The global monopole spacetime and its topological charge

We show that the global monopole spacetime is one of the exact solutions of the Einstein equations by treating the matter field as a non-linear sigma model, without the weak field approximation applied in the original derivation by Barriola and Vilenkin. Furthermore, we find the physical origin of the topological charge in the global monopole spacetime. Finally, we generalize the proposal which generates spacetime from thermodynamical laws to the case of spacetime with global monopole charge. (paper)