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# Conservation laws, uncertainty relations, and quantum limits of measurements

## Abstract

The uncertainty relation between the noise operator and the conserved quantity leads to a bound for the accuracy of general measurements. The bound extends the assertion by Wigner, Araki, and Yanase that conservation laws limit the accuracy of “repeatable”, or “nondisturbing”, measurements to general measurements, and improves the one previously obtained by Yanase for spin measurements. The bound also sets an obstacle to making a small quantum computer.

In 1952, Wigner  found that conservation laws put a limit on measurements of quantum mechanical observables. In 1960, Araki and Yanase  proved the following assertion known as the Wigner-Araki-Yanase (WAY) theorem: Observables which do not commute with bounded additive conserved quantities have no “exact” measurements . Subsequently, Yanase  found a bound for the accuracy of measurements of the $`x`$-component of spin in terms of the “size” of the apparatus, where the “size” is characterized by the mean-square of the $`z`$-component of the angular momentum . Yanase  and Wigner  concluded from this result that in order to increase the accuracy of spin measurement one has to use a very large measuring apparatus.

In the WAY theorem, for a measurement to be “exact” the following two conditions are required to be satisfied: (i) the Born statistical formula (BSF) and (ii) the repeatability hypothesis (RH), asserting that if an observable is measured twice in succession in a system, then we obtain the same value each time. Yanase’s bound does not assume the RH. Instead, a condition, to be referred to as Yanase’s condition, is assumed that the probe observable, the observable in the apparatus to be measured after the measuring interaction, commutes with the conserved quantity, to ensure the measurability of the probe observable . Elaborating the suggestions given by Stein and Shimony , Ohira and Pearle  constructed a simple measuring interaction that satisfies the conservation law and the BSF, assuming the precise probe measurement, but does not satisfy the RH. Based on their model, Ohira and Pearle claimed that it is possible to have an accurate measurement of spin component regardless of the size of the apparatus, if the RH is abandoned. However, their model does not satisfy Yanase’s condition, so that the problem remains as to the measurability of the probe observable.

Yanase’s argument, however, assumes a large (but of variable size) measuring apparatus having the continuous angular momentum from the beginning for technical reasons and concludes that accurate measurement requires a very large apparatus. To avoid a circular argument, a rigorous derivation without such an assumption is still demanded. Moreover, Wigner  pointed out the necessity for generalizing the bound to general quantum systems other than spin 1/2 systems, as well as including all additive conservation laws.

In order to accomplish the suggested generalization, a new approach to the problem is proposed in this letter based on the uncertainty relation between the conserved quantity and the noise operator, defined as the difference between the post-measurement probe and the measured quantity. We obtain a bound for the mean-square error of general measuring interactions imposed by any additive conservation laws without assuming the RH. This bound also clarifies the trade-off between the size and the commutativity of the noise operator with the conserved quantity, unifying the suggestion by WAY and others and the one suggested by Ohira and Pearle. For spin measurements, this bound with Yanase’s condition leads to a tight bound for the error probability of spin measurement, which improves Yanase’s bound.

Let $`𝐀(𝐱)`$ be a measuring apparatus with macroscopic output variable $`𝐱`$ to measure, possibly with some error, an observable $`A`$ of the object $`𝐒`$, a quantum system represented by a Hilbert space $``$. The measuring interaction turns on at time $`t`$, the time of measurement, and turns off at time $`t+\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ between the object $`𝐒`$ and the probe $`𝐏`$, a part of the apparatus that interacts with the object, represented by a Hilbert space $`𝒦`$. Denote by $`U`$ the unitary operator on $`𝒦`$ representing the time evolution of $`𝐒+𝐏`$ in the time interval $`(t,t+\mathrm{\Delta }t)`$.

At the time of measurement the object is supposed to be in an unknown (vector) state $`\psi `$ and the probe is supposed to be prepared in a known (vector) state $`\xi `$; all state vectors are assumed to be normalized unless stated otherwise. Thus, the composite system $`𝐒+𝐏`$ is in the state $`\psi \xi `$ at time $`t`$. Just after the measuring interaction, the probe is subjected to a local interaction with the subsequent stages of the apparatus. The last process is assumed to measure an observable $`M`$, called the probe observable, of the probe with arbitrary precision, and the outcome is recorded as the value of the macroscopic outcome variable $`𝐱`$.

In the Heisenberg picture with the original state $`\psi \xi `$ at time $`t`$, we shall write $`A(t)=AI`$, $`M(t)=IM`$, $`A(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t)=U^{}(AI)U`$, and $`M(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t)=U^{}(IM)U`$. We shall denote by “$`𝐱(t)\mathrm{\Delta }`$” the probabilistic event that the outcome of the measurement using apparatus $`𝐀(𝐱)`$ at time $`t`$ is in an interval $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$. Since the outcome of this measurement is obtained by the measurement of the probe observable $`M`$ at time $`t+\mathrm{\Delta }t`$, the probability distribution of the output variable $`𝐱`$ is given by

$$\mathrm{Pr}\{𝐱(t)\mathrm{\Delta }\}=E^{M(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t)}(\mathrm{\Delta })(\psi \xi )^2,$$
(1)
where $`E^{M(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t)}(\mathrm{\Delta })`$ stands for the spectral projection of the operator $`M(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t)`$ corresponding to the interval $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$. We call the above description of the measuring process as the indirect measurement model determined by $`(𝒦,\xi ,U,M)`$ .

We say that apparatus $`𝐀(𝐱)`$ measures observable $`A`$ precisely, if $`𝐀(𝐱)`$ satisfies the BSF for observable $`A`$,

$$\mathrm{Pr}\{𝐱(t)\mathrm{\Delta }\}=E^A(\mathrm{\Delta })\psi ^2$$
(2)
on every input state $`\psi `$. Otherwise, we consider apparatus $`𝐀(𝐱)`$ to measure observable $`A`$ with some noise.

The noise operator $`N`$ of apparatus $`𝐀(𝐱)`$ for measuring $`A`$ is defined by

$$N=M(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t)A(t).$$
(3)
The noise $`ϵ(\psi )`$ of apparatus $`𝐀(𝐱)`$ for measuring $`A`$ on input state $`\psi `$ is, then, defined by

$$ϵ(\psi )^2=N^2,$$
(4)
where $`\mathrm{}`$ stands for $`\psi \xi |\mathrm{}|\psi \xi `$. The noise $`ϵ(\psi )`$ represents the root-mean-square error in the outcome of the measurement. By Eq. (4), we have

$$ϵ(\psi )^2(\mathrm{\Delta }N)^2,$$
(5)
where $`\mathrm{\Delta }X`$ stands for the standard deviation of an observable $`X`$ in $`\psi \xi `$, i.e., $`(\mathrm{\Delta }X)^2=X^2X^2.`$

We define the noise $`ϵ`$ of apparatus $`𝐀(𝐱)`$ to be the least upper bound of $`ϵ(\psi )`$ over all possible input states $`\psi `$. One of the fundamental properties of the noise is that precise apparatuses and noiseless apparatuses are equivalent notions, as ensured by the following theorem : Apparatus $`𝐀(𝐱)`$ measures observable $`A`$ precisely if and only if $`ϵ=0`$.

Consider the additive conservation law (ACL) for observables $`L_1`$ of the object $`𝐒`$ and $`L_2`$ of the probe $`𝐏`$, i.e.,

$$[U,L_1I+IL_2]=0.$$
(6)
In the Heisenberg picture, we shall write $`L_1(t)=L_1I`$, $`L_2(t)=IL_2`$, $`L_1(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t)=U^{}(L_1I)U`$, and $`L_2(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t)=U^{}(IL_2)U`$. The ACL, (6), can be restated as the invariance principle

$$L_1(t)+L_2(t)=L_1(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t)+L_2(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t).$$
(7)
The WAY theorem  states that if $`L_1`$ is bounded, there is no apparatus precisely measuring $`A`$ that satisfies the RH and the ACL, unless $`A`$ commutes with the conserved quantity $`L_1`$. In the following argument, we shall require the ACL but abandon the RH.

Why does the conservation law limit the accuracy of measurement in general? A simple observation on the noise operator will lead to a significant interplay between the conservation law and the uncertainty relation. As we have discussed above, the measurement is precise if and only if $`N^2=N(\psi \xi )^2=0`$. If this is the case, the uncertainty relation

$$(\mathrm{\Delta }N)^2(\mathrm{\Delta }[L_1(t)+L_2(t)])^2\frac{1}{4}|[N,L_1(t)+L_2(t)]|^2$$
(8)
concludes that if the conserved quantity does not commute with the noise operator in the initial state, the conserved quantity should have infinite variance, or the precise measurement is impossible for the bounded conserved quantity.

Let us study the quantitative relations shown by the uncertainty relation, (8), in detail. Since $`L_1(t)`$ and $`L_2(t)`$ are statistically independent, the variance of their sum is the sum of their variances, i.e.,

$$(\mathrm{\Delta }[L_1(t)+L_2(t)])^2=[\mathrm{\Delta }L_1(t)]^2+[\mathrm{\Delta }L_2(t)]^2.$$
(9)
Since $`A`$ and $`L_1`$ are in the object and $`M`$ and $`L_2`$ are in the probe, we have

$$[M(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t),L_1(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t)]=[A(t),L_2(t)]=0.$$

By the ACL, (7), we obtain

$`[N,L_1(t)+L_2(t)]`$ (10)
$`=`$ $`[M(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t),L_2(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t)][A(t),L_1(t)].`$ (11)
From Eqs. (5), (8), (9), and (10), we obtain the following fundamental lower bound of the noise of apparatus $`𝐀(𝐱)`$.

$$ϵ(\psi )^2\frac{|[M(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t),L_2(t+\mathrm{\Delta }t)][A(t),L_1(t)]|^2}{4[\mathrm{\Delta }L_1(t)]^2+4[\mathrm{\Delta }L_2(t)]^2}.$$
(12)
From the above lower bound, in order to attain $`ϵ=0`$ it is necessary to choose $`\xi `$, $`U`$, and $`M`$ satisfying

$$\xi |U^{}(I[M,L_2])U|\xi =[A,L_1].$$
(13)
Stein and Shimony  and Ohira and Pearle  gave examples that actually attain $`ϵ=0`$. Does this mean that if we abandon the RH, the ACL allows to have a noiseless measuring apparatus regardless of the size of the apparatus? Recall that the noise $`ϵ`$ is defined as the one from the measuring interaction, which quantum mechanics can analyze in detail. Thus, if we do not assume that the probe measurement is carried out precisely, the noise $`ϵ`$ depends on the boundary between the probe and the rest of the apparatus. Since this boundary is rather arbitrary, it can be seen that the measuring apparatus carries out the precise measurement if and only if the noise $`ϵ`$ vanishes for any boundaries. Thus, in order to show that the ACL limits the accuracy of the measuring apparatus, it suffices to show that a particular boundary leads to an inevitable noise. For this purpose, we shall consider the maximal boundary in a given apparatus. In this case, the notion of the probe is identical with a quantum mechanical description of a measuring apparatus, so that we can assume (i) the probe includes all the external sources of interactions, and (ii) the probe observable plays a role of the record. Assumption (i) is justified, since the measuring apparatus operates covariantly so that it can be used in any laboratory and at any time. Assumption (ii) is justified, since the measuring apparatus includes a record which the observer can access repeatedly. From assumption (i) we can assume that the measuring interaction satisfies the ACL. From assumption (ii) we can assume that the probe observable can be measured by another external measuring apparatus satisfying the RH. Then, the WAY theorem requires that the probe observable should commute with the additive conserved quantities; we call this condition Yanase’s condition. Therefore, the above argument supports our hypothesis below that in any measuring apparatus there is a boundary between the probe and the rest of the apparatus for which the ACL and Yanase’s condition hold.

Now, we assume Yanase’s condition

$$[M,L_2]=0.$$
(14)
In this case, the fundamental noise bound, (12), turns out to be the following form.

$$ϵ(\psi )^2\frac{|[A(t),L_1(t)]|^2}{4[\mathrm{\Delta }L_1(t)]^2+4[\mathrm{\Delta }L_2(t)]^2}.$$
(15)
Since the input state is unknown but the probe is prepared in a known state, the bound is optimized when the input-independent quantity $`\mathrm{\Delta }L_2(t)`$ is maximized. Thus, we can conclude that in order to decrease the noise of the apparatus, one has to increase the variance of the conserved quantity in the probe.

Consider the case where the object $`𝐒`$ is a particle of spin 1/2. Let $`\widehat{S}_x`$, $`\widehat{S}_y`$, and $`\widehat{S}_z`$ be the spin observables of $`𝐒`$ in the $`x`$, $`y`$, and $`z`$ directions, respectively; we shall write $`\alpha _i=|\widehat{S}_i=\mathrm{}/2`$ and $`\beta _i=|\widehat{S}_i=\mathrm{}/2`$ for $`i=x,y,z`$. In what follows, we shall optimize the noise $`ϵ`$ of apparatus $`𝐀(𝐱)`$ for measuring the $`x`$-component of the spin of particle $`𝐒`$, under the following constraints: (i) the measuring interaction preserves the $`z`$-component of the total angular momentum, i.e.,

$$[U,\widehat{S}_z+\widehat{L}_z]=0,$$
(16)
where $`\widehat{L}_z`$ is the $`z`$-component of the angular momentum of probe $`𝐏`$, and (ii) the probe observable $`M`$ commutes with the conserved quantity, i.e.,

$$[M,\widehat{L}_z]=0.$$
(17)
By the optimization it is meant, here, to obtain the saddle point in which the bound is maximized by the object state and minimized by the probe state. From the above constraints, Eq. (15) holds for $`A=\widehat{S}_x`$, $`L_1=\widehat{S}_z`$, and $`L_2=\widehat{L}_z`$. By the relation $`[A,L_1]=[\widehat{S}_x,\widehat{S}_z]=i\mathrm{}\widehat{S}_y,`$ we obtain the following bound for the noise.

$$ϵ(\psi )^2\frac{\mathrm{}^2\widehat{S}_y(t)^2}{4[\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{S}_z(t)]^2+4[\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{L}_z(t)]^2}.$$
(18)
For apparatuses with large $`[\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{L}_z(t)]^2`$, the optimal bound achieves when the numerator of the right-hand-side of Eq. (18) is maximized. This is achieved by $`\psi =\alpha _y`$, for instance, in which we have $`\widehat{S}_y(t)=\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{S}_z(t)=\mathrm{}/2`$. In this case, we have the optimal bound as follows.

$$ϵ^2ϵ(\alpha _y)^2\frac{\mathrm{}^2}{4+16[\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{m}_z]^2},$$
(19)
where $`\widehat{m}_z`$ is the initial angular momentum normalized by $`\mathrm{}`$, i.e., $`\widehat{m}_z=\widehat{L}(t)_z/\mathrm{}`$. If $`\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{m}_z`$ is not large enough, the right-hand-side of Eq. (19) may not be optimal; however, Eq. (19) still gives a correct lower bound, since our derivation uses no approximation.

For spin 1/2 measurements, the mean-square error is considered to be the $`\mathrm{}^2`$ times the error probability, and hence we should define the error probability $`P_e(\psi )`$ by

$$P_e(\psi )=\frac{ϵ(\psi )^2}{\mathrm{}^2}.$$
(20)
Then, the maximum error probability $`P_e`$ is bounded by

$$P_eP_e(\alpha _y)\frac{1}{4+16[\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{m}_z]^2}.$$
(21)
For the engineering of microscopic information processors such as quantum logic gates , this bound is considered to be a serious obstacle to realizing small and accurate quantum devices.

In addition to the formulation discussed above, Yanase  and Wigner  considered the measuring interaction with the following form:

$`U(\alpha _x\xi )`$ $`=`$ $`\alpha _x\xi ^++\beta _x\eta ^+,`$ (23)
$`U(\beta _x\xi )`$ $`=`$ $`\beta _x\xi ^{}+\alpha _x\eta ^{}.`$ (24)
The states $`\xi ^\pm `$ and $`\eta ^\pm `$ are not normalized. The states $`\xi ^\pm `$ are assumed to be eigenstates of the observable $`M`$ satisfying

$`M\xi ^\pm `$ $`=`$ $`\pm {\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{}}{2}}\xi ^\pm .`$ (25)
The problem is to find a lower bound of the sum of the two “unsuccessful probabilities” $`\eta ^+^2`$ and $`\eta ^{}^2`$,

$$ϵ_Y^2=\eta ^+^2+\eta ^{}^2,$$
(26)
to show a trade-off with the “size” of the apparatus characterized by the mean-square, $`\widehat{m}_z^2`$, of the normalized angular momentum.

Under these, and the additional technical assumptions that $`ϵ_Y`$ is very small and that $`\widehat{m}_z^2`$ is so large that the eigenvalues of $`\widehat{m}_z`$ can be treated as a continuous parameter, Yanase  obtained the following lower bound.

$$ϵ_Y^2>\frac{1}{8\widehat{m}_z^2}.$$
(27)
Later, Ghirardi et al.  derived the same bound for rotationally invariant interactions without continuous parameter approximation.

In what follows, we shall obtain a tighter bound for $`ϵ_Y^2`$ without any approximation. For this purpose, we shall show the relation

$$ϵ_Y^2\frac{2}{\mathrm{}^2}ϵ(\alpha _y)^2=2P_e(\alpha _y).$$
(28)
The proof runs as follows. Easy computations show

$`UN(\alpha _x\xi )`$ $`=`$ $`\beta _x(M{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{}}{2}}I)\eta ^+,`$ (30)
$`UN(\beta _x\xi )`$ $`=`$ $`\alpha _x(M+{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{}}{2}}I)\eta ^{}.`$ (31)
By the relation $`2\alpha _y=(1+i)\alpha _x+(1i)\beta _x`$, we have

$`ϵ(\alpha _y)^2`$ $`=`$ $`UN(\alpha _y\xi )^2`$
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(M{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{}}{2}}I)\eta ^+^2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(M+{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{}}{2}}I)\eta ^{}^2`$
$``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{}^2}{2}}\eta ^+^2+{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{}^2}{2}}\eta ^{}^2={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{}^2}{2}}ϵ_Y^2.`$
Thus, we obtain Eq. (28). By combining relations (21) and (28), we conclude

$$ϵ_Y^2\frac{1}{2+8(\mathrm{\Delta }m_z)^2}.$$
(32)
Under the conditions (i) $`1(\mathrm{\Delta }m_x)^2`$ and (ii) $`\widehat{m}_z0`$, Yanase’s bound, (27), turns out to be a good approximation for the rigorous bound, (32), and otherwise the new bound is tighter.

In order to show that the bound (21) typically vanishes for macroscopic apparatuses, we assume that the probe is a three-dimensional isotropic harmonic oscillator in a coherent state. Let $`|\alpha `$ and $`|\beta `$ be the coherent states quantized along the $`x`$ and $`y`$ axes, respectively. Then from Ref.  we have

$$(\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{m}_z)^2=|\alpha |^2+|\beta |^2,$$
(33)
and hence the optimal bound turns to

$$P_e\frac{1}{4+16|\alpha |^2+16|\beta |^2}.$$
(34)
If the probe is a macroscopic harmonic oscillator, we have $`|\alpha |^2,|\beta |^21`$, and hence the error probability $`P_e`$ can be arbitrarily small.

We have obtained a bound for the accuracy of general measurements imposed from conservation laws and uncertainty relations. This bound shows that in order to make a precise measurement, the probe is required to have very large variance of the conserved quantity, as long as the probe can be observed repeatably. If the apparatus is macroscopic, this bound poses no serious limit. However, for quantum information processing, measuring interactions occur between qubits, which can have only a small amount of conserved quantities. The relevance of this bound with the fundamental limit of quantum information processing will be worth further investigations.

###### Acknowledgements.

The author would like to thank Professor M. M. Yanase and Professor A. Shimony for helpful discussions.


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# An optimal Q-state neural network using mutual information

## References


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# QCD Studies at HERA11footnote 1Talk given at the Intern. Conference on New Trends in High Energy Physics, 22-29.9.2001, Yalta, Crimea, Ukraine. Selected Topics

## 1 Introduction

Studies of Deep-inelastic lepton-nucleon scattering (DIS) have played a fundamental role in establishing QCD as the strong interaction theory and in exploring the parton structure of the nucleon. With the advent of HERA, in which electrons or positrons of 27.5 GeV energy collide with protons of 820 GeV (in the last years 920 GeV), the tests of QCD have been extended by several orders of magnitude with respect to the range in Bjorken-$`x`$ and in $`Q^2`$, the squared momentum transfer between lepton and nucleon. The early fixed target experiments observed scaling violations, i.e. the variation of the structure functions with $`Q^2`$. The scaling violations are well described by QCD, in which they are related to the gluon density in the proton, and to the strong interaction coupling constant, $`\alpha _s`$.

At HERA the low $`x`$ region was experimentally explored for the first time, and the first measurements of the proton structure function $`F_2(x,Q^2)`$ revealed a steep rise of $`F_2`$ towards low $`x`$ values. indicating a high gluon density in the proton at low $`x`$. A key question is then the validity of the DGLAP evolution equations at low $`x`$ values, since in the DGLAP evolution higher order terms proportional to $`\alpha _sln(1/x)`$ are neglected. One expects that at some value of $`x`$ non-linear gluon interaction effects will become important, damping the rise of the cross section in accordance with unitarity requirements. While this question cannot yet be answered, the low $`x`$ region remains a key area for future QCD studies at HERA.

Figure 1: Diagram for lowest order $`ep`$ DIS

At the same time as precision measurements of the inclusive DIS cross section and the proton structure functions are being pursued, QCD tests of processes of higher order in $`\alpha _s`$ are also being investigated. These tests involve the study of jet production in DIS, a field for which HERA is well suited with its large $`ep`$ CMS energy $`\sqrt{s}=300320`$ GeV. This experimental work is intimately connected with theory development, since tests of higher order jet production need the corresponding processes to be quantitatively estimated.

## 2 The Inclusive DIS Cross Section and the Proton Structure

Inclusive $`ep`$ neutral current (NC) DIS is to lowest order, $`𝒪(\alpha _s^0)`$, described by the diagram in Fig. 1, in which a virtual boson is emitted by the electron and scatters off a parton in the proton. In the one-photon exchange approximation, the double differential cross section can be written as

$`\frac{d^2\sigma }{dxdQ^2}=\frac{2\pi \alpha ^2}{xQ^4}(Y_+F_2(x,Q^2)y^2F_L(x,Q^2)),Y_+=1+(1y)^2.`$

The inelasticity $`y=Q^2/xs`$ represents the energy fraction transferred to the proton in the scattering process. $`F_2`$ and $`F_L`$ are the (unpolarized, electromagnetic) proton structure functions and contain the information about the momentum distribution of partons in the proton. They are not calculable in theory and have to be measured. However, when measured at a given $`Q^2`$ value, their evolution in $`Q^2`$ can be predicted in theory.

The NC DIS cross section can also be written as

$`\frac{d^2\sigma }{dxdQ^2}=\mathrm{\Gamma }(y)(\sigma _T+ϵ(y)\sigma _L)`$

where the $`ep`$ scattering process is considered as the interaction of a flux of virtual photons with the proton. Here $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(y)=Y_+\alpha /(2\pi Q^2x)`$ is the flux factor and $`ϵ(y)=2(1y)/Y_+`$ defines the photon polarization. $`\sigma _T`$ and $`\sigma _L`$ are the cross sections of the interaction of transverse and longitudinally polarized photons with the proton. These cross sections are related to the structure functions:

$`F_2(x,Q^2)=\frac{Q^2}{4\pi ^2\alpha }(\sigma _T(x,Q^2)+\sigma _L(x,Q^2))`$ and $`F_L(x,Q^2)=\frac{Q^2}{4\pi ^2\alpha }\sigma _L(x,Q^2).`$

Due to cross section positivity, the relation $`0F_LF_2`$ is obeyed.

In the QPM world, without gluons, $`\sigma _L=0`$, since longitudinally polarized photons do not interact with massless spin 1/2 partons. Thus, in QPM also $`F_L=0`$. In QCD quarks radiate gluons and interact through gluon exchange. Radiated gluons in turn can split into quark-antiquark pairs (“sea quarks”) or gluons. The gluon radiation results in a transverse momentum component of the quarks, which can now also couple to longitudinally polarized photons. Thus, $`\sigma _L`$ and $`F_L`$ get non-zero values. Due to its origin, $`F_L`$ is directly dependent on the gluon distribution in the proton and therefore the measurement of $`F_L`$ provides a sensitive test of QCD at low $`x`$ values. In fact, the low $`x`$ region cannot be understood without measuring $`F_L`$ precisely.

Figure 2: $`F_2`$ vs $`Q^2`$, for fixed values of $`x`$. Data from ZEUS and fixed target experiments. The curves show the NLO QCD fit to the data.

The $`ep`$ cross section is usually written in the “reduced” form, in which the $`Q^2`$ dependence due to the photon propagator is removed,

$`\sigma _rF_2(x,Q^2)\frac{y^2}{Y_+}F_L(x,Q^2).`$

Since the contribution of the longitudinal structure function $`F_L`$ to the cross section can be sizeable only at large values of $`y`$, in a large kinematic range the relation $`\sigma _rF_2`$ holds to a very good approximation.

The H1 and ZEUS collaborations have recently presented high statistics measurements of the NC DIS cross section and extracted $`F_2`$ in the kinematic range $`1.52.7<Q^2<30000`$ GeV2 and $`3610^5<x<0.65`$. The ZEUS data are shown in Fig. 2. The strong (positive) scaling violations at low $`x`$ values, due to the increase of the gluon density ($`\frac{F_2}{\mathrm{log}Q^2}\alpha _sxg`$ at low $`x`$), are clearly seen. At large $`x`$ values negative scaling violations appear ($`\frac{F_2}{\mathrm{log}Q^2}\alpha _sF_2`$ at large $`x`$).

The ZEUS and H1 data are in very good agreement, both with each other and, at the largest $`x`$ values where data overlap, with the earlier fixed target experiments.

Both collaborations have subjected their $`F_2`$ data to extensive QCD analyses in next-to-leading-order (NLO), extracting the parton density functions (PDFs) and $`\alpha _s`$. While the general analysis and fit strategy is similar in both collaborations, there are also many differences in the details, e.g. in the density parametrizations and in the treatment of flavour number and in the use of the fixed target data. An extensive discussion can be found in .

Fig. 2 shows that the NLO QCD fits, which are based on the DGLAP evolution, describe the data very well over no less than four orders of magnitude and down to surprisingly low $`Q^2`$ of a few GeV2. The gluon density extracted in the NLO QCD fits is shown for both experiments in Fig. 3 for three values of $`Q^2`$. Within the error bands there is reasonable agreement. Like $`F_2`$, the gluon density increases towards low $`x`$ values, and the increase is steeper with increasing $`Q^2`$.

Figure 3: Gluon density for three different values of $`Q^2`$. The error bands show the experimental and (for H1) also the total (including theoretical) uncertainty.

Figure 4: $`\alpha _s`$ values obtained in the NLO QCD analyses of $`F_2`$ data. Also shown are $`\alpha _s`$ values obtained in a recent NNLO analysis as well as other $`\alpha _s`$ values obtained at NNLO level.

The $`\alpha _s`$ values obtained in the NLO fits of H1 and ZEUS are shown in Fig. 4222Figure courtesy M. Erdmann, LP2001, Rome 2001.. In the H1 case also the error due only to the experimental uncertainty is shown. Thus, the theoretical uncertainty dominates the total error. The major part of this error is due to the choice of renormalization scale, and to a lesser extent, also to the choice of the factorization scale. This is expected to change once next-to-next-to-leading-order (NNLO) QCD calculations are available. Fig. 4 also shows the result of a recent NNLO analysis of $`ep`$ DIS data, in which the moments of $`F_2`$ are fitted to obtain an impressingly small error on $`\alpha _s`$. Comparing the $`ep`$ DIS $`\alpha _s`$ result with the result obtained when using the more imprecise $`\nu N`$ scattering data, or with the $`\alpha _s`$ values obtained in NNLO for $`\tau `$-decays, $`\mathrm{{\rm Y}}`$-decays, or in analysis of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(Z)`$, it is obvious that the $`ep`$ DIS data are very competitive in precision determinations of $`\alpha _s`$. Note that the analysis in  used earlier data on $`F_2`$, and not yet the most recent, very precise data.

Both collaborations are working on further reduction of the experimental errors on the $`F_2`$ data, errors which are completely dominated by systematics, in particular the uncertainty on the calorimetric energy scale. Clearly, theoretical progress is essential in order to profit from future, still better experimental precision in the $`F_2`$ data.

## 3 The Longitudinal Structure Function $`𝑭_𝑳`$

A fully independent measurement of $`F_L`$ at HERA, in a wide range of $`x`$ and $`Q^2`$, is only possible via a substantial variation of the beam energies; at any given values of $`x`$ and $`Q^2`$ the difference of the reduced cross section, measured at two values of the CMS energy $`s=Q^2/xy`$, is a direct measure of $`F_L`$:

$`\sigma _{r,1}\sigma _{r,2}=[(y^2/Y_+)_1(y^2/Y_+)_2]F_L`$.

Figure 5: Reduced cross section vs. $`x`$, for $`Q^2=12`$ GeV2. The curves are due to the H1 NLO QCD fit and represent $`F_2`$ and the cross section.

This measurement is not yet performed but is part of the HERA II physics program. While waiting for this to happen, the H1 collaboration has performed several indirect extractions of $`F_L`$. The methods of extraction are based on the direct measurement of the cross section in the high $`y`$ region, and on the extrapolation of the precise knowledge of $`F_2`$ at low values of $`y`$, into the region of high $`y`$. Cross section measurements of the NC DIS process in the high $`y`$ region pose a challenge to the HERA experiments, since low energy (down to 3 GeV is achieved) scattered electrons have to be triggered, identified and well measured. The detailed understanding of the detector and of the photoproduction background is essential and an important part of the measurement is therefore the improvement of both calorimetry and the detection of charged tracks in the H1 central and backward regions. The measurement of track charge and momentum at all scattering angles is particularly important in

estimating the amount and shape of the background from photon conversions (with photons from the $`\pi ^{}\gamma \gamma `$ decay), through the identification of ”wrong” charge electrons.

Two methods are used for the extraction of $`F_L`$ from the cross section measurements, namely the ”subtraction” method applied at $`Q^2>10`$ GeV2, and the ”derivative” method, applied for $`Q^2<10`$ GeV2. The subtraction method is illustrated in Fig. 5, showing the reduced cross section as function of $`x`$ at fixed $`Q^2=12`$ GeV2. At the lowest $`x`$ values (corresponding to high $`y`$ values) the cross section falls below the $`F_2`$ curve, extrapolated via the H1 NLO QCD fit. Thus, $`F_L`$ is obtained from the difference $`F_2\sigma _r`$. This method was first explored in  and in the recent analyses, using data from 1996-97 and 1998-2000, $`F_L`$ is extracted up to $`Q^2`$ values of 700 GeV2. Fig. 6 shows the $`Q^2`$ dependence of $`F_L`$, separately for $`e^+p`$ and $`e^{}p`$ data. As it should be, $`F_L`$ is independent of the lepton beam. One also sees that $`F_L`$ is clearly different from the extreme possibilities, $`F_L=0`$ or $`F_L=F_2`$. Within the precent precision of the data there is good agreement with the QCD expectation, as projected using the H1 NLO fit.

In the second method of extracting $`F_L`$, the derivative of the reduced cross section with respect to $`\mathrm{ln}y`$ is formed:

$`\left(\frac{\sigma _r}{\mathrm{ln}y}\right)_{Q^2}=\left(\frac{F_2}{\mathrm{ln}y}\right)_{Q^2}F_L2y^2\frac{2y}{Y_+^2}\frac{F_L}{\mathrm{ln}y}\frac{y^2}{Y_+}.`$

Figure 6: $`F_L`$ vs. $`Q^2`$ (or, equivalently, vs. $`x`$, upper scale), for fixed $`y=0.75`$, for $`e^+p`$ and $`e^{}p`$ data. The curves show the H1 NLO QCD fit, obtained for several assumptions on $`F_L`$. The shaded band shows the expectation for $`F_L`$ and its uncertainty from the QCD fit.

For $`y1`$ the cross section derivative tends to the limit $`(F_2/\mathrm{ln}y)_{Q^2}2F_L`$, neglecting the contribution from the derivative of $`F_L`$. At largest $`y`$ the $`F_L`$ contribution dominates the derivative of the reduced cross section $`\sigma _r`$. This is in contrast to the influence of $`F_L`$ on $`\sigma _r`$ which is dominated by the contribution of $`F_2`$ for all $`y`$. A further advantage of the derivative method is that it can be applied down to very low $`Q^2`$ 1 GeV2 where a QCD description of $`F_2(x,Q^2)`$ is complicated due to higher order and possible non-perturbative corrections. The measured cross section derivative is shown in Fig. 7 as a function of $`y`$, in several bins of $`Q^2`$. Since for a given $`Q^2`$ value, $`F_2x^\lambda e^{\lambda \mathrm{ln}y}`$, and since $`\lambda `$ is small for low values of $`Q^2`$, $`\frac{F_2}{\mathrm{ln}y}`$ is linear in $`\mathrm{ln}y`$ to good approximation. This is clearly seen in Fig. 7. In each $`Q^2`$ bin straight line fits were made to the de-

rivative data for $`y<`$ 0.3. The line fits describe the data very well and the extrapolation of the straight line was taken to represent the contribution of $`F_2`$ at high $`y`$. The small contribution of $`F_L/\mathrm{ln}y`$ to the derivative was corrected for by using NLO QCD and the correction was included in the overall error of the measured $`F_L`$. The derivative method was used in the analysis of the low $`Q^2`$ data, both in the 1996-97 data and in the 1999-2000 data. Since the latter data have higher $`p`$ beam energy, 920 Gev as compared to 820 GeV in the earlier data, the accessible $`x`$ range could be extended to even smaller values. It is also worthwhile to note that the H1 NLO fit is based on the 1996-97 data; when using this fit in the analyses of the later data proper account was taken in order to correct for the difference in $`p`$ beam energy.

Figure 7: Measurement of $`(\sigma _r/\mathrm{ln}y)_{Q^2}`$ vs. $`y`$, in bins of $`Q^2`$. The curves represent the NLO QCD fit to the H1 1996/97 data for $`y<`$ 0.35 and $`Q^2`$ 3.5 GeV2, calculated for several assumptions on $`F_L`$.

Figure 8: Longitudinal Structure Function $`F_L`$ vs. $`x`$ and in bins of $`Q^2`$, obtained by H1 and fixed target experiments. Error bands are due to experimental (inner) and model (outer) uncertainties using the H1 NLO QCD fit to the H1 1996/97 data for $`y<`$ 0.35 and $`Q^2`$ 3.5 GeV2.

Fig. 8 gives an overview of the current H1 data on $`F_L(x,Q^2)`$ in the $`Q^2`$ range $`2.2700`$ GeV2. The data extend the knowledge of $`F_L`$ into the region of low $`x`$, much beyond the range of the fixed target experiments. The increase of $`F_L(x,Q^2)`$ towards low $`x`$ is consistent with the NLO QCD calculation, reflecting the rise of the gluon density in this region. The values of $`F_L(x,Q^2)`$ are thus severely constrained by the present data, unless there are deviations from the assumed extrapolation of $`F_2`$ into the region of large $`y`$ corresponding to the smallest $`x`$.

$`F_L`$ has also been calculated in the ZEUS NLO QCD fit; the calculation is consistent with the H1 data.

## 4 Inclusive Jets and Dijets in DIS

Figure 9: Diagrams for QCD Compton and Boson Gluon Fusion processes.

The fully inclusive DIS process, shown in Fig. 1, is of zero order in $`\alpha _s`$. There is direct sensitivity only to the quark PDF’s, and the determination of $`\alpha _s`$ and gluon density is indirect, via the scaling violations of $`F_2`$, measured over a large range of $`x`$ and $`Q^2`$.

The DIS processes shown in Figs. 9a and b, QCD Compton (QCDC) scattering and Boson Gluon Fusion (BGF), are of order $`\alpha _s`$ and due to the latter contribution there is direct sensitivity to the gluon density of the proton. At high enough energy, the involved final state partons manifest as jets of hadrons. The multi-jet final state can be characterized by the jet mass, $`M_{jj}`$, and the variable $`\xi =x_{Bj}(1+M_{jj}^2/Q^2)`$. The dijet mass $`M_{jj}`$ gives the CM energy of the boson-parton reaction and the fractional momentum $`x`$ (the longitudinal momentum fraction of the proton carried by the parton specified by the PDFs) is given by $`\xi `$, which is much larger than $`x_{Bj}`$ if $`M_{jj}`$ is large.

Two hard scales enter in these diagrams, $`Q^2`$ and $`E_{T,jet}`$. Studies of the dynamics of multi-jet production are usually performed in the Breit frame, where the virtual boson interacts head-on with the proton. In lowest order, $`𝒪(\alpha _s^0)`$, the parton from

the proton is backscattered into opposite direction, and no transverse energy is produced. Thus, appearance of jets with large $`E_T`$ can only be explained by hard QCD processes of at least $`𝒪(\alpha _s)`$, and $`E_{T,jet}`$ is then the physical scale at which e.g. hard gluon radiation is resolved. Experimentally, jets are usually identified using a $`k_T`$ algorithm.

The H1 and ZEUS collaborations have recently presented high statistics studies of inclusive jet and dijet production in NC DIS. The data span the kinematic range $`510<Q^2<101510^3`$ GeV2 and $`57<E_{T,jet}<60`$ GeV. NLO QCD calculations in general describe the data very well, over almost the whole range of $`Q^2`$ and $`E_{T,jet}`$. This is exemplified in Fig. 10, showing the H1 inclusive jet cross section as function of $`E_{T,jet}`$ and $`Q^2`$, and in Fig. 11, showing the ZEUS dijet cross section as function of $`Q^2`$. The largest uncertainty in the QCD calculations stems from the uncertainty in the choice of renormalization scale $`\mu _r`$, which is taken either as $`Q`$ or as mean jet transverse energy, $`\overline{E}_{T,jet}`$. The uncertainty is largest for low $`Q^2`$ values (Fig. 11b), and cuts are made at 150 (H1) and 470 (ZEUS) GeV2 in the QCD analyses of the data. At large values of $`Q^2`$ the experimental uncertainties are also smaller, and this is true as well for the hadronic (parton-to-hadron) corrections to the NLO calculations, as shown in Figs. 10 and 11c.

Once the good agreement of the QCD calculation with the jet data has been established, one can proceed to perform a QCD analysis, determining $`\alpha _s`$ and the gluon density. The analysis strategy is as follows:

1. Fit the jet data to the NLO QCD predictions, using PDFs obtained from global, external fits. With the PDFs externally fixed, there is only one free parameter, namely $`\alpha _s`$. Note that the PDFs themselves depend implicitly on $`\alpha _s`$, and that this complication was properly taken into account in the fits.
2. After establishing that the fitted $`\alpha _s`$ value agrees well with other, external measurements, $`\alpha _s`$ is fixed (e.g. to the world average) and the jet data are then fitted in order to extract the PDFs, in particular the gluon density of the proton.
3. Finally, a global, simultaneous fit of both $`\alpha _s`$ and the PDFs can be performed. This would be a more independent test of QCD with the data. However, although in this global fit the quark PDFs emerge as identical to those resulting from the fit in step (2), the simultaneous fit fails to produce meaningful results for $`\alpha _s`$ and the gluon density. The reason is

Figure 10: Inclusive jet cross section vs. $`E_{T,jet}`$, in several intervals of $`Q^2`$. Also shown are NLO QCD calculations, with and without hadronic corrections.

Figure 11: Dijet cross section vs. $`Q^2`$. The shaded band represents the calorimeter energy scale uncertainty. The curves show NLO QCD calculations for several choices of $`\mu _r`$ and proton PDF sets. b) Ratio data/theory showing in addition the effect of the theoretical scale uncertainty.
c) Parton-to-hadron correction.

the strong anti-correlation between $`\alpha _s`$ and the gluon density, which can be understood from the fact that in the phase space region considered, jet production is dominated by the gluon contribution, which enters in the cross section as the product $`\alpha _sxg(x)`$.

Figure 12: $`\alpha _s`$ running in 2 scales, $`E_{T,jet}`$ and $`Q`$. Uncertainties due to calorimeter energy scale and to theory are indicated in the ZEUS plot. Upper curves show the RGE prediction.

Figure 13: Gluon density in the proton, determined in a combined QCD fit using inclusive DIS , inclusive jet and dijet cross sections. The error band includes all experimental and theoretical uncertainties, also that of $`\alpha _s(M_Z)`$.

Both H1 and ZEUS have performed step 1 in this strategy, and the resulting $`\alpha _s`$ measurements are shown in Fig. 11. Note that the “running” of $`\alpha _s`$ is here clearly seen in both scales, $`Q`$ and $`E_{T,jet}`$, and the running is moreover seen within each single experiment. The running is consistent with the renormalization group equation (RGE). The comparison of the measurements with other HERA measurements, and with the world average values is given in Fig. 15. The fact that the $`\alpha _s`$ values obtained from the DIS jet data agree very well with other measurements, in particular with measurements from processes which do not involve hadrons in the initial state, like $`e^+e^{}`$ annihilation to hadrons, can be taken as proof of the validity of perturbative QCD at NLO in DIS jet production.

Step 2 in the strategy was performed by H1, and the gluon density extracted from the data is shown in Fig. 13. The fit includes the combined cross sections of inclusive jet data, dijet data and inclusive DIS. The result is in good agreement with recent global analyses. For a detailed comparison of this result with the gluon densities obtained from the $`F_2`$ scaling violations, see .

## 5 Jet Substructure

Figure 14: a) Integrated jet shape and b) mean subjet multiplicity as functions of $`E_{T,jet}`$. NLO QCD calculations are shown for three different values of $`\alpha _s`$.

At sufficiently high transverse jet energy, $`E_{T,jet}(\mathrm{or}E_T^{jet})`$, fragmentation effects become negligible and both the shape and other features of the internal jet structure are expected to be calculable in perturbative QCD. The ZEUS collaboration has recently presented several results based on studies of jet substructure, using the variables “integrated jet shape” $`\mathrm{\Psi }(r)`$ and “mean subjet multiplicity” $`n_{subjet}`$:

$`\mathrm{\Psi }(r)=\frac{1}{N_{jet}}_1^{N_{jet}}\frac{E_T^{jet}(r)}{E_T^{jet}(r=R)}`$ and $`n_{subjet}=\frac{1}{N_{jet}}_1^{N_{jet}}n_{subjet}.`$

The radius $`r`$ is defined in $`\varphi \eta `$ space, where the jet search is performed. The subjets within a given jet are found by repeating the jet algorithm with smaller resolution scale.

Among the results presented in  are

* The average subjet multiplicity in jets in Charged Current (CC) and NC events is found to be similar. Since the jets in CC and NC DIS are predominatly quark initiated, the similarity in jet substructure indicates that the pattern of parton radiation within a quark jet is independent of the specific hard scattering process.
* In a dijet event sample, $`c`$-quark jets were tagged through the identification of a $`D^{}`$ meson. The internal structure of the charm induced jets is found to be similar to that of the quark jets in NC DIS. Since the latter are dominantly light quark initiated, one can conclude that the evolution of the outgoing partons, which determines the internal structure of the jet, is independent of the hard subprocess from which the outgoing partons originate.
* Using the internal jet structure of the tagged, charm induced jets in the dijet event sample, and comparing with the internal jet structure of the total dijet