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# Explosion of a Collapsing Bose-Einstein Condensate

## Abstract

We show that elastic collisions between atoms in a Bose-Einstein condensate with attractive interactions lead to an explosion that ejects a large fraction of the collapsing condensate. We study variationally the dynamics of this explosion and find excellent agreement with recent experiments on magnetically trapped 85Rb. We also determine the energy and angular distribution of the ejected atoms during the collapse.

Introduction. — Ever since the achievement of Bose-Einstein condensation in an atomic gas with attractive interactions , it has been an important objective to study in detail the condensate collapse that is predicted to occur  if the number of condensate atoms exceeds a certain maximum number determined by the strength of the attractive interactions . In the pioneering experiments of Bradley et al. this objective was very difficult to achieve for two reasons. First, the use of doubly spin-polarized atomic 7Li results for these experiments in a maximum number of condensate atoms of only about 1400 atoms, which is too small to allow for nondestructive imaging of the collapse dynamics. Second, the inherent stochastic nature of the growth and collapse cycles that occur because one aims at evaporatively cooling far below the critical temperature , prevents sufficient control over the initial conditions of the condensate to perform a sequence of destructive measurements. However, a statistical analysis of the condensate growth and collapse cycles has nevertheless revealed important information on the collapse process , and new experimental techniques are presently being applied to overcome in particular the latter of these problems .

Complementary to these developments, Cornish et al. have recently been able to overcome both problems in an ingenious experiment with spin-polarized atomic 85Rb . In this experiment one makes use of the fact that the $`f=2`$, $`m_f=2`$ hyperfine ground state of 85Rb has a so-called Feshbach resonance  at a magnetic field of about $`1.55`$ mT, which offers the opportunity to magnetically tune the interatomic interactions from strongly repulsive to very attractive. As a consequence Cornish et al. were able to first produce a large, stable and essentially pure condensate, and then suddenly switch the interactions from repulsive to attractive to induce a collapse and observe its properties.

Perhaps the most surprising outcome of this experiment is that during the collapse an explosion occurs that ejects a large number of relatively highly energetic atoms from the condensate. A possible mechanism that immediately comes to mind for the production of these energetic atoms are inelastic collisions between condensate atoms that flip a spin and, therefore, convert Zeeman energy into kinetic energy. However, a simple estimate shows that this mechanism generally leads to particles with much too high energies and is also incapable of ejecting so many atoms from the condensate. Similarly it appears that elastic collisions between a condensate atom and an atom in the thermal cloud, which in principle cannot experimentally be excluded to be present, also occur too infrequent to explain the experimental results. We are thus faced with the important theoretical task to determine what physical mechanism is responsible for the observed explosion. It is the main purpose of this Letter to point out that elastic collisions between two condensate atoms can provide such a mechanism.

Elastic Condensate Collisions. — In detail, the scattering process that we have in mind is a collision between two condensate atoms by which one of the atoms is stimulated back into the condensate again but the other atom is ejected out of the condensate. It is important to realize that such a process is forbidden for a homogeneous condensate due to momentum conservation. However, for a trapped gas this is no longer true, because the condensate now occupies a band of low-lying momentum states. Note also that momentum and energy conservation ensure that the ejected atoms will automatically have, as compared to inelastic spin-flip collisions, small kinetic energies and can thus remain trapped as seen in experiment. To see if the above mechanism can also explain the large amount of ejected atoms, we need to calculate the rate associated with this process.

This can be most easily achieved by using the fact that we are dealing with a two-body interaction process. As a result the rate of change of the total number of condensate atoms $`N_\mathrm{c}(t)`$ is related to the instantaneous interaction energy of the condensate $`E_\mathrm{c}^{\mathrm{int}}(t)`$ by

$$\frac{dN_\mathrm{c}(t)}{dt}=\frac{2}{\mathrm{}}\mathrm{Im}\left[E_\mathrm{c}^{\mathrm{int}}(t)\right].$$
(1)
In the Bogoliubov theory of the dilute Bose gas we simply have that

$$E_\mathrm{c}^{\mathrm{int}}(t)=\frac{T^{2\mathrm{B}}}{2}𝑑𝐱|\varphi (𝐱,t)|^4,$$
(2)
which in momentum space reads

$`E_\mathrm{c}^{\mathrm{int}}(t)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\left({\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{4}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{d𝐤_i}{(2\pi )^3}}\right)\varphi ^{}(𝐤_4,t)\varphi ^{}(𝐤_3,t)`$ (3)
$`\times (2\pi )^3\delta (𝐤_4+𝐤_3𝐤_2𝐤_1)T^{2\mathrm{B}}\varphi (𝐤_2,t)\varphi (𝐤_1,t).`$ (4)
Here the two-body T(ransition) matrix equals $`T^{2\mathrm{B}}=4\pi a\mathrm{}^2/m`$ in terms of the $`s`$-wave scattering length $`a`$ and the mass $`m`$ of the 85Rb atoms, and $`\varphi (𝐱,t)`$ is the condensate wave function. In this approximation the condensate interaction energy is thus purely real and the number of condensate atoms is conserved.

However, a microscopic derivation  shows that in Eq. (3) the expression $`(2\pi )^3\delta (𝐤_4+𝐤_3𝐤_2𝐤_1)T^{2\mathrm{B}}`$ should in principle be replaced by the many-body T-matrix element $`T^{\mathrm{MB}}(𝐤_4,𝐤_3,𝐤_2,𝐤_1)`$, whose real part is at low temperatures indeed well approximated by the Bogoliubov result $`(2\pi )^3\delta (𝐤_4+𝐤_3𝐤_2𝐤_1)T^{2\mathrm{B}}`$. However, the many-body T matrix describes also real (incoherent) collisions taking place in the gas and as a result acquires an imaginary part that can be obtained from an optical theorem . Being interested in the ejection of relatively highly energetic particles, we can in first instance neglect the mean-field effects on the corresponding intermediate state to obtain

$`\mathrm{Im}\left[T^{\mathrm{MB}}(𝐤_4,𝐤_3,𝐤_2,𝐤_1)\right]`$ (5)
$`=2\pi (T^{2\mathrm{B}})^2{\displaystyle \frac{d𝐤}{(2\pi )^3}\delta (ϵ(𝐤_2)+ϵ(𝐤_1)ϵ(𝐤)ϵ(𝐤_2+𝐤_1𝐤))\varphi (𝐤_4+𝐤_3𝐤,t)\varphi ^{}(𝐤_2+𝐤_1𝐤,t)},`$ (6)
where $`ϵ(𝐤_i)=\mathrm{}^2𝐤_i^2/2m`$, $`\mathrm{}𝐤`$ is the momentum of the ejected atom, and the dependence on the condensate wave function is caused by the effect of Bose enhancement of scattering into already occupied states. Interestingly, the latter is here nondiagonal in momentum space due to the inhomogeneity of the condensate.

Notice that from a field-theoretical point of view, we have in the above manner just arrived at an evaluation of the Feynman diagram drawn in Fig. 1. We thus conclude that we are effectively dealing with a three-body process. Indeed, by taking the functional derivative $`\delta /\delta \varphi ^{}(𝐱,t)`$ of our result for the condensate interaction energy, we can obtain an imaginary three-body correction term to the Gross-Pitaevskii equation of the condensate, which provides another way of deriving the desired ejection rate. It is also worth mentioning that we qualitatively expect mean-field effects to reduce the above ejection rate in the case of a gas with positive scattering length, because it then costs energy to remove a particle from the condensate. Such an effect, however, does not occur for the negative scattering length case of interest here.

Collapse Dynamics. — To make further progress we need to determine the condensate wave function during the collapse. We do this by solving the Gross-Pitaevskii equation variationally, taking for the wave function an anisotropic Gaussian with time-dependent widths denoted by $`q_x(t)`$, $`q_y(t)`$, and $`q_z(t)`$. In detail we use, apart from a for our purposes irrelevant phase factor,

$`\varphi (𝐱,t)=\sqrt{N_\mathrm{c}}{\displaystyle \underset{j}{}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{\pi q_j^2(t)}}\right)^{1/4}`$ (7)
$`\times \mathrm{exp}\left\{{\displaystyle \frac{x_j^2}{2q_j^2(t)}}\left(1i{\displaystyle \frac{mq_j(t)}{\mathrm{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{dq_j(t)}{dt}}\right)\right\}.`$ (8)
The reason for this Gaussian ansatz is that it is the appropriate description of the condensate after the explosion has occurred and the remnant contains only a relatively small amount of atoms . Moreover, it is well-known that a Gaussian ansatz gives excellent results for the collective modes of the condensate, even when the number of atoms in the condensate is so large that the Gaussian approximation for the condensate wave function is strictly speaking no longer valid . We thus expect it to give physically sensible results for the dynamics of the collapse at all times.

Within this approach the explosion of the collapsing condensate is described by the ‘classical’ equations of motion

$$m\frac{d^2q_j(t)}{dt^2}=\frac{}{q_j}V(𝐪(t);N_\mathrm{c}(t)),$$
(9)
with a potential energy that is equal to

$$V(𝐪;N_\mathrm{c})=\underset{j}{}\left(\frac{\mathrm{}^2}{2mq_j^2}+\frac{m\omega _j^2q_j^2}{2}\right)+\sqrt{\frac{2}{\pi }}\frac{a\mathrm{}^2N_\mathrm{c}}{mq_xq_yq_z}$$
(10)
for an anisotropic harmonic trapping potential with spring constants $`m\omega _j^2`$. Moreover, these equations are coupled to the rate equation for the number of condensate atoms that follows from Eqs. (1) and (5). In the anisotropic case this cannot be worked out fully analytically and we have to determine the ejection rate numerically. However, in the isotropic case we simply find that

$$\frac{dN_\mathrm{c}(t)}{dt}=\frac{2\sqrt{5}}{\pi }\frac{a^2\mathrm{}N_\mathrm{c}^3(t)}{mq^4(t)}.$$
(11)
The dependence of the right-hand side on $`N_\mathrm{c}(t)`$ and $`q(t)`$ is somewhat unusual, because if we had discussed the effect of inelastic two-body processes the rate of change of the number of condensate atoms would be proportional to $`N_\mathrm{c}^2(t)/q^3(t)`$. The additional factor of $`N_\mathrm{c}(t)`$ is easily understood and reflects the fact that the ejection of the atoms is Bose stimulated. As mentioned previously, our mechanism therefore effectively behaves as a three-body process. The additional factor of $`1/q(t)`$ is more subtle and shows that, if the condensate collapses and the wave function becomes more spread out in momentum space, more atoms can satisfy the energy and momentum constraints for the ejection. Having said this, we should make sure that the dominant contribution to the integration in the right-hand side of Eq. (5) comes from momenta $`\mathrm{}𝐤`$ that lie outside the band of momenta occupied by the condensate. We can most conveniently achieve this by including in the integrand the factor $`(1|\varphi (𝐤,t)|^2/|\varphi (\mathrm{𝟎},t)|^2)`$, which smoothly interpolates between $`0`$ for $`𝐤𝐪1`$ and $`1`$ for $`𝐤𝐪1`$. In the following we always use this smooth cut-off, because atoms with momenta below the cut-off are most likely stimulated back into the condensate and do not contribute to the ejection rate. It has, however, only a small quantitative effect as can be seen explicitly in the isotropic case, where the right-hand

side of Eq. (11) just becomes multiplied by the factor $`(1(8/25)\sqrt{2/5})0.8`$.

