Stability of self-gravitating magnetic monopoles

The stability of a spherically symmetric self-gravitating magnetic monopole is examined in the thin wall approximation: modeling the interior false vacuum as a region of de Sitter space; the exterior as an asymptotically flat region of the Reissner-Nordstr\"om geometry; and the boundary separating the two as a charged domain wall. There remains only to determine how the wall gets embedded in these two geometries. In this approximation, the ratio $k$ of the false vacuum to surface energy densities is a measure of the symmetry breaking scale $\eta$. Solutions are characterized by this ratio, the charge on the wall $Q$, and the value of the conserved total energy $M$. We find that for each fixed $k$ and $Q$ up to some critical value, there exists a unique globally static solution, with $M\simeq Q^{3/2}$; any stable radial excitation has $M$ bounded above by $Q$, the value assumed in an extremal Reissner-Nordstr\"om geometry and these are the only solutions with $M<Q$. As $M$ is raised above $Q$ a black hole forms in the exterior: (i) for low $Q$ or $k$, the wall is crushed; (ii) for higher values, it oscillates inside the black hole. If the mass is not too high these `collapsing' solutions co-exist with an inflating bounce; (iii) for $k$, $Q$ or $M$ outside the above regimes, there is a unique inflating solution. In case (i) the course of the bounce lies within a single asymptotically flat region (AFR) and it resembles closely the bounce exhibited by a false vacuum bubble (with Q=0). In cases (ii) and (iii) the course of the bounce spans two consecutive AFRs.