Universality of quantum entropy for extreme black holes

We consider the extremal limit of a black hole geometry of the Reissner-Nordstrom type and compute the quantum corrections to its entropy. Universally, the limiting geometry is the direct product of two 2-dimensional spaces and is characterized by just a few parameters. We argue that the quantum corrections to the entropy of such extremal black holes due to a massless scalar field have a universal behavior. We obtain explicitly the form of the quantum entropy in this extremal limit as a function of the parameters of the limiting geometry. We generalize these results to black holes with toroidal or higher genus horizon topologies. In general, the extreme quantum entropy is completely determined by the spectral geometry of the horizon and in the ultra-extreme case it is just a determinant of the 2-dimensional Laplacian. As a byproduct of our considerations we obtain expressions for the quantum entropy of black holes which an not of the Reissner-Nordstrom type: the extreme dilaton and extreme Kerr-Newman black holes. In both cases the classical Bekenstein-Hawking entropy is modified by logarithmic corrections. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V.