We have solved the above set of coupled equations for the conditions of the experiment performed by Cornish et al. . In this experiment one uses a cigar-shaped magnetic trap with a radial frequency of $`\omega _r=\omega _x=\omega _y=2\pi \times 17.5`$ Hz and an axial frequency of $`\omega _z=2\pi \times 6.8`$ Hz. Moreover, one first makes a large condensate with about $`4000`$ atoms and a positive scattering length of $`2500`$ $`a_0`$. The scattering length is then within $`0.5`$ ms changed to $`60`$ $`a_0`$ by means of a linear ramp in the magnetic bias field. The outcome of our simulation of this experiment is summarized in Figs. 2 and 3, and appears to be in excellent agreement with the preliminary experimental data . From these figures we see that the condensate collapses first in the radial direction in approximately $`\pi /(2\omega _r)14`$ ms. During the last part of this collapse an explosion occurs in which about $`3/4`$ of the initial number of atoms is expelled from the condensate. As a result the number of condensate atoms is now less than the maximum number of atoms possible to have a metastable condensate, and the radial collapse of the condensate is turned into a large amplitude oscillation. In principle we can discern at each inner turning point of the radial and axial oscillation an increased loss of condensate atoms, but these are never as dramatic as in the first time, since the condensate is now no longer unstable.

Explosion Process. — To explore the physics of the explosion further, we have also determined the energy and angular distribution of the ejected atoms, which have not yet been examined in detail experimentally. In Fig. 4 we show the energy distribution at two times during the first radial collapse of the condensate. What is most striking is that at later times the distribution is much broader. This is again caused by the condensate wave function being much more spread out in momentum space at the

later time, so that the ejected atoms can gain much more energy from the condensate collisions. In Fig. 5 we have also depicted at various times the angular probability distribution, which turns out to be essentially independent of the energy of the ejected atoms but is clearly seen to depend strongly on the ratio of the radial and axial widths of the condensate. In particular, at the peak of the explosion the distribution is very anisotropic and almost no atoms are being ejected along the z-axis. This can be understood from the fact that the condensate has at that time a very elongated cigar shape. As a result both the total momentum of the two colliding condensate atoms as well as the momentum of the atom that is stimulated back into the condensate, always have to be directed almost perpendicular to the z-axis. The same is therefore true for the momentum of the ejected atom.

Discussion. — Although we have focused in this Letter on the recent exciting experiments with 85Rb, we believe that the new condensate loss mechanism that we have proposed here is also important for the experiments with 7Li and may resolve the existing discrepancy between theory and experiment in that case . In this respect it should be noted that the collapse occurring in the 85Rb experiments is physically quite different and in a sense not so violent than the one occurring in 7Li. Roughly speaking the difference is that in the former case the large condensate ejects so many particles that the remnant of the explosion corresponds to a metastable condensate, whereas in the latter case it is precisely this metastable condensate that collapses to even smaller sizes. Possibly another important difference is that in the experiments of Cornish et al. no thermal component is visible, whereas the experiments of Sackett et al. are close to the critical temperature and, therefore, a large thermal cloud is constantly feeding the condensate. We intend to come back to a detailed theoretical treatment of these interesting issues in a future publication.

It is our pleasure to thank Simon Cornish and Carl Wieman for providing us with their experimental data before publication and for stimulating discussions that have initiated the above. This work is supported by the Stichting Fundamenteel Onderzoek der Materie (FOM), which is financially supported by the Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek (NWO).


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# Radio Emission from the Composite Supernova Remnant G326.3-1.8 (MSH 15-56)

## 1 Introduction

The supernova remnant (SNR) G326.3$``$1.8 or MSH15-5$`\mathit{6}`$ (Mills et al., 1961) is the prototype of the class of composite SNRs containing a shell with a relatively steep radio spectrum and an interior flat-spectrum plerion component (Weiler & Sramek, 1988). In some composite SNRs a pulsar is observed in the plerion, e.g. 0540$``$693 in the Large Magellanic Cloud (Seward et al., 1984; Manchester et al., 1993) but in a number of others, including G326.3-1.8, no pulsar has been detected. In all cases, however, a pulsar is presumed to be present to inject high energy particles into the plerion component. The lack of detection is attributed to a misalignment of the pulsar’s axis so that its beam does not cross the earth. Alternatively, the pulsar may be very old and faint so that more sensitive surveys are needed to detect it or the pulsed emission may have ceased altogether.

The shell, on the other hand, is produced by the interaction of supersonic ejecta from the explosion and swept-up material from the surroundings. Strong shocks heat the gas to produce x-rays and accelerate particles to relativistic speeds which, together with magnetic fields amplified in the interaction zone, produce synchrotron radiation. Subsequent cooling and compression of the shocked gas can locally increase the synchrotron emission and also produce optical recombination-line emission.

There is a great range of relative sizes and brightnesses of the plerion and shell components in composite remnants. The large size and high brightness of the plerion in G326.3$``$1.8 place it near the extreme in each category. It fills about 0.04 of the area and has about 0.20 of the integrated flux density of the entire remnant. By contrast, the well known SNR W44 represents the other end of the range for comparison: its plerion covers only about 0.0025 of the area and has a flux density of 0.001 that of the entire SNR (Giacani et al., 1997; Frail et al., 1996).

To understand the relation between the different components and how they might evolve, we need detailed studies of both the shell and the plerion in several composite SNRs covering the full range of parameters from G326.3$``$1.8 to W44. G326.3$``$1.8 has been investigated at a number of wavelengths. The highest resolution radio images to date are from the MOST at 0.843 GHz (Kesteven & Caswell, 1987; Milne et al., 1989; Whiteoak & Green, 1996) and from the Fleurs Synthesis Telescope at 1.414 GHz (Milne et al., 1989); both had half-power beamwidths of about 45 arcsec. These show the faint, rather incomplete shell but were unable to resolve fine scale features within the plerion. The shell is slightly non-circular with a diameter between about 40 and 35 arcmin. The plerion is displaced about 7 arcmin to the southeast from the center of the SNR; its outline is irregular but is contained within an ellipse having axes of 10 arcmin $`\times `$ 5 arcmin. The long axis is aligned approximately SE-NW. The best polarimetry available, by Milne et al. (1989), has a resolution of 3 arcmin at 8.4 GHz. The plerion is strongly polarized with the magnetic field aligned approximately along its major axis.

The x-ray emission also shows shell structure in some locations (Kassim et al., 1993). Extended features in both hard and soft x-rays appear within the interior although they show no correspondence to the radio plerion nor to other features seen in the radio or optical (Plucinsky, 1998). Optical filaments are present around parts of the shell and on the face of the SNR (van den Bergh, 1979; Zealey et al., 1979) but, again, show little relation to any radio features. The filaments show a high ratio of \[S II\]/H$`\alpha `$ which is typical of shocked material in radiative equilibrium (Dennefeld, 1980).

Although the plerion is unseen in the other wavelength ranges, it is clearly an important part of the SNR. Its radio synchrotron emission is strong, implying a large content of low-energy relativistic electrons but apparently a rapid loss of high energy ones. Determination of structure within the plerion may help establish the relation to any pulsar. Other characteristics can give indications of its relation to other parts of the SNR and its evolution within it. In addition, it is important to do a sensitive search for any radio counterparts to the various x-ray features seen in the remnant.

We adopt the kinematic distance determined from an H$`\alpha `$ radial veocity measurement by Rosado et al. (1996) of 4.1 kpc. This value is compatible with a visual extinction measurement of $`>`$ 5.1 magnitudes by Dennefeld (1980) and a 21-cm absorption measurement of $`>`$ 1.5 kpc by Caswell et al. (1975). At this distance, the outer edge of the shell of G326.3$``$1.8 has dimensions of 48 $`\times `$ 42 pc and the extent of the irregular boundary of the plerion is about 12 $`\times `$ 6 pc.

To investigate the radio structure and polarization in detail we have observed G326.3$``$1.8 with the Australia Telescope Compact Array (ATCA). Polarimetric images of the plerion and its near environs have been obtained at 4.8 and 8.64 GHz while the entire SNR has been imaged at 1.34 GHz. These observations reveal the detailed structure of the plerion and its polarization for the first time. The equipment and observations are described in section 2, the results are presented in section 3, the interpretation is discussed in section 4, and a summary is is section 5.

## 2 Equipment and Observations

The ATCA (Australia Telescope, 1992) can record both 1.34 and 2.4 GHz simultaneously or both 4.8 and 8.64 GHz simultaneously. Both pairs of frequencies were observed but the data at 2.4 GHz were seriously degraded by interference and not used in the analysis. Each set of observations was done with four separate antenna configurations giving a total of 54 independent baselines covering a range of spacings from 31 to 6000 meters. The observing parameters are given in Table 1. The beams at the two higher frequencies were nearly round and so were restored with circular half-power beamwidths but the more elliptical beam at 1.34 GHz with a HPBW of 8.5′′ $`\times `$ 6.4′′ at a position angle of 11, was left with its original elliptical dimensions.

The large angular size and low surface brightness of G326.3$``$1.8 required long-integration, full-synthesis mosaic observations. At 1.34 GHz, the entire SNR was covered by a 16-point mosaic pattern with pointings spaced by 11 arcmin. At 4.8 and 8.64 GHz it was decided to concentrate only on the bright plerion component which was covered by a 25-point mosaic with spacings of 2.5 arcmin which was just under the half width of the primary beam pattern at 8.64 GHz.

