text:
# Visibility, efficiency, and Bell violations in real Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen experiments.

\[

## Abstract

The violation of Bell’s inequalities in Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen experiments has been demonstrated for photons and ions. In all experiments of this kind the relation between visibility, efficiency, and Bell violation is generally unknown. In this paper we show that simulations based on a local hidden variables models for entangled photons provide this information. It is established that these properties are closely related by the way, in which photons are detected after a polarizer beam splitter. On this basis we suggest controlled experiments which, for the first time, subject the superposition principle to experimental tests.

03.65.Ud,03.65.Ta

\]

The Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) problem has long occupied a central place in the understanding of quantum mechanics . Bell’s inequalities in conjunction with correlation measurements seemed to prove that reality in microphysics is manifestly nonlocal . Furthermore, the experimental evidence seems to contradict even the notion of an independent reality .

But as recently shown, the experimental data can be fully reproduced with a local and realistic model of correlation measurements . The model focussed on the electromagnetic fields of the propagating photons. The essential connection between the two points of measurement is the phase acquired at their common origin. The basic realistic model, Furry’s integral , was shown to be a wrong representation of the digital output of the polarizer beam splitters (PBS). The new model has three key advantages: (i) It is a hidden variables model, the hidden variable is the angle of polarization of a photon’s electromagnetic field; (ii) it is strictly local, all events can be traced from one point in space and time to the next; (iii) the main experimental limitations are included in the model. Decoherence, for example, is described as a random segment of a photon’s optical path. We also introduced a generic parameter, the threshold $`\mathrm{\Delta }s`$, which describes the data selection at the critical polarization angle 45 of a PBS. In simulations of actual experiments it was shown that the Bell inequalities can be violated by a close to arbitrary amount, depending on the data suppressed around the critical angle.

This result points to a gap in our current understanding of these important experiments. The relation between visibility, decoherence, Bell violations, and data selection is in general not known. The problem is aggravated by the aim of experimenters for high visibility in their experiments. Because this, in turn, may destroy the fair sampling of their experimental data. The most efficient method to gain a proper understanding of the relation between the important parameters in such an experiment are numerical simulations.

In this paper we simulate experiments over the whole range of experimental parameters. The parameter space is determined by decoherence and by the value of $`\mathrm{\Delta }s`$. We simulate measurements from fully coherent to fully decoherent photon beams. The PBS parameters in one limit ($`\mathrm{\Delta }s=0`$) allow an arbitrarily precise resolution of angles at 45. In the opposite limit ($`\mathrm{\Delta }s=0.5`$) not a single photon will be measured, because the limit is outside the range of possible values. The paper is structured as follows: first we shall briefly describe the setup of the experiment and explain, why the diagonal in a PBS is such a critical angle. Then we shall introduce the numerical model and explain its connection to experimental parameters. And finally, we shall present our simulations of EPR experiments under realistic conditions over the whole parameter space of the model.

The main idea which underlies the numerical model is a one to one correspondence between the model and the experiment for single events. It is, for example, conceivable that agreement between experiments and simulations could be obtained only after all results have been summed up. In this case the statistics enter the picture in the distribution of single events, which may be different for the model and the experiment. In fact, no successful model on this basis has ever been developed. On the contrary, the only local realistic model within this framework  does not reproduce experiments. In this model the total probability $`P(\alpha ,\beta )`$ of a coincidence between two polarizers set to $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$, respectively, is given by the sum over $`\mathrm{cos}^2(\lambda \alpha )\mathrm{cos}^2(\lambda \beta )`$, where $`\lambda `$ is the hidden angle of polarization. The reason for the disagreement is that in the experiments we do not sum up products of trigonometric functions, which in principle can be arbitrarily low, but we sum up integer coincidences on both measurement devices. In effect, we make the results digital on the level of single photons and thus introduce a cutoff in our trigonometric functions. This cutoff is due to the PBS.

In experiments with entangled photons a pair of photons is emitted from a common source. After the polarization of one photon is altered by an angle $`\alpha `$ both photons are analyzed at their respective PBS. In our model we simulate this feature by a switch at the critical angle of the PBS of $`|\lambda \alpha |=45^{}`$. The polarizer beam splitter projects a given field vector of the electromagnetic field onto two orthogonal directions, say $`\alpha _1`$ and $`\alpha _2`$. The output of one channel is the projection onto one axis (+), the intensity is $`\mathrm{cos}^2(\varphi _1\alpha _1)`$, where $`\varphi _1`$ is the polarization angle of the electromagnetic field. The projected intensity onto the other axis (-) is $`\mathrm{sin}^2(\varphi _1\alpha _1)`$, since $`\alpha _2`$ is perpendicular to $`\alpha _1`$. If we set $`\alpha _1=0`$ and $`\alpha _2=\pi /2`$, then if $`\varphi _1=\pi /4`$ we get the same intensity on both outputs (+) and (-). This case must be excluded, since it is not compatible with the desired results in quantum mechanics, where we have either (+) or (-), but never both. For this reason we include a threshold to account for the elimination of undesired results. The threshold $`\mathrm{\Delta }s`$ simulates the way, the combination of a PBS and a detector operates. Statistics enter our model due to an unknown initial polarization of the coupled two-photon system. The unknown initial phase is created by a random number generator . It is also the hidden variable, which makes the single event unpredictable.

It should be noted that the probability $`P(\alpha ,\beta )`$ of the ideal measurement can also be described as an integral of two factored functions $`\overline{A}(\varphi _1,\alpha )`$ and $`\overline{B}(\varphi _2,\alpha )`$. In the ideal case these functions for photons of perpendicular polarization ($`\varphi _2=\varphi _1+\pi /2`$) are given by:

$$\overline{A}(\varphi _1,\alpha )=\frac{1}{2}\left[sign\left[\mathrm{cos}^2(\varphi _1\alpha )\frac{1}{2}\right]+1\right]$$
(1)
$$\overline{B}(\varphi _2,\beta )=\frac{1}{2}\left[sign\left[\mathrm{sin}^2(\varphi _1\beta )\frac{1}{2}\right]+1\right]$$
(2)
$$P(\alpha ,\beta )=\frac{1}{2\pi }_0^{2\pi }𝑑\varphi _1\overline{A}(\varphi _1,\alpha )\overline{B}(\varphi _2,\beta )$$
(3)
The model is deterministic in the sense that it is uniquely determined by the angles $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$, and that it is a unique integral over the angle of polarization $`\varphi _1`$ (the local hidden variable). In this formulation we encounter no longer any element of randomness. But the model is also compatible with the fundamental assumption in Bell’s inequalities. The inequalities, however, are not compatible with quantum mechanics, because they entail infinitely precise measurements even for non-commuting observables. Since operators of different settings do not commute, the spin states at different settings cannot be simultaneously eigenstates of the system. Thus it is impossible to obtain the limit of the standard inequalities within the framework of quantum mechanics.

A simulation run starts by an initialization of the random number generator . The generator is initialized only once, at the beginning of a simulation cycle. The random number is mapped onto the initial phase from 0 to $`2\pi `$ of the photon pair. Simulations are generally made with a phase difference of $`\pi /2`$ between the angles of polarization of photon one and photon two. We introduce decoherence as a random segment of the optical path of a photon. 100 % decoherence, for example, means that half a wavelength of the optical path is random. After covering the distance to polarizer one and two the photons are measured. We assumed, without lack of generality, that both distances are integer multiples of the wavelength. After a single pair has been measured, we record the coincidences (++,+-,-+,–). The procedure is repeated for all pairs, then the polarization angle of device one is changed by $`\pi /100`$. A run ends, when all pairs at the final position of polarizer one have been measured ($`\pi `$). In the simulation we recorded the correlations of 2000 pairs of photons. We vary decoherence from 0% to 100%, and the threshold of the polarizer from 0.0 to 0.5. The results displayed, the correlation function, the visibility, and efficiency plots are all derived from $`N_{++}`$.

One key requirement in EPR experiments is the space like separation of the two measurements. In general this involves an optical waveguide between the source of the photon pair and the polarizers. Unless all components in such an experiment are cooled to temperatures near 0K and decoupled from their environment, we expect the components of the optical system to oscillate. This oscillation introduces randomness into the correlation measurements, which has the same effect as decoherence of the electromagnetic field of the photon. Any realistic theoretical model must include a random optical path of at least 5% or about 10 - 20nm, if the laser operates with visible light. This translates into about 10% decoherence. Depending on the setup and the experimental precision much higher decoherence seems possible. In Fig. 1 we show the correlation function for the whole range of decoherence from 0% (fully coherent fields) to 100% (fully random polarization angles). As expected, the correlation function becomes a straight line in the limit of full decoherence. In the intermediate region (10 - 50 % decoherence) it is sinusoidal, while the ideal correlation is a sawtooth . It should be noted that the phase is a hidden variable in all measurements, also of linear polarization. Because the polarization measurements at a device which combines polarizer beam splitters and photodetectors is an energy measuring device. And energy, from a field theoretical point of view, is intensity, which depends on the phase at the point of measurement.

In all experiments efficiency is less than 10% . Within the present model efficiency decreases due to increased polarizer thresholds. This decrease is close to linear in the high efficiency range. Efficiency in terms of the polarizer threshold is plotted in Fig. 2. The curve shows the statistical noise due to the random variables in our simulation. Given the values we obtain, the main reason for the lack of efficiency in the measurements should not be the polarizer threshold. For realistic values around 0.1, values which can be deduced from the visibility in a measurement, the efficiency is still around 80%. We thus have to conclude that the experimental settings are not the main reason for lacking efficiency. However, if the efficiency decreases with a change of experimental parameters, one possible reason is the increase of the polarizer threshold. And this, in turn, changes the most important values measured in such an experiment.

One of these values is the visibility of the correlation function. It is defined as $`(maxmin)/(max+min)`$, where $`max`$ ($`min`$) denote the maximum (minimum) number of coincidences over all polarizer settings. Essentially, the visibility can be increased by reducing the minimum count to a value close to zero. The increase of the polarizer threshold has exactly this effect. In Fig. 3 we show the result of our simulation. The visibility is color coded and emphasized by contour lines. Even in case of decoherence of more than 20% it is possible to obtain 95% visibility in the experiment if the polarizer threshold is raised to 0.13. The experimental values of Weihs et al. , for example, point to a decoherence of 10 – 12% and a threshold of 0.1 – 0.12. It seems quite unexpected that the parameter range with a visibility of more than 99% covers roughly one fourth of the whole parameter space. The requirement of high visibility therefore does not decisively limit the parameter space of real measurements. Visibility seems thus unsuitable as a measure of experimental precision. As a technical point we remark that the statistical spread from one value to the next shows a high fluctuation. This is due to a multiplication of statistical deviations in the computation of the visibility.

