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# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

String theory predicts the existence of a scalar particle called the dilaton, with prescribed tree-level couplings at the string scale. Its discovery would be a major step toward experimentally validating string theory. It is believed that nonperturbative effects could generate a potential for the dilaton, but the mechanism and the form of this potential are presently unknown. In particular, there is no theory for the mass of the dilaton. Assuming dilaton mass generation is associated with supersymmetry breaking, a naive estimate would suggest that the dilaton mass is roughly $`m\mathrm{\Lambda }_{SUSY}^2/M_{PL}`$, where $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{SUSY}`$ is the supersymmetry breaking scale, and $`M_{PL}`$ is the Planck mass. $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{SUSY}`$ could be as low as a few TeV, corresponding to a dilaton Compton wavelength on the order of a millimeter. Such a dilaton will mediate a measurable long range Yukawa force. Currently there are several experiments testing for deviations from Newton’s law of gravity at sub-millimeter distances . In order to know what mass range for the dilaton they are sensitive to, it is necessary to know the dilaton’s coupling to matter. In the large extra dimension scenarios, the dilaton can affect not only experimental tests of gravity, but also cooling rates of supernovae. In this note, we compute the leading contributions to the light dilaton coupling to matter. Our analysis and results differ from earlier calculations of the dilaton coupling .

## 2 Low Energy dilaton coupling to quarks and gluons

We begin by computing the dilaton couplings assuming closed string theory above the string scale $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_s`$, and an effective field theory below $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_s`$ consisting of the dilaton and QCD with the three light flavors of quarks ($`u,d,s`$) and an arbitrary number of heavy quarks, of which the charm quark is the lightest. As we will discuss below, to leading order the only way that high energy physics enters the calculation (such as electroweak physics, supersymmetry, grand unification) is through the value of the strong coupling, $`\alpha _3(\mathrm{\Lambda }_s)`$. Therefore the results and conclusions we derive in this section are actually independent of the particle content between the weak scale and the string scale.

Assuming that the dilaton $`\varphi `$ is the only light modulus, and that perturbation theory is valid at the string scale $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_s`$, the lagrangian for this system at $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_s`$ is

$`={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(\varphi )^2V(\varphi ){\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(1\sqrt{2}\kappa \varphi )\mathrm{Tr}G_{\mu \nu }G^{\mu \nu }+{\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}\left[\overline{q}_ii\text{/}Dq_i\left(1+{\displaystyle \frac{\kappa }{\sqrt{2}}}\varphi \right)m_i\overline{q}_iq_i\right]`$ (1)
where $`V(\varphi )`$ is the unknown potential for the dilaton (with minimum at $`\varphi =0`$), $`G_{\mu \nu }`$ is the gluon field strength, and

$`\kappa =\sqrt{8\pi G_N}={\displaystyle \frac{\sqrt{8\pi }}{M_{PL}}}=[2.43\times 10^{18}\mathrm{GeV}]^1.`$ (2)
In eq. (1) we have only kept those terms linear in $`\kappa `$. In order to use this lagrangian to compute the coupling of a light dilaton to nucleons, we need to scale it down to the QCD scale $`1`$ GeV and match onto an effective theory of hadrons. To do so, we employ the powerful techniques developed by Shifman, Vainshtein and Zakharov in ref.  to discuss the coupling of a light Higgs boson to nucleons (see also ). We make use of the fact that both of the operators $`m_i\overline{q}_iq_i`$ and $`_\mu S^\mu `$ are renormalization group invariants, where $`_\mu S^\mu `$ is the divergence of the scale current:

$`_\mu S^\mu ={\displaystyle \frac{\beta _3}{g_3}}\mathrm{Tr}G_{\mu \nu }G^{\mu \nu }+(1\gamma _m){\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}m_i\overline{q}_iq_i,`$ (3)
$`\beta _3`$ and $`\gamma _m`$ being the beta function for the QCD coupling $`g_3`$ and the mass anomalous dimension respectively. The coupling of the dilaton at the string scale may be rewritten in terms of these operators as

$`_\varphi =\varphi {\displaystyle \frac{\kappa }{\sqrt{2}}}{\displaystyle \frac{g_3(\mathrm{\Lambda }_s)}{\beta _3(\mathrm{\Lambda }_s)}}\left[_\mu S^\mu c{\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}(m_i\overline{q}_iq_i)\right]`$ (4)
where

$`c=\left[1\gamma _m+{\displaystyle \frac{\beta _3}{g_3}}\right]_{\mu =\mathrm{\Lambda }_s}.`$ (5)
Note that $`g_3(\mathrm{\Lambda }_s)`$ denotes the running QCD coupling evaluated at the string scale.

To compute the coupling of the dilaton to matter, we need to first integrate out the heavy quarks. This is easily done to leading order in $`\alpha _3`$ by equating the divergence of the scale current in the theory renormalized just above the heaviest quark threshold, to the same quantity computed in the effective theory just below the charm quark mass. One finds

$`{\displaystyle \underset{\mathrm{heavy}}{}}m_i\overline{q}_iq_i=\left(1{\displaystyle \frac{b_0^s}{b_0^{\mathrm{}}}}\right)\left(_\mu S^\mu {\displaystyle \underset{\mathrm{light}}{}}m_i\overline{q}_iq_i\right)+𝒪\left(\alpha (m_c)\right)+𝒪\left(\alpha (m_c)\mathrm{\Lambda }_{QCD}^2/m_c^2\right).`$ (6)
where the QCD $`\beta `$-function is given by $`\beta =b_0g^3/16\pi ^2+𝒪(g^5)`$, where $`b_0=(112/3N_f)`$ and $`N_f`$ is the number of quark flavors lighter than the renormalization scale. The quantity $`b_0^s`$ is computed at the string scale, including the heavy quark fields, while $`b_0^{\mathrm{}}`$ is computed in the effective theory with only the three light quarks. Putting this altogether, the dilaton coupling may be written as

$`_\varphi =\varphi {\displaystyle \frac{K\kappa }{\sqrt{2}}}\left[_\mu S^\mu {\displaystyle \underset{u,d,s}{}}(m_i\overline{q}_iq_i)\right]+\mathrm{},K={\displaystyle \frac{4\pi /b_0^{\mathrm{}}}{\alpha _3(\mathrm{\Lambda }_s)}}={\displaystyle \frac{4\pi /9}{\alpha _3(\mathrm{\Lambda }_s)}}`$ (7)
where the ellipses refer to the $`O(\alpha _3(m_c))`$ and higher order corrections 111This formula disagrees with two prior calculations in the literature. Our answer is similar to the formula of Ellis et al. , but differs in two ways: First, eq. (40) in that paper shows the enhancement factor $`K`$ proportional to $`1/b_0^s`$ instead of $`1/b_0^{\mathrm{}}`$ as in eq. (7) above. The difference arises from our inclusion of the effects of the heavy colored matter fields. Second, we find that the terms responsible for violations of the principle of equivalence receive the $`K=𝒪(1/\alpha _3(\mathrm{\Lambda }_s))`$ enhancement, while they are found to be $`𝒪(1)`$ in . The earlier work of Taylor and Veneziano  also found a logarithmic enhancement of the dilaton coupling, but otherwise differs from our result.. We have dropped the terms in eq. (5) involving $`\gamma _m`$ and $`\beta _3/g_3`$ evaluated at $`\mu =\mathrm{\Lambda }_s`$, which are subleading in $`g_3(\mathrm{\Lambda }_s)`$, the strong coupling at the string scale.

The result eq. (7) is valid at leading order in $`\alpha _3`$ provided the dilaton is the only light modulus (if there are several light moduli then they can mix with each other). Our result eq. (7) is independent of assumptions about the nature of physics between the weak scale and the string scale, other than that the gluon coupling remain perturbative in this regime 222We explain in appendix B why the inclusion of electromagnetism does not change the form of eq. (7) to the order we are working.. Using the measured value of $`\alpha _3(M_Z)`$, the coupling $`K`$ can be computed in any particular model. For example, in the standard model, $`1/\alpha _3(M_{PL})52`$ and if $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_s=M_{PL}`$ the enhancement factor is

$`K73(\mathrm{Standard}\mathrm{Model},\mathrm{\Lambda }_s=M_{PL}).`$ (8)
In theories with additional heavy colored particles, or a lower string scale $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_s`$, the dilaton coupling will be weaker, because the QCD coupling will be larger at the string scale. For example in the minimal supersymmetric extension of the standard model (MSSM) the scalar partners of the quarks and the gluinos contribute to the beta function above the weak scale, increasing the value of the strong coupling at the string scale. In this case $`1/\alpha _3(M_{PL})=27`$ and so $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_s=M_{PL}`$ implies an enhancement factor

$`K38(\mathrm{MSSM},\mathrm{\Lambda }_s=M_{PL}).`$ (9)
It is possible to have $`K`$ as small as $`𝒪(1)`$ if there is a large number of heavy colored states below the string scale, as occurs in many supersymmetric GUT models with $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_s=M_{PL}`$. In any case, detecting the dilaton will give a direct measurement of the strong coupling constant at the string scale.

We conclude this section with an aside about the relation between the dilaton mass and its coupling, imposed by naturalness. Naturalness is simply the statement that the physical dilaton mass should be at least as large as the size of radiative corrections to the mass computed in perturbation theory. Radiative corrections to the dilaton mass due to gluon loops are quadratically divergent, and therefore sensitive to (unknown) high energy physics. However the computable standard model contribution due to gluon loops ought to serve as a lower bound on the radiative corrections. We estimate the standard model contribution with a cutoff of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{SM}=1TeV`$ to be

$`m_\varphi >\left[\delta m_\varphi \right]_{SM}`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\pi }}{\displaystyle \frac{\kappa }{\sqrt{2}}}{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha _3(\mathrm{\Lambda }_{SM})}{\alpha _3(\mathrm{\Lambda }_s)}}\mathrm{\Lambda }_{SM}^2`$ (10)
$`=`$ $`2K\times 10^6\mathrm{eV}.`$
This lower bound is sufficiently weak that it does not constrain the unexplored parameter space accessible to experiments attempting to detect new long range forces. However, if the scale of new physics is higher, such as $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{SM}10\mathrm{TeV}`$, the naturalness constraint becomes significant.

In any case, naturalness arguments are not conclusive as one can imagine that the unnaturally small value of the cosmological constant is somehow related to similarly unnatural properties of the dilaton. In fact, the currently favored value of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }0.7`$ implies an energy density $`(10^3\mathrm{eV})^4`$, making the exploration of (sub)-millimeter gravity especially intriguing .

## 3 The dilaton coupling to nucleons

To the order we are working, the effective nucleon-dilaton coupling is given by

$`_{N\varphi }=\varphi \left(y_p\overline{p}p+y_n\overline{n}n\right),`$ (11)
where the Yukawa couplings are given by the matrix element

$`y_i={\displaystyle \frac{\kappa }{\sqrt{2}}}KN_i|_\mu S^\mu \chi |N_i,\chi (m_u\overline{u}u+m_d\overline{d}d+m_s\overline{s}s),`$ (12)
where $`N_i`$ is the nucleon doublet. As the matrix element of the divergence of the scale current is

$`N_i|_\mu S^\mu |N_i=M_i,`$ (13)
the Yukawa potential between two nucleons of types $`i,j`$ may be written as

$`V_{ij}(r)={\displaystyle \frac{y_iy_j}{4\pi r}}e^{M_\varphi r}=K^2{\displaystyle \frac{G_N_i_j}{r}}e^{M_\varphi r}`$ (14)
where $`K=(4\pi /9)/\alpha _3(\mathrm{\Lambda }_s)`$ is the enhancement factor in eq. (7),

$`_p`$ $`=`$ $`M_p\left(1\widehat{\chi }_+\widehat{\chi }_{}\right),`$
$`_n`$ $`=`$ $`M_n\left(1\widehat{\chi }_++\widehat{\chi }_{}\right),`$ (15)
$`\widehat{\chi }_\pm `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{p|\chi |p}{M_p}}\pm {\displaystyle \frac{n|\chi |n}{M_n}}\right).`$
We compute $`\chi _\pm `$ to leading order in chiral perturbation theory in appendix A, finding

$`\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill \widehat{\chi }_+& =& (2.7\pm 0.8)\times 10^1,\hfill \\ & & \\ \hfill \widehat{\chi }_{}& =& (1.5\pm 0.5)\times 10^3,\hfill \end{array}`$ (19)
where the errors quoted reflect an estimated $`30\%`$ violation of $`SU(3)`$ symmetry.

In the isospin symmetric limit $`\widehat{\chi }_{}=0`$ we see that the dilaton mediated force between nucleons obeys the principle of equivalence and is $`K^2(1\widehat{\chi }_+)^2`$ times stronger than gravity; the factor $`K`$ was computed in eq. (7), while $`(1\widehat{\chi }_+)^20.5`$.

The isospin violating term proportional to $`\widehat{\chi }_{}`$ contributes to a force which violates the principle of equivalence. The difference between the accelerations of a proton and a neutron in a dilaton field is proportional to

$`\mathrm{\Delta }_{p,n}=\left({\displaystyle \frac{_p}{M_p}}{\displaystyle \frac{_n}{M_n}}\right)=2\widehat{\chi }_{},`$ (20)
a $`0.3\%`$ effect relative to the common acceleration.

One might suppose that the inclusion of electromagnetism would give rise to comparable equivalence principle violating effects. However, the leading electromagnetic effects are already accounted for in eq. (15) when the physical nucleon masses are used; additional electromagnetic contributions are suppressed by an additional power of $`\alpha _{em}`$ or $`1/K`$, as discussed in appendix B.

## 4 The dilaton coupling to atoms

The Yukawa potential between two atoms $`i`$ and $`j`$, from dilaton exchange, is

$`V_{ij}(r)=K^2{\displaystyle \frac{G_N_i_j}{r}}e^{M_\varphi r}`$ (21)
where $`K=(4\pi /9)/\alpha _3(\mathrm{\Lambda }_s)`$ is the enhancement factor in eq. (7) and

$`\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill _i& =& i|_\mu S^\mu \chi m_e\overline{e}e|i\hfill \\ & & \\ & =& M_ii|\chi +m_e\overline{e}e|i,\hfill \end{array}`$ (25)
where $`M_i`$ is the mass of atom $`i`$, and we have included the electron coupling of the dilaton. The mass of an atom with charge $`Z`$ and neutron number $`N`$ may be written as

$`M=ZM_p+Zm_e+NM_n,`$ (26)
where $``$ is the binding energy, $`<A\times (9\mathrm{MeV})`$, where $`A=(Z+N)`$ is the atomic number. Thus we can write the matrix element in eq. (25) as

$`i|\chi +m_e\overline{e}e|i`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{a=u,d,s,e}{}}m_adM_i/dm_a`$
$`=`$ $`\left(Z_iM_p+N_iM_n\right)\widehat{\chi }_++\left(Z_iM_pN_iM_n\right)\widehat{\chi }_{}+Z_im_e{\displaystyle \underset{a}{}}m_a{\displaystyle \frac{d}{dm_a}}`$
$``$ $`M_i\left[\widehat{\chi }_++\left({\displaystyle \frac{Z_iN_i}{A_i}}\right)\widehat{\chi }_{}+{\displaystyle \frac{m_e}{M_N}}{\displaystyle \frac{Z_i}{A_i}}{\displaystyle \underset{a}{}}m_a{\displaystyle \frac{d(/M_i)}{dm_a}}\right]`$
In the last line we expanded to linear order in $`\widehat{\chi }_{}`$, $`m_e/M_i`$, $`(M_nM_p)/M_N`$ and $`/M_i`$; we have retained terms of order $`(/M_i)\widehat{\chi }_+`$, which are of comparable magnitude to $`Z_im_e/M_i`$ and $`\widehat{\chi }_{}`$.

We do not know how to compute the last term in eq. (4), the dependence of the binding energy on the quark and elecron masses. It is expected to be dominated by the $`m_s\overline{s}s`$ operator, and on dimensional grounds it should be of comparable magnitude to $`(/M_i)\widehat{\chi }_+`$. We therefore define the parameters $`\xi _i`$ by

$`{\displaystyle \underset{a}{}}m_a{\displaystyle \frac{d(/M_i)}{dm_a}}\xi _i{\displaystyle \frac{}{M_i}}\widehat{\chi }_+,`$ (28)
and expect $`|\xi _i|1`$.

Assembling these results we find that the parameter $`_i`$ appearing in the force law eq. (21) is

$`_iM_i\left(1\widehat{\chi }_+\left({\displaystyle \frac{Z_iN_i}{A_i}}\right)\widehat{\chi }_{}{\displaystyle \frac{m_e}{M_N}}{\displaystyle \frac{Z_i}{A_i}}\xi _i{\displaystyle \frac{}{M_i}}\widehat{\chi }_+\right).`$ (29)
As for nucleons, we find that the equivalence principle conserving part of the force is $`K^2(1\widehat{\chi }_+)^20.5K^2`$ times the gravitational force. As discussed above, the numerical value of $`K^2`$ is unknown, and could be $`𝒪(1)𝒪(10^3)`$; it is directly related to the gluon coupling at the string scale through eq. (7).

Violations of the equivalence principle in the force between atoms $`i`$ and $`j`$ are proportional to

$`\mathrm{\Delta }_{i,j}=\left({\displaystyle \frac{_i}{M_i}}{\displaystyle \frac{_j}{M_j}}\right)`$ (42)
which gets contributions from the last three terms in eq. (29). In Table 1 we give the sizes for these equivalence principle violating terms for several isotopes, given the chiral perturbation theory calculation of $`\widehat{\chi }_+`$ in eq. (19). Note that by choosing to compare different pairs materials, it is in principle possible to have the equivalence principle violating parameter $`\mathrm{\Delta }_{ij}`$ be selectively sensitive to each of the last three terms in eq. (29).

## 5 Dilaton couplings with large extra dimensions

String theory has additional spatial dimensions beyond the three we have observed. In writing the Lagrangian in eq. (1) we have assumed that these extra dimensions are small (size of order $`1/\mathrm{\Lambda }_s`$) and that only the particular combination of higher dimensional metric components and higher dimensional dilaton field that appears as a factor scaling the effective four dimensional action remains light. It is this combination that is the effective four dimensional dilaton field $`\varphi `$ that occurs in eq. (1). Recently the possibility of having the string scale of order the weak scale has been explored . The large effective four dimensional Planck mass arises because some of the additional extra dimensions have sizes much larger than $`1/\mathrm{\Lambda }_s`$. In these scenerios enhancement of the low energy dilaton coupling to matter is different from that presented in eq. (7) . This difference arises for several reasons. Firstly to avoid experimental constraints the matter fields must be confined to a three-brane and at leading order in string perturbation theory the effective field theory arises from string amplitudes on the disk instead of the sphere. It is possible for there to be a dilaton mass term on the brane as well as in the bulk. Even with toroidal compactification and no warp factor a brane mass term gives rise to Kaluza-Klein excitations of the dilaton that are not just plane waves and a lowest mode that is not constant in the extra dimensions. This can dramatically influence the dilaton couplings to matter on the brane. In this section we assume that the dilaton couplings have the form one would deduce in the simplest possible case, where its lowest mass mode is constant in the extra dimensions and its Kaluza-Klein excitations are simply plane waves.

With $`n`$ large extra dimensions the low energy dilaton couplings to quarks and gluons are given by eq. (7) but the enhancement factor is changed to

$`K_n={\displaystyle \frac{\sqrt{4+2n}}{4}}K={\displaystyle \frac{\pi \sqrt{4+2n}}{9\alpha _3(\mathrm{\Lambda }_s)}}.`$ (43)
Note that $`K_n`$ is a factor of $`\sqrt{4+2n}/2`$ larger than $`K`$ from the normalization appropriate to rescaling the $`4+n`$ dimensional metric to go from the string metric to the Einstein metric, and an additional factor of $`2`$ smaller because the couplings arise from string amplitudes calculated on the disk. With two large extra dimensions and the string scale equal to $`10\mathrm{TeV}`$, the enhancement factor in eq. (43) is $`K_215`$. There is one more complication that effects the calculation of the force between matter from dilaton exchange. The dilaton may not be a mass eigenstate, it might mix with components of the higher dimensional metric. Assuming that this mixing angle $`\theta `$ is not small 333For small $`\theta `$ terms that we neglected, which are not enhanced by $`1/K_n`$, may be important. , the force between matter from exchange of the lowest mass eigenstate is then given by eq. (14) (for nucleons) or eq. (21) (for atoms) but with $`K`$ replaced by $`K_n`$ and a factor of $`\mathrm{cos}^2\theta `$ inserted.

For two large extra dimensions an important constraint on the size of the extra dimensions comes from the rate of supernova cooling associated with emission of Kaluza Klein excitations of the graviton and of a combination components of the higher dimensional metric which is also sometimes called the dilaton. If the string theory dilaton is also light then it will contribute to this constraint. We can estimate the size of this effect using the recent results of Hanhart et al. . The emissivity due to Kaluza-Klein excitations of the string theory dilaton is larger than $`\varphi `$ emission computed in ref.  by a factor of

$`f={\displaystyle \frac{3(n+2)K_n^2}{4}}.`$ (44)
For $`n=2`$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_s10\mathrm{TeV}`$ this enhancement is $`f550`$. This results in a total emissivity approximately 8 times larger than computed in ref.  for a given size $`R`$ of the two flat extra dimensions. The upper bound on $`R`$ becomes stronger by $`\sqrt{8}`$, or $`R<2.5\times 10^4\mathrm{mm}`$.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We thank J. Polchinski and M. Savage for useful comments. D.B.K. is supported in part by DOE grant DE-FG03-00-ER-41132; M.B.W. is supported in part by DOE grant DE-FG03-92-ER-40701.

