May 25-29, 2026; Forte Village Resort (Sardinia, Italy)
We are pleased to organize the workshop “The Microscopic Structure of Black Holes: From Theory to Observation and Back,” which will take place on 24–29 May 2026 at the Forte Village Resort, a stunning seaside venue in Sardinia (Italy), located 40 km from Cagliari.
This will be a small, focused, invitation-only workshop bringing together experts from different communities to explore the theoretical and phenomenological aspects of new physics at the scale of the black-hole horizon, as suggested by both quantum-information-theory arguments and explicit constructions in string theory. The aim is to address long-standing puzzles associated with classical black holes and discuss observational tests of this proposal.
We will host 20+ leading scientists to foster cross-disciplinary interactions around the following thematic areas:
- Theory: explicit solutions, microstates of astrophysical black holes, numerical solutions with complex topology
- Simulations: formation, dynamics, and stability of black-hole microstates
- Phenomenology & Observations: gravitational-wave and electromagnetic observables, searches and constraints
Preliminary program:
List of participants:
Ibou Bah (JHU, USA)
Leor Barack (Southampton, UK)
Iosif Bena (Saclay, FR)
Emanuele Berti (JHU, USA)
Massimo Bianchi (Tor Vergata, IT)
Alessandra Buonanno (AEI, DE)
Vitor Cardoso (NBI, DK)
Katy Clough (Queen's Mary, UK)
Thibault Damour (IHES, FR)
Alexandru Dima (Sapienza, IT)
Chris Van Der Broeck (Utretch, NL)
Oscar Campos Dias (Southampton, UK)
Roberto Emparan (Barcelona, ES)
Pierre Heidmann (Ohio, USA)
Tanja Hinderer (Utretch, NL)
Niels Obers (NBI, DK)
Costantino Pacilio (INFN, IT)
Paolo Pani (Sapienza, IT)
Jorge Santos (Cambridge, UK)
Helvi Witek (Illinois, USA)
Nicolas Yunes (Illinois, USA)
Scientific Secretariat: Alessandra Curto
Organizing Committee: Iosif Bena, Paolo Pani, Jorge Santos, Helvi Witek
Support: This event is supported by the FIS2 Advanced Grant ET-NOW – “Fundamental Physics, Nuclear Physics and Cosmology with the Einstein Telescope,” funded by the Italian Ministry of Research.
