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# ON THE INTERPRETATION OF CYLINDRICALLY SYMMETRIC LEVI-CIVITA SPACETIME FOR 0≤𝜎<∞

## 1 Introduction

The cylindrically symmetric static vacuum solution of Einstein’s field equations was obtained by Levi-Civita (LC)  in 1919. Ever since much was written by researchers trying to grasp its physical and geometrical interpretations. But this endeavour proved to be difficult and uncertain. Only in 1958 Marder  established that the solution contains two arbitrary independent parameters usually called $`\sigma `$ and $`a`$. Understanding the origin, geometry and physics that lies behind these two parameters is the big challenge to understand the solution. For small values of $`\sigma `$, as noticed by LC himself, the corresponding Newtonian field is the external gravitational field produced by an infinitely long homogeneous line mass, with $`\sigma `$ representing the mass per unit length. In this approximation the parameter $`a`$ is also associated to the constant arbitrary potential that exists in the Newtonian solution. In 1979 Bonnor  pointed out that $`a`$ is also dressed with a relevant global topological meaning, and cannot be removed by scale transformations. There is a series of obstacles and apparently contradictory properties of $`\sigma `$ to allow possible interpretations (see a discussion in ). In this article we present some results concerning $`\sigma `$ that suggest certain interpretations but, we are aware, collide with other results. In section 2 we study the nature of the coordinates LC solution related to the range of different values of $`\sigma `$ between 0 and $`\mathrm{}`$. Circular geodesics are studied in this same range for $`\sigma `$ in section 3. A cylindrical shell source of anisotropic fluid is matched to LC solution with $`0\sigma <\mathrm{}`$ satisfying the energy conditions in section 4. The definition of energy per unit length is studied in section 5 for the shell source and compared to the properties of the geodesics studied in section 3. We end the article with a short conclusion.

## 2 The Levi-Civita metric

The general static cylindrically symmetric vacuum spacetime satisfying Einstein’s field equations is given by Levi-Civita (LC) metric , which we write in the form

$$ds^2=\varrho ^{4\sigma }dt^2\varrho ^{4\sigma (2\sigma 1)}\left(d\varrho ^2+\frac{1}{a_m^2}dm^2\right)\frac{1}{a_n^2}\varrho ^{2(12\sigma )}dn^2,$$
(1)
where $`\mathrm{}<t<\mathrm{}`$ is the time and $`0\varrho <\mathrm{}`$ the radial coordinates, and $`\sigma `$, $`a_m`$ and $`a_n`$ are constants. This spacetime clearly has the Killing vectors $`\xi _{(t)}^\mu =\delta _t^\mu `$, $`\xi _{(m)}^\mu =\delta _m^\mu `$ and $`\xi _{(n)}^\mu =\delta _n^\mu `$. The nature of the coordinates $`m`$ and $`n`$, so far unspecified, depends upon the behaviour of the metric coefficients. Either $`a_m`$ or $`a_n`$ can be transformed away by a scale transformation depending upon the behaviour of the coordinates $`m`$ and $`n`$, thus leaving the metric with only two independent parameters. In order to find that behaviour in a comprehensive way, we first transform the radius $`\varrho `$ into a proper radius $`r`$ by defining

$`\varrho ^{2\sigma (2\sigma 1)}d\varrho =dr,`$ (2)
so obtaining

$`\varrho =R^{1/\mathrm{\Sigma }},R=\mathrm{\Sigma }r,\mathrm{\Sigma }=4\sigma ^22\sigma +1;`$ (3)
the metric (1) then becomes

$`ds^2=f(r)dt^2dr^2h(r)dm^2l(r)dn^2,`$ (4)
with

$`f(r)=R^{4\sigma /\mathrm{\Sigma }},h(r)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{a_m^2}}R^{4\sigma (2\sigma 1)/\mathrm{\Sigma }},l(r)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{a_n^2}}R^{2(12\sigma )/\mathrm{\Sigma }}.`$ (5)
When $`\sigma =0`$ we have $`\mathrm{\Sigma }=1`$ and considering $`a_m=a_n=1`$, then (4) becomes

$`ds^2=dt^2dr^2dm^2r^2dn^2,`$ (6)
corresponding to a flat four-geometry; by inspection we interprete $`m`$ as an axial $`z`$ coordinate, and $`n`$ as an azimuthal $`\varphi `$ coordinate, and write

$`ds^2=dt^2dr^2dz^2r^2d\varphi ^2.`$ (7)
It is customary to assume that $`\varphi `$ ranges from 0 to $`2\pi `$, and topologically identify these two extremes; in so doing, the picture of a cartesian two-dimensional plane naturally follows, in surfaces where $`t`$ and $`z`$ are constants. Equivalently, one may assume that $`\varphi `$ ranges from $`\mathrm{}`$ to $`\mathrm{}`$, together with the topological identification of every $`\varphi `$ with $`\varphi +2\pi `$. However, sometimes a two-dimensional flat conical structure with $`t`$ and $`z`$ constants appears more suitable to represent the physical situation, and some modification of the previous assumptions is demanded. One could simply maintain (7) as the line element, with the fact that $`\varphi `$ now ranges from 0 to $`2\pi \mathrm{sin}\alpha `$, where $`\alpha `$ is the half-angle of the cone, together with the topological identification of 0 and $`2\pi \mathrm{sin}\alpha `$. However, the most common strategy in these cases is to set $`g_{\varphi \varphi }=r^2\mathrm{sin}^2\alpha d\varphi ^2`$, while maintaining $`\varphi `$ going from 0 to $`2\pi `$ with the topological identification of 0 and $`2\pi `$ as before. In this paper we often deal with two-dimensional surfaces $`t`$ and $`z`$ constants, endowed with rotational symmetry $`\xi _{(\varphi )}^\mu `$, but with radially varying gaussian curvature. In all circumstances we shall follow the convention that $`\mathrm{}<\varphi <\mathrm{}`$ with the equivalence $`\varphi \varphi +2\pi `$.

Concerning the variable $`z`$ in (7), the most common assumption is that it goes from $`\mathrm{}`$ to $`\mathrm{}`$ and that points with different $`z`$ are always different; however, this last statement is an unnecessary topological limitation, since the topological identification of any $`z`$ with $`z+\zeta `$ is admissible without destroying the flatness of the four-space. Assuming $`zz+\zeta `$ promotes compactification of the space in the $`z`$ direction (for $`\zeta `$ finite and nonzero), an occasionally desirable operation.

Before proceeding, a few words seem worthwhile concerning the cylindrical coordinates $`(r,z,\varphi )`$ in a curved three-space with cylindrical symmetry. We consider the line element

$`dl^2=dr^2+h(r)dm^2+l(r)dn^2,`$ (8)
which clearly has the commuting vector fields $`\xi _{(m)}^\mu `$ and $`\xi _{(n)}^\mu `$; certainly $`r`$ is the radial coordinate, but which of the coordinates $`m`$ and $`n`$ is the angular $`\varphi `$ and which is the axial $`z`$? By analogy with the flat case (where $`g_{\varphi \varphi }=r^2`$ and $`g_{zz}=1`$), it seems appropriate to call angular that coordinate whose metric coefficient vanishes at $`r=0`$, and call axial the other coordinate when the corresponding metric coefficient does not vanish at $`r=0`$.

We now return to the line element given by (4) and (5), and consider $`0<\sigma <1/2`$. For this range of $`\sigma `$ we always have $`h(r)`$ diverging when $`r0`$, and always $`l(0)=0`$; we then visualize $`m`$ as the axial coordinate $`z`$, and $`n`$ as the angular coordinate $`\varphi `$:

$`ds^2=R^{4\sigma /\mathrm{\Sigma }}dt^2dr^2R^{4\sigma (12\sigma )/\mathrm{\Sigma }}dz^2{\displaystyle \frac{1}{a^2}}R^{2(12\sigma )/\mathrm{\Sigma }}d\varphi ^2,`$ (9)
with possible topological identifications in $`z`$ and $`\varphi `$.

When $`\sigma =1/2`$ the two metric coefficients $`h`$ and $`l`$ in (5) are constant, unitary. Then neither $`m`$ nor $`n`$ is entitled to be an angular coordinate, and the three coordinates $`(r,m,n)`$ are better visualized as cartesian coordinates $`(x,y,z)`$. We have, e.g., the Rindler flat spacetime , whose $`t`$=const sections have planar symmetry:

$`ds^2=z^2dt^2dx^2dy^2dz^2,`$ (10)
with possible topological identifications in the coordinates $`x`$ and $`y`$.

We next consider $`1/2<\sigma <\mathrm{}`$; in this range of $`\sigma `$ we always have $`h(0)=0`$ and $`l(r)`$ diverging when $`r0`$; so we now interprete $`m`$ as an angular coordinate $`\varphi `$, and $`n`$ as an axial coordinate $`z`$:

$`ds^2=R^{4\sigma /\mathrm{\Sigma }}dt^2dr^2R^{2(2\sigma 1)/\mathrm{\Sigma }}dz^2{\displaystyle \frac{1}{a^2}}R^{4\sigma (2\sigma 1)/\mathrm{\Sigma }}d\varphi ^2,`$ (11)
with possible topological identifications in $`z`$ and $`\varphi `$, and where we replaced $`a_m`$ for $`a`$. We thus see that the constant $`\sigma `$ cannot be chosen arbitrarily, since its value is intimately connected with the boundary conditions on the $`z`$ axis and on the radially far regions.

The Kretschmann scalar $`=R_{\alpha \beta \gamma \delta }R^{\alpha \beta \gamma \delta }`$ for the metric (4) is

$$=\frac{64\sigma ^2(2\sigma 1)^2}{\mathrm{\Sigma }^3r^4};$$
(12)
from (12) we see that the spacetime (4) is locally flat only for $`\sigma =0,1/2`$ and $`\mathrm{}`$. In section 3 we match (9) and (11) to a cylindrical anisotropic shell of matter. The interior of the shell cylinder is assumed to be Minkowski spacetime, hence there the coordinates have a well defined meaning. The matching condition, of the continuity of the metrics, relates the respective metric coefficients for each coordinate, in particular $`g_{zz}`$ and $`g_{\varphi \varphi }`$, thus giving a further support to the coordinates chosen in (9) and (11).

## 3 Circular geodesics

For the circular geodesics  we have $`\dot{r}=\dot{z}=0`$ and $`g_{\varphi \varphi ,r}\dot{\varphi }^2+g_{tt,r}\dot{t}^2=0`$ where the dot stands for differentiation with respect to $`s`$. The angular velocity $`\omega `$ of a particle moving along a geodesics is $`\omega =\dot{\varphi }/\dot{t}`$ and its tangential velocity $`W^\mu `$ is given by $`W^\varphi =\omega /\sqrt{g_{tt}}`$ which is the only non null component.

In the case $`0\sigma <1/2`$, from (9) we obtain

$`\omega ^2={\displaystyle \frac{2\sigma }{12\sigma }}a^2R^{2(4\sigma 1)/\mathrm{\Sigma }},`$ (13)
$`W^2={\displaystyle \frac{2\sigma }{12\sigma }};`$ (14)
and, in the case $`1/2<\sigma <\mathrm{}`$, from (11) we have

$`\omega ^2={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2\sigma 1}}a^2R^{8\sigma (1\sigma )/\mathrm{\Sigma }},`$ (15)
$`W^2={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2\sigma 1}}.`$ (16)
It is worthwhile noting that for a given system (i.e. a fixed $`\sigma `$) the squared velocity $`W^2`$ is the same for all circular geodesics, in agreement with the corresponding Newtonian gravitation.

We see from (14) that $`W`$ monotonically increases with $`\sigma `$, that is from $`\sigma =0`$ producing $`W=0`$, to $`\sigma =1/4`$ attaining $`W=1`$ (the speed of light), and finally $`\sigma =1/2`$ producing geodesics with $`W=\mathrm{}`$. With $`\sigma `$ increasing beyond 1/2, we note from (16) that $`W`$ diminishes, attaining $`W=1`$ for $`\sigma =1`$ and $`W=0`$ for $`\sigma =\mathrm{}`$. In other words, the circular geodesics are timelike when either $`0<\sigma <1/4`$ or $`\sigma >1`$, are lightlike when $`\sigma =1/4`$ or $`\sigma =1`$, and are spacelike when $`1/4<\sigma <1`$.

These facts suggest that, while $`\sigma `$ increases from zero to $`1/2`$, the effective energy density per unit length, $`\mu `$, of the line source that produces the spacetime (9) increases too. So that for a test particle to remain in a circular motion its velocity has to increase in order to make a balance between the attracting gravitational force, that increases with $`\mu `$, and the centrifugal force, that increases with $`W`$. On the other hand, when $`\sigma `$ further increases from 1/2 to $`\mathrm{}`$ in the spacetime (11), it appears that the effective energy per unit length monotonically decreases to zero value.

## 4 Matching LC spacetime to a cylindrical shell source

Here we follow the same procedure as in . We consider an infinitely thin cylindrical shell of anisotropic fluid matter with a finite radius and we match it to the exterior LC spacetime given by either (9) or (11). For simplicity we shall assume that the source is static. For the interior of the shell cylinder we assume Minkowski spacetime, since it is the only static spacetime deprived of energy density .

In order to do the matching we require the continuity of the metric coefficients across the shell , allowing us to obtain the most general anisotropic shell fluid source. Using the same coordinate system as in (9) or (11), we have for the interior $`0r<r_0`$ of the shell cylinder with radius $`r=r_0`$ the Minkowski spacetime,

$$ds_{}^2=dt^2dr^2dz^2r^2d\varphi ^2.$$
(17)
Indices $``$ and $`+`$ refer to interior and exterior spacetimes, respectively. In order to have the general matching at $`r=r_0`$ satisfied for the exterior LC metric, we make a reparametrization of $`t`$ and $`z`$ like

$$t\frac{t}{A},z\frac{z}{B},$$
(18)
where $`A`$ and $`B`$ are constants. Then (9) with (18) becomes, for $`0\sigma 1/2`$,

$$ds_+^2=\frac{1}{A^2}R^{4\sigma /\mathrm{\Sigma }}dt^2dr^2\frac{1}{B^2}R^{4\sigma (2\sigma 1)/\mathrm{\Sigma }}dz^2\frac{1}{a^2}R^{2(12\sigma )/\mathrm{\Sigma }}d\varphi ^2,$$
(19)
and (11) with (18), for $`1/2\sigma <\mathrm{}`$,

$$ds_+^2=\frac{1}{A^2}R^{4\sigma /\mathrm{\Sigma }}dt^2dr^2\frac{1}{B^2}R^{2(12\sigma )/\mathrm{\Sigma }}dz^2\frac{1}{a^2}R^{4\sigma (2\sigma 1)/\mathrm{\Sigma }}d\varphi ^2.$$
(20)
Then, considering the junction condition

$$g_{\mu \nu }^+_{r_0}=g_{\mu \nu }^{}_{r_0},$$
(21)
we obtain from (17) and (19), for $`0\sigma 1/2`$,

$$A=R_0^{2\sigma /\mathrm{\Sigma }},B=R_0^{2\sigma (2\sigma 1)/\mathrm{\Sigma }},ar_0=R_0^{(12\sigma )/\mathrm{\Sigma }},$$
(22)
where $`R_0=\mathrm{\Sigma }r_0`$; and from (17) and (20), for $`1/2\sigma <\mathrm{}`$,

$$A=R_0^{2\sigma /\mathrm{\Sigma }},B=R_0^{(12\sigma )/\mathrm{\Sigma }},ar_0=R_0^{2\sigma (2\sigma 1)/\mathrm{\Sigma }}.$$
(23)
Taub has shown  that if (21) is satisfied then the first derivatives of the metric are in general discontinuous across $`r=r_0`$, giving rise to a shell of matter. Following him,

$$g_{\mu \nu ,\lambda }^+_{r_0}g_{\mu \nu ,\lambda }^{}_{r_0}=n_\lambda b_{\mu \nu },$$
(24)
where $`n_\lambda `$ is the normal to the hypersurface $`r=r_0`$, directed outwards, giving $`n_\lambda =\delta _\lambda ^r`$. From (24) we calculate $`b_{\mu \nu }`$ and obtain the energy momentum tensor $`T_{\mu \nu }`$ of the shell, which is given by

$$T_{\mu \nu }=\tau _{\mu \nu }\delta (rr_0),$$
(25)
where

$$\tau _{\mu \nu }=\frac{1}{16\pi }[b(ng_{\mu \nu }n_\mu n_\nu )+n_\lambda (n_\mu b_\nu ^\lambda +n_\nu b_\mu ^\lambda )nb_{\mu \nu }n_\lambda n_\delta b^{\lambda \delta }g_{\mu \nu }],$$
(26)
and where $`\delta (rr_0)`$ denotes the Dirac delta function, $`n=n_\lambda n^\lambda `$, and $`b=b_\lambda ^\lambda `$. Considering (17) and (19) we obtain from (24) the nonvanishing components of $`b_{\mu \nu }`$ for $`0\sigma 1/2`$,

$$b_{\mu \nu }=\frac{4\sigma }{R_0}diag(1,0,12\sigma ,2\sigma r_0^2),$$
(27)
where the order of the coordinates is $`(t,r,z,\varphi )`$; and from (17), (20), and (24) we find for $`1/2\sigma <\mathrm{}`$

$$b_{\mu \nu }=\frac{2}{R_0}diag(2\sigma ,0,2\sigma 1,r_0^2).$$
(28)
With (27) and (28) substituting into (26) we can write the shell energy momentum ancillary tensor as

$$\tau _{\mu \nu }=diag(\rho ,0,p_z,r_0^2p_\varphi ),$$
(29)
where $`\rho `$ is the energy density and $`p_z`$ and $`p_\varphi `$ are the pressures in the $`z`$ and $`\varphi `$ directions respectively.

For $`0\sigma 1/2`$ these quantities measure

$$\rho =\frac{\sigma }{4\pi R_0},p_z=\frac{\sigma (12\sigma )}{4\pi R_0},p_\varphi =\frac{\sigma ^2}{2\pi R_0},$$
(30)
while for $`1/2\sigma <\mathrm{}`$ they are

$$\rho =\frac{\sigma }{4\pi R_0},p_z=\frac{2\sigma 1}{8\pi R_0},p_\varphi =\frac{1}{8\pi R_0}.$$
(31)
It can easily be shown that the anisotropic fluids described by (30) and (31) satisfy the weak, strong and dominant energy conditions . In particular, neither the linear mass density $`\rho `$ nor the anisotropic pressures $`p_z`$ and $`p_\varphi `$ are negative in any of the equations (30) and (31).

## 5 The energy per unit length of the shell

In the Newtonian limit of the LC spacetime $`\sigma `$ can be interpreted as the energy per unit length of the source. Considering Israel’s definition of energy density per unit length  we obtain, for both (30) and (31),

$$\mu =_0^{\mathrm{}}_0^{2\pi }(\rho +p_z+p_\varphi )\delta (rr_0)\sqrt{g}𝑑r𝑑\varphi =\frac{\sigma }{\mathrm{\Sigma }},$$
(32)
where $`g`$ is the determinant of the metric. From (32) we see that for small $`\sigma `$ we have $`\mu \sigma `$, which is consistent with the Newtonian limit. As $`\sigma `$ increases $`\mu `$ increases too, reaching a maximum at $`\mu _{max}=\sigma =1/2`$; then $`\mu `$ starts diminishing with further increase of $`\sigma `$, becoming $`\mu =0`$ for $`\sigma \mathrm{}`$.

These results are consistent with (14) and (16), showing that the tangential speed steadily increases with $`\sigma `$ and $`\mu `$ up to a maximum $`W\mathrm{}`$ at $`\sigma =\mu _{max}=1/2`$, and then decreases with increasing $`\sigma `$ and decreasing $`\mu `$ up to $`W=0`$, when also $`\mu =0`$. Furthermore, when $`W=1`$ the circular geodesics are null. From (14) and (16) we can see that this corresponds to $`\sigma =1/4`$ and $`\sigma =1`$, for which we have $`\mu (1/4)=\mu (1)=1/3`$. These properties between $`\mu `$ and $`W`$ can be seen too from the expression of $`\mu `$ in terms of $`W`$ which is, for $`\sigma <1/2`$, from (14), as well as for $`\sigma >1/2`$, from (16),

$$\mu =\frac{W^2(1+W^2)}{2(1+W^2+W^4)}.$$
(33)
It is worth noticing that the relations above between $`\omega `$, $`\sigma `$ and $`\mu `$ are consistent with the behaviour of a gyrosocope moving along a circular path (not necessarily a geodesic) with angular velocity $`\omega `$.

Indeed, using the Rindler-Perlick method , it is not difficult to find the rate of precession $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ of such gyroscope for the line element (4),

$$\mathrm{\Omega }=\frac{\omega (l^{}flf^{})}{2\sqrt{fl}(f\omega ^2l)},$$
(34)
where $`l=g_{\varphi \varphi }`$ and $`\omega `$ is any angular velocity of the gyroscope around the line source. For $`0\sigma 1/2`$ we have from (9),

$$\mathrm{\Omega }=\frac{a\omega (14\sigma )R^{2\sigma (1+2\sigma )/\mathrm{\Sigma }}}{a^2\omega ^2R^{2(14\sigma )/\mathrm{\Sigma }}};$$
(35)
whereas for $`1/2\sigma <\mathrm{}`$ we have from (11),

$$\mathrm{\Omega }=\frac{4a\omega \sigma (\sigma 1)R^{(1+2\sigma )/\mathrm{\Sigma }}}{a^2\omega ^2R^{8\sigma (\sigma 1)/\mathrm{\S }igma}}.$$
(36)
Thus we see that the gyroscope is locked at the lattice, $`\mathrm{\Omega }=0`$, for $`\sigma =1/4`$ and $`1`$ respectively, as expected for null paths , and both values of $`\sigma `$ produce from (32) $`\mu (1/4)=\mu (1)=1/3`$.

Also, for $`\sigma =0`$ we obtain the Thomas precession (modified by the effect of $`a`$)

$$\mathrm{\Omega }=\frac{a\omega }{a^2\omega ^2r^2};$$
(37)
and similarly for $`\sigma 1`$,

$$\mathrm{\Omega }\frac{a\stackrel{~}{\omega }}{a^2\stackrel{~}{\omega }^2r^2},$$
(38)
where $`\stackrel{~}{\omega }=4\omega \sigma ^2`$. However, for $`\sigma =1/2`$ the situation is not so clear (see  and the discussion below).

Also observe that $`\mu `$ has only one maximum at $`\sigma =1/2`$ , and the maximum is finite, with the value $`=1/2`$. Then, since in cylindrical sources no black holes are formed, one might conclude that the minimum mass per unit length to form a black hole satisfies the constraint $`\mu >1/2`$. Indeed, according to our present understanding of the black hole physics, there should exist a lower mass limit to form them. For example, it is accepted that the mass of a neutron star is between $`1.2M_{}`$ and $`1.7M_{}`$, where $`M_{}`$ denotes the solar mass . When the mass of a star is $`M1.7M_{}`$, it might exist only in the state of a black hole.

There are two other expressions for mass per unit length besides Israel’s (32). One is given by Marder , which is

$`\mu _M={\displaystyle _0^{\mathrm{}}}{\displaystyle _0^{2\pi }}\rho \delta (rr_0)\sqrt{g_{(2)}}𝑑r𝑑\varphi ,`$ (39)
where $`g_{(2)}`$ is the determinant of the induced metric on the 2-surface defined by $`t=z=`$const. The other definition is given by Vishveshwara and Winicour , based on the Killing vectors of time translation $`\xi _{(0)}^\mu =\delta _t^\mu `$ and rotation $`\xi _{(3)}^\mu =\delta _\varphi ^\mu `$, which is

$`\mu _{VW}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2\tau }}(\lambda _{33}\lambda _{00,\tau }\lambda _{03}\lambda _{03,\tau }),`$ (40)
where

$`\lambda _{00}=\xi _{(0)}^\mu \xi _{\mu (0)},\lambda _{03}=\xi _{(0)}^\mu \xi _{\mu (3)},\lambda _{33}=\xi _{(3)}^\mu \xi _{\mu (3)},`$ (41)
$$\tau ^2=2(\lambda _{00}\lambda _{33}\lambda _{03}^2).$$
(42)
Using (19,30) or (20),31) we obtain

$$\mu _M=\frac{\sigma }{2\mathrm{\Sigma }},\mu _{VW}=\sigma ;$$
(43)
we see that $`\mu _M`$ does not produce the Newtonian limit, and $`\mu _{VW}`$ does not explain the circular geodesics behaviour. Hence we discard both definitions. (In  the expressions (15) and (16) should be interchanged with their respective analises.)

## 6 Conclusion

We have presented the cylindrically symmetric static vacuum solution of Einstein’s field equations, obtained by LC in its general form, by only specifying the time and radial coordinates and not specifying the other two. We showed that the nature of the two coordinates is closely linked with the range of $`\sigma `$. There are two ranges, $`0\sigma <1/2`$ and $`1/2<\sigma <\mathrm{}`$, where the coordinates, being $`z`$ and $`\varphi `$, switch their nature . We calculated the circular geodesics for these two ranges and it appears, from their behaviour, that the energy per unit length increases by increasing $`\sigma `$ up to $`1/2`$ and then diminishes while $`\sigma `$ increases to $`\mathrm{}`$.

We matched a shell source to LC solution satisfying the energy conditions for the whole range of $`\sigma `$. The energy per unit length $`\mu `$ calculated from the definition given by Israel reproduces the behaviour of the circular geodesics and, furthermore, while producing a maximum for $`\mu `$ suggests a possible explanation for the non existence of event horizons in LC spacetime. Of course, we are aware that $`\mu `$ is model dependent and cannot be given a general meaning but none the less it satisfies part of the expected properties.

Some questions, however, remain unanswered, which leaves the puzzle incomplete.

Indeed, observe that for $`\sigma =1/2`$ the energy density $`\rho `$ as well as $`p_\varphi `$ and $`\mu `$ are nonvanishing, but the spacetime is flat. Now, if the source would be a plane (as seems to be the case in ) then one could invoke the equivalence principle to explain the vanishing of the Riemann tensor. However in our case the proper radius of the cylinder (unlike the case analyzed in ) remains constant and finite for any value of $`\sigma `$. So the question is: why does a cylinder with positive energy density and pressure distribution produce vanishing curvature? This last question, together with the fact that a gyroscope moving along the $`\varphi `$-coordinate in the LC spacetime with $`\sigma =1/2`$ behaves in an unexpected way (see ), brings out the difficulties in interpreting the $`\sigma =1/2`$ case as due to a cylinder, in spite of the fact that the source presented in section 4 is physically satisfactory.

The situation described above might have its origins in the following two facts:

1. The source is a shell and therefore the second fundamental form is discontinuous across the boundary surface. It is then unclear whether demanding both fundamental forms to be continuous is compatible with a reasonable cylindrical source or if, instead, it leads always to the same results as in  when $`\sigma =1/2`$. Indeed, the use of a shell source, although very useful for its simplicity, may screen in some cases, relevant aspects of the problem. On the other hand the discussion on the basis of a general (not related to a specific equation of state) source satisfying both Darmois conditions, is presently out of our reach.
2. Axial and angular coordinates switch meaning at $`\sigma =1/2`$, so it is reasonable to ask if for this value of $`\sigma `$, $`r=r_0`$ describes a cylinder. In fact, as commented above equation (10), in this case the three spatial coordinates are better visualized as cartesian coordinates. Therefore one is leaned to identify the topology of the source with that of a plane rather than a cylinder.

At any rate it is clear that this point requires further discussion.

## 7 Acknowledgment

NOS is grateful to Professor Alberto Santoro for his kind hospitality at the Centro Brasileiro de Pesquisas Físicas, where this work was developed.The financial assistance from CNPq (NOS, AZW) and FAPERJ (AZW) is also gratefully acknowledged.


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# The build-up of halos within Press-Schechter theory

## 1 Introduction

Deep surveys are beginning to probe the morphological evolution of non-active field galaxies out to redshifts where cosmological changes in the population as a whole become apparent. The evolution of such galaxies is expected to be driven by the hierarchical build-up of the dark matter halos in which the galaxies reside, with mergers between halos of approximately equal size being particularly important. Such mergers can lead to the disruption of galaxy structure producing observable signatures. Consequently, it is important to be able to model the growth of halos in sufficient detail to determine the relative frequency of mergers.

Press-Schechter (PS) theory \[Press & Schechter 1974\] provides a simple analytic model for the build-up of halos. In this theory, the initial field of density fluctuations is smoothed on varying scales around a given position to obtain information about the probability of later collapse. The distribution of overdensities as a function of filter size is called a trajectory. If filter size and halo mass are linked, each trajectory contains information about the mass of halo within which a test-particle associated with that trajectory and position in the linear density field resides. Linking perturbation amplitude with the epoch at which fluctuations undergo non-linear collapse, and assuming that collapse occurs on the largest scale for which there is sufficient excess overdensity provides a complete model for halo mass growth.

The standard use of PS theory is to calculate the mass function $`f(M|t)dM`$, the distribution of mass in isolated halos at a given epoch \[Press & Schechter 1974, Peacock & Heavens 1990, Bond et al. 1991\]. For the sharp $`k`$-space filter, it is possible to obtain an analytic formula, although this is not true for more general filters. A numerical method for generating trajectories for general spherically symmetric filters was given by Bond et al. \[Bond et al. 1991\] and is summarized in Section 2. The effect of the choice of filter on the resulting mass function is considered in Section 4, where the top-hat filter is shown to provide the best match to recent N-body simulation results. The distribution of times at which halos of a given mass are created can also be determined by PS theory \[Percival & Miller 1999\], and is discussed for different filters in Section 5.

It is possible to use PS theory to follow the build-up of halos that have mass $`M`$ at time $`t`$ by considering the behaviour of trajectories that pass through this location. This is often called ‘extended PS theory’ and leads to conditional analogues of the mass function and halo creation rate \[Bower 1991, Bond et al. 1991, Lacey & Cole 1993, Percival & Miller 1999\]. Extended PS theory is often used to estimate halo merger trees, which are in turn used in semi-analytic models of galaxy formation \[Kauffmann & White 1993, Sheth & Lemson 1999, Somerville et al. 2000\]. The distribution of progenitor masses at an earlier epoch is termed the backwards conditional mass function, while the distribution of halo masses in which a particle might find itself at a later time is termed the forward conditional mass function. Lacey & Cole \[Lacey & Cole 1994\] showed that the forward conditional mass function from simulations with power law spectra appears to be well fitted by a variant of PS theory. In this paper this work is extended to determine the effect of filter choice on the backwards conditional mass function and the predicted frequency of merger events as a mechanism for the build-up of dark matter halos. The backwards mass function is analysed in Section 6. Starting with the premise that mergers between halos correspond to jumps in the mass associated with a single trajectory in PS theory, the relative frequency of mergers are compared for different filters in Section 7.

The usefulness of this analysis is demonstrated in Section 8, where the proportion of halos that have undergone recent merger is calculated. This is linked to the field galaxy merger rate, and recent observational results are shown to be consistent with a variety of cosmological models. Further observations could, in principle, lead to estimates of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_m`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_v`$.

## 2 The principles of Press-Schechter theory

Press-Schechter (PS) theory is based on two simple ideas. First, the field of initial density fluctuations is filtered to determine the amplitude of the perturbations on different scales. Second, the perturbation amplitudes are linked to their collapse time or lack of it, thereby providing a complete statistical model for the build-up of structure in the Universe. Three filters are compared in this paper, defined in $`k`$-space by

Sharp $`k`$-space (1)
$`\stackrel{~}{W_{ks}}(k;R_{ks})=`$ $`\vartheta \left(1kR_{ks}\right)`$
Top-Hat (2)
$`\stackrel{~}{W_{th}}(k;R_{th})=`$ $`3{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{sin}(kR_{th})(kR_{th})\mathrm{cos}(kR_{th})}{(kR_{th})^3}}`$
Gaussian (3)
$`\stackrel{~}{W_g}(k;R_g)=`$ $`\mathrm{exp}\left({\displaystyle \frac{R_g^2k^2}{2}}\right)`$
where $`\vartheta (x)`$ is the Heaviside step function, $`\vartheta (x)=1`$ for $`x0`$ and $`\vartheta (x)=0`$ otherwise. The mass variance, $`\sigma _M^2`$ inside a volume $`V`$ whose shape and size are dependent on the filter is given by

$$\sigma _M^2=\frac{1}{2\pi ^2}_0^{\mathrm{}}P(k)\stackrel{~}{W}^2(k;R)k^2𝑑k,$$
(4)
where P(k) is the power spectrum of the initial density perturbations, and is often simply referred to as the power spectrum. Unless stated otherwise, the standard CDM power spectrum of Bond et al. \[Bond et al. 1991\] has been assumed with $`\mathrm{\Gamma }\mathrm{\Omega }_mh=0.5`$. The set of overdensities corresponding to different $`R`$ for a given position in the linear density field (this can also be thought of as corresponding to a test-particle or small mass element) is called a trajectory.

Examples of trajectories created for the filters defined by Equations 12 & 3 are presented in Fig. 1. These trajectories were calculated using Langevin integration as described by Bond et al. \[Bond et al. 1991\]. First, a Monte-Carlo realisation of a Gaussian random field was created, integrated over contiguous spherical shells in $`k`$-space. The amplitudes of the field integrated over non-overlapping shells are independent and, for thin shells from $`\mathrm{ln}k\mathrm{ln}k+\delta \mathrm{ln}k`$, are given by a Gaussian random variable with variance

$$\sigma _{\mathrm{shell}}^2=\frac{1}{2\pi ^2}k^3P(k)\delta \mathrm{ln}k.$$
(5)
For the trajectories presented in Sections 4 & 5, the field was determined around a given position for $`2^{12}`$ shells equally spaced in $`7<\mathrm{ln}k<6`$. Trajectories were then created by summing over these shells, weighted by the filter window function for $`2^8`$ radii equally spaced in $`\mathrm{log}\sigma _M^2`$. As a check that the density field is adequately sampled, results are presented in Sections 4 & 5 for the sharp $`k`$-space filter, for which the result is known analytically. Tests have also shown that increasing or decreasing the sampling does not significantly alter the results. A detailed analysis of the sampling required to calculate the backwards conditional mass function is given in Section 6.

In order to provide a complete description of the hierarchical build-up of mass, the epoch of collapse must be linked with the overdensity. In fact, the link between the critical overdensity $`\delta _c`$ and the collapse epoch is predicted to be independent of mass for the simple spherical top-hat collapse model (Percival, Miller & Peacock 2000), the model adopted in standard PS theory. The mass of halo surrounding a given position at time $`t`$ is then given by the first, or largest mass, upcrossing of a horizontal barrier $`\delta =\delta _c(t)`$ by the trajectory.

## 3 Parameters in PS theory

This Section discusses the free parameters in Press-Schechter theory, and outlines the conventions used in this paper.

The choice of filter was presented as a single free parameter in Section 2. However, because PS theory only predicts an analytic form for the unconditional and conditional mass functions for the sharp $`k`$-space filter, many authors have in the past used these analytic functions and have calculated $`\sigma _M^2`$ using a different filter. The choice of filter used to calculate $`\sigma _M^2`$ becomes an additional free parameter in PS theory (with the choice of filter to determine the mass function being a different free parameter). For instance, both Kauffmann & White (1993) and Somerville & Kolatt (1999) use the spatial top-hat filter to calculate $`\sigma _M^2`$, and the sharp $`k`$-space filter to determine the mass functions. Similarly, Lacey & Cole (1994), allowed the choice of filter used to calculate $`\sigma _M^2`$ to be different to the sharp $`k`$-space filter used to determine the mass function. The effect of this switch is equivalent to using the sharp $`k`$-space filter throughout with a slightly modified power spectrum. In this paper, the same filter is used to determine both the mass function and $`\sigma _M^2`$.

Another parameter that is often allowed to vary is the critical overdensity for collapse, $`\delta _c`$, with authors tuning this parameter to fit simulations (Lacey & Cole 1994), or using the ellipsoidal collapse model (Sheth, Mo & Tormen 2001). For simplicity, only the spherical top-hat collapse model is considered in this paper.

In order to compare results calculated using different filters, the radii of the different filters need to be matched. In each step of a trajectory, the power spectrum is convolved with a transitional weighting function. Fig. 2 shows an example of the transitional weighting applied by the three filters considered in this paper. Matching the radii of the different filters effectively matches the weightings applied to the power spectrum. A common method is to integrate each filter over all real space to calculate its ‘volume of influence’ and the average mass enclosed. Equating volumes leads to

$$R_{ks}=\left(\frac{9\pi }{2}\right)^{1/3}R_{th}0.414R_{th},$$
(6)
$$R_g=\left(\frac{4\pi }{3}\right)^{1/3}\frac{1}{(2\pi )^{1/2}}R_{th}0.643R_{th}.$$
(7)
For the differentiable filters it is also possible to match filter radii to second order in the expansion around $`k=0`$. This requires $`R_g=1/\sqrt{5}R_{th}0.447R_{th}`$.

Each point in a trajectory is calculated by integrating over $`k`$-shells, and matching different filters simply alters the region of the power spectrum probed. It is possible to directly match the peak value of $`k`$ probed at a given step in a trajectory. For the non-differentiable sharp $`k`$-space filter, $`k_{\mathrm{max}}=1/R_{ks}`$. For the Gaussian filter the first solution to the differential equation $`d^2\stackrel{~}{W}/dRdk=0`$ is given by $`k_{\mathrm{max}}=\sqrt{2}/R_g`$ and for the top-hat filter solving this equation numerically gives $`k_{\mathrm{max}}3.342/R_{th}`$. Combining these equations gives

$$R_{ks}0.299R_{th},R_g0.423R_{th}.$$
(8)
The differential weighting applied in a particular trajectory ‘step’ by each filter for this choice of matching filters is shown in Fig. 2.

In order to highlight the effect of filter choice on halo growth, it seems prudent to ensure that the same region of the power spectrum is probed at each trajectory step. Because of this, where appropriate, the filter radii have been matched using Equation 8. Having adopted this convention, the halo mass $`M`$ was defined as

$$M=\frac{4\pi }{3}\overline{\rho }R_{th}^3,$$
(9)
where $`\overline{\rho }`$ is the mean density of the universe. Because the mass variance, $`\sigma _M^2`$ is dependent on filter choice (Equation 4), comparing results as a function of $`\sigma _M^2`$ implicitly matches filter radii. In this case, the relationship between the radii of different filters is dependent on the power spectrum. Filter radii are only matched using Equation 8 when the halo mass is required.

## 4 The halo mass function

The mass function $`f(M|t)dM`$, gives the distribution of mass in isolated halos at a given epoch, and is related to the number density of halos by $`\overline{\rho }f(M|t)dM=Mn(M)dM`$. The mass function can be calculated analytically for a sharp $`k`$-space filter because the trajectories are Brownian random walks and therefore have special symmetries \[Press & Schechter 1974, Peacock & Heavens 1990, Bond et al. 1991\]. Defining

$$\nu \frac{\delta _c}{\sigma _M},$$
(10)
the PS mass function can be written as

$$f(\mathrm{ln}\nu |t)d\mathrm{ln}\nu =\sqrt{\frac{2}{\pi }}\nu e^{\nu ^2/2}d\mathrm{ln}\nu .$$
(11)
Note that when the mass function is written in this way, its form is independent of epoch. It is not possible to obtain corresponding analytic formulae for top-hat or Gaussian filtering \[Bond et al. 1991\].

By creating an ensemble of $`10^6`$ trajectories for each of the filters given by Equations 12 & 3 using the method described in Section 2, the mass function has been estimated at six epochs. These data are presented in Fig. 3 as a function of $`\nu `$.

Recent work analysing the mass function predicted by numerical simulations has suggested that, although the mass function has a universal form when written as a function of $`\nu `$, this form is altered from that of Equation 11 \[Sheth & Tormen 1999, Percival, et al. 2000, Jenkins et al. 2001\]. Instead, Sheth & Tormen \[Sheth & Tormen 1999\] found that a good fit to the N-body data was given by

$$f(\mathrm{ln}\nu |t)d\mathrm{ln}\nu =A\sqrt{\frac{2}{\pi }}\left(1+\frac{1}{\nu ^{2p}}\right)\nu ^{}e^{\nu ^2/2}d\mathrm{ln}\nu ,$$
(12)
where $`\nu ^{}=a^{1/2}\nu `$ and $`a`$ & $`p`$ are parameters. $`A`$ is determined by requiring that the probability density function is correctly normalized. Sheth & Tormen found best fit parameters $`a=0.707`$ and $`p=0.3`$ for their simulations and group finding algorithm. The standard PS multiplicity function has $`a=1`$, $`p=0`$ and $`A=1/2`$. In Percival et al. \[Percival, et al. 2000\], a small tweak was required for the parameters in order to fit the data giving $`a=0.774`$$`p=0.274`$. These fits to the mass function are presented in Fig. 3.

The mass function calculated from trajectories determined for the sharp $`k`$-space has close to its predicted analytic behaviour given by Equation 11, showing that the Monte-Carlo procedure works for this filter. The smoother trajectories calculated for the top-hat and Gaussian filters produce mass functions more like that observed in numerical simulations, with fewer high mass halos than predicted by Equation 11. This match is not perfect, and the smoother filters predict more low mass halos than Equation 12.

## 5 The halo creation rate

The halo creation rate $`f(t|M)dt`$ for halos of mass $`M`$ is given by the distribution of first upcrossing times of a barrier at the filter radius corresponding to $`M`$. The distribution of halo creation times determined for Gaussian, top-hat and sharp $`k`$-space filters are plotted in Fig. 4 for the subset of Monte-Carlo trajectories that predict the creation of a halo with one of six masses. Each trajectory does not necessarily have a first upcrossing at a particular mass because the mass can undergo finite ‘jumps’ (see Section 7). Consequently, the total number of creation events recorded from a fixed number of trajectories depends on the filter chosen. As the sharp $`k`$-space filter provides a ‘rough’ trajectory compared to top-hat and Gaussian, there are more mass jumps and less creation events for this filter at a given final halo mass. In fact, it is only because of the discrete nature of these trajectories that any creation events at a particular mass are found.

It follows from the Bayesian argument presented in Percival et al. \[Percival, et al. 2000\] that

$$\nu f(\mathrm{ln}\nu |t)d\mathrm{ln}\nu f(\mathrm{ln}\nu |M)d\mathrm{ln}\nu .$$
(13)
In the first of these probability density functions $`\nu `$ is considered to be a function of mass, while in the second it is considered to be a function of time. The model mass functions plotted in Fig. 3 have been converted to creation rates by multiplying by $`\nu `$ and renormalising, and are compared with the creation rate calculated from the Monte-Carlo trajectories in Fig. 4.

The results are similar to those of Fig. 3, with the Monte-Carlo creation rate calculated for the sharp $`k`$-space filter closely following the expected form. The creation rates calculated using the fit to the N-body simulations (Equation 12) are closer to PS theory with the top-hat and Gaussian filters although, as for the mass function, the match is not perfect. Comparing Figs. 3 & 4 shows that the Bayesian link between the halo creation rate and mass function is closely followed by the Monte-Carlo data.

## 6 The backwards conditional mass function

### 6.1 PS theory

The subset of trajectories that pass through a selected position determine the probability density functions for the past and future masses of that halo. As for the mass function, analytic formulae are possible for the sharp $`k`$-space filter \[Bower 1991, Bond et al. 1991, Lacey & Cole 1993\], whereas for top-hat and Gaussian filters numerical techniques must be used. The conditional analogue of $`\nu `$ is defined as

$$\nu _{12}\frac{\delta _1\delta _2}{\sqrt{\sigma _1^2\sigma _2^2}},$$
(14)
where $`\sigma _2^2<\sigma _1^2`$ ($`M_2>M_1`$) and $`\delta _2<\delta _1`$ ($`t_2>t_1`$), and the subscripts $`M`$ and $`c`$ have been omitted for simplicity. For the backwards conditional mass function, $`\sigma _2^2`$ and $`\delta _2`$ (and $`\delta _1`$) are known and $`\nu _{12}`$ is considered to be a function of $`\sigma _1^2`$. For the sharp $`k`$-space filter

$$f(\mathrm{ln}\nu _{12}|\delta _1,\delta _2,\sigma _2^2)d\mathrm{ln}\nu _{12}$$

$$=\sqrt{\frac{2}{\pi }}\nu _{12}e^{\nu _{12}^2/2}d\mathrm{ln}\nu _{12},$$
(15)
which has the same form as Equation 11. This is expected because the form of the trajectories is invariant to a linear shift in $`\delta `$ or $`\sigma ^2`$.

For the top-hat and Gaussian filters, the equivalent distribution can be calculated by analysing numerical realisations of trajectories. In order that all upcrossings at small $`\mathrm{\Delta }\delta _c(\delta _2\delta _1)`$ were realized, the trajectories used for this analysis were sampled at $`2^{10}`$ steps in $`R`$, equally spaced in $`6<\mathrm{log}_{10}(\sigma _2^2\sigma _1^2)<2`$. For the sharp $`k`$-space filter, only a single $`k`$-shell covering each interval in $`R`$ is required. The other two filters have a broader shape and each step in a trajectory will depend on a larger region of $`k`$-space. Two $`k`$-shells within each interval in $`R`$ and $`2^7`$ shells either side of the minimum and maximum radii, equally spaced in $`\mathrm{ln}k`$ were found to sufficiently sample $`k`$-space.

The backwards conditional mass functions resulting from these trajectories are presented in Fig. 5 for three values of $`\mathrm{\Delta }\delta _c`$. In order to match the N-body results (for an Einstein-de Sitter cosmology), only trajectories that predict a halo of mass $`10^{14}`$$`M_{}`$ at $`\delta _1>1.69`$ have been counted. The smoother trajectories calculated using top-hat and Gaussian filters predict low mass progenitors, particularly for small $`\mathrm{\Delta }\delta _c`$.

### 6.2 Numerical Simulations

Three numerical simulations, completed using the Hydra N-body, hydrodynamics code \[Couchman, Thomas & Pearce 1995\], have been analysed in order to estimate the backwards conditional mass function for halos of mass $`10^{14}`$$`M_{}`$. Details of the cosmologies adopted for these simulations are summarized in Table 1.

Each simulation contained $`128^3`$ dark matter particles, and particle positions were output at a large number of epochs (362 for $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$CDM, 345 for OCDM & 499 for $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$CDM), separated by approximately equal intervals in time. The box size chosen was 100 $`h^1`$Mpc for all three simulations that gave a particle mass of $`2.6\times 10^{11}`$$`M_{}`$ for $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$CDM and $`7.9\times 10^{10}`$$`M_{}`$ for the other two simulations. Groups of particles were found using a standard friends-of-friends algorithm with linking length set to $`b=0.2`$ times the mean interparticle separation.

Fig. 6 shows the conditional mass function calculated for different values of $`\mathrm{\Delta }\delta _c`$. Halos of between 200 and 1500 particles were selected from every output time, corresponding to masses $`1.6\times 10^{13}`$$`M_{}`$$`<M<3.9\times 10^{14}`$$`M_{}`$, and the particles were traced back to determine the mass of the halo they resided in at the output time nearest the required $`\mathrm{\Delta }\delta _c`$. Only halos containing at least 40 particles, and with over $`50\%`$ of their particles in common with the final halo were considered to be progenitors. The choice of $`50\%`$ is reasonably arbitrary, and does not affect the progenitor distribution significantly. $`\sigma _M^2`$ was calculated for these halos using the top-hat filter. We have tried using Gaussian and sharp $`k`$-space filters to calculate $`\sigma _M^2`$ and find that the result is not significantly affected by this choice.

The values of $`\mathrm{\Delta }\delta _c`$ adopted correspond to $`\mathrm{\Delta }z0.01`$, $`\mathrm{\Delta }z=0.1`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }z=0.5`$ for an Einstein-de Sitter cosmology. The smallest of these intervals corresponds to consecutive output from the simulations.

Comparing Fig. 5 and Fig. 6 provides weak evidence that the build-up of halos in PS theory is most like that predicted by the sharp $`k`$-space filter. This is discussed further in Section 9.

## 7 The cosmological distribution of mergers

In order to link halo growth with the observed evolution of the baryonic component of galaxies, it is important to distinguish between major mergers, which can disrupt structure creating observable signatures, and the slow accretion of matter. Where trajectories dip and rise again (as the filter radius decreases), the mass associated with the trajectory undergoes a jump. Such an event is shown in Fig. 1 for a trajectory calculated with a sharp $`k`$-space filter. These jumps are often associated with mergers, and it is expected that close congregations of excess overdensity in the linear density field that initially collapse as single entities and subsequently merge together, will create such a dip and rise as the filter increases in size and the number of enclosed clumps increases. For PS theory with a sharp $`k`$-space filter, jumps are the only mechanism for gaining mass as the trajectories are not differentiable.

The halo creation events analysed in this Section can be thought of as being instantaneous. However, numerical limitations are placed on how well we can follow these events because the trajectories are discretized in mass and the simulations are discretized in both mass and time. For the simulations, simultaneous outputs from the simulations were used to determine whether a halo had just been created, and whether the creation event was a merger. For the trajectories, the behaviour of a trajectory before it passed through a point was analysed to determine whether it was a first upcrossing (a creation event), and the subsequent behaviour was analysed to determine the form of creation. Both the trajectories and the simulations were sufficiently sampled that this numerical problem should not affect the conclusions drawn from this work. Defining the merger fraction, $`f_{\mathrm{merg}}(M_f,z_f)`$, by

$$f_{\mathrm{merg}}(M_f,z_f)=\frac{\mathrm{No}.\mathrm{mergers}}{\mathrm{No}.\mathrm{new}\mathrm{halos}}|_{M_f,z_f},$$
(16)
where $`z_f`$ is the final redshift of the halo and $`M_f`$ is the final mass of the halo, we can write the normalized proportion of new halos created by merger as

$$\mu ^{}(M_f,z_f)=\frac{f_{\mathrm{merg}}(M_f,z_f)}{\overline{f}_{\mathrm{merg}}(M_f)}$$
(17)
where $`\overline{f}_{\mathrm{merg}}(M_f)`$ is the average of $`f_{\mathrm{merg}}(M_f,z_f)`$ over all redshift. These data were combined over all final halo masses of interest, weighted by the standard Binomial variance treating the number of creation events found for each $`M_f`$ and $`z_f`$ as the number of ‘experiments’ performed. The resulting normalized merger fraction, a function of redshift only, is denoted by $`\mu `$. This procedure is designed to allow the merger fraction to be a function of mass and to highlight any cosmological changes in the overall merger rate.

Fig. 7 shows the cosmological variation in $`\mu `$, calculated from PS trajectories, for mergers defined such that both the mass jump and the progenitor correspond to at least a quarter of the mass of the final halo. Results presented in this Section are not sensitive to this choice. The numbers of mergers and halo creation events were determined from a set of $`10^6`$ trajectories, calculated as described in Section 2 for each of the three filters given by Equations 1 \- 3. The discrete nature of the trajectories provides the required lower limit of the size of possible accretion event and stops the number of halo creation events in any time interval becoming infinite. Data have been combined for all creation events that result in a halo of mass $`4\times 10^{10}M_{}<M<10^{13}M_{}`$, in such a way that the results should be directly comparable with those calculated from N-body simulations.

The Markovian nature of the trajectories calculated using a sharp $`k`$-space filter means that the probability that a halo was created by merger is independent of creation time: the normalized merger probability is flat. However, the trajectories calculated for the other filters are non-Markovian and the probability of merger is dependent on cosmological epoch. There is a general trend for these filters that when a halo is created at early times it’s more likely to have been created via the slow build-up of matter rather than by merger.

It is interesting to compare this behaviour with that observed in N-body simulations. Here, the discrete nature of the simulations stops the number of halo creation events within a time interval from tending to infinity. Halo creation was defined to have occurred for a given halo at a given time if at least half of the particles had not previously been contained within a halo with equal or greater mass. Only halos comprising at least 45 particles were included in this analysis. A creation event was said to have been a merger if there were two possible progenitors at the previous output, each with mass greater than a quarter of the final halo mass. Using the analysis described above for combining data from halos of different mass, these data are presented in Fig. 8.

Fig. 8 suggests that the distribution of mergers follows the PS model with a sharp $`k`$-space filter, with no evidence for a cosmological trend as predicted by PS theory with either the top-hat or Gaussian filters. PS theory with the sharp $`k`$-space filter would therefore seem to provide the best model for the build-up of clumps of dark matter determined using the FOF algorithm.

## 8 The tie-in with observed galaxy evolution

A variety of different techniques have been used to determine the amount of evolution in the field galaxy merger rate as a function of redshift: recent studies have used observations of the cosmological change in either the angular correlation function \[Neuschaefer et al. 1997\], pair counts \[Carlberg, Pritchet & Infante 1994, Patton et al. 1997\] or galaxy morphologies \[Lavery et al. 1996\]. See Abraham et al. \[Abraham 1998\] for a review. There is now strong evidence that the number of interacting systems grows rapidly with look-back time. The cosmological change in the proportion of galaxies involved in mergers is usually fitted by a power-law of the form $`(1+z)^n`$, and results are parametrized by the best fit value of $`n`$. A recent study using follow-up HST imaging of a sample of 185 galaxies with measured redshifts from the CFRS and Autofib-LDSS surveys has provided the most convincing measurement of $`n`$ to date \[Le Fèvre et al. 2000\]. This work extends the pair-count analysis of Patton et al. \[Patton et al. 1997\] from $`z=0.33`$ to $`z=0.9`$ and reveals a consistent amount of evolution between such studies and results from the morphological classification of galaxies. A best fit value of $`n=2.7\pm 0.6`$ is determined after correction for biases attributed to selection effects: the combination of ground-based and HST observations means that the sample is biased towards finding close pairs that are thought to be single galaxies in the magnitude limited ground-based sample, but which can be resolved into separate galaxies by HST.

These observational studies select galaxies based on properties of the baryonic galaxy component. In order to model such observations, the predicted evolution in the halo merger rate has to be combined with the time-scale over which the tracers of halo merger are visible, including any time difference between the merger of the baryonic components and the halos caused by the dynamical friction time-scale. The dynamical friction time-scale describes how long it takes for a galaxy (or progenitor) to spiral to the centre of a halo. If this takes a long time compared to the cosmological time-scale of interest, it would affect the relative distribution of baryonic and halo mergers. However, by concentrating on galaxies in small groups or field galaxies at relatively low redshifts, the dynamical friction timescale is expected to be small \[Barnes & Hernquist 1992\]. For such studies, or by using galaxy counts rather than morphologies, the observed evolution is expected to be driven by the proportion of halos that have undergone recent merger.

Percival et al. \[Percival, et al. 2000\] showed that multiplying the mass function by $`d\delta _c/dt`$ leads to the joint distribution of halo creation events in mass and time. In Section 7 the distribution of mergers in numerical simulations was shown to follow that predicted by PS theory with a sharp $`k`$-space filter, and to have the same form as the distribution of creation events. The proportion of halos that have just undergone merger is given by the creation rate divided by the number of halos, given by the standard PS mass function (Equation 11). The resulting cosmological change is proportional to $`d\delta _c/dt`$, and only depends on the Friedmann equation. A method for calculating $`d\delta _c/dt`$ was given by Percival et al. \[Percival, et al. 2000\]. Because PS theory does not include sub-halos that form part of a larger collapsed system, this is only valid for field galaxies. This will also be the evolution of any combination of halos of different mass, provided the combination is independent of redshift. For the three cosmologies parametrized in Table 1, approximating $`d\delta _c/dt`$ by $`(1+z)^n`$ gives $`n=2.5`$ for SCDM, $`n=2.1`$ for OCDM and $`n=2.3`$ for $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$CDM. These values are in agreement with the best fit value of Le Fèvre et al. \[Le Fèvre et al. 2000\], $`n=2.7\pm 0.6`$ within the errors and uncertainties. Further observations to provide more accurate observational data could, in principle, provide an interesting mechanism for constraining the best-fit cosmology.

## 9 Conclusions

The build-up of halos predicted by PS theory has been shown to be strongly dependent on the filter used to smooth the density field. None of the filters provides a perfect match for the build-up of structure in the numerical simulations presented in this paper. The simulation mass function \[Sheth & Tormen 1999, Percival, et al. 2000\] is most similar with PS theory with a top-hat filter, as is the halo creation rate.

The top-hat and Gaussian filters predict mass growth due to continuous accretion with the occasional merger, while the sharp $`k`$ space filter predicts mass growth completely due to mergers. Because of this, the predicted backwards conditional mass function is strongly dependent on the choice of filter. Analysing numerical simulations suggests a backwards conditional mass function most like that of PS theory with the sharp $`k`$-space filter, although again, the match is not perfect. The resolution of the simulations means that it is difficult to resolve mergers with small enough halos. However, there is weak evidence that the simulations contain more mergers with small mass halos than are predicted by the smoother trajectories associated with the top-hat and Gaussian filters.

For the sharp $`k`$-space filter, the cosmological distribution of halo mergers is independent of merger parameters. This result follows from the Markovian nature of the trajectories produced. For the other filters, which predict non-Markovian trajectories, the probability of merger is shown to be dependent on the halo creation epoch. No evolution is seen in the probability that a given halo was created by merger measured from N-body simulations, and PS theory with a sharp $`k`$-space therefore provides the best fit to these data. This provides the most convincing evidence that PS theory with a sharp $`k`$-space filter provides the best model of halo growth. In this work, a standard FOF group finder was used. An interesting test would be to analyse the observed build-up of halos using a number of different algorithms to find halos. However, this is not expected to significantly alter the conclusions because the build-up of mass in the simulations is independent of the group finder.

When combined with the link between the mass function and halo creation rate described in Percival et al. \[Percival, et al. 2000\], this leads to the interesting result that the cosmological change in the proportion of halos that have undergone recent merger is predicted to be independent of power spectrum, halo mass, mass function, and to only depend on the Friedmann cosmology through $`d\delta _c/dt`$. In Section 8 it was argued that the field galaxy merger rate should be driven by the halo merger rate, and that observations of field galaxies estimate the cosmological evolution in the halo merger rate. In Section 8, recent observational data were shown to be consistent with the presently favoured $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$CDM cosmology, although they are insufficiently accurate to usefully distinguish between cosmological parameters. It is hoped that future studies of this evolution will provide sufficiently accurate results that this picture will change.

## 10 Acknowledgements

I would like to thank John Peacock and the anonymous referee for useful comments that helped to improve this paper. The Hydra N-body code \[Couchman, Thomas & Pearce 1995\] was kindly made available by the Hydra consortium.


text:
# More Straightforward Extraction of the Fundamental Lepton Mixing Parameters from Long-Baseline Neutrino Oscillations

## I Introduction

The observation of solar and atmospheric neutrino oscillations in the Super-Kamiokande experiment has provided the most convincing evidence that neutrinos are massive and lepton flavors are mixed  ***The latest SNO measurement , together with the Super-Kamiokande data, has provided the first direct evidence that there is a muon- and (or) tau-neutrino component in the solar electron-neutrino flux.. It opens an important window for deep insight into the dynamics of fermion mass generation and flavor mixing in particle physics, and has important implications in astrophysics and cosmology.

Although some useful constraints on the lepton flavor mixing matrix can be obtained from the Super-Kamiokande measurements and other non-accelerator neutrino experiments, a precise determination of its parameters has to rely on the new generation of accelerator neutrino experiments with very long baselines , including possible neutrino factories . The terrestrial matter effects in all long-baseline neutrino experiments must be taken into acount, since they unavoidably modify the genuine behaviors of neutrino oscillations in vacuum.

To express the pattern of neutrino oscillations in matter in the same form as that in vacuum, one may define the effective neutrino masses $`\stackrel{~}{m}_i`$ and the effective lepton flavor mixing matrix $`\stackrel{~}{V}`$ in which the terrestrial matter effects are already included. In this commonly-accepted approach, it is necessary to find out the concrete relations between the fundamental quantities of lepton mixing in vacuum ($`m_i`$ and $`V`$) and their effective counterparts in matter ($`\stackrel{~}{m}_i`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{V}`$). The analytically exact formulas of $`\stackrel{~}{m}_i`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{V}`$ as functions of $`m_i`$ and $`V`$ have been achieved in the three-neutrino mixing scheme , but no effort has been made to derive the expressions of $`m_i`$ and $`V`$ in terms of $`\stackrel{~}{m}_i`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{V}`$. The latter case is equivalently interesting in phenomenology, because our physical purpose is to determine the fundamental parameters of lepton flavor mixing from the effective ones, which can directly be observed from a variety of long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments.

This paper aims to present the analytically exact results of the fundamental quantities $`m_i`$ and $`V`$ in terms of the effective quantities $`\stackrel{~}{m}_i`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{V}`$. In Section 2, we first point out the interesting reversibility between $`(m_i,V)`$ and $`(\stackrel{~}{m}_i,\stackrel{~}{V})`$, and then derive their explicit relations in a way independent of any specific parametrizations of the lepton flavor mixing matrix. In Section 3, the standard parametrization is introduced to describe $`V`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{V}`$ in a parallel form. We calculate the mixing angles and the CP-violating phase(s) of $`V`$ as functions of the relevant parameters of $`\stackrel{~}{V}`$, and give a typical numerical illustration. Section 4 is devoted to a brief summary.

## II Reversibility and parametrization-independent formulas

Let us concentrate on the flavor mixing between three active neutrinos and three charged leptons. The $`3\times 3`$ lepton flavor mixing matrix $`V`$ in vacuum is defined to link the neutrino mass eigenstates ($`\nu _1,\nu _2,\nu _3`$) to the neutrino flavor eigenstates ($`\nu _e,\nu _\mu ,\nu _\tau `$):

$$V=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}V_{e1}& V_{e2}& V_{e3}\\ V_{\mu 1}& V_{\mu 2}& V_{\mu 3}\\ V_{\tau 1}& V_{\tau 2}& V_{\tau 3}\end{array}\right).$$
(1)
A similar definition can be made for $`\stackrel{~}{V}`$, the effective counterpart of $`V`$ in matter. If neutrinos are massive Dirac fermions, $`V`$ or $`\stackrel{~}{V}`$ can be parametrized in terms of three rotation angles and one CP-violating phase. If neutrinos are Majorana fermions, however, two additional CP-violating phases are in general needed to fully parametrize $`V`$ or $`\stackrel{~}{V}`$. The strength of CP or T violation in neutrino oscillations, no matter whether neutrinos are Dirac or Majorana particles, depends only upon a universal parameter $`J`$ (in vacuum) or $`\stackrel{~}{J}`$ (in matter) :

$`\mathrm{Im}\left(V_{\alpha i}V_{\beta j}V_{\alpha j}^{}V_{\beta i}^{}\right)`$ $`=`$ $`J{\displaystyle \underset{\gamma ,k}{}}\left(ϵ_{\alpha \beta \gamma }^{}ϵ_{ijk}^{}\right),`$ (2)
$`\mathrm{Im}\left(\stackrel{~}{V}_{\alpha i}\stackrel{~}{V}_{\beta j}\stackrel{~}{V}_{\alpha j}^{}\stackrel{~}{V}_{\beta i}^{}\right)`$ $`=`$ $`\stackrel{~}{J}{\displaystyle \underset{\gamma ,k}{}}\left(ϵ_{\alpha \beta \gamma }^{}ϵ_{ijk}^{}\right),`$ (3)
where the Greek subscripts $`(\alpha ,\beta ,\gamma )`$ and the Latin subscripts $`(i,j,k)`$ run over $`(e,\mu ,\tau )`$ and $`(1,2,3)`$, respectively. Of course, $`J`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{J}`$ are two rephasing-invariant quantities.

The effective Hamiltonian responsible for the propagation of neutrinos in vacuum or in matter can be written as

$`H_\nu `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2E}}V\left(\begin{array}{ccc}m_1^2& 0& 0\\ 0& m_2^2& 0\\ 0& 0& m_3^2\end{array}\right)V^{},`$ (4)
$`\stackrel{~}{H}_\nu `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2E}}\stackrel{~}{V}\left(\begin{array}{ccc}\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2& 0& 0\\ 0& \stackrel{~}{m}_2^2& 0\\ 0& 0& \stackrel{~}{m}_3^2\end{array}\right)\stackrel{~}{V}^{},`$ (5)
where $`E`$ is the neutrino beam energy; $`m_i`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{m}_i`$ (for $`i=1,2,3`$) denote the neutrino masses in vacuum and those in matter, respectively. The deviation of $`\stackrel{~}{H}_\nu `$ from $`H_\nu `$ results non-trivially from the charged-current contribution to the $`\nu _ee^{}`$ forward scattering , when neutrinos travel through a normal material medium like the earth:

$$\mathrm{\Delta }H_\nu \stackrel{~}{H}_\nu H_\nu =\left(\begin{array}{ccc}a& 0& 0\\ 0& 0& 0\\ 0& 0& 0\end{array}\right),$$
(6)
where $`a=\sqrt{2}G_\mathrm{F}N_e`$ with $`N_e`$ being the background density of electrons. Subsequently we assume a constant earth density profile (i.e., $`N_e`$ = constant), which is a very good approximation for all of the presently-proposed long-baseline neutrino experiments A careful analysis with the method of the Fourier series expansion demonstrates that the matter profile effect is essentially irrelevant, if the baseline of neutrino oscillations is about 3000 km or shorter . Therefore one may safely assume $`N_e`$ to be a constant in those realistic medium- and long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments with $`L3500`$ km. For $`L>3500`$ km (in particular, $`L5000`$ km), however, details of the earth density profile have to be taken into account towards an accurate description of the features of terrestrial neutrino oscillations..

With the help of Eqs. (3) and (4), we obtain the following relations:

$`\left(\begin{array}{ccc}m_1^2& 0& 0\\ 0& m_2^2& 0\\ 0& 0& m_3^2\end{array}\right)`$ $`=`$ $`V^{}\left[\stackrel{~}{V}\left(\begin{array}{ccc}\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2& 0& 0\\ 0& \stackrel{~}{m}_2^2& 0\\ 0& 0& \stackrel{~}{m}_3^2\end{array}\right)\stackrel{~}{V}^{}\left(\begin{array}{ccc}A& 0& 0\\ 0& 0& 0\\ 0& 0& 0\end{array}\right)\right]V,`$ (7)
$`\left(\begin{array}{ccc}\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2& 0& 0\\ 0& \stackrel{~}{m}_2^2& 0\\ 0& 0& \stackrel{~}{m}_3^2\end{array}\right)`$ $`=`$ $`\stackrel{~}{V}^{}\left[V\left(\begin{array}{ccc}m_1^2& 0& 0\\ 0& m_2^2& 0\\ 0& 0& m_3^2\end{array}\right)V^{}+\left(\begin{array}{ccc}A& 0& 0\\ 0& 0& 0\\ 0& 0& 0\end{array}\right)\right]\stackrel{~}{V},`$ (9)
where $`A=2aE`$ depending linearly on the neutrino beam energy $`E`$. This result implies that the expression of $`\stackrel{~}{m}_i`$ as a function of $`A`$, $`m_j`$ and $`V_{ej}`$ is reversible with that of $`m_i`$, which must behave via the same function of variables $`A`$, $`\stackrel{~}{m}_j`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{V}_{ej}`$; namely,

$`m_i`$ $`=`$ $`f_i(\stackrel{~}{m}_j,|\stackrel{~}{V}_{ej}|,A),`$ (10)
$`\stackrel{~}{m}_i`$ $`=`$ $`f_i(m_j,|V_{ej}|,+A).`$ (11)
As $`m_i`$ is real and positive, it depends only upon the absolute values of $`\stackrel{~}{V}_{\alpha j}`$. The specific texture of $`\mathrm{\Delta }H_\nu `$ assures that only the matrix elements $`|\stackrel{~}{V}_{ej}|`$, which are always associated with the matter parameter $`A`$, can affect $`m_i`$. The similar argument is valid for $`\stackrel{~}{m}_i`$. Analogously, there exists the simple reversibility between the expressions of $`V_{\alpha i}`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{V}_{\alpha i}`$:

$`V_{\alpha i}`$ $`=`$ $`F_{\alpha i}(\stackrel{~}{m}_j,\stackrel{~}{V}_{\beta j},A),`$ (12)
$`\stackrel{~}{V}_{\alpha i}`$ $`=`$ $`F_{\alpha i}(m_j,V_{\beta j},+A).`$ (13)
We observe that the reversible relations in Eqs. (6) and (7) coincide formally with the sum rules of neutrino mass and mixing parameters obtained in Ref. :

$$\underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}\left(m_i^2V_{\alpha i}V_{\beta i}^{}\right)=\underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}\left(\stackrel{~}{m}_i^2\stackrel{~}{V}_{\alpha i}\stackrel{~}{V}_{\beta i}^{}\right),$$
(14)
where $`\alpha \beta `$ running over $`(e,\mu ,\tau )`$. In the limit $`A=0`$, $`\stackrel{~}{m}_i=m_i`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{V}_{\alpha i}=V_{\alpha i}`$ must hold. Hence the functions $`f_i`$ and $`F_{\alpha i}`$ might have transparent dependence on $`A`$. To find out the explicit forms of $`f_i`$ and $`F_{\alpha i}`$ is simply an algebraic exercise in the three-neutrino mixing scheme .

Using Eqs. (6) and (7), one may obtain the formulas of $`m_i`$ and $`V_{\alpha i}`$ straightforwardly from those of $`\stackrel{~}{m}_i`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{V}_{\alpha i}`$, which have been presented in Ref.  in a parametrization-independent way. We then arrive at

$`m_1^2`$ $`=`$ $`\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}}\stackrel{~}{x}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}}\sqrt{\stackrel{~}{x}^23\stackrel{~}{y}}\left[\stackrel{~}{z}+\sqrt{3\left(1\stackrel{~}{z}^2\right)}\right],`$ (15)
$`m_2^2`$ $`=`$ $`\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}}\stackrel{~}{x}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}}\sqrt{\stackrel{~}{x}^23\stackrel{~}{y}}\left[\stackrel{~}{z}\sqrt{3\left(1\stackrel{~}{z}^2\right)}\right],`$ (16)
$`m_3^2`$ $`=`$ $`\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}}\stackrel{~}{x}+{\displaystyle \frac{2}{3}}\stackrel{~}{z}\sqrt{\stackrel{~}{x}^23\stackrel{~}{y}},`$ (17)
where $`\stackrel{~}{x}`$, $`\stackrel{~}{y}`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{z}`$ are given by

$`\stackrel{~}{x}`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{21}^2+\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{31}^2A,`$ (18)
$`\stackrel{~}{y}`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{21}^2\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{31}^2A\left[\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{21}^2\left(1|\stackrel{~}{V}_{e2}|^2\right)+\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{31}^2\left(1|\stackrel{~}{V}_{e3}|^2\right)\right],`$ (19)
$`\stackrel{~}{z}`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{cos}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}}\mathrm{arccos}{\displaystyle \frac{2\stackrel{~}{x}^39\stackrel{~}{x}\stackrel{~}{y}27A\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{21}^2\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{31}^2|\stackrel{~}{V}_{e1}|^2}{2\left(\stackrel{~}{x}^23\stackrel{~}{y}\right)^{3/2}}}\right]`$ (20)
with $`\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{21}^2\stackrel{~}{m}_2^2\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{31}^2\stackrel{~}{m}_3^2\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2`$. Furthermore, $`V`$ reads as follows:

$$V_{\alpha i}=\frac{\stackrel{~}{N}_i}{\stackrel{~}{D}_i}\stackrel{~}{V}_{\alpha i}\frac{A}{\stackrel{~}{D}_i}\left[\left(m_i^2\stackrel{~}{m}_j^2\right)\stackrel{~}{V}_{\alpha k}\stackrel{~}{V}_{ek}^{}+\left(m_i^2\stackrel{~}{m}_k^2\right)\stackrel{~}{V}_{\alpha j}\stackrel{~}{V}_{ej}^{}\right]\stackrel{~}{V}_{ei},$$
(21)
where $`\alpha `$ runs over $`(e,\mu ,\tau )`$; $`i`$, $`j`$ or $`k`$ runs over $`(1,2,3)`$ with $`ijk`$; and In obtaining Eqs. (11) and (12), we have required that $`\stackrel{~}{N}_i`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{D}_i`$ have the same sign. Therefore $`A=0`$ leads to $`\stackrel{~}{N}_i/\stackrel{~}{D}_i=1`$ and $`V_{\alpha i}=\stackrel{~}{V}_{\alpha i}`$.

$`\stackrel{~}{N}_i`$ $`=`$ $`\left(m_i^2\stackrel{~}{m}_j^2\right)\left(m_i^2\stackrel{~}{m}_k^2\right)+A\left[\left(m_i^2\stackrel{~}{m}_j^2\right)|\stackrel{~}{V}_{ek}|^2+\left(m_i^2\stackrel{~}{m}_k^2\right)|\stackrel{~}{V}_{ej}|^2\right],`$ (22)
$`\stackrel{~}{D}_i^2`$ $`=`$ $`\stackrel{~}{N}_i^2+A^2|\stackrel{~}{V}_{ei}|^2\left[\left(m_i^2\stackrel{~}{m}_j^2\right)^2|\stackrel{~}{V}_{ek}|^2+\left(m_i^2\stackrel{~}{m}_k^2\right)^2|\stackrel{~}{V}_{ej}|^2\right].`$ (23)
Obviously $`A=0`$ leads to $`V=\stackrel{~}{V}`$. The exact and compact formulas obtained above show clearly how the flavor mixing matrix in vacuum is connected to that in matter. Some instructive analytical approximations can be made for Eq. (11), once the hierarchy of effective neutrino masses and that of effective flavor mixing matrix elements are experimentally known.

With the help of Eq. (11), one may calculate the universal CP-violating parameter $`J`$ in vacuum. Indeed it is easier to derive the relationship between $`J`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{J}`$ by use of either the sum rules in Eq. (8)  or the equality between the determinants of lepton mass matrices in matter and in vacuum . The result is

$$J=\stackrel{~}{J}\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{21}^2}{\mathrm{\Delta }m_{21}^2}\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{31}^2}{\mathrm{\Delta }m_{31}^2}\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{32}^2}{\mathrm{\Delta }m_{32}^2},$$
(24)
where the neutrino mass-squared differences in vacuum can be read off from Eq. (9).

Note that the afore-obtained results are valid only for neutrinos propagating in vacuum and interacting with matter. As for antineutrinos, the respective formulas for $`m_i^2`$, $`V`$ and $`J`$ can straightforwardly be obtained from Eqs. (9) – (13) through the replacements $`\stackrel{~}{V}\stackrel{~}{V}^{}`$ and $`AA`$.

## III Standard parametrization and numerical illustration

It is well known that the 3$`\times `$3 lepton flavor mixing matrix can be parametrized in terms of three rotation angles ($`\theta _1,\theta _2,\theta _3`$) and three phase angles ($`\delta ,\rho ,\sigma `$), if neutrinos are Majorana particles. There are nine distinct parametrizations of this nature , but only one of them is particularly convenient in the analyses of experimental data on the neutrinoless double beta decay and neutrino oscillations. This “standard” parametrization reads in vacuum as

$$V=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}c_1c_3& s_1c_3& s_3\\ c_1s_2s_3s_1c_2e^{i\delta }& s_1s_2s_3+c_1c_2e^{i\delta }& s_2c_3\\ c_1c_2s_3+s_1s_2e^{i\delta }& s_1c_2s_3c_1s_2e^{i\delta }& c_2c_3\end{array}\right)\left(\begin{array}{ccc}1& 0& 0\\ 0& e^{i\rho }& 0\\ 0& 0& e^{i\sigma }\end{array}\right)$$
(25)
with $`s_i\mathrm{sin}\theta _i`$ and $`c_i\mathrm{cos}\theta _i`$ (for $`i=1,2,3`$). Without loss of generality, the three mixing angles ($`\theta _1,\theta _2,\theta _3`$) can all be arranged to lie in the first quadrant. Arbitrary values between $`\pi `$ and $`+\pi `$ are allowed for the CP-violating phases $`\delta `$, $`\rho `$ and $`\sigma `$. Note that the location of the Dirac-type phase $`\delta `$ in $`V`$ is different from that advocated by the Particle Data Group in Ref. . The advantage of our present phase assignment is that $`\delta `$ itself does not appear in the effective Majorana mass term of the neutrinoless double beta decay . Note also that normal neutrino oscillations are completely insensitive to the Majorana-type phases $`\rho `$ and $`\sigma `$, therefore the magnitudes of these two parameters keep unchanged even when neutrinos propagate in matter . On the other hand, the other four parameters $`\theta _1,\theta _2,\theta _3`$ and $`\delta `$ may be contaminated by the terrestrial matter effects in realistic long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments. In analogy to Eq. (14), the effective (matter-corrected) lepton flavor mixing matrix can be parametrized as follows:

$$\stackrel{~}{V}=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}\stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_3& \stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_3& \stackrel{~}{s}_3\\ \stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{s}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3\stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_2e^{i\stackrel{~}{\delta }}& \stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{s}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3+\stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_2e^{i\stackrel{~}{\delta }}& \stackrel{~}{s}_2\stackrel{~}{c}_3\\ \stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3+\stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{s}_2e^{i\stackrel{~}{\delta }}& \stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3\stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{s}_2e^{i\stackrel{~}{\delta }}& \stackrel{~}{c}_2\stackrel{~}{c}_3\end{array}\right)\left(\begin{array}{ccc}1& 0& 0\\ 0& e^{i\rho }& 0\\ 0& 0& e^{i\sigma }\end{array}\right)$$
(26)
with $`\stackrel{~}{s}_i\mathrm{sin}\stackrel{~}{\theta }_i`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{c}_i\mathrm{cos}\stackrel{~}{\theta }_i`$ (for $`i=1,2,3`$). The universal CP-violating parameters $`J`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{J}`$ defined in Eq. (2) depend respectively upon the Dirac-type phases $`\delta `$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\delta }`$; i.e.,

$`J`$ $`=`$ $`s_1c_1s_2c_2s_3c_3^2\mathrm{sin}\delta ,`$ (27)
$`\stackrel{~}{J}`$ $`=`$ $`\stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{s}_2\stackrel{~}{c}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3\stackrel{~}{c}_3^2\mathrm{sin}\stackrel{~}{\delta }.`$ (28)
The CP- and T-violating asymmetries of neutrino oscillations are proportional to $`J`$ in vacuum and $`\stackrel{~}{J}`$ in matter.

Now let us proceed to figure out the analytical expressions of the fundamental parameters $`(\theta _1,\theta _2,\theta _3,\delta )`$ in terms of the effective parameters $`(\stackrel{~}{\theta }_1,\stackrel{~}{\theta }_2,\stackrel{~}{\theta }_3,\stackrel{~}{\delta })`$, which can directly be measured from a variety of long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments. To do so, we simply apply the standard parametrization of $`\stackrel{~}{V}`$ to the parametrization-independent formula in Eq. (11). Then the matrix elements of $`V`$ read explicitly as

$$V_{\alpha i}=\frac{\stackrel{~}{N}_i}{\stackrel{~}{D}_i}\stackrel{~}{V}_{\alpha i}\frac{A}{\stackrel{~}{D}_i}\underset{k=1}{\overset{3}{}}\left(\stackrel{~}{T}_{\alpha k}P_{ki}\right),$$
(29)
where $`\stackrel{~}{N}_i`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{D}_i`$ have been given in Eq. (12), $`P\mathrm{Diag}\{1,e^{i\rho },e^{i\sigma }\}`$ denotes the diagonal Majorana phase matrix, and the matter-associated quantities $`\stackrel{~}{T}_{\alpha k}`$ are given as

$`\stackrel{~}{T}_{e1}`$ $`=`$ $`+\stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_3\left[\left(m_1^2\stackrel{~}{m}_2^2\right)\stackrel{~}{s}_3^2+\left(m_1^2\stackrel{~}{m}_3^2\right)\stackrel{~}{s}_1^2\stackrel{~}{c}_3^2\right],`$ (30)
$`\stackrel{~}{T}_{e2}`$ $`=`$ $`+\stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_3\left[\left(m_2^2\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2\right)\stackrel{~}{s}_3^2+\left(m_2^2\stackrel{~}{m}_3^2\right)\stackrel{~}{c}_1^2\stackrel{~}{c}_3^2\right],`$ (31)
$`\stackrel{~}{T}_{e3}`$ $`=`$ $`+\stackrel{~}{s}_3\stackrel{~}{c}_3^2\left[\left(m_3^2\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2\right)\stackrel{~}{s}_1^2+\left(m_3^2\stackrel{~}{m}_2^2\right)\stackrel{~}{c}_1^2\right],`$ (32)
$`\stackrel{~}{T}_{\mu 1}`$ $`=`$ $`+\stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_3^2\left[\left(m_1^2\stackrel{~}{m}_2^2\right)\stackrel{~}{s}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3\left(m_1^2\stackrel{~}{m}_3^2\right)\left(\stackrel{~}{s}_1^2\stackrel{~}{s}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3\stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_2e^{i\stackrel{~}{\delta }}\right)\right],`$ (33)
$`\stackrel{~}{T}_{\mu 2}`$ $`=`$ $`+\stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_3^2\left[\left(m_2^2\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2\right)\stackrel{~}{s}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3\left(m_2^2\stackrel{~}{m}_3^2\right)\left(\stackrel{~}{c}_1^2\stackrel{~}{s}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3+\stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_2e^{i\stackrel{~}{\delta }}\right)\right],`$ (34)
$`\stackrel{~}{T}_{\mu 3}`$ $`=`$ $`\stackrel{~}{s}_3\stackrel{~}{c}_3\left[\left(m_3^2\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2\right)\stackrel{~}{s}_1^2\stackrel{~}{s}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3+\left(m_3^2\stackrel{~}{m}_2^2\right)\stackrel{~}{c}_1^2\stackrel{~}{s}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{21}^2\stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_2e^{i\stackrel{~}{\delta }}\right],`$ (35)
$`\stackrel{~}{T}_{\tau 1}`$ $`=`$ $`+\stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_3^2\left[\left(m_1^2\stackrel{~}{m}_2^2\right)\stackrel{~}{c}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3\left(m_1^2\stackrel{~}{m}_3^2\right)\left(\stackrel{~}{s}_1^2\stackrel{~}{c}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3+\stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{s}_2e^{i\stackrel{~}{\delta }}\right)\right],`$ (36)
$`\stackrel{~}{T}_{\tau 2}`$ $`=`$ $`+\stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_3^2\left[\left(m_2^2\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2\right)\stackrel{~}{c}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3\left(m_2^2\stackrel{~}{m}_3^2\right)\left(\stackrel{~}{c}_1^2\stackrel{~}{c}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3\stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{s}_2e^{i\stackrel{~}{\delta }}\right)\right],`$ (37)
$`\stackrel{~}{T}_{\tau 3}`$ $`=`$ $`\stackrel{~}{s}_3\stackrel{~}{c}_3\left[\left(m_3^2\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2\right)\stackrel{~}{s}_1^2\stackrel{~}{c}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3+\left(m_3^2\stackrel{~}{m}_2^2\right)\stackrel{~}{c}_1^2\stackrel{~}{c}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{21}^2\stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{s}_2e^{i\stackrel{~}{\delta }}\right].`$ (38)
It should be noted that the matrix elements $`V_{\mu 3}`$ and $`V_{\tau 3}`$ in Eq. (17) are complex and dependent on the effective CP-violating phase $`\stackrel{~}{\delta }`$, as one can see from $`\stackrel{~}{T}_{\mu 3}`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{T}_{\tau 3}`$ in Eq. (18). Hence a proper redefinition of the phases for muon and tau fields is needed, in order to make $`V_{\mu 3}`$ and $`V_{\tau 3}`$ real in the course of linking $`\stackrel{~}{V}`$ in Eq. (15) to $`V`$ in Eq. (14). The instructive relations between the effective mixing angles in matter ($`\stackrel{~}{\theta }_1,\stackrel{~}{\theta }_2,\stackrel{~}{\theta }_3`$) and the fundamental mixing angles in vacuum ($`\theta _1,\theta _2,\theta _3`$) are found to be

$`{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{tan}\theta _1}{\mathrm{tan}\stackrel{~}{\theta }_1}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\stackrel{~}{N}_2A\left[\left(m_2^2\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2\right)\stackrel{~}{s}_3^2+\left(m_2^2\stackrel{~}{m}_3^2\right)\stackrel{~}{c}_1^2\stackrel{~}{c}_3^2\right]}{\stackrel{~}{N}_1A\left[\left(m_1^2\stackrel{~}{m}_2^2\right)\stackrel{~}{s}_3^2+\left(m_1^2\stackrel{~}{m}_3^2\right)\stackrel{~}{s}_1^2\stackrel{~}{c}_3^2\right]}}{\displaystyle \frac{\stackrel{~}{D}_1}{\stackrel{~}{D}_2}},`$ (39)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{tan}\theta _2}{\mathrm{tan}\stackrel{~}{\theta }_2}}`$ $`=`$ $`1{\displaystyle \frac{A\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{21}^2\stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{s}_3\mathrm{cos}\stackrel{~}{\delta }/\left(\stackrel{~}{s}_2\stackrel{~}{c}_2\right)}{\stackrel{~}{N}_3+A\left[\left(m_3^2\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2\right)\stackrel{~}{s}_1^2+\left(m_3^2\stackrel{~}{m}_2^2\right)\stackrel{~}{c}_1^2\right]\stackrel{~}{s}_3^2}},`$ (40)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{sin}\theta _3}{\mathrm{sin}\stackrel{~}{\theta }_3}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\stackrel{~}{N}_3}{\stackrel{~}{D}_3}}{\displaystyle \frac{A}{\stackrel{~}{D}_3}}\left[\left(m_3^2\stackrel{~}{m}_1^2\right)\stackrel{~}{s}_1^2+\left(m_3^2\stackrel{~}{m}_2^2\right)\stackrel{~}{c}_1^2\right]\stackrel{~}{c}_3^2.`$ (41)
Note that we have only presented the next-to-leading order expression for $`\mathrm{tan}\theta _2/\mathrm{tan}\stackrel{~}{\theta }_2`$ in Eq. (19), since the exact result is too complicated to be instructive. The former works to a high degree of accuracy, and it is identical to the exact result provided that $`\stackrel{~}{\theta }_2=\pi /4`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\delta }=\pm \pi /2`$ hold. Once the relations between $`\stackrel{~}{\theta }_i`$ and $`\theta _i`$ (for $`i=1,2,3`$) are fixed, one can derive the relation between the effective CP-violating phase $`\stackrel{~}{\delta }`$ in matter and the genuine CP-violating phase $`\delta `$ in vacuum by use of Eq. (16) as well as the relationship between $`\stackrel{~}{J}`$ and $`J`$ in Eq. (13). We obtain

$$\frac{\mathrm{sin}\delta }{\mathrm{sin}\stackrel{~}{\delta }}=\frac{\stackrel{~}{s}_1\stackrel{~}{c}_1\stackrel{~}{s}_2\stackrel{~}{c}_2\stackrel{~}{s}_3\stackrel{~}{c}_3^2}{s_1c_1s_2c_2s_3c_3^2}\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{21}^2}{\mathrm{\Delta }m_{21}^2}\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{31}^2}{\mathrm{\Delta }m_{31}^2}\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{32}^2}{\mathrm{\Delta }m_{32}^2}.$$
(42)
Of course, $`\stackrel{~}{\delta }=\delta `$ holds in the limit $`A=0`$. The formulas obtained in Eqs. (19) and (20) are very useful for the purpose of extracting the fundamental parameters of lepton flavor mixing from the matter-corrected ones, which can be measured from various long- and medium-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments in the near future.

Note again that the afore-obtained results are valid only for neutrinos interacting with matter. As for antineutrinos, the corresponding expressions of $`\theta _1`$, $`\theta _2`$, $`\theta _3`$ and $`\delta `$ can straightforwardly be achieved from Eqs. (19) and (20) through the replacements $`\stackrel{~}{\delta }\stackrel{~}{\delta }`$ and $`AA`$.

It is worthwhile at this point to remark two advantages of the results presented above over those obtained by Zaglauer and Schwarzer in Ref. . First, our relations clearly show the proportionality between the sine or tangent functions of $`(\theta _1,\theta _2,\theta _3,\delta )`$ and $`(\stackrel{~}{\theta }_1,\stackrel{~}{\theta }_2,\stackrel{~}{\theta }_3,\stackrel{~}{\delta })`$. Second, our relations make the dependence of $`\stackrel{~}{\theta }_1`$, $`\stackrel{~}{\theta }_2`$, $`\stackrel{~}{\theta }_3`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\delta }`$ on the matter parameter $`A`$ more transparent. Therefore our results are expected to be more useful for the analytical study of terrestrial matter effects on lepton flavor mixing and CP violation.

For numerical illustration, we assume the matter density of the earth’s crust to be constant. Then $`A2.2810^4\mathrm{eV}^2E/[\mathrm{GeV}]`$ is a good approximation , where $`E`$ is the neutrino beam energy. We typically take $`E=5`$ GeV. The input values of the effective neutrino mixing parameters in matter are listed on the left side of Table 1. With the help of Eqs. (9) and (10) as well as Eqs. (19) and (20), one may calculate the fundamental neutrino mixing parameters in vacuum. We list our numerical results on the right side of Table 1 for both the case of neutrinos ($`+A`$) and that of antineutrinos ($`A`$). One can see that the input values of $`(\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{21}^2,\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{31}^2)`$ and $`(\stackrel{~}{\theta }_1,\stackrel{~}{\theta }_2,\stackrel{~}{\theta }_3,\stackrel{~}{\delta })`$ are rather ad hoc. The reason is simply that we contrive to get the appropriate sizes of $`(\mathrm{\Delta }m_{21}^2,\mathrm{\Delta }m_{31}^2)`$ and $`(\theta _1,\theta _2,\theta _3,\delta )`$, which are compatible with the present Super-Kamiokande data on solar and atmospheric neutrino oscillations . Indeed we observe from Table 1 that $`\mathrm{\Delta }m_{\mathrm{sun}}^2\mathrm{\Delta }m_{21}^24.6210^5\mathrm{eV}^2`$ (or $`5.0510^5\mathrm{eV}^2`$) and $`\mathrm{sin}^22\theta _{\mathrm{sun}}\mathrm{sin}^22\theta _10.75`$ (or $`0.90`$) do agree with the large-angle MSW solution to the solar neutrino problem, and $`\mathrm{\Delta }m_{\mathrm{atm}}^2\mathrm{\Delta }m_{31}^23.0010^3\mathrm{eV}^2`$ (or $`2.8910^3\mathrm{eV}^2`$) together with $`\mathrm{sin}^22\theta _{\mathrm{atm}}\mathrm{sin}^22\theta _20.99`$ (or $`0.97`$) is consistent with the atmospheric neutrino oscillation data. Moreover, $`\mathrm{sin}^22\theta _{\mathrm{CHOOZ}}\mathrm{sin}^22\theta _30.03<0.1`$ coincides with the CHOOZ and Palo Verde reactor experiments . Note that $`\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{~}{m}_{21}^2A\mathrm{\Delta }m_{21}^2`$ holds for the given value of $`E`$, hence there appears a substantial difference between $`\theta _1`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\theta }_1`$. On the other hand, $`\theta _2\stackrel{~}{\theta }_2`$ and $`\delta \stackrel{~}{\delta }`$ hold to an excellent degree of accuracy. The tiny difference between $`\theta _2`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\theta }_2`$ in our numerical illustration can easily be understood: the special input $`\stackrel{~}{\delta }=\pm 90^{}`$ assures the vanishing of the term proportional to $`A\mathrm{cos}\stackrel{~}{\delta }`$ on the right-hand side of the expression for $`\mathrm{tan}\theta _2/\mathrm{tan}\stackrel{~}{\theta }_2`$ in Eq. (19), leading straightforwardly to $`\theta _2=\stackrel{~}{\theta }_2`$ in the next-to-leading order approximation. In general, $`\theta _2\stackrel{~}{\theta }_2`$ remains a good approximation, if the condition $`|\mathrm{\Delta }m_{21}^2||\mathrm{\Delta }m_{31}^2|`$ is satisfied . One may numerically check that $`\delta \stackrel{~}{\delta }`$ is generally valid as well, provided that $`|\mathrm{\Delta }m_{21}^2||\mathrm{\Delta }m_{31}^2|`$ holds. Analytically, however, we have not found a transparent way to show the approximate equality between $`\delta `$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\delta }`$. Some more effort is obviously desirable, in order to understand why the CP-violating phase $`\delta `$ is in most cases insensitive to the terrestrial matter effects .

Our numerical results illustrate that the fundamental neutrino mixing parameters can straightforwardly be extracted from their matter-corrected counterparts, once the latter are measured from the future long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments. In particular, $`|\mathrm{\Delta }m_{21}^2||\mathrm{\Delta }m_{31}^2|`$ assures that $`\stackrel{~}{\theta }_2\theta _2`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\delta }\delta `$ hold in the standard parametrization of lepton flavor mixing.

## IV Summary

We have pointed out that there exists the reversibility between the fundamental neutrino mixing parameters in vacuum and their effective counterparts in matter. The former can therefore be expressed in terms of the latter, allowing more straightforward extraction of the genuine lepton mixing quantities from a variety of long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments. Besides the parametrization-independent formalism, we have presented the formulas based on the standard parametrization of the neutrino mixing matrix and given a typical numerical illustration. Our results are expected to be a useful addition to the phenomenology of lepton flavor mixing and neutrino oscillations.