) the only non vanishing components of this tensor (divided by $`4\pi r^2`$) are:

$`T_{uv}`$ $`=`$ $`T_{vu}={\displaystyle \frac{P}{r^2}}d_u,`$ (3)
$`T_{uu}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{P}{r^2}}(h_uh^2),`$ (4)
$`T_{vv}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{P}{r^2}}(d_vd^2),`$ (5)
wherein $`P`$ is a constant, which is proportional to the number of massless scalar fields. $`P`$ controls the rate of the evaporation and it also defines the length scale where the semiclassical approximation breaks down.

We write the coupled set of the semiclassical Einstein-Maxwell-KG equations:

Einstein equations:

$`E1`$ $`:`$ $`d_u={\displaystyle \frac{fg}{r^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha ^2}{4r^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha ^2q^2}{2r^4}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(wz^{}+w^{}z){\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}iea(sz^{}s^{}z),`$
$`E2`$ $`:`$ $`g_v=2dgrz^{}z{\displaystyle \frac{P}{r}}(d_vd^2),`$
$`E3`$ $`:`$ $`f_v={\displaystyle \frac{fg}{r}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4r}}\alpha ^2+{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha ^2q^2}{4r^3}}`$
$``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{P}{4r}}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{fg}{r^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha ^2}{4r^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha ^2q^2}{2r^4}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(wz^{}+w^{}z){\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}iea(sz^{}s^{}z)\right].`$
Maxwell equations:

$`M1`$ $``$ $`a_v{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha ^2q}{2r^2}}=0,`$
$`M2`$ $``$ $`q_vier^2(s^{}zsz^{})=0.`$
Where $`a(u,v)=A_u`$ is the electromagnetic potential and $`q(u,v)`$ is the charge. The complex scalar field (Klein-Gordon) equations expand to:

$`S1`$ $``$ $`rz_u+fz+gw+iearz+ieags+{\displaystyle \frac{ie}{4r}}\alpha ^2qs=0,`$
$`S2`$ $``$ $`rw_v+gw+fz+iearz+ieags+{\displaystyle \frac{ie}{4r}}\alpha ^2qs=0.`$
Finally, the definitions (2) are rewritten as:

$`D1`$ $``$ $`d{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha _v}{\alpha }}=0,`$
$`D2`$ $``$ $`gr_v=0,`$
$`D3`$ $``$ $`zs_v=0.`$
These equations should be accompanied by a specification of the initial data and the suitable boundary conditions.

## III Initial Setup and the Numerical Scheme

The characteristic initial value problem for the complex scalar field is a straightforward generalization of that given in Ref. . We have formulated it in  and describe it briefly here.

We choose the initial characteristic surfaces to be: the ingoing $`v=constv_i`$ hypersurface, and, the outgoing $`u=constu_i`$ hypersurface. The coordinate gauge freedom is fixed by constraining the $`r`$ to be linear with $`u`$ or $`v`$ along the characteristic hypersurfaces. Namely, on $`u=u_i`$ segment we choose $`gr_v=1`$, on $`v=v_i`$ segment we choose $`fr_u=r_{u0}`$. To get $`r`$ along initial surfaces it is necessary to supply $`r_0=r(u_i,v_i)`$ that serves as a free parameter. For convenience we choose $`u_i=0`$, $`v_i=r_0`$. Therefore, one obtains: $`r(u_i,v)=v,r(u,v_i)=ur_{u0}+r_0`$ .

The domain of integration in the $`v`$ direction confined in the compact region: $`v_ivv_f`$. The origin $`r=0`$, for simplicity, is not included in the integration domain. This is achieved by an appropriate choice of the final outgoing hypersurface $`u_f`$. The scalar field distribution is chosen to be non-vanishing only in the compact segment $`v_ivv_p`$ ($`v_p=v_2,v_2^{}`$) and is taken in a shape of a pulse, which is smoothly matched at the endpoints ($`v_i`$ and $`v_p=v_2,v_2^{}`$) to the rest of the integration domain:

$$s(u_i,v)=A\mathrm{sin}^2\left(\pi \frac{vv1}{v_2v1}\right)+iB\mathrm{sin}^2\left(\pi \frac{vv1}{v_2^{}v1}\right),$$
(6)
where $`A,B`$ are the amplitudes of the pulse. The initial values of integrated variables are:

$`z(u_i,v)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{A\pi }{v_2^{}v_1}}\mathrm{sin}\left(2\pi {\displaystyle \frac{vv_1}{v_2^{}v_1}}\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{iB\pi }{v_2v_1}}\mathrm{sin}\left(2\pi {\displaystyle \frac{vv_1}{v_2v_1}}\right),`$ (7)
$`w(u,v_i)`$ $``$ $`0.`$ (8)
The initial value for $`d(u_i,v)`$ can be obtained by a numerical integration of the constraint equation $`E2`$ along the initial $`u=u_i`$ hypersurface, together with the choice $`\alpha (u_i,v_i)=1`$. We neglect the quantum stress-energy tensor on the initial hypersurfaces. This is justified as we verify later in the numerical solution. From $`E2`$ we obtains the initial value for $`d`$:

$`d(u_i,v)={\displaystyle \frac{A^2\pi ^2v}{2(v_2^{}v_1)^2}}\mathrm{sin}^2\left(2\pi {\displaystyle \frac{vv_1}{v_2^{}v_1}}\right)+`$ (10)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{B^2\pi ^2v}{2(v_2v_1)^2}}\mathrm{sin}^2\left(2\pi {\displaystyle \frac{vv_1}{v_2v_1}}\right).`$
With no sources the spacetime is Minkowski spacetime for $`vv_i`$. The boundary value for $`\alpha (u,v_i)`$ is obtained from the second constraint equation $`E3`$ to be: $`\alpha (u,v_i)=1`$. The rest of the boundary setup is $`q(u,v_i)=0,a(u,v_i)=0`$.

In our coordinates the mass-function is: $`M(u,v)=\frac{r}{2}\left(1+\frac{q^2}{r^2}+\frac{4}{\alpha ^2}r_ur_v\right)`$. Since it vanishes for Minkowski spacetime (in the region $`vv_i`$) one can calculate: $`r_{u0}=\frac{1}{4}`$. It should be noted that for $`vM`$ our ingoing null coordinate $`v`$ is closely related (proportional) to the ingoing Eddington-Finkelstein null coordinate $`v_\mathrm{e}`$. The $`u`$ coordinate measures the proper time of an observer at the origin .

The numerical scheme used to evolve the initial data is similar to the one used for the classical equations . At each step we evolve $`d`$ and $`z`$ using $`E1`$ and $`S1`$ from the hypersurface $`u`$ to $`u+du`$. We calculate the derivative $`d_v`$. Then we solve the appropriate equations for the rest of quantities along the outgoing null rays $`u+du=const`$, starting from the initial outgoing hypersurface $`v=v_i`$. We integrate equation $`D1`$ to find $`\alpha `$, then we solve the coupled differential equations $`D2`$ and $`E2`$ to obtain $`r`$ and $`g`$. Next, equations $`D3,M2,M1`$ are integrated to obtain $`s,q`$ and $`a`$. Finally, the differential equations $`E3`$ and $`S2`$ are solved for $`f`$ and $`w`$, respectively.

This integration scheme uses several different numerical methods  to evolve the initial data. To evolve the quantities in the $`u`$-direction we utilize the 5-th order Cash-Karp Runge-Kutta method. The differential equations in the $`v`$ direction are solved using a 4-th order Runge-Kutta method. The integrations in the $`v`$ direction are performed using a three-point Simpson method. The new feature of the current scheme relative to the classical one is the necessity of calculating of partial derivative $`d_v`$ in equation $`E2`$. This derivative is calculated using a Savitzky-Golay smoothing filter.

## IV Results and Discussion

### A The Evaporation

As a test we check that our code reproduces the uncharged black hole evaporation . To do this, we solve numerically the set of the coupled Klein-Gordon-Einstein equations. The complex scalar field is replaced by a real one. We set $`B=0,e=0`$, but $`A0`$. We set the free parameters to be: $`r_0=v_1=10,v_f=200,u_i=0,v_3=20,P=0.01`$ and $`A=0.65`$. In Figure 1 we show the dynamical spacetime obtained in this case.

Figure 1(a) depicts the radius as a function of the outgoing null coordinate $`v`$ along a sequence of an outgoing $`u=const`$ null rays. The evaporation is mandatory from this picture. Rays which initially incline towards the central $`r=0`$ singularity manage at some later moment (at the apparent horizon, where $`r_v=0`$) to escape to infinity. The evaporation is indicated by the decreasing radius of the apparent horizon. Figure 1(b) displays the radius contour lines in the $`uv`$-plane. The apparent horizon is indicated by vanishing of the $`r_v`$ derivative. Again, the decrease of this radius is clear. In passing, we note that our null coordinates are not very convenient to resolve the evaporation of a neutral black holes. The evaporation is contained within a tiny $`u`$ lapse. The convenient choice is the null coordinates defined at infinity . In these coordinates the evaporation takes an infinite (retarded) time. We did not used these coordinates since our target is the entire spacetime of an evaporating charged black hole. Therefore, we need a set of coordinates which are regular on the outer horizon in order to push the integration inside the black hole. Our original coordinates, being Kruskal-like, supply this set. We find out that our results are in agreement with the previously established ones  and turn to the main concern of this work – the evaporation of charged black holes.

We have set the rest of the free parameters as: $`v_1=5,v_2=14,v_2^{}=v_3,v_f=2000,A=0.35,B=0.43`$ and $`e=0.151`$. The Figures below are obtained with this specific choice of the parameters. Figure 2(a) displays the radius $`r(u,v)`$ as a function of the advanced time $`v`$ along a sequence of $`u=const`$ outgoing null rays. The retarded time $`u`$ increases from the rightmost ray to the leftmost one. The rays are emitted from the surface of a collapsing matter (at the left bottom corner). The first rays, which escapes to infinity, are unaffected by the matter indicating the asymptotic flatness of the spacetime. As the collapse proceeds the rays begin to curve back towards the origin. Without evaporation there would be a ray which does not escape to infinity, but stays at a constant radius, this ray indicates the event horizon. The rays emitted after that would asymptotically ($`v\mathrm{}`$) become vertical indicating the formation of the Cauchy horizon (CH) . Finally, the rays emitted in late retarded time would inevitably fall into the strong central singularity. In Figure 3 we depict the $`rv`$-diagram obtained in the classical case, a case without evaporation.

Inclusion of the evaporation changes this picture, specifically the inner and the outer horizons are not stationary null hypersurfaces. Figure 2(c) depicts the enlarged part of Figure 2(a) – the part where the outgoing rays curve to be swallowed by the formed black hole, but then managed to escape to infinity. The locus of the turn-points of these outgoing rays indicates the outer apparent horizon. Figure 2(b) displays another enlarged part of Figure 2(a)– the part where the outgoing rays tend towards the CH. The incline of these, classically vertical, rays towards the outer horizon (above the thick dashed line, see Figure) can be observed. The turn-points (i.e. vanishing of the $`r_v`$ derivative) of these rays indicate the inner apparent horizon.

To gain a further insight into the emerging spacetime we depict in Figure 4 the radius contour lines in $`uv`$-plane. We show explicitly the inner apparent horizon (a thick dashed line) and the outer apparent horizon (a thick dot-dashed line). The outer horizon initially grows from zero, that corresponds to the formation of a black hole and then it shrinks signaling on the mass-evaporation. The inner horizon (CH) does not remain a contracting null hypersurface, as in a case without evaporation, but instead it expands outwards to meet asymptotically the outer horizon.

The spacetime of the EBH has a very different structure from the non-extremal one, in particular the outer and the inner horizons are located at the same radial coordinate. In the evolutionary context, where the initially non-extremal black hole evolves towards the EBH, the merge of the both horizons will occur in an infinite advanced time (as $`v\mathrm{}`$). The numerical simulation can proceed only to finite values of $`v`$, and the horizons will only tend to approach each other. We indeed observe this during the simulation. The outer horizon (indicated by tick dotted line in Fig.2(b)) approaches the inner horizon (indicated by tick dashed line in Fig.2(c)). The same picture is seen in Fig. 4. It should be noted that the shrinking of the outer apparent horizon is contained within a small variation of the $`u`$ coordinates, as in a neutral collapse. That’s because of a Kruskal-like nature of our coordinates.

It was interesting to compare the shrinking of the radius of the outer apparent horizon with the radius of this horizon, as it is calculated assuming the external RN metric. In the latter case the radius of the horizon is given by:

$$r_+=M+\sqrt{M^2Q^2}.$$
(11)
Here and below $`MM_{\mathrm{AH}}(u,v)`$ and $`QQ_{\mathrm{AH}}`$ is the mass and the charge of the apparent black hole. In Figure 5 we depict the radius of the outer apparent horizon vs. the advanced time. One can observe that the numerically calculated radius of the horizon (designated by the circles in Figure) and the one obtained by the above formula (solid line) practically coincide. It must not be confusing, despite this remarkable result, the entire spacetime of the dynamically evaporating black hole is very different from the RN one. The radius of the inner horizon, defined in a RN spacetime as $`r_{}=M\sqrt{M^2Q^2}`$ does not coincide with the calculated inner horizon. This is because of presence of energy influx which changes the mass-function inside the black hole. This mass-function is different from the external one, $`M_{\mathrm{AH}}`$.

The Hawking-Bekenstein temperature of a RN black hole, as it measured in infinity is defined as:

$$T=\frac{\sqrt{M^2Q^2}}{2\pi r_+}.$$
(12)
In Figure 6(a) we plot the dependence of the temperature of the dynamical black hole on the advanced time $`v`$. The temperature is seen to decrease. We note that the obtained black hole is close to a EBH as $`1Q/M1/400`$.

Another quantity of interest is the mass-loss rate. This can be calculated from a negative infalling energy flux $`T_{vv}`$, which expected to drive black hole mass-evaporation according to:

$$\frac{dM}{dv}=T_{vv}|_{AH}.$$
(13)
Figure 6(b) depicts the explicitly calculated infalling energy flux $`T_{vv}`$ along the outer apparent horizon as a function of an advanced time $`v`$. The negative influx approaches zero value with the lapse of the advanced time $`v`$. This corresponds to the stable point in the evolution of the black hole. The black hole tends towards the EBH state, which would be reached at an infinite lapse of $`v`$.

### B  Evaporation with Discharge

In the next stage of the analysis we relax the assumption of a stable charge, allowing it to be radiated away via the Schwinger pair creation process. We assume that charged particles are not produced in the Hawking process. We examine analytically the fate of a simultaneously evaporating and discharging black hole.

We suppose that the discharge begins only when the electric field of the collapsing matter approaches the critical value, $`E_c`$, and there is no pair creation for the subcritical fields. This is justified since the rate of pair creation for subcritical fields is exponentially suppressed (see e.g.).

Figure 7 is the QM-diagram. The black hole can only form if $`QM`$ thus only the region below $`M=Q`$ is allowed. $`M=Q`$ is designated by the dashed line in this Figure. The solid line represents black holes for which: $`E=Q/r_+^2=E_c`$ along the outer horizon. Below this line the electric field upon the outer horizon is subcritical and charged particles are not produced. Using (11) we find the equation of this trajectory:

$$M(Q,E_c)=\frac{1}{2}\sqrt{\frac{Q}{E_c}}+\frac{1}{2}\sqrt{\frac{E_c}{Q}}Q^2.$$
(14)
This line intersects the $`Q=M`$ EBH line at $`Q=E_c^1`$. After the intersection the line continues to the unphysical, $`Q>M`$, region.

A trajectory of a black hole that evaporates, starting from an initial mass and charge, is represented by a horizontal line in this diagram. If this trajectory intersects the $`E=E_c`$ line it signals the onset of discharge. We depict such a trajectory (dash-dot line in the diagram) that all the three lines intersect at the same point, $`Q=E_c^1`$, the point C in Figure 7. The black holes that evolve along horizontal trajectories lying above the dash-dot line never experience a critical pair-creating field along their horizon. These black holes do not discharge but rather settle down to the stable EBH state. The fate of the black holes that do experience critical field is completely different.

We show below that the following scenario holds. Black holes which evaporate along trajectories, lying below the dash-dot track reach the pair creating field at some moment. Then the black hole evolve along the $`E=E_c`$ line discharging and evaporating simultaneously, decaying to a zero size. If the black hole evaporates exactly on the dash-dot track then it moves towards point C. Here we must recall that a small number of pairs will be produced even for a subcritical field. This small amount of pairs is sufficient to reduce (just a little) the charge of a black hole, pushing it away from the point C towards the decaying regime. This behavior will hold also for a small region above C as long as the pair creation is not suppressed exponentially.