## Appendix A Computing $`_{p,n}`$ in leading order chiral perturbation theory

The matrix elements $`\widehat{\chi }_\pm `$ may be easily computed at leading order in chiral perturbation theory, using the $`SU(3)_L\times SU(3)_R`$ baryon chiral lagrangian. Using the notation of ref. , the mass terms in this Lagrangian are,

$`_m=m_0\mathrm{Tr}\overline{B}B+2a_1\mathrm{Tr}\overline{B}MB+2a_2\mathrm{Tr}\overline{B}BM+2a_3\mathrm{Tr}M\mathrm{Tr}\overline{B}B,`$ (45)
where $`M`$ is the quark mass matrix $`\mathrm{diag}\{m_u,m_d,m_s\}`$, and $`B`$ is the baryon octet matrix. The constants $`m_0`$ and $`a_i`$ times the quark masses can be determined in terms of the octet baryon masses, the quark mass ratios determined in the meson sector, and the pion-nucleon “$`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$-term”,

$`\mathrm{\Sigma }_{\pi N}\left({\displaystyle \frac{m_u+m_d}{2}}\right)N|\overline{u}u+\overline{d}d|N`$ (46)
extracted from $`\pi N`$ scattering data. The leading order result (i.e, to linear order in quark masses) is

$`\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill \widehat{\chi }_+& =& \frac{1}{M_N}N|m_s\overline{s}s+\left(\frac{m_u+m_d}{2}\right)(\overline{u}u+\overline{d}d)|N\hfill \\ & & \\ & =& \frac{1}{M_N}\left[\mathrm{\Sigma }_{\pi N}\left(1+\frac{m_s}{m_u+m_d}\right)(M_\mathrm{\Xi }+M_\mathrm{\Sigma }2M_N)\left(\frac{m_s}{2m_sm_um_d}\right)\right],\hfill \\ & & \\ \hfill \widehat{\chi }_{}& =& \frac{1}{M_N}p|\left(\frac{m_um_d}{2}\right)(\overline{u}u\overline{d}d)|p\hfill \\ & & \\ & =& \frac{1}{M_N}\left[(M_\mathrm{\Xi }M_\mathrm{\Sigma })\left(\frac{m_dm_u}{2m_sm_um_d}\right)\right]\hfill \end{array}`$ (54)
The quark mass ratios have been determined from the measured pseudoscalar octet meson masses to be

$`{\displaystyle \frac{m_s}{m_u}}=34.4\pm 3.7,{\displaystyle \frac{m_s}{m_d}}=18.9\pm 0.8`$ (55)
while recent analyses of $`\pi N`$ scattering yields

$`\mathrm{\Sigma }_{\pi N}45\mathrm{MeV}.`$ (56)
These numbers, along with the measured hyperon masses yield

$`\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill \widehat{\chi }_+& =& \frac{1}{2}\left(\frac{_p}{M_p}+\frac{_n}{M_n}\right)=(2.7\pm 0.8)\times 10^1,\hfill \\ & & \\ \hfill \widehat{\chi }_{}& =& \frac{1}{2}\left(\frac{_p}{M_p}\frac{_n}{M_n}\right)=(1.5\pm 0.5)\times 10^3,\hfill \end{array}`$ (60)
where we have assigned (somewhat arbitrarily) a 30% error estimate typical for $`SU(3)`$ violation. Note that in the standard model with $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_s=M_{PL}`$, $`K73`$ and the dilaton force between nucleons is approximately $`2.6\times 10^3`$ times stronger the gravity, while the component violating the principle of equivalence is approximately $`8`$ times stronger than gravity 444At leading order in chiral perturbation theory, $`\chi _+`$ is dominated by the strange matrix element $`p|m_s\overline{s}s|p218\mathrm{MeV}`$. This value is somewhat controversial . Reducing the value of $`p|m_s\overline{s}s|p`$ has the effect of boosting the overall strength of the force between nucleons from dilaton exchange. For example, if $`p|m_s\overline{s}s|p=0`$, at short distance the dilaton force between nucleons is enhance to $`5\times 10^3`$ stronger than gravity..

## Appendix B Electromagnetic effects on dilaton coupling to nucleons

The above analysis is apparently incomplete, as it neglects electromagnetic effects. One might think that the inclusion of electromagnetism would change the equivalence violating potential by an amount comparable to that due to the $`(m_um_d)`$ mass difference, as the two sources of isospin violation contribute comparably to the $`np`$ mass splitting. While true, such effects are already accounted for when the physical proton and neutron masses (which include electromagnetic contributions) are used in eq. (15). All additional electromagnetic contributions to equivalence principle violation are relatively suppressed by either a factor of $`1/K`$ or $`\alpha _{em}`$.

Including electromagnetic interactions gives rise to a new coupling of the dilaton at the string scale. In addition to the terms in eq. (1) there is now a term

$`_\varphi ^{(em)}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}(1\sqrt{2}\kappa \varphi )F_{\mu \nu }F^{\mu \nu }.`$ (61)
However when the dilaton couplings are scaled down from the string scale its coupling to the electromagnetic field strength tensor, shown above, does not get enhanced by the large factor $`K`$ and hence we can neglect the dilaton coupling in eq. (61). The divergence of the scale current has a piece proportional to the the square of the electromagnetic field strength tensor and so the low energy dilaton coupling is changed from that in eq. (7) to

$`_\varphi =\varphi {\displaystyle \frac{\kappa }{\sqrt{2}}}K\left[_\mu S^\mu \chi {\displaystyle \frac{\beta (e)}{2e}}F_{\mu \nu }F^{\mu \nu }\right].`$ (62)
The last term proportional to the square of the electromagnetic field strength tensor has neutron and proton matrix elements of order $`\alpha _{em}^2`$ and can be neglected. The dominant electromagnetic effect is the electromagnetic correction to the matrix element of the term in $`_\mu S^\mu `$ proportional to the square of the gluon field strength tensor and it gives the contribution to the neutron and proton masses of order $`\alpha _{em}\mathrm{\Lambda }_{QCD}`$. This has already been included by using the full nucleon masses in eq. (15).


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# Distinguishing between MSSM and NMSSM with 𝑒𝛾 Scattering

## 1 Introduction

Supersymmetry is up to now one of the most attractive theories beyond the Standardmodel (SM). But from the theoretical point of view there exist many ways for a supersymmetric extension of the SM. One of the widely used models is the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model (MSSM) that has minimal content in the Higgs sector. The masses, mixings and couplings of the four neutralinos are determined by the parameters $`M_1`$, $`M_2`$, $`\mu `$ and $`\mathrm{tan}\beta `$. The minimal extension of the MSSM by a higgs singlet field $`S`$ is the Next-to-Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model (NMSSM) . The neutralino sector now contains five neutralinos being mixtures of the MSSM gauginos and higgsinos and an additional singlino $`\stackrel{~}{S}`$. The NMSSM neutralino mixing depends on the parameters $`M_1`$, $`M_2`$, $`\mathrm{tan}\beta `$, the singlet vacuum expectation value $`x`$ and the trilinear couplings $`\lambda `$ and $`\kappa `$ . For large values of $`x`$ the singlino dominated neutralino decouples and the remaining four neutralinos have the same masses and characters as in the MSSM if one identifies $`\mu =\lambda x`$ .

The linear collider (LC) will first run in the $`e^+e^{}`$-mode. However, associated neutralino production $`e^+e^{}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0`$ may not give sufficient evidence for a discrimination between MSSM and NMSSM, especially if this is the only kinematical accesible neutralino production process in the $`e^+e^{}`$-mode. In our contribution we want to investigate the possibilities to distinguish between the models with the help of $`e\gamma `$ scattering $`e\gamma \stackrel{~}{e}_{L/R}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_{1/2}^0e\stackrel{~}{\chi }_{1/2}^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$.

## 2 Cross sections of $`e\gamma \stackrel{~}{e}_{L/R}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0e\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$

We first study the associated production of left/right selectrons and the lightest neutralino (LSP) in $`e\gamma `$ scattering. The high energetic photon comes from Compton back-scattering of laser photons off one electron beam at a LC. The production proceeds via s-channel exchange of an electron and t-channel exchange of selectrons. The formulas for special cases are given in , the complete analytical expressions for the differential and total cross sections for polarized beams will be given in a forthcoming paper . The subsequent decay of the selectrons in electrons and the LSP leads to an $`e^{}`$ and missing energy in the final state. The total cross section for the production and decay in the $`ee`$-cms depends on the polarisation $`P_e`$ of the electron beam, the helicity $`\lambda _L`$ of the laser photon and the helicity $`\lambda _e`$ of the converted electron beam.

In fig. 1 we show the contours of constant total cross sections for the process $`e^{}\gamma \stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{e}_{L/R}e^{}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ in the $`M_2`$-$`\mu `$-plane for the MSSM and the $`M_2`$-$`x`$-plane for the NMSSM for $`\sqrt{s_{ee}}=500`$ GeV. For the calculations we choose the longitudinal polarisation of the electron beam $`P_e=80\%`$, the helicity of the converted electron beam $`\lambda _e=80\%`$ and the helicity of the laser photon $`\lambda _L=100\%`$. This set of polarisations can be achieved at TESLA and leads to the most significant contours. We set $`\mathrm{tan}\beta =3`$, the common scalar mass $`m_0=110`$ GeV and use the GUT relation $`M_1=5/3\mathrm{tan}^2\theta _WM_2`$. The trilinear couplings are choosen as $`\lambda =0.5`$ and $`\kappa =0.1`$ (fig. 1b), $`\lambda =0.5`$ and $`\kappa =0.01`$ (fig. 1c) and $`\lambda =0.1`$ and $`\kappa =0.01`$ (fig. 1d).

If in the NMSSM the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ is dominated by the singlino content the production is supressed, because electron and selectron only couple to the gaugino components of the neutralino. Then the total cross section is smaller than 1 fb in some parameter regions (fig. 1b-d) and probably lies below the detection limit of a $`e\gamma `$ collider. Otherwise one obtains cross sections similar to the MSSM. For $`M_2>0`$ there also exist a small band with 1 fb $`<\sigma <`$ 10 fb (fig. 1c/d). In this region the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ is the mainly singlino-like, but nevertheless it will be very difficult to extract this small signal from the background $`e\gamma W\nu `$ .

## 3 Distinguishing NMSSM and MSSM with $`e\gamma `$ Scattering

In this section we consider two cases: (a) $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ has singlino character and $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^{0,NMSSM}`$ corresponds to $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^{0,MSSM}`$; (b) $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0`$ is singlino dominated and $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ is similar in NMSSM and MSSM. In table 1 we present four reference scenarios I, II (a) and III, IV (b) with fixed $`m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}`$ and $`m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0}`$ for comparison. In all scenarios the lightest MSSM-like neutralino is dominated by gaugino components, which couple to electrons and selectrons, while the higgsino components do not. For $`m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0}>\sqrt{s_{ee}}/2`$ and $`m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}+m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_3^0}>\sqrt{s_{ee}}`$, the only channel for direct production of neutralinos in $`e^+e^{}`$ annihilation is $`e^+e^{}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0`$. However, if one of the neutralinos is mainly singlino this process will be suppressed. The cross sections for the process $`e^+e^{}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0`$ in fig. 2a are calculated with longitudinal polarisations $`P_e^{}=80\%`$ of the electron beam and $`P_{e^+}=60\%`$ of the positron beam. Fig. 2b/c shows the cross sections for $`e^{}\gamma \stackrel{~}{\chi }_{1/2}^0\stackrel{~}{e}_Re^{}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_{1/2}^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ with polarisations $`P_e=80\%`$, $`\lambda _e=80\%`$ and $`\lambda _L=100\%`$ in the reference scenarios. In all scenarios we fix the masses $`m_{\stackrel{~}{e}_R}=180`$ GeV and $`m_{\stackrel{~}{e}_L}=300`$ GeV.

### 3.1 If $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ is singlino-like…

… we expect for $`e^+e^{}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0`$ a production cross section of $`\sigma =0.9`$ fb for scenario I and $`\sigma =0.27`$ fb for scenario II at $`\sqrt{s_{ee}}=500`$ GeV (fig. 2a). The smaller cross section in scenario II is due to the different relative signs of $`m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0}`$ and $`m_{\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0}`$, which leads to cancellations in the interference terms . Now it will be a question of luminosity and background supression, whether the cross sections are measurable. Even if a signal is detected, the decision whether $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ or $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0`$ is the singlino dominated neutralino will be difficult since the cross sections are very similar ($`\sigma =0.9`$ fb in scenario I and $`\sigma =1.1`$ fb in scenario III, see fig. 2a). In $`e\gamma `$ scattering the process $`e^{}\gamma \stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{e}_Re^{}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ will be strongly supressed (see sec. 1). Then the first detectable neutralino production process at a high luminosity collider will be $`e^{}\gamma \stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0\stackrel{~}{e}_Re^{}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$. Fig. 2c shows total cross sections of $`\sigma =3.8`$ fb in scenarios I and II at $`\sqrt{s_{ee}}=500`$ GeV which further increase for higher energies. This process, however, will lead to a completely different final state compared to the LSP-selectron production because of the additional decay of the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0`$ . Therefore one can decide via detection of the $`e\gamma `$ process that the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ is mainly singlino.

If the $`e^+e^{}`$ cross section is too small for detection, the production and decay of $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0`$ together with $`\stackrel{~}{e}_R`$ in $`e\gamma `$ will be the first direct production process of neutralinos that would be measurable at $`\sqrt{s_{ee}}=500`$ GeV with high luminosity. The non-detection of the $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{e}_R`$ production suggests a singlino-like $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ and therefore extended supersymmetry as the underlying theory.

### 3.2 If $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0`$ is singlino-like …

… we expect for $`e^+e^{}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0`$ a production cross section $`\sigma =1.1`$ fb in scenario III and $`\sigma =0.31`$ fb in scenario IV at $`\sqrt{s_{ee}}=500`$ GeV. If one assumes these cross section to be detectable one again can use $`e\gamma `$ scattering to decide which neutralino is singlino dominated. The detection of the process $`e^{}\gamma \stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{e}_Re^{}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ would prove the singlino character of $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0`$. In scenario III and IV one obtains $`\sigma =90`$ fb for $`\sqrt{s_{ee}}=500`$ GeV (fig. 2b).

If, however, the cross section for associated neutralino production in $`e^+e^{}`$ annihilation can not be observed, the process $`e^{}\gamma \stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{e}_Re^{}\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ would be the first process for direct production of neutralinos. But this process alone does not aalow to discriminate between the MSSM and the NMSSM.

## 4 Conclusion

* For a singlino dominated $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ the associated production of selectrons and the LSP in $`e\gamma `$-scattering will be strongly suppressed.
* $`e\gamma \stackrel{~}{\chi }_{1/2}^0\stackrel{~}{e}_{L/R}`$ could be the first process to identify neutralinos and to determine the underlying supersymmetric model.
* If neutralino pair production $`e^{}e^+\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0`$ gives evidence for a neutralino with singlino character, the $`e\gamma `$ process can be used to decide, whether $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_1^0`$ or $`\stackrel{~}{\chi }_2^0`$ is singlino dominated.


text:
# Fano hypersurfaces in weighted projective 4-spaces

A Fano variety is a projective variety whose anticanonical class is ample. A 2–dimensional Fano variety is called a Del Pezzo surface. In higher dimensions, attention originally centered on smooth Fano 3–folds, but singular Fano varieties are also of considerable interest in connection with the minimal model program. The existence of Kähler–Einstein metrics on Fano varieties has also been explored, see \[Bourguignon97\] for a summary of the main results. Here again the smooth case is of primary interest, but Fano varieties with quotient singularities and their orbifold metrics have also been studied.

In any given dimension there are only finitely many families of smooth Fano varieties \[Campana91, Nadel91, KoMiMo92\], but very little is known about them in dimensions 4 and up. By allowing singularities, infinitely many families appear and their distribution is very poorly understood.

A natural experimental testing ground is given by hypersurfaces and complete intersections in weighted projective spaces. These can be written down rather explicitly, but they still provide many more examples than ordinary projective spaces. Experimental lists of certain 3–dimensional complete intersections were compiled by \[Fletcher89\]. In connection with Kähler–Einstein metrics, the 2–dimensional cases were first investigated in \[Demailly-Kollár99\] and later in \[Johnson-Kollár00\].

It is also of interest to study Calabi–Yau hypersurfaces and hypersurfaces of general type in weighted projective spaces. \[Fletcher89\] contains some lists with terminal singularities.

The aim of this paper is threefold.

First, we determine the complete list of anticanonically embedded quasi smooth Fano hypersurfaces in weighted projective 4-spaces. There are 48 infinite series and 4442 sporadic examples (7). As a consequence we obtain that the Reid–Fletcher list (cf. \[Fletcher89, II.6.6\]) of 95 types of anticanonically embedded quasi smooth terminal Fano threefolds in weighted projective 4-spaces is complete (11).

Second, we prove that many of these Fano hypersurfaces admit a Kähler–Einstein metric (15). We also study the nonexistence of tigers on these Fano 3–folds (in the colorful terminology of \[Keel-McKernan99\]).

Third, we prove that there are only finitely many families of quasi smooth Calabi–Yau hypersurfaces in weighted projective spaces of any given dimension (16). This implies finiteness for various families of general type hypersurfaces (18).

###### Definition 1.

For positive integers $`a_i`$ let $`(a_0,\mathrm{},a_n)`$ denote the weighted projective $`n`$-space with weights $`a_0,\mathrm{},a_n`$. (See \[Dolgachev82\] or \[Fletcher89\] for the basic definitions and results on weighted projective spaces.) We always assume that any $`n`$ of the $`a_i`$ are relatively prime. We frequently write $``$ to denote a weighted projective $`n`$-space if the weights are irrelevant or clear from the context. We use $`x_0,\mathrm{},x_n`$ to denote the corresponding weighted projective coordinates. $`P_i(a_0,\mathrm{},a_n)`$ denotes the point $`(x_j=0ji)`$. These are sometimes called the vertices of the weighted projective space. (The vertices are uniquely determined if none of the $`a_i`$ divides another.) The affine chart where $`x_i0`$ can be written as

$`(\text{1}.1)`$
$$^n(y_0,\mathrm{},\widehat{y_i},\mathrm{},y_n)/_{a_i}(a_0,\mathrm{},\widehat{a_i},\mathrm{},a_n).$$

(Here and later $`\widehat{}`$ denotes an omitted coordinate.) This shorthand denotes the quotient of $`^n`$ by the action

$$(y_0,\mathrm{},\widehat{y_i},\mathrm{},y_n)(ϵ^{a_0}y_0,\mathrm{},\widehat{y_i},\mathrm{},ϵ^{a_n}y_n),$$

where $`ϵ`$ is a primitive $`a_i`$th root of unity. The identification is given by $`y_j^{a_i}=x_j^{a_i}/x_i^{a_j}`$. (1.1) are called the orbifold charts on $`(a_0,\mathrm{},a_n)`$.

For any $`i`$, $`(a_0,\mathrm{},a_n)`$ has an index $`a_i`$ quotient singularity at $`P_i`$. For any $`i<j`$, if $`\mathrm{gcd}(a_0,\mathrm{},\widehat{a_i},\mathrm{},\widehat{a_j},\mathrm{},a_n)>1`$, then $`(a_0,\mathrm{},a_n)`$ has a quotient singularity along $`(x_i=x_j=0)`$. These give all the codimension 2 singular subsets of $`(a_0,\mathrm{},a_n)`$.

For every $`m`$ there is a rank 1 sheaf $`𝒪_{}(m)`$ which is locally free only if $`a_i|m`$ for every $`i`$. A basis of the space of sections of $`𝒪_{}(m)`$ is given by all monomials in $`x_0,\mathrm{},x_n`$ with weighted degree $`m`$. Thus $`𝒪_{}(m)`$ may have no sections for some $`m>0`$.

###### 2Anticanonically embedded quasi smooth Fano hypersurfaces.

Let $`X|𝒪_{}(m)|`$ be a hypersurface of degree $`m`$. The adjunction formula

$$K_X𝒪_{}(K_{}+X)|_X𝒪_{}(m(a_0+\mathrm{}+a_n))|_X$$

holds if $`X`$ does not contain any of the codimension 2 singular subsets. If this condition is satisfied then $`X`$ is a Fano variety iff $`m<a_0+\mathrm{}+a_n`$. Frequently the most interesting cases are when $`m`$ is as large as possible. Thus we consider the case $`X_d|𝒪_{}(d)|`$ for $`d=a_0+\mathrm{}+a_n1`$. Such an $`X`$ is called anticanonically embedded.

