Black hole mass threshold from nonsingular quantum gravitational collapse

Phys Rev Lett. 2005 Aug 26;95(9):091302. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.95.091302. Epub 2005 Aug 24.

Abstract

Quantum gravity is expected to remove the classical singularity that arises as the end state of gravitational collapse. To investigate this, we work with a toy model of a collapsing homogeneous scalar field. We show that nonperturbative semiclassical effects of loop quantum gravity cause a bounce and remove the black hole singularity. Furthermore, we find a critical threshold scale below which no horizon forms: quantum gravity may exclude very small astrophysical black holes.