The observing bandwidth was 128 MHz divided into 32 4-MHz channels. At 4.8 and 8.64 GHz, edge channels were removed and the central 24 channels averaged together to give a single channel for the analysis. At 1.34 GHz the central channels were maintained separately to remove phase smearing near the edges of the fields and to prevent possible Faraday depolarization across the band. The data reduction was done with the AIPS and MIRIAD packages. After editing and calibration were carried out, the mosaic images were formed using uniform weighting and deconvolution was performed with CLEAN. The mosaicing operation automatically corrects for the primary beam response function. The total intensity image at 1.34 GHz was made with the multi-frequency synthesis technique. In all cases the missing short spacings and the presence of bright nearby sources made confusion noise greater than the thermal system noise. This was particularly true for the total intensities whereas the polarized intensities were weak enough that the theoretical noise levels were almost reached. The noise values listed in Table 1 were the measured values on the images.

For the polarization analysis, the images in the individual Stokes parameters Q and U were deconvolved separately and then combined to produce polarized intensity and position angle maps. The intensities were corrected for the Ricean bias which arises from the quadratic combination of two intensities. At 1.34 GHz, the initial data were combined into five 20-MHz channels to produce five polarized intensity and position angle maps. This sufficiently reduced the Faraday depolarization and also allowed good determination of the Faraday rotation between these channels across the full band so that no 180 ambiguities in position angle were present. The polarized intensity maps for the individual channels were subsequently averaged to produce a single map. At the higher frequencies, the Faraday depolarization effects are less significant and the entire bandwidth was used for a single map at each frequency.

Flux density calibration was carried out using observations of PKS B1934$``$638. The antenna gains and polarization were calibrated by regular observations of PKS B1520$``$58 throughout the observing runs.

## 3 Results

### 3.1 Total Intensity

#### 3.1.1 Morphology

Figure 1 is a greyscale image of the whole SNR at a frequency of 1.34 GHz with a half-power beamwidth of 8.5′′ $`\times `$ 6.4′′. The entire periphery of the remnant can be seen as a faint complete shell. This shell was not as obvious in previous lower-resolution images (Milne et al., 1979; Whiteoak & Green, 1996) which contained the full complement of short spacings between elements and showed the emission across the full face of the SNR. The overall emission appears to be more filled in toward the southwest of the plerion than it is around the rest of the remnant. The overall east-west alignment of filaments recognized in the previous images is also present in this ATCA image, primarily on the eastern side. Some of the individual filaments, particularly in the northwestern corner, appear unresolved but often sit on a smoother background which may contain several overlapping features. There are a number of faint optical filaments in G326.3$``$1.8 but they do not form a complete shell and several sit on the face of the remnant (van den Bergh, 1979; Zealey et al., 1979; Dennefeld, 1980; Rosado et al., 1996) where no particular radio enhancements are visible.

The new image also reveals structure within the plerion for the first time. This component of the SNR appears virtually identical at all three observing frequencies (see Figure 2 for the 4.8 and 8.64 GHz images). It consists of several parallel ridges running along the major axis with some irregular patches at the ends. In particular, a circular ring is seen on the northwestern end. There is smooth emission between the ridges and over the interior of the ring. All of the individual features in the plerion appear to be resolved with half-power thicknesses of about 15 - 20 arcsec.

#### 3.1.2 Spectrum

As indicated above, it is impossible to measure the total flux density of the whole SNR even at 1.34 GHz because of the missing short spacings of the telescope array. The plerion, however, is smaller and we have tried to estimate its integrated flux density at all three frequencies. The major difficulty remains the determination of the background level including emission from the shell component. By examination of various slices and images, we estimate the uncertainty to be about 33$`\%`$ of the values determined. These three values, together with all other published flux densities for both the plerion and for the entire SNR are listed in Table 2 and shown in Figure 3. Except for the few uncertainties listed, no other authors have been brave enough to give values for their uncertainties. We have assumed that they are all comparable and so have fit the spectra with unweighted least-square lines.

The resultant spectra with power-law slopes of $``$0.29 for the whole SNR and $``$0.18 for the plerion are shown by the solid lines. The dashed line with a slope of $``$0.34 represents the spectrum of the whole SNR minus the plerion or that of the shell component alone. Both components have spectral indices consistent with their classifications although that of the shell is on the flat side of their distribution, similar to the well-known shell remnant IC443 (Green, 1998). The integrated flux density of the shell at 1 GHZ is 114 Jy which corresponds to a surface brightness of 1.23 $`\times `$ 10-20 W m-2 Hz-1 sr-1. The plerion with a flux density of 26 Jy at 1 GHz has a surface brightness of 7.8 $`\times `$ 10-20 W m-2 Hz-1 sr-1. Both values are about average for objects of their classification and size.

### 3.2 Polarization

The intensity of the shell at 1.34 GHz is too low to evaluate the polarization in detail but in Figure 4, we show a greyscale image of the polarized intensity with superimposed total-intensity contours. The plerion is bright and has a mean fractional polarization of 12%. Much of the apparent ring around the plerion in both total and polarized intensities is a grating response but the polarized emission is stronger on the shell and does fill in somewhat southwest of the plerion toward the shell, just as the total intensity does. The subsequent discussion will concentrate on the plerion which is significantly polarized at all three wavelengths. Because the resolution was about a factor of 2 better at the two higher frequencies, we will concentrate on those results.

Figure 5 shows the electric vectors of the polarized intensity at 4.8 GHz with superimposed total-intensity contours. For visibility on this and all other polarimetric maps, the vectors are spaced by 12 arcsec or over 3 half-power beamwidths. This spacing also means that each vector is entirely independent. It can be seen that the polarized intensity follows the total intensity quite closely and Figure 6 is a greyscale image of the fractional polarization at 4.8 GHz with the same superimposed total-intensity contours. The mean fractional polarization is 35% with no significant variation across the plerion. The results at 8.4 GHz are very similar with a mean fractional polarization of 40%. These fractional values are very high for SNRs; they are likely artificially increased in the aperture synthesis observations because the polarized intensity probably has more fine structure than does the total intensity and the lack of short spacings between the antennas will misrepresent the background level under the plerion. Observations with the Parkes 63-m telescope find 20% at 8.4 GHz (Milne et al., 1989), 12% at 5 GHz (Milne & Dickel, 1975; Whiteoak & Gardner, 1971), and 2% at 2.7 GHz (Milne, 1972) toward the peak of the plerion. Because the low resolution of the single dish observations would smear the structure within the plerion, the true values probably lie between these extremes.

The position angles at 4.8 and 8.34 MHz can be used to evaluate the Faraday rotation. The results, shown in Figure 7, with filled boxes indicating positive values of rotation measure and open boxes negative values. The rotation measure is quite uniform at $``$300 rad m-2 with reliable values falling between $``$200 and $``$400 rad m-2. The few positive values seen are probably not real as they all lie near the edges of the image where the polarized intensity is too weak to determine the rotation measure accurately.

Because the measured position angles can always have 180 ambiguities, there can be n $`\times `$ 180 additional rotation - either plus or minus - between the two frequencies. The 1.34 GHz results for the 5 adjacent 20-MHz bands, however, also give $``$300 rad m-2 for the rotation measure and thus confirm the adopted result.

The rotation measure can be used, in turn, to derotate the measured position angles to their zero-wavelength or intrinsic values. Figure 8 shows the actual direction of the $`\mathrm{𝑚𝑎𝑔𝑛𝑒𝑡𝑖𝑐}`$ field vectors of the plerion in G326.3$``$1.8. The lengths are proportional to the polarized intensity at 4.8 GHz and the contours are, again, the total intensity at 4.8 GHz. We note that the field aligns beautifully with the ridges in the total intensity and on the northwestern end of the plerion the field direction actually curves around to follow the ring struture.

## 4 Discussion

G326.3$``$1.8 is a composite SNR with an evolutionarily old faint and thin shell but a bright plerion which may still be receiving input from an unseen pulsar. The shell looks like those which are well into the point-blast stage of development in which the radius, R, expands as R $``$ t0.4 where t is time. The outline may be slightly flattened to the northwest but must be expanding fairly uniformly. The overall x-ray emission is fairly uniform with only marginal indications of a shell structure but it does appear brighter toward the center and southeastern parts of the remnant (Kassim et al., 1993). Infrared data (Arendt, 1989), on the other hand, show the apparent Galactic ridge to the northwest so the reduction of apparent x-ray emission there could be absorption by intervening material which could also be beginning to interact with the expanding shell.

The lack of correlation of the radio and x-ray emission in the interior of this SNR is very unusual. The missing x-ray emission from the radio plerion is particularly hard to understand. It appears to be the only known plerion with strong radio emission but no x-rays. We note that, if anything, there is an indication of a decrease in the infrared structure at the position of the plerion (Arendt, 1989). If radio emission trails behind a pulsar the brightest part of the radio plerion could be behind the hardest x-rays. Such a situation appears to be true for the plerion N157B in the LMC (Lazendic et al., 2000) but there is still significant radio emission from the suspected position of the x-ray pulsar (Marshall et al., 1998; Wang & Gotthelf, 1998) and significant x-ray emission from the position of the brightest radio emission in that object. A pulsar moving at perhaps 500 km sec-1 could have covered the approximate 8 pc distance from the center of the SNR to the radio plerion in about 15,000 years and then have moved outward to the position of the current hard x-ray feature in about another 15,000 years, leaving the plerion behind.

Estimation of the expected x-ray emission from the radio plerion requires knowledge of the spectrum of the emission between the x-ray and radio wavelengths. Theoretical predictions (Pacini & Salvati, 1973; Reynolds & Chevalier, 1984), with some observational support (Salter et al., 1989; Green & Scheuer, 1992), indicate that the synchrotron emission generated by a pulsar should have a break in its spectrum from synchrotron radiation losses. This will move downward in frequency with time as the highest energy particles lose their energy the fastest. To determine the break frequency and thus the overall spectrum, we need to know the magnetic field strength. Using equations 5.7 to 5.12 of Ginzburg & Syrovatski (1965) for synchrotron emission we find that the emission is proportional to the product of the relativistic electron energy and the magnetic field strength to the 1 - $`\alpha `$ power, where $`\alpha `$ is the spectral index. Adopting the observed spectral index of -0.18 and the 1 GHz flux density of 26 Jy found above and then integrating the radio emission from 10 MHz to 100 GHz for the plerion at a distance of 4.1 kpc, we find an integrated luminosity of 3 $`\times `$ 1034 erg sec-1. The total energy density in relativistic electrons radiating between 10 MHz and 100 GHz is then 9 $`\times `$ 1042/H1.18 ergs. The three dimensional volume of the plerion is, of course, unknown but we shall approximate it as a cylinder with a length of 12 pc and a radius of 3 pc. The energy density is then 1.8 $`\times `$ 10-15/H1.18 erg cm-3. In Kepler’s SNR (Matsui et al., 1984) and N23 in the LMC (Dickel & Milne, 1998), the approximate ratio of relativistic electron energy to magnetic energy is about 3, so we will adopt this value to arrive at a mean magnetic field strength of 45 $`\mu `$Gauss. This value is high for an old shell SNR but low for a young plerion where particle injection and magnetic field amplification are still occurring. It may indeed be appropriate for an older plerion. Such a field would give a break frequency near 1.6 $`\times `$ 1013 Hz for a lifetime of 3 $`\times `$ 104 years. For this spectral break, the integrated 0.5-10 keV x-ray luminosity of the radio plerion should be about 2 $`\times `$ 1038 erg sec-1, orders of magnitude above that detected toward the hard x-ray feature to the west. Even with large uncertainties in the parameter estimates, this must indeed be a very unusual source not to be detected in x-rays.

