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# Non-abelian plane waves and stochastic regimes for (2+1)-dimensional gauge field models with Chern-Simons term

## I Introduction

The non-abelian Yang-Mills (YM) gauge field theory is essentially nonlinear. In particular, such characteristic infrared phenomena of QCD as confinement and chiral symmetry breaking are explained by the nonlinear nature of gluon interactions leading to the formation of specific nonperturbative configurations of gauge fields responsible for these phenomena. Various exact topologically nontrivial finite energy solutions of the classical gauge field equations in (3+1)-dimensional space-time with or without Higgs fields (e.g. instantons, vortices , monopoles ) as well as non-abelian plane-wave solutions , , ,  have been found (for a detailed discussion of YM equations, see, e.g., ,). In (2+1)-dimensional space-time, a nonlinear topological term (the so called Chern-Simons (CS) secondary character) which is responsible for formation of a topological mass of the non-abelian gauge field, may be added to the field Lagrangian . In this case, constant non-abelian solutions of the gauge field equations with a CS mass were found . Clearly, the investigation of general properties of classical solutions of gauge field equations is important and may provide new knowledge about the vacuum structure of a given theory. Among these properties the irregular stochastic character of the gauge field dynamics is of great interest (see ). The stochastic behavior of the YM theory has been studied in the pioneering papers , , , , . The consideration of possible interactions with a Higgs field is also interesting, but makes the problem somewhat more complicated. Investigations of the stochastic behavior of classical field systems with Higgs fields but without Chern-Simons term were e.g. made in . Moreover, numerical investigations of Poincare sections of the YM-Higgs theory with an $`SU(2)`$ doublet Higgs field were performed in . Taking only the vacuum expectation value of the Higgs field into account, the authors of this paper showed qualitatively the stabilizing role of the Higgs mechanism for the YM dynamics. Furthermore, in  the dynamical contribution of Higgs fields was considered. It was shown that a field system with spatially uniform but time-dependent dynamical Higgs fields, coupled to a gauge field ($`SO(3)`$ Georgi-Glashow model), also demonstrates chaotic behavior with certain threshold values of the energy.

It is further worth noticing that the chaotic dynamics of the three-dimensional topologically massive gauge fields (without Higgs fields) was also studied in the framework of the time-dependent and spatially-uniform Chern-Simons model in ref. . The numerical studies of the CS field equations were performed there by the Runge-Kutta method. The boundary conditions were chosen in such a way that all three gauge potentials, now being considered as coordinates of fictitious “particles”, were put on a circle. The general motion might thus be interpreted as that of three effective particles moving in a plane and interacting nonlinearly through a quartic potential and under the influence of an “external magnetic field” of strength $`\mu `$ ($`\mu `$ is a topological mass). It was demonstrated that a background “magnetic field” tries to order the system, forcing the “particles” to move in periodic orbits, similar to the influence of a Higgs condensate on the otherwise chaotic classical YM dynamics. Therefore, if the strength $`\mu `$ of the topological term is large compared to the energy density (in the quantized theory, this would mean strong coupling), the motion is regular, while in the opposite case it is chaotic. This “order to chaos transition” was observed in numerical studies of the CS-model as well as in the coupled YM-Higgs model, although the two models differ in many respects. Note also that the transition from regularity to irregularity in quantum systems, which are classically chaotic, was considered for a $`d=(2+1)`$ YM-Higgs theory in .

In the present paper, we consider the generalization of the plane-wave solutions, found earlier in the $`d=3+1`$-case (see, , , ), to the case of a (2+1)-dimensional gauge field theory with topological Chern-Simons term. Clearly, the topological mass provides an additional dimensional parameter for the massive nonlinear field configuration in question. In this way, we find a new plane-wave solution of the corresponding field equations. Next, the possibility of passing to a constant background field  with energy density lower than the perturbative vacuum energy is considered. Moreover, we demonstrate that the dynamics of 3-d YM fields with a CS topological mass interacting with Higgs fields is described by solutions that, generally speaking, are not regular, but rather obtain ergodic properties. This study was made for an ansatz which is specific for the gauge fields in (2+1)-dimensional space-time and different from that considered earlier in the (3+1)-d case without CS term or in the (2+1)-d case with CS term. Our numerical study of the stochastic properties of solutions with growing energy demonstrates that a chaotic behavior of solutions is observed mostly for those values of the energy which are near to the critical “saddle” point value of the potential energy of the effective mechanical system. We emphasize that we have also considered the important case of spontaneous symmetry breaking in the CS-Georgi-Glashow model (where the mass term has the sign required for spontaneous symmetry breaking, and the real mass squared is negative $`m^2<0`$). Finally, the dynamics of a system of coupled gauge and Higgs fields is investigated in the general case, where fairly large values of the energy are admitted and, in contrast to earlier work, no assumptions are made that the system is near a stable solution (near the “minimum” critical point of the effective potential).

## II Time-dependent solutions

Consider a 3-dimensional $`SU(2)`$ gauge field theory with a Chern-Simons term. The gauge field Lagrangian can be written as follows

$`_g={\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}F_{\mu \nu }^aF^{\mu \nu a}+{\displaystyle \frac{\mu }{4}}ϵ^{\mu \nu \alpha }[F_{\mu \nu }^aA_\alpha ^a{\displaystyle \frac{g}{3}}ϵ^{abc}A_\mu ^aA_\nu ^bA_\alpha ^c],`$ (1)
where $`F_{\mu \nu }^a=_\mu A_\nu ^a_\nu A_\mu ^a+gϵ^{abc}A_\mu ^bA_\nu ^c`$ is the gauge field tensor. The last term in (1) is the CS term  that describes the topological mass $`\mu `$ of the gauge field.

The Lagrangian (1) is not gauge invariant, since it changes by a full derivative under a gauge transformation

$`S={\displaystyle d^3x_g}{\displaystyle d^3x_g}+\mu (8\pi ^2/g^2)W(U),`$ (2)
where

$`W(U)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{24\pi ^2}}{\displaystyle d^3xϵ^{\alpha \beta \gamma }tr[_\alpha UU^1_\beta UU^1_\gamma UU^1]},`$ (3)
and $`U(x)=\mathrm{exp}[i\sigma ^a\theta ^a(x)]`$. Here $`W(U)`$ is the “winding number” of the gauge transformation $`U(x)`$, $`\sigma ^a`$ are Pauli matrices. In order to make $`\mathrm{exp}(iS)`$ gauge-invariant, the Chern-Simons parameter $`\mu `$ should be quantized

$`\mu ={\displaystyle \frac{g^2n}{4\pi }},nZ.`$ (4)
From the Lagrange equations

$`{\displaystyle \frac{_g}{A_\nu ^a}}{\displaystyle \frac{}{x^\mu }}{\displaystyle \frac{_g}{A_{\nu ,\mu }^a}}=0,`$ (5)
one obtains the field equation

$`D_\nu F^{\nu \mu a}+{\displaystyle \frac{\mu }{2}}ϵ^{\mu \alpha \beta }F_{\alpha \beta }^a=0,`$ (6)
where $`D_\mu F_{\alpha \beta }^a=_\mu F_{\alpha \beta }^a+gϵ^{abc}A_\mu ^bF_{\alpha \beta }^c`$ .

Let us seek solutions $`A_\mu ^a=A_\mu ^a(t)`$ that depend only on the time $`t`$, but not on coordinates $`𝐱`$ and choose the following rather restrictive ansatz

$`A_\mu ^a=\delta _\mu ^af_a(t),A^{\mu a}=g^{\mu a}f_a(t),`$ (7)
$`a=1,2,3,\mu =1,2,3(x_1=t,x_2=x,x_3=y),`$ (8)
$`g_{\mu \nu }=\text{diag}(+,,),`$ (9)
where no summation over $`a`$ is assumed. This case formally corresponds to a mechanical system with a finite number of degrees of freedom, whose motion is described by the system of equations

$`\mu gf_2f_3+g^2f_1(f_2^2+f_3^2)=0,`$ (11)
$`\mu gf_1f_3\ddot{f_2}+g^2f_2(f_1^2f_3^2)=0,`$ (12)
$`\mu gf_1f_2\ddot{f_3}+g^2f_3(f_1^2f_2^2)=0,`$ (13)
$`\mu \dot{f_2}+g(\dot{f_1}f_3+2f_1\dot{f_3})=0,`$ (14)
$`\mu \dot{f_3}+g(\dot{f_1}f_2+2f_1\dot{f_2})=0,`$ (15)
where $`\dot{f_a}=\frac{f_a}{t}`$ . It is evident that these equations describe three coupled unharmonical oscillators. It is interesting to note that for $`f_1=f_2=f_3=f`$ only a trivial solution exists, i.e., $`f=0`$. Thus, in order to find a non-trivial solution, the functions $`f_a`$ should not be taken equal. Let us seek solutions from the class $`f_1f_2=f_3=f`$. In this case, one obtains

$`\mu gf^2+2g^2f_1f^2=0,`$ (16)
$`\mu gf_1f\ddot{f}+g^2f(f_1^2f^2)=0,`$ (17)
$`\mu \dot{f}+g(\dot{f_1}f+2f_1\dot{f})=0.`$ (18)
First of all, we mention that this system of equations has constant solutions, found earlier in

$`f_1={\displaystyle \frac{\mu }{2g}},f_2=f_3=\pm i{\displaystyle \frac{\mu }{2g}}.`$ (19)
Solutions that depend on time can also be found

$`f_1={\displaystyle \frac{\mu }{2g}},`$ (20)
$`f_2=f_3=f(t).`$ (21)
Then the corresponding chromoelectric and chromomagnetic field components are defined as follows

$`E_i^a=F_{1i}^a,`$ (22)
$`E_i^1=(0,0,0),E_i^2=(0,\dot{f},{\displaystyle \frac{\mu }{2}}f),E_i^3=(0,{\displaystyle \frac{\mu }{2}}f,\dot{f})`$ (23)
$`H^a={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}ϵ^{ij}F_{ij}^a,H^1=gf^2,H^2=H^3=0.`$ (24)
The function $`f(t)`$ satisfies the following nonlinear differential equation

$`\ddot{f}+{\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^2}{4}}f+g^2f^3=0.`$ (25)
This equation has a first integral which is the energy integral of motion $``$ for our mechanical system

$`\dot{f}^2+{\displaystyle \frac{g^2}{2}}f^4+{\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^2}{4}}f^2=const=.`$ (26)
At the same time $``$ is the energy density of the Yang-Mills field corresponding to the $`T_0^0`$ component of the energy-momentum tensor of the field

$$T_0^0==\frac{1}{2}((H^a)^2+(E_i^a)^2).$$

Note that the Chern-Simons term gives no contribution to the energy density.

The equation (26) can be easily integrated

$`{\displaystyle \frac{df}{\sqrt{\frac{g^2}{2}f^4\frac{\mu ^2}{4}f^2}}}=tt_0.`$ (27)
This integral can be expressed in terms of the elliptic functions,

$`f(t)={\displaystyle \frac{\mu }{\sqrt{2}g}}{\displaystyle \frac{k}{\sqrt{12k^2}}}cn(({\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^4}{16}}+2g^2)^{\frac{1}{4}}(tt_0),k),`$ (28)
where $`cn(x,k)`$ is the elliptic Jacobi cosine function of the argument $`x`$ and the module $`k`$

$`k=\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\left(1{\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^2}{4(\frac{\mu ^4}{16}+2g^2)^{\frac{1}{2}}}}\right)}.`$ (29)
This solution is periodical with the period

$`T={\displaystyle \frac{4\mathrm{K}(k)}{(\frac{\mu ^4}{16}+2g^2)^{\frac{1}{4}}}},`$ (30)
where $`\mathrm{K}(x)`$ is a full elliptic integral of the first kind .

The oscillation period is inversely proportional to the combination of the dimensional parameters of the theory, i.e. the CS mass $`\mu `$ and the energy of the solution $``$. This, evidently, could be predicted without solving the equation: there are two scales in the equations, one of them is provided by a characteristic amplitude of the field $`gA(g^2)^{1/4}`$, whose dimension is $`[(gA)]=m1/T`$, and the other is the Chern-Simons parameter with the dimension of a mass $`[\mu ]=m`$.

Since the solution is a function of time only and does not depend on spatial coordinates, this corresponds to the rest frame of reference for the field configuration. Therefore, it is quite natural that $`P^i=T^{0i}=0`$, i.e., the energy flux is equal to zero in this frame.

Note that the constant solution (19) can be obtained from the solution (28) in the limit of an infinite period $`T\mathrm{}`$. This is achieved, if we allow $``$ to be equal to $`\frac{\mu ^4}{32g^2}`$

$`{\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^4}{32g^2}},T\mathrm{},{\displaystyle \frac{k}{\sqrt{12k^2}}}\pm {\displaystyle \frac{i\mu }{\sqrt{2}}}`$ (31)
$`f(t)\pm {\displaystyle \frac{i\mu }{2g}}.`$ (32)
It is evident that this limiting procedure can be performed only if complex values of $`f`$ are allowed. In this case, the energy $``$ remains real, though it becomes negative, which indicates a possibility of lowering the gauge field energy.

Using our solution, we can pass to the limit of a vanishing Chern-Simons term corresponding to the Lagrangian

$$_g=\frac{1}{4}F_{\mu \nu }^aF^{\mu \nu a}.$$

To this end, we assume $`\mu 0,A_1^10`$ . As a result, the following limiting solution is received

$`A_1^1=0,A_2^2=A_3^3=({\displaystyle \frac{2}{g^2}})^{\frac{1}{4}}cn((2g^2)^{\frac{1}{4}}(tt_0),1/\sqrt{2}).`$ (33)
It should be mentioned that a similar solution was obtained in ref. for the case of a 4-dimensional Yang-Mills theory without Chern-Simons term.

## III Plane-wave solutions

The solution (28) describes a nonlinear standing wave. By applying a Lorentz boost, one can obtain nonlinear propagating waves. It is easy to see that the argument of the above periodical solution can be Lorentz transformed in the following way: $`x_\mu ^{}=a_\mu ^\nu (\stackrel{}{v})x_\nu `$, $`kx=k^{}x^{}`$, where:

$`k_0^{}=M\gamma ,k_i^{}=Mv_i\gamma ,(\gamma =(1v^2)^{1/2}).`$ (34)
Here $`M`$ has the meaning of a mass, since $`k^2=M^2`$.

As was already mentioned above, $``$ and $`g`$ have the following dimensions

$`[m]^3,g[m]^{\frac{1}{2}}.`$ (35)
To define the effective mass of the solution, we have to take the factor with the dimension of a mass in front of $`(tt_0)`$ in the cn–function leading to the expression

$`M({\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^4}{16}}+2g^2)^{\frac{1}{4}}.`$ (36)
As expected, the effective mass includes besides the energy density of the solution the topological mass of the gauge field. Further investigations of realistic field configurations of this type should concentrate on the search for possible non-abelian solutions that describe localized field configurations with a finite energy at rest (for a general discussion of this point see, e.g.,   ).

## IV (2+1)-d gauge field theory with a CS term and Higgs fields

In the previous sections we considered the SU(2) gauge field model in 2+1 dimensions with a Chern-Simons topological term and obtained non-abelian plane wave solutions. Let us now generalize our considerations by including in addition a Higgs field contribution which leads us to a D=3 Georgi-Glashow model with CS term (“CS-Georgi-Glashow model”).

The Lagrangian can now be written as follows

$`=_g+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(D_\mu \mathrm{\Phi }^a)(D^\mu \mathrm{\Phi }^a)+{\displaystyle \frac{m^2}{2}}\mathrm{\Phi }^a\mathrm{\Phi }^a{\displaystyle \frac{\lambda }{4}}(\mathrm{\Phi }^a\mathrm{\Phi }^a)^2,`$ (37)
where $`_g`$ is the gauge field Lagrangian (1), and $`\mathrm{\Phi }^a(a=1,2,3)`$ is the scalar Higgs field in the adjoint representation ($`D_\mu \mathrm{\Phi }^a=_\mu +gϵ^{abc}A_\mu ^b\mathrm{\Phi }^c`$). The corresponding field equations take now the form

$`D_\nu F^{\nu \mu a}+{\displaystyle \frac{\mu }{2}}ϵ^{\mu \alpha \beta }F_{\alpha \beta }^a+gϵ^{bac}\mathrm{\Phi }^cD^\mu \mathrm{\Phi }^b=0,`$ (38)
$`D_\nu D^\nu \mathrm{\Phi }^am^2\mathrm{\Phi }^a+\lambda (\mathrm{\Phi }^b\mathrm{\Phi }^b)\mathrm{\Phi }^a=0.`$ (39)
We are again seeking solutions that depend only on the time $`t`$, but not on $`𝐱`$, $`A_\mu ^a=A_\mu ^a(t),\mathrm{\Phi }^a=\mathrm{\Phi }^a(t).`$ Let us choose the following restrictive Ansatz

$`A_\mu ^a=\delta _\mu ^af_a(t),A^{\mu a}=g^{\mu a}f_a(t),\mathrm{\Phi }^a=(\mathrm{\Phi }_1(t),\mathrm{\Phi }_2(t),\mathrm{\Phi }_3(t)),`$ (40)
$`a=1,2,3,\mu =1,2,3(x_1=t,x_2=x,x_3=y),`$ (41)
where no summation over $`a`$ is assumed. Then we arrive at the following equations of motion for a mechanical system with a finite number of degrees of freedom

$`\mu gf_2f_3+g^2f_1(f_2^2+f_3^2)+g^2f_1(\mathrm{\Phi }_3^2+\mathrm{\Phi }_2^2)=0,`$ (42)
$`\mu gf_1f_3\ddot{f_2}+g^2f_2(f_1^2f_3^2)g^2f_2(\mathrm{\Phi }_3^2+\mathrm{\Phi }_1^2)=0,`$ (43)
$`\mu gf_1f_2\ddot{f_3}+g^2f_3(f_1^2f_2^2)g^2f_3(\mathrm{\Phi }_2^2+\mathrm{\Phi }_1^2)=0,`$ (44)
$`\mu \dot{f_2}+g(\dot{f_1}f_3+2f_1\dot{f_3})+g^2\mathrm{\Phi }_3\mathrm{\Phi }_2f_3=0,`$ (45)
$`\mu \dot{f_3}+g(\dot{f_1}f_2+2f_1\dot{f_2})g^2\mathrm{\Phi }_2\mathrm{\Phi }_3f_2=0,`$ (46)
$`g\mathrm{\Phi }_1(\dot{\mathrm{\Phi }_3}+gf_1\mathrm{\Phi }_2)=0,`$ (47)
$`g\mathrm{\Phi }_1(\dot{\mathrm{\Phi }_3}+g\mathrm{\Phi }_2f_1)=0,`$ (48)
$`g\mathrm{\Phi }_1(\dot{\mathrm{\Phi }_2}+g\mathrm{\Phi }_3f_1)=0,`$ (49)
$`g^2f_2\mathrm{\Phi }_2\mathrm{\Phi }_1=0,`$ (50)
$`g^2f_3\mathrm{\Phi }_3\mathrm{\Phi }_1=0,`$ (51)
$`\ddot{\mathrm{\Phi }_1}+g^2\mathrm{\Phi }_1(f_2^2+f_3^2)m^2\mathrm{\Phi }_1+\lambda \mathrm{\Phi }^a\mathrm{\Phi }^a\mathrm{\Phi }_1=0,`$ (52)
$`\ddot{\mathrm{\Phi }_2}g(\dot{f_1}\mathrm{\Phi }_3+2f_1\dot{\mathrm{\Phi }_3})+g^2\mathrm{\Phi }_2(f_3^2f_1^2)m^2\mathrm{\Phi }_2+\lambda \mathrm{\Phi }^a\mathrm{\Phi }^a\mathrm{\Phi }_2=0,`$ (53)
$`\ddot{\mathrm{\Phi }_3}+g(\dot{f_1}\mathrm{\Phi }_2+2f_1\dot{\mathrm{\Phi }_2})+g^2\mathrm{\Phi }_3(f_2^2f_1^2)m^2\mathrm{\Phi }_3+\lambda \mathrm{\Phi }^a\mathrm{\Phi }^a\mathrm{\Phi }_3=0,`$ (54)
where $`\dot{f_a}=\frac{f_a}{t},\dot{\mathrm{\Phi }^a}=\frac{\mathrm{\Phi }^a}{t}`$. Let us seek solutions from the following class $`f_1f_2=f_3=f,\mathrm{\Phi }_1=\mathrm{\Phi },\mathrm{\Phi }_2=\mathrm{\Phi }_3=0`$. In this case, one obtains

$`\mu gf^2+2g^2f_1f^2=0,`$ (55)
$`\mu gf_1f\ddot{f}+g^2f(f_1^2f^2)g^2f\mathrm{\Phi }^2=0,`$ (56)
$`\mu \dot{f}+g(\dot{f_1}f+2f_1\dot{f})=0,`$ (57)
$`\ddot{\mathrm{\Phi }}+2g^2\mathrm{\Phi }f^2m^2\mathrm{\Phi }+\lambda \mathrm{\Phi }^3=0.`$ (58)
The first equation in (56) is solved for $`f_1=\frac{\mu }{2g}`$, while for $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ and $`f`$ we get the equations

$`\ddot{f}+f({\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^2}{4}}+g^2\mathrm{\Phi }^2)+g^2f^3=0,`$ (59)
$`\ddot{\mathrm{\Phi }}+\mathrm{\Phi }(2g^2f^2m^2)+\lambda \mathrm{\Phi }^3=0.`$ (60)
The potential energy for this system

$`U(f,\mathrm{\Phi })={\displaystyle \frac{g^2}{2}}f^4+\lambda {\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Phi }^4}{4}}+{\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^2}{4}}f^2{\displaystyle \frac{m^2}{2}}\mathrm{\Phi }^2+g^2f^2\mathrm{\Phi }^2`$ (61)
is presented in Fig. 1.

There are three critical points: two points of the “minimum” type with the coordinates $`(0,\pm \sqrt{\frac{m}{\lambda }})`$, and one point of the “saddle” type with the coordinates $`(0,0)`$.

The system of equations (60) has a first integral, which is the conserved energy for the mechanical system with coordinates $`f`$ and $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$

$`\dot{f}^2+{\displaystyle \frac{g^2}{2}}f^4+{\displaystyle \frac{\dot{\mathrm{\Phi }}^2}{2}}+\lambda {\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Phi }^4}{4}}+{\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^2}{4}}f^2+g^2f^2\mathrm{\Phi }^2{\displaystyle \frac{m^2}{2}}\mathrm{\Phi }^2=const=.`$ (62)
The nonlinear system (60) has many solutions, most of them can be obtained only numerically, and only few can be found analytically. As an example, we present here an analytical periodical solution expressed in terms of the elliptic Jacobi cosine $`cn(x,k)`$ and sine $`sn(x,k)`$ functions of the argument $`x`$ and the module $`k`$

$`f={\displaystyle \frac{1}{g}}\sqrt{\left(1{\displaystyle \frac{g^2}{\lambda }}\right)\left({\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^2}{2}}+2m^2\right)}cn(Bt,k),`$ (63)
$`\mathrm{\Phi }=\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\lambda }}({\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^2}{2}}+2m^2)}sn(Bt,k),`$ (64)
$`B^2={\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\mu ^2+\left(1{\displaystyle \frac{g^2}{\lambda }}\right)\left({\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^2}{2}}+2m^2\right),`$ (65)
$`k^2=1{\displaystyle \frac{\frac{\mu ^2}{2}+m^2}{B^2}}.`$ (66)
The energy integral $``$ for the solution (64) reads

$`=\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{g^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\lambda }}\right)\left({\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}m^2\mu ^2+{\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^4}{4}}+2m^4\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^2}{4\lambda }}\left(m^2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\mu ^2\right).`$ (67)
It is seen that this solution for $`f`$ and $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ is real, if $`\lambda >g^2`$. This evidently describes a regular periodic motion of the system around the saddle point of the potential, $`f=0,\mathrm{\Phi }=0`$. The energy $``$ in this case is positive, and well above the “saddle” point value of the potential $`U(f,\mathrm{\Phi })=0`$. This classical solution corresponds to the situation with restored symmetry of the YM–Higgs Lagrangian in quantum theory (for negative values of the energy $`<0`$ the effective “classical” particle should move near one of the nontrivial minima of the potential, which corresponds to broken symmetry of the YM–Higgs Lagrangian). It is easily seen that with growing $`\mu ,`$ the energy increases (if $`\lambda >g^2`$). Thus, we may suppose that the presence of the CS term is conducive to restoration of symmetry. For energy values below the saddle point the solution tends to concentrate near one of the nontrivial minima of the potential (corresponding to breaking of symmetry). It should be expected that near the saddle point, trajectories of the system are highly unstable and the system should demonstrate stochastic behavior. In order to study this situation we should apply numerical methods of calculation. This will be done in the following section.

## V  Effective system with the potential $`U(f,\mathrm{\Phi })`$

Here, we will numerically analyze the behavior of the effective mechanical system with the potential $`U(f,\mathrm{\Phi })`$ given in (61) leading to the system of equations (60). Let us look for its numerical solutions for various choices of initial conditions. The functions $`f(t)`$ and $`\mathrm{\Phi }(t)`$ for two choices of initial conditions are plotted in Figs. 2, 3. The curves are depicted for the following values of parameters $`g=1,\mu =1,m=1,\lambda =2`$.

From the figures, one can see that there exist significantly differing types of motion for the system. Indeed, the trajectories correspond to three different types of motion: periodical, quasi-periodical and stochastic ones. The latter situation can be described by treating the interacting fields as an effective mechanical system with coordinates $`\mathrm{\Phi },f`$ and the Lagrangian

$`L=\dot{f}^2{\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^2}{4}}f^2{\displaystyle \frac{g^2}{2}}f^4+{\displaystyle \frac{\dot{\mathrm{\Phi }}^2}{2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{m^2}{2}}\mathrm{\Phi }^2\lambda {\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Phi }^4}{4}}g^2f^2\mathrm{\Phi }^2.`$ (68)
Let us now consider the term $`g^2f^2\mathrm{\Phi }^2`$ as a perturbation of the unperturbed system described by the Lagrangian

$`L_0=\dot{f}^2{\displaystyle \frac{\mu ^2}{4}}f^2{\displaystyle \frac{g^2}{2}}f^4+{\displaystyle \frac{\dot{\mathrm{\Phi }}^2}{2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{m^2}{2}}\mathrm{\Phi }^2\lambda {\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Phi }^4}{4}}.`$ (69)
For the system with the Lagrangian $`L_0`$ all trajectories are either periodical or quasi-periodical, since variables $`f`$ and $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ are separately described by independent equations of the typical form $`\dot{x}^2+ax^2+bx^4=const`$ with the solutions $`Acn(Bx,k)`$ and $`Asn(Bx,k)`$ . In order to describe the role of the perturbation, the KAM-theorem  can be applied which states that, if the perturbation is analytical and small enough, the part of the phase space, spanned by our system, can be divided into two regions of nonvanishing volumes, one of them being small as compared to the other and tending to zero in the limit of a vanishing perturbation. The larger region consists of invariant embedded toruses, densely covered with trajectories. In other words, for the majority of possible initial conditions, trajectories are of the Lissajous type, similar to the oscillator case. However, there exists a comparatively small region, corresponding to a small set of initial conditions, where trajectories are completely chaotic and may go astray from the neighboring “restricted” trajectories. This region has a non-zero volume and it may be called “instability region”.

To examine the trajectories in detail, let us follow  and seek numerical solutions with the Lagrangian $`L`$ and find intersections of trajectories and the plane $`f=0`$ under the condition $`f^{}>0`$. Plotting the intersection points in the so called Poincaré surfaces of intersection, we can study the character of motion for the mechanical system equivalent to our interacting gauge and Higgs fields. In Fig. 4 we present such pictures for different values of $``$. Each picture contains a set of trajectories with equal $``$. If the set of intersection points for the given trajectory is restricted to a point, the motion is periodical; if they lie along the same curve, the motion is quasi-periodical.

For the stochastic motion, the intersection points cover densely a finite area. The left picture in Fig. 4 corresponds to comparatively low energies, well below the “saddle” point. It is easily seen that all the trajectories form closed curves. According to KAM-theorem, this means that practically the entire phase space consists of toruses, which corresponds to quasiperiodical motion. For higher energies and larger perturbations (the right picture of Fig. 4), the situation is completely different: there arise regions of ergodic behavior, though there remain some small regions of toroidal structure. It should be clearly understood that dispersed points in Fig. 4 form one and the same trajectory which chaotically goes through almost the entire accessible domain of the phase space. For still higher energies the situation is different. The motion of the system again becomes more and more stabilized, which is seen in Figs. 4 and 5. The conclusion which follows from these numerical calculations is that near the saddle point the character of motion changes, corresponding to the symmetry breaking in the Lagrangian. The motion becomes more unstable and its stochastic character more pronounced when the energy is closer to the saddle point value.

We have also made use of the Toda-Brumer criterion  to find the critical energy $`E_c`$ such that for energies below $`E_c`$ no chaotic trajectories should be found. For our choice of parameters ($`g=1,\mu =1,m=1,\lambda =2`$)), we found $`E_c=\frac{5}{72}`$. This value does not contradict our conclusion made with regard to numerical calculations and studies of Poincaré surfaces of section (see above). Unfortunately the Toda-Brumer criterion failed for critical energies above the saddle point.

## VI Summary and conclusions

In this paper we have found an exact plane-wave solution of the field equations for the 3-d gauge field theory with a non-zero topological mass. The effective mass of the solution depends on two dimensional parameters of the model: the amplitude of the wave and the Chern-Simons topological mass. The plane-wave form of the solution becomes evident after applying the Lorentz boost. Thus, we obtain a nonlinear massive plane wave, and this is due not only to the nonlinear character of the gauge field equations, as was the case with the usual 4-d Yang-Mills equation , but also to the role of the massive Chern-Simons term. This term, on one hand, adds a positive contribution to the effective mass of the solution, and this makes the wave even heavier. On the other hand, it allows the energy density to become negative. Here, as a limiting case, we obtained a known static solution with the lowest energy possible for the class of solutions considered.

We were faced with another interesting situation, when we chose to include not only the CS term, but also a scalar Higgs field. A choice of the restrictive ansatz, similar to the one used in the previous Sections, now led us to an effective mechanical system with two degrees of freedom. We have demonstrated that for special initial conditions, the phase space trajectories are closed and regular. Chaotic behavior of the Yang-Mills theory in the 4-d space-time was discovered and studied by Matinyan and Savvidy (see , and  for reviews and discussions). In  the $`d=2`$ dimensional YM-Higgs theory was studied. There, the Higgs field was chosen to be an $`SU(2)`$ doublet. In that paper it was qualitatively demonstrated that spontaneous breakdown of gauge symmetry by the Higgs mechanism has a stabilizing effect on non-abelian gauge field dynamics. In our case, no spontaneous breaking of symmetry was initially assumed, rather the Higgs field was taken as a dynamical variable. Moreover, since we studied the $`d=3`$ case, we included the CS term into the consideration. Our result, based on numerical calculations, is that with growing energy $`E`$, the motion of the effective classical mechanical system first becomes more chaotic (in the vicinity of the critical saddle point of the potential), then with further growth of energy, again some regular components may appear.

The general physical conclusion of Matinyan and Savvidy  is that the Yang-Mills field system is not exactly solvable (otherwise, the trajectories would have a regular rather than chaotic form). This conclusion is confirmed in the present paper for the case of a 3-d gauge field model with a topological CS term and an additional interaction with a dynamical Higgs field. The presence of the CS topological mass in the 3-d case is conducive to the restoration of symmetry and to stabilizing the system.

## Acknowledgements

One of the authors (D.E.) acknowledges the support provided to him by the Ministry of Education and Science and Technology of Japan (Monkasho) for his work at RCNP of Osaka University. He is also grateful to H. Toki for the kind hospitality at RCNP. Two of the authors (V.Ch.Zh. and M.Rogal) gratefully acknowledge the hospitality of Prof. Mueller-Preussker and his colleagues at the particle theory group of the Humboldt University extended to them during their stay there. This work is supported in part by DFG-Project 436 RUS 113/477/4.


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# Théorème 1.

## 1. Introduction

Let $`X`$ be a closed oriented surface of genus $`g2`$ and let $`G`$ be a connected Lie group. The set of reductive representations $`\mathrm{Hom}^+(\pi _1X,G)`$ of the fundamental group of $`X`$ in $`G`$ is a real analytic variety, and hence it is a topological space with the analytic topology. There is an action of $`G`$ on $`\mathrm{Hom}^+(\pi _1X,G)`$ by conjugation and we give the moduli space

$$_G=\mathrm{Hom}^+(\pi _1X,G)/G$$

the quotient topology; this is Hausdorff because we have restricted attention to reductive representations. It is well known that $`_G`$ can also be viewed as the moduli space of flat $`G`$-bundles on $`X`$. This space has been the object of much interest both in mathematics and physics and it has been extensively studied from the points of view of topology, gauge theory and algebraic geometry. The purpose of the present note is to determine the number of connected components of $`_G`$ in the case of $`G=\mathrm{PU}(p,q)`$. Previous results on this problem for non-compact real groups $`G`$ include those of Goldman , Gothen , Hitchin , Markman and Xia , and Xia .

In order to state our result we need some preliminary observations. Let $`[\rho ]_{\mathrm{PU}(p,q)}`$, then the corresponding flat $`\mathrm{PU}(p,q)`$-bundle can be lifted to a $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$-bundle which, in turn, has a reduction to its maximal compact subgroup $`\mathrm{U}(p)\times \mathrm{U}(q)`$. Let $`VW`$ be the corresponding complex rank $`p+q`$ vector bundle, then its isomorphism class is independent of the choices made and hence the pair of integers $`(d_V,d_W)=(\mathrm{deg}(V),\mathrm{deg}(W))`$ is a well defined invariant of $`[\rho ]`$. It follows from results of Domic and Toledo  (improving on a bound obtained by Dupont  in the case $`G=\mathrm{SU}(p,q)`$), that there is the Milnor-Wood type inequality

$$\frac{|qd_Vpd_W|}{p+q}\mathrm{min}\{p,q\}(g1),$$
(1)
giving bounds on the possible values of the topological invariants $`(d_V,d_W)`$. Define

$$(d_V,d_W)=\{[\rho ]:(\mathrm{deg}(V),\mathrm{deg}(W))=(d_V,d_W)\},$$

where $`VW`$ is the rank $`p+q`$ vector bundle associated to $`[\rho ]`$ as above. We can now state our main result.

###### Theorem 1.

For each $`(d_V,d_W)𝐙^2`$ satisfying (1) the space $`(d_V,d_W)`$ is non-empty and it is a connected component of the moduli space $`_{\mathrm{PU}(p,q)}`$.

From the points of view of representations of the fundamental group and flat bundles it is most natural to work with the adjoint form $`\mathrm{PU}(p,q)`$ of $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$. However one can also consider the moduli space $`_{\mathrm{U}(p,q)}`$ of bundles with a reductive connection with constant central curvature; in terms of representations of the fundamental group this corresponds to representations of a universal central extension of $`\pi _1X`$ in $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$. There is a natural map $`_{\mathrm{U}(p,q)}_{\mathrm{PU}(p,q)}`$ whose fibres can be identified with $`\mathrm{Hom}(\pi _1X,\mathrm{U}(1))`$. Since the centre $`\mathrm{U}(1)`$ of $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$ is connected, this map induces an isomorphism between the sets of connected components of the moduli spaces. Thus we could equally well consider the space $`_{\mathrm{U}(p,q)}`$. This is actually more natural from the point of view of the holomorphic vector bundle methods which we shall employ, and we shall do this from now on.

## 2. Outline of proof of Theorem 1

The proof rests on a holomorphic approach. This requires giving $`X`$ the structure of a Riemann surface. The two basic ingredients are Higgs bundles and holomorphic triples.

A *Higgs bundle* is a pair $`(E,\mathrm{\Phi })`$, where $`E`$ is a holomorphic bundle on $`X`$ and $`\mathrm{\Phi }H^0(X;\mathrm{End}(E)K)`$ is a holomorphic endomorphism of $`E`$ twisted by the canonical bundle $`K`$ of $`X`$. The slope of a Higgs bundle is by definition the slope of the underlying vector bundle, $`\mu (E)=\mathrm{deg}(E)/\mathrm{rk}(E)`$. There is a stability condition, generalizing the usual slope stability for holomorphic vector bundles: a Higgs bundle is called stable if $`\mu (F)<\mu (E)`$ for any proper subbundle $`F`$ of $`E`$ preserved by $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$, and one has the corresponding notions of semi-stability and poly-stability.

By results of Corlette , Donaldson , Hitchin , and Simpson  there is a homeomorphism between the moduli space $`_{\mathrm{U}(p,q)}`$ and the moduli space of poly-stable Higgs bundles $`(E,\mathrm{\Phi })`$ of the form

$$E=VW,\mathrm{\Phi }=\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& b\\ c& 0\end{array}\right)$$

where $`V`$ and $`W`$ are holomorphic vector bundles on $`X`$ of rank $`p`$ and $`q`$ respectively, $`bH^0(\mathrm{Hom}(W,V)K)`$, and $`cH^0(\mathrm{Hom}(V,W)K)`$. We shall call such a Higgs bundle a *$`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$-Higgs bundle*.

The homeomorphism above comes via an interpretation of $`_{\mathrm{U}(p,q)}`$ as a gauge theory moduli space: it is possible to find a preferred (harmonic) metric in a reductive flat bundle and also to find a preferred metric in a poly-stable Higgs bundle. Both of these constructions lead to a solution to a set of gauge theoretic equations known as Hitchin’s equations . Thus $`_{\mathrm{U}(p,q)}`$ can also be seen as the gauge theory moduli space of solutions to Hitchin’s equations modulo gauge equivalence. This point of view allows one to define the function

$$f(E,\mathrm{\Phi })=_X|\mathrm{\Phi }|^2$$

on $`_{\mathrm{U}(p,q)}`$, which from Uhlenbeck’s weak compactness theorem is known to be proper .

Clearly each $`(d_V,d_W)`$ is a union of connected components. Hence all we need to prove is that each of these spaces is non-empty and connected. Since $`f`$ is proper it is sufficient to show connectedness of the subspace $`𝒩(d_V,d_W)`$ of local minima of $`f`$ restricted to $`(d_V,d_W)`$. Thus the first main step in the proof of Theorem 1 is the following characterization of the local minima of $`f`$.

###### Lemma 2.

A poly-stable $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$-Higgs bundle is a local minimum of $`f`$ if and only if at least one of the sections $`b`$ and $`c`$ vanishes.

###### Proof (sketch).

Assume that $`(E,\mathrm{\Phi })`$ is a stable $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$-Higgs bundle. This means that it represents a smooth point of the moduli space (an extra argument, similar to the one given by Hitchin in , is required to deal with the case of non-smooth points of the moduli space). It is known from  that $`(E,\mathrm{\Phi })`$ represents a critical point of $`f`$ on $`_{\mathrm{U}(p,q)}`$ if and only if it is a variation of Hodge structure. In our case this means that it is a $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$-Higgs bundle of the form

$$E=F_1\mathrm{}F_m,$$

where $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ maps $`F_k`$ to $`F_{k+1}K`$ and each $`F_k`$ is contained in either $`V`$ or $`W`$. Define

$$U_k=\underset{ij=k}{}\mathrm{Hom}(F_j,F_i).$$

It follows from the results of  that the eigenvalues of the Hessian of $`f`$ at $`(E,\mathrm{\Phi })`$ are all even integers and that its $`2k`$-eigenspace is isomorphic to the first hypercohomology of the complex

$$C_{2k}^{}:U_{2k}\stackrel{\mathrm{ad}(\mathrm{\Phi })}{}U_{2k+1}K.$$

The key ingredient in the proof is then the following vanishing criterion: the first hypercohomology $`𝐇^1(C_{2k}^{})`$ vanishes if and only if $`\mathrm{ad}(\mathrm{\Phi }):U_{2k}U_{2k+1}K`$ is an isomorphism. This is proved using the fact that $`(\mathrm{End}(E),\mathrm{ad}(\mathrm{\Phi }))`$ is a semi-stable Higgs bundle. Using this criterion it is then a matter of elementary linear algebra to show that $`𝐇^1(C_{m1}^{})0`$. It follows that $`(E,\mathrm{\Phi })`$ is not a local minimum of $`f`$ whenever $`m3`$, thus concluding the proof. ∎

###### Remark 3.

We can actually be a bit more specific in the statement of this Lemma: it is easy to see that a $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$-Higgs bundle with $`d_V/p<d_W/q`$ is a local minimum if and only if $`c=0`$, that a $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$-Higgs bundle with $`d_V/p>d_W/q`$ is a local minimum if and only if $`b=0`$, and that a $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$-Higgs bundle with $`d_V/p=d_W/q`$ is a local minimum if and only if $`b=c=0`$.

###### Remark 4.

The vanishing criterion for hypercohomology described in the above proof can also be formulated for groups $`G`$ other than $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$ and it should prove useful for the analysis of the connected components of $`_G`$ in these cases.

Lemma 2 allows us to reinterpret $`𝒩(d_V,d_W)`$ as a moduli space of so-called holomorphic triples. These objects were studied in  and ; we briefly recall the relevant definitions. A *holomorphic triple* on $`X`$, $`T=(E_1,E_2,\varphi )`$ consists of two holomorphic vector bundles $`E_1`$ and $`E_2`$ on $`X`$ and a holomorphic map $`\varphi :E_2E_1`$. For any $`\alpha 𝐑`$ the *$`\alpha `$-slope* of $`T`$ is defined to be

$$\mu _\alpha (T)=\mu (E_1E_2)+\alpha \frac{\mathrm{rk}(E_2)}{\mathrm{rk}(E_1)+\mathrm{rk}(E_2)}.$$

There is an obvious notion of subtriple and, using the $`\alpha `$-slope, one can define the notions of stability, semi-stability and poly-stability in the standard way. The existence of moduli spaces of $`\alpha `$-stable triples was proved in . Denote by

$$_\alpha (n_1,n_2,d_1,d_2)$$

the moduli space of $`\alpha `$-poly-stable triples $`T`$ with $`\mathrm{rk}(E_i)=n_i`$ and $`\mathrm{deg}(E_i)=d_i`$ for $`i=1,2`$.

Let $`(E,\mathrm{\Phi })`$ be a $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$-Higgs bundle with $`c=0`$. We can then define a holomorphic triple $`(E_1,E_2,\varphi )`$ by setting

$$E_1=VK,E_2=W,\varphi =b;$$

and, conversely, given a holomorphic triple we can define an associated $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$-Higgs bundle with $`c=0`$. Analogously, there is a bijective correspondence between $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$-Higgs bundles with $`b=0`$ and holomorphic triples. Of course $`(n_1,n_2,d_1,d_2)`$ can be expressed in terms of $`(p,q,d_V,d_W)`$, and vice-versa.

There is a link between the stability conditions for holomorphic triples and $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$-Higgs bundles: one can show (see ) that a $`\mathrm{U}(p,q)`$-Higgs bundle $`(E,\varphi )`$ with $`b=0`$ or $`c=0`$ is (semi-)stable if and only if the corresponding holomorphic triple $`(E_1,E_2,\varphi )`$ is $`\alpha `$-(semi-)stable for $`\alpha =2g2`$. Lemma 2 then implies the following result.

###### Lemma 5.

The subspace $`𝒩(d_V,d_W)`$ of local minima of $`f`$ on $`(d_V,d_W)`$ is isomorphic to the moduli space $`_\alpha (n_1,n_2,d_1,d_2)`$ of $`\alpha `$-poly-stable triples for $`\alpha =2g2`$ (and suitable values of $`(n_1,n_2,d_1,d_2)`$).

Thus Theorem 1 follows from our second main result:

###### Theorem 6.

The moduli space $`_\alpha (n_1,n_2,d_1,d_2)`$ of $`\alpha `$-poly-stable triples is non-empty and irreducible for $`\alpha 2g2`$ and the values of the topological invariants $`(n_1,n_2,d_1,d_2)`$ allowed by (1).

###### Proof (sketch).

The proof of this Theorem applies the strategy used by Thaddeus  in his proof of the Verlinde formula. First one obtains a relatively simple description of the moduli space $`_\alpha `$ for an extreme value of the parameter $`\alpha `$. Next one studies the variation of the moduli spaces $`_\alpha `$ as $`\alpha `$ varies, in order to obtain information about $`_\alpha `$ for the value of $`\alpha `$ in which one is interested.

We note that it is sufficient to consider the case $`n_1n_2`$, since the case $`n_1n_2`$ can be dealt with via duality of triples.

Via a careful analysis involving the stability condition for triples we obtain a bound on the values of $`\alpha `$: for $`n_1>n_2`$ the moduli space $`_\alpha `$ is empty, unless

$$0\alpha \alpha _M=\frac{2n_1}{n_1n_2}\left(\mu (E_1)\mu (E_2)\right).$$

For $`n_1=n_2`$ there is no upper bound on $`\alpha `$, however, the moduli spaces $`\alpha `$ stabilizes for $`\alpha `$ sufficiently large. Thus it makes sense to consider the “large $`\alpha `$ moduli space”, $`_{\mathrm{}}`$, in both cases. Analysis of $`_{\mathrm{}}`$ shows that it is non-empty and irreducible—for $`n_1=n_2`$ this is the main result of Markman and Xia .

There is a finite number of so-called critical values of the parameter $`\alpha `$, these are values for which strict $`\alpha `$-semi-stability is possible. The $`\alpha `$-stability condition remains the same between critical values. Thus we need to study how $`_\alpha `$ varies as $`\alpha `$ crosses a critical value and, in particular, show that it remains non-empty and irreducible. The locus where $`_\alpha `$ changes consists of triples which are strictly $`\alpha `$-semi-stable for the critical value of $`\alpha `$, and what we need to show is that this locus has strictly positive codimension.

The category of triples is an Abelian category and we study strictly semi-stable triples via their Jordan-Hölder filtration by stable triples. This involves developing the theory of extensions of triples; in particular we show that the set of extensions of a triple $`T^{\prime \prime }=(E_1^{\prime \prime },E_2^{\prime \prime },\varphi ^{\prime \prime })`$ by a triple $`T^{}=(E_1^{},E_2^{},\varphi ^{})`$ is isomorphic to the first hypercohomology of the complex

$`E_{1}^{\prime \prime }{}_{}{}^{}E_1^{}E_{2}^{\prime \prime }{}_{}{}^{}E_2^{}`$ $`E_{2}^{\prime \prime }{}_{}{}^{}E_1^{}`$
$`(\psi _1,\psi _2)`$ $`\varphi ^{}\psi _2\psi _1\varphi ^{\prime \prime }.`$
One can show that the codimension of the locus where $`_\alpha `$ changes as $`\alpha `$ crosses a critical value is strictly positive if this first hypercohomology group is non-vanishing for any extension. An important fact which we prove in the course of these arguments is that for $`\alpha 2g2`$ any $`\alpha `$-stable triple is a smooth point of the moduli space.

Finally the non-vanishing of the above first hypercohomology is proved using a vanishing criterion which is reminiscent of the one described in the proof of Lemma 2 above. ∎

Detailed proofs of these results will appear elsewhere.

### Acknowledgements.

We thank the mathematics departments of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, the Department of Pure Mathematics of the University of Porto and the Mathematical Institute of the University of Oxford for their hospitality during various stages of this research. The authors are members of VBAC (Vector Bundles on Algebraic Curves), which is partially supported by EAGER (EC FP5 Contract no. HPRN-CT-2000-00099) and by EDGE (EC FP5 Contract no. HPRN-CT-2000-00101). The third author was partially supported by the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (Portugal) through the Centro de Matemática da Universidade do Porto and through grant no. SFRH/BPD/1606/2000.


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# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

This paper presents the first measurement of the elastic cross section for Deeply Virtual Compton Scattering (DVCS) (Fig. 1a) i.e. the diffractive scattering of a virtual photon off a proton  by studying the reaction:

$$e^++pe^++\gamma +p.$$
(1)
The interest of this process, because of its apparent simplicity, resides in the particular insight it gives for the applicability of perturbative Quantum Chromo Dynamics (QCD) in the field of diffractive interactions. The wide kinematic range in the photon virtuality, $`Q^2`$, accessible at HERA, provides a powerful probe for the interplay between perturbative and non-perturbative regimes in QCD. Furthermore the DVCS process gives access to a new class of parton distribution functions, the skewed parton distributions (SPD)  which are generalisations of the familiar parton distributions and include parton momentum correlations.

The reaction studied receives contributions from both the DVCS process whose origin lies in the strong interaction, and the purely electromagnetic Bethe-Heitler (BH) process (Fig. 1b and c) where the photon is emitted from the positron line. The BH process is precisely known as it depends only on QED calculations and proton elastic form factors. The DVCS cross section is extracted by subtracting the BH contribution from the total cross section, which is possible since the interference contribution vanishes when averaged over the full azimuthal angle of the final state particles. A recent measurement of the single spin asymmetry in a longitudinally polarised electron beam  complements this measurement.

The QCD interpretation of DVCS is based on the two diagrams shown in Fig. 2.

In the presence of a hard scale, the DVCS scattering amplitude factorises  into a hard scattering part calculable in perturbative QCD and parton distributions which contain the non-perturbative effects due to the proton structure. The DVCS process is similar to diffractive vector meson electro-production, a real photon replacing the final state vector meson. Recent measurements of diffractive vector meson production at HERA  indicate that $`Q^2`$ is relevant for the hard scale of the interaction in QCD calculation. In comparison to vector meson production, DVCS avoids the theoretical complications and uncertainties associated with the unknown vector meson wave function. However, even at $`Q^2`$ values above a few GeV2, non perturbative effects influence the predictions and have to be modeled. The DVCS cross section is suppressed relative to that of vector meson production by the additional electromagnetic coupling.

Calculations of the DVCS cross section have been published by Frankfurt, Freund and Strikman (FFS)  and by Donnachie and Dosch (DD) . Both contain “soft” (non-perturbative) and “hard” contributions. The soft part in the FFS prediction is based on the aligned jet model , whereas reggeon and soft pomeron exchanges are considered in the DD prediction. The hard contribution in FFS is calculated in perturbative QCD. The hard contribution in DD is based on a dipole model where all parameters are determined from $`pp`$ and $`\gamma ^{}p`$ cross section measurements. These predictions only provide the scattering amplitude at $`t=t_{min}m_p^2Q^4/W^4`$, where $`|t|`$ is the squared momentum transfer to the proton, $`m_p`$ the proton mass and $`W`$ the invariant mass of the $`\gamma ^{}p`$ system. In both cases an exponential $`t`$-dependence, $`e^{b|t|}`$, is assumed.

For the DVCS process as well as for the vector meson production, the transition from a virtual photon to an on shell particle forces the fractional momenta of the two partons involved to be unequal and imposes a correlation. Therefore, the cross section calculation necessitates the use of skewed parton distributions . The difference in fractional momenta, the skewedness, becomes important at high $`Q^2`$ values or high vector meson masses. In particular SPDs have been introduced in order to reconcile QCD calculations with the $`\mathrm{{\rm Y}}`$ diffractive photo-production measurements at HERA . For vector meson production SPDs appear quadratically in the cross section expression. A unique feature of DVCS is that they appear linearly in the interference term with the Bethe-Heitler process. Therefore the DVCS measurement, in contrast to vector meson production, offers a particularly suitable channel to extract skewed parton distributions .

In this paper, the elastic DVCS cross section measurement at HERA is presented differentially in $`Q^2`$ and $`W`$ in the $`Q^2`$ range from $`2`$ to $`20`$GeV2, $`W`$ from $`30`$ to $`120`$GeV and $`|t|`$ below $`1`$GeV2.

## 2 H1 Detector, Kinematics and Monte Carlo Simulation

A detailed description of the H1 detector can be found in . Here only the detector components relevant for the present analysis are shortly described. The SPACAL , a lead – scintillating fibre calorimeter covers the backward111 H1 uses a right-handed coordinate system with the $`z`$ axis taken along the beam direction, the $`+z`$ or “forward” direction being that of the outgoing proton beam, the “transverse” directions are perpendicular to the $`z`$ axis. The polar angle $`\theta `$ is defined with respect to the $`z`$ axis. The pseudo-rapidity is defined by $`\eta =\mathrm{ln}\mathrm{tan}\theta /2`$. region of the H1 detector ($`153^{}<\theta <177.5^{}`$). Its energy resolution for electromagnetic showers is $`\sigma (E)/E7.1\%/\sqrt{E/GeV}1\%`$. The uncertainty on the alignment of the calorimeter corresponds to an uncertainty of $`1.3`$mrad on the scattered positron polar angle. The liquid argon (LAr) calorimeter ($`4^{}\theta 154^{}`$) is situated inside a solenoidal magnet. The energy resolution for electromagnetic showers is $`\sigma (E)/E11\%/\sqrt{E/GeV}`$ as obtained from test beam measurements . The major components of the central tracking detector are two 2 m long coaxial cylindrical drift chambers, the CJC, with wires parallel to the beam direction. The measurement of charged particle transverse momenta is performed in a magnetic field of $`1.15`$T, uniform over the full tracker volume. The forward components of the detector, used here to tag hadronic activity at high pseudo-rapidity ($`5<\eta <\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}7}`$), are the forward muon spectrometer (FMD) and the proton remnant tagger (PRT). The FMD, designed to identify and measure the momentum of muons emitted in the forward direction, contains six active layers, each made of a pair of planes of drift cells. The three layers between the main calorimeter and the toroidal magnet can be reached by secondary particles arising from the interaction of particles scattered under small angles hitting the beam collimators or the beam pipe walls. Secondary particles or the scattered proton at large $`|t|`$ can also be detected by the PRT, located at $`24`$m from the interaction point and consisting of double layers of scintillator surrounding the beam pipe. The trigger used is based on the detection of a cluster in the electromagnetic section of the SpaCal calorimeter with an energy greater than 6 GeV.

The data were obtained with the H1 detector in the 1997 running period when the HERA collider was operated with $`820`$GeV protons and $`27.5`$GeV positrons. The sample corresponds to an integrated luminosity of $`8`$$`\mathrm{pb}^1`$.

The reconstruction method for the kinematic variables $`Q^2`$ and $`x`$-Bjorken relies on the polar angle measurements of the final state electron, $`\theta _e`$, and photon, $`\theta _\gamma `$, (double angle method):

$`Q^2`$ $`=`$ $`4E_0^2{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{sin}\theta _\gamma (1+\mathrm{cos}\theta _e)}{\mathrm{sin}\theta _\gamma +\mathrm{sin}\theta _e\mathrm{sin}(\theta _e+\theta _\gamma )}}`$ (2)
$`x`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{E_0}{E_p}}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{sin}\theta _\gamma +\mathrm{sin}\theta _e+\mathrm{sin}(\theta _e+\theta _\gamma )}{\mathrm{sin}\theta _\gamma +\mathrm{sin}\theta _e\mathrm{sin}(\theta _e+\theta _\gamma )}}`$ (3)
$`W^2`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{Q^2}{x}}(1x)`$ (4)
where $`E_0`$ and $`E_p`$ are the electron and the proton beam energies, respectively. In case a vertex cannot be reconstructed, the nominal position of the $`ep`$ interactions is taken. The variable $`t`$, the square of the four-momentum transfer to the proton, is very well approximated by the negative square of the transverse momentum of the outgoing proton. The latter is computed as the vector sum of the transverse momenta of the final state photon $`\stackrel{}{p}_{t_\gamma }`$ and of the scattered positron $`\stackrel{}{p}_{t_e}`$:

$$t|\stackrel{}{p}_{t_\gamma }+\stackrel{}{p}_{t_e}|^2.$$
(5)
Monte Carlo simulations are used to estimate the corrections to be applied to the data for the acceptance and resolutions of the detector. The generated events are passed through a detailed simulation of the H1 detector and are subject to the same reconstruction and analysis chain as the data. The DVCS process is simulated (for more details see ) according to the predicted cross section of FFS , which includes the DVCS process, the Bethe-Heitler process and their interference222 The free parameters have been set in the simulation to the following values: the $`t`$-slope parameter $`b=7`$GeV-2, the phase of the QCD amplitude, $`\eta _{QCD}=1\frac{\pi }{2}(0.176+0.33\mathrm{log}Q^2)`$  and the sensitivity to the skewedness of the parton densities $`R_\gamma =0.55`$ . The proton structure function as extracted from the H1 data  has been used.. Photon radiation from the incoming positron has been included in the simulation in the collinear approximation. The Monte Carlo generator COMPTON 2.0  is used to simulate Bethe-Heitler events. To simulate the background sources (see section 3), diffractive $`\rho `$$`\omega `$ and $`\varphi `$ meson events are generated with the DIFFVM Monte Carlo , dilepton production through a photon-photon interaction is simulated using the GRAPE program .

## 3 Event Selection

The cross section of the Bethe-Heitler process, proceeding via Bremsstrahlung from the positron lines, is the largest when the positron and the photon are both produced in the backward direction. In the DVCS case, the final state photon does not originate from the positron and therefore the ratio of DVCS over BH process is expected to increase when the photon is found in the forward direction. The analysis is thus restricted to the case where the photon is detected in the central or in the forward parts of the detector, i.e. in the LAr calorimeter. A data sample, dominated by Bethe-Heitler events, is used as a reference sample to monitor the detector performance and its simulation. Two event samples are selected.

* Enriched DVCS sample: The photon candidate is detected in the LAr calorimeter and the positron candidate in the SpaCal calorimeter. Both DVCS and Bethe-Heitler processes are expected to contribute to this sample with similar magnitudes.
* Control sample: The photon candidate is detected in the SpaCal calorimeter and the positron candidate in the LAr calorimeter. The contribution of DVCS to this sample is negligible.

The event selection is based on the detection of exactly two electromagnetic clusters, corresponding to the final state photon and positron. One cluster is required to be detected in the SpaCal calorimeter with energy larger than $`15\mathrm{GeV}`$ and the other one in the LAr calorimeter ($`25^{}145^{}`$) with a transverse momentum $`p_t>1\mathrm{GeV}`$. Events with more than one track are rejected. Events with one track are only kept if the track is associated to one of the clusters which hence identifies the positron candidate. If no track is reconstructed, the SpaCal cluster is assumed to be the positron. In order to reject inelastic and proton dissociation events, no further cluster in the LAr calorimeter with energy above $`0.5\mathrm{GeV}`$ is allowed and the absence of activity above the noise level in forward detectors PRT and FMD is required. The influence of QED radiative corrections is reduced by requirements on the longitudinal momentum balance333 The quantity $`EP_z`$ is required to be above $`45\mathrm{GeV}`$. $`E`$ denotes the energy and $`P_z`$ is the momentum along the beam axis of the final state particles. The sum is calculated for the final state positron and photon.. To enhance the DVCS signal with respect to the Bethe-Heitler contribution, and to maintain a large detector acceptance, the kinematic domain is explicitly restricted to: $`2<Q^2<20\mathrm{GeV}^2`$, $`|t|<1\mathrm{GeV}^2`$ and $`30<W<120\mathrm{GeV}`$. It has to be noted that for the BH process, the $`Q^2`$ and $`W`$ variables cannot be associated with the photon virtuality and the $`\gamma ^{}p`$ center of mass energy, respectively.

### 3.1 Control sample

This sample of 338 events is dominated by the Bethe-Heitler process. Due to the large scattering angle of the positron, the DVCS process is suppressed to negligible levels. In order to have a control of the detector response in the same energy and angular ranges as for the enriched DVCS sample, the kinematic cuts in $`Q^2`$ and $`W`$ are applied to this sample, treating the photon candidate in SpaCal as the scattered positron and the positron candidate in the LAr calorimeter as the photon. Background contributions from inelastic Bethe-Heitler events, diffractive $`\rho `$ meson production and electron pair production have to be considered. The contribution of inelastic Bethe-Heitler events is estimated to be $`7.7\pm 3.8\%`$. The diffractive electro production of $`\rho `$ mesons constitutes a background when one of the decay pions is mis-identified as a positron in the calorimeter and the other pion is undetected, while the positron scattered into the SpaCal calorimeter is taken to be the photon. The elastic production of electron pairs by photon-photon processes $`e^+pe^+e^{}e^+p`$ contributes to the background when only two of the three leptons are detected. These processes have been simulated using the Monte Carlo programs COMPTON 2.0 (both for elastic and inelastic BH), DIFFVM and GRAPE respectively. In the left column of Fig. 3, event distributions of the control sample are shown. The data are compared to the sum of the absolute MC predictions which includes the Bethe-Heitler process, elastic $`\rho `$ production and elastic dilepton production, all normalised to luminosity. A good description of the data by the sum of the different MC samples is achieved, showing that the detector response is well described by the simulation.

### 3.2 Enriched DVCS sample

This sample (172 events) is found to be dominated by the DVCS contribution although the contribution of the Bethe-Heitler process is non negligible. An important contamination to DVCS elastic candidates is due to the DVCS process with proton dissociation:

$$e^++pe^++\gamma +Y,$$
(6)
when the decay products of the baryonic system $`Y`$ are not detected in the forward detectors. The sum of non elastic DVCS and BH contributions has been estimated to be $`16\pm 8\%`$ of the final sample , based on the fraction of events with proton dissociation tagged by the forward detectors and the detection efficiency of the forward detectors for proton dissociation events using the DIFFVM Monte Carlo. The other sources of background to be considered are due to diffractive $`\omega `$ and $`\varphi `$ production, with decay modes to final states including photons (directly or from $`\pi ^0`$ decay) or $`K_L^0`$. The main contributions originate from $`\omega \pi ^0\gamma `$ and $`\varphi K_L^0K_S^0`$ followed by $`K_S^0\pi ^0\pi ^0`$. The background arising from $`\pi ^0`$ production, with the decay photons reconstructed in a single cluster, in low multiplicity DIS, is estimated from data. According to the MC simulation the two decay photons are recognised, in this energy range, in $`20\%`$ of the events in separate clusters. The selection has thus been extended to events with at least two clusters in the LAr calorimeter of energies exceeding $`0.5\mathrm{GeV}`$. The two photon invariant mass spectrum is in agreement with expectation from diffractive $`\omega `$ and $`\varphi `$ production. Background from $`\pi ^0`$ production is therefore inferred to be negligible. Figure 3 shows data distributions in comparison to the sum of the predictions according to the FFS calculation and the diffractive $`\omega `$ and $`\varphi `$ backgrounds. The BH contribution in the FFS prediction and the $`\omega `$ and $`\varphi `$ backgrounds are normalised to luminosity. The DVCS contribution in the FFS prediction is here normalised such that the sum of all contributions is equal to the total number of events in the data. The pure Bethe-Heitler contribution is also shown. The DVCS signal exhibits different kinematic distributions from the Bethe-Heitler contributions, in particular in the polar angle of the LAr cluster (Fig. 3c-d) and in coplanarity (Fig. 3e-f), which is defined as the difference of the azimuthal angles of the two clusters and is related to the $`p_t`$-balance of the positron-photon system. The coplanarity distribution is found to be broader ($`\mathrm{rms}=5.3^{}`$) for the sum of the contribution in the enriched DVCS sample than for the Bethe-Heitler dominated control sample ($`\mathrm{rms}=3.2^{}`$). This is attributed to the electromagnetic nature of the BH process which implies a steeper $`t`$ distribution than the DVCS signal.

## 4 Cross section measurement and model comparison

To extract the cross section, the data of the enriched DVCS sample have been corrected for detector effects, acceptance and for initial state radiation of real photons from the positron line using the Monte Carlo simulation. The bin size has been chosen according to the statistical accuracy and is large with respect to resolutions in $`Q^2`$ ($`12\%`$) and $`W`$ ($`6\%`$). The contamination of inelastic BH and DVCS events with proton dissociation ($`16\pm 8\%`$) is subtracted statistically. The background contributions from diffractive $`\omega `$ and $`\varphi `$ production, estimated to be $`3.5\%`$ on average and below $`6\%`$ in all bins, have been subtracted bin by bin.

The $`e^+pe^+\gamma p`$ cross section is presented in Fig. 4 and in Table 1 differentially in $`Q^2`$ and $`W`$. The data are compared to the estimate of the pure Bethe-Heitler contribution. The total cross section is dominated by the DVCS process at small $`W`$ values and the Bethe-Heitler process at large $`W`$ values. With the present precision, the $`Q^2`$ slopes of the two processes appear similar. The limited resolution and statistics do not allow the cross section measurement differentially in $`t`$ and the extraction of the slope from the present data. The main contribution, of $`8\%`$, to the systematic error arises from detector effects and is due to the uncertainty on the measurement of the angle of the scattered positron. Other detector related errors are estimated to be around or below $`2\%`$. The second largest systematic error arises from the estimate of the contamination of non elastic BH and DVCS ($`8\%`$). The total systematic error is found to be around $`15\%`$.

In the leading twist approximation the contribution of the interference term to the cross section is proportional to the cosine of the photon azimuthal angle444The photon azimuthal angle is defined as the angle between the plane formed by the incoming and scattered positrons and the $`\gamma ^{}`$ proton plane.. Since the present measurement is integrated over this angle, the overall contribution of the interference term is negligible. Therefore the Bethe-Heitler cross section can be subtracted from the total cross section in order to obtain the DVCS cross section. The DVCS $`e^+pe^+\gamma p`$ cross section is then converted to a DVCS $`\gamma ^{}p\gamma p`$ cross section using the equivalent photon approximation (as in ).

The $`\gamma ^{}p`$ cross section for the DVCS process is shown in Fig. 5 and given in Table 2 as a function of $`Q^2`$ for $`W=75`$GeV, and as a function of $`W`$ for $`Q^2=4.5`$GeV2. The systematic errors on the $`\gamma ^{}p`$ cross section are due to the propagation of the systematic errors on the $`e^+p`$ cross section combined with the bin center corrections error ($`7\%`$). The data are compared with the predictions by FFS and DD. The shape of the data is well described by both calculations both in $`Q^2`$ and $`W`$. The absence of predictions for the $`t`$-slope leaves an uncertainty on the normalisation of the theoretical models. The band associated to each prediction corresponds to a variation of the $`t`$-slope of $`5<b<9\mathrm{GeV}^2`$, covering the measured range for light vector meson production . Both predictions are consistent with the data within this uncertainty. It is noted that these data provide constraints also for recent NLO calculations, which invoke skewed parton distributions .

## 5 Conclusion

The DVCS process has been studied in the kinematic region $`2<Q^2<\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}20}`$GeV2, $`30<W<\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}120}`$GeV and $`|t|<\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1}`$GeV2 using a data sample taken by the H1 detector and corresponding to an integrated luminosity of $`8`$$`\mathrm{pb}^1`$. The cross section for the reaction $`e^+pe^+\gamma p`$ has been measured for the first time and presented differentially in $`Q^2`$ and $`W`$. The DVCS process is observed to dominate over the Bethe-Heitler process for $`W<\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}\hspace{0.17em}100}`$ GeV. The $`\gamma ^{}p`$ DVCS cross section has been extracted and compared to the QCD based predictions  which both describe the measured $`Q^2`$ and $`W`$ distributions within errors.

## Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the HERA machine group whose outstanding efforts have made and continue to make this experiment possible. We thank the engineers and technicians for their work in constructing and now maintaining the H1 detector, our funding agencies for financial support, the DESY technical staff for continual assistance and the DESY directorate for the hospitality which they extend to the non DESY members of the collaboration. We are grateful to M. Diehl and A. Freund for valuable discussions.


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# Multiple phase transitions in Ce(Rh,Ir,Co)In5 heavy-fermion superconductors

## Abstract

Magnetic susceptibility, electrical resistivity and heat capacity data for single crystals of Ce(Rh,Ir)1-x(Co,Ir)xIn5 (0 $``$ $`x`$ $``$ 1) have allowed us to construct a detailed phase diagram for this new family of heavy-fermion superconductors(HFS). CeRh1-xIrxIn5 displays superconductivity(SC) ($`T_c`$ $``$ 1 K) over a wide range of composition, which develops out of and coexists (0.30 $``$ x $``$ 0.5) with a magnetically ordered state, with $`T_N`$ $``$ 4 K. For CeCo1-xRhxIn5, the superconducting state ($`T_c`$ $``$ 2.3 K for $`x`$ = 0) becomes a magnetic state ($`T_N`$ $``$ 4 K, for $`x`$ = 1) with two phase transitions observed for 0.40 $``$ $`x`$ $``$ 0.25. CeCo1-xIrxIn5 also shows two transitions for 0.30 $``$ $`x`$ $``$ 0.75. For those alloys in which SC is found, a roughly linear relationship between $`T_c`$ and the lattice parameter ratio c/a, was found, with composition as the implicit parameter. The interplay between magnetism and SC for CeRh1-x(Ir,Co)xIn5 and the possibility of two distinct superconducting states in CeCo1-xIrxIn5 are discussed.

Recently, a new series of CeMIn5 tetragonal compounds for M=Co, Rh or Ir have become the focus of much research due to the discovery of heavy-fermion superconductivity in these materials. In particular, CeCoIn5 ($`\gamma `$ $``$ 300 mJ/mole-K2) has the highest $`T_C`$ = 2.3 K yet observed for HFS at ambient pressure, and the SC has been claimed as unconventional and presumably magnetically mediated. CeIrIn5($`\gamma `$ $``$ 720 mJ/mole-K2) also shows ambient-pressure heavy-fermion SC at $`T_c`$ $``$ 0.4 K. In contrast, CeRhIn5 is an antiferromagnet at ambient pressure ($`T_N`$ $``$ 3.8 K and $`\gamma `$ $``$ 400 mJ/mol-K2) which evolves to a superconducting state for P $`>`$ Pc $``$ 16kbar and $`T_c`$ $``$ 2 K. As such, the CeMIn5 family is a great opportunity to investigate the tunability of HF ground states using external control parameters such as pressure or doping. In this regard, recent studies of CeRh1-xIrxIn5 have revealed a remarkably rich phase diagram which is reminiscent of the high-$`T_c`$ cuprates. The main findings of these studies were: i)SC was observed in a very wide doping range ( 0.30 $`<`$ x $``$ 1.0), ii) Magnetism ($`T_N`$ $``$ 3.8 K) and SC ($`T_c`$ $``$ 1 K) $`coexist`$ for a significant range of concentration (0.3 $`<`$ x $`<`$ 0.65), and iii)The maximum $`T_c`$ was found at the boundary between magnetism and SC. Here we report the generalization of Ref. 5 to include pseudo binary phase diagrams for the Rh-Co and Ir-Co alloys. Our two main results are: 1) the presence of multiple coexisting phases is a general feature of the ground states of CeMIn5 and 2)for those materials that superconduct, a universal relationship between $`T_c`$ and $`c/a`$, independent of alloy composition, is found.

Figure 1 shows the generalized temperature-composition phase diagram for Ce(Rh,Ir,Co)In5, derived mainly from heat capacity measurements on single crystals. SC is found in wide ranges of $`x`$ for Rh-Ir, Rh-Co and Co-Ir alloys. The robustness of the superconducting state as a function of doping for these compounds is unusual for HFS. As discussed in Ref.5, details of the Rh-Ir section of this phase diagram resemble that of the high-$`T_c`$ cuprates. Because CeRhIn5 is an antiferromagnet, and CeIrIn5 and CeCoIn5 are superconductors at ambient pressure, studies of CeRh1-x(Ir,Co)xIn5 allow the interplay between magnetism and SC to be studied in detail. As Co, Rh, and Ir are all isovalent, the parameter being tuned is not effective doping, but rather effective magnetic coupling or hybridization. For both Ir and Co substitutions, a comparable and large amount of doping is required to suppress long range magnetic order. Further, both Rh-Ir and Rh-Co alloys show ranges of concentration ( 0.3 $`<`$ x $`<`$ 0.65 and 0.30 $``$ $`x`$ $``$ 0.75, respectively) where two phase transition are observed by heat capacity measurements. Additional resistivity and $`chi_{ac}`$ measurements allowed us to identify the higher temperature transition as a magnetic transition and the lower-T transition as SC, consistent with the systematic evolution of ground states of the end member compounds(see Fig.1).

With respect to their proximity to magnetism, Ce-based HFS belong to a class in which ordered magnetism seems to compete with SC and in which both states have been observed concomitantly only for small windows of parameter space. The phase diagram reported here is a counterexample to the above categorization because significant ranges of coexistence of these states have been found, and in fact, is more reminiscent of phase diagrams associated with U-based HFS. For CeRh1-xIrxIn5 NQR, $`\mu `$SR and neutrons scattering experiments indicate $`microscopic`$ coexistence of magnetism and SC and the absence of gross phase segregation. Finally, the phase diagram of Fig.1 presents an interesting asymmetry with respect to the interaction between magnetism and SC: in the case of Rh-Ir, Tc increases as the magnetic boundary is approached, whereas in the Rh-Co case, Tc decreases. Thus, whether the SC in CeMIn5 requires proximity to magnetism to exist or is destroyed only by a sufficiently strong magnetic state remains to be seen.

Turning now to CeCo1-xIrxIn5, two heat capacity anomalies are observed for 0.30 $``$ $`x`$ $``$ 0.60. Zero resistivity is achieved at the high-T transition and maintained through the low-T transition. Preliminary $`\chi _{ac}`$ data reveal the onset of diamagnetism at the upper transition and no obvious signature at the lower one. Although powder diffraction patterns and low residual resistivity suggest otherwise, at this point we cannot rule out the possibility of sample inhomogeneity (such as a distribution of doping concentration) as being the origin of the two transition. The fact the both pure compounds CeCoIn5 and CeIrIn5 are superconductors might suggest the presence of two superconducting phase transitions.

Finally, aside from the absence of SC for compounds near CeRhIn5, one can find a quasi-linear increase of $`T_c`$ as a function of $`x`$ for CeRh1-x(Ir,Co)xIn5 (dashed line in Fig.1). Not coincidentally, the lattice parameter ratio $`c/a`$ also increases in the sequence CeIrIn5-CeRhIn5-CeCoIn5. Figure 2 presents $`T_c`$ versus $`c/a`$ for Ce(Rh,Ir,Co)In5 for those compounds in which SC is observed. A linear dependence that spans more than a factor of five in Tc is apparent. Estimates of anisotropic compressibility derived from thermal expansion measurements on CeIrIn5 allow the inclusion of $`T_c`$ for CeRhIn5 and CeIrIn5 under pressure in the Fig.2. This surprising positive linear relationship between $`T_c`$ and $`c/a`$ perhaps gives support for recent calculations for magnetically mediated superconductors.In these calculations, quasi-2D crystal structures and nearly commensurate antiferromagnetic correlations are essential for producing higher $`T_c`$s. Thus, the increasing of $`c/a`$ in this family of compounds may increase the 2D character of the relevant spins fluctuations. However, how relatively small changes in $`c/a`$ can lead to a rather dramatic tuning of the ground-state properties of these materials remains to be clarified (e.g., tuning the f-ligand hybridization, changing the symmetry of Ce crystal-field ground state, etc.) A linear fit to data on Fig.2 yields a slope $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$$`T_c`$/$`\mathrm{\Delta }`$$`c/a`$ $``$ 70 K. Optimistically (and naively), a member of the CeMIn5 family with a $`c/a`$ $``$ 6 would be a room temperature superconductor.


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# P-mode observations on 𝛼 Cen ABased on observations collected with the CORALIE echelle spectrograph on the 1.2-m Euler Swiss telescope at La Silla Observatory, ESO Chile

## 1 Introduction

One of the major objectives of the stellar physic is the understanding of stellar interiors and the modelisation of star evolution. Asteroseismology, which consists to measure amplitudes and frequencies of oscillation modes is an ideal tool to constrain stellar models and evolutionary theory.

Recent results of ground-based observations using Doppler techniques have permitted to detect solar-like oscillations in the F5IV-V star Procyon (Martic et al. martic99 (1999)) and the G2IV star $`\beta `$ Hydri (Bedding et al. bedding01 (2001); Carrier et al. carrier01 (2001)). These two stars exhibit good evidence for excess power centered at 1 mHz with peak amplitude of about 50 cm s-1.

A primary and challenging target for the search for p-mode oscillations is the G2V star Rigil Centaurus ($`\alpha `$ Cen A, HR 5459). Thanks to its proximity and its belonging to a binary system, its characteristics are well-determined which simplifies the interpretation of asteroseimological results. Scaling from the solar case, the frequency of its greatest mode is expected to be $`\nu _{\mathrm{max}}=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2.3}`$ mHz, the primary frequency splitting $`\mathrm{\Delta }\nu _0=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}105.8}`$ $`\mu `$Hz and the oscillation amplitude $`A_{\mathrm{osc}}=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}31.1}`$ cm s-1 (Kjeldsen & Bedding 1995a ). Detailed Models with seismological analysis have been recently proposed for $`\alpha `$ Cen A (see, e.g., Pourbaix et al. pourbaix99 (1999), Guenther & Demarque guenther00 (2000), Morel et al. morel00 (2000)).

Several groups have already conducted thorough attempts to detect signature of the p-mode oscillations on this star. Two groups claimed mode detections with amplitudes 3.2 - 6.4 greater than solar (Gelly et al. gelly86 (1986); Pottasch et al. pottasch92 (1992)). It was however infirmed by three others groups which obtained upper limits of mode amplitudes of 1.4 - 3 times solar (Brown & Gilliland brown90 (1990); Edmonds & Cram edmonds95 (1995); Kjeldsen et al. kjeldsen99 (1999)). More recently Schou & Buzasi (schou01 (2001)) have made photometric observations of $`\alpha `$ Cen A with the WIRE spacecraft and reported a possible detection of P-modes.

We obtained high precision radial velocity (RV) measurements on $`\alpha `$ Cen A and report in this paper our observations and the power spectrum analysis of this star.

## 2 Observations and data reduction

The observations of $`\alpha `$ Cen A were carried out with the CORALIE fiber-fed echelle spectrograph (Queloz et al. queloz00 (2000)) mounted on the 1.2-m Swiss telescope at the ESO La Silla Observatory. CORALIE is the southern hemisphere twin of the ELODIE spectrograph (Baranne et al. baranne96 (1996)), both of them well known for their discoveries of extra-solar planets. The wavelength domain ranges from 3875 to 6820 Å recorded on 68 orders. Thanks to a slightly different optical combination at the entrance of the spectrograph and the use of a 2k by 2k CCD with 15-$`\mu `$m pixels, CORALIE reaches a spectral resolution of 50 000 with a 3 pixels sampling. The total efficiency including atmosphere, telescope, spectrograph and detector was measured and reaches about 1.5 % at 5500 Å in the best seeing case. During stellar exposures, the spectrum of a thorium lamp carried by a second fiber is simultaneously recorded in order to monitor the spectrograph instability and thus to obtain high precision velocity measurements. Spectra are extracted and reduced in real time using the INTER-TACOS software package developed by D. Queloz and L. Weber at the Geneva Observatory (see Baranne et al. baranne96 (1996)).

The standard RV computation by a cross-correlation algorithm was replaced by an algorithm based on the optimum weight procedure first proposed by Connes (connes85 (1985)). We developed this method and showed that the optimum procedure is a factor 1.6 more efficient in term of photon noise than the cross-correlation procedure (Bouchy et al. bouchy01 (2001)). The method uses the full spectral information available and compares two spectra of the same source to compute their velocity difference. Its present limitation is that the Doppler shift must remain small compared to the line-width. This is the case in the time scale of few hours when the velocity change, dominated by Earth motion, is less than 100 m s-1 ($``$ 1/50 of a typical stellar line-width). During a whole night, Earth motion can introduce a Doppler shift greater than 500 m s-1. An error of about 3 to 5 % is then introduced if an unique ”reference” spectrum is used during the whole night. However, this effect can be entirely eliminated by a low order polynomial fit subtraction without consequences for the characterization of high frequency oscillation modes.

$`\alpha `$ Cen A was observed over 5 nights in May 2001. A journal of these observations is given in Table 1. We took sequences of 40-s exposures with a dead time of 110-s in-between. In total, 1260 spectra were collected with typical signal-to-noise ratio in the range 300 - 420 at 550 nm.

Radial velocities are computed for each night relatively to the highest signal-to-noise ratio spectrum obtained in the middle of the night. The resulting velocities are presented in Fig. 1. The dispersion of these measurements reaches 1.47 m s-1 and the individual value of each night is listed in Table 1. The precision of our RV measurements is compared with the fundamental uncertainty due to photon noise using the method described by Bouchy et al. (bouchy01 (2001)). The uncertainties coming from the stellar spectrum and from the simultaneous thorium spectrum used in the instrumental tracking are typically the same and equal to 0.50 m s-1. The quadratic sum of these two photon noise contributions is 0.70 m s-1.

## 3 Power spectrum analysis

In order to compute the power spectrum of the velocity time series of Fig. 1, we used the Lomb-Scargle modified algorithm (Lomb lomb76 (1976), Scargle scargle82 (1982)) for unevenly spaced data. The resulting LS periodogram, shown in Fig. 2, exhibits a series of peaks between 1.7 and 3 mHz modulated by a broad envelope, which is the typical signature of solar-like oscillations. This signature also appears in the power spectrum of every individual night. Toward the lowest frequencies ($`\nu `$ $`<`$ 0.5 mHz), the power rises and scales inversely with frequency squared as expected for instrumental instabilities. The mean white noise level $`\sigma _{ps}`$, computed in the range 0.5-1.5 mHz, reaches $`3.06\times 10^3`$ m2 s-2. With 1260 measurements, the velocity accuracy corresponds thus to 0.98 m s-1.

Observed mode frequencies expected for solar-like stars correspond to low angular degree $`l`$ and high radial order $`n`$ and are well approximated by the asymptotic relation :

$`\nu (n,l)`$ $``$ $`\mathrm{\Delta }\nu (n+{\displaystyle \frac{l}{2}}+ϵ)`$ (1)
with $`\mathrm{\Delta }\nu =\nu _{n,l}\nu _{n1,l}`$ .
The large splitting $`\mathrm{\Delta }\nu `$ reflects the average stellar density and $`ϵ`$ is a constant near unity (1.46 for the Sun) sensitive to the surface layers. In order to determine the average large splitting $`\mathrm{\Delta }\nu `$, we calculate the comb response of the power spectrum as proposed by Kjeldsen et al. (1995b ). An average comb response is computed using all peaks greater than 0.03 m2 s-2 (i.e. with S/N greater than 3 in the amplitude spectrum) in the frequency range 1.7 - 3 mHz. The resulting comb response shown in Fig. 3 gives $`\mathrm{\Delta }\nu =\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}105.7}`$ $`\mu `$Hz.

In order to estimate the average amplitude of modes, we followed the method described and used by Kjeldsen & Bedding (1995a ). A simulated time series was generated with artificial signal plus noise using our window function. The generated signal corresponds to 20 modes centered at 2.36 mHz, separated by $`\mathrm{\Delta }\nu /2`$ and convolved by a gaussian envelope. The generated noise is gaussian with a standard deviation of 1 m s-1. Several simulations show that the average amplitude of peaks is in the range 33 - 37 cm s-1.

An attempted identification of the strongest modes was processed with the CLEAN algorithm (Roberts et al. roberts87 (1987)) in order to remove the effect of the window function. The identified modes are listed in Table 2 and shown in Fig. 4. The values of $`n`$ and $`l`$ are deduced from the asymptotic relation (see Eq. 1) assuming that the main peak corresponds to $`n=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}21}`$ and $`l=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0}`$. With this configuration, the parameter $`ϵ`$ is estimated to 1.35. This value is located in-between the Sun value (1.46) and the value deduced from theoretical models (Guenther & Demarque guenther00 (2000), Morel et al. morel00 (2000)) which give $`ϵ`$ in the range 1.07 - 1.27. The last row in Table 2 gives the average large splitting for $`l=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0}`$ and $`l=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1}`$. Both values are in agreement with this deduced from the comb response.

## 4 Concluding remarks and prospects

Our observations of $`\alpha `$ Cen A conduct to an obvious detection of p-mode oscillations. Several identifiable modes appear in the power spectrum between 1.7 and 3 mHz with an average large splitting of 105.7 $`\mu `$Hz and an amplitude of about 35 cm s-1. These characteristics are in full agreement with the expected values scaling from the Sun presented in section 1 and will bring constraints on theoretical models.

This result demonstrates the power of the simultaneous thorium RV method which reaches here the precision of 1 m s-1 at frequency higher than 0.5 mHz. We hope to obtain similar convincing seismological results on some bright solar-like stars with CORALIE.

Observations of $`\alpha `$ Cen A were conducted by T. Bedding and his collaborators during the same period with the UCLES spectrograph on the 3.9-m Anglo Australian Telescope and the UVES spectrograph on the 8.2-m Very Large Telescope. We hope that these observations will conduct to multi-site data combination in order to improve the spectral window and explore further the P-mode spectrum of $`\alpha `$ Cen A.

We are aware that ground based observation is far from the expected accuracy of the future space missions like MOST, MONS and COROT. However the future spectrograph HARPS (Pepe et al. pepe00 (2000)), which will be installed on the 3.6-m ESO telescope at La Silla Observatory at the end of 2002, is expected to observe stars with magnitude 5 dimmer than CORALIE (Bouchy et al. bouchy01 (2001)). It will thus be able to conduct complementary ground based asteroseismological study on a large sample of stars.

###### Acknowledgements.

We are grateful to M. Mayor who encourages our program and gives us time allocation at the Euler Swiss telescope. D. Queloz and L. Weber are acknowledged for their help in the adaptation of the pipeline reduction needed for our observation sequences. This work was financially supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation.