Paper detail

Holographic description of quantum black hole on a computer

The discovery of the fact that black holes radiate particles and eventually evaporate led Hawking to pose the well-known information loss paradox. This paradox caused a long and serious debate since it claims that the fundamental laws of quantum mechanics may be violated. A possible cure appeared recently from superstring theory, a consistent theory of quantum gravity: if the holographic description of a quantum black hole based on the gauge/gravity duality is correct, the information is not lost and quantum mechanics remains valid. Here we test this gauge/gravity duality on a computer at the level of quantum gravity for the first time. The black hole mass obtained by Monte Carlo simulation of the dual gauge theory reproduces precisely the quantum gravity effects in an evaporating black hole. This result opens up totally new perspectives towards quantum gravity since one can simulate quantum black holes through dual gauge theories.