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# 1 The COMPETE project

## 1 The COMPETE project

Analytic parametrizations of forward $`(t=0)`$ hadron scattering amplitudes is a well-established domain in strong interactions. The basic idea is to implement as much as possible general principles - analyticity, unitarity, crossing -symmetry and positivity of total cross-sections - supplemented by some other general properties like the connection between Regge poles and resonance masses. In the absence of an explicit form of the forward amplitude derived from QCD, such an approach could provide a useful tool for studying non-perturbative physics.

However, in the past, the phenomenology of forward scattering had quite a high degree of arbitrariness.

Some of the arbitrariness in question are :

* An excessive focus on $`pp`$ and $`\overline{p}p`$ scattering. When other reactions were studied they were often analyzed one by one. Of course, the extraction of the free parameters and their physical interpretation lead to contradictory conclusions.
* Important physical constraints are often mixed with less general or even ad-hoc properties.
* The cut-off in energy, defining the region of applicability of the high-energy models, differs from one author to the other.
* The set of data considered by different authors is sometimes not the same, even if the cut-off in energy is the same : arbitrary exclusions of experimental data are performed.
* No rigorous connection is made between the number of parameters and the number of data points. The requirement of the smallest possible number of free parameters does not necessarily signify the physical validity of the model.
* No attention was paid to the necessity of the stability of parameter values when different blocks of data or different sets of observables were used.
* The experiments were performed in the past in quite a chaotic way : huge gaps are sometimes present between low-energy and high-energy domains or inside the high-energy domain itself. As the data at low energies are often quite precise we are in the paradoxical situation of jumping to conclusions concerning the high-energy structure of scattering amplitudes on the basis of information concentrated at low energies.

This is only a partial list and is of course not exhaustive.

The COMPETE (COmputerized Models and Parameter Evaluation for Theory and Experiment) project  tries to cure as much as possible the above discussed arbitrariness.

First of all, we include in our analysis  all the existing forward data ($`pp,\overline{p}p,`$
$`\pi p,Kp,\gamma p,\gamma \gamma ,\mathrm{\Sigma }p`$) for the total cross-sections $`\sigma (s)`$ and the $`\rho `$-parameter

$$\rho (s)=\frac{ReF(s,t)}{ImF(s,t)}|_{t=0}$$
(1)
by developing the procedure initiated in Refs.  and , thus taking problem i) into account.

The problem ii) is cured by studying a large variety of variants of a given model, each variant corresponding to a given set of physical properties.

The problems iii)-vi) are treated by defining appropriate numerical indicators . The $`\chi ^2/dof`$ criterium is not able, by itself, to cure the difficulties iii)-vi): new indicators have to be defined.

Once these indicators are defined, an appropriate sum of their numerical values is proposed in order to establish the rank of the model under study : the highest the numerical value of the rank the better the model under consideration.

The problem vii) is not yet solved: theory or phenomenology can not replace the experiment itself. We very much hope that, in the future, experiments (e.g. at RHIC) will scan the available region of energies in small energy steps.

The final aim of the COMPETE project is to provide our community with a periodic cross assessments of data and models via computer-readable files on the Web .

## 2 The form of the forward scattering amplitudes

We consider the following exemplar cases of the imaginary part of the scattering amplitudes :

$$ImF^{ab}=s\sigma _{ab}(s)=P_1^{ab}(s)+P_2^{ab}(s)+R_+^{ab}(s)\pm R_{}^{ab}(s)$$
(2)
where :
\- the $`\pm `$ sign in formula 2 corresponds to antiparticle(resp. particle) - particle scattering amplitude.
\- $`R_\pm `$ signify the effective secondary-Reggeon ($`(f,a_2),(\rho ,\omega )`$) contributions to the even(odd)-under-crossing amplitude

$$R_\pm (s)=Y_\pm \left(\frac{s}{s_1}\right)^{\alpha _\pm }$$
(3)
$`Y`$ being a constant residue, $`\alpha `$ \- the reggeon intercept and $`s_1`$ \- a scale factor fixed at 1 GeV2 ;
\- $`P_1(s)`$ is the contribution of the Pomeron Regge pole

$$P_1^{ab}(s)=C_1^{ab}\left(\frac{s}{s_1}\right)^{\alpha _{P_1}},$$
(4)
$`\alpha _{P_1}`$ is the Pomeron intercept $`\alpha _{P_1}=1,`$ and $`C^{ab}`$ are constant residues.
\- $`P_2^{ab}(s)`$ is the second component of the Pomeron corresponding to three different $`J`$-plane singularities :

* a Regge simple - pole contribution

$$P_2^{ab}(s)=C_2^{ab}\left(\frac{s}{s_1}\right)^{\alpha _{P_2}},\text{with}\alpha _{P_2}=1+ϵ,ϵ>0,\text{and }C_2^{ab}\text{ const. ;}$$
(5)
* a Regge double-pole contribution

$$P_2^{ab}(s)=s\left[A^{ab}+B^{ab}\mathrm{ln}\left(\frac{s}{s_1}\right)\right],\text{with }A^{ab}\text{ and }B^{ab}\text{ const. ;}$$
(6)
* a Regge triple-pole contribution

$$P_2^{ab}(s)=s\left[A^{ab}+B^{ab}\mathrm{ln}^2\left(\frac{s}{s_0}\right)\right],$$
(7)
where $`A^{ab}`$ and $`B^{ab}`$ are constants and $`s_0`$ is an arbitrary scale factor.

The real part of the $`F^{ab}`$ amplitude is obtained from formula 2 via the well-known substitution rule $`sse^{i\pi /2}`$ or, in an equivalent way, from the derivative relations .

In other words, (2) with (4),(5) and (7) represents three exemplar cases for the asymptotic behaviour of total cross-sections :

$$\sigma \underset{s\mathrm{}}{}\text{const.},\mathrm{ln}s,\mathrm{ln}^2s,$$
(8)
while (2) with (5) is the special case

$$\sigma \underset{s\mathrm{}}{}s^{1+ϵ}$$
(9)
corresponding to the violation of the Froissart axiomatic bound . It however proved to be useful for studying the data at non-asymptotic energies  and therefore we will include it as well, and assume that unitarity corrections will restore this bound. In fact, the three exemplar cases (4), (6) and (7) are representatives of an infinite class of analytic parametrizations leading to a $`(\mathrm{ln}s)^{\beta _+}(0\beta _+2)`$ behaviour of the total cross-sections , so our study is quite general.

As can be seen from formulae (2)-(7), we consider that the Pomeron has two soft components , a property in agreement with perturbative QCD : recently, Bartels, Lipatov and Vacca  discovered that there are, in fact, two types of Pomeron in LLA : besides the well-known BFKL pomeron associated with 2-gluon exchanges, and with an intercept bigger than 1, there is a second one associated with $`C=+1`$ three-gluon exchanges and having an intercept precisely located at 1. The case (4)-(5) is directly inspired by this result, while the cases (4) with (6) and (7) are subtler because both the components of the Pomeron satisfy the unitarity constraint via Regge singularities all located at $`J=1`$ .

## 3 Results of the fits

We consider all the existing forward data for $`pp,\overline{p}p,\pi p,Kp,\gamma \gamma `$ and $`\mathrm{\Sigma }p`$ scatterings . The number of data points is : 904, 742, 648, 569, 498, 453, 397, 329 when the cut-off in energy is 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 GeV respectively. When only $`\sigma `$ data are considered the number of points is reduced to 726, 581, 507, 434, 369, 331, 285, 230 respectively.

A large number of variants were studied and classified . All definitions and numerical details can be found in Ref..

In order to describe our main results let us first introduce some notations.

The 2-component Pomeron classes of models are RRPE, RRPL and
RRPL2, where by RR we denote the two effective secondary-reggeon contributions, by P - the contribution of the Pomeron Regge-pole located at $`J=1`$, by E - the contribution of the Pomeron Regge-pole located at $`J=1+ϵ`$, by L - the contribution of the component of the Pomeron, located at $`J=1`$ (double pole) and leading to a $`\mathrm{ln}s`$ behaviour of $`\sigma `$, and by L2 - the contribution of the component of the Pomeron located at $`J=1`$ (triple pole) and leading to a $`\mathrm{ln}^2s`$ behaviour of $`\sigma `$.

We also studied the 1-component Pomeron classes of models RRE, RRL and RRL2.

Our two main conclusions are the following :

* The familiar RRE model is rejected at the 98% C.L. when models which achieve a $`\chi ^2/dof`$ less than 1 for $`\sqrt{s}5`$ GeV are considered.
* The best fits are given by models that contain a triple pole at $`J=1`$, which then produce $`\mathrm{log}^2s`$, $`\mathrm{log}s`$ and constant terms in the total cross section.

510

In his seminal paper, published in 1952 , Heisenberg was the first to introduce the $`\mathrm{ln}^2s`$ dependence of the hadronic total cross-sections, by simple and familiar arguments. His main assumption was that the fraction of energy which goes into the meson field (whose lower limit is given by the minimal energy for the creation of at least a pair of pions) is proportional to the overlap of the meson fields in the nucleon. Interestingly enough, the Heisenberg result is a finite-energy one : his total cross-section is a quadratic form in $`\mathrm{ln}s`$. Only a decade later, a rigorous proof of the Heisenberg result, but only in the case of asymptotic energies, was given .

A striking result, directly seen from the data, is the universality of the $`\mathrm{ln}^2(s/s_0)`$ terms in eq. 7 : $`B^{ab}`$ and $`s_0^{ab}`$ are independent of the hadrons involved in the scattering . A general theoretical proof of this property does not exist yet. It is tempting to speculate that, after unitarization is performed in the gluon sector, the BFKL Pomeron would finally lead to a universal Heisenberg-type Pomeron, exclusively connected with the gluon sector.

As a typical example of high-rank RRPL2 models let us consider in more detail the RRPL2u (21) model (where the $`u`$ index denotes the above discussed universality property and the number between parenthesis denotes the number of the free parameters.

The explicit forms of the observables are the following :

$`\sigma _{pp}`$ $`=`$ $`Z_{pp}+B\mathrm{ln}^2\left({\displaystyle \frac{s}{s_0}}\right)+Y_+^{pp}s^{\eta _+}Y_{}^{pp}s^\eta _{},`$ (10)
$`\sigma _{\overline{p}p}`$ $`=`$ $`Z_{pp}+B\mathrm{ln}^2\left({\displaystyle \frac{s}{s_0}}\right)+Y_+^{pp}s^{\eta _+}+Y_2^{pp}s^\eta _{},`$ (11)
$`\sigma _{\pi ^+p}`$ $`=`$ $`Z_{\pi p}+B\mathrm{ln}^2\left({\displaystyle \frac{s}{s_0}}\right)+Y_+^{\pi p}s^{\eta _+}Y_{}^{\pi p}s^\eta _{},`$ (12)
$`\sigma _{\pi ^{}p}`$ $`=`$ $`Z_{\pi p}+B\mathrm{ln}^2\left({\displaystyle \frac{s}{s_0}}\right)+Y_+^{\pi p}s^{\eta _+}+Y_{}^{\pi p}s^\eta _{},`$ (13)
$`\sigma _{K^+p}`$ $`=`$ $`Z_{Kp}+B\mathrm{ln}^2\left({\displaystyle \frac{s}{s_0}}\right)+Y_+^{Kp}s^{\eta _+}Y_{}^{Kp}s^\eta _{},`$ (14)
$`\sigma _{K^{}p}`$ $`=`$ $`Z_{Kp}+B\mathrm{ln}^2\left({\displaystyle \frac{s}{s_0}}\right)+Y_+^{Kp}s^{\eta _+}+Y_{}^{Kp}s^\eta _{},`$ (15)
$`\sigma _{\gamma p}`$ $`=`$ $`Z_{\gamma p}+\delta B\mathrm{ln}^2\left({\displaystyle \frac{s}{s_0}}\right)+Y_+^{\gamma p}s^{\eta _+},`$ (16)
$`\sigma _{\gamma \gamma }`$ $`=`$ $`Z_{\gamma \gamma }+\delta ^2B\mathrm{ln}^2\left({\displaystyle \frac{s}{s_0}}\right)+Y_+^{\gamma \gamma }s^{\eta _+},`$ (17)
$`\sigma _{\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}p}`$ $`=`$ $`Z_{\mathrm{\Sigma }p}+B\mathrm{ln}^2\left({\displaystyle \frac{s}{s_0}}\right)+Y_+^{\mathrm{\Sigma }p}s^{\eta _+}Y_{}^{\mathrm{\Sigma }p}s^\eta _{},`$ (18)
$`\rho _{pp}\sigma _{pp}`$ $`=`$ $`\pi B\mathrm{ln}\left({\displaystyle \frac{s}{s_0}}\right){\displaystyle \frac{Y_+^{pp}s^{\eta _+}}{\mathrm{tan}\left[\frac{1\eta _+}{2}\pi \right]}}{\displaystyle \frac{Y_{}^{pp}s^\eta _{}}{\mathrm{cot}\left[\frac{1\eta _{}}{2}\pi \right]}},`$ (19)
$`\rho _{\overline{p}p}\sigma _{\overline{p}p}`$ $`=`$ $`\pi B\mathrm{ln}\left({\displaystyle \frac{s}{s_0}}\right){\displaystyle \frac{Y_+^{pp}s^{\eta _+}}{\mathrm{tan}\left[\frac{1\eta _+}{2}\pi \right]}}+{\displaystyle \frac{Y_{}^{pp}s^\eta _{}}{\mathrm{cot}\left[\frac{1\eta _{}}{2}\pi \right]}},`$ (20)
$`\rho _{\pi ^+p}\sigma _{\pi ^+p}`$ $`=`$ $`\pi B\mathrm{ln}\left({\displaystyle \frac{s}{s_0}}\right){\displaystyle \frac{Y_+^{\pi p}s^{\eta _+}}{\mathrm{tan}\left[\frac{1\eta _+}{2}\pi \right]}}{\displaystyle \frac{Y_{}^{\pi p}s^\eta _{}}{\mathrm{cot}\left[\frac{1\eta _{}}{2}\pi \right]}},`$ (21)
$`\rho _{\pi ^{}p}\sigma _{\pi ^{}p}`$ $`=`$ $`\pi B\mathrm{ln}\left({\displaystyle \frac{s}{s_0}}\right){\displaystyle \frac{Y_+^{\pi p}s^{\eta _+}}{\mathrm{tan}\left[\frac{1\eta _+}{2}\pi \right]}}+{\displaystyle \frac{Y_{}^{\pi p}s^\eta _{}}{\mathrm{cot}\left[\frac{1\eta _{}}{2}\pi \right]}},`$ (22)
$`\rho _{K^+p}\sigma _{K^+p}`$ $`=`$ $`\pi B\mathrm{ln}\left({\displaystyle \frac{s}{s_0}}\right){\displaystyle \frac{Y_+^{Kp}s^{\eta _+}}{\mathrm{tan}\left[\frac{1\eta _+}{2}\pi \right]}}{\displaystyle \frac{Y_{}^{Kp}s^\eta _{}}{\mathrm{cot}\left[\frac{1\eta _{}}{2}\pi \right]}},`$ (23)
$`\rho _{K^{}p}\sigma _{K^{}p}`$ $`=`$ $`\pi B\mathrm{ln}\left({\displaystyle \frac{s}{s_0}}\right){\displaystyle \frac{Y_+^{Kp}s^{\eta _+}}{\mathrm{tan}\left[\frac{1\eta _+}{2}\pi \right]}}+{\displaystyle \frac{Y_{}^{Kp}s^\eta _{}}{\mathrm{cot}\left[\frac{1\eta _{}}{2}\pi \right]}},`$ (24)
$$\text{where }\eta _\pm =1\alpha _\pm \text{ and }Z_{ab}C_1^{ab}+A^{ab}.$$
(25)
The numerical values of the free parameters are given in Table 1.

This model gives a very good $`\chi ^2/dof=0.973`$ and has a high rank point with a total indicator value $`P^M=222`$. It describes well the data for $`\sqrt{s}5`$ GeV (648 data points), respecting all our numerical criteria for the selection of acceptable models.

In order to understand the content of this empirically-found universality property let us consider the most general form of the two - component PL2 Pomeron as given by (4) and (7) with $`Z_{ab}`$ defined by (25) :

$$\frac{1}{s}\left(P_1^{ab}+P_2^{ab}\right)=Z_{ab}+B^{ab}\mathrm{ln}^2\left(\frac{s}{s_0^{ab}}\right).$$
(26)
This form contains 18 free parameters :
$`Z_{pp},Z_{\pi p},Z_{Kp},Z_{\mathrm{\Sigma }p},Z_{\gamma p},Z_{\gamma \gamma }`$ ; $`B^{pp},B^{\pi p},B^{Kp},B^{\mathrm{\Sigma }p},B^{\gamma p},B^{\gamma \gamma }`$ ; $`s_0^{pp},s_0^{\pi p},s_0^{Kp},s_0^{\mathrm{\Sigma }p},s_0^{\gamma p},s_0^{\gamma \gamma }`$.

The content of our empirical universality property is threefold :

* a finite energy property : all scale factors $`s_0`$ are the same :

$$s_0s_0^{pp}=s_0^{\pi p}=s_0^{Kp}=s_0^{\mathrm{\Sigma }p}=s_0^{\gamma p}=s_0^{\gamma \gamma };$$
(27)
* an asymptotic property : all hadron-hadron cross-sections are the same at infinite energies :

$$\sigma _{ab}\underset{s\mathrm{}}{}B\mathrm{ln}^2s,$$
(28)
where

$$BB^{pp}=B^{\pi p}=B^{Kp}=B^{\mathrm{\Sigma }p};$$
(29)
* a second (factorization) asymptotic property :

$$\sigma _{\gamma p}\underset{s\mathrm{}}{}\sqrt{\sigma _{\gamma \gamma }}\sqrt{\sigma _{pp}}=\delta B\mathrm{ln}^2s$$
(30)

The nine constraints resulting from (27)-(30) reduce the number of free parameters of the PL2 Pomeron from 18 to 9.

The secondary-reggeon contributions involve 12 more parameters : $`Y_\pm ^{pp}`$, $`Y_\pm ^{\pi p},Y_\pm ^{Kp},Y_\pm ^{\mathrm{\Sigma }p},Y_+^{\gamma p},Y_+^{\gamma \gamma };\alpha _+,\alpha _{}`$.

Hence we have a total of 21 parameters for the RRPL2u (21) model. It is interesting to note that the high-energy (Pomeron) part is more constrained than the low-energy (secondary-reggeon) part. At the RHIC, LHC and cosmic-ray energies the RRPL2u model has only 9 free parameters. The cosmic-ray experimental data (not included in fits) are very well described by our high-rank model.

| Model | RRPL2u | |
| --- | --- | --- |
| $`\chi ^2/dof`$ | 0.973 | |
| CL\[%\] | 67.98 | |
| Parameter | Mean | Uncertainty |
| $`s_0`$ | 34.0 | 5.4 |
| B | 0.3152 | 0.0095 |
| $`\alpha _+`$ | 0.533 | 0.015 |
| $`\alpha _{}`$ | 0.4602 | 0.0064 |
| $`Z_{pp}`$ | 35.83 | 0.40 |
| $`Z_{\pi p}`$ | 21.23 | 0.33 |
| $`Z_{Kp}`$ | 18.23 | 0.30 |
| $`Z_{\mathrm{\Sigma }p}`$ | 35.6 | 1.4 |
| $`Z_{\gamma p}`$ | 0.109 | 0.021 |
| $`Z_{\gamma \gamma }`$ | 0.075 | 0.026 |
| $`Y_+^{pp}`$ | 42.1 | 1.3 |
| $`Y_{}^{pp}`$ | 32.19 | 0.94 |
| $`Y_+^{\pi p}`$ | 17.8 | 1.1 |
| $`Y_{}^{\pi p}`$ | 5.72 | 0.16 |
| $`Y_+^{Kp}`$ | 5.72 | 1.40 |
| $`Y_{}^{Kp}`$ | 13.13 | 0.38 |
| $`Y_+^{\mathrm{\Sigma }p}`$ | -250. | 130. |
| $`Y_{}^{\mathrm{\Sigma }p}`$ | -320. | 150. |
| $`Y_+^{\gamma p}`$ | 0.0339 | 0.0079 |
| $`Y_+^{\gamma \gamma }`$ | 0.00028 | 0.00015 |
| $`\delta `$ | 0.00371 | 0.00035 |

Table 1. The numerical values of the free parameters, $`\chi ^2/dof`$ and the confidence level CL in the case of the RRP2u (21) model ($`\sqrt{s}5`$ GeV).

|  | Region of | Numerical value | $`\alpha _+\alpha _{}`$ | Remarks |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|  | validity | of the rank points |  |  |
| RRPL2u(21) | $`\sqrt{s}5`$ GeV | 222 | $``$ 0.07 | - |
| RRPL(21) | $`\sqrt{s}5`$ GeV | 173 | $``$ 0.33 | $`Z_{pp},Z_{\pi p},Z_{Kp}<0`$ |
| RRPEu(19) | $`\sqrt{s}8`$ GeV | 158 | $``$ 0.20 | $`Z_{\pi p},Z_{Kp}<0`$ |

Table 2. Comparison between 3 high-rank representative models.

In Table 2 we compare three representative models for each class of 2-component Pomeron : RRPL2u (21), RRPL (21) and RRPEu (19).

It is seen from Table 2 that the RRPL2u (21) model respects the Regge exchange-degeneracy to a very good approximation, in contrast with the
RRPEu (19) and RRPL (21) models. The latter model leads to a huge violation, incompatible with the masses of the resonances on the respective Regge trajectories. This difficulty of the RRPEu (19) and RRPL (21) models is algebraically correlated with the negativity of the $`Z`$ parameters (see Table 1), a suspect feature which could lead - via factorization of Regge residues - to negative cross-sections in the case of the scattering involving $`s,c,b`$ and $`t`$ quarks.

This point reinforces our conclusion that the solution RRPL2u (21) is the best one, currently meeting all theoretical, phenomenological and numerical requirements.

## 4 Future prospects

One problem remaining in the analysis of the forward data is the difficulty in adequately fitting the data for the $`\rho `$ parameter in $`pp`$ and in $`\pi ^+p`$ reactions. The extraction of the $`\rho `$ data from the measurements of the differential cross sections data at small $`t`$ is a delicate problem. A reanalysis of these data may be needed, but it will call for simultaneous fits to the total cross-section data and to the elastic differential cross-sections in the Coulomb-nuclear interference region and in the diffractive cones, hence an extension of the parametrization considered here to the non-forward region.


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# Spectroscopic Analysis of the DAB White Dwarf PG 1115+166: An Unresolved DA + DB Degenerate Binary

## 1 Introduction

DAB stars are white dwarfs whose optical spectra are characterized by the simultaneous presence of strong hydrogen Balmer lines together with weaker neutral helium lines. To date, only a handful of these objects are known (see Burleigh et al., 2001, and references therein). DAB stars are particularly important objects as they are likely to provide the key to understanding the nature of the so-called “DB gap”, a range in effective temperature between $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}30,000`$ and 45,000 K where no helium atmosphere white dwarf (DO or DB stars) has ever been identified (Liebert et al., 1986); the coolest DO star PG 1133$`+`$489 has an estimated temperature of $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=46,000`$ K (Dreizler & Werner, 1997), while the hottest DB star PG 0112$`+`$104 is below $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=31,500`$ K (Beauchamp et al., 1999). The most widely accepted explanation for the presence of this gap is the existence of competing mechanisms that are affecting the atmospheric composition of white dwarfs as they evolve along the cooling sequence (see, e.g., Fontaine & Wesemael, 1997). Hence it is believed that residual hydrogen present in the envelope of hot DO white dwarfs slowly diffuses towards the surface, building an atmosphere that is gradually enriched with hydrogen. By the time cooling DO stars have reached $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}45,000`$ K, they would all bear the signature of a hydrogen-rich atmosphere, a DA star. Such DA stars should have a thin hydrogen atmosphere in diffusive equilibrium on top of the helium envelope. At the red edge of the DB gap, convective dilution of this thin hydrogen atmosphere with the underlying convective helium envelope is then believed to turn $`20`$% of all DA stars near $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}30,000`$ K into DB white dwarfs. The identification of white dwarfs with hybrid spectra in these particular ranges of effective temperature has always been of significant interest since they may represent objects transitioning from one spectral type to another.

Recently, Burleigh et al. (2001) have reported the discovery of a new DAB white dwarf, PG 1115$`+`$166, as part of a survey aimed at identifying helium-rich objects crossing the DB gap. The authors have examined hot white dwarfs that went undetected by the ROSAT and EUVE surveys of the extreme ultraviolet sky. Effective temperatures and surface gravities for the objects in their sample had been supplied by us as part of another project aimed at redetermining the luminosity function of DA stars using $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}`$ and $`\mathrm{log}g`$ values obtained from detailed fits to the hydrogen lines (see, e.g., Bergeron et al., 1992). As such, the DAB nature of PG 1115$`+`$166 was already known to us back in 1996 from our own spectroscopic observations of the PG sample. The optical spectrum of PG 1115$`+`$166 had also been thoroughly analyzed using model atmospheres with homogeneous and stratified helium/hydrogen compositions. In this paper, we report the results of our findings. Interestingly enough, we show that the conclusions of Burleigh et al. (2001) that PG 1115$`+`$166 is probably a double degenerate binary composed a DA and a DB star is confirmed by our detailed analysis.

We first present our spectroscopic observations and model atmosphere calculations in §§ 1 and 2, respectively. The optical spectrum is then analyzed in detail in § 3 using using homogeneous, stratified, and composite model atmospheres. Our discussion of the results follows in § 4.

## 2 Spectroscopic Observations

Optical spectroscopy for PG 1115$`+`$166 has been obtained on 1996 May 20 using the Steward Observatory 2.3-m reflector telescope equipped with the Boller & Chivens spectrograph and a Loral CCD detector. The 4.5 arcsec slit together with the 600 l/mm grating in first order provided a spectral coverage of $`\lambda \lambda `$3200–5300 at an intermediate resolution of $`6`$ Å FWHM.

Our optical spectrum for PG 1115$`+`$166 is compared in Figure Spectroscopic Analysis of the DAB White Dwarf PG 1115$`+`$166: An Unresolved DA + DB Degenerate Binary with those of MCT 0453$``$2933 and MCT 0128$``$3846 taken from Wesemael et al. (1994). There is an obvious similarity between all three objects. The HeI $`\lambda \lambda `$4026 and 4471 absorption lines can be seen in all three spectra with about equal shape and strength. Weaker HeI features at $`\lambda \lambda `$4713, 4921, and 5015 are also observed in PG 1115$`+`$166 and MCT 0453$``$2933; these lines are much weaker but nevertheless present in the spectrum of MCT 0128$``$3846. The two MCT objects have been analyzed by Wesemael et al. (1994) and shown to be unresolved, composite systems consisting of a DA white dwarf together with a DB or DBA star.

## 3 Model Atmospheres and Synthetic Spectra

The mixed hydrogen and helium model atmospheres and synthetic spectra used in this analysis are described in Bergeron et al. (1994). These are calculated assuming either a homogeneous or a stratified chemical H/He composition. The homogeneous model atmospheres are similar to those described in Wesemael et al. (1980), while the stratified configurations have been calculated using the formalism discussed at length in Jordan & Koester (1986) and Vennes & Fontaine (1992). The homogeneous model grid covers a range of $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=20,000(5000)100,000`$ K, $`\mathrm{log}g=6.5(0.5)8.5`$, and $`\mathrm{log}N(\mathrm{He})/N(\mathrm{H})=5.0(1.0)0.0`$ (where the numbers in parentheses indicate the step value), as well as pure hydrogen models. Stratified models have been calculated for the same range of effective temperature and surface gravity, with $`\mathrm{log}q_\mathrm{H}\mathrm{log}M_\mathrm{H}/M_{}=17.0(0.5)15.0`$ at $`\mathrm{log}g=8.0`$. As discussed in Bergeron et al. (1994), the particular range of $`\mathrm{log}q_\mathrm{H}`$ used varies with $`\mathrm{log}g`$ as to yield synthetic spectra that look relatively similar with respect to the strength of the helium lines in the $`\mathrm{log}g`$$`\mathrm{log}q_\mathrm{H}`$ plane.

The synthetic spectra for the mixed H/He models have been calculated following Bergeron et al. (1991, see also ), where the treatment of the hydrogen line profiles is described at length. The HeI lines have been treated as Voigt profiles with the Stark broadening parameters listed in Bergeron et al. (1994).

Our grid of model atmospheres and synthetic spectra for DB stars is described in Beauchamp et al. (1996). These include the improved Stark profiles of neutral helium of Beauchamp et al. (1997). The model atmospheres used here assume a pure helium composition and cover a range of $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=10,000(1000)16,000(2000)30,000`$ K and $`\mathrm{log}g=7.0(0.5)9.0`$.

## 4 Model Atmosphere Analysis

Our fitting technique relies on the nonlinear least-squares method of Levenberg-Marquardt (Press et al., 1986), which is based on a steepest descent method. The model spectra (convolved with a Gaussian instrumental profile) and the optical spectrum of PG 1115$`+`$166 are first normalized to a continuum set to unity. The calculation of $`\chi ^2`$ is then carried out in terms of these normalized line profiles only. All atmospheric parameters – $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}`$, $`\mathrm{log}g`$, $`N(\mathrm{He})/N(\mathrm{H})`$ or $`\mathrm{log}q_\mathrm{H}`$ – are considered free parameters. When fitting DA + DB model spectra, the total flux of the system is obtained from the sum of the monochromatic Eddington fluxes of the individual components, weighted by their respective radius. Those radii are obtained from the thin and thick hydrogen envelope evolutionary models with carbon/oxygen cores described in Bergeron et al. (2001).

Our best fits to the optical spectrum of PG 1115$`+`$166 using homogeneous, stratified, and composite DA+DB models are shown in Figure Spectroscopic Analysis of the DAB White Dwarf PG 1115$`+`$166: An Unresolved DA + DB Degenerate Binary. The solution using homogeneous models, $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=32,000`$ K, $`\mathrm{log}g=7.95`$, and $`\mathrm{log}N(\mathrm{He})/N(\mathrm{H})=1.44`$, is in excellent agreement with that obtained by Burleigh et al. (2001), $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=33,000`$ K and $`\mathrm{log}N(\mathrm{He})/N(\mathrm{H})=1.5`$ (their value of $`\mathrm{log}g`$ is not given). The problem mentioned by these authors with the HeII $`\lambda `$4686 predicted by their models is not observed here, however, even though this particular line is included in our model calculations. The fits to the hydrogen Balmer lines are qualitatively similar between the homogeneous and stratified models: the low Balmer lines (H$`\beta `$ to H$`\delta `$) are predicted too strong while the higher members are too weak. The homogeneous model yields a satisfactory fit for the HeI lines $`\lambda \lambda `$4026, 4713, and 5015, but a poor fit to the remaining helium lines. The fit with the stratified model is considerably worse.

On the other hand, the DA+DB solution provides an excellent fit to the Balmer and neutral helium lines simultaneously. All observed features are reproduced in detail and this is clearly the only viable solution for PG 1115$`+`$166. The effective temperatures determined for both the DA and the DB components are significantly lower than the values achieved under the assumption of a single object with a homogeneous or stratified composition. This is a direct consequence of the hydrogen lines being diluted by the continuum flux of the DB star (see below); the Balmer lines are weakened, and the effective temperature of the model needs to be increased to match the observed line profiles.

The surface gravities of both components of the system are almost identical, $`\mathrm{log}g8.15`$, which corresponds to a mass of $`0.7`$ $`M_{}`$ using the evolutionary models described above. The white dwarf cooling ages inferred for the DA and DB stars are respectively $`6.0\times 10^7`$ and $`2.2\times 10^8`$ years. Since both stars have roughly the same radius, the contribution of each component to the total luminosity is only a function of the effective temperature. Since the DB star is significantly cooler than the DA component, the former will contribute less to the combined luminosity of the system. This is illustrated more quantitatively in Figure Spectroscopic Analysis of the DAB White Dwarf PG 1115$`+`$166: An Unresolved DA + DB Degenerate Binary where the contribution of each component to the total flux is depicted. Also shown is the multichannel $`ugvr`$ photometry taken from Green et al. (1986, $`v=15.14`$, $`uv=0.15`$, $`gv=0.14`$, $`gr=0.51`$), which is in good agreement with our adopted solution, with the exception of the $`u`$ magnitude; multichannel $`u`$ magnitudes were sometimes compromised by the atmospheric dispersion, the finite size of the entrance aperture, and the drift of the target away from the aperture center during the exposure. While the flux in the ultraviolet is completely dominated by the DA component, there is a more significant contribution of the DB star in the optical regions of the energy distribution. In particular, the cores of the lower Balmer lines are filled in by the continuum flux of the DB star, resulting in the poor fits of the homogeneous and stratified solutions displayed in Figure Spectroscopic Analysis of the DAB White Dwarf PG 1115$`+`$166: An Unresolved DA + DB Degenerate Binary and discussed above.

Finally, Burleigh et al. (2001) have reported radial velocity variations in PG 1115$`+`$166 from H$`\alpha `$ measurements (see their Fig. 2), with possible HeI $`\lambda `$6678 moving in anti-phase with the hydrogen line, in agreement with a DA+DB interpretation. No orbital period has yet been reported.

## 5 Discussion

Our analysis has shown conclusively that the simultaneous presence of hydrogen and helium in the spectrum of PG 1115$`+`$166 is a simple result of an unresolved binary system composed of a DA white dwarf and a DB star. Both components of the PG 1115$`+`$166 system lie well below the cool edge of the DB gap, and as such, this DAB “system” cannot contribute to our understanding of the nature of the DB gap. Two other DAB stars, MCT 0128$``$3846 and MCT 0453$``$2933 shown in Figure Spectroscopic Analysis of the DAB White Dwarf PG 1115$`+`$166: An Unresolved DA + DB Degenerate Binary, are similar DA + DB (or DBA) unresolved composite systems, rather than single objects with mixed hydrogen and helium compositions.

Additional DAB stars include HS 0209$`+`$0832, a $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}35,000`$ K white dwarf that has been recently observed with HST and analyzed by Wolff et al. (2000). The authors conclude that the hydrogen and helium lines, as well as numerous metallic features, are all compatible with a homogeneously mixed composition, and that the object is probably in the process of accreting matter from the interstellar medium. If this is the case, HS 0209$`+`$0832 is a transient phenomenon, and is not connected to the DB gap either. Its temperature within the DB gap is thus purely coincidental.

The case of G104$``$27 reported by Holberg et al. (1990), with a temperature of $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=26,000`$ K, is also peculiar. Their spectrum shows a weak HeI $`\lambda `$4471 feature, and possible $`\lambda `$5015. However, subsequent observations of this object, including 7 independent spectra collected over the years by one of us (PB), reveal a featureless spectrum near the $`\lambda `$4471 region. This particular spectroscopic feature may of course be variable, as is the case for HS 0209$`+`$0832 (Edelmann et al., 2001). Such variations could be expected if G104$``$27 and HS 0209$``$0832 accrete from an inhomogeneous interstellar medium, or if the distribution of helium on the stellar surface is inhomogeneous, as discussed by Edelmann et al. (2001).

Finally, there is GD 323, the prototype of DAB stars. Liebert et al. (1984) showed that the combined ultraviolet and optical spectrophotometry of this star could not be reproduced with a homogeneously mixed hydrogen and helium composition, and suggested that a fit with a stratified composition be attempted. This idea was explored more quantitatively by Koester et al. (1994) who confirmed that the most promising explanation to account for the observed line profiles was a stratified atmosphere. Their estimated temperature of $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=28,750`$ K places GD 323 just below the cool end of the empirical DB gap. However, even their stratified solution does not reproduce the optical spectrum very well, at least not at the level of our best fit for PG 1115$`+`$166 shown in Figure Spectroscopic Analysis of the DAB White Dwarf PG 1115$`+`$166: An Unresolved DA + DB Degenerate Binary, and inconsistent values of the hydrogen layer mass are derived from the optical and ultraviolet spectra.

All in all, there seems to be no such objects as “DAB stars transiting the DB gap”, as sought by Burleigh et al. (2001); we mention also that no additional DAB spectrum has been identified in our PG luminosity function sample. This is perhaps not surprising, however. Indeed, if the scenario proposed to explain the DB gap is correct, by definition we should not observe any helium-rich objects crossing the DB gap. Stars with mixed hydrogen and helium compositions must be searched either slightly above the hot end of the DB gap ($`T_{\mathrm{eff}}\stackrel{>}{}45,000`$ K) or slightly below the cool end ($`T_{\mathrm{eff}}\stackrel{<}{}30,000`$ K). Interestingly enough, such stars have probably already been identified. PG 1305$``$017 analyzed by Bergeron et al. (1994), with an estimated temperature of $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=44,400`$ K, is the perfect example of a hybrid white dwarf with strong hydrogen and helium lines – a DAO star in this case – that can be successfully explained in terms of a stratified chemical composition (see Fig. 8 of Bergeron et al.). This object corresponds precisely to our expectation of a DO star turning into a DA star near the hot end of the DB gap, i.e. a thin hydrogen atmosphere in diffusive equilibrium on top of a helium envelope. Similarly, at the cool end of the DB gap, the reappearance of helium-rich atmosphere white dwarfs near 30,000 K is explained in terms of the dilution of this thin hydrogen atmosphere with the more massive underlying helium convection zone. It is clear that DA white dwarfs caught in the process of being convectively diluted will have a complex chemical stratification that will not be homogeneous nor stratified. GD 323 with a temperature slightly below the cool edge of the DB gap might be such an exotic object. Hence, objects that could support the DO to DA and DA to DB transition scenarios do exist, but they should not be looked for within the DB gap itself. This interpretation is at least currently supported by observations.

One possible scenario for the origin of Type Ia Supernovae is the double degenerate model in which two white dwarfs with a total mass exceeding the Chandrasekhar limit are assumed to coalesce (Webbink, 1984; Iben & Tutukov, 1984). In order for the system to merge within a Hubble time, however, the orbital period must be less than $`10`$ hours. Since the total mass of the PG 1115$`+`$166 system ($`M1.4`$ $`M_{}`$) is close to the Chandrasekhar limit, a precise measurement of its orbital period would establish whether PG 1115$`+`$166 represents a likely supernova candidate.

This work was supported in part by the NSERC Canada, by the Fund FCAR (Québec), and by the NSF grant AST 92-27961.


text:
# A quasi classical approach to electron impact ionization

## 1 Introduction

Electron impact ionization of hydrogen probes the scattering properties of three charged particles without any influence from passive core electrons or other perturbations. For this reason it has served as a benchmark system to understand non–separable Coulomb collision dynamics for a long time which is reflected in the enormous amount of literature and the remarkable theoretical and experimental success in handling these collisions. A milestone were the experiments by Ehrhardt and his group obtaining fully differential cross sections on an absolute scale . Theoretically, many different approximate treatments have reached increasingly better agreement with the experiment  and fully numerical calculations, first available for the total cross section , have reached a break-through recently  for fully differential cross sections and are now producing results for many impact energies and geometries .

Our goal with the formulation of a quasiclassical theory of electron impact ionization is to open the way for scattering of more than three particles as already done experimentally with double ionization by electron impact . Furthermore, we aim at a description which allows for a calculation of the entire scattering information (i.e. the whole accessible parameter space in final angles and energies) at once. This is motivated by similar experimental capabilities made possible by the COLTRIMS technique which allows for a new representation of scattering data (see e.g. ).

Clearly, with the present computational and theoretical tools this is not possible for four our more particles. One has to fall back to quasiclassical approximations based on the rather successful CTMC method . As will be explained later, there is a an obstacle deeply rooted in classical mechanics which has hindered CTMC to be extended to more than one active target electron. One goal of our work is to overcome this obstacle. In the present paper we have restricted ourselves to three particles, namely electron impact ionization of hydrogen, in order to see where the strengths and weaknesses of our quasiclassical approach lie. Also, we would like to make contact with the original CTMC method by deriving it as a limiting case of our approach.

Combining the classical treatment with quantum effects has had a long history in collision theory. Already shortly after Abrines and Percival introduced the “classical trajectory Monte-Carlo” method where the target electron was represented by an ensemble of Kepler orbits of fixed energy (“microcanonical distribution”), alternative descriptions were proposed, e.g., the Wigner transform of the quantum wave function , “superpositions” of microcanonical distributions of different energies  or, only recently, an “optimum classical description”, based on symmetry considerations and phase space partitioning . In an attempt to describe four-body systems helium was modeled classically in an independent electron picture or the interaction between the two bound electrons was switched off temporarily to prevent autoionization (see, e.g. ). All these attempts had in common, that they started from the purely classical model and tried to extend it by implementing quantum elements (see, e.g. ). Such strategies have limited predictive power, as parameters or switch-on times must be fitted to reproduce particular cross sections.

As briefly reported in  we propose an alterative approach: we start from the (exact) time-dependent quantum formulation, translate it to phase space by means of the Wigner formalism and finally approximate this description classically by setting $`\mathrm{}=0`$. Hence, we can approximate quantum collisions in a controlled way. Furthermore, we gain additional freedom for the description of the target electron. This leads to an improved agreement of quasiclassical differential cross sections with the experiment and, even more important, opens the way to incorporate multi-electron targets without any further approximation to the dynamical description.

The paper is organized as follows: the derivation of the “quasiclassical” approximation will be given in section 2, in section 3 we will characterize the four initial state distributions we use for the hydrogen target; the results will be presented and discussed in section 4. The last section contains a conclusion and an outlook to multi-electron targets.

## 2 The quasiclassical modeling of a collision

We divide the complete ionization process into three parts: setting up the initial state, propagating this initial phase space distribution and finally extracting cross sections from the scattered initial distribution. To arrive at a consistent formulation each part is treated in the same way by translation into the Wigner picture of quantum mechanics . The classical approximation is subsequently achieved by setting $`\mathrm{}=0`$ .

### 2.1 Initial distribution

We construct the initial distribution $`w(\stackrel{}{p},\stackrel{}{q})`$ from the $`\mathrm{}=0`$ limit of the Wigner distribution. This distribution is discretized and the individual mesh points in phase space then represent initial conditions for solving classical equations of motion. However, the resulting paths are not those of real electrons in real space, rather they should be interpreted as the evolution of a discretized phase space density which may have negative parts as well (e.g., for the Wigner distribution). These parts simply contribute to the cross sections with their negative weight, there is no need to argue about “negative probabilities” which clearly demonstrates the advantage of starting with a quantum formulation.

However, naively incorporating such a generalized initial phase space distribution $`w(\stackrel{}{p},\stackrel{}{q})`$ into the usual classical framework leads to other difficulties : in general $`w(\stackrel{}{p},\stackrel{}{q})`$ will not be stationary under the classical propagation, i.e., its Poisson bracket with the Hamiltonian of the unperturbed target does not vanish, $`\{H_0^i,w\}0`$. Hence, the initial target distribution will look very different at the time the projectile has reached the target and the collision actually happens.

Another problem is even more severe: when using a classical phase space distribution derived from a quantum wave function to select initial values for a classical trajectory calculation, most of these initial values do not have the energy of the hydrogen ground state, but they start from a range of energies around the binding energy. Consequently, when extracting cross sections, it is not sufficient any more to only test the final energy of one of the electrons, as the other electron’s final energy can not be calculated as the difference to the mean total energy. In a total cross section this energy spread might be neglected, but cross sections differential in energy would either be convoluted with the initial energy spread or, if the final energy of both continuum electrons is added up for a specific trajectory, only trajectories with those initial conditions from the initial distribution contribute which initially started on the energy shell. We will explicitly address this problem, which has not been mentioned in previous calculations using non–microcanonical initial distributions .

Next, we will propose a formulation of the propagation and the extraction of the cross section that can deal with the difficulties arising from general initial distributions.

### 2.2 Propagation

Quantum mechanical time dependent scattering is described by calculating the transition amplitude between initial and final state through the S–matrix, which is in turn related to the T–matrix describing directly the cross section, see, e.g., ,

$$S_{fi}=f|\mathrm{\Omega }_{}^{}\mathrm{\Omega }_+|i,$$
(1)
where

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_{}=\underset{t\pm \mathrm{}}{lim}U^{}(t)U_0(t)$$
(2)
are the Møller operators. The meaning of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_+`$, e.g., is to propagate backwards with $`U_0(t)=\mathrm{exp}[iH_0^it]`$ using the asymptotic initial Hamiltonian $`H_0^i`$ without the projectile–target interaction and then forward under the full Hamiltonian with $`U(t)`$. If the initial and final states are eigenstates of the asymptotic Hamiltonians $`H_0^i`$ and $`H_0^f`$, often a short version is used:

$$S_{fi}=\underset{t\mathrm{}}{lim}f|U(t)|i.$$
(3)
By a Wigner transform the quantum time evolution operator $`U(t)`$ can be directly transformed with the help of the quantum Liouville operator $`_q`$, which reduces to the classical Liouville operator $`_c`$ in the limit $`\mathrm{}0`$ . The latter describes the evolution of a phase space distribution $`w(\stackrel{}{p},\stackrel{}{q},t)`$ according to the Poisson bracket

$$_tw=\{H,w\}i_cw$$
(4)
in analogy to the quantum evolution of the density matrix $`\rho `$ generated by the commutator,

$$_t\rho =i[H,\rho ].$$
(5)
Hence, we could directly use the translation of (3) to classical mechanics via the Liouville operator. In connection with the microcanonical initial state distribution this is indeed equivalent to the CTMC formulation .

However, (3) is insufficient, if the distribution is not stationary under the initial asymptotic propagation. Instead, one must use the complete form (1) of the scattering operator $`S=\mathrm{\Omega }_{}^{}\mathrm{\Omega }_+`$. Correspondingly, the Møller operators are translated into a classical propagation scheme, which “transforms” the initial non–stationary phase space distribution $`w_i(\gamma )`$, where $`\gamma =(\stackrel{}{p}_1,\stackrel{}{q}_1,\stackrel{}{p}_2,\stackrel{}{q}_2)`$ is a point in the 12-dimensional phase space, into the “scattered” result of the reaction $`w_f(\gamma )`$ at the same point in time:

$$w_f(t=0)=\underset{t+\mathrm{}}{lim}\underset{t^{}\mathrm{}}{lim}e^{i_c^ft}e^{i_c(tt^{})}e^{i_c^it^{}}w_i𝒦w_i(t=0).$$
(6)
To perform the actual calculation the initial distribution is discretized, $`w_i(\gamma )=_nw_n\delta ^{12}(\gamma \gamma _n^i)`$ with the normalization $`w_n=1`$. With (6) we get as final distribution

$$w_f(\gamma )=𝒦w_i=\underset{n}{}w_n\delta ^{12}(\gamma \gamma _n^f),$$
(7)
where each phase space point $`\gamma _n^f`$ emerges from $`\gamma _n^i`$ through solving successively Hamilton’s equations, first with $`H_0^i`$, then with $`H`$, and eventually with $`H_0^f`$. With this propagation scheme a non–stationary initial distribution will spread when being propagated backwards with the asymptotic $`_c^i`$. However, it will be refocused under the following forward propagation with $`_c`$. Hence, when the actual collision happens at $`t0`$ the original target distribution is restored, slightly polarized by the approaching projectile.

The propagation now compensates for the non–stationarity of the initial distribution, which means, that *any* arbitrary phase space description can be used for the target, even classically unstable multi-electron targets like helium.

### 2.3 Extraction of cross sections

According to (1) the cross section is extracted from the overlap between the scattered initial wave function $`S|i`$ and the asymptotic final state $`|f`$, which is an eigenstate of $`H_0^f`$. For ionization we assume that $`|f`$ can be approximated by two free electrons. However, before we come to the actual evaluation we have to formulate the cross section such that it can make full use of the non–stationary initial phase space distribution $`w_i(\stackrel{}{p}_1,\stackrel{}{q}_1)`$, where “1” refers to the target electron. Without modification the total energy $`E`$ of the final state forces by energy conservation for each classical trajectory only those parts of the initial phase space distribution to contribute to the cross section which have the same total energy $`E`$ (see above). However, this would bring us essentially back to the microcanonical description. In order to make the entire non–stationary initial state distribution “visible” to the collision process, we use the energy transfer $`\mathrm{\Delta }E_1=E_1^fE_1^i`$ to the target electron rather than its energy $`E_1^f`$ itself as a differential measure. Of course, as long as the initial state is on the energy shell with a well defined energy $`E=E_1^i+E_2^i`$ the new definition coincides with the usual expression for the cross section,

$$\frac{d^5\sigma }{d\mathrm{\Omega }_1d\mathrm{\Omega }_2dE_1}|_E=\frac{d^5\sigma }{d\mathrm{\Omega }_1d\mathrm{\Omega }_2d\mathrm{\Delta }E_1}|_E,$$
(8)
where $`d\mathrm{\Omega }_i`$ are the differentials for the solid angles of the two electrons, respectively.

To extract this cross section we have to evaluate the phase space integral

$$\frac{d^5\sigma }{d\mathrm{\Omega }_1d\mathrm{\Omega }_2d\mathrm{\Delta }E_1}=𝑑\gamma ^i\delta (\mathrm{\Omega }_1^f\mathrm{\Omega }_1)\delta (\mathrm{\Omega }_2^f\mathrm{\Omega }_2)\delta (\mathrm{\Delta }E_1^f\mathrm{\Delta }E_1)w_f,$$
(9)
where the integration is over the initial state variables with the “scattered” distribution $`w_f(\gamma ^f)=𝒦w_i(\gamma ^i)`$.

The cross section (9) is a generalization of the one derived, e.g., in , where the initial target bound state was assumed to live on a torus, i.e., $`w_i(\stackrel{}{p}_1,\stackrel{}{q}_1)=\delta (\stackrel{}{I}(\stackrel{}{p}_1,\stackrel{}{q}_1)\stackrel{}{I}_0)`$ with a well defined multidimensional action $`\stackrel{}{I}_0`$ and the initial project state fixes $`(\stackrel{}{p}_2,\stackrel{}{q}_2)`$, except for the impact parameter area $`dx_2dy_2`$. Note that the change of variables from the momenta and positions for the scattered distribution $`w_f`$ to scattering angles and energy transfer in (9) contains a constraint how a differential phase space volume centered around its guiding trajectory contributes to the cross section: only those phase space cells are relevant for ionization whose trajectory has the correct energy transfer *and* positive energy after the change of variables. Trajectories with correct energy transfer but final negative energy (i.e., one electron is still bound) do not contribute to the ionization cross section. Consequently, if one is interested in the total ionization cross section only, (9) simplifies to

$$\sigma _{tot}=\pi b_{max}^2\underset{E_1^f,E_2^f0}{}w_n\mathrm{\Theta }(\mathrm{\Delta }E_1^f\mathrm{\Delta }E_1).$$
(10)
Finally, we have to respect the Pauli principle for the two identical electrons. This can be done in the initial or final state. The Wigner transformed (anti)–symmetrized asymptotic state wave function has two parts: the “classical” part, independent of $`\mathrm{}`$, where the indices of the two electrons are interchanged and an “interference term”. In the limit $`\mathrm{}0`$ the latter part oscillates infinitely rapidly and its contribution to the cross section (9) vanishes upon integration. In the actual calculation it is easier to perform the remaining classical symmetrization in the final state.

## 3 Initial target phase space distributions

In the previous section we have taken the theoretical effort to formulate an approximate scattering theory which goes beyond the classical approximation still using classical trajectories as in CTMC. Our goal was to allow for non–stationary initial target distributions in phase space as they occur if one translates the quantum wave function into a phase space distribution. This translation, however, is not unique and depends on the used correspondence rule as shown by Moyal , see also .

Our main interest in this first application of non–stationary distributions is not to optimize the initial distribution but to learn how the collision dynamics is influenced by different aspects of initial distributions. For this purpose we have chosen four prominent distributions for which we will compare the same collision processes. Apart from the well known microcanonical distribution we have chosen Cohen’s ensemble, which is a superposition of microcanonical distributions . In addition to these more classical distributions we will implement the product distribution, the product of the quantum mechanical density in momentum and coordinate space , and the well known Wigner distribution .

All four distributions have the correct expectation value of the binding energy of $`E_b=0.5`$ a.u.¿ However, they have different energy spreading, defined as

$$(\mathrm{\Delta }E)^2=\frac{d^3pd^3qw(\stackrel{}{p},\stackrel{}{q})(H(\stackrel{}{q},\stackrel{}{p})E_b)^2}{d^3pd^3qw(\stackrel{}{p},\stackrel{}{q})}.$$
(11)
¿From table 1 one sees that the Wigner and the product distribution have a rather broad energy distribution. This is in general the price one must pay for phase space distributions which resemble closely quantum wave functions. For later reference we characterize very briefly each distribution.

### 3.1 The Wigner distribution

From a wave function $`\psi (\stackrel{}{r})`$ one obtains the Wigner distribution by the reversible transformation

$$w(\stackrel{}{p},\stackrel{}{q};t)=\frac{1}{(2\pi \mathrm{})^3}d^3se^{i\stackrel{}{p}\stackrel{}{s}/\mathrm{}}\psi ^{}(\stackrel{}{q}+\stackrel{}{s}/2,t)\psi (\stackrel{}{q}\stackrel{}{s}/2,t).$$
(12)
By construction the Wigner function reproduces the quantum probability densities in coordinate and momentum space:

$$d^3pw(\stackrel{}{p},\stackrel{}{q})=|\psi (\stackrel{}{q})|^2\text{and}d^3qw(\stackrel{}{p},\stackrel{}{q})=|\psi (\stackrel{}{p})|^2.$$
(13)
Note that the Wigner function depends on the angle between $`\stackrel{}{p}`$ and $`\stackrel{}{q}`$ with negative contributions outside the classically allowed region, thus incorporating quantum correlations into phase space. We have calculated the Wigner function following Eichenauer etal. .

### 3.2 The product distribution

As the name indicates the product distribution is defined as the product of the radial quantum probabilities in coordinate and momentum space , in our case for the hydrogen ground state:

$`w(r,p)=\rho (r)\times \sigma (p)\text{with}`$
$`\rho (r)=4r^2e^{2r}\text{and}\sigma (p)={\displaystyle \frac{32p^2}{\pi (1+p^2)^4}},`$ (14)
where $`r=|\stackrel{}{q}|`$ and $`p=|\stackrel{}{p}|`$. Clearly, by definition the correct quantum density is obtained in coordinate or momentum space as for the Wigner function (13). However, now the directions of $`\stackrel{}{q}`$ and $`\stackrel{}{p}`$ are independent of each other.

### 3.3 The microcanonical distribution

The microcanonical distribution is the standard (classical) distribution of CTMC based on Bohr’s model of the hydrogen atom . The classically accessible area of phase space on the energy shell is sampled with equal probability in angle–action coordinates. This distribution has the “correct” vanishing spread of the binding energy and the correct quantum density in momentum space. However, the coordinate space density

$$\rho _{\text{micro}}(r)=\frac{2r^2}{\pi }\sqrt{\frac{2}{r}1},$$
(15)
has a cutoff which is not present in the quantum density (cf. (14)). Since the microcanonical distribution is derived from Bohr’s atomic model, there exists, of course, no extension to construct a corresponding classical distribution for more complex targets, e.g., the helium atom. Finally we note that the Wigner distribution, if forced to be on the energy shell, reduces to the microcanonical distribution for hydrogen.

### 3.4 Cohen’s distribution

In order to preserve the stationarity of the microcanonical distribution, but still come closer to the quantum densities Cohen proposed another distribution which we will call Cohen’s distribution in the following : It is obtained by summing microcanonical distributions of different energies such that the mean binding energy is correct and only bound orbits contribute. The resulting (analytical) coordinate density is set to the quantum mechanical one. By these constraints the system of equations is already fully determined and the momentum density obtained is only slightly different from the quantum mechanical one. The energy spread of this distribution is small compared to the Wigner or product distribution.

In the following we will see how these four distributions perform under different collisions. Thereby, we will also gain some insight which properties of the target system are highlighted by a specific cross section.

## 4 Results for electron impact ionization of hydrogen at three different impact energies

We will present our results for the three different impact energies of 250 eV, 54.4 eV and 17.6 eV. These values are motivated by existing experimental data for comparison. At a given impact energy all cross sections, total, single and multiple differential ones, can be extracted from the same numerical data set, see table 2. The only difference is that higher differential cross sections require many more trajectories to achieve sufficient statistics since only a few hundred out of several million trajectories typically contribute to a fully differential cross section.

For this reason we have carefully implemented the numerical integration of the trajectories. The equations of motion have been regularized to avoid the attractive Coulomb singularities  and a sixth order symplectic integrator  with adaptive stepsize control has been used. Hence, we are able to handle electron trajectories which directly hit the nucleus. As a consequence the integration is very stable: At a given total energy less than ten trajectories had to be discarded due to a too large integration error. This stability is important, since the trajectories discarded should be significantly fewer than those contributing to a fully differential cross section.

### 4.1 Total ionization cross sections

For the microcanonical distribution, the product distribution and Cohen’s energy distribution every trajectory $`j`$ has the same weight $`w_j=+1/N_{tot}`$ in (10) which reduces as a consequence to

$$\sigma _{tot}=\pi b_{max}^2N_{ion}/N_{tot},$$
(16)
the familiar form of standard CTMC. The result for the three impact energies under consideration is given in table 3.

The total cross section was calculated for the energy range from 15 eV up to 500 eV impact energy. As one can see from fig. 1 the overall trend of the experimental cross section is reproduced. However, the energy at the maximum of the cross section is too low by nearly a factor of two and the high energy limit of the calculations obeys the classical $`1/E`$ law  instead of the quantum mechanical $`\mathrm{ln}(E)/E`$ behavior . The fact that all initial state distributions, from the classical microcanonical one to the quantum Wigner distribution, result in the same total cross section to within some ten percent shows that the deviation from the exact result is mainly due to the dynamical evolution of the distribution during the collision. The classical evolution cannot account for quantum tunneling, e.g., which becomes relevant for higher impact energies.

Can one hope under these circumstances to obtain reasonable results for differential cross sections? As it has been shown previously  disagreement in the absolute values of the cross section does not necessarily imply a similar disagreement in the shape of the differential cross sections.

### 4.2 Single differential ionization cross section

Generally the single-differential cross section evolves from a U–shaped form for high energies (fig. 2, left panel, at 250 eV) to a flat curve for low energies (fig. 2, right panel, at 17.6 eV) The cross section at 54.4 eV follows this trend and is not shown here. There is little difference between the initial distributions. The agreement with the (scaled) experiment by Shyn  as well as with a calculation by Roy  employing an exchange–modified Glauber approximation is fairly good at 250 eV. Our result is also consistent with a coupled pseudo state approximation  and a distorted-wave Born calculation . At 17.6 eV the form of the quasiclassical cross section agrees well with results for the $`L=0`$ partial wave obtained with two different fully quantal methods, namely exterior complex scaling and a time dependent CCC method . However, there is clear disagreement with Bray’s CCC calculation . In this context it should be noted that towards threshold (13.6 eV impact energy) the contributions of all partial waves should behave as the S-wave contribution . Moreover, the Wannier theory and classical calculations  predict a flat cross section to within 5%.

Overall, the single differential cross sections are in good agreement with the experiment and full quantum calculations and they do not provide a critical test for the used initial phase space distributions. However, the very formulation of energy differential cross sections for non–stationary initial distributions has been possible only by the definition of the cross section in terms of the energy transfer (see sec. 2.3 and table 1).

### 4.3 Multiply differential cross sections at 250 eV impact energy

The impact energy of 250 eV has often been studied, since it is high enough for the first Born approximation to be applicable, but still not too high for a reasonable counting rate in the experiments.

#### 4.3.1 Double differential ionization cross section

As an example for a double differential cross section we present the angular distribution of the electrons for fixed energy sharing of 231.4 eV + 5 eV. The shape from the different distributions in the left panel of fig. 3 for the fast electron is similar and close to the quantum calculations (there are no experiments available for this energy).

The situation is quite different for the slow electron (fig. 3, right panel). However, the large deviation from the experiment at small angles is probably due to a systematic error in the experiment  (see remarks in ). More interesting for us is the fact that already at the level of double differential cross sections different initial state distributions begin to make a difference. In particular the microcanonical distribution leads to a cross section with opposite trend compared to the others. The binary peak (around 70) is almost absent and the cross section is shifted towards larger angles. Apparently, the angular dependence of the scattered slow electron is sensitive to the initial spatial distribution of the bound electron which is not correctly modeled in the microcanonical distribution (see (14), (15)).

#### 4.3.2 Triple differential ionization cross section

For electron impact ionization of hydrogen at an impact energy of 250 eV a wide range of available data exists from measured fully differential cross sections (see, e.g. ) as well as from calculated ones, for a recent review see .

The small volume of the final phase space imposes a serious statistical limit on our quasiclassical calculations: A triply differential cross section at the experimental resolutions of about $`\pm `$ 1 in the scattering angle of the fast electron, $`\pm `$ 2 for the slow electron, the definition of the scattering plane at $`\pm `$ 10 and an energy resolution of less then 1 eV consists of a fraction of less then $`10^9`$ of the final state phase space volume only. If the ionization events were equally distributed over the whole phase space, we would hardly find one trajectory for a cross section. Due to the structure in the pattern of the outgoing electrons, we can record about 100 to 300 events for those configurations where experimental data is available.

The small number of trajectories contributing to the TDCS forced us to set the bins of the scattering angle $`\theta _b`$ larger than their distance. With this trick each event contributes to two or three adjacent data points of the cross section. Still, the comparison with the DDCS shows that the number of propagated trajectories would have to be increased by one or two orders of magnitude for full statistical convergence.

Once the trajectories have been calculated it is easy to filter out cross sections for arbitrary final electron configurations. We will show cross sections for some of the measured data in Ehrhardt geometry, where the fast electron is fixed at a small angle and the angular distribution of the slow electron at a fixed energy is measured: This configuration is very sensitive to the details of the initial distribution and, due to the slow ionized electron, to the dynamics of the reaction. In general two main features appear: the so called binary peak, located around the direction of the momentum transfer (in the range between 70 and 85) is usually explained by the classical picture of a binary scattering of the two electrons without interacting with the nucleus. The recoil peak consists of electrons which are rescattered from the nucleus by 180 after the binary encounter. The recoil peak lies roughly opposite to the binary peak (for an overview over the various processes and their explanations see, e.g., ).

Out of the many parameters for which experimental data is available we show two examples from Erhardt  in figure 4. Angles out of the scattering plane between $`\pm 5^{}`$ and $`\pm 20^{}`$ have virtually no influence on the shape of the cross section, they only affect the statistics. We set the angular range to $`\pm 10^{}`$.

As it is clear from figure 4 the microcanonical distribution is not capable of reproducing the main features of the cross section: there is no binary peak (the “classical” part of the cross section) at small momentum transfer and at higher momentum transfer it is much too small and shifted to larger angles. There is some structure in the region of the recoil peak, but as its maximum is opposite to the direction of the fast outgoing electron, this is probably an “artifact” of the calculation.

To describe the recoil peak in a quantum Born approximation the final state wave function for the slow electron has to be a Coulomb wave, i.e., it must include the interaction with the nucleus. The overlap of this infinitely extended wave function with the small, localized, radially symmetric ground state selects only the central region of the Coulomb wave, which correspondents to rescattering at vanishing impact parameter. In the classical approximation only a vanishingly small fraction of trajectories leads to a head on collision with the nucleus after the momentum has been transferred. Hence the probability for rescattering by 180 is negligible and this quantum interpretation of the recoil peak can only be used with caution for the classical approximation. However, one should keep in mind that this picture of the electron recoil from the nucleus comes from the Born perturbation series with its hierarchy of orders, i.e., a number of sudden two particle interactions takes place one after the other . It is only in this interpretation, that ionization and rescattering are two distinct events; in the full dynamical description all three bodies interact simultaneously.

The other three distributions perform remarkably better, especially with the product and the Wigner distribution the position and the width of the binary maximum are reproduced to within the statistical uncertainties. These two distributions are characterized by the correct densities in coordinate *and* momentum space, whereas Cohen’s energy distribution lacks the correct momentum distribution and the microcanonical one has the wrong spatial dependence. We may conclude, that at 250 eV impact energy the cross section is a projection of the initial distribution’s phase space density onto the final configuration: both, in momentum and in coordinate space the description of the target must be correct.

### 4.4 Multiply differential cross sections at 54.4 eV impact energy

The impact energy of 54.4 eV is close to the maximum of the experimental total cross section. The presentation of the cross sections will be similar to that at 250 eV.

#### 4.4.1 Double differential ionization cross section

The doubly differential cross section is presented again for a pair of matching energies for the fast (fig. 5) and the slow electrons (fig. 6) with 35.8 eV and 5 eV, respectively. No experimental data exists for the fast electrons. Comparison, however, is possible with Bray’s CCC calculation . For the slow electrons, experiments by Shyn are available, but only at an impact energy of 60 eV. These experimental data were scaled onto the correct total cross section at 54.4 eV. They show systematically too high values at small angles similarly as for 250 eV (cf. section 4.3.1 and refs. ).

The cross sections for the faster electrons are similar (fig. 5), the quasiclassical results show slightly higher contributions at angles above 45, almost independent of the phase space distribution describing the target.

For the slow electrons the picture is quite different (fig. 6, left panel): the Wigner distribution reproduces the position of the binary peak (about 70) and its width fairly well, whereas the microcanonical distribution nearly inverts the shape of the quantum mechanical cross section. Cohen’s energy distribution gives a cross section somewhere between the quantum Wigner description and the classical microcanonical modeling.

The cross section from the product distribution is much too high at small angles. This behavior can be simulated with the Wigner distribution as well, if $`|w_n|`$ is taken instead of $`w_n`$ in (10), see the right panel of fig. 6.

The Wigner and the product distribution both reproduce the correct density in coordinate and momentum space; the difference is that in the quantum Wigner distribution the radius and the momentum vector are correlated with negative weights in regions outside of the classical turning point (see sec. 3.1). The difference between the Wigner cross section with the correct sign for each final value and the one with the same sign for each trajectory shows, that the contributions at small scattering angles come from these outer regions. The negative parts of the Wigner distribution lead to partial cancellation of classically allowed contributions, which nevertheless do not occur in the cross section. The product distribution lacks the correlations and consequently gives the wrong cross section at small angles, here all trajectories contribute. In the microcanonical distribution no initial values at all exist for radii larger than 2 a.u., consequently the cross section is much too small for small angles. We conclude that this type of a doubly differential cross section strongly depends on quantal features which are beyond the scope of a purely classical ansatz as standard CTMC. However, they can be incorporated in our $`\mathrm{}=0`$ approximation through the initial distribution.

#### 4.4.2 Triple differential ionization cross section

The triply differential cross section at 54.4 eV impact energy has been measured by Röder etal  in Ehrhardt geometry. We show the cross sections for the parameters given in table 4.

The DDCS for the fast electrons, fig. 5, is too high for small angles. We therefore not only scale the TDCS onto the total cross section, but additionally for $`\theta _a`$ = 4 by a factor of 0.25. This scaling has been performed to see, if the shape of the cross sections for the slow electrons is reproduced correctly.

The differences between the phase space distributions can be seen clearly: the classical microcanonical distribution fails to reproduce the binary peak at all parameters, whereas the recoil peak agrees astonishingly well. The next more quantal description, Cohen’s energy distribution, performs better with increasing $`\theta _a`$, but the angle of the binary peak is always too large. The opposite tendency, placing the binary peak at too small angles, is seen with the product distribution. At small $`\theta _a`$ the electrons even leave in the same direction, a configuration that should be strongly suppressed by their mutual repulsion. This problem will be discussed in detail for the impact energy of 17.6 eV. The distribution which is closest to quantum mechanics, the Wigner distribution, can reproduce the cross sections over the entire range of parameters, but with similar effects of both electrons leaving in forward direction at $`\theta _a`$ = 4.

At this impact energy switching from the classical models of the microcanonical or Cohen’s energy distribution that only reproduce either the coordinate or the momentum space density, to the more quantal ones results in a definite improvement in the cross sections. The product distribution, which satisfies both momentum and coordinate space densities, already shows a binary peak, although shifted. With the correlated Wigner distribution the best correspondence between experiment and our calculations is achieved.

### 4.5 Multiply differential cross sections at 17.6 eV impact energy

At the low impact energy of 17.6 eV the projectile is only slightly faster than a classical electron on a circular orbit with the Bohr radius and the ionized electrons can only share 4 eV of energy. Hence, we expect different qualities of the initial distribution to become important, compared to the higher impact energies.

At these low energies quantum calculations, using analytic final state wave functions constructed from two-body wave functions, fail or perform only very poorly . This indicates, that here a correct description of the simultaneous interaction of the three particles is crucial. In this context it should be emphasized that we do not approximate the three-body dynamics beyond the classical $`\mathrm{}=0`$ limit: All long range Coulomb interactions between all particles are taken fully into account.

#### 4.5.1 Double differential ionization cross section

For the DDCS no experimental comparison exists, our results will be compared to Bray’s CCC calculation  and to results of an ECS calculation by Isaacs etal . For symmetric energy sharing the CCC single differential cross section is too small by approximately one third, hence the CCC DDCS was scaled by $`1/0.66`$ for better comparison of the shape. Our results are scaled onto the total cross section again.

As can be seen in fig. 8, the more classical phase space distributions give considerably better results. With the microcanonical distribution the cross section deviates only for angles of less than 30 around the forward and backward direction. With Cohen’s distribution the shape is too flat, whereas the Wigner and the product distribution overestimate the forward direction. Both electrons have the same small final energy, which means that they influence each other for a long time. Consequently, these cross sections are more dominated by the post collisional interaction (PCI) than those at higher energies. In order to describe PCI effects correctly, the relative energy of the outgoing electrons is important. Due to our construction of the cross section in terms of the energy transfer this ratio is correctly described only for initial distributions on the energy shell (i.e. without an energy spread).

#### 4.5.2 Triple differential ionization cross section

At this impact energy experiments exist for a variety of geometries . Table 5 summarizes them for the cross sections shown. For an overview over recent quantum calculations see .

For the Wigner and the product distribution the same behavior as at $`E_{in}`$ = 54.4 eV can be observed, but now the fraction of electrons going into the same direction is much larger, see the fully symmetric cross section and in Ehrhardt geometry, fig. 9. This should not occur due to the mutual repulsion of the electrons. However, for those initial distributions which are not restricted to the energy shell (all but the microcanonical one) the energy of the initially bound electron calculated from the energy transfer does not necessarily correspond to the actual momentum of the electron. Hence, the two electrons may leave the nucleus one after the other, although they have the same “nominal” energy. This problem does not occur for the microcanonical distribution which is on the energy shell.

At 17.6 eV impact energy none of the initial distributions can fully reproduce the cross sections, but in the overall picture Cohen’s distribution plays best: the energy spread is on the one hand small enough to prevent the electrons from going into the same direction and on the other hand the phase space density is still accurate enough for the “fast” binary ionization process. Hence, Cohen’s distribution is the only one which predicts the location and widths of binary and recoil peaks although not their height (fig. 9). At constant $`\theta _{ab}`$ for all but Cohen’s distribution the (relative) magnitude of the cross section for different angles is grossly wrong (fig. 10). For the Wigner and the product distribution even the shape of the cross section is in disagreement with the experiment at $`\theta _{ab}`$ = 90.

The cross sections at 17.6 eV show that even at this low total energy the fully differential cross section is sensitive to the initial phase space density. On the other hand Wannier’s arguments suggest that close to threshold the cross sections depend primarily on the final phase space configuration determined by the long time behavior of the ionization dynamics . To describe it correctly the accurate energy of the outgoing electrons is crucial. Hence, the initial distribution must have a minimal energy spread. At 4 eV above threshold these two (contradicting) requirements are fulfilled best by Cohen’s energy distribution.

## 5 Summary and outlook

We have derived and tested a quasiclassical ansatz for charged particle impact ionization. Starting from the time-dependent quantum mechanical formulation in the quantum Wigner picture we can reproduce in the limit $`\mathrm{}=0`$ the standard Classical Trajectory Monte Carlo (CTMC) method. However, our ansatz is more general. By keeping the backward–forward propagation scheme of the Møller formalism and by defining the cross section in terms of energy transfer we can exploit the full classical limit ($`\mathrm{}=0`$) of the Wigner distribution for the initial state, which is neither stationary in the classical approximation nor confined to the energy shell, two properties which are necessary for standard CTMC. In fact, our formulation allows one to use arbitrary initial phase space distributions. We have calculated and compared fully differential classical ionization cross sections for four initial state distributions: the quantum Wigner function, the (standard) classical microcanonical distribution and two other distributions which interpolate to some extent between Wigner and microcanonical distribution. From our results we conclude that at high impact energies the density in phase space is the crucial property to describe the ionization process. For lower energies the correlation between coordinate and momentum becomes increasingly important. Even at the low energy of 4 eV above threshold the initial state has to be modeled correctly in coordinate and momentum space, although the long time evolution of the slow ionized electrons gains more and more influence on the dynamics.

The classical calculations are not meant to be a high quality alternative for quantum treatments; rather we wanted to formulate and test a consistent quasiclassical scattering theory, applicable to the most differential cross sections, and free from the limitation to one active target electron of previous approaches. Yet, most of the technical expertise from previous CTMC calculations can be used with only minor modifications in the description of the initial target state, the propagation scheme and the extraction of the cross sections.

With the present work we have demonstrated for one-electron targets, namely hydrogen, that the aforementioned goals can be achieved. However, the main advantage of being able to deal with unstable initial distributions will become apparent when calculating double ionization of two-electron atoms. The classical autoionization of the bound electrons does not affect our quasiclassical approach. What should be improved in future work, particularly if one is interested in collisions with small excess energy, is the implementation of contributions off the energy shell. Since we have seen that less differential cross sections tend to be better approximated with the quasiclassical approach we are optimistic that a quasiclassical triple differential cross section will be more accurate for double ionization than for single ionization. However, this remains to be proven in future work.

Most of this work was funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft through the SFB 276 at the University of Freiburg, Germany.


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# 1 Motivations and theoretical constraints

## 1 Motivations and theoretical constraints

Pions are produced in many reactions. A good experimental and theoretical information on low, medium and high-energy pion-pion interactions should give us a better understanding of non-perturbative QCD and of the chiral perturbation theory. It allows a better insight into $`q\overline{q}`$ vacuum condensate and then into the mechanism of spontaneous breaking of chiral symmetry. It should also give a better knowledge of the meson spectrum in particular of the $`\sigma `$-meson and glueballs.

Recently Kamiński et al. , using not only pion-exchange but also $`a_1`$-exchange, have reanalyzed the data obtained in the seventies on the $`\pi ^{}p\pi ^+\pi ^{}n`$ reaction at 17.2 GeV/c without and with a polarized target. Essentially, for $`m_{\pi \pi }`$ between 600 and 980 MeV, two solutions “up-flat” and “down-flat” (hereafter called up and down) were found for the pion-pion isoscalar $`S`$-wave.

Besides unitarity and analyticity, crossing symmetry plays a very important role in the $`\pi \pi `$ interactions as in each channel the same particles interact. Projection on partial waves of the twice subtracted fixed-t dispersion relations leads to Roy’s equations for the scattering amplitude of isospin I, viz.

$$Ref_{\mathrm{}}^I(s)=\left(\begin{array}{c}a_0^0\\ 0\\ a_0^2\end{array}\right)\delta _\mathrm{}0+(2a_0^05a_0^2)\frac{s4m_\pi ^2}{12m_\pi ^2}\left(\begin{array}{c}\delta _\mathrm{}0\\ \delta _\mathrm{}1/6\\ \delta _\mathrm{}0/2\end{array}\right)+\underset{I^{}=0}{\overset{2}{}}\underset{\mathrm{}^{}=0}{\overset{1}{}}\underset{4m_\pi ^2}{\overset{110m_\pi ^2}{}}K_\mathrm{}I^\mathrm{}^{}I^{}(s,s^{})\text{Im }f_{\mathrm{}^{}}^I^{}(s^{})𝑑s^{}+d_{\mathrm{}}^I(s).$$

These equations are valid for $`4m_\pi ^2s68m_\pi ^2(=1.15\text{ GeV})`$ and express the real part of the scalar-isoscalar, scalar-isovector and vector-isovector partial waves as integrals on their imaginary parts. The two subtractions are expressed in terms of the scattering lengths $`a_{\mathrm{}}^I`$: $`a_0^0`$ and $`a_0^2`$. The kernels K are known singular functions. The driving terms $`d_{\mathrm{}}^I(s)`$ contain the contributions of the partial waves $`\mathrm{}^{}2`$ as well as the high-energy contributions . For the driving terms we use the parameterization of Basdevant et al. .

Pions are the quasi-Goldstone bosons of the chiral symmetry of strong interaction, so at low $`m_{\pi \pi }`$ we use constraints from chiral perturbation theory. For instance the two-loop calculations of the $`\pi \pi `$ amplitudes using $`K_\mathrm{}4`$ decay constraints lead to: $`a_0^0=0.219\pm 0.005m_\pi ^1`$, $`a_0^2=0.042\pm 0.001m_\pi ^1`$ and to the slope parameters of the phase shifts; $`b_0^0=0.279\pm 0.011m_\pi ^3`$, $`b_0^2=0.076\pm 0.002m_\pi ^3`$ .

## 2 Applications and outlook

For the scalar-isoscalar phase shifts $`\delta _0^0`$ we use the unitary three-channel model of Kamiński et al.  with chiral symmetry constraints on $`a_0^0,b_0^0`$ and on $`\pi \pi K\overline{K}`$ and $`K\overline{K}K\overline{K}`$ reactions at the $`\pi \pi `$ threshold as given by Donoghue et al. . For $`\delta _0^2`$ we use chiral symmetry constraints on $`a_0^2`$ and $`b_0^2`$ and do a fit to Hoogland A data  using the Padé approximant parameterization of Schenk . For $`\delta _1^1`$ we use the Schenk parameterization with $`a_1^1=0.035m_\pi ^1`$ .

First we built up a three-channel fit to the solution down and to Roy’s equations. The quality of fit to Roy’s equations is judged by a comparison between the exact real part of the partial waves calculated from phase shifts and inelasticities (called input) and the output calculated from Roy’s equations. These equations are well satisfied by this fit called “best-down” fit. The input is close to the output with some small deviations above 900 MeV, in particular for the scalar-isotensor wave.

Let us try to solve the up-down ambiguity. The solution up and down differ mainly for $`800m_{\pi \pi }980`$ MeV. We use a Padé approximant with 8 parameters to fit $`\mathrm{tan}\delta _0^0`$ of the solutions up and down. The parameters are determined: i) to reproduce the ”chiral” values $`a_0^0,b_0^0`$ and the $`\delta _0^0`$ of the “best-down” fit at 500 and 600 MeV, ii) to have a smooth junction to the “best-down” fit close to 970 MeV and iii) to obtain a best fit of the data between 680 and 950 MeV.

Results of different fits with their corresponding $`\chi ^2`$ are shown in Fig. 1. The “Padé lower” and “Padé upper” denote the fits to the data shifted downwards and upwards according to their error bars. In Fig. 2 we check how this “upper” and “lower” fits satisfy Roy’s equations. For the $`S`$-wave and for $`840m_{\pi \pi }950`$ MeV (left panel) there is no overlap between the “upper” and “lower” input and output bands. Here the solution up does not satisfy Roy equation, i.e. it is not compatible with crossing symmetry. On the contrary for the solution down (right panel), for $`m_{\pi \pi }950`$ MeV, both bands overlap. The other waves satisfy relatively well Roy’s equations. The solution down is compatible with crossing symmetry.

Let us remark here that recent joint analysis by Kamiński et al.  of the CERN-Munich, the CERN-Cracow-Munich $`\pi ^+\pi ^{}`$ data and of the $`\pi ^0\pi ^0`$ data of the Brookhaven E852 Collaboration at 18.3 GeV/c  eliminates the “up-flat” solution and leads to a solution compatible with solution down. Our study here shows that only the solution down satisfies crossing symmetry.

Currently we are studying the sensitivity of the driving terms to the parameterization of the resonant $`f_2(1270)`$ and $`\rho _3(1690)`$ amplitudes and to the high energy Regge contributions. We shall compare our results to those of Ananthanarayan et al. .

The present study shows that we can construct a three-channel $`\pi \pi ,K\overline{K}`$ and effective $`(2\pi )(2\pi )`$ model which fulfills unitarity, crossing symmetry and chiral symmetry constraints. This will give more confidence in the parameters of the scalar-isoscalar mesons predicted by the model. This will also allow to check the amplitudes below the $`K\overline{K}`$ threshold. Let us finally mention that any new precise data on $`\pi \pi `$ are welcome.

Acknowledgments: The LPNHE is a Unité de Recherche des Universités Paris 6 et Paris 7, associée au CNRS. This work was done in the framework of the IN2P3-Polish laboratories Convention (project No. 99-97).