text:
# First results from multi-wavelength observations during the 2001 outburst of WZ Sge

## 1. Introduction

The cataclysmic variable (CV) WZ Sge was classified as a recurrent nova after it had displayed the outbursts in 1913 and 1946 (Mayall 1947). However, subsequent optical observations showed the source to be a dwarf nova (e.g. Warner 1976). Its class was finally established during the outburst in 1978, when the source displayed superhumps at a period which was about 0.8% longer than the orbital period, thus showing it to be an SU UMa star (e.g. Patterson et al. 1981). WZ Sge, in fact, belongs to the ‘extreme’ SU UMa subclass named after itself, i.e. the WZ Sge stars. They exhibit very infrequent and large amplitude \[super\]outbursts (e.g. Bailey 1979).

Mass estimates of the white dwarf range from 0.25–1.2 M (e.g. Patterson 1998). During the 2001 outburst, Steeghs et al. (2001b) detected the secondary (see Sect. 3.2) and found that the donor has a relatively low mass of $`<`$0.1 M (see also Patterson 2001). The derived mass function implies that the white dwarf has a mass $`>`$0.77 M. Binary evolution models predict that all CVs should eventually evolve through a minimum orbital period around 70 min, when the mass donor becomes degenerate. With an orbital period of 81.6 min (Krzemiński 1962; see Skidmore et al. 2000, for a latest update), WZ Sge is close to that minimum period. The inclination at which we view the source is 75, just high enough for the donor to obscure the accretion disk but not the white dwarf (Krzemiński 1962; Smak 1993). The white dwarf rotates rapidly (Cheng et al. 1997) at a period near 28 s (Patterson et al. 1998; Lasota, Kuulkers & Charles 1999, and references therein; but see Skidmore et al. 1999).

At the distance of 45 pc (astrometric parallax, J. Thorstensen 2001, priv. comm.) it is one of the closest CVs. When in outburst it is therefore bright (up to 7.5–8 mag), providing an excellent target to investigate the accretion of matter from the donor, through the disk, onto the white dwarf, not only for professionals but also for amateur observers.

## 2. The 2001 outburst

On Monday 2001 July 23, the astronomical community was alerted by the Variable Star Network (VSNET)111http://www.kusastro.kyoto-u.ac.jp/vsnet/Mail/alert6000/msg00093.html that WZ Sge had brightened considerably by $``$5.5 mag from its quiescent magnitude of $``$15.5 (Ishioka et al. 2001a; Mattei 2001). Based on the times of three previous outbursts a new outburst had not been expected until 2011. The 2001 outburst therefore seemed to be 10 years ‘too early’. However, we note that although the superoutburst recurrence times of SU UMa stars are quite stable, they do change from time to time (Vogt 1980).

In Fig. 1 we show the visual and other optical observations of the 2001 outburst as reported to VSNET222For an excellent optical coverage and many examples of light curves we refer to the VSNET webpage dedicated to WZ Sge: http://www.kusastro.kyoto-u.ac.jp/vsnet/DNe/wzsge01.html. (see also Ishioka et al. 2001b). Within half a day WZ Sge brightened from its quiescence level to about 10.5 mag. It peaked at 8 mag, giving a large outburst amplitude of about 7.5 mag. The main outburst lasted for about 25 days, after which it displayed a dip of 2 mag lasting for about 5 days. It then showed irregular rebrightening/outburst behaviour for another month. It then declined to 13.5 mag; since then no new rebrightening has been observed, and the superoutburst seems to have ended.

Also in Fig. 1 we have overplotted in gray the previous observed outbursts (visual, photometric and photographic measurements; from Kuulkers 1999). Clearly, the 2001 outburst resembles the 1978 outburst, except for the fact that the durations of the main outburst and the outburst stage after the dip were shorter (about 5 days and 10 days, respectively) for the 2001 outburst. Note that the brightness after the 2001 outburst is still about 2 mag above quiescence, at the same level as after the 1946 outburst. This is due to the hot white dwarf, see Sect. 3.4.

Both ‘orbital superhumps’ (Kato et al. 2001a), commonly observed in the beginning of the superoutbursts of WZ Sge-stars, and ‘true’ (Kato et al. 2001b) superhumps were present. The true superhumps appeared about two weeks into the outburst, whereas at the same time the orbital superhumps died away. Note that the change from orbital to true superhumps is not abrupt. They overlap and coexist in the light curves for a few days, suggesting a different nature.

The superoutburst of WZ Sge was extensively monitored from the ground and from space333See http://www.astro.soton.ac.uk/$``$ds/wzsge.html.. In the next sections we give an account of the first results from (mainly spectroscopic) observations at optical, UV and X-ray wavelengths in which we have been involved, as well as a few radio observations.

## 3. Multi-wavelength observations during the 2001 outburst

### 3.1. Radio observations: no detection

Various radio observations (VLA: 3.6 cm, 6 cm; V. Dhawan, M. Rupen 2001, priv. comm.; Ryle: 2 cm; G. Pooley 2001, priv. comm.) were performed between July 24 and Aug 9, but yielded no detections. Upper limits on e.g. Aug 4 were 0.12 and 0.18 mJy per beam at 3.7 and 6 cm, respectively (M. Rupen 2001, priv. comm.).

### 3.2. Optical spectroscopy: spiral waves and secondary star

One of the first (July 23.74) optical spectra showed H$`\alpha `$ and H$`\beta `$ lines in absorption on top of a blue continuum (Ishioka et al. 2001a). About a day later the spectra had changed dramatically, now showing strong double-peaked emission lines of e.g. He II (4686Å) and C III and N III. H$`\beta `$ showed both emission and absorption features similar to P Cyg profiles, whereas higher series were seen as broad absorption features. The emission profiles showed variations on the orbital period (Baba, Sadakane & Norimoto 2001).

Service override observations on the 2.5 m INT at La Palma (PI: Steeghs) were performed between July 28.02–28.24 (see Fig. 1), yielding high resolution phase resolved spectra (Steeghs et al. 2001a). The same emission lines as seen by Baba et al. (2001) were present. In Fig. 2 we display the phase dependent emission profiles of He II (4686 Å) and the nearby Bowen fluorescence complex. The Bowen blend consists of several C III and N III transitions, but is dominated by C III and closely reflects the line kinematics of He II. The corresponding Doppler tomograms (Marsh & Horne 1988) are also plotted in Fig. 2 and reveal prominent spiral arms in the accretion disk of WZ Sge. These two armed structures are very similar to those observed in longer period dwarf novae during outburst (Steeghs 2001, Boffin & Steeghs, these proceedings). On the other hand, the Balmer and He I lines are dominated by deep, phase dependent absorption components. We conjecture here that the observed spiral arms are related to the orbital superhumps. A more detailed comparison between the observed disk structure with the photometric behaviour may shed light on this.

Spectroscopy obtained during later phases of the outburst revealed growing narrow emission components in the Balmer lines originating from the irradiated secondary star (Steeghs et al. 2001b). Such emission features from the secondary are commonly observed in CVs during outburst, as well as persistent X-ray binaries such as Sco X-1 (Steeghs & Casares 2001). For WZ Sge this provided the first opportunity to directly reveal its low-mass secondary star. Apart from the appearance of secondary star features, the accretion disk emission also makes a significant transition from strong spirals arms to a disk flow dominated by an extended bright spot around 20 days into the outburst. The large amount of optical spectroscopy obtained during the 2001 outburst of WZ Sge should shed important insights into the evolution of the accretion disk.

### 3.3. X-ray observations: RXTE and Chandra

A 10-min snapshot was performed with RXTE on the same evening of the discovery (UT July 23, 20:40), followed by a 30-min observation on July 27 06:40 (UT). No detections were made with 95% confidence upper limits of 5.3$`\times `$10-12 erg cm-2 s-1 and 3.7$`\times `$10-12 erg cm-2 s-1 (2–6 keV), respectively, assuming a typical 6 keV MEKAL spectrum. We note that due to the limited sensitivity of RXTE we can not say whether there is an X-ray delay with respect to the optical outburst, commonly observed in outbursts of dwarf novae.

Three Chandra/LETGS (PI: Wheatley) and four Chandra/ACIS-S (PI: Kuulkers) observations were performed throughout the outburst, see Fig. 1. Note that the second RXTE observation was simultaneous with the first Chandra/LETG observation. XMM-Newton and BeppoSAX were unable to observe WZ Sge due to viewing constraints.

The first Chandra/LETGS observation was carried out three and a half days into the outburst (Wheatley et al. 2001). The mean zeroth-order count rate was 4.5 c s-1, showing the source to be bright, and was modulated with the orbital period. In Fig. 3 we show the averaged 20 ksec grating spectrum, which had a mean count rate of 20 c s-1. The superb spectrum shows a ‘forest’ of broad emission lines longward of $``$65Å from e.g. O V–VII, Ne V–VIII, Fe VII–IX. The FWHM of these lines are between 800–1200 km s-1 (see e.g. left panel of Fig. 6). At shorter wavelengths ($`<`$65 Å) one sees weaker lines of highly ionized ions, with O VIII (18.9 Å) standing out. The mean flux in the 2–180 Å band was 1.6$`\times `$10-12 erg cm-2 s-1.

The long wavelength spectrum resembles the EUVE spectra taken during an outburst of U Gem between orbital phase 0.6–0.8 (Long et al. 1996), as well as during a superoutburst of OY Car (Mauche & Raymond 2000). Both U Gem and OY Car are high-inclination systems, like WZ Sge. The forest of broad lines may therefore be formed by scattering of emission from the white dwarf’s vicinity into the photo-ionized accretion disk wind. Note that some direct optically-thick boundary layer emission is still visible in the case of U Gem. During the second LETGS observation on Aug 6 this component had faded considerably. The mean zeroth-order count rate had dropped to 0.2 c s-1.

The first ACIS-S444Covering 0.2–10 keV or 1.2–60 Å. observation (2.5 c s-1) starting on July 29 16:50 (UT) showed the spectrum to be also dominated by strong emission lines, although they were not as well-resolved as in the LETGS spectrum, due to the much lower energy resolution. A strong emission line was seen near (2.4 keV, 5.2 Å), probably associated with He-like S XV, which cannot be accounted for using an optically-thin thermal plasma model.

### 3.4. UV observations: FUSE and HST

The only satellite observations during previous outbursts are those obtained by IUE in 1978, from the start of the outburst up to the first dip in the outburst light curve (Fabian et al. 1980; Naylor 1989; Smak 1993, and references therein).

Several FUSE (PI: Long) and HST observations were performed during the 2001 outburst (see Fig. 1). The first HST observations were mainly aimed at orbital phase resolved UV spectroscopy (PI: Knigge). The other HST observations (PI: Sion) will continue way after the outburst, and will (among other things) permit detailed study of the cooling white dwarf (see also below). Note that the third HST observation was simultaneous with the third Chandra/ACIS-S observation.

The mean spectrum of the FUSE observation on July 30 (Fig. 4) is dominated by a broad line feature due to O VI. The EW of this feature is between 50 and 60Å, depending on how you treat the narrow features which punctuate it. Its FWZI is close to 9000 km s-1. The absorption features which interrupt the emission profile of O VI are blue shifted by about 300 km s-1 from the rest wavelengths of the O VI doublet. The average flux between 1050 and 1150 Å was 6$`\times `$10-12 erg cm-2 s-1 Å-1. The narrow absorption lines seen in the spectrum are due to interstellar hydrogen. There is no evidence of molecular H or of metal absorption lines, which is expected given WZ Sge’s proximity.

This observation preceded the first HST observation taken nine days later (see below), but in fact the continua of the FUSE and the HST spectrum match up pretty well in the overlap region. It is, therefore, reasonable to say that the line spectrum associated with the 1s–2p lines of Li-like O, N, and C indicates a very high excitation spectrum. The continuum spectrum, on the other hand, is punctuated by a lot of features mostly associated with lower ionization. The line widths of the unblended lines are all of order 500–700 km s-1. They are somewhat reminiscent of outburst spectra of U Gem obtained with FUSE (Froning et al. 2001; Froning et al., these proceedings).

Fig. 5 shows the mean HST/STIS spectrum obtained on Aug 8; the average flux between 1150 and 3100 Å was 2.3$`\times `$10-12 erg cm-2 s-1 Å-1. Broadened emission lines from N V and C IV are seen, as well as some He II. Shortward of 1410 Å, a lot of strong broadened absorption lines are present, associated with C, S, Si and O. Above 1410 Å the strongest absorption lines are from Al III (1850–1860 Å) and Mg II (2790–2810 Å). The others are most probably associated with Fe. Note that some part of the Mg II absorption has an interstellar origin. Still, most of it is due to the source, since all the other IS lines are weak and WZ Sge is rather close. Note that the spectra obtained by IUE during the 1978 outburst (Fabian et al. 1980; Naylor 1989) look very similar to the HST spectrum.

In the right panel of Fig. 6 we show the C IV profile in more detail. The emission is line is clearly broad, as expected if formed in the wind, and somewhat asymmetric. Superimposed are absorption dips blueward of the center. We note the striking similarity between the C IV and N VI profiles (compare both panels of Fig. 6). The complex C IV line profile is somewhat reminiscent of that seen in the high inclination nova-like variable UX UMa (Mason et al. 1995). In that system, the C IV line is thought to be produced in a powerful accretion disk, with the absorption dips arising in a vertically extended accretion disk chromosphere (Knigge & Drew 1997). However, it is still far from clear whether the roughly similar line profiles actually imply physically similar line-forming regions in WZ Sge and UX UMa.

As evidenced by IUE spectroscopy of the late phases of the 1978 outburst (Slevinsky et al. 1999), the slow decline of the optical light curve at the end of each outburst is consistent with cooling of the white dwarf. It is interesting to note that the optical brightness at the bottom of the dips in the 1978 and 2001 outburst light curves fall on the backwards extrapolated white dwarf cooling tracks. At such times not much disk emission would be expected, and the white dwarf would dominate the emission. Preliminary analysis of the second HST observation during the dip indicates that the spectrum is indeed dominated by an approximately 28 000 K hot white dwarf, while the first and third observation resemble that expected from an accretion disk.

## 4. Conclusions

It is clear that the 2001 outburst has been looked at in great detail with various instruments with exquisitely high temporal and high wavelength (or energy) resolution. We have shown the first exciting preliminary results of a few of these observations, which already reveal a rich amount of information. The enormous amount of data accumulated over the outburst at various wavelength will leave us work for the years to come, and may well reveal the nature of superoutbursts in WZ Sge stars, as well as SU UMa stars in general!

#### Acknowledgments.

The observations shown here represent the work of a large collaboration, which includes T. Marsh (optical/HST), J. Casares, E. Harlaftis, W. Skidmore (optical), C. Markwardt, J. Swank (RXTE), J. Drake, J. Kaastra, C. Mauche, S. Starrfield, M. Wagner (Chandra), P. Szkody, E. Sion (FUSE), R. Hynes and R. Doyle (HST). Many thanks to the Isaac Newton Group staff for obtaining part of the data through the ING service programme, and V. Dhawan and M. Rupen for spending some of their VLA time on WZ Sge. In addition we are profoundly grateful for the support of many amateur observers who sacrifice their nights for observing stars like WZ Sge, and the collaboration of organizations such as VSNET and the AAVSO, who enabled us to plan the observations discussed here.

## References

Baba, H., Sadakane, K., Norimoto, Y. 2001, IAUC 7672

Cheng, F., Sion, E.M., Szkody, P., Huang, M. 1997, ApJ, 333, 227

Fabian, A.C., et al. 1980, MNRAS, 191, 457

Froning, C.S., et al. 2001, ApJ, 746, in press

Ishioka, R., Uemura, M., Matsumoto, Kato, T., Yamaoka, H. 2001a, IAUC 7669

Ishioka, R., et al. 2001b, in preparation

Kato, T., et al. 2001a, IAUC 7672

Kato, T., et al. 2001b, IAUC 7678

Knigge, C., Drew, J.E. 1997, ApJ, 486, 445

Krzemiński, W. 1962, PASP, 74, 66

Kuulkers, E. 1999, NewA Reviews, 44, 27

Lasota, J.-P., Kuulkers, E., Charles, P. 1999, MNRAS, 305, 473

Long, K.S., et al. 1996, ApJ, 469, 841

Marsh, T., Horne, K. 1988, MNRAS, 235, 269

Mason, K.O., et al. 1995, MNRAS, 274, 271

Mattei, J. 2001, IAUC 7669

Mauche, C.W., Raymond, J.C. 2000, ApJ, 541, 924

Mayall, M.W. 1947, AJ 52, 127

Naylor, T. 1989, MNRAS, 238, 587

Patterson, J. 1998, PASP, 110, 1132

Patterson, J. 2001, PASP, 113, 736

Patterson, J., et al. 1981, ApJ, 248, 1067

Patterson, J., Richman, H., Kemp, J., Mukai, K. 1998, PASP 110, 403

Skidmore, W., et al. 2000, MNRAS, 318, 429

Skidmore, W., et al. 1999, MNRAS, 310, 750

Slevinsky, R.J., et al. 1999, PASP, 111, 1292

Smak, J. 1993, Acta Astr., 43, 101

Steeghs, D. 2001, in: Astrotomography, H. Boffin, D. Steeghs, J. Cuypers (eds.), Lecture Notes in Physics Series Volume 573, Springer Verlag

Steeghs, D., Casares, J. 2001, ApJ, in press \[astro-ph/0107343\]

Steeghs, D., Marsh, T., Kuulkers, E., Skidmore, W. 2001a, IAUC 7675

Steeghs, D., et al. 2001b, ApJ Letters, submitted \[astro-ph/0109311\]

Vogt, N. 1980, A&A, 88, 66

Wheatley, P.J., et al. 2001, IAUC 7677


format: text

text:
# Advanced Compton Telescope Designs and SN Science

## 1 Introduction

Detections of gamma-ray lines from supernovae are some of the most exciting aspects of “Astronomy with Radioactivites”. Radionuclei produced in both thermonuclear and core-collapse supernovae decay on various timescales leading to potentially detectable emission over a range of epochs. Initially, short-lived radionuclei produce intense gamma-ray lines that might be observed from supernovae in other galaxies. Detection of emission during the early epoch permits studies of the evolution of the opacity to the gamma-ray emission, and of the yields of short-lived isotopes. At later times, longer-lived radionuclei produce a less-intense emission that could be observed from multiple galactic supernova remnants (hereafter call SNR emission). Detection of emission during this intermediate epoch permits the study of the yields of these isotopes as well as of the kinematics of the SN ejecta. At even later times, long-lived radionuclei produce a faint emission that is not attributable to specific remnants, but rather is collectively observed as a diffuse emission. Observations of this diffuse emission studies the million-year history of supernovae in the Galaxy, as a contributor to the total galactic line emission. Although interesting, we do not discuss this diffuse emission.

We simulate the transport of gamma-ray line photons through the ejecta of SN models. Combining these simulations with three sets of specifications of Advanced Compton Telescopes (ACT), and inferred SN rates, we produce estimates of the rate at which supernovae will be detectable as prompt gamma-ray line sources. We also provide estimates of the various gamma-ray lines that might be detectable from specific supernova remnants. The purpose of this exercise is to quantify the expectations of an ACT in performing SN science, and thus to assist the gamma-ray community in assessing what direction they would like to pursue for the future of gamma-ray astronomy.

## 2 SN Types, Rates and Emission Profile

For this study we assume that 100 SNe Ia per year within 100 Mpc. Of these 100 SNe, 60 would be normally-luminous, 20 sub-luminous, and 20 super-luminous. (The reader is referred to an earlier work (Milne et al. 2000a) for a derivation of these rates, and the relevant references.) We further assume that SNe Ia occur uniformly through-out space at this density, ignoring the possibility of a nearby local void. The type II/Ib/Ic SN rate has always been suggested to be higher than the SN Ia rate (we adopt a rate for the Galaxy of 1.7 SNe II/Ib per century). This is important for studies of SNR and diffuse gamma-ray line emission. However, the distance to which a type II/Ib SN will be detectable is much less than the distance to which a SN Ia will be detectable. The much smaller volume that results negates the enhanced SN rate. Thus, it is unlikely that a type II/Ib/Ic SN will be detected as a source of prompt emission by an ACT.

Considerable variations exist within the collection of SN Ia models. These variations are driven both by the uncertainty as to the correct explosion scenario(s) and by the heterogeneity displayed in the spectra and light curves of observed SNe Ia (for a general discussion, see Wheeler 1995). It is beyond the scope of this paper to define and compare SN explosion scenarios, we will simply introduce the model types used in this study. We have included four single-degenerate Chandrasekhar mass (SDCM) models in our simulations (all with Mej $``$ 1.4 M); (1) the normally-luminous deflagration, W7 (0.58 M(56Ni), Nomoto, Thielemann, & Yokoi 1984), (2) the normally-luminous delayed detonation, DD23C (0.60 M(56Ni), Hőflich et al. 1998), (3) the sub-luminous pulsed-delayed detonation, PDD54 (0.17 M(56Ni), Hőflich, Khokhlov & Wheeler 1995), and (4) the super-luminous delayed detonation, W7DT (0.76 M(56Ni), Yamaoka et al. 1992). We have included three variants of the sub-Chandrasekhar mass (SC) scenario; (1) the normally-luminous SC model, HED8 (0.96 M (Mej), 0.51 M(56Ni)), (2) the sub-luminous SC model, HED6 (0.77 M (Mej), 0.26 M(56Ni), Hőflich & Khokhlov 1996), (3) the super-luminous SC model, HECD (1.07 M (Mej), 0.72 M(56Ni) Kumagai & Nomoto 1997). A double degenerate scenario involving the merger of two CO white dwarfs has also been suggested to explain SNe Ia (MERG). We have included three variants of the MERG scenario; DET2, DET2ENV2, and DET2ENV6 (all with 0.62 M(56Ni), and Mej = 1.2, 1.4, 1.8 M). Although the observations of SNe II/Ib also suggest considerable variations within this class, for this study we test only the model, W10HMM. Simulations of gamma-ray and positron transport have been performed for all of these models. Explanations of the simulation algorithms are contained in previous works .

After the SN envelope is transparent to gamma-rays, line fluxes from SNRs reflect the decay rates, which gives the isotopic yield. In addition, the flux levels for Ti44 (1157 keV), Al26 (1809 keV), and Fe60 (1173 keV) remain roughly constant for many years, making young and old SNRs potentially detectable. However, the intensity of the flux is much lower than for prompt emission, so the majority of detectable SNRs will be in the Galaxy. The SN Ia yields used in this work are primarily from deflagration models (Iwamoto et al. 1999), and do not treat the variations within the type Ia class. The SN II/Ib yields are a compilation as summarized by Knodlseder (2000). The r-process isotopic yields (126Sn) are based upon the assumption that the solar abundance of these isotopes has been entirely due to SNe II/Ib occuring at the rate of 1.7 SNe II/Ib per century in the Galaxy (see Ott, these proceedings).

In addition to these gamma-ray lines, we simulate the 511 keV line emission that would be expected from SNRs. For SNe Ia, we assume that 5% of the positrons created in 19% of 56Co decays escape the ejecta (8 x 1052 positrons per SN Ia). For SNe II/Ib, we assume that 100% of 44Ti and 26Al decay positrons (scaled to 0.95 and 0.82 branching ratios, respectively) escape the ejecta. In both cases we make the ad-hoc assumptions that 1) the escaping positrons annihilate on a 105 year timescale, and 2) the annihilation radiation matches that observed from the Galaxy-wide emission (i.e. with 0.58 511 keV photons produced per annihilation (fPs=0.95), and the 511 keV line having a 5 keV FWHM). These assumptions lead to fluxes of 1.2 x 10-4 phot cm-2 s-1 and 3.7 x 10-6 phot cm-2 s-1, respectively, from 1 kpc distant SN Ia and SN II/Ib remnants.

Prompt SN emission has been treated as being emitted by a point source for the various instruments, but for SNR emission the angular sizes of the larger remnants are important. We performed our estimates assuming two extremes. The “extended source” extreme assumes that all of the emission is uniformly distributed throughout the projected optical remnant. We then scaled the sensitivity such that the effective sensitivity scaled as, Extended Sensitivity = Point Source Sensitivity $``$ ( $`\theta _{SNR}`$ / $`\theta _{Det}`$ )1/2, where $`\theta _{SNR}`$ is the angular size of the optical remnant, and $`\theta _{Det}`$ is the angular resolution of the detector. This is the lower limit for the detection of gamma-ray lines used in this work. The “single knot” extreme assumes that all of the emission emanates from a single knot that is smaller than the detector’s angular resolution. This is clearly an upper limit for the detection of gamma-ray lines.

## 3 Compton Telescope Options and Mission Scenarios

NASA’s Gamma-Ray Working Group (GRAPWG) identified the study of nuclear astrophysics and sites of gamma-ray line emission as its highest priority science topic (June 1999), and the development of an Advanced Compton Telescope (ACT) as its highest priority major mission. The GRAPWG has outlined a baseline ACT with a goal of achieving a point source localization accuracy of of $``$ 5’, an energy resolution of $``$ 3 keV (@1 MeV), a FoV of 60 and a broad-line sensitivity of 1 x 10-6 phot cm-2 s-1 (106s, 3$`\sigma `$). The Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) is investigating both germanium and silicon Compton telescope designs, with the intention of exceeding the baseline specifications in both sensitivity and FoV (Kurfess et al. 1999). The advances that will make this improvement possible are: 1) large volume detector arrays which will increase the effective area, 2) excellent spatial and energy resolution from the use of position-sensitive solid-state detectors, and 3) in one mode of analysis, employing two Compton scatters and a third interaction to determine the incoming energy and angle rather than a single scatter and total energy absorption. The current NRL/ACT design will increase the FoV to 120, and improve the broad-line sensitivity to 3 x 10-7 phot cm-2 s-1 (106s, 3$`\sigma `$). The point source localization will be poorer than the baseline, increasing to 30’ -60’ for the weakest sources, but this improves for strong sources. The energy resolution is expected to be $``$ 20 keV.

It is generally accepted that the timescale to construct an ACT capable of meeting either the GRAPWG specifications, or the NRL specifications, will be more than ten years. It has been argued that an “intermediate” instrument needs to be constructed, both to continue to develop the relevant technologies involved with the construction of an ACT, and to provide some data for scientists working in this field. During this meeting Bloser desribed one design of an intermediate ACT, the Medium Energy Gamma-ray Astronomy ACT. We have performed simulations loosely based upon the specifications described for MEGA. Shown in Table 1 are the sensitivities, FoVs, energy and angular resolutions that we assume for the “INTERMEDIATE”, “BASELINE” and “SUPERIOR” ACT concept designs. The accumulation efficiencies depend upon the observing mode. We have allowed for two observing modes for these designs, surveying or Target of Opportunity (ToO). The survey mode assumes that the ACT has been placed in an equatorial orbit. The INTERMEDIATE and SUPERIOR instruments are nearly full-sky, and would be zenith-pointed in survey mode. The BASELINE instrument would alternate between $`b`$=-30, and $`b`$=+30 pointings in survey mode. The accumulation efficiency for these instruments is then the combination of the fraction of the time the SN would be within the FoV and the estimate of roughly 10% dead-time for each instrument. The INTERMEDIATE instrument was alternatively operated in ToO mode, responding to the optical detection of a SN Ia one week pre-peak, or roughly 11 days after the explosion.111Current optical SN searches do not regularly achieve -7d detections. However, it is possible that searches will achieve such early detections by the time an INTERMEDIATE ACT would become operational. The accumulation efficiency in ToO mode was adopted to be 65%, combining the influences of earth-occultation and dead-time.

The length of observation affects whether the SN or SNR will be detectable in a given gamma-ray line. For prompt emission, we assume that the observations continue until 300d after the SN explosion. The survey mode allows the observation of a SN from the time of explosion without requiring the optical detection of the SN! For SNR emission, we assume two year mission lifetimes for the survey mode. For ToO mode (better described as “pointed mode” when observing SNRs), we assume a two month observation. Also shown in Table 1 are the same specifications for the INTEGRAL instruments SPI and IBIS. These instruments would also operate in ToO mode for prompt emission and pointed mode for SNRs. The Vela and RXJ0852-4622 SNRs are scheduled to receive the equivalent of a one month observation in the first two years of the INTEGRAL Core Program.

## 4 SN Science Prospects for Different Intruments

Gamma-ray detection of SNe Ia will be the most basic level of SN science that will be performed with an ACT. Through SN detections we learn about the relative rates of SN Ia sub-classes, the SN Ia rate as a function of galaxy morphological class, and the radial distribution of SNe Ia. All of these studies assume that the gamma-ray observations are coordinated with optical observations. SN searches suffer from the Shaw effect as well as from extinction effects, as highly extincted SNe are less likely to be detected. Gamma-rays are not expected to suffer from these effects and will detect all SNe Ia in a galaxy.

Many SNe need to be detected for the estimated SN rates and distributions to be significant. Shown in the upper panel of Table 2 are the distances and rates at which given SN models could be detected (5$`\sigma `$) via the combined observation of the 812, 847, 1238 & 1562 keV lines. We assume all lines to be detected at the quoted broad-line sensitivity, and account for relative intensity. For each ACT the 56Ni-rich super-luminous SNe Ia will be detected to the largest distances, but the larger SN rate of normally-luminous SNe Ia make them the most frequently sampled sub-class. Sub-luminous SNe Ia will be infrequently detected due to both the under-production of 56Ni and the low SN rate. The INTERMEDIATE ACT would detect 1-2 SNe Ia per year, and would be slightly more efficient at detecting SNe if used as a ToO instrument (but only if the telescope can respond to 100% of nearby SNe Ia more than a week before the optical peak). Regardless of the mode of operation, a rate of a few SNe Ia per year is inadequate to contribute to the study of SN rates. The BASELINE design is more efficient at detecting SNe Ia, detecting roughly 10 per year. The SUPERIOR ACT would detect almost 160 SNe per year, detecting multiple members of each sub-class. We assert that a 5 year sampling of 800 SNe Ia will allow SN rate studies capable of quantifying the biases of optical searches.

For a subset of the detected SNe Ia, the line fluxes will be large enough to generate gamma-ray light curves. This will allow discrimination between the various models suggested to explain each sub-class. The estimated rate (per year) at which a given SN model could be distinguished from alternative models is shown in the lower panel of Table 2. The highest rate for discrimination between SN sub-classes with the INTERMEDIATE instrument (in either mode of operation) is less than one-SN per six years, thus those values are not shown. These discrimination rates assume that the explosion date is known to within $`\pm `$1 days from optical spectra obtained as part of a coordinated study. It is unlikely that a SN will occur near enough for the the INTERMEDIATE instrument to be able to discriminate between explosion scenarios. The BASELINE instrument would be more successful, but would require a multi-year mission to accumulate more than a couple of distinguishable SNe Ia. The SUPERIOR ACT would be capable of distinguishing between the SN models we simulated for about 10 SNe Ia per year. Over a 5 year mission, for perhaps 30 normal SNe Ia, the SDCM and SC explosion scenarios could be distinguished. In addition, multiple SNe from the super- and sub-luminous sub-classes would be distinguishable, especially if the distance to the host galaxy were known. It is clear from these estimates that improved sensitivity and a large FoV are more useful for studying prompt SN emission than are improved angular and energy resolution.

Using estimates of the distance, age, size and SN type of 19 SNRs previously compiled in Milne (2000b) combined with estimates of the isotopic yields and the instrument specifications, we predict which gamma-ray lines will be detected from these SNRs (Table 3). Lines denoted by capital letters would be detected during a 2 year mission, while lines denoted by lower-case letter would require a 5 year mission. Lines encased in parantheses would only be detected if the single-knot approximation is valid. The INTERMEDIATE ACT would primarily be capable of studying positron annihilation radiation from nearby and/or type Ia remnants and of studying 1157 keV emission from young SNRs. The BASELINE and SUPERIOR ACTs would be capable of detecting line emission from a large number of remnants. Note that the Fe60 line would be detectable from up to six remnants with the BASELINE ACT, and from seven remnants with the SUPERIOR ACT. The BASELINE ACT performance would be greatly improved for clumpy emission. The SUPERIOR ACT would even detect emission from SN 1987A.

## 5 Discussion

It should suprise no one that improved specifications from an INTERMEDIATE to a BASELINE to a SUPERIOR ACT lead to predictions of increased scientific capability. This exercise was performed not to demonstrate that the hypothetical SUPERIOR ACT is indeed a better ACT, but to quantify what can be anticipated from three different sets of specifications. The INTERMEDIATE ACT will not be an instrument ideally suited for studies of prompt emission from SNe Ia, but it will advance the understanding of galactic SNRs. It is up to the gamma-ray community to assess whether this level of gamma-ray SN science is important enough to include it as a selling point for an intermediate mission.

Between the BASELINE and the SUPERIOR ACT designs, we have shown that sensitivity and wide FoVs are crucial for high rates of SN detections and discrimination. The SUPERIOR ACT would be a truly breakthrough instrument for SN science, especially when consideration is given for the option of simultaneously using the SUPERIOR ACT in a second mode that accepts total deposition events (and thus improves the energy resolution and angular resolution for brighter objects). We argue that whether or not an intermediate ACT is constructed, the longer-term ACT is what is necessary for rich SN science. This ACT would be capable of studying SN rates, the explosion mechanism of type Ia SNe and the nucleosynthesis and ejecta kinematics in supernova remnants.


text:
# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

The $`hep`$ process in the Sun

$`{}_{}{}^{3}\text{He}+p{}_{}{}^{4}\text{He}+e^++\nu .`$ (1)
produces the highest energy solar neutrinos, $`E_\nu ^{\mathrm{max}}(hep)`$$``$20 MeV. The $`hep`$ neutrinos therefore can influence the interpretation of the results of a recent Super-Kamiokande experiment that have raised many important issues concerning the solar neutrino problem and neutrino oscillations . It is to be noted that the reliable estimation of the $`hep`$ cross section, indispensable for addressing these issues, is a long-standing challenge for nuclear physics . This is mainly because the leading one-body contributions are highly suppressed and furthermore the chiral filter mechanism – which allows us to accurately estimate many-body corrections – is ineffective for this process. For a detailed discussion, see Ref..

The objective of our present work is to obtain a significantly improved estimate of the $`hep`$ rate using effective field theory (EFT). To this end, we adopt a strategy that exploits the known merits of the standard nuclear physics approach (SNPA) and heavy-baryon chiral perturbation theory (HBChPT) simultaneously. HBChPT, a well established low-energy EFT of QCD, is used to calculate the transition operators; all the operators up to next-to-next-to-next-to-leading order (N3LO) will be considered. The evaluation of the corresponding nuclear matrix elements requires highly accurate nuclear wave functions. Although it is, at least in principle, possible to derive from HBChPT nuclear wave functions to a specified chiral order, we choose not to do so. Instead, we use realistic wave functions obtained in SNPA. The power of the proposed scheme is the ability to correlate the beta decay processes in the $`A=2,3,4`$ nuclei. Thus, as explained in more detail below, if the single unknown constant in our EFT is fixed using one of these processes, then we can make totally parameter-free predictions for the remaining processes.

## 2 Theory and Results

The $`hep`$ process is dominated by the Gamow-Teller (GT) transition, and hence the reliability of the $`hep`$ rate estimate is essentially governed by precision with which one can calculate the GT amplitude. According to the chiral counting rule , the leading order contributions are due to the well-known one-body (1B) operators, and the first corrections arise from N3LO two-body (2B) currents that are suppressed by $`(Q/\mathrm{\Lambda }_\chi )^3`$ compared to the 1B. Here $`Q`$ stands for the typical three-momentum scale and/or the pion mass, and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_\chi 1\text{GeV}`$ is the chiral scale. As stated, we consider here all the contributions up to N3LO. It is worth emphasizing that three-body currents, which are N4LO, can be legitimately ignored in our N3LO calculation.

The N3LO 2B currents consist of the one-pion-exchange (OPE) and nucleon-nucleon contact-term (CT) parts, $`𝐀_{2\mathrm{B}}=𝐀_{2\mathrm{B}}(\text{OPE})+𝐀_{2\mathrm{B}}(\text{CT}).`$ With the low-energy constants fixed from $`\pi N`$ data , the OPE part is completely determined. On the other hand, the CT part contains one parameter, $`\widehat{d}^R`$, whose direct evaluation from QCD is not available at present. Fortunately, it turns out that tritium $`\beta `$-decay, $`\mu `$-d capture and $`\nu `$$`d`$ scattering are sensitive to the same parameter, $`\widehat{d}^R`$, and that they do not depend on any additional parameters up to N3LO. Thus, any of these processes can give the renormalization condition to fix the value of $`\widehat{d}^R`$. Here we choose to use the tritium $`\beta `$-decay rate, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\beta `$, which is accurately known experimentally . Once $`\widehat{d}^R`$ is fixed, our calculation involves no unknown parameters.

We calculate the matrix elements of the transition operators with state-of-the-art realistic nuclear wave functions. We employ the correlated-hyperspherical-harmonics (CHH) wave functions, obtained with the Argonne $`v_{18}`$ (Av18) potential (supplemented with the Urbana-IX three-nucleon potential for the $`A3`$ nuclei) . To control short-range physics in a consistent manner, we apply the regulator

$`S_\mathrm{\Lambda }(q^2)=\mathrm{exp}\left({\displaystyle \frac{q^2}{2\mathrm{\Lambda }^2}}\right).`$ (2)
to all the nuclear systems in question. The cutoff parameter $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ characterizes the energy-momentum scale of our EFT.

The value of $`\widehat{d}^R`$ determined from the experimental value of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\beta `$ is $`\widehat{d}^R=(1.00\pm 0.07,1.78\pm 0.08,3.90\pm 0.10)`$. Here and hereafter, parenthesized three numbers correspond to the three choices of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ = 500, 600 and 800 MeV, in this order. To see the role of the $`\widehat{d}^R`$-term, it is informative to look at $`\delta _{2\mathrm{B}}`$, the ratio of the 2B matrix element to that of 1B. With only the OPE part taken into account, we have $`\delta _{2\mathrm{B}}^{\mathrm{OPE}}=(1.1,1.5,2.0)`$. The inclusion of the $`\widehat{d}^R`$ term leads to $`\delta _{2\mathrm{B}}^{\mathrm{N3LO}}=\delta _{2\mathrm{B}}^{\mathrm{OPE}+\mathrm{CT}}=(0.60,0.64,0.73)`$. Thus the $`\widehat{d}^R`$-term drastically reduces the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$-dependence of the 2B contribution; we see only $``$10 % variation for the entire range of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ under study. The $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$-dependence in the total GT amplitude becomes more pronounced due to a strong cancellation between the 1B and 2B terms, but this amplified $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$-dependence still remains within acceptable levels.

In addition to the $`{}_{}{}^{3}S_{1}^{}`$ contributions governed by the GT amplitude, there are also tiny $`{}_{}{}^{1}S_{0}^{}`$ and sizable $`P`$-wave contributions. The latter have little $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$-dependence ($`<2`$ %), and responsible for about one-third of the total $`S`$ factor. Adding all the contributions, the $`S`$-factor at threshold reads

$`S(hep)=(8.6\pm 1.3)\times 10^{20}\text{ keV-b},`$ (3)
where the “error” spans the range of the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$-dependence for $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ = 500–800 MeV. This result is to be compared to the latest SNPA estimate in Ref. : $`S=9.64\times 10^{20}\text{ keV-b}`$.

## 3 Discussion

By determining the only parameter of the theory, $`\widehat{d}^R`$, from the experimental data on triton beta decay, we have succeeded in estimating the $`hep`$ S-factor in a parameter-free and error-controlled manner. Our HBChPT calculation (up to N3LO) gives a much more accurate estimate than hitherto available. The EFT results turn out to give support to those obtained in the latest SNPA calculation .

To decrease the uncertainty in Eq.(3), we need to reduce the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$-dependence in the two-body GT term. According to a general tenet of EFT, the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$-dependence should diminish when higher order terms are included. A preliminary study indicates that it is indeed possible to reduce the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$-dependence significantly by including N4LO corrections. In this connection, we remark that the $`hen`$ process, $`{}_{}{}^{3}\text{He}+n{}_{}{}^{4}\text{He}+\gamma `$, seems very interesting to look into. The $`hen`$ process shares many features with the $`hep`$ including the suppression of the 1B matrix element and the structure of the many-body currents. Accurate experimental data are available for the $`hen`$ cross sections, but so far no theoretical calculations have succeeded in explaining the data quantitatively. Thus applying the same EFT technique to the $`hen`$ process  is very interesting, and that will also provide a useful check of the formalism employed in our estimation of $`S(hep)`$.


text:
# Coordinated Slowing of Metabolism in Enteric Bacteria under Nitrogen Limitation: A Perspective

## Abstract

It is natural to ask how bacteria coordinate metabolism when depletion of an essential nutrient limits their growth, and they must slow their entire rate of biosynthesis. A major nutrient with a fluctuating abundance is nitrogen. The growth rate of enteric bacteria under nitrogen-limiting conditions is known to correlate with the internal concentration of free glutamine, the glutamine pool. Here we compare the patterns of utilization of L-glutamine and L-glutamate, the two central intermediates of nitrogen metabolism. Monomeric precursors of all of the cell’s macromolecules – proteins, nucleic acids, and surface polymers – require the amide group of glutamine at the first dedicated step of biosynthesis. This is the case even though only a minority ($``$12%) of total cell nitrogen derives from glutamine. In contrast, the amino group of glutamate, which provides the remainder of cell nitrogen, is generally required late in biosynthetic pathways, e.g. in transaminase reactions for amino acid synthesis. We propose that the pattern of glutamine dependence coordinates the decrease in biosynthesis under conditions of nitrogen limitation. Hence, the glutamine pool plays a global regulatory role in the cell.

INTRODUCTION

Enteric bacteria are notable for their varying environment. Within a host they can experience conditions of high nutrient availability, high osmolarity, and high toxicity; outside a host, they can encounter the opposite. Evolution has adapted enteric bacteria to grow and divide, albeit at different rates, under both conditions. One can reasonably ask “How does the metabolism of these bacteria remain in balance under such different conditions?” Here we consider this question in relation to the response of E. coli and S. typhimurium to nitrogen availability.

We chose to consider nitrogen metabolism for several reasons. First, central metabolism of nitrogen is well studied and is relatively simple compared to carbon metabolism: there are only two central intermediates in nitrogen metabolism, the amino acids glutamate and glutamine, and these are synthesized from a single precursor, 2-oxoglutarate. In contrast, carbon metabolism entails the synthesis of 12 central intermediates. Second, all assimilated nitrogen is used for biosynthesis, so it is not necessary to consider storage forms or waste products. Finally, enteric bacteria have a strong nitrogen starvation response. It appears that transcription of up to 2% of the E. coli genome is activated by nitrogen regulatory protein C (NtrC) .

Enteric bacteria assimilate inorganic NH3 into organic molecules by two means. In the reaction catalyzed by biosynthetic glutamate dehydrogenase, NH3 is assimilated directly into glutamate. In the reactions of the glutamine synthase/glutamate synthase (GS/GOGAT) cycle, which is widely present in prokaryotes, NH3 is assimilated first into glutamine and then into glutamate (Fig. 1). Under nitrogen-limited growth conditions, the major assimilatory pathway is the glutamine synthase/glutamate synthase (GS/GOGAT) cycle . If one traces biosynthetic nitrogen back to its last appearance in one of the two central intermediates, then only $`12\%`$ of cellular nitrogen derives from glutamine. The remainder comes from glutamate . Nevertheless, enteric bacteria appear to perceive external nitrogen limitation as internal glutamine limitation . For a variety of nitrogen-limiting conditions, the growth rate of enterobacteria was found to correlate with the glutamine pool, which dropped by a factor of 10 or more. The glutamate pool remained high.

Motivated by the above observations, we explored whether the metabolic uses of glutamine might be better suited than those of glutamate to slowing biosynthesis in a coordinated manner. It is remarkable that glutamine is required at the first dedicated step in the biosynthesis of many of the cell’s major biosynthetic monomers: amino acids, purines and pyrimidines, and UDP-GlcNAc, a precursor of the cell-surface polymers murein and lipopolysaccharide. We consider the consequences of this pattern of glutamine utilization and propose that the uses of glutamine in metabolism, coupled to the drop in the glutamine pool, may be important in maintaining homeostasis under nitrogen-limiting conditions.

METHODS

To compare patterns of glutamine and glutamate utilization in metabolism, we made use of the following sources: Escherichia coli and Salmonella typhimurium edited by Neidhardt , and references contained therein; The Enzymes of Glutamine Metabolism edited by Prusiner and Stadtman ; and The Amidotransferases by Zalkin . We made extensive use of original literature, particularly for $`K_m`$ values for the enzymes of glutamine and glutamate metabolism (Tables 1 and 2). Because these apparent $`K_m`$ values – concentrations required for half-maximal velocity – were measured in vitro under a variety of conditions, they can be regarded as only approximate guides to in vivo properties of the enzymes. Two easily accessible Web databases and portals that we utilized are EcoCyc, a database of metabolic pathways in E. coli (http://ecocyc.pangeasystems.com/ecocyc/), and KEGG, a database of metabolic pathways for a collection of organisms
(http://www.genome.ad.jp/kegg/).

RESULTS

Glutamine and glutamate play different roles in biosynthesis. (i) Though the source of only 12% of cell nitrogen, the amide group of glutamine is required directly for the biosynthesis of monomeric units of all macromolecules (proteins, nucleic acids, and surface polymers). (ii) With the exception of the histidine biosynthetic pathway, glutamine is required at the first dedicated step of every pathway in which it is utilized. By contrast, glutamate is required more often than not at the end or in the middle of pathways. (iii) Glutamine-dependent reactions are generally coupled to ATP hydrolysis, and hence are essentially irreversible. More than half of the reactions involving glutamate are reversible transaminase reactions.

We first consider the utilization of glutamine. The enzymes of glutamine metabolism are listed in Table 1, along with their $`K_m`$ values for glutamine. Co-reactants for these enzymes and the conventional pathway designations are also listed. The $`K_m`$ values for glutamine of the enzymes fall in the range 0.2 - 1.7 mM. The glutamine pool concentration of S. typhimurium dropped from approximately 3-4 mM on ammonia, the optimal nitrogen source, to $`<0.3`$ mM on growth-rate-limiting nitrogen sources, or in continuous culture with ammonia as the limiting nutrient. Comparison of pool sizes to $`K_m`$ values provides evidence that the velocities of many enzymes that utilize glutamine fall below half-maximal under nitrogen-limiting conditions. The fluxes in the corresponding biosynthetic pathways will be concomitantly reduced.

Figures 2-7 diagram the biosynthetic pathways that require glutamine. Glutamine is required directly for the biosynthesis of all of the major macromolecules of the cell: proteins (via the amino acids tryptophan, histidine, arginine, and glutamine itself), nucleic acids (via purines and pyrimidines), and cell-surface polymers (via glucosamine). Glutamine is also required for the biosynthesis of the cofactor folic acid. In all of these cases, glutamine acts as a “nitrogen carrier”, losing its amide group and hence yielding glutamate as an immediate product.

In all but one case, the glutamine-dependent reaction is the first dedicated step in a biosynthetic pathway or the first dedicated step in synthesis of a parent compound of the pathway (e.g. carbamyl phosphate for the arginine and pyrimidine pathways). For example, as shown in Fig. 2, glutamine is a substrate for the first reaction unique to tryptophan biosynthesis. The other substrate, chorismate, is a precursor for many other aromatic compounds. Likewise, glutamine is required at the first dedicated step in purine biosynthesis. For this reaction, the other substrate, phosphoribosyl pyrophosphate (PRPP), is a common precursor for several pathways, including the histidine, tryptophan, and pyrimidine biosynthetic pathways. The fourth dedicated step of purine biosynthesis also requires glutamine, as does the biosynthesis of guanosine monophosphate (GMP) from xanthosine monophosphate (XMP).

Figure 4 shows the glutamine-dependent steps in the pyrimidine pathway. Glutamine is required for the biosynthesis of carbamyl phosphate. The latter is a parent compound for both the pyrimidines and for arginine. Glutamine is also required in the pyrimidine pathway at the final step from UTP to CTP.

The major intermediate in the biosynthesis of surface polymers is the compound UDP-GlcNAc. Initiation of the synthesis of peptidoglycan (murein), lipid A, O antigen, and enterobacterial common antigen all require UDP-GlcNAc . As shown in Fig. 5, the synthesis of UDP-GlcNAc requires the amino sugar D-glucosamine 6-phosphate, which is a product of glutamine and the central metabolite D-fructose 6-phosphate . Hence, glutamine is required at the first dedicated step in the biosynthesis of the cell-surface polymers.

Glutamine is also required for the biosynthesis of the folic-acid family of coenzymes. As shown in Fig. 6, glutamine enters at the first dedicated step of the folic-acid pathway. The other substrate is the common precursor chorismate.

The utilization of glutamine in histidine biosynthesis breaks with the above pattern. As shown in Fig. 7, glutamine is required at the fifth step of the dedicated histidine pathway. The enzyme which catalyzes this reaction has a $`K_m`$ for glutamine of 0.24 mM, the lowest of the enzymes of glutamine metabolism. This is below the concentration of glutamine measured by Ikeda et al. Therefore, the velocity of this reaction may not depend strongly on glutamine in the range of nitrogen limitation studied.

Finally, the amino acid asparagine is synthesized directly from glutamine, aspartate, and ATP. There is also an enzyme aspartate-ammonia ligase in E. coli that utilizes NH3 in place of glutamine to synthesize asparagine. However, strains lacking the glutamine-dependent enzyme asnB cannot grow in nitrogen-limited media .

We consider now the utilization of glutamate. The enzymes of glutamate metabolism are listed in Table 2. They are divided into two classes: transaminase reactions and all others. The co-reactants and pathways are listed, along with the $`K_m`$ values for glutamate of the enzymes where available. Most of the measured $`K_m`$ values for glutamate are roughly 10 times as large as those for glutamine. This is consistent with the observation that the glutamate pool stays fixed in the range 15-25 mM, approximately 6 times larger than the glutamine pool of 3-4 mM under unlimited nitrogen .

In all the transaminase reactions, glutamate loses its amine group yielding 2-oxoglutarate as one product. For these reactions, glutamate plays the role of a nitrogen carrier, similar to the role played by glutamine. In contrast, the entire glutamate molecule is assimilated in the non-transaminase reactions.

In the interests of space, we have chosen to show only a few characteristic examples of metabolic pathways involving glutamate. Figure 8 shows the tyrosine pathway, starting from the common precursor chorismate. The reaction involving glutamate is a reversible transaminase reaction and occurs at the final step of the pathway. As shown in Table 2, there are twelve other pathways in which glutamate is involved via a transaminase reaction. In nine of the twelve, the glutamate dependent step is later than the first dedicated step of the pathway. The cases in which glutamate is required for the first dedicated step are the aspartate pathway and the valine pathways, both of which are one-step pathways from common precursors, and the enterobacterial common antigen (ECA) pathway. In the ECA pathway, the co-substrate with glutamate, dTDP-4-dehydro-6-deoxy-D-glucose, is also an intermediate in the biosynthesis of rhamnose, a common constituent of gram-negative O-antigens .

Figure 9 shows the arginine pathway. Glutamate is the precursor compound and is also required for a transaminase reaction at the fourth step. Ornithine, an intermediate product in the arginine pathway, is also a precursor for the polyamines putrescine and spermidine .

As shown in Table 2, glutamate is required in seven non-transaminase reactions. Of these, the two in the folic-acid pathway occur later than the first dedicated step of the pathway. In contrast to the transaminase reactions, five of the non-transaminase reactions are coupled to ATP hydrolysis, and hence are expected to be irreversible in the cell.

Essentially all nitrogen in cell products derives ultimately from glutamine or glutamate. For example, amino groups of amino acids not listed in Table 2 still come indirectly from glutamate. Specifically, aspartate and serine provide nitrogens in the synthesis of several other amino acids, and their nitrogens are derived from glutamate. Unlike the reversible transaminase reactions involving glutamate, the amino-acid biosynthetic reactions involving aspartate or serine are either coupled to hydrolysis of ATP, or involve incorporation of the entire amino-acid molecule into the final product.

DISCUSSION

Several aspects of glutamine utilization appear to suit it to a general metabolic regulatory role. While the amide group of glutamine donates only 12% of cellular nitrogen (with the remainder derived from glutamate), glutamine dependent monomers are required to initiate the syntheses of the cell’s macromolecules. Primary depletion of the free pool of glutamine under nitrogen-limiting conditions would therefore presumably slow fluxes into a number of biosynthetic pathways simultaneously. As a consequence of glutamine dependence at the first dedicated step in these pathways, no useless and/or toxic intermediates would accumulate. Instead, any accumulation would be of precursors for the pathways, i.e. substrates for their first enzymatic steps. These are substances like chorismate, PRPP, D-fructose 6-P, and HCO$`{}_{}{}^{}{}_{3}{}^{}`$, which are common precursors for several pathways and are readily converted into other central metabolites (e.g. ribose 5-P and ATP from PRPP). In addition, many of the glutamine-utilizing reactions are essentially irreversible because they are coupled to hydrolysis of ATP. Thus, these reactions cannot reverse to refill a glutamine pool depleted by a decrease in ammonia assimilation. Glutamine product pools can therefore be maintained high – thus preventing product starvation responses – even in the presence of a depleted glutamine pool. Finally, maintenance of a high glutamate pool under nitrogen-limiting conditions would insure that synthesis of biosynthetic monomers, once initiated, would be completed. There are transaminase-type reactions in both the purine and arginine pathways that utilize the amino group of aspartate rather than that of glutamate. All these reactions are coupled to hydrolysis of ATP or GTP, thus also assuring completion of monomer synthesis.

By contrast, if depletion of the glutamate pool were the primary consequence of decreased ammonia assimilation, the result would be the accumulation of useless and/or toxic intermediates in many biosynthetic pathways, e.g. folic-acid, histidine, iso-leucine, and lysine pathways. The presence of excess glutamine under these conditions would exacerbate the accumulation of such intermediates in pathways initiating with glutamine, e.g. the intermediate 7,8-dihydropteroate and its precursors in the folic-acid pathway. Moreover, the reversibility of the transaminase reactions utilizing glutamate would tend to replenish a depleted glutamate pool and would carry down the pools of its products. A drop in product pools would induce product starvation responses, including upregulation of enzymes metabolizing glutamate, resulting in a futile tug-of-war with overexpressed enzymes competing for the depleted glutamate pool.

If the free pool of glutamine does indeed regulate biosynthetic fluxes, we believe it is critical to determine as directly as possible which pool or pools of glutamine-derived products are, like the pool of glutamine itself, actually depleted under nitrogen-limiting conditions. It is these secondary depleted pools which will directly limit the growth of the cell. Knowledge of which glutamine-product pools are depleted will give insight into the mechanisms the cell has adopted for slowing growth without disrupting, for example, the expression of proteins responsible for nitrogen assimilation. (The $`K_m`$ value for glutamine of glutaminyl-tRNA synthetase is measured to be 0.15-0.21 mM , well below the glutamine concentrations measured for slow-growing cells , so direct glutamine-dependent slowing of protein synthesis can be discounted as a primary cause of slow growth.)

At least one glutamine-product pool must become depleted under nitrogen limitation or there would be no slowing of growth. However, it is unclear whether glutamine depletion propagates into depletion of multiple product pools, or into depletion of just a single product pool. The depletion of multiple product pools would provide a simple functional explanation for why so many biosynthetic pathways depend on glutamine. Moreover, a slowing of growth by depletion of multiple pools would likely be robust to fluctuations in product pool sizes.

If only a single glutamine-product pool is depleted, the slowing of growth would result in reduced demand for other cell products and, potentially, large and measurable increases in other product pools. In this scenario, the widespread dependence of biosynthesis on glutamine would function to reduce these accumulations by directly reducing biosynthetic rates. Insofar as growth rate is limited by the overall rate of nitrogen assimilation, no obvious growth advantage would accrue from a mutation to increase the pool of the one depleted product.

Nucleotides and Nucleic Acids – Glutamine is a substrate for the first enzymatic steps in synthesis of ATP, GTP, UTP, and CTP. A significant drop in the pool concentrations of these nucleotides would presumably decrease rates of synthesis of both RNA and DNA. A global decrease in $`m`$RNA synthesis might, in turn, decrease protein synthesis. However, genes of the nitrogen-starvation response are known to be upregulated under nitrogen limitation , and would have to escape such a global decrease in $`m`$RNA synthesis. ATP and GTP are widely employed by the cell as energy carriers, so a significant drop in their pools would have a widespread effect on metabolic rates. CTP, which is a direct glutamine-product from UTP (Fig. 4), is also required in the biosynthesis of phospholipids  and coenzyme A .

Cell-surface polymers – Similar to its role in nucleotide synthesis, glutamine is required for synthesis of glucosamine from the common precursor D-fructose 6-P (Fig. 5). Glucosamine is the substrate for synthesis of UDP-GlcNAc and UDP-MurNAc (Fig. 10). The latter is used to initiate synthesis of the repeating unit of the osmotically-resistant layer of the cell envelope, murein . UDP-GlcNAc is also used to initiate synthesis of two of the three portions of the lipopolysaccharide (LPS) component of the outer membrane, the lipid A and core portions . The biosynthesis of lipid A begins with the fatty acylation of UDP-GlcNAc and later the core region is assembled using lipid A as a substrate. In E. coli, UDP-GlcNAc is also required to initiate synthesis of the third portion of LPS, the O-antigen. UDP-galactose is used in place of UDP-GlcNAc in O-antigen synthesis in S. typhimurium. Finally, as shown in Fig. 11, UDP-GlcNAc is used to initiate synthesis of the trisaccharide repeating unit of the enterobacterial common antigen (ECA), a glycolipid found in the outer membrane of enterobacteriaceae . Depletion of glucosamine under nitrogen limitation would therefore potentially impact synthesis rates of the entire suite of cell-surface polymers.

Amino acids and proteins – In comparison to the above, the roles of glutamine in synthesis of the amino acids tryptophan, histidine, arginine, and asparagine are less clear-cut, both in terms of the positions of the glutamine-dependent reactions in their biosynthetic pathways and in terms of the potential effects of depletion of these amino acids on growth. Although glutamine is required to initiate synthesis of tryptophan and is required for the synthesis of asparagine from aspartate, glutamine is utilized later in the arginine and histidine biosynthetic pathways. Given that ornithine, the co-substrate of the glutamine-dependent (or more specifically carbamyl phosphate-dependent) reaction in the arginine biosynthetic pathway (Fig. 9), is also a precursor of polyamines, the position of the glutamine-dependent reaction can be rationalized. As noted in Results, this is not the case for the histidine pathway, where glutamine is required at the fifth dedicated step (Fig. 7). However, the enzyme involved in histidine synthesis, imidazole glycerol-p synthase, has an unusually low $`K_m`$ (0.24mM) for glutamine, suggesting that this reaction is driven to completion even under nitrogen-limited conditions.

Although depletion of the tryptophan, histidine, arginine, and asparagine pools could certainly slow the rate of elongation of proteins, it would not be expected to slow their rate of initiation. Depletion of amino-acid pools therefore runs the risk of stalling protein elongation in the midst of synthesis. Interestingly, a requirement for glutamine by the enzyme that catalyzes the first committed step in folate biosynthesis might indirectly affect initiation of protein synthesis. This enzyme, aminodeoxychorismate synthase, has an unusually high $`K_m`$ (1.6mM) for glutamine (Table 1) so that flux into this pathway will be strongly reduced following glutamine depletion. The co-factor, folate, is required for one-carbon transfer reactions and hence is essential for both the synthesis of methionine and for the formylation of methionine that allows it to serve in the first step of protein synthesis. Though not in the context of nitrogen limitation, the possibility that initiation of translation may be modulated by the folate pool has been noted by Gold .

As outlined above, primary glutamine depletion is expected to translate into secondary depletion of pools of one or more glutamine products. Under conditions of depletion, the specific regulatory systems for many of these product pathways (e.g. tryptophan and histidine) are known to increase activity and synthesis of pathway enzymes. Increased synthesis of these enzymes due to depletion of product pools would consume already scarce nitrogen without benefit and would result in a futile tug-of-war between specific regulatory mechanisms and our postulated general metabolic regulatory role for glutamine. Recent data from DNA microarrays indicate that transcription of the tryptophan and histidine biosynthetic operons is, in fact, slightly repressed under nitrogen-limiting conditions, and hence that this tug-of-war does not occur. For product pools that rise under nitrogen limitation, repression of enzyme expression is expected. For the specific product pools that deplete under nitrogen limitation, the regulatory mechanisms may be designed to avoid upregulation of enzymes under this condition. Interestingly, Rose and Yanofsky  described an uncharacterized “override mechanism” that allows repression of the tryptophan operon under conditions of slow growth, even when tryptophan pools are low.

To conclude, measurement of pools of glutamine products will shed light on how cellular homeostasis is maintained under nitrogen limitation. Comparative measurements between pool sizes under maximal and slow growth conditions, rather than absolute measurements, will suffice for this purpose. Bioassays may therefore be appropriate to measure relative pools of, e.g. folates , and other products for which absolute assays are not practical.

We acknowledge valuable conversations with W. van Heeswijk, J. Ingraham, R. A. Lewis, R. Simon, and D. Zimmer.

Abbreviations used:
AICAR – aminoimidazole carboxamide ribonucleotide,
C55-P – undecaprenyl monophosphate,
CoA – coenzyme A,
ECA – enterobacterial common antigen,
FGAM – 5’-phosphoribosyl-N-formylglycinamidine,
FGAR – 5’-phosphoribosyl-N-formylglycinamide,
Fuc4NAc – 4-acetamido-4,6-dideoxy-D-galactose,
GlcNAc – N-acetyl-D-glucosamine,
LPS – lipopolysaccharide,
ManNAcA – N-acetyl-D-mannosaminuronic acid,
MurNAc – N-acetyl-D-muramic acid,
PRFAR – phosphoribulosylformimino-AICAR-P,
PRPP – phosphoribosyl pyrophosphate,
THF – tetrahydrofolate,
THF(glu)n – folylpolyglutamate,
XMP – xanthosine monophosphate


text:
# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

Measurements of high energy exclusive production of $`J/\psi `$ meson in photon-proton collisions serve as an important testing ground to quantify the “hard” physics of pQCD in the limit of a small scaling variable $`x`$. A process is considered to be “hard” if a large momentum scale is involved, so that the leading contribution of the hadronic fluctuation of the photon is a small perturbative $`q\overline{q}`$ pair. This large momentum scale may be a heavy quark mass, large virtuality of the photon $`Q^2`$ or large four momentum transfer squared at the proton vertex ($`t`$). For the diffractive photoproduction of $`J/\psi `$ this hard scale is provided by the charm quark mass. In our recent letter  we presented a screened model which yielded impressive agreement with the rich experimental data on high energy $`J/\psi `$ photoproduction. The model includes contributions of the off diagonal (skewed) gluon distributions , as well as the real part of the production amplitude. In addition, we addressed the issue of Fermi motion of the heavy quark within the quarkonium system , which provides further suppression of the final cross section. We argued that on one hand this effect is sensitive to the charm quark mass, while on the other hand, in the relevant kinematical region of the experimental data, it has a rather mild energy dependence. An obvious conclusion of the above argument is that with the current theoretical uncertainties regarding the Fermi motion suppression, the benefits resulting from a phenomenological model would be rather small. The correction due to Fermi motion has been estimated as an overall suppression factor of approximately 30%.

In the present work, we present an analysis for the $`t`$ dependence of the $`J/\psi `$ differential cross section which is compatible with our recent investigation of the integrated cross section. To compare with the experimental data we need to know $`B`$ \- the $`J/\psi `$ forward slope of the differential cross section. In  we assumed a weak dependence of $`B`$ on $`x`$, which was calculated by averaging the square of the impact parameter $`b`$, using our screening correction (SC) formalism . This input assumption is not sufficient for a detailed $`t`$ dependence study of $`J/\psi `$ differential cross sections as the presently available preliminary experimental data on $`B`$  show a steeper energy dependence than our prediction. The goals of the present improved version of our model are, thus, to reproduce the value as well as the energy dependence of $`B`$ while maintaining the quality of the results achieved in .

In our previous study, a $`b`$-space Gaussian was assumed for $`S(b)`$, the gluon ladder-proton non perturbative form factor . After a careful check, it appears that the integrated cross sections  and nucleon structure function  are not sensitive to the choice of $`S(b)`$. The impact parameter dependence plays an important role, when calculating screening corrections to heavy nuclei structure functions, where a Wood-Saxon like  profile function has been used , or for the $`J/\psi `$ differential photoproduction cross sections  which is the main goal of the present study. As we shall demonstrate, the experimental data  for the forward differential cross section slope can be well reproduced with the observation that the energy dependence of $`B`$ is sensitive to the choice of $`S(b)`$. It appears that the Fourier transform of the dipole electromagnetic form factor, is the preferred profile for estimating the screening corrections to $`B`$.

The momentum transfer $`t`$ at the proton vertex controls the size of the interacting system, which emits the gluon ladder. The $`t`$ dependence of hard processes can, thus, be separated into three kinematical zones. The low $`|t|`$ region, where the transverse size of the interacting system is of the order of $`1/Q_0`$, where $`Q_0^2`$ is the input scale for the DGLAP evolution ($`Q_0^21\text{GeV}^2`$). This region, in which $`0<|t|<Q_0^2`$, has been explored experimentally, mainly via elastic processes . The hard scale in this region is determined by the c-quark mass $`m_c^2M_{J/\psi }^2/4`$. The second region is the intermediate region $`Q_0^2<|t|<M_\psi ^2`$. We suggest that the physics of this region is similar to the physics of the small $`|t|`$ region, i.e.the process is still dominated by large logarithms due to momentum integration over loops in the ordered gluon ladder. However, the scale of the initial conditions of the DGLAP evolution is determined by $`t`$, as it becomes of comparable size to $`Q_0^2`$. More specifically, the process is dominated by $`\mathrm{log}(M_{J/\psi }^2/t)`$. In the intermediate region, the vector meson is produced mostly quasi elastically, while the proton dissociates into a diffractive mass. Note that the diffractive $`t`$ slope is considerably smaller than the elastic one. In the present study we compare our calculations in this region with preliminary experimental data which were read off figures given in Refs. . As $`|t|`$ increases, the hard process behavior is dominated by the value of $`|t|`$, the $`|t|`$ dependence is inverted  and the momenta on the gluon ladder are no longer strongly ordered. Consequently, predictions for the cross section cannot be described using conventional DGLAP evolution. This third region of large $`|t|`$ has not been explored experimentally.

These three regions of $`|t|`$ were first discussed in  by Forshaw and Ryskin and by Bartels, Forshaw, Lotter and Wuesthoff in the framework of the BFKL equation , where it was stated that each of the above regions corresponds to different physics. In a later publication , a BFKL calculation of vector meson production, and in particular of $`J/\psi `$ production, was presented and a good description of experimental data was obtained.

In this paper, we suggest a description of the second kinematic region of intermediate $`|t|`$ ($`Q_0^2<|t|<M_\psi ^2`$) using the DGLAP  approach, this yields simple and transparent formulae which have explicit matching to the region of small $`|t|`$.

Our paper is organized as follows: in section 2 we calculate the forward slope for different profiles and compare with the experimental data. In sections 3 and 4 we calculate the differential cross sections for exclusive $`J/\psi `$ production both in the elastic and the inelastic channels, respectively. Our conclusions are given in section 5.

## 2 Forward Slope for Differential Cross Section

In this section we calculate the $`B`$-slope for $`J/\psi `$ production, including screening corrections for up to one extra gluon emission. Our formalism for calculating the screening corrections  is based on the iteration of the non-linear evolution equation  for the imaginary part of the elastic amplitude for a dipole to scatter off a hadron target, which is valid in the whole kinematic region, including the low $`x`$ region .

The interaction of a dipole with the target is realized through an exchange of gluons. In the target rest frame, one can use Gribov’s factorization in the context of a dipole-nucleon interaction: a dipole emits a soft gluon which develops into a ladder by successive emissions of small $`x`$ gluons. Subsequently, the gluon ladder interacts with the target. At high energies, the transverse size of an interacting dipole does not change during the QCD interaction, and therefore dipoles are good degrees of freedom. In the limit of large number of colors, a leading logarithmic soft gluon wave function is equivalent to a dipole wave function, and thus, the interaction between a dipole and a target can be treated as a process which is subsequent to a transition of a dipole into two dipoles. Consider a decay of a dipole with transverse size $`r_{}`$ into two dipoles as shown in Fig. 1. The probability for this decay is given by the square of the wave function of the dipole. At large $`N_c`$ one can view this decay as an emission of a zero transverse size gluon. In this framework, the cross section for the virtual photon-nucleon interaction is written as

$$\sigma _{tot}(\gamma ^{}p)=d^2r_{}𝑑z\left|\mathrm{\Psi }^\gamma ^{}(Q^2;r_{},z)\right|^2\sigma _{dipole}(r_{},z)$$
(1)
where the wave functions of the virtual photon are well known, in particular the transverse wave function is given by the Bessel function $`K_1`$. In our model, the dipole-nucleon cross section consists of two contributions:

1. The first, denoted $`\widehat{\sigma }^q(r_{})`$, is the percolation of a $`q\overline{q}`$ pair through the target, without taking into account the extra gluon, and it is calculated using a multi gluon ladder exchange. This contribution can be expressed as a product of the dipole wave function and the cross section for the dipole to scatter off the nucleon. In impact parameter space, $`\widehat{\sigma }^q`$ can be written in the form

$$\widehat{\sigma }^q(r_{})d^2b_{}d^2r_{}K_1(\overline{Q}r_{})\left(1e^{\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{\Omega }_q}\right),$$
(2)
where $`\overline{Q}=(Q^2+M_\psi ^2)/4`$, $`x=(Q^2+M_\psi ^2)/W^2`$ and the opacity $`\mathrm{\Omega }_q=\mathrm{\Omega }_q(b,r_{},x)`$ is defined as

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_q=\mathrm{\Omega }_q(b,r_{},x)=\frac{\pi ^2}{3}r_{}^2\alpha _\mathrm{s}\left(\frac{4}{r_{}^2}\right)xG(x,\frac{4}{r_{}^2})S(b_{}).$$
(3)
The $`b_{}`$ dependence of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_q`$ is expressed through the profile function $`S(b_{})`$, which we shall discuss later. Note that the argument of the Bessel function should be $`ar_{}`$, where $`a^2=z(1z)Q^2+M_\mathrm{\Psi }^2/4`$, however, for heavy quarks, we use the approximation $`z=\frac{1}{2}`$.
2. For the second contribution, denoted $`\widehat{\sigma }^g(r_{})`$ below, we consider an additional gluon in the hadronic state which percolates through the target. We assume that the parent dipole whose transverse size is $`r_{}`$, is larger than the produced dipole whose transverse size is $`\rho _{}`$ (see Fig. 1). The second contribution can be written in the form :

$$\widehat{\sigma }^g(r_{})d^2b_{}d^2r_{}K_1(\overline{Q}r_{})\frac{C_F}{\pi ^2}\alpha _\mathrm{s}r_{}^2\frac{dx}{x}_{\rho _{}>r_{}}\frac{d^2\rho _{}}{\rho _{}^4}\left(1e^{\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{\Omega }_g}\right),$$
(4)
with $`\mathrm{\Omega }_g(b,r_{},x)=\frac{9}{4}\mathrm{\Omega }_q(b,r_{},x)`$.

The forward slope $`B`$ is given by :

$$B=\frac{1}{2}b_{}^2=\frac{b_{}^2𝑑b_{}^2S(b_{})}{2𝑑b_{}^2S(b_{})},$$
(5)
where the factor of one half is introduced since $`B`$ is measured for cross sections rather than amplitudes. To calculate the forward slope $`B`$, we need to average over the impact parent $`b_{}`$, using the sum of (2) and (4) as weights,

$$B=\frac{d^2b_{}d^2r_{}b_{}^2K_1(\overline{Q}r_{})\left[\left(1e^{\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{\Omega }_q}\right)+\frac{C_F}{\pi ^2}\alpha _\mathrm{s}r_{}^2\frac{dx}{x}_{\rho _{}>r_{}}\frac{d^2\rho _{}}{\rho _{}^4}\left(1e^{\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{\Omega }_g}\right)\right]}{2d^2b_{}d^2r_{}K_1(\overline{Q}r_{})\left[\left(1e^{\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{\Omega }_q}\right)+\frac{C_F}{\pi ^2}\alpha _\mathrm{s}r_{}^2\frac{dx}{x}_{\rho _{}>r_{}}\frac{d^2\rho _{}}{\rho _{}^4}\left(1e^{\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{\Omega }_g}\right)\right]}.$$
(6)
Being the root mean square average in $`b_{}`$ space, $`B`$ is sensitive to the $`b_{}`$ dependence of the opacities $`\mathrm{\Omega }_q`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_g`$, which depend on $`S(b_{})`$.

The profile functions $`S(b_{})`$ are connected to the form factors via Fourier transforms. We have investigated three different form factors listed below, and compared the results with the relevant experimental data on the $`J/\psi `$ forward slope .

1. An exponential form factor,

$$F_{exp}(t)=e^{\frac{1}{4}R^2t},$$
(7)
which transforms into a Gaussian in impact parameter space.
2. An electromagnetic form factor

$$F_{dipole}(t)=\frac{1}{(1\frac{1}{8}R^2t)^2},$$
(8)
its Fourier transform in $`b_{}`$ space is

$$S(b_{})=\frac{1}{\pi R^2}\frac{\sqrt{8}b_{}}{R}K_1(\frac{\sqrt{8}b_{}}{R}).$$
(9)
3. For completeness, we have also investigated the form factor, suggested in ,

$$F_{DL}(t)=\frac{4m_p^22.79t}{4m_p^2t}\frac{1}{(1t/0.71)^2},$$
(10)
where $`m_p`$ is the proton’s mass. The Fourier transforms of $`F_{DL}`$ is given by,

$$S(b_{})=\frac{1}{4\pi }\left[a_1\left(K_0(\sqrt{0.71}b_{})K_0(2m_pb_{})\right)+a_2bK_1(\sqrt{0.71}b_{})\right],$$
(11)
where the values of $`a_10.8`$ and $`a_20.33`$ were calculated from the numerical coefficients in (10).

The various coefficients are determined from the normalization condition $`d^2b_{}S(b_{})=\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}1}`$.

In our calculations we have substituted each of the above mentioned profiles in (6), and calculated $`B`$ for the three different PDF parameterizations  for the gluon distribution which appears in (3). Our results are shown in Fig. 2. While the energy dependence obtained using $`F_{dipole}`$ and $`F_{DL}`$ is in agreement with the ZEUS data, the Gaussian distribution predicts an increase with energy which is too mild to reproduce the measured slope. Regarding normalization, the data is well reproduced by (9) with the choice $`R^2=10GeV^2`$. However, some adjustments are needed regarding the numerical parameters of (11). The choice of our single parameter, is comparable with our earlier estimations ($`R^2=8.5GeV^2`$), where we used a Gaussian distribution for $`S(b_{})`$, and we maintain the quality of our results presented in Ref. .

## 3  Differential Cross Section at Low $`|𝐭|`$

In this section we calculate $`d\sigma /dt`$ as a function of $`t`$ for the region of $`|t|<Q_0^2`$, where $`Q_0^2`$ is the scale at which the input for the evolution is computed. Our expressions are based on a simplified model of two Pomeron exchange, which we find to be satisfactory, given the sizeable experimental errors, although our screening correction formalism is capable of deriving a full series calculation. It should be appreciated that what follows in this section is a very simplified picture of screening corrections to the lowest order and it should not be used for calculating other physical quantities, e.g.integrated cross sections, on which more accurate data exist.

The procedure for calculating the forward differential cross section for photo production of a heavy vector meson in the color dipole approximation is straightforward . We follow  and write the differential cross section at $`t=0`$, in the leading logarithmic approximation of pQCD, including a contribution from the real part of the production amplitude  and the skewed (off diagonal) gluon distribution,

$$\frac{d\sigma (\gamma pVp)}{dt}=\frac{16\pi ^3\mathrm{\Gamma }_{ee}}{3\alpha _{\mathrm{em}}M_V^2}\left(\frac{2^{2\lambda +3}\mathrm{\Gamma }(\lambda +\frac{5}{2})}{\sqrt{\pi }\mathrm{\Gamma }(\lambda +4)}\right)^2\left\{1+\mathrm{tan}^2(\frac{\pi \lambda }{2})\right\}\alpha _\mathrm{s}^2(\overline{Q})xG^2(x,\overline{Q}^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}2}}),$$
(12)
where $`\lambda =\mathrm{log}xG/\mathrm{log}(1/x)`$. In the derivation of (12), a simple static non relativistic estimate of the vector meson wave function was used. As stated , we consider the correction due to Fermi motion, which changes the numerical value obtained from the above equation, by an overall (constant) suppression factor.

In  we took into account further suppression of (12) due to screening. These are facilitated by damping factors  which are the ratios of the screened to non screened observables. Specifically, the DLLA contributions to the damping factors, are due to screening in the quark sector (denoted $`D_q`$) and and in the gluon sector (denoted $`D_g`$). The DLLA screening correction calculation, was derived in  using a Gaussian distribution for the profile $`S(b_{})`$ \[see Eq. (7)\]. For completeness, we briefly described the basic formulae.

The damping factor due to the screening in the quark sector i.e.the percolation of the $`c\overline{c}`$ through the target, is:

$$D_q^2=\left(\frac{1}{\kappa _q}E_1(\frac{1}{\kappa _q})e^{\frac{1}{\kappa _q}}\right)^2,$$
(13)
where $`\kappa _q`$ is given by

$$\kappa _q=\frac{2\pi \alpha _S}{3R^2\overline{Q}^2}xG^{DGLAP}(x,\overline{Q}^2).$$
(14)
Our expression for the damping in the gluon sector, is the square of the gluon damping defined in ,

$$xG^{SC}(x,Q^2)=D_g(x,Q^2)xG^{DGLAP}(x,Q^2),$$
(15)
where

$$xG^{SC}(x,Q^2)=\frac{2}{\pi ^2}_x^1\frac{dx^{}}{x^{}}_0^{Q^2}𝑑Q^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}}𝑑b^2\left(1e^{\kappa _g(x^{},Q^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}};b^2)}\right),$$
(16)
and $`\kappa _g=\frac{9}{4}\kappa _q`$. The overall damping factor for (12) is $`D^2(x,Q^2)=D_q^2(x,Q^2)D_g^2(x,Q^2)`$.

Since the opacities used in (13)-(16) for calculating $`D^2(x,Q^2)`$ were calculated using a Gaussian profile, we examined the sensitivity of $`D^2(x,Q^2)`$ to the choice of $`S(b_{})`$, so as to validate our normalization for the $`t=0`$ differential cross section which had been used for calculating the integrated cross section. The result of our calculations show that replacing a Gaussian profile with (9) leads to a change of $`D^2`$ which is less than 4% . We thus conclude that as far as screening corrections are concerned, we can safely rely on our previous estimations at $`t=0`$.

Eq. (2) and Eq. (4) can be viewed as the exchange of many “hard” Pomerons (gluon ladders). In the region of small $`|t|`$ we approximate this process by the exchange of one and two “hard” Pomerons (see Fig. 3). The $`t`$-dependence of a single Pomeron exchange amplitude is proportional to $`e^{\frac{1}{2}B(W)t}`$. The exchange of two “hard” Pomerons leads to an integration over $`d^2k`$:

$$d^2ke^{\frac{1}{2}B(W)\left((\frac{\stackrel{}{q}}{2}\stackrel{}{k})^2+(\frac{\stackrel{}{q}}{2}+\stackrel{}{k})^2\right)}e^{\frac{1}{4}B(W)t}$$

where $`t=q^2`$. Hence, in Fig. 3 the first diagram is proportional to $`e^{\frac{1}{2}B(W)t}`$ and the second diagram is proportional to $`e^{\frac{1}{4}B(W)t}`$.

We therefore approximate the differential cross section as the sum of these two exchanges i.e.,

$$\frac{d\sigma (W,t)}{dt}=A_{el}^2\left(e^{\frac{1}{2}B(W)t}\eta e^{\frac{1}{4}B(W)t}\right)^2.$$
(17)
We fix our normalization factors $`A_{el}^2`$ and $`\eta `$ by the requirement that at $`t=0`$, Eq. (12) and Eq. (17), once screening corrections as well as Fermi suppression are taken into account, match. Comparing (12) and (17) including these corrections we find:

$`A_{el}^2(x,\overline{Q}^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}2}})`$ $`=`$ $`K_f{\displaystyle \frac{16\pi ^3\mathrm{\Gamma }_{ee}}{3\alpha _{\mathrm{em}}M_V^2}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{2^{2\lambda +3}\mathrm{\Gamma }(\lambda +\frac{5}{2})}{\sqrt{\pi }\mathrm{\Gamma }(\lambda +4)}}\right)^2\left\{1+\mathrm{tan}^2({\displaystyle \frac{\pi \lambda }{2}})\right\}\alpha _\mathrm{s}^2(\overline{Q}^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}2}})xG^2(x,\overline{Q}^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}2}}),`$
$`\eta (x,\overline{Q}^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}2}})`$ $`=`$ $`1D(x,\overline{Q}^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}2}}),`$ (18)
where $`K_f`$ is the Fermi motion normalization factor.

We calculate $`d\sigma /dt`$ using (17) and (18) for low values of $`t`$, and compare the numerical calculations with the experimental data for elastic exclusive $`J/\psi `$ production . Note that our model, as presented in (17)-(18), contains no additional parameters. Specifically, the normalization at $`t=0`$ is taken from the integrated cross section data , and $`B`$ is taken from section 2. Our results are shown in Fig. 4. The shaded areas in Fig. 4 correspond to the numerical calculations of (17) at each energy range given by Ref. , and the dashed lines were calculated by putting $`\eta =0`$ in (17). It can be seen that a single-term exponential expression cannot describe the experimental data without modification to the overall normalization, which, as stated, is taken from rich data of integrated cross section. On the other hand, the reproduction of the data is reasonably good, when considering both terms of Eq. (17).

It is interesting to examine numerically the relative role of the first and second contributions of (17). Squaring the ratio between the second term and the first term we have $`\eta ^2e^{\frac{1}{2}B(W)|t|}`$, which is not only an increasing function of $`|t|`$ but also an increasing function of $`W`$, since both $`B`$ and $`\eta `$ increase with the energy. Hence, the second term becomes more and more important as $`|t|`$ and/or $`W`$ increase. According to our calculations, at $`t=0`$ the contribution of the second term to the differential cross section varies from 4% at $`W=50\text{GeV}^2`$ to 10% at $`W=150\text{GeV}^2`$. At $`|t|Q_0^2`$ both the first and the second terms of (17) are numerically larger than the value of $`d\sigma /dt`$, where the second term is $`20(60)`$% from the first term at low (high) center of mass energy.

As the theoretical uncertainties are difficult to estimate, we used the experimental errors to calculate the deviation of our simplified model from the data. The corresponding $`\chi ^2/\text{n.d.f}`$ for the entire measured energy range is 0.7. As in , our parameters are strongly constrained by the experimental data.

## 4  Differential Cross Section at Intermediate $`|𝐭|`$

The inelastic contribution to the cross section becomes more and more important as the momentum transfer increases. The exponential $`t`$ dependence (17) was written using the elastic forward slope derived in section 2, which is compatible with the experimental data. In this section we would like to suggest a simple expression for the inelastic differential cross section.

As stated in the introduction, hard processes can be calculated using the DGLAP equation, provided the scales of the interaction are such that the momenta on the gluon ladder are ordered. The production of a heavy vector meson can be viewed as the exchange of a gluon ladder between a nucleonic target and vector meson, which is a $`q\overline{q}`$ system of small transverse size ($`1/M_V^2`$). For intermediate values of $`|t|`$, the momenta are still ordered on the ladder, hence we argue that the DGLAP evolution continues to play a role up to $`|t|`$ of the order of $`M_V^2`$. Specifically,

we can write the amplitude of the lowest rung of the ladder at the proton vertex (see Fig. 5) using the two gluons proporgators $`k_1^2`$ and $`k_2^2`$. The corresponding amplitude is proportional to:

$$\frac{(k_1)(k_2)}{(k_1)^2(k_2)^2},$$
(19)
where $`k_1=(q/2+k)`$, $`k_2=(q/2k)`$ and the factor $`k_1k_2`$ is implied by gauge invariance. From (19) one can see that the dominant contribution to the evolution equation comes from large logarithms which appear when $`k^2>q^2/4=t/4`$. For $`|t|`$ which is not too large, i.e.in the intermediate region, the DGLAP equation is still valid for calculating the production amplitude utilizing a gluon distribution function which evolves from $`t/4`$ rather than from $`Q_0^2`$.

The physical interpretation of the above discussion is simple. At small $`|t|`$ ($`<1/m_p^2`$) the size of the target is roughly the proton size, the “evolution range” is large and the evolved gluon distribution consists of a large number of gluons. At higher values of momentum transfer the effective size of the target is of the order of $`1/|t|`$. This leads to a smaller number of emitted gluons, or in other words to a smaller numerical value of $`xG`$.

From Eq. (12) we note that the differential cross section is determined by $`xG`$. The gluon distribution is related to the numerical value of the opacities, thereby to the screening corrections to the process. Thus, the main $`t`$ dependence of the process comes from the scale from which the gluon distribution evolves.

Based on the above discussion, we propose the following expression for the differential cross section:

$$\frac{d\sigma (x,\overline{Q}^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}2}},t)}{dt}=A_{in}^2D^2(x,\overline{Q}^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}2}},t)xG^2(x,\overline{Q}^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}2}},t)$$
(20)
where,

$`xG(x,\overline{Q}^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}2}},t)`$ $`=`$ $`xG(x,{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{Q}^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}2}}}{1+\frac{t}{4Q_0^2}}}),`$ (21)
$`x`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{Q^2+M_\psi ^2t}{W^2}}`$ (22)
and $`D(x,\overline{Q}^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}2}},t)`$ is calculated by substituting (21) in (3) and carrying out the screening corrections procedure  in both sectors.

The justification for choosing the particular dependence of variables that the gluon distribution depends on is to incorporate its depenence on $`t`$. Eq. (21) is written in a typical dimensional form, i.e.the second argument of the gluon distribution has dimensions of $`\text{GeV}^2`$. This form is useful for most of the available parameterizations , where each parameterization evolves from a slightly different scale $`Q_0^2`$. Since the DGLAP evolution is manifested by logarithms of $`Q^2/Q_0^2`$, the gluon distribution function has a dimensionless form. Our ansatz may be better understood by considering a non-dimensional form of (21), namely $`xG(x,\overline{Q}^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}2}}/(Q_0^2+|t|/4))`$ were it can be seen that as $`|t|`$ increases, it dominates the scale of evolution whereas at small $`|t|`$ the gluon distribution function coincide with $`xG(x,\overline{Q}/Q_0^2)`$.

In (20), the coefficient $`A_{in}^2`$ is determined by a continuity requirement, that (17) and (20) match at $`t=t_0`$, where $`t_0`$ is our separation parameter. The results of the numerical calculations, for two different values of $`t_0`$, are shown in Fig. 6, together with the H1 and ZEUS data which have been read off the plot in  and , respectively. As can be seen from Fig. 6 the large $`|t|`$ preliminary data set of ZEUS  is below the H1 preliminary data .

Our calculations of Eq. (20) depends on the fitted value of our free separation parameter $`t_0`$. The upper curve shown in Fig. 6 corresponds to $`|t_0|=0.54\text{GeV}^2`$, at which $`A_{in}^2`$ has been determined to reproduce the H1 data with $`\chi ^2/\text{n.d.f}=0.65`$. However, as the preliminary sets of H1 and ZEUS data are consistently different, the task of finding a satisfactory description of both sets using the same parameters is not trivial. The best $`\chi ^2`$ for the ZEUS data is obtained with $`|t_0|=0.65\text{GeV}^2`$ (the lower curve of Fig. 6) where we calculated $`\chi ^2/\text{n.d.f}=1.53`$ . Note that the difference between the two fitted values of $`t_0`$ reflects the presumed difference between the H1 and ZEUS sets. This is not necessarily a genuine difference and may just be a consequence of different cuts applied at the diffractive proton vertex, by the two collaborations.

At first sight, it looks as if (20) may affect the results of our previous publication, inter alia on account of the $`t`$-dependence of screening corrections at high $`|t|`$. However, this effect is compensated by the value of the forward slope, which we calculate using the dipole electromagnetic form factor, as opposed to an exponential form factor used in . Indeed, we found that we still reproduce all the available experimental data. The compensation is so accurate, that the two curves practically overlap, and we have the same $`\chi ^2`$ values as given in .

## 5  Summary and Conclusions

In this paper we have explored the momentum transfer dependence of exclusive production of $`J/\psi `$ vector mesons. By using a Fourier transform of an electromagnetic form factor as the profile function in the impact parameter space, we calculated the forward differential cross section slope.

We used the expression derived for the slope and calculated the differential cross section for the elastic production of $`J/\psi `$ by using a simple exponential expression approximating one and two Pomeron exchange.

For the inelastic process, we calculated the differential cross section as a function of $`t`$, based on a somewhat naive picture of the interaction. In which we suggested replacing the argument of the gluon distribution so as to obtain a decreasing function of $`|t|`$, which coincides with pQCD calculations at small $`|t|`$.

Our conclusions are:

1. The value of the $`B`$ slope is sensitive to the choice of the profile function $`S(b_{})`$. Our calculations of $`B`$ reproduce the experimental data and are not sensitive to the choice of the PDF.
2. The fact that the screening correction formalism with a dipole-type $`b_{}`$ dependence ($`F_{dipole}`$) reproduces both the value and the energy dependence of the $`t`$-slope, is important for the understanding of the energy dependence of the “hard” Pomeron trajectory. The contributions of the screening corrections increase with energy and therefore $`\alpha _{eff}^{}`$, the effective slope of the “hard” Pomeron trajectory, should also increase with energy. This result is particular to a screening corrections approach and is not obtained in non-screened pQCD calculations.
3. The screening corrections, which we express through the damping factor $`D`$ are not effected by a change in the $`b`$ dependence of the opacities.
4. An exponential form of the differential cross section, which is in agreement with the experimental fits to the forward slope, is suitable for reasonable description of the elastic, low $`|t|`$, experimental data. This form consists of the first two terms of a multi Pomeron exchange, which are supplemented by screening corrections, as well as corrections due to Fermi motion of the quarks within the charmonium system. This approximation is also valid for describing the integrated cross section.
5. At intermediate values of $`|t|`$, inelastic data are well reproduced by pQCD which is based on DGLAP evolution. The value of $`|t|`$ at which the inelastic processes are comparable with elastic processes is $`t_00.5\text{GeV}^2`$.
6. At intermediate values of $`|t|`$ the screening corrections dependence on $`t`$ reflects the decrease of the gluon distribution function.

## Acknowledgments

We wish to thank E. Ferreira, who participated in the preliminary stages of this investigation, for his contribution and comments. E.G. wishes to acknowledge the hospitality of the Theoretical Nuclear Physics Group at BNL, where part of this work was done. E.L. thanks the Theory Group at DESY for the stimulating environment provided while U.M. is indebted to LAFEX at CBPF (Rio de Janeiro) for their support. This research was supported by the BSF grant # 9800276, by the GIF grant # I-620-22.14/1999 and by the Israel Science Foundation, founded by the Israel Academy of Science and Humanities.