# The Mass of the Oppenheimer-Snyder Black Hole

## Abstract

The only instance when the General Relativistic (GTR) collapse equations have been solved (almost) exactly to explicitly find the metric coefficients is the case of a homogeneous spherical dust ( Oppenheimer and Snyder in 1939 in Phy. Rev. 56, 455). The equation (37) of their paper showed the formation of an event horizon for a collapsing homogeneous dust ball of mass $`M`$ in that the circumference radius the outermost surface, $`r_br_0=2GM/c^2`$ in a proper time $`\tau _0r_0^{1/2}`$ in the limit of large Schrarzschild time $`t\mathrm{}`$. But Eq.(37) was approximated from the Eq. (36) whose essential character is ($`tr_0\mathrm{ln}\frac{\sqrt{y}+1}{\sqrt{y}1}`$) where, at the boundary of the star $`y=r_b/r_0=r_bc^2/2GM`$. And since the argument of a logarithmic function can not be negative, one must have $`y1`$ or $`2GM/r_bc^21`$. This shows that, atleast, in this case (i) trapped surfaces are not formed, (ii) if the collapse indeed proceeds upto $`r=0`$, we must have $`M=0`$, and (iii) proper time taken for collapse $`\tau \mathrm{}`$. Thus, the gravitational mass of OS black holes are unique and equal to zero.

One of the oldest and most fundamental problem of physics and astrophysics is that of gravitational collapse, and, specifically, that of the ultimate fate of a sufficiently massive collapsing body. Most of the astrophysical objects that we know of, viz. galaxies, stars, White Dwarfs (WD), Neutron Stars (NS), in a broad sense, result from gravitational collapse. It is well known that the essential concept of BHs, in a primitive form, was born in the cradle of Newtonian gravitation. In Newtonian gravity, the mass of a collapsing gas cloud is constant even if it is radiating, and equal to its baryonic mass $`M_i=M_f=M_0`$. Thus as $`r`$ decreases, natuarally, the value of $`M/r=M_0/r`$ steadily increases and at a certain stage one would have $`2GM/r=c^2`$ when the “escape velocity” from the surface of the fluid becomes equal to the speed of light $`c`$ (henceforth $`G=c=1`$). Soon afterwards, a Newtonian BH would be born.

And in the context of classical General Theory of Relativity (GTR), it is believed that the ultimate fate of sufficiently massive bodies is collapse to a Black Hole (BH). In contrast to Newtonian gravity, here, the gravitational mass of a radiating fluid constantly decrease and therefore unlike the Newtonian case, one can not predict with real confidence the actual value of $`M_f`$ when one would have $`2M_f/r=1`$. Given an initial gravitational mass $`M_i`$, the three quantities, $`M_i`$, $`M_f`$ and $`M_0`$ are not connected amongst themselves by means of any fundamental constants or by any basic physical principles. Thus, in a strict sense, one reqires to solve the Einstein equations for the collapsing fluid for realistic and ever evolving equation of state (EOS) and radiation transport properties. Unfortunately, the reality is that even when one does away with the EOS by assuming the fluid to be a dust whose pressure is zero everywhere including the center, there is no unique solution to the problem. Depending upon the initial conditions like density distributions and assumptions, like self-similarity, adopted, one may find either a BH or a “naked singularity”.

It is only when the dust is assumed to be homogeneous, a unique solution can be found. Homogeneous or inhomogeneous, all dust balls have a very special property: they have no internal energy and they can not radiate. Consequuenly, the graviational mass of a dust remains constant during the collapse process, which is, essentially, a Newtonian property. And if the dust collapse starts from a state of infinite dilution at $`r=r_{\mathrm{}}=\mathrm{}`$, the graviational mass of a dust must be equal to its baryonic mass $`M=M_0`$, another Newtonian property. Having made these remarks, we would now proceed to self-consistently analyze the pioneering work of Oppenheimer and Snyder (OS) to determine the mass of the BH whose formation it suggested.

Since the OS solutions are the only (asymptotic and near) exact solutions for the GTR collapse, and are believed to explicitly show the formation of an “event horizon” (EH), it is extremely important to critically reexamine them. The study of any collapse problem becomes more tractable if one uses the comoving coordinates which are free from any kind of “coordinate singularities”. By definition, for a given fluid element, the comoving coordinate $`R`$ is fixed. The most natural choice for $`R`$ is the number of baryons within a given mass shell $`N(R)`$ or any number proportional to it. The comoving time $`\tau `$ is of course the time recordrd by a clock attached to a fluid element at $`R=R`$. Since a dust is in perennial free fall, comoving time is synonymous with “proper time” and, therefore, the dust metric is

$$ds^2=d\tau ^2e^{\overline{\omega }}dR^2e^\omega (d\theta ^2+\mathrm{sin}^2\theta d\varphi ^2)$$
(1)   
It turns out that, for any spherically symmetric metric, the angular part is the same and we have

$$e^\omega =r^2$$
(2)   
where $`r`$ is the invariant circumference radius, and this was the Eq. (27) in the OS paper. OS tried to solve the collapse equation by using the metric (2); and by skipping several intermediate equations, we shall focus attention on the solutions they oobtained. The Eq. (23-27) of their paper essentially leads to a relationship between $`\tau `$ and $`r`$:

$$\tau =\frac{2}{3}\frac{R^{3/2}r^{3/2}}{(R/R_b)^{3/2}r_0^{1/2}};RR_b$$
(3)   
By transposing, the foregoing equation yields

$$\frac{r}{R}=\left(1\frac{3}{2}\frac{r_0^{1/2}\tau }{R_b^{3/2}}\right)^{2/3};RR_b$$
(4)   
Apart from the the comoving coordinate system, there is another useful coordinate system, the Schwarzschild system

$$ds^2=e^\nu dt^2e^\lambda dr^2r^2(d\theta ^2+\mathrm{sin}^2\theta d\varphi ^2)$$
(5)   
and, in principle, it should be possible to work out the collapse (or any) problem in this coordinate system. The time $`t`$ appearing in the Schwarzschild cooordinate system is the proper time of a distant inertial observer. Further, by definition, the “comoving” coordinates can not be extended beyond the boundary of the fluid. Thus from either consideratiion, the external solutions must be expressed in terms of Schwarzschild system. OS obtained a general form of the Schwarzschild metric coefficients which involved derivatives, $`\dot{r}=r/\tau `$ and $`\dot{t}=t/\tau `$ :

$$g_{rr}=e^\lambda =(1\dot{r}^2)^1$$
(6)   
and

$$g_{tt}=e^\nu =\dot{t}^2(1\dot{r})^2$$
(7)   
Again by skipping few intermediate steps, we note that obtained a general relationship between the coordinate time $`t`$ and coordinate radius $`R`$ ifor the region inside the collapsing body:

$$t=\frac{2}{3}r_0(R_b^{3/2}r_0^{3/2}y^{3/2})2r_0y^{1/2}+r_0\mathrm{ln}\frac{y^{1/2}+1}{y^{1/2}1}$$
(8)   
where

$$y\frac{1}{2}\left[(R/R_b)^21\right]+\frac{R_br}{r_0R}$$
(9)   
It is the above Eq. (8) which corresponds to Eq. (36) in the OS paper, and, for very large $`t`$, it attains the form

$$t=r_0\mathrm{ln}\frac{y^{1/2}+1}{y^{1/2}1}$$
(10)   
Now we trace some of the intermediate steps used by OS and not contained in their paper. By using the simple relation $`\mathrm{ln}(m/n)=\mathrm{ln}(n/m)`$, one may rewrite the above equation as

$$t=r_0\mathrm{ln}\frac{y^{1/2}1}{y^{1/2}+1}$$
(11)   
In the limit of large $`t`$ and $`y1`$, the above equation becomes

$$t=r_0\mathrm{ln}\left(\frac{y1}{4}\right)$$
(12)   
Or,

$$y1=4e^{t/r_0}$$
(13)   
However, OS overlooked the numerical factor of “4” in their exercise. From Eqs. (10) and (14), we find that

$$y1=\frac{1}{2}\left[(R/R_b)^23\right]+\frac{R_br}{r_0R}=4e^{t/r_0}$$
(14)   
The following equation obtained from the foregoing one is used to eliminate $`r`$ from relevant equations

$$\frac{R_br}{r_0R}=4e^{t/r_0}\frac{1}{2}\left[(R/R_b)^23\right]$$
(15)   
And using Eqs. (15) and (16) into (13) we obtain

$$tr_0\mathrm{ln}\left\{\frac{1}{8}\left[\left(\frac{R}{R_b}\right)^23\right]+\frac{R_b}{4r_0}\left(1\frac{3r_0^{1/2}\tau }{2R_b^{3/2}}\right)^{2/3}\right\}$$
(16)   
However, the corresponding equation in the OS paper (Eq.) contained two small errors:

$$tr_0\mathrm{ln}\left\{\frac{1}{2}\left[\left(\frac{R}{R_b}\right)^23\right]+\frac{R_b}{2r_0}\left(1\frac{3r_0^{1/2}\tau }{2R_b^2}\right)^{2/3}\right\}$$
(17)   
While the first error is a genuine one; which is due to the omission of the factor 4, the second one is a typographical error : the power of $`R_b`$ in the numerator of the last term of this equation should be $`3/2`$ and not $`2`$. From the foregoing equation, they concluded that, “for a fixed value of $`r`$ as $`t`$ tends toward infinity, $`\tau `$ tends to a finite limit, which increases with $`r`$”. The fact that $`\tau `$ is finite at $`r=r_0`$ or $`r=0`$ is evident from Eq. (4) too (provided $`r_b\mathrm{}`$ and $`r_0>0`$). This was essentially the idea behind the occurrence of an Event Horizon (EH).

By differtiating Eq. (16) with respect to $`\tau `$, we obtain

$$\dot{t}=\frac{e^{t/r_0}}{4}\left(\frac{r_0R}{rR_b}\right)^{1/2}$$
(18)   
Similarly differentiating Eq. (15), and using the above result, we obtain

$$\dot{r}=\frac{R^{3/2}r_0^{1/2}}{R_b^{3/2}r^{1/2}}$$
(19)   
Now using Eqs. (15), (19) and (20) in Eqs. (7-8), we obtain

$$e^\lambda =1(R/R_b)^2\left\{4e^{t/r_0}+\frac{1}{2}\left[3(R/R_b)^2\right]\right\}^1$$
(20)   
and

$$e^\nu =e^{\lambda 2t/r_0}\left\{\frac{e^{t/r_0}}{4}+\frac{1}{8}\left[3(R/R_b)^2\right]\right\}$$
(21)   
However, in the paper of OS, these two foregoing equations appear (Eqs. \[38-39\]) in a slightly erroneous form because of the omission of the nemerical factor of 4 in Eq. (13):

$$e^\lambda =1(R/R_b)^2\left\{e^{t/r_0}+\frac{1}{2}\left[3(R/R_b)^2\right]\right\}^1$$
(22)   
and

$$e^\nu =e^{\lambda 2t/r_0}\left\{e^{t/r_0}+\frac{1}{2}\left[3(R/R_b)^2\right]\right\}$$
(23)   
Note these equations were obtained by eliminating $`r`$ and the $`t\mathrm{}`$ limit covers both the $`rr_0`$ limit as well as the further $`r0`$ limit. Now, if we recall that the comoving coordinates $`R`$ and $`R_b`$ are fixed, and, when there is a total collapse to a physical point at $`r=0`$, the metric coefficients must blow up irrespective of the value of $`R`$ (i.e, the the label of a given mass shell). But this does not happen for the solutions obtained by OS! OS correctly pointed out that, it is only the outer boundary ($`R_b`$) for which the (one of the) metric coefficients assume the desired form : $`e^\lambda \mathrm{}`$. “For $`R`$ equal to $`R_b`$, $`e^\lambda `$ tends to infinity like $`e^{t/r_0}`$ as $`t`$ approaches infinity. But for any interior point, the limitting values are different, and infact, $`e^\lambda =finite`$ even when the collapse is supposed to be complete! OS noted “For $`R`$ less than $`R_b`$, $`e^\lambda `$ tends to a finite limit as $`t`$ tends to infinity” without trying to find why it is so.

And on the other hand, when $`e^\lambda =finite`$, one sees that $`e^\nu 0`$. But, for the external boundary, for which $`e^\lambda \mathrm{}`$, it can not be predicted whether $`e^\nu `$ indeed approaches zero (these limits remain unchanged even when one ignores the numerical factor of 4). They admitted this problem while they wrote “Also for $`rr_0`$, $`\nu `$ tends to minus infinity”. This $`\nu \mathrm{}`$ limit would correspond to the singularity $`R0`$. However they did not ponder why for $`R=R_b`$, $`e^\nu `$ does not behave in the desired manner.

Specifically the fact that for $`R<R_b`$, $`e^\lambda `$ fails to blow up at the singularity definitely hints that there is some tacit assumption, made in the OS analysis, which is not realized in Nature (GTR) or there is a basic fault in the formulation of the problem. In our attempt for a possible resolution of this physical anomaly with regard to the unphysical aspect of OS solutions, we see from Eq. (8), that, $`t\mathrm{}`$ if either or both of the two following conditions are satisfied:

$$r_00;t\mathrm{}$$
(24)   
and

$$y1;t\mathrm{}$$
(25)   
OS implicitly assumed that $`r_0`$ is finite and then $`y1`$ and then $`y<1`$ as $`t\mathrm{}`$ “For $`\lambda `$ tends to a finite limit for $`rr_0`$ as $`t`$ approaches infinity, and for $`r_b=r_0`$ tends to infinity. Also for $`rr_0`$, $`\nu `$ tends to to minus infinity.” But, while doing so, they completely overlooked the most important feature of Eq. (8) (their Eq. 36), and Eq. (10) that in view of the presence of the $`t\mathrm{ln}\frac{y^{1/2}+1}{y^{1/2}1}`$ term, in order that $`t`$ is definable at all, one must have

$$y1$$
(26)   
For an insight into the problem, we first focus attention on the outermost layer where $`y_b=r_b/r_0`$, so that the above condition becomes

$$r_br_0$$
(27)   
This condition tells that $`r_b`$ can never plunge below $`r_0`$: Thus a careful analysis of the GTR homogeneous dust problem as enunciated by OS themselves actually tell that trapped surfaces can not be formed even though one is free to chase the limit $`rr_0`$. We may further rewrite this condition as

$$\frac{r_b}{r_0}1;\frac{2M}{r_b}1$$
(28)   
This means that, if the collapse indeed proceeds upto $`r_b=0`$, the final gravitational mass of the configuration would be

$$M_f(r=0)=0$$
(29)   
But then, for a dust or any adiabatically evolving fluid

$$M_i=M_f=constant$$
(30)   
Therefore, we must have $`M_i=0`$ too. This means that $`r_0=0`$ in this case, and then, it may be promptly verified that, irrespective of the value of $`r`$, Eqs. (21) and (22) lead to a unique limiting value for the metric coefficients :

$$e^\lambda 1\left(4e^{t/r_0}+1\right)0$$
(31)   
or,

$$e^\lambda \mathrm{}$$
(32)   
and

$$e^\nu e^{\lambda 2t/r_0}0$$
(33)   
because $`t/r_0`$ approaches $`\mathrm{}`$ much faster than $`\lambda `$, if $`r_0=0`$. Thus, technically, the final solutions of OS are correct, except for the fact they did not organically incorporate the crucial $`y0`$ condition in the collapse equations (here we ignore the missing numerical factor of 4). And all we have done here is to rectify this colossal lacunae to fix the value of $`r_0=0`$.

This conclusion that the work of OS demands $`r_0=0`$ could have obtained in a much more direct fashion simply from the definition of $`y`$ in Eq. (15). To this effect, we rewrite this equation as

$$y\frac{1}{2}(\alpha ^21)+\frac{r}{r_0\alpha }$$
(34)   
Note that during the collapse process $`R/R_b\alpha `$ remains fixed for a given mass shell. Suppose we are considering the collapse of an interior shell with $`\alpha <1`$ and $`\alpha ^21<0`$. Then if $`r_0>0`$, the second term on the left hand side of the foregoing equation can ne made arbitrarily small as $`r0`$. Therefore $`y`$ would become negative as the collapse progresses if $`r_0>0`$. To avoid this, we must have $`r/r_01`$.

We may recall here that, long ago, Harrison et al. (pp. 75) mentioned that spherical gravitational collapse should come to a decisive end with $`M_f=M^{}=0`$. And they termed this understanding as a “Theorem” (without offering a real proof):

“THEOREM 23: Provided that matter does not undergo collapse at the microscopic level at any stage of compression, then, regardless of all features of the equation of state - there exists for each fixed number of baryons a gravitationally collapsed configuration, in which the mass-energy $`M^{}`$ as sensed externally is zero.”

In a somewhat more realistic way Zeldovich & Novikov (see pp. 297) discussed the possibility of having an ultracompact configuration of degenerate fermions obeying an equation of state $`p=e/3`$, where $`e`$ is the proper internal energy density, with $`M0`$.

And it is also well known that the so-called “naked singularities” could be of zero-gravitational mass.

We have already seen that the coordinate time required for collapse to the event horizon or beyond is $`t=\mathrm{}`$. And, it may be found that the proper time for collapse of the outer boundary of a dust ball to the central singularity is

$$\tau =\pi \left(\frac{r_{\mathrm{}}}{8M}\right)^{1/2}$$
(35)   
where, the dust ball is assumed to be at “rest” at $`r=r_{\mathrm{}}`$ at $`\tau =t=0`$. This equation is also obtainable from Eq. (4) provided one chooses $`R_b`$ in such a way thay

$$R_b^{3/2}=\frac{\sqrt{2}\pi }{3}r_{\mathrm{}}^{3/2}$$
(36)   
Since $`M=0`$ for the OS problem, the proper time for collapse is infinite: $`\tau =\mathrm{}`$, and not finite. Physically this means that, at any finite proper or coordinate time, there is never any OS-black -hole. The collapse process goes on and on indefinitely as spacetime becomes infinitely curved near the would be singularity $`r=0`$. If this picture is correct, for self-consistency, Nature should not allow the existence of finite mass BHs. And at this juncture, some readers may argue that, this is not so. Irrespective of the results of the OS problem, as highlighted by us in this paper, it may be argued that GTR allows the existence of arbitray mass Schwarzschild BHs.

In another related paper, we assumed the existence of a finite mass BH which is described by Kruskal- Szekeres metric. If this assumption of the existence of a finite mass BH is indeed allowed by GTR, one would find the world line of a material partcle to be timelike, $`ds^2>0`$, everywhere except probably at the central singularity $`r=0`$. However, we have found that, even in the Kruskal-Szekeres metric the metric appears to be null, $`ds^2=0`$, at $`R=2M`$. If we describe the region interior to the EH by Lemaitre metric, we have found that, in this case too, the metric becomes null at the EH. We have further shown that, in the Kruskal-Szekeres metric, the metric continues to be null for $`R<2M`$ too. And this can be explained only when we realize that the Event Horizon, itself is the end of spacetime for the free falling particle. This implies that mass of the BH is actually $`M0`$, in complete agreement with the present exact analysis. This is also in complete agreement with the idea of Einstein that Schwarzschild singularity can not be realized in practice ($`\tau =0`$).