The extended feature in the ASCA hard x-ray band (2.5 - 9 keV) between the plerion and the shell to the southwest (Plucinsky, 1998) is intriguing as it might represent the current location of the pulsar presumed to be responsible for the various emission components. Although there is a slight increase in the overall radio emission in that general area, it appears as if it is a brightness enhancement on the face of the shell. There are also several optical filaments in that area (van den Bergh, 1979; Dennefeld, 1980), but there is no morphological association of any feature with the x-rays. The integrated x-ray emission is so faint, about 3 $`\times `$ 1033 erg sec-1 between 0.5 and 10 keV (Plucinsky, 1998), however, that it would be missed by the radio surveys. Although we cannot measure the field in that direction, if the break frequency is the same as toward the radio plerion, the expected radio flux density at 1.34 GHz would be of order 1/2 mJy from the whole 6 $`\times `$ 3 arcmin area of the hard x-ray source. Even with the 45-arcsec beam of the MOST, such emission would not be detectable. We note that a stronger magnetic field as might be expected near the pulsar, would move the break frequency lower and increase the expected radio emission but the time scale near the pulsar is also shorter which will work in the opposite direction to reduce the ratio of x-ray and radio emission.

One possible way to make G326.3$``$1.8 the necessary extreme case of particle injection and decay might be for it to have been a magnetar with an extremely high initial magnetic field so that it very quickly gave up most of its energy and stopped producing the hardest x-rays. The current production of x-ray and radio emitting particles is very low but the lower energy electrons from the initial much more energetic pulsar would have persisted longer and, as indicated above, they can still be radiating significantly after some thousands of years provided that the average magnetic field strength does not much exceed the current value of 45 $`\mu `$Gauss estimated above.

The structure of the plerion is unusual wherever the pulsar may be located. The morphology shows a bundle of parallel ridges running from southeast to northwest. Presumably injection from a pulsar could create one tube or perhaps a spiral pattern, e.g. SS433 (Hjellming & Johnston, 1981), but it is difficult to see how to get the aligned structures, much less the ring with a diameter of about 3.6 pc at one end. The motion of any pulsar relative to the observed structures also remains unclear. If it started in the center of the remnant and moved outward to the present position of the hard x-ray component, the nearly perpendicular plerion coming out from one side near the middle of the path is very peculiar. If the ring structure represents a bubble around the original position of the pulsar and the pulsar then moved along the axis of the plerion, it had to make an abrupt turn to get to the present location of the hard x-rays. Detection of a pulsar and measurements of its proper motion would greatly aid in understanding this peculiar object.

The magnetic field is also aligned along the ridges but wraps around with the ring structure on the northwestern end (Figure 8). The relatively high fractional polarization and very uniform Faraday rotation suggest that there is little internal Faraday effect and that the magnetic field is quite uniform. The field is probably frozen into the fluid structure. Unfortunately, it is not possible to determine the thermal energy and pressure to see if that dominates the magnetic field in the plerion since it is seen only in radio synchrotron emission.

## 5 Summary

As often happens in astronomy, the first identified object in the class of composite SNRs is one of the most unusual. While the shell component appears quite normal, the plerion has several unique characteristics. It is certainly one of the largest and brightest plerions relative to its shell although there are several apparently naked plerions which are larger including G328.4+0.2 (Gaensler et al., 2000), N157B (Chu et al., 1992; Lazendic et al., 2000) with a detected 16 msec x-ray pulsar (Marshall et al., 1998), and G74.9+1.2 (Weiler & Shaver, 1978) all of which reach a diameter of about 25 pc.

While most plerions are elongated like that in G326.3$``$1.8, they generally show a rather amorphous or irregular structure rather than the apparent bundle of parallel filaments seen in this object. Further, the ring on the northwestern end might be a preexisting bubble or somehow related to the pulsar and plerion. The magnetic field strength is moderate and the field follows the direction of the ridges but also circles around the ring.

There is no x-ray emission specifically associated with the very bright radio plerion. Perhaps if the stellar remains of the supernova explosion were a magnetar with a magnetic field strength of $``$ 1015 Gauss and rapid energy loss, the initial emission would have been very bright but have dropped quickly. The break frequency in the synchrotron spectrum could also have dropped quickly but then would have slowed as the plerion expanded and the magnetic field strength dropped. This process could reduce the x-ray emission quickly but leave significant radio emission. The very faint hard x-ray emission to the southwest of the radio plerion could represent what is left of the stimulation by the magnetar.

We thank Paul Plucinsky for information on the x-ray emission. Brian O’Shea helped with some of the data analysis. JRD acknowledges a Visitor’s Fellowship from the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) during his very enjoyable stay at ASTRON.


text:
# Generic Spectrum and Ionization Efficiency of a Heavy Initial Mass Function for the First Stars

## 1. INTRODUCTION

One of the most important challenges in modern cosmology is to understand when and how the cosmic “dark ages” ended (Loeb 1998, 1999; Rees 1999). The absence of a Gunn-Peterson trough in the spectra of high-redshift quasars implies that the universe was reionized at a redshift $`z>5.8`$ (Fan et al. 2000). An early, pregalactic generation of stars (the so-called Population III) has long been suspected to control this process (e.g., Carr, Bond, & Arnett 1984; Couchman & Rees 1986; Haiman & Loeb 1997). The feedback of the first generation of stars on the ionization history of the intergalactic medium (IGM) depends crucially on their initial mass function (IMF). Recent numerical simulations presented evidence that the primordial IMF might have favored massive stars with a mass $`10^2M_{}`$ (Bromm, Coppi, & Larson 1999, 2001; Abel, Bryan, & Norman 2000). This prediction relies on the existence of a characteristic scale for the density and temperature of the primordial gas, and consequently of a characteristic Jeans mass of $`M_J10^3M_{}`$ (see also Larson 1998). At present, it is not known with any certainty, what fraction of a Jeans-unstable clump of gas will eventually be incorporated into the resulting star. This is due to the complicated physics of the protostellar feedback on a dust-free envelope, and the accretion from it.

Here we adopt the view that the simulated clump masses are indicative of the final stellar masses, and explore the implications. Recent observations of the formation process of present-day stars seem to support this view. Motte, André, & Neri (1998) have mapped the nearby $`\rho `$ Ophiuchi star forming cloud in the 1.3 mm dust continuum. Their study identifies a number of dense, gravitationally-bound clumps with masses close to stellar values, which appear to lack the emission from embedded stellar sources. These starless clumps, therefore, might be the direct progenitors of individual stars.

Ultimately, the question of how massive the first stars were, has to be answered by observations. It is therefore important to ask whether future observatories, such as the Next Generation Space Telescope (NGST), could place any constraints on the primordial IMF. To address this question, we have constructed models for the interior structure, and the emerging spectra of massive Population III stars. Since metal-free stars have systematically higher effective temperatures ($`T_{eff}10^5`$ K for $`M>100M_{}`$), they are very efficient at producing photons capable of ionizing hydrogen and helium. The reionization of the intergalactic helium has traditionally been attributed to a population of quasars. A generation of very massive Population III stars would provide an important alternative channel, operating at redshifts higher than what is typically assumed for quasars.

Recently, Tumlinson & Shull (2000) have discussed the case of metal-free stars with a normal (Salpeter-like) IMF, up to masses of $`90M_{}`$ (see also Ciardi et al. (2000b) for the effect of introducing a lower mass cutoff at $`M_c=5M_{}`$). It is important, however, to extend this mass range into the regime of very massive stars with $`M>100M_{}`$, since both the nature of the feedback on the IGM, as well as the spectral characteristics, change in a significant way for this regime.

In §2, we describe our models for the stellar interior and for the spectrum. In §3 and §4 we address the ionization efficiency and discuss the observational signatures, respectively. Finally, §5 summarizes the implications of our results.

## 2. Stellar Models

### 2.1. Stellar Structure

We construct models for static, metal-free stars in complete (i.e., dynamical and thermal) equilibrium by solving the time-independent equations of stellar structure (e.g., Schwarzschild 1958; Kippenhahn & Weigert 1990). The integration is performed in the standard way by fitting solutions for the core and envelope at a suitably chosen intermediate point, and the considered mass range is: $`100M/M_{}1000`$. Stars in this mass range have traditionally been termed Very Massive Objects, or VMOs (Bond, Arnett, & Carr 1984). For such a massive star with the concomitant high interior temperatures, the only effective source of opacity is electron scattering, given by $`\kappa =0.2(1+X)`$ cm2 g-1, where $`X0.76`$ is the mass fraction in hydrogen. Other sources of opacity are not included in our calculations.

In the absence of metals, and in particular of the catalysts necessary for the operation of the CNO cycle, nuclear burning proceeds in a non-standard way. At first, hydrogen burning can only occur via the inefficient $`pp`$ chain. To provide the necessary luminosity, the star has to reach very high central temperatures ($`T_c10^{8.1}`$ K). These temperatures are high enough for the simultaneous occurrence of helium burning via the triple-$`\alpha `$ process. After a brief initial period of triple-$`\alpha `$ burning, a trace amount of heavy elements has been formed. Subsequently, the star follows the CNO cycle. In constructing our main-sequence models, we therefore assume a level of pre-enrichment with metals, amounting to a mass fraction of $`Z=10^9`$. The resulting models consist of a convective core, containing 90–$`100\%`$ of the mass, and a thin radiative envelope. Due to the high mass and temperature, the stars are dominated by radiation pressure, and have luminosities close to the Eddington limit: $`LL_{\text{EDD}}=1.25\times 10^{38}`$ erg s-1 ($`M/M_{}`$).

In this work, we do not include the evolution of the stars away from the main sequence, which crucially depends on the poorly understood mass-loss mechanism. While this is clearly an idealization, it is justified by the fact that the stars spend a major fraction of their total lifetime, estimated to be $`\tau 0.007Mc^2/L_{\text{EDD}}3\times 10^6`$ yr, near the location of the main-sequence.

In Figure 1, we show the resulting sequence of models for Population III stars, and compare to the corresponding Population I sequence (calculated with $`Z=0.02`$). Our results agree well with those of El Eid, Fricke, & Ober (1983) in the mass range $`100<M/M_{}<500`$. It is evident that the respective effective temperatures approach an asymptotic value which is independent of mass, $`T_{eff}1.1\times 10^5`$ K for Population III, and $`T_{eff}6.5\times 10^4`$ K for Population I. This characteristic behavior of very massive stars derives from the assumptions of hydrostatic equilibrium, radiation pressure support with a luminosity close to the Eddington limit, and the nuclear physics of hydrogen burning. The peculiar behavior of very massive Population III stars has already been discussed by a number of previous authors (see Bond, Arnett, & Carr (1984) and references therein). Bond, Arnett, & Carr (1984), in particular, have pointed out that the effective temperature, $`T_{eff}10^5`$ K, is almost independent of mass for $`M>100M_{}`$. For completeness, we here give a somewhat simplified version of the argument.

The mechanical structure of a massive, radiation-pressure dominated star is approximately given by a polytrope of index $`n=3`$ (see Kippenhahn & Weigert 1990). If $`w(z)`$ is the corresponding solution of the Lane-Emden equation, and $`z=(z_3/R)r`$ the dimensionless radial coordinate, one can express the density and pressure as $`\rho =\rho _cw^3`$, and $`P=(\pi GR^2\rho _c^{2/3}/z_3^2)\rho ^{4/3}`$, respectively. Here, $`z_3=6.89685`$ is the dimensionless radius of the polytrope, $`\rho _c=54.1825(3M/4\pi R^3)`$ the central density, and the other symbols have their usual meaning. With the polytropic value for the central pressure, $`P_c11.1GM^2/R^4`$, one can estimate the temperature at the center of the star, $`T_c=(3P_c/a)^{1/4}`$, to be

$$T_c8.4\times 10^7\text{ K }\left(\frac{M}{100M_{}}\right)^{1/2}\left(\frac{R}{10R_{}}\right)^1\text{ .}$$
(1)
To further constrain $`T_c`$, we follow Fowler & Hoyle (1964), and consider the global energy balance of the star. The average nuclear energy generation rate (in erg s-1 g-1) is $`\overline{ϵ}=L/M=_0^Mϵ\text{d}m`$, and we assume $`ϵϵ_{\text{CNO}}`$. Writing $`ϵ=ϵ_c(\rho /\rho _c)(T/T_c)^\nu `$, with $`c`$ denoting central values, one finds

$$\overline{ϵ}162.5ϵ_c\left(\frac{1}{z_3^3}_0^{z_3}w^{6+\nu }z^2\text{d}z\right)\text{ .}$$
(2)
A reasonable fit to the CNO cycle energy generation rate close to $`\text{log}T8.1`$ is given by

$$ϵ1.3\times 10^{12}ZX\rho \left(\frac{T}{10^8\text{ K}}\right)^8\text{ .}$$
(3)
This form derives from a linear fit to the exact expression for $`ϵ_{\text{CNO}}`$ (Kippenhahn & Weigert 1990, p. 165), at $`\text{log}T8.1`$. Using $`\nu =8`$ in equation (2) gives $`\overline{ϵ}0.05ϵ_c`$. From $`LL_{\text{EDD}}=\overline{ϵ}M`$ follows the desired relation

$$T_c1.9\times 10^8\text{ K }\left(\frac{Z}{10^9}\right)^{1/8}\left(\frac{M}{100M_{}}\right)^{1/8}\left(\frac{R}{10R_{}}\right)^{3/8}\text{ .}$$
(4)
Combining equations (1) and (4) gives the mass-radius relation for very massive stars

$$M370M_{}\left(\frac{Z}{10^9}\right)^{0.2}\left(\frac{R}{10R_{}}\right)^{2.2}\text{ ,}$$
(5)
from which it can be seen that approximately $`MR^2`$. Finally, the effective temperature can be estimated from $`LL_{\text{EDD}}=4\pi R^2\sigma T_{eff}^4`$. Using equation (5) to eliminate the radius, we find

$$T_{eff}1.1\times 10^5\text{ K }\left(\frac{Z}{10^9}\right)^{0.05}\left(\frac{M}{100M_{}}\right)^{0.025}\text{ .}$$
(6)
This analytical estimate for $`T_{eff}`$, and the very weak dependence on mass, are in good agreement with the numerical results in Figure 1.

### 2.2. Emergent Spectrum

Having determined the basic stellar parameters, we now construct model atmospheres and emergent spectra. The extreme luminosities very close to the Eddington limit and the very high effective temperatures require the sophisticated effort of using NLTE unified model atmospheres with spherical extension and stellar winds, as originally introduced by Gabler et al. (1989). This new type of model atmospheres provides a smooth transition from the subsonic, quasi-hydrostatic photosphere to the supersonic, radiation-driven stellar wind, and allows the simultaneous treatment of spectral features formed deep in the photosphere (such as optical continua and line wings) and those arising from the outer layers, where the influence of winds becomes significant (such as strong absorption edges, far infra-red continua and line cores). A detailed discussion is given by Kudritzki (1998).

For our work, we use the new unified model code originally developed by Santolaya-Rey, Puls, & Herrero (1997), and further improved by J. Puls (private communication). Bound-bound, bound-free and free-free absorption by hydrogen and helium, as well as Thomson scattering are included as opacity sources. A value of 0.1 has been adopted for the number ratio of helium to hydrogen. Changing this ratio towards slightly smaller values closer to estimates for the primordial helium abundance would not lead to a significant modification of the calculated spectra.

The atmospheric models are fully specified by the effective temperature, the gravity and the stellar radius (all taken at the Rosseland optical depth $`\tau _{\mathrm{ross}}=2/3`$) together with the mass-loss rate $`\dot{M}`$, the terminal velocity $`v_{\mathrm{}}`$, and the parameter $`\beta `$ which describes the radial slope of the velocity field via

$$v(r)=v_{\mathrm{}}(1b/r)^\beta \text{ .}$$
(7)
The constant $`b`$ is chosen to guarantee a smooth transition into the hydrostatic stratification at a prespecified outflow velocity smaller than the isothermal sound speed (normally 0.1 $`c_s`$). Velocity fields of this form are predicted by the theory of radiation driven winds (e.g., Castor, Abbott, & Klein 1975; Pauldrach, Puls, & Kudritzki 1986) and usually lead to an excellent fit to observed stellar wind lines based on radiative transfer and model atmosphere calculations (see Kudritzki & Puls 2000).

At zero metallicity, we expect stellar winds to be of only minor importance. However, a radiatively driven wind might still arise due to the opacity in the He II resonance lines, in combination with the contribution from bound-free and free-free absorption. No wind models have been constructed so far for this extreme case of zero metallicity. Kudritzki (2000) has developed a new algorithm, which allows to deal with line driven winds at very low metallicity down to $`10^4`$ of the solar value. As a rough extrapolation from his results we adopt $`\dot{M}=10^{10}M_{}`$ yr-1, $`v_{\mathrm{}}=1900`$ km s-1 and $`\beta =1`$. This choice of stellar wind parameters results in an almost hydrostatic, but still spherically extended density structure. From a number of additional test calculations carried out with different wind parameters we note that the resulting emergent spectra show only a very small parameter dependence as long as the winds are weak. For instance, enhancing the mass-loss rate to a value of $`\dot{M}=10^8M_{}`$ has little influence on the energy distribution and line profiles.

In Figure 2, we present the resulting spectra for different masses. Shown is the specific flux, $`F_\nu `$, at the surface of the star. At these high effective temperatures, there is still a rich spectrum of He II and H lines in the EUV, UV, optical, and IR. Some of these lines show emission features as a result of an overpopulation of their upper levels due to NLTE effects. The He II resonance lines have emission wings and central absorption cores, whereas some of the He II Pickering lines have a central emission peak on top of absorption wings. Such types of line profiles reflect the stratification of the ratio of the NLTE departure coefficients of the upper to the lower line level and are common for very hot stars. A first interpretation of the underlying physics has been given in the pioneering paper by Auer & Mihalas (1972). Strikingly, the He II absorption edge at $`228\text{ Å}`$ is very weak or turns into emission for higher masses. This is again a distinct NLTE effect which has been discussed in detail by Husfeld et al. (1984) and Gabler et al. (1989, 1992).

For $`M>300M_{}`$, the spectra become increasingly similar. This similarity is even more evident when the resulting specific luminosity, $`L_\nu =4\pi R^2F_\nu `$, is plotted per unit stellar mass, as shown in Figure 3. Stars with luminosities close to the Eddington limit, $`L_\nu L_{\text{EDD}}M`$, approach a universal value for their flux per unit mass. The prediction that the total spectral luminosity depends only on the total mass of stars but is independent of the initial mass function, is a unique feature of a population of very massive stars. In §4, we explore the observational consequences of this result, but discuss first the production of ionizing photons from these stars.

## 3. FEEDBACK EFFECTS

The spectrum for a population of very massive, zero-metal stars deviates most strongly from the case with a Salpeter IMF at short wavelengths, near the peak of the corresponding black body at $`\lambda _{em}250\text{ Å}`$. An important difference is therefore expected in the rate of producing ionizing photons. To quantify this effect for the species H I, He I, and He II, we calculate the number of ionizing photons per unit stellar mass according to

$$\dot{N}_{ion}=\frac{1}{M}_{\nu _{th}}^{\mathrm{}}\frac{L_\nu \text{d}\nu }{h\nu }\text{ ,}$$
(8)
where $`\nu _{th}`$ is the respective threshold for ionization. We here make the somewhat idealized assumption that all Population III stars were more massive than $`300M_{}`$. Therefore, as demonstrated in the previous section, their spectra, when scaled to stellar mass, have a generic form which is almost independent of mass. Specifically, we take the luminosity per unit mass, $`L_\nu /M`$, for a $`1000M_{}`$ star, as given by the dot-dashed line in Fig. 3, to be representative for the generic form, and use it in evaluating the integral in equation (8). The resulting production rates are presented in Table 1. Comparing these rates to the corresponding ones for a Salpeter IMF, as given by Tumlinson & Shull (2000), we find an enhancement in the number of ionizing photons by a factor of $`1020`$ for H I and He I, and by a factor of $`75`$ for He II. We have verified that using $`L_\nu /M`$ for the $`300M_{}`$ case (dotted line in Fig. 3) results in ionization efficiencies that are at most a factor of two smaller: $`1.2\times 10^{48}`$ photons s-1 $`M_{}^1`$ for the ionization of H I, $`8.6\times 10^{47}`$ photons s-1 $`M_{}^1`$ for He I, and $`2.0\times 10^{47}`$ photons s-1 $`M_{}^1`$ for He II. By comparing to Table 1, one can see that our choice of the $`1000M_{}`$ spectrum as being representative for the mass range $`1000M_{}>M>300M_{}`$ is well justified.

To illustrate the implications of this result, consider the following zeroth-order estimate for the fraction of baryons that has to be incorporated into stars, $`f_{}`$, in order to reionize the respective species. Assuming that $`\eta `$ ionizing photons are needed per atom ($`\eta >1`$ to account for the effect of recombinations), we find for hydrogen

$$f_{}(\text{H I})\frac{\eta X}{m_\text{H}\tau _{\text{MS}}\dot{N}_{ion}(\text{H I})}10^4\eta _{10}\text{ ,}$$
(9)
where $`\eta _{10}=(\eta /10)`$, and $`\tau _{\text{MS}}2\times 10^6`$ yr is the approximate main-sequence lifetime of a very massive star. For helium, one has $`f_{}(\text{He I})10^5\eta _{10}`$ and $`f_{}(\text{He II})4\times 10^5\eta _{10}`$. The corresponding fractions for a Salpeter IMF are $`f_{}10^3\eta _{10}`$.

Consequently, if the first stars are indeed characterized by a heavy IMF, the intriguing possibility arises that the rare star forming clouds, which originate from the high-$`\sigma `$ peaks in the primordial density field, might have played an important role in the reionization of both hydrogen and helium at high redshifts. Furthermore, helium might have even been reionized before hydrogen. Such a sequence of events would be in marked contrast to the standard scenarios of reionization (e.g., Gnedin & Ostriker 1997; Haiman & Loeb 1997; Gnedin 1998; Ciardi et al. 2000a; Haiman, Abel, & Rees 2000; Miralda-Escudé, Haehnelt, & Rees 2000). Recently, Madau, Haardt, & Rees (1999) have pointed out that the known populations of quasars and star-forming galaxies are not sufficient to account for the required number of ionizing photons at redshifts $`z5`$. An early generation of very massive stars could alleviate this problem, and contribute a significant part of this unexplained deficit.

## 4. OBSERVATIONAL SIGNATURE

### 4.1. Stellar Spectrum

Since the first clusters of stars form prior to the epoch of reionization, they are embedded within a neutral IGM. Consequently, the observed flux shortward of the Ly$`\alpha `$ resonance wavelength, $`\lambda _\alpha =1216`$ Å, will be suppressed by the neutral IGM before reionization (Gunn & Peterson 1965) and by the Ly$`\alpha `$ forest after reionization. The suppression will be complete (due to the neutral IGM) for observed wavelengths between $`(1+z_{\mathrm{reion}})\lambda _c`$ and $`(1+z_s)\lambda _\alpha `$ and partial (due to the Ly$`\alpha `$ forest) at shorter wavelengths (Haiman & Loeb 1999). Here, $`\lambda _c=912`$ Å is the Lyman-limit wavelength, $`z_s`$ is the source redshift, and $`z_{\mathrm{reion}}`$ is the reionization redshift. The sharp trough of the observed flux at $`(1+z_s)\lambda _\alpha `$ can be used to unambiguously determine the redshift of the source, even in the absence of strong spectral lines. To predict the observed spectrum at wavelengths longer than $`\lambda _\alpha `$, we consider $`L(\nu _{em})`$, the monochromatic luminosity per unit stellar mass at the emitted frequency $`\nu _{em}`$. We again make the assumption that the spectrum for a star of $`1000M_{}`$ is representative for the mass range $`M>300M_{}`$. With the flux at the surface of the $`1000M_{}`$ star being $`F(\nu _{em})`$, as shown in Figure 2, one has $`L(\nu _{em})=4\pi R^2F(\nu _{em})`$, where $`R13.7R_{}`$ is the stellar radius. The observed flux, unattenuated by the neutral IGM, at a frequency $`\nu _{obs}=\nu _{em}/(1+z_s)`$ is

$$f(\nu _{obs})=\frac{L(\nu _{em})}{4\pi r^2(1+z_s)}\text{ ,}$$
(10)
where

$$r=\frac{c}{H_0}_0^{z_s}\frac{\text{d}z}{\sqrt{\mathrm{\Omega }_m(1+z)^3+\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }}}\text{ .}$$
(11)
In Figure 4, we show the predicted spectrum for a cluster at $`z_s=10`$, assuming a flat universe with $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=1\mathrm{\Omega }_m=0.7`$ and a Hubble constant of $`H_0=65`$ km s-1 Mpc-1. We have taken into account the red damping wing of the Gunn-Peterson trough, using the analytical expression given by Miralda-Escudé (1998). In evaluating the optical depth in the vicinity of the Ly$`\alpha `$ resonance, we assume $`z_{\mathrm{reion}}=7`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_bh=0.03`$, corresponding to a Gunn-Peterson optical depth of $`\tau _0(z_s)=7.4\times 10^5`$. We find that the resulting line shape is not very sensitive to the choice of $`z_{\mathrm{reion}}`$.

The peak flux is conveniently located in the spectral range between $`15\mu `$m, where NGST is expected to reach a photometric sensitivity of $`0.11`$ nJy. We plot the flux per $`10^6M_{}`$, but it is straightforward to adjust the spectrum to other cases due to the linear scaling with total stellar mass. The composite spectrum of a Salpeter IMF with stellar masses in the range $`0.1M/M_{}100`$, has been worked out by Tumlinson & Shull (2000), and is also shown in Figure 4, normalized to the same total stellar mass. In comparing the two spectra, it is evident that the observed flux at any given wavelength is a factor of $`510`$ larger for the case calculated with a heavy IMF. The difference in absolute flux, however, will not allow to discriminate between the two IMFs, since the total stellar mass of the observed system is not known a priori. One instead has to rely on the difference in colors.

For this purpose, we define the ratios $`F_{12}/F_{23}`$ and $`F_{23}/F_{45}`$, where $`F_{12}`$, $`F_{23}`$, and $`F_{45}`$ are the integrated fluxes between $`12\mu `$m, $`23\mu `$m, and $`45\mu `$m, respectively. The two colors can then be expressed as a difference in magnitude

$$\mathrm{\Delta }m_A=2.5\mathrm{log}\frac{F_{12}}{F_{23}}\text{ ,}$$
(12)
and

$$\mathrm{\Delta }m_B=2.5\mathrm{log}\frac{F_{23}}{F_{45}}\text{ .}$$
(13)
Using the spectra in Figure 4, we find these ratios to be $`F_{12}/F_{23}2.7`$ and $`F_{23}/F_{45}9.3`$ in the case of a heavy IMF, and $`F_{12}/F_{23}2.5`$ and $`F_{23}/F_{45}7.3`$ in the case of a Salpeter IMF. In terms of magnitudes, one has

$$\mathrm{\Delta }m_A\{\begin{array}{cc}1.1\hfill & \text{for a heavy IMF }\hfill \\ 1.0\hfill & \text{for a Salpeter IMF }\hfill \end{array}\text{ ,}$$

and

$$\mathrm{\Delta }m_B\{\begin{array}{cc}2.4\hfill & \text{for a heavy IMF }\hfill \\ 2.1\hfill & \text{for a Salpeter IMF }\hfill \end{array}\text{ .}$$

Hence, the observed spectrum in the case of a heavy IMF is significantly bluer. Redenning by dust is expected to be weak for the first star clusters (and is already small in some known high-redshift galaxies, see Kudritzki et al. 2000). Moreover, the two colors differentiate between the IMFs in a way that is not degenerate with conventional dust. To see this, we ask: Can the presence of dust in the cluster with a heavy IMF cause the two colors to simultaneously agree with those predicted in the Salpeter case? Applying the average extinction curve for the interstellar medium of the Milky Way (e.g., Savage & Mathis 1979), we adjust the amount of dust present in the cluster such that color $`A`$ is reddened to agree with the prediction for the Salpeter IMF. The corresponding change in color $`B`$ results in $`\mathrm{\Delta }m_B1.5`$, compared to $`\mathrm{\Delta }m_B2.1`$ for the Salpeter IMF. Unless one invokes rather contrived properties for the dust, the photometric signature of a heavy IMF therefore cannot masquerade as the one expected from a Salpeter IMF. By measuring these colors, NGST might thus be able to either confirm or exclude the dominance of very massive stars in the early universe.

### 4.2. Strong Emission of Recombination Lines

The hard UV emission from a star cluster with a heavy IMF is likely to be reprocessed by the surrounding interstellar medium and produce very strong recombination lines of hydrogen and helium. With $`\dot{N}_{ion}`$ as derived in §3, the emitted luminosity $`L_{line}^{em}`$ per unit stellar mass in a particular recombination line can be estimated as follows

$$L_{line}^{em}=p_{line}^{em}h\nu \dot{N}_{ion}(1p_{cont}^{esc})p_{line}^{esc}\text{ ,}$$
(14)
where $`p_{line}^{em}`$ is the probability that a recombination would lead to the emission of a photon in the corresponding line, $`\nu `$ is the frequency of the line and $`p_{cont}^{esc}`$ and $`p_{line}^{esc}`$ are the escape probabilities for the ionizing photons and the line photons, respectively. It is natural to assume that the stellar cluster is surrounded by an ionization bounded H II region, and hence $`p_{cont}^{esc}`$ is close to zero (Wood & Loeb 2000; Ricotti & Shull 2000). In addition, $`p_{line}^{esc}`$ is likely to be close to unity in the H II region, due to the lack of dust in the ambient metal-free gas. Although the emitted line photons may be scattered by neutral gas, they will diffuse out to the observer and eventually survive if the gas is dust free. Thus, for simplicity, we adopt a value of unity for $`p_{line}^{esc}`$.

