On the smoothness of horizons in the most generic multi center black hole and membrane solutions

Abstract

We study the differentiability of the metric and other fields at any of the horizons of the \emph{most generic} multi center Reissner-Nordstrom black hole solutions in $d \ge 5$ and of multi center $M2$ brane solutions. Most generic means that the centers are generically located in transverse space and consequently the solutions do not have any transverse spatial isometries. We construct the Gaussian null co-ordinate system for the neighborhood of a horizon by solving (all) the geodesic equations in expansions of (appropriate powers of) the affine parameter. Organizing the harmonic functions that appear in the solution in terms of generalized Gegenbauer polynomials, introduced in \cite{Gowdigere:2014aca}, is key to obtaining the solution to the geodesic equations in a compact and manageable form. We then compute the metric and other fields in the Gaussian null co-ordinate system and find that the differentiability of the horizon in the most generic solution is \emph{identical to} the differentiability of the horizon in the two center/collinear solution (centers distributed on a line in transverse space). We isolate those aspects of the computation that are most relevant to this result. We perform these computations in some cases, in several co-ordinate systems.