In most cases, all hypersurfaces of a given degree $`d`$ are singular and pass through some of the vertices $`P_i`$. In these cases the best one can hope is that a general hypersurface $`X_d`$ is smooth in the orbifold sense, called quasi smooth. At the vertex $`P_i`$ this means that the preimage of $`X_d`$ in the orbifold chart $`^n(y_0,\mathrm{},\widehat{y_i},\mathrm{},y_n)`$ is smooth. In terms of the monomials of degree $`d`$ this is equivalent to saying that

$`(\text{2}.1)`$ For every $`i`$ there is a $`j`$ and a monomial $`x_i^{m_i}x_j`$ of degree $`d`$.
$`j=i`$ is allowed, corresponding to the case when the general $`X_d`$ does not pass through $`P_i`$. The condition that $`X_d`$ does not contain any of the singular codimension 2 subsets is equivalent to

$`(\text{2}.2)`$
$$\begin{array}{c}\text{If }\mathrm{gcd}(a_0,\mathrm{},\widehat{a_i},\mathrm{},\widehat{a_j},\mathrm{},a_n)>1\text{ then there is a}\hfill \\ \text{monomial of degree }d\text{ not involving }x_i,x_j\text{.}\hfill \end{array}$$

For $`n3`$, these are the two most important special cases of the general quasi smoothness condition:

$`(\text{2}.3)`$
$$\begin{array}{c}\text{For every }I\{0,\mathrm{},n\}\text{ there is an injection}\hfill \\ \text{ }e:I\{0,\mathrm{},n\}\text{ and monomials}\hfill \\ \text{ }x_{e(i)}_{jI}x_j^{m_{ij}}\text{ of degree }d\text{ for every }iI\text{.}\hfill \end{array}$$

###### Remark 3.

The quasi-smoothness condition in \[Fletcher89, I.5.1\] says that

$`(\text{2}.3^{})`$
$$\begin{array}{c}\text{For every }I\{0,\mathrm{},n\}\text{ either (}\text{2}\text{.3) holds,}\hfill \\ \text{or there is a monomial }_{jI}x_j^{b_j}\text{ of degree }d\text{.}\hfill \end{array}$$

The two versions are, however, equivalent. We prove this by induction on $`|I|`$. Indeed, assume that there is a monomial $`_{jI}x_j^{b_j}`$ of degree $`d`$ and let $`I^{}I`$ be all the indices which are involved in at least one such monomial. By induction (2.3) holds for $`II^{}`$, giving monomials $`x_{e(i)}_{jII^{}}x_j^{b_{ij}}`$ for $`iII^{}`$. By assumption these $`e(i)`$ are not in $`I`$, so we can choose $`I^{}e(II^{})`$ as the image of $`e:I\{0,\mathrm{},n\}`$. (A suitable reordering of the values of $`e`$ may be necessary.)

The computer searches done in connection with \[Fletcher89\] and \[Demailly-Kollár99\] looked at values of $`a_i`$ in a certain range to find the $`a_i`$ satisfying the constraints (2.1-3). This approach starts with the $`a_i`$ and views (2.1-3) as linear equations in the unknown nonnegative integers $`m_i,m_{ij}`$.

In the cases studied in \[Fletcher89\] and \[Demailly-Kollár99\] these searches seemed exhaustive. Aside from one series of examples, the computers produced solutions for low values of the $`a_i`$ and then did not find any more as the range of the allowable values was extended. This of course does not ever lead to a proof that the lists were complete.

A similar search for log Fano hypersurfaces in weighted projective 4–spaces seems much harder. With some reasonably large bounds, say $`a_i100`$, the programs run very slowly and they produce examples where the $`a_i`$ are near 100. It is quite unlikely that any systematic search of this kind could have discovered the example with the largest $`a_0`$:

$`(407,547,5311,12528,18792)`$ with monomials

$$x_4^2,x_3^3,x_1^{59}x_2,x_0x_2^7,x_0^{91}x_1,$$

or the beautiful pair of sporadic examples with largest $`a_4`$:

$`(223,9101,46837,112320,168480)`$ with monomials

$$x_4^2,x_3^3,x_1x_2^7,x_0x_1^{37},x_0^{1301}x_2,\text{and}$$

$`(253,7807,48101,112320,168480)`$ with monomials

$$x_4^2,x_3^3,x_1^{37}x_2,x_0x_2^7,x_0^{1301}x_1.$$

The biggest values of $`a_0`$ are of some interest in connection with the conjectures of \[Shokurov97, 1.3\].

Next we describe the computer programs that led to the list of anticanonically embedded quasi smooth Fano hypersurfaces in weighted projective 4-spaces. The programs, written in C, are available at

```
www.math.princeton.edu/~jmjohnso

```

###### 4Preliminary steps.

In order to find all solutions, we change the point of view. We consider (2.1) to be the main constraint with coefficients $`m_i`$ and unknowns $`a_i`$. The corresponding equations can then be written as a linear system

$`(\text{4}.1)`$
$$(M+J+U)(a_0a_1a_2a_3a_4)^t=(11111)^t$$

where $`M=\mathrm{diag}(m_0,m_1,m_2,m_3,m_4)`$ is a diagonal matrix, $`J`$ is a matrix with all entries $`1`$ and $`U`$ is a matrix where each row has 4 entries $`=0`$ and one entry $`=1`$. The main advantage is that some of the $`m_i`$ can be bounded a priori. Assume for simplicity that $`a_0a_1\mathrm{}a_4`$.

Consider for instance $`m_4`$. The relevant equation is

$$m_4a_4+a_{e(4)}=a_0+a_1+a_2+a_3+a_41.$$

Since $`a_4`$ is the biggest, we get right away that $`1m_33`$. Arguing inductively with some case analysis we obtain that

$`(\text{4}.2)`$
$$3m_216,2m_36,1m_43$$

Thus we have only finitely many possibilities for the matrix $`U`$ and the numbers $`m_2,m_3,m_4`$. Fixing these values, we obtain a linear system

$$(M+J+U)(a_0a_1a_2a_3a_4)^t=(11111)^t,$$

where the only variable coefficients are $`m_0,m_1`$ in the upper left corner of $`M`$. Solving these formally we obtain that

$$a_0=\frac{\alpha _0m_1+\beta _0}{\gamma _2m_0m_1+\gamma _0m_0+\gamma _1m_1+\delta },a_1=\frac{\alpha _1m_0+\beta _1}{\gamma _2m_0m_1+\gamma _0m_0+\gamma _1m_1+\delta }.$$

where the $`\alpha _i,\beta _i,\gamma _i,\delta `$ depend only on $`U`$ and $`m_2,m_3,m_4`$.

We distinguish 3 cases. The first one is the main source of examples. Cases 2 and 3 are anomalies from the point of view of our method. In both cases we ended up experimentally finding strong restrictions on the $`a_i`$. Even with hindsight we do not know how to prove these a priori.

###### Case 1 ($`\gamma _20`$).

In this case the absolute value of

$$\frac{\alpha _0m_1+\beta _0}{\gamma _2m_0m_1+\gamma _0m_0+\gamma _1m_1+\delta }$$

goes to zero as $`m_0,m_1`$ go to infinity. It is not hard to write down the precise condition and a computer check shows that

$$\frac{\alpha _0m_1+\beta _0}{\gamma _2m_0m_1+\gamma _0m_0+\gamma _1m_1+\delta }1\mathrm{min}\{m_0,m_1\}83.$$

###### Case 2 ($`\gamma _2=0,\gamma _0\gamma _10`$ ).

It turns out that if this holds then $`\gamma _0\gamma _1>0`$ and $`a_0,a_1`$ are bounded by 8 for $`\mathrm{min}\{m_0,m_1\}36`$. Moreover, the 3 linear forms

$$\alpha _0m_1+\beta _0,\alpha _1m_0+\beta _1,\gamma _0m_0+\gamma _1m_1+\delta $$

are dependent. This implies that

$$\alpha _1\gamma _1a_0+\alpha _0\gamma _0a_1=\alpha _0\alpha _1.$$

A computer search shows that this is possible only if $`a_0=a_1=1`$.

###### Case 3 ($`\gamma _2=0,\gamma _0\gamma _1=0`$).

It turns out that one of $`\alpha _0m_1+\beta _0,\alpha _1m_0+\beta _1`$ equals $`\gamma _0m_0+\gamma _1m_1+\delta `$. Thus $`a_0=1`$ or $`a_1=1`$. Moreover, we also see by explicit computation that one of the following holds:

$$a_2=a_3=a_4,a_2=a_3=a_4/2\text{or}a_2=a_3/2=a_4/3.$$

###### 5Main Computer Search.

Here we discuss the main case when, in addition to the inequalities (4.2) we also assume that $`3m_183`$. In this case the system (4.1) reduces to a single unknown $`m_0`$. This is very similar to the 4–variable case discussed in \[Johnson-Kollár00\].

We solve formally for $`a_0`$ to get

$$a_0=\frac{\gamma _0}{m_0\alpha +\beta }$$

where $`\alpha ,\beta ,\gamma _0`$ depend only on $`U`$ and $`m_1,m_2,m_3,m_4`$. If $`\alpha 0`$ then we get a bound on $`m_0`$ too, and we are down to finitely many possibilities all together. There are 403455 cases of this. The resulting solutions need considerable cleaning up. Many of them occur multiply and we also have to check the other conditions (2.2-3). Discarding repetitions, we get 15757 cases, out of which 4594 are quasi smooth.

If $`\alpha =0`$ then we get a series solution where the $`a_i`$ are linear functions of a variable $`m_0`$. There are 550122 cases of this. Here the main difficulty is that the program does not produce the series in a neat form. Usually one series is put together out of many pieces according to some congruence condition.

###### 6Additional Cases.

Assume first that we are in Case 2 of (4). Since $`a_0=a_1=1`$, the numbers $`a_1,a_2,a_3,a_4`$ and $`d=a_1+a_2+a_3+a_4`$ satisfy the numerical conditions (2.3). This leads to a lower dimensional problem which is easy to solve.

Case 2 of (4) is even easier. We get solutions of the form

$$(1,a,b,b,b),(1,a,b,b,2b)\text{or}(1,a,b,2b,3b).$$

Applying (2.3) to $`I=\{2,3,4\}`$ gives that $`b|a`$. Thus $`b`$ divides all but one of the weights, so $`b=1`$. This implies that $`a6`$. At any case, all these appear also under Case 2 of (4).

At the end we obtain our first main result:

###### Theorem 7.

The following is a complete list of anticanonically embedded quasi smooth Fano hypersurfaces in weighted projective 4-spaces:

1. 48 infinite series of the form

$$X_{2k(b_1+b_2+b_3)}(2,kb_1,kb_2,kb_3,k(b_1+b_2+b_3)1)\text{for }k=1,3,5,$$

The occurring 3-tuples $`b_1,b_2,b_3`$ are described in (9).
2. 4442 sporadic examples whose list is available at

```
www.math.princeton.edu/~jmjohnso

```

###### 8An error check.

We wrote a program that looked at all 5-tuples satisfying

$$a_0100,a_1200,a_2200,a_3400,a_4600.$$

The program ran for 4 days and produced 3610 quasi smooth examples. These were in complete agreement with the correspondingly truncated list of 4442 sporadic examples.

###### Remark 9.

It turns out that a 3-tuple $`b_1,b_2,b_3`$ appears in (7.1) iff $`|2K|`$ of $`(b_1,b_2,b_3)`$ has a quasi smooth member. The list of these is implicit in Reid’s list of 95 families of singular K3 surfaces in weighted projective 3-spaces. In \[Fletcher89, II.3.3\] they correspond to those quadruplets $`(b_1,b_2,b_3,b_4)`$ for which $`b_4=b_1+b_2+b_3`$. Our 48 3-tuples occured explicitly in \[Yonemura90, Tomari00\] in connection with the study of simple K3 singularities of multiplicity 2.

One direction of this observation is easy to establish in all dimensions.

###### Lemma 10.

Assume that $`|2K|`$ of $`(b_1,\mathrm{},b_n)`$ has a quasi smooth member. Then the general anticanonically embedded Fano hypersurface in

$$(2,kb_1,\mathrm{},kb_n,k(b_1+\mathrm{}+b_n)1)$$

is quasi smooth for $`k=1,3,5,`$

We conjecture that conversely, every infinite series is of this form. It is interesting that every quasi smooth hypersurface in $`(2,kb_1,\mathrm{},kb_n,k(b_1+\mathrm{}+b_n)1)`$ has a codimension 2 singular set. Thus the above conjecture would imply that for every $`n4`$ there are only finitely many anticanonically embedded quasi smooth Fano hypersurfaces with isolated singularities in weighted projective $`n`$-spaces.

It is not hard to check which of the above Fano threefolds have terminal singularities. The families in (7.1) always have nonisolated singularities, and for the remaining cases the conditions of \[Fletcher89, II.4.1\] work. As a consequence, we obtain the following:

###### Corollary 11.

The Reid–Fletcher list (cf. \[Fletcher89, II.6.6\]) of 95 families of anticanonically embedded quasi smooth terminal Fano threefolds in weighted projective 4-spaces is complete. ∎

Next we study the existence of Kähler–Einstein metrics and the nonexistence of tigers on our Fano hypersurfaces. After some definitions we recall the criterion established in \[Johnson-Kollár00\]. In the case of Kähler–Einstein metrics this in turn relies on earlier work of \[Nadel90, Demailly-Kollár99\].

###### Definition 12.

Let $`X`$ be a normal variety and $`D`$ a $``$-divisor on $`X`$. Assume for simplicity that $`K_X`$ and $`D`$ are both $``$-Cartier. Let $`g:YX`$ be any proper birational morphism, $`Y`$ smooth. Then there is a unique $``$-divisor $`D_Y=e_iE_i`$ on $`Y`$ such that

$$K_Y+D_Yg^{}(K_X+D)\text{and}g_{}D_Y=D.$$

We say that $`(X,D)`$ is klt (resp. log canonical) if $`e_i>1`$ (resp. $`e_i1`$) for every $`g`$ and for every $`i`$. See, for instance, \[Kollár-Mori98, 2.3\] for a detailed introduction.

###### Definition 13.

\[Keel-McKernan99\] Let $`X`$ be a normal variety. A tiger on $`X`$ is an effective $``$-divisor $`D`$ such that $`DK_X`$ and $`(X,D)`$ is not klt. As illustrated in \[Keel-McKernan99\], the tigers carry important information about birational transformations of log del Pezzo surfaces. They are expected to play a similar role in higher dimensions.

###### Proposition 14.

\[Johnson-Kollár00\] Let $`X_d(a_0,\mathrm{},a_n)`$ be a quasi smooth hypersurface of degree $`d=a_0+\mathrm{}+a_n1`$.

1. $`X`$ does not have a tiger if $`da_0a_1`$.
2. $`X`$ admits a Kähler–Einstein metric if $`d<\frac{n}{n1}a_0a_1`$.∎

###### Corollary 15.

Of the sporadic series of quasi smooth Fano hypersurfaces given in (7.2), there are 1605 types where none of the members have a tiger and 1936 types where every member admits a Kähler–Einstein metric. This information is contained in the list given in (7.2).

Finally we study the case of Calabi–Yau hypersurfaces and hypersurfaces of general type in weighted projective spaces. For these cases there are finiteness results in all dimensions. The key part is the case of Calabi–Yau hypersurfaces.

###### Theorem 16.

For any $`n`$ there are only finitely many types of quasi smooth hypersurfaces with trivial canonical class in weighted projective spaces $`(a_0,\mathrm{},a_n)`$.

Proof. As in the Fano case, first we look at those hypersurfaces which are quasi smooth at the vertices of $`(a_0,\mathrm{},a_n)`$. This condition is equivalent to a linear system of equations

$`(\text{16}.1)`$
$$(M+J+U)(a_0,\mathrm{},a_n)^t=(0,\mathrm{},0)^t$$

where $`M=\mathrm{diag}(m_0,\mathrm{},m_n)`$ is a diagonal matrix, $`J`$ is a matrix with all entries $`1`$ and $`U`$ is a matrix where each row has $`n`$ entries $`=0`$ and one entry $`=1`$. In the geometric setting the $`m_i`$ and the $`a_i`$ are positive integers, but it will be convenient to allow the $`a_i`$ to be positive real numbers. By the homogenity of the system we may assume that $`a_i=1`$.

Assume now that we have an infinite sequence of solutions $`(a_0(t),\mathrm{},a_n(t))`$ where a priori $`M(t),J(t),U(t)`$ also vary with $`t`$. By passing to a subsequence we may assume that $`J(t),U(t)`$ are constant and each $`a_i(t)`$ converges to a value $`A_i`$. Thus we can write $`a_i(t)=A_i+c_i(t)`$ where $`lim_t\mathrm{}c_i(t)=0`$, $`_iA_i=1`$ and $`_ic_i(t)=0`$. By passing to a subsequence and rearranging, we can also assume that $`I:=\{i:c_i(t)<0\}`$ is independent of $`t`$ and that $`A_0/(c_0(t))`$ is the smallest positive number among $`\{A_i/(c_i(t)):iI\}`$. The quasi smoothness condition at the vertex $`P_0`$ translates into $`m_0(t)a_0(t)+a_j(t)=1`$. $`lim_t\mathrm{}a_0(t)=A_0>0`$ since $`c_0(t)<0`$, hence $`m_0(t)`$ is bounded from above. Thus we may assume that $`m_0(t)=m_0`$ is constant and $`lim_t\mathrm{}m_0c_0(t)+c_j(t)=0`$. $`m_0a_0(t)+a_j(t)=1`$ is equivalent to

$`(\text{16}.2)`$
$$[m_0A_0+A_j]+[m_0c_0(t)+c_j(t)]=1.$$

By the above considerations, (16.2) splits into 2 equations

$`(\text{16}.3)`$
$$m_0A_0+A_j=1\text{and}m_0c_0(t)+c_j(t)=0.$$

Using $`_ic_i(t)=0`$ and the second equation in (16.3) we obtain that

$`(\text{16}.4)`$
$$\underset{iI}{}c_i(t)=\underset{iI}{}c_i(t)c_j(t)=m_0c_0(t).$$

Multiplying by $`A_0/c_0(t)`$ and using the special choice of $`A_0/c_0(t)`$ we get that

$`(\text{16}.5)`$
$$m_0A_0\underset{iI}{}c_i(t)\frac{A_0}{c_0(t)}\underset{iI}{}A_i.$$

Combining with the first equation of (16.3) we get that

$`(\text{16}.6)`$
$$1=m_0A_0+A_jA_j+\underset{iI}{}A_i\underset{i=0}{\overset{n}{}}A_i=1.$$

This implies that all inequalities in (16.4–6) are equalities. Hence $`A_k,c_k(t)`$ are zero for $`kI\{j\}`$. By assumption the $`a_k(t)`$ are positive, so $`I\{j\}=\{0,\mathrm{},n\}`$. Moreover, the ratios $`A_i/c_i(t)`$ are all the same for $`iI`$.

These imply that, up to rearranging the indices, the $`a_i(t)`$ are of the form

$$(A_0(1c(t)),\mathrm{},A_{n1}(1c(t)),A_n+c(t)_{i=0}^{n1}A_i).$$

Consider next the equation

$$m_n(A_n+c(t)_{i=0}^{n1}A_i)+A_j(1c(t))=1,$$

where for notational simplicity we allow $`j=1`$ with $`A_1=0`$. For large $`t`$ this implies that $`_{i=0}^{n1}A_i=A_j`$, which is not possible for $`n2`$. Thus $`A_n=0`$ and the solutions become

$`(\text{16}.7)`$
$$(A_0(1c(t)),\mathrm{},A_{n1}(1c(t)),c(t))\text{where}_{i=0}^{n1}A_i=1.$$

To get quasi smoothness, we need to understand all monomials of degree $`a_i`$, which amounts to finding all integer solutions of $`b_ia_i=1`$. In our case, for large $`t`$ there are no solutions with $`b_n=0`$ which means that every hypersurface of degree $`a_i`$ contains the hyperplane $`(x_n=0)`$, hence they are all reducible. Thus the solutions (16.7) do not correspond to quasi smooth hypersurfaces.∎

###### Remark 17.

The solutions (16.7) do correspond to interesting series of singularities. Namely, for every integer solution of $`_{i=0}^{n1}\frac{1}{m_i}=1`$ they give an infinite series of singularities

$$(x_0^{m_0}+\mathrm{}+x_{n1}^{m_{n1}}+x_n^k)x_n=0𝔸^{n+1}\text{for }k=1,2,\mathrm{}\text{.}$$

These singularities are weighted homogeneous and semi log canonical (see \[Kollár et al.92, 16.2.1\] for the definition) but not isolated. By adding a general higher degree term, we get isolated log canonical singularities.

###### Corollary 18.

For any $`n`$ and $`k>0`$ there are only finitely many families of quasi smooth hypersurfaces $`X(a_0,\mathrm{},a_n)`$ such that $`\omega _X𝒪_X(k)`$.

Proof. Assume that

$$X=(F(x_0,\mathrm{},x_n)=0)(a_0,\mathrm{},a_n)$$

is quasi smooth of degree $`d`$ and $`\omega _X𝒪_X(k)`$. Then

$$X^{}:=(F(x_0,\mathrm{},x_n)+x_{n+1}^d+\mathrm{}+x_{n+k}^d=0)(a_0,\mathrm{},a_n,\stackrel{ktimes}{\stackrel{}{1,\mathrm{},1}})$$

is also quasi smooth of degree $`d`$ and $`\omega _X𝒪_X`$. Thus we are done by (16).∎

###### Remark 19.

The finiteness result (18) is in accordance with the conjectures \[Kollár et al.92, 18.16\]. On the other hand, (16) seems to be a more special finiteness assertion.

###### Acknowledgments .

We thank J. McKernan for helpful comments and references. Partial financial support was provided by the NSF under grant number DMS-0096268.

Princeton University, Princeton NJ 08544-1000

```
jmjohnso@math.princeton.edu

```

```
kollar@math.princeton.edu

```


text:
# Origin of the highest energy cosmic rays

## 1 Introduction

The origin of the highest energy particles observed in the universe continues to present a major challenge to physicists. These particles reach energies as high as $`\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}10}^{20}`$ eV. If protons, their flux is expected to drop sharply at $`\mathrm{5\hspace{0.17em}10}^{19}`$ eV due to the interaction with the microwave background, commonly referred to as the Greisen-Zatsepin-Kuzmin- or GZK-cutoff after its discoverers. However, the number of particles known to be beyond $`10^{20}`$ eV continues to increase, with now 14 published , and a further 10 expected from new observations with HIRES and a reanalysis of the Yakutsk data.

There are three basic difficulties:

First, we need to find a site that can produce particles at such energies . There is only one class that has been argued to require protons at such energies in the source, namely radio galaxies with powerful jets and/or hot spots, such as M87  or Cyg A. M87 has been under suspicion to be the primary source for ultra high energy cosmic rays for a long time, e.g., . Gamma ray bursts are another possible class.

Secondly, there is the additional difficulty of getting these particles to us, that is, overcoming the losses in the bath of the cosmological microwave background. That implies that the source should not be very much further than 20 Mpc.

The third difficulty is the explanation of the nearly isotropic distribution of the arrival directions of these events.

There are several ways out of these difficulties.

Here we present the consequences of introducing a magnetic Galactic wind in analogy to the solar wind. The magnetic field of the wind bends the particle orbits without adding substantial travel time.

## 2 A model for a magnetic galactic wind

It has long been expected that our Galaxy has a wind, e.g., akin to the solar wind . Recent modelling  shows that such winds can be quite fast, and ubiquituous.

It seems plausible that this wind is powered by the combined action of cosmic rays and magnetic fields and starts in the hot phase of the interstellar medium seen in X-rays by ROSAT .

Parker has shown  that in a spherical wind the azimuthal part of the magnetic field quickly becomes dominant with $`B_\varphi \mathrm{sin}\theta /r`$ in polar coordinates.

Cosmic ray driving is similar to radiation driving of winds in massive stars, and so  magnetic fields can lead to an increase of the momentum of the wind.

The data on the sign of the azimuthal component show that in the part of the sky most relevant for calculating orbits of energetic charged particles in our Galaxy, the field points to the direction of galactic longitude about 90 degrees . That means immediately that positively charged particles traced backwards have their origin above us, at high positive galactic latitudes.

We adopt the simplest possible model. We assume that the magnetic field in the galactic wind has a dominant azimuthal component, and ignore all other components. We assume that this azimuthal component has the same sign everywhere . Most measures of magnetic field underestimate its strength. Therefore we will consider for reference a model which has a field strength near the Sun of 7 microGauss; this is close to the best estimates for the total local field . The second parameter, the distance to which this wind extends, is more uncertain: Our Galaxy dominates its near environment well past our neighbor, M31, the Andromeda galaxy, and might well extend its sphere of influence to half way to M81. Therefore we will adopt as outer the halo wind radius half the distance to M81, 1.5 Mpc.

## 3 Tracing the path backwards

To follow the particle trajectories in the Galactic halo we trace protons backwards, e.g.,  from their arrival direction at Earth. We use the 14 published cosmic ray events above 1020 eV, the list from Watson (included in ) and the new list from AGASA . There is a big uncertainty with the energy estimate of the highest energy Yakutsk  event, which we therefore exclude from the present analysis, and hence we arrive at a final tally of 13 events used.

The interesting result of these model calculations is that the directions of all tracks point North. All events are consistent with arising originally from Virgo A. Since these particles are assumed to be accelerated out of cosmic gas, about 1/10 of all particles may be Helium nuclei with the same energy per particle. If the two highest energy events are in fact He nuclei, all 13 events point within 20 degrees of Virgo A.

If Virgo A is indeed the acceleration site of the highest energy cosmic ray events, they all require additional systematic bending at a ten to twenty degree level. Such bending could be easily accomodated within the plausible magnetic field strength within the supergalactic sheet from here to Virgo .

How critical are our assumptions for these results?

The assumption of the symmetry of the magnetic field above and below the Galactic disk is important.

The value of the magnetic field, here adopted as 7 microGauss, for the wind near the Sun, is a key parameter. If the magnetic field were considerably weaker, the focussing would be largely removed.

The scale of the Galactic wind here 1.5 Mpc, is not a critical parameter, since the calculations show that most of the bending happens within the first few 100 kpc.

## 4 Discussion and implications

This particular model can be tested in several ways; some of these tests are direct tests with data, and others take the form of a consistency check:

The most important test is obviously with more data, and the HIRES data are soon to be released and will allow straight tests to be made. For instance, the apparent focussing is fully maintained at $`\mathrm{5\hspace{0.33em}10}^{19}`$ eV.

The very concept of a magnetic wind, driven by cosmic rays, but with an initial magnetic field as strong as that in the disk, needs to be examined more closely.

There is one important consequence: If the model proposed here could be confirmed, then it would constitute strong evidence that all powerful radiogalaxies produce high energy cosmic rays, and that they do this at a good fraction of their total power output. This then implies that compact radio galaxies  do provide a good test bed for particle interactions, since they have a large screen of interstellar gas around the radio hot spots and jets as seen in mm-wavelength radio data . There the paradigm is materialized of having a gigantic accelerator, and a beam dump. These radio galaxies may be used for particle interaction experiments in the sky. If a significant correlation in arrival direction between ultra high energy cosmic rays and this specific class of radio quasars could be confirmed , then properties of new particles could be constrained.

In summary, we propose here that a very simple model for a Galactic wind rather analoguous to the Solar wind, may allow particle orbits at $`10^{20}`$ eV to be bent sufficiently to allow “super-GZK” particles to get here from M87, and also explain the apparent isotropy in arrival directions.

Acknowledgments. This work was started at the 1999 astrophysics summer school at the Vatican Observatory; both E.-J.A. and P.L.B. are grateful to George Coyne, S.J. and his colleagues for inviting us and for the fruitful and inspiring atmosphere at these schools. P.L.B, G.M.-T. and T.St. would like to acknowledge also useful discussions with Rainer Beck, Venya Berezinsky, Pasquale Blasi, E. Boldt, Glennys Farrar, J.L. Han, Anatoly Ivanov, Randy Jokipii, Frank Jones, Hyesung Kang, Phil Kronberg, Martin Lemoine, Friedrich Meyer, Hinrich Meyer, Biman Nath, Dongsu Ryu, Michael Salomon, Günther Sigl, Alan Watson, Arnold Wolfendale and many others. We thank Phil Kronberg for a careful reading of an earlier manuscript. Work with P.L.B. is partially supported by a DESY-grant, G.M.-T. is partially supported by the Brazilian agencies FAPESP and CNPq, T.St. is supported by NASA grant NAG5–7009, and PLB and TST have jointly a grant from NATO.


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# Untitled Document

The histories interpretation:

stability instead of consistency?

C J S Clarke,

Faculty of Mathematical Studies,

University of Southampton,

Southampton, SO17 1BJ, UK

Abstract Using a reformulation of conventional results in decoherence theory, a condition is proposed for singling out a distinguished class of histories which includes those which use the “pointer basis” of Zurek.

1. What’s good and bad about consistent histories The basic problem faced by any extension of quantum theory outside the laboratory realm of Bohr’s interpretation can be expressed by the slogan (Giulini et al., 1996) “how does the classical world emerge?” Unpacking the meaning of “classical world” we can extract several interlinked problems:

1. How is it that the logic of propositions about macroscopic objects is classical (that is, a Boolean lattice) whereas the logic of quantum propositions is an orthocomplemented lattice (Beltrametti & Cassinelli, 1981)?

2. Where the classical behaviour is, as a consequence of underlying quantum processes, indeterministic, then

(a) what determines the particular Boolean sub-lattice of quantum states that can be expressed as corresponding classical states (why does the Schrödinger’s cat Gedankenexperiment have the result that we believe it would have)?

(b) how is the statistical mechanics of these probabilistically chosen classical states derived from the dynamics of quantum theory?

(c) on each individual occurrence, what determines which one of the classically allowed states is in fact actualised?

3. When the classical behaviour is (at least to a high accuracy) deterministic, how is the classical dynamics derived from the quantum dynamics?

I would claim that, apart from Bohm’s interpretation, which relies on intrinsically unobservable hidden variables, and interpretations involving essentially new and untested physics, existing interpretations can solve 2b and 3 in many situations, but can only partially solve the others. The consistent histories approach (Omnès, 1999a; Giulini et al., 1996) has proceeded futhest with resolving these problems, and has done so in a way that introduces the minimum of controversional ontological scafolding (many worlds etc). I want to propose a modification of the histories approach that solves 1 and 2a more satisfactorily. 2c remains a problem for me, and for versions of the histories approach other than that of (Omnès, 1999b), who deconstructs the question on metaphysical grounds.

Attempts to solve 1 and 2a rest (as does 2b) on the phenomenon of decoherence which ensures that a statistical ensemble of macroscopic systems linked to microscopic states, all initially prepared in the same state, will as a result of environmental influences, evolve to an ensemble described by a density matrix that is almost exactly diagonal in a basis (the pointer basis, Zurek, 1981; Giulini et al., 1996) adapted to the distinct classical states of the macroscopic system. This leaves two unresolved difficulties, however, which I will justify shortly:

A. The consistency condition used by the histories programme (see (2) below) in fact implies, tautologously without any physics, that the histories obey classical logic (in the sense of satisfying probability sum rules: see Dowker and Kent (1996) eqn (2.5)). Thus 1 is not being solved by a physical explanation, but is in effect just being put in “by hand.”

B. Even if we accept the consistency condition, which forces a Boolean lattice, how do we know that there is not some other Boolean lattice, in addition to that defined by macroscopically distinguishable states, which still satisfies the consistency condition? If that were the case, then the consistency condition would not determine the lattice of classical states and 2a would not be solved.

Both these problems are of physical interest; for, if we could clearly articulate physical conditions under which a unique Boolean lattice emerged in the quantum limit, then it would become of great interest, and would be theoretically grounded, to look for areas where there were slight departures from a Boolean lattice. Some aspects of biology might provide evidence of such areas (Ho, 1998). Point B rests (i) on the circumstances that no rigorous mathematical proof exists of the uniqueness of the pointer basis in generating a classical logic, and (ii) on the demonstration by Dowker and Kent (1996) that, both in specific examples and in general on dimension-counting grounds, this basis is not unique. The latter argument is not cast-iron, since it could be that special symmetries invalidate the general dimension-counting arguments; but the onus is now on those who claim uniqueness of the pointer basis to demonstrate it rigorously. Point A, however, provides the main focus of this paper

2. Consistent histories and the stability condition  The consistent histories formalism

I assume here that we are dealing with conventional quantum mechanics over a given Hilbert space $``$. The version of the histories formalism that I am using here is taken from Dowker and Kent (1996) except that my notation interchanges their sub- and superscripts. This version is not explicitly relativistic, but I do not regard this as essential for the point being made here.