To be concrete, let us consider case B recombination which yields $`p_{line}^{em}`$ of about 0.65 and 0.47 for the Ly$`\alpha `$ and He II 1640 Å lines, respectively. In arriving at these numbers, we assume an electron temperature of $`3\times 10^4`$K, and an electron density of $`10^210^3`$ cm-3 inside the H II region (see Storey & Hummer 1995). With $`\dot{N}_{ion}`$ from Table 1, we then obtain $`L_{line}^{em}=1.7\times 10^{37}`$ and $`2.2\times 10^{36}`$ erg s$`{}_{}{}^{1}M_{}^{1}`$ for the recombination luminosity of Ly$`\alpha `$ and He II 1640 Å per embedded stellar mass. A cluster of $`10^6M_{}`$ in stars would then produce 4.4 and 0.6 $`\times 10^9L_{}`$ in the Ly$`\alpha `$ and He II 1640 Å lines. Similarly high luminosities would be produced in other recombination lines at longer wavelengths, such as He II 4686 Å and H$`\alpha `$.

The rest–frame equivalent width of these emission lines measured against the stellar continuum of the embedded cluster at the line wavelengths is given by

$$W_\lambda =\left(\frac{L_{line}^{em}}{L_\lambda }\right)\text{ ,}$$
(15)
where $`L_\lambda `$ is the spectral luminosity per unit wavelength of the stars at the line resonance. From Figure 3, we obtain a spectral luminosity per unit frequency $`L_\nu =2.7\times 10^{21}`$ and $`1.8\times 10^{21}`$ erg s-1 Hz$`{}_{}{}^{1}M_{}^{1}`$ at the corresponding wavelengths. Converting to $`L_\lambda `$, we obtain rest-frame equivalent widths of $`W_\lambda `$ = 3100 Å and 1100 Å for Ly$`\alpha `$ and He II 1640 Å , respectively. These extreme emission equivalent widths are more than an order of magnitude larger than the expectation for a normal cluster of hot stars with the same total mass and a Salpeter IMF under the same assumptions concerning the escape probabilities and recombination (e.g., Kudritzki et al. 2000). The equivalent widths are, of course, larger by a factor of $`(1+z_s)`$ in the observer frame. Extremely strong recombination lines, such as Ly$`\alpha `$ and He II 1640 Å, are therefore expected to be an additional spectral signature that is unique to very massive stars in the early universe. Tumlinson & Shull (2000) have discussed the possible observational role of the He II 1640 Å line in the context of a standard Salpeter IMF.

The He II 1640 Å line would reach the observer unaffected by the intervening IGM, since its wavelength is longer than that of the Ly$`\alpha `$ transition which dominates the IGM opacity. However, the Ly$`\alpha `$ line emitted by the source would be resonantly scattered by the intergalactic H I. At redshifts lower than the reionization redshift, most of the IGM is ionized and only the blue wing of the line would be suppressed by the Ly$`\alpha `$ forest. But if the star cluster lies beyond the reionization redshift, the intervening neutral IGM acts as fog and obscures the view of the source at the Ly$`\alpha `$ wavelength. The line photons emitted by the source scatter until they eventually redshift out of resonance and escape due to the Hubble expansion of the surrounding intergalactic H I. As a result, the source creates a faint Ly$`\alpha `$ halo on the sky (Loeb & Rybicki 1999). For a source at $`z_s10`$, the halo occupies an angular radius of $`15^{\prime \prime }`$ and corresponds to a line that is broadened and redshifted by $`10^3\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ relative to the source. The scattered photons are also highly polarized (Rybicki & Loeb 1999). A heavy IMF would make the detection of diffuse Ly$`\alpha `$ halos around the first star clusters more accessible to future telescopes, and would provide an important tool for probing the neutral IGM prior to the epoch of reionization. Observations which focus directly on the bright central source are more straightforward, and should show a strong suppression of the Ly$`\alpha `$ line by the damping-wing of the “Gunn-Peterson trough”, caused by the IGM scattering (Miralda-Escudé 1998). The very brightest sources might be an exception, in that the H II region they generate in the surrounding IGM might shift the Ly$`\alpha `$ damping wing and allow a portion of the red wing of the emission line to be observed (Cen & Haiman 2000; Madau & Rees 2000).

## 5. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

We have explored the consequences of a possible early generation of very massive, zero-metal stars. These stars are almost fully convective, have luminosities close to the Eddington limit, and effective temperatures, $`T_{eff}10^5`$K, which are almost independent of stellar mass. Using a spherically extended, NLTE stellar atmosphere code, we have subsequently constructed the emerging spectra. If normalized by the mass of the star, the spectrum has a generic form, almost independent of mass for $`M300M_{}`$. Based on the photometric colors of the composite spectrum from a cluster of Population III stars, we find that it would be feasible observationally to constrain the primordial IMF with future infrared telescopes such as NGST (Fig. 4).

We also investigated the ionizing photon production from these massive stars. Compared to a population of stars with a normal, Salpeter-like IMF, the rate of producing ionizing photons is enhanced by an order of magnitude for H and He I, and by a factor of $`100`$ for He II. As a result, the interstellar medium of a star cluster with a heavy IMF is likely to generate extremely strong recombination lines, such as Ly$`\alpha `$ and He II 1640 Å , with equivalent widths that are larger by at least an order of magnitude compared to a standard IMF.

Very massive Population III stars might have played a significant role in the reionization of the hydrogen and helium in the IGM at high redshifts. The ability to efficiently ionize He II provides an alternative channel for a process which has otherwise to rely on the presence of quasars with their non-thermal spectra. Equally important is the possible contribution of massive stars to the ionizing photon budget at $`z5`$, where the known quasars and galaxies are unable to maintain the IGM in an ionized state as long as the IMF is assumed to have the standard form (Madau et al. 1999).

The massive stars considered in this work are likely to end up as black holes (Fryer, Woosley, & Heger 2000). If $`\gamma `$-ray bursts (GRBs) originate from the collapse of these massive stars, then a heavy IMF will produce a larger abundance of GRBs at high redshifts than previously estimated (Ciardi & Loeb 2000). The bright afterglows of these GRBs would provide an important probe of the IGM at high-redshifts (Lamb & Reichart 2000).

A valuable contribution to the early stages of this work was made by Pierre Demarque, who adapted the Yale stellar structure code to compute models of very massive zero-metallicity stars; although the results reported in this paper were obtained with a more efficient code kindly supplied by Dimitar Sasselov, the models of Pierre Demarque provided an important check on their correctness. The authors wish to thank Joachim Puls for the assistance in using his unified model atmosphere code, and Michael Shull and Jason Tumlinson for making available to us their composite Population III spectrum. We are grateful to Martin Haehnelt and Martin Rees for helpful discussions. VB thanks Paolo Coppi for financial support under NASA grant NAG5-7074, and AL acknowledges support by NASA grant NAG 5-7768 and NSF grant AST-0071019.


text:
# Composite defect extends cosmology – 3He analogy

\[

## Abstract

Spin-mass vortices have been observed to form in rotating superfluid 3He-B, following the absorption of a thermal neutron and a rapid transition from the normal to superfluid state. The spin-mass vortex is a composite defect which consists of a planar soliton (wall) which terminates on a linear core (string). This observation fits well within the framework of a cosmological scenario for defect formation, known as the Kibble-Zurek mechanism. It suggests that in the early Universe analogous cosmological defects might have formed.

\]

Experiments with superfluid 3He  have shown that quantized vortex lines are formed in the aftermath of a neutron absorption event, during the subsequent rapid transition from the normal to the superfluid state. These observations agree with a theory of defect formation, the Kibble-Zurek (KZ) mechanism , which was developed for the phase transitions of the early Universe. In this scenario a network of cosmic strings is formed during a rapid non-equilibrium second order phase transition, in the presence of thermal fluctuations. The real experimental conditions in the neutron irradiation experiment of 3He-B (and also probably in the early Universe) do not coincide with the perfectly homogeneous transition assumed in the KZ scenario: The temperature distribution within the “neutron bubble” is nonuniform, the transition propagates as a phase front between the high and low-temperature phases, and the phase is fixed outside the bubble. This requires modifications to the original KZ scenario  and even raises concerns whether the KZ mechanism is responsible for the defects which are extracted from the neutron bubble and observed in the experiment . New measurements now demonstrate that a more unusual composite defect is also formed and directly observed in the neutron experiment. This strengthens the importance of the KZ mechanism and places further constraints on the interplay between it and other competing effects.

Composite defects exist in continuous media and in quantum field theories, if a hierarchy of energy scales with different symmetries is present . Examples are strings terminating on monopoles and walls bounded by strings. Many quantum field theories predict heavy objects of this kind, that could appear only during symmetry-breaking phase transitions at an early stage in the expanding Universe . Various roles have been envisaged for them. For example domain walls bounded by strings have been suggested as a possible mechanism for baryogenesis . Composite defects also provide one possible mechanism for avoiding the monopole overabundance problem .

In high-energy physics it is generally assumed that composite defects can exist after two successive symmetry-breaking phase transitions, which are far apart in energy . An example of successive transitions in Grand Unification theories is $`SO(10)SU(4)\times SU(2)_R\times SU(2)_LSU(3)_C\times SU(2)_L\times U(1)_YSU(3)_C\times U(1)_Q`$. In condensed matter physics composite objects are known to result even from a single transition, provided that at least two distinct energy scales are involved, such that the symmetry at large lengths can become reduced . An example is the spin-mass vortex in superfluid 3He-B. It was discovered in rotating NMR measurements, after a slow adiabatic first order 3He-A $``$ 3He-B transition had taken place in the rotating liquid . Our new observations show that the spin-mass vortex is also formed in a rapid non-equilibrium quench through the second order transition from the normal phase to 3He-B.

Superfluid 3He-B corresponds to a symmetry-broken state $`U(1)\times SO(3)_L\times SO(3)_SSO(3)_{L+S}`$, where $`SO(3)_L`$ and $`SO(3)_S`$ are groups of rotations in orbital and spin spaces, respectively. In this state two topologically distinct linear defects with singular cores are possible . Their structure can be seen from the B-phase order parameter , a 3$`\times `$3 matrix $`A_{\alpha j}=\mathrm{\Delta }_\mathrm{B}e^{i\varphi }R_{\alpha j}(\widehat{𝐧},\theta )`$. It is a product of the energy gap $`\mathrm{\Delta }_\mathrm{B}`$, the phase factor $`e^{i\varphi }`$, and a rotation matrix $`R_{\alpha j}`$. The latter is an abstract rotation which reflects the broken relative $`SO(3)`$ symmetry between spin and orbital spaces. The unit vector $`\widehat{𝐧}`$ points in the direction of the rotation axis while $`\theta `$ is the angle of rotation.