Experimentally, one seeks to obtain high visibility in an experiment before embarking on the actual run, where valid data are measured. In this case it is to be expected that practically all the data in these experiments are obtained in the high visibility range. Incidentally, this is the same range where the Bell inequalities are maximally violated. For the calculation of the Bell violations we fixed polarizer one and two at the angles of maximum violation (0,22.5,45,67.5), and simulated the measurement of 10000 pairs of photons for every datapoint. We computed the Bell violation from the coincidence counts using the formulation of Clauser et al. . From this value we have subtracted 2.0 and show only the values above zero. The simulation is shown in Fig. 4. It can be seen that every threshold allows for a wide range of Bell violations. For a threshold value $`>0.2`$, for example, the inequalities can be violated by 0.0 – 2.0, depending on the decoherence of the photon beams. The contour lines describe the violation. Comparing with the previous plot it can be seen that the condition of high visibility alone guarantees that the Bell inequalities are maximally violated. If a violation exceeding 0.82 (the value in quantum mechanics) has so far not been observed, we refer this to the low coherence in the measurements and the requirement of high efficiency. The former generally reduces the violation, while the latter makes a high threshold undesirable.

A synopsis of all data obtained in the simulations reveals that the experimental results can be changed arbitrarily by changing the parameters in the experiments. Generally speaking, EPR experiments if analyzed with our model exhibit a much larger span of possible parameters and results than presently assumed. From our simulations we conclude that there will be not one value for the Bell violation, which can be compared with theoretical predictions, but there should be many, depending entirely on the parameters in the experiment. In this sense the simulation allows, for the first time, to check quantum mechanics in controlled EPR experiments. If the Bell violation decreases from an initial value as experimental conditions become more ideal, then the predictions in quantum mechanics must be wrong. Increasing coherence can be obtained e.g. by cooling down the experimental components to very low temperature and by reducing their distances to a minimum. If, however, increasing coherence and efficiency leads to a higher violation of the Bell inequalities, then the present local model of EPR measurements must be inadequate. The actual point in the parameter space of such an experiment can be obtained from experimental values. Increasing visibility and efficiency is related to to lower threshold values and lower decoherence, in short, to more ideal experimental conditions. With these experiments also the superposition principle can be tested experimentally. The principle is fundamental for all current standard frameworks, it is based on linearity of fields and wavefunctions between two points of measurement. The principle is violated in our model, because the two measurements have been factored. We can therefore use the predictions of our theoretical model for a first experimental test of superposition. In case the local hidden variables model is correct, which can be checked by the above procedure, the superposition principle is not generally applicable: a consequence which may require major adjustment in current theories.

In summary we have shown that the whole parameter space of EPR experiments can be analyzed by numerical simulations within a local hidden variables model. We pointed out that the Bell inequalities are maximally violated in all cases, where an experiment possesses high visibility. And we suggested controlled EPR experiments to detect a possible deviation of quantum mechanical predictions from the results of measurements.

Acknowledgements. \- The EPR problem has been widely discussed with colleagues over the last year. In particular I am indebted to G. Adenier, D. Bowler, A. Fisher, J. Gavartin, J. Gittings, and R. Stadler. Computing facilities at the HiPerSPACE center were funded by the Higher Education Funding Council for England.


format: text

text:
# Predicting Metallicities and Color Distributions for Secondary GCs Forming in Spiral Galaxy Mergers at Various Redshifts

## 1. Introduction

F. Schweizer’s contribution (this conf.) has shown that in the local Universe, we can witness the formation of – sometimes populous – star cluster systems in the powerful starbursts accompanying gas-rich spiral galaxy mergers. Many of these clusters are compact and massive enough to be Globular Clusters (GCs) able to survive for many Gyr. Formed from pre-enriched gas they will stand out in metallicity for all times, even when their colors and luminosities will have become inconspicuous. Spirals were more gas-rich in the past and mergers were more frequent. The origin of elliptical galaxies is still a matter of debate. Were their stars formed “all at once” in the early Universe – either in a monolithic collapse scenario or in some “coordinated effort” in building blocks that later merged stellardynamically – or do they have significant populations of stars formed in one major spiral-spiral merger or in a series of hierarchical mergers that still involved gas to power star formation. Observations of metallicity and color distribution of GC systems may tell us more about a galaxy’s formation history than its integrated light (cf. S. Zepf, this conf.). Spectroscopy of reasonable numbers of GCs in elliptical or S0 galaxies reaches its limits at Virgo cluster distances and has to cope with crowding and the galaxy background. GC color distributions from HST observations are becoming available for many galaxies (e.g. Gebhardt & Kissler – Patig 1999).

In a 1st step I present results from our new set of evolutionary synthesis models for Simple (= single burst) Stellar Populations (SSPs) of various metallicities, and in a 2nd step I combine these results with the information we have about the redshift evolution of spiral galaxies’ ISM abundances. The aim is to provide a grid of color and luminosity distributions of any secondary GC population formed at some time in the past for comparison with observations.

## 2. Evolutionary Synthesis of SSPs

Using Padova isochrones including the thermal pulsing AGB phase (TP-AGB) we obtain the time evolution of spectra (90 Å– 160 $`\mu \mathrm{m}`$), colors, luminosities (U … K), and stellar mass loss from ages $`110^81510^9`$ yr for SSPs of 5 different metallicities \[Fe/H\] $`=1.7,0.7,0.4,0,+0.4`$ (Schulz, Fritze – v. A., Fricke 2001). Inclusion of the TP-AGB phase in the stellar evolutionary tracks is very important for the (V-I) and (V-K) colors at ages $`\stackrel{>}{}610^7`$ yr, more so for higher metallicities than for lower ones. For $`\mathrm{Z}_{}`$ it makes colors redder by $`>0.3`$ mag in (V-I) and $`>1`$ mag in (V-K) at ages $`110^8110^9`$ yr. This means that ages determined for young star clusters from HST (V-I) colors and models without TP-AGB are strongly overestimated.

Without going into any details, we only recall here that – compared to solar metallicity – SSPs at lower metallicities are brighter in UBVRI and fainter in K, are bluer and have lower mass loss, lower M/LB,V and higher M/LK values all through their time evolution (Fritze – v. A. 2000). Models are shown to not only correctly reproduce the observed GC colors after a Hubble time but also the empirical calibrations like (B-V) or (V-I) vs \[Fe/H\] for Milky Way (MW) GCs. Models also show how strongly those calibrations change as clusters get younger (cf. Schulz et al. 2001 for details).

In our 1st step, we compare the time evolution of GC ($`=`$ SSP) model colors of various metallicities with the observed mean colors of MW halo GCs from Barmby et al. ’s (2000) compilation. We find that low metallicity clusters (\[Fe/H\]$`=1.7`$) start out bluer than MW GCs with $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]=1.35`$ and come close to their mean colors at ages $`>5`$ Gyr both in (B-V) and in (V-I). In (V-K) these low metallicity GCs are close to the MW halo clusters at all ages. At intermediate metallicity \[Fe/H\]$`=0.4`$, clusters also start out bluer than MW GCs in (B-V) and (V-I), they cross the MW GC colors around ages of 2 Gyr and become redder thereafter. In (V-K) they are slightly redder than MW GCs from the very beginning. High metallicity clusters \[Fe/H\]$`=+0.4`$ already have mean MW GC colors at ages around 1 Gyr in (B-V) and (V-I) and get considerably redder thereafter. In (V-K) they already are redder than MW GCs at 0.3 Gyr.

Note that certain combinations in age and metallicity, that are indistinguishable in optical colors due to the well-known age – metallicity degeneracy, do visibly split up in (V-K).

We conclude that an observed unimodal GC color distribution need not necessarily imply that all GCs have the same age and metallicity. Two (or more) GC populations may hide in one peak. In case of an observed bimodal GC color distribution it is not a priori clear if a red or blue peak is due to an older/younger or metal-rich/metal-poor cluster population. Individual cluster spectroscopy is required to clarify the situation.

In Fritze – v. A. (2001) we also study the luminosity functions (LFs) of these secondary GCs in their time evolution. We assume a mass function similar to that of the MW GCs and gauge the luminosity of an SSP with \[Fe/H\]=-1.35 to their mean $`\mathrm{M}_{\mathrm{V}_\mathrm{o}}=7.3`$ to see for which combinations of age and metallicity the LF of a model GC population could be distinguished from the observed MW GC LF. Depending on the specific combinations of ages and metallicities all combinations are seen to appear for two GC populations: uni- and bimodal color distributions with uni- and bimodal LFs.

## 3. Color Distributions and Luminosity Functions of GCs Forming in Spirals-Spiral Mergers at Various Redshifts

In evolutionary synthesis models galaxies of various spectral types are parametrised by their respective star formation (SF) histories. Starting from an initial gas cloud and specifying a SF history and an IMF, our models simultaneously yield the spectrophotometric evolution of the stellar population and the chemical evolution in terms of ISM abundances, both as a function of time and, for any kind of cosmological model, also as a function of redshift. Following both aspects of galaxy evolution simultaneously allows to describe the evolution in a chemically consistent way, i.e. to monitor the initial (= gas phase) abundance at which any star is born and follow it on a track and with yields appropriate for its metallicity (Fritze – v. A. 1999). This gives results in good agreement with observed stellar metallicity distributions, template spectra, and HII region abundances of local galaxy types as well as with the observed redshift evolution of luminosities and colors (Möller et al. 1999). Comparison with precise individual element abundances measured on high resolution spectra of Damped Ly$`\alpha `$ absorbers for a series of elements (Fe, Si, Zn, Cr, Ni, S, Al, Mn) shows good agreement with the redshift evolution of the absolute abundances in our spiral models over a redshift range from $`\mathrm{z}>4`$ to $`\mathrm{z}0.4`$. By $`\mathrm{z}=0`$ models directly meet observed characteristic HII region abundances. The observed weak redshift evolution of abundances and the large scatter at any redshift are seen to be a consequence of the SF timescales in spirals and their differences from early to late-type spirals (cf. Lindner et al. 1999 for details). Optical properties of the models are in agreement with the large number of non-detections and with the properties of the few detected Damped Ly$`\alpha `$ absorbers (Fritze – v. A. et al. 1999). Hence, we believe that we reasonably understand the redshift evolution of spiral galaxies’ ISM abundances over large lookback times, and in the following, I will use these to investigate the metallicities of hypothetic secondary populations of GCs forming from this ISM in spiral – spiral mergers at various redshifts. Combining with SSP models for the respective metallicities, the time evolution of colors and characteristic luminosities of these secondary GCs are obtained.

In Fritze – v. A. & Gerhard (1994) we predicted abundances for the young star clusters in the Sc – Sc merger remnant NGC 7252 to be $`\stackrel{>}{}\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{Z}_{}`$. Spectroscopy of the brightest clusters, i.e. those formed towards the end of the extended starburst, yielded abundances $`\mathrm{Z}\mathrm{Z}_{}`$ with some indication of $`\alpha `$-element enhancement from the burst itself (Schweizer & Seitzer 1993, 1998, Fritze – v. A. & Burkert 1995) in good agreement with model predictions.

The redshift evolution of ISM abundances for various spiral types shows that only a limited range of combinations between metallicity and age of secondary GCs is expected to result from mergers of normal spirals. Despite a significant amount of scatter introduced by the metallicity differences among different spiral types at fixed redshift, a broad cosmic age – metallicity relation is found. The ISM metallicity in spirals increases slowly with decreasing redshift. Hence secondary GCs formed out of this gas are predicted to be the more metal-rich the later the merger, i.e. the younger the GCs are at the present time. SSP models have shown that metallicity effects on the evolution of a GC depend both on wavelength/color and on age. Hence, it is the interplay of age and metallicity that determines the color and luminosity evolution.

In Fig. 1 we present the color distributions as predicted for today for secondary GCs that formed in spiral – spiral mergers at various redshifts. We also plot the observed color distributions of MW halo GCs which we take as a reference for the primary GC population in our mergers. We assume the same intrinsic widths for the color distributions of primary and secondary cluster systems and plot a situation where both populations contain comparable numbers of clusters. In reality, however, the two peaks may have different heights according to the relative numbers of primary and secondary GCs. The number of secondary GCs will depend on the amount of gas available and on the cluster formation efficiency in the burst. A 2nd peak is easiest to detect if comparable in height to the primary. Note that many – if not most – of the observed GC systems show a peak in their (V-I) distribution at or close to that of the MW halo GCs, suggesting a certain uniformity of primary GC systems.

Fig. 1 shows that the color distributions of secondary GCs are bluer than those of the MW GCs for all very early mergers at $`\mathrm{z}4`$ and Sd-Sd mergers at $`\mathrm{z}2`$, they are hidden in the primary GC color distributions for Sa-Sa mergers at $`\mathrm{z}3`$, Sb-Sb mergers at $`3\mathrm{z}2`$, and Sd-Sd mergers at $`\mathrm{z}0.2`$. Color distributions of secondary GCs finally are redder than those of MW GCs for Sa-Sa mergers at $`\mathrm{z}<2`$, Sb-Sb mergers at $`\mathrm{z}1`$.

It is very intriguing and a result of the restricted range of age – metallicity combinations in spiral mergers that LFs in all cases – even in those with clearly bimodal color distributions – are unimodal and narrow, thus “saving” this method of distance determination (cf. Fritze – v. A. 2001). Observed GC LFs, as well, are unimodal in several systems with bimodal color distributions (e.g. M87, NGC 4472, …).

## 4. Outlook

These first and very simplified models need to be extended to mergers among galaxies of different types, including gas-rich dwarfs. Observationally it is very important to have imaging in more than two bands, and in particular in the NIR, and to obtain spectra of reasonable numbers of GCs in both kinds of systems, those with bimodal and rich unimodal color distributions, to reveal if they contain different metallicity subpopulations that – for specific ages – may perfectly hide within one peak of the color distribution.

## References

Barmby, P., Huchra, J. P., Brodie, J. P., D. A. Forbes, L. L. Schroeder & C. J. Grillmair 2000, AJ 121, 1482

Fritze – v. Alvensleben, U. 1999, in ASP Conf. Ser. 192, Spectrophotometric Dating of Stars and Galaxies, eds. I. Hubeny, S. R. Heap, R. H. Cornett, 273

Fritze – v. Alvensleben, U. 2000, in ASP Conf. Ser. 211, Massive Stellar Clusters, eds. A. Lan con & C. M. Boily, 3

Fritze – v. Alvensleben, U. 2001, A&A in prep.

Fritze – v. Alvensleben, U. & Burkert, A. 1995, A&A 300, 58

Fritze – v. Alvensleben, U. & Gerhard, O. E. 1994, A&A 285, 751 + 775

Fritze – v. Alvensleben, U. 1999, in Chemical Evolution from Zero to high Redshift, eds. J. R. Walsh, M. R. Rosa, Springer 1999, p. 256

Gebhardt, K. & Kissler – Patig, M. 1999, AJ 118, 1526

Lindner, U., Fritze – v. Alvensleben, U. & Fricke, K. J. 1999, A&A 341, 709

Möller, C. S., Fritze – v. Alvensleben, U. & Fricke, K. J. 1999, IAU Symp. 183, 158

Schulz, J., Fritze – v. Alvensleben, U. & Fricke, K. J. 2001, A&A in prep.

Schweizer, F. & Seitzer, P., 1993 ApJ 417, L29

Schweizer, F. & Seitzer, P. 1998, AJ 116, 2206

## Discussion

Leo Girardi:  Let me add a small comment to your important point about the necessity to have TP-AGB stars in the SSP models: fortunately, nowadays most models include the TP-AGB in a reasonable way (as for instance yours, Padova, and Bruzual & Charlot’s), but we should also take care that there are other models where the TP-AGB is included in a way that simply does not make sense from the point of view of stellar evolution theory.

Jan Palous:  How do you mix the chemical elements in a merger. Do you assume that the violent relaxation mixes the ISM and smears out the metallicity gradients?

Uta Fritze – v. A.:  Our models do not include any dynamics or spatial resolution. We assume that after the lifetime of a star all the H, He, and heavy elements it gives back are instantaneously and perfectly mixed with the ISM. In mergers with strong global starbursts able to form new GCs this approximation may not be too bad due to the efficiency of stirring at work.

Acknowledgement: I gratefully acknowledge travel support from the DFG (Fr 916/9-1) and from the organisers.


text:
# The Tolman Surface Brightness Test for the Reality of the Expansion. III. HST Profile and Surface Brightness Data for Early-Type Galaxies in Three High-Redshift Clusters

## 1 Introduction

In the first two papers of this series (Sandage & Lubin 2001, hereafter Paper I; Lubin & Sandage 2001a, hereafter Paper II), we review the Tolman (1930, 1934) surface brightness test for the reality of the expansion. In Paper I, we present the calibration of the diagnostic diagrams at zero redshift of mean surface brightness $`SB`$, absolute magnitude $`M`$, and linear radius R at various Petrosian (1976) $`\eta `$ metric radii. The Petrosian $`\eta `$ function is defined as the difference in magnitude between the mean surface brightness averaged over the area interior to a particular radius and the surface brightness at that radius. The unique properties of this function in defining a metric size, which is essential when comparing parameters of galaxies at different redshifts, are described in detail in §2 of Paper I. For the local calibrations, we have used the photometric data of Postman & Lauer (1995) for first ranked cluster galaxies in 118 low redshift Abell clusters. In Paper II, we describe the effect on the profile data of finite angular resolution and the differences in the diagnostic diagrams for early-type galaxies of different flattening ratios.

The purpose of the present paper is to measure the three galaxy parameters of mean surface brightness $`SB`$, apparent magnitude $`m`$, and angular radius $`r`$ as a function of the Petrosian radius $`\eta `$ for early-type galaxies at high redshift. We have obtained this galaxy sample from the three high-redshift clusters Cl 1324+3011 ($`z=0.76`$), Cl 1604+4304 ($`z=0.90`$), and Cl 1604+4321 ($`z=0.92`$). These clusters were observed with the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) by Postman, Lubin, and Oke as discussed by Oke, Postman & Lubin (1998, hereafter OPL), Postman, Lubin & Oke (1998, 2001; hereafter, PLO98 and PLO01), and Lubin et al. (1998, 2001). We have used their extensive photometric data for the present paper. The sample selection and the methods of calculating the $`SB(\eta )`$, $`m(\eta )`$, and $`r(\eta )`$ functions for these galaxies are given in §2. The method of calculating the photometric $`K`$ corrections in the Cape/Cousins $`RI`$ photometric system is given in §3. The surface brightnesses and apparent magnitudes in $`I`$ for the clusters Cl 1324+3011 and Cl 1604+4304 have been corrected by the $`K(I)`$ correction to the rest-frame $`I`$ system. The data in $`R`$ for Cl 1604+4321 have been corrected by $`K(R)`$ to the rest-frame $`R`$ system. These data listed in Tables 5–7 are free from all cosmological assumptions as to world model; however, for the analysis in Lubin & Sandage (2001b, hereafter Paper IV) the absolute magnitude ($`M`$) and linear radius (R) values, each which require knowledge of the deceleration parameter $`q_o`$, are needed for the comparison of the high-redshift data with the calibrations of the diagnostic diagrams of Paper I. Because the basic observational data in the present paper are cosmological-model free, whereas the analysis in Paper IV is not, we have separated the discussions into the two papers (III here, and IV) to emphasize the difference between the data source presented in this paper with its analysis in Paper IV.

## 2 Measurements of Mean Surface Brightness, Apparent Magnitude, and Radius for the High-Redshift Early-Type Galaxies

### 2.1 The Color and Magnitude System

#### 2.1.1 The Keck Observations

The observations by Oke, Postman & Lubin (1998) of the three clusters were made both with the Keck 10-meter telescopes and with HST. The CCD observations at Keck were made in the four photometric passbands that are close to, but not identical with, the standard $`BV`$ system of Johnson and the $`RI`$ system of Cape/Cousins (see Figure 1 of OPL). The data on the natural Keck system were reduced to the standard $`BVRI`$ systems by observing selected standard stars measured by Landolt (1992). These were chosen to be adequately faint in order not to saturate in the short Keck exposures that were taken to determine the color equations.

The importance of the Keck $`BVRI`$ data for these high-redshift galaxies is that the extended color range permits the choice of an appropriate synthetic spectral energy distribution (SED) of each galaxy from the library of evolved SED models of Bruzual & Charlot (1993). These evolved rest-frame SEDs have been used to calculate the $`K(R)`$ and $`K(I)`$ corrections in §3.

#### 2.1.2 The HST Observations

The profile data needed for the calculation of the mean surface brightness $`SB`$, apparent magnitude $`m`$, and angular radius $`r`$ at various $`\eta `$ values were obtained using HST for the same galaxies observed at the Keck telescopes. Clusters Cl 1324+3011 ($`z=0.76`$) and Cl 1604+4304 ($`z=0.90`$) were observed using the Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2) in the $`F814W`$ bandpass, while cluster Cl 1604+4321 ($`z=0.92`$) was observed in the $`F702W`$ bandpass. The color and magnitude equations between these HST filter systems and the standard Cape/Cousins ($`RI`$) systems are

$$R=F702W+0.272(VR),$$
(1)
and

$$I=F814W0.05\mathrm{for}\mathrm{all}(VI)>0.7.$$
(2)
These equations are the linear approximations to the quadratic equations of Holtzman et al. (1995). They are accurate to better than 0.01 mag.

The sense of equation (1) is that the $`R`$ magnitudes are fainter than the $`F702W`$ magnitudes by 0.32 mag at $`(VR)=1.2`$, which is the observed mean ($`VR`$) color of the galaxies in the three clusters (see Tables 5–7). The sense of equation (2) is that the $`I`$ magnitudes are brighter by 0.05 mag than the $`F814W`$ magnitudes of HST in the relevant color range of the galaxies presented here.111It is important to recall (see §2.2 of Sandage 1997) that the Cape/Cousins $`R`$ system of magnitudes differs substantially from the Johnson $`R_J`$ system (Johnson 1964, 1965; Johnson et al. 1966), which is the same as the $`r_{S20}`$ system introduced by Sandage & Smith (1963). $`R_J=r_{S20}`$ is also the system used by Sandage (1973, Paper V of the redshift-distance series) for the Palomar program on the Hubble diagram for brightest cluster galaxies. The difference between the Cape/Cousins $`R`$ and $`R_J`$ is a function of $`(VI)`$ given by equations (25) and (26) in Sandage (1997). In the color range of interest for early type galaxies (i.e. $`BV=1.0`$ to 1.1), the Johnson/Sandage magnitudes are 0.25 mag brighter than the Cape/Cousins $`R`$ magnitudes. This difference must be taken into account when comparing the aperture photometry of Postman & Lauer (1995), which is on the Cape/Cousins $`R`$ system, with that of Sandage (1973), which is on the $`R_J`$ system, for cluster galaxies in common to both studies.

### 2.2 The Sample Selection

To complete the Tolman test, we require a comparison of high-redshift galaxies with the Postman & Lauer (1995) sample of nearby early-type galaxies. Therefore, we have selected our high-redshift sample by choosing only those galaxies which are (1) morphologically classified as early-type galaxies and (2) confirmed members of the three clusters. To satisfy the first criteria, each galaxy had to be morphologically classified from the high-angular-resolution HST images as an early-type, either an elliptical or S0, galaxy by the classifiers in Lubin et al. (1998, 2001).

For the second criteria, the galaxy had either to be a spectroscopically-confirmed cluster member with an elliptical-like (K-star absorption) spectrum, or to have the broad-band colors characteristic of an early-type galaxy at the cluster redshift. The latter criteria essentially uses a photometric redshift technique to identify cluster members (for details, see Brunner & Lubin 2000). In Tables 5–7, we mark those galaxies which are selected based on their photometric, rather than their spectroscopic, redshifts. The resulting samples contain 13, 7, and 14 galaxies in the clusters Cl 1324+3011, Cl 1604+4304, and Cl 1604+4321, respectively.

### 2.3 The Profile Data and the Three Diagnostic Functions

The two-dimensional HST data were analyzed by the method of ellipse fitting described in §2 of Paper II. Optimized ellipses (i.e. using all the data around the bounding, iterated elliptical contours with optimized pixel width) were fitted to the data by the profile-fitting IRAF task ELLIPSE. These fits produce intensities at a series of increasing radii that could be quantified in several ways. The profile intensities can be listed at (1) the semi-major axis, $`a`$, of each ellipse, (2) the “effective” circular radius, $`\sqrt{ab}`$, where $`b`$ is the semi-minor axis, or (3) some intermediate radius such as that at $`45^\mathrm{o}`$ from the major axis which has sometimes been used in the literature.

In §4 of Paper II we showed that measuring the growth curve using circular apertures was equivalent to using the profile data obtained from the IRAF task ELLIPSE, integrating the data within circular areas of an “effective” radius, $`r=\sqrt{ab}`$, and listing the data at that $`\sqrt{ab}`$ radius. Consequently, by using this “equivalent circular” galaxy method, we are able to make an accurate comparison with the local sample of Postman & Lauer (1995) that was originally analyzed using circular apertures. Therefore, for all of the data derived and listed in this paper, we have used the profile data given by the IRAF program ELLIPSE and have integrated this profile with circular apertures of radius, $`r=\sqrt{ab}`$, rather than the semi-major axis, $`a`$.

The total magnitude inside this radius, which defines the growth curve $`m(r)`$, follows directly from the integrations. Calculation of the Petrosian radius $`\eta `$ at various $`\sqrt{ab}`$ radii follows from the equivalent definition of $`\eta `$ of Djorgovski & Spinrad (1981), where $`\eta `$ is the difference in magnitudes between the surface brightness averaged over a radius $`r`$ to the surface brightness (i.e. the profile intensity) at that radius $`r`$ (see also Sandage & Perelmuter 1990 for a different derivation of this equivalent definition).

We illustrate the calculations using the HST data for three sample galaxies, one from each cluster studied here. Figure 1 shows the HST image of galaxy HST #40 in Cl 1324+3011. This is the ninth-ranked galaxy in the list of 13 galaxies for this cluster (see Table 5). Its total magnitude, derived from the asymptote of the growth curve and using equation (2), is $`I=21.63`$. Its half-light radius is $`\sqrt{ab}=0\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}26`$. (Note that the half-light radius for galaxies with normal intensity profiles occurs near $`\eta =1.0`$ mag; see Sandage & Perelmuter 1990).

The HST photometric data for this galaxy in the $`F814W`$ photometric system are listed in Table 1. Column 1 gives the log of the $`\sqrt{ab}`$ radius. Column 2 lists the $`F814W`$ surface brightness and the rms error (in magnitudes) of the profile at that radius, as determined by the IRAF program ELLIPSE. Column 3 gives the total magnitude (and error) within a circular aperture of radius $`\sqrt{ab}`$. This quantity was calculated by integrating the profile data in column 2 within the “effective” circular aperture of radius $`\sqrt{ab}`$ listed in column 1. These data define the growth curve, $`m(r)`$. Column 4 lists the mean surface brightness, $`SB`$, averaged over the circular aperture with radius $`\sqrt{ab}`$. It is calculated by adding $`5\times \mathrm{log}(\sqrt{\pi ab})`$ to the magnitude in column 3. Column 5 lists the Petrosian $`\eta `$ value (and error) calculated by subtracting column 4 from column 2. Column 6 lists the ellipticity, defined as $`ϵ=1\frac{b}{a}`$, of the best-fitting ellipse at the listed radius, as determined using the IRAF program ELLIPSE.

Figure 2 shows the four diagnostic curves for HST #40 in Cl 1324+3011, based on the data given in Table 1. The format of these diagrams is the same as Figures 8 and 9 of Paper II. Three of the panels show mean surface brightness $`SB`$, apparent magnitude $`m`$, and Petrosian radius $`\eta `$ versus the “effective” circular radius, $`\sqrt{ab}`$ (in arcsec). The lower right panel shows $`SB`$ versus $`\eta `$.

Figure 3 shows the image of galaxy HST #13 in Cl 1604+4304. This is the third-ranked galaxy of the seven galaxies listed for this cluster in Table 6. Its total magnitude, derived from the asymptote of the growth curve and using equation (2), is $`I=20.68`$. Its half-light radius is 0$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$36. Table 2 lists the same data as Table 1 but for HST #13 in Cl 1604+4304. Again, the listings are given in the HST $`F814W`$ photometric system. Figure 4 shows the resulting four diagnostic diagrams.

Figure 5 shows the image of galaxy HST #29 in Cl 1604+4321. This is the second-ranked galaxy of the 14 galaxies listed for this cluster in Table 7. The HST observations were made in the $`F702W`$ filter. The total magnitude from the asymptote of the growth curve, the observed Keck color of $`(VR)=0.99`$ (see Table 7), and equation (1), is $`R=22.36`$. Its half-light radius is 0$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$35. Table 3 lists the same basic data as Tables 1 and 2. Figure 6 shows the four diagnostic diagrams, with the photometry given in the $`F702W`$ bandpass.

These three galaxies are typical of the program galaxies, although they are neither the brightest nor the faintest in each cluster. The angular radii at $`\eta =1`$ mag of the 34 program galaxies range from 0$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$57 for the largest to 0$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$17 for the smallest. It was shown in Paper II that galaxies with half-light radii of 0$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$25 should be free from systematic errors larger than $`\mathrm{\Delta }SB=0.07`$ mag due to the finite point spread function of WFPC2 for all $`\eta 1.8`$. Hence, the data presented here for $`\eta =1.8`$ mag and larger should be free of systematic errors due to the finite resolution of HST. For $`\eta <1.8`$ mag, the data on the smallest galaxies will not be free from some systematic error. We test this prediction in Paper IV where the systematics of the analysis are given for different $`\eta `$ values.

All 34 galaxies in the three high-redshift clusters were analyzed in the same ways illustrated in Tables 1–3 and Figures 2, 4, & 6. The data measured at each designated $`\eta `$ value for each galaxy in our sample, obtained by a linear interpolation in similar diagrams for each galaxy, are listed in Tables 5–7 (see §4).

## 3 Calculation of the $`K`$ Corrections for the Three High-Redshift Clusters

In order to make a comparison with observations of local objects at zero redshift, the $`K`$ term is a technical correction that must be applied to any observed finite-bandwidth photometry for objects whose spectrum is redshifted (Humason, Mayall & Sandage 1956; Oke & Sandage 1968; Sandage 1995). As defined by these authors, the $`K`$ term corrects the observed intensity to what would have been observed in the rest frame of the particular photometric band defined by a given filter with its color equation.

The observations by OPL with the Keck telescopes were made with a set of filters whose transmission functions are close to those of the Johnson/Cousins standard $`BVRI`$ system (see Figure 1 of OPL). The filters, of course, sample the near ultraviolet spectra of the highly redshifted cluster galaxies studied here. For example, the $`R`$ and $`I`$ filters with mean wavelengths of 6000Å and 8000Å, respectively, sample the rest-frame spectral energy distributions at the mean rest wavelengths of 3158Å and 4211Å, respectively, for a galaxy at $`z=0.90`$.

To determine what the observed intensities would have been if the redshifted galaxies had been observed at the rest-frame wavelengths of the Cape/Cousins $`RI`$ system, we must know the spectral energy distribution (SED) of the redshifted galaxy in order to tie the observed data at the near-UV and $`B`$ rest wavelengths to the standard $`R`$ and $`I`$ rest wavelengths. Therefore, to calculate the $`K`$ correction for a given galaxy at redshift of e.g. $`z=0.90`$, we need the true SED of that galaxy over the rest wavelength range from 3000Å to the limit of the transmission function of the $`I`$ filter near 11000Å (Figure 1 of OPL).

The $`K`$ corrections that have been tabulated in most of the early literature (e.g. Oke & Sandage 1968; Whitford 1971; Yoshii & Takahara 1988; Coleman, Wu & Weedman 1988) used SEDs that were either observed for local, low-redshift galaxies over a large wavelength range or were calculated using stellar population synthesis programs in the no-evolution case. For early-type (elliptical and S0) galaxies, the observed SEDs of elliptical galaxies, such as NGC 4486 or NGC 4472, and/or the central bulge of Sb galaxies, such as M31, were used. These spectra then were redshifted through the filter curves to calculate $`K_z(BVRI)`$.

However, it became clear from the color indices measured by OPL and analyzed by PLO98 and PLO01 that the observed colors of the high-redshift galaxies used here could not be explained with no-evolution SEDs (see Figure 7). Therefore, to calculate valid $`K`$ corrections for the galaxies in the three high-redshift clusters, we require knowledge of their actual SEDs, taking into account a luminosity evolution that is a function of wavelength (see Figures 10 & 11 of PLO98).

We have obtained the actual SEDs through work originally performed by Postman, Lubin & Oke to examine the star-formation histories and the ages of the cluster members (PLO98; PLO01). These authors compared the observed broad-band ($`BVRI`$) AB magnitudes of each galaxy with a measured redshift to synthetic SEDs calculated from the 1996 stellar evolution code of Bruzual & Charlot (1993) under a variety of the star-formation scenarios. Specifically, they used solar metallicity ($`Z=0.02`$) models where the star-formation rate falls exponentially with time. These models are referred to as tau ($`\tau `$) models. A best-fit, zero-redshift SED was calculated for each galaxy using its broad-band AB magnitudes which were blueshifted to the appropriate rest wavelengths by a factor of $`(1+z)`$ in $`\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\lambda }{\lambda }`$ (see PLO98 and PLO01 for details of the fitting procedure).

We note that, over the observed passbands, the final best-fit spectrum is nearly independent of the particular $`\tau `$ model. The largest differences arise at rest UV wavelengths of $`2500`$Å which are most sensitive to the youngest stars. This result is illustrated in Figure 7 where we show the best-fit spectrum from a $`\tau =0.2`$ Gyr model (solid line) and a $`\tau =0.6`$ Gyr model (dotted line) to the observed AB magnitudes of galaxy HST #11 in Cl 1324+3011. The redshift of this galaxy is $`z=0.7580`$ (PLO01). The difference in the $`K`$ correction measured from the two best-fit synthetic SEDs would be only $`\mathrm{\Delta }K<0.06`$ mag, depending on the particular passband. Consequently, we have adopted for this paper the results from the $`\tau =0.2`$ Gyr model of Bruzual & Charlot (1993).

Once an individual SED was adopted for each galaxy, it was used to calculate an individual $`K`$ correction at the mean redshift of the cluster. This was done by redshifting the adopted rest-wavelength synthetic SED by $`(1+z)`$ and calculating the intensity ratio of the redshifted SED to the non-redshifted SED after convolving each with the appropriate filter function from Figure 1 of OPL. Because the effective bandwidth of the shifted SED is smaller than that for the unshifted spectrum by $`\frac{\lambda }{1+z}`$, the non-selective bandwidth factor of $`2.5\mathrm{log}(1+z)`$ mag must be added to this intensity ratio (expressed in magnitudes). \[What we have just described is the explanation of equation (B7) in Appendix B of Humason, Mayall & Sandage (1956), where the theory of the $`K`$ correction is given in detail.\]

We have calculated individual $`K(R)`$ and $`K(I)`$ values for each of the early-type galaxies in the three clusters by using the best-fit synthetic Bruzual & Charlot SED based on the individual, observed AB magnitudes. The corrections are not all identical in a given cluster because of variations in the measured magnitudes at different wavelengths which are caused by a combination of measuring errors due to photon statistics and real differences in the intrinsic SEDs. Therefore, we have averaged the individual $`K`$ corrections for each cluster and have adopted the mean values listed in Table 4. The rms variation in the individual $`K`$ terms, listed as $`\mathrm{\Delta }K`$ in Table 4, are small at $`\mathrm{\Delta }K0.08`$.

## 4 $`K`$-Corrected Apparent Magnitudes, Mean Surface Brightnesses, and Angular Radii for the Program Galaxies at Five $`\eta `$ Values

We have measured the total magnitude $`m`$, mean surface brightness $`SB`$, and angular radius $`r`$ at each of the five $`\eta `$ values for each galaxy in our sample. These data were derived from the HST profile data in the way described in §2. However, in order to remove some of the stochastic nature of the curves (see e.g. Figures 2, 4 & 6), the measured $`SB(r)`$, $`SB(r)`$, $`m(r)`$, and $`\eta (r)`$ functions of each galaxy were smoothed with a three-point boxcar filter. The smoothed curves permitted the growth curve $`m(\eta )`$, the mean surface brightness $`SB(\eta )`$, and the angular radii $`r(\eta )`$ functions to be interpolated analytically at the discrete values of $`\eta =\{1.0,1.3,1.5,1.7,2.0\}`$. These values, corrected by the adopted mean $`K`$ terms in Table 4, are given in Tables 5–7. We have estimated the error on the total magnitude by adding in quadrature the uncertainties associated with the measured $`K`$ correction (including both the rms error on the mean value and the uncertainty in the choice of Bruzual & Charlot model; see §3) and our “effective circular” galaxy approximation (see §4.2 of Paper II). These errors also apply to the measurements of mean surface brightness $`SB`$.

A reader attentive to details will notice that the entries in Tables 5–7 do not always agree precisely with

$$SB=m+5\mathrm{log}(\sqrt{\pi ab})$$
(3)
which is the definition of mean surface brightness. This equation was used, as described in §2.2, to calculate $`SB`$ from the total magnitude, $`m`$, and “effective” circular radius, $`\sqrt{ab}`$, using data tables similar to Tables 1–3. However, the entries in Tables 5–7 are obtained by interpolating the smoothed curves of the $`SB`$, $`m`$, and log $`\sqrt{ab}`$ as a function of $`\eta `$ for each of the program galaxies. In the majority of cases, the listed log $`\sqrt{ab}`$ values in Tables 5–7 are within less than 0.01 dex of the requirement of equation (3). Where there are differences, they are due to the effects of the smoothing of the observed $`SB(\eta )`$ and $`r(\eta )`$ functions which produce small deviations among the measured quantities. Deviations in the log of the linear radius R (used in Paper IV) at the level of 0.007 dex, which is the rms value for the mean deviations from equation (3) of all listed angular radii in Tables 5–7, are totally negligible for the analysis.

The data in Tables 5–7 are the source in the search for a Tolman signal in Paper IV. It is to be emphasized again that the data are independent of any assumptions about cosmological parameters. They are directly observed from the profile data. The $`\eta `$ values are metric radii defined by the ratio of surface brightnesses that are measured directly over the face of the galaxy, with no assumption as to any value of a linear radius. The apparent magnitudes within the designated $`\eta `$ radius requires only a summing of intensities in the pixels interior to that radius.

On the other hand, use of these data for the Tolman test by comparing the $`SB`$ values in Tables 5–7 with those of the local galaxies in Paper I requires knowledge of the absolute magnitudes, $`M`$, and linear radii, R. These quantities are needed to produce the diagnostic diagrams of Paper I. The calculations of $`M`$ and R do require knowledge of the deceleration parameter, $`q_o`$, that appears in the Mattig (1958) equations. Although the analysis for the Tolman test is slightly degenerate because of this requirement, we have shown in §5 of Paper I that the resulting hermeneutical circularity is sufficiently small. We shall show this again in Paper IV by comparing the Tolman signals for different assumed $`q_o`$ values.

We are grateful to Bev Oke and Marc Postman for their kindness in permitting our use of the Oke, Postman & Lubin photometric data for the various calculations before the publication of the complete data in the literature. LML was supported by NASA through Hubble Fellowship grant HF-01095.01-97A from the Space Telescope Science Institute, which is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., under NASA contract NAS 5-26555. AS acknowledges support for publication from NASA grants GO-5427.01-93A and GO-06459.01-95A for work that is related to data taken with the Hubble Space Telescope.


text:
# Multipole modes and spin features in the Raman spectrum of nanoscopic quantum rings

## I Introduction

Very recently, quantum rings in InAs-GaAs heterostructures have been fabricated in the nanometer scale , and the capacitance and far-infrared (FIR) response have been measured for the one- and two-electron quantum rings. Previously, the FIR response had been measured for mesoscopic rings in GaAs-GaxAl1-xAs heterostructures, for which a description based on classical and hydrodynamical models works fairly well. In nanoscopic rings quantum effects are important and for this reason theoretical studies at a more microscopic level have been undertaken .

In some of these calculations a major emphasis has been put on describing the Aharonov-Bohm (AB) quantum effect which manifests in the presence of an external magnetic field $`(B)`$ as the existence of a persistent current, and leads to periodic oscillations in the energy spectrum and the persistent current as a function of $`B`$. These AB oscillations have been observed in mesoscopic rings in a GaAlAs/GaAs heterostructure by measuring the conductance across the ring.

The experimental results for one- and two-electron nanoscopic rings have been theoretically analyzed using the current density (CDFT) and time-dependent local-spin density-functional (TDLSDFT) theories, and a good agreement between theory and experiment is found (see also Refs.  and ). Motivated by this success, in this work we extend this approach to a systematic study of ground state (gs) and spectroscopic properties of nanoscopic rings containing up to $`N=24`$ electrons. Our aim is to show the physical appearance of quantities that could be measured in the future if the problem of fabricating many-electron nanoscopic rings is eventually solved. Specifically, we have obtained electro-chemical potentials $`\mu (N)=E(N)E(N1)`$, where $`E(N)`$ is the total energy of the $`N`$-electron ring, addition energies $`\mathrm{\Delta }_2(N)=\mu (N+1)\mu (N)=E(N+1)2E(N)+E(N1)`$, and the spin and charge density responses at finite on-plane transferred wave-vector, which are relevant for the analysis of Raman spectra. All these quantities have been measured in $`N`$-electron quantum dots, see for example Refs.  and references therein. Particular emphasis is given to spectroscopic results. We show that the collective excitation energies exhibit discontinuities in their $`B`$ dependence, which are a manifestation of changes in the spin configuration of the ground state, and that in a ring-wire would be related to the fractional Aharonov-Bohm effect.

The structure of the ring gs has been obtained within the CDFT as described in Refs.  and . To obtain the charge and spin density responses we have used TDLSDFT as described in Refs.  and . Essentially, the method implies that to obtain the ground state and excited modes of the system, besides the direct electron-electron interaction, exchange and correlation effects have been included in a local density approximation. We refer the reader to these references for a comprehensive exposure of the CDFT and TDLSDFT, of direct applicability here changing the shape of the confining potential from a dotlike potential to a ringlike potential.

## II Ground state results

Following Ref. , we have modeled the ring confining potential by a parabola

$$V^+(r)=\frac{1}{2}m\omega _0^2(rR_0)^2$$
(1)
with $`R_0=20`$ nm and $`\omega _0=12`$ meV. These values are close to the ones used to describe the rings studied by Lorke et al. The electron effective mass $`m^{}=0.063`$ (we write $`m=m^{}m_e`$ with $`m_e`$ being the physical electron mass) and effective gyromagnetic factor $`g^{}=0.43`$ have been taken from the experiments, and the value of the dielectric constant has been taken to be $`ϵ=12.4`$. The model is strictly two-dimensional, and as a consequence of circular symmetry, the single particle (sp) wave functions are eigenstates of the orbital angular momentum $`l_z`$ and can be written as $`u_{nl\sigma }(r)e^{il\theta }`$ with $`l=0,\pm 1,\pm 2\mathrm{}`$ Notice that with this convention, the sp orbital angular momentum is $`l`$.

Some times we have used effective atomic units, defined by $`\mathrm{}=e^2/ϵ=m=`$1. In this system of units, the length unit is the effective Bohr radius $`a_0^{}=a_0ϵ/m^{}`$, and the energy unit is the effective Hartree $`H^{}=Hm^{}/ϵ^2`$. This yields $`a_0^{}`$ 10.4 nm and $`H^{}`$ 11.15 meV. The Bohr magneton is defined as $`\mu _B=\mathrm{}e/2m_ec`$.

Fig. 1 shows the addition energies $`\mathrm{\Delta }_2(N)`$ at zero magnetic field. Saw-tooth structures and large peaks at magic numbers $`N=2`$, 6, 10, 16 and 24 that correspond to close-shell rings are clearly seen. Had we not taken into account electron-electron interactions (single-particle picture), the magic numbers would have been $`N=2`$, 6, 10, 16, 20 and 24. The effect of interaction is to weaken some shell closures, for example that at $`N=20`$ in the displayed results. The total-spin third-component of the gs configuration is indicated in the figure, and shows that Hund’s first rule, according to which as degenerate states are filled, the total spin $`S`$ takes the maximum allowed value by the exclusion principle and becomes zero for closed shells, is satisfied up to $`N=16`$. For larger electron numbers Hund’s first rule is violated and the higher spin state no longer is the gs. In particular, $`S_z`$ becomes zero at $`N=20`$ instead of having the Hund’s first rule value $`S_z=2`$. These considerations may change if the geometrical characteristics of the studied ring are different. In this respect, we want to point out that according to the one-dimensionality criterium established in Ref. , the rings we describe cannot be considered as ring-wires, an obvious statement if one looks at the electron density plotted in Fig. 2.

Similarly to what happens in quantum dots, the application of an external magnetic field produces a nontrivial change in the ring structure, inducing changes in the spin of the gs configuration. This can be seen in the middle panel of Fig. 3 where we have plotted the $`B`$ evolution of the sp energies up to $`B=6.5`$ T for $`N=10`$. Paying attention to the $`4.8<B<6`$ T region for example, one may observe a level crossing around the Fermi energy when $`B5`$ T. An electron moves from the $`(0,)`$ to the $`(5,)`$ sp level and, as a consequence, the spin state changes from a singlet to a triplet state (ST transition). In such a way the system minimizes its exchange energy and the gs becomes ferromagnetic. A further increase of $`B`$ changes again the situation, and at $`B5.8`$T an electron moves now from the $`(0,)`$ to the $`(5,)`$ sp level and the system undergoes a triplet $``$ singlet (TS) transition. Exchange gaps in the sp energies similar to this one also occur near $`B`$ 1 and 3 T, and again at $`B8.5`$ T (not shown in the figure), and are characteristic of even-$`N`$ rings before full magnetization. Exchange gaps have been analyzed in quantum dots to experimentally determine the contribution form the direct Coulomb and exchange electron-electron interaction to the total energy.

The situation is quite different for odd-$`N`$ rings, for which the system always remains ferromagnetic ($`S_z0`$). This can be seen in the top panel of Fig. 4, where we have plotted the $`B`$ evolution of the sp levels of the $`N=`$ 9 ring up to $`B=6.5`$ T. Now, the level crossings around the Fermi energy occur without spin changing. The situation shown in this figure is similar for all the odd-$`N`$ rings considered in this work.

Level crossings strongly influence the $`B`$ behavior of the electro-chemical potential, which is shown in Fig. 5 for $`0B10`$ T up to $`N=12`$. For even electron numbers the number of ST transitions depends on $`N`$ and increases with it, as the number of level crossings to arrive at full polarization also increases. The critical $`B`$ value at which the system is fully polarized also increases with $`N`$, and is well visible in this figure up to $`N=9`$. For odd electron numbers, the spin of the gs configuration remains constant ($`S_z=\frac{1}{2}`$) in a wide $`B`$-range, and from a certain $`B`$ value on it starts increasing up to full polarization.

The pairing between peaks in the electrochemical potential corresponding to consecutive $`N`$ values, as for example 9 and 10, indicates antiparallel spin filling of a sp $`l`$-orbital by two electrons. This pairing is violated at $`B=0`$ for $`N=4`$ and 8, and it is a manifestation of Hund’s first rule. It is also violated in the narrow $`B`$-regions where the spin triplet state is the gs configuration of even-$`N`$ rings. This effect cannot be seen in Fig. 5 because of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }B=0.5`$ T step used to obtain it, but can be seen in the top panel of Fig. 11 below, which gives a magnified view of $`\mu (10)`$ in the region around $`B3`$ T. This is the same behavior found for quantum dots in Ref. .

Quasi-periodic $`B`$-oscillations can be observed in the electro-chemical potential. The changes in spin configurations and the maxima and minima of the electro-chemical potential curves are related to sp level crossing at the Fermi energy. For example, for $`N=10`$ the ST transitions around $`B=1`$, 3, and 5.5 T, and the maxima of $`\mu (10)`$, can be related to the level crossings at these $`B`$ values shown in Fig. 3. The minima of $`\mu (9)`$ and $`\mu (10)`$ at $`B2`$ and 4.5 T correspond to the level crossings without spin change shown in Figs. 3 and 4.

These quasi-periodic oscillations are absent in quantum dots, and are a characteristic inherent to quantum rings. We recall that for a one-electron ring-wire of radius $`R_0`$ the energies are given by

$$ϵ_l=\frac{\mathrm{}^2}{2m^{}R_0^2}\left(l\frac{\mathrm{\Phi }}{\mathrm{\Phi }_0}\right)^2,$$
(2)
where $`\mathrm{\Phi }/\mathrm{\Phi }_0`$ is the number of flux quanta penetrating the ring, $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0=hc/e`$, and are periodic in the flux $`\mathrm{\Phi }=\pi R_0^2B`$ with periodicity $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0`$. The persistent current $`I_l`$ associated with the $`l`$-state

$$I_l=c\frac{ϵ_l}{\mathrm{\Phi }}$$
(3)
has the same periodicity. As $`B`$ increases the occupied $`l`$-state changes and gives rise to discontinuities in the current $`I_l`$ (the AB effect), which have been experimentally observed in a mesoscopic loop in a GaAs heterojunction.

We have plotted in Figs. 3 and 4 the total energy $`E`$ and the persistent current determined as $`I=J(r)𝑑r`$ with

$$𝐉(𝐫)=𝐉_p(r)\frac{e}{m^{}c}n(r)𝐀(r),$$
(4)
where $`𝐉_p(r)=\widehat{e}_\theta l[u_{nl\sigma }(r)]^2/r`$, being $`\widehat{e}_\theta `$ the azimuthal vector unit, is the paramagnetic current that for many-electron rings is obtained adding the sp paramagnetic currents, and the second term is the diamagnetic current, being $`n(r)=[u_{nl\sigma }(r)]^2`$ and $`𝐀(r)`$ the electron density and external vector potential, respectively.

In a many-electron nanoscopic ring-wire, electron-electron interactions give rise to changes in the gs configuration that decreases the period of the AB oscillations. This effect has been explained in Ref.  as a consequence of Hund’s first rule which favors the occurence of ferromagnetic $`S_z=1`$ phases. A ring with a low degree of one-dimensionality tends to loose the periodic features of the ideal ring-wire, being somehow an intermediate case between a ring-wire and a quantum dot, and for these systems the effect is not so marked, appearing as a small amplitude oscillation whose $`B`$-width coincides with that of the ferromagnetic phase (see Fig. 3). The crucial role played by the degree of one-dimensionality in the appearance of the AB oscillations can also be appraised comparing the results for two and four electron rings obtained in Refs. . In the case of an $`S_z=0`$ ring as for $`N=10`$, we have found a period halving. For an $`S_z=\frac{1}{2}`$ ring like that with $`N=9`$, the oscillations due to ST and TS transitions are absent but there still is a period halving which in this case can be traced back to that arising for non-interacting spin-$`\frac{1}{2}`$ fermions. We have estimated that to have $`\mathrm{\Phi }=\mathrm{\Phi }_0`$ for a ring-wire of radius equal to the maximum electronic density radius in Fig. 2, one needs $`B2.2`$ T. Consequently, a period of $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0/2`$ corresponds to a period of $`B1`$ T as shown in the bottom panel of Fig. 4. A period $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0`$, i.e., $`B2`$ T between large amplitude oscillations of the current shown in the bottom panel of Fig. 3 is also consisten with this picture.

We have also checked that calculating the current from the $`B`$ derivative of the total energy, as suggested by Eq. (3), one obtains discontinuities at the same $`B`$ values. However, both ways of calculating the persistent current do not yield the same value. This difference is attributed to the fact that our ring is not in a ‘clean’ AB situation in which electrons move essentially in a $`B`$-free region. Rather, an appreciable magnetic flux is going across the effective ring surface.

## III Raman spectra

Raman spectra are obtained through two-photon inelastic light scattering. The process consists in creating an electron-hole pair (absorption of the incident photon) and subsequent recombination between valence and conduction bands (emission of the final photon). In this process the electrons of the conduction band are excited via the transfer of energy $`\omega `$ and momentum $`q`$. In a backscattering geometry, with incoming and scattered photon polarization vectors $`\widehat{𝐞}_i`$ and $`\widehat{𝐞}_s`$ lying in the $`xy`$ plane perpendicular to $`B`$, the charge and spin density Raman cross sections are essentially determined by the longitudinal strength (or dynamical structure) functions in the charge (CDE) $`S_{nn}(q,\omega )`$ and the spin density channel (SDE) $`S_{mm}(q,\omega )`$:

$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2\sigma ^C}{d\omega _sd\mathrm{\Omega }_s}}`$ $``$ $`|\widehat{𝐞}_i\widehat{𝐞}_s|^2S_{nn}(q,\omega )`$ (5)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2\sigma ^S}{d\omega _sd\mathrm{\Omega }_s}}`$ $``$ $`|\widehat{𝐞}_i\times \widehat{𝐞}_s|^2S_{mm}(q,\omega ),`$ (7)
where $`\omega =\omega _i\omega _s`$ is the energy difference of the incoming and scattered photon. Using the above expressions one assumes that only conduction band electron are involved, and only off-resonance Raman peaks excited by laser energies above the valence-conduction band gap can be described.

To obtain $`S_{nn}(q,\omega )`$ and $`S_{mm}(q,\omega )`$ within the TDLSDFT, we have calculated the response to operators whose spatial dependence in the on-plane wave vector $`\stackrel{}{q}`$ is a plane wave $`e^{i\stackrel{}{q}\stackrel{}{r}}`$. We refer the reader to Refs.  and  for a detailed description of the longitudinal response at $`q0`$, and at finite $`q`$.

Figure 6 shows the CDE’s and SDE’s at $`B=0`$ for the $`N=10`$ ring and several $`q`$ values. For each $`q`$ value, we have considered in the expansion of the plane wave into Bessel functions of integer order

$$e^{i\stackrel{}{q}\stackrel{}{r}}=J_0(qr)+\underset{L>0}{}i^LJ_L(qr)(e^{iL\theta }+e^{iL\theta })$$
(8)
as many multipole terms as needed to exhaust the $`f`$-sum rule:

$$m_1^{(nn)}[e^{i\stackrel{}{q}\stackrel{}{r}}]=m_1^{(mm)}[e^{i\stackrel{}{q}\stackrel{}{r}}]=q^2\frac{N}{2}.$$
(9)
We infer from this figure that the modes have no appreciable wave-vector dispersion, a clear signature of the ‘zero-dimensionality’ of the ring. A similar conclusion was drawn for dots, in agreement with experiment. It can also be observed from this figure that a few number of multipoles (up to $`L=2`$ for the largest $`q`$ value) is enough to yield the plane wave response, and that in the $`q0`$ long wave-length limit only the dipole $`L=1`$ mode contributes.

The $`B`$ dispersion of the dipole mode for the $`N=10`$ ring in the long wave-length limit is shown in the top panel of Fig. 3. It is worth to see that edge modes have a smooth $`B`$ dispersion except in the regions where the ring is in the ferromagnetic $`S_z=1`$ phase. The discontinuities in the magnetoplasmon and spin modes, or equivalently these appearing in the absorption spectrum, are features that could be detected in optical-absorption experiments, making observable the ST and TS transitions and the ferromagnetic phases.

In the one-electron ring-wire case, the energies of the dipole modes are given by

$`\omega _+=ϵ_{l+1}ϵ_l={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{}^2}{2m^{}R_0^2}}\left[12\left({\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Phi }}{\mathrm{\Phi }_0}}l\right)\right]`$ (10)
(11)
$`\omega _{}=ϵ_{l1}ϵ_l={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{}^2}{2m^{}R_0^2}}\left[1+2\left({\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Phi }}{\mathrm{\Phi }_0}}l\right)\right].`$ (12)
These excitation energies show AB oscillations with the same period as gs energy and persistent current oscillations. Furthermore, they are discontinuous at the $`B`$ values corresponding to level crossings. The $`B`$ dependence of the absorption spectrum of a quasi ring-wire with two electrons was obtained by an exact diagonalization calculation, and it was shown to display fractionary AB oscillations of period $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0/2`$. The ring-wire character of the system is crucial for it to present distinct AB oscillations.

Neither spin nor charge density modes with $`L1`$ can be detected in FIR spectroscopy. In contradistinction, Raman spectroscopy in QD’s has proved to be able to disentangle spin from density modes, and to identify non-dipole charge and spin density modes. We show the charge and spin density strengths for $`q=0.05`$ nm-1 in Figs. 7 and 8, respectively. Only modes up to the octupole ($`L=3`$) mode are excited with some intensity. The octupole strength is very small because at $`q=0.05`$ nm-1 it contributes very little to the Bessel-function expansion of the plane wave in the region where the electronic density is concentrated, see Fig. 2. The monopole $`L=0`$ strength in the charge density channel has only one high-energy peak, whereas it is very fragmented in the spin density channel.

We have identified the polarization of the main peaks with a $`+`$ ($``$) sign when the peak arise from $`\mathrm{\Delta }|L_z|=L(L)`$ changes in orbital angular momentum. They come, respectively, from the $`e^{iL\theta }`$ and $`e^{iL\theta }`$ contributions in the expansion of the plane wave, Eq. (8). The lower energy $`(+)`$ peak corresponds to the outer edge mode, the high energy ($``$) peak to the bulk mode, and the lower ($``$) peak to the inner edge mode. Actually, the distinction between edge and bulk modes only makes sense at high enough magnetic fields; in the present case, well developed Landau bands appear at $`B5`$ T, and for lower magnetic fields the charge and spin density spectrum is fairly complex.

We have collected in Figs. 9 and 10 the $`B`$ dispersion of the more intense CDE’s and SDE’s, respectively, for $`q=0.05`$ nm-1. It can be noted that the discontinuities in the energy of the inner edge dipole mode ($``$) we have discussed in the long wave-length limit (top panel of Fig. 3) are well visible. For quadrupole modes, at some $`B`$ values we have found more than one single intense peak of a give polarization (see also Fig. 7). In these cases, the more intense peak is indicated by a full symbol, and the less intense peak by an open symbol.

At high magnetic fields, the positive $`B`$ dispersion CDE’s and SDE’s have a clear tendency to bundle. These peaks arise from interband transitions whose Landau index differs in one unit. As explained in Ref.  for the case of dots, this happens because the Landau bands are made of many sp states with different $`l`$ values and energies rather $`l`$ independent if $`B`$ is large enough. Only finite-size effects and the $`L`$ dependence of the electron-hole interaction cause some dependence on the mode multipolarity. The origin of the high energy, weak quadrupole CDE’s are excitations involving interband transitions whose Landau index differs in two units. Notice also that the quadrupole spin density strength is very fragmented, especially around the $`B5`$ T ferromagnetic region.

It is interesting to notice that ‘$``$’ edge modes only appear in the dipole case. Recalling that these are inner edge modes, Fig. 2 helps to understand this finding. It can be seen that only the $`L=0`$ and 1 multipoles of the plane wave expansion are sizeable in the inner edge region, and as a consequence, the strength of the $`J_L(qr)e^{iL\theta }`$ component with $`L>1`$ goes to the high energy mode of the same polarization. In contradistinction, the ‘$`+`$’ outer edge mode has no high-energy counterpart and takes the whole strength of the $`J_L(qr)e^{iL\theta }`$ component. The high sensitivity of the ‘$``$’ edge modes to the ring morphology might help to shed light into the actual structure of the ring inner edge. We recall that the experimental nanoscopic rings have been fabricated from InAs self-assembled dots grown on GaAs covered by a thin layer of GaAs by an annealing process.

The existence of ferromagnetic phases causes the coupling of spin and charge density responses. This effect can be detected experimentally, and as a matter of fact, it has been observed in QD’s using Raman spectroscopy. This means that in the spin density channel, besides the main SDE’s, a spin-dependent external field excites other low intensity peaks lying at the energy of the more intense CDE’s which appear in the charge density channel, and conversely. The coupling of CDE’s and SDE’s has been thoroughly discussed within TDLSDTF in Refs.  and  for QD’s, and in Ref.  for antidots. An example of how this coupling looks like for rings is presented in Fig. 11, where we show the charge and spin dipole modes near $`B3`$ T. One can see that both responses are decoupled if the gs is paramagnetic, as it is at $`B=2.6`$ T, and are coupled if the gs is ferromagnetic, as it is at $`B=2.8`$ T, for example.

The existence of islands of spin-triplet gs’s of rather wide $`B`$-extension is a characteristic of nanoscopic rings which mesoscopic rings hosting several thousand electrons lack of. Indeed, only for few electron rings the spin polarization $`\xi =(N_{}N_{})/N`$ is sizeable in the triplet state, a $`20\%`$ for the $`N=10`$ ring. Large couplings only arise from large spin polarizations through the spin dependence of the exchange-correlation potential.

Finally, we present in Fig. 12 a grey-scale plot of the Raman strength in the charge (left panel) and spin density channels (right panel) corresponding to the $`4.8B6`$ T region. This figure clearly reveals the ST and TS transition points as discontinuities in the $`B`$ dispersion of the multipole modes, especially visible in the inner edge dipole mode. These discontinuities are fingerprints of gs spin transitions and could be detected in Raman experiments.

## IV Summary

In this work we have studied physical aspects of charge and spin density responses of nanoscopic rings that might be detected by Raman spectroscopy. We have considered rings whose morphology is close to that of the systems recently fabricated, excluding for this reason the interesting case of nanoscopic ring-wires that can also be addressed using the same method. We have taken as case of study a ring with 10 electrons and have seen that monopole to quadrupole modes clearly appear in the spin, and especially in the charge density channel. Both channels are coupled if the gs is ferromagnetic, and the ST and TS transition points may be identified as discontinuities in the $`B`$ dispersion of the multipole modes.

We have also discussed the addition spectrum of rings hosting up to 24 electrons, and have found that their shell structure is similar to that of quantum dots up to $`N=6`$. For larger $`N`$ values this is not so; the rings present shell closures at $`N=2,6,10,16`$, and 24. Hund’s first rule is satisfied up the fourth shell for the assumed ring geometry.

The non one-dimensional character of these rings hinders the existence of fractionary AB oscillations in the sp energy levels, permanent current and collective modes. Yet, the existence of triplet gs’s is manifested by the correlated presence of spin gaps in the $`B`$ dipersion of the sp levels, discontinuities in the multipole collective modes, and small amplitude oscillations superimposed to the integer AB oscillation of the persistent current and ring total energy.

###### Acknowledgements.

This work has been performed under grants PB98-1247 from DGESIC, Spain, and 2000SGR00024 from Generalitat de Catalunya.


text:
# Reply to Comment by Dhar

In our paper “Can disorder induce a finite thermal conductivity in 1D lattices?” (Phys. Rev. Lett. 86, 63-66 (2001)), we have pointed out two important things. First, the disorder can induce a finite thermal conductivity in lower temperature regime. Second, our numerical calculations with Noośe-Hoover thermostats shown that a unique nonequilibrium stationary state may not exist in a disorder harmonic chain.

In his comment, Dhar claims that the second point is not true. He mentioned that the existence and uniqueness of a nonequilibrium stationary state has been proved by Lebowitz et al . We should stress here that, our observation does not contradict the proof of Lebowitz et al. In Ref., the authors only proved that when such a (mass) disordered harmonic chain is placed in contact with stochastic reservoirs of the Langevin type, a nonequilibrium stationary state can be reached. However, they didn’t prove the existence and uniqueness of the nonequilibrium stationary state for the general case, namely, when the chain is in contact with general thermostated reservoirs. As pointed out recently by Bonetto, Lebowitz and Rey-Bellet that “for general thermostated reservoirs the problem seems to be mathematically out of reach at the present time”. So, the existence and uniqueness of a stationary state in a disordered harmonic chain for a general thermostated reservoir is still an open question. Most recently, Parisi shows that, the time needed to equilibrate in a harmonic chain is infinite. Our numerical results agree with this conclusion, viz., at any finite time, one cannot obtain a definite steady state starting from different initial conditions.

Dhar’s claim that our results might be caused by the insufficient equilibration time also seems to be unlikely. In Fig. 4(a), we have shown that the temperature profile at two different time scales $`t=10^6`$ and $`t=10^7`$ are almost identical (see also the inset of this figure) when starting from the same initial condition.

B Li1∗, H Zhao2, and B Hu3,4

1 Department of Physics, National University of Singapore, 119260 Singapore.

2 Department of Physics, Lanzhou University, 730000 Lanzhou, PR China

3 Department of Physics and Center for Nonlinear Studies, Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong, China

4 Department of Physics, University of Houston, Houston, Texas 77204-506.

Author to whom correspondence should be addressed. Email: phylibw@nus.edu.sg


text:
# CO emission from high redshift

## 1 Introduction

Modern cosmology continues to push the boundaries of the known universe to higher and higher redshifts. We are designing telescopes capable of detecting the very first objects that formed in the universe. The real breakthrough will occur in the next decade: the New Generation Space Telescope (NGST), the The Far IR and Submillimiter Space Telescope (FIRST), and the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) will allow us to reach cosmological redshifts in excess of 10. ALMA is especially important, because it can observe CO emission from primordial galaxies redshifted into the millimeter band. Because the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) temperature increases toward the past, higher rotational levels of the CO molecule are populated at high redshifts \[Silk & Spaans 1997, Sakamoto 1999, Blain et al. 2000\], resulting in a large negative K-correction. The effect is so large that a star-forming galaxy will appear equally bright at $`z=5`$ and at $`z=10`$.

At lower redshift, CO emission from galaxies and quasars has already been detected \[Solomon, Downes, & Radford 1992, Barvainis et al. 1994, Omont et al. 1996, Guilloteau et al. 1997, Scoville et al. 1997, Barvainis et al. 1998, Frayer et al. 1998, Downes et al. 1999, Frayer et al. 1999, Andreani et al. 2000, Papadopoulos et al. 2000, Papadopoulos et al. 2001\]. These results provide information on the kinematics and energetics of the star-forming (molecular) ISM and thereby complement observations of the stellar light component in primordial systems.

In this paper we show that ALMA, with its significantly higher sensitivity, will be able to image primordial galaxies to redshift 10 and even beyond. It is conceivable that it will even be able to detect dwarf spheroidal satellites of primordial galaxies and their tidal tails (which should be in abundance at high redshift, where the merger rate is much higher than in the local universe).

## 2 Method

### 2.1 Simulations

We use the cosmological simulations of reionization reported in Gnedin \[Gnedin 2000\]. The simulations include 3D radiative transfer (in an approximate implementation) and other physical ingredients required for modeling the process of cosmological reionization.

Two simulations of a representative CDM+$`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ cosmological model111With the following cosmological parameters: $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0=0.3`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0.7`$, $`h=0.7`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_b=0.04`$, $`n=1`$, $`\sigma _8=0.91`$, where the amplitude and the slope of the primordial spectrum are fixed by the COBE and cluster-scale normalizations. were performed with the parameters specified in Table 1. Both simulations were stopped at $`z=4`$ because at this time the rms density fluctuation in the computational box is about 0.25, and at later times the box ceases to be a representative region of the universe.

The two simulations from Table 1 allow us to investigate the sensitivity of our results to the inevitably missing small-scale and large-scale power. The difference between the two runs can be interpreted as the theoretical uncertainty in our calculations, given a cosmological model. Clearly, our results will be different for different assumptions about cosmological parameters.

### 2.2 Calculating CO emission from early galaxies

The code described in Spaans \[Spaans 1996\] and applied as in Silk & Spaans \[Silk & Spaans 1997\] has been used to rerun the models presented in \[Silk & Spaans 1997\] with the latest atomic and molecular collision and chemistry data. These models use the Orion molecular cloud and its so-called bar region as being representative of a region of active star formation. The star formation rate in $`M_{}`$ yr-1 of a fiducial model galaxy is then related to the total number of Orion-like star formation sites through division by the average star formation rate of the Orion region, $`3\times 10^4`$ $`M_{}`$ yr-1 \[Hillenbrand 1997\]. In Silk & Spaans \[Silk & Spaans 1997\] it has been shown that the CMB becomes an important source of excitation at high redshift because of the fortuitous coincidence between the CO level spacing and the $`1+z`$ increase in the CMB temperature. This causes galaxies at $`z=5`$ and $`z=10`$ to be observable at similar flux density levels, provided they in fact are present. It has been assumed that the Orion-like regions responsible for the star formation activity occur throughout the model galaxy, and are not all confined to the inner few 100 pc as in Combes, Maoli, & Omont \[Combes, Maoli, & Omont 1999\] This assumption decreases the mean optical depth of the CO lines and is most likely to hold at high ($`z>3`$) redshifts, when galaxies are still being built up through mergers and accretion.

In order to compute the spectrum of CO emission as a function of wavelength, for a given bandwidth $`\lambda _1<\lambda <\lambda _2`$ and a given transition $`JJ1`$, we identify a range of cosmological scale factors $`a_1<a<a_2`$ that correspond to our bandwidth. This range of scale factors in turn corresponds to the range of comoving distances $`x_1<x<x_2`$. However, due to periodic boundary conditions adopted in the simulations, we cannot always model this range of comoving distances directly - if it is large enough, it will correspond to more than one box size. If we simply stack a sufficient number of simulation boxes together, we will get an unphysical result due to periodicity. In order to break this periodicity, we use the approach described in Gnedin & Jaffe \[Gnedin & Jaffe 2001\]: we randomize the neighboring boxes by randomly flipping, transposing, and shifting each of the periodic images of the computational box.

## 3 Results

Figure 1 serves to illustrate the uncertainty of our calculations due to the finite size of the computational box and finite numerical resolution, as measured by the difference between the two simulations A and B. In addition, since both simulations were stopped at $`z=4`$, a contribution from later redshifts cannot be included. In order to estimate the effect of this contribution, we calculated the CO emission for two cases: no star formation after $`z=4`$, and constant star formation after $`z=4`$. The difference between those two cases quantifies the uncertainty due to the finite value for the final redshift of our simulation.

For $`\lambda <0.3\text{ cm}`$ our calculation is not reliable even in a qualitative sense (to within a factor of 2). At higher wavelengths finite numerical resolution still prevents us from achieving better than about 50% accuracy. More than that, since the star formation rate in our simulations is normalized to the observed value at $`z=4`$, which is in turn uncertain to at least a factor of two \[Nagamine, Cen, & Ostriker 2000, Steidel et al. 1999\], our results in general are uncertain to a factor of two to three. However this is quite sufficient for our purpose, which is to emphasize the possibilities rather than to make some definite predictions. Because ALMA will not be commissioned until about 2010, theorists have plenty of time to improve upon our calculations and come up with more definitive predictions.

Figure 2 shows the evolution of the mean mass-weighted metallicity of the gas and stars in our large simulation (run A). One can see that stars quickly gain a metallicity of 3% solar by $`z15`$, and then gain another order of magnitude on average by the end of the simulation at $`z=4`$. The metallicity of the gas is always lower than stellar, but increases more rapidly. The decrease in stellar metallicities at higher redshifts slightly mitigates the increase in the CO emission due to higher CMB temperature, however it is not sufficient to completely remove the negative K-correction, and thus high redshift star forming galaxies should be considerably brighter than their low redshift counterparts.

In Figure 3 we show our main result: the 4 square degrees of the sky (an image of our computational box) at four different wavelengths. The peak of CO emission corresponds to a broad range of transitions with values in the range of $`J=5`$ to 12 \[Silk & Spaans 1997\]. This means that several epochs correspond to a single observed wavelength: $`\lambda =0.3\text{ cm}`$ maps redshifts from about 5 to 13, $`\lambda =0.6\text{ cm}`$ corresponds to redshifts from about 10 to 30, and $`\lambda =1.0\text{ cm}`$ includes everything from $`z=20`$ to $`z=50`$. This is somewhat unfortunate, because it means that a simple image at a given wavelength can only provide information about star formation over a range of redshifts. On the other hand, primordial star forming galaxies have relatively narrow velocity ranges, which means that by observing the CO emission in a narrow wavelength band, it is still possible to disentangle different epochs.

This is illustrated in Figure 4, where we show the same wavelength but at four different spectral resolutions. With a resolution $`\lambda /\mathrm{\Delta }\lambda =10^4`$ we can eliminate most of the emission from different redshifts and obtain an image of a single primordial galaxy (lower left panel in Fig. 4). Notice that not only the galaxy itself is measurable by ALMA, but also its satellites - young dwarf spheroidals - are clearly visible in the image. A fortunate circumstance - an enhancement in population of high $`J`$ levels due to higher CMB temperature - may allow ALMA even to see dwarf spheroidals being tidally disrupted in the vicinity of larger galaxies and to map their tidal tails (although this will be a very difficult observation). And, of course, the high redshift picture is much more spectacular than its local equivalents because the merging rate at $`z10`$ is some 500 times higher than in the local universe.

The distribution of flux density on the sky is shown in Figure 5. We also show a sensitivity limit for ALMA for a typical observation. While ALMA will be just short of measuring typical objects with a spectral resolution of $`10^3`$, at a resolution of $`10^4`$ it will be able not only to detect primordial galaxies but also to take their images. High spectral resolution is also required to separate emission from different redshifts, so this mode appears to be the most promising for high redshift observations with ALMA.

Figure 6 summarizes our results by giving the fraction of the sky above the ALMA sensitivity as a function of wavelength. ALMA will have an easy time observing primeval star-forming galaxies at $`z510`$, but will not be able to see much beyond that because of the strong decrease in stellar metallicities and star formation rates at higher redshifts. The latter statement is, of course, strongly dependent on the cosmological model - models with large amounts of small scale power will have star formation commencing earlier.

## 4 Conclusions

We have demonstrated that future observations with ALMA will be able to detect star-forming primordial galaxies, and even their dwarf spheroidal satellites, in CO emission lines, mostly due to a large negative K-correction. High spectral resolution observations are required to both separate contributions from several objects at different redshifts all emitting at the same wavelength from different rotational levels, and to increase the signal-to-noise. Direct imaging will be possible for galaxies up to redshifts approaching 10. Unfortunately, the expected decrease in the star formation rates and stellar metallicities at higher redshifts will make observations of the era before $`z=10`$ extremely difficult.

A simple possible strategy for these observations might include a shallow large area survey to identify early forming massive galaxies (rare peaks), with subsequent targeted deep observations of their environments. In this case it is possible to observe the same region on the sky at several wavelength bands spaced around several subsequent CO emission lines, in order to get a linear increase in the signal-to-noise.

Broadly speaking, CO emission lines, boosted by higher CMB temperature in the dawn of galaxy formation, will allow millimeter observations with ALMA and other instruments not only to complement observations with the Next Generation Space Telescope (NGST), but, perhaps, to directly compete with the NGST in the race for the highest observable redshifts.

This work was partially supported by National Computational Science Alliance under grant AST-960015N and utilized the SGI/CRAY Origin 2000 array at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA).