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# Hyperon-hyperon interactions and properties of neutron star matter

## I Introduction

The physics of compact objects like neutron stars offers an intriguing interplay between nuclear processes and astrophysical observables. Neutron stars exhibit conditions far from those encountered on earth; typically, expected densities $`\rho `$ of a neutron star interior are of the order of $`10^3`$ or more times the ’neutron drip’ density $`410^{11}`$ g/cm3, where nuclei begin to dissolve and merge together. Thus, the determination of an equation of state (EoS) for dense matter is essential to calculations of neutron star properties. The EoS determines properties such as the mass range, the mass-radius relationship, the crust thickness and the cooling rate. The same EoS is also crucial in calculating the energy released in a supernova explosion.

At densities near to the saturation density of nuclear matter, ($`\rho _0=0.16`$ fm-3), we expect the matter to be composed of mainly neutrons, protons and electrons in $`\beta `$-equilibrium, since neutrinos have on average a mean free path larger than the radius of the neutron star. The equilibrium conditions can then be summarized as

$$\mu _n=\mu _p+\mu _e,\rho _p=\rho _e,$$
(1)
where $`\mu _i`$ and $`\rho _i`$ refer to the chemical potential and density of particle species $`i`$, respectively. At the saturation density of nuclear matter, $`\rho _0`$, the electron chemical potential is of the order $`100`$ MeV. Once the rest mass of the muon is exceeded, it becomes energetically favorable for an electron at the top of the $`e^{}`$ Fermi surface to decay into a $`\mu ^{}`$. A Fermi sea of degenerate negative muons starts then to develop and, consequently, the charge balance needs to be changed according to $`\rho _p=\rho _e+\rho _\mu `$ as well as requiring that $`\mu _e=\mu _\mu `$.

As the density increases, new hadronic degrees of freedom may appear in addition to neutrons and protons. One such degree of freedom is hyperons, baryons with a strangeness content. Contrary to terrestrial conditions where hyperons are unstable and decay into nucleons through the weak interaction, the equilibrium conditions in neutron stars can make the inverse process happen, so that the formation of hyperons becomes energetically favorable. As soon as the chemical potential of the neutron becomes sufficiently large, energetic neutrons can decay via weak strangeness non-conserving interactions into $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hyperons leading to a $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ Fermi sea with $`\mu _\mathrm{\Lambda }=\mu _n`$. However, one expects $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ to appear via

$$e^{}+n\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}+\nu _e,$$
(2)
at lower densities than the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, even though $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ is more massive. The negatively charged hyperons appear in the ground state of matter when their masses equal $`\mu _e+\mu _n`$, while the neutral hyperon $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ appears when its mass equals $`\mu _n`$. Since the electron chemical potential in matter is larger than the mass difference $`m_\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}m_\mathrm{\Lambda }=81.76`$ MeV, $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ will appear at lower densities than $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$. For matter with hyperons as well the chemical equilibrium conditions become

$`\mu _\mathrm{\Xi }^{}=\mu _\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}=\mu _n+\mu _e,`$ (3)
$`\mu _\mathrm{\Lambda }=\mu _{\mathrm{\Xi }^0}=\mu _{\mathrm{\Sigma }^0}=\mu _n,`$ (4)
$`\mu _{\mathrm{\Sigma }^+}=\mu _p=\mu _n\mu _e.`$ (5)
Hyperonic degrees of freedom have been considered by several authors, mainly within the framework of relativistic mean field models  or parametrized effective interactions , see also Balberg et al.  for a recent update. Realistic hyperon-nucleon interactions were employed by Schulze et al. , in a many-body calculation in order to study the onset of hyperon formation in neutron star matter. In a recent work , they extend their work to study the properties of neutron stars with hyperons, paying special attention to the role played by three-body nucleon forces. All these works show that hyperons appear at densities of the order of $`2\rho _0`$.

In Refs.  the hyperon-hyperon interaction was not included. However, it is clear that as soon as the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ hyperon appears, one needs to consider the interaction between hyperon pairs since it will influence the single-particle energy of hyperons, hence affecting the equilibrium conditions from that density on and the density where other hyperons (e.g. the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$) appear. The aim of this work is thus to present results of many-body calculations for $`\beta `$-stable neutron star matter with hyperonic degrees of freedom, employing interactions which also account for strangeness $`S<1`$. To achieve this goal, our many-body scheme starts with the most recent parametrization of the free baryon-baryon potentials for the complete baryon octet as defined by Stoks and Rijken in Ref. . This entails a microscopic description of matter starting from realistic nucleon-nucleon, hyperon-nucleon and hyperon-hyperon interactions. In a recent work  we have developed a formalism for microscopic Brueckner-type calculations of dense nuclear matter that includes all types of baryon-baryon interactions and allows to treat any asymmetry on the fractions of the different species ($`n,p,\mathrm{\Lambda },\mathrm{\Sigma }^{},\mathrm{\Sigma }^0,\mathrm{\Sigma }^+,\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Xi }^0`$).

Here we extend the calculations of Ref.  to studies of $`\beta `$-stable neutron star matter. A brief summary of the formalism discussed in Ref.  is presented in section II. Our results are shown in section III. In III A we discuss the equation of state (EoS) and the composition of $`\beta `$-stable matter with strangeness, using various nucleonic contributions to the EoS. Based on the composition of matter we discuss in section III B the possible neutron star structures. Our conclusions are given in section IV.

## II Formalism

Our many-body scheme starts with the most recent parametrization of the free baryon-baryon potentials for the complete baryon octet as defined by Stoks and Rijken in Ref. . This potential model, which aims at describing all interaction channels with strangeness from $`S=0`$ to $`S=4`$, is based on SU(3) extensions of the Nijmegen potential models  for the $`S=0`$ and $`S=1`$ channels, which are fitted to the available body of experimental data and constrain all free parameters in the model. In our discussion we employ the interaction version NSC97e of Ref. , since this model, together with the model NSC97f of Ref. , results in the best predictions for hypernuclear observables . For a discussion of other interaction models, see Refs. .

With a given interaction model, the next step is to introduce effects from the nuclear medium. Here we will construct the so-called $`G`$-matrix, which takes into account short-range correlations for all strangeness sectors, and solve the equations for the single-particle energies of the various baryons self-consistently. The $`G`$-matrix is formally given by

$`B_1B_2\left|G(\omega )\right|B_3B_4=B_1B_2\left|V\right|B_3B_4+`$ (6)
$`{\displaystyle \underset{B_5B_6}{}}B_1B_2\left|V\right|B_5B_6{\displaystyle \frac{Q}{\omega E_{B_5}E_{B_6}+ı\eta }}`$ (7)
$`\times B_5B_6\left|G(\omega )\right|B_3B_4`$ . (8)
Here $`B_i`$ represents all possible baryons $`n`$, $`p`$, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$, $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^0`$, $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^+`$, $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Xi }^0`$ and their quantum numbers such as spin, isospin, strangeness, linear momenta and orbital momenta. $`Q`$ is the Pauli operator which allows only intermediate states $`B_5B_6`$ compatible with the Pauli principle, and the energy variable $`\omega `$ is the starting energy defined by the single-particle energies of the incoming external particles $`B_3B_4`$. The $`G`$-matrix is solved using relative and centre-of-mass coordinates, see e.g., Refs.  for computational details. The single-particle energies are given by

$$E_{B_i}=T_{B_i}+U_{B_i}+M_{B_i}$$
(9)
where $`T_{B_i}`$ is the kinetic energy and $`M_{B_i}`$ the mass of baryon $`B_i`$. We note that the $`G`$-matrix, Eq. (8), has been solved using the standard prescription (i.e. $`E_B=T_B+M_B`$) for the intermediate states $`B_5B_6`$. The single-particle potential $`U_{B_i}`$ is defined by

$$U_{B_i}=\mathrm{R}e\underset{B_jF_j}{}B_iB_j\left|G(\omega =E_{B_j}+E_{B_i})\right|B_iB_j,$$
(10)
where the linear momentum of the intermediate single-particle state $`B_j`$ is limited by the size of the Fermi surface $`F_j`$ for particle species $`B_j`$. The matrix element in Eq. (10) is properly antisymmetrized when the species $`B_i`$ and $`B_j`$ are the same. This equation is displayed in terms of Goldstone diagrams in Fig. 1. Diagram (a) represents contributions from nucleons only as hole states, while diagram (b) has only hyperons as holes states in case we have a finite hyperon fraction in $`\beta `$-stable neutron star matter. The external legs represent nucleons and hyperons. Detailed expressions for the single-particle energies and the $`G`$-matrices involved can be found in Ref. .

The total non-relativistic energy density, $`\epsilon `$, measured with respect to the nucleon mass, is obtained by adding the non-interacting leptonic contribution, $`\epsilon _l`$, and the baryonic contribution, $`\epsilon _b`$, the latter being obtained from the baryon single-particle potentials

$$\epsilon =\epsilon _l+\epsilon _b=\epsilon _l+2\underset{B}{}_0^{k_F^{(B)}}\frac{d^3k}{(2\pi )^3}\left(M_B+\frac{\mathrm{}^2k^2}{2M_B}+\frac{1}{2}U_B(k)M_N\right).$$
(11)
The total binding energy per baryon, $``$, is then given by

$$=\frac{\epsilon }{\rho },$$
(12)
where $`\rho `$ is the total baryonic density. The density of a given fermion species is given by

$$\rho _i=\frac{k_{F_i}^3}{3\pi ^2}=x_i\rho _T,$$
(13)
where $`x_i`$ is the fraction of particle species $`i`$ and $`\rho _T=\rho +\rho _l`$ is the total density which includes the baryonic ($`\rho `$) and the leptonic one ($`\rho _l`$).

