Paper detail

Can a primordial black hole or wormhole grow as fast as the universe?

This review addresses the issue of whether there are physically realistic self-similar solutions in which a primordial black hole is attached to an exact or asymptotically Friedmann model for an equation of state of the form $p=(γ-1)ρc^2$. In the positive pressure case ($1 < γ< 2$), there is no such solution when the black hole is attached to an exact Friedmann background via a sonic point. However, it has been claimed that there is a one-parameter family of asymptotically Friedmann black hole solutions providing the ratio of the black hole size to the cosmological horizon size is in a narrow range above some critical value. There are also "universal" black holes in which the black hole has an apparent horizon but no event horizon. It turns out that both these types of solution are only asymptotically {\it quasi}-Friedmann, because they contain a solid angle deficit at large distances, but they are not necessarily excluded observationally. We also consider the possibility of self-similar black hole solutions in a universe dominated by a scalar field. If the field is massless, the situation resembles the stiff fluid case, so any black hole solution is again contrived, although there may still be universal black hole solutions. The situation is less clear if the scalar field is rolling down a potential and therefore massive, as in the quintessence scenario. Although no explicit asymptotically Friedmann black hole solutions of this kind are known, they are not excluded and comparison with the $0 < γ< 2/3$ perfect fluid case suggests that they should exist if the black hole is not too large. This implies that a black hole might grow as fast as the cosmological horizon in a quintessence-dominated universe in some circumstances, supporting the proposal that accretion onto primordial black holes may have played a role in the production of the supermassive black holes in galactic nuclei.