Let us consider an evaporating black hole, moving along a horizontal line in the region below the dash-dot track. At some moment this black hole will approach the $`E(r_+)=E_cQ/r_c^2`$ line. Suppose that the black have evolved slightly into the region above that line. The electric field along its outer horizon is now supercritical and pairs are intensively created. The created pairs reduce the charge of a black hole to the value $`Q_c`$ defined by $`Q_c/r_+^2=E_c`$. The pairs being created in the vicinity ($`1\frac{r_+}{r_c}1`$) of the outer horizon of the black hole are swallowed by it. This forces the increase, $`\mathrm{\Delta }M`$, of the mass of a black hole and therefore increase of the radius of the outer horizon $`r_+r_+^{}>r_+`$. The electric field along $`r_+`$ is exactly critical and therefore along $`r_+^{}`$ is subcritical. As a result the black hole moves outwards away from the supercritical region. The black hole has evolved $`(M,Q)(M^{},Q_c)`$ with $`M^{}=M+\mathrm{\Delta }M`$ during the pair creating stage. In the next stage the black hole evaporates until reaching (and maybe exceeding) again the critical field along its horizon. At the end of this phase the black hole would evolve $`(M^{},Q_c)(M^{\prime \prime },Q_c)`$. If the electric field along the outer horizon is supercritical the above story takes place once again and so on until the full decay. The cycle $`(M,Q)(M^{},Q_c)(M^{\prime \prime },Q_c)`$ is indicated by the cycle 1-2-3 in the zoom-insert in Figure 7. The processes in nature are not discrete as we presented it but rather continuous and both phases take place simultaneously.

The conclusion from the above considerations is clear – the black holes will evolve along the $`E(r_+)=E_c`$ track after approaching it. Along this track it satisfies

$$\frac{dM}{dQ}=\frac{1}{4}\sqrt{\frac{1}{E_cQ}}+\frac{3}{4}\sqrt{E_cQ},$$
(15)
as obtained by differentiating Eq. (14).

It is also of interest to calculate the mass- and the charge-loss rates of a black hole evolving along the $`E(r_+)=E_c`$ line. To address this question we implement the idea that if the electric field of a black hole exceeds the critical pair-creating value then the number of created pairs is not simply $`N_0=\frac{Q_cQ}{e}`$, but rather enormously amplified. This observation was previously made in , tough the calculation we present below differs from that in Ref. . The energy of the created pairs, $`ϵ_p`$, is extracted from the energy of the electric field of the black hole. If the electric field exceeds only slightly the critical value (that holds for $`1\frac{r_+}{r_c}1`$ in our circumstance) then the pairs are created nearly at their rest energy with very little kinetic energy. This is in fact the definition of the critical pair-creating field. Therefore, the number of the created pairs can be estimated as $`N_pϵ_p/m=\mathrm{\Delta }M/m`$ and $`N_pN_0`$ (holding for $`e/m1`$). The pairs are created in the region $`(r_+,r_c)`$ with the proper thickness of $`\delta rr_cr_+`$. The pairs constituting that region are in a state of the quasi-neutral plasma. Only the outermost and the innermost layers of this shell have an uncompensated charge of $`QQ_c`$ and the number of pairs in these layers is indeed $`N_0`$ .

The rate of the pair creating process at a given radius within the pair-creating region can be approximated as

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }=\frac{dN}{\sqrt{g}d^4x}=\frac{1}{4\pi }\left(\frac{eE}{\pi }\right)^2e^{\frac{\pi E_c}{E}}.$$
(16)
From this we can estimate the time needed to create the $`N_p`$ pairs as

$$\mathrm{\Delta }\tau _{dis}\frac{N_p}{\mathrm{\Gamma }V},$$
(17)
where $`V`$ is the proper volume of the pair creating region. Using the above results we can estimate the mass increase and the charge loss by the black hole due to discharge.

The charge loss is estimated as $`\dot{Q}=e\frac{dN_0}{d\tau }\frac{QQ_c}{\mathrm{\Delta }\tau _{dis}}\frac{QQ_c}{N_p}\mathrm{\Gamma }V`$. The total energy of pairs and therefore the mass increase, $`\mathrm{\Delta }M`$, of the black hole is estimated knowing the initial, $`Q/r^2`$, and the final, $`Q_c/r^2`$ electric field configurations

$$\mathrm{\Delta }M\frac{Q^2Q_c^2}{2r_+}.$$
(18)
Here we have ignored the energy carried by the $`N_0`$ particles, repulsed to infinity since $`N_pN_0`$. Using Eq. (18) to calculate $`N_p=\mathrm{\Delta }M/m`$ one obtains, using $`\delta rr_+`$, the charge loss

$$\dot{Q}\frac{2r_+}{Q+Q_c}m\mathrm{\Gamma }V\frac{r_+}{Q}m\mathrm{\Gamma }V.$$
(19)
In the evaporation phase the mass is radiated away by the Hawking process. In order to estimate this rate of mass loss we assume that the black hole radiates as a black body with temperature T, defined by (12), and surface area $`𝒜=4\pi r_+^2`$. Hence we obtain the approximate mass-evaporation rate:

$$\dot{M}_{ev}H\sigma T^4𝒜,$$
(20)
where $`\sigma `$ is the Stefan-Boltzmann constant.