In order to satisfy the equations for $`\beta `$-stable matter summarized in Eq. (5), we need to know the chemical potentials of the particles involved. In Brueckner-Hartree-Fock (BHF) theory the chemical potential is taken as the single particle energy at the Fermi momentum of the baryon, $`k_F^{(B)}`$, which at the lowest order reads

$$\mu _B=E_B(k_F^{(B)})=M_B+T_B(k_F^{(B)})+U_B^N(k_F^{(B)})+U_B^Y(k_F^{(B)}),$$
(14)
where, in the last equality, the baryon single-particle potential $`U_B`$ has been split into a contribution, $`U_B^N`$, coming from the nucleonic Fermi seas ($`p,n`$) and a contribution, $`U_B^Y`$, coming from the hyperonic ones ($`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{},\mathrm{\Lambda },\mathrm{}`$). From calculations in pure nucleonic matter it is well known that the nucleon chemical potential obtained from of Eq. (14) differs considerably from the thermodynamic definition

$$\mu _B=\frac{\epsilon }{\rho _B}.$$
(15)
Therefore, for the nucleons, we replace the nucleonic contribution to the chemical potential in Eq. (14), i.e. $`\mu _N^N=M_N+T_N(k_F^{(N)})+U_N^N(k_F^{(N)})`$, by $`\mu _N^N=\epsilon _{NN}/\rho _N`$, where

$$\epsilon _{NN}=2\underset{B=n,p}{}_0^{k_F^{(B)}}\frac{d^3k}{(2\pi )^3}\left(M_B+\frac{\mathrm{}^2k^2}{2M_B}+\frac{1}{2}U_B^N(k)\right)$$
(16)
is the nucleonic contribution to the baryonic energy density including only the interaction between $`NN`$ pairs. For the hyperons, we keep the prescription of Eq. (14). As shown in Ref. , these approximations amount to ignoring the weak dependence of $`U_N^N,U_Y^N`$ on the hyperon fractions and of $`U_N^Y,U_Y^Y`$ on the nucleon ones, and are good enough as long as the proton and hyperon fractions keep moderately small. Using the parabolic approximation for $`\epsilon _{NN}`$ one obtains

$$\mu _{p,n}(\rho _N,\beta )=\mu _{p,n}(\rho _N,\beta =0)\left(\beta ^2\pm 2\beta \beta ^2\rho _N\frac{}{\rho _N}\right)E_{sym}(\rho _N),$$
(17)
where $`\beta =12\rho _p/\rho _N`$ is the asymmetry parameter, with $`\rho _N=\rho _n+\rho _p`$. The symmetry energy $`E_{sym}`$ can be expressed as the difference of the energy per nucleon, $`\stackrel{~}{}`$, between pure neutron ($`\beta =1`$) and symmetric nuclear ($`\beta =0`$) matter:

$$E_{sym}(\rho _N)=\stackrel{~}{}(\rho _N,\beta =1)\stackrel{~}{}(\rho _N,\beta =0)=\frac{1}{2}\frac{\stackrel{~}{}}{\beta }(\rho _N,\beta =1),$$
(18)
where $`\stackrel{~}{}`$ is the nucleonic contribution to the total energy per nucleon, $`\stackrel{~}{}=\epsilon _{NN}/\rho _N`$, and $`\mu _{p,n}(\rho _N,\beta =0)`$ is given by

$$\mu _{p,n}(\rho _N,\beta =0)=\stackrel{~}{}(\rho _N,\beta =0)+\rho _N\frac{\stackrel{~}{}(\rho _N,\beta =0)}{\rho _N}.$$
(19)
The many-body approach outlined above is the lowest-order BHF method extended to the hyperon sector. This means also that we consider only two-body interactions. However, it is well-known from studies of nuclear matter and neutron star matter with nucleonic degrees of freedom only that three-body forces are important in order to reproduce the saturation properties of nuclear matter, see e.g., Ref.  for the most recent approach. The effect of nucleon three-body forces on the properties of $`\beta `$-stable matter with hyperons has been studied in Refs. . It is found that the repulsion induced by the three-body force at high densities enhances substantially the hyperon population and produces a strong softening of the EoS. In order to include such effects, we will alternatively use for the nucleonic sector, the EoS of Ref.  (hereafter referred to as APR98), which is obtained from a variational calculation using the Argonne $`V_{18}`$ nucleon-nucleon interaction  with relativistic boost corrections and a fitted three-body interaction model.

In the discussions below we will thus present two sets of results for $`\beta `$-stable matter, one where the nucleonic contributions to the self-energy of nucleons are derived from the baryon-baryon potential model of Stoks and Rijken  and one where the nucleonic contributions to the neutron and proton chemical potentials are calculated from the parametrization of the APR98 EoS discussed in Eq. (49) of Ref. . We note that replacing the nucleon-nucleon part of the interaction model of Ref.  with that from the $`V_{18}`$ nucleon-nucleon interaction , does not introduce large differences at the BHF level. However, the inclusion of three-body forces as done in Ref.  is important. Hyperonic contributions will however all be calculated with the baryon-baryon interaction of Stoks and Rijken . We emphasize that, in the present work, $`YN`$ as well as $`YY`$ interactions are taken into account.

## III Results

### A Equation of state and composition of $`\beta `$-stable matter

The above models for the pure nucleonic part (NSC97e and APR98) combined with the hyperon contribution (NSC97e) yield the composition of $`\beta `$-stable matter, up to total baryonic density $`\rho =1.2`$ fm-3, shown in Fig. 2. In the upper panel, results for NSC97e model for $`NN`$, $`YN`$ and $`YY`$ interactions are presented. Results combining the APR98 model for the nucleonic sector with the NSC97e for the $`YN`$ and $`YY`$ interactions are shown in the lower panel. In both panels, solid lines correspond to the case in which all the interactions $`NN`$, $`YN`$ and $`YY`$ are considered.

As can be seen by comparing the solid lines in both panels in Fig. 2, the composition of $`\beta `$-stable neutron star matter has a strong dependence on the model used to describe the non-strange sector. In both cases, $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ is the first hyperon to appear due to its negative charge. Since the APR98 EoS yields a stiffer pure nucleonic matter EoS than the corresponding one for NSC97e, the onset of $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ for the APR98 case occurs at a smaller density ($`\rho =0.27`$ fm-3) than for the NSC97e case ($`\rho =0.34`$ fm-3). In both cases, as soon as the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ hyperon appears, leptons tend to disappear, totally in the APR98 case (the electron chemical potential changes sign at $`\rho =1.01`$ fm-3, signaling the appearance of positrons), whereas in the NSC97e case only muons disappear. The onset of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ formation takes place at higher density. Recalling the condition for the appearance of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, $`\mu _\mathrm{\Lambda }=\mu _n=\mu _p+\mu _e^{}`$, and that the APR98 EoS is stiffer due to the inclusion of three-body forces, this clearly enhances the possibility of creating $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hyperons at lower density with this interaction model with respect to the NSC97e case. Indeed, the APR98 model produces $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hyperons from $`\rho =0.67`$ fm-3 on, whereas the neutron chemical potential of the NSC97e model turns out to be too small to equal the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ one in the range of densities explored. The absence of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hyperons in the NSC97e case can also, in addition to a softer EoS, be retraced to a delicate balance between the nucleonic and hyperonic hole state contributions (and thereby to features of the baryon-baryon interaction) to the self-energy of the baryons considered here, see diagrams (a) and (b) in Fig. 1. Stated differently, the contributions from $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$, proton and neutron hole states to the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ chemical potential are not attractive enough to lower the chemical potential of the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ so that it equals that of the neutron. Furthermore, the increase of the chemical potential of the neutron with density is slowed down with the NSC97e $`YN`$ interaction model since contributions from $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ hole states to the neutron self-energy are attractive, see e.g., Ref.  for a detailed account of these aspects of the interaction model. We note that the isospin-dependent component (Lane term) of the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ single-particle potential for the new Nijmegen interaction  is strongly attractive, as opposed to what is found  for other interactions, including the old Nijmegen one . This in turn implies a strong attraction for $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}n`$ ($`T=3/2`$) pairs, which is 10 times that obtained for the old Nijmegen potential at saturation density. These differences become more noticeable as density increases: while the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}n`$ pairs become increasingly more attractive with the new Nijmegen potentials (see e.g. Fig. 5 in ), they turn out to be strongly repulsive for the old one (see e.g. Figs. 1 and 2 in ). This is why in Ref.  the onset density for the appearance of $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ is larger than that for free hyperons, whereas the reverse situation is found here (compare the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ onset point in Fig. 2 with what would be extracted from Fig. 3). Within our many-body approach, no other hyperons appear at densities below $`\rho =1.2`$ fm-3. These results differ from present mean field calculations , where all kinds of hyperons can appear at the densities considered here. Although the APR98 EoS may be viewed as the currently most realistic approach to the nucleonic EoS, our results have to be gauged with the uncertainty in the hyperon-hyperon and hyperon-nucleon interactions. Especially, if the hyperon-hyperon interactions tend to be more attractive, this may lead to the formation of hyperons such as the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^0`$, $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^+`$, $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Xi }^0`$ at lower densities. The stiffness of the nucleonic contribution, together with the hyperon-nucleon and hyperon-hyperon interactions play crucial roles in the appearance of various hyperons beyond the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$.

In order to examine the role of the hyperon-hyperon interaction on the composition of $`\beta `$-stable neutron star matter, the dashed lines in the lower panel of Fig. 2 show the results of a calculation in which only the $`NN`$ and $`YN`$ interactions are taken into account. When the $`YY`$ interaction is switched off, the scenario described above changes only quantitatively. The onset point of $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ does not change, because $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ is the first hyperon to appear and therefore the $`YY`$ interaction plays no role for densities below this point. We note that the reduction of the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ fraction compared with the case which includes the $`YY`$ interaction, is a consequence of neglecting the strongly attractive $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ interaction , which allows the energy balance ($`nn\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}p`$) to be fulfilled with a smaller $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ Fermi sea. In turn, the reduction of the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ fraction yields a moderate increase of the leptonic content in order to keep charge neutrality (in fact only muons disappear now). On the other hand, a smaller amount of $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$’s implies less $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$$`n`$ pairs. Recalling that the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$$`n`$ interaction is attractive in this model (see e.g. Fig. 7 of Ref. ), this means that the chemical potential of the neutrons becomes now less attractive. As a consequence, the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hyperons appear at a smaller density ($`\rho =0.65`$ fm-3) and have a larger relative fraction.

As it has been mentioned, the composition of $`\beta `$-stable matter depends strongly on the model used to describe the nucleonic sector. In order to study this dependence, Fig. 3 shows the chemical potential of the neutron and the sum $`\mu _n+\mu _e^{}`$ for $`\beta `$-stable matter composed of nucleons and free hyperons for three different $`NN`$ interaction models. The solid lines correspond to the variational calculation denoted by APR98, which uses the Argonne $`V_{18}`$ interaction and includes three-body forces and relativistic boost corrections. The dashed and dot-dashed lines correspond to lowest-order BHF calculations using, respectively, the NSC97e and the Argonne $`V_{18}`$ potentials, the latter extracted from the results of Ref. . Dotted lines denote the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ and $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ masses. In this case, the onset conditions for $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ and $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ are, respectively, $`\mu _n=m_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ and $`\mu _n+\mu _e^{}=m_\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$. As can bee seen from the figure, the onset points of both hyperons are different depending on the $`NN`$ interaction model employed. In the APR98 model both the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hyperons appear at lower densities than in the lowest-order BHF models using the Argonne $`V_{18}`$ or the NSC97e interactions. This is a consequence of the different stiffness of the EoS generated by the three $`NN`$ interaction models. In fact, the NSC97e interaction gives the softest EoS and it is not even able to produce $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hyperons in the range of densities explored. Note that the hyperon onset points determined from Fig. 3 differ slightly from those observed in Fig. 2 as a consequence of the effect of the $`YN`$ and $`YY`$ interactions. Since the differences are not so large one concludes that the main features of the composition of matter are dominated by the pure nucleonic contribution to the EoS.

At present, the APR98 EoS represents perhaps the most sophisticated many-body approach to nuclear matter. Therefore, in what follows, we restrict our results to this $`NN`$ interaction model supplemented with the NSC97e one for the hyperonic sector.

In Fig. 4 we show the chemical potentials in $`\beta `$-stable neutron star matter for different baryons. We note that neither the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^0`$ nor the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^+`$ do appear since, as seen from the figure, the respective stability criteria of Eq. (5) are not fulfilled. This is due, partly, to the fact that none of the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^0`$-baryon and the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^+`$-baryon self-energies are attractive enough. A similar argument applies to $`\mathrm{\Xi }^0`$ and $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$. In the latter case the mass of the particle is $`1315`$ MeV and an attraction of around $`200`$ MeV would be needed to fulfill the condition $`\mu _\mathrm{\Lambda }=\mu _{\mathrm{\Xi }^0}=\mu _n`$ at the highest density explored in this work. From the figure we see, however, that the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^0`$ hyperon could appear at densities close to $`1.3`$ fm-3.

Fig. 5 shows the EoS for four different cases: pure nucleonic matter (solid line); matter with nucleons and free hyperons (dotted line); matter with nucleons and hyperons interacting only with nucleons (dashed line) and, finally, matter with nucleons and hyperons interacting both with nucleons and hyperons (long-dashed line). Each curve corresponds to a different composition of $`\beta `$-stable neutron star matter, obtained by requiring the equilibrium conditions of Eq. (5), with the appropriate chemical potentials for each of the four cases. The leptonic contribution to the EoS is also included in all the cases. As can be seen comparing the solid and dotted lines the appearance of hyperons leads to a considerable softening of the EoS. This softening is essentially due to a decrease of the kinetic energy because the hyperons can be accomodated in lower momentum states and in addition have a large bare mass. The hyperon-nucleon interaction (dashed line) has two effects. On one hand, for densities up to $`\rho 0.72`$ fm-3, the $`YN`$ interaction reduces the total energy per baryon making the EoS even softer. On the other hand, for densities higher than $`\rho =0.72`$ fm-3, it becomes repulsive and therefore, the EoS becomes slightly stiffer than that for non-interacting hyperons. The contribution from the hyperon-hyperon interaction (long-dashed line) is always attractive producing a softening of the EoS over the whole range of densities explored. We note that, at high densities, the combined incorporation of the repulsive $`YN`$ and attractive $`YY`$ interactions causes the EoS to become closer to that for non-interacting hyperons.

### B Structure of neutron stars

We end this section with a discussion on neutron star properties with the above equations of state.

The best determined neutron star masses are found in binary pulsars and all lie in the range $`1.35\pm 0.04M_{}`$  except for the nonrelativistic pulsar PSR J1012+5307 of mass $`M=(2.1\pm 0.8)M_{}`$ . Several X-ray binary masses have been measured of which the heaviest are Vela X-1 with $`M=(1.9\pm 0.2)M_{}`$  and Cygnus X-2 with $`M=(1.78\pm 0.2)M_{}`$ . The recent discovery of high-frequency brightness oscillations in low-mass X-ray binaries provides a promising new method for determining masses and radii of neutron stars, see Ref. . The kilohertz quasi-periodic oscillations (QPO) occur in pairs and are most likely the orbital frequencies of accreting matter in Keplerian orbits around neutron stars of mass $`M`$ and its beat frequency with the neutron star spin. According to Zhang et al.  and Kaaret et al.  the accretion can for a few QPO’s be tracked to its innermost stable orbit. For slowly rotating stars the resulting mass is $`M2.2M_{}(\mathrm{kHz}/\nu _{QPO})`$. For example, the maximum frequency of 1060 Hz upper QPO observed in 4U 1820-30 gives $`M2.25M_{}`$ after correcting for the neutron star rotation frequency. If the maximum QPO frequencies of 4U 1608-52 ($`\nu _{QPO}=1125`$ Hz) and 4U 1636-536 ($`\nu _{QPO}=1228`$ Hz) also correspond to innermost stable orbits the corresponding masses are $`2.1M_{}`$ and $`1.9M_{}`$. These observations define a range of variation for the mass between $`M1.35M_{}`$ and $`M2.2M_{}`$, which severely restricts the EoS for dense matter.

In order to obtain the radius and mass of a neutron star, we have solved the Tolman-Oppenheimer-Volkov equation with and without rotational corrections, following the approach of Hartle , see also Ref. .

Following the discussion of Figs. 3, 4 and 5, we use the pure nucleonic matter EoS of Akmal et al. , including both relativistic boost corrections and three-body interactions. Relating to the discussion of the previous subsection, we study two additional cases as well. One case where we just include the hyperon-nucleon interaction as done in e.g., Refs.  and another case where we include both the hyperon-nucleon and the hyperon-hyperon interactions.

In Fig. 6 we show the resulting mass as function of these equations of state without rotational corrections. In Fig. 7 we include rotational corrections to the mass. The mass-radius relations for the same equations of state are shown in Fig. 8.

For $`\beta `$-stable pure nucleonic matter the EoS is rather stiff compared with the EoS obtained with hyperons, see Fig. 5. The EoS yields a maximum mass $`M=1.89M_{}`$ without rotational corrections and $`M=2.11M_{}`$ when rotational corrections are included. The results for the masses as functions of central density $`\rho _c`$ are shown by the solid lines in Figs. 6 and 7. The corresponding mass-radius relation for masses without rotational corrections are shown in Fig. 8.

The second set of results refers to the case where we allow for the presence of hyperons and consider the hyperon-nucleon interaction but explicitly exclude the hyperon-hyperon one. The corresponding results are shown by the short-dashed lines in Figs. 6, 7 and 8. Without rotational corrections, we obtain a maximum mass $`M=1.47M_{}`$ whereas the rotational correction increases the mass to $`M=1.60M_{}`$. Thus, the inclusion of the the $`YN`$ interaction with the corresponding formation of $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ leads to a reduction of the mass by $`0.40.5M_{}`$. This large reduction is mainly a consequence of the strong softening of the EoS due to appearance of hyperons.

The last EoS employed is that which combines the nucleonic part of Ref.  with the computed hyperon contribution including both the hyperon-nucleon and the hyperon-hyperon interactions. These results are shown by the long-dashed lines in Figs. 6, 7 and 8. The inclusion of the hyperon-hyperon interaction leads to a further softening of the EoS in Fig. 5, and, as can be seen from Fig. 6, this leads to an additional reduction of the total mass. Without rotational corrections we obtain a maximum mass $`M1.34M_{}`$, whilst the rotational correction increases the mass to $`M1.44M_{}`$. The size of the reduction due to the presence of hyperons, $`\mathrm{\Delta }M0.60.7M_{}`$, and the obtained neutron star masses are comparable to those reported by Balberg et al. .

There are other features as well to be noted from Figs. 6, 7 and 8. The EoS with hyperons reaches a maximum mass at a central density $`\rho _c1.31.4`$ fm-3. In Fig. 2 we showed that the only hyperons which can appear at these densities are $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ and $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$. If other hyperons were to appear at higher densities, this would most likely lead to a further softening of the EoS, and thereby smaller neutron star masses.

The reader should however note that our calculation of hyperon degrees freedom is based on a non-relativistic BHF approach. Although the nucleonic part extracted from Ref. , including three-body forces and relativistic boost corrections, is to be considered as a benchmark calculation for nucleonic degrees of freedom, relativistic effects in the hyperonic calculation could result in a stiffer EoS and thereby larger mass. However, relativistic mean field calculations with parameters which result in a similar composition of matter as shown in Fig. 2, result in similar masses as those reported in Fig. 6. In this sense, our results with and without hyperons may provide a lower and upper bound for the maximum mass. This leaves two natural options when compared to the observed neutron star masses. If the above heavy neutron stars prove erroneous by more detailed observations and only masses like those of binary pulsars are found, this may indicate that heavier neutron stars simply are not stable which in turn implies a soft EoS, or that a significant phase transition must occur already at a few times nuclear saturation densities. Our EoS with hyperons would fit into this case, although the mass without rotational corrections is on the lower side. Else, if the large masses from QPO’s are confirmed, then the EoS for baryonic matter needs to be stiffer. This would then pose a severe problem to present hadronic models since, when the nucleonic part of the EoS is sufficiently stiff to support large masses, one cannot avoid the appearance of hyperons which, in turn, produce a softening of the EoS.

Although we have only considered the formation of hyperons in neutron stars, transitions to other degrees of freedom such as quark matter, kaon condensation and pion condensation may or may not take place in neutron star matter. We would however like to emphasize that the hyperon formation mechanism is perhaps the most robust one and is likely to occur in the interior of a neutron star, unless the hyperon self-energies are strongly repulsive due to repulsive hyperon-nucleon and hyperon-hyperon interactions, a repulsion which would contradict present data on hypernuclei . The EoS with hyperons yields however neutron star masses without rotational corrections which are even below $`1.4M_{}`$. This means that our EoS with hyperons needs to be stiffer, a fact which may in turn imply that more complicated many-body terms not included in our calculations, such as three-body forces between nucleons and hyperons and/or relativistic effects, are needed.

## IV Conclusions

Employing the recent parametrization of the free baryon-baryon potentials for the complete baryon octet of Stoks and Rijken , we have performed a microscopic many-body calculation of the structure of $`\beta `$-stable neutron star matter including hyperonic degrees of freedom. The potential model employed allows for the presence of only two types of hyperons up to densities of about ten times nuclear matter saturation density. These hyperons are $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$. The interactions for strangeness $`S=1`$, $`S=2`$, $`S=3`$ and $`S=4`$ are not attractive enough to allow the formation of other hyperons.

The presence of hyperons leads however to a considerable softening of the EoS, entailing a corresponding reduction of the maximum mass of the neutron star. With hyperons, including only the hyperon-nucleon interaction, we obtain maximum masses of the order $`M=1.47M_{}`$ and $`M=1.60M_{}`$ without and with rotational corrections, respectively. The inclusion of the hyperon-hyperon interaction leads to a further softening of the EoS and reduces the obtained masses to $`M=1.34M_{}`$ and $`M=1.44M_{}`$ without and with rotational corrections, respectively.

The corresponding numbers with just nucleonic degrees of freedom are $`M=1.89M_{}`$ and $`M=2.11M_{}`$, showing that the reduction in mass due to hyperonic degrees of freedom is $`0.50.7M_{}`$.

Our novel result is that a further softening of the EoS is obtained when including the effect of the $`YY`$ interaction since it is attractive over the whole density range explored. This is mainly due to the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ interaction which is strongly enough to develop a bound state . We note that the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ attraction produced by this model is only mild, not being able to reproduce the experimental $`2`$$`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ separation energy of $`\mathrm{\Delta }B_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}45`$ MeV .

Wether this additional softening is realistic or not will depend on the details of the $`YY`$ interaction that is, unfortunatelly, not well constrained at present. New data in the $`S=2`$ sector, either from double–$`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hypernuclei or from $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$–atoms, are very much awaited for.

## Acknowledgements

We are much indebted to M. Baldo, F. Burgio, Ø. Elgarøy, H. Heiselberg, H.-J. Schulze and V. G. J. Stoks for many useful comments. This work has been supported by the DGICYT (Spain) Grant PB95-1249, the Program SCR98-11 from the Generalitat de Catalunya and the Research Council of Norway. One of the authors (I.V.) wishes to acknowledge support from a doctoral fellowship of the Ministerio de Educación y Cultura (Spain).


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# Anomalous diffusion through coupling to a fractal environment: Microscopic derivation of the “whip–back” effect.

\[

## Abstract

Two models for quantum Brownian motion — the Oscillator Bath (OB) model and the Random Band–Matrix (RBM) model — are compared and a relation between the spectral density function $`I(\omega )`$ and the variance $`\overline{V_{ab}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}`$ is established. The extension to a fractal environment is then considered and the microscopic origin of anomalous diffusion is discussed. In particular, it is shown that the asymptotic behavior of the normalized velocity auto–correlation function (VACF) is entirely determined by the band form factor. This allows for a microscopic derivation of the “whip–back” effect.

\] Anomalous diffusion has attracted considerable attention in the last decade (for a review see ) and numerous studies have been devoted to its description, mostly at the phenomenological level. Among different approaches are fractional diffusion equations , Lévy walks , fractional Fokker–Planck equations , nonextensive statistical mechanics , quantum Lévy processes  and generalized Langevin equations . Anomalous diffusion often results from the interaction with a complex, non–homogeneous background. Examples include porous or disordered media , chaotic heat baths  and also fractal environments . In this Letter we focus on a system coupled to a fractal heat bath and explore the microscopic origin of anomalous diffusion with the help of the RBM model for quantum Brownian motion introduced in Ref. . In order to make a direct comparison between the OB model  and the RBM model, and to extent the latter to the case of a fractal environment, we first calculate the bath correlation function and investigate the validity of the Kubo–Martin–Schwinger (KMS) condition. We then relate the VACF to the microscopic band form factor by employing the first dissipation–fluctuation theorem and derive the “whip–back” effect .

We consider a quantum system $`S`$ weakly coupled to a heat bath $`B`$. The coupling is taken linear in the position coordinate $`x`$ of the system. The composite Hamiltonian is given by

$$H=H_S\text{11}_B+\text{11}_SH_B+xV,$$
(1)
where $`H_S`$ ($`H_B`$) is the system (bath) Hamiltonian and $`V`$ is an operator acting on the bath. It is assumed that at $`t=0`$, $`S`$ and $`B`$ are uncorrelated, so that the initial total density operator factorizes, $`\widehat{\rho }(0)=\widehat{\rho }_S(0)\widehat{\rho }_B(0)`$, where $`\widehat{\rho }_{S,B}(t)=\text{tr}_{B,S}[\widehat{\rho }(t)]`$. It is further assumed that the bath is initially in thermal equilibrium at temperature $`T`$, $`\widehat{\rho }_B(0)=Z^1\mathrm{exp}(\beta H_B)`$, with $`\beta =(kT)^1`$.

In the standard approach to quantum dissipation , the bath is modelled by an ensemble of independent harmonic oscillators (mass $`m_i`$, frequency $`\omega _i`$) and $`V`$ is assumed to be linear in the positions $`x_i`$ of the oscillators, $`V=_ic_ix_i`$, where the $`c_i`$’s are coupling constants. The coupling to the heat bath is fully characterized by the spectral density function $`I(\omega )`$, which is defined by

$$I(\omega )=\pi \underset{i}{}\frac{c_i^2}{2m_i\omega _i}\delta (\omega \omega _i).$$
(2)
On the other hand, in the random–matrix model the structure of the bath is not specified, in particular there are no environmental oscillators, and $`V`$ is a centered Gaussian random band–matrix. In this approach the coupling to the bath is uniquely characterized by the second moment $`\overline{V_{ab}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}`$ of the random interaction. The explicit form used in Ref. reads

$$\overline{V_{ab}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}=A_0\left[\rho (\epsilon _a)\rho (\epsilon _b)\right]^{\frac{1}{2}}\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{(\epsilon _a\epsilon _b)^2}{2\mathrm{\Delta }^2}\right].$$
(3)
Here $`\epsilon _a`$’s denote the eigenenergies of the bath Hamiltonian ($`H_B|a=\epsilon _a|a`$), $`A_0`$ is the strength of the coupling, $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ the bandwidth and $`\rho (\epsilon )`$ is the density of states of the bath. Using the equivalence of the canonical and microcanonical ensembles in the thermodynamical limit, the bath may be parametrized as

$$\widehat{\rho }_B(0)=|a^{}a^{}|\text{and}\rho (\epsilon ^{})=\rho _0e^{\beta \epsilon ^{}},$$
(4)
where the state $`|a^{}`$ is defined by the temperature $`T`$ and $`\rho _0=Z/\sqrt{\pi kT^2C_V}`$ ($`C_V`$ being the heat capacity at constant volume).

In Ref.  we have demonstrated that the averaged Markovian master equation for the system obtained from the RBM model is identical to the equation derived starting from the OB model. This shows that the two models, although being completely different in nature, are somehow related (at least at the level of the master equation). It is our aim to make this connection more precise and to directly relate the quantities that define the two models, namely the spectral density function (2) and the variance (3). This will be achieved by evaluating the bath correlation function.

The bath correlation function is defined as

$$K(t)=\stackrel{~}{V}(t)\stackrel{~}{V}(0)_B,$$
(5)
where $`\stackrel{~}{V}(t)=\mathrm{exp}(iH_Bt)V\mathrm{exp}(iH_Bt)`$ and $`\mathrm{}_B=\text{tr}_B[\widehat{\rho }_B(0)\mathrm{}]`$ denotes the thermal average. Performing the average over the random–matrix ensemble in Eq. (5) leads to

$$\overline{K}(t)=_{\mathrm{}}^+\mathrm{}𝑑\epsilon _b\rho (\epsilon _b)\overline{V_{ab}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}e^{i(\epsilon _a\epsilon _b)t}.$$
(6)
The above equation shows that $`\overline{K}(t)`$ is essentially the Fourier transform of the variance $`\overline{V_{ab}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}`$ with respect to $`\epsilon _b`$. On the other hand, the correlation function can also be written in terms of the spectral density $`I(\omega )`$ as

$`K(t)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle _0^{\mathrm{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{d\omega }{\pi }}I(\omega )\left(\mathrm{coth}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\beta \omega }{2}}\right)\mathrm{cos}(\omega t)i\mathrm{sin}(\omega t)\right)`$ (7)
$`=`$ $`K^{}(t)+iK^{\prime \prime }(t)`$ (8)
by using the identity of $`K(t)`$ with the kernel of the influence functional . We see from Eq. (7) that the imaginary part $`K^{\prime \prime }(t)`$ of the correlation function is simply the Fourier sine transform of the spectral density. Before we make use of this observation to obtain the relation between $`I(\omega )`$ and $`\overline{V_{ab}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}`$, let us find the most general form of the variance allowed by the laws of thermodynamics. More specifically, let us determine the conditions under which $`\overline{K}(t)`$ satisfies the KMS condition, $`\overline{K}(t)=\overline{K}(ti\beta )`$, which is known to define the thermal equilibrium state of the bath . To this end, we consider the following form of the variance ($`k>0`$),

$$\overline{V_{ab}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}=A_0\left[\rho (\epsilon _a)\rho (\epsilon _b)\right]^k\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{(\epsilon _a\epsilon _b)^2}{2\mathrm{\Delta }^2}\right].$$
(9)
Substituting (9) into Eq. (6), we obtain

$$\overline{K}(t)=\frac{A_0\sqrt{2\pi }\mathrm{\Delta }}{\rho (\epsilon _a)^{2k1}}\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }^2}{2}\left(t+i(1k)\beta \right)^2\right],$$
(10)
where we have replaced the density of states $`\rho (\epsilon )`$ by the expression (4). We see from (10) that the KMS condition is only fulfilled for the value $`k=1/2`$ (which is the form we have used so far) and that this is independent of the actual form of the band. This can be understood by the following qualitative argument. Let us write $`|\epsilon _a\epsilon _b|=nd`$ where $`d=\rho ^1`$ is the mean level spacing and let us assume that $`nd\mathrm{\Delta }`$. According to (9), the intensity of the coupling is approximately given by $`A_0d^{2k}`$. As a result, we observe that the coupling is much stronger for $`k=0`$ than for $`k=1/2`$ (recall that the spectrum of $`B`$ is quasi-continuous which means that $`d0`$). This strong coupling then prevents the bath from being in equilibrium. In the opposite limit $`k=1`$, the coupling is so weak that the imaginary part $`\overline{K^{\prime \prime }}(t)`$ vanishes. This implies that there is no dissipation (see Eq. (15)).

The most general expression for the variance which respects the KMS condition is hence of the form

$$\overline{V_{ab}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}=\left[\rho (\epsilon _a)\rho (\epsilon _b)\right]^{\frac{1}{2}}\text{f}(\omega _{ab}=\epsilon _b\epsilon _a),$$
(11)
where we have introduced the (symmetric) band form factor $`\text{f}(\omega )`$. Note that the form (11) ensures the passivity of the heat bath in accordance with the Second Law of thermodynamics  (for $`k>1`$ the damping coefficient defined in Eq. (16) is negative and the bath is clearly active) and also guarantees that the bath remains in equilibrium at all times. Now, by comparing the imaginary parts of Eqs. (6) and (7), we arrive at the relation

$$I(\omega )=2\pi \mathrm{sinh}\left(\frac{\beta \omega }{2}\right)\text{f}(\omega ).$$
(12)
This equation provides a link between the two models. A straightforward application of the above formula using the form (3) yields

$$I(\omega )=2\pi A_0\mathrm{sinh}\left(\frac{\beta \omega }{2}\right)\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{\omega ^2}{2\mathrm{\Delta }^2}\right].$$
(13)
One may also check that the power spectrum of $`\overline{K^{}}(t)`$ satisfies the fluctuation–dissipation theorem

$$\overline{K^{}}(\omega )=\mathrm{coth}\left(\frac{\beta \omega }{2}\right)I(\omega ).$$
(14)
At this point, it is useful to introduce the damping kernel

$$\gamma (t)=\frac{2}{M}_{\mathrm{}}^t𝑑t^{}\overline{K^{\prime \prime }}(t^{}).$$
(15)
In the limit $`1\mathrm{\Delta }kT`$, (15) is found to be equal to

$$\gamma (t)=2\pi \frac{A_0\beta }{M}\delta (t)=2\gamma \delta (t).$$
(16)
With the help of Eq. (16), Eq. (13) thus reduces to

$$I(\omega )M\gamma \omega $$
(17)
in the limit $`\omega 0`$. Clearly, the variance (3) defines Ohmic damping, as expected from the results of Ref. . Let us now turn to the determination of the band form factor in the non–Ohmic case.

In the non–Ohmic regime, the spectral density of the bath obeys $`I(\omega )\omega ^\alpha ,\alpha >0`$, at low frequencies. For $`\alpha `$ non–integer, the bath is called fractal . We immediately see that if the band form factor satisfies

$$\text{f}(\omega )g_\alpha |\omega |^{\alpha 1},$$
(18)
in the limit $`\omega 0`$, then, according to Eq. (12),

$$I(\omega )\pi \beta \omega \text{f}(\omega )\pi \beta g_\alpha \omega ^\alpha ,\omega >0.$$
(19)
We conclude that the damping regime is determined by the shape of the band at the origin and that the non-Ohmic (fractal) regime is the result of a shape of type (18). (Notice that the algebraic singularity appearing in Eq. (6) for $`\alpha <1`$ can easily be regularized, since the diagonal matrix elements $`V_{aa}`$ have no physical meaning, by taking Hadamard’s finite part $`_{\mathrm{}}^{\mathrm{}}x^{\alpha 1}g(x)𝑑x=_{\mathrm{}}^{\mathrm{}}x^{\alpha 1}[g(x)g(0)]𝑑x`$, see e.g.). Furthermore, it is known that the coupling to a fractal environment gives rise to anomalous diffusion at finite temperature . In the long–time limit, the mean–square displacement $`s(t)=(x(t)x(0))^2_t`$ for a free damped particle grows like $`t^\alpha `$ for $`\alpha <2`$ and like $`t^2`$ for $`\alpha >2`$. This leads to normal diffusion in the Ohmic case $`\alpha =1`$ and to sub(super)diffusion in the case $`\alpha <1`$ ($`1<\alpha <2`$). For $`\alpha >2`$, the growth of $`s(t)`$ is ballistic. These different regimes can be qualitatively understood by looking at the behavior of the band form factor at the origin (see Figure 1). Compared to the diffusive case $`\alpha =1`$, we observe that subdiffusion is the consequence of the strong enhancement of small energy transfers which occurs for $`\alpha <1`$ (the absorption by the bath of a given amount of energy necessitates, on average, more steps in the latter case: the bath becomes “stiff” and diffusion is slowed down), while superdiffusion results from the suppression of these small transitions for $`1<\alpha <2`$. The value $`\alpha =2`$ is singled out in all anomalous diffusion phenomena. This happens here too. When $`\alpha >2`$, the derivative at the origin of the function $`\omega ^{\alpha 1}`$ vanishes and the form factor $`\text{f}(\omega )`$ shows a gap around $`\omega =0`$. As a result, the motion of the free particle is dissipative only as long as its energy is larger than the value of the gap. Once its energy is smaller, the particle behaves, on average, as if it were free (ballistic motion). The foregoing discussion can be made more quantitative and the microscopic origin of anomalous diffusion more transparent by evaluating the VACF of the particle.

We shall now show that the long time behavior of the normalized VACF $`C_v(t)`$ of the system can be written in a simple way in terms of the band form factor. Let us recall that the canonical correlation function of the velocity operator $`v`$ is defined as

$$\stackrel{~}{v}(0);\stackrel{~}{v}(t)=\beta ^1_0^\beta 𝑑\lambda \stackrel{~}{v}(i\mathrm{}\lambda )\stackrel{~}{v}(t).$$
(20)
In the limit $`\mathrm{}0`$, (20) reduces to the classical correlation function $`v(0)v(t)`$. The first fluctuation–dissipation theorem

$$C_v[z]=\left(z+\gamma [z]\right)^1$$
(21)
then relates the Laplace transform $`C_v[z]`$ of the normalized VACF $`C_v(t)=\stackrel{~}{v}(0);\stackrel{~}{v}(t)/\stackrel{~}{v}(0);\stackrel{~}{v}(0)`$ to the Laplace transform of the damping kernel $`\gamma (t)`$, which is given by

$$\gamma [z]=\frac{2}{M}_0^{\mathrm{}}\frac{d\omega }{\pi }\frac{I(\omega )}{\omega }\frac{z}{z^2+\omega ^2}.$$
(22)
We further note that in Eq. (22)

$$\underset{z0}{lim}\frac{1}{\pi }\frac{z}{z^2+\omega ^2}=\delta (z).$$
(23)
This gives

$$\underset{z0}{lim}\gamma [z]=\frac{\pi \beta }{M}\underset{z0}{lim}\text{f}(z),$$
(24)
where we have used Eq. (19). Hence, by virtue of the final value theorem  (assuming that the limit of $`C_v(t)`$ exists), we can write

$$\underset{t\mathrm{}}{lim}C_v(t)=\underset{z0}{lim}\left(1+\frac{\pi \beta }{M}z^1\text{f}(z)\right)^1.$$
(25)
Eqs. (24) and (25) show that the band form factor governs both the asymptotic behavior of the damping kernel and of the VACF. To be more precise, we shall assume that the VACF is of the form $`C_v(t)t^\lambda `$ for large times and employ the following theorem on the asymptotic properties of the Laplace transform of a function $`F(t)`$

$`\text{If }F(t)`$ $``$ $`ct^\lambda ,t\mathrm{}`$ (26)
$`\text{then }zF[z]`$ $``$ $`c\mathrm{\Gamma }(\lambda +1)z^\lambda ,z0.`$ (27)
This theorem is a consequence of

$$_0^{\mathrm{}}t^\lambda e^{zt}𝑑t=\mathrm{\Gamma }(\lambda +1)z^{(\lambda +1)}.$$
(28)
In view of Eq. (19), we rewrite the right–hand side of (25) as

$$zC_v[z]\left(1+\frac{\pi \beta }{M}g_\alpha z^{\alpha 2}\right)^1,z0$$
(29)
Two cases have to be distinguished: $`\alpha `$ smaller or larger than two. In the case $`\alpha <2`$, Eq. (29) reduces to

$$zC_v[z]\frac{MkT}{\pi g_\alpha }z^{(\alpha 2)},z0.$$
(30)
By using the theorem (26), we then infer

$$C_v(t)\frac{MkT}{\pi g_\alpha }\frac{t^{\alpha 2}}{\mathrm{\Gamma }(\alpha 1)},t\mathrm{}.$$
(31)
For $`\alpha <1`$ (subdiffusion), the normalized VACF has a negative power–law tail (this can be seen by noting that $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(\alpha 1)=\mathrm{\Gamma }(\alpha )/(\alpha 1)`$). This negative correlation leads to a incessant change of direction of the velocity of the particle and has been named “whip-back” effect in Ref.  (see also Ref. ) for this reason. This effect is responsible for the slower diffusion of the particle. In contrast, for $`\alpha >1`$ (superdiffusion), the VACF possesses a positive tail which means that the particle is more likely to move always in the same direction: this results in a enhanced diffusion. In the Ohmic case $`\alpha =1`$, the VACF vanishes for large times since $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(0)=\mathrm{}`$ and the velocities are therefore uncorrelated. This is of course in agreement with the exact form of the VACF, $`C_v(t)=\mathrm{exp}(\gamma t)`$, which is obtained by taking the inverse transform of Eq. (21) with $`\gamma [z]=\gamma `$. On the other hand, in the case $`\alpha >2`$, we note that $`z^{\alpha 2}`$ tends to zero in the limit $`z0`$. Eq. (29) can therefore be rewritten in the form

$$zC_v[z]1,z0,$$
(32)
and we have accordingly

$$C_v(t)1,t\mathrm{}.$$
(33)
The VACF (33) corresponds to ballistic motion.

In conclusion, we have investigated the validity of the KMS condition for the RBM model by calculating the bath correlation function. We have found that the most general form of the variance compatible with the Second Law of thermodynamics is given by Eq. (11). This form guarantees the passivity of the heat bath. We have further derived a relation (Eq. (12)) between the spectral density of the OB model and the band form factor and extended the latter to a fractal environment. We have then discussed the microscopic origin of anomalous diffusion; first qualitatively by examining the form factor at the origin, and second, quantitatively, by expressing the asymptotic behavior of the normalized VACF in terms of the band form factor. This resulted in the derivation of the “whip–back’ effect.

We wish to thank H. Grabert for having suggested the direct comparison between the RBM and OB models and H.A. Weidenmüller for useful discussions.


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# Moment of Inertia and Quadrupole Response Function of a Trapped Superfluid

## Abstract

We derive an explicit relationship between the moment of inertia and the quadrupole response function of an interacting gas confined in a harmonic trap. The relationship holds for both Bose and Fermi systems and is well suited to reveal the effects of irrotationality of the superfluid motion. Recent experimental results on the scissors mode are used to extract the value of the moment of inertia of a trapped Bose gas and to point out the deviations from the rigid value due to superfluidity.

PACS numbers: 03.65.-w, 05.30.Jp, 32.80.Pj, 67.40.-w

Important evidences of superfluidity in Bose-Einstein condensed gases have become available in a recent series of experiments. These include the occurrence of quantized vortices , the existence of a critical velocity for the motion of external impurities , and the rotational properties associated with the scissors mode . In particular this latter experiment has revealed the consequences  of the quenching of the moment of inertia with respect to the classical rigid value. The reduction of the moment of inertia follows from irrotationality which makes it impossible, for a superfluid, to respond to a transverse probe and to rotate in a rigid way. The moment of inertia characterizes the response of the system to a rotational field $`\mathrm{\Omega }J_z`$ and is defined by the ratio

$$\mathrm{\Theta }=\frac{J_z}{\mathrm{\Omega }}$$
(1)
between the angular momentum $`J_z`$ induced by the rotation (hereafter assumed to take place around the $`z`$-axis) and the angular velocity $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$. In superfluid helium the moment of inertia was determined long time ago by rotating the bucket containing the liquid and by measuring the angular momentum of the sample . This experiment pointed out the occurrence of significant deviations from the rigid value for temperatures below the $`\lambda `$-point. Relation (1) naturally defines the moment of inertia in the linear regime. At higher angular velocities new phenomena, associated with the creation of quantized vortices, take place in superfluids . Like in superfluid helium, also in a cold trapped gas the moment of inertia is expected to deviate significantly from the rigid value. The temperature dependence of $`\mathrm{\Theta }`$ for a trapped Bose gas below the critical temperature $`T_c`$ for Bose-Einstein condensation and the corresponding deviations from the rigid value were investigated in . First estimates of the moment of inertia of a trapped Fermi gas below the BCS transition have been also reported . In a trapped gas one can rotate the confining potential using magnetic or optical methods . Actually this procedure has proven quite successful in producing quantized vortices in Bose-Einstein condensed gases . However, the direct measurement of the angular momentum induced by the rotation of the trap is difficult in atomic gases, since most of diagnostic techniques, based on optical imaging, provide information on the density profiles, either in situ or after the expansion of the gas.

In this work we propose a method to measure the moment of inertia of a trapped gas based on the study of the collective oscillations resulting from the coupling between the rotational and the quadrupole motion. Our analysis, which develops the ideas introduced in , is based on the derivation of an explicit relationship between the moment of inertia and the quadrupole response function, and will be applied to the recent experiments on the scissors mode of a trapped Bose gas . The possibility of revealing the effects of superfluidity using this method would be particularly appealing in the case of Fermi systems, where most of diagnostic techniques are insensitive to the occurrence of the BCS transition.

The starting point of our analysis is the commutation rule ($`\mathrm{}=1`$)

$$[H,J_z]=i(x_yy_x)V_{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫),$$
(2)
where $`J_z=_{i=1}^Nx_ip_i^yy_ip_i^x`$ is the third component of the angular momentum operator and

$$H=\underset{i=1}{\overset{N}{}}\frac{p_i^2}{2M}+\underset{i<j}{}V(𝐫_i𝐫_j)+V_{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫),$$
(3)
is the Hamiltonian of the system, containing the external confining potential $`V_{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)`$. Result (2) is independent of the choice of the two-body potential, and follows from the rotational symmetry of the internal Hamiltonian $`HV_{\mathrm{ext}}`$. In the following we will consider harmonic potentials

$$V_{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)=\underset{i=1}{\overset{N}{}}\frac{M}{2}(\omega _x^2x_i^2+\omega _y^2y_i^2+\omega _z^2z_i^2)$$
(4)
with an asymmetry $`(\omega _x\omega _y)`$ in the rotating plane. In this case the commutation rule (2) takes the simple form

$$[H,J_z]=iM(\omega _x^2\omega _y^2)Q,$$
(5)
where

$$Q=\underset{i=1}{\overset{N}{}}x_iy_i$$
(6)
is the relevant quadrupole operator. Eqs. (5)-(6) explicitly reveal the coupling between the degrees of freedom associated with the angular momentum and quadrupole variables, induced by the deformation of the confining potential.

For a sample in thermal equilibrium at temperature $`T`$ the moment of inertia is given, according to linear response theory, by the expression

$$\mathrm{\Theta }=\frac{1}{𝒵}\underset{n,m}{}\left[e^{\beta \omega _m}e^{\beta \omega _n}\right]\frac{|m|J_z|n|^2}{\omega _n\omega _m},$$
(7)
where $`|n`$ and $`\omega _n`$ are eigenstates and eigenfrequencies of the Hamiltonian (3), $`𝒵`$ is the canonical partition function and $`e^{\beta \omega _n}`$ is the usual Boltzmann factor, with $`\beta =1/k_BT`$.

Because of the algebraic relationship (5) the moment of inertia can be also written in the form

$$\mathrm{\Theta }=\frac{M^2}{\pi }(\omega _x^2\omega _y^2)^2𝑑\omega \frac{\chi _Q^{\prime \prime }(\omega )}{\omega ^3}$$
(8)
where

$$\chi _Q^{\prime \prime }(\omega )=\frac{\pi }{𝒵}\underset{n,m}{}[e^{\beta \omega _n}e^{\beta \omega _m}]|m|Q|n|^2\delta (\omega \omega _{nm}),$$
(9)
is the imaginary part of quadrupole dynamic response function

$$\chi _Q(\omega )=\frac{2}{𝒵}\underset{n,m}{}e^{\beta \omega _m}\frac{|m|Q|n|^2\omega _{nm}}{(\omega +i\eta )^2\omega _{nm}^2},$$
(10)
and $`\omega _{nm}=\omega _n\omega _m`$. Here and in the following the frequency integrals are taken between $`\mathrm{}`$ and $`+\mathrm{}`$. It is useful to compare the moment of inertia (8) with the rigid value

$$\mathrm{\Theta }_{\mathrm{rig}}=MNx^2+y^2$$
(11)
given by classical theory. One can easily show that the average (11) is proportional to the double commutator of the Hamiltonian (3) with the quadrupole operator (6). In fact the following sum rule holds : $`[Q,[H,Q]]=Nx^2+y^2/M`$. This result is the natural extension of the dipole Thomas-Reiche-Kuhn sum rule  to the quadrupole operator. On the other hand the double commutator is directly related to the energy weighted moment of the imaginary part (9) of the quadrupole response function, so that one finally obtains the exact relationship $`Nx^2+y^2=M𝑑\omega \chi _Q^{\prime \prime }(\omega )\omega /\pi `$, which permits to write the ratio between the moment of inertia (8) and the rigid value (11) in the useful form

$$\frac{\mathrm{\Theta }}{\mathrm{\Theta }_{\mathrm{rigid}}}=(\omega _x^2\omega _y^2)^2\frac{𝑑\omega \chi _Q^{\prime \prime }(\omega )/\omega ^3}{𝑑\omega \chi _Q^{\prime \prime }(\omega )\omega }.$$
(12)
Eq. (12) represents a major result of the present paper. It explicitly shows that the occurrence of superfluidity, characterized by a reduction of the value of the moment of inertia with respect to the rigid value, must show up also in the structure of the quadrupole excitations of the system, characterized by the function $`\chi _Q^{\prime \prime }(\omega )`$. Actually the physical consequence of superfluidity is rather clear. The constraint of irrotationality suppresses the modes with low frequency ($`\omega |\omega _x\omega _y|`$). As a consequence in a perfect superfluid the integral (8) approaches a constant value when $`\omega _x\omega _y`$ with the consequent quenching of the value of $`\mathrm{\Theta }`$, which behaves like $`(\omega _x^2\omega _y^2)^2`$. The suppression of the low frequency oscillations in the presence of Bose-Einstein condensation has been experimentally pointed out in . Conversely, in a normal system the occurrence of low frequency modes is crucial to bring the moment of inertia to the rigid value.

It is worth discussing the effects of superfluidity more explicitly. The equations characterizing the macroscopic behaviour of a superfluid at zero temperature have the form of irrotational hydrodynamics

$`{\displaystyle \frac{\rho }{t}}+\mathbf{}(\rho 𝐯)=0`$ (13)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{𝐯}{t}}+\mathbf{}\left({\displaystyle \frac{v^2}{2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{V_{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)}{M}}+{\displaystyle \frac{\mu _{\mathrm{loc}}(\rho )}{M}}\right)=0`$ (14)
where $`\mu _{\mathrm{loc}}(\rho )`$ is the chemical potential of a uniform system evaluated at density $`\rho `$, and $`𝐯`$ is the irrotational superfluid velocity. These equations hold in particular for a cold dilute Bose gas in the Thomas-Fermi limit . In this case $`\mu _{\mathrm{loc}}(\rho )=g\rho `$ is linear in the density, the coupling constant $`g=4\pi a/m`$ being fixed by the $`s`$-wave scattering length $`a`$. In this limit the hydrodynamic equations (13-14) are equivalent to the Gross-Pitaevskii equation for the order parameter and can be easily solved to obtain the collective frequencies of a trapped Bose-Einstein condensed gas . In Ref.  the same Eqs. (13-14) have been used to calculate the corrections to the collective frequencies of a trapped Bose gas, due to the inclusion of the Lee-Huang-Yang term  in the equation of state. Applicability of Eqs. (13-14) is not however restricted to Bose superfluids. They are in fact expected to hold also in the case of Fermi superfluids. Of course in this case the equation of state can be very different due Pauli effects. For example, in a very dilute Fermi gas the chemical potential is a purely kinetic effect: $`\mu _{\mathrm{loc}}(\rho )=(3\pi ^2\rho )^{2/3}/2m`$ (we consider here a Fermi gas of two spin species with equal density). In this limit the hydrodynamic equations of superfluids have been investigated in . In general the applicability of Eqs. (13-14) is subject to the following constraints: (i) the non-superfluid component of the system should be negligible and hence the temperature should be much smaller than the transition temperature to the normal phase; (ii) the sample should be large enough in order to ensure the validity of the local density approximation for the chemical potential (Thomas-Fermi limit); (iii) the length scale of the oscillations should be larger than the healing length.

Starting from the equations of irrotational hydrodynamics it is straightforward to calculate the moment of inertia. To this purpose it is convenient to rewrite these equations in the frame rotating with angular velocity $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$. One finds

$`{\displaystyle \frac{\rho }{t}}+\mathbf{}\left(\rho (𝐯𝛀\times 𝐫)\right)=0`$ (15)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{𝐯}{t}}+\mathbf{}\left({\displaystyle \frac{v^2}{2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{V_{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)}{M}}+{\displaystyle \frac{\mu _{\mathrm{loc}}(\rho )}{M}}𝐯(𝛀\times 𝐫)\right)=0.`$ (16)
The stationary solutions in the rotating frame have the simple irrotational form

$$𝐯=\mathrm{\Omega }\frac{x^2y^2}{x^2+y^2}\mathbf{}(xy).$$
(17)
From Eq. (17) one can easily calculate the angular momentum and, using definition (1), one finds the irrotational result :

$$\mathrm{\Theta }=\left[\frac{x^2y^2}{x^2+y^2}\right]^2\mathrm{\Theta }_{\mathrm{rigid}}$$
(18)
for the moment of inertia, showing that in a superfluid the value of the moment of inertia is smaller than the rigid value . Results (17-18) are not restricted to the perturbative regime of small $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$. They are simply the consequence of the fact that the equilibrium density, fixed by the stationary solution of the Euler equation (16), depends on the variables $`x`$ and $`y`$ through the quadratic combination $`\alpha _xx^2+\alpha _yy^2`$ . For small angular velocities the moment of inertia (18) reduces to

$$\mathrm{\Theta }=\left[\frac{\omega _x^2\omega _y^2}{\omega _x^2+\omega _y^2}\right]^2\mathrm{\Theta }_{\mathrm{rig}}.$$
(19)
Another important feature emerging from the hydrodynamic Eqs. (13-14) is that also the behaviour of the surface oscillations, characterized by the condition $`\mathbf{}𝐯=0`$, is independent of the equation of state . In particular, by adding a term of the form $`\lambda xye^{i\omega t}+\text{c.c.}`$ in the external potential one finds that the quadrupole operator (6) excites, in the linear limit, only one mode with frequency

$$\omega _{\mathrm{HD}}=\sqrt{\omega _x^2+\omega _y^2},$$
(20)
so that the imaginary part of the quadrupole response function takes the simple form

$$\chi _Q^{\prime \prime }=\frac{N\pi }{2}\frac{x^2+y^2}{M\omega _{\mathrm{HD}}}\left[\delta (\omega \omega _{\mathrm{HD}})\delta (\omega +\omega _{\mathrm{HD}})\right].$$
(21)
By inserting result (21) into Eq. (12) one immediately recovers the irrotational value (19) for the moment of inertia.

In the second part of the work we show that the deviations of the moment of inertia from the rigid value can be measured through a rather straightforward experiment which consists of a sudden rotation of the confining trap by a small angle, followed by the imaging of the oscillations of the gas. This experiment has been recently carried out  in a trapped Bose gas where the effects of superfluidity predicted in  for the scissors mode have been directly observed.

The abrupt rotation of the harmonic trap is characterized by the transformation of coordinates $`xx\mathrm{cos}\varphi _0+y\mathrm{sin}\varphi _0`$, $`yx\mathrm{sin}\varphi _0+y\mathrm{cos}\varphi _0`$. For small values of $`\varphi _0`$, satisfying the condition $`\varphi _0(\omega _x^2\omega _y^2)/(\omega _x^2+\omega _y^2)`$, the corresponding change in the harmonic potential (4) produces a time dependent perturbation of the form

$$H_{\mathrm{pert}}=\lambda Q\theta (t),$$
(22)
where $`\lambda =M(\omega _x^2\omega _y^2)\varphi _0`$, $`Q`$ is the quadrupole operator (6) and $`\theta (t)`$ is the usual step function. Eq. (22) can be rewritten in its Fourier components as

$$H_{\mathrm{pert}}=\lambda Q\frac{i}{4\pi }𝑑\omega \frac{e^{i\omega t}}{\omega +i\eta }+\text{H.c.}.$$
(23)
According to linear response theory the average value $`Q(t)Q`$ of the quadrupole operator evolves, for $`t>0`$, as

$$Q(t)=\lambda \frac{i}{4\pi }𝑑\omega \frac{e^{i\omega t}}{\omega +i\eta }\chi _Q(\omega )+\text{c.c.},$$
(24)
where $`\chi _Q(\omega )`$ is the quadrupole response (10). Integrating (24) in the complex plane and using the analytic properties of $`\chi _Q(\omega )`$, one can rewrite Eq. (24) in the form

$$Q(t)=𝑑\omega Q(\omega )e^{i\omega t}𝑑\omega Q(\omega ),$$
(25)
with

$$Q(\omega )=\frac{\lambda }{\pi }\frac{\chi _Q^{\prime \prime }(\omega )}{\omega }.$$
(26)
Combining the above results with Eq. (12), one finally finds the useful relationship

$$\frac{\mathrm{\Theta }}{\mathrm{\Theta }_{\mathrm{rigid}}}=(\omega _x^2\omega _y^2)^2\frac{𝑑\omega Q(\omega )/\omega ^2}{𝑑\omega Q(\omega )\omega ^2},$$
(27)
which provides the sought link between the moment of inertia of the system and the Fourier transform of the observable quadrupole signal

$$Q(t)=𝑑𝐫\rho (𝐫,t)xy.$$
(28)
In actual experiments the quantity which is more easily measured is the angle of rotation $`\varphi (t)`$ rather than the quadrupole moment (28). The angle $`\varphi (t)`$ fixes the position of the symmetry axis of the gas with respect to the new symmetry axis of the confining trap. During the rotation the density of the gas varies according to the law, valid for small angles,

$$\rho (𝐫,t)=\rho _0(𝐫)+(x_yy_x)\rho _0(𝐫)(\varphi (t)\varphi _0),$$
(29)
where $`\rho _0(𝐫)`$ is the density before the sudden rotation of the trap. Using Eqs. (28) and (29) one derives the useful relationship

$$Q(t)=Nx^2y^2(\varphi (t)\varphi _0)$$
(30)
between the angle of rotation and the quadrupole moment.

We are now ready to use our formalism to extract the moment of inertia from the experiment of Ref. . At low temperature the angle $`\varphi (t)`$ was measured at different times after the sudden rotation of the confining potential. The experimental results have confirmed the occurrence of a single frequency in $`\varphi (t)`$, as predicted by hydrodynamic theory:

$$\varphi (t)=\varphi _0\mathrm{cos}(\omega _{\mathrm{HD}}t).$$
(31)
The observed frequency $`\omega `$ coincides, with excellent accuracy, with the hydrodynamic value (20). Using the relationship (30) and inserting the experimental values $`\omega _x=2\pi (90\pm 0.2)`$ sec-1, $`\omega _y=2\pi (249\pm 0.6)`$ sec-1 and $`\omega =2\pi (265.6\pm 0.8)`$ sec-1 into Eq. (27), one obtains the value $`\mathrm{\Theta }/\mathrm{\Theta }_{\mathrm{rigid}}0.6`$, providing an unambiguous proof of the superfluidity of the sample.

At higher temperature, well above $`T_c`$, the situation changes drastically. In first approximation the effects of interactions can be neglected and the time evolution of $`\varphi (t)`$ can be described by the non-interacting model

$$\varphi (t)=\frac{1}{2}\varphi _0[\mathrm{cos}(\omega _+t)+\mathrm{cos}(\omega _{}t)],$$
(32)
where

$$\omega _\pm =|\omega _x\pm \omega _y|$$
(33)
are the two frequencies excited by the external perturbation. The experimental results of , carried out at $`T5T_c`$, well agree with these predictions. In fact the observed frequencies $`\omega _+=2\pi (338.5\pm 0.8)`$ sec-1 and $`\omega _{}=2\pi (159.1\pm 0.8)`$ sec-1 are very close to the theoretical values (33) and enter the measured signal $`\varphi (t)`$ with practically equal weight. These results, inserted into Eq. (27), give finally $`\mathrm{\Theta }/\mathrm{\Theta }_{\mathrm{rigid}}1`$, confirming the crucial role played by the mode with the low frequency $`\omega =|\omega _x\omega _y|`$ in providing the rigid response to the rotational field.

A similar behaviour is expected to occur also in a Fermi gas. In fact at temperatures much smaller that the BCS transition the response is still given by the hydrodynamic predictions (20) and (31). On the other hand, in the normal phase of a very dilute Fermi gas one can use the predictions (32)-(33) of the non-interacting model.

The above procedure can be also used to investigate the effects of superfluidity as a function of temperature. In particular, by investigating the measured signal (28) and inserting its Fourier transform into Eq. (27), one can determine the value of the moment of inertia at any value of $`T`$. One should however take into account that, below the critical temperature, the density profile of the oscillating system cannot be simply parametrized through a single angle of rotation, like in Eq. (29), because the normal and the superfluid components will respond in a different way to the rotation of the trap. As a consequence one should introduce two distinct angles and the density of the gas will oscillate, in the linear limit, according to

$$\rho (𝐫,t)=\rho _0(𝐫)+(x_yy_x)\rho _S(𝐫)\varphi _S(t)+(x_yy_x)\rho _N(𝐫)\varphi _N(t),$$
(34)
where $`\rho _0(𝐫)=\rho _S(𝐫)+\rho _N(𝐫)`$ is the sum of the superfluid and normal component at equilibrium. The careful investigation of the time evolution of the density profile would provide unique information on the shape of the superfluid and normal components. In a dilute Bose gas these components are expected to coincide, respectively, with the condensate and the thermal cloud, except for temperature smaller than the chemical potential. The situation is very different in Fermi gases, where the total density profile is scarcely affected by the BCS transition , and the separation between the two components is much less trivial.

In conclusion we have shown that the moment of inertia $`\mathrm{\Theta }`$ of a gas trapped by harmonic potential can be explicitly measured by analyzing the quadrupole oscillations generated by the a sudden rotation of the trap. An explicit evaluation of $`\mathrm{\Theta }`$ has been provided using the recent data on the scissors mode available for a trapped Bose gas either at very low temperature and above the critical temperature. In the first case the method explicitly reveals the quenching of the moment of inertia due to superfluidity. The same method can be naturally applied to a Fermi system in order to reveal the effects of superfluidity associated with the BCS transition. Moreover, with suitable modifications, it can be also extended to the case of non-harmonic trapping.

Stimulating discussions with D. Guéry-Odelin are acknowledged. We are also grateful to O. Maragò for providing us the data of the Oxford experiment on the scissor mode.