text:
# Multi-mode description of an interacting Bose-Einstein condensate

## Abstract

We study the equilibrium dynamics of a weakly interacting Bose-Einstein condensate trapped in a box. In our approach we use a semiclassical approximation similar to the description of a multi-mode laser. In dynamical equations derived from a full $`N`$-body quantum Hamiltonian we substitute all creation (and annihilation) operators (of a particle in a given box state) by appropriate c-number amplitudes. The set of nonlinear equations obtained in this way is solved numerically. We show that on the time scale of a few miliseconds the system exhibits relaxation – reaches an equilibrium with populations of different eigenstates fluctuating around their mean values.

Bose-Einstein condensation of an ideal gas is a famous example of a phase transition which relies purely on quantum statistics. The recent experimental achievement of Bose-Einstein condensation in a dilute gas of trapped alkali atoms  triggered a revival of interest in various properties of the condensate. Some old but fundamental problems of statistical description of the Bose-Einstein condensate have been extensively studied. In particular, the issue of microcanonical and canonical fluctuations of a noninteracting condensate was solved successfully . On the contrary, a closed system description of fluctuations of the weakly interacting condensate seems to be still a controversial problem at least at temperatures close to the critical one . The standard mean field description based on the Bogolubov approach fails  at the critical temperature, as then the order parameter vanishes. On the other hand many excited states become highly occupied particularly in the case of realistic systems consisting of a finite number of atoms. The complexity of the problem grows further when one is interested in an estimation of the characteristic time scale of the condensate fluctuations. The calculation of the two-time correlation function requires obviously a dynamical approach.

In the following, we present an approach that allows the study of the time evolution of an interacting Bose gas. The problem is very difficult and existing approaches lead to numerical algorithms which are hard to implement. The first one  invokes quantum kinetic theory and leads to a quantum Boltzmann master equation. The second one  is based on the separation of the “classical” mean field describing the condensate from its fluctuations. The fluctuations are quantal in nature and the dynamics couples averages of both their normal and anomalous parts to the condensate mean field. None of the two mentioned methods seems to be capable of handling a realistic case of a large number of particles at a relatively high temperature.

The first problem one encounters in describing the interacting condensate is the real N-body nature of the system. The link between this problem and the traditional “giant matter wave” description is not straightforward. The only exception is the case of a gas trapped in a box with periodic boundary conditions. Here the symmetry of the potential uniquely enforces the form of the eigenstates of the one-particle density matrix regardless the interaction. Due to the symmetry, the condensate can be associated with the ground state of the trap. Therefore, to avoid all ambiguities related to the identification of the condensate we are going to study here the system in a box with periodic boundary conditions .

We want to present our approach rooted in the theory of multi-mode lasers. Let us start with a general formulation of the N-body problem. The second-quantized Hamiltonian for the atomic system confined in a box with periodic boundary conditions and interacting via pairwise contact potential may be written in the following form:

$$H=\mathrm{d}^3r\mathrm{\Phi }^{}\frac{p^2}{2m}\mathrm{\Phi }+\frac{V\mathrm{}g}{2}\mathrm{d}^3r\mathrm{\Phi }^{}\mathrm{\Phi }^{}\mathrm{\Phi }\mathrm{\Phi },$$
(1)
where $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ is an atomic field operator, $`V=L^3`$ is a volume of the system ($`L`$ being a size of the box) and $`g=\frac{4\pi \mathrm{}a}{mV}`$ characterizes the atom-atom interactions in the low-energy, s-wave approximation ($`a`$ being the scattering length and $`m`$ – the mass of the atom). The field $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ is expanded in natural modes of the system – the plane waves:

$$\mathrm{\Phi }(𝐫)=\frac{1}{\sqrt{V}}\underset{𝐤}{}\mathrm{exp}(i𝐤𝐫)a_𝐤,$$
(2)
where $`a_𝐤`$ are bosonic annihilation operators, and $`𝐤=\frac{2\pi }{L}𝐧`$ with $`n_i=0,\pm 1,\pm 2,\mathrm{}`$ ($`i=x,y,z`$). With this substitution the Hamiltonian assumes its final form:

$$\frac{H}{\mathrm{}}=\xi \underset{𝐤}{}n^2a_𝐤^{}a_𝐤+\frac{1}{2}g\underset{𝐤,𝐤^{},𝐤^{\prime \prime }}{}a_{𝐤+𝐤^{}𝐤^{\prime \prime }}^{}a_{𝐤^{\prime \prime }}^{}a_𝐤^{}a_𝐤,$$
(3)
where $`\xi =\frac{\mathrm{}}{2m}(\frac{2\pi }{L})^2`$. After elimination of a fast time dependence with the substitution $`a_𝐤=\mathrm{exp}(i\xi n^2t)\alpha _𝐤`$, the Heisenberg equations of motion for the operators $`\alpha _𝐤`$ acquire the following form:

$$\dot{\alpha }_𝐤=ig\underset{𝐤^{},𝐤^{\prime \prime }}{}\mathrm{exp}\left[2i\xi (𝐧𝐧^{})(𝐧𝐧^{\prime \prime })t\right]\alpha _{𝐤^{}+𝐤^{\prime \prime }𝐤}^{}\alpha _𝐤^{}\alpha _{𝐤^{\prime \prime }}.$$
(4)
Solving the nonlinear operator equations (4) is difficult. The complexity of the problem obviously requires some approximation. A semiclassical approximation is particularly well suited for the description of a finite system at temperatures below the critical one, except the region close to the absolute zero.

The semiclassical approximation consists in replacing all operators $`\alpha _𝐤`$ by c-number complex amplitudes (we are not going to introduce a separate notation for corresponding complex fields). At very low temperatures only the lowest lying states are macroscopically occupied and quantum fluctuations in excited states become important (see  for comparison). Therefore, the relevant range of temperatures for the applicability of our model excludes temperatures close to zero. From the viewpoint of the Bogolubov method , such an approach is legitimate as indeed many modes are macroscopically populated, i.e. their occupation is greater than quantum fluctuations.

The semiclassical approximation leads to nonlinear differential equations which must be solved numerically. The first observation is that Eqs.(4) can be viewed as a set of Hamilton equations for the complex degrees of freedom. Our approximate dynamics preserves the number of particles: $`N=_𝐤\alpha _𝐤^{}\alpha _𝐤`$, as well as the total energy of the system. It therefore corresponds to a genuine microcanonical description. Moreover, the resulting equations resemble the famous Fermi-Pasta-Ulam  problem of a system of harmonic oscillators coupled by a nonlinear interaction. A one-dimensional version of this dynamics has been studied recently  in the context of the pure Bose-Einstein condensate ($`T=0`$) reloaded from a harmonic into a rectangular trap. Equations studied here, however, in spite of a formal analogy, describe quite a different physical situation. Our complex amplitudes are not expansion coefficients of the condensate wave function in some convenient basis. They represent a number of coupled “mean fields” – a natural extension of the condensate mean field of the Bogolubov approach. Let us notice that if we start with $`100\%`$ occupation of the $`𝐤=0`$ mode and keep only this mode in the model we simply recover the standard Gross-Pitaevskii equation for the interacting condensate.