A conventional vortex is the result of broken gauge $`U(1)`$ symmetry, which is common to all superfluids and superconductors. It has $`2\pi \nu `$ winding in the phase $`\varphi `$ of the order parameter around the singular core, with integer $`\nu `$. This vortex belongs to the homotopy group $`\pi _1(U(1))=Z`$ and its quantum number $`\nu `$ obeys a conventional summation rule $`1+1=2`$. The phase winding translates to a persistent quantized supercurrent circulating around the central core and thus this vortex is called a “mass vortex”.

The second type of defect appears in the order parameter matrix $`R_{\alpha j}(\widehat{𝐧},\theta )`$ (Fig. 1, top). On moving once around its core, $`\widehat{𝐧}`$ reverses its direction twice: First by smooth rotation while the angle $`\theta `$ remains at the equilibrium value $`\theta _D104^{}`$, which minimizes the spin-orbit interaction energy. Later by increasing $`\theta `$ to $`180^{}`$, where both directions of $`\widehat{𝐧}`$ are equivalent, and then decreasing back to $`\theta _D`$. The second leg in the direction reversal does not minimize the spin-orbit interaction and hence it becomes confined in space within a planar structure, a soliton sheet, which terminates on the linear singular core or on the wall of the container. This structure becomes possible through the existence of two different energy (and length) scales: The superfluid condensation energy defines the scale of the coherence length $`\xi 10`$$`100`$nm, which is roughly the radius of the singular core. The much weaker spin-orbit interaction defines the scale of the dipolar healing length $`\xi _D10\mu `$m, at which the angle $`\theta `$ becomes fixed. This length determines the thickness of the soliton sheet. Since the matrix $`R_{\alpha j}`$ spans the space $`SO(3)`$, this defect belongs to the homotopy group $`\pi _1(SO(3))=Z_2`$, a two-element group with a summation rule $`1+1=0`$ for its topological charge. Such a defect with the charge 1 is identical to its antidefect and represents a nonzero (but not quantized) circulation of current in the spin part of the order parameter around a singular core. It is named a “spin vortex”. By itself the spin vortex is an unstable structure: The surface tension of its soliton tail leads to its annihilation.

Mass and spin vortices do not interact significantly – they “live in different worlds”, i.e. their order parameters belong to different isotopic spaces. The only instance where the spin vortex has been found to remain stable in the rotating container arises when the cores of a spin and a mass vortex happen to get close to each other and it becomes energetically preferable for them to form a common core. Thus by trapping the spin vortex on a mass vortex, the combined core energy is reduced  and a composite object — $`Z_2`$-string + soliton + mass vortex, or “spin-mass vortex” (SMV) — is formed. Its equilibrium position in the rotating container, which has a deficit of the usual mass vortices, is slightly outside of the cluster of mass vortex lines (Fig. 1, middle right). This is determined by the balance of the Magnus force from the externally applied normal-superfluid counterflow and the surface tension of the soliton.

Details about the experiment are given in Refs. . The stable configuration of the spin-mass vortex in the rotating container can be observed with different types of NMR methods. One signature from the spin-mass vortex in the neutron irradiation measurement is illustrated in Fig. 2, where the height of the NMR absorption peak, used for monitoring the number of vortex lines, is plotted as a function of time. This accumulation record shows one oversize downward jump in the absorption amplitude. The total number of vortex lines accumulated by the end of the irradiation session can be determined by different independent methods. These include: (a) measurement of the annihilation threshold, i.e. of the rotation velocity at which vortex lines start to annihilate at the wall of the container during deceleration ; (b) measurement of the relative heights of the two peaks in the NMR spectrum of Fig. 1, known as the counterflow and Larmor peaks ; (c) comparison to measurements at other rotation velocities using an empirically established $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ dependence of the vortex formation rate . These comparisons prove that the large jump can include at most a few ($`5`$) circulation quanta.

A large reduction in the peak height of the NMR absorption, together with a small number of circulation quanta, can only be attributed to a soliton sheet which is trapped on the spin-mass vortex. This identification is based on the change in the line shape of the NMR spectrum with and without the spin-mass vortex (Fig. 1, bottom). The first spectrum was recorded right after the neutron irradiation and shows the shifted absorption at the maximum possible frequency shift, the characteristic signature of the soliton sheet. The second spectrum, recorded after reducing the rotation briefly to a sufficiently low value where the spin-mass vortex is selectively removed by pushing it to the container wall, displays no soliton signal. Such a recovery of the NMR spectrum to the line shape of an axially symmetric configuration, with a central vortex cluster surrounded by a co-axial region of vortex-free counterflow (Fig. 1, middle left), provides a most tangible demonstration of the initial presence of the spin-mass vortex at the edge of the cluster. In neutron absorption events where only mass vortex lines are formed, the reduction in the NMR peak height is not accompanied by a frequency shift in the location of the maximum, while the soliton produces discontinuities in both the absorption and dispersion signals (Fig. 2).

The spin-mass vortex is a rare product from the neutron absorption event, compared to the yield of vortex lines. In the conditions of Fig. 2 their ratio is roughly 1:100. Nevertheless, its presence is thought to convey an important signal. The spin-mass vortex is the only other type of defect, besides mass-current vortices, which so far has been observed to form in a neutron absorption event. (Indirect experimental evidence for the creation of 3He-A – 3He-B interfaces has been discussed in Ref. ). It demonstrates that more than one type of order-parameter defect can be created. This limits the possible scenarios of defect formation which work within or around the small volume of about $`100\mu `$m in diameter which is heated to the normal state by the energy of the decay products from the neutron absorption reaction. The formation of defects occurs during the rapid cooling back to the superfluid state on a time scale of microseconds.

At the moment the only presently viable general principle by which defects can be created under such constraints and which would give rise to different types of order-parameter defects is the quench-cooling of thermal fluctuations within the KZ scenario. Two possible routes can be suggested for the formation of the spin-mass vortex: One possibility is that the spin and mass vortices are formed independently, since the random order-parameter fabric after the quench may contain discontinuity in both the phase $`\varphi `$ as well as in the relative rotation of the spin and orbital axes of the order parameter. Where these two types of vortices happen to fuse, the combined spin-mass vortex appears. The long-range attractive force between the spin and mass vortices is due to Casimir-type effects: In the vicinity of the spin vortex the order parameter amplitude and thus the superfluid density $`\rho _s`$ is reduced. This reduces the kinetic energy of superflow $`v_s`$ around the mass vortex, $`\frac{1}{2}𝑑V\rho _sv_s^2`$. The magnitude of this force is smaller by the factor $`\xi ^2/d^2`$ than the interaction between two vortices of the same type, where $`d`$ is the distance between the vortices.

A second possibility is a similar process as that after which the spin-mass vortex was first observed : In addition to the neutron absorption event, so far the only other effective method for forming spin-mass vortices in larger numbers is from A-phase vortex lines when the A$``$B transition is allowed to propagate slowly through the rotating container. In a neutron absorption event, AB interfaces are also among the objects which should be formed in the KZ process . The present measurements favor this second explanation: In neutron absorption events spin-mass vortices are formed only at high pressure close to the AB transition line. Earlier measurements  have established that also the yield of vortex lines from a neutron absorption event is reduced in the vicinity of the stable A-phase regime. The most straightforward explanation is to assume that AB interfaces, which are formed as additional defects within the rapidly cooling neutron bubble, intervene in the formation of vortex lines.

Within the neutron bubble a spin-mass vortex is initially formed as a loop which traps both the spin and mass currents, with the soliton spanned like a membrane across the loop. This loop expands in sufficiently strong applied counterflow to a rectilinear vortex line, in the same manner as other loops formed from mass-current vortices. The threshold velocity for the expansion corresponds to the largest possible loop size, limited by the diameter of the neutron bubble. This threshold velocity is higher for a spin-mass vortex than for a mass-current vortex, because the energy of the composite object is larger. In the logarithmic approximation the energy of a spin-mass vortex is the sum of the energies of the constituent mass and spin vortices. The energy of the spin vortex is about 0.6 of that of the mass vortex . Thus one obtains the estimate $`E_{SMV}/E_{MV}1.6`$ and the same ratio for their threshold velocities. This is consistent with the measurements: The threshold velocity for the creation of the mass vortices at the experimental conditions of Fig. 2 is $`0.75`$rad/s, while spin-mass vortices were not observed below 2 rad/s. However, the actual threshold velocity for the SMV might be smaller because the irradiation time at such high rotation velocities cannot be extended indefinitely due to the rapid accumulation of mass vortices.

In addition to the KZ mechanism also other sources might give rise to the mass vortex lines which are counted in Fig. 2. While the measurements clearly point to a volume effect , recent numerical simulations of the experiment  conclude that a surface phenomenon dominates as the origin for these directly observed vortices. Using the thermal diffusion equation to describe the cooling neutron bubble and a one-component order parameter in the time-dependent Ginzburg-Landau equation to model the order-parameter relaxation, this calculation confirms the appearance of a tangled vortex network within the bubble volume via the KZ mechanism. However in the presence of the externally applied counterflow from the rotation, vortex rings are also formed on the bubble surface, due to the classical corrugation instability of the normal/superfluid interface. This flow instability at the warm boundary of the neutron bubble does not require the presence of thermal fluctuations  and may be interpreted as an instability of a vortex-sheet-like intermediate state . These vortex rings around the boundary of the neutron bubble screen the externally applied counterflow and allow the random vortex network inside the bubble volume to be dissipated.

The formation of a spin-mass vortex in the flow instability seems unlikely, since the applied counterflow does not significantly interact with the spin degrees of the order parameter. More likely, fluctuations must be an essential ingredient in its formation process. Thus here again the experiment prefers the fluctuation-dominated KZ mechanism as a more plausible explanation. For the description of composite defects simulation calculations should be extended to the multi-component order parameter of 3He-B. However, the interplay between the KZ mechanism within the bubble volume and the flow instability at the bubble surface might depend on the details of the transition process, which cannot be described by the time-dependent Ginzburg-Landau equations, but requires a microscopic treatment of quasiparticle dynamics in the presence of a rapidly changing order parameter.

The observation of the spin-mass vortex, as a product from neutron irradiation of 3He-B, strengthens the importance of the fluctuation-mediated mechanisms as the source of defect formation in non-equilibrium transitions. It shows that composite objects do not necessarily require for their creation two phase transitions at very different energies.

This work was carried out with support from the EU-IHP programme and the ESF Network on Topological Defects. We thank N. Kopnin, A. Schakel and E. Thuneberg for discussions.