Both processes of evaporation and discharge are simultaneous. The evaporating black hole approaches and exceeds slightly, say by $`\delta r`$, the critical radius $`r_c`$. The value of $`\delta r`$, which defines the volume of the pair-creating region according to $`V=4\pi r_+^2\delta r`$, will be determined by the requirement that the ratio $`\dot{M}/\dot{Q}`$ is given by (15). That is the black hole evolves nearly along the $`E(r_+)=E_c`$ line. The rate of the mass loss is given by $`\dot{M}=\dot{M}_{ev}\dot{M}_{dis}=H\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }M}{\mathrm{\Delta }\tau _{dis}}Hm\mathrm{\Gamma }V`$. The rate of the charge loss is given by Eq. (19). Therefore, from

$$\left(\frac{dM}{dQ}\right)\frac{\dot{M}}{\dot{Q}}=\frac{Hm\mathrm{\Gamma }V}{\left(\frac{r_+}{Q}\right)m\mathrm{\Gamma }V},$$
(21)
assuming that $`\left(\frac{dM}{dQ}\right)=\left(\frac{dM}{dQ}\right)_{E(r_+)=E_c}`$ one obtains

$$\dot{M}=H\left(1\frac{1}{\frac{r_+}{Q}\left(\frac{dM}{dQ}\right)_{E(r_+)=E_c}+1}\right).$$
(22)
With the use of Eqs.(14), (15) and (20) this determines the rate of the mass loss in the combined discharge-evaporation process. We have also to perform the necessary consistency check which assures that $`\delta r/r_+1`$. From Eqs. (21),(22) and (16) with $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(E)\mathrm{\Gamma }(E_c)`$ one finds that $`\delta r/r_+1`$ if $`1/Mm1`$ i.e. if $`\mathrm{\lambda ̄}/r_+1`$, where $`\mathrm{\lambda ̄}`$ is the Compton wavelength of the created particles. The last inequality holds until the very late stages of the decay when the discharge occurs also via the Hawking process. Hence until the late phases of decay our calculation remains reliable.

Since $`\frac{r_+}{Q}\left(\frac{dM}{dQ}\right)_{E(r_+)=E_c}`$ is positive and both $`\frac{r_+}{Q}>1`$ and $`\left(\frac{dM}{dQ}\right)_{E(r_+)=E_c}>1`$, the rate (22) of decay of charged black hole is slower than that of the uncharged evaporating one $`\dot{M}<H`$ and together $`H>\dot{M}>H/2`$. Therefore the life-time of the evaporating and discharging black hole is longer than the life-time of an evaporating neutral black hole of the same mass. This is readily understood – what we have after all is the conversion of electrostatic energy of a black hole to the mass, which is radiated away as a Hawking radiation. Since that effective mass exceeds $`M`$ (approximately by the energy of the electric field), the process of decay lasts more time.

Clearly the decay as we describe it is valid only above the Planck scales, where our (semiclassical) approximation breaks down in favor of full Quantum gravity.

## V Summary and Conclusion

We have investigated the formation and evaporation of charged black holes. In the first stage of analysis we assumed stability of the charge, while allowing an evaporation and a decrease of the mass via Hawking radiation. The evaporation was modeled by introducing the expectation value of a 2D stress-energy tensor of a 2D quantized scalar field as a source to the semiclassical Einstein equations. By doing so, we disregard possible contributions which arise from the dimensional reduction procedure . The source which we utilized is (at least) a part of the full 4D stress-energy tensor, and it gives a feeling of the full back-reaction.

We find that the evaporating black hole loses its mass and approaches asymptotically a stable endpoint corresponding to the extremal black hole. Starting from an initially regular matter distribution we have dynamically obtained a non extremal black hole and than, after evaporation, a near extremal one. The outcome of our analysis is the entireActually, our solution does not include the origin of coordinates, $`r=0`$, and the asymptotically late advanced time region. The first is not included in a sake of simplicity of the numerics, while the second is not included since it has an infinite extension. In any case the region which is obtained supply enough information to draw the conclusions, which we have drawn.  dynamical spacetime of such a black hole.

The spacetime structure of a non extremal and an extremal black holes are very different. The most striking feature of the latter is that its inner and outer apparent horizons are located at the same radial coordinate. In the dynamical context we observe that the horizons tend to approach each other in a late advanced time. The actual merge will occur indeed in an infinite (advanced) time, i.e. as $`v\mathrm{}`$. Thisis in agreement with the unattainability formulation of the third law of the black hole thermodynamics. The stability of the final EBH state is manifest from the vanishing of the negative energy influx, $`T_{vv}`$, governing the black hole evaporation according to Eq. (13). The Hawking-Bekenstein temperature decreases as the black hole approaches the EBH state.

We have also considered a collapse with evaporation accompanied by a discharge due to instability of the vacuum in strong electric fields. In this case there is a limiting value of charge for a given mass such that black holes with a charge above this value would not discharge but rather evaporate towards a stable EBH state. Black holes with a charge below the limiting charge evaporate and discharge simultaneously, decaying to zero size. It is interesting to note that such black holes are pushed away from the EBH state. The discharge thus prevents from small black holes to become extremal. The life time of an evaporating and discharging black hole is longer then that of an uncharged black hole of the same mass that decays to zero emitting Hawking radiation.

Note added: When this work was completed its brought to our attention that there are related works  considering evaporation of 2D RN black holes.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS: The research was supported by a grant from the Israel Basic Research Foundation.

Electronic address: sorkin@merger.phys.huji.ac.il

Electronic address: tsvi@nikki.phys.huji.ac.il


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# Towards Population III: Simulations of Primordial Gas Collapse and Fragmentation

## 1. Introduction: Why Consider Population III (Again)?

At first glance, the study of the very first stars in the universe might appear to be a rather academic and even quixotic endeavor. After all, we have never directly seen such stars. Since we believe that heavy elements are synthesized almost exclusively in stars, the very first “Population III” stars were, by definition, made of zero metal gas. Intensive searches for metal poor stars in the halo galaxy, however, have only turned up stars with metallicities $`Z>10^4Z_{}`$ (Beers 2000). Furthermore, the formation of a zero metal star is in some sense a rather singular event. Once that star goes supernova and pollutes its environment with metals, the stars that subsequently form in its vicinity will no longer be Population III (with zero metallicity). Population III may also be suicidal in the sense that UV radiation from the first stars could destroy the molecular hydrogen that allows primordial gas to cool and form these stars in the first place. There has therefore been considerable speculation, e.g., Cayrel (1986) and Haiman, Rees, & Loeb (1997), that the Population III (Pop. III) phase in the evolution of our universe was very brief indeed.

Nonetheless, while the Pop. III phase may have been a brief one, it seems to have been a pervasive one. Even in the least evolved regions of the universe that we can probe today, the high redshift Lyman $`\alpha `$ clouds, we still find evidence for a non-zero metallicity $`Z_{min}10^3Z_{}`$ (Cowie & Songaila 1998). More importantly, the epoch of the Pop. III stars probably represents the first substantial input of energy, photons, and metals into the universe since the Big Bang and marks the end of the “dark ages” (e.g., Loeb 1999, Rees 1999) that started when the cosmic background light redshifted out of the visible range (at $`z1000`$). Because structure formation depends critically on the ability of baryons to cool, and this in turn depends critically on the metallicity and ionization state of the baryonic gas, the “feedback” effects of the first stars on the intergalactic medium (IGM) in fact play a subtle but key role in determining the subsequent evolution of the Universe. The significant interest in primordial star formation at this conference is therefore not an accident. Large-scale cosmological simulations (e.g., Ostriker & Gnedin 1996; Abel et al. 1998; Fuller & Couchman 2000) are just now becoming good enough to resolve the $`10^6M_{}`$ scales of the first objects in the universe that can cool and collapse (Tegmark et al. 1997). Understanding the star formation that will occur in these objects and accurately incorporating its effects into cosmological codes therefore represents the next major challenge in our quest to integrate forwards from the Big Bang.

The interest in Population III, however, is not purely a theoretical one. Studies of cosmic microwave background (CMB) anisotropies are now providing us with information on the physical conditions at $`z1000,`$ when the universe became transparent to CMB radiation, while observations of high-redshift quasars and galaxies tell us about the universe at redshifts $`z56`$ below. Current observations, however, give us little information on the “dark ages,” the crucial epoch in between. Reaching into this epoch is thus our next observational challenge and is the primary motivation, for example, of the Next Generation Space Telescope (NGST) which will provide unprecedented sensitivity at near-infrared wavelengths (Loeb 1998). The study of the first stars is thus timely, providing a theoretical framework for the interpretation of what NGST might discover, less than a decade from now. Even if NGST does not directly image the first stars, it will probe the epoch of the reionization of the IGM (e.g., Barkana, this proceedings). UV photons from the first stars, perhaps together with an early population of quasars, may have contributed significantly to this reionization (e.g., see Ciardi et al. 2000; Miralda-Escudé, Haehnelt, & Rees 2000). If the reionization occurred early enough, CMB fluctuations on scales $`<10^{}`$ will be damped by electron scattering (e.g,. Haiman & Loeb 1997) and this effect could be detected by other next generation instruments like MAP and PLANCK. The energy input from the first stars may also have left a small but measurable imprint on the CMB on very small scales (e.g., see the contributions here by Sugiyama et al. and Bruscoli et al.). In sum, the implications of Pop.III star formation might be testable in the not too distant future!

Before that day arrives, however, a skeptical observer might still question whether concrete progress can actually be made in understanding primordial star formation. In the case of present-day star formation, we cannot predict the initial mass function from first principles despite the wealth of observational data available. How could we hope to do something like this for unseen primordial stars? A scan of the considerable early literature on primordial star formation (e.g., Yoneyama 1972; Hutchins 1976; Silk 1977, 1983; Carlberg 1981; Kashlinsky & Rees 1983; Palla, Salpeter, & Stahler 1983; Carr, Bond, & Arnett 1984; Couchman & Rees 1986; Uehara et al. 1996, Haiman, Thoul, & Loeb 1996; Omukai & Nishi 1998) would tend to support this conclusion. The range of mass estimates for the first stars spans spans six(!) decades, from $`1`$ to $`10^6M_{}.`$ There are reasons for hope, however.

First, the physics of the first stars is considerably simpler than that of present-day star formation (Larson 1998; Loeb 1998). The present-day interstellar medium is an exceedingly complex environment, but primordial gas initially has no metals, no dust grains and no cosmic rays to complicate the gas cooling function. Since we think we know the primordial abundances well and the number of relevant species is small, the gas chemistry and cooling function are relatively simple and have been extensively studied (e.g., see Galli & Palla 1998). Also, because there are no stars yet, the only relevant external radiation is the cosmic background whose behavior we also think is well-understood. Additionally, if one believes that galactic strength magnetic fields resulted from dynamo action perhaps enhanced by compression (e.g., Kulsrud 1997), then magnetic fields at early times are likely to be dynamically insignificant. Finally, before the first supernovae went off, the early IGM must also have been a rather quiescent place, with no sources to sustain turbulent motion. The remaining consideration in understanding how primordial gas collapses to form stars is knowledge of the typical initial conditions: the initial gas density and temperature profile, the gas angular momentum distribution, the density and velocity distribution of the dark matter halos containing the gas, and the underlying cosmology. Estimating these initial conditions for a specific cosmological scenario is no longer a problem given the current state of simulations. In sum, at least during the initial phases of primordial star formation, we have a well-posed problem where the relevant physics is in hand.

Secondly, computers can now follow the inherently three dimensional process of primordial gas fragmentation and collapse. This is critical because it is not immediately obvious when gas fragmentation in primordial clouds halts. To appreciate the difficulties, note that since gas can cool and increase its density arbitrarily (at least until an opacity limit sets in), the Jeans mass for a collapsing gas cloud, i.e., the scale below which fragmentation halts, can become extremely small. Such behavior is indeed seen in one dimensional simulations of isothermal filament collapse. One might therefore predict primordial stars to have very low masses. However, if the initial density perturbations in the cloud are not very large or the cloud has a very strong central density concentration, the cloud can collapse into a single object before the perturbations have time to grow and fragment the cloud (e.g., Tohline 1980). Thus, depending on exact initial conditions, one could also predict that the first objects to turn around and cool will collapse directly into very massive stars or black holes (the so-called “VMOs” or Very Massive Objects). Furthermore, one cannot straightforwardly apply the intuition on fragmentation developed in the more extensive studies of present-day star formation. In the present-day case, gas cooling is very efficient and one typically takes the collapsing gas to be isothermal. Molecular hydrogen is a very poor coolant, however, and the timescale for zero-metal gas to cool can often be comparable to or longer than the dynamical timescale for the gas to collapse. This has profound consequences, as we show next.

## 2. Numerical Simulations of a Collapsing Primordial Gas Cloud

The results shown are the thesis work of Volker Bromm. (See Bromm, Coppi, & Larson 1999 for a more extended discussion of the calculation.) Our goal here is to follow the gravitational fragmentation of a cloud to see if there is indeed a characteristic mass scale at which fragmentation stops and gravitational collapse proceeds unhindered. This “clump” mass scale and the overall spectrum of runaway clump masses that we find, of course, cannot be directly translated into a stellar mass scale or IMF, but it is an important first step. In the case of present-day star formation, at least, there is increasing evidence that the two may in fact be closely related.

Our calculational approach is intermediate to that of the other two primordial gas collapse calculations shown at this meeting. The first of these (see contribution by Nakamura & Umemura) uses a high resolution 2-D mesh code to follow the evolution of an idealized primordial gas cloud for many different initial conditions and perturbations. The second (see contribution by Abel et al.) is a full 3-D calculation that starts from a large scale cosmological simulation and uses the adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) technique to zoom in on the evolution of the first object to undergo collapse in their simulation volume. Only a few realizations of the cosmological initial conditions have been explored. In an attempt to increase the number of realizations we can explore, we instead follow the cosmological evolution of a tophat density perturbation with parameters close to those expected for the first objects that can collapse ($`M_{tot}10^6M_{},`$ e.g., see Tegmark et al. 1997). We use a 3-D particle code based on the TreeSPH code of Hernquist & Katz (1990) that incorporates the full primordial chemistry of Galli & Palla (1998), including the effects of HD cooling. The SPH technique does not handle shocks as well as mesh techniques, but strong shocks are not important in the regime considered here and SPH is simple and flexible. For example, it easy to turn a group of gas particles into a single “sink” particle without having to worry about mesh artifact/resampling issues. This is useful for allowing a simulation to continue beyond the runaway collapse of the first clump ( which ordinarily would halt the calculation because of the Courant limit). It is also easy to increase our spatial resolution in a desired region (i.e., perform a “poor man’s” version of AMR) by tagging the particles that enter that region, and then restarting the calculation with each of the tagged particles replaced by many lower mass particles, e.g., see Fig. 7.

Fig. 1-4 show results one of our typical top-hat collapse/ fragmentation calculations. At $`z=100`$ we endow a spherical, uniform density halo of total mass $`2\times 10^6M_{}`$ (baryonic plus dark matter) with a Hubble expansion such that virialization occurs at $`z_{vir}30.`$ The dark matter is perturbed with a $`P(k)k^3`$ power spectrum expected from CDM on small scales. The baryons are uniformly distributed and have a mass fraction $`\mathrm{\Omega }_B=0.05.`$ Both halo components are initially in solid body rotation about the $`z`$ axis, with angular momentum corresponding to a cosmological spin parameter $`\mathrm{\Lambda }=0.05.`$ These are typical parameters for the first objects ($`3\sigma `$ density fluctuation) that turn around and are massive enough to cool in a Hubble time (e.g., see Tegmark et al. 1997). The dark matter initially plays a key role as the baryons fall into the potential wells of the growing small-scale dark matter perturbations (Fig 1). Eventually, the dark matter undergoes violent relaxation and starts to lose its substructure. The baryons sink into the center of the overall dark matter potential well and start to fragment (Fig. 2). In Fig. 3, we plot the properties of the gas particles at $`z=31.2.`$ Note the “pile up” of particles at density $`n_H10^{34}\mathrm{cm}^3`$ and temperature $`T300`$ K, corresponding to a Jeans mass $`1000M_{}.`$ The pile up reflects the fact that gas undergoing collapse “loiters” at these values (see the time history in Fig. 4, and discussion below).

We have carried out many other runs, varying quantities like the total angular momentum of the cloud, the slope of the dark matter perturbation spectrum, the degree to which the mass is centrally concentrated (the standard top-hat assumes a uniform density distribution, which is optimal in terms of producing many fragments but may not always be realistic), the baryon mass fraction ($`\mathrm{\Omega }_B`$), and the total mass and turnaround redshift of the cloud. We find two main results. First, in terms of the morphology of the collapsed gas and the overall “efficiency” of fragmentation (the fraction of gas that ends up in clumps), we find that varying the initial conditions of the cloud does make a significant difference, e.g., compare the gas morphology in Fig. 2 with that in Fig. 6. Similar dependences, e.g., on the cloud’s angular momentum and degree of central mass concentration, are in fact found in gas simulations of present-day star formation (e.g., Tsuribe & Inutsuka 1999). Note that this dependence on initial conditions means it is not possible to make statements about the overall efficiency of primordial star formation without first carrying out a comprehensive survey of the relevant conditions. Second, despite the differences in gas morphology, we always find find roughly the same initial clump masses. Here, initial clump mass is defined as the amount of gas that is gravitationally bound and infalling when the center of a clump starts it runaway collapse, i.e., it does not include any further gas that may eventually accrete onto the clump.

