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# The HI Content of Spirals. II. Gas Deficiency in Cluster Galaxies

## 1 Introduction

In nearby clusters, environmental interactions leave their imprint on the fragile gaseous disks of the spirals. As a result, comparison of the neutral hydrogen content of cluster objects with respect to their field counterparts has been frequently used to evaluate the strength of these perturbations and to identify their physical origin. Thus far, the most extensive 21-cm-line studies of high galaxian density regions have been those of Giovanelli & Haynes (1985, hereinafter GH85), who examined a sample of nine nearby clusters, and those reported by Haynes & Giovanelli (1986, hereinafter HG86) and Hoffman, Helou, & Salpeter (1988), who investigated large compilations of Virgo cluster galaxies. The HI data published by R. G. and M. P. H. have been analyzed further by Dressler (1986), Magri et al. (1988), and Valluri & Jog (1991). These investigations argued in favor of an ongoing interaction between spiral disks and their environment, but the process responsible for the gas depletion could not be unambiguously identified.

Because of the renewed interest in the interplay between galaxies and their surroundings and the substantial body of new cluster HI data that have been accumulated, conditions are ripe for a new evaluation of the HI content of galaxies in clusters that can provide fresh input to the debate about the extent to which the environment influences the evolution of galaxies. The firsts steps in this direction were taken a few years ago in a paper by Solanes, Giovanelli, & Haynes (1996, hereinafter Paper I), which was focused on the derivation of Malmquist-bias free estimates of the HI mass standards for the different morphological subgroups of luminous spirals. In the present paper, we exploit a large dataset of HI observations of spiral galaxies in the regions of eighteen nearby clusters with the aim of unmasking the cause of the observed gas deficiency.

The outline of the paper is as follows. The next section describes the criteria adopted for the selection of the cluster galaxy samples and the manner in which the HI deficiency is measured. The Virgo cluster and a composite formed by the remaining HI-deficient systems are used in § 3 to investigate the spatial pattern of HI deficiency. The dependence of HI deficiency both on the main global properties of clusters, and on the morphology and size of the galaxies is explored in § 4 and 5, respectively. Finally, § 6 examines the orbits of the spirals in HI-deficient clusters according to their gaseous content. The implications of the results of such analyses are discussed in § 7. The paper concludes with a summary of our findings. For all calculations involving the Hubble parameter we take $`H_0=100h`$ km s-1 Mpc-1.

## 2 The Cluster Sample

The galaxies used in the present study have been extracted from the all-sky database of nearby galaxies maintained by R. G. and M. P. H. known as the Arecibo General Catalog (AGC). Apart from several entries listing 21-cm line information, the AGC contains an extensive compilation of galaxy parameters from optical observations, such as morphologies and apparent sizes. A large number of galaxies have morphological types and visual estimates of their angular diameters listed in the Uppsala General Catalog of Galaxies (UGC, Nilson, 1973). For non-UGC objects, these properties have been obtained from the visual examination of the Palomar Observatory Sky Survey prints. The typical uncertainty in the morphological classification is $`+/`$ one Hubble type, although for some individual galaxies, especially the ones with the smallest angular sizes, the errors may be larger. Apparent diameters are estimated in bins of $`0\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}1`$ for dimensions larger than $`1\mathrm{}`$ and in bins of $`0\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}05`$ for dimensions below that value. Because the eye measures at about the level of a *face-on* isophotal radius, independently of inclination (Giovanelli et al., 1994), visual diameters have not been corrected for the inclination of the parent galaxy (internal absorption). We also neglect the effects of galactic extinction on apparent dimensions. The AGC also contains information on heliocentric radial velocities from radio and/or optical wavelengths (the radio measurement taking always preference over the optical one when the two are available).

Following our previous work in this subject, HI deficiencies for individual galaxies have been quantified by means of a parameter DEF that compares, in logarithmic units, the observed HI mass, $`h^2M_{\mathrm{HI}}^{\mathrm{obs}}`$, inferred from the corrected HI flux, with the value expected from an isolated (i.e. free from external influences) galaxy of the same morphological type, $`T^{\mathrm{obs}}`$, and optical linear diameter, $`hD_{\mathrm{opt}}^{\mathrm{obs}}`$, calculated from the major visual dimension (for details, see Haynes & Giovanelli 1984, hereinafter HG84). Specifically:

$$\text{DEF}=\mathrm{log}M_{\mathrm{HI}}(T^{\mathrm{obs}},D_{\mathrm{opt}}^{\mathrm{obs}})\mathrm{log}M_{\mathrm{HI}}^{\mathrm{obs}},$$
(1)
so positive values of DEF indicate HI deficiency. In eq. (1) the HI mass is expressed in solar units and the optical diameter in kpc. For the expectation value of the (logarithm of the) HI mass, we use the maximum likelihood linear regressions of $`\mathrm{log}(h^2M_{\mathrm{HI}})`$ on $`\mathrm{log}(hD_{\mathrm{opt}})`$ inferred from the field galaxy sample summarized in Table 2 of Paper I. Because the standards of normalcy for the HI content are well defined only for the giant spiral population (Sa–Sc), we have excluded from the present study earlier Hubble types, as well as all galaxies unclassified or with peculiar or very disturbed morphologies. Nonetheless, HI mass contents for the few HI-rich Sd’s, Sdm’s, and Magellanic-type irregulars included in our samples have been calculated from the relationship inferred for the Sc’s following the results of HG84. Because the AGC data have been gathered from a wide variety of sources, data quality is inhomogeneous. While we have been careful to select only those galaxies for which a meaningful HI measure can be calculated, the reader should be aware that the applicability of the assembled dataset is essentially statistical. Imprecisions in the diameter measures and morphological type assignments, together with the built-in distance dependence of the $`M_{\mathrm{HI}}D_{\mathrm{opt}}`$ relationship, make determinations of the HI deficiency for individual objects uncertain.

To be assigned to a given cluster field, a galaxy must lie within a projected distance of 5$`R_\mathrm{A}`$, i.e. within 7.5 $`h^1`$ Mpc, of the cluster center and have a radial velocity which is separated from the recessional velocity of the cluster no more than $`3`$ times its average velocity dispersion. Since we are especially interested in the central portions of clusters where environmental influences are strongest, we have only selected those clusters with at least 10 galaxies (of types Sa–Sdm/Irr) with good HI detections located within the innermost 1$`R_\mathrm{A}`$ (1.5 $`h^1`$ Mpc) radius circle.

Of all the cluster fields sampled in the AGC a total of eighteen satisfy all the above constraints. These are the sky regions centered on the ACO (Abell, Corwin, & Olowin, 1989) clusters A262, A397, A400, A426 (Perseus), A539, A779, A1060 (Hydra I), A1367, A1656 (Coma), A2063, A2147, A2151 (Hercules), and A3526 (Centaurus30), on the clusters of Virgo, Pegasus, Cancer, and Pisces, and on the group of galaxies around NGC507, hereinafter referred to as N507. Table 1 lists, for the above galaxy concentrations, the following quantities: cluster name in column (1); in columns (2) and (3) the cluster center coordinates referred to the 1950 epoch (mostly taken from the *Einstein* catalog of Jones & Forman 1999; when no X-ray observations are available—as for N507—we use the peak of the galaxy distribution); our velocity filter used to define cluster membership in column (4); in column (5) the Abell radius of the cluster expressed in degrees, inferred from its cosmological distance; and in columns (6) and (7), respectively, the total number of S’s meeting the membership criteria within 1 and 5$`R_\mathrm{A}`$, except for the Virgo cluster region for which a maximum radial cutoff of 3$`R_\mathrm{A}`$ has been imposed to avoid dealing with large angular separations. The sky distributions of the galaxies belonging to each one of the eighteen cluster regions are plotted in Figure 1. Figure 2 shows the histograms of the distribution of the measured values of DEF according to equation (1) for these same regions. In the histograms, the filled areas illustrate the distribution for the galaxies within 1$`R_\mathrm{A}`$—for which we adopt the cluster distance—, while the unfilled areas correspond to those objects at larger radii. Apart from some expected contamination by outliers, it is evident from this latter figure that, while the outer distributions tend to be bell-shaped, exhibit a dispersion comparable to the value of 0.24 measured for isolated galaxies (see Paper I), and peak around zero DEF, the central galaxies of the majority of the clusters show evidence for strong HI deficiency. The most notable case is that of Virgo, for which some of the inner galaxies have HI masses up to two orders of magnitude below their expectation values. Note that some of the datasets include a few galaxies undetected in HI but for which a reliable upper limit of their HI content has been calculated (see again HG84 for further details). In the calculations of DEF made through this paper, non-detections always contribute with their nominal lower limit of deficiency.

We choose to define a cluster as HI deficient when a two-sample Kolmogorov-Smirnov (KS) test gives a probability of less than 10% that its observed inner and outer distributions of DEF are drawn from the same parent population. Although it could be argued that the small size of the inner distributions makes some comparisons uncertain, the adopted definition has the advantage of being fully objective. Indeed, the results of the KS test confirm essentially the visual impression: the central spiral populations of twelve of the cluster fields in our dataset, Pegasus, Virgo, A262, A397, A400, A426, A779, A1060, A1367, A1656, A2063, and A2147 (identified in Fig. 2 by an asterisk after the name) have statistically significant reduced HI contents. Among these, only for A400 and A1060—two clusters with rather complex central velocity distributions (see e.g. Beers et al., 1992; Fitchett & Merrit, 1988)— is it not possible to reject the null hypothesis at better than the $`5\%`$ level of significance. For the other six galaxy concentrations, Cancer, N507, Pisces, A539, A2151, and A3526, the presence of objects with large HI deficiencies in the central regions is an exception of the norm. The results of the KS test are listed in the last column of Table 1.

From Figure 2 and Table 1, it is also readily apparent that, in spite of the stricter radial cutoff applied, the galaxy sample of the Virgo region is, because of its proximity, the largest. The difference in size is especially striking when one looks at the central 1$`R_\mathrm{A}`$-radius circle: within this zone, clusters other than Virgo contain on the average 20 objects, while this latter system has nearly 11 times more galaxies. Thanks to this substantial wealth of HI data, Virgo is the only single cluster of our dataset for which it is possible to investigate in detail the relationship of HI deficiency with the position, morphology and kinematics of the galaxies (see §§ 3.1, 5, and 6). The remaining galaxy samples are useful to investigate the HI deficiency only in an overall sense, while for more detailed analysis, one must resort to the combination of the individual datasets to increase the statistical reliability of the results.

## 3 The Spatial Pattern of HI Deficiency

### 3.1 The Virgo Cluster

The Virgo cluster is the nearest large-scale galaxy concentration which offers the possibility of exploring the manifestations of environmental effects on galaxies with greatest detail. Nowadays, thanks to the large amount of 21-cm data accumulated, the case supporting the HI deficiency of the spirals in the core of this cluster is solidly established (e.g. Davis & Lewis 1973; van den Bergh 1976; Giovanardi et al. 1983; Giovanelli & Haynes 1983; Chamaraux, Balkowski, & Fontanelli 1986; HG86; Guiderdoni 1987). It has also been clearly demonstrated that the sizes of the gaseous disks of the HI-poor Virgo spirals are reduced with respect to their field counterparts (e.g. Helou et al., 1981; Giovanardi et al., 1983; Giovanelli & Haynes, 1983; Warmels, 1988a, b) in an amount that increases with decreasing distance to the cluster center—marked by the giant elliptical galaxy M87 (Warmels, 1986; Cayatte et al., 1994). The selective sweeping of HI in the outer portions of the disks points to gas removal mechanisms initiated by the surrounding intergalactic medium (IGM).

Figure 3 shows the 2D adaptive map of the gas deficiency in the central cluster region. We have restricted our original Virgo sample to the subset of 187 galaxies with good 21-cm measures located in a region of size $`10\mathrm{°}\times 10\mathrm{°}`$ bounded by $`12^\mathrm{h}7^\mathrm{m}\text{R.A.}12^\mathrm{h}47^\mathrm{m}`$, $`6\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}5\text{Dec.}16\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}5`$. This region is centered on (and covers most of) the classical Virgo I Cluster area (de Vaucouleurs & de Vaucouleurs, 1973). When constructing the HI-deficiency map, we have also taken into account the close proximity and dynamical complexity of the Virgo cluster. The lack of correspondence between the observed radial velocity and distance in regions detached from the Hubble flow is a source of scatter that, for the nearby Virgo system, largely dominates the calculation of intrinsic parameters that have a built-in distance dependence, such as our deficiency estimator (eq. ): $`M_{\mathrm{HI}}D_{\mathrm{opt}}^n`$, with $`n1.7`$ for Sc’s and $`n1.2`$ for earlier spiral types (Paper I). To estimate the contribution to the HI-deficiency map of spurious fluctuations caused by possible erroneous distance assignments, we have derived a second map by using a distance-independent approximation to equation (1) based on the difference between the expected and observed logarithm of the mean HI surface density, $`\overline{\mathrm{\Sigma }}_{\mathrm{HI}}`$, that is:

$$\text{DEF}=\mathrm{log}\overline{\mathrm{\Sigma }}_{\mathrm{HI}}(T^{\mathrm{obs}})\mathrm{log}\overline{\mathrm{\Sigma }}_{\mathrm{HI}}^{\mathrm{obs}},$$
(2)
with $`\overline{\mathrm{\Sigma }}_{\mathrm{HI}}=F_{\mathrm{HI}}/a_{\mathrm{opt}}^2`$, and where $`F_{\mathrm{HI}}`$ represents the corrected HI flux density integrated over the profile width in units of Jy km s-1 and $`a_{\mathrm{opt}}`$ the apparent optical diameter in arcmin (see also eqs. , , and  of Paper I). Note that $`\overline{\mathrm{\Sigma }}_{\mathrm{HI}}`$ is a hybrid quantity since it uses the optical disk area. Figure 3 shows that, except for a global mild enhancement of $`0.15`$ units in the values of the HI deficiency parameter most likely caused by background contamination, the original radio map (Fig. 3a) exhibits a spatial distribution of deficiency almost identical to that of its distance-independent approximation (Fig. 3b). This result allow us to conclude that all the fluctuations depicted in the Figure 3a reflect true local variations in the gas content of the galaxies.

Several structures emerge clearly from the cluster HI deficiency distribution. The zone with the maximum gas deficiency coincides with both the peak of X-ray emission and the main density enhancement known as Cluster A (Binggeli, Popescu, & Tammann, 1993). This is a double system comprising the subclusters centered on the giant ellipticals M87 and M86, which seem to be in the process of merging (Schindler, Binggeli, & Böhringer, 1999). Five other distinct gas-deficient patches appear to be radially connected with the central one. Two of them are located along the N-S direction: to the South, the HI deficiency extends towards the clump dominated by M49 (Cluster B in Binggeli et al. 1993); to the North, there is a mild increase of gas deficiency around the spiral M100. Along the EW axis, the distribution of HI deficiency is dominated by a region of strong gas depletion to the East. This EW asymmetry in the HI content has also been observed at X-ray wavelengths by Böhringer et al. (1994), who found that the faint Virgo X-ray emission can be traced out to a distance of $`5\mathrm{°}`$, except in the western side where the emission falls off more steeply. On the other hand, the position of the eastern local maximum of deficiency is located about one and a half degrees South of the peak of the density enhancement known as Cluster C around the pair of galaxies M59 and M60. The last two zones of important HI depletion are found near the periphery of the surveyed region, where no X-ray gas is detected, in the areas of the background galaxy concentrations known as the M cloud in the NW, and the W’ group and (northernmost part of the) W cloud in the SW.

We comment upon the implications of the maps depicted in Figure 3 on the possible origin of gas deficiency in this cluster at the end of § 7.

### 3.2 The Radial Variation of HI Deficiency

A well-known property of the HI deficiency pattern in clusters is its radial nature. Previous studies of cluster galaxy samples have already revealed that gas-poor objects are more abundant in the centers of clusters than in their periphery (Giovanelli, Chincarini, & Haynes 1981; Sullivan et al. 1981; Bothun, Schommer, & Sullivan 1984; GH85; HG86; Magri et al. 1988; Bravo-Alfaro et al. 2000). With our new data, this effect can also be observed in the greyscale maps depicting the HI deficiency distribution in the dynamically unrelaxed Virgo core (Fig. 3). In spite of the irregular distribution of the galaxies, the shade intensity of these maps, which is proportional to the deficiency measure, grows toward the position of M87, where the density of the environment is highest.

A more precise characterization of the radial behavior of HI deficiency is obtained by combining into a single dataset the HI measures for spirals in all the clusters which show HI deficiency other than Virgo (see § 2), with their clustercentric distances normalized to $`R_\mathrm{A}`$. This composite sample of eleven HI-deficient clusters allows us to trace deficiency out to projected distances from the cluster center of 5$`R_\mathrm{A}`$ in much greater detail than the (relatively) small samples of the individual clusters, while at the same time reduces possible distortions caused by substructure and asphericity. Virgo is excluded from this composite cluster because of its smaller radial extent and the fact that its much larger dataset would dominate the composite cluster. Because the established upper limits of gas content for undetected galaxies in nearby clusters are more stringent than in distant ones, it is not appropriate to use average values of DEF to characterize gas removal. We adopt instead a measure based on the relative populations of deficient and normal spirals, much less sensitive to the presence of censored data. In Figure 4, we show the variation in the fraction of spirals with $`\text{DEF}>0.30`$ per bin of projected radial distance, in Abell radius units, for our composite HI-deficient cluster. The radial dependence of HI deficiency is clearly evident for $`r2`$$`R_\mathrm{A}`$: the percentage of gas-poor spirals increases monotonically up to the center. Beyond this projected distance, however, the fraction of gas-deficient disks remains constant around a value of $``$10–15%, a value consistent with the fraction of field spirals with $`\text{DEF}>0.30`$ expected from a Gaussian distribution of values of this parameter with an average dispersion of $`0.24`$ (Paper I). Similar results are obtained when the deficiency threshold is increased to 0.48 (equivalent to a factor of three decrease in $`M_{\mathrm{HI}}`$). We have also included in Figure 4 a second panel showing the variation of HI deficiency with projected radius. It provides visual verification of the fact that, at large clustercentric distances where gas-deficient galaxies are scarce and the contribution of non-detections negligible, the distributions of HI content at different radii are in excellent agreement both in terms of location and scale with that of field galaxies. This latter result supports further the statistical reliability of our measures of DEF through eq. (1).

The same two previous plots are repeated in Figure 5 for the superposition of the clusters which are not deficient in HI. It can be seen that the spirals belonging to these systems show HI contents which are both essentially independent of their clustercentric distance and typical of the field population. Comparison of the results in Figures 4 and 5 reinforce also our cluster subdivision into HI-deficient and “HI-normal” systems and therefore the soundness of the procedure followed for such classification.

It is clear from Figure 4 that the influence of the cluster environment on the neutral gas content of galaxies can extend beyond one Abell radius (plots of the radial variation of HI deficiency for individual clusters, not shown here, indicate that the extent of the zone of significant HI deficiency fluctuates significantly from cluster to cluster; see also GH85). On the other hand, Balogh et al. (1998), using \[OII\] equivalent width data, have found that the mean star formation rate in cluster galaxies, another property sensitive to environmental effects, shows signs of depression with respect to the field values at distances around twice the $`R_{200}`$ “virial” radius222In a typical nearby rich cluster the values of $`R_{200}`$ and the Abell radius are similar: simple calculations show that these two scales coincide for a $`z=0`$ cluster with a velocity dispersion of 866 km s-1 (Carlberg, Yee, & Ellingson, 1997). These results seem to pose a problem for stripping mechanisms which require high environmental densities to be effective. The reduction of both the gas content and the star formation rate of these outer cluster galaxies can be achieved, however, if they are on strongly eccentric orbits that have carried them through the cluster center at least once (see §§ 6 and 7). From the theoretical point of view, this possibility is supported by the simulations of hierarchical structure formation by Ghigna et al. (1998) and Ramírez & de Souza (1998), and by recent direct models of the origin of clustercentric gradients in the star formation rates within cold dark matter cosmogonies by Balogh, Navarro, & Morris (2000).

## 4 HI Deficiency and Cluster Properties

The compilation of the principal properties of our clusters from the literature presents a number of difficulties, most important of which is the heterogeneity of the available data. Thus, in spite of the fact that for some of the clusters it is possible to draw their relevant parameters from detailed individual studies, data were extracted mainly from large cluster catalogs. By adopting this approach, we insure that the information available for each cluster property is homogeneous. The global parameters available for most of the systems in our sample are summarized in Table 2. These are: three different estimates of the X-ray luminosity in the 0.01–80 keV (bolometric), 0.5–3 keV (soft), and 2–10 keV (hard) bandpasses, in columns (2)–(4), respectively; spectral X-ray temperature (col. 5); radial velocity dispersion (col. 6); Abell galaxy number counts (col. 7); and spiral fraction (col. 8). Table 2 is completed with a global measure of the degree of gas removal in each cluster computed as the ratio of the number of spirals with $`\text{DEF}>0.30`$ found within 1$`R_\mathrm{A}`$ of the cluster center to that of all objects of this type observed in HI within the same region. This “HI-deficient fraction”, $`F_{\mathrm{DEF}}`$, and its associated Poissonian $`1\sigma `$-error are indicated in column (9). The reference sources have been appended to the tabular information.

The fact that the characteristics of our clusters vary widely suggests that it is worth investigating correlations between the overall degree of gas depletion and the global cluster properties that reflect the strength of the environmental perturbations on the gaseous disks. Figure 6 shows the four X-ray parameters included in Table 2 plotted against $`F_{\mathrm{DEF}}`$, while in Figure 7 this fraction is compared with the three optical properties. A fourth panel in this last figure compares the bolometric X-ray luminosity with the total spiral fraction. We note that all plots involving the parameter $`F_{\mathrm{DEF}}`$ resemble essentially scatter diagrams with no significant correlations. We have tested different thresholds of HI deficiency without finding appreciable changes. Neither does the use of the distance-independent approximation to DEF given by eq. (2) modify the results significantly, implying that the possible contamination by interlopers has a negligible contribution to the scatter of the relationships. Only for the Virgo cluster does the value of $`F_{\mathrm{DEF}}`$ drop significantly (from 63 to 46%), indicating that, for this system, most of the interlopers are located in the background.

We recall at this point that in the original investigation of GH85, suggestive though inconclusive indications of a trend toward greater HI-deficient fraction among clusters with high X-ray luminosity (in the 0.5–3.0 keV band) were found. This relationship, however, is not corroborated with the present larger dataset. One reasonable explanation for the lack of any discernible correlation is the possible transmutation of some of the swept spirals into lenticulars, thereby weakening the relationships we are investigating by reducing the fraction of HI deficient galaxies to a greater degree for the strong X-ray clusters than for the weak ones. This possibility is suggested by the very strong anticorrelation between the total spiral fraction and the X-ray luminosity ($`r0.90`$ for all three wavebands; see also Bahcall 1977 and Edge & Stewart 1991) in the bottom right panel of Figure 7, implying that the fraction of lenticulars is correlated with X-ray luminosity.

One caveat that should be mentioned here is that possible selection effects and the incompleteness of some of our cluster galaxy samples—not included in the formal random error bars but which may blur significantly the results—might also explain the lack of good correlations between the fraction of HI-deficient spirals in clusters and the global properties of those systems. Note, for instance, that X-ray luminous clusters are more susceptible to incompleteness effects since they have a lower fraction of spirals. In an attempt to reduce the scatter of the plots, we have excluded from the analysis those samples containing fewer than than 20 objects (identified in Figures 6 and 7 with light gray circles), which are the most likely affected by problems related to the small sample size. Systems in this restricted dataset certainly show signs of a possible relationship between $`F_{\mathrm{DEF}}`$ and the cluster X-ray luminosity in the 0.5–3.0 keV range (the linear correlation coefficient, $`r`$, is equal to 0.55), but there is no evidence for this trend in the other two X-ray windows. We argue that the results of the present exercise are not fully conclusive and require further investigation by means of still larger and more complete 21-cm-line investigation of galaxies in cluster fields.

## 5 HI Deficiency and Galaxy Properties

Important clues to the nature of HI deficiency can also be inferred from studying the variation of the degree of gas depletion with the intrinsic properties of the galaxies. In this section, we investigate possible connections between the gas content and the morphology and optical size of the disks.

### 5.1 Variation with Morphological Type

The increase of gas deficiency towards early morphological types was first noted for the Virgo giant spiral population by Stauffer (1983) and Guiderdoni & Rocca-Volmerange (1985). This trend was bolstered by Chamaraux et al. (1986), who found that the HI deficiency in the Virgo cluster spirals increases monotonically along the Hubble sequence from Sc to the earliest spiral types. GH85’s HI data were also found to obey a gas deficiency-morphology relationship by Dressler (1986), which was independent of the projected radial distance of the galaxies from the cluster center.

With our new, extensive data, the variation of HI deficiency with morphological type can now be reviewed in a far greater detail and put on a much firmer ground. We restrict the analysis to the twelve HI-deficient clusters to emphasize the significance of the results. As before, the data are grouped in a single composite cluster, except for the Virgo galaxies which are treated separately. We begin by presenting, in Figure 8, the bar charts of the percentage of galaxies inside 1$`R_\mathrm{A}`$ at a given morphology with deficiency parameter $`\text{DEF}>0.30`$ in the Virgo and the composite samples. Hubble types have been replaced by its numerical $`T`$-code by HG84, which for the galaxies in the present study runs from $`T=3`$ for Sa’s to $`T=9`$ for Sd–Sm and irregular galaxies. No distinction has been made between normal and barred spirals. Comparison of the two bar charts shows, in the first place, that the Virgo cluster exhibits a notably larger fraction of gas-deficient galaxies for any given morphological class, a result which is simply due to the fact that we are sampling farther down the HI mass function in Virgo than in the more distant clusters. Differences in the normalization aside, the bar charts confirm that for a spiral, the likelihood of being HI deficient depends on its morphology. Both the Virgo and the composite cluster sample share a common pattern: a roughly gradual descent of the fraction of HI-deficient galaxies as the Hubble type goes from Sa to Sc, by a total amount of $`40\%`$, which levels off for the latest types. The only discrepancy arises in the very latest morphology bin, which shows a noticeable recovery of the deficiency fraction for Virgo and a sharp drop for the composite cluster. In this case, we assign more credibility to the Virgo data since very gas-poor dwarf galaxies are underrepresented in the more distant clusters.

We have also produced for the above two cluster galaxy subsets the distributions of values of the parameter DEF separately by morphological type. Given the differences in the morphological composition between Virgo and the composite cluster (indicated by the numbers inside the bars in Fig. 8), we find it preferable to adopt a distinct type grouping for the two samples, so that we give priority to the reduction of statistical noise. A major feature of the plots displayed in Figure 9 is the strong positive skewness of all distributions. In the Virgo cluster, the Sa’s exhibit the most radical behavior: 16 out of the 21 galaxies of this type have HI deficiencies larger than 1, i.e. a factor of 10 decrement over the typical HI mass. Indeed, all Virgo galaxies with $`\text{DEF}2`$ belong to this subclass (it should be noted that the high fraction of non-detections for this type indicates even higher deficiency values than this limit). Most of the remaining strongly deficient galaxies ($`\text{DEF}1`$) in the Virgo sample, including the rest of the non-detections but one, belong to the Sdm/Irr class. This result demonstrates that the dwarf types, as well as the Sa’s, are not only more likely to be deficient in HI than the intermediate spirals, but they also have a higher gas deficiency. The distributions for the composite cluster, on the other hand, show a progressive increase in the positive skewness and boxiness towards the early types, but the differences among the histograms are less pronounced than for the Virgo data. There are also very few galaxies with $`\text{DEF}1`$. The fractions of non-detections, however, are seen to increase towards the two extremes of the morphological range. No doubt selection biases against galaxies with very low HI masses are responsible for the abrupt cutoff of the high-HI-deficiency tails of the distributions. Clearly, the Virgo sample is much deeper and complete than any of the other cluster galaxy samples under scrutiny.

Yet, the possibility remains that the observed correlation between HI deficiency and morphology might reflect nothing more than the well-known morphological segregation of cluster galaxies. In other words, the larger deficiency of the earlier types might be explained simply by their more central locations. Figure 10 demonstrates that this is not the case. In this plot, we reproduce the radial run of the HI-deficient fraction for the composite HI-deficient cluster sample of Figure 4 but separating the early ($`T`$: $`3÷6`$) and late ($`T`$: $`7÷9`$) spiral type subsets. From this graph, one sees that, inside the region of influence of the cluster environment ($`r2`$$`R_\mathrm{A}`$), early-type galaxies have systematically higher gas deficiencies, *at any projected radius*, than the late types. Identical results, although with more abrupt radial variations due to the spatial lumpiness of the cluster, are found for the Virgo sample. We can also rule out strong projection effects, which would affect preferentially the late types, for two reasons. The first argument results from the radial velocity filters applied in the selection of the galaxy samples. The second reason has to do with the fact that the contribution of a (presumably) uniform distribution of outliers would be less noticeable in the centermost radial bins, where the cluster density is the highest. Contrary to these expectations, Figure 10 shows that the difference between the HI-deficient fractions of the early- and late-type populations increases gradually towards the cluster center. We conclude that the observed correlation of HI deficiency and morphology is not a secondary effect of the spatial segregation of the galaxies, but reflects the interplay between the intrinsic characteristics of these objects and the physical mechanism behind HI depletion.