For the initial conditions we assume “Bose-Einstein-like” occupation of different trap states. While calculating the energy in order to determine this distribution, however, we neglect the energy of interparticle interactions. This is evidently not the equilibrium distribution for the interacting system. Moreover, a population of individual states does not specify initial conditions uniquely. It defines the modulus of the corresponding amplitude but says nothing about its phase. In our approach each mode is assigned an initial, randomly chosen, phase. Any subsequent dynamics depends on the initial phases and, in a sense, a single simulation describes a single experimental realization. Microcanonical expectation values would require, therefore, an average over these initial phases. As we have checked, instead of doing this, it is enough to start with some random phases and trace the system evolution for a sufficiently long time. The observed self-averaging can be attributed to the ergodicity of the studied dynamics. Contrary to the 1-D analogue which is completely integrable , the 3-D version of the dynamics may be chaotic. We make use of this fact in our simulations and avoid averaging over phases of the complex amplitudes.

Values of the parameters in the model are $`\xi =`$71.373 Hz, $`N=10^5`$ and $`g=`$0.018 Hz (the atomic mass and the scattering length are those of 87Rb and the size of the box is equal to the Thomas-Fermi radius of a condensate of $`N`$ atoms in a trap with frequency of $`\omega _0=2\pi \mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}80}`$ Hz). We performed our calculations for the model with 729 modes ($`n_i=4,\mathrm{},4`$, $`i=x,y,z`$). Further increasing of the number of modes does not lead to a substantial change in the results for the case studied in this paper. Our calculations show that after a time of the order of a few miliseconds the system reaches a dynamical equilibrium. The mean occupation of the condensate (k=0 mode) stabilizes at some value and on larger time scales (of the order of a second) it only fluctuates around this mean value – see Figure 1.

The similarity to the Fermi-Pasta-Ulam problem may cast some doubts on the genuine ergodicity of the dynamics investigated in this paper . Originally, Fermi, Pasta, and Ulam intended to test the ergodic hypothesis in the chain of coupled harmonic oscillators. However, they observed a quasiperiodic behavior identified by the returns of energy to the initial (lowest) mode. This kind of behavior has been discovered also by J.H. Eberly and co-workers  in a resonantly coupled system composed of a two-level atom and a single mode of a monochromatic electromagnetic field being initially in a coherent state. Occurrence of the so called revivals in the system proves the quantum nature of the electromagnetic field. In our calculations the largest time scale for which we have studied the dynamics was of the order of one second. On this time scale we did not observe any revivals but this, obviously, does not exclude the possibility of revivals on much larger time scales. In fact our numerical simulations involve a finite number of modes and so the numerical implementation inevitably leads to a quasiperiodic evolution.

Since the evolution (see Eqs.(4)) is Hamiltonian, the most natural choice of independent variables are the energy and the particle number. The number of particles was fixed through all our calculations ($`N=10^5`$) and the energy of the system was the control parameter. Traditionally, however, the temperature, not the energy, is used as an independent thermodynamic variable. Calculation of the microcanonical temperature requires monitoring of the entropy of the system for different energies. Although, in principle, this can be done , we think that the energy is a much better characteristic of the system. The reason is twofold. First of all, it is not obvious whether the ergodic hypothesis can be applied in the studied case and therefore whether the notion of the temperature can be unambiguously introduced. Secondly, in realistic experiments it is rather the final energy of thermal atoms which is detected in destructive time-of-flight measurements. The temperature is a parameter fitted to the observed velocity distribution.

In Figure 2 we present probability distributions of the condensate population. The different colors signify different total energies. Let us stress two main features which can be seen in Figure 2: (i) positions of the maxima of these distributions correspond to a mean (time-averaged) occupation of the Bose-Einstein condensate, (ii) the spread of these distributions around the most probable value is a measure of condensate fluctuations. The figure clearly indicates that the condensate population decreases monotonically with energy while fluctuations become larger.

The occupation and the fluctuations of the interacting condensate are shown in detail in Figure 3, where the mean occupation of the condensate is depicted (in blue). We see that the condensate disappears at the energy per particle close to $`E/\mathrm{}=2000`$ Hz.

Figure 3 also presents fluctuations of the condensate (in red). Both the mean occupation and the fluctuations of the condensate are smooth functions of the energy. They do not show any discontinuity signifying a phase transition because they correspond to a finite system of $`N=10^5`$ atoms. Let us notice, however, that fluctuations reach the maximum value at the energy per particle close to $`E/\mathrm{}=1450Hz`$. Moreover, this value of energy corresponds to the inflection point of the mean occupation of the condensate. Both curves distinguish the same characteristic value of the energy. Close to this energy the system undergoes rapid changes. This characteristic energy corresponds to the critical energy for the Bose-Einstein condensation.

In conclusions: first of all, we have proposed a very efficient approach to the time evolution of an interacting Bose-Einstein condensate. This approach is valid for a wide range of temperatures except for very small ones. We have shown that the method works very well in a realistic and relevant range of parameters: energy, number of particles, and interaction strength. We calculated the mean occupation as well as the fluctuations of the interacting condensate by averaging the corresponding time-dependent quantities. We did not explore all possible applications of our method. Our aim was rather to show its potential. We believe that the semi-classical approach presented here is perfectly suited for studying many properties of an interacting condensate which so far, due to their complexity, were beyond direct theoretical investigations. In particular, it may shed new light at the unresolved problem of nucleation of a condensate and other dynamical phenomena. The method is easily extendible to more than one field which allows to study coupled (via photoassociation or Feshbach resonances) atomic and molecular systems (see ) or other mixtures of Bose gases at finite temperatures.

K.R. and K.G. are supported by the subsidy of the Foundation for Polish Science. M.G. acknowledges support by Polish KBN grant no 2 P03B 078 19. Part of the results has been obtained using computers at the Interdisciplinary Centre for Mathematical and Computational Modeling (ICM) at Warsaw University.


format: text

text:
# Directed Flow of Baryons in Heavy-Ion Collisions

## I Introduction

Collective flows of various types (radial, directed, elliptic,…) observed experimentally in heavy-ion collisions reveal a space–momentum correlated motion of strongly interacting nuclear matter. This collective motion is essentially caused by the pressure gradients arising during the time evolution in the collision, and hence opens a promising way for obtaining information on the equation of state (EoS) and, in particular, on a possible phase transition. Recently, this feature has stimulated a large number of experimental and theoretical investigations on flow effects (cf. review articles ).

Manifestations of the deconfinement phase transition have been considered already some time ago by Shuryak, Zhirov  and van Hove . Since a phase transition slows down the time evolution of the system due to softening of the EoS, the authors expect around some critical incident energy a remarkable loss of correlation between the observed particle momenta and the reaction plane, and hence a reduction of the directed flow. Assuming a first-order phase transition Hung, Shuryak  and Rischke et al.  have recently obtained quantitative predictions for heavy-ion collisions. For an expanding fireball Hung and Shuryak expect the softest point effect around $`E_{lab}=30`$ A$``$GeV. Within a one-fluid hydrodynamic model Rischke et al. show that the excitation function of the directed flow exhibits a deep minimum near $`E_{lab}=6`$ A$``$GeV. However, preliminary experimental results  in this energy range do not confirm these predictions. In the following, we report on a study of the directed flow within a two-fluid hydrodynamic model  for the statistical mixed-phase EoS  which is adjusted to available lattice QCD data.

## II Equation of state within the mixed-phase model

Our consideration is essentially based on the recently proposed Mixed-Phase (MP) model  which is consistent with available QCD lattice data . The underlying assumption of the MP model is that unbound quarks and gluons may coexist with hadrons forming a homogeneous quark/gluon–hadron phase. Since the mean distance between hadrons and quarks/gluons in this mixed phase may be of the same order as that between hadrons, the interaction between all these constituents (unbound quarks/gluons and hadrons) plays an important role and defines the order of the phase transition.

Within the MP model  the effective Hamiltonian is expressed in the quasiparticle approximation with density-dependent mean-field interactions. Under quite general requirements of confinement for color charges, the mean-field potential of quarks and gluons is approximated by

$$U_q(\rho )=U_g(\rho )=\frac{A}{\rho ^\gamma };\gamma >0$$
(1)
with the total density of quarks and gluons

$$\rho =\rho _q+\rho _g+\underset{j}{}\nu _j\rho _j,$$

where $`\rho _q`$ and $`\rho _g`$ are the densities of unbound quarks and gluons outside of hadrons, while $`\rho _j`$ is the density of hadron type $`j`$ and $`\nu _j`$ is the number of valence quarks inside. The presence of the total density $`\rho `$ in (1) implies interactions between all components of the mixed phase. The approximation (1) mirrors two important limits of the QCD interaction. For $`\rho 0`$, the interaction potential approaches infinity, i.e. an infinite energy is necessary to create an isolated quark or gluon, which simulates the confinement of color objects. In the other extreme case of large energy density corresponding to $`\rho \mathrm{}`$, we have $`U_q=U_g=0`$ which is consistent with asymptotic freedom.

The use of the density-dependent potential (1) for quarks and the hadronic potential, described by a modified non-linear mean-field model , requires certain constraints to be fulfilled, which are related to thermodynamic consistency . For the chosen form of the Hamiltonian these conditions require that $`U_g(\rho )`$ and $`U_q(\rho )`$ do not depend on temperature. From these conditions one also obtains a form for the quark–hadron potential .

A detailed study of the pure gluonic $`SU(3)`$ case with a first-order phase transition allows one to fix the values of the parameters as $`\gamma =0.62`$ and $`A^{1/(3\gamma +1)}=250`$ MeV. These values are then used for the $`SU(3)`$ system including quarks. As is shown in Fig.1 for the case of quarks of two light flavors at zero baryon density ($`n_B=0`$), the MP model is consistent with lattice QCD data providing a continuous phase transition of the cross-over type with a deconfinement temperature $`T_{dec}=153`$ MeV. For a two-phase approach based on the bag model a first-order deconfinement phase transition occurs with a sharp jump in energy density $`\epsilon `$ at $`T_{dec}`$ close to the value obtained from lattice QCD.

Though at a glimpse the temperature dependences of the energy density $`\epsilon `$ and pressure $`p`$ for the different approaches presented in Fig.1 look quite similar, there are large differences revealed when $`p/\epsilon `$ is plotted versus $`\epsilon `$ (cf. Fig.2, left panel). The lattice QCD data differ at low $`\epsilon `$, which is due to difficulties within the Kogut–Susskind scheme  in treating the hadronic sector. A particular feature in the MP model is that, for $`n_B=0`$, the softest point of the EoS, defined as a minimum of the function $`p(\epsilon )/\epsilon `$ , is not very pronounced and located at comparatively low values of the energy density: $`\epsilon _{SP}0.45`$ GeV/fm3, which roughly agrees with the lattice QCD value . This value of $`\epsilon `$ is close to the energy density inside the nucleon, and hence, reaching this value indicates that we are dealing with a single big hadron consisting of deconfined matter. In contradistinction, the bag-model EoS exhibits a very pronounced softest point at large energy density $`\epsilon _{SP}1.5`$ GeV/fm3 .

The MP model can be extended to baryon-rich systems in a parameter-free way . As demonstrated in Fig.2 (right panel), the softest point for baryonic matter is gradually washed out with increasing baryon density and vanishes for $`n_B\text{ }>0.4n_0`$ ($`n_0`$ is normal nuclear matter density). This behavior differs drastically from that of the two-phase bag-model EoS, where $`\epsilon _{SP}`$ is only weakly dependent on $`n_B`$ . It is of interest to note that the interacting hadron gas model has no softest point at all and, in this respect, its thermodynamic behavior is close to that of the MP model at high energy densities .

These differences between the various models should manifest themselves in the dynamics discussed below.

## III Two-fluid hydrodynamic model

In contrast to the one-fluid hydrodynamic model, where local instantaneous stopping of projectile and target matter is assumed, a specific feature of the dynamical two-fluid description is a finite stopping power. Experimental rapidity distributions in nucleus–nucleus collisions support this specific feature of the two-fluid model. In accordance with , the total baryonic current and energy-momentum tensor are written as

$`J^\mu `$ $`=`$ $`J_p^\mu +J_t^\mu ,`$ (2)
$`T^{\mu \nu }`$ $`=`$ $`T_p^{\mu \nu }+T_t^{\mu \nu },`$ (3)
where the baryonic current $`J_\alpha ^\mu =n_\alpha u_\alpha ^\mu `$ and energy-momentum tensor $`T_\alpha ^{\mu \nu }`$ of the fluid $`\alpha `$ are initially associated with either target ($`\alpha =t`$) or projectile ($`\alpha =p`$) nucleons. Later on – while heated up – these fluids contain all hadronic and quark–gluon species, depending on the model used for describing the fluids. The twelve independent quantities (the baryon densities $`n_\alpha `$, 4-velocities $`u_\alpha ^\mu `$ normalized as $`u_{\alpha \mu }u_\alpha ^\mu =1`$, as well as temperatures and pressures of the fluids) are obtained by solving the following set of equations of two-fluid hydrodynamics

$`_\mu J_\alpha ^\mu `$ $`=`$ $`0,`$ (4)
$`_\mu T_\alpha ^{\mu \nu }`$ $`=`$ $`F_\alpha ^\nu ,`$ (5)
where the coupling term

$`F_\alpha ^\nu =n_p^sn_t^sV_{rel}{\displaystyle 𝑑\sigma _{NNNX}(s)(pp_\alpha )^\nu }`$ (6)
characterizes friction between the counter-streaming fluids. Here, $`n_\alpha ^s`$ and $`(pp_\alpha )`$ denote respectively the scalar density of the fluid and the 4-momentum transfer gained by a particle of the fluid $`\alpha `$ after collision with a particle of the counter-streaming fluid. The cross sections $`d\sigma _{NNNX}`$ take into account all elastic and inelastic interactions between the constituents of different fluids at the invariant collision energy $`s^{1/2}`$ with the local relative velocity $`V_{rel}=[s(s4m_N^2)]^{1/2}/2m_N^2.`$ The average in (6) is taken over all particles in the two fluids which are assumed to be in local equilibrium intrinsically . The set of Eqs. (4) and (5) is closed by an EoS, which is naturally the same for both colliding fluids.

The friction term $`F_\alpha ^\nu `$ in Eq. (5) originates from both elastic and inelastic $`NN`$ collisions. The latter give rise to a direct emission of mesons in addition to the thermal mesons in the fluids. In the present version only for the pions the direct emission is included by the additional equations

$`_\nu J_\pi ^\nu `$ $`=`$ $`n_p^sn_t^sV_{rel}{\displaystyle 𝑑\sigma _{NN\pi X}},`$ (7)
$`_\mu T_\pi ^{\mu \nu }`$ $`=`$ $`n_p^sn_t^sV_{rel}{\displaystyle 𝑑\sigma _{NN\pi X}p_\pi ^\nu },`$ (8)
where $`p_\pi `$ is the 4-momentum of an emitted direct pion. These equations together with (5) provide the total energy–momentum conservation

$`_\mu (T_\pi ^{\mu \nu }+T_p^{\mu \nu }+T_t^{\mu \nu })=0.`$ (9)
It is assumed  that in the subsequent evolution these direct pions interact neither with the fluids nor with each other. This is a reasonable assumption at relativistic energies, simulating a long formation time of these direct pions. At moderate energies, where the latter argument does not hold in general, the number of direct pions is negligible compared to the number of thermal pions.

For the calculation of the friction force (6), approximations of $`N`$-$`N`$ cross-sections are used. It was found  that a part of the friction term, which is related to the transport cross-section, may be well parametrized by an effective deceleration length $`\lambda _{\mathrm{eff}}`$ with a constant value $`\lambda _{\mathrm{eff}}5`$ fm. However, there are reasons to consider $`\lambda _{\mathrm{eff}}`$ as a phenomenological parameter, as it was pointed out in . First, the value of $`\lambda _{\mathrm{eff}}`$ is highly sensitive to the precise form of parameterization of the free cross-sections which, in addition, may be essentially modified by in-medium effects. Furthermore, the model neglects the interactions of direct pions both with each other and with baryons, as well as the direct emission of other mesons which are produced quite abundantly at SPS energies. Due to all these effects the stopping power at SPS energies is somewhat underestimated . This shortcoming of the model is cured by an appropriate choice of the $`\lambda _{\mathrm{eff}}`$ value as

$$\lambda _{\mathrm{eff}}=a\mathrm{exp}(b\sqrt{s})$$

with $`a=6.6`$ fm and $`b=0.106`$ GeV-1 adjusted to the rapidity distributions of nucleons and pions in central Au+Au collisions at AGS and SPS energies.

Following the original paper , it is assumed that a fluid element decouples from the hydrodynamic regime, when its baryon density $`n_B`$ and densities in the eight surrounding cells become smaller than a fixed value $`n_f`$. A value $`n_f=0.8n_0`$ was used for this local freeze-out density which corresponds to the actual density of the frozen-out fluid element of about 0.5$`n_0`$ to 0.7$`n_0`$.

## IV Collective flow from heavy-ion collisions

For central nucleus–nucleus collisions only the isotropic transverse expansion, or transverse radial flow, develops due to the azimuthal symmetry of a system. The presence of the reaction plane for non-central collisions destroys this symmetry and gives rise to various patterns of collective motion generated by compressed and excited nuclear matter created during the collision. For example, the directed (or sideward) flow characterizes the deflection of emitted hadrons away from the beam axis within the reaction plane. In particular, one defines the differential directed flow by the mean in-plane component $`p_x(y)`$ of the transverse momentum at a given rapidity $`y`$. This deflection is believed to be quite sensitive to the elasticity or softness of the EoS.

The $`p_x(y)`$ distributions of baryons are shown in Fig.3 for Au+Au collisions at $`E_{lab}=10`$ A$``$GeV calculated for different EoS at an impact parameter $`b=3`$ fm. In general, the characteristic $`S`$-shape of the distribution is reproduced, demonstrating a definite anti-correlation between nucleons bounced-off from the target and projectile regions. One should keep in mind that the protons bound in observed complex particles (e.g., in deuterons) are not excluded in our calculations. Therefore, all hydrodynamic results should be compared to the triangle points in Fig.3, where nucleons from complex particles do contribute. The MP and interacting hadronic models***The interaction in the hadron model is taken into account in the same manner as that in the hadronic sector of the MP model . give similar results, both getting into error bars of these triangle points, though the flow in the MP model is slightly lower due to softening of EoS near the crossover phase transition. This softening is stronger for the bag-model EoS. However, one should note that different versions of

transport codes, which do not account for a phase transition, also give a reasonable description of $`p_x(y)`$ (e.g., see the comparison with RQMD results in ). Therefore, convincing evidence on a possible phase transition, based solely on the data at a single bombarding energy, is hardly possible.

The rapidity dependence of the mean in-plane transverse momentum can be quantified in terms of the derivative at mid-rapidity

$$F_y=\frac{dp_x(y)}{dy}|_{y=y_{cm}},$$
(10)
which is quite suitable for analyzing the flow excitation function. The slope parameter $`F_y`$ calculated with the MP-model EoS is presented in Fig.4 (upper panel) together with available experimental points covering the whole range of incident energies. The results describe correctly the decrease of $`F_y`$ with increasing energy and shows essentially no dependence on impact parameter for semi-central collisions. It was shown experimentally  that the directed flow is larger for heavier fragments. As mentioned before, hydrodynamic calculations deal with primordial nucleons, and hence they describe the mean value of $`F_y`$ for free nucleons and nucleons bound in deuterons and heavier fragments. Therefore, our hydrodynamic results lie between the experimental points for identified protons (open circles in Fig.4) and the data  (full circles in Fig.4) for intermediate mass fragmentsFor complex particles the value $`F_y`$ was deduced from $`p_x`$ per baryon. The FOPI data for intermediate mass fragments are often scaled by factor 0.7 to make absolute values comparable to those for $`p,d,\alpha `$ . We do not use this scaling factor. Note that everywhere we deal with $`F_y`$ defined by Eq.(10), which differs from the frequently used flow parameter $`F=F_yy_{cm}`$. The extra beam-rapidity factor $`y_{cm}`$ obscures a relative role of dynamical effects in the energy dependence of the directed-flow slope parameter. . This effect is particularly strong for energies below $`E_{lab}1`$ A$``$GeV, where the baryonic flow is largest (and heavy fragments in the mid-rapidity range are abundant).

To our knowledge no other hydrodynamic calculations of $`F_y(E_{lab})`$ have been reported. Therefore, we compare our results with transport calculations in the lower panel of Fig.4. The ARC and ART are cascade models, while the RQMD takes also into account mean-field effects. Though all these models agree with experimental data at $`E_{lab}10`$ A$``$GeV (considered as a reference point), values of $`F_y`$ at lower energies are clearly underestimated, as is evident from comparison with preliminary results of the E895 Collaboration  (see empty squares in Fig.4). Recently, a good description of experimental points (including the E895 data) was reported within a relativistic BUU (RBUU) model . The good agreement with experiment was achieved by a special fine tuning of the mean fields involved in the particle propagation.

It is of interest to mention that the calculated value of $`F_y`$ for the baryon flow becomes negative (antiflow) for beam energies $`\text{ }>100`$ A$``$GeV, while the experiment  gives a small but positive value even at 158 A$``$GeV. The reason of this antiflow is a wiggle in the $`p_x(y)`$ distribution arising in hydrodynamic results within a narrow mid-rapidity interval $`|\delta y|\text{ }<1`$ due to a peculiar interplay between the transverse radial and directed flows. The possibility of such an effect was noticed in  some time ago and later also observed in the UrQMD transport calculations . However, actual measurements have been taken at larger rapidities and then extrapolated into this unmeasured region . Therefore, more accurate data in the mid-rapidity region are necessary to clarify this behavior.

The directed flow can be characterized by another quantity which is less sensitive to possible rapidity fluctuations of the in-plane momentum. Such a quantity is the average directed flow which is defined by

$$P_x=\frac{{\displaystyle 𝑑p_x𝑑p_y𝑑yp_x\left(E\frac{d^3N}{dp^3}\right)}}{{\displaystyle 𝑑p_x𝑑p_y𝑑y\left(E\frac{d^3N}{dp^3}\right)}},$$
(11)
where the integration in the c.m.system runs over the rapidity region $`[0,y_{cm}]`$. The calculated excitation functions for the average directed flow of baryons within different models are shown in Fig.5. Conventional (one-fluid) hydrodynamics for pure hadronic matter  results

in a very large directed flow due to the inherent instantaneous stopping of the colliding matter. This instantaneous stopping is unrealistic at high beam energies. If the deconfinement phase transition, based on the bag-model EoS , is included into this model, the excitation function of $`P_x`$ exhibits a deep minimum near $`E_{lab}6`$ A$``$GeV, which manifests the softest-point effect of the bag-model EoS depictured in the right panel of Fig.2.

The result of two-fluid hydrodynamics with the MP EoS noticeably differs from the one-fluid calculations. After a maximum around 1 A$``$GeV, the average directed flow decreases slowly and smoothly. This difference is caused by two reasons. First, as follows from Fig.2, the softest point of the MP EoS is washed out for $`n_B\text{ }>0.4`$. The second reason is dynamical: the finite stopping power and direct pion emission change the evolution pattern. The latter point is confirmed by comparison to three-fluid calculations with the bag EoS  plotted in the lower panel of Fig.5. The third pionic fluid in this model is assumed to interact only with itself neglecting the interaction with baryonic fluids. Therefore, with regard to the baryonic component, this three-fluid hydrodynamics  is completely equivalent to our two-fluid model and the main difference is due to the different EoS. As seen in Fig.5, the minimum of the directed flow excitation function, predicted by the one-fluid hydrodynamics with the bag EoS, survives in the three-fluid (nonunified) regime but its value decreases and its position shifts to higher energies. If one applies the unification procedure of , which favors fusion of two fluids into a single one, and thus making stopping larger, three-fluid hydrodynamics practically reproduces the one-fluid result and predicts in addition a bump at $`E_{lab}40`$ A$``$GeV.

## V Conclusions

We have studied relativistic nuclear collisions within 3D two-fluid hydrodynamics combined with different EoS, including that of the statistical mixed-phase model of the deconfinement phase transition, developed in . It has been shown that the directed flow excitation functions $`F_y`$ and $`P_x`$ for baryons are sensitive to the EoS, but this sensitivity is significantly masked by nonequilibrium dynamics of nuclear collisions. Nevertheless, the results indicate that the widely used two-phase EoS, based on the bag model  and giving rise to a first-order phase transition, seems to be inappropriate. The neglect of interactions near the deconfinement temperature results in an unrealistically strong softest-point effect within this two-phase EoS. In fact, its prediction of a minimum in $`P_x(E_{lab})`$ near $`E_{lab}6`$ A$``$GeV has not been confirmed experimentally . However, accurate experimental investigations of the differential directed flow and flow excitation functions in the energy region between AGS and SPS are still highly demanded not only in searching for a shifted minimum of $`P_x(E_{lab})`$, but also in clarifying the physics of a possible negative slope (antiflow) of the baryonic directed flow $`F_y`$. This antiflow is particularly sensitive to the EoS. While for the EoS in the MP model the antiflow is predicted at incident energies only above 100 A$``$GeV, it occurs already at 8 A$``$GeV, when the bag EoS is used .

In this respect a dramatic phenomenon of the cracked nut proposed recently as a hydrodynamic signature of the QCD phase transition at RHIC and LHC energies  looks questionable. The authors argue that the softest point in the EoS may lead to the development of two shells at the edge of the almond-like initial fireball, which are then cracked by internal pressure and separated, resulting in a specific flow pattern. However, this speculation was based on the bag-model EoS. The application of the QCD-consistent EoS of the MP model to this problem would be interesting.

The directed flow is the first coefficient in the Fourier decomposition of the azimuthal momentum distribution of particles . The second coefficient, the elliptic flow, is expected to be more sensitive to the EoS and some hints of the phase transition have been indicated by an analysis of the measured excitation function for the elliptic flow (see review articles ). The study of the elliptic flow within two-fluid hydrodynamics for the mixed-phase model EoS is in progress.

## ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We are grateful to V. Russkikh for making his hydrodynamic code available to us. We thank P. Danielewicz, B. Friman and E. Kolomeitsev for useful discussions. Yu.B.I., E.G.N. and V.D.T. gratefully acknowledge the hospitality at the Theory Group of GSI, where this work has been done. This work was supported in part by DFG (project 436 RUS 113/558/0) and RFBR (grant 00-02-04012). Yu.B.I. was partially supported by RFBR grant 00-15-96590.


text:
# Constraints on color dipole-nucleon cross section from diffractive heavy quarkonium production

## 1 Introduction

Recently hard diffractive processes in QCD have attracted considerable theoretical and experimental interests. In particular, diffractive photo- and leptoproductions of vector mesons off the proton, $`\gamma ^{()}+pV(\rho ^0,\omega ,\varphi ,J/\psi ,\mathrm{})+p`$, provide crucial constraints on gluon dynamics at small-$`x`$. In the target rest frame, this process can be described by the color dipole picture, where the incoming photon undergoes $`q\overline{q}`$ fluctuations and these components subsequently interact with the target nucleon. Within this picture, a number of exclusive and inclusive processes can be formulated in terms of a universal color dipole-nucleon cross section by virtue of the QCD factorization theorem.

Behavior of the dipole-nucleon cross section $`\sigma _{dip}(b)`$ is of great interest, where $`b`$ is a transverse size of the dipole, especially for intermediate region ($`b`$ 0.3-0.4fm). There are several phenomenological works to determine the dipole cross section to reproduce the experimental data. In this work, we calculate the dipole-nucleon cross section within perturbative QCD. Hence, we deal with the process which contains a hard scale such as a large momentum transfer $`Q^2,t`$ or the heavy quark mass. Since we are interesetd in the vector meson production at HERA energy, typically $`x10^3`$, we do not cosider the saturation of the gluon density at small-$`x`$.111If we focus on much smaller-$`x`$, e.g. $`x10^5`$, we should include the saturation effects on the dipole-nucleon cross section. We discuss how resulting dipole cross section differs from the well-known perturbative $`\sigma _{dip}b^2`$ behavior, and calculate observables which are sensitive to the behavior of the dipole cross section.

## 2 Hard color dipole cross section

Leading order diagrams for dipole-nucleon scattering, $`q\overline{q}(q)+p(p)q\overline{q}(q+\mathrm{\Delta })+p(p\mathrm{\Delta })`$, are shown in Fig.1. With the unintegrated gluon density of the proton $`f(x,l_T)`$, the dipole cross section at forward limit, $`t=\mathrm{\Delta }^2=0`$, is expressed as

$`\sigma _{dip}={\displaystyle \frac{4\pi ^2\alpha _s}{3}}{\displaystyle ^{Q^2}}𝑑l_T^2\left[1J_0(bl_T)\right]{\displaystyle \frac{f(x,l_T^2)}{l_T^4}}`$ (1)
where $`Q^2`$ is the virtuality of the incoming photon which sets the scale of the process, and $`x,l_T`$ are longitudinal momentum fraction and transverse momentum of the gluon, respectively. Our calculation is essentially based on the $`k_T`$-factorization scheme. Relation between $`Q^2`$ and the transverse distance $`b`$ is studied in ref. .

The unintegrated gluon density is not precisely known at present. In principle, there is a $`Q^2`$ dependence in $`f(x,l_T^2,Q^2)`$, and such a scale dependence can be studied, say, by solving CCFM equation, although we do not incorporate it in this work. Here, we simply assume that the unintegrated gluon density is related to the conventional gluon distribution measured in deep inelastic scattering via

$`f(x,l_T)l_T^2{\displaystyle \frac{xG(x,l_T^2)}{l_T^2}}.`$ (2)
Before going to evaluate eq. (1) explicitly, we shall show an approximate expression for the small size dipole. Assuming $`bl_T<<1`$ and keeping terms up to second order of $`(bl_T)`$, we rewrite eq. (1) as

$`\sigma _{dip}={\displaystyle \frac{\pi ^2\alpha _s}{3}}b^2xG(x,Q^2)`$ (3)
We refer this approximation as the small dipole approximation (SDA), in which the dipole cross section has a simple geometrical expression $`\sigma _{dip}b^2`$. This expression is frequently used for various applications. It is clear that this approximation works well for small-$`b`$ region, or, in other words, the process with large $`Q^2`$.

Now we come back to eq. (1). To integrate out eq. (1), we use the parametrization of the gluon distribution function. However, available parametrizations are known for $`Q^2`$ a few $`\text{GeV}^2`$. Here, we follow one of the prescriptions made in ref. : the linear extrapolation for $`Q^2`$ below $`Q_0^2`$,

$`G(x,Q^2)=\{\begin{array}{cccccccccccccccccccc}G(x,Q^2)Q^2Q_0^2& & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & \\ \frac{Q^2}{Q_0^2}G(x,Q_0^2)Q^2Q_0^2& & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & & \end{array}`$ (6)
where $`Q_0^2`$ is an initial input scale of the parametrizations $`1\text{GeV}^2`$.

Calculated dipole cross section is shown in Fig.2 at $`x=10^3`$. Solid curve denotes our full result eq. (1), while the dashed one indicates the result with SDA (3). Both results agree at small $`b<0.2`$fm as expected. However, difference between them is substantial at $`b=0.30.4`$fm. Since we use the perturbative technique, the result at $`b1`$fm cannot be justified. Nevertheless, there is a distinct deviation at intermediate $`b`$, which is crucial for observables discussed in the following sections. To get the full result of Fig.2, we used CTEQ5m with the linear extrapolation. We have also used several sets of parametrization of the gluon distribution and other approximation scheme for the low $`Q^2`$ region. The difference is about $`1020\%`$.

## 3 $`\psi ^{}`$ to $`J/\psi `$ ratio

Using the dipole cross section, one can write the diffractive vector meson production amplitude symbolically as;

$`𝒜=\psi _\gamma \sigma _{dip}\psi _V`$ (7)
where $`\psi _\gamma ,\psi _V`$ are light-cone wave functions of the photon and vector meson, respectively. In eq. (7) integrations are performed over $`z`$, longitudinal momentum fraction of a heavy quark, and $`b`$. Typical scale of this process is $`Q_{eff}^2=Q^2/4+m^2`$ where $`m`$ is the heavy quark mass.

The SDA approach is adopted to evaluate the $`J/\psi `$ production in refs. , and gives reasonable results in agreement with the data. However, as pointed out by Hoyer and Peigné very recently, the ratio of $`\psi ^{}`$ to $`J/\psi `$ photoproduction cross sections calculated in SDA is much smaller than the measured values, when one uses realistic non-relativistic quark models to obtain the charmonium wave functions. The formula used in SDA is obtained by assuming that $`(bl_T)`$ is small as discussed in section 2. However, the quark model indicates that the size of $`\psi ^{}0.8\text{fm}`$ is twice as large as the radius of $`J/\psi `$. Hence, the validity of SDA is questionable for $`\psi ^{}(2S)`$ case. We may expect considerable contributions from the overlap of the large size color dipole and $`\psi ^{}`$ wave function. Above argument motivates us to calculate the diffractive $`J/\psi `$ and $`\psi ^{}`$ productions without resorting to the small dipole approximation.

We obtain the results shown in Fig.3 with the dipole cross section of Fig.2. Calculation without (with) the small dipole approximation is depicted by the solid (dashed) curve. For large $`Q^2`$ the difference between them becomes small as expected. However, around $`Q^2=0`$, the full calculation with eqs. (1) and (2) is clearly larger than the result obtained by eq. (3) by factor about 2, and shows a reasonable agreement with the experimental data.

We also consider the production of $`\mathrm{{\rm Y}}`$-states. Results for $`\mathrm{{\rm Y}}^{}(2S)/\mathrm{{\rm Y}}(1S)`$ and $`\mathrm{{\rm Y}}^{}(3S)/\mathrm{{\rm Y}}(1S)`$ are consistent with those obtained by SDA. SDA is already enough for the $`\mathrm{{\rm Y}}`$ production due to the large bottom quark mass.

## 4 $`t`$-slope of heavy quarkonium production

Measured diffractive production cross section of the vector meson at small momentum transfer, $`t0`$, can be parametrized as,

$`{\displaystyle \frac{d\sigma }{dt}}=\left({\displaystyle \frac{d\sigma }{dt}}\right)_{t=0}\text{exp}(Bt)`$ (8)
where the diffractive slope $`B`$ is a function of $`W,Q^2,t`$ in general. At low $`t`$, we may decompose the $`t`$-slope $`B`$ as

$`B=B_{dip}+B_{Soft}+\mathrm{},`$ (9)
where $`B_{dip}`$ indicates contributions from the color dipole-nucleon dynamics, and the remainder expresses other possible contributions including the soft nucleon structure $`B_{Soft}`$.

The contribution from the dipole part for small $`t`$ is given by

$`B_{dip}\psi _\gamma b^2\sigma _{dip}\psi _V.`$ (10)
Our results for $`B_{dip}`$ are shown in Fig.4 for $`J/\psi ,\psi ^{}`$, although $`B_{dip}`$ cannot be directly compared with the data. Here, $`L`$ and $`T`$ denote the longitudinal and transverse polarizations of the photon. For $`J/\psi `$, results with the full dipole cross section and SDA give almost the same behavior. However, for $`\psi ^{}`$, there is a clear difference. Such large differences come from the intermediate-$`b`$ behavior of the dipole cross section. In turn, the $`t`$-slope of the $`\psi ^{}`$ production could be useful to constrain the behavior of the dipole-nucleon cross section for $`b>0.3`$fm.

Let us consider the difference of $`t`$-slopes, $`B_{J/\psi }B_\psi ^{}`$. Because the contribution from soft nucleon structure in eq. (9) is independent of wave functions of the vector mesons, it must be the same for $`J/\psi `$ and $`\psi ^{}`$ productions. Therefore, it is easy to arrive at a relation;

$`B_{J/\psi }B_\psi ^{}=B_{dip}(J/\psi )B_{dip}(\psi ^{})`$ (11)
which suggests $`B_{J/\psi }B_\psi ^{}`$ is dominated by the dipole contribution, and thus a suitable quantity to study the shape of the dipole-nucleon cross section. We calculate this difference for the transversely polarized case shown in Fig.5. Results with the full dipole cross section gives a considerably smaller value than that of SDA. Recent preliminary data from HERA is rather consistent with our full calculation. More accurate data is quite important for detailed studies.

## 5 Conclusion

We have calculated the $`q\overline{q}`$ dipole-nucleon cross section in terms of the unintegrated gluon density. The dipole cross section is the universal quantity which characterizes the various hard processes. We have found the $`\psi ^{}`$ to $`J/\psi `$ diffractive production cross section ratio is sensitive to the behavior of $`\sigma _{dip}`$ for $`b>0.3`$fm. We have demonstrated the major improvement of the ratio is caused by the use of realistic dipole cross section. We have also discussed $`t`$-slope of the diffractive leptoproduction of $`J/\psi `$ and $`\psi ^{}`$. We have emphasized that the difference of $`B_{J/\psi }B_\psi ^{}`$ is sensitive to the shape of the dipole cross section. Our result for the photoproduction is about $`0.3\text{GeV}^2`$, which seems to be consistent to recent preliminary data.


text:
# XMM-Newton EPIC Observation of SMC SNR 0102-72.3 Based on observations with XMM-Newton, an ESA Science Mission with instruments and contributions directly funded by ESA Member states and the USA (NASA).

## 1 Introduction

SNR 0102$-$72.3 is one of the brightest X-ray sources in the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) and was discovered by the IPC instrument onboard the Einstein Observatory (Seward & Mitchell SM81 (1981)). The Einstein HRI resolved a shell-like supernova remnant (SNR), and optical emission is seen from a variety of filaments rich in oxygen and neon (Dopita & Tuohy DT84 (1984)) arranged in an incomplete clumpy ring with radius of about 12″. Enrichment in the element oxygen is indicative for remnants of a type II SN explosion. The maximum velocity of the optical filaments \[O iii\], not visible in H$`\alpha `$ (Dopita et al. D81 (1981)), was found to be up to 6500 km/s (Tuohy & Dopita TD83 (1983)). The bright O iii knots, assumed to be dense ejecta clumps or Rayleigh-Taylor fingers of ejecta (density $``$1 cm-3), correspond in some parts well with bright X-ray features (Gaetz et al. G00 (2000)) but in other parts not. The estimated ionization timescale of $`\mathrm{log}(nt)<12`$ adds to the origin of the X-ray emission being a shock heated X-ray plasma in a state of non-equilibrium ionization (NEI). Radio observations of SNR 0102$-$72.3 with 3″ resolution in the 6 cm wavelength band by Amy & Ball (AB93 (1993)) unveiled an outer radio shell diameter of 40″$`\pm `$5″. The radio emission is found to lie predominantly outside the bright X-ray emission but within an outer faint X-ray rim of $``$44″ (Gaetz et al. G00 (2000)). Hayashi et al. (H94 (1994)) reported on a broadband spectrum of SNR 0102$-$72.3 gained from the ASCA SIS instrument showing most of the emission from SNR 0102$-$72.3 lying in the 0.5 – 2.3 keV energy band. The most prominent line features were interpreted as He-like K$`\alpha `$, H-like K$`\alpha `$ and K$`\beta `$ emission from ionized atoms of the elements oxygen, neon and magnesium. Their difficulties to describe the overall spectrum with simple NEI models was interpreted as an inhomogeneous abundance pattern within the emitting plasma and possibly two components, namely forward shock in the interstellar medium (ISM) and reverse shock in the ejecta, contributing to the overall X-ray emission. XMM-Newton with its high sensitivity now enables spatially resolved spectroscopy on various parts of SNR 0102$-$72.3. The following section describes the details of the observation and the data. Spectra from the selected regions are presented and fitted in Sec. 3. Finally, the results are discussed in Sec. 4.

## 2 Data

SNR 0102$-$72.3 was observed by the XMM-Newton (Jansen et al. J01 (2001)) in April 2000 during its calibration phase (see Table 1). There were two observations with different filters, thin and medium. In order to study the morphologies of the SNR, XMM-Newton EPIC-MOS (Turner et al. T01 (2001)) data were used. The MOS camera collected the emission of the complete SNR, whereas in the EPIC-PN (Strüder et al. S01 (2001)) observations the SNR was split into two parts by CCD chip borders. The EPIC-MOS data was processed through the XMM-Newton Science Analysis System (XMM-SAS) and events in the energy band of 0.2 – 3.0 keV were selected. Fig. 1 shows an overlay of the image created from the EPIC-MOS thin filter observation and contours of a radio image of the 4790 MHz observations at the Australia Telescope Compact Array (ATCA).

The region centered on SNR 0102$-$72.3 was observed as part of the ATCA mosaic observations of the SMC with a baseline of 375 m at frequencies of 1420 and 2370 MHz with a corresponding angular resolution of $``$90″ and 45″ . ATCA observations in snap-shot mode at 4800 and 8640 MHz were undertaken for specific regions of interest including SNR 0102$``$72.3. The baseline of these observations were as well 375 m and we achieved resolution of $``$30″ and $``$15″, respectively (Filipović & Staveley-Smith FS98 (1998)). Amy & Ball (AB93 (1993)) studied the SNR 0102$-$72.3 at 4790 Hz, but with higher resolution (3″). We made use of their data and merged it with our observations (Filipović et al. F98 (1998) and references therein) to compensate for possible short space missing flux.

As can be seen in Fig. 1, the radio emission of the SNR is highest in the north whereas the brightest knots in X-rays are found in the south. The emission from non-thermal electrons which forms the radio ring, is located outside the bright X-ray ring, especially in the north. This is in good agreement with the comparison of Chandra ACIS data with the radio image of Amy & Ball (AB93 (1993)) by Gaetz et al. (G00 (2000)). Due to higher spatial resolution of Chandra, the ACIS image shows a detailed structure of the SNR not available to XMM, and it was found that the radio emission is mainly located between the bright X-ray ring and the rim of faint X-ray emission.

For spectral studies we analyzed the EPIC-PN data. The effective exposure times were 15.5 ksec and 10.9 ksec, respectively. We used the standard processed data from XMM-SAS and selected single pattern events only. On the EPIC-PN detector the remnant was located in the CCD chips No. 4 and 7, unfortunately divided into two parts, the larger (eastern) part lying on chip No. 7. For spectral analysis of the SNR we selected a circular region of radius 40″ around the center of the X-ray ring. Events in a ring with inner radius of 3$`\stackrel{}{.}`$8 and outer radius of 8$`\stackrel{}{.}`$8 on the chips No. 4 and 7, excluding out of time events, were used to estimate the background. In addition we extracted two regions of the X-ray emission with inner radius of 8″ and outer radius of 25″ which is thought to arise mainly from the hot ejecta. The first region (hereafter REGION 01) matches the northern part on the chip No. 7 starting from 10° to 80° counterclockwise from the north, and covers the faintest part of the X-ray ring. REGION 02 is selected from 80° to 185° including the southeastern bright emission of the SNR.

## 3 X-ray spectrum

For each selected region spectra were created from both the thin and medium filter data separately. In order to combine both observations, the two different spectra were fitted in XSPEC simultaneously with either model. In Fig. 2 the thin filter spectrum of SNR 0102$-$72.3 is shown. Additionally the best double VGNEI fit (for details see below) is plotted and the positions of the He-like emission lines of O vii, Ne ix, Mg xi, Si xiii, and S xv as well as the H-like lines of O viii and Ne x are marked. These lines have been confirmed in the XMM-Newton RGS spectrum of the same pointings (Rasmussen et al. R01 (2001)).

Simply looking at the spectra of the northeastern and southeastern parts (Fig. 3 and Fig. 4) makes a more prominent line emission of the He-like ions of oxygen and neon compared to the line emission of the H-like ions in the southeastern spectrum obvious. In the spectrum of REGION 01 the higher ionized O viii and Ne x clearly are brighter. Even for the ions of magnesium this difference is visible. The spectrum of REGION 02 shows a striking line feature of Mg xi around 1.34 keV with a steep fall-off at higher energies. REGION 01 however gives a spectrum with a less prominent Mg xi line feature and a less steep fall-off towards the higher energy end, where the location of the H-like Mg xii is expected ($``$1.47 keV).

Due to these He-like and H-like emission lines of oxygen and neon, as well as other He-like lines, the spectra could not be modeled by one non-equilibrium ionization (NEI) model. Thus we used two generalized NEI components with time varying temperature (VGNEI, Borkowski B00 (2000)). The model VGNEI describes a homogeneous neutral gas which was initially cold, but is heated spontaneously. The ionized plasma is not in thermal equilibrium for small ionization timescales $`\tau =n_\mathrm{e}t<10^{12}`$ s cm-3, i. e. the electron temperature is lower than the ion temperature. The temperatures vary with time. Beside the parameters temperature $`kT`$ (keV), heavy-element abundances, and the ionization timescale $`\tau `$, the ionization timescale averaged temperature $`kT`$ (keV) is determined. For the two VGNEI components, the abundances were tied together, while the temperatures and the ionization timescales remained free parameters.

Furthermore we applied a plane-parallel shock model (VNPSHOCK) which takes different NEI states into account. Essential parameters of the model are the mean shock temperature $`kT_\mathrm{s}`$ (keV), postshock electron temperature $`kT_\mathrm{e}`$ (keV) immediately behind the shock front, and the ionization timescale $`\tau `$. In collisionless shocks in SNRs electrons and ions are presumably not in thermal equilibrium. The electrons are heated by Coulomb collisions with ions which have higher temperatures in the postshock plasma. Far behind the shock front, electron temperature becomes equal to ion temperature for higher $`\tau `$.

The absorption consists of fixed foreground absorption with galactic $`N_\mathrm{H}`$ of $`5.36\times 10^{20}\mathrm{cm}^2`$ (Dickey & Lockman DL90 (1990)) and an additional absorption column density which is a free fit parameter with fixed abundances of 0.2 typical for the interstellar gas in the SMC (Russell & Dopita RD92 (1992)). The resulting parameters of the simultaneous two-observation-fit for the entire SNR and the two regions are given in Table 2.

In all selected regions fitting the spectrum results in an overabundance of oxygen, neon, and magnesium (see Tab. 2). Using the double VGNEI model, two ionization timescales were determined differing in one order of magnitude, $`\tau 10^{11}`$ s cm-3 and $`\tau 10^{10}`$ s cm-3. The lower $`\tau `$ component dominates in the softer part of the spectrum below 0.8 keV. The higher ionization states are reproduced by the higher $`\tau `$ component which is prominent in the higher energy end of the spectrum.

In REGION 01 the determined temperatures are the highest both in the double VGNEI model and the VNPSHOCK model with temperatures higher than 1 keV. This is the part with the lowest emission along the X-ray ring. Both the shape of the spectrum and the temperatures indicate that this region is more highly ionized than in the south.

In REGION 02 and the entire SNR spectrum the temperatures are lower, but the abundances higher than in REGION 01. REGION 02 includes the brightest part of the X-ray ring visible in the analyzed EPIC-PN observation and the abundances of oxygen, neon, and magnesium are higher than in the northeast with 3.9, 5.9, and 3.2 relative to solar in the double VGNEI model, respectively. The comparison of the spectra of the entire SNR and REGION 02 makes clear that the temperatures and the abundances are almost the same. Although there is a slight difference in the ionization timescale $`\tau _1`$ of the higher $`\tau `$ component of the double VGNEI-model, which is higher in the entire spectrum, the observed X-ray emission of the SNR is dominated by the emission from REGION 02. Furthermore the He-like emission lines of S xv could be identified around 2.45 keV in the overall spectrum, since the spectrum extends up to 6 keV thanks to good photon statistics. For the whole SNR the single plane-parallel shock model yields an unsatisfying fit. This corroborates the results of ASCA observations that the X-ray emission of the SNR originates from at least two different thermal plasma states (Hayashi et al. H94 (1994)).

## 4 Discussion

SNR 0102$-$72.3 is a young SNR with an estimated age of about 1000 yr (Tuohy & Dopita TD83 (1983)), which is no longer in the free expansion phase. Most of the X-ray emission originates from a bright ring with radius $``$14″ and a mean FWHM of 5″ caused by a reverse shock propagating through the ejecta (Gaetz et al. G00 (2000); Hughes et al. H00 (2000)). The XMM-Newton EPIC observations confirm this overall picture.

The spectra of the northeastern and southeastern regions of the SNR can be fitted with a two component NEI model, each component with a characteristic single ionization timescale. The emission lines of the two highest ionization stages of oxygen and neon, as well as the two values for $`\tau `$ point out, that there is an ongoing shock ionization. This effect differs in the northeastern and the southeastern part of the SNR which can be seen in the unequal spectra of these regions (Fig. 3 and Fig. 4). The plasma temperature for the northeastern part is up to 4 times higher than in the rest of the SNR, indicating that the shock velocity is higher in this region ($`v_\mathrm{s}T_\mathrm{s}^{0.5}`$). Though most of the X-ray emission of the SNR arises from the hot ejecta, in the northeastern part the forward shock of the blast wave propagating into the ISM becomes important, verified in radio observations showing synchrotron emission right behind the blast wave which can be seen in Fig. 1. The X-ray emission of the entire SNR is dominated by the ejecta emission, which can be seen in the significant similarity between the overall spectrum and the spectrum of the southeastern region.

All the spectra extracted from EPIC-PN data were better reproduced by the two component NEI model than in a single plane-parallel shock model. The two NEI components differ not only in temperatures, but much more significantly in the ionization timescale $`\tau `$. While the lower $`\tau _2`$ component values themselves are similar for both selected regions as well as for the overall spectrum, the higher $`\tau _1`$ value is the lowest in the northeastern region. In this part of the SNR, also the fractional emission measure of the higher $`\tau _1`$ component is smaller than in the southeastern region or the whole SNR. Since in the southeastern (and the entire SNR) the ratio of the bright X-ray emission originating from the inner parts of the SNR (i.e. the bright X-ray ring) to the X-rays from the outer parts is higher (see Fig. 1), the higher $`\tau _1`$ component can be assigned to the bright X-ray ring, outlining regions with higher densities. The implied density distribution around the SNR ring is also supported by the extended overall shape along the southwest to northeast axis, which was already reported by Gaetz et al. (G00 (2000)) and can be verified in Fig. 1. This is indicative of a less decelerated expansion in that direction. Chandra observations have shown that there is evidence for a spatially varying distribution of the ionization stages and the existence of a reverse shock in the ejecta (Gaetz et al. G00 (2000); Flanagan et al. F01 (2001)). The results obtained from the spectral analysis of the XMM-Newton EPIC-PN data show that there are differences in the plasma states between various parts of the SNR with spatial temperature and ionization stage variations, contributing to its complicated structure.

###### Acknowledgements.

The authors wish to thank Andrew Rasmussen for the valuable referee report. The XMM-Newton project is supported by the Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung / Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt (BMBF/DLR), the Max-Planck Society and the Heidenhain-Stiftung.