The reason for this perhaps surprising second conclusion can be found in Fig. 3-5. If we plot the temperatures and densities of our gas particles when the first clumps start to collapse, we always find an excess of particles with temperatures $`T`$ 200 K and hydrogen densities $`n10^{34}`$ cm$`^3.`$ These two numbers are not accidental and are set molecular hydrogen physics – which does not depend on the initial conditions. Specifically, a temperature $`T100200`$ K is the minimum one attainable via H2 cooling because of the molecular energy levels. The corresponding critical density, beyond which the H2 rotational levels are populated according to LTE, is then $`n_{crit}10^310^4`$ cm-3. At the transition from NLTE to LTE, the cooling rate changes from being proportional to $`n^2`$ to merely linear in $`n,`$ i.e., the cooling time required for the gas to lose a significant fraction of its energy now becomes independent of density. Due to this inefficient cooling, the gas ‘loiters’ and passes through a phase of quasi-hydrostatic, slow contraction before undergoing runaway collapse (see Fig. 4). This loitering appears to be crucial as it allows pressure waves to damp out density anisotropies and inhibits further fragmentation. Although our results are still somewhat preliminary, we have carried out higher resolutions runs (e.g., Fig. 7,8) to follow the collapse of a clump to much higher densities, and we indeed see no evidence for sub-fragmentation. Abel et al. have reached the same conclusion in the even higher resolution runs that they have carried out. Although we cannot guarantee that some of our clumps will not break up into a few objects, e.g., a binary system, it seems unlikely they will break up into hundreds or thousands of subclumps. In other words, to astrophysical accuracy, the Jeans mass $`M_J1000M_{}`$ that follows from the typical density and temperature values in Fig. 3 really is the characteristic clump mass scale for collapsing primordial gas. The fact that three groups at this conference arrived at the same conclusion using rather different codes and initial conditions tells us that a robust explanation, like the physics of molecular hydrogen, must lie behind it.

## 3. Implications and Future Directions

Although we are still far from solving the primordial star formation problem, the results presented at this meeting indicate we have made substantial progress. Unless our understanding of primordial gas cooling is very wrong (note that our simulations included HD cooling which some have speculated to be important) or the typical physical conditions during the early dark ages are very different from current expectations, it appears inescapable that the first typical objects to collapse will fragment into clumps of initial mass $`1000M_{}.`$ It also appears likely that these clumps will not fragment much further as their interiors collapse to form a star or a few stars. Therefore, typical primordial protostars are likely to look quite different from those around us today, and in particular, will be surrounded by much more massive $`1001000M_{}`$ envelopes. As noted at this meeting, it is not at all obvious how much of this mass actually makes it onto the final star. However, given that all the scales are so much larger and resemble those we find around present-day massive stars in the process of being born, it is difficult to see how one can make ordinary solar mass stars from such a gas configuration, i.e., primordial star formation is probably strongly biased towards massive ($`10100M_{}`$) and possibly very massive ($`1000M_{}`$) stars. This would explain why we see no zero-metal stars today and has important consequences that have not been fully explored yet, e.g., massive primordial stars produce many more ionizing UV photons per unit mass than low mass ones (see Bromm, Kudritski, & Loeb 2000 for a detailed calculation of the spectrum from a massive zero metal star).Also, such massive stars could be good progenitors for hypernovae and gamma-ray bursts, or the seeds for massive black hole formation.

There remain important questions that do not require a major leap in computing power to answer. First, at this meeting it became clear we need to deide what are typical, realistic initial conditions, e.g, Nakamura & Umemura pointed out that it is possible to fragment down to $`1M_{}`$ if one can start out with dense enough filaments ($`n_H>10^6\mathrm{cm}^3).`$ We agree since this would skip the “loitering” phase of the collapse, but we do not see how such filaments arise in a realistic scenario. Quantifying the relevant initial conditions for primordial gas collapse will let us determine the efficiency of clump formation, which in turn gives us an upper limit on the primordial star formation efficiency and provides a first indication as to the importance of the first stars. Secondly, we can consider what happens to gas collapse and fragmentation in the presence of trace metals and UV background radiation from a previous generation of stars. Population III star formation is often considered to be a short-lived event because the pristine conditions required are wiped out once the first stars produce UV light and the first supernovae produce metals. However, as metallicity does not build up instantly, there may well be an extended window of time when star formation either proceeds in the massive clump/star mode described here (if H2 is present) or not at all (if H2 is destroyed by UV radation). Our preliminary calculations indicate that metal cooling does not become important until the gas metallicity reaches $`Z>10^410^3Z_{}`$ – which coincidentally is the range of the lowest observed metallicities and also the range where abundance anomalies begin to appear in metal poor stars. (These anomalies are often interpreted as increased scatter due to enrichment by individual supernova events, but they could also reflect atypical progenitor stars, e.g., that had much hotter interiors than stars today.) Finally, it should be possible to push the spherically symmetric protostar calculation of Omukai and Nishi (1998) through to the accretion phase (along the lines of Masunaga, Miyama, and Inutskuka 1999 in the present-day star formation case). This will enable a first cut at understanding the feedback of the primordial protostar’s radiation on its envelope. The feedback is likely to be strong, and Abel conjectured at this meeting, for example, that all accretion may stop once the protostar reaches $`10M_{}`$ and produces enough ionizing radiation to destroy the envelope’s molecular hydrogen, thereby removing its primary means of cooling. Without a real calculation, however, it is not clear what the outcome will be. If the envelope gas simply becomes adiabatic, accretion can still occur if a sufficient central mass concentration has already been established (Bondi 1952).

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$`{}_{}{}^{}\mathrm{Our}`$ work was supported by NASA grant NAG5-7074. We thank the organizers for a well-run and stimulating conference.