The Structure of AdS Black Holes and Chern Simons Theory in 2+1 Dimensions

Sharmanthie Fernando, Freydoon Mansouri

Published 1998-04-22, updated 1998-07-17Version 3

We study anti-de Sitter black holes in 2+1 dimensions in terms of Chern Simons gauge theory of anti-de Sitter group coupled to a source. Taking the source to be an anti-de Sitter state specified by its Casimir invariants, we show how all the relevant features of the black hole are accounted for. The requirement that the source be a unitary representation leads to a discrete tower of states which provide a microscopic model for the black hole.