A history set is a pair $`\text{H}=(\rho ,(\sigma _1,\sigma _2,\mathrm{},\sigma _n))`$ for some $`n`$ where

$`\rho `$ is a density matrix (unit trace non-negative Hermitean operator on $``$)

for each $`i`$, $`\sigma _i=(P_1^{(i)},\mathrm{},P_{k_i}^{(i)})`$ with the $`P_j^{(i)}`$ being projections (interpreted as Heisenberg picture operators) satisfying

$`P_j^{(i)}P_k^{(i)}=\delta _{jk}P_j^{(i)}`$

$`_{j=1}^{k_i}P_j^{(i)}=1`$

Note that through these conditions we are putting in by hand the classicality of the propositions for any one instant, but we are not demanding it overall in the way that the different $`\sigma _i`$ relate to each other.

A history belonging to H is a sequence $`H=(P_1,\mathrm{},P_n)`$ with $`P_i\sigma _i`$ for all $`i`$ and the probability of $`H`$ in the initial state $`\rho `$ is given by

$$\text{P}(\rho ;H):=\text{Tr}(P_n\mathrm{}P_1\rho P_1\mathrm{}P_n).$$
$`(1)`$
The consistency condition on H in its strongest form (the arguments given above also apply to many of the weaker forms) is that

$$\text{Tr}(P_{i_n}^{(n)}\mathrm{}P_{i_1}^{(1)}\rho P_{j_1}^{(1)}\mathrm{}P_{j_n}^{(n)})=\delta _{i_1j_1}\mathrm{}\delta _{i_nj_n}\text{P}(\rho ;(P_{i_1}^{(1)},\mathrm{}P_{j_n}^{(n)})).$$
$`(2)`$
The stability condition This condition is based on the well known distinction (see, for example, the survey in Tegmark, 2000) between the dynamical timescale $`t_d`$ and the decoherence timescale $`t_{dc}`$ for a system. The dynamical time scale is determined by the system Hamiltonian, independently of the environment; whereas both are involved in decoherence. Dynamical timescales can vary widely: for human experience, based on neuronal firing rates, this might be $`10^3`$s, for cosmology in the present era $`10^{15}`$s and for electon-positron pair production (where the logic would be highly non-classical) $`10^{20}`$s. The principle of the stability condition is that the probabilities for histories should not vary (as a function of the timing of their propositions) on a timescale (the stability timescale) that is very much less than the dynamical timescale $`t_d`$. We cannot, for instance, claim to be talking about human experience and then introduce a proposition whose probability changes on a timescale of $`10^{10}`$s. It is straight forward (see §3 below) to see that the probabilities for “unphysical” propositions (referring, for example, to superposed states of the human brain) vary on the decoherence timescale, and so this condition does precisely what is required.

This proposal still has an air of the ad hoc about it, and needs to be related to a more fundamental theory. But it is, unlike the consistency condition, non-trivial (in the sense of point A, that it does not beg the question it is trying to solve) and is sufficiently grounded physically to point the way to a correct fundamental theory. The rest of the paper is devoted to spelling out in more detail how this operates in practice.

We consider a situation where we are examining the effect of a proposition $`P`$ posed after a subhistory $`H^{(i)}=(P_1,\mathrm{},P_i)`$ with an initial state of $`\rho `$. Thus we are concerned with $`\text{P}(\rho ;H^{(i)},P)`$. Now let $`P_t`$ denote the proposition obtained by evolving $`P`$ for time $`t`$, namely

$$P_t:=\mathrm{exp}(iHt/\mathrm{})P\mathrm{exp}(iHt/\mathrm{}).$$
$`(3)`$
Then we define the repetition probability by

$$p(t):=\text{P}(\rho ;H^{(i)},P,P_t).$$
$`(4)`$
Note that $`p(0)>p(t)`$ for $`t>0`$.

We can now define the (repetition) stability timescale $`t_s`$ for $`P`$ in this context. The idea is elementary but its formulation rather tedious; again, an indication that the theory cannot be in any sense fundamental. We want to define the stability timescale as the inverse of the gradient of $`p(t)`$ near $`t=0`$ (more precisely: the slope of the chord from $`t=0`$ to a suitable point). Unfortunately, $`p(t)`$ may be subject to small fluctuations due to perturbations from background noise (of a normal physical kind unconnected with decoherence) which could give rise to large gradients on a very small timescale. We define the magnitude of these possible fluctuations away from $`t=0`$ by setting

$$V(t,c):=\underset{\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{tt_1<t_2t_d}{t_2t_1c}}{sup}\frac{|p(t_2)p(t_1)|}{t_2t_1}$$
$`(5)`$
Then let $`F`$ be the ratio of the slope of the chord from $`t=0`$ to the slope of the following fluctuations:

$$F(t):=\frac{p(0)p(t)}{t}/V(t,t)$$
$`(6)`$
having a supremum of $`F^{}`$, and let $`t^{}`$ be the smallest point (it exists!) for which

$$\underset{tt^{}}{lim\; sup}F(t)=F^{}.$$
$`(7)`$
The stability timescale is then the inverse slope of the chord to $`t^{}`$:

$$t_s:=\frac{t^{}}{p(0)p(t^{})}.$$
$`(8)`$
The stability condition is then the requirement on each $`\sigma _i`$ that $`t_s>\lambda t_d`$ where $`\lambda `$ is some chosen small parameter.

3. Stability and decoherence

This section fills in the obvious connection between stability and decoherence, showing that as a result of the latter, the stabiity condition rules out superpositions of macroscopically distinct states, and thus gives rise to a Boolean lattice. Decoherence involves the setting where $`=_E_S`$ where $`S`$ refers to the system and $`E`$ to the environment. It is hard to give a completely general formulation of the results concerning decoherence and the pointer basis (see Giulini et al., 1996); but a model of the idea sufficient for our purposes might be the proposition that each $`\sigma _i`$ can be chosen so that

(a) For all $`k`$, $`\text{Range}P_k^{(i)}=_EV_k^{(i)}`$ for a subspace $`V_k^{(i)}`$ of $`_S`$

(b) If $`|eV_k^{(i)}`$ and $`|fV_l^{(i)}`$ for $`kl`$, then $`e|\rho _S|f0`$ in the decoherence timescale, where $`\rho _S`$ is the density matrix projected to $`_S`$ by tracing over environment variables.

Consider, then, the possibility of measuring a projection on a superposition $`|k=a|e+b|f`$ (i.e. a “live cat $`+`$ dead cat” situation) with $`|a|^2+|b|^2=1`$. Thus let $`P=|kk|`$. Let $`\rho ^{}=H^{(i)T}\rho H^{(i)}`$ where T denotes transpose. Then from (4)

$$p(t)=\text{Tr}P_tP\rho ^{}PP_t.$$
$`(9)`$
The effective density matrix following $`P`$, projected onto the system variables, is

$$\rho ^{}:=\left(\frac{P\rho ^{}P}{p(0)}\right)_S.$$
$`(10)`$
This is a unit trace matrix proportional to $`|kk|`$, and hence is equal to $`|kk|`$ ($`=P`$), the non-zero terms, in a basis containing $`|e`$ and $`|f`$ being

$$\rho ^{}\left[\begin{array}{cc}|a|^2& a\overline{b}\\ \overline{a}b& |b|^2\end{array}\right].$$
$`(11)`$
The off-diagonal terms decay with the decoherence time $`t_{dc}`$, while the diagonal terms are stable and so from (9) and (10), noting that tracing over the environment commutes with $`P`$ (but not with $`H`$)

$$p(t)=p(0)[\begin{array}{cc}a& b\end{array}]\left[\begin{array}{cc}|a|^2& ϵ\\ ϵ& |b|^2\end{array}\right]\left[\begin{array}{c}\overline{a}\\ \overline{b}\end{array}\right]$$
$`(12)`$
where $`|ϵ|e^{t/t_{dc}}`$. Thus

$$p(t)p(0)(|a|^4+|b|^4)=p(0)(12|a|^2|b|^2).$$

This will violate the stability condition unless either $`|a|`$ or $`|b|`$ is very small, that is, unless the superposition is very close to a pure macroscopic state, as required.

4. Conclusion  I have stressed that this is a provisional theory with ad hoc elements. There seems to be a growing feeling among some workers (e.g. Zeh, 2000) that the inadequacies of the current situation can only be overcome by a theory of mind; a view that I would endorse, though without thereby endorsing a many-minds metaphysics. There remains, however, a considerable gap between approaches to a theory of mind starting from the requirements of quantum theory (e.g. Donald, 1995) and those starting from psychology (e.g. Velmans, 2000). Work under way to bridge this gap (e.g. Clarke, 2000) still needs to develop an adequate dynamics; but the requirement of a stability condition can now be used to provide a clear goal in this work.

References

Beltrametti, Enrico G & Cassinelli, Gianni (1981) The Logic of Quantum Mechanics, Addison Wesley, Reading, Mass. Clarke, C J S (2000) “Consciousness and non-hierarchical physics” in The physical nature of consciousness, Ed. Philip van Looke, Jon Benjamins Publishing Donald, M (1995) “A mathematical characterisation of the physical structure of observers, Foundations of Physics, 25, 529-571 Dowker, F and Kent, A (1996) “On the consistent histories approach to quantum mechanics” J. Stat. Phys. 82 1575 Omnès, Roland (1999a) Understanding Quantum Mechanics Princeton University Press, Princeton NJ Omnès, Roland (1999b) Quantum philosophy Princeton University Press, Princeton NJ Giulini, D, Joos, E, Kiefer, C, Kupsch, J, Stamatescu, I-O & Zeh, H D (Eds) (1996) Decoherence and the appearance of a classical world, Springer-Verlag, Berlin and Heidelberg Ho, M-W (1998) The Rainbow and the Worm (2nd Edition) London: World Scientific Tegmark, M (2000) Phys. Rev. E 61 (4) 4194–4206 Velmans, M (2000) Understanding Consciousness Routledge Zeh, H. D. (2000) “The problem of conscious observation in quantum mechanical description”, Found. Phys. Lett. 13 221-233 Zurek, W. H. (1981) Phys. Rev. D, 24 1516


text: # 1 Loop diagrams contributing to charge radius at 𝒪(1/"HEAVY"²). The single internal line denotes an intermediate octet state while the double line denotes a decuplet state.