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# Shocked molecular gas towards the SNR G359.1–0.5 and the Snake

## 1 Introduction

OH(1720 MHz) maser emission detected towards supernova remnants (SNRs) has been attributed to shock waves driven into adjacent molecular clouds (Frail, Goss & Slysh, 1994). The production of this maser emission, without the simultaneous production of maser emission in the other three ground state OH transitions at 1612, 1665 and 1667 MHz, requires specific conditions (gas density $`n_{\mathrm{H}_2}`$$``$$`10^5`$ cm-3, gas temperature $`T_{kin}`$$``$50 – 125 K, OH column density $`N_{\mathrm{OH}}`$ $`10^{15}`$$`10^{16}`$ cm-2) which can be attained in the cooling gas behind a non-dissociative shock wave (Lockett, Gauthier & Elitzur, 1999; Wardle, 1999). Surveys by Frail et al. (1996), Green et al. (1997) and Koralesky et al. (1998) have found that about 10 per cent of $``$180 observed Galactic SNRs are associated with OH(1720 MHz) masers. The detection fraction increases to 30 per cent for objects in the Galactic Centre region (Yusef-Zadeh et al., 1996a).

Perhaps the most striking result of the survey towards the Galactic Centre region is the detection of OH masers along the radio–continuum shell of the SNR G359.1–0.5 (Yusef-Zadeh et al., 1995, 1996b). The brightest of the masers (maser A from Yusef-Zadeh et al. 1995) occurs where a nonthermal filament known as ‘the Snake’ appears to cross the western edge of the SNR shell. The filament differs from other Galactic Centre nonthermal filaments in showing a number of kinks along its 20 arcmin extent (Gray et al., 1995), and its origin is not well established (Nicholls & Le Strange, 1995; Benford, 1997; Uchida et al., 1996). The latest model by Bicknell & Li (2001) proposes that the Snake is a magnetic flux tube anchored in dense rotating material. It has been suggested that the Snake is interacting with the shell of G359.1–0.5 because both objects show change in brightness at the apparent crossing point (Uchida, Morris & Yusef-Zadeh, 1992; Gray et al., 1995). This could, however, be an artifact due to superposition of disparate components along the line of sight. Nevertheless, the presence of an OH(1720 MHz) maser – a signature of SNR/molecular cloud interaction – at this location is quite intriguing. In order to investigate the proposed interaction between the Snake and the SNR, and to characterise the ambient molecular gas in the region, we observed molecular hydrogen (H2) and a number of other molecular species, particularly searching for signatures of shocked gas. The observations are discussed in section 2, the results are presented in section 3 and discussed in section 4. The conclusions are presented in section 5.

## 2 Observations

### 2.1 UNSWIRF observations

The observations towards maser A ($`\mathrm{RA}(1950)=17^\mathrm{h}41^\mathrm{m}46\stackrel{s}{.}042`$, $`\mathrm{Dec}.(1950)=29\mathrm{°}49\mathrm{}51\stackrel{}{.}03`$) were carried out in June 1998 with UNSWIRF111University of New South Wales Infrared Fabry–Perot (Ryder et al., 1998)  on the Anglo–Australian Telescope (AAT). Two data sets comprising five and six Fabry–Perot frames, each spaced by 40 km s-1, were taken in the 2.12 $`\mathrm{\mu m}`$ H2 1–0 S(1) transition. An additional frame was taken at a setting of $``$400 km s-1 to enable subsequent continuum subtraction. The integration time was 120 seconds per frame. A resulting image has diameter of 100 arcsec and a pixel size of 0.77 arcsec. The velocity resolution was $``$ 75 km s-1 FWHM. All the data were reduced using modified routines in the iraf software package as described in Ryder et al. (1998). Intensity calibration was performed using the standard star BS 5699. A velocity cube was constructed by averaging the frames at the same Fabry–Perot setting from two data sets, which was then fitted with the instrumental Lorentzian profile to determine the line flux (to within 30 per cent) and central velocity (to within 20 km s-1) for the H2 emission across the field. We note that these data do not provide a true velocity–spatial cube of the emission, as the instrument does not have the velocity resolution to provide an accurate line velocity at each position. Rather, the line velocity is the central velocity at each position. Changes in line center velocity can, however, be determined. To confirm the detection, the observations were repeated in June 1999 for the 1–0 S(1) line and additional observations were obtained in the 2.25 $`\mathrm{\mu m}`$ H2 2–1 S(1) line. On this occasion five Fabry–Perot frames were used for both transitions, with an integration time of 180 seconds per frame. To establish the coordinate scale for the UNSWIRF images, we used the positions of stellar sources in the K-band continuum image listed in the Two Micron All Sky Survey (2MASS) point source catalogue (Cutri, 1997) (which has an accuracy of $`0\stackrel{}{.}1`$).

### 2.2 SEST observations

A millimetre–line survey towards maser A was carried out with the 15–m SEST222The Swedish–ESO Submillimetre Telescope (SEST) is operated by the Swedish National Facility for Radio Astronomy, Onsala Space Observatory and by the European Southern Observatory (ESO). at La Silla, Chile during June 2000. Position–switching was used with a reference position at $`\mathrm{RA}(1950)=17^\mathrm{h}45^\mathrm{m}00^\mathrm{s}`$, $`\mathrm{Dec}.(1950)=31\mathrm{°}00\mathrm{}00\mathrm{}`$. For periodic pointing calibration and focusing the 3-mm SiO maser of AH Sco was observed. The main–beam brightness temperature ($`T_{mb}`$) scale of the spectra was calibrated on–line using a black–body calibration source at ambient temperature, and later corrected for the telescope main–beam efficiency (0.74, 0.70, 0.67 and 0.45 at 85 – 100 GHz, 100 – 115 GHz, 130 – 150 GHz and 220 – 265 GHz respectively). Simultaneous observation of transitions in two different bands was available using dual SIS receivers at 3 and 2 mm, or 3 and 1.3 mm.

For spectral–line observing we used an acousto–optical spectrometer split into two 43–MHz bands, each with 1000 channels, providing velocity coverages ranging from 60 to 100 km s-1 and velocity resolution ranging from 0.06 to 0.14 km s-1 across the total wavelength range. A low–resolution spectrometer with resolution of $``$1–2 km s-1 was also used simultaneously to determine the spectral baselines in the case of broad–line emission. The final data were smoothed over three channels. The observed transitions, frequencies and antenna beam sizes (FWHM) are listed in Table 1. For the 12CO, 13CO and CS transitions we obtained maps with approximately half–beam and one–beam sampling intervals at lower and higher transitions respectively. The final images covered the $`2\times 2`$ arcmin2 region around maser A that coincides with the UNSWIRF field of view. The integration time was 30 seconds for CO isotopomers and 90 seconds for CS transitions. A set of spectra on–source and at offsets of 20 arcsec in RA and Dec. was obtained for each of the other molecular transitions listed in Table 1, with integration times of 180 seconds at each position.

## 3 Results and analysis

### 3.1 H2 emission

Fig. 1 shows contours of velocity–integrated 2.12 $`\mathrm{\mu m}`$ H2 1–0 S(1) line emission superimposed on a greyscale image of the 2MASS K-band. Some small–scale structure apparent in the H2 distribution are residuals from subtracting the stellar continuum. A bar of H2 emission, 1.5 arcmin in length and 15 arcsec in width, extends from the north–east to the south–west. We note, however, that there is weak extensive diffuse emission across the observed region, which was not included in fitting procedure because low S/N. The lowest contour in Fig. 1 thus corresponds to a (4 $`\sigma `$) flux level of 2$`\times 10^5`$ erg s-1 cm-2 sr-1. The peak flux density is 10.6$`\times 10^4`$ erg s-1 cm-2 sr-1 and the total flux density is 9.2$`\times 10^{13}`$ erg s-1 cm-2. After correcting for the typical extinction of the Galactic Centre region (3 magnitudes in K–band) the parameters of the 1–0 emission are: peak flux density of 1.7$`\times 10^2`$ erg s-1 cm-2 sr-1, total flux density of (1.4$`\pm `$0.4)$`\times 10^{11}`$ erg s-1 cm-2 and luminosity of $``$33 $`L_{}`$. There is no obvious emission in the individual frames of the 2.25 $`\mathrm{\mu m}`$ H2 2–1 S(1) data. However, adding the pixels in the central frame of the 2–1 cube over the region delineated by the 1–0 emission, we derive a total flux density of (2.4$`\pm `$0.4)$`\times 10^{14}`$ erg s-1 cm-2, which is $``$ 2.9$`\times 10^{13}`$ erg s-1 cm-2 after correcting for extinction. The corresponding total flux density in the 1–0 peak frame is 3.1$`\times 10^{13}`$ erg s-1 cm-2, i.e. 4.9$`\times 10^{12}`$ erg s-1 cm-2 after correcting for extinction. The ratio between the 1–0 and 2–1 line emission is thus $`20`$.

The line–centre velocity distribution of H2 1–0 S(1) emission (Fig. 2) shows a systematic velocity gradient along the H2 bar, with the mean velocity ranging from 0 km s-1 in the north to $`50`$ km s-1 in the south. These velocities are comparable with the average values of about $``$13 km s-1 for the northern part and $``$35 km s-1 for the southern part obtained from the repeated observations in June 2000. Fig. 3 shows a cut along the H2 bar illustrating the velocity gradient. Note that the small–scale structure showing deviations of $``$10–15 km s-1 probably reflects the errors in determining the velocity at each position.

The presence of a star ($`\mathrm{RA}(1950)=17^\mathrm{h}41^\mathrm{m}46\stackrel{s}{.}5`$ , $`\mathrm{Dec}.(1950)=29\mathrm{°}49\mathrm{}45\stackrel{}{.}0`$) in the centre of the H2 filament, together with the velocity difference between the north-east and south-west sections, and the jet–like appearance of the brightest H2 contours would be consistent with a collimated bipolar jet originating from the star. However, other considerations suggest that this is unlikely. Firstly, the star in question cannot be a protostar. The 2MASS point source catalogue gives the J, H and K magnitudes of the star as $`13.22\pm 0.04`$, $`10.31\pm 0.05`$ and $`8.97\pm 0.04`$ respectively. Using the JHK intrinsic colours from Bessell & Brett (1988) and Koornneef (1983), and the reddening vector from Bessell & Brett (1988), we find that the extinction in K-band is $`A_K2`$ (visual extinction $`A_V20`$). These values are consistent with the lack of detection in the Digitized Sky Surveys (DSS). After correcting for extinction, we find that derived magnitudes are consistent with either a K dwarf within 100 pc of the Sun, or a K or M giant at a distance of several kpc. The former case can be excluded given that there are no molecular clouds within 200 pc of the Sun that could give rise to the H2 emission. In the latter case the bright star is evolved and cannot be driving the outflow. The apparent location of the star at the centre of the H2 bar is, therefore, most probably a chance alignment. Of course, it is possible that apparent outflow is being produced by a star at several kpc which is too faint to be detected. A more serious problem is that the emission does not resemble that of other outflows detected in the 1–0 S(1) line. In bipolar outflows, such as Cep E (Eisloffel et al., 1996), the emission associated with jets generally peaks in discrete knots or lobes at some distance from the driving source. Furthermore, the jets are narrow close to the driving source and the lobes have distinct, roughly constant velocities. The velocity gradient and morphology, including the extended diffuse component, present in our H2 data are thus not consistent with entrainment by a fast, narrow protostellar jets.

Fig. 4 shows contours of velocity–integrated H2 line emission superimposed on a 6–cm greyscale VLA image with a resolution of 12 $`\stackrel{}{.}`$7 $`\times `$ 8 $`\stackrel{}{.}`$2 (P.A. = 62°) (Yusef-Zadeh et al., 2001). The bar of H2 emission is almost perpendicular to the Snake and it runs parallel to the edge of an elliptical depression located $``$15 arcsec to the west of the H2 bar. The synchrotron emissivity of this depression is reduced by $`30`$ per cent and it surrounds the Snake filament where it crosses the shell of G359.1–0.5.

### 3.2 Characteristics of associated molecular cloud

#### 3.2.1 Identifying the cloud associated with G359.1–0.5

Observations of molecular clouds associated with SNRs are potentially subject to confusion due to other molecular clouds along the line of sight. However, the maser velocity of $``$5 km s-1 can be related to the systemic velocity of the post–shock material next to the SNR shell because the OH(1720 MHz) masers are only seen in orientation where they are transverse to the motion of the expanding shock front. Hence they closely match the systemic velocity of the SNR rather than any local intrinsic expansion. We therefore expect that molecular gas with similar velocity originates from the molecular cloud associated with G359.1–0.5. In Fig. 5 we show the spectra of 12CO, HCO+, 13CO J=1–0 and CS J=2–1 towards maser A. In the velocity range of interest, between $``$20 and 0 km s-1, the shape of the 13CO line profile differes from those of the other profiles. Inspection of the velocity cubes implies that emission within this range is most likely associated with the SNR shell. In contrast, the emission between $``$40 and $``$20 km s-1 and the narrow features at $`+`$5 and $`+`$16 km s-1 appear to be uncorrelated with the SNR shell or the H2 bar.

Compared with the 13CO spectra, the 12CO and HCO+ spectra, and to a lesser extent the CS spectra, all show an absorption feature between $``$20 and $`5`$ km s-1. In Table 1 we list the results of a Gaussian fit to the 13CO feature, but for the other species affected by absorption we give only the maximum of the observed line profiles, which thus represent minimum $`T_{mb}`$ for these species. The correspondence between the peak of the 13CO emission and the centre of the absorption dip in the other three spectra implies that part of the molecular cloud is being self–absorbed in the molecular species with higher optical depth.

The overall distribution of 12CO, 13CO and CS emission show differences due to variations in optical depth across the region (the spectra of HCO+ were not obtained over the whole region, as the other molecules, but only towards the maser and in four positions around the maser). Maps of the emission, integrated between $`20`$ and 0 km s-1, are shown in Fig. 6 overlaid with the contours of H2 emission. The true distribution of gas column density is represented by the 13CO because of its low optical depth, in contrast to the high optical depths of the other species. We note that the 13CO distribution is dominated by the gas located to the west of the H2 bar. Although the 12CO and CS emitting gas is covering the same region as shown by the 13CO map, these molecules show regions dominated by optically thin gas which is not self–absorbed, and is located east from the H2 bar. East of the bar we thus have the gas with lower optical depth, while to the west the gas has higher optical depth. The 12CO and CS maps both show an elongated feature near and parallel to the H2 emission and the SNR shell. The H2 bar is located at the edge of this filament of molecular gas.

#### 3.2.2 Physical properties of the molecular cloud

Self–absorption in molecular clouds can be produced by an overlaying colder or sub–thermally excited layer. To estimate the kinetic temperature and density of the gas we have modeled the observed values of the 13CO J=2–1 and J=1–0 line intensities using a statistical–equilibrium excitation code supplied by J. H. Black. The code employs a mean–escape probability (MEP) approximation for radiative transfer (Jansen, van Dishoeck & Black, 1994) and calculates line intensities given kinetic temperature and density of the gas, the total column density of the molecule and the line width. For the western part of the cloud we find gas temperature of 8 $`\pm `$ 2 K, gas density of $`10^4`$ cm-3, 13CO column density of 2.0$`\times 10^{16}`$ cm-2 and 13CO J=1–0 optical depth of 0.3. This low optical depth is consistent with the non–detection of C18O transitions. Also, the density of $`10^4`$ cm-3 is consistent with the molecular distribution being affected by absorption in this part of the cloud, as the lower–excitation temperatures occur at these densities for the HCO+ and CS lines. Using a 12CO/13CO abundance ratio of 30 (Gardner & Whiteoak, 1982) we have the 12CO column density of 6.0$`\times 10^{17}`$ cm-2 and 12CO J=1–0 optical depth of 9. On the other hand, the eastern part of the cloud must have density $``$ $`10^5`$ cm-3 because of the CS J=3–2 detection. For such densities the corresponding gas temperature derived from the code is 10 $`\pm `$ 2 K, 13CO column is $`10^{16}`$ cm-2 and 13CO J=1–0 optical depth is 0.1. This yields a 12CO column density of 3.0$`\times 10^{17}`$ cm-2 and optical depth of 3.

These results show that western region of the cloud may be slightly colder than the eastern region. To investigate whether this difference in temperature is sufficient to produce the observed self–absorption, we use the following:

$$T_{abs}=f(T_{bg})e^{\tau _{fg}}+f(T_{fg})(1e^{\tau _{fg}}),$$
(1)
where

$$f(T)=\frac{h\nu }{k}[(e^{\frac{h\nu }{kT}}1)^1(e^{\frac{h\nu }{kT_{cmb}}}1)^1].$$
(2)
$`T_{abs}`$ is the observed temperature at the velocity of maximum absorption in 12CO, $`T_{fg}`$ is the excitation temperature of the foreground part of the cloud, $`T_{bg}`$ is the excitation temperature of the background part of the cloud and $`\tau _{fg}`$ is the optical depth of the foreground cloud. The observed $`T_{abs}`$ ranges from 2 to 3.3 K across the mapped region and $`T_{cmb}`$ = 2.7 K is the temperature of the cosmic microwave background. Using $`T_{bg}`$ = 10 K and $`\tau _{fg}`$ = 3 for the eastern part of the cloud we derive the foreground cloud excitation temperature of $`T_{fg}=6\pm 1`$ K. For the western part of the cloud $`T_{abs}`$ depends only on the excitation temperature of the foreground part of the cloud because of the high optical depth in that region ($`\tau _{fg}`$ = 9). Fitting the observed $`T_{abs}`$ we derive same $`T_{fg}`$ of 6 $`\pm 1`$ K.

The kinetic temperature of the western part of the cloud (8 $`\pm `$ 2 K) is in good agreement with the excitation temperature of 6 $`\pm `$ 1 K derived for the foreground part of the cloud. In other words, for the western part of the cloud $`T_{kin}`$= $`T_{ex}`$. Since this is the part of the cloud where 12CO distribution is affected by absorption, we conclude that physically cold, not sub–thermally excited layer of the cloud is responsible for the self–absorption in the observed spectra.

## 4 Discussion

The H2 1–0/2–1 S(1) line ratio of $``$ 20 is consistent with shock excitation, as expected from the presence of the OH(1720 MHz) maser. Although UV excitation can, in principle, produce the 1–0 S(1) line intensity without violating the limit on the 2–1 line when molecular gas of density $`10^5`$$`10^6`$ cm-3 is exposed to a FUV flux of $`G_010^{4.5}`$ (Burton, Hollenbach & Tielens, 1990), there is no OB star within 1 pc, as evident from the 2MASS point source catalogue, there are no H ii regions apparent in the continuum map, and no significant emission in the Midcourse Space Experiment333http://www.ipac.caltech.edu/ipac/msx/msx.html (MSX) bands at 8.3 and 21.3 µm within an arcmin of the maser.

The H2 emission must then originate from a shock driven by the SNR. The OH(1720 MHz) maser is expected to be located within the cooling gas behind a C–type shock wave (Lockett et al., 1999), and its location just inside the sharp western edge of the H2 emission supports the idea that the expanding shell of G359.5-0.1 is driving a shock into a molecular cloud at that location. Shock models do not predict OH column density required to produce OH(1720 MHz) masers (Draine, Roberge, & Dalgarno, 1983; Kaufman & Neufeld, 1996). Lockett et al. (1999) and Wardle (1999) suggested that the OH column density is enhanced by UV photodissocaition of H2O. The internal FUV field generated by the X–rays from an SNR interior are able to dissociate more than 1 per cent of H2O, which is enough to produce the required OH abundance (Wardle, 1999). How does this FUV field affects the H2 emission? It is about 100 times weaker than the standard interstellar field (1.6$`\times 10^3`$ erg s-1 cm-2), which makes it far less than that associated with an H ii region or PDR. The corresponding local X–ray energy deposition per particle is then $`H_x/n7\times 10^{29}`$ erg cm3 s-1 (see equation 2 from Maloney, Hollenbach, & Tielens 1996). From Fig.6a in Maloney et al. (1996) the intensity in the 2.12 $`\mathrm{\mu m}`$ H2 1–0 S(1) line of 3.2$`\times 10^5`$ erg s-1 cm-2 sr-1 which is 0.2 per cent of observed peak H2 flux. Thus, the FUV field produced by X–rays has negligible contribution to the excitation of the 2.12 $`\mathrm{\mu m}`$ H2 1–0 S(1) line.

The H2 bar follows the distribution of extended OH(1720 MHz) maser emission (Yusef-Zadeh et al., 1995), which is believed to be an evidence of this interaction on the global scale (Yusef-Zadeh et al., 1999). Indeed, X–ray observations (Bamba et al., 2000) show a centre–filled morphology of this SNR which, in conjunction with the shell morphology in radio band, has been proposed as a characteristic of SNRs interacting with molecular clouds (Rho & Petre, 1998). We found the H2 emission near other masers in this SNR aligned well with the SNR shell (Lazendic et al., 2001). The magnetic field along the line of sight towards maser A was estimated to be $`560\mu `$G and the magnetic field was found oriented along the H2 bar (Yusef-Zadeh, Roberts & Bower, 2001). The thickness of the shock is expected to be of order $`10^{17}`$ cm, about an arcsec at a distance of 8.5 kpc. We identify the sharp western edge of the bar as being the leading, limb brightened edge of a curved shock front. The maser velocity is distinct from the mean velocity of about $``$30 km s-1 of the shocked H2 at this location, but the maser is preferentially produced when the shock front is perpendicular to the line of sight. The H2 velocity gradient could be the result of a pre–existing gradient, since a gradient of $``$5 km s-1 is found in the 13CO gas in same direction.

The results derived from the molecular spectra imply the presence of a density gradient across the region, and the obvious mechanism to produce such a gradient is the passage of an SNR shock wave. The denser gas ($``$$`10^5`$ – $`10^6`$ cm-3) then corresponds to post–shocked gas and the lower density gas ($``$$`10^4`$ cm-3) corresponds to ambient pre–shocked gas, with the H2 filament being the boundary between the two regions. A similar case of self–absorption by pre–shocked gas was also seen in IC 443 (White et al., 1987; van Dishoeck, Jansen, & Phillips, 1993). The values obtained for gas densities are consistent with those expected in shocks. Because of the presence of the OH(1720 MHz) maser, which requires a density $``$$`10^5`$ cm-3, the pre–shock density must be $``$$`10^4`$ cm-3 since the typical compression in shocks is $``$20–30 (for shock speed of 20–30 km s-1 and Alfv$`\stackrel{´}{\mathrm{e}}`$n speed in molecular clouds of 2 km s-1). In Fig. 7 we present a schematic model of the SNR shock passing through the molecular cloud. Dense gas is located mostly on the eastern side of the H2 filament, i.e. behind the shock front, while the lower density gas extends mostly to the west from the H2 emission, i.e. in front of the shock front.

The gas temperature between the pre–shock and post–shock gas does not differ much since the gas cools rapidly behind the C–type shock. We did not detect the warm molecular gas, other than in H2, found in other SNRs associated with OH(1720 MHz) masers (van Dishoeck, Jansen, & Phillips, 1993; Frail & Mitchell, 1998; Reach & Rho, 1999). The reason is probably beam dilution. The warm gas is less than 0.6 pc away from the shock front, as inferred from the H2 emission, and our beam of 1–2 pc in size includes the volume of gas further away that has been cooled to near–ambient gas temperature. The post–shock/ambient cloud temperature of 10 K is consistent with the excitation temperature derived for the clouds in the Galactic Centre region (Oka et al., 1998). The beam dilution might be also the reason for non–detection of H2CO and SiO transitions which favour regions with higher temperatures. Although the pre–shock gas temperature of $``$8 K is lower than typical molecular cloud temperatures of $`10`$ K (Goldsmith, 1987), dark clouds are found with temperatures low as this (Dickman, 1975; Snell, 1981). In our case, a likely explanation for this is the broad line width of the cloud (15 – 20 km s-1) which enables more efficient cooling. This is supported by the results of the MEP code. As CO is the dominant coolant at densities $``$$`10^4`$ cm-3 (Goldsmith & Langer, 1978), we can estimate the total cooling rate using the total power in the rotational transition of 12CO. For a 12CO column density of $`10^{18}`$ cm-2 and volume density of $`10^4`$ cm-3, the power emitted for $`\mathrm{\Delta }v`$ = 20 km s-1 and $`T_{kin}`$= 8 K is $``$4$`\times 10^{23}`$ erg s-1 CO-1, and for $`\mathrm{\Delta }v`$ = 2 km s-1 and $`T_{kin}`$= 15 K is $``$4.7$`\times 10^{23}`$ erg s-1 CO-1. Thus the cooling rate from a 8 K cloud with 20 km s-1 line width is similar to that of a 15 K cloud with a 2 km s-1 line width.

Despite the positional coincidence and spatial proximity of the two, we did not find any morphological evidence in our data that supports the interaction between the SNR and the Snake. Similarly besides the positional coincidence, there is no obvious relationship between the H2 emission and the Snake. In the view of the recent suggestion by Bicknell & Li (2001) that the origin of the Snake is linked to rotating molecular clouds, we examined the possibility that the velocity gradient in H2 of $`\pm `$20 km s-1 might originate from rotation of a flattened cloud. The 1–0 S(1) emission runs along an elliptical depression in the 6–cm emission from the SNR where the Snake crosses it (see Fig 4). This depression could be caused by a rotating dense molecular cloud. However, we derive the mass of the cloud from our 13CO data to be $`700`$$`M_{}`$, in which case its escape speed is about 1.6 km s-1 and its self–gravity could not sustain the rotation.

## 5 Conclusions

We carried out near–IR and millimetre wavelength observations of the region around the OH(1720 MHz) maser located at the apparent intersection of the nonthermal filament the Snake and the SNR shell G359.1–0.5. A bar of H2 emission was found encompassing the OH(1720 MHz) maser and aligned with the SNR shell. We suggest that H2 emission originates from the expansion of the SNR blast wave, which is evident from the sharp western edge that corresponds to the forward shock. This shocked H2 emission, as inferred from the 1–0 and 2–1 S(1) line ratio, supports the notion that the OH(1720 MHz) masers association with SNRs are produced in molecular shock waves.

Emission from the molecular species 12CO, CS, HCO+ and 13CO was detected at the maser velocity. The spectra of the former three species are affected by broad–line absorption which originates from a colder layer of molecular gas. Optically thin 13CO was unaffected by the absorption and is produced mostly in this colder layer, identified as pre–shocked gas. The inferred density gradient across the region places higher density post–shocked gas west of the H2 bar. The distribution of the pre–shock and post–shock gas is consistent with the passage of the SNR shock and the H2 bar being the boundary between the two regions.

The warm molecular gas from post–shocked gas was not detected in millimetre wavelengths probably because of beam dilution. For a better morphological and qualitative study of the shocked molecular gas towards maser A we plan to obtain observations at sub–millimetre wavelengths, which will have improved spatial resolution. Observations at other maser positions in the SNR are in progress to obtain a global view of the interaction of the SNR G359.1–0.5 with its molecular gas environment.

## Acknowledgments

We thank both the SEST and the AAT for the allocation of observing time. We thank J. Black for use of his MEP code and M. Cohen, M. Reid and T. Bourke for useful discussions. JSL was supported by the Australian Government International Postgraduate Research Scholarship and the Sydney University Postgraduate Scholarship, and acknowledges travel support from the Access to Major Research Facilities Program of the Australian Nuclear Science & Technology Organisation. MW was supported by the Australian Research Council.

This publication makes use of data products from: (1) the Two Micron All Sky Survey (2MASS), which is a joint project of the University of Massachusetts and the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center/California Institute of Technology, funded by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the National Science Foundation; and (2) the Digitized Sky Surveys (DSS) were produced at the Space Telescope Science Institute under U.S. Government grant NAG W-2166. The images of these surveys are based on photographic data obtained using the Oschin Schmidt Telescope on Palomar Mountain and the UK Schmidt Telescope. The plates were processed into the present compressed digital form with the permission of these institutions. The National Geographic Society - Palomar Observatory Sky Atlas (POSS-I) was made by the California Institute of Technology with grants from the National Geographic Society.


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# The Holistic Universe and the Variation of the Fine Structure Constant

## 1 Introduction

Recently Inaba  has argued that a fluctuation in the Robertson-Walker geometry yields a random motion for a particle in the universe, which latter is equivalent to the usual Quantum Theory. He argues that this may be suggestive of a manifestation of Mach’s principle. Inaba’s simple model is based on the work of Santamoto , who tried to give a geometrical interpretation for Quantum Theory. The object of the present note is to confirm this result, from a different and more general viewpoint, namely, in terms of fluctuations in the universe.

## 2 Fluctuations

We first observe that it is not surprising that Quantum Theory should be the effect of fluctuations in the universe as a whole. In fact as pointed out , the fluctuation in the mass of a typical elementary particle, for example the pion, due to the fluctuation $`\sqrt{N}`$ of the particle number $`N10^{80}`$ is given by

$$\mathrm{\Delta }m\frac{G\sqrt{N}m^2}{c^2R}$$

Whence

$$(\mathrm{\Delta }mc^2)T=\frac{G\sqrt{N}m^2}{R}T=\frac{G\sqrt{N}m^2}{c}$$
(1)
where $`T`$ is the age of the universe and $`R`$ its radius, which equals $`cT`$.
Not only is the right side of equation (1) the reduced Planck constant $`\mathrm{}`$, in the order of magnitude sense, but also equation (1) itself is an expression of the Uncertainity relation

$$\mathrm{\Delta }E\mathrm{\Delta }t\mathrm{}.$$

Equation (1) again suggests the origin of Quantum Theory in cosmic fluctuations.
Before proceeding it is worth mentioning that the above line of reasoning leads to a cosmology which deduces from theory all the supposedly miraculously coincidental large number relations of Dirac as also the empirical inexplicable Weinberg formula which relates the mass of the elementary particle, the pion to large scale parameters like the Hubble Constant ,

$$m_\pi \left(\frac{H\mathrm{}^2}{Gc}\right)^{1/3}$$

The cosmological scheme is also consistent with the subsequent discovery that not only is the universe not decelerating but is actually accelerating and will expand for ever .
Inaba deduces for a nearly flat Robertson-Walker universe from a minimum average curvature principle, the Hamilton-Jacobi equation for a single particle,

$$_tS+\frac{1}{2m}g^{ıj}(_ıS)+V\alpha R=0.$$
(2)
where the curvature $`R`$ is given by

$$R=R^{(b)}+R^{};R^{(b)}=6\left(\frac{\dot{a}}{a}+\frac{\ddot{a}^2}{a^2}\right),$$

$`R^{}`$ being the fluctuation effect, $`R^{(b)}`$ being the curvature in the standard Robertson-Walker geometry.
Equation (2) leads by the standard Madelung-Bohm or Nelson Theory to the Schrodinger equation

$$ı\mathrm{}_t\psi =\frac{\mathrm{}^2}{2m}\mathrm{\Delta }\psi +V\psi \frac{\mathrm{}^2}{4m}R^{(b)}$$
(3)
Inaba then argues that (3) is indeed the Quantum Mechanical equation in the classical Robertson-Walker geometry - it is the perturbation $`R^{}`$ in the Robertson-Walker geometry that lead to (3).
We can justify the above conclusion as follows: We first observe that in the random motion of $`N`$ particles, $`l`$ the fluctuation in the length is given by

$$l\frac{R}{\sqrt{N}}$$
(4)
What is very interesting is that using for $`R`$ the actual radius of the universe $`10^{28}cm`$, and for $`N`$ the actual number of particles in the universe, (4) reduces to the well known Eddington formula, $`l10^{12}cm`$ being the Compton wavelength of a typical elementary particle, like the electron.
Further the diffusion equation describing the motion of a particle with position given by $`x(t)`$ subject to random corrections is given by the well known equation

$$|\mathrm{\Delta }x|=\sqrt{<\mathrm{\Delta }x^2>}\nu \sqrt{\mathrm{\Delta }t},$$

where the diffusion constant $`\nu `$ is related to the mean free path $`l`$ and the mean velocity $`v`$

$$\nu lv$$
(5)
Identifying $`l`$ of equation (5) with that in (4), we, as in the case of Nelson’s derivation, arrive at the Hamilton-Jacobi equation (2) and thence the Schrodinger equation (3) . Incidentally, this also provides a rationale to the otherwise adhoc identification in Nelsonian theory viz.,

$$\nu =\mathrm{}/m$$

Thus using the equations of Brownian Motion in the context of all the particles in the universe, we arrive at the same equations (2) and (3) of Inaba based on a minimum curvature principle and Santamoto’s geometric Quantum Mechanics.
Infact one can look upon the above results in terms of the fluctuation of the metric itself. In Santamoto’s original formulation , the geometry is Weyl’s guage invariant geometry, where there is no invariant length and infact we have

$$\delta l^2l^2\delta g_{ık}$$
(6)
It must be stressed that (6) is valid for arbitrary vectors $`A^ı`$, in which case $`l`$ would be their length.
Using the usual geometrodynamic formula for the fluctuation of the metric, we have

$$l^2\delta g_{ık}\mathrm{\Delta }g_{ık}\frac{l_P}{l}$$
(7)
where $`l_P`$ is the Planck length.
Whence we get

$$\delta g_{ık}1$$
(8)
if $`l`$ is of the order $`10^{11}cm`$ or the electron Compton wavelength.
Similarly using (4) in (6), we recover (8), as in the Weyl geometry.
This establishes the equivalence of the two approaches and reconfirms the Machian feature, from a more general viewpoint.

## 3 The Fine Structure Constant

In the Weyl geometry considered above, or in a more general scheme of a non commutative geometry we have equations like (6), (7) and (8). What they show is that at the Compton wavelength $`l`$, the variation of length $`\delta l`$ is the Planck length, the absolute minimum length; in this sense $`l`$ is the minimum physical length (Cf.refs.and ).
We now observe that, in the above spirit if we consider the gravitational potential energy of the particle as its inertial energy, we get

$$\frac{NGm^2}{r}mc^2$$
(9)
In (9) if $`N=1`$ and $`r`$ the Planck length, then we get the Planck mass. If $`N10^{80}`$ and $`r`$ of the radius of the universe, we get the mass of an elementary particle like the electron. Thus it is the presence of $`N`$ particles that leads to electromagnetism. If $`N=1`$, then we would be at the Planck mass and Planck length. Indeed as can be seen from (1), in this case the Compton wavelength of such a Planck particle would equal its schwarzschild radius and electromagnetism and gravitation would become one (Cf.refs. and ): electromagnetism would disappear.
Let us now examine the above situation in the light of the fluctuational cosmology model (Cf.ref. and ). In this model $`\sqrt{N}`$ particles are fluctuationally created within the minimum Compton scale time, and as noted in Section 2 this leads to a consistent explanation of several otherwise adhoc features as also the recently observed acceleration of the universe. It then follows that in the early universe when $`N1,`$ the present day Compton wavelenth would have been of the order of the Planck length.
On the other hand the Compton wavelength leads to a correction in the electrostatic potential experienced by an orbiting electron in an atom, similar to the Darwin term. Briefly we have

$$\delta V=V(\stackrel{}{r}+\delta \stackrel{}{r})V(\stackrel{}{r})$$

$$=\delta r\frac{V}{r}+\frac{1}{2}\underset{ıj}{}\delta r_ı\delta r_j\frac{^2V}{r_ır_j}$$

$$0(1)\delta r^2^2V$$
(10)
From (10) it follows that if $`\delta rl`$, the Compton wavelength then

$$\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\alpha }{\alpha }10^5$$
(11)
where $`\alpha `$ is the fine structure constant and $`\mathrm{\Delta }\alpha `$ is the change in the fine structure constant from the early uniiverse.
Equation (11) is consistent with the recent observational estimates of Webb et al., for the evolution of the fine structure constant.


text:
# 1 Left: DOS for hopping Hamiltonian with 𝑡(𝑟)<0. The inset shows the effect of the AFM coupling (𝐽=15 meV). The 𝜎=↑ and 𝜎=↓ bands (thick lines) are no longer degenerate at low temperatures. For comparison, we plot the 𝐽=0 DOS as well (thin line). Right: dependence of the average IPR on the energy, In both pictures x=0.0093.

Berciu and Bhatt reply: The point raised by the authors of the Comment regarding the hopping term $`t(r)`$ we use  to describe the impurity band (IB) of holes in Ga1-xMnxAs, needs clarification. A proper description of the hopping between impurity states in such alloys is a very complicated and, to our knowledge, unsettled issue. In our work, we used a hopping parameter of magnitude corresponding to two isolated s-wave impurities, with $`t(r)<0`$ in the hole representation. This parametrization captures two important length scales - the inter Mn-Mn distance, and the impurity Bohr radius - present in a complete model of the experimental system. With our parameters, in the absence of magnetization, we obtain an impurity band for holes whose density of states (DOS) is plotted in Fig.1 (left), for a Mn concentration $`x=0.93\%`$ using the impurity Rydberg (Ry) as a unit (1Ry=112 meV for Mn in GaAs). The top of the hole impurity band is 3 Ry above the valence band, while the Fermi energy $`E_F`$ for holes lies 2.5 Ry above the top of the valence band. These appear to be reasonable numbers: for a random distribution of acceptor centers A, the top of the hole band would be expected to correspond to the ionization potential of the most stable configuration, which is likely an $`A_4`$ complex accomodating 4 holes in the ground impurity state. In a hydrogenic model, this is $`4.5`$ Ry; for centers with strong central cell like Mn in GaAs, it is likely reduced somewhat. In the mean-field approach, this is the situation above $`T_c`$, while for $`T<T_c`$, the coupling to the Mn spins causes the spin up and down bands to split, leaving the system fully polarized at $`T=0`$ (see inset).

Additionally, with the parameters used the IB shows a mobility edge close to $`E_F`$, as demonstrated by computing the inverse participation ratio IPR=$`_i|\varphi (i)|^4`$, where $`\varphi (i)`$ is the wavefunction amplitude at site i. For an extended wave-function, IPR$`1/N_d`$, where $`N_d`$ is the number of sites of a finite sample. For localized wavefunctions, the IPR is independent of system size. The average IPR for the wavefunctions of our hopping Hamiltonian are shown in Fig. 1 (right) for $`N_d=125`$ and 1000. The occupied hole states at the top of the hole impurity band are localized, with relatively high and size-independent IPR, whereas states of lower energy, which are occupied only at higher hole fillings, are extended with IPR’s depending on size in the expected manner. Thus, the model captures the proximity of the Metal-Insulator Transition, seen in experiment. (For $`x=5\%`$, where the magnetization is much less anomalous, the IB top is again split a few Ry above the valence band, and is somewhat wider).

On the other hand, as pointed out in the Comment, the choice $`t(r)>0`$ in the hole picture, which inverts the IB ($`EE`$), is not suitable because it leads to an unphysical long tail of the DOS in the gap at the densities of interest, and a consequent low DOS at $`E_F`$. Moreover, all the relevant states are extended (there is no mobility edge). A more realistic calculation of the IB, including

the Coulomb potential from the other Mn impurities as well the charged impurities responsible for the large compensation, and using the more complicated structure of a hole impurity wavefunction, will likely remove the unphysical tail and yield a DOS similar to the one used in our calculation, with proximity to a mobility edge. Already the tail is absent in e.g. Ref. 3, for a hydrogenic lattice. Since the nature of compensation in GaMnAs is still an open question, we opted to use a simple model that gives a physically acceptable description of the IB.

Our goal in Ref.  was to use this simple IB model to point out non-trivial effects of disorder in Mn positions on the shape of the magnetization curve $`M(T)`$ and the critical temperature $`T_\mathrm{C}`$. To our knowledge, all previously published studies had neglected this aspect. Studies appearing since support our claim of increased $`T_\mathrm{C}`$ with increased Mn disorder . While we agree that a better modeling of the impurity band and inclusion of the valence band and other factors such as screening (on a proper, local scale, taking into account strong charge inhomogeneities) are necessary to achieve a proper quantitative description especially in the metallic regime $`x>0.03`$, we maintain that the underlying physics captured by our simple model of Ref.  is essentially correct.


text:
# Hiccups in the night: X-ray monitoring of the two Crab-like LMC pulsars

## 1. Introduction

A characteristic signature of young rotation-powered pulsars is the phenomena of “glitches”, sudden discontinuous changes in their spin periods (e.g., see Lyne & Graham-Smith 1998). The physical causes of these glitches are not understood. Suggestions include sudden changes in the neutron star (NS) crust configuration (“starquakes”), abrupt reconfiguration of the magnetic field, or perhaps to the sudden unpinning of vortices in the superfluid neutrons in the inner part of the NS crust. For the latter, the amplitude of the glitch provides an estimate of the fractional part of the moment of inertia carried by superfluid neutrons (Lyne et al. 1996).

The largest glitches have relative amplitudes ($`\mathrm{\Delta }\nu /\nu `$) of several parts per million, but the range of amplitudes covers many orders of magnitude. Often there is a partial recovery back toward the pre-glitch rotation rate on a time scale of $`100`$ days, however, the spin-down rate may be permanently altered. Lyne (1995) noted that the amount of recovery in the rotation rate tends to be inversely proportional to the characteristic age of the pulsar. For some pulsars (e.g. Crab) the glitches are accompanied by a persistent increase in the spin-down rate with a relative amplitude of a few $`\times 10^4`$. This increase may be caused, for example, by changes in the alignment of the magnetic field because of starquakes (Allen & Horvath 1998; Link et al. 1998).

In this paper we present preliminary results on the first detection of glitches from the two LMC Crab-like pulsars.

## 2. Observations and Results

All data presented herein were obtained with the PCA instrument on-board the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer (RXTE) for the purpose of monitoring the 16 ms pulsar PSR J0537-6910 (Marshall et al. 1998). However, the 50 ms PSR B0540-69, located $`22^{}`$ away, lies well within the RXTE $`1^{}`$ (FWHM) field of view and was thus simultaneously observed. The duration and spacing between observations were optimized to phase-link the pulses from PSR J0537-6910 which is more then sufficient to allow a similar analysis for PSR B0540-69, which is both slower and brighter than PSR J0537-6910.

The PCA is sensitive to X-rays in the $`260`$ keV band, with a spectral resolution $`\delta E/E18\%`$ at 6 keV and a time resolution of $`<100\mu s`$. To optimize the pulsar detection, we selected $`215`$ keV photons from the top layer of the PCA only. Photon arrival times were corrected to the solar system barycenter.

Our timing analysis procedure is summarized below (see Zhang et al. 2001 for details). For each observation we folded the arrival times into 20 phase bins over a range of frequencies centered on an initial value found from an FFT of the data set (without accounting for any $`\dot{\nu }`$). From the folded profile we determined a pulse time-of-arrival (TOA) for each observation in an iterative manner, initially using a linear fit to the TOA’s then adding higher order derivative terms as needed.

### 2.1. The 50 ms LMC Pulsar PSR 0540-69

Using the above prescription we fitted the TOA’s for the PSR 0540-69 data sets. A linear fit was used as a quadratic term was not needed to improve the fit. However, we found an apparent timing glitch had occurred, too small to show up directly in a frequency residuals but large enough to be evident in the analysis of the TOAs. An improved fit was obtained by breaking up the data set up into two groups and fitting each separately. Figure 1 presents the pulse arrival times fitted with the ephemeries of Zhang et al. (2001). We determine that the glitch occurred at MJD $`51,325\pm 45`$. The glitch at this epoch changed in frequency and frequency derivative $`\mathrm{\Delta }\nu /\nu =(1.90\pm 0.05)\times 10^9`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }\dot{\nu }/\dot{\nu }=(8.5\pm 0.5)\times 10^5`$, respectively; the magnitude of $`\mathrm{\Delta }\dot{\nu }`$ for this glitch is $`3.5`$ times larger than the one Deeter, Nagase, & Boynton (1999) suggested.

Our timing result for PSR B0540-69 is most consistent with the extrapolated ephemeris of Deeter et al. (1987 to 1991) and agrees to within the uncertainties, while that of Boyd (spanning 1979 to 1993) over-predicts our measured frequencies by tens of micro-hertz. Our braking index of $`1.81\pm 0.07`$ is significantly lower than than the values of $`2.28\pm 0.02`$ (Boyd et al. 1995) and $`2.0799\pm 0.00027`$ (Deeter et al. 1999). Eikenberry et al. (1998) found $`n=2.5`$ whose errors are dominated by timing noise. However, all previous measurements explicitly assumed that the pulsar had not suffered any glitches during the observation intervals.

Given our new result, and the apparent inconsistent in the reported braking index, it is likely that there may have been many other glitches in the timing history of PSR B0540-69. In particular, when we combine the data points in Table 1 of Boyd et al. (1995) with the frequency measurements of the work presented herein, we obtain a braking index of $`2.103\pm 0.005`$, significantly lower than $`2.28\pm 0.02`$. Based on the glitch rates from other Crab-like pulsars, such as PSR J537-6910 (see below) and on Vela (nine glitches in 25 yr; Lyne et al. 1996), it is certainly possible that PSR B0540-69 could have an average glitch rate of one per year. Since our measurements come from phase-linked data sets, they likely provide the most accurate measure of the secular braking index.

### 2.2. The 16 ms LMC Pulsar PSR 0537-6910

Following a similar analysis as described above, for PSR J0537-6910 we find six large glitches occurred during the first 900 days of our monitoring campaign. The intervals between glitches ranged between $`80`$ to $`300`$ days. The relative increases of the pulse frequency ranged from $`0.14\times 10^6`$ to $`0.68\times 10^6`$, and relative amplitude ranged from $`0.150.68\times 10^6`$ in frequency. Glitches with amplitudes as small as $`0.01\times 10^6`$ could have easily been detected. Their absence suggests that small glitches are relatively rare in PSR J0537-6910.

With the exception of the Jan 2000 observations, we are able to maintain the cycle-count of the pulse period for all data between the glitches. The long term spindown of the pulsar continues to average $`1.9743\times 10^{10}`$ Hz/s, i.e., the same value previously reported. With continued monitoring we should be able to determine the braking index, $`n`$ for PSR J0537-6910; this may allow us to distinguish between possible physical mechanisms contributing to the spindown.

Although PSR J0537-6910 is the oldest and most rapidly rotating Crab-like pulsar, the observed rate of glitching appears to be the highest of all known Crab-like systems. The frequency and size of the glitches are comparable to the extreme values for any pulsar. The pulsars exhibiting the largest known rates of glitches are PSR J1740-3015, for which nine glitches have been observed in 8 years (Shemar & Lyne 1996), and PSR J1341-6220, for which 12 glitches have been seen in 8.2 years (Wang et al. 2000). Most of these glitches were relatively small, however, with typical relative amplitudes of $`<1\times 10^7`$. However, the Vela pulsar has had nine major glitches in 25 years of comparable size as those found for PSR J0537-6910 (Lyne et. al 1996).

#### Acknowledgments.

This research is supported by the NASA LTSA grant NAG5-22250. J. M. thanks the University of California’s Institute for Nuclear and Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology (INPAC) for funding.

## References

Allen, M.P. & Horvath, J.E. 1997, MNRAS, 287, 615.

Boyd, P. T., et al. 1995, ApJ, 448, 365

Caraveo, P. A., Bignami, G. F., Mereghetti, S., & Mombelli, M. 1992, ApJ, 395, L103

Deeter, J. E., Nagase, F., & Boynton, P. E. 1999, ApJ, 512, 300

Eikenberry, S. S., Fazio, G. G., & Ransom, S. M. 1998, ApJ, 492, 754

Link, B. et al. 1998, ApJ, 508, 838.

Lyne, A.G. 1995, in Lives of Neutron Stars, p. 167.

Lyne, A.G. et al. 1996, MNRAS, 281, L14.

Lyne, A. G., Pritchard, R. S., Graham-Smith, F., & Camilo, F. 1996, Nature, 381, 497

Lyne, A. G., Pritchard, R. S., & Smith, F. G. 1988, MNRAS, 233, 667

Marshall, F. E., Gotthelf, E. V., Zhang, W., Middleditch, J., & Wang, Q. D. 1998, ApJ, 499, L179

Shemar, S.L. & Lyne, A.G. 1996, MNRAS, 282, 677.

Wang, N., Manchester, R.N., Pace, R.T., Bailes, M., Kaspi, V.M., Stappers, B.W., & Lyne, A.G., MNRAS, 317, 843

Zhang, W., Marshall, F. E., Gotthelf, E. V., Middleditch, J., & Wang, Q. D. 2001 ApJ, 54, L177


text:
# CMB Polarization: Scientific Case and Data Analysis Issues

## 1 Introduction

Strong theoretical arguments suggest the presence of fluctuations in the polarized component of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) at a level of 5-10% of the temperature anisotropy. A wealth of scientific information is expected to be encoded in this polarized signal. However, while the existence of anisotropies in the temperature of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) has now been firmly established by several experiments boom ; max ; dasi , only upper limits are currently available for fluctuations in the polarization of the CMB radiation.

The prospect of detecting CMB polarization anisotropy at small angular scales is now more promising than in the past. In the next few years, a number of experiments (e.g. BOOMERanG, Planck) will have the right sensitivity, as well as the necessary control on systematic effects, to make the measurement of polarization an achievable goal.

In this contribution we will first quickly review the major features of CMB polarization, then we will address some of the issues that will have to be faced in order to analyze the data collected by the forthcoming experiments.

## 2 CMB Polarization: Theoretical Framework

There are at least three features of CMB polarization that make it an appealing target for observation. First, CMB polarization anisotropies are generated at last scattering, so they are not affected by effects taking place after recombination, as opposed to temperature anisotropies. Second, distinctive polarization patterns are produced by different kind of density perturbations (e.g. scalar, vector, tensor). Finally polarization provides information complementary to temperature, helping in clarifying issues such as cosmological parameter degeneracies in the temperature power spectrum.

The rest of this chapter covers basic theoretical aspects of CMB polarization. Excellent reviews on the subject are koso ; primer .

### 2.1 Formalism

A useful way to characterize the polarization properties of the CMB is to use the Stokes parameters formalism chandra . For a nearly monochromatic plane electromagnetic wave propagating in the $`z`$ direction,

$$E_x=a_x(t)\mathrm{cos}\left[\omega _0t\theta _x(t)\right],E_y=a_y(t)\mathrm{cos}\left[\omega _0t\theta _y(t)\right],$$
(1)
the Stokes parameters are defined by:

$$Ia_x^2+a_y^2,Qa_x^2a_y^2,U2a_xa_y\mathrm{cos}(\theta _x\theta _y),V2a_xa_y\mathrm{sin}(\theta _x\theta _y),$$
(2)
where the brackets $``$ represent time averages. The parameter $`I`$ is simply the average intensity of the radiation. The polarization properties are described by the remaining parameters: $`Q`$ and $`U`$ describe linear polarization, while $`V`$ describes circular polarization. Unpolarized radiation (or natural light) is characterized by having $`Q=U=V=0`$. CMB polarization is produced through Thomson scattering (see below) which, by symmetry, cannot generate circular polarization. Then, $`V=0`$ always for CMB polarization. The Stokes parameters $`Q`$ and $`U`$ are not scalar quantities. If we rotate the reference frame of an angle $`\varphi `$ around the direction of observation, $`Q`$ and $`U`$ transform as:

$$Q^{}=Q\mathrm{cos}(2\varphi )+U\mathrm{sin}(2\varphi ),U^{}=Q\mathrm{sin}(2\varphi )+U\mathrm{cos}(2\varphi ).$$
(3)
We can define a polarization vector $`𝐏`$ having:

$$\left|𝐏\right|=\left(Q^2+U^2\right)^{1/2},\alpha =\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{tan}^1\left(\frac{U}{Q}\right).$$
(4)
Although $`𝐏`$ is a good way to visualize polarization, it is not properly a vector, since it remains identical after a rotation of $`\pi `$ around $`z`$, thus defining an orientation but not a direction. Mathematically, $`Q`$ and $`U`$ can be thought as the components of the second-rank symmetric trace-free tensor:

$$𝐏_{ab}=\frac{1}{2}\left(\begin{array}{cc}Q& U\mathrm{sin}\theta \\ \multicolumn{2}{c}{}\\ U\mathrm{sin}\theta & Q\mathrm{sin}^2\theta \end{array}\right),$$
(5)
where the trigonometric functions come from having adopted a spherical coordinate system.

### 2.2 Physical Mechanisms

The CMB photons interact before recombination with the free electrons of the primeval plasma through Thomson scattering. The dependence of the Thomson scattering cross-section on polarization is given by:

$$\frac{d\sigma }{d\mathrm{\Omega }}=\frac{3\sigma _T}{8\pi }\left|\widehat{ϵ}\widehat{ϵ}^{}\right|^2,$$
(6)
where $`\widehat{ϵ}`$ and $`\widehat{ϵ}^{}`$ are incident and scattered polarization directions. After scattering, initially unpolarized light has:

$$I=\frac{3\sigma _T}{16\pi }I^{}\left(1+\mathrm{cos}^2\theta \right),Q=\frac{3\sigma _T}{16\pi }I^{}\mathrm{sin}^2\theta ,U=0.$$
(7)
Integrating over all incoming directions gives:

$$I=\frac{3\sigma _T}{16\pi }\left[\frac{8}{3}\sqrt{\pi }a_{00}+\frac{4}{3}\sqrt{\frac{\pi }{5}}a_{20}\right],QiU=\frac{3\sigma _T}{4\pi }\sqrt{\frac{2\pi }{15}}a_{22}.$$
(8)
Then, polarization is only generated when a quadrupolar anisotropy in the incident light at last scattering is present. This has two important consequences. Because it is generated by a causal process, CMB polarization peaks at scales smaller than the horizon at last scattering. Moreover, the degree of polarization depends on the thickness of last scattering surface. As a result, the polarized signal for standard models at angular scales of tens of arcminutes is about $`10\%`$ of the total intensity (even less at larger scales). Typically, this means a polarized signal of a few $`\mu `$K.

### 2.3 Statistics

Since polarization is not a scalar, it cannot be expanded over the sky using spherical harmonics, as it is done with temperature. We can however expand the polarization tensor using the tensor spherical harmonics basis varsha , as:

$$𝐏_{ab}=T_0\underset{l=2}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\underset{m=l}{\overset{l}{}}\left[a_{(lm)}^\mathrm{E}Y_{(lm)ab}^\mathrm{E}+a_{(lm)}^\mathrm{B}Y_{(lm)ab}^\mathrm{B}\right]$$
(9)
where the $`E`$ and $`B`$ labels refer to the scalar and pseudo-scalar components of the polarization tensor. The statistical properties of the CMB anisotropies polarization are then characterized by six power spectra: $`C_l^T`$ for the temperature, $`C_l^E`$ for the E-type polarization, $`C_l^B`$ for the B-type polarization, $`C_l^{TE}`$, $`C_l^{TB}`$, $`C_l^{EB}`$ for the cross correlations. For the CMB, $`C_l^{TB}=C_l^{EB}=0`$. Furthermore, since $`B`$ relates to the component of the polarization field which possesses a handedness, one has $`C_l^B=0`$ for scalar density perturbations. The detection of a non zero $`B`$ component would point to the existence of a tensor contribution to density perturbations.

The relation relating ($`E`$,$`B`$) to ($`Q`$,$`U`$) has a non-local nature. In the limit of small angles it can be written as:

$$E(\theta )=𝐝^\mathrm{𝟐}\theta ^{}\omega (\stackrel{~}{\theta })𝐐_𝐫(\theta ^{}),𝐁(\theta )=𝐝^\mathrm{𝟐}\theta ^{}\omega (\stackrel{~}{\theta })𝐔_𝐫(\theta ^{}),$$
(10)
where the 2D angle $`\theta `$ defines a direction of observation in the coordinate system perpendicular to $`z`$,

$$Q_r(\theta )=Q(\theta ^{})\mathrm{cos}(2\stackrel{~}{\varphi })U(\theta ^{})\mathrm{sin}(2\stackrel{~}{\varphi }),U_r(\theta )=U(\theta ^{})\mathrm{cos}(2\stackrel{~}{\varphi })+Q(\theta ^{})\mathrm{sin}(2\stackrel{~}{\varphi }).$$
(11)
and $`\omega (\stackrel{~}{\theta })`$ is a generic window function.

### 2.4 Theoretical Predictions

The theoretical study of the CMB, for what concerns both its polarized and unpolarized components, is in a fully mature stage. We can produce high-precision predictions of the expected statistical CMB pattern for any given cosmological model. Figure 1 shows a simulated map of the CMB temperature anisotropy, and the corresponding polarization field, represented by the polarization vector $`|𝐏|`$. This kind of simulation can be very helpful in investigating optimal observational strategy for future experiments. In particular, now that high-resolution CMB temperature maps are available for certain areas of the sky, one can use this information to predict the statistical properties of the expected polarized signal in those regions, and tailor the polarization observations to enhance the likelihood of a detection.

Figure 2 shows an example of how a polarization measurement could complement the information from temperature. Two models that would be undistinguishable from their temperature power spectra (because of the degeneracy between the effect of reionization and of tensor modes) can be discerned by their signature in the polarization power spectrum: only the model having a tensor contribution produces B-type polarization. Furthermore, reionization produces a bump at low $`l`$’s in the polarization spectrum.

## 3 CMB Polarization: Data Analysis

In order to extract the cosmological information encoded in the CMB polarization, one has to face the challenge of a complicated data analysis stage after the observations are performed. CMB data analysis was successfully performed for recent CMB temperature experiments. While analyzing polarized data is in principle not different from unpolarized data, further complications have to be addressed. In the following we show how the problem of producing polarized maps from time-ordered observations can be addressed using the same kind of algorithms and formalism developed for the temperature case natoli .

### 3.1 Map-making

We can write the total signal measured from a generic noiseless polarimeter as:

$$=\frac{1}{2}\left(I+Q\mathrm{cos}2\varphi +U\mathrm{sin}2\varphi \right).$$
(12)
Consider the experimental set-up shown in Figure 3, where the four polarimeters are assumed to observe the same point on the sky. Then, one can write:

$`Q`$ $`=`$ $`\left(_{A1}_{A2}\right)\mathrm{cos}2\varphi \left(_{B1}_{B2}\right)\mathrm{sin}2\varphi `$ (13)
$`U`$ $`=`$ $`\left(_{A1}_{A2}\right)\mathrm{sin}2\varphi +\left(_{B1}_{B2}\right)\mathrm{cos}2\varphi .`$ (14)
More generally, the time-ordered data stream for a noisy polarimeter $`(i)`$ is:

$$d_t^{\left(i\right)}=\frac{1}{2}A_{tp}^{\left(i\right)}\left[I+Q_p\mathrm{cos}2\varphi _t^{\left(i\right)}+U_p\mathrm{sin}2\varphi _t^{\left(i\right)}\right]+n_t^{\left(i\right)}.$$
(15)
For the previous set-up:

$`\stackrel{~}{d_t}^A`$ $`=`$ $`A_{tp}^A\left[Q_p\mathrm{cos}2\psi _t+U_p\mathrm{sin}2\psi _t\right]+\stackrel{~}{n_t}^A`$ (16)
$`\stackrel{~}{d_t}^B`$ $`=`$ $`A_{tp}^B\left[Q_p\mathrm{sin}2\psi _t+U_p\mathrm{cos}2\psi _t\right]+\stackrel{~}{n_t}^B,`$ (17)
where:

$$\stackrel{~}{d_t}^Ad_t^{A1}d_t^{A2},\stackrel{~}{d_t}^Bd_t^{B1}d_t^{B2},\stackrel{~}{n_t}^An_t^{A1}n_t^{A2},\stackrel{~}{n_t}^Bn_t^{B1}n_t^{B2}.$$
(19)
We can recast everything in a matrix formalism:

$$𝐃_t=𝐀_{tp}𝐒_p+𝐧,$$
(20)
where:

$$𝐃_t\left(\begin{array}{c}\stackrel{~}{d_t}^A\\ \stackrel{~}{d_t}^B\end{array}\right),𝐀_{tp}\left(\begin{array}{cc}\mathrm{cos}2\psi _tA_{tp}^A& \mathrm{sin}2\psi _tA_{tp}^A\\ & \\ \mathrm{sin}2\psi _tA_{tp}^B& \mathrm{cos}2\psi _tA_{tp}^B\end{array}\right),𝐒_p\left(\begin{array}{c}Q_p\\ U_p\end{array}\right),𝐧_t\left(\begin{array}{c}n_t^A\\ n_t^B\end{array}\right).$$
(21)
We then obtain the standard map-making solution:

$$\stackrel{~}{𝐒}_𝐩=\left(𝐀^t𝐍^1𝐀\right)𝐀^t𝐍^1𝐃,$$
(22)
where:

$$𝐍𝐧_t𝐧_t^{}=\left(\begin{array}{cc}n_t^An_t^{}^A& n_t^An_t^{}^B\\ & \\ n_t^Bn_t^{}^A& n_t^Bn_t^{}^B\end{array}\right),$$
(23)
which can be further simplified if:

$$n_t^An_t^{}^B=n_t^Bn_t^{}^A=\mathrm{𝟎}.$$
(24)
An example of the application of this procedure is shown in Figure 4, for the 100 GHz channel of Planck Low Frequency Instrument.

## 4 Conclusions

Temperature anisotropy measurements have just started to have the accuracy required for high precision cosmology. Polarization has enormous scientific potential, but is still a big challenge, both experimentally (low signal, fine-scale structure, systematics, etc.) and for data analysis (which must be both accurate and efficient). The next few years will most likely bring us definitive high-resolution high-sensitivity maps of the CMB temperature anisotropy by satellites (MAP, Planck). The new frontier of cosmological exploration will then shift towards observations of CMB polarization, which will certainly provide us with new insights about the physics of the early universe.

It is a pleasure to thank the organizers of this interesting workshop for the invitation and for the stimulating environment. We acknowledge use of HEALPix (http://www.eso.org/science/healpix/) and CMBFAST.


text:
# Exploring the global topology of the universe

## I Introduction

The preferred cosmological models for the description of the universe, except for its very first instants, are those of Friedmann-Lemaître-Robertson-Walker (FLRW), popularly known as ‘Big Bang’ models. See, for example, Ohanian and Ruffini.

It is generally assumed that the global topology of cosmic spatial sections is simply connected, that is, they are one of the spherical $`(S^3),`$ Euclidean $`\left(E^3\right)`$, or hyperbolic $`(H^3)`$ spaces, which have positive, null, and negative curvature, respectively.

But spaces $`E^3`$ and $`H^3`$ have infinite extension. This has led some pioneers, like Einstein, Schwarzschild, and Friedmann, to consider the question of the finite vs. infinite size of the universe, and its topology.

Beginning in 1971, with a paper by Ellis, research on the possibility of cosmic space being finite and its topology multiply connected, has been done more systematically, if slowly at first.

Today there is a reasonable number of researchers in this area (my guess is about a hundred worldwide), including here in Brazil.

Since this area is still little known, in this talk I will present a summary of work done by myself and a few collaborators at IFT/UNESP in São Paulo. The sections that follow list a number of published papers, which are representative of the effect of nontrivial cosmic topology on the topics: section II, formal theoretical works; III, the quasar redshift controversy; IV, fitting models to data; V, cosmic crystallography; VI, quantum field theory and quantum cosmology; and VII, the cosmic microwave background.

Note that most of this research was done before 1998, so we could with impunity assume a null cosmological constant.

## II Formal theoretical works

### A A cosmological model with compact space sections and low mass density.

In this model the adopted spacetime topology was $`M^4=R\times \mathrm{\Sigma }`$, where $`R`$ is the time axis and $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ is the space section. This form of spacetime holds for all works cited below (with different $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$’s, of course).

Here $`\mathrm{\Sigma }=T_g\times S^1,`$ where $`T_g`$ is the genus-$`g`$ surface and $`S^1`$ is the circle. The metric is

$`ds^2=a^2(\eta )(d\eta ^2d\rho ^2\mathrm{sinh}^2\rho d\phi ^2)b^2(\eta )d\zeta ^2,`$

where

$`ct(\eta )`$ $`=`$ $`a_{}(\mathrm{sinh}\eta \eta ),`$
$`a(\eta )`$ $`=`$ $`a_{}(\mathrm{cosh}\eta 1),`$
$`b(\eta )`$ $`=`$ $`3a_{}[\eta \mathrm{coth}(\eta /2)2],`$
with $`a_{}`$ = constant. This metric had been studied by Kantowski and Sachs , and is of type III in the classification of Bianchi.

At the time I was unaware of the existence of three-dimensional closed hyperbolic manifolds, and this was the best substitute I could find for a closed Friedmann model of undercritical density.

### B Compactification of Friedmann’s hyperbolic model

Now $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ is a closed hyperbolic manifold constructed by Best . I did not go into the details of image formation, but found that the space of images was the covering space $`H^3`$, and that homogeneity and isotropy should be reinterpreted in terms of the distribution of multiple images in the covering space. I also found that we should have the relative density of matter $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0<0.964`$ in order that a repeated pattern of images could be observed.

### C Relativisic cosmologies with closed, locally homogeneous spatial sections

Here I established a correspondence between the geometric classifications of Bianchi and Kantowski-Sachs (BKS) on one side, and Thurston’s on the other, according to the following table:

| Thurston type | BKS type |
| --- | --- |
| T1 | BIX |
| T2 | BI, BVII(0) |
| T3 | BV, BVII(A$`>`$0) |
| T4 | KS |
| T5 | BVI(1) |
| T6 | BVIII |
| T7 | BII |
| T8 | BVI(0) |

It was also found that Bianchi types $`IV`$ and $`VI(A),0<A<1,`$ cannot be compactified - i. e., there are not any closed, locally homogeneous manifolds of these Bianchi types.

### D Closed spaces in cosmology

This paper improves on the previous one, and discusses the question of local vs. global homogeneity of the constant curvature models.

### E Numerical study of a perturbed Einstein-de Sitter cosmological model

Here $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ is the 3-torus $`T^3`$. Our purpose was to find how an inhomogeneity of the matter density, written as $`\rho (x,\tau ),\tau =1t,`$ affects the metric, which was assumed to have the form

$`ds^2=c^2d\tau ^2a^2(x,\tau )dx^2b^2(x,\tau )(dy^2+dz^2),`$

where $`a^2(x,\tau )`$, $`b^2(x,\tau )`$ reduce to $`a_{EdS}(t)=(t/t_0)^{2/3}`$ if we remove the perturbation. The result was that, for a perturbation of $`\rho `$ of about 80%, the metric fluctuated at most 5%, in agreement with a heuristic estimate of Barrow

## III The quasar redshift controversy

### A Quasar-galaxy associations with discordant redshifts as a topological effect. II. A closed hyperbolic model

$`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ is one of Best’s manifolds with a regular icosahedron as fundamental polyhedron (FP). The metric is the same as in Friedmann’s open model.

The search for images in conjunction to simulate the controversial pairs was done by computer, by scanning all directions that met the observer. The obtained pairs were not realistic: e. g., redshifts 0.12 for the galaxy and 4.3 for the quasar.

### B Smallest universe of negative curvature

$`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ is the smallest known CHM, with normalized volume 0.9427… and 18 faces, discovered independently by Weeks and by Matveev and Fomenko. It was assumed $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0=0.1.`$ Here I got better results for the quasar-galaxy associations than in the previous case: many of the simulated pairs had realistic redshifts, like 0.002 for the galaxy and 1.31 for the quasar or quasi-stellar object (QSO).

However, comparison with Burbidge et al.’s catalog of associations, for example, would still not be reliable: the model parameters are arbitrary, only 31 sources were used in the simulation, and of course many conjunctions are line-of-sight concidences.

The model is also interesting on account of the small volume: multiple images would allow astronomers to see objects at different epochs of their evolution; and it has a larger probability than a larger model for the spontaneous creation of the universe.

## IV Fitting models to data

### A A search for QSO’s to fit a cosmological model with flat, closed spatial sections

Based on a catalog with about 1500 quasars, we looked for pairs equidistant from Earth, and along three orthogonal axis. $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ was the 3-torus, with a rectangular parallepiped as FP, whose sides were fitted to 3591, 2966, and 2792 Mpc.

### B A suggestion on the pair of QSO triplets 1130+106{B,A,C},{X,Y,Z}

The quasars in the title are two aligned triplets discovered by Arp and Hazard, with similar corresponding redshifts, which are {2.1, 0.54, 1.6} for the first triplet, and {2.1, 0.51, 1.7} for the second one. They were adjusted to an Einstein-de Sitter model with a cube of side 387 Mpc as FP, which is an unrealistically small size.

## V Cosmic crystallography

### A On closed Einstein-de Sitter universes

The method of cosmic crystallography (CC) introduced by Lachièze-Rey et al. was applied to a few models, all with Einstein-de Sitter metric but varying topologies. The idea was to verify that the CC method yields observable (in principle) results, even if the FP’s sides are of the order of the horizon’s radius $`R_H=2c/H_0`$, where $`H_0`$ is Hubble’s constant. Good results were obtained with the FP’s sides equal $`0.7H_0,`$ and not so good ones with sides equal $`1.2H_0`$

### B Cosmic crystallography in a compact hyperbolic universe

$`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ and FP are the same as in. We applied the CC method to this geometrically inhomogeneous model and did not obtain any sharp peaks - as expected from the independent works of Lehoucq et al. and Gomero et al..

But we did get a smaller fluctuation that is not present in the control open cosmology. We are at present tentatively attributing these small fluctuations to type II pairs, as defined in .

## VI Quantum field theory and quantum cosmology

### A A cosmic lattice as the substratum of quantum fields

This work is a lowest-order attempt to avoid the infinities of quantum electrodynamics renormalization. Both configuration and momentum spaces are assumed to have the topology of a 3-torus $`T^3,`$ with cubes of sides $`a=c/H_0=8000`$ Mpc = $`2.7\times 10^{28}`$ cm, and $`P=2\pi \mathrm{}/a`$ $`10^{20}`$ Gev/$`c,`$ respectively.

Lorentz invariance is abandoned for very large, presently inaccessible energies.

For charge and mass renormalization at the one-loop order, I got $`Z_3=0.925`$, $`e=\sqrt{Z_3}e_0=0.962e_0,`$ $`m=1.185m_0,`$ and $`Z_2=1.160`$, in the notation of Itzykson and Zuber.

### B Casimir energy in a small volume, multiply connected, static hyperbolic preinflationary universe

This work was orally communicated at this Meeting, and appears elsewhere in these Proceedings.

### C Birth of a closed universe of negative spatial curvature ; On the birth of a closed hyperbolic universe

$`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ is the first the lens space $`L(50,1)`$, then Weeks manifold as in .

Starting with the spontaneous creation, from a spherical orbifold, of a de Sitter universe with the topology of a lens space, we proceeded as De Lorenci et al., to obtain a quantum topology change into a de Sitter universe with Weeks manifold as space section. After inflation it becomes a closed hyperbolic universe, with the metric of an open FLRW universe.

## VII The cosmic microwave background radiation

### A The quadrupole component of the relic radiation in a quasi-hyperbolic cosmological model

This was an application of the model in to a quadrupole moment of the cosmic microwave background reported by Fabbri and Melchiorri. Comparing the obtained relation

$`1+Z={\displaystyle \frac{a(\eta _{observ})}{a(\eta _{emission})}}(1\epsilon \mathrm{cos}^2\theta _{observ})`$

with the result of, I obtained $`\epsilon =4Q/2.7`$K $`=0.0013,`$ $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0=13\epsilon /2=0.998.`$

### B Fitting hyperbolic universes to Cayón-Smoot spots in COBE maps; Sources of CMB spots in closed hyperbolic universes

Cayón and Smoot identified several spots in NASA’s satellite COBE’s maps of the cosmic microwave background as physical (rather than noise), hence as small fluctuations of the matter density.

In these papers I simulated the position of six cold and eight hot CS spots in closed hyperbolic manifolds, and interpreted them as having evolved into today’s galaxy superclusters and galaxy voids, respectively.

Present catalogs only list superclusters up to $`Z=0.12`$, which is completely inadequate for a fit of the simulated models: typically, in one of the latter the 14 redshifts are in the range $`0.361`$ to $`1.370`$.

I thank the Brazilian agency CNPq for partial financial support.


text:
# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

Our goal is to describe the hadrons and their interactions in terms of their constituents, quarks and gluons, using the underlying theory, QCD. The set of Dyson–Schwinger equations \[DSEs\] form a useful tool for this purpose . In rainbow-ladder truncation, they have been successfully applied to calculate the masses and decay constants of light pseudoscalar and vector mesons . The dressed-quark propagator, as obtained from its DSE, together with the meson Bethe–Salpeter amplitude \[BSA\], form the necessary elements for calculations of strong interactions in impulse approximation, such as the $`\rho \pi \pi `$ decay. For electroweak processes, such as the electromagnetic form factors, radiative decays, and semileptonic decays, one also needs the $`q\overline{q}\gamma `$ and $`q\overline{q}W`$ vertices.

### 1.1 Dyson–Schwinger equations

The DSE for the renormalized quark propagator in Euclidean space is

$$S(p)^1=iZ_2/p+Z_4m(\mu )+Z_1\frac{d^4q}{(2\pi )^4}g^2D_{\mu \nu }(pq)\frac{\lambda ^i}{2}\gamma _\mu S(q)\mathrm{\Gamma }_\nu ^i(q,p),$$
(1)
where $`D_{\mu \nu }(k)`$ is the dressed-gluon propagator and $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\nu ^i(q;p)`$ the dressed-quark-gluon vertex. The most general solution of Eq. (1) has the form $`S(p)^1=i/pA(p^2)+B(p^2)`$ and is renormalized at spacelike $`\mu ^2`$ according to $`A(\mu ^2)=1`$ and $`B(\mu ^2)=m(\mu )`$ with $`m(\mu )`$ the current quark mass.

Mesons are described by solutions of the homogeneous BSE

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_H(p_+,p_{};Q)=\frac{d^4q}{(2\pi )^4}K(p,q;Q)S(q_+)\mathrm{\Gamma }_H(q_+,q_{};Q)S(q_{}),$$
(2)
at discrete values of $`Q^2=m_H^2`$, where $`m_H`$ is the meson mass. In this equation, $`p_+=p+\eta Q`$ and $`p_{}=p(1\eta )Q`$ are the outgoing and incoming quark momenta respectively, and similarly for $`q_\pm `$. The kernel $`K`$ is the renormalized, amputated $`q\overline{q}`$ scattering kernel that is irreducible with respect to a pair of $`q\overline{q}`$ lines. Together with the canonical normalization condition for $`q\overline{q}`$ bound states, Eq. (2) completely determines the bound state BSA $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_H`$. Different types of mesons, such as (pseudo-)scalar, (axial-)vector, and tensor mesons, are characterized by different Dirac structures.

The dressed $`q\overline{q}\gamma `$ and $`q\overline{q}W`$ vertices satisfy an inhomogeneous BSE: e.g. the quark-photon vertex $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu (p_+,p_{};Q)`$, with $`Q`$ the photon momentum and $`p_\pm `$ the quark momenta, satisfies

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu (p_+,p_{};Q)=Z_2\gamma _\mu +\frac{d^4q}{(2\pi )^4}K(p,q;Q)S(q_+)\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu (q_+,q_{};Q)S(q_{}).$$
(3)
Solutions of the homogeneous version of Eq. (3) define vector meson bound states at timelike photon momenta $`Q^2=m_\mathrm{V}^2`$. It follows that $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu (p_+,p_{})`$ has poles at those locations .

### 1.2 Model truncation

To solve the BSE, we use a ladder truncation,

$$K(p,q;P)𝒢\left((pq)^2\right)D_{\mu \nu }^{\mathrm{free}}(pq)\frac{\lambda ^i}{2}\gamma _\mu \frac{\lambda ^i}{2}\gamma _\nu ,$$
(4)
in conjunction with the rainbow truncation for the quark DSE: $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\nu ^i(q,p)\gamma _\nu \lambda ^i/2`$ together with $`Z_1g^2D_{\mu \nu }(k)𝒢(k^2)D_{\mu \nu }^{\mathrm{free}}(k)`$ in Eq. (1). This truncation preserves, independent of the details of the effective interaction $`𝒢(k^2)`$, both the vector Ward–Takahashi identity \[WTI\] for the $`q\overline{q}\gamma `$ vertex and the axial-vector WTI. The latter ensures the existence of massless pseudoscalar mesons connected with dynamical chiral symmetry breaking . In combination with impulse approximation, the former ensures electromagnetic current conservation .

For the effective quark-antiquark interaction, we employ the Ansatz given in Ref. . The ultraviolet behavior of this effective interaction is chosen to be that of the QCD running coupling $`\alpha (k^2)`$; the ladder-rainbow truncation then generates the correct perturbative QCD structure of the DSE-BSE system of equations. In the infrared region, the interaction is sufficiently strong to produce a realistic value for the chiral condensate of about $`(240\mathrm{GeV})^3`$. With this model, we can solve the BSE for pseudoscalar and vector mesons, and calculate the meson masses and leptonic decay constants. The model parameters, along with the quark masses, are fitted to give a good description of the chiral condensate, $`m_{\pi /K}`$ and $`f_\pi `$. The results of our model calculations  are shown in Table 1 and are in reasonable agreement with the data.

## 2 Meson interactions

In impulse approximation, processes such as electromagnetic scattering, the weak $`K_{l3}`$ decay, radiative and strong decays of vector mesons, can all be described by the same generic loop integral

$$I^{abc}(P,Q,K)=N_c\frac{d^4q}{(2\pi )^4}\mathrm{Tr}\left[S^a(q)\mathrm{\Gamma }^{a\overline{b}}(q,q^{};P)S^b(q^{})\mathrm{\Gamma }^{b\overline{c}}(q^{},q^{\prime \prime };Q)S^c(q^{\prime \prime })\mathrm{\Gamma }^{c\overline{a}}(q^{\prime \prime },q;K)\right],$$
(5)
where $`qq^{}=P`$, $`q^{}q^{\prime \prime }=Q`$, $`q^{\prime \prime }q=K`$, and momentum conservation dictates $`P+Q+K=0`$. In Eq. (5), $`S^i`$ is the dressed quark propagator with flavor index $`i`$, and $`\mathrm{\Gamma }^{i\overline{j}}(k,k^{};P)`$ stands for a generic vertex function with incoming quark flavor $`j`$ and momentum $`k^{}`$, and outgoing quark flavor $`i`$ and momentum $`k`$. Depending on the specific process under consideration, this vertex function could be a meson BSA, a $`q\overline{q}\gamma `$ vertex, or, in case of weak processes, a $`q\overline{q}W`$ vertex. In the calculations discussed below, the propagators, the meson BSAs, and the $`q\overline{q}\gamma `$ and $`q\overline{q}W`$ vertices are all obtained as solutions of their respective DSE in rainbow-ladder truncation, without adjusting any of the model parameters.

### 2.1 Electromagnetic form factors

Meson electromagnetic form factors in impulse approximation are described by two diagrams, with the photon coupled to the quark and to the antiquark respectively. Each diagram corresponds to an integral like Eq. (5) with two meson BSAs and one $`q\overline{q}\gamma `$-vertex. With $`Q`$ being the photon momentum, and the incoming and outgoing pseudoscalar mesons having momentum $`PQ/2`$, we can define a form factor for each of these diagrams

$`2P_\nu F_{a\overline{b}\overline{b}}(Q^2)`$ $`=`$ $`I_\nu ^{abb}(PQ/2,Q,(P+Q/2)).`$ (6)
We work in the isospin symmetry limit, and thus $`F_\pi (Q^2)=F_{u\overline{u}u}(Q^2)`$. The $`K^+`$ and $`K^0`$ form factors are given by $`F_{K^+}=\frac{2}{3}F_{u\overline{s}u}+\frac{1}{3}F_{u\overline{s}\overline{s}}`$ and $`F_{K^0}=\frac{1}{3}F_{d\overline{s}d}+\frac{1}{3}F_{d\overline{s}\overline{s}}`$ respectively.

Our result for $`Q^2F_\pi `$ is shown in Fig. 1, together with experimental data from Refs. ; the corresponding charge radius, together with the neutral and charged kaon charge radii, are given in Table 2. The obtained charge radii agree quite well with the experimental data , as do our form factors. Up to about $`Q^2=2\mathrm{GeV}^2`$, our result for $`F_\pi `$ can be described very well by a monopole with mass scale given by our calculated $`m_\rho `$, $`m=742\mathrm{MeV}`$. Above this value, our curve starts to deviate more and more from this naive VMD monopole. Our results for $`F_K`$ are given in Ref.  and can be fitted quite well up to about $`Q^2=23\mathrm{GeV}^2`$ by a monopole with mass scale slightly larger than the $`\rho `$ mass. Asymptotically, these form factors behave like $`Q^2F(Q^2)c`$ up to logarithmic corrections . However, numerical limitations prevent us from accurately determining the constants $`c`$.

### 2.2 Weak interactions

The matrix element $`\pi ^{}(P+Q/2)|\overline{s}\gamma _\mu u|K^0(PQ/2)`$ describing the semileptonic decay of neutral kaons via a $`W`$-boson with momentum $`Q`$ can be characterized by two form factors

$`I_\mu ^{dsu}(PQ/2,Q,(P+Q/2))`$ $`=`$ $`2P_\mu f_+(Q^2)+Q_\mu f_{}(Q^2).`$ (7)
The form factors $`f_\pm `$ for the $`K^0`$ decay are essentially the same as those for $`K^+`$; in the isospin limit, the only difference between the matrix elements for the $`K^0`$ and the $`K^+`$ decay is a factor of $`\sqrt{2}`$, the $`\pi ^0`$ being $`(u\overline{u}d\overline{d})/\sqrt{2}`$, which results in a factor of 2 difference in the partial decay width.

In the right panel of Fig. 1 we show our result for $`f_+(t)`$ , together with the experimental data for this form factor . Experiments are often characterized in terms of the transverse, $`f_+`$, and the scalar form factor $`f_0`$, rather than $`f_{}`$, which is defined by

$`f_0(Q^2)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{Q_\mu I_\mu ^{dsu}(PQ/2,Q,(P+Q/2))}{m_K^2m_\pi ^2}}=f_+(Q^2){\displaystyle \frac{Q^2}{m_K^2m_\pi ^2}}f_{}(Q^2).`$ (8)
The dimensionless slope parameter $`\lambda `$ for these form factors is defined as $`\lambda =m_\pi ^2f^{}(0)/f(0)`$; $`\xi `$ is defined as $`f_{}(0)/f_+(0)`$. The partial decay width can be obtained by integrating the decay rate, which depends on the lepton masses. Both the shape and the magnitude we obtain for these form factors agree well with experiments, as can be seen from Table 2.

### 2.3 Radiative decay of vector mesons

We can describe the radiative decay of the vector mesons using the same loop integral, Eq. (5), this time with one vector meson BSA, one pseudoscalar BSA, and one $`q\overline{q}\gamma `$-vertex  . The on-shell value gives us the coupling constant, which can be used to calculate the partial decay width. For virtual photons, we can define a form factor $`F_{VP\gamma }(Q^2)`$, normalized to 1 at $`Q^2=0`$, which can be used in estimating meson-exchange contributions to hadronic processes .

In the isospin limit, the $`\rho ^0\pi ^0\gamma `$ and $`\rho ^\pm \pi ^\pm \gamma `$ vertices are identical, and are given by

$`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}}I_{\mu \nu }^{uuu}(P,Q,(P+Q))`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{g_{\rho \pi \gamma }}{m_\rho }}ϵ_{\mu \nu \alpha \beta }P_\alpha Q_\beta F_{\rho \pi \gamma }(Q^2),`$ (9)
where $`P`$ is the $`\rho `$ momentum. The $`\omega \pi \gamma `$ vertex is a factor of 3 larger, due to the difference in isospin factors. For the $`K^{}K\gamma `$ decay, we have to add two terms: one with the photon coupled to the $`\overline{s}`$-quark and one with the photon coupled to the $`u`$\- or $`d`$-quark, corresponding to the charged or neutral $`K^{}`$ decay respectively.

As Eq. (9) shows, it is $`g_{VP\gamma }/m_V`$ that is the natural outcome of our calculations; therefore, it is this combination that we report in Table 3, together with the corresponding decay widths . The agreement between theory and experiment for $`g_{VP\gamma }/m_V`$ is within about 10%, except for the discrepancy in the charged $`K^{}K\gamma `$ decay for which we have no explanation. Likewise the large difference between the neutral and charged $`\rho `$ decay width is beyond the reach of the isospin symmetric impulse approximation. Note that part of the difference between the experimental and calculated decay width comes from the phase space factor because our calculated vector meson masses deviate up to 5% from the physical masses.

### 2.4 Strong decays of vector mesons

If we continue the calculation of the electromagnetic form factors into the timelike region, we find a pole at the mass of the vector meson bound states. Using the behavior of the electromagnetic form factors $`F_{u\overline{u}u}`$ and $`F_{u\overline{s}\overline{s}}`$ around this pole, we can extract the coupling constants $`g_{\rho \pi ^+\pi ^{}}`$ and $`g_{\varphi K^+K^{}}`$ respectively  , which govern the strong decays $`\rho \pi \pi `$ and $`\varphi KK`$. The results from this analysis are given in Table 4, and are reasonably close to the experimental data. Similarly, the two form factors $`f_+`$ and $`f_0`$ describing the weak $`K_{l3}`$ decay exhibit poles at $`Q^2=m_K^{}^2`$ and $`Q^2=m_\kappa ^2`$ respectively, due to vector and scalar $`u\overline{s}`$ bound states . From the behavior close to the pole we can extract the coupling constant for the strong decay $`K^{}K\pi `$ as well. A direct calculation of the strong vector meson decays, using on-shell meson BSAs but different numerical techniques , agrees reasonably well with these results extracted from the electroweak form factors. Note that the factor of three difference between the experimental and our calculated decay width for the $`\varphi `$ is due to the phase factor $`(14m_K^2/m_\varphi ^2)^{3/2}`$: with our calculated masses, this factor is $`0.051`$, whereas with the actual physical masses this factor is $`0.015`$. The dimensionless coupling constants agree within 10% to 15% with the experimental data.

## 3 $`\pi `$-$`\pi `$ scattering

Although impulse approximation seems to work remarkably well for a variety of interactions involving three external particles, one has to go beyond impulse approximation in order to describe processes with four (or more) external particles. As an example, consider $`\pi `$-$`\pi `$ scattering at threshold. The generic loop integral for $`\pi `$-$`\pi `$ scattering in impulse approximation is

$`A`$ $`=`$ $`N_c{\displaystyle \frac{d^4q}{(2\pi )^4}\mathrm{Tr}\left[S(q)\mathrm{\Gamma }_\pi (q,q^{})S(q^{})\mathrm{\Gamma }_\pi (q^{},q^{\prime \prime })S(q^{\prime \prime })\mathrm{\Gamma }_\pi (q^{\prime \prime },q^{\prime \prime \prime })S(q^{\prime \prime \prime })\mathrm{\Gamma }_\pi (q^{\prime \prime \prime },q)\right]}.`$ (10)
At threshold in the chiral limit, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\pi (k+P/2,kP/2)i\gamma _5B(k^2)/f_\pi `$, and thus

$`A`$ $``$ $`4N_c{\displaystyle \frac{d^4k}{(2\pi )^4}\frac{B^4(k)/f_\pi ^4}{(k^2A^2(k)+B^2(k))^2}},`$ (11)
which is nonzero. On the other hand, chiral symmetry dictates that the threshold scattering amplitudes vanish in the chiral limit like $`m_\pi ^2/f_\pi ^2`$ . Clearly, impulse approximation is insufficient to describe $`\pi `$-$`\pi `$ scattering.

In order to properly describe $`\pi `$-$`\pi `$ scattering in the rainbow-ladder truncation, all possible diagrams with one or more insertions of the ladder kernel $`K`$ across two pion BSAs should be added to the impulse contribution , as indicated in Fig. 2.

If we include these sets of ladder diagrams, we can show numerically that the threshold $`\pi `$-$`\pi `$ scattering amplitudes indeed vanish like $`m_\pi ^2/f_\pi ^2`$, using the same model as in the previous section. The corresponding scattering lengths are given in Table 4. We expect that in particular $`a_0^0`$ will receive significant corrections from pion loop effects, which we have not included in our calculation: in chiral perturbation theory, higher order corrections (i.e. pion loops) change the leading order result to $`a_0^0=0.220`$ and $`a_0^2=0.0444`$ .

So far, we have only considered $`\pi `$-$`\pi `$ scattering, but also in other hadronic 4-particle processes one should consider the contributions from these infinite sums of ladder terms, in addition to the impulse term. In general, we expect the role of these summed ladder contributions to be less important than in $`\pi `$-$`\pi `$ scattering, except for processes that receive significant contributions from resonances. By adding these ladder diagrams one can unambiguously incorporate $`q\overline{q}`$ bound state effects, and we expect that this approach can provide a fundamental underpinning to many processes described by effective meson lagrangians.

Acknowledgments: I would like to thank Peter Tandy for our collaboration on the electromagnetic form factors; the work on $`\pi `$-$`\pi `$ scattering was done in collaboration with Pedro Bicudo, Steve Cotanch, Felipe Llanes-Estrada, Emilio Ribiero, and Adam Szczepaniak; I would also like to thank Dennis Jarecke, Chueng-Ryong Ji, and Craig Roberts for useful discussions. This work was funded by DOE under grants No. DE-FG02-96ER40947 and DE-FG02-97ER41048, and by NSF under grant No. INT-9807009, and benefitted from the resources of the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center.


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# Superhump-like variation during the anomalous state of SU UMa

## 1 Introduction

SU UMa is the prototype of SU UMa-type dwarf novae (for a recent review of SU UMa-type stars and their observational properties, see Warner 1995). Although SU UMa shows typical superoutbursts and associated superhumps as in other SU UMa-type dwarf novae (Udalski, 1990), the star is also known to sometimes show anomalous states lacking superoutbursts, or even normal outbursts (cf. Rosenzweig et al. 2000). According to Rosenzweig et al. (2000), the period of 1980–1983 was the most remarkable, when SU UMa almost completely stopped outbursting. Several instances have been known, that SU UMa showed a lesser degree of anomalously outbursting state. February, 1992 was another such period (cf. Rosenzweig et al. 2000), when SU UMa ceased to show normal outbursts. During that period, the mean brightness of SU UMa was observed brighter than the averaged quiescent level.

## 2 Observation

We obtained time-resolved CCD photometric runs on three night in 1992 February, when SU UMa was reported to be in an anomalous state. The long observation on February 17 was done between BJD 2448669.959 and 2448670.252, covering 7 hours.

Two shorter runs were done under less favorable conditions before and after this night. We used a CCD camera (Thomson TH 7882, 576 $`\times `$ 384 pixels, on-chip 3$`\times `$3 binning adopted) attached to the Cassegrain focus of the 60 cm reflector (focal length=4.8 m) at Ouda Station, Kyoto University (Ohtani et al., 1992). An interference filter was used which had been designed to reproduce the Johnson V band. The exposure time was 30 s. The frames were first corrected for standard de-biasing and flat fielding, and were then processed by a microcomputer-based aperture photometry package developed by the author. The magnitudes of the object were determined relative to GSC 4129.95 ($`V`$=13.38, $`BV`$=+0.75), whose constancy during the run was confirmed using GSC 4129.224. The magnitude of the comparison star is taken from Misselt (1996). Barycentric corrections to the observed times were applied before the following analysis. Table 1 lists the log of observations, together with nightly averaged magnitudes.

Fig. 1 shows the overall light curve of this observation. SU UMa was fading from a small outburst (or a minor brightening), not apparently recorded in Rosenzweig et al. (2000), probably because of the faintness of the peak brightness ($`V`$13.3). Since most of recent outbursts of SU UMa reach $`V`$=12, such a faint outburst was already anomalous. The enlargement of the February 17 light curve (Fig. 2) shows hump-like modulations, with an approximate period close to, but slightly longer than, the orbital period ($`P_{\mathrm{orb}}`$=0.07635 d, Thorstensen et al. (1986)). The observation on the preceding night was unfortunately affected by a large gap owing to clouds; on the next night, the object had faded and again moderately affected by clouds. Only high-quality February 17 observations were used for the subsequent period analysis.

The observations on February 17 were analyzed, after removing a linear trend of decline, with the Phase Dispersion Minimization (PDM) method (Stellingwerf, 1978). The resultant theta diagram and phase-averaged light curve are shown in Figs. 3 and 4, respectively.

## 3 Result and discussion

The period analysis strongly supports that presence of the period of 0.0832$`\pm `$0.0019 d. The error of the period was estimated using the application of Lafler-Kinman class of methods by Fernie (1989). Although the error of period estimation is rather large due to the limited length of a single-night baseline, the period is 3.6$`\sigma `$ longer than the orbital period, and is 2.1$`\sigma `$ longer than the superhump period by Udalski (1990). Since superhump periods can vary to a considerable extent (e.g. Kato 2001a), the present periodicity, which is significantly longer than the orbital period, is more regarded as a variety of superhumps, rather than the one reflecting the orbital period.

The hump profile shown in Fig. 4. A rapid rise and slower fade, and the presence of a secondary hump at phase 0.6 (cf. Udalski (1990) for the discussion of secondary superhumps during a superoutburst), are also very characteristic of superhumps. Such appearance of the superhump signal may be related to the anomalous state of SU UMa.

Rosenzweig et al. (2000) argued that the complete cessation of outburst in the period of 1980–1983 was probably caused by a strong variation of mass-transfer rates ($`\dot{M}`$). This interpretation, however, does not seem to adequately explain the 1992 anomalous state, since the interval of superoutbursts (labeled S020 on JD 2448784 and S021 on JD 2449047 in Rosenzweig et al. (2000)) just before and after this anomalous state was 263 d, which is only slightly longer than the typical value of this object (see Fig. 5 of Rosenzweig et al. (2000)). This interval is also a very typical value as seen in other SU UMa-type dwarf novae (Nogami et al., 1997). Since the length of a supercycle is primarily governed by the transferred angular momentum from the secondary star (Osaki, 1989), the interval of successive superoutbursts is roughly inversely proportional to $`\dot{M}`$ (Ichikawa & Osaki, 1994). This suggests that $`\dot{M}`$ was relatively normal during this anomalous state, and that normal outbursts may have been somehow suppressed even under the condition of a usual $`\dot{M}`$.

There are some known SU UMa-type dwarf novae which show a permanently, or temporarily, reduced frequency of normal outbursts, in contrast to their high frequency of superoutbursts (V503 Cyg: Harvey et al. 1995, Ishioka et al. in preparation; V1113 Cyg: Kato 2001b). The presence of active and inactive phases in V1113 Cyg, in terms of the frequency of normal outbursts, while maintaining the supercycle length, seems to require an unknown mechanism which effectively suppresses normal outbursts (Kato, 2001b).

The present discovery of a signal, which can be attributed to superhumps, during a similarly anomalously outbursting state of SU UMa provides an additional clue to this phenomenon. SU UMa during anomalous outbursting states may more or less resemble permanent superhumpers (cf. Osaki 1996), which do not show strong dwarf nova-type outbursts, but show superhumps. The accretion disk in permanent superhumpers is believed to be hot enough to suppress usual thermal instability, which is responsible for normal outbursts, but is tidally unstable, giving rise to permanent superhumps (Osaki, 1996). Altough it is not yet clear whether such a condition is met during this anomalously outbursting state of SU UMa, or whether a similar explanation can be applicable to SU UMa-type dwarf novae with strongly variable activities, the possibility of an ensuing tidally unstable state following the preceding superoutburst can be a viable mechanism to effectively suppress normal outbursts. Since such anomalous states are known to be rather infrequent, intensive target-of-opportunity observations are strongly encouraged when future occurrence of such a state is recognized.

This work is partly supported by a grant-in aid (13640239) from the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology.