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# References

Rotations of Nuclei with Reflection Asymmetry Correlations

Nikolay Minkov111e-mail: nminkov@inrne.bas.bg, S. B. Drenska, P. P. Raychev, R. P. Roussev, and Dennis Bonatsos
Institute for Nuclear Research and Nuclear Energy,
72 Tzarigrad Road, 1784 Sofia, Bulgaria
Institute of Nuclear Physics, N.C.S.R. “Demokritos”,
GR-15310 Aghia Paraskevi, Attiki, Greece

## Abstract

We propose a collective Hamiltonian which incorporates interactions capable to generate rotations in nuclei with simultaneous presence of octupole and quadrupole deformations. It is demonstrated that the model formalism could be applied to reproduce the staggering effects observed in nuclear octupole bands. On this basis we propose that the interactions involved would provide a relevant handle in the study of collective phenomena in nuclei and other quantum mechanical systems with reflection asymmetry correlations.

The properties of nuclear systems with octupole deformations  are of current interest due to the increasing number of evidences for the presence of octupole instability in different regions of nuclear table . Various parametrizations of the octupole degrees of freedom have opened a useful tool for understanding the role of the reflection asymmetry correlations and for analysis of the collective properties of such kind of systems . As an important step in this direction it is necessary to elucidate the question: which are the collective nuclear interactions that correspond to the different octupole shapes and how do they determine the structure of the respective energy spectra? The physically meaningful answer could be obtained by taking into account the simultaneous presence of other collective degrees of freedom, such as the quadrupole ones.

In the present work we address the above problem by examining the interactions that generate collective rotations in a system with octupole deformations. Based on the octahedron point symmetry parametrization of the octupole shape , we propose a general collective Hamiltonian which incorporates the interactions responsible for the rotations associated with the different octupole deformations. It will be shown that after taking into account the quadrupole degrees of freedom and the appropriate higher order quadrupole-octupole interaction the model formalism would be able to reproduce schematically some interesting effects of the fine rotational structure of nuclear octupole bands. The study is strongly motivated by the need of theoretical explanation of the recently observed staggering patterns in octupole bands of light actinides  as well as by the possibility to gain an insight into the fine structure of negative parity rotational bands based on octupole vibrations.

Our model formalism is based on the understanding that the collective properties of a physical system in which octupole correlations take place should be influenced by the following most general octupole field $`V_3=_{\mu =3}^3\alpha _{3\mu }^{fix}Y_{3\mu }^{}`$, (in the intrinsic, body-fixed frame) which can be written in the form :

$$V_3=ϵ_0A_2+\underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}ϵ_1(i)F_1(i)+\underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}ϵ_2(i)F_2(i),$$
(1)
where the quantities

$`A_2`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{i}{\sqrt{2}}}(Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}2}}Y_{32})={\displaystyle \frac{1}{r^3}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{105}{4\pi }}}xyz,`$ (2)
$`F_1(1)`$ $`=`$ $`Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}0}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{r^3}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{7}{4\pi }}}z(z^2{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}x^2{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}y^2),`$ (3)
$`F_1(2)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\sqrt{5}(Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}3}}Y_{33})+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\sqrt{3}(Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}1}}Y_{31})`$ (4)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{r^3}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{7}{4\pi }}}x(x^2{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}y^2{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}z^2),`$
$`F_1(3)`$ $`=`$ $`i{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\sqrt{5}(Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}3}}+Y_{33})i{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\sqrt{3}(Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}1}}+Y_{31})`$ (5)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{r^3}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{7}{4\pi }}}y(y^2{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}z^2{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}x^2),`$
$`F_2(1)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}}(Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}2}}+Y_{32})={\displaystyle \frac{1}{r^3}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{105}{16\pi }}}z(x^2y^2),`$ (6)
$`F_2(2)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\sqrt{3}(Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}3}}Y_{33})+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\sqrt{5}(Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}1}}Y_{31})`$ (7)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{r^3}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{105}{16\pi }}}x(y^2z^2),`$
$`F_2(3)`$ $`=`$ $`i{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\sqrt{3}(Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}3}}+Y_{33})+i{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\sqrt{5}(Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}1}}+Y_{31})`$ (8)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{r^3}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{105}{16\pi }}}y(z^2x^2),`$
(with $`r^2=x^2+y^2+z^2`$) belong to the irreducible representations (irreps) of the octahedron group ($`O`$). $`A_2`$ is one-dimensional, while $`F_1`$ and $`F_2`$ are three-dimensional irreps. The seven real parameters $`ϵ_0`$ and $`ϵ_r(i)`$ ($`r=1,2;i=1,2,3`$) determine the amplitudes of the octupole deformation. Their relation to the $`\alpha _{3\mu }^{fix}`$ is given in .

Our proposition is that the general collective Hamiltonian which incorporates the shape characteristics of the octupole field (1) can be constructed on the basis of the above octahedron irreps. For this purpose we introduce operator forms of the quantities $`A_2`$, $`F_1(i)`$ and $`F_2(i)`$ ($`i=1,2,3`$) in which the cubic terms of the Cartesian variables $`x`$, $`y`$ and $`z`$ in Eqs (2)–(8) are replaced by appropriately symmetrized combinations of cubic terms of the respective angular momentum operators $`\widehat{I}_x`$, $`\widehat{I}_y`$, $`\widehat{I}_z`$ (with $`\widehat{I}^2=\widehat{I}_x^2+\widehat{I}_y^2+\widehat{I}_z^2`$). The following Hamiltonian is then obtained:

$$\widehat{H}_{oct}=\widehat{H}_{A_2}+\underset{r=1}{\overset{2}{}}\underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}\widehat{H}_{F_r(i)},$$
(9)
with

$`\widehat{H}_{A_2}`$ $`=`$ $`a_2{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}[(\widehat{I}_x\widehat{I}_y+\widehat{I}_y\widehat{I}_x)\widehat{I}_z+\widehat{I}_z(\widehat{I}_x\widehat{I}_y+\widehat{I}_y\widehat{I}_x)],`$ (10)
$`\widehat{H}_{F_1(1)}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}f_{11}\widehat{I}_z(5\widehat{I}_z^23\widehat{I}^2),`$ (11)
$`\widehat{H}_{F_1(2)}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}f_{12}(5\widehat{I}_x^33\widehat{I}_x\widehat{I}^2),`$ (12)
$`\widehat{H}_{F_1(3)}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}f_{13}(5\widehat{I}_y^33\widehat{I}_y\widehat{I}^2),`$ (13)
$`\widehat{H}_{F_2(1)}`$ $`=`$ $`f_{21}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}[\widehat{I}_z(\widehat{I}_x^2\widehat{I}_y^2)+(\widehat{I}_x^2\widehat{I}_y^2)\widehat{I}_z],`$ (14)
$`\widehat{H}_{F_2(2)}`$ $`=`$ $`f_{22}(\widehat{I}_x\widehat{I}^2\widehat{I}_x^3\widehat{I}_x\widehat{I}_z^2\widehat{I}_z^2\widehat{I}_x),`$ (15)
$`\widehat{H}_{F_2(3)}`$ $`=`$ $`f_{23}(\widehat{I}_y\widehat{I}_z^2+\widehat{I}_z^2\widehat{I}_y+\widehat{I}_y^3\widehat{I}_y\widehat{I}^2)`$ (16)
The Hamiltonian parameters $`a_2`$ and $`f_{ri}`$ ($`r=1,2;i=1,2,3`$) are formally related to the parameters in (1) as follows $`a_2=ϵ_0\sqrt{105/(4\pi )}`$, $`f_{1i}=ϵ_1(i)\sqrt{7/(4\pi )}`$, $`f_{2i}=ϵ_2(i)\sqrt{105/(16\pi )}`$, $`i=1,2,3`$.

During the procedure described above, the $`r^3`$ factors appearing in the denominators of Eqs (2)–(8) are replaced by $`\widehat{I}^3`$ factors. In the final result, Eqs (10)–(16), we normalize with respect to $`\widehat{I}^3`$, i.e. we multiply the results by $`\widehat{I}^3`$, an operation which is equivalent to the transition to a unit sphere, a natural thing to do since we are interested in surface shapes.

We remark that the terms of the Hamiltonian obtained (as a function of the angular momentum operators $`\widehat{I}_x`$, $`\widehat{I}_y`$, $`\widehat{I}_z`$) correspond to the same octupole shapes which appear in Eqs (2)–(8) and belong to the same irreps of the octahedron group. In other words, through the above procedure we determine the octahedron point symmetry properties of the system in angular momentum space.

Our analysis shows that the operator $`\widehat{H}_{F_1(1)}`$, Eq. (11), which corresponds to $`Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}0}}`$ (with axial deformation) is the only one octupole operator possessing diagonal matrix elements in the states with collective angular momentum $`I`$. Below it will be shown that it is of major importance for determining the fine structure of collective bands with octupole correlations. Actually, it is well known that the $`Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}0}}`$ (axial) deformation is the leading mode in the systems with reflection asymmetric shape (See for review ).

Further, it is known that the use of the pure octupole field (1) is not sufficient to incorporate the collective shape properties of the system. More specifically a unique parametrization of the pure octupole field in an intrinsic frame has not been obtained yet in a consistent way . In this respect the consideration of octupole degrees of freedom together with the quadrupole deformations is important. A general treatment of a combined quadrupole-octupole field is proposed in the framework of a general collective model for coupled multipole surface modes .

Based on the above consideration we suggest that the most general collective Hamiltonian of a system with octupole correlations should contain also the standard (axial) quadrupole rotation part

$$\widehat{H}_{rot}=A\widehat{I}^2+A^{}\widehat{I}_z^2,$$
(17)
where $`A`$ and $`A^{}`$ are the inertial parameters. In addition the following higher order diagonal quadrupole-octupole interaction term (corresponding to the product $`Y_{\mathrm{2\hspace{0.17em}0}}Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}0}}`$) could be introduced:

$$\widehat{H}_{qoc}=f_{qoc}\frac{1}{I^2}(15\widehat{I}_z^514\widehat{I}_z^3\widehat{I}^2+3\widehat{I}_z\widehat{I}^4).$$
(18)
This operator is normalized with respect to the multiplication factor $`I^3`$. (More precisely we use the product $`I^3Y_{\mathrm{2\hspace{0.17em}0}}Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}0}}`$) so as to keep all non-quadrupole Hamiltonian terms of the same order.)

Then the Hamiltonian of the system can be written as

$$\widehat{H}=\widehat{H}_{bh}+\widehat{H}_{rot}+\widehat{H}_{oct}+\widehat{H}_{qoc}.$$
(19)
Here

$$\widehat{H}_{bh}=\widehat{H}_0+f_k\widehat{I}_z,$$
(20)
is a pure phenomenological part introduced to reproduce the bandhead energy in the form

$$E_{bh}=E_0+f_kK,$$
(21)
were $`E_0`$ and $`f_k`$ are free parameters. The $`K`$-dependence of $`E_{bh}`$, which can be reasonably referred to the intrinsic motion, provides the correct value of the bandhead angular momentum projection $`K`$ in the variation procedure described below.

We remark that the Hamiltonian (19) is not a rotational invariant in general. It does not commute with the total angular momentum operators and any state with given angular momentum is energy split with respect to the quantum number $`K`$. Therefore, the physical relevance of this Hamiltonian depends on the possibility to determine in an unique way the angular momentum projection. The basic assumption of our consideration is that K is not frozen within the states of the collective rotational band. We suggest that for any given angular momentum it should be determined so as to minimize the respective collective energy. The resulting energy spectrum represents the yrast sequence of energy levels for our model Hamiltonian. We remark that similar procedure is used in Refs.  in reference to the $`\mathrm{\Delta }I=2`$ staggering effect in superdeformed nuclei.

As a first step in testing our Hamiltonian we consider its diagonal part

$$\widehat{H}^d=\widehat{H}_{bh}+\widehat{H}_{rot}+\widehat{H}_{oct}^d+\widehat{H}_{qoc}.$$
(22)
were the operator $`\widehat{H}_{oct}^d\widehat{H}_{F_1(1)}`$ represents the diagonal part of the pure octupole Hamiltonian $`\widehat{H}_{oct}`$, Eq. (9).

The following diagonal matrix element is then obtained:

$`E_K(I)`$ $`=`$ $`E_0+f_kK+AI(I+1)+A^{}K^2+f_{11}\left({\displaystyle \frac{5}{2}}K^3{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}KI(I+1)\right)`$ (23)
$`+`$ $`f_{qoc}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{I^2}}\left(15K^514K^3I(I+1)+3KI^2(I+1)^2\right).`$
Following the above assumption for the third angular momentum projection, we determine the yrast sequence $`E(I)`$ after minimizing Eq. (23) as a function of integer $`K`$ in the range $`IKI`$. The obtained energy spectrum depends on six model parameters: $`E_0`$ essentially responsible for the bandhead energy; $`f_k`$ which provides minimal energy for $`K=K_{bh}=I_{bh}`$; $`A`$ and $`A^{}`$ are the quadrupole inertial parameters which should generally correspond to the known quadrupole shapes (axes ratios) of nuclei; $`f_{11}`$ and $`f_{qoc}`$ are the parameters of the diagonal octupole (11) and quadrupole-octupole (18) interactions respectively. We consider the latter two parameters as free parameters.

We applied several exemplary sets of the above parameters and obtained the corresponding schematic energy spectra. One of them is given in Table 1. It is seen that the “yrast” values of the quantum number $`K`$ gradually increase with the increase of the angular momentum $`I`$. We remark that they correspond to the local minima of Eq. (23) as a function of $`K`$. This is illustrated on Fig. 1. We see that these minimums are well determined and their depth increases with the increase of the angular momentum. Such a behavior of the spectrum corresponds to a wobbling motion and could also be interpreted as a multiband-crossing phenomenon. The obtained yrast sequence can be considered as the envelope of the curves with different values of the quantum number $`K`$ as it is illustrated in Fig. 2.

In addition we see that the $`K`$\- values of the odd and the even sequence of levels are grouped by couples which imply the presence of odd–even staggering effect. Indeed, the presence of such an effect is demonstrated in Fig. 3 (a)–(e), where the quantity

$$Stg(I)=6\mathrm{\Delta }E(I)4\mathrm{\Delta }E(I1)4\mathrm{\Delta }E(I+1)+\mathrm{\Delta }E(I+2)+\mathrm{\Delta }E(I2),$$
(24)
with $`\mathrm{\Delta }E(I)=E(I+1)E(I)`$, is plotted as a function of angular momentum $`I`$ for several different sets of model parameters. (The quantity $`Stg(I)`$ is the discrete approximation of the fourth derivative of the function $`\mathrm{\Delta }E(I)`$, i.e. the fifth derivative of the energy $`E(I)`$. Its physical relevance has been discussed extensively in Refs .)

Fig. 3(a) illustrates a long $`\mathrm{\Delta }I=1`$ staggering pattern with several irregularities, which looks similar to the “beats” observed in the octupole bands of some light actinides such as 220Ra, 224Ra and 226Ra . Also, it is rather similar to the staggering patterns observed in rotational spectra of diatomic molecules . In Fig. 3(b) the increased values of $`f_{11}`$ and $`f_{qoc}`$ provide a wide angular momentum region (up to $`I40`$) with a regular staggering pattern. The further increase of $`f_{qoc}`$ results in a staggering pattern with different amplitudes, shown in Fig. 3(c). These two figures resemble the staggering behavior of some rotational (negative parity) bands based on octupole vibrations . The further increase of $`f_{11}`$ and $`f_{qoc}`$ leads to a staggering pattern with many “beats”, as shown in Fig 3(d). Notice that in Fig. 3(d) the first three “beats” are completed by $`I40`$, while in Fig. 3(a) the first three “beats” are completed by $`I70`$. An example with almost constant staggering amplitude is shown in Fig. 3(e). It resembles the form of the odd–even staggering predicted in the SU(3) limit of various algebraic models (see Ref.  for details and relevant references). It also resembles the odd–even staggering seen in some octupole bands of light actinides, such as 222Rn .

Now we can discuss the general Hamiltonian structure (19) including the various non-diagonal terms (10), (12)–(16). Here, the major problem is the circumstance that $`K`$ is generally not a good quantum number. However we are able to provide our analysis for small values of the respective parameters which conserve $`K`$ “asymptotically” good. This requirement assumes a weak $`K`$-bandmixing interaction which guarantees that for any explicit energy minimum appearing in the diagonal case the corresponding perturbed Hamiltonian eigenvalue will be uniquely determined. Thus we are able to obtain respective $`K`$-mixed yrast energy sequence. Our numerical analysis of the Hamiltonian eigenvector systems shows that the parameters of the non-diagonal terms should be by a order smaller in value than the parameter $`f_{11}`$. In addition, we established that the following couples of non-diagonal terms give the same contribution in the energy spectrum: $`\widehat{H}_{A_2}`$ and $`\widehat{H}_{F_2(1)}`$; $`\widehat{H}_{F_1(2)}`$ and $`\widehat{H}_{F_1(3)}`$; $`\widehat{H}_{F_2(2)}`$ and $`\widehat{H}_{F_2(3)}`$.

In Fig. 3(f) a staggering pattern with a presence of $`K`$-bandmixing is illustrated. In fact we added the following three non-diagonal terms $`\widehat{H}_{F_1(2)}`$, $`\widehat{H}_{F_2(1)}`$ and $`\widehat{H}_{F_2(2)}`$ to the already considered diagonal Hamiltonian (22), with the parameters of the latter being kept the same as in Fig. 3(b) (and in Table 1). We see that the mixing leads to a decrease in the staggering amplitude with the increase of angular momentum so that the staggering pattern is reduced completely in the higher spin region. This pattern resembles the experimental situation in 218Rn and 228Th  (odd–even staggering with amplitude decreasing as a function of $`I`$).

So, the staggering patterns illustrated so far (Fig. 3) cover almost all known $`\mathrm{\Delta }I=1`$ staggering patterns in nuclei and molecules. The amplitudes obtained for the examined sets of parameters vary up to $`300`$ keV. Some reasonable theoretical patterns with $`Stg(I)500`$keV can be easily obtained. On this basis we suppose that the model parameters can be adjusted appropriately so as to reproduce the staggering effects in nuclear octupole bands as well as in some rotational negative parity bands built on octupole vibrations. Also, an application of the present formalism to the spectra of diatomic molecules could be reasonable.

Here the following comments on the structure of the collective interactions used and the related symmetries would be relevant:

1) The equal contribution of the three couples of non-diagonal terms (mentioned above) indicates that only four octupole Hamiltonian terms are enough to determine the energy spectrum. This result reflects the circumstance that in the intrinsic frame three octupole degrees of freedom, from the seven ones, are related to the orientation angles. For example we could suggest that the following terms \[applied in Fig. 3(f)\] give an independent contribution in the total Hamiltonian: $`\widehat{H}_{F_1(1)}`$, $`\widehat{H}_{F_1(2)}`$, $`\widehat{H}_{F_2(1)}`$ and $`\widehat{H}_{F_2(2)}`$. We remark that our analysis (related to the collective rotations of the system) gives a natural way to determine the four collective octupole interaction terms.

2) From symmetry point of view we remark that the diagonal term $`\widehat{H}_{F_1(1)}`$ which corresponds to $`Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}0}}`$ possesses an axial symmetry while the non-diagonal terms $`\widehat{H}_{F_1(2)}`$, $`\widehat{H}_{F_2(1)}`$ and $`\widehat{H}_{F_2(2)}`$ (of previous item 1)) are constructed by using the combinations $`(Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}1}}Y_{31})`$ with C2v symmetry, $`(Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}2}}+Y_{32})`$ with Td symmetry and $`(Y_{\mathrm{3\hspace{0.17em}3}}Y_{33})`$ with D3h symmetry. So, our analysis shows that the axial symmetric term should play the major role in the structure of the collective rotational Hamiltonian while the non-axial parts could be considered as small $`K`$-band-mixing interactions. From microscopic point of view, a detailed analysis of the above spherical harmonic combinations and the respective symmetries has been provided on the basis of the one particle spectra of the octupole-coupled two-level model .

3) The observed influence of the non-diagonal Hamiltonian terms on the fine structure of our “schematic” spectra suggests an important physical conclusion: the non-diagonal $`K`$\- mixing interactions suppress the staggering pattern. In such a way we find that the axial symmetric term $`\widehat{H}_{F_1(1)}`$ is the only one pure octupole degree of freedom which provides “beat” staggering behavior of the quantity (24) (See Fig. 3(e)). (The quadrupole–octupole term $`\widehat{H}_{qoc}`$ gives an additional contribution and provides wider angular momentum regions with regular staggering.) So, our analysis suggests that the $`\mathrm{\Delta }I=1`$ staggering effect observed in systems with octupole deformations could be referred to the dominant role of the axial symmetric “pear-like” shape.

In addition, it is important to remark that the fine (staggering) behavior of our schematic energy spectra reflects the structure of the interactions considered through the K- sequences generated in the above minimization procedure. Thus our analysis suggests that in the high angular momentum region some high K band structures should be involved. From microscopic point of view the values $`K=0`$, 1, 2, 3 have been included in calculations, showing that in the beginning of the rare earth region the values $`K=0`$, 1 are important for the lowest $`3^{}`$ state, while in the middle of the region the values $`K=1`$, 2 are important and in the far end of the region the values $`K=2`$, 3 are important . The same authors deal with nuclei with $`A222`$ in Ref. . One of the authors of Refs.  in Ref.  finds that the restriction to $`K3`$ is not justifiable for large energies. This is in agreement with our findings of Table 1.

In conclusion, we remark that the collective interactions considered in this work suggest the presence of various fine rotational band structures in quantum mechanical systems with collective octupole correlations. In particular, they provide various forms of staggering patterns which appear as the results of a delicate interplay between the terms of pure octupole field and the terms of high order quadrupole–octupole interaction. The analysis carried out outlines the dominant role of the axial symmetric “pear-like” shape for the presence of a $`\mathrm{\Delta }I=1`$ staggering effect. The obtained multi K- band crossing structures could be referred to a wobbling collective motion of the system. We propose that the interactions involved would provide a relevant handle in the study of collective phenomena in nuclei and other quantum mechanical systems with complex shape correlations.

Acknowledgments

This work has been supported by the Bulgarian National Fund for Scientific Research under contract no MU–F–02/98. We are grateful to Prof. P. Quentin for the illuminating discussions.

Figure Captions

Figure 1. The diagonal energy matrix element $`E_K(I)`$ (in MeV), Eq. (23), is plotted as a function of $`K`$ for $`I=1,2,\mathrm{},10`$, for the parameter set $`E_0=500`$keV, $`f_k=7.5`$keV, $`A=12`$keV, $`A^{}=6.6`$keV, $`f_{11}=0.56`$keV, $`f_{qoc}=0.085`$keV.

Figure 2. The diagonal energy matrix element $`E_K(I)`$ (in MeV), Eq. (23), is plotted as a function of $`I`$ for $`K=10,11,12,13`$, for the parameter set of Figure 1.

Figure 3. $`\mathrm{\Delta }I=1`$ staggering patterns \[Eq. (24)\] obtained: (a) – (e) by the diagonal Hamiltonian (22) for several different sets of model parameters; (f) by adding three non-diagonal terms $`\widehat{H}_{F_1(2)}`$ \[Eq. (12)\], $`\widehat{H}_{F_2(1)}`$ \[Eq. (14)\] and $`\widehat{H}_{F_2(2)}`$ \[Eq. (15)\] to the diagonal Hamiltonian (22).


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# Quantum Anomaly in Molecular Physics

## Abstract

The interaction of an electron with a polar molecule is shown to be the simplest realization of a quantum anomaly in a physical system. The existence of a critical dipole moment for electron capture and formation of anions, which has been confirmed experimentally and numerically, is derived. This phenomenon is a manifestation of the anomaly associated with quantum symmetry breaking of the classical scale invariance exhibited by the point-dipole interaction. Finally, analysis of symmetry breaking for this system is implemented within two different models: point dipole subject to an anomaly and finite dipole subject to explicit symmetry breaking.

In this Letter we establish the existence of a remarkably simple physical realization of a quantum anomaly in Nature. An anomaly tre:85 ; don:92  is one of the three possible types of symmetry breaking exhibited by a physical system with an invariance of some kind—the other two being explicit and spontaneous symmetry breaking hol:00 . In particular, it arises when a classical invariance of a system is violated upon quantization. Its physical realizations in Nature have been recognized in high-energy physics since the introduction of the Adler-Bell-Jackiw anomaly a-b-j1 ; a-b-j2 ; a-b-j3 , which amounts to violation of chiral symmetry. As a practical tool, this concept has become useful for the analysis of elementary particles in the standard model don:92  and its extensions extensions , as well as in string theory string . In addition to its phenomenological relevance, the study of anomalies has been the source of numerous theoretical investigations tre:85 ; for example: (i) in the path-integral formulation, the chiral-symmetry-breaking anomaly is due to lack of invariance of the functional measure fuj:79 ; (ii) in the Hamiltonian formulation, an operator becomes anomalous when it does not keep invariant the domain of definition of the Hamiltonian est:86 .

The novel physical realization of a quantum anomaly that we now consider occurs in the realm of molecular physics. Specifically, while the consequences implied by our analysis have been known in the literature for some time now, their interpretation in terms of the anomaly concept is totally new. Therefore, in this Letter, by studying this particular realization, we highlight the relevance and simplicity of the anomaly phenomenon beyond its original high-energy physics context. In fact, this remarkable interpretation is the central result of our Letter.

Our analysis involves three essential ingredients: (i) the identification of the relevant symmetry that undergoes an anomalous breaking; (ii) the renormalization, including dimensional transmutation col:73 ; cam:00b , of a nonrelativistic inverse square potential; and (iii) the subsequent application of the inverse square potential to the interaction of an electric dipole with a charge.

First, the symmetries relevant to our work are identical to those of the inverse square potential; under time reparametrizations, they include scale invariance jac:72 , which is part of a larger conformal symmetry with SO(2,1) group-theory structure alf:76 . Surprisingly, the relevance of these symmetry analyses for the dipole potential has remained unnoticed despite its central physical importance in molecular physics. Correspondingly, in this Letter, we review and adapt the symmetry arguments to the case of the dipole-charge interaction.

Second, we have recently considered the inverse square potential using field-theory techniques and shown the existence of a critical coupling for the onset of dimensional transmutation cam:00 . On the other hand, dimensional transmutation has been recently viewed as an example of a quantum anomaly: that associated with the breaking of scale invariance jac:91 ; hol:93 . However, this anomaly has been discussed only in the context of the two-dimensional delta-function potential cab:98 . In this Letter we show that the concepts of anomaly and dimensional transmutation apply to the inverse square potential and related physical problems, including the intriguing electric dipole-charge interaction, with far-reaching implications in molecular physics.

Third, the nonrelativistic interaction of an electric dipole with a charge poses a problem whose physical relevance was first recognized in nuclear physics fer:47 ; wig:49  and then in molecular physics lev:67 ; bro:67 ; cra:67 . In the traditional treatments of this problem tur:77 , a key ingredient is the existence of a critical dipole moment for the capture of the electric charge by the dipole. This unambiguous prediction of quantum mechanics has led to a standard lore in molecular physics, according to which any neutral molecule with a dipole moment of the order of 2 D or greater debye  should be capable of capturing an electron and sustaining a molecular anion cra:71 . Recent experiments mea:84 ; des:94  and numerical simulations des:94  confirm this generic prediction. This immediately leads one to pose the question: what is the origin of this critical coupling and why is it robust? In this Letter we shed light on this issue by treating the problem using scale invariance and its associated anomaly, dimensional transmutation.

The interaction of an electric charge $`Q`$ with a point dipole $`𝐩`$, which we treat nonrelativistically and refer to as the point-dipole potential, is described by means of

$$V(𝐫)=K_e\frac{Qp\mathrm{cos}\theta }{r^2},$$
(1)
which can be regarded as a generalized inverse square potential with an anisotropic coupling strength. As usual, in Eq. (1), the polar angle $`\theta `$ is measured from the direction of the dipole moment, and we assume that the problem occurs in ordinary three-dimensional space. The coupling can be rewritten in a dimensionless form

$$\lambda =\frac{2mK_e}{\mathrm{}^2}Qp=\frac{p}{p_0},$$
(2)
with $`m`$ being the reduced mass of the system and $`K_e`$ the electrostatic constant. In Eq. (2) the characteristic dipole moment $`p_0`$ sets the scale for our analysis and is the relevant dimensional parameter whose order of magnitude will provide an estimate for criticality (charge capture). For the particular case of an electron interacting with a polar molecule, $`Q=e`$ (with $`e`$ being the electron charge magnitude), and $`p_0=ea_0/21.271D`$, where $`a_0`$ is the Bohr radius and $`D`$ is the debye debye . The Hamiltonian associated with Eqs. (1) and (2),

$$H=\frac{\mathrm{}^2}{2m}\left[^2+\lambda \frac{\mathrm{cos}\theta }{r^2}\right],$$
(3)
is explicitly scale and conformally invariant, as the analysis below shows.

The corresponding classical Lagrangian $`L=mv^2/2V(𝐫)`$ has an associated action that is invariant under the scale transformations $`t\tau t`$, $`𝐫\varrho 𝐫`$, (with $`\tau >0`$ and $`\varrho >0`$), $`\varrho ^2=\tau `$; this property is shared by the larger class of homogeneous potentials of degree $`2`$ cam:00b , which also includes the two-dimensional delta-function potential. In the language of dimensional analysis, this symmetry means that the point-dipole potential has no characteristic dimensional scales and the coupling $`\lambda `$ is dimensionless self-adjointness .

The symmetry analysis under time reparametrizations can be generalized to jac:80 ; jac:90  $`t\stackrel{~}{t}=t\alpha f(t)`$, $`𝐫\stackrel{~}{𝐫}(\stackrel{~}{t})=J^\delta 𝐫(t)`$, with $`J=|d\stackrel{~}{t}/dt|`$. Invariance of the action occurs only when the following two conditions are simultaneously satisfied: (i) $`\delta =1/2`$ and (ii) $`f(t)`$ is quadratic in $`t`$. This selects the SO(2,1) conformal group, just as for the inverse square potential alf:76 , the magnetic monopole jac:80 , and the magnetic vortex jac:90 , with the following three generators: (i) the Hamiltonian $`H`$, Eq. (3), associated with time translations $`tt\alpha `$ \[for $`f(t)=1`$\]; (ii) the dilation generator

$$D=tH\frac{1}{4}\left(𝐫𝐩+𝐩𝐫\right),$$
(4)
associated with the scale transformation defined in the previous paragraph, with $`\tau =1\alpha `$ \[for $`f(t)=t`$\]; and (iii) the conformal generator

$$K=Ht^2\frac{1}{2}(𝐩𝐫+𝐫𝐩)t+\frac{1}{2}mr^2,$$
(5)
associated with the time special conformal transformation $`1/t1/t+\alpha `$ \[for $`f(t)=t^2`$\]. The corresponding commutators $`[D,H]=i\mathrm{}H`$, $`[D,K]=i\mathrm{}K`$, and $`[H,K]=2i\mathrm{}D`$ show that these three operators form an SO(2,1) algebra wyb:74 .

We will now examine how scale invariance is broken at the quantum-mechanical level. This symmetry breaking manifests itself in the appearance of a critical dipole moment, whose existence and numerical value we will establish next by generalizing our treatment of the inverse square potential cam:00 . This goal can be accomplished by writing the Schrödinger equation for the point dipole in spherical coordinates, with the separation of variables $`\mathrm{\Psi }(r,\theta ,\varphi )=u(r)\mathrm{\Theta }(\theta )e^{im\varphi }/r`$, where the azimuthal dependence corresponds to conservation of the axial component $`L_z`$ of angular momentum. Then, the corresponding equations for $`r`$ and $`\theta `$ are explicitly given by

$$\frac{d^2u(r)}{dr^2}+\left(\eta +\frac{\gamma }{r^2}\right)u(r)=0$$
(6)
and

$$\widehat{A}\mathrm{\Theta }(\theta )=\gamma \mathrm{\Theta }(\theta ),$$
(7)
where $`\eta =2mE/\mathrm{}^2`$,

$$\widehat{A}=\mathrm{\Lambda }^2+\lambda \mathrm{cos}\theta ,$$
(8)
and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }^2=L^2/\mathrm{}^2`$ is the dimensionless angular momentum (squared). Equations (6) and (7) constitute a coupled system of eigenvalue equations linked by the separation constant $`\gamma `$. Notice that Eq. (6) can be interpreted as defining an isotropic inverse square potential for the zero angular-momentum channel in three dimensions, with coupling strength $`\lambda _{\mathrm{ISP}}\gamma `$. In addition, $`\gamma `$ is implicitly related to the actual coupling $`\lambda `$ of the point-dipole potential by means of the eigenvalue equation (7). This relation can be obtained by recasting Eq. (7) into matrix form through the matrix

$$M(\gamma ,\lambda )=A(\lambda )+\gamma 𝟙$$
(9)
(where $`𝟙`$ is the identity matrix) and subsequently setting up the corresponding characteristic equation lev:67 ; bro:67 ; cra:67

$$D(\gamma ,\lambda )detM(\gamma ,\lambda )=0.$$
(10)
It should be noticed that the existence of symmetry breaking for the dipole potential can be viewed as a consequence of the corresponding symmetry breaking for the inverse square potential. As shown in Ref. cam:00 , this quantum anomaly occurs for the inverse square potential in the supercritical or strong-coupling regime $`\gamma \gamma ^{()}=1/4`$ (for $`l=0`$ in three dimensions). It then follows that there exists a critical value $`\lambda ^{()}`$ of the dimensionless dipole moment to be determined from the corresponding critical inverse-square coupling $`\gamma ^{()}=1/4`$, i.e.,

$$D(\gamma ^{()},\lambda ^{()})=0,$$
(11)
and such that a quantum anomaly occurs for the strong-coupling regime $`\lambda \lambda ^{()}`$. A straightforward calculation shows that $`\lambda ^{()}1.279`$, which amounts to the familiar critical dipole moment $`p^{()}1.625D`$ fer:47 ; wig:49 ; lev:67 ; bro:67 ; cra:67 . Extensive empirical and numerical studies have confirmed the existence of a critical dipole moment of a similar value for a large number of molecules mea:84 ; des:94 . This remarkable universal property of polar molecules can be regarded as the simplest physical example of a quantum anomaly.

The fact that the predictions arising from the quantum anomaly analyzed in the previous paragraph agree with the corresponding empirical and numerical findings requires further elaboration. In effect, a polar molecule is better modeled as a finite dipole, with an interaction potential

$$V(𝐫)=K_eQq\left(\frac{1}{R_+}\frac{1}{R_{}}\right)=K_e\frac{Qp\mathrm{cos}\theta }{r^2}+V_{\mathrm{sb}}(𝐫).$$
(12)
In Eq. (12) $`R_\pm `$ represents the distance to the charge $`Q`$ from the positive and negative charges of the dipole, which are separated by a distance $`a`$. Equation (12) displays the point-dipole potential (1), with $`p=qa`$ ($`l=1`$), supplemented by a symmetry-breaking potential $`V_{\mathrm{sb}}(𝐫)`$, which includes higher-order multipoles (for $`l>1`$ and $`r>a/2`$, with moments $`qa^l=pa^{l1}`$), as well as the contribution to the potential for $`r<a/2`$. In short, in this model, the SO(2,1) symmetry of potential (1) undergoes explicit symmetry breaking by the introduction of additional terms in the Hamiltonian. The corresponding Schrödinger equation with potential (12) can be derived by separation of variables in prolate spheroidal coordinates prolate , thus providing a solution lev:67 ; bro:67 ; cra:67 ; finite\_dipole  that illustrates the effect of adding explicit symmetry-breaking terms.

A priori, it is by no means obvious that the approximate point-dipole representation captures the correct behavior and the correct numerical value of the critical dipole moment. However, as we will show next, this is indeed the case. In other words, even though the finite dipole introduces a length scale $`a`$ and amounts to an example of explicit symmetry breaking, the existence of a critical dipole moment as well as its numerical value are independent of $`a`$. In fact, this result is confirmed by the explicit solution of the problem with potential (12). In short, the simplified point-dipole model exhibits an anomaly, whose relevance is highlighted by a robust prediction—one that survives when the finite size of the molecule is considered.

Let us now see the dimensional argument that proves the statement of the previous paragraph. The characteristic dimensional parameters for the dynamics of the finite dipole are $`\mathrm{}`$, $`m`$, $`q`$, and $`a`$, as well as the finite charge $`Q`$; moreover the interaction only involves the product $`Qq`$. Then, according to Buckingham’s Pi theorem of dimensional analysis pi\_theorem ,

$$E_{\mathrm{gs}}=\frac{\mathrm{}^2}{2ma^2}F(\lambda ),$$
(13)
where $`\lambda `$ is the dimensionless combination of the given parameters that we previously defined in Eq. (2) and $`F(\lambda )`$ is an arbitrary function of $`\lambda `$. On the other hand, the critical value of the dimensionless coupling, $`\lambda ^{()}`$, occurs when the ground state energy $`E_{\mathrm{gs}}`$ comes into existence going through a zero value energy\_subtlety . Thus, the critical dipole moment is defined by the condition

$$F(\lambda ^{()})=0,$$
(14)
whose solution is a dimensionless number independent of the size $`a`$ of the dipole. In particular, the critical value survives in the limit $`a0`$, which amounts to the ideal point dipole. This shows that the point-dipole model with anomalous symmetry breaking predicts the correct physics of the finite dipole, for which the symmetry is explicitly broken.

In conclusion, we have found theoretical and empirical evidence—further confirmed by numerical computations—of the existence of a quantum anomaly in molecular physics. Specifically, this anomaly is manifested by the formation of anions through electron capture by polar molecules with supercritical dipole moments and, to our knowledge, represents the simplest realization of quantum-mechanical symmetry breaking in a physical system.

This research was supported in part by CONICET and ANPCyT, Argentina (L.N.E., H.F., and C.A.G.C.) and by the University of San Francisco Faculty Development Fund (H.E.C.). Instructive discussions with Profs. Carlos R. Ordóñez and B. Montgomery Pettitt are gratefully acknowledged by H.E.C.


text:
# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

The analysis of the types of attacks an eavesdropper (Eve) can make on quantum key distribution protocols is the subject of intensive research . An important goal of this research is to find upper bounds on the amount of secret key information that may be compromised by the attack. In this paper we explore the consequences of the fact that Eve must conceal her attack from the sender (Alice) and the receiver (Bob) of the secret key material. The importance of unperturbed error statistics is well established in the literature. However other important signatures of Eve’s activity, such as the effect on overall count rate and the incidence of multiple photon events at Bob’s apparatus, have not yet received sufficient attention. In this paper we describe a specific class of attack and analyze the extent to which these constraints can reduce the amount of information available to an eavesdropper.

## 2 Analysis

Alice and Bob use a BB84 protocol  augmented with error correction, authentication, and privacy amplification. We consider the special case of weak coherent pulses produced by attenuating the output of a pulsed laser. The number of photons in any given pulse is a Poison-distributed random variable:

$$\widehat{\chi }(\mu ,l)=e^\mu \frac{\mu ^l}{l!},$$
(1)
where $`\mu `$ is the average number of photons per pulse. The quantum channel is characterized by a transmittivity $`\alpha `$, and the quantum efficiency of Bob’s detector is $`\eta `$. The dark count rate of the detector will not be taken into account as it substantially complicates the analytical results without providing significant additional insight. Eve begins her attack by measuring the number of photons in the pulse. This destroys the coherence of the pulse, but does not affect the polarization, which encodes the information Alice and Bob intend to share. The rest of the attack then depends on the number of photons in the pulse.

If there are 3 or more photons in the pulse, Eve makes a “direct” attack  by making separate measurements of the polarizations of the photons. We denote by $`\widehat{z}_E\left(l\right)`$ the probability that she is successful in determining the polarization of the photons sent by Alice . If she is successful, she arranges for an accomplice to inject a photon of the correct polarization state into the transmission channel near Bob’s detector. This ensures that any qubit whose value she knows is among those that Bob actually receives. If the measurements do not determine the state, she does nothing, and Bob receives no photons for that pulse. By itself, this would result in a measurable change in the count statistics by which Bob could detect the eavesdropping. Eve compensates for this by blocking some of the pulses that contain only 1 or 2 photons. Finally, Eve eavesdrops on the classical channel during sifting to discover which of the pulses result in bits of sifted key material. She then uses her measured polarizations to determine this subset of Alice and Bob’s shared key.

If there are 2 photons in the pulse, Eve blocks the pulse with some probability $`p_b`$. Otherwise she makes an “indirect” attack  in which she stores the state of one of the photons in a quantum memory until after the sifting phase. By eavesdropping on the sifting phase, she learns which basis to use to measure the stored photon, thus unambiguously determining the value of the bit shared by Alice and Bob. In  it is shown that direct attacks are more effective than indirect attacks when the probability of a photon reaching Bob is below a certain threshold but that direct attacks are of no use when there are only 2 photons in the pulse . Eve chooses to use direct attacks for the stronger pulses and indirect attacks for the 2-photon pulses.

Finally, if there is 1 photon in the pulse, Eve blocks the pulse with probability $`p_b`$. If the pulse is not blocked, she lets a fraction $`1p_m`$ of the pulses pass through. For the remaining pulses, she picks a basis at random and measures the polarization in that basis. She then prepares a photon in the state she has measured and sends it to Bob. In this case, the photons for which she chose the wrong basis will increase the error rate seen by Alice and Bob. We assume that Eve has the technology required to compensate Alice and Bob’s intrinsic error rate (this common assumption constitutes a compromise of transmission security ). She then adjusts the parameter $`p_m`$ so that the error rate observed by Alice and Bob is within the limits they expect.

We wish to determine the average amount of information leaked to Eve using this particular attack. Consider first the information she obtains from the single-photon pulses. For Eve to obtain a bit of information, 1 photon must be in the initial pulse, it must not be blocked by Eve, it must be measured by Eve, it must reach Bob, it must be detected by his detector, and all parties must use compatible bases. If there are 2 photons in the initial pulse, Eve will obtain a bit of the sifted key if she does not block the pulse, if the photon she passes is received and detected by Bob, and if Alice and Bob use compatible bases. If there are 3 or more photons, Eve’s attack is successful if she successfully measures the state, if Bob detects the photon, and if Alice and Bob use compatible bases. The resulting expression for the information obtained by Eve is then (the superscript emphasizes the fact that we do not consider the effect of error correction)

$$s^{partial}=\frac{m}{2}\left[\frac{1}{2}\chi (\mu ,1)\left(1p_b\right)p_m\eta \alpha +\chi (\mu ,2)\left(1p_b\right)\eta \alpha +z_E\left(\mu \right)\eta \right],$$
(2)
where we denote by $`z_E\left(\mu \right)`$ the average of $`\widehat{z}_E\left(l\right)`$ over the photon number states $`l>3`$.

Recall that Eve must tune the parameters $`p_b`$ and $`p_m`$ so that the count rate and error rate measured by Bob are the same as they would have been with no eavesdropping. General expressions for the number of sifted bits per block and the number of errors per block may be found in . The number of sifted bits in the limit of vanishing dark count is

$$n=\frac{m}{2}\psi (\eta \mu \alpha ,1),$$
(3)
where $`\psi (X,l)`$ is the probability for having $`l`$ or more photons in a coherent pulse with mean photon number $`X`$. We next find the number of sifted bits per block when Eve is making the attack described above:

$$\widehat{n}=\frac{m}{2}\left\{\left[\chi (\mu ,1)+\chi (\mu ,2)\right]\left(1p_b\right)\eta \alpha +z_E\left(\mu \right)\eta \right\}.$$
(4)
We may now determine $`p_b`$ by requiring $`n=\widehat{n}`$, which gives

$$p_b=1\frac{\psi (\eta \mu \alpha ,1)z_E\left(\mu \right)\eta }{\left[\chi (\mu ,1)+\chi (\mu ,2)\right]\eta \alpha }.$$
(5)
The value $`p_b`$ thus obtained must be between $`0`$ and $`1`$. This implies constraints on the region of parameter space in which the attack as described can be performed at all. The consequences of these constraints will be explored in detail in a subsequent paper . The principal effect is to force Eve to modify her attack in a way that further reduces the amount of information she is able to obtain.

Next we consider the error rate. In the absence of Eve’s attack, the number of errors in Bob’s sifted key is

$$e_T=\frac{m}{2}\psi (\eta \mu \alpha ,1)r_c,$$
(6)
where $`r_c`$ is the intrinsic error probability of the source, channel, and detector apparatus and we have ignored the dark count. We assume that Eve can control the error rate of the channel from Alice to Bob. If so, then she achieves the strongest attack by removing the intrinsic errors entirely, in which case we have

$$\widehat{e}_T=\frac{m}{8}\chi (\mu ,1)\left(1p_b\right)p_m\eta \alpha .$$
(7)
Eve therefore adjusts $`p_m`$ to avoid perturbing the error count, resulting in

$$p_m=\frac{\psi (\eta \mu \alpha ,1)}{\chi (\mu ,1)\eta \alpha }\frac{4r_c}{1p_b}.$$
(8)
This quantity must be no larger than $`1`$, which implies an additional constraint on the parameter space .

Note that we have not yet discussed the effect of Eve’s attack on the probability that Bob receives multiple photon counts for a given pulse. Since this is also a measurable consequence of her attack, she must adjust her attack to emulate the unperturbed multiple photon event statistics seen by Bob. One approach to this issue has been analyzed in . We explore this topic further in .

## 3 Conclusion

The Figure shows the information loss, $`s^{partial}`$ as a function of $`\mu `$, for three cases of interest. The other parameters are chosen to have reasonable practical values ($`\alpha =0.01,\eta =0.5,r_c=0.01`$). The upper curve is an upper bound for all attacks consistent with the measured error rate . The lower curve is for the attack described here, in which Eve adjusts her parameters to match both the count rate and the error rate. The curve in the middle is for an attack in which Eve matches the error rate, but does not attempt to match the count rate. Note that the middle and lower curves come close to achieving the maximum for small $`\mu `$. Requiring Eve to match the count rate modestly reduces the strength of her attack.

This analysis raises several questions for further research. First, can these results be extended to incorporate a general attack by Eve? Second, are there regions of ($`\mu ,\alpha ,\eta ,r_c`$) space for which the enforced reduction of information available to Eve through eavesdropping becomes significant? If so, the corresponding rates of key generation will be greater than current estimates predict. Finally, what is the effect of imprecise knowledge of the parameters $`\mu ,\alpha ,\eta ,r_c`$ on these results?


text:
# THE MORPHOLOGICAL EVOLUTION OF MERGER REMNANTS

## 1 Analytic

In a hierarchical clustering scenario, elliptical galaxies form by the merger of smaller stellar systems. Mergers of equal-mass progenitors tend to form fairly flattened systems; after violent relaxation, the ratio of the shortest to longest axis of the merger remnant is typically $`c/a0.5`$ . However, once an elliptical merger remnant has completed violent relaxation, its shape does not remain constant. In the central regions of the galaxy – well inside the effective radius – the morphological evolution is driven by two-body relaxation, the result of close gravitational encounters between the point masses of which the galaxy is made. The net effect of two-body relaxation is to make a galaxy more nearly spherical with time.

Consider an idealized case of two-body relaxation in which a mass $`M`$ is plunked down in an isothermal stellar system with velocity dispersion $`\sigma `$. The introduced mass will disrupt the orbits of stars which come within a critical distance $`bGM/\sigma ^2`$. If the mass $`M`$ is just another star, with mass $`M1\mathrm{M}_{}`$, then stars will have to come within a distance $`b5\mathrm{R}_{}(\sigma /200\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1)^2`$ before their orbits are randomized. Thus, for a typical elliptical galaxy, stars must come within a few stellar radii of each other for two-body relaxation to occur, and the star/star relaxation time is much longer than a Hubble time. If stars were the only point masses which elliptical galaxies contained, we would thus conclude that the effects of two-body relaxation on the structure of ellipticals are negligibly small so far. However, there’s more to a galaxy than stars. Most, if not all, elliptical galaxies contain central black holes, with a mass given by the relation $`M_{\mathrm{BH}}10^8\mathrm{M}_{}(\sigma /200\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1)^{4.8}`$. With this black hole mass, a star coming within a distance $`b10\mathrm{pc}(\sigma /200\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1)^{2.8}`$ will have its orbit disrupted. Thus, relaxation due to star/black-hole encounters will be vastly more effective than relaxation due to star/star encounters. The net effect of the central black hole will be to increase the entropy of the stellar system and to make it more nearly spherical with time.

It should also be noted that if an elliptical forms by the merger of two progenitors, each with a central black hole, a binary black hole may exist for many gigayears before dynamical friction, gas dynamical effects, and gravitational radiation will cause the two black holes to coalesce. Three-body interactions between a star and a bound black hole binary will generally increase the star’s kinetic energy. Thus, binary black holes have been proposed as a mechanism for lowering the stellar density in the central regions of an elliptical and creating a ‘core’ profile .

## 2 Observational

Given the brevity of human life, we cannot sit and watch for a few billion years while a post-merger elliptical becomes rounder with time; nor can we take the time to circumnavigate a galaxy and discover its true three-dimensional shape at a given time. The best we can do, to test our belief that merger remnants become rounder with time, is to examine a sample of elliptical galaxies and see whether the apparent shape of a galaxy is correlated with the time elapsed since it last underwent a major merger.

Estimating the time that has passed since an elliptical galaxy’s last major merger is not a simple or straightforward task. However, if the merger in question involved a pair of reasonably gas-rich galaxies, then the merger will be accompanied by a burst of star formation that will leave its spectroscopic mark on the galaxy. Terlevich and Forbes have recently compiled a catalog of spectroscopic galaxy ages, based on a homogeneous data set of galaxies with high-quality H$`\beta `$ and \[MgFe\] absorption line indices. The stellar population model of Worthey is used to assign an age to the stellar population of each galaxy in the catalog. For the 74 elliptical galaxies in the Terlevich & Forbes catalog, we searched the published literature for isophotal fits, and found the apparent axis ratio $`qb/a`$ at six reference radii: $`R(ab)^{1/2}=R_e/16`$, $`R_e/8`$, $`R_e/4`$, $`R_e/2`$, $`R_e`$, and $`2R_e`$. Details of the analysis, for those who love details, are given by Ryden, Forbes, & Terlevich.

Figure 1 is a plot of $`q`$ versus the spectroscopic age $`t`$ at the six reference radii. Particularly at the innermost radius, $`R=R_e/16`$, there is a correlation between $`q`$ and $`t`$, with ‘old’ ellipticals tending to be rounder than ‘young’ ellipticals. A Kolmogorov-Smirnov test, comparing the distribution of $`q(R_e/6)`$ for galaxies with $`t7.5\mathrm{Gyr}`$ to the distribution for galaxies with $`t>7.5\mathrm{Gyr}`$, reveals that the distributions differ significantly, with $`P_{\mathrm{KS}}=0.00034`$.

The question ‘Why are there so many round old ellipticals?’ is similar to the question ‘Why are there so many little old ladies?’ It is tempting to interpret the prevalence of little old ladies as being due purely to the evolution of individuals, with ladies tending to become littler as they grow older. However, there are other effects at work as well. For instance, extremely large ladies tend to die prematurely; in addition, today’s population of old ladies grew up when nutritional standards were lower, thus resulting in reduced adult stature. Both these effects, neither of which involves the morphological evolution of individual ladies, contribute to the predominance of little old ladies over large old ladies. Similarly, the predominance over round old ellipticals over flattened old ellipticals is not necessarily due to the morphological evolution of individual galaxies.

The difference in apparent shape between galaxies with young stellar populations and those with old stellar populations is tied, in a most intriguing manner, to the core/power-law distinction. Elliptical galaxies with power-law profiles have luminosity densities which are well fit be a pure power law all the way to the limit of resolution; ellipticals with core profiles, by contrast, have densities which show a break to a shallower inner slope. In Figure 1, core ellipticals are designated by squares, power-law ellipticals are designated by triangles, and ellipticals of unknown profile type are designated by empty circles. Note that the ‘old’ ellipticals tend to have core profiles and round central isophotes, while the ‘young’ ellipticals tend to have power-law profiles and flattened central isophotes. The 29 known core galaxies in our sample have a mean and standard deviation for their estimated stellar ages of $`t=8.6\pm 3.3\mathrm{Gyr}`$; the 22 known power-law galaxies have $`t=6.9\pm 3.5\mathrm{Gyr}`$.

## 3 Numerical

The observational results are consistent with a scenario in which elliptical galaxies are formed in a major merger, then evolve to become more nearly spherical with time. However, they do not compel such a scenario – remember the cautionary tale of the little old ladies! Fortunately, numerical simulations of galaxy mergers, and of the evolution of merger remnants, can be run on timescales much shorter than a gigayear (and, more to the point, shorter than than the lifetime of a graduate student.)

We ran n-body simulations (with no attempt to include gas dynamical effects) of the merger of a pair of disk/bulge/halo galaxies. In our merger simulations, each progenitor has a disk:bulge:halo mass ratio of 1:1:5.8. (The progenitors can be thought of as a pair of S0 galaxies, with big bulges and no gas). The disk, the bulge, and the halo each contain 16K particles. We ran three different merger simulations, differing only in the mass of the central black hole assigned to each progenitor galaxy. One simulation contained no central black holes. In the next simulation, the progenitor galaxies contained central black holes equal in mass to 0.2% of the total stellar mass (disk + bulge). In the final simulation, the progenitors contained black holes equal in mass to 2% of the total stellar mass.

We used the n-body code GADGET for all integrations. GADGET is a tree code designed to run on distributed memory, multi-processor computers. It employs continuously variable timesteps which are individual to each particle. The timesteps are computed with an accuracy parameter, $`\eta `$, set to $`0.02`$. The gravitational smoothing lengths for the disk, bulge, and halo particles were 0.08, 0.08, and 0.4 respectively. For force calculations between any particle and a black hole, a smoothing length of 0.001 was used. (For reference, the disk scale length of the progenitor galaxies was 1.0.)

In the first simulation, whose results are presented in Figure 2, the merging galaxies contained no central black holes. Note that both the intermediate-to-long axis ratio (illustrated in the upper panel of Figure 2) and the short-to-long axis ratio (illustrated in the lower panel) evolve steadily toward unity in this simulation, despite the absence of a central black hole. This is a spurious two-body relaxation effect, resulting from the coarseness of our simulation; instead of being made of tens of billions of stars, the ‘luminous’ portions of our simulated galaxies contain only tens of thousands of mass points.

In Figure 3, showing the evolution in shape of a merger remnant with moderate mass black holes (0.2% of the total stellar mass of the progenitors), we see that the evolution toward a spherical shape is more rapid than in the absence of black holes. Moreover, the drive toward a spherical shape is most rapid for the 5% most tightly bound particles (the heavy solid line in Figure 3) than for the 50% most tightly bound (the light solid line). In short, the added black holes drive the central, most tightly bound, regions of the merger remnant toward a spherical shape on gigayear timescales.

Adding black holes an order of magnitude more massive, as shown in Figure 4, dramatically shortens the time for making the merger remnant spherical. With big black holes, equal to 2% of the total stellar mass, the merger remnant rapidly becomes very nearly oblate (that is, the ratio b/a, shown in the upper panel of Figure 4, rapidly approaches one.) The ratio c/a, shown in the lower panel, approaches unity more gradually. However, we can conclude that if merging galaxies contained extremely massive black holes, equal to one or two percent of their total stellar mass, then merger remnants would become nearly oblate on timescales shorter than a gigayear. The relative scarcity of nearly circular isophotes ($`q>0.95`$) in the central regions of elliptical galaxies – see the upper left panel of Figure 1 – argues that elliptical galaxies are probably not oblate in their central regions. However, given the relatively small size of the Terlevich-Forbes sample, this is not a chiseled-in-stone conclusion.

More data are needed (unsurprisingly). A larger sample size of observational data will help to pin down the relationship among galaxy age, isophote shape, and luminosity profile type. Much work remains to be done (also unsurprisingly). Higher-resolution numerical simulations will reduce the ugly effects of spurious two-body relaxation and will enable us to focus on the physically real effects of massive black holes.

## References


text:
# References

NYU-TH/01/06/02

TPI-MINN-01/31

UMN-TH-2015

astro-ph/0106449

Comments on “A Supernova Brane Scan”
Cédric Deffayet1, Gia Dvali1, and Gregory Gabadadze2

1Department of Physics, New York University, New York, NY 10003
2Theoretical Physics Institute, University of Mineesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455

Abstract

Recently we proposed that the acceleration of the Universe could be due to gravity leaking to extra dimensions. This scenario gives an alternative to the cosmological constant or quintessence. In \[astro-ph/0106274\] the authors claimed that this proposal is strongly disfavored if not ruled out by the existing data on Supernovae, Cosmic Microwave Background and clusters. We show that the work \[astro-ph/0106274\] contains incorrect statements in the theoretical part, and, moreover, we argue that the main conclusions of the work concerning the comparison with the data are premature.

In Ref.  we proposed a brane-world scenario in which the late time acceleration of the Universe is due to the fact that gravity at ultra-large distances becomes five-dimensional and can leak into the extra fifth dimension. This proposal is an alternative to the cosmological constant or quintessence scenarios for the accelerated Universe. It is based on a brane-world model of Ref. , and on a subclass of cosmological solutions found in Ref. .

We analyzed qualitatively in  the Supernovae and Cosmic Microwave Background data. The analysis in  indicated that the existing data cannot discriminate between our model and standard cosmology, but the results of further precision measurements might do so. The next step is of course the confrontation with the real data.

Recently, the authors of Ref.  claimed that the model , and the proposal  is strongly disfavored if not ruled out completely by the existing data on Type Ia Supernovae, Cosmic Microwave Background and clusters. The purpose of the present note is to discuss the work of Ref. . In particular, we will argue that these claims are premature.

First we briefly review the main features of the model  and then turn to our proposal .

The model of Ref.  describes a four-dimensional (4D) world which is confined to a hyper-surface (a “brane”) in five-dimensional (5D) space with infinite flat extra dimension. The electromagnetic, weak and strong interactions are “stuck” to the brane hyper-surface, however gravity is an exception and can propagate everywhere in the whole 5D space. As a result, the gravitational interactions are different in our 4D world: Gravity behaves in a conventional Newtonian way at observable distances, however, the interactions are modified at ultra-large cosmological distances where they become five-dimensional.

From the phenomenological standpoint, there is one free parameter in the model of , that is the 5D gravity scale $`M_{(5)}`$. The latter controls the crossover distance $`r_c`$ between the conventional 4D and unconventional 5D regimes:

$`r_c={\displaystyle \frac{M_P^2}{2M_{(5)}^3}},`$ (1)
where $`M_P10^{18}`$ GeV is the reduced 4D Planck mass. For distances $`r`$ smaller than $`r_c`$ gravity is conventional and gives the $`1/r^2`$ Newton law. However, for distances bigger than $`r_c`$ this breaks down and gravity enters the 5D regime. As was pointed out in Ref. , and shown in detail in Ref.  the high-energy particle processes, astrophysical constraints and the results of sub-millimeter gravitational measurements put the lower bound on $`M_{(5)}`$, that is $`M_{(5)}\stackrel{>}{}10^3\mathrm{eV}`$. On the other hand, the requirement that the cosmological evolution be conventional four-dimensional until the late times requires that $`M_{(5)}\stackrel{<}{}10\mathrm{MeV}`$. Thus, we have the following range for the parameter $`M_{(5)}`$:

$`10^3\mathrm{eV}\stackrel{<}{}M_{(5)}\stackrel{<}{}10^7\mathrm{eV}.`$ (2)
Using (1) these constraints on $`M_{(5)}`$ translate roughly into the following admissible range for the crossover distance $`r_c`$:

$`10^{29}\mathrm{cm}\stackrel{<}{}r_c\stackrel{<}{}10^{59}\mathrm{cm}.`$ (3)
Thus, the lowest possible value of $`r_c`$ is of the order of present-day horizon size.

Different values of $`r_c`$ are interesting from a different perspective. A model with $`r_c10^{59}\mathrm{cm}`$, i.e., with $`M_{(5)}10^3\mathrm{eV}`$, predicts a deviation from the Newtonian gravity at very small sub-millimeter distances (see detailed discussions in ) where the Newtonian gravity is just being tested experimentally . For this value of $`r_c`$, in order to obtain the accelerated Universe one has to add a cosmological constant or a quintessence field on a brane. In this case, the model of  cannot be distinguished from the conventional 4D scenario on the basis of cosmological arguments (but it can be distinguished in sub-millimeter measurements of the gravitation law).

From the point of view of cosmology it is interesting to consider another range of the parameter space in Eqs. (2), (1), that is $`M_{(5)}10^7\mathrm{eV}`$, i.e., $`r_c10^{29}\mathrm{cm}`$. As was discussed in Ref.  there are interesting cosmological predictions for this value of the parameter $`M_{(5)}`$ if one uses the self-accelerated cosmological solution of Ref. .

After this brief introduction we comment on the results of Ref. .

The first comment concerns the statements made in the abstract, introduction and conclusions of  claiming that the model of  (which the authors of  call the DGP model) is ruled out by the cosmological data. This statement is false since the model of  can in no way be ruled out by cosmology as we just discussed. Indeed, for the most part of the parameter space in (2) the model of  predicts no changes in conventional 4D cosmology. For instance, if $`M_510^3\mathrm{eV}`$, the crossover scale $`r_c`$ is about 30 orders of magnitude bigger than the present day horizon size and the cosmology of the model  is identical for all the practical purposes to the conventional 4D cosmology.

Let us now turn to the proposal of Ref. . There we chose the lowest possible value of the parameter $`r_c10^{29}\mathrm{cm}`$. In this case the modification of gravity takes place at the size of the present day horizon. We confined ourselves to a particular cosmological solution with self-acceleration which was found in Ref.  and proposed in  to use this solution for the description of the Supernovae data on the acceleration of the Universe . It is only this proposal which could be ruled out in principle in  by the cosmological data. In other words, cosmological considerations could rule out the part of the parameter space of the model  with $`M_{(5)}10`$ MeV, but not the model of  itself as claimed in .

Moreover, we will ague below that given the state of the current data the proposal of  cannot be favored over the conventional scenarios, and certainly cannot be disfavored or excluded, in contrast with the conclusions of Ref. . We will turn to this momentarily after a minor digression in the next paragraph.

Here it is appropriate to make one more comment on the claims of Ref. . Authors of  state that one cannot accommodate on a brane with infinite extra space the closed ($`k=1`$) universe since the latter requires a finite volume. Although this issue has only an academic interest (as the current data supports the flat Universe with $`k=0`$), nevertheless, for the sake of completeness we will comment on this. The statement of  is not correct since the $`k=1`$ solutions can be accommodated on the brane along the lines of Refs. ,. Since this is just a straightforward rewriting of the equations of Refs. , for the $`k=1`$ case we will not repeat them here. It seems that the authors of  did not realize the fact that even if the volume of the extra space is infinite, this does not mean that the 3D volume of the observable braneworld Universe should also be infinite 111As an additional side comment we just briefly mention that the problem of the extra polarization of the 5D graviton which was discussed in  and is a point of concern in , was recently resolved in ..

The cosmology of the model considered in  is governed by the following first Friedmann equation

$$H(z)^2=H_0^2\left\{\mathrm{\Omega }_k(1+z)^2+\left(\sqrt{\mathrm{\Omega }_{r_c}}+\sqrt{\mathrm{\Omega }_{r_c}+\mathrm{\Omega }_M(1+z)^3}\right)^2\right\},$$
(4)
where $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{r_c}`$ is defined by $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{r_c}(2r_cH_0)^2`$ and the only energy-momentum content of the universe is non relativistic matter (and no cosmological constant). The Friedmann equation is thus non standard as is the normalization condition 222Note that $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_k`$ are defined in a conventional way.

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_k+\left(\sqrt{\mathrm{\Omega }_{r_c}}+\sqrt{\mathrm{\Omega }_{r_c}+\mathrm{\Omega }_M}\right)^2=1.$$
(5)
The outcome of equation (4) is that the early cosmology is standard matter-dominated, whereas the late time cosmology exhibits acceleration when the matter density becomes small enough. This late time behavior enables to explain the Supernovae observations  without the need of a cosmological constant or quintessence field .

Let us now turn to the issue of comparison with the data.

As it is easy to see from the plots presented in Ref.  one needs a lower value of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M`$ than in standard cosmology in order to fit the SN data in our model. Our current estimate , which is based on a fit of 54 Supernovae (18 nearby and 36 distant, taken from second Ref. of ) is for a flat universe (as required by CMB observations) at one sigma level

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.24_{0.06}^{+0.08}.$$
(6)
This should be compared with the number quoted in  obtained for our model by fitting 92 Supernovae (at one sigma level)333and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.2_{0.1}^{+0.1}`$ at $`99\%`$ confidence level:

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.2_{0.05}^{+0.05}.$$
(7)
It is at least an overstatement to claim, as in , that such numbers are enough to rule out the model on the basis of estimates of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M`$ coming from other means than SN or CMB observations. One can certainly pick a single, least favorable value among these estimates to compare it to our model, as it was done in , but this cannot be justified by any scientific means. The value of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M`$ obtained from fitting the data which is quoted in  is $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.35_{0.07}^{+0.07}`$. Even if one is to accept this value and (7) for granted, one could really wonder whether a two sigma discrepancy is enough to rule out a model, given the state of the art of measurements of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M`$. The estimates for $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M`$ from other means than Supernovae data (and CMB) is far from being settled with such a good precision to rule out (6) or (7). Moreover, it is well known that the different measurements have systematic uncertainties which are very difficult to assign (see for example the discrepancy between the values quoted in  and the one obtained by X-Ray or SZ measurements quoted in ). We will not comment on this any longer, let a reader decide if numbers such as (6) or (7) are good enough to rule out a model.

On the other hand, as pointed out in , it is perfectly true that the model can be disproved with coming data and precision cosmological tests, and this makes it exciting. However, given the status of the current data it does not seem reasonable to make strong statements such as those made in Ref. .

Some of us are currently working on a more comprehensive comparison with the data including the large scale structure and CMB results .

We would like to thank Pierre Astier, Andrei Gruzinov, David Hogg, Jim Peebles, Roman Scoccimarro and Matias Zaldarriaga for useful discussions.


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# M31 globular cluster metallicities and ages

## 1. Introduction

Studies of the M31 globular cluster system are thoroughly reviewed by Jablonka (these proceedings). One of the most important discoveries about the M31 GCS is that, like that of the Milky Way, it contains two populations of globular clusters with different metallicities, kinematics, and spatial distributions. Many other galaxies’ GCSs also show this bimodality, and it has been seized upon as an important key to GCS and galaxy history. An important question is whether the two populations of clusters have different ages.

Measuring ages for individual M31 GCs by fitting isochrones to their CMDs is not possible with existing technology, although it is part of the design reference mission for NGST (Rich & Neill 1999). Age estimates using horizontal branch morphologies, as done by Sarajedini et al. (2000) for M33 clusters, is possible, although it relies on the (still controversial) assumption that age is the dominant ‘second parameter’. We used a new catalog of integrated properties of M31 GCs and GC candidates (Barmby et al. 2000) to investigate the ages of the metal-poor and metal-rich M31 GCs. An important feature of this catalog is its use to determine the extinction of individual clusters, and thus their intrinsic colors and magnitudes.

## 2. Cluster colors and SSP models

The original idea of this work (Barmby & Huchra 2000) was to compare the intrinsic colors of M31 and Milky Way globular clusters to the predictions of simple stellar population models. This is important not only for eliciting the properties of M31 GCs, but also for testing the models. GCs are among the simplest stellar populations known, and models which cannot reproduce their integrated colors will presumably have problems when used to study composite populations like galaxies.

The intrinsic colors of M31 globular clusters are taken from our catalog (Barmby et al. 2000); colors for Milky Way globulars are from the Harris (1996) catalog, augmented by infrared colors published in Brodie & Huchra (1990). For this comparison, we used only clusters with measured spectroscopic metallicities and reddening $`E(BV)<0.5`$, since uncertainty in the reddening, and hence the intrinsic colors, increases for large values of $`E(BV)`$.

We compared the cluster colors to those of simple stellar populations from three sets of models: those of Worthey, Bruzual & Charlot (both the Worthey and B&C models are the versions reported in Leitherer et al. 1996), and Kurth, Fritze-von Alvensleben, & Fricke (1999). We used all the available model metallicities, and model ages of 8, 12, and 16 Gyr. Although model colors are tabulated in smaller age increments (typically 1 Gyr), we decided that it was more reasonable to use only a few typical ages than attempt to derive precise cluster ages from integrated colors.

The models generally fit the data very well, with offsets in the bluer colors likely due to model problems. However, the best-fit models for the metal-rich clusters have younger ages (8 or 12 Gyr) than those for the metal-poor clusters (16 Gyr). Unless there is some systematic problem with metallicity in our data and/or the models, this means that the metal-rich clusters are younger than the metal-poor clusters in both M31 and the Milky Way.

## 3. GCLF variation

Many factors influence the total luminosity of a globular cluster, including mass, IMF, age, and metallicity. It is thus somewhat surprising that the distribution of integrated GC luminosities, the globular cluster luminosity function or GCLF, is so similar from galaxy to galaxy. In Barmby, Huchra, & Brodie (2001), we computed the GCLF for various sub-samples of the M31 GCS. We used the intrinsic $`V_0`$ magnitudes for clusters with $`V<18`$ and careful corrections for incompleteness, and computed the GCLF parameters using the maximum likelihood method described in Secker & Harris (1993).

The peak of the GCLF was brighter for clusters near the center of M31 than for more distant clusters. The GCLF difference found was comparable to theoretical predictions of cluster destruction effects (e.g., Ostriker & Gnedin 1997). We also found a difference between the GCLFs of metal-rich and metal-poor clusters. The metal-rich clusters are brighter, not fainter as would be expected from the effects of metallicity on $`M/L_V`$ (Ashman, Conti, & Zepf 1995). One way for the metal-rich clusters to be brighter than the metal-poor clusters is for them to be significantly younger. Comparisons with the population synthesis models mentioned above show that the luminosity difference we measured could be caused by a difference in age of about 55%.

## 4. Summary

Integrated colors and luminosities of M31 globular clusters provide photometric evidence that at least some of the metal-rich GCs in M31 are younger than the bulk of the population. Such an effect has previously been suggested to explain the ratio of dwarf to giant light found in the spectra of metal-rich M31 clusters by Tripicco (1989). The age differences our results imply are large — up to 8 Gyr. Chemical evolution models generally do not require this much time to enrich protocluster gas, so we need some other reason for the large age gap between populations. One possibility is that the metal-rich clusters in M31 formed in a merger (as in the picture of Ashman & Zepf 1992), but any such merger would have to be gentle enough not to destroy the M31 disk. Another possibility is that the metal-poor clusters were formed before the galaxy itself, and the metal-rich clusters formed with the galaxy. If this was the case, one might expect to see similar age differences in the GC populations of other galaxies. Integrated broad-band magnitudes and colors are clearly not the best way to age-date globular clusters, although they provide tantalizing hints in the case of the M31 GCs. More precise methods are needed for age-dating extragalactic globular clusters.

### Acknowledgments.

I thank the conference organizers for a stimulating meeting and for the financial assistance which enabled me to attend, and the Smithsonian Institution for financial support.

## References

Ashman, K. M. & Zepf, S. E. 1992, ApJ, 384, 50

Ashman, K. M., Conti, A. & Zepf, S. E. 1995, AJ, 110, 1164

Barmby, P. & Huchra, J. P. 2000, ApJ, 531, L29

Barmby, P., Huchra, J. P., & Brodie, J. P. 2001, AJ, 121, 1482

Barmby, P., Huchra, J. P., Brodie, J. P., Forbes, D. A., Schroder, L. L. & Grillmair, C. J. 2000, AJ, 119, 727

Brodie, J. P. & Huchra, J. P. 1990, ApJ, 362, 503

Harris, W. 1996, AJ, 112, 1487

Kurth, O. M., Fritze-von Alvensleben, U. & Fricke, K. J. 1999, A&AS, 138, 19

Leitherer, C. et al. 1996, PASP, 108, 996

Ostriker, J. P. & Gnedin, O. 1997, ApJ, 487, 667

Rich, R. M. & Neill, J. D. 1999, BAAS, 194, 712

Sarajedini, A., Geisler, D., Schommer, R. & Harding, P. 2000, AJ, 120, 2437

Secker, J. & Harris, W. E. 1993, AJ, 105, 1358

Tripicco, M. J. 1989, AJ, 97, 735


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# ASCA observations of massive medium-distant clusters of galaxies. II.

## 1 Introduction

Statistical studies of massive clusters of galaxies – the largest bound entities in the universe – can provide important clues for cosmology. The most useful constraints on cosmology are provided by quantities such as dynamics, virialization, galaxy content, intracluster medium (ICM) enrichment, and temperature. Specifically, it is of prime interest to detect any sign of evolution in the cluster properties, because this is directly influenced by the mean density of the universe and the nature of the dark matter. However, problems with detailed cluster studies beyond $`z0.5`$ are their low fluxes and the limited angular resolving power of instruments. Therefore, we have selected 7 X-ray bright medium-distant clusters from a ROSAT All-Sky Survey flux limited sample, which are shown in Table 1 along with their spectroscopic redshifts (Pierre et al. Pierre1999 (1999) ; hereafter Paper I). We have performed detailed multi-wavelength observations for them at radio, infrared, optical, and X-ray wavelengths (Pierre et al. 1994a ; 1994b ). Following Paper I which reported the ASCA results of RX J1131.9 (A 1300) and RX J1325.1 (A 1732) observed during ESA time, this paper presents the analysis of the ASCA data of the remaining five sample clusters, acquired under ISAS time. The complementary combined analysis of the ROSAT HRI, radio and detailed optical spectroscopic data has been performed by Lémonon (Lemonon1999 (1999)) and will be published in a forthcoming comprehensive paper. Throughout this paper, we assumed that $`H_0`$ = 50 km s-1 Mpc-1, and $`q_0`$ = 0.5. The solar abundance of iron relative to hydrogen was taken to be 4.68$`\times 10^5`$ (Anders & Grevesse Anders1989 (1989)). The errors in this paper are given at the 90 % confidence level.

## 2 Observations and data reduction

All data were obtained with two solid-state imaging spectrometers (SIS0 and SIS1) and two gas-imaging spectrometers (GIS2 and GIS3) at the foci of four thin-foil X-ray mirrors (XRT) on board the ASCA satellite. Table 2 shows the log of the ASCA observations. Details concerning the instruments can be found in Burke et al. (Burke1991 (1991)), Ohashi et al. (Ohashi1996 (1996)), Makishima et al. (Makishima1996 (1996)), and Serlemitsos et al. (Serlemitsos1995 (1995)), while Tanaka et al. (Tanaka1994 (1994)) gives a general description of ASCA. The SIS data were obtained in the 1-CCD faint mode, and the GIS data were obtained in the normal PH mode. Those data were screened with the standard selection criteria: data taken in the South Atlantic Anomaly, Earth occultation, and regions of low geomagnetic rigidity are excluded. We also eliminated the contamination by the bright Earth, removed hot and flickering pixels from the SIS data, and applied rise-time rejection to exclude particle events from the GIS data. We further applied the “flare-cut” criteria for the GIS data to exclude non X-ray background events as many as possible (Ishisaki et al. Ishisaki1997 (1997)). After these screenings, we obtained effective exposure times given in Table 2.

## 3 Analysis and Results

From the screened data, we extracted the SIS and GIS images of our sample clusters. We show the GIS images in the 0.7 – 2.0 keV band and in the 2.0 – 10 keV band in Fig. 1. RX J1023.8, RX J1203.2, and RX J1314.5 were observed twice. However, since we found no differences between the two observations, only the images obtained by the first observation (i.e. the observations labeled #1 in Table 2) are shown. We found no remarkable structures such as distortions or substructures in the images except for RX J1050.5: a clump is conspicuous in the soft-band image, some $`6^{}`$ south off the cluster center. We identify this as a foreground star and it is described further in the Appendix.

We extracted the SIS and GIS spectra of each cluster from the screened data. The extraction regions were circular, and centered on each cluster. The extraction radii were $`6^{}`$ for the GIS and $`4^{}`$ for the SIS for all clusters except RX J1050.5. For the data of RX J1050.5, the extraction radii for the GIS spectra were also restricted to $`4^{}`$ in order to avoid contamination by the foreground star. The spectra were then rebinned to contain at least 40 counts in each spectral bin to utilize the $`\chi ^2`$ technique.

Background spectra for the GIS were extracted from the blank sky data taken during the Large Sky Survey project (e.g. Ueda et al. Ueda1998 (1998)) with the same data-reduction method as for the cluster data. We obtained the SIS background spectra from a source-free region around each cluster. We confirmed that our results did not change significantly when using the GIS spectra taken from the source free regions as the GIS backgrounds. In our spectral analysis, we fitted the SIS0, SIS1, GIS2, and GIS3 spectra of each cluster simultaneously using the XSPEC spectral fitting package ver 10.0 (Arnaud Arnaud1996 (1996)).

### 3.1 RX J1023.8, RX J1050.5, RX J1203.2, and RX J1314.5

The extracted spectra for RX J1023.8, RX J1050.5, RX J1203.2, and RX J1314.5 in the 3 – 10 keV band are fitted with a thermal bremsstrahlung model. Next, we added a Gaussian line model to the bremsstrahlung model, and compared the $`\chi ^2`$ values to examine the existence of iron K lines and to investigate whether the redshift of the iron K lines is consistent with the redshift in Table 1. This analysis showed that the four clusters have statistically significant Gaussian lines. The best-fit values are shown in Table 3. Assuming the redshifts in Table 1, we confirmed that the center energy of the Gaussian lines at the rest frames of the clusters are consistent with the iron K $`\alpha `$ lines from thin thermal plasma by using the MEKAL code (Mewe et al. Mewe1995 (1995)).

We then performed spectral fitting in the 0.6 – 10 keV band for the SIS, and in the 0.7 – 10 keV band for the GIS. We fitted the spectra with the thin thermal plasma model (the MEKAL model) modified by interstellar absorption. We fixed the redshift of each cluster to the values presented in Table 1. The free parameters were the absorption column density ($`N_\mathrm{H}`$), temperature ($`kT`$), metal abundance, and normalization. Since the metal abundance was determined mainly by the iron K $`\alpha `$ lines, it can be regarded as the iron abundance ($`A_{\mathrm{Fe}}`$). Fig. 2 shows the spectra with the best-fit model, and Table 4 shows the best-fit parameters. The temperatures are consistent with those in Table 3, but have much smaller errors. This is the result of using wider energy ranges which improved the data statistics. The $`N_\mathrm{H}`$ values obtained here are consistent with the Galactic values (Dickey & Lockman Dickey1990 (1990)) except for RX J1023.8. The Galactic $`N_\mathrm{H}`$ toward RX J1023.8 is 5.4$`\times 10^{20}`$ cm-2. The excess column density of 7.9$`\times 10^{20}`$ cm-2 suggests that RX J1023.8 has a cooling flow (White et al. White1991 (1991)).

### 3.2 RX J1031.6

Lémonon (Lemonon1999 (1999)) analyzed the radial profile of RX J1031.6 obtained with the ROSAT HRI and found that the profile is consistent with a point source which coincides with an optical galaxy at a redshift of 0.2441, which has been measured during a spectroscopic run at the ESO 3.6m telescope (Pierre et al 1994a ). This suggests that the X-ray emission is dominated by an AGN, and consequently, that the object was misclassified as a “bright” cluster from the low resolution RASS data. From the optical point of view, this cluster indeed appears as a loose group. The radial profiles of the SIS and GIS images are also consistent with a point source.

We fitted the spectra with the MEKAL model modified by the absorption. The redshift is fixed to the value in Table 1 ($`z`$ = 0.247). The best-fit parameters were $`N_\mathrm{H}`$ = 1.0$`{}_{1.0}{}^{}{}_{}{}^{+1.3}`$$`\times 10^{20}`$ cm-2, $`kT`$ = 5.0$`{}_{0.2}{}^{}{}_{}{}^{+0.3}`$ keV, $`A_{\mathrm{Fe}}`$ = 0.07$`{}_{0.05}{}^{}{}_{}{}^{+0.04}`$ solar, and $`\chi ^2/d.o.f.`$ = 616.89/575. Though the $`\chi ^2`$ value suggests that the fitting is acceptable, we found residual structures between the data and the best-fit model above 5 keV.

As a next step, we tried a power-law model modified by the absorption, since X-ray spectra from typical AGNs can be roughly described by the power-law model (e.g. Mushotzky et al. Mushotzky1993 (1993)). The free parameters were the column density, photon index ($`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$), and normalization. The best-fit parameters were $`N_\mathrm{H}`$ = 14.1$`{}_{1.6}{}^{}{}_{}{}^{+1.7}`$$`\times 10^{20}`$ cm-2, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ = 2.1$`{}_{0.1}{}^{}{}_{}{}^{+0.1}`$, and $`\chi ^2/d.o.f.`$ = 519.54/576. In this case, the $`\chi ^2`$ value is much lower than with the MEKAL model fitting. Therefore, it is reasonable to conclude that the X-ray emission from RX J1031.6 is dominated by an AGN, though the best-fit photon index is a little higher than the typical value ($``$ 1.7). The spectra of RX J1031.6 are shown in Fig. 3 along with the best-fitting power-law model. The flux and unabsorbed luminosity obtained with the GIS in the 0.5 – 10 keV band are 7.6$`\times 10^{12}`$ erg s-1 cm-2, and 2.7$`\times 10^{45}`$ erg s-1, respectively, for a redshift of 0.244, which is the redshift of the central galaxy. The $`N_\mathrm{H}`$ value obtained here is much larger than the Galactic value (5.3$`\times 10^{20}`$ cm-2; Dickey & Lockman Dickey1990 (1990)), and this means that the X-ray emission from the AGN suffers absorption due to its host galaxy.

There are two ROSAT HRI archival data of RX J1031.6. Each of them was observed on May 25, 1996, and Dec. 19, 1996. We analyzed them and found that the HRI counting rate of RX J1031.6 was ($`4.0\pm 0.5`$)$`\times 10^2`$ c s-1 on May 25, 1996, and ($`2.4\pm 0.4`$)$`\times 10^2`$ c s-1 on Dec. 19, 1999. Assuming the best-fitting power-law model to the ASCA data, these counting rates correspond to the fluxes of ($`2.8\pm 0.4`$)$`\times 10^{12}`$ erg s-1 cm-2 and ($`1.7\pm 0.3`$)$`\times 10^{12}`$ erg s-1 cm-2 in the 0.5 – 10 keV band. Thus, we found that the AGN has time variability.

### 3.3 Cooling flow clusters (RX J1023.8 and RX J1050.5)

Lémonon (Lemonon1999 (1999)) analyzed the ROSAT HRI images of RX J1050.5 and RX J 1023.8, and found that the radial profiles were strongly peaked at the cluster centers. This suggests they have a cooling flow. Considering the cooling time at the cluster center, the mass deposition rates were found to be of the order of 1400 $`M_{\mathrm{}}`$ yr-1 for RX J1050.5 and 2500 $`M_{\mathrm{}}`$ yr-1 for RX J1023.8 (Lémonon Lemonon1999 (1999)). The excess column density above the Galactic value found in RX J1023.8 also supports the presence of the cooling flow in RX J1023.8, though the column density of RX J1050.5 is marginally consistent with the Galactic value of 4.1$`\times 10^{20}`$ cm-2 (Dickey & Lockman Dickey1990 (1990)).

Therefore, we tried to fit the spectra of the two clusters with a two-temperature MEKAL model modified by the absorption, which can be represented by $`N_\mathrm{H}\times (\mathrm{MEKAL}(\mathrm{cool})+\mathrm{MEKAL}(\mathrm{hot}))`$. We fixed the redshifts to the values in Table 1. We also assumed the metal abundance of the hot component is the same as that of the cool component. Then, the free parameters were the column density, the temperatures of the hot and cool components, the metal abundance, and the normalizations of the cool and hot components. However, we obtained no significant improvement compared with the one-temperature MEKAL model. Thus, it appears not possible to spectroscopically assess the multi-temperature structure of the ICM with the current data statistics (the number of X-ray photons used in the analysis is 9080 for RX J1050.5 and 9444 for RX J1023.8).

## 4 Discussion

The temperature-luminosity relation of our sample clusters excluding RX J1031.6, plus the two clusters (RX J1131.9 and RX J1325.1) presented in Paper I is shown in Fig. 4. In Fig. 4, we also display the data for nearby clusters ($`z<0.1`$) whose temperatures and luminosities were determined by ASCA (Matsumoto et al. Matsumoto2000 (2000)). These two samples are reduced in the same manner so that cross-calibration variations between different instruments should not be an issue. We notice that the cooling flow clusters, RX J1023.8 and RX J1050.5, have rather large luminosities in comparison to the other clusters of similar temperatures. This is an indicator in favor of the presence of large amounts of cold gas (e.g. Fabian Fabian1994 (1994)).

The other clusters in our sample are in good agreement with the nearby cluster relationship, which is consistent with previous claims that there is no evolution in the temperature-luminosity relation at $`z<1.0`$ (Mushotzky & Scharf Mushotzky1997b (1997); Matsumoto et al. Matsumoto2000 (2000)). The ROSAT HRI images of RX J1203.2 and RX J1314.5 show signs of structure, and they are thought to be merging systems (Lémonon Lemonon1999 (1999)). However, the clusters do not depart from the average temperature-luminosity correlation. The hottest cluster, RX J1203.2, may suggest that the temperature-luminosity relation flattens at high temperatures. However, this flattening is partly due to the definition of our luminosity, because we use the luminosity in the 0.5 – 10 keV band and the temperature of the cluster is outside of this energy band. We also should note that the temperature-luminsoty relation has significant dispersion. In fact, a high temperature cluster MS 1054-0321 ($`kT=12.3_{2.2}^{+3.1}`$ keV) at $`z=0.829`$ does not show the evidence of the flattening (Donahue et al. Donahue1998 (1998)).

The temperature-iron abundance relation is seen Fig. 5. There is no clear difference between our sample clusters and the nearby ones, which confirms the previous result that there is no evolution in the iron abundance at $`z<1.0`$ (Mushotzky & Loewenstein Mushotzky1997a (1997); Matsumoto et al. Matsumoto2000 (2000)).

We also investigated the redshift-iron abundance relation (Fig. 6). As already noted by Mushotzky & Loewenstein Mushotzky1997a (1997), we can see no evidence for the evolution of the iron abundance with redshift. The mean abundance of our sample is $`0.30\pm 0.05`$ solar.

## 5 Conclusion

We have analyzed the ASCA data of five medium-distant clusters of galaxies; RX J1023.8, RX J1031.6, RX J1050.5, RX J1203.2, and RX J1314.5. Except for RX J1031.6 whose X-ray emission is dominated by an AGN, we were able to fit the ASCA spectra of the clusters with the one-temperature thermal plasma model. We compared the temperature-luminosity relation of our sample clusters with that of the nearby clusters ($`z<0.1`$). We found that RX J1023.8 and RX J1050.5 have rather large luminosities in the temperature-luminosity plane. This can be explained by the presence of a cooling flow, although the present statistics do not allow multi-temperature fitting. The other clusters lay well within the mean temperature-luminosity relation defined by the low-redshift clusters. In addition, the metallicity of our sample clusters are in good agreement with the local temperature-iron abundance relationship, which is consistent with the previous findings out to $`z<1.0`$.

###### Acknowledgements.

We would like to thank the ASCA team members for their support. HM is supported by the JSPS Postdoctoral Fellowships for Research Abroad. This research has made use of the SIMBAD database, operated at CDS, Strasbourg, France.

## Appendix A Contaminating source for RX J1050.5-0236

Fig. 7 shows the ASCA SIS (SIS0 + SIS1) image of RX J1050.5. The peak designated as “source 1” is RX J1050.5. Another peak (“source 2”) is conspicuous $`6^{}`$ away from source 1. On the ROSAT HRI image, source 2 is pointlike and its position ( $`(\alpha ,\delta )_{\mathrm{J2000}}`$ = (10h50m27.72s, -2d41m43.1s)) coincides with HD~93917, a K0 star (Lémonon Lemonon1999 (1999)). Despite the low number of photons in the ASCA image, we attempt to fit a single-thermal plasma model to this source: best-fit parameters are $`N_\mathrm{H}=1.2{}_{0.7}{}^{}{}_{}{}^{+1.1}\times 10^{21}`$ cm-2, $`kT=0.69{}_{0.05}{}^{}{}_{}{}^{+0.16}`$ keV, $`A_{\mathrm{Fe}}=0.14{}_{0.04}{}^{}{}_{}{}^{+0.05}`$ solar, and $`z=0.0(<0.057)`$. The flux in the 0.5 – 10 keV band is 4.7$`\times 10^{13}`$ erg s-1 cm-2. Spectra are displayed on Fig. 8.