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# The power spectral properties of the Z source GX 340+0

## 1. Introduction

GX 340+0 is a bright low-mass X-ray binary (LMXB) and a Z source (Hasinger & van der Klis 1989). The Z-shaped track traced out by Z sources in the X-ray color-color diagram or hardness-intensity diagram (HID) is divided into three branches: the horizontal branch (HB), the normal branch (NB), and the flaring branch (FB). The power spectral properties and the HID of GX 340+0 were previously described by van Paradijs et al. (1988) and Kuulkers & van der Klis (1996) using data obtained with the EXOSAT satellite, by Penninx et al. (1991) using data obtained with the Ginga satellite, and by Jonker et al. (1998) using data obtained with the Rossi X -ray Timing Explorer (RXTE) satellite. An extra branch trailing the FB in the HID has been described by Penninx et al. (1991) and Jonker et al. (1998). When the source is on the HB or on the upper part of the NB, quasi-periodic oscillations (QPOs) occur with frequencies varying from 20–50 Hz: the horizontal branch quasi-periodic oscillations or HBOs (Penninx et al. 1991; Kuulkers & van der Klis 1996; Jonker et al. 1998). Second harmonics of these HBOs were detected by Kuulkers & van der Klis (1996) and Jonker et al. (1998) in the frequency range 73–76 Hz and 38–69 Hz, respectively. In the middle of the NB, van Paradijs et al. (1988) found normal branch oscillations (NBOs) with a frequency of 5.6 Hz. Recently, Jonker et al. (1998) discovered twin kHz QPOs in GX 340+0. These QPOs have now been seen in all six originally identified Z sources (Sco X–1, van der Klis et al. 1996; Cyg X–2, Wijnands et al 1998a; GX 17+2, Wijnands et al. 1997b; GX 349+2, Zhang et al. 1998; GX 340+0, Jonker et al. 1998; GX 5–1, Wijnands et al. 1998b; see van der Klis 1997, 1999 for reviews), but not in Cir X–1, which combines Z source and atoll source characteristics (Oosterbroek et al. 1995; Shirey, Bradt, and Levine 1999; see also Psaltis, Belloni, & van der Klis 1999).

In the other class of LMXBs, the atoll sources (Hasinger & van der Klis 1989), kHz QPOs are observed as well (see van der Klis 1997, 1999 for reviews). Recently, also HBO-like features have been identified in a number of atoll sources (4U 1728–34, Strohmayer et al. 1996, Ford & van der Klis 1998, Di Salvo et al. 1999; GX13+1, Homan et al. 1998; 4U 1735–44, Wijnands et al. 1998c; 4U 1705–44, Ford, van der Klis, & Kaaret 1998; 4U 1915–05, Boirin et al. 1999; 4U 0614+09, van Straaten et al. 1999; see Psaltis, Belloni, & van der Klis 1999 for a summary). Furthermore, at the highest inferred mass accretion rates, QPOs with frequencies near 6 Hz have been discovered in the atoll sources 4U 1820–30 (Wijnands, van der Klis, & Rijkhorst 1999c), and XTE J1806–246 (Wijnands & van der Klis 1998e, 1999b; Revnivtsev, Borozdin, & Emelyanov 1999), which might have a similar origin as the Z source NBOs.

At low mass accretion rates the power spectra of black hole candidates, atoll, and Z sources show similar characteristics (van der Klis 1994a,b). Wijnands & van der Klis (1999a) found that the break frequency of the broken power law which describes the broad-band power spectrum, correlates well with the frequency of peaked noise components (and sometimes narrow QPO peaks) observed in atoll sources (including the millisecond X-ray pulsar SAX J1808.4–3658; Wijnands & van der Klis 1998d, Chakrabarty & Morgan 1998), and black hole candidates. The Z sources followed a slightly different correlation. In a similar analysis, Psaltis, Belloni, & van der Klis (1999) have pointed out correlations between the frequencies of some of these QPOs and other noise components in atoll sources, Z sources, and black hole candidates, which suggests these phenomena may be closely related across these various source types, or at least depend on a third phenomenon in the same manner. Because of these correlations, models describing the kHz QPOs which also predict QPOs or noise components in the low-frequency part of the power spectrum can be tested by investigating this low-frequency part.

In this paper, we study the full power spectral range of the bright LMXB and Z source GX 340+0 in order to further investigate the similarities between the atoll sources and the Z sources, and to help constrain models concerning the formation of the different QPOs. We report on the discovery of two new components in the power spectra of GX 340+0 with frequencies less than 40 Hz when the source is on the left part of the HB. We also discuss the properties of the NBO, and those of the kHz QPOs.

## 2. Observations and analysis

The Z source GX 340+0 was observed 24 times in 1997 and 1998 with the proportional counter array (PCA; Jahoda et al. 1996) on board the RXTE satellite (Bradt, Rothschild & Swank 1993). A log of the observations is presented in Table 1. Part of these data (observations 1, 9–18) was used by Jonker et al. (1998) in the discovery of the kHz QPOs in GX 340+0. The total amount of good data obtained was $``$390 ksec. During $``$19% of the time only 3 or 4 of the 5 PCA detectors were active.

The data were obtained in various modes, of which the Standard 1 and Standard 2 modes were always active. The Standard 1 mode has a time resolution of 1/8 s in one energy band (2–60 keV). The Standard 2 mode has a time resolution of 16 s and the effective 2–60 keV PCA energy range is covered by 129 energy channels. In addition, high time resolution data (with a resolution of 244 $`\mu `$s or better for the 2–5.0 keV band and with a resolution of 122 $`\mu `$s or better for the 5.0–60 keV range) were obtained for all observations.

For all observations except observation 1, which had only 4 broad energy bands, and observation 22, for which technical problems with the data occurred, we computed power spectra in five broad energy bands (2–5.0, 5.0–6.4, 6.4–8.6, 8.6–13.0, 13.0–60 keV) with a Nyquist frequency of 256 Hz dividing the data in segments of 16 s length each. We also computed power spectra for all observations using 16 s data segments in one combined broad energy band ranging from 5.0–60 keV with a Nyquist frequency of 4096 Hz.

To characterize the properties of the low-frequency part (1/16–256 Hz) of the power spectrum we experimented with several fit functions (see Section 3) but finally settled on a fit function that consisted of the sum of a constant to represent the Poisson noise, one to four Lorentzians describing the QPOs, an exponentially cut-off power law component, $`P\nu ^\alpha exp(\nu /\nu _{cut})`$ to describe the low frequency noise (LFN), and a power law component to represent the very low frequency noise (VLFN) when the source was on the NB.

To describe the high frequency part (128 to 4096 Hz or 256 to 4096 Hz) of the power spectrum we used a fit function which consisted of the sum of a constant and a broad sinusoid to represent the dead-time modified Poisson noise (Zhang et al. 1995), one or two Lorentzian peaks to represent the kHz QPOs, and sometimes a power law to fit the lowest frequency part ($`<`$ 150 Hz). The PCA setting concerning the very large event window (Zhang et al. 1995; van der Klis et al. 1997) was set to 55 $`\mu `$s. Therefore, its effect on the Poisson noise was small and it could be incorporated into the broad sinusoid. The errors on the fit parameters were determined using $`\mathrm{\Delta }\chi ^2`$=1.0 ($`1\sigma `$ single parameter). The 95% confidence upper limits were determined using $`\mathrm{\Delta }\chi ^2`$=2.71.

We used the Standard 2 data to compute hardnesses and intensities from the three detectors that were always active. Figure 1 shows three HIDs; one (A) for observations 1 and 9–18 combined (data set A), one (B) for observation 2–8 combined (data set B), and one (C) for observation 19–24 combined (data set C). The observations were subdivided in this way because the hard vertex, defined as the HB–NB intersection, is at higher intensities in data set C than in data set A. The hard vertex of data set B falls at an intermediate intensity level.

We assigned a value to each power spectrum according to the position of the source along the Z track using the $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ parameterization (Dieters & van der Klis 1999, Wijnands et al. 1997) applied to each HID separately. In this parametrization, the hard vertex (defined as the HB-NB intersection) is assigned the value $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ = 1.0 and the soft vertex (defined as the NB–FB intersection) is assigned $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ = 2.0. Thus, the distance between the hard and soft vertex defines the length scale along each branch. Since for HID C we only observed part of the Z track, we used the position of the soft vertex of HID A in HID C. From the fact that the soft vertex of the HID B was consistent with that from HID A, we conclude that the error introduced by this is small.

The shifts in the position of the hard vertex prevented us from selecting the power spectra according to their position in an HID of all data combined. We selected the power spectra according to the $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ value in each of the three separate Z tracks, since Jonker et al. (1998) showed that for GX 340+0 the frequency of the HBO is better correlated to the position of the source relative to the instantaneous Z track than to its position in terms of coordinates in the HID. The power spectra corresponding to each $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ interval were averaged. However, employing this method yielded artificially broadened HBO peaks, and sometimes the HBO profile even displayed double peaks. The reason for this is that in a typical $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ selection interval of 0.05 the dispersion in HBO frequencies well exceeds the statistical one, as shown in Figure 2. While the relation between $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ and HBO frequency is roughly linear, the spread is large.

For this reason, when the HBO was detectable in the 5.0–60 keV power spectra, we selected those power spectra according to HBO frequency rather than on $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ value. In practice, this was possible for all data on the HB. To determine the energy dependence of the components, the 2–5.0, 5.0–6.4, 6.4–8.6, 8.6–13.0, 13.0–60 keV power spectra were selected according to the frequency of the HBO peak in the 2–60 keV power spectrum, when detectable.

The HBO frequency selection proceeded as follows. For each observation we constructed a dynamical power spectrum using the 5–60 keV or 2–60 keV data (see above), showing the time evolution of the power spectra (see Fig. 3). Using this method, we were able to trace the HBO frequency in each observation as a function of time. We determined the maximum power in 0.5 Hz bins over a range of 2 Hz around the manually identified QPO frequency for each power spectrum, and adopted the frequency at which this maximum occurred as the HBO frequency in that power spectrum. This was done for each observation in which the HBO could be detected.

The 18–52 Hz frequency range over which the HBO was detected was divided in 16 selection bins with widths of 2 or 4 Hz, depending on the signal to noise level. For each selection interval the power spectra were averaged, and a mean $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ value was determined.

The HBO selection criteria were applied to all data along the HB and near the hard vertex. When the source was near the hard vertex, on the NB, or the FB, we selected the power spectra according to the $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ value. An overlap between the two methods occurred for data near the hard vertex; both selection methods yielded the same results for the fit parameters to well within the statistical errors (see Section 3). Separately, for each set of observations (A,B, and C) we also determined the kHz QPO properties according to the $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ method.

## 3. Results

Using the fit function described by Jonker et al. (1998) which consisted of two Lorentzians to describe the HBO and the second harmonic of the HBO, and a cut-off power law to describe the LFN noise component, we obtained poor fits. Compared with Jonker et al. (1998) we combined more data, resulting in a higher signal to noise ratio. First we included a peaked noise component (called sub-HBO component) at frequencies below the HBO, since a similar component was found by van der Klis et al. (1997) in Sco X–1. This improved the $`\chi _{red}^2`$ of the fit. Remaining problems were that the frequency of the second harmonic was not equal to twice the HBO frequency (similar problems fitting the power spectra on the HB of Cyg X–2 were reported by Kuulkers, Wijnands, & van der Klis 1999), and the frequency of the sub-HBO component varied erratically along the HB. Inspecting the fit showed that both the fit to the high frequency tail of the HBO, and the fit to its second harmonic did not represent the data points very well. Including an additional component in the fit function representing the high frequency tail of the HBO (called shoulder component after Belloni et al.  who used this name) resulted in a better fit to the HBO peak, a centroid frequency of the HBO second harmonic more nearly equal to twice the HBO frequency, and a more consistent behavior of the frequency of the sub-HBO component (which sometimes apparently fitted the shoulder when no shoulder component was present in the fit function).

We also experimented with several other fit function components to describe the average power spectra which were used by other authors to describe the power spectra of other LMXBs. Using a fit function built up out of a broken power law, to fit the LFN component, and several Lorentzians to fit the QPOs after Wijnands et al. (1999a) results in significantly higher $`\chi _{red}^2`$ values than when the fit function described in Section 2 was used ($`\chi _{red}^2`$= 1.66 for 205 degrees of freedom (d.o.f.) versus a $`\chi _{red}^2`$= 1.28 with 204 d.o.f.). We also fitted the power spectra using the same fit function as described in Section 2 but with the frequency of the sub-HBO component fixed at 0 Hz, in order to test whether or not an extra LFN-like component centred around 0 Hz was a good representation of the extra sub-HBO component. Finally, we tested a fit function built up out of two cut-off power laws; one describing the LFN and one either describing the sub-HBO component or the shoulder component, and three Lorentzians, describing the HBO, its second harmonic, and either the sub-HBO or shoulder component when not fitted with the cut-off power law. But in all cases the $`\chi _{red}^2`$ values obtained using these fit functions were significantly higher (for the 24–26 Hz selection range values of 1.52 for 205 d.o.f., 1.62 for 204 d.o.f., and 2.00 for 205 d.o.f. were obtained, respectively).

Settling on the fit function already described in Section 2, we applied an F-test (Bevington & Robinson 1992) to the $`\chi ^2`$ of the fits with and without the extra Lorentzian components to test their significance. We derived a significance of more than 8 $`\sigma `$ for the sub-HBO component, and a significance of more than 6.5 $`\sigma `$ for the shoulder component, in the average selected power spectrum corresponding to HBO frequencies of 24 to 26 Hz. In Figure 4 we show the contribution of all the components used to obtain the best fit in this power spectrum.

The properties of all the components used in describing the low-frequency part of the average power spectra along the HB are given in Fig. 5 as a function of $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$. When the HBO frequency was higher than 32 Hz, the sub-HBO and shoulder component were not significant. We therefore decided to exclude these two components from the fit function in the HBO frequency selections of 32 Hz and higher. When this affected the parameters determined for the remaining components in the fit function, we mention so. Splitting the total counts into different photon energies reduced the signal to noise in each energy band and therefore these effects were more important in the fits performed to determine the energy dependence of the parameters.

### 3.1. The LFN component

The fractional rms amplitude of the LFN decreased as a function of $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ (Fig 5 A), with values ranging from 10% to 2.2% (5.0–60 keV). Upper limits on the LFN component were calculated by fixing the power law index at 0.0. The power law index of the LFN component increased from $``$ 0 at $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ 0.5 to $``$ 0.4 around $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$= 0.9; when the source moved on to the NB the index of the power law decreased to values slightly below 0.0 (Fig 5 B). The cut-off frequency of the LFN component increased as a function of $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$. For $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}>1.0`$ the cut-off frequency could not be determined with high accuracy (Fig 5 C).

The LFN fractional rms amplitude depended strongly on photon energy all across the selected frequency range. The rms amplitude increased from 5% at 2–5.0 keV to more than 15% at 13.0–60 keV ($`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$=0.48). The power law index, $`\alpha `$, of the LFN component was higher at lower photon energies (changing from 0.3–0.5 along the HB at 2–5.0 keV) than at higher photon energies (changing from $``$0.2–0.2 along the HB at 13.0–60 keV). The cut-off frequency of the LFN component did not change as a function of photon energy.

### 3.2. The HBO component

The fractional rms amplitude of the HBO decreased as a function of $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ (Fig 5 G), with values ranging from 10% to 1.7% over the detected range (5.0–60 keV). Upper limits on the HBO component were determined using a fixed FWHM of 15 Hz. The frequency of the HBO increased as a function of $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ but for $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}>`$1.0 it was consistent with being constant around 50 Hz (Fig 5 I).

The ratio of the rms amplitudes of the LFN and the HBO component, of interest in beat frequency models (see Shibazaki & Lamb 1987) decreased from $``$ 1 at an $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ value of 0.48 to $`0.6`$ at $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ values of 0.8–1.0. The ratio increased again to a value of $``$ 0.9 at $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}=`$1.05 when the source was on the NB.

The HBO rms amplitude depended strongly on photon energy all across the selected frequency range. The rms amplitude increased from 5% at 2–5.0 keV to $``$ 16% at 13.0–60 keV (at $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$=0.48) (see Figure 6 \[dots\] for the HBO energy dependence in the 26–28 Hz range). The increase in fractional rms amplitude of the HBO towards higher photon energies became less as the frequency of the HBO increased. At the highest HBO frequencies the HBO is relatively stronger in the 8.4–13.0 keV band than in the 13.0–60 keV band. The ratio between the fractional rms amplitude as a function of photon energy of the HBO at lower frequencies and the fractional rms amplitude as a function of photon energy of the HBO at higher frequencies is consistent with a straight line with a positive slope. The exact fit parameters depend on the HBO frequencies at which the ratios were taken. This behavior was also present in absolute rms amplitude ($`\mathrm{fractional}\mathrm{rms}\mathrm{amplitude}\mathrm{I}_\mathrm{x}`$, where $`\mathrm{I}_\mathrm{x}`$ is the count rate), see Fig. 7. So, this behavior is caused by actual changes in the QPO spectrum, not by changes in the time-averaged spectrum by which the QPO spectrum is divided to calculate the fractional rms spectrum of the HBO. The FWHM and the frequency of the HBO were the same in each energy band.

### 3.3. The second harmonic of the HBO

The rms amplitude of the second harmonic of the HBO decreased as a function of $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ (Fig 5 M) from 5.2% to 3.6% (5.0–60 keV). Upper limits on the second harmonic of the HBO were derived using a fixed FWHM of 25 Hz. The frequency of the second harmonic of the HBO was consistent with being twice the HBO frequency when the sub-HBO and the shoulder component were strong enough to be measured (see Fig 5 O, and Fig. 8). When these two extra components could not be determined significantly, due to the limited signal to noise, and we therefore omitted them from the fit function (as explained above), the frequency of the second harmonic of the HBO was clearly less than twice the HBO frequency (see Fig. 8).

The rms amplitude of the second harmonic of the HBO was also energy dependent. Its rms amplitude increased from less than 4% in the 2–5.0 keV, to more than 9% in the 8.6–13 keV band. The FWHM of the second harmonic varied erratically in the range of 10–50 Hz. This is not necessarily a property of the second harmonic since the HBO shoulder component which was not significant by themselve was omitted from the fit function. This may have influenced the fit to the FWHM of the second harmonic when it was weak. Its frequency was consistent with being the same in each energy band.

### 3.4. The sub-HBO component

The centroid frequency (Fig 5 F) and FWHM (Fig 5 E) of the Lorentzian at sub-HBO frequencies increased from 9.3$`\pm `$0.3 Hz to 13.6$`\pm `$1.0 Hz and from 7.1$`\pm `$0.6 Hz to 18$`\pm `$3 Hz, respectively, as the source moved up the HB from $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}=`$ 0.48 to 0.67. The rms amplitude of this component did not show a clear relation with $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$; its value was consistent with being constant around 5% (Fig 5 D). Upper limits on the sub-HBO component were determined using a fixed FWHM of 15 Hz. The frequency of the sub-HBO component is close to half the frequency of the HBO component. The fact that the ratio between the HBO frequency and the sub-HBO frequency is not exactly 2 but $`2.2`$ may be accounted for by the complexity of the data and therefore its description.

We detected the sub-HBO component in the three highest energy bands that we defined over an $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ range from 0.48–0.65. Its rms amplitude is higher in the highest energy band ($``$7% in 13.0–60 keV, and less than 5% in 6.4–8.6 keV) and decreased as a function of $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$, while the FWHM and the frequency increased from 6–12 Hz, and 9–15 Hz, respectively.

### 3.5. The HBO shoulder component

At an $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ value of 0.48 (the left most part of the HB) the frequency of the shoulder component was higher than the frequency of the HBO, and the frequency separation between them was largest (Fig 5 L and Fig. 8). Both the frequency of the shoulder and the HBO increased when the source moved along the HB, but the frequency difference decreased. The FWHM of the shoulder component increased from 7$`\pm `$2 Hz to 17$`\pm `$3 Hz and then decreased again to 8.6$`\pm `$1.0 Hz as the frequency of the HBO peak increased from 25.7$`\pm `$0.7 Hz to 30.9$`\pm `$0.4 Hz (Fig 5 K). From an $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ value of 0.61 to 0.67 the frequency was consistent with being constant at a value of 32 Hz. The rms amplitude was consistent with being constant around 4% (5.0–60 keV), over the total range where this component could be detected (Fig 5 J), but the data is also consistent with an increase of fractional rms amplitude with increasing HBO frequency. Upper limits on the HBO shoulder component were determined using a fixed FWHM of 7 Hz.

In the various energy bands the HBO shoulder component was detected seven times in total; once in the 2–5.0 keV band, three times in the 6.4–8.6 keV band, and three times in the in the 8.6–13.0 keV band, with rms amplitudes increasing from $``$3% in the 2–5.0 keV band to $``$6% in the 8.6–13.0 keV band, and a FWHM of $``$10 Hz. Upper limits of the order of 3%–4%, and of 5%–7% were derived in the two lowest and three highest energy bands considered, respectively. These are comparable with or higher than the rms amplitudes of this component determined in the 5–60 keV band.

### 3.6. The NBO component

The NBOs were not observed when the source was on the HB, with an upper limit of 0.5% just before the hard vertex (for an $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ value of 0.96). They were detected along the entire NB and they evolved into a broad noise component on the FB. The properties are listed in Table 2. The rms amplitude of the NBO gradually increased while the source moved from the upper NB to the middle part of the NB where the rms amplitude is highest. On the lower part of the NB the NBO rms amplitude gradually decreased. Upper limits on the NBO components were determined using a fixed FWHM of 5 Hz.

As the NBO got stronger towards the middle of the NB the profile of the NBO became detectably asymmetric (see Fig. 9); between $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$=1.25 and 1.54 the NBO was fitted using two Lorentzians. The FWHM of the NBO as a function of the position along the NB was first decreasing from $``$10 Hz at $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$=1.038 to around 2.5 Hz on the middle part of the NB ($`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ values from 1.25–1.54), and then increased again to $``$ 5 Hz on the lowest part of the NB.

Due to the fact that the NBO profiles had to be fitted using two Lorentzians in part of the data, the behavior of the NBO frequency as a function of $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ is also not determined unambiguously. Therefore, we weighted the frequencies of these two Lorentzians according to one over the square of the FWHM. The FWHM weighted average of the two centroid frequencies of the two Lorentzians used to describe the NBO was consistent with a small increase as a function of $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ from $`5.27\pm 0.07`$ Hz at $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$=1.25 to $`5.83\pm 0.18`$ Hz at $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$=1.54.

We combined all power spectra with an $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ between 1.0 and 1.9 in order to investigate the energy dependence of the NBO. The rms amplitude of the NBO increased as of function of photon energy (see Figure 6 \[squares\]).

### 3.7. KHz QPOs

Using the HBO frequency selection method in all data combined, the frequency of the kHz QPO peaks increased from $`197_{70}^{+26}`$ Hz to $`565_{14}^{+9}`$ Hz and from $`535_{48}^{+85}`$ Hz to $`840\pm 21`$ Hz for the lower and upper peak, respectively, while the frequency of the HBO increased from $`20.55\pm 0.02`$ Hz to $`48.15\pm 0.08`$ Hz. Using the $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$ selection method on the three data sets we defined in Section 2 (Figure 1), we found that the relation between the kHz QPO and the HBO is consistent with being the same in all three data sets (Fig. 10 upper panel). The same relation was found when we combined all data and selected the power spectra according to the HBO frequency.

Upper limits on the kHz QPOs were determined with the FWHM fixed at 150 Hz. When only one of the two kHz QPO peaks was detected the upper limit on the other peak was determined by fixing the frequency at the frequency of the detected peak plus or minus the mean difference frequency between the two peaks, depending on whether the lower or the upper peak was detected. The properties of the kHz QPOs as determined in all data combined when selected according to the HBO frequency are listed in Table 3.

The kHz QPO peak separation was consistent with being constant at 339$`\pm `$8 Hz over the observed kHz QPO range (Fig. 10 lower panel), but a decrease towards higher upper peak frequencies similar to that found in Sco X–1 (van der Klis et al. 1997), 4U 1608–52 (Méndez et al. 1998), 4U 1735–44 (Ford et al. 1998), 4U 1702–429 (Markwardt, Strohmayer, & Swank 1999), and 4U 1728–34 (Méndez & van der Klis 1999) cannot be excluded. The FWHM of neither the lower nor the higher frequency kHz QPO peak showed a clear relation with frequency. The rms amplitude of the lower and upper kHz QPO peak decreased from 3.1% to 1.1%, and from 4.2% to 1.2%, respectively when the HBO frequency increased from 20.55 to 48.15 Hz.

## 4. Discussion

In the present work we combined all RXTE data presently available for the Z source GX 340+0 using our new selection method based on the frequency of the HBO peak. This allowed us to distinguish two new components in the low-frequency part of the power spectrum.

These two extra components were strongest when the source was at the lowest count rates on the HB (see Fig. 1), between $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}=`$ 0.48–0.73, i.e., at the lowest inferred $`\dot{M}`$. The frequency of one of these components, the sub-HBO component, is close to half the frequency of the HBO component. The frequency ratio was consistent with being constant when the frequency of the sub-HBO changed from 9 to 14 Hz. A similar feature at sub-HBO frequencies has been reported by van der Klis et al. (1997) in Sco X–1. Since the frequency of this component is close to twice the predicted Lense-Thirring (LT) precession frequency for rapidly rotating neutron stars (Stella & Vietri 1998), we shall discuss the properties of this component within this framework.

The other component we discovered, the HBO shoulder component, was used to describe the strong excess in power in the HBO profile towards higher frequencies. If this shoulder component is related to the HBO and not to a completely different mechanism which by chance results in frequencies close to the frequency of the HBO, it can be used to constrain the formation models of the HBO peak. We demonstrated that both the HBO and the NBO have a similar asymmetric profile. In the NBO this was previously noted by Priedhorsky et al. (1986) in Sco X–1. We shall consider the hypothesis that the formation of this shoulder is a common feature of the two different QPO phenomena, even if the two peaks themselves perhaps occur due to completely different physical reasons.

Our results on the kHz QPOs based on more extensive data sets at three different epochs and using the new HBO selection method are consistent with those of Jonker et al. (1998). We discuss the properties of the kHz QPOs within the framework of precessing Keplerian flows (Stella & Vietri 1999), the sonic point model (Miller, Lamb, & Psaltis 1998), and the transition layer model described by Osherovich & Titarchuk (1999), and Titarchuk, Osherovich, & Kuznetsov (1999).

### 4.1. Comparison with other observations

In various LMXBs, QPOs have been found whose profiles are clearly not symmetric. Belloni et al. (1997) showed that for the black hole candidate (BHC) GS 1124–68 the QPO profiles are asymmetric, with a high frequency shoulder. Dieters et al. (1998) reported that the 2.67 Hz QPO of the BHC 4U 1630–47 was also asymmetric with a high frequency shoulder. In the Z source Sco X–1 the NBO profile was also found to be asymmetric (Priedhorsky et al. 1986). It is clear that asymmetric shapes of the QPO profiles are frequently observed in LMXBs and are not restricted to either the black hole candidates or the neutron star systems.

In the BHCs GS 1124–68 (Belloni et al. 1997) and XTE J1550–564 (Homan et al. 1999) several QPOs were discovered which seem to be harmonically related in the same way as we report for GX 340+0, i.e. the third harmonic is not detected, while the first, the second and the fourth harmonic are. If this implies that these QPOs are the same, models involving the magnetic field of the neutron star for their origin could be ruled out. The time lag properties of the harmonic components of the QPOs in XTE J1550–564 are complex and quite distinctive (Wijnands, Homan, & van der Klis 1999). In GX 340+0 no time lags of the harmonic components could be measured, but the time lags measured in the HBO in the similar Z source GX 5–1 (Vaughan et al. 1994) are quite different.

In order to study in more detail the relationship found by Wijnands & van der Klis (1999) between the QPOs and the noise break frequency in the power spectrum of LMXBs, we fitted the LFN component using a broken power law. To determine the value for the break frequency we fixed the parameters of all other components to the values found when using a cut-off power law to describe the LFN. Wijnands & van der Klis (1999a) reported that the Z sources did not fall on the relation between the break and QPO frequency established by atoll sources and black hole candidates. They suggested that the Z source LFN is not similar to the atoll HFN but the noise component found in Sco X–1 at sub-HBO frequencies is. By using the centroid frequency of that peaked noise component as the break frequency instead of the LFN break frequency, the HBO frequencies did fall on the reported relation. On the other hand, we find that using the sub-HBO frequency instead of the HBO frequency together with the LFN break frequency, the Z source GX 340+0 also falls exactly on the relation. Therefore, the suggestion made by Wijnands & van der Klis (1999a) that the strong band-limited noise in atoll and Z sources have a different origin is only one of the two possible solutions to the observed discrepancy. Our proposed alternative solution is that the Z and atoll noise components are the same, but that it is the sub-HBO in Z sources which corresponds to the QPO in atoll sources. An argument in favour of the noise components in Z and atoll sources being the same is that the cut-off frequency of the LFN component increased as a function of $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$, in a similar fashion as the frequency associated with the atoll high frequency noise (van der Klis 1995, Ford & van der Klis 1998, van Straaten et al. 1999).

Following Psaltis, Belloni, & van der Klis (1999) we plotted the sub-HBO frequency against the frequency of the lower-frequency kHz QPO. The sub-HBO does not fall on the relation found by Psaltis, Belloni, & van der Klis (1999) between the frequency of the HBO and the lower-frequency kHz QPO frequency. Instead the data points fall between the two branches defined by the HBO-like QPO frequencies vs. the lower kHz QPO frequency at high frequencies (see Psaltis, Belloni, & van der Klis 1999).

### 4.2. HBO – kHz QPO relations

#### 4.2.1 Lense-Thirring precession frequency

Stella & Vietri (1998) recently considered the possibility that the HBO is formed due to the LT precession of the nodal points of sligthly tilted orbits in the inner accretion disk, but as they already mentioned the Z sources GX 5–1 and GX 17+2 did not seem to fit in this scheme. For reasonable values of I/M, the neutron star moment of inertia divided by its mass, the observed frequencies were larger by a factor of $``$2 than the predicted ones. Jonker et al. (1998) showed that for GX 340+0 the predicted frequency is too small by a factor of 3, if one assumes that the higher frequency peak of the kHz QPOs reflects the Keplerian frequency of matter in orbit around the neutron star, and that the mean peak separation reflects the neutron star spin frequency. Using the same assumptions Psaltis et al. (1999) also concluded that a simple LT precession frequency model is unable to explain the formation of HBOs in Z sources.

Detailed calculations of Morsink & Stella (1999) even worsen the situation, since their calculations lower the predicted LT frequencies. They find that the LT precession frequencies are approximately a factor of two too low to explain the noise components at frequencies $``$20–35 Hz observed in atoll sources (4U 1735–44, Wijnands & van der Klis 1998c; 4U 1728–34, Strohmayer et al 1996, Ford & van der Klis 1998). Stella & Vietri (1998) already put forward the suggestion that a modulation can be produced at twice the LT precession frequency if the modulation is produced by the two points where the inclined orbit intersects the disk plane (although they initially used this for explaining the discrepancy of a factor of two between the predicted and the observed LT precession frequencies for the Z sources).

The sub-HBO peaked noise component we discovered could be harmonically related to the HBO component. If the sub-HBO is the second harmonic of the fundamental LT precession frequency, as needed to explain the frequencies in the framework of the LT precession model where the neutron star spin frequency is approximately equal to the frequency of the kHz QPO peak separation, the HBO must be the fourth and the harmonic of the HBO must be the eighth harmonic component, whereas the sixth and uneven harmonics must be much weaker. This poses strong (geometrical) constraints on the LT precession process. On the other hand, if the HBO frequency is twice the LT precession frequency, which implies a neutron star spin frequency of $``$900 Hz (see Morsink & Stella 1999), the frequency of the sub-HBO component is the LT precession frequency, and the frequency of the second harmonic of the HBO is four times the LT precession frequency. In that case only even harmonics and the LT precession frequency are observed.

#### 4.2.2 Magnetospheric beat frequency and radial-flow models

In this section, we discuss our findings concerning the QPOs and the LFN component in terms of the magnetic beat frequency model where the QPOs are described by harmonic series (e.g. Shibazaki & Lamb 1987).

If the sub-HBO frequency is proven not to be harmonically related to the HBO, the sub-HBO peak might be explained as an effect of fluctuations entering the magnetospheric boundary layer periodically. Such an effect will be strongest at low HBO frequencies since its power density will be proportional to the power density of the LFN (Shibazaki & Lamb 1987). If it is the fundamental frequency and the HBO its first overtone then the magnetospheric beat frequency model proposed to explain the HBO formation (Alpar & Shaham 1985; Lamb et al. 1985) is not strongly constrained.

Within the beat frequency model the high frequency shoulder of the HBO peak can be explained as a sign of radial drift of the blobs as they spiral in after crossing the magnetospheric boundary layer (Shibazaki & Lamb 1987). Shibazaki & Lamb (1987) describe another mechanism which may produce a high frequency shoulder. Interference between the LFN and the QPO caused by a non uniform phase distribution of the blobs will also cause the QPO to become asymmetric. This effect will be strongest when the LFN and the QPO components overlap, as observed. Finally, an asymmetric initial distribution of frequencies of the blobs when entering the magnetospheric boundary layer may also form an asymmetric HBO peak.

The changes in the power law index of the LFN as a function of photon energy can be explained by varying the width or the steepness of the lifetime distribution of the blobs entering the magnetic boundary layer (Shibazaki & Lamb 1987). The decrease in increase of both the fractional and absolute rms amplitude of the HBO as a function of energy towards higher frequencies (Fig. 7) also constrains the detailed physical interactions occurring in the boundary layer.

Fortner et al. (1989) proposed that the NBO is caused by oscillations in the electron scattering optical depth at the critical Eddington mass accretion rate. How a high frequency shoulder can be produced within this model is not clear. Both the HBO and the NBO shoulder components were detected when the rms amplitude of the HBO and the NBO was highest. In case of the NBO, this may be a result of the higher signal to noise. Since the rms amplitude of the NBO shoulder component is consistent with being $``$2/3 of the NBO rms amplitude (see Table 2), combining more observations should increase the range over which this shoulder component is detected, if this ratio is constant along $`\mathrm{S}_\mathrm{z}`$. In case of the HBO the two components seem to merge. While the fractional rms amplitude of the HBO shoulder component increased that of the HBO decreased. When the fractional rms amplitudes were comparable, the HBO was fitted with one Lorentzian. The rms amplitude of both shoulder components increased in a similar way as the rms amplitudes of the NBO and the HBO with photon energy. So, the formation of these shoulder components seems a common feature of both QPO forming mechanisms.

#### 4.2.3 Radial oscillations in a viscous layer

In Sco X–1, Titarchuk, Osherovich, & Kuznetsov (1999) interpreted the extra noise component in the power spectra (van der Klis et al. 1997) as due to radial oscillations in a viscous boundary layer (Titarchuk & Osherovich 1999). If the noise component in Sco X–1 is the sub-HBO component in GX 340+0, the model of Titarchuk & Osherovich (1999) can be applied to the frequencies and dependencies we found for the sub-HBO component in GX 340+0. Fitting our data to the relation between the frequency of the extra noise component and the Keplerian frequency, using the parameters and parametrization given by Titarchuk, Osherovich, & Kuznetsov (1999), we obtained a value of $`C_N=15`$ for GX 340+0. This value is much larger than the value obtained for Sco X–1 (9.76). According to Titarchuk & Osherovich (1999) a higher $`C_N`$ value implies a higher viscosity for the same Reynold’s number.

### 4.3. KHz QPOs and their peak separation

Recently, Stella & Vietri (1999) have put forward a model in which the formation of the lower kHz QPO is due to the relativistic periastron precession (apsidal motion) of matter in (near) Keplerian orbits. The frequency of the upper kHz QPO peaks is the Keplerian frequency of this material. The peak separation is then equal to the radial frequency of matter in a nearly circular Keplerian orbit, and is predicted to decrease as the Keplerian frequency increases and approaches the predicted frequency at the marginally stable circular orbit. This model can explain the decrease in peak separation as observed in various sources (see Section 3.7).

Beat frequency models stating that the upper kHz QPO peak is formed by Keplerian motion at a preferred radius in the disk (e.g. the sonic point radius, Miller, Lamb, & Psaltis 1998), whereas the lower kHz QPO peak formed at the frequency of the beat between the neutron star spin frequency and this Keplerian frequency, cannot in their original form explain the decrease in peak separation in these two sources. A relatively small extension of the model (Lamb, Miller, & Psaltis 1998) can, however, produce the observed decrease in peak separation.

Osherovich & Titarchuk (1999) developed a model in which the kHz QPOs arise due to radial oscillations of blobs of accreting material at the magnetospheric boundary. The lower kHz QPO frequency is in their model identified with the Keplerian frequency. Besides this QPO two eigenmodes are identified whose frequencies coincide with the upper kHz QPO peak frequency and the frequency of the HBO component in the power spectra of Sco X–1 (Titarchuk & Osherovich 1999). Interpreting our findings within this framework did not result in stringent constraints on the model.

We found that the peak separation is consistent with being constant (Fig. 10 A and B), but neither a decrease towards higher $`\dot{M}`$ as in Sco X–1, 4U 1608–52, 4U 1735–44, 4U 1702–429, and 4U 1728–34 nor a decrease towards lower $`\dot{M}`$, as predicted by Stella & Vietri (1999) can be ruled out. If the model of Stella & Vietri turns out to be the right one the mass of the neutron star most likely is in the range of 1.8 to 2.2 $`M_{}`$ (see Fig. 10 B). This is in agreement with the mass of Cyg X–2 derived by Orosz & Kuulkers (1999), and with the masses of the neutron stars derived when interpreting the highest observed kHz QPO frequencies as due to motion at or near the marginally stable orbit (Kaaret, Ford, & Chen 1997; Zhang, Strohmayer, & Swank 1997).

This work was supported in part by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) grant 614-51-002. This research has made use of data obtained through the High Energy Astrophysics Science Archive Research Center Online Service, provided by the NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center. This work was supported by NWO Spinoza grant 08-0 to E.P.J.van den Heuvel. MM is a fellow of the Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas de la República Argentina. Support for this work was provided by the NASA through the Chandra Postdoctoral Fellowship grant number PF9-10010 awarded by the Chandra X-ray Center, which is operated by the Smitsonian Astrophysical Observatory for NASA under contract NAS8-39073.


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# Primordial Adiabatic Fluctuations from Cosmic Defects

## I Introduction

Cosmology is entering a crucial stage, where a growing body of high-precision data will allow us to determine a number of cosmological parameters, and to identify the mechanism that produced the “seeds” for the structures we observe today . There are currently two classes of models that could be responsible for these—topological defect  and inflationary  models. The main difference between them is related to causality. Initial conditions for the defect network are set up on a Cauchy surface that is part of the standard history of the universe. Hence, there will not be any correlations between quantities defined at any two spacetime points whose backward light cones do not intersect on that surface. Inflation pushes this surface to much earlier times, and if the inflationary epoch is long enough there will be essentially no causality constraints. This can also be seen by noting that inflation can be defined as an epoch when the comoving Hubble length decreases. It starts out very large, and perturbations can be generated causally. Then inflation forces this length to decrease enough so that, even though it grows again after inflation ends, it’s never as large (by today) as the pre-inflationary era value. Once primordial fluctuations are produced they can simply freeze in comoving coordinates and let the Hubble length shrink and then (for small enough scales) grow past them.

As a step towards identifying the specific model that operated in the early universe, one would like to determine which of the two mechanisms above was involved. The presence of super-horizon perturbations might seem a good enough test, but this is not the case: in defect models (as well as open or $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$-models) significant contributions are generated after the epoch of last scattering due to the integrated Sachs-Wolfe effect. The presence of the ‘Doppler peaks’ on small angular scales  is also not ideal: Turok  has shown that a causal scaling source can be constructed so as to mimic inflation and reproduce its contribution to the CMB anisotropies. This source is constructed “by hand”, and there is no attempt to provide a framework in which it could be realized. In any case, it shows that inflationary predictions are not as unique as one might think. We should also mention, however, that a nice argument due to Liddle  (see also ) shows that the existence of adiabatic perturbations on scales much larger than the Hubble radius implies that either inflation occurred in the past, the perturbations were there as initial conditions, or causality (or Lorentz invariance) is violated. On the other hand, it is also possible to construct “designer inflation” models  that would have no secondary Doppler peaks, although these suffer from analogous caveats and they would still be identifiable by other means .

Finally, there are Gaussianity tests. There have been recent claims of a non-Gaussian component in the CMB  (but see also ). Defects will generally produce non-Gaussian fluctuations on small enough scales , whereas the simplest inflationary models produce Gaussian ones. It’s possible to build inflationary models that produce, eg. non-Gaussianity with a chi-squared distribution , but if one found non-Gaussianity in the form of line discontinuities, then it is hard to see how cosmic strings could fail to be involved.

This discussion shows that although defect and inflationary models have of course a number of distinguishing characteristics, there is a greater overlap between them than most people would care to admit. It is also easy to obtain models where both defects and inflation generate density fluctuations . The aim of this letter is to present a further example of this overlap. We discuss a model where the primordial fluctuations are generated by a defect network, but are nevertheless very similar to a standard inflationary model. The only difference between these models and the standard inflationary scenario will be a small non-Gaussian component. A detailed discussion will be presented in a forthcoming publication .

## II The model

Our model follows the recent work on so-called ‘varying speed of light’ theories , and more particularly the spirit of ‘two-metric’ theories , having two natural speed parameters, say $`c_\varphi `$ and $`c`$; the first is relevant for the dynamics of the scalar field which will produce topological defects, while the second is the ordinary speed of light that is relevant for gravity and all standard model interactions.

We assume that $`c_\varphi c`$ so that the correlation length of the network of topological defects will be much greater than the horizon size. We could, in analogy with , define our effective theory by means of an action, and postulate a relation between the two metrics. However, this is not needed for the basic point we’re discussing, so we leave it for a future publication . We concentrate on the case of cosmic strings, whose dynamics and evolution are better known than those of other defects  although much of what we will discuss will apply to them as well. Note that $`c_\varphi `$ could either be a constant (say $`[g_\varphi ]_{00}=(c_\varphi ^2/c^2)g_{00}`$) or, as in  one could set up a model such that the two speeds are equal at very early and at recent times, and between these two epochs there is a period, limited by two phase transitions, where $`c_\varphi c`$. As will become clear below, the basic mechanism will work in both cases, although the observational constraints on it will be different for each specific realization.

The string network evolution is qualitatively analogous to the standard case , and in particular a “scaling” solution will be reached after a relatively short transient period. The long-string characteristic length (or “correlation length”) $`L`$ will evolve as $`L=\gamma c_\varphi t`$, with $`\gamma =𝒪(1)`$, while the string RMS velocity will obey $`v_\varphi =\beta c_\varphi `$, with $`\beta <1`$. Note, however, that there are some differences relative to the standard scenario. The first one is obvious: if $`c_\varphi c`$, the string network will be outside the horizon, measured in the usual way. Hence these defects will induce fluctuations when they are well outside the horizon, thus avoiding causality constraints Note that compensation now acts outside the ‘$`c_\varphi `$-horizon’. We expect the effect of gravitational back-reaction to be much stronger than in the standard case . The general effect of the back-reaction is to reduce the scaling density and velocity of the network relative to the standard value . Thus we should expect fewer defects per “$`c_\varphi `$-horizon”, than in the standard case. However, despite this strong back-reaction, strings will still move relativistically. It can be shown  that although back-reaction can slow strings down by a measurable amount, only friction forces  can force the network into a strong non-relativistic regime. Thus we expect $`v_\varphi `$ to be somewhat lower than $`c_\varphi `$, but still larger than $`c`$. Only in the case of monopoles, which are point-like, one would expect the defect velocities to drop below $`c`$ due to graviton radiation . This does not happen for extended objects, since their tension naturally tends to make the dynamics take place with a characteristic speed $`c_\varphi `$ . This is actually crucial: if the network was completely frozen while it was outside the horizon (as in standard scenarios ) then no significant perturbations would be generated.

A third important aspect is that the the symmetry breaking scale, say $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$, which produces the defects can be significantly lower than the GUT scale, as density perturbations can grow for a longer time than usual. The earlier the defects are formed, the lighter they could be. Proper normalization of the model will produce a further constraint on $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$. Finally, in the case where $`c_\varphi `$ is a time-varying quantity which only departs from $`c`$ for a limited period, the defects will become frozen and start to fall inside the horizon after the second phase transition. Here we require that the defects are sufficiently outside the horizon and are relativistic when density fluctuations in the observable scales are generated. This will introduce additional constraints on model parameters, notably on the epochs at which the phase transitions take place.

## III Cosmological consequences

In the synchronous gauge, the linear evolution equations for radiation and cold dark matter perturbations, $`\delta _r`$ and $`\delta _m`$, in a flat universe with zero cosmological constant are

$`\ddot{\delta }_m+{\displaystyle \frac{\dot{a}}{a}}\dot{\delta }_m{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\dot{a}}{a}}\right)^2\left({\displaystyle \frac{a\delta _m+2a_{eq}\delta _r}{a+a_{eq}}}\right)=4\pi G\mathrm{\Theta }_+,`$ (1)
$`\ddot{\delta }_r{\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}}^2\delta _r{\displaystyle \frac{4}{3}}\ddot{\delta }_m=0,`$ (2)
where $`\mathrm{\Theta }_{\alpha \beta }`$ is the energy-momentum tensor of the external source, $`\mathrm{\Theta }_+=\mathrm{\Theta }_{00}+\mathrm{\Theta }_{ii}`$, $`a`$ is the scale factor, “eq” denotes the epoch of radiation-matter equality, and a dot represents a derivative with respect to conformal time. We will consider the growth of super-horizon perturbations with $`ck\eta 1`$. Then eqn. (1) becomes:

$$\ddot{\delta }_m+\frac{\dot{a}}{a}\dot{\delta }_m\frac{1}{2}\left(\frac{\dot{a}}{a}\right)^2\left(\frac{3a+8a_{eq}}{a+a_{eq}}\right)\delta _m=4\pi G\mathrm{\Theta }_+,$$
(3)
and $`\delta _r=4\delta _m/3`$. Its solution, with initial conditions $`\delta _m=0`$, $`\dot{\delta }_m=0`$ can be written as

$$\delta _m^S(𝐱,\eta )=4\pi G_{\eta _i}^\eta 𝑑\eta ^{}d^3x^{}𝒢(X;\eta ,\eta ^{})\mathrm{\Theta }_+(𝐱^{},\eta ^{}),$$
(4)
$$𝒢(X;\eta ,\eta ^{})=\frac{1}{2\pi ^2}_0^{\mathrm{}}\stackrel{~}{𝒢}(k;\eta ,\eta ^{})\frac{\mathrm{sin}kX}{kX}k^2𝑑k.$$
(5)
Here $`X=|𝐱𝐱^{}|`$ and ‘S’ indicates that these are the ‘subsequent’ fluctuations, according to the notation of , to be distinguished from ‘initial’ ones.

We are interested in computing the inhomogeneities at late times in the matter era. When $`\eta _0\eta _{eq}`$, the Green functions are dominated by the growing mode, $`a_0/a_{eq}`$, so the function we would like to solve for is

$$T(k;\eta )=\underset{\eta _0/\eta _{eq}\mathrm{}}{lim}\frac{a_{eq}}{a_0}\stackrel{~}{𝒢}(k,\eta _0,\eta ).$$
(6)
Consider the growth of super-horizon perturbations, for which the transfer function can be written

$$T(0;\eta )=\frac{\eta _{eq}}{10(32\sqrt{2})\eta }.$$
(7)
Linear perturbations induced by defects are the sum of initial and subsequent perturbations:

$`\delta _m(k;\eta _0)`$ $`=`$ $`\delta _m^I(k;\eta _0)+\delta _m^S(k;\eta _0)`$ (8)
$`=`$ $`4\pi G(1+z_{eq}){\displaystyle _{\eta _i}^{\eta _0}}𝑑\eta T_c(k;\eta )\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Theta }}_+(k;\eta ),`$ (10)
where $`\eta _i`$ is the epoch of defect formation. The transfer function for the subsequent perturbations, those generated actively, was obtained in eqn. (7) for super-horizon perturbations with $`ck\eta _01`$. To include compensation for the initial perturbations, $`\delta _m^I`$, we make the substitution $`T_c(k;\eta )=\left(1+(k_c/k)^2\right)^1T(k;\eta )`$, where $`k_c(c_\varphi \eta )^1`$ is a long-wavelength cut-off at the compensation scale. This results from the fact that defect perturbations cannot propagate with a velocity greater than $`c_\varphi `$. For $`(c_\varphi \eta _0)^1k(c_\varphi \eta _i)^1`$ the analytic expression for the power spectrum of density perturbations induced by defects is

$$P(k)=16\pi ^2G^2(1+z_{\mathrm{eq}})^2_0^{\mathrm{}}𝑑\eta (k,\eta )|T_c(k,\eta )|^2,$$
(11)
where $`(k,\eta )`$ is the structure function which can be obtained directly from the unequal time correlators . It can be shown that for a scaling network $`(k,\eta )=(k\eta )`$ which, combined with the above relations gives

$$P(k)_0^{\mathrm{}}𝑑\eta 𝒮(k\eta )/\eta ^2k$$
(12)
where the function $`𝒮`$, is just the structure function, $``$, times the compensation cut-off function. Up until now we only considered the spectrum of primordial (ie, generated at very early times) fluctuations induced by cosmic defects. In our model a Harrison-Zel’dovich spectrum is predicted just as in the simplest inflationary models. The final processed spectrum will also be the same as for the simplest inflationary models.

We investigate the Gaussianity of the string-induced fluctuations as in . The conclusions can easily be extended for other defect models. In the standard cosmic string scenario the structure function $`(k,\eta )`$ has a turn-over scale at the network correlation length, $`k_\xi =20(c_\varphi \eta )^1`$ . At a particular time, perturbations induced on scales larger than the correlation length are generated by many string elements and are expected to have a nearly Gaussian. On the other hand, perturbations induced on smaller scales are very non-Gaussian because they can be either very large within the regions where a string has passed by or else very small outside these. This allows us to roughly divide the power spectrum of cosmic-string-seeded density perturbations into a nearly Gaussian component generated when the string correlation length was smaller than the scale under consideration, and a strongly skewed non-Gaussian component generated when the string correlation length was larger (we call these the ‘Gaussian’ and ‘non-Gaussian’ contributions respectively). The ratio of this two components may be easily computed by splitting the structure function in (11), in two parts: a Gaussian part $`_\mathrm{g}(k,\eta )=(k,\eta )`$ for $`k<k_\xi `$ ($`_\mathrm{g}=0`$ for $`k>k_\xi `$) and a non-Gaussian part $`_{\mathrm{ng}}(k,\eta )=(k,\eta )`$ for $`k>k_\xi `$ ($`_{\mathrm{ng}}=0`$ for $`k<k_\xi `$). We can then integrate (11) with this Gaussian/non-Gaussian split, to compute the relative contributions to the total power spectrum. The final result will depend on the choice of compensation scale $`k_c`$. If we take the maximum compensation scale allowed by causality  ($`k_c2(c_\varphi \eta )^1`$) the Gaussian contribution to the total power spectrum will be less than $`5\%`$. In any case, the non-Gaussian contribution will always be smaller that the Gaussian one if, as expected, the compensation scale is larger or equal to the correlation length of the string network ($`k_ck_\xi `$). Departures from a Gaussian distribution are scale independent and analogous to those of standard defect models on large scales.

By allowing for a characteristic velocity for the scalar field $`c_\varphi `$ much larger than the velocity of light (and gravity), we were able to construct a model with primordial, adiabatic ($`\delta _r=4\delta _m/3`$), nearly Gaussian fluctuations whose primordial spectrum is of the Harrison-Zel’dovich form. This is almost indistinguishable from the simplest inflationary models (as far as structure formation is concerned) except for the small non-Gaussian component which could be detected with future CMB experiments. The $`C_l`$ spectrum and the polarization curves of the CMBR predicted by this model should also be identical to the ones predicted in the simplest inflationary models as the perturbations in the CMB are not generated ‘directly’ by the defects.

## IV Discussion and conclusions

We presented further evidence of the non-negligible overlap between topological defect and inflationary structure formation models. The key ingredient is having the speed of the defect-producing scalar field much larger than the speed of gravity and standard model particles. This provides a ‘violation of causality’, as required by . The only distinguishing characteristic of this model, by comparison with the simplest inflationary models, will be a small non-Gaussian signal.

Admittedly our model could be considered “unnatural” in the context of our present theoretical prejudices, and the same can certainly be said about other examples such as “mimic inflation”  and “designer inflation” . Be that as it may, however, the fact that these examples can be constructed (and one wonders how many more are possible) highlights the fact that extracting robust predictions from cosmological observations is a much more difficult and subtle task than many experimentalists (and theorists) believe.

###### Acknowledgements.

We thank Paul Shellard for useful discussions and comments. C.M. is funded by FCT (Portugal) under ‘Programa PRAXIS XXI’, grant no. PRAXIS XXI/BPD/11769/97. We thank CAUP for the facilities provided.


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# The Merger Rate to Redshift One from Kinematic Pairs: Caltech Faint Galaxy Redshift Survey XI

## 1 Introduction

Merging is a fundamental mode of stellar mass addition to galaxies. Moreover, merging brings in new gas and creates gravitational disturbances that enhance star formation or fuel a nuclear black hole. The general process of substructure infall may be the rate fixing process for the buildup of a galaxy’s stars and consequently may largely regulate its luminosity history. Gravitational forces on relatively large scales dominate merger dynamics which allows direct observation of the mechanism, although with the considerable complication that dark matter dominates the mass. N-body simulations (Toomre & Toomre, 1972; Barnes & Hernquist, 1992) give the detailed orbital evolution, morphological disturbances and eventual outcomes of the encounters of pairs of galaxies.

The purpose of this paper is to estimate the rate of mass gain per galaxy due to mergers over the redshift zero to one interval. Our primary statistic is the fractional luminosity in close kinematic pairs, which is readily related to n-body simulations and sidesteps morphological interpretation. This approach provides a clear sample definition which is closely connected to the large scale dynamics of merging. In common with all merger estimates it requires an estimate of the fraction of the pairs that will merge and a mean time to merger.

The number of kinematic pairs is proportional to the volume integral at small scales of the product of two-point correlation function, $`\xi `$, and the luminosity function (LF). The high luminosity galaxies appear to be evolving purely in luminosity (Lilly et al., 1995; Lin et al., 1999), which can be easily compensated. The measured evolution of $`\xi `$ suggests that the density of physical pairs should not vary much with redshift, $`(1+z)^{0\pm 1}`$ (LeFèvre et al., 1996; Carlberg et al., 1997, 1999). This inference is in notable contrast with the pair counts or morphological typing approaches to merger estimation (Zepf & Koo, 1989; Carlberg Pritchet & Infante, 1994; Yee & Ellingson, 1995; Patton et al., 1997; LeFèvre et al., 1999), which suggest that merging rate by number varies as $`(1+z)^{3\pm 1}`$. HST photometric pairs, with no redshift information leads to a dependence of $`(1+z)^{1.2\pm 0.4}`$ (Neuschaefer et al., 1997).

In the next section we combine the Caltech Faint Galaxy Redshift Survey (CFGRS) and the Canadian Network for Observational Cosmology field galaxy survey (CNOC2) from which we construct evolution compensated, volume-limited, subsamples. In Section 3 we measure the fractional luminosity in 50 and 100$`h^1`$ kpc companions as a function of redshift. The CNOC2 sample is used in Section 4 to relate this wide pair sample to a close pair sample which is more securely converted into a mass merger rate. Section 5 discusses our conclusions. We use $`H_0=100h\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{Mpc}^1`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.2`$ in open and flat cosmologies.

## 2 The CFGRS and CNOC2 Volume-Limited Samples

The CFGRS sample of the HDF plus flanking fields is discussed in detail elsewhere (Hogg et al, 1999; Cohen et al., 2000). We use the high coverage subsample lying within a 240 arcsecond radius circle, with a center located at 12h 36m 50s and 62 12 55′′ (J2000). The computed magnitude selection function, $`s(m_R)`$, (in Cousins R) is accurately approximated as a constant 90% spectroscopic completeness for $`m_R<22.8`$ mag with a linear decline to 19% at $`m_R<23.4`$ mag, our sample limit. The magnitude weight is $`1/s(m_R)`$. The CFGRS k-corrections and evolution compensation are here approximated as $`k(z)=Kz`$ mag from the tables of Poggianti (1997). For galaxies that Cohen et al. (2000) classify as “E” (emission), $`K=1.0`$, “A” types have $`K=2.0`$ and all types have $`K=1.7`$

The CNOC2 selection weights and k-corrections are discussed in Yee et al. (2000). . The evolution of the luminosity function is approximated as a uniform $`M_{}(z)=M_{}Qz`$, with $`Q1`$, (Lin et al., 1999) which we use over the entire CNOC2-CFGRS redshift range.

The kinematic pair fraction is directly proportional to the mean density of the sample and is therefore sensitively dependent on correcting to a complete and uniform sample (Patton et al. 2000a, ). The most straightforward approach is to impose a strict volume limit. For our primary sample we will limit the CFGRS and the CNOC2 samples at $`M_R^{k,e}=19.8+5\mathrm{log}h`$ mag, which yields volume-limited samples of about 300 CFGRS galaxies between redshift 0.3 to 1.1 and 3000 CNOC2 galaxies between 0.1 to 0.5. The volume density of the sample is approximately constant at $`1.2\times 10^2h^3`$ Mpc-3 over the entire redshift range for $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0.8`$ but rises roughly as $`(1+z)^{0.8}`$ for $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0`$. Both the CFGRS and the CNOC2 surveys are multiply masked, which minimizes the effects of slit crowding, however there is still a measurable pair selection function. The CNOC2 catalogue has about a 20% deficiency of close angular pairs. We model the measured angular pair selection weight as, $`w(\theta )=[1+a_s\mathrm{tanh}(\theta /\theta _s)]^1,`$ where $`[a_s,\theta _s]`$ is $`[0.5,5^{\prime \prime }]`$ for the CFGRS sample and $`[0.3,10^{\prime \prime }]`$ for the CNOC2 sample with typical pair corrections being 10%.

## 3 The Pair Fractional Luminosity Fraction

The preferred choice of pair statistic depends on the application (Patton et al. 2000a, ). Here we are primarily interested in the impact of merging on galaxy mass increase, for which the k-corrected, evolution compensated R luminosity is a stand-in. The rate of merging per galaxy depends on the density of galaxies in the near neighborhood and their velocity distribution. As a practical redshift space estimator, we compute the fractional luminosity in close kinematic pairs,

$$f_L(z|\mathrm{\Delta }v^{\mathrm{max}},r_p^{\mathrm{max}},M_R^{k,e})=\frac{\underset{j}{}\underset{ij,<\mathrm{\Delta }v^{\mathrm{max}},<r_P^{\mathrm{max}}}{}w_jw_iw(\theta _{ij})L_i}{_jw_jL_j},$$
(1)
where the weights, $`w_i`$, allow for the magnitude selection function. Note that the $`ij`$ and $`ji`$ pairs are both counted. The ratio has the benefit of being fairly stable for different luminosity limits, self-normalizing for luminosity evolution, identical to a mass ratio for a fixed $`M/L`$ population. For an unperturbed pair luminosity function it is mathematically identical to the $`N_c`$ of Patton et al. (2000a) although constructed out of somewhat different quantities. The two parameters, $`\mathrm{\Delta }v^{\mathrm{max}}`$ and $`r_p^{\mathrm{max}}`$, are chosen on the basis of merger dynamics and the characteristics of the sample. The rate of mass increase per galaxy is calculated from this statistical estimator using a knowledge of merger dynamics and the measured correlations and kinematics of galaxy pairs in the sample.

The mean fractional pair luminosity, based on 18 CFGRS pairs and 91 CNOC2 pairs, with $`\mathrm{\Delta }v1000\text{km}s^1`$ and $`5r_p50h^1\mathrm{kpc}`$ pairs is displayed in Figure 1. These kinematic separation parameters are larger than is suitable for reliably identifying “soon-to-merge” pairs. However, they provide a statistically robust connection to those pairs and take into account the lower velocity precision and sample size of the CFGRS relative to CNOC2. The errors are computed from the pair counts, $`n_p^{1/2}`$. The measurements of $`f_L(z)`$ in Figure 1 are fit to $`f_L(\mathrm{\Delta }v,r_p,M_r^{ke})(1+z)^{m_L}`$, finding $`[f_L,m_L]`$ of $`[0.14\pm 0.07,0\pm 1.4]`$ for $`r_p50h^1\mathrm{kpc}`$ pairs and $`[0.37\pm 0.7,0.1\pm 0.5]`$ for $`r_p100h^1\mathrm{kpc}`$, both for $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.2,\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0.8`$. The increase with $`r_p`$ of $`f_L`$ is consistent with a $`\gamma =1.8`$ two-point correlation function. If $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.3,\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0.7`$, then $`m_L`$ at 100$`h^1`$ kpc rises by about 0.05 whereas if $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.2,\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0.0`$, then $`m_L=0.50`$. The increase is largely as a result of the rise in the implied co-moving sample density over this redshift range.

The merger probability of a kinematic pair depends sensitively on the pairwise velocity dispersion, $`\sigma _{12}`$, of galaxies. The model pairwise velocity distribution is computed as the convolution of the correlation function with the distribution of random velocities. The infall velocities are negligible at these small separations and we will assume that the peculiar velocities are drawn from a Gaussian distribution. The measured fraction of the CNOC2 pair sample with velocities smaller than some $`\mathrm{\Delta }v`$, normalized to the value at 1000 km s-1, is displayed in Figure 2. The 50$`h^1`$ kpc wide pairs limited at $`19.5`$ mag are plotted as open squares, the 20$`h^1`$ kpc pairs limited at $`18.5`$ and $`19.5`$ mag are plotted as octagons and diamonds, respectively. The upper curve assumes that $`\sigma _{12}`$ is 200 km s-1 and the lower one 300 km s-1, which approximately span the data.

## 4 Merger Rate Estimation

The merger rate is best estimated from very close kinematic pairs, 20$`h^1`$ kpc or less, about half of which are physically close and have significant morphological disturbance Patton et al. 2000a . However the fraction of galaxies in such close pairs is about one percent, giving poor statistics. Since the number of pairs increases smoothly as $`r^{3\gamma }`$, where $`\gamma `$ is the slope of the small scale correlation function, we can use pairs at somewhat larger separations as statistically representative of the close pairs, however we prefer to stay within the radius of virialized material around a galaxy over our redshift range, which is no larger than about 100$`h^1`$ kpc. The mass accretion rate from major mergers is therefore estimated as,

$$_M=\frac{1}{2}f_L(\mathrm{\Delta }v,r_p,z)C_{zs}(\mathrm{\Delta }v,\gamma )F(v<v_{mg})MT_{mg}^1(z,r_p),$$
(2)
where the factor of one half allows for the double counting of pairs, $`C_{zs}(\mathrm{\Delta }v,\gamma )`$ converts from redshift space to real space pairs, F gives the fraction of the pairs that will merge in the next $`T_{mg}`$ (the “last orbit” in-spiral time from $`r_p`$) and $`M`$ is the mean incoming mass as estimated assuming a constant M/L. For the relatively massive galaxies considered here the dynamical friction is so strong that it is more violent relaxation with little timescale dependence on the masses. The measured ratio of the numbers of 50 and 100$`h^1`$ kpc pairs to 20$`h^1`$ kpc pairs in the CNOC2 sample is $`3.8\pm 1.0`$ and $`9.4\pm 3.0`$, respectively, in accord with the expectation of a growth as $`r_p^{3\gamma }`$ with the inner cutoff of 5$`h^1`$ kpc.

Not all kinematic pairs are close in physical space. The relation between the kinematic pairs closer than $`r_p`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }v`$ and pairs with a 3D physical distance $`r_p`$ is readily evaluated by integrating the velocity convolved correlation function over velocity and projected radius and ratioing to the 3D integral of the correlation function. We find that $`C_{zs}=0.54`$ for $`\mathrm{\Delta }v=1000\text{km}s^1`$ and $`\gamma =1.8`$ There is support for this value on the basis of morphological classification, as tested in Patton et al. (1999), where about half of the kinematic pairs exhibited strong tidal features.

The fraction of physically close pairs that are at sufficiently low velocity to merge is a key part of the rate calculation. It is clear that many galaxies will have close encounters which do not lead to immediate mergers, although mergers could of course occur on subsequent orbital passages. The key quantity that we need is the ratio of the critical velocity to merge, $`v_{mg}`$, to $`\sigma _{12}`$. The timescale for close pairs to merge is much shorter than the time over which morphological disturbances are clearly evident, by nearly an order of magnitude (Barnes & Hernquist, 1992; Mihos & Hernquist, 1996; Dubinski Mihos & Hernquist, 1999). This is one of our reasons for preferring kinematic pairs as a merger estimator. The simulation results indicate that the time to merge is, on the average, roughly that of a “half-circle” orbit, which at $`r_p`$ of 20$`h^1`$ kpc at a velocity of 200 km s-1 is close to 0.3 Gyr. A straight-line orbit with instantaneous merging would merge in about 0.1 Gyr, although that is not likely to be representative.

To compute the merger probability, $`F(<v_{mg})`$, we need to know the maximal velocity to merge, $`v_{mg}`$, at a physical separation of 20$`h^1`$ kpc for a typical $`M_{}`$ galaxy. A not very useful lower bound is fixed by the Keplerian escape velocity at 20$`h^1`$ kpc, $`v_c\sqrt{2}\text{km}s^1`$, where the circular velocity is approximately 200 km s-1. An upper bound to $`v_{mg}`$ is the velocity that an object would have if it is captured into a galaxy’s extended dark halo at the virialization radius and orbits to 20$`h^1`$ kpc with no dynamical friction. The virialization radius is approximately at the radius where the mean interior overdensity is $`200\rho _c`$, implying $`r_{200}=v_c/(10H_0)`$, or, about 200$`h^1`$ kpc for our typical galaxy. The largest possible apogalactic velocity at $`r_{200}`$ is $`v_c`$, which leads to an undissipated velocity at 20$`h^1`$ kpc of $`2.37v_c`$. Using $`\sigma _{12}=200(300)\text{km}s^1`$ at 20$`h^1`$ kpc, we find that the fraction of all physical pairs that merge in one $`T_{mg}`$ is about 0.40(0.16). Therefore, we will normalize to a merger probability of 0.3, noting the 50% or so uncertainty.

The absolute magnitude limit of $`19.8+5\mathrm{log}h`$ mag corresponds to $`L0.5L_{}`$ which contains about 58% of the luminosity for the mean CNOC2 LF, $`M_{}=20.4`$ and $`\alpha =1.2`$. To make our merger rate inclusive of major mergers we normalize to $`L0.2L_{}`$, which includes 85% of the luminosity. Within the current statistical accuracy, the paired and field galaxies have identical LFs. On the basis of n-body experiments (Barnes & Hernquist, 1992) galaxies with masses greater than about $`0.2M_{}`$ will merge in approximately one orbital time.

On the basis of these considerations we find that the rate of mass accumulation of galaxies with luminosities of $`0.2M_{}`$ and above is,

$$_M=(0.02\pm 0.01)M_{}(1+z)^{0.1\pm 0.5}\frac{F(v_{mg}/\sigma _{12})}{0.3}\frac{0.3\mathrm{Gyr}}{T_{mg}}\mathrm{Gyr}^1,$$
(3)
where we have adopted the 100$`h^1`$ kpc $`m_L`$ value for a flat, low density cosmology and explicitly assumed that the velocity and timescale factors do not vary over this redshift range, as expected at these small scales in a low $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ universe (Colin Carlberg & Couchman, 1997). There is direct evidence that once evolution compensated that the luminous galaxies retain have no evolution in their circular velocities (Vogt et al., 1997; Mallen-Ornelas Lilly Crampton & Schade, 1999).

## 5 Discussion and Conclusions

Our main observational result is that for galaxies with $`M_R^{k,e}19.8+5\mathrm{log}h`$ mag, the fraction of galaxy luminosity in 50$`h^1`$ kpc wide kinematic pairs is about 14%, with no noticeable redshift dependence over the redshift zero to one range. This implies an integrated mass accretion rate of about 2% of $`L_{}`$ per Gyr per galaxy for merging galaxies having $`L0.2L_{}`$. Our rate is uncertain at about the factor of two level due to uncertainty in the dynamical details of merging for our sample definitions. This merger rate implies a 15% mass increase in an $`M_{}`$ galaxy since redshift one. If the correlations of lower luminosity galaxies are only somewhat weaker than these (Carlberg et al., 1998) then the same $`0.15M_{}`$ merged-in mass causes a 50% mass increase in a 0.3$`M_{}`$ galaxy.

There are several issues that require further investigation. First, the rate of merging of similarly selected kinematic pairs should be studied in appropriately matched n-body experiments to better determine the orbital timescales. Second, the absence of a redshift dependence of $`\sigma _{12}`$ and $`v_{mg}`$ needs to be observationally checked. Third, the connection between close kinematic pairs and morphologically disturbed galaxies, which does conform to the kinematic pair predictions at low redshift (Patton et al. 2000a, ), needs to be better understood at high redshift.

This research was supported by NSERC and NRC of Canada. HL and DWH acknowledge support provided by NASA through Hubble Fellowship grants HF-01110.01-98A and HF-01093.01-97A, respectively, awarded by the Space Telescope Science Institute, which is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., for NASA under contract NAS 5-26555.


text:
# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

Turbulent boundary layer flow over a smooth flat plate outside a close vicinity of the plate tip contains two unambiguous elements: The viscous sublayer adjacent to the plate, where the velocity gradient is large and the viscous stress is comparable with the Reynolds stress, and the statistically uniform free stream.

According to classical theory \[1\], the region intermediate between these two consists of two layers with different properties. The first, adjacent to the viscous sublayer is a universal, Reynolds-number-independent logarithmic layer. In the second, the “wake region”, there is a smooth transition from the universal logarithmic layer to the free stream.

Our analysis of all available experiments \[2-4\] contradicts this classical theory. Indeed, in the clear-cut case of a smooth plate and low free stream turbulence, the intermediate structure does consist of two layers. However, the boundary between them is sharp. Most important, both layers are self-similar, substantially Reynolds-number-dependent, and described by different scaling laws. It is interesting to note (see the details below) that the same configuration of two self-similar layers with a sharp interface between them can be seen in all runs used in \[1\] for the illustration of the wake region model.

We found it possible \[2-4\] to introduce a characteristic length scale $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ so that the average velocity distribution in the first intermediate layer coincides with Reynolds-number-dependent scaling law obtained previously for pipe flows, when the Reynolds number is chosen as $`U\mathrm{\Lambda }/\nu `$, with $`U`$ the free stream velocity and $`\nu `$ the fluid’s kinematic viscosity. The sharp boundary between the self-similar intermediate layers also defines a length scale $`\lambda `$. We show, by analysis of experimental data, that these two length scales $`\lambda `$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ are close.

## 2 Background

In a previous paper \[2\] we noted that when the turbulence level in the free stream is small, the intermediate structure between the viscous sublayer and the free stream consists of two self-similar layers: one adjacent to the viscous sublayer where the average velocity profile is described by the scaling law

$$\varphi =A\eta ^\alpha ,$$
(2.1)
and one adjacent to the free stream where

$$\varphi =B\eta ^\beta .$$
(2.2)
Here

$$\varphi =\frac{u}{u_{}},u_{}=\sqrt{\frac{\tau }{\rho }},\eta =\frac{u_{}y}{\nu },$$

$`u`$ is the average velocity, $`\tau `$ is the shear stress at the wall, $`\rho `$ and $`\nu `$ are the fluid density and kinematic viscosity; $`A,B`$, $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$ are Reynolds number dependent constants.

Our processing of all experimental data available in the literature \[3,4\] confirmed these observations and showed that it is always possible to find a length scale $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ so that, setting $`Re=U\mathrm{\Lambda }/\nu `$, we can represent the scaling law (2.1) in the form

$$\varphi =\left(\frac{1}{\sqrt{3}}\mathrm{ln}Re+\frac{5}{2}\right)\eta ^{\frac{3}{2\mathrm{ln}Re}}$$
(2.3)
obtained by us earlier for pipe flows (see, e.g. \[5\]). This suggests that the structure of wall regions in all wall-bounded shear flows at large Reynolds numbers is identical, if the length scale and velocity scale are properly selected. The natural question is, however, what is the physical meaning of this length scale $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ in boundary layer flow? This question is of substantial importance and should be clarified for proper understanding of the identity of scaling laws for different wall-bounded shear flows.

We note that the intermediate structure has another characteristic length scale $`\lambda `$ — the wall-region thickness determined by the sharp intersection $`\eta =\eta _{}`$ of the two velocity distribution laws $`\varphi =A\eta ^\alpha `$ and $`\varphi =B\eta ^\beta `$ valid in the different layers. We have

$$A\eta _{}^\alpha =B\eta _{}^\beta ,$$
(2.4)
so that

$$\eta _{}=\left(\frac{A}{B}\right)^{\frac{1}{\beta \alpha }},$$
(2.5)
and the wall-region thickness $`\lambda `$ is determined by the relation

$$\lambda =\left(\frac{A}{B}\right)^{\frac{1}{\beta \alpha }}\frac{\nu }{u_{}}.$$
(2.6)
On the other hand, the characteristic length scale $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is determined by the relation

$$\mathrm{\Lambda }=Re\frac{\nu }{U}=\left(\frac{u_{}}{U}\right)\left(\frac{\nu }{u_{}}\right)Re$$
(2.7)
so that the ratio of these two scales is

$$\frac{\mathrm{\Lambda }}{\lambda }=\left(\frac{u_{}}{U}Re\right)\frac{1}{\eta _{}}=\left(\frac{u_{}}{U}Re\right)\left(\frac{B}{A}\right)^{\frac{1}{\beta \alpha }}.$$
(2.8)
## 3 Analysis of experimental data

We analyzed the recent data of J.M. Österlund presented on the Internet (www.kth.se/$``$jens/zpg/). The data seem to us to be reliable, however much we disagree with their processing and interpretation in the paper by Österlund et al \[6\] (see \[4\]). All 70 runs presented on the Internet give the characteristic broken-line average velocity distribution in $`\mathrm{lg}\eta ,\mathrm{lg}\varphi `$ coordinates (see the examples in Figure 1; all the other cases are similar), so that the possibility of determining $`A,\alpha ,B,\beta `$ and $`\eta _{}`$ accurately from these experimental data is unquestionable. These results are presented in Table 1 for all Österlund’s experiments where $`Re_\theta =U\theta /\nu >10,000`$. Here $`\theta `$ is the momentum thickness; the runs in the Österlund’s experimental data are labelled by $`Re_\theta `$.

The effective Reynolds number $`Re`$ was obtained \[4\] by the formula

$$\mathrm{ln}Re=\frac{1}{2}(\mathrm{ln}Re_1+\mathrm{ln}Re_2)$$
(3.9)
where $`\mathrm{ln}Re_1`$ and $`\mathrm{ln}Re_2`$ are the solutions of the equations

$$\frac{1}{\sqrt{3}}\mathrm{ln}Re_1+\frac{5}{2}=A,\frac{3}{2\mathrm{ln}Re_2}=\alpha $$
(3.10)
and the values of $`A`$ and $`\alpha `$ were obtained by standard statistical processing of Österlund’s data. For $`Re_\theta >10,000`$ the difference $`\delta `$ between $`\mathrm{ln}Re_1`$ and $`\mathrm{ln}Re_2`$ does not exceed 3%, so that they coincide within experimental accuracy.

According to (2.7) and (2.8)

$$\mathrm{lg}\frac{\mathrm{\Lambda }}{\lambda }=(\mathrm{lg}Re\mathrm{lg}\eta _{})+\mathrm{lg}\frac{u_{}}{U}.$$
(3.11)
The data for $`u_{}`$ and $`U`$ are presented by Österlund on the Internet for each run. In Figure 2 we present the values of $`\mathrm{lg}(\mathrm{\Lambda }/\lambda )`$ for all runs. The mean value of $`\mathrm{lg}(\mathrm{\Lambda }/\lambda )`$ is approximately 0.2, so that the characteristic length scale $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is about 1.6 times the thickness of the wall region.

If we take into account that $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is calculated from the value of $`Re`$, and that $`\mathrm{ln}Re`$, not $`Re`$ itself, has been determined from experiment, the ratios $`\mathrm{\Lambda }/\lambda `$ as shown in Figure 2 are close to unity.

We processed in \[3,4\] the data of 90 zero-pressure-gradient boundary layer experiments at low free stream turbulence performed by different authors during the last 25 years — all the experiments of this kind available to us. Without exception, all runs revealed identical configurations of the intermediate structure in the boundary layer: two adjacent self-similar layers separated by a sharp interface.

According to the classical model \[1\], the intermediate structure consists of the (universal) logarithmic layer and a non-self-similar “wake region” smoothly matching the logarithmic layer. It was natural to also process the very data used in \[1\] for the justification of the wake region model with the general procedure we used on the other data. The data presented in Figure 21 of \[1\] were scanned and replotted in $`\mathrm{lg}\eta ,\mathrm{lg}\varphi `$ coordinates as was done for all experimental data processed in \[3,4\]. Processing revealed the same broken-line structure, i.e. two adjacent self-similar layers (see Table 2 and Figure 3, where a typical example is presented). The difference between $`\mathrm{ln}Re_1`$ and $`\mathrm{ln}Re_2`$ determined from the wall layer data is small: this shows that the procedure is adequate. We conjecture that the values of $`\beta `$ are larger than in newer experiments because of a non-zero pressure gradient in all these runs (see \[1\]). The results of our processing fail to confirm the wake region model proposed in \[1\].

## 4 Conclusion

We have shown that one can find a length scale $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ so that, if the Reynolds number $`Re`$ in a zero-pressure-gradient boundary layer flow is defined by $`Re=U\mathrm{\Lambda }/\nu `$, with $`U`$ the free stream velocity and $`\nu `$ the kinematic viscosity, then the scaling law for the self-similar region adjacent to the viscous sublayer coincides with the scaling law for turbulent pipe flow. Using the recent experimental data of Österlund (www.kth.se/$``$jens/zpg/) we confirmed this fact and reached the important conclusion that $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is roughly equal to the wall-region thickness. Our results are in disagreement with the classical model of the wake region in the boundary layer \[1\].

Acknowledgments. This work was supported in part by the Applied Mathematics subprogram of the U.S. Department of Energy under contract DE–AC03–76–SF00098, and in part by the National Science Foudnation under grants DMS 94–16431 and DMS 97–32710.

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