### 5.2 Variation with Galaxy Size

The analysis by Valluri & Jog (1991) of the central galaxies in four of the HI-deficient clusters identified by GH85—A262, A1367, Coma, and Virgo—revealed an apparent tendency for HI deficiency to increase with increasing optical galaxy size, a result arising essentially from the galaxies located at relatively large projected radial distances from the cluster center ($`r>0.75`$$`R_\mathrm{A}`$). According to those authors, this observational result was difficult to reconcile with galaxy-intracluster medium interactions, such as ram pressure stripping and transport processes, even if significant mass segregation was invoked. Therefore, it becomes quite important to review with our new data this possible relationship between optical size and gas deficiency, because its confirmation would put serious strain on some of the most popular mechanisms of gas depletion.

In order to emphasize the contribution of cluster members, we have restricted this study to the galaxies within a projected distance of 1$`R_\mathrm{A}`$ from the center of the twelve HI-deficient clusters identified in our catalog. The linear optical sizes of the galaxies are calculated from their major angular diameters as given in the AGC and from the mean cluster distances (see § 2). The optical diameters are then distributed in logarithmically spaced bins. As in previous sections, we have investigated separately the variation of the HI-deficient fraction as a function of galaxy size for the Virgo dataset and for the composite sample formed by the combination of the remaining HI-deficient clusters. The top two panels of Figure 11 depict the corresponding histograms. Contrary to the results reported in Valluri & Jog (1991), we find no obvious relationship between HI deficiency and optical size. A $`\chi ^2`$-test corroborates that, statistically, there is no significant difference between the observed distributions and the uniform. We have verified that the results of the analysis are insensitive to alterations in the binning and to the exact deficiency criterion adopted.

We know from the results of the preceding sections that HI deficiency correlates with the morphology of the galaxies and their projected distance from the cluster center. As a simple method of subtracting the contributions of these two factors to the correlation that is being investigated, we have broken down the original histograms by morphological type (EARLY or LATE) and radial position (INside or OUTside a circle of $`r=0.5`$$`R_\mathrm{A}`$). The results depicted, respectively, in the middle and bottom panels of Figure 11 correspond only to the Virgo cluster, but they can be extended to the composite cluster too. Inspection of these plots shows no noticeable differences between the behaviors of the histograms of each partition, which are all again statistically flat, except for the expected overall increase in the HI deficiency of the EARLY and IN subsets. Notice also that the dynamical range of the optical diameters for this dataset is much wider than that of the composite sample, justifying the independent analysis of the Virgo cluster.

Two arguments can be invoked to explain the different results obtained by Valluri & Jog (1991). The most important is the fact that the deficiency parameter adopted by those authors had a relatively strong residual dependence on the optical diameter, because it relied upon the comparison of the mean values of the hybrid surface density of HI (as in eq. ). As shown in Paper I, $`\overline{\mathrm{\Sigma }}_{\mathrm{HI}}`$ decreases significantly with increasing disk size for all the giant spiral types but the latest. Since the galaxy population in dense environments is biased against late disks, investigations of the HI deficiency in galaxy clusters based on the constancy of this quantity are likely to overestimate (underestimate) the gas deficiency of the largest (smallest) objects. At the time the earlier study was made, however, the standards of HI content available predicted that $`M_{\mathrm{HI}}D_{\mathrm{opt}}^{1.8}`$ for the entire spiral population (HG84). This prompted Valluri & Jog to neglect the intrinsic size dependence of $`\overline{\mathrm{\Sigma }}_{\mathrm{HI}}`$ as insufficient to explain the observed trend. A second factor that might have contributed to generate the false relationship is the small size of the galaxy samples, which forced those authors to operate with a reduced number of intervals dominated by strong numerical uncertainties.

## 6 HI Deficiency and Galaxy Orbits

The hypothesis that HI-deficient galaxies lose their interstellar HI at small distances from cluster cores but can still be found at large radial distances (§ 3.2) suggests that the HI-deficient objects follow highly eccentric orbits. We now investigate the trajectories of the galaxies in the central regions ($`r1`$$`R_\mathrm{A}`$) of Virgo and the composite HI-deficient cluster as a function of their gas contents and morphologies. It should be noted that this approach is less severely affected by the randomizing effects of geometric projections than analyses of the distributions of HI deficiency vs. projected velocity, which have failed to provide any evidence that these two quantities are interrelated (GH85; HG86).

Information on the eccentricity of galaxy orbits can be extracted from the radial run of the line-of-sight (los) velocity dispersion. While the inverse problem of recovering orbital information from radial velocity data only is undetermined, the direct problem is not. Thus, a system with galaxies predominantly in radial orbits necessarily produces an outwardly declining $`\sigma _{\mathrm{los}}`$ profile. Accordingly, the observation of such a trend in a cluster *is consistent* with radial orbits, while the opposite behavior suggests instead that the galaxy orbits are largely circular. On the other hand, a roughly constant velocity dispersion with projected radius is characteristic (although not exclusive) of an isotropic distribution of velocities.

We have applied a procedure based on the deconvolution method developed by Sanromá & Salvador-Solé (1989) and Salvador-Solé & Sanromá (1989) to determine the velocity dispersion curves. This technique—which can be used to infer the radial profile of any positive quantity in systems with circular or self-similar symmetry—presents several advantages over the crude annular binning used by Dressler (1986) in his investigation of the orbital parameters of GH85’s galaxies. Among its interesting features are, for instance, its suitability for small samples since the binning of the data is avoided and the fact that it yields a quasi-continuos numerical solution (i.e. known with an arbitrarily small sampling interval). We refer those interested in the fundamentals of this method to the references provided above.

The dependence of the los velocity dispersion on (projected) radius from the cluster center is obtained simply by taking the square root of the ratio of the specific kinetic energy—given by the observed peculiar velocity squared—and the number density profiles of the galaxies. In order to remove from this kinematic profile the disturbing effects of subclustering, each system has been first “circularized” by performing azimuthal scramblings of the observed galaxy positions around the cluster center. In this manner, the distribution of clustercentric distances is preserved, while at the same time any possible subclumps existing in the original structure are destroyed. In addition, the observed peculiar velocities of the galaxies are scaled to the average los velocity dispersion of their parent cluster (see Table 2). This normalization, which is relevant for the composite dataset, has been adopted to give equal weight to identical fractional variations in the velocity dispersion coming from galaxies in different clusters, as well as to avoid artefacts caused by possible fluctuations in the degree of completeness of the galaxy samples according to the clustercentric distance. The mean radial profiles of the normalized los velocity dispersion, $`\sigma _{\mathrm{los}}^{}`$, for six different galaxian subpopulations, calculated from 100 circularized realizations of the Virgo and composite clusters, are displayed in Figure 12. A low-passband filter with a resolution length of 0.3$`R_\mathrm{A}`$ has been applied to each individual simulation to wash out the noise from non-significant statistical fluctuations.

We see in the bottom panel of Figure 12, which depicts the curves corresponding to the composite HI-deficient cluster, that the normalized velocity dispersion for the spirals with the strongest gas deficiencies ($`\text{DEF}0.48`$) drops significantly in a manner consistent with radial orbits (see also Dressler, 1986). The curve for the gas-rich objects ($`\text{DEF}0`$) decreases too with increasing radius—instead of rising as in Dressler’s study—although the decline is sensibly weaker than for the gas-deficient galaxies. These results suggest that one possible explanation for the relationship between disk morphology and gas content (§ 5.1) could be that early spirals have an orbital distribution more radially anisotropic than late types. To test this possibility, we have inferred the velocity dispersion profiles of the spirals subdivided into early and late disks. Again, we find indications of radial orbits for these two broad morphological groupings. However, the trajectories of the galaxies in the first group does not seem to be more eccentric than those in the second: if anything there is a hint for the opposite effect. Not surprisingly, the kinematic behavior of the entire spiral population is intermediate among those shown by all the previous subdivisions. The lowest curve in the diagram, on the other hand, displays the radial run of the velocity dispersion for the earliest Hubble types, i.e. lenticulars and ellipticals, which have been included in the cluster galaxy samples for this purpose only. These galaxies exhibit a markedly different behavior from the spirals, keeping an almost constant radial profile compatible with an isotropic distribution of velocities. (Recall that the interpretations adopted for the observed trends in the velocity dispersion curves are only valid in the quasi-static cluster interiors.) All these findings are yet another manifestation of the well-known fact that S and E+S0 galaxies do not share the same kinematics: late-type galaxies are likely recent arrivals to the virialized cluster cores, which consist essentially of ellipticals and lenticulars (e.g. Sodré et al., 1989). In addition to supporting this basic picture, our data also indicate that a segregation develops among the orbits of the infalling spirals according to their gaseous contents since the objects with the more eccentric trajectories, *regardless of morphology*, reach deeper into the cluster cores and are thus more efficiently stripped of their neutral hydrogen.

The same analysis for the Virgo cluster galaxies is reproduced in the top panel of Figure 12. We see that, to a first approximation, the velocity dispersion profiles corresponding to all the different galaxy subgroups are essentially flat (notice, for instance, the curve exhibited by the entire spiral population), although with a noticeably positive excess of the velocity dispersion of the spirals relative to the E+S0 population. As Virgo is still a dynamically young galaxy system (see e.g. Schindler et al., 1999; Gavazzi et al., 1999), we interpret these results as indicative of the fact that the trajectories of the spiral galaxies within the central Virgo region are strongly perturbed by large and rapid fluctuations of the mean gravitational field caused by the ongoing merger of major subclumps. Because of this large-scale phase mixing, environmental influences on the disks have not yet been capable of inducing a neat orbital segregation between gas-poor and gas-rich objects. After this paper was submitted a preprint from Vollmer et al. (2000) became available that investigates, by means of an analytical model of the Virgo cluster, the link between the neutral gas contents of the cluster spirals and their orbits. Their model leads to a scenario in which the majority of HI deficient galaxies of the Virgo centermost region are on radial orbits and have passed through the cluster center at least once. Interestingly enough, the presence of some high-velocity gas-poor objects at relatively large clustercentric distances is interpreted by these authors as a consequence of the perturbations to the main gravitational potential arising from the radial infall of M86 towards M87. These “special” galaxies would result from the spirals that populate the outskirts of the M86 cloud and that, still bound to the system, have been scattered with high velocities to large apocenter orbits during the merger process.

## 7 Implications of the Results on the Mechanism of HI Depletion

The idea that a spiral galaxy moving through the hot intracluster medium may have its HI removed by ram pressure was first introduced by Gunn & Gott (1972) and has since been extensively invoked. The typical value for the disk restoring force inferred in the solar neighborhood implies that, for ram pressure to be effective, galaxies must pass through or near the cluster cores. Under such circumstances, the low-density HI component can be stripped fairly easily, particularly from the outer disk regions (Abadi, Moore, & Bower, 1999). However, the molecular clouds, with densities one million times higher and much lower filling factors, should not be affected. This prediction is in agreement with the observations by Stark et al. (1986) and Kenney & Young (1989) that several HI-deficient Virgo spirals show normal molecular gas contents as indicated by their CO luminosities. Similarly, Kennicut, Bothun, & Schommer (1984) found that the distribution of H$`\alpha `$ equivalent widths for spirals in the Cancer, Coma, and A1367 clusters was poorly correlated with the HI content. Truncation of the outer HI disks is also expected from a mechanism in which the local gravity of the galaxy plays an important role in counteracting gas removal. Indeed, the efficiency of ram pressure is regulated by factors such as the mass surface density of the gas and the replenishment rate of the interstellar medium (ISM), related to galaxy type. This complication may well explain our finding that gas deficiency varies with morphology, while it is essentially independent of the size of the stellar disk (§ 5). In this one respect, it is interesting to note that Sb’s and earlier spirals often exhibit central HI depressions (Cayatte et al., 1994; Broeils & van Woerden, 1994) which, according to recent hydrodynamical treatments of stripping, amplify the effectiveness of this process (Moore, Quilis, & Bower, 1999). Thus, it seems reasonable that the strongest deficiencies correspond to the earliest spiral disks.

Observational evidence of ongoing ISM-IGM interactions is provided by galaxies with strongly asymmetric HI distributions (e.g. Dickey & Gavazzi, 1991; Bravo-Alfaro et al., 2000). The HI surface-density distributions of these objects show shifts between the optical and 21-cm positions, with extended tails combed backwards from the cluster center and a sharp edge on the forward side, as would be expected from external dynamical pressure effects if the galaxies were currently moving towards the cluster center. In some cases, these asymmetries are associated with radio continuum trails in the same direction as the HI is offset and enhanced star formation on the compressed side of the gas disk (Gavazzi & Jaffe, 1987; Dickey & Gavazzi, 1991). Often, the interaction of the galaxies with the intracluster medium has been cited as one the most probable explanations for the presence of blue galaxies with low HI contents in the central portion of some clusters (e.g. Bothun & Dressler, 1986). Theoretical studies back up also the plausibility of ram pressure as the physical mechanism behind the change in the star formation rates and colors observed in high-redshift clusters (Fujita & Nagashima, 1999), the morphology-density relation of the disk galaxy population in present-day rich clusters (Solanes & Salvador-Solé, 1992), and the observed HI deficiency pattern in the Virgo cluster (Vollmer et al., 2000).

Thermal conduction is another IGM-related mechanism capable of producing substantial stripping rates (Nulsen, 1982). Its efficiency notwithstanding, this process has longer timescales than ram pressure and is insensitive to the orbital parameters of the galaxies. In addition, it depends very weakly on the galaxy’s gravity, so it is unlikely that it can generate the observed asymmetries in the HI surface distributions. Galaxy-galaxy interactions (Icke, 1985) can also cause important gas depletion, either directly by the tides generated in these encounters or indirectly by inducing star formation. The fact that the galaxy relaxation times are comparable to, or greater than, the age of the universe has led Valluri & Jog (1991) to propose that tidal encounters must occur within subclumps prior to the cluster virialization. Gravitational encounters, however, cannot remove the HI from the inner parts of the galaxies without leaving their imprint on the stars or the molecular component. Model calculations show that tidal effects should produce extended tail structures both in the stellar distribution and in the neutral hydrogen, the latter with surface densities well above the detection threshold of the most sensitive two-dimensional observations. This prediction is at odds with aperture synthesis observations, which show that the HI distributions of cluster galaxies fall off rather rapidly with respect to field galaxies, implying a dearth of atomic gas in the outer parts. The role of gravitational interactions on the morphology of disks—summarized in the modern concept of “galaxy harassment”—has been examined in the context of hierarchical cosmogonies by Moore et al. (1996, 1998). According to their numerical simulations, low surface brightness galaxies can evolve into low luminosity dwarf spheroidals under the influence of rapid tidal encounters with giant galaxies and cluster substructure over a timescale of several billion years. Luminous spirals with large bulges are only affected marginally by this process.

The natural consequence of gas losses as radical as our results indicate would be—provided gas replenishment does not occur at exceptionally high rates—a reduction in the star-formation activity of the galaxy, followed by the fading of the disk. This prediction is in good agreement with the decline of disk luminosity and the invariance of bulge brightness with increasing local density observed in the spirals of rich clusters (Solanes et al., 1989). Also quite consistent with this idea is the finding by Koopmann & Kenney (1998) that objects in Virgo classified as Sa have similar bulge to disk ratios than the Sc’s and only differ in their overall star formation rates which are strongly reduced in the outer disk. The morphological transformation of the swept galaxies into S0-like objects could be completed through the suppression of the spiral features by continued disk heating by tidal encounters, as suggested by Moore et al. (1999). Of course, the possible morphological evolution of cluster spirals towards earlier types has serious difficulties in explaining the presence of S0’s in the field. While some stripped galaxies may have fairly radial orbits that carry them at large distances from the cluster centers, one must bear in mind that not all the lenticular galaxies, outside and inside clusters, arise necessarily from HI-deficient spirals.

We conclude that the present investigation provides clear evidences of the strong influence that the cluster environment has on the gaseous disks of spirals. The marked radial pattern of HI deficiency (§ 3.2) indicates that galaxies lose their gas near the cluster centers. This result is consistent with the finding that spirals with substantial HI deficiency follow orbits with large radial components (§ 6). It appears then, that the stripping of gas requires high IGM densities and relative velocities. According to these results, ISM-IGM interactions, basically ram pressure supplemented by the accompanying effects of viscosity and turbulence, are favored over other environmental interactions as the main cause of gas depletion in clusters. The existence of very HI-deficient galaxies in the cluster cores, often with deficiency factors of 10 or more (§ 5.1), but that look normal in other aspects (e.g. intrinsic color indices, CO contents), lends weight to the conclusion that the stripping must be relatively recent (probably a few Gyrs ago).

Qualitative support to an IGM-related stripping scenario arises also from the HI deficiency map of the central Virgo region (§ 3.1). The two main subunits of this cluster appear to be in an advanced state of merging, so it is not surprising that their member galaxies, which are moving through the densest portions of the gas sitting on the cluster main potential well, exhibit the highest deficiencies. We have detected also lumps of high HI-deficient galaxies at large projected distances, likely related to secondary galaxy density enhancements and/or background subclumps, which appear to be connected with the cluster center by gas-deficient zones. We speculate that these galaxy aggregates may have already experienced a first high-velocity passage through the Virgo core, that could have affected the gas content of their galaxies and left behind a trail of gas-deficient objects, but that was insufficient to tear apart the densest portions of the lumps. Finally, we want to point out that the two zones having the lowest gas deficiency in our HI-deficiency maps—a small region to the East and South of M49 and a larger one mainly to the South of the M cloud—show a good positional correspondence with two infalling clouds composed almost entirely ($`80\%`$) of spirals (Gavazzi et al., 1999).

## 8 Summary

In this paper, we have used 21-cm-line data to infer the HI contents of 1900 spiral galaxies spanning types Sa to Sdm/Irr in 18 nearby cluster regions. Each galaxy sample is defined by a radial velocity filter of $`3\sigma `$ around the systemic velocity of the central cluster and a projected radius of 5$`R_\mathrm{A}`$ around the cluster center, except for the Virgo region, in which we have included only the galaxies located within 3$`R_\mathrm{A}`$ of M87.

Following our previous studies, HI deficiency has been quantified by the difference between the observed neutral hydrogen mass and that expected for an isolated galaxy with the same morphological type and linear optical diameter. Improved standards of comparison are taken from the sample of galaxies in low density environments discussed in Paper I. The quality, sensitivity, and large size of the dataset assembled has afforded us the possibility of making—for the first time in a study of these characteristics—an exhaustive, statistically rigorous investigation of the connections between gas deficiency and the properties of both the underlying galaxies and their environment. The main results are:

* Comparison of the distributions of HI content for the spiral population in the inner ($`r1`$$`R_\mathrm{A}`$) and outer ($`r>1`$$`R_\mathrm{A}`$) portions of each cluster field shows that twelve of the systems investigated here—A262, A397, A400, A426, A779, A1060, A1367, Virgo, A1656, A2063, A2147, and Pegasus—may be considered deficient in HI. Among the non-deficient clusters, three are in the ACO catalog—A539, A3526, and A2151—, while the other three—Pisces, N507, and Cancer—are loosely organized galaxy concentrations.
* The zone of HI paucity can extend out to as much as 2$`R_\mathrm{A}`$ from the center of clusters. In the outskirts of these systems, the proportion of gas-deficient objects is compatible with the field values, while in the central cluster regions, HI deficiency is strongly anticorrelated with the projected radial position of the galaxies.
* The total fraction of HI-deficient spirals in a cluster shows no statistically significant trend with other cluster global properties such as X-ray luminosity and temperature, velocity dispersion, richness, or spiral fraction. This result could simply be due to a higher rate of transformation of swept spirals into lenticulars in the richest X-ray clusters. However, possible selection effects and biases propitiated by the small size of some of our cluster galaxy samples make any firm conclusions about this point impossible and demand further investigation with still larger and more complete datasets.
* The amount of gas depletion appears to be related to the morphology of the disks, but it is hardly a function of their optical size. The type dependence is in the sense that both the proportion of gas-deficient objects and the degree of depletion are higher for the early spirals. In the Virgo cluster, where 21-cm observations expand a large range in HI mass, most Sa’s have gas deficiencies exceeding factors of 10, a few being HI poor by more than a factor of 100. The HI deficiency distribution for the Sdm/Irr types in this cluster shows also a heavy tail at the high-deficiency end.
* Orbital segregation of disks according to gas content is observed in HI-deficient clusters: spirals devoid of gas have more eccentric orbits than the gas-rich objects. In the dynamically young Virgo cluster, however, no dependence of the gas deficiency on the orbital parameters of the galaxies is discernible. Collective relaxation effects might be responsible for the spatial pattern of HI deficiency observed in the central Virgo region.

The progressive increase of gas deficiency towards the cluster centers, the eccentricity of the orbits of the gas-poor galaxies, and the 2D pattern of HI deficiency in the central Virgo region, point to a scenario in which gas-sweeping events occur close to the cluster cores where the density of the IGM is highest and the gas-dynamical interactions are strongest. The detection of galaxies with extreme HI deficiencies, but still retaining their spiral morphology, suggests that the stripping of the atomic hydrogen is a relatively recent event in the life of these objects. Furthermore, the details of the relationship between HI deficiency and morphology are consistent with the idea that the presence of central depressions in the HI disks increases the efficiency of gas removal.

We propose that ISM-IGM dynamical interactions are the main agent causing the ablation of the spiral disks in the cluster interiors.

We would like to thank Gregory Bothun for his careful and prompt refereeing which has led to a much-improved presentation of the paper. J. M. S. would like also to express his gratitude to Eduardo Salvador-Solé for many fruitful discussions and the Departament d’Astronomia i Meteorologia at the Universitat de Barcelona for its generous hospitality. J. M. S., A. M., C. G. G., and G. G. C. acknowledge support by the Dirección General de Investigación Científica y Técnica, under contracts PB96–0173 and PB97–0411. Partial support has also been provided by US NSF grants AST–9528860 to M. P. H., AST–9617069 to R. G., and AST–9900695 to M. P. H. and R. G.


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# Security of Continuous Variable Quantum Cryptography

## I Introduction

The distribution of random number keys for cryptographic purposes can be made secure by using the fundamental properties of quantum mechanics to ensure that any interception of the key information can be detected . In particular the act of measurement in quantum mechanics inevitably disturbs the system. Further more, for single quanta such as a photon, simultaneous measurements of non-commuting variables are forbidden. By randomly encoding the information between non-commuting observables of a stream of single photons any eavesdropper (Eve) is forced to guess which observable to measure for each photon. On average, half the time Eve will guess wrong, revealing herself through the back action of the measurement to the sender (Alice) and receiver (Bob). There are a number of disadvantages in working with single photons, particularly the strong restrictions on data rates. Also it is of fundamental interest to quantum information research to investigate links between discrete variable, single photon phenomena and continuous variable, multi-photon effects. This has motivated a consideration of quantum cryptographic schemes using multi-photon light modes .

The question of optimum protocols and eavesdropper strategies has been studied in detail for the single quanta case , leading to general proofs of security for discrete systems. Up till now no such proofs of security have been made for continuous variable quantum cryptographic schemes. In this paper we introduce a scheme whose implementation and evaluation is sufficiently simple that a general proof of minimum guaranteed security can be derived. It is shown that in principle levels of security approaching those of single quanta schemes can be achieved.

The paper is laid out in the following way. In section II we review a coherent state scheme which provides limited security but none-the-less serves to illustrate the basic concepts. In section III we derive in a general way the minimum disturbance Eve can make to the information Bob receives for a particular level of interception. This relationship is then used to make a general evaluation of the coherent scheme of section II. In section IV we extend our discussion to a scheme employing 2-mode squeezed states. We show that the 2-mode scheme can, in principle, provide high levels of guaranteed security. In section V we make the interesting observation that teleportation represents an optimum eavesdropper strategy for this system and in section VI we conclude.

## II Coherent State Quantum Cryptography

In this section we will introduce the basic idea of our continuous variable cryptographic technique by reviewing a coherent state scheme  which though not very secure, is illustrative. In both of our schemes we will consider encoding key information as small signals carried on the amplitude and and phase quadrature amplitudes of the beam. These are the analogues of position and momentum for a light mode and hence are continuous, conjugate variables. Although simultaneous measurements of these non-commuting observables can be made in various ways, for example splitting the beam on a 50:50 beamsplitter and then making homodyne measurements on each beam, the information that can be obtained is strictly limited by the generalized uncertainty principle for simultaneous measurements . If an ideal measurement of one quadrature amplitude produces a result with a signal to noise of

$$(S/N)^\pm =\frac{V_s^\pm }{V_n^\pm }$$
(1)
then a simultaneous measurement of both quadratures cannot give a signal to noise result in excess of

$$(S/N)_{sim}^\pm =(\frac{\eta ^\pm V_s^\pm }{\eta ^\pm V_n^\pm +\eta ^{}V_m^\pm })S/N^\pm $$
(2)
Here $`V_s^\pm `$ and $`V_n^\pm `$ are, respectively, the signal and noise power of the amplitude ($`+`$) or phase ($``$) quadrature at a particular rf (radio frequency) with respect to the optical carrier. The quantum noise which is inevitably added when dividing the mode is $`V_m^\pm `$. The splitting ratio is $`\eta ^\pm `$ and $`\eta ^+=1\eta ^{}`$ (e.g a 50:50 beamsplitter has $`\eta ^+=\eta ^{}=0.5`$). The spectral powers are normalized to the quantum noise limit (QNL) such that a coherent beam has $`V_n^\pm =1`$. Normally the partition noise will also be at this limit ($`V_m^\pm =1`$). For a classical light field, i.e. where $`V_n^\pm >>1`$ the penalty will be negligible. However for a coherent beam a halving of the signal to noise for both quadratures is unavoidable when the splitting ratio is a half. The Hartley-Shannon law  applies to Gaussian, additive noise, communication channels such as we will consider here. It shows, in general, that if information of a fixed bandwidth is being sent down a communication channel at a rate corresponding to the channel capacity and the signal to noise is reduced, then errors will inevitably appear at the receiver. Thus, under such conditions, any attempt by an eavesdropper to make simultaneous measurements will introduce errors into the transmission. In the following we will first examine what level of security is guaranteed by this uncertainty principle if a coherent state mode is used. We will then show that the level of security can in principle be made as strong as for the single quanta case by using a special type of two-mode squeezed state.

Consider the set up depicted in Fig.1. A possible protocol is as follows. Alice generates two independent random strings of numbers and encodes one on the phase quadrature, and the other on the amplitude quadrature of a bright coherent beam. Bob uses homodyne detection to detect either the amplitude or phase quadrature of the beam when he receives it. He swaps randomly which quadrature he detects. On a public line Bob then tells Alice at which quadrature he was looking, at any particular time. They pick some subset of Bob’s data to be the test and the rest to be the key. For example, they may pick the amplitude quadrature as the test signal. They would then compare results for the times that Bob was looking at the amplitude quadrature. If Bob’s results agreed with what Alice sent, to within some acceptable error rate, they would consider the transmission secure. They would then use the undisclosed phase quadrature signals, sent whilst Bob was observing the phase quadrature, as their key. By randomly swapping which quadrature is key and which is test throughout the data comparison an increased error rate on either quadrature will immediately be obvious.

Let us first quantify our results for some specific situations to illustrate the essential points. Consider the specific encoding scheme of binary pulse code modulation, in which the data is encoded as a train of 1 and 0 electrical pulses which are impressed on the optical beam at some rf using electro-optic modulators. The amplitude and phase signals are imposed at the same frequency with equal power. Let us now consider some specific strategies Eve could adopt (see Fig.2). Eve could guess which quadrature Bob is going to measure and measure it herself (Fig.2(a)). She could then reproduce the digital signal of that quadrature and impress it on another coherent beam which she would send on to Bob. She would learn nothing about the other quadrature through her measurement and would have to guess her own random string of numbers to place on it. When Eve guesses the right quadrature to measure Bob and Alice will be none the wiser, however, on average 50% of the time Eve will guess wrong. Then Bob will receive a random string from Eve unrelated to the one sent by Alice. These will agree only 50% of the time. Thus Bob and Alice would see a 25% bit error rate in the test transmission if Eve was using this strategy. This is analogous to the result for single quanta schemes in which this type of strategy is the only available. Another single measurement strategy Eve could use is to do homodyne detection at a quadrature angle half-way between phase and amplitude. This fails because the signals become mixed. Thus Eve can tell when both signals are 0 or both are 1 but she cannot tell the difference between 1,0 and 0,1. This again leads to a 25% bit error rate.

However, for bright beams it is possible to make simultaneous measurements of the quadratures, with the caveat that there will be some loss of information. So a second strategy that Eve could follow would be to split the beam in half, measure both quadratures and impose the information obtained on the respective quadratures of another coherent beam which she sends to Bob (Fig.2(b)). How well will this strategy work? Suppose Alice wishes to send the data to Bob with a bit error rate (BER) of about 1%. For bandwidth limited transmission of binary pulse code modulation

$$BER=\frac{1}{2}erfc\frac{1}{2}\sqrt{\frac{1}{2}S/N}$$
(3)
Thus Alice must impose her data with a S/N of about 13dB. For simultaneous measurements of a coherent state the signal to noise obtained is halved (see Eq.2). As a result, using Eq.3, we find the information Eve intercepts and subsequently passes on to Bob will only have a BER of 6%. This is clearly a superior strategy and would be less easily detected. Further more Eve could adopt a third strategy of only intercepting a small amount of the beam and doing simultaneous detection on it (Fig.2(c)). For example, by intercepting 16% of the beam, Eve could gain information about both quadratures with a BER of 25% whilst Bob and Alice would observe only a small increase of their BER to 1.7%. In other words Eve could obtain about the same amount of information about the key that she could obtain using the “guessing” strategy, whilst being very difficult to detect, especially in the presence of losses.

## III Optimum Eavesdropper Strategy

It is already clear from the preceding discussion that the coherent scheme does not provide good security. However our evaluation has been in terms of specific eavesdropper strategies. This is unsatisfactory for evaluating the security of more promising schemes. Instead we wish to be able to evaluate our schemes’ security against attack from some theoretical, optimum eavesdropper strategy. Our approach is to identify the minimum disturbance allowed by quantum mechanics to the information Bob receives given a particular level of interception by Eve. We are then able to derive the minimum BER that Bob and Alice can find for a given BER in the information that Eve intercepts. We choose to couch our evaluation in terms of BER’s because they represent an unambiguous, directly observable measure of the extent to which Eve can intercept information and the resulting corruption of Bob’s information. Depending on the particular technique Eve uses Bob and Alice may be able to gain additional evidence for Eve’s presence by comparing the absolute noise levels of the sent and received signals. This can only increase the security of the system. By considering a general limit on BER’s we can find a minimum guaranteed security against eavesdropping regardless of the technique Eve employs.

A more general statement of the generalized uncertainty principle  requires that for any simultaneous measurements of conjugate quadrature amplitudes

$$V_M^+V_M^{}1$$
(4)
where $`V_M^\pm `$ are the measurement penalties for the amplitude ($`+`$) and phase ($``$) quadratures, normalized to the amplification gain between the system observables and the measuring apparatus. For example suppose an attempt to measure the amplitude quadrature variance of a system $`V_k^+`$ returned the result $`G_1V_k^++G_2V_m^+`$ where $`V_m^+`$ represents noise. Then we would have $`V_M^+=(G_2/G_1)V_m^+`$. Eq.2 follows directly from Eq.4 for ideal simultaneous measurements. Let us investigate what general restrictions this places on the information that Eve can intercept and the subsequent corruption of Bob’s signal. Firstly Eve’s measurements will inevitably carry measurement penalties $`V_E^\pm `$ constrained by

$$V_E^+V_E^{}1$$
(5)
Now suppose Bob makes an ideal (no noise added) amplitude measurement on the beam he receives. In order to satisfy Eq.4 it must be true that the noise penalty carried on the amplitude quadrature of this beam $`V_B^+`$ due to Eve’s intervention, is sufficiently large such that

$$V_B^+V_E^{}1$$
(6)
Similarly, Bob can also choose to make ideal measurements of the phase quadrature so we must also have

$$V_E^+V_B^{}1$$
(7)
Eqs.5,6,7 are the quantum mechanical basis for our measure of minimum guaranteed security. They set strict limits on the minimum disturbance Eve can cause to Bob’s information given a particular maximum quality of the information she receives. This applies regardless of the method she uses to eavesdrop. Given a particular encoding scheme, bandwidth and initial signal to noise, we can calculate minimum BER’s from these results.

Let us analyze the coherent state scheme using Eqs.5,6,7. In general the signal transfer coefficients, defined as the ratio of the output to input signal to noises are given by

$`T_E^+`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{(S/N)_{eve}^+}{(S/N)_{in}^+}}={\displaystyle \frac{V_{in}^+}{V_{in}^++V_E^+}}`$ (8)
$`T_E^{}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{(S/N)_{eve}^{}}{(S/N)_{in}^{}}}={\displaystyle \frac{V_{in}^{}}{V_{in}^{}+V_E^{}}}`$ (9)
$`T_B^+`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{(S/N)_{bob}^+}{(S/N)_{in}^+}}={\displaystyle \frac{V_{in}^+}{V_{in}^++V_B^+}}`$ (10)
$`T_B^{}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{(S/N)_{bob}^{}}{(S/N)_{in}^{}}}={\displaystyle \frac{V_{in}^{}}{V_{in}^{}+V_B^{}}}`$ (11)
Substituting Eqs.11 into Eqs.5,6,7 and using the fact that $`V_{in}^\pm =1`$ we find

$`T_E^++T_E^{}`$ $``$ $`1`$ (12)
$`T_E^++T_B^{}`$ $``$ $`1`$ (13)
$`T_B^++T_E^{}`$ $``$ $`1`$ (14)
Eqs.14 clearly show that any attempt by Eve to get a good signal to noise on one quadrature (e.g. $`T_E^+1`$) results not only in a poor signal to noise in her information of the other quadrature (e.g. $`T_E^{}0`$) but also a poor signal to noise for Bob on that quadrature (e.g. $`T_B^{}0`$), making her presence obvious. This is the general limit of the guessing strategy presented in the last section and leads to the same error rates.

Because of the symmetry of Bob’s readout technique Eve’s best approach is a symmetric attack on both quadratures. Eqs.14 then reduces to two equations

$`2T_E^\pm `$ $``$ $`1`$ (15)
$`T_E^\pm +T_B^\pm `$ $``$ $`1`$ (16)
If Eve extracts her maximum allowable signal to noise transfer, $`T_E^\pm =0.5`$, then ideally Bob suffers the same penalty $`T_B^\pm =0.5`$. This is the general limit of the second strategy of the previous section. The same reduction in Bob’s signal to noise occurs as in the specific implementation (Fig.2(b)) thus this implementation can be identified as an optimum eavesdropper strategy for obtaining maximum simultaneous information about both quadratures.

Eve’s best strategy is to intercept only as much information as she can without being detected. The system will be secure if that level of information is negligible. Suppose, as in the last section, Eve only intercepts a signal transfer of $`T_E^\pm =.08`$. From Eq.16 this means Bob can receive at most a signal transfer of $`T_B^\pm =.92`$. This is greater than the result for the specific implementation shown in Fig.2(c), thus that implementation is not an optimum eavesdropper strategy. Using the optimum eavesdropper strategy the error rates for the specific encoding scheme discussed in the last section will be: if Eve intercepts information with a BER of 25%, then the minimum BER in Bob’s information will be 1.4%.

In this section we have derived a limit to the minimum back-action that Eve can produce on Bob’s signal for a given quality of her intercepted signal. This limit is completely general, not dependent on the specific eavesdropping scheme employed. We have used our limits to investigate more generally the security of the coherent state scheme, coming to the same conclusion, i.e. that it is not very secure.

## IV Squeezed State Quantum Cryptography

The preceding discussion has shown that a cryptographic scheme based on coherent light provides much less security than single quanta schemes. We now consider whether squeezed light can offer improved security. For example amplitude squeezed beams have the property $`V_n^+<1<V_n^{}`$. Because the amplitude quadrature is sub-QNL greater degradation of S/N than the coherent case occurs in simultaneous measurements of amplitude signals (see Eq.2). Unfortunately the phase quadrature must be super-QNL, thus there is less degradation of S/N for phase signals. As a result the total security is in fact less than for a coherent beam. However in the following we will show that by using two squeezed light beams, security comparable to that achieved with single quanta can be obtained. The following scheme is similar to that presented in our previous publication  except that now only a single quantum limited beam is sent from Alice to Bob. This removes the possibility of Eve making a coherent attack, a loophole which (contrary to the claims in Ref.) was not adequately resolved in the previous protocol.

The set-up is shown in Fig.3. Once again Alice encodes her number strings digitally, but now she impresses them on the amplitude quadratures of two, phase locked, amplitude squeezed beams, $`a`$ and $`b`$, one on each. A $`\pi /2`$ phase shift is imposed on beam $`b`$ and then they are mixed on a 50:50 beamsplitter. The resulting output modes, $`c`$ and $`d`$, are given by

$`c`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}}(a+ib)`$ (17)
$`d`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}}(aib)`$ (18)
These beams are now in an entangled state which will exhibit Einstein, Podolsky, Rosen (EPR) type correlations . Negligible information about the signals can be extracted from the beams individually because the large fluctuations of the anti-squeezed quadratures are now mixed with the signal carrying squeezed quadratures. One of the beams, say $`c`$, is transmitted to Bob. The other beam, $`d`$, Alice retains and uses homodyne detection to measure either its amplitude or phase fluctuations, with respect to a local oscillator in phase with the original beams $`a`$ and $`b`$. She randomly swaps which quadrature she measures, and stores the results. Bob, upon receiving beam $`c`$, also randomly chooses to measure either its amplitude or phase quadrature and stores his results. After the transmission is complete Alice sends the results of her measurements on beam $`d`$ to Bob on an open channel. About half the time Alice will have measured a different quadrature to Bob in a particular time window. Bob discards these results. The rest of the data corresponds to times when they both measured the same quadratures. If they both measured the amplitude quadratures of each beam Bob adds them together, in which case he can obtain the power spectrum

$`V^+`$ $`=`$ $`<|(\stackrel{~}{c}^{}+\stackrel{~}{c})+(\stackrel{~}{d}^{}+\stackrel{~}{d})|^2>`$ (19)
$`=`$ $`V_{s,a}+V_{n,a}^+`$ (20)
where the tilde indicate Fourier transforms. Thus he obtains the data string impressed on beam $`a`$, $`V_{s,a}`$, imposed on the sub-QNL noise floor of beam $`a`$, $`V_{n,a}^+`$. Alternatively if they both measured the phase quadratures of each beam, Bob subtracts them, in which case he can obtain the power spectrum

$`V^{}`$ $`=`$ $`<|(\stackrel{~}{c}^{}\stackrel{~}{c})(\stackrel{~}{d}^{}\stackrel{~}{d})|^2>`$ (21)
$`=`$ $`V_{s,b}+V_{n,b}^+`$ (22)
i.e. he obtains the data string impressed on beam $`b`$, $`V_{s,b}`$, imposed on the sub-QNL noise floor of beam $`b`$, $`V_{n,b}^+`$. Thus the signals lie on conjugate quadratures but both have sub-QNL noise floors. This is the hallmark of the EPR correlation . As for the coherent state case Alice and Bob now compare some sub-set of their shared data and check for errors. If the error rate is sufficiently low they deem their transmission secure and use the undisclosed sub-set of their data as their key.

Consider now eavesdropper strategies. Eve must intercept beam $`c`$ if she is to extract any useful information about the signals from the classical channel (containing Alice’s measurements of beam $`d`$) sent later. She can adopt the guessing strategy by detecting a particular quadrature of beam $`c`$ and then using a similar apparatus to Alice’s to re-send the beam and a corresponding classical channel later. As before she will only guess correctly what Bob will measure half the time thus introducing a BER of 25%. Instead she may try simultaneous detection of both quadratures of beam $`c`$. As in the coherent case the noise she introduces into her own measurement ($`V_E^\pm `$) and that she introduces into Bob’s ($`V_B^\pm `$) are in general limited according to Eqs.5,6 and 7. However now the consequences of these noise limits on the signal to noise transfers that Eve and Bob can obtain behave quite differently because the signals they are trying to extract lie on sub-QNL backgrounds. Eve’s signal transfer coefficients are given by

$`T_E^+`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{V_{n,a}^+}{V_{n,a}^++0.5V_E^+}}`$ (23)
$`T_E^{}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{V_{n,b}^+}{V_{n,b}^++0.5V_E^{}}}`$ (24)
and similarly Bob’s are

$`T_B^+`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{V_{n,a}^+}{V_{n,a}^++0.5V_B^+}}`$ (25)
$`T_B^{}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{V_{n,b}^+}{V_{n,b}^++0.5V_B^{}}}`$ (26)
For the squeezed noise floors the same ($`V_{n,a}^+=V_{n,b}^+=V_n`$) we find the signal transfers are restricted via

$$4V_n^2(\frac{1}{T_E^+}1)(\frac{1}{T_E^{}}1)1$$
(27)
$$4V_n^2(\frac{1}{T_E^+}1)(\frac{1}{T_B^{}}1)1$$
(28)
$$4V_n^2(\frac{1}{T_B^+}1)(\frac{1}{T_E^{}}1)1$$
(29)
It is straightforward to show that a symmetric attack on both quadratures is Eve’s best strategy as it leads to a minimum disturbance in both her and Bob’s measurements. Using this symmetry to simplify Eq.27 leads to the following general restriction on the signal transfer Eve can obtain:

$$T_E^\pm \frac{2V_n}{2V_n+1}$$
(30)
Once the squeezing exceeds 3 dB ($`V_n=0.5`$) the signal to noise that Eve can obtain simultaneously is reduced below that for the coherent state scheme. In the limit of very strong squeezing ($`V_n0`$) Eve can extract virtually no information simultaneously. Similarly Bob’s signal transfer is restricted according to:

$$\frac{T_E^\pm T_B^\pm }{(1T_E^\pm )(1T_B^\pm )}4V_n$$
(31)
If squeezing is strong then almost any level of interception by Eve will result in very poor signal transfer to Bob. As a numerical example consider the specific encoding scheme of section 2 and suppose the squeezing is 13 dB ($`V_n=0.05`$). If Eve makes an ideal simultaneous measurement then both she and Bob will obtain a signal transfer of .09. As a result,assuming initial S/N of 13dB and using Eqs3, 30, 31 we find the information Eve intercepts and Bob receives will both have a minimum BER of about 24%. In other words, the security against an eavesdropper using simultaneous measurements is now on a par with the guessing strategy. Eve must reduce the amount of information she intercepts to virtually nothing before Bob’s change in BER becomes negligible. The trade-off between Eve and Bob’s BER’s are shown graphically in Fig.4 for various levels of squeezing. Also shown is the corresponding trade-off for an ideal single quanta scheme. For high levels of squeezing the results are comparable.

In any realistic situation losses will be present. Losses tend in general to reduce security in quantum cryptographic schemes . Eve can take advantage of losses by setting up very close to Alice and effectively disguising herself as loss. In such a situation her signal transfer remains as in Eq.30 but Bob’s changes to

$$(\frac{1}{T_E^\pm }1)(\frac{1}{T_B^\pm }1\frac{(1\eta )}{2\eta V_n})\frac{1}{4V_n}$$
(32)
where $`\eta `$ is the transmission efficiency. In Fig.5 some numerical examples including loss are given. Although these examples demonstrate some tolerance to loss for our continuous variable system it should be noted that single quanta schemes can tolerate much higher losses  making them more practical from this point of view.

## V Teleportation as the Optimum Eavesdropper Strategy

In this section we show that Eve can use continuous variable teleportation  as an optimum eavesdropper strategy. Quantum teleportation uses shared entanglement to convert quantum information into classical information and then back again (see Fig.6). In particular continuous variable teleportation uses 2-mode squeezed light as its entanglement resource. In the limit of very strong squeezing no information about the teleported system can be extracted from the classical channel but a perfect reproduction of the quantum system can be retrieved. On the other hand with lower levels of squeezing some information about the system can be obtained from the the classical channel but at the expense of a less than perfect reproduction. We show in the following that under particular operating conditions the disturbance in the teleported state is precisely the minimum required by the generalized uncertainty principle, given the quality of information that can be extracted from the classical channel. Teleportation thus constitutes an optimum eavesdropper strategy.

Eves strategy would be to send the field she intercepts from Alice through a teleporter, adjusted such that she can read some information out of the classical channel, but still reconstruct the field sufficiently well such that Bob and Alice don’t see a large BER. The classical channel of a lossless continuous variable teleporter can be written

$`F_c`$ $`=`$ $`K(f_{in}+j_1^{})`$ (33)
$`=`$ $`K(f_{in}+\sqrt{G}v_1^{}+\sqrt{G1}v_2)`$ (34)
where $`f_{in}`$ is the annihilation operator of the input to the teleporter and $`j_1=\sqrt{G}v_1+\sqrt{G1}v_2^{}`$ is the annihilation operator for one of the entangled beams. The $`v_i`$ are the vacuum mode inputs to the squeezers, $`G`$ is the parametric gain of the squeezers and $`K>>1`$ is the measurement amplification factor. Being a classical channel simultaneous measurements of both quadratures can be made without additional penalty thus immediately Eve’s measurement penalty is

$$V_E^\pm =2G1$$
(35)
For no squeezing ($`G=1`$) $`V_E^\pm =1`$, the minimum possible for simultaneous detection of both quadratures (see Eq.5). For large squeezing ($`G>>1`$) $`V_E^\pm `$ become very large and Eve can obtain little information from the classical channel.

The output of the teleporter is given by

$`f_{out}`$ $`=`$ $`\lambda f_{in}+j_1^{}j_2`$ (36)
$`=`$ $`\lambda f_{in}+(\lambda \sqrt{G}\sqrt{G1})v_1^{}+(\sqrt{G}\lambda \sqrt{G1})v_2`$ (37)
where $`\lambda `$ is the gain of the teleporter and $`j_2=\sqrt{G}v_2+\sqrt{G1}v_1^{}`$ is the annihilation operator for the other entangled beam. Thus Bob’s measurement penalty for ideal measurements of either of the quadratures is

$$V_B^\pm =\frac{(\lambda \sqrt{G}\sqrt{G1})^2+(\sqrt{G}\lambda \sqrt{G1})^2}{\lambda ^2}$$
(38)
If Eve operates the teleporter with gain

$$\lambda _{opt}=\frac{1+V_{sq}^2}{1V_{sq}^2}$$
(39)
where $`V_{sq}=(\sqrt{G}\sqrt{G1})^2`$, then Bob’s noise penalty is

$$V_B^\pm (\lambda _{opt})=\frac{1}{2G1}$$
(40)
and so Eve causes the minimum allowable disturbance, i.e. $`V_E^\pm V_B^\pm =1`$.

## VI Conclusion

We have derived quantum mechanical limits to the minimum disturbance that can be observed in the data shared by Alice and Bob in a continuous variable cryptographic scheme, in the presence of an eavesdropper using an optimum eavesdropper strategy. Using these limits we have shown, for the first time, a continuous variable scheme which can, in principle, have a guaranteed minimum security comparable with those of discrete, single quanta systems. In practice the high levels of squeezing and low levels of loss required will restrict the applicability of this particular scheme. Never-the-less we believe this work can be viewed as a simple, but rigorous starting point from which more practical schemes may be developed. Some promising lines for future inquiry are: investigating different encoding and transmission protocols; developing tighter security bounds and; investigating the use of higher order entanglement.

We have shown that continuous variable teleportation is an optimum eavesdropper strategy for our system. This identifies continuous variable teleportation as the optimum method for extracting information from a quantum object whilst causing the least possible disturbance.

Most generally this system is an example of a new quantum information technology based on continuous variable, multi-photon manipulations. Such technologies may herald a new approach to quantum information.