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# Stretched exponential relaxation in a diffusive lattice model.

## I Introduction

Lattice-gas models of dense fluids have been explored  in order to understand the microscopic details of their slow dynamics and to compare them with the behavior of other disordered systems like structural glass formers, spin glasses and colloids.

Among the lattice models Random Sequential Adsorption (RSA) of particles on a substrate is of particular interest. RSA has been invented to mimic many experimental situations like chemisorption on crystal surfaces, reactions on polymer chains, adsorption of macromolecules and colloidal particles, monolayer and multilayer growth processes (for an an extensive review see ). In particular RSA with added Diffusion (RSAD) has been considered a model which captures the main features of the compaction dynamics in granular matter . The description of the relaxation processes in the RSAD model has been investigated through the behavior of the time density correlation function in a limited number of studies and only during the deposition process .

In this paper we explore by computer simulation the equilibrium dynamical properties of a lattice gas of dimers as a function of density in two dimensions. The starting configurations have been produced with a RSAD model where by deposition and diffusion of particles we reach the desired value for the density. In this way, due to the geometrical frustration, as the dimer density increases trapping configurations that only depend on the local environment  are created in the system. The dynamical properties are studied by switching the deposition off.

In the next section we describe the model and the details of our Monte Carlo simulation. In the third section we present our results for the single dimer dynamics as a function of particle density. In particular we analyze the mean square displacement, the Van Hove self correlation function and its space Fourier transform, the self intermediate scattering function. Last section is devoted to concluding remarks.

## II Model and Computational Details

In order to investigate the dynamical properties of dimers on a square lattice with fixed density we have generated the starting configurations through a RSA model of dimers with diffusion in two dimensions (RSAD$`2d`$ by Monte Carlo (MC) simulations. We performed also simulations of the same model in one dimension (RSAD$`1d`$) for comparison. We have considered a square lattice of $`N=L\times L`$ sites, with periodic boundary conditions in both directions. Two kinds of dynamical processes can occur in the system, namely deposition of a dimer on an empty pair of sites and diffusion of a deposited dimer on an empty first neighbor site; no overlap of dimers is allowed. The lattice is initially empty and at each MC step one deposition event (or one diffusion event) is selected with probability $`p`$ (or $`1p`$), where $`0<p1`$. Dimers can be adsorbed on the lattice in two possible orientations (horizontal and vertical) and can diffuse along their own axis. In the case of deposition, the dimer can occupy a randomly selected pair of sites if they are both empty, otherwise the attempt is rejected. In the case of diffusion the randomly selected horizontal (vertical) particle attempts to move left or right (up or down), with equal probability. A diffusion event to the right (left) or up (down) is possible only if the chosen pair of sites is occupied and the corresponding right (left) or up (down) neighbor site is empty, otherwise the attempt is rejected. As usual the MC time unit corresponds to $`N`$ deposition/diffusion attempts. We checked that finite-size effects are negligible for $`L40`$, so in the following we analyze a square lattice with $`L=40`$. We produced 11 starting configurations at densities $`\rho =0.60,0.70,0.75,0.80,0.88,0.94,0.96,0.98,0.99,0.995,0.998`$. For each configuration production runs at constant density have been obtained by switching the deposition events off. In this way we are able to follow the dynamics of the system in an equilibrium situation. In fact, the equilibrium distribution for this system, where all allowed configurations have the same weight, is a constant. Therefore the detailed balance condition reduces to two requirements: transitions to forbidden states are not allowed, and transition from an allowed state to another has the same probability as the reverse one. Both these requirements are satisfied by the adopted algorithm.

A more complete investigation of the irreversible dynamics of these models and discussion of the role of the dimensionality is presented elsewhere .

## III Single Dimer Dynamics

In this section we investigate the dynamical behavior of this lattice model through the single dimer density correlators. We have chosen relatively large values of the density ($`\rho 0.60`$), since we are interested in the diffusive dynamics of the system in the high densification regime where slow dynamics is more likely to occur. The time over which the diffusive motion of particles has been followed reaches in most cases $`10^6`$ MC time units (because of the statistical noise in the last decade only $`t`$ up to $`10^5`$ is shown in the plots).

### A Diffusion properties

We analyze in the following the mean square displacement (MSD) of the particle, $`<r^2(t)>`$, defined as

$$<r^2(t)>=\frac{1}{N_{part}}<\underset{i=1}{\overset{N_{part}}{}}|𝐫_i(t)𝐫_i(0)|^2>,$$
(1)
where $`N_{part}=N\rho /2`$ is the number density, $`𝐫_i`$ is the position of particle $`i`$ at time $`t`$ and $`<>`$ denotes a time average. In fig. 1 we show a log-log plot $`<r^2(t)>`$ for RSAD$`2d`$ for the different densities investigated.

After an initial transient, which is more pronounced at high densities, the temporal behavior of the MSD can be fitted with two power laws. In the first time region $`<r^2(t)>t^{\delta _1}`$. In the intermediate time region for the lower densities the MSD shows a bent followed by a slight increase in the exponent, i.e. $`<r^2(t)>t^{\delta _2}`$ with $`\delta _2>\delta _1`$, where the exponents depend upon density. The bent becomes more evident as the density increases. Values of $`\delta _1`$ and $`\delta _2`$ are reported in table I.

They are less than $`1`$ for all the densities considered: in particular $`\delta _1`$ and $`\delta _2`$ do not exceed respectively $`0.75`$ and $`0.80`$, which are the values found for the lowest density, i.e. $`\rho =0.60`$. The difference between the two exponents is more marked for intermediate densities ($`0.80<\rho <0.96`$). For the highest density ($`\rho =0.998`$) the MSD shows a plateau for large times. In the time region investigated none of the curves shown attains the Brownian diffusive regime, $`\delta _2=1`$.

These findings can be interpreted in terms of the density characterizing the degree of motion of particles like the thermal energy in thermal systems. For low densities single particles can move freely and the diffusive dynamics is almost independent of time. Increasing the density particles remain trapped in local transient configurations  and diffusion slows down. For very high density the trapping configurations are frozen and the system does not evolve any more on the time scale of our simulations. The existence of trapping configurations and subdiffusive behavior is in general linked to the presence of disorder  that in the present case can be ascribed to the random barriers associated with the local environment determined by the geometrical constraints. The particle has to overcome these barriers and spend a long time before detrapping (see  for an analogous case in a random walk model).

These dynamical features are not present in the RSAD$`1d`$ model, where we have found a MSD with a density independent slope for this case. Nevertheless the behavior is subdiffusive, with an exponent $`\delta =0.5`$ constant over the whole time window investigated.

### B Density correlator

For a closer analysis of the motion of the dimer we have considered the self part of the van Hove correlation function (SVHCF) $`G_s(r,t)`$, defined as

$$G_s(r,t)=\frac{1}{N_{part}}<\underset{i=1}{\overset{N_{part}}{}}\delta (r|𝐫_i(t)𝐫_i(0)|)>,$$
(2)
which gives the probability of finding a particle around a distance $`r`$ at time $`t`$, given that the same particle was at the origin at time $`t=0`$. The MSD analyzed in the previous subsection is the second spatial moment of the SVHCF. Nonetheless, in disordered diffusive systems that do not have a simple behavior, the SVHCF might contain additional information on the microscopic relaxation mechanisms of the system, that could be smeared out in the MSD.

The SVHCF is shown for our system in fig. 2 for four densities at different times. We have calculated the one dimensional SVHCF along the horizontal or the vertical direction. In fig. 2 we show the SVHCF averaged over the two directions. The self correlation functions shows a single peak centered around zero for all the times investigated. The appearance of more than one peak at a given time would have evidenced the existence of more than one, well distinct, relaxation mechanism for that time.

The single peaked structure confirms the dynamics to be mastered only by a single mechanism related to the existence of high entropic barriers generated by configurations in which a particle is locally trapped. It is also seen that at low density the SVHCF is localized at short distances (typically $`1r2`$) for short times and tends to delocalize for large times, since it is able to explore more configurations. At higher densities we observe a “clustering” of the various curves for $`1r2.5`$ (this effect is particularly evident in fig. 2(d)): this is the signature of the fact that the movement of particles drastically slows down at such densities.

### C Intermediate scattering function

The space Fourier transform of the SVHCF, i.e. the Self Intermediate Scattering Function (SISF) $`F_s(𝐪,t)`$, is given by

$$F_s(𝐪,t)=\frac{1}{N_{part}}\underset{i=1}{\overset{N_{part}}{}}\mathrm{exp}\left[i𝐪(𝐫_i(t)𝐫_i(0))\right],$$
(3)
where $`𝐪=(q_x,q_y)`$ is the discrete wave vector ($`q_{x,y}=2\pi n_{x,y}/L`$ with $`n_{x,y}`$ an integer between $`0`$ and $`L1`$). For all the densities considered in the simulations $`F_s(q,t)`$ is found to decay more slowly the smaller $`q`$ is. We show in fig. 3 data for $`𝐪=(2\pi (L1)/L,0)`$ at several different densities. This $`q`$ value is chosen of the order of the inverse of the typical size of the trapping region, which we estimate to be of the order of $`23`$ lattice spacing . As it can be seen, the entire dynamical behavior at low-intermediate densities is observed in the time window of our simulations, since the SISF decays to zero for such densities. For high values of the density only a part of the SISF can be observed, due to the very slow dynamical relaxation and the freezing of particles which is also evident in the MSD. The short-intermediate time behavior of SISF can be fitted with a Kohlrausch-Williams-Watts law (KWW)

$$F_s(q,t)\mathrm{exp}[(t/\tau )^\beta ],0<\beta 1.$$
(4)
The curve resulting from this fitting, also shown in fig. 3, reproduces the data obtained from MC simulations quite accurately for several decades.

A deviation of MC results from eq. (4) is observable only in the tails of the correlators. The collapse of correlators onto a single curve when plotted versus $`t/\tau (\rho )`$ demonstrates the existence of a well defined scaling law on several decades for this kind of systems. In the range of density considered the stretching exponent $`\beta `$ is essentially constant, with a value $`0.68`$, the density dependence being reflected only in the relaxation time $`\tau `$.

Furthermore we have found that the behavior of $`\tau `$ versus $`\rho `$ follows the scaling law

$$\tau ^1A(\rho _c\rho )^\gamma .$$
(5)
This fit is shown in the inset of fig. 3 together with the points determined from the parameters of eq. (4). As it can be seen from the figure, eq. (5) applies satisfactorily in the entire range of densities considered. Our estimates yield $`A0.0023`$, $`\gamma 2.5`$ and $`\rho _c1.0`$. Given the uncertainties in the fit, this value found for $`\rho _c`$ cannot be distinguished from the maximal density reachable in this system, which has been found to be $`0.998`$ in numerical simulations (see ). This would suggest that there is no dynamical transition in this model, i.e. no critical density (lower than the maximal density) exists at which a structural arrest of the system occurs. It is important to stress that the relaxation time obeys the power law eq. (5), which has the same kind of scaling found in many glassy systems and is the signature of a sluggish dynamical behavior. The existence of a power law behavior for $`\tau `$ as a function of density and the validity of KWW law are novel and interesting points for systems of this kind. It would be interesting to investigate in the future the $`\tau `$ and $`\beta `$ dependence on the wavevector to check on the range of validity of both the KWW law and of the power law.

## IV Conclusions

We presented a Monte Carlo study of the single dimer density correlators for a randomly diffusive model of dimers on a square lattice as function of density. For each density the starting configurations have been generated through a RSAD2d model. We found that the dynamical behavior is related with the system dimensionality and that the diffusive dynamics is non Brownian for the time regimes investigated. In spite of its simplicity the model considered shows a quite complex dynamical behavior, and in particular some features resembling that of the slow relaxation of structural glass formers are found.

The most interesting results came from the SISF analysis. We have found that this correlator in the $`q,t`$ space has a well defined scaling behavior with density that can be described with a high degree of accuracy by the KWW function in most of the time region investigated. This function is well known to reproduce many features of disordered systems, and is connected to fractality in configurational space . The exponent of the stretched exponential function $`\beta `$ is density independent and the relaxation time follows a power law with an exponent $`\gamma `$ in the range of those of structural glass formers . The power law predicts a divergence of the relaxation time for density around one. From these findings it can be consistently derived that for this non thermal system the role of thermal energy is played by the density.

We correspondingly find a subdiffusive behavior in the MSD. The slow down of the system that becomes more significant as density is increased can be attributed to transient trapping configurations. We point out that with respect to lattice-gas models of the kind considered in ref.  we did not introduce any explicit constraint to induce the trapping of the dimers. In our system in fact it naturally arises because of geometrical constraints.

###### Acknowledgements.

We thank V. Loreto and A. Barrat for useful discussions.


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# GLITCHES INDUCED BY THE CORE SUPERFLUID

## 1 INTRODUCTION

Glitches are observed in radio pulsars as sudden changes $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}`$ in the rotation frequency $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}`$ of the crust with observed values of the jump in the range $`10^9\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}}{\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}}10^6`$. In younger pulsars the jump in $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}`$ is also accompanied by an increase $`\mathrm{\Delta }\dot{\mathrm{\Omega }}_\mathrm{c}`$ in the observed spin-down rate $`\dot{\mathrm{\Omega }}_\mathrm{c}`$ of the crust which causes a recovery or relaxation back towards the pre-glitch behavior of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}`$ over time scales of days to years (Radhakrishnan & Manchester 1969; Lyne 1995). It is generally understood that glitches should be caused by mechanisms related to the internal structure of the star. This is because no correlated variation in the electromagnetic signature (intensity, polarization, pulse profile, etc.) of a pulsar has been observed at the time of their glitches. The two generally accepted mechanisms for glitches thus invoke starquakes (Baym et. al. 1969) and “unpinning” of the vortices of a superfluid component in the crust (Anderson & Itoh 1975). In the latter mechanism, which is more relevant to the present discussion, a sudden release and rapid outward motion of a large number of otherwise pinned vortices acts as the source of the excess angular momentum which is transferred to the crust hence causing the observed jump in $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}`$. Suggested mechanisms for the sudden release of a large number of initially pinned vortices include catastrophic unpinning due to an intrinsic instability, breaking down of the crustal lattice by magnetic stresses, and thermal instability resulting in an increase in the mutual friction between the vortices and the superfluid (Anderson & Itoh 1975; Ruderman 1976; Greenstein 1979; Jones 1991; Link & Epsein 1996; Ruderman, Zhu & Chen 1998).

The core superfluid, on the other hand, is not commonly considered to play any major role in driving the glitches; there has been some earlier attempts in this regards which does not seem to have gained much support and acceptance (Packard 1972; Muslimov & Tsygan 1985; see, however, Sedrakian & Cordes 1997 for a recent suggestion based on a different model of pinning in the core than that invoked here). The coupled evolution of the neutron vortices and the proton fluxoids has been nevertheless discussed in various other respects, including its role in the post-glitch relaxation and also in driving glitches indirectly through crustal effects (Sauls 1989; Srinivasan et al 1990; Jones 1991; Chau, Cheng & Ding 1992; Ruderman et al 1998). Our aim here is to point at a so far neglected property of the rotational evolution of the core superfluid that might serve to cause glitches, directly. This is suggested based on the calculated long-term evolution of the rotational lag $`\omega `$ between the superfluid and its vortices; the latter being in corotation, on time scales larger than a few seconds, with the crust. Section 2 starts with a quick description of the model computations that were detailed elsewhere (Jahan-Miri 2000). In Section 2.1 the results of the same computations, generalized to the various superfluid shells within the stellar core, is used to advance the “jumping-lag” model as a new possibilty for the glitches. The model is further shown in Section 2.2 to be supported by the data on the unrelaxed components of the glitches. In Section 3 some other expected features of the glitch activity in pulsars is explored, based on a more detailed picture of the predicted evolution for the rotation of the core superfluid.

## 2 EVOLVING PATTERN OF SUPERFLUID DIFFERENTIAL ROTATION

The starting point for the new results, reported here, is the computations that were originally aimed at a study of the evolution of magnetic fields of pulsars (Ding et al. 1993; Jahan-Miri 2000). This required a determination of the velocity $`v_\mathrm{p}`$ of the outward motion of the fluxoids which carry the magnetic flux being initially trapped within the superconducting core of the star. As a by-product, the superfluid rotational lag $`\omega `$ had also to be calculated simultaneously; although it had no immediate use for that study, it does so in a study of the superfluid rotation as attempted here. We adopt the same formalism, detailed in the above references, and generalize it to the various radial locations within the stellar core.

The steady-state radial motion of a fluxoid (the vortex of the proton superconductor in the core) at any given radial distance $`r`$ from the rotation axis is determined from the balance equation (the Magnus equation) for all the radial forces that act on it. The forces include a pinning force $`F_\mathrm{n}`$ exerted by the vortices on fluxoids at their crossing points, as well as an outward buoyancy force $`F_\mathrm{b}`$, an inward drag $`F_v`$ due to the scattering of electrons, and an inward curvature $`F_\mathrm{c}`$ force which might operate at some stages. The effective value of the pinning force $`F_\mathrm{n}`$, per unit length, on the fluxoids is decided by the Magnus force on the neutron-vortices, which is in turn determined by the rotational lag $`\omega `$ between the vortices and the neutron superfluid. Notice that $`\omega `$ represents also the difference between the rotational frequencies of the superfluid and that of the crust, which is the quantity of interest in the following discussion. The magnitude of $`F_\mathrm{n}`$ depends also on further assuming either of the following two plausible possibilities for the behaviour of vortices. Namely, a (neutron) vortex might remain straight and moves as a whole throughout its length, or else its individual pinned segments might move independently. The first is assumed in the model used here; see Jahan-Miri 2000 for the other possibility.

The magnitude of the pinning force which is exerted, at each intersection, by a vortex on a fluxoid, and vice versa, is however limited by a maximum value $`f_\mathrm{P}`$ corresponding to the given strength of the pinning energy $`E_\mathrm{P}`$ and the finite length scale $`d_\mathrm{P}`$ of the interaction, namely $`E_\mathrm{P}=f_\mathrm{P}d_\mathrm{P}`$. The Magnus force on the vortices which has to be balanced by the pinning force on them cannot therefore exceed a corresponding limit which in turn implies also a maximum (absolute) value for the lag $`\omega `$. This maximum critical lag $`\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$ is estimated (Ding et. al 1993) as

$`\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$ $`=`$ $`1.6\times 10^{10}B_\mathrm{c}^{1/2}\mathrm{rad}\mathrm{s}^1,`$ (1)
where $`B_\mathrm{c}`$ is the strength of the magnetic field in the stellar core, in units of G. The dependence on $`B_\mathrm{c}`$ in the above equation is because of the dependence of $`\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$ on the number density of the fluxoids, which would reduce as the flux continues to be expelled from the core. More explicitly, the pinning force per unit length of a vortex is inversely proportional to the spacing between the fluxoids, and consequently decreases as the number of fluxoids is reduced. Since the pinning force on the vortex, exerted by the fluxoids, is balanced by the Magnus force on it, exerted by the superfluid, a reduction in the former implies a reduction in the latter, ie. the Magnus force which is in turn proportinal to the lag $`\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$.

The equation of motion of the fluxoids is thus

$`F_\mathrm{n}+F_v+F_\mathrm{b}+F_\mathrm{c}`$ $`=`$ $`0.`$ (2)
The forces are calculated from the following equations:

$`F_\mathrm{n}`$ $`=`$ $`5.03\times 10^{14}{\displaystyle \frac{\omega }{P_\mathrm{s}B_8}}\mathrm{dyn}\mathrm{cm}^1`$ (3)
$`F_v`$ $`=`$ $`7.30\times 10^7v_\mathrm{p}\mathrm{dyn}\mathrm{cm}^1`$ (4)
$`F_\mathrm{b}`$ $`=`$ $`0.51\mathrm{dyn}\mathrm{cm}^1`$ (5)
$`F_\mathrm{c}`$ $`=`$ $`0.35\mathrm{dyn}\mathrm{cm}^1`$ (6)
Substituting in Eq. 2 it reduces to

$`\alpha {\displaystyle \frac{\omega }{P_\mathrm{s}B_\mathrm{c}}}\beta v_\mathrm{p}+\delta =0,`$ (7)
where $`P_\mathrm{s}`$ is the rotation period in units of s, and $`\alpha `$, $`\beta ,`$ and $`\delta (F_\mathrm{b}+F_\mathrm{c})`$ are the constants defined by Eqs 3–6. The effect of the curvature force $`F_\mathrm{c}`$ depends on further assuming fluxoids may bend when their radial velocity exceeds certain limiting value, $`v_{\mathrm{max}}`$, set by the speed of Ohmic diffusion of the magnetic field in the crust. Alternatively, it might be argued that collective rigidity of fluxoids requires them to remain always straight hence their velocity may never exceed the limiting speed of their end points; $`v_\mathrm{p}v_{\mathrm{max}}`$. The first possibility has been assumed in the computations reported here, thus a negative inward curvature force, as given in Eq. 6, acts only when $`v_\mathrm{p}>v_{\mathrm{max}}`$; otherwise a value of $`F_\mathrm{c}=0`$, hence $`\delta =F_\mathrm{b}`$, is used. Accordingly, $`\delta `$ attains only positive values, throughout the evolution time, for the adopted model; negative values of $`\delta `$ may be also realized for the other above choice of the effect of $`F_\mathrm{c}`$, nevertheless it does not lead to any significant new result for the purpose of the present discussion. Notice however that $`\omega `$, in units of rad s-1, might take either positive or negative values at different times, while $`\alpha `$, and $`\beta `$ are positive constants.

The above equation, Eq. 7, represents the azimuthal component of the Magnus equation of motion for the fluxoids and includes two unknown variables $`\omega `$ and $`v_\mathrm{p}`$, in units of cm s-1. It may be noted that the dependence on $`\omega `$ is through the Magnus force acting on the vortices, and that on $`v_\mathrm{p}`$ through the viscous drag force on the fluxoids. There exist however additional restrictions on the motion of the fluxoids which helps to fix, instantaneously, the value of one of the two variables and solve for the other, given the spin-down torque on the star which determines $`\dot{\mathrm{\Omega }}_\mathrm{s}(t)\dot{\mathrm{\Omega }}_\mathrm{c}(t)`$ and thus the radial velocity $`v_\mathrm{n}`$ of the vortices. Namely, for a co-moving state $`v_\mathrm{p}=v_\mathrm{n}`$ is given and Eq. 3 can be be solved for $`\omega `$. And, for the other two alternative cases where $`v_\mathrm{p}`$ is unknown and either $`v_\mathrm{p}<v_\mathrm{n},`$ or $`v_\mathrm{p}>v_\mathrm{n}`$ then $`\omega `$ is given as $`\omega =\omega _{\mathrm{cr}},`$ or $`\omega =\omega _{\mathrm{cr}},`$ respectively. It should be however appreciated that one and only one of the above three solutions (viz., $`v_\mathrm{p}=v_\mathrm{n}`$, $`\omega =\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$, or $`\omega =\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$ ) would be satisfied at any time, for any given set of values of the variables $`v_\mathrm{n},B_\mathrm{c},`$ and $`P_\mathrm{s}`$.

Hence, from the instantaneous value of the spin-down rate of the star one finds the velocity $`v_\mathrm{n}`$ of the outward motion of the vortices, at any given instant, and for any assumed distance $`r`$ from the axis. At the same time, $`\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$ may be determined for the known value of the core field strength $`B_\mathrm{c}`$, from Eq. 1. It is important to note that the superfluid is assumed to be spinning down at the same rate as the rest of the star, in order to find its long-term steady-state behaviour. A long-term permanent difference between the two rates would result in a permanent increase of the lag $`\omega `$, which is ruled out. However, the true instantaneous value of the superfluid spin-down rate could as well be different than its time averaged value, that we have used. The instantaneous value of the spin-down rate may rather be determined by simultaneously solving the equations of motion of both the fluxoids as well as the vortices, for the given external torque on the star, which is not attempted here. In other words, the present calculations does not have the required time resolution (over time scales of a few years, or less) to fix the exact value of the lag $`\omega `$ at any given instant. The predicted values of $`\omega `$ should be thus understood as its averaged values, over time scales of a few years or so, denoted by $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ (to use the common notation).

A solution of Eq. 3, for the given values of $`v_\mathrm{n}`$ and $`\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$ at a given time $`t`$, then determines the corresponding values of the fluxoids velocity $`v_\mathrm{p}`$ and the lag $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$, at a given $`r`$. The predicted time behavior of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$, as well as the critical lag $`\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$, for a single pulsar subject to the standard dipole torque, are shown in Fig. 1a & b, for the two locations $`r=R_\mathrm{c}`$ and $`r=\frac{R_\mathrm{c}}{10}`$, respectively, where $`R_\mathrm{c}`$ is the radius of the core of a neutron star. Three distinctive phases of relative rotation are realized, at each location, during the lifetime of the star, as is seen in Fig. 1. The lag takes positive and negative values, both with a magnitude $`|\omega _{\mathrm{}}|=\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$, during the early and the late times of the star’s lifetime, respectively, and undergoes through the intermediate values at the intermediate times. During these three successive phases the radial motion of the vortices is, faster, same, and slower than the fluxoids, respectively. It is noted that when the fluxoids move (radially) faster, than the vortices, the pinning force on them is radially inward, ie. $`F_\mathrm{n}<0`$, which corresponds to a negative value of the lag, $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}=\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$. The superfluid in the core of a neutron star may thus spin down while maintaining a negative rotational lag with its vortices; an unusual state of affairs peculiar to the core superfluid. The above time variation of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ (Fig. 1) is however superimposed on that of $`\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$ itself which decreases steadily, as the magnetic flux is expelled out of the core (Eq. 1). As already indicated, similar results were reported earlier in studies of the magnetic evolution of pulsars (Ding et al 1993; Jahan-Miri 2000), which were however restricted to the single location of $`r=R_\mathrm{c}`$, as required for that purpose.

One can observe, from Fig. 1, that as a neutron star ages there is a secular change in the rotational lag $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ between the core superfluid and the “crust,” which is true for both radial locations indicated in that Figure. At both radii (and in fact throughout the core, as will be further demonstrated, below) the magnitude of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ decreases over the lifetime of the star, and becomes finally vanishingly small around an age $`10^7`$ yr. This is indeed a manifestation of the expulsion of the magnetic flux out of the core, during that time period. The core field strength $`B_\mathrm{c}`$ determines (see Eq. 1) $`\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$ which in turn sets the limit on the magnitude of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$. Moreover, a comparison of the two panels in Fig. 1 reveals that $`\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$ differes by an order of magnitude between the two radii indicated. This comes about simply because of the $`r`$-dependence of the Magnus force on the vortices that in turn determines the pinning force on the fluxoids (see Eqs 2 & 3 in Jahan-Miri 2000). Thus the core superfluid must be “rotating differentially,” ie. its spin frequency is a function of the distance $`r`$ from the rotation axis; $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{s}(r)`$. Fig. 1 points at still another property of the superfluid rotation, namely the change in $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ occurs first at the inner radii and later at the outer radii. That is, the pattern of differential rotation of the core superfluid evolves over the lifetime of a pulsar. This is further demonstrated explicitly in Fig. 2 where the predicted relative value of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{s}`$ with respect to $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}`$ (taken as the reference value) is plotted as a function of $`r`$. It is appreciated that the Figure has been produced by calculating the same quantity $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}(r,t)`$, at each time and location separately, and using the relation $`\omega =\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{s}\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}`$. The two panels of Fig. 2 correspond to two extreme cases considered: (a) a relatively young pulsar, with an age comparable to the Crab pulsar, and (b) a relatively old pulsar with an age $`10^7`$ yr. The dash-dotted line in Fig. 2b (to be further exploited below) represents the loci of the largest negative values (of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$) attained at different intermediate times at the different corresponding values of $`r`$. As may be seen from Fig. 2b (the dotted line), the initial pattern of (differential) relative rotation has disappeared and also the superfluid, at all values of $`r`$, has come into near corotation with the rest of the star (the “crust”), by an age $`10^7`$ yr. The excess angular momentum associated with the initial state of rotation, in contrast to the final corotation, must have obviously been shared between the superfluid and the “crust,” while both have been also spinning down at the same steady-state rate, driven by the radiation torque acting on the star.

### 2.1 The “Jumping-lag” Model

The important question that now remains to be addressed is whether the above predicted change in the rotational lag, corresponding to the transition from conditions (between the dotted lines) in Fig. 2a to that in Fig. 2b, occurs in a gradual and continuous manner or instead as discrete jumps. In other words whether the superfluid rotation remains always in a stable equilibrium state or else the predicted long-term evolution of its spin frequency (as well as $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$) would be hindered among successive metastable states, superimposed on its secular spinning down. If the latter is indeed the relevant process one would then expect that the sudden relaxation events in $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ would produce corresponding discrete jumps in the spin frequency of the crust. As already indicated, the predicted evolution of $`\omega `$ (Fig. 1) is based on the assumed condition $`\dot{\mathrm{\Omega }}_\mathrm{s}=\dot{\mathrm{\Omega }}_\mathrm{c}`$, which is mandatory only for the time-averaged value of the superfluid spin-down rate. However, the instantaneous value of $`\dot{\mathrm{\Omega }}_\mathrm{s}`$, which determines $`v_\mathrm{n}`$ for a solution of Eq. 7, may as well be different than its steady-state value thus calculated. The computed curve of time evolution of $`\omega `$ in Fig. 1 represents but an “envelope” for its true time-resolved behaviour that could as well depart from the one given here. As was pointed out long ago by Packard (1972) and Anderson & Itoh (1975), it is quite likely that the pinned vortices in a neutron star exhibit metastable equilibrium states, similar to that observed in the laboratory experiments of superfluid Helium (Tsakadze & Tsakadze 1975). The pinned core superfluid might as well evolve through metastable states which would make the predicted reduction in $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$, hence in $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{s}`$, to occur discontinuously. That is the pinned superfluid in the core may spin-down at a rate smaller than that of the crust (its container) over short time scales (of, say, a few years or less) which will result in a temporary build up of the value of $`\omega `$, as is observed in laboratory experiments and is also invoked for the crustal superfluid. The situation is however unstable and a sudden relaxation will restore the dynamically predicted value of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$, which is itself evolving over the much larger time scale of the evolution of the star. Should the change in the lag, or part of it, be instead accomplished in a smooth gradual way then its observable effect would be a decrease in the so-called braking index $`n`$ of pulsars ($`n=\frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}\ddot{\mathrm{\Omega }}_\mathrm{c}}{\dot{\mathrm{\Omega }}_{\mathrm{c}}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}`$). We emphasize that the above two possibilities for the behaviour of $`\omega `$ are at an equivalent footing as far as the present calculations can say; here we will explore the consequences of one of the two alternatives at a greater length.

The predicted magnitude of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ in the core (see Fig. 1) is, on the other hand, large enough such that an assumed sudden relaxation of the superfluid, or part of it, could safely account for a jump in $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}`$ similar to that observed in the glitches. The largest observed glitches, in Vela pulsar, accompany a change $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}10^4\mathrm{rad}\mathrm{s}^1`$ in the rotation frequency of the “crust.” The crust would include, for the present model, the remaining part of the stellar moment of inertia except that in the core superfluid which is the donor of the angular momentum that would cause a glitch. Thus a change $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{s}10^5\mathrm{rad}\mathrm{s}^1`$ in the rotation frequency of the core superfluid would be required, considering a ratio $`10\%`$ for the fractional moment of inertia of the “crust.” The required change $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{s}`$ is seen, from Fig. 1, to be much smaller than the predicted values of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ (note, also, the vlaues of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ in Fig. 3b, below, which are even larger); a relaxation of only part of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$, in only some regions of the superfluid, could quantitatively be responsible for the largest observed glitches.

The above possibility for the driving cause of glitches, based on the long-term evolution of the core superfluid, may be contrasted with the other suggested mechanisms that are likewise based on a superfluid component of the star. In the most popular model glitches are driven by a sudden relaxation of the crustal superfluid out of an assumed metastable state (Anderson & Itoh 1975). A similar mechanism had been also suggested for the pinned core superfluid (Packard 1972). In both these models, the instantaneous value of $`\omega `$ is assumed to initially differ from its expected steady-state value, hence the superfluid being in a temporary metastable state. The relaxation, that manifests as a glitch, then serves to reduce the instantaneous lag to achieve its steady-state value (it might overshoots to lower values as well). Thus, the magnitude of the steady-state lag plays no role by itself in these models; what matters is the departure of the instantaneous lag from its steady-state value. The latter could be however, in those models, a preserved quantity, in principle; it varies slightly only owing to the long-term variation of, the external torque hence, the spin-down rate of the whole star. In contrast, in the model that is proposed here the evolution of the steady-state lag itself drives the effect; here this is a quantity which would vary even if the spin-down rate of the whole star were to remain constant! In still another model for the glitches the pinned core superfluid is assumed to remain decoupled from the secular spinning down of the “crust” most of the time, viz. throughout the inter-glitch intervals (Muslimov & Tsygan 1985). Hence, the lag increases steadily untill $`\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$ is reached which causes a sudden spin-down of the superfluid, hence a decrease in $`\omega `$. This is again different than the jumping-lag model wherein the core superfluid is assumed to continuously take part in the steady-state spinning down of the star, at a rate similar to the “crust.” Therefore, the alternative or the additional mechanism that is suggested here for the glitches, relying on an assumed pinned superfluid component in the stellar core, differs from the earlier similar models in a fundamental way, too. The jumps in the rotational lag, suggested here, are a consequence of the evolution of the steady-state lag itself, that could not be avoided, either.

For the same reason, the new suggested model could in principle provide a predictable rate for the occurence of the glitches; more accurately, an estimate for the time average of the rate times the magnitude of the glitches. In contrast the catastrophic unpinning events suggested for the crust superfluid (Anderson & Itoh 1975) are unpredictable and stochastic in nature. According to the model of vortex creep (Alpar et. al. 1984) the crust superfluid might as well spin down at a given steady-state rate while the pinned vortices are creeping steadily, at a prescribed steady-state value of the lag. This situation should however persist indefinitely, according to that model, without leading by itself to the conditions required for the sudden unpinning events. Eventhough, for the glitch-inducing free movement of the vortices $`\omega \omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$ is needed however the assumed steady-state conditions in the creep model does not lead to it directly; some other instabilities must be invoked. Therefore, the glitch expectancy rate calculated (Alpar & Baykal 1994) based on the vortex creep model seems to be contradicting the underlying creep process, particularly, because $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}<\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$ is assumed (Alpar et al. 1984). In contrast, the jumps in the lag suggested here are driven by the lifetime evolution of the spin period and the magnetic field of the star which would determine the average rate of change in $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$, hence the glitch expectancy rate. It is further noted that the predicted decrease in the value of the lag is a robust result, being independent of the particular choice of the forces acting on the fluxoids. Indeed, even in the absence of any other force except the pinning force the same is expected; the magnitude of the lag would still decrease because the number density of the fluxoids reduces as they migrate out of the core. True, in the latter case the lag would never become negative, however this does not change our arguments, in any fundamental way. Also, it would be appreciated that the realization of a pattern of differential rotation, or its particular profile, is not a necessary requirement for the core superfluid in order to play its role in driving the glitches; it may do so even if it were to rotate rigidly. The differential rotation, as indicated by our results, nevertheless adds to the diversity of the effects that might be expected to occur at glitches induced by the core superfluid.

Post-glitch relaxation ?!
Before proceeding further with the new model for inducing glitches, the post-glitch relaxation associated with the assumed pinned core superfluid might present itself as a major drawback for the model. The point is that given the large moment of inertia of the core, a disturbance in $`\omega `$ might be expected to cause a decoupling of the superfluid from the spin-down of the rest of the star, hence an increase in the observable spin-down rate much larger than is usually observed. Although a detailed discussion of the post-glitch reponse caused by the assumed pinning in the core superfluid is not intended here, its possible role in driving the glitches may not be however objected, on the above ground, for the following reasons. One may assume, for the sake of the present argument, that the core superfluid remains coupled throughout a glitch. This is possible, and consistent with the suggested mechanism for the glitches, because the quantity which undergoes a jump is the steady-state value of the lag! there need not be a departure from it, hence no reason for a decoupling either. The spin-down rate of the superfluid has been indeed set, in the computaions reported here, equal to the rest of the star, which is consistent with the above assumption. Moreover, the difficulty might arise if the core superfluid is assumed to decouple as a whole. A decoupling of only some part of it, which could be accomodated by the predicted evolving pattern of differential rotation, and/or a dynamically partial decoupling, could be consistent with the existing observational constraints. One is reminded that the very large post-glitch spin-down rates already observed would be in fact more consistent with a partial contribution from the core superfluid, than otherwise; fractional increase in the spin-down rate by $`60\%`$ in Vela, and $`>10\%`$ in PSR 0355+54, over timescales of $`0.4`$ d, and $`44`$ d, respectively, has been observed (Lyne 1987; Flanagan 1995).

### 2.2 The Q-Test

A quantity of interest in the study of glitches, that may be determined observationally, is the recovery amplitude expressed in terms of a percentage recovery factor $`Q`$. The unrelaxed part of a glitch is parametrized as $`(1Q)\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}`$, with $`0Q1`$. The different observed values of the recovery factor in different glitching pulsars seem to be correlated with the age of the pulsar. In the younger pulsars the jump in $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}`$ is accompanied by an increase in the spin-down rate $`\dot{\mathrm{\Omega }}_\mathrm{c}`$, both of which approach their extrapolated pre-glitch values over the post-glitch relaxation period ($`Q1`$). For the older pulsars, on the other hand, observations show that there is very little recovery in $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}`$ ($`Q<<1`$), and that the small amount of the recovery depends inversely upon the characteristic age of the pulsar (Lyne 1995).

A glitch caused by the proposed sudden relaxation of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ to its current expected value may also offer a natural explanation for the observed large unrelaxed component of $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}`$. The distinction with other similar models lies in the fact that, as indicated earlier, the pre-glitch value of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ need not be anymore recovered during the post-glitch era. That is, in the other models the rotational lag acts as a temporary reserve tank of angular momentum which is pumped in during the inter-glitch interval and out at the glitch. However in the new model the tank need not be re-filled to its previous level! The $`(1Q)`$ part of the glitch may correspond, in this scenario, to the net amount of relative angular momentum which ought to be lost by part of the superfluid, owing to the predicted long-term decrease in the value of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}(r)`$, achieved instantaneously. The same would be deposited in the crust, which will show up as the offset above the pre-glitch extrapolated values of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}`$. Nevertheless, zero values of $`Q`$ could be also accomodated, since simultaneous positive and negative jumps in $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ at different locations within the core could occur (see Fig. 3 below).

The above correspondence may however be tested against the existing observational data on the unrelaxed parts of glitches for pulsars of various ages. As is implied by Fig. 1a and Fig. 1b, a decrease in $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}(r)`$, at relatively early times, is predicted only for the inner regions of the core superfluid. At later times, however both the inner and the outer parts would contribute, noticing also the larger moment of inertia of the outer regions. Accordingly, a larger loss of angular momentum by the superfluid, hence smaller $`Q`$ values, might be expected for the older pulsars, which is in agreement with the observed trend (Lyne 1995). Moreover, the total predicted initial excess angular momentum in the superfluid core of a young pulsar should be, according to this model, comparable to (or at least smaller than, to make allowance for other mechanisms) the total sum of that associated with the unrelaxed parts of all the glitches during the whole pulsar lifetime. This may be tested, quantitatively, against the data at hand. The observable accumulated increase $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{total}}`$ in the rotation frequency of the crust due to the unrelaxed parts of all glitches occuring between times $`t_1`$ to $`t_2`$ could be estimated as

$`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{total}}={\displaystyle _{t_1}^{t_2}}\left(1Q(t)\right)\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}(t)A(t)dt,`$ (8)
where the glitch activity parameter $`A(t)`$ is the fractional increase in the rotation frequency (per year) due to the glitches, and $`t`$ is in units of yr. Based on the observational data collected by Lyne (1995), the two unknown functions may be estimated as

$`Q(t)`$ $``$ $`176t^{0.88},\mathrm{and}`$ (9)
$`A(t)`$ $``$ $`4.87\times 10^3t^{1.04},`$ (10)
where the latter applies to times $`t10^4`$ yr. Also, the observed periods of pulsars may be fitted as

$`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}7000t^{0.5}\mathrm{rad}\mathrm{s}^1`$ (11)
for an assumed standard dipole torque. Neglecting the contribution from times $`t10^4`$ yr, which is small because of the large values of $`Q`$ for that period, Eq. 4 then implies a value of

$`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{total}}0.3\mathrm{rad}\mathrm{s}^1,`$ (12)
for all glitches expected during a pulsar lifetime. Therefore, and in order for the unrelaxed parts of the glitches to be associated with the predicted long-term decline of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ during a pulsar lifetime, an average initial value of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}=\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}0.03\mathrm{rad}\mathrm{s}^1`$ would be expected, assuming a fractional moment of inertia for the core superfluid $`90\%`$; a lower proportion might be however more plausible according to predictions of some equations of states for the matter in the core, which will increase the expected value of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$. The above expected value of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ may be contrasted with the results in Figs 1 or 2, which are seen to be of the same order of magnitude; they agree perfectly for the inner radii, though. The overall agreement might be considered to be promissing, given the theoretical uncertainities of the model calculations and the poor statistics of the data used to derive the expressions for $`A`$ and $`Q`$. However, a better agreement is already within the reach. Namely, the values of $`\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$ in Figs 1 & 2 correspond to an assumed lower limit for the pinning energy $`E_\mathrm{P}0.3`$ MeV. The adopted value of $`E_\mathrm{P}`$ could as well be larger by a factor of $`6`$; since $`\frac{\lambda }{\xi }=\sqrt{2}`$ has been used (following Eq. 7 in Ding et. al 1993) instead of $`\frac{\lambda }{\xi }10`$ for the proton superconductor in the core, which brings in the factor $`\frac{\mathrm{ln}10}{\mathrm{ln}\sqrt{2}}6`$ in the dependence of $`E_\mathrm{P}`$ on $`\mathrm{ln}\frac{\lambda }{\xi }`$. The larger corresponding values of $`\omega _{\mathrm{cr}}`$ may be read off from Fig. 3b, below. Thus the model seems to account for all, or at least the major part, of the observed unrelaxed components of the glitches. It may be recalled that according to the vortex creep model the unrelaxed parts of the glitches are assumed to be caused by a so-called “capacitor region” in the crust superfluid that remains permanently pinned and decoupled from the rest of the star except for its effect at a glitch (Alpar 1995). The suggested resolution here for the unrelaxed parts of glitches might at least serve as a complementary process next to the formation of capicitor regions, since the latter has been found inadequate to account, by itself, for all the observed effect (Lyne 1995).

## 3 Other Implications

As we have argued, the profile of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{s}(r)`$ across the stellar core, relative to $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{c}`$, is different at different ages of a pulsar, because the transition from the initial to the final values shown in Fig. 2 occurs at different epochs for the different regions (Fig. 1). Moreover, in each region, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{s}`$ is predicted to first drop to a value (the dash-dotted line in Fig. 2b) smaller than its corresponding final value at times $`t>10^7`$ yr (the dotted line in Fig. 2b). The predicted relative profiles at intermediate phases are shown in Fig. 3 (the thick dashed line), where the initial and final profiles are also plotted (the dotted lines) for reference. Fig. 3 shows, in effect, the transition between the conditions of Fig. 2a to that in 2b in smaller time steps; it presents few snap-shots from the long-term evolution of the pinned core superfluid, identifying some characteristically different phases which may be realized. Figs 3a & 3b are identical, except that a larger value of the pinning energy ($`E_\mathrm{P}=1.8`$ M eV) has been used in Fig. 3b, which results in the larger values of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$, too. As was indicated, these larger values of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ (Fig. 3b) could produce a better agreement between the predicted value of the integrated glitch activity ($`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{total}}`$) with that implied by the observations. Moreover, Fig. 3b indicates a lower age limit for the youngest pulsars in which a glitch might be induced by the core superfluid (ie. $`10^3`$ yr, in contrast to values $`3\times 10^4`$ yr implied by Fig. 3a), as judged by the earliest time when a departure from the initial values of $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ is seen to occur.

One can see, from Fig. 3, that the discrete jumps in $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}(r)`$ could behave differently, hence having different observable effects, depending on the age of the pulsar. The expected jump at different times may occur in different regions, with different magnitudes, and also with opposite signs, with an effect that would be weighted by the moment of inertia of the region(s) involved. The observable effect would, moreover, depend on the way in which the released excess angular momentum is shared between the crust and the rest of the core superfluid, as noted earlier. An attempt to draw a definite, and quantitative, correspondence between theory, at the present status of the model, and observations could not be, admittedly, conclusive. However, the potentially rich consequences of the model should be emphasized. In the following we briefly list some of the features that might be expected, based on the results in Fig. 3, for the jumps at different stages of a pulsar lifetime, and speculate on their possible observational effects.

* The sudden change in the rotation rate of the core superfluid occurs initially only at the innermost regions. Because of the smaller moment of inertia of these regions the corresponding induced jumps in the rotation rate of the crust (glitches) might be expected to be smaller in the youngest pulsars.
* At later times the changes should take place in larger regions, hence the glitch activity should increase with the pulsar age.
* However, the innermost regions of the core-superfluid are also expected to soon reach the stage of makeing negative transitions from their earlier states corresponding to the dash-dotted line in Fig. 2b to the less negative values of the lag.
* Later on, in the oldest pulsars, the inner regions would have reached their final evolutionary states and only the outer parts would be responsible for the glitches.
* The competition between these effects should result in a peak for the glitch activity, as well as the magnitude of the glitches, to occur at some intermediate pulsar age.
* Negative jumps in the rotation frequency of old pulsars, with an age $`t_{\mathrm{sd}}10^7`$ yr, might be observed when $`\omega _{\mathrm{}}`$ is negative throughout the core and its magnitude is decreasing in order to achieve the final predicted values. As already indicated, the transition between the initial and the final patterns of superfluid rotation shown in Fig. 2 (the dotted lines) occurs after an earlier transition to states with lower (relative) angular momenta, ie. the more negative values of $`\omega `$, also indicated in Fig. 2 (the dash-dotted line). Accordingly, as a normal glitch (ie. a sudden spin-up of the crust) would correspond to transitions accompanying a decrease in the (algebraic) value of $`\omega `$, likewise a transition in which $`\omega `$ increases its value (jumping from the dash-dotted line toward the dotted line in Fig. 2b) may result in an (observable) sudden spin-down of the crust.
* A “glitch” may or may not show up as a sudden rise in the observable rotation rate of the crust. That is to say the “standard” fast-rising glitches observed usually may be a subset of a larger class of disturbances in the rotation of a neutron star, induced by its core superfluid. If the excess vortices released at an event originate from an outer region of the core superfluid they might move out, and annihilate at the core-crust boundary, fast enough to induce a “standard” fast-rising glitch. However, should the released vortices belong to an inner region then the required re-arrangement of all vortices in the core, in order to transfer the excess angular momentum out to the crust, might be suspected to be hindered by the existing pinning barriers. The process might as well take some macroscopically large time; a quantitative estimate would require a model for the coupling of the superfluid under conditions different than the assumed steady-state. A “slow rise” in the angular velocity, over a period of few days, has been already observed in the youngest known pulsar, ie. the Crab (Lyne 1995). It is interesting to note that the predicted jump in the lag for the youngest pulsars also occurs only in the innermost regions.

To summarize, it was observed that the superfluid component in the core of a neutron star, being subject to the pinning of its vortices with the fluxoids, rotates differentially. The pattern of the superfluid differential rotation evolves with time owing to an accompanying decrease in the number of the fluxoids which are expelled out of the core. Over time scales of millions of years the superfluid lag diminishes and the differential rotation almost disappears. Namely, the superfluid rotation initially supports a reservoir of excess angular momentum in the core of a neutron star which is exhausted as the star evolves. Thus it should act as an additional spin-up mechanism for the rest of the star, the “crust”, superimposed on the overall spinning down of the both, which is driven by the general dipole torque acting on a neutron star. It was suggested that the predicted decrease in the lag, hence in the spin frequency of the superfluid, might take place at discrete steps in which case it would show up as the observed glitches in radio pulsars. Some aspects of the observational data on glitches were argued to be consistent with, and support, the predictions made on this basis. Further improvement, and test, of the model requires simulation of the long-term evolution of the fluxoid-vortex motion to be carried out, self-consistently, across the entire core.

I am thankful to the referee for making valuable comments/suggestions which helped to improve the manuscript. This work was supported by a grant from the Research Committee of Shiraz University. Raman Research Institute is acknowledged for their kind hospitality, and partial support, when carrying out the computations reported here.


text:
# Lower energy bounds for quantum lattice Hamiltonians

## 1 Introduction

When computing the low energy eigenstates for some quantum Hamiltonian, $`H`$, one usually extracts an energy estimate by calculating the expectation of $`H`$ for some approximate wavefunction. In the case of the ground state this estimate also provides an upper bound on the energy. The calculation is usually repeated with systematically improved wavefunction approximations and the final result is determined by extrapolation. While in principle this procedure should work, in practice computational difficulties can block improvement beyond some point. One common culprit is the fermion sign problem. Although the sign problem can be delayed with some success, as shown in , in the end it will eventually lead to exponential scaling of computational effort. In such cases it is quite useful to have some idea of how far a given estimate is from the exact answer.

Since in most cases the result in hand provides an upper bound to the ground state energy, what is needed is a reasonably accurate lower bound. In this letter we state and derive a general lower bound for the ground state energy of any translationally invariant lattice Hamiltonian. Our result is very general and applies to any number of dimensions, size of lattice, type of particle, or form of local interactions. In particular this includes single-site terms, nearest and next-nearest neighbor hoppings, and gauge plaquettes. The only restriction is that the interactions are localized and do not extend throughout the entire lattice. The lower bound is stated in terms of the ground state energy for a renormalized Hamiltonian defined on a cluster subset. As we find in the example described below, the error appears to scale as the ratio of the boundary size to the bulk size of the cluster. Since the lower bound is defined on clusters, it is most convenient for position-space computational schemes which already partition the lattice into clusters. This includes density matrix renormalization group methods  and Monte Carlo simulations using Hamiltonian partitioning .

Our letter is organized as follows. We begin by proving a general inequality involving two Hamiltonians which are equivalent within a projection subspace. We then apply the general inequality to a simple but illustrative example involving a one-dimensional periodic chain Hamiltonian and a non-periodic chain Hamiltonian. We then state and prove our main result, the lower energy bound. To conclude we check the lower bound numerically for our one-dimensional example and note the scaling of the error with cluster size.

After posting this preprint to the archive, it has come to our attention that the lower bound techniques presented here have already been discussed in the literature -.

## 2 General inequality

We prove a simple but useful result from which the lower energy bound follows as a special case. Let $`H`$ be a self-adjoint Hamiltonian. Let $`P`$ be a projection operator that projects onto a subspace $`V_P`$. We assume that $`P`$ commutes with $`H`$. Let $`H^{}`$ be any self-adjoint operator whose spectrum is bounded below and satisfies

$$PHP=PH^{}P.$$
(1)
Let $`E_0^{}`$ be the ground state energy of $`H^{}`$. For any vector $`v`$ we find

$$Pv,HPv=v,PHPv=v,PH^{}Pv=Pv,H^{}Pv.$$
(2)
Since

$$Pv,H^{}PvE_0^{}Pv,Pv,$$
(3)
we conclude that

$$Pv,HPvE_0^{}Pv,Pv.$$
(4)
Therefore the spectrum of $`H`$ restricted to $`V_P`$ is bounded below by $`E_0^{}`$.

## 3 Application to lattice Hamiltonians

We now apply the general result (4) to a translationally invariant lattice Hamiltonian. For clarity we consider a simple but sufficiently general example. Our example is a length $`N`$ one-dimensional periodic chain with one type of fermion. We define $`O_1`$ as a hopping term to and from the origin

$$O_1=a_1^{}a_0+a_0^{}a_1\text{,}$$
(5)
and $`O_2`$ as the number operator at the origin,

$$O_2=a_0^{}a_0\text{.}$$
(6)
Our Hamiltonian describes a free one-dimensional fermion,

$$H=c_1\underset{n=0,\mathrm{},N1}{}\left[a_{n+1}^{}a_n+a_n^{}a_{n+1}\right]+c_2\underset{n=0,\mathrm{},N1}{}a_n^{}a_n.$$
(7)
Let us now take a four-site non-periodic chain and the renormalized Hamiltonian $`H^{}`$,

$$H^{}=\frac{c_1}{3}\underset{n=0,1,2}{}T_nO_1+\frac{c_2}{4}\underset{n=0,1,2,3}{}T_nO_2.$$
(8)
The reason for the renormalization of coefficients will be apparent shortly. We define $`E_0^{}`$ as the ground state energy of $`H^{}`$ and take $`P`$ as the projection operator

$$P=\frac{1}{N}\underset{n=0,\mathrm{},N1}{}T_n\text{.}$$
(9)
We note that

$`PH^{}P`$ $`=\frac{c_1}{3}3PO_1P+\frac{c_2}{4}4PO_2P`$ (10)
$`=\frac{1}{N}PHP\text{.}`$
From (4) we conclude that the spectrum of $`H`$ in the translationally invariant subspace is bounded below by $`NE_0^{}`$.

## 4 Lower energy bound

We now state the general result, a lower energy bound for finite periodic lattices of any size or number of dimensions. Let $`T_\stackrel{}{r}`$ be the operator corresponding with translation by the vector $`\stackrel{}{r}`$. We observe that a local operator such as $`a_\stackrel{}{s}`$ transforms as $`T_\stackrel{}{r}a_\stackrel{}{s}T_\stackrel{}{r}=a_{\stackrel{}{r}+\stackrel{}{s}}`$. Let $`G`$ be any subgroup of lattice translations $`T_\stackrel{}{r}`$ and $`\left|G\right|`$ be the number of elements of $`G`$. Let $`H`$ be a lattice Hamiltonian defined by

$$H=\underset{T_\stackrel{}{r}G}{}\left[\underset{j}{}c_jT_\stackrel{}{r}O_jT_\stackrel{}{r}\right],$$
(11)
where the $`c_j`$’s are coefficients and $`O_j`$’s are general quantum operators. Let $`H^{}`$ be a modified Hamiltonian defined on a subset of lattice points,

$$H^{}=\underset{j}{}\left[\frac{c_j}{n_j}\underset{k=1,\mathrm{},n_j}{}T_{\stackrel{}{r}_{j,k}}O_jT_{\stackrel{}{r}_{j,k}}\right].$$
(12)
The $`n_j`$’s are arbitrary positive integers and each $`\stackrel{}{r}_{j,k}`$ is a lattice vector (not necessarily distinct). Let $`E_0^{}`$ be the ground state energy of $`H^{}.`$ Since $`H^{}`$ and $`\frac{1}{\left|G\right|}H`$ are equivalent within the $`G`$-invariant subspace, we conclude from (4) that the energy spectrum of $`H`$ is bounded below by $`\left|G\right|E_0^{}`$.

## 5 Numerical example

We now numerically check the lower energy bound for our one-dimensional chains. We use the notation $`E_0^N(c_1,c_2)`$ for the ground state energy of the periodic chain Hamiltonian in (7). This is trivially calculated in our example by momentum decomposition,

$$E_0^N(c_1,c_2)=\underset{k=0,\mathrm{},N1}{}\mathrm{min}(2c_1\mathrm{cos}(\frac{2k\pi }{N})+c_2,0).$$
(13)
It easy to see that the lowest point of the spectrum in the translationally invariant subspace is also $`E_0^N(c_1,c_2)`$. We take $`E_0^M(\frac{c_1}{M1},\frac{c_2}{M})`$ to be the ground state energy of the non-periodic chain Hamiltonian of length $`M`$. We have renormalized the coefficients as prescribed in (12). In Tables 1 and 2 we show $`E_0^N(c_1,c_2)`$ and the lower energy bound $`NE_0^M(\frac{c_1}{M1},\frac{c_2}{M})`$ for several values of $`N`$, $`M`$, $`c_1`$, and $`c_2`$. The values for $`E_0^M(\frac{c_1}{M1},\frac{c_2}{M})`$ were calculated by Lanczos diagonalization.

$$\begin{array}{c}\text{Table 1.  Lower bounds and energies for }c_1=1,c_2=0\\ \begin{array}{cccccc}N\hfill & NE_0^4\hfill & NE_0^8\hfill & NE_0^{12}\hfill & NE_0^{16}\hfill & E_0^N\hfill \\ 16\hfill & 11.93\hfill & 10.88\hfill & 10.61\hfill & 10.49\hfill & 10.05\hfill \\ 32\hfill & 23.85\hfill & 21.75\hfill & 21.23\hfill & 20.99\hfill & 20.31\hfill \\ 64\hfill & 47.70\hfill & 43.51\hfill & 42.45\hfill & 41.98\hfill & 40.71\hfill \\ 128\hfill & 95.41\hfill & 87.02\hfill & 84.90\hfill & 83.95\hfill & 81.47\hfill \end{array}\end{array}$$

$$\begin{array}{c}\text{Table 2.  Lower bounds and energies for }c_1=1,c_2=1\\ \begin{array}{cccccc}N\hfill & NE_0^4\hfill & NE_0^8\hfill & NE_0^{12}\hfill & NE_0^{16}\hfill & E_0^N\hfill \\ 16\hfill & 4.63\hfill & 4.08\hfill & 3.90\hfill & 3.76\hfill & 3.53\hfill \\ 32\hfill & 9.26\hfill & 8.17\hfill & 7.79\hfill & 7.52\hfill & 7.00\hfill \\ 64\hfill & 18.52\hfill & 16.33\hfill & 15.59\hfill & 15.05\hfill & 13.96\hfill \\ 128\hfill & 37.04\hfill & 32.67\hfill & 31.18\hfill & 30.10\hfill & 27.91\hfill \end{array}\end{array}$$

We note that the error between the lower bound estimate and the actual energy scales as $`M^1`$, the ratio of the boundary size to the bulk size of the cluster. This is also expected in the general case.

## 6 Summary

We have derived lower energy bounds for any translationally invariant lattice Hamiltonian. Our result is general and applies to virtually any local quantum lattice Hamiltonian relevant to particle, nuclear, or many-body physics. The lower bound is given in terms of the ground state energy for a renormalized Hamiltonian defined on a subset of lattice points. We find that the error scales as the ratio of the boundary size to the bulk size of the cluster. Given the simplicity, generality, and convenience of the result, we hope this lower bound estimate will be useful in many future computational lattice calculations.


text:
# Extra dimensions vs. supersymmetric interpretation of missing energy events at a linear collider

## I Introduction

In this report we assume that a signature for new physics is observed at a linear collider in the photon + missing energy channel,

$$e^+e^{}\gamma +\overline{)}E.$$
(1)
We analyze two possible interpretations of this signal. One possibility is in the context of the proposal of Arkani-Hamed, Dimopoulos and Dvali (ADD) Arkani-Hamed:1998rs  that we live in a world with extra spatial dimensions. In this proposal, the gauge hierarchy problem is resolved by assuming that the fundamental, higher-dimensional gravitational scale is around a TeV. The apparent high value of the Planck scale in the effective four-dimensional theory can be explained if the volume of the extra dimensions is large. The Standard Model (SM) degrees of freedom are confined to a four-dimensional manifold (a “brane”) in the full space-time, while gravitons can propagate in the extra dimensions. If an extra-dimensional graviton is emitted in a particle collision, it would not be detected, leading to the signature of (1).

Another possibility is in the context of an effective supersymmetric theory obtained from a spontaneously broken supergravity theory. If the scale of supersymmetry breaking is sufficiently low such theories will contain an extremely light gravitino, $`m_{\stackrel{~}{G}}10^3`$ eV. Gravitino pair production in conjunction with a photon will again produce the signature of (1).

In this work we ask how well we can interpret a photon + missing energy signal. In particular, we would like to know whether one can distinguish between the two possibilities discussed above. We will also study if it is possible to distinguish between the ADD-type models with various numbers of extra dimensions.

## II Gravitons in Extra dimensions

In theories with large extra dimensions, the missing energy in $`e^+e^{}\gamma +\overline{)}E`$ could be carried by the Kaluza-Klein(KK) excitations of the gravitons. The differential cross-section is given by Giudice:1999ck Mirabelli:1999rt :

$$\frac{d^2\sigma }{dx_\gamma d\mathrm{cos}\theta }(e^+e^{}\gamma G)=\frac{\alpha }{32}S_{n1}\left(\frac{\sqrt{s}}{M_{}^{(n)}}\right)^{n+2}\frac{1}{s}f(x_\gamma ,\mathrm{cos}\theta )$$
(2)
$$f(x,y)=\frac{2(1x)^{\frac{n}{2}1}}{x(1y^2)}\left[(2x)^2(1x+x^2)3y^2x^2(1x)y^4x^4\right].$$
(3)
Here $`M_{}^{(n)}`$ is the fundamental mass scale, $`n`$ is the number of extra dimensions, $`S_{n1}`$ is the surface area of an $`n`$-dimensional sphere of unit radius, $`x_\gamma =2E_\gamma /\sqrt{s}`$, $`E_\gamma `$ is the photon energy, and $`\theta `$ is the angle between the photon and beam directions.

## III Gravitino signal

In supersymmetric theories with a superlight gravitino, photon + missing energy events could arise due to the pair-production of gravitinos, $`e^+e^{}\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{G}}\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{G}}\gamma `$. The differential cross-section is given by Brignole:1998sk :

$$\frac{d^2\sigma }{dx_\gamma d\mathrm{cos}\theta }=\left(\frac{\alpha G_N^2}{45}\right)\frac{s^3}{m_{\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{G}}}^4}f_{\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{G}}\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{G}}\gamma }(x_\gamma ,\mathrm{cos}\theta )$$
(4)
$$f_{\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{G}}\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{G}}\gamma }(x,\mathrm{cos}\theta )=2(1x)^2\left[\frac{(1x)(22x+x^2)}{x\mathrm{sin}^2\theta }+\frac{x(6+6x+x^2)}{16}\frac{x^3\mathrm{sin}^2\theta }{32}\right]$$
(5)
where $`\alpha `$ is the fine structure constant, $`G_N`$ is the gravitational constant, $`m_{\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{G}}}`$ is the gravitino mass, $`x_\gamma `$ is the photon scaled energy ($`E_\gamma /E_{\mathrm{beam}}`$) and $`\theta `$ is the polar angle.

## IV Observations

Single photon plus missing energy events also occur within the SM due to escaping neutrinos. The SM background is $`e^+e^{}\nu \overline{\nu }\gamma `$, and can be obtained from numerous Monte Carlo packages, including Pandora Peskin:1999hh . Previous analyses Giudice:1999ck ; Mirabelli:1999rt ; Brignole:1998sk  have carefully outlined the parameter spaces that produce a discernible excess of signal events over SM background in extra dimensional gravity models and in superlight gravitino models. We do not reproduce those results here, but are more interested in how similar or dissimilar the graviton-induced signal is to the gravitinos-induced signal.

To help us see the difference between the possible signal interpretations of single photon plus missing energy events at a linear collider, we have plotted in Fig. 1 the differential cross-section as a function of the photon missing energy, $`x_\gamma =2E_\gamma /\sqrt{s}`$, obtained by integrating the cross-sections (2) and (4) with respect to $`\mathrm{cos}\theta `$. The three solid lines are for the graviton KK signal with 2, 4 and 6 extra dimensions. At $`x_\gamma =0.5`$ the ordering of the solid lines is $`n=2`$ highest, and $`n=6`$ lowest. The dashed line is the gravitino signal. The scales ($`M_{}^{(n)}`$ for the ADD-type models and $`m_{\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{G}}}`$ for the supersymmetric model) have been chosen so that the total cross sections within the applied kinematic cuts, $`x_\gamma >0.05`$ and $`|\mathrm{cos}\theta |<0.95`$, are equal in all four cases. Similarly, Fig. 2 shows the normalized differential cross-sections of the four models as a function of $`\mathrm{cos}\theta `$, obtained by integrating with respect to $`x_\gamma `$. The ordering of the solid lines at $`\mathrm{cos}\theta =0`$ is $`n=2`$ highest, and $`n=6`$ lowest.

It is clear from the figures that both the recoil energy and angular distributions of the events are quite similar in all four cases. It is still possible, however, to use the photon energy distribution to discriminate between the ADD models with different values of $`n`$. To do this, we perform a harder cut on the photon energy, $`x_\gamma >0.2`$. This is advantageous because in this region, the differences between cross sections with different $`n`$ do not change sign. We also perform an additional cut on $`x_\gamma `$ to get rid of the peak in the Standard Model background associated with on-shell $`Z`$ production. Assuming that electron and positron beam polarizations of 80 and 60% respectively are achieved at a 500 GeV linear collider, and that the cross section can be measured with 1% precision, we find that, for example, the case $`n=2`$ can be distinguished from $`n=3`$ for values of $`M_{}^{(2)}`$ up to 4.6 TeV. (If the uncertainty is purely statistical, 1% error on the cross section measurement corresponds to integrated luminosity of about 270 fb<sup>-1</sup>.) Note, however, that the photon energy distributions for the cases of gravitino emission and $`n=6`$ ADD model are extremely close. It is not likely that the ambiguity between these two cases can be resolved by this measurement.

We have also studied whether performing a more restrictive angular cut could help in distinguishing between the cases of gravitino and $`n=6`$ graviton emission. From Fig. 2 it appears that the two signals have discernible differences at small values of $`\mathrm{cos}\theta `$. We have found, however, that with the assumed 1% precision on the cross section measurement, this analysis will not be able to conclusively separate these two cases.

Another way to distinguish between models is by varying the collider center of mass energy $`\sqrt{s}`$. The TESLA study TESLA  has shown that measuring cross sections at two design center of mass energies, $`500\mathrm{GeV}`$ and $`800\mathrm{GeV}`$, allows to determine the number of extra dimensions in the ADD models for a wide range of parameters. For example, if there are two extra dimensions, the $`n=3`$ case can be excluded at 99% CL for values of $`M_{}^{(2)}`$ up to 6.1 TeV. The beam polarizations assumed in TESLA  coincide with the values chosen for our analyses here.

While upgrading the linear collider energy from 500 GeV to 800 GeV, for example, will take much time, effort and money, the beam energy can be changed by as much as 5% without significantly disrupting the operation of the collider. Therefore, it is interesting to study if different models can be distinguished by performing measurements at two center of mass energies separated by 5%. We have performed such a study using Pandora. We have chosen the scales of each model so that their cross sections (with the same cuts and polarizations as before) are identical at $`\sqrt{s}=500`$ GeV, and evaluated their differences at $`\sqrt{s}=475`$ GeV. Taking the Standard Model background into account and assuming that the cross sections at each energy can be measured with 1% precision, we find that the $`n=2`$ and $`n=3`$ cases can be distinguished at the 3$`\sigma `$ level for $`M_{}^{(2)}\begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}3.9`$ TeV. The sensitivity of this method is thus somewhat lower than for studying photon energy distributions. Surprisingly, the scaling of the gravitino pair production cross section with $`\sqrt{s}`$ is again identical to the $`n=6`$ ADD model. Changing collider energy does not help in separating these two cases.

We conclude that while the ADD models with $`n6`$ can be distinguished from the supersymmetric models with light gravitino by carefully studying the photon + missing energy signal alone, this cannot be done for the case of 6 extra dimensions. (Let us note in passing that the missing energy signal in the $`n=6`$ ADD model is also identical to the one due to the emission of scalar states associated with the brane coordinates Creminelli:2001gh .) In this case, distinctions between the models will only occur with additional phenomena. The next-best observables in the extra-dimensional graviton model include the dimension-eight contact interactions Giudice:1999ck ; Hewett:1999sn  induced by

$$e^+e^{}G^{(n)}\gamma \gamma ,f\overline{f},\mathrm{etc}.,$$
(6)
or from string Regge states Dudas:2000gz ; Cullen:2000ef .

The superlight gravitino models are supersymmetric models, and the superpartner spectrum must satisfy the same naturnalness criteria as other supersymmetry ideas. The expectation is that some superpartner states, most notably charginos and neutralinos, should be accessible and well-studied at a 500 GeV linear collider Abe:2001wn . The kinematic reach for superpartners then approaches $`\sqrt{s}/2=250\mathrm{GeV}`$ in $`e^+e^{}`$ collisions. An increase of the reach of selectrons is possible in $`e^{}\gamma \stackrel{~}{G}\stackrel{~}{e}_{R,L}`$ collisions, since selectron masses approaching $`\sqrt{s}=500\mathrm{GeV}`$ are kinematically accessible Gopalakrishna:2001cm . The full complement of observables will be needed to distinguish the precise underlying theory being discovered at the colliders.

## V Acknoledgements

We would like to thank the organizers of the Snowmass 2001 workshop where this work was initiated. We are grateful to many of the workshop’s participants and especially to the members of the P3 and E3 working groups for interesting discussions. We are indebted to Michael Peskin for his invaluable help with the Pandora event generator.

This work was supported in part by the Director, Office of Science, Office of High Energy and Nuclear Physics, of the U.S. Department of Energy under Contract DE-AC03-76SF00098.


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# Crystal structures, magnetic and superconducting properties of the RuSr2NdCu2Ox and RuSr2GdCu2Oy compounds

## Abstract

We report the magnetization and the susceptibility measurements of the RuSr2GdCu2Oy and RuSr2NdCu2Ox perovskite materials. We find that RuSr2GdCu2Oy compound exhibits a magnetic transition at $`T_n`$=135 K followed by a superconducting one with an onset $`T_c`$=35 K. Samples of RuSr2NdCu2Ox material have shown neither superconductivity nor magnetic transition. XRD measurements show that in RuSr2NdCu2Ox the Nd ions tend to substitute to Sr ions in very high percentages. The relevance of this phenomenon on the absence of superconductivity in RuSr2NdCu2Ox is discussed.

Keywords: Rutheno-cuprate materials, Superconductivity, Magnetization, X-ray powder diffraction.

A. Vecchione,a***Antonio Vecchione, Unità I.N.F.M. di Salerno, Dipartimento di Fisica “E.R. Caianiello”, Università di Salerno, Via Salvador Allende, I-84081 Baronissi (Salerno), Italy. Fax: +39 089 953804, e-mail: vecchione@sa.infn.it M. Gombos,a S. Pace,a C. Tedesco,b and D.Zola.a

a Unità I.N.F.M. di Salerno, Dipartimento di Fisica “E.R. Caianiello”

Università di Salerno, Via S. Allende, I-84081 Baronissi (Salerno), Italy

b Dipartimento di Chimica, Università di Salerno,

via S. Allende, I-84081 Baronissi, Italy

The rutheno-cuprate RuSr2GdCu2Oy (Gd-1212) system is a subject of great interest because exhibits coexistence of bulk superconductivity and magnetic ordering . The RuSr2GdCu2Oy tetragonal structure is an analog of Y1Ba2Cu3O7 with replacement of Ru ions into Cu(1) sites. This results in a perovskite consisting of different sequences of alternating CuO2 bilayers and RuO2 monolayer. In this hybrid rutheno-cuprate system both the Cu-O and Ru-O planes form very similar square-planar arrays, and the coexistence of superconductivity and long range magnetic order is intriguing . However, in spite of extensive investigation a consistent picture of the magnetic structure is still lacking ,.

In the present investigation, we show the effects on the structural and superconducting properties of Gd-1212 rutheno-cuprate compound by substituting Gd rare earth with Nd.

Policrystalline samples of RuSr2NdCu2Ox and RuSr2GdCu2Oy were prepared by conventional solid state reaction by mixing stoichiometric amounts of highly pure RuO2, Nd2O3, Gd2O3, CuO oxides and strontium carbonate (SrCO3). After calcination in air at 960C the powders were ground, milled and annealed in argon flow at 1020C for 10 hours. At the final stage the powders were oxygenated with a procedure made by several cycles of heating at temperatures ranging from 1050C to 1080 C. The phases produced after each step were monitored by X-ray diffraction.

X-ray diffraction patterns were recorded by means of Philips PW-1700 diffractometer using Ni-filtered Cu K$`\alpha `$ radiation. Magnetization and susceptibility measurements were performed by means of a Oxford Maglab Vibrating Sample Magnetometer (VSM). The samples vibrate in a region where the field homogeneity is equal to $`10^6`$. Structural and magnetization measurements were carried out after sieving the materials and collecting the fraction with size smaller than 10 $`\mu `$m. The correct stoichiometry of both RuSr2NdCu2Ox and RuSr2GdCu2Oy compounds and the absence of contamination from both alumina crucibles and other spurious elements were checked by EDS analysis.

X-ray diffraction patterns of oxygen annealed RuSr2NdCu2Ox and RuSr2GdCu2Oy samples are shown in Fig.1. Reflections marked by stars are due to small amounts of extra-phase. X-ray diffraction patterns of RuSr2NdCu2Ox has been successfully indexed assuming a cubic cell with $`a`$=3.907 Å. This implies that a disordered cubic perovskite structure can be assumed: Nd and Sr cations occupy the same site and the same applies to Cu and Ru. As already reported , RuSr2GdCu2Oy exhibits a tetragonal cell ($`a`$=3.838 Å, $`c`$=11.573 Å) with alternating CuO2 and RuO2 planes. The proposed structural model for Nd-1212 compound in space group $`Pm\overline{3}m`$ is similar to that of RuSr2GdCu2Oy with mixed Cu/Ru and Nd/Sr cation sites and oxygen coordinates fixed by the symmetry of the space group.

The possible effects of the cations intermixing on the magnetic and superconducting properties were analyzed by susceptibility and magnetization measurements. We measured a DC susceptibility, $`\chi `$, for RuSr2NdCu2Ox and RuSr2GdCu2Oy samples in the temperature range from 5 K to 270 K. In Fig.2 we show the zero-field-cooled DC susceptibility, $`\chi (T)`$, measured in RuSr2NdCu2Ox powders in an external field of 10 G. In the temperature range investigated neither ferromagnetic nor superconducting transition occurs. The RuSr2NdCu2Ox is paramagnetic and follows a behaviour well described in term of Curie law for $`T<`$ 150 K (see inset of Fig.2). We also carried out measurements of $`\chi (T)`$, shown in the inset of the Fig.3, on a RuSr2GdCu2Oy sample. The main features observed are a large rise for $`T<`$ 150 K due to the magnetic transition and a large drop for $`T<`$ 35 K ascribed to the onset superconducting transition. The signal revealed in superconducting region is not diamagnetic and no Meissner phase is observed down to 5 K as already reported in literature . We do not observe a peak in DC susceptibility. A reason could be in our experimental set-up. In fact the superconducting magnet of the VSM has a persistent field measured by Hall probe which has 1 G as sensibility. To perform zero field cooling measurement we cancel this persistent field applying an opposite magnetic field. Probably the residual field lower than 1 G is enough to orientate the magnetic domain in our sample during the initial cooling. However, the peak in zero field cooled susceptibility was not observed by Felner et al. in not superconducting RuSr2EuCu2O8 and by Williams and Kramer for field higher than 2.5 kG .

In order to investigate the magnetic behaviour in the RuSr2GdCu2Oy sample, we performed measurements of the magnetization $`M`$ in external magnetic field $`H`$ up to 5 T at different temperatures. As can be observed from Fig. 3, an irreversible behaviour is revealed in $`M(H)`$ loop. This finding has been ascribed  to the presence of a ferromagnetic phase in these samples.

Our data point out that the substitution of the neodymium in Gd-1212 compounds involves a change in the superconducting and magnetic properties. The observed magnetic transition in RuSr2GdCu2Oy, attributed to the ordering in the ruthenium planes, does not take place in RuSr2NdCu2Ox . At the same time the superconducting transition, occurring in copper planes of Gd-based compound, is also suppressed. The presence of structural disorder in Nd-based compound play a role preventing a long range extension of both Cu-O and Ru-O planes through out the structure. This implies the suppression of the superconducting and (ferro)magnetic order parameters.

In conclusion, we have prepared RuSr2NdCu2Ox and RuSr2GdCu2Oy materials whose structure and transport properties have been described by XRD analysis and magnetization and susceptibility measurements. A description of the x-ray patterns has been achieved assuming that the Nd-based 1212 phase is cubic and not isostructural to the Gd-1212 phase. In particular, we attribute the absence of superconductivity and magnetic ordering in RuSr2NdCu2Ox compound to the partial intermixing between Ru and Cu and between Nd and Sr into the crystalline structure.
We acknowledge Dr. Canio Noce for helpful discussions.

Figure Captions

Figure 1. X-ray diffraction powder patterns of the RuSr2NdCu2Ox (up) and RuSr2GdCu2Oy (bottom). Peaks marked by stars are due to phase impurities.

Figure 2. DC susceptibility measurement of the RuSr2NdCu2Ox compound. Inset: 1/$`\chi `$ versus $`T`$ showing Curie paramagnetic behaviour.

Figure 3. Magnetization measurements of RuSr2GdCu2Oy taken at three different temperatures. Inset: DC susceptibility tversus $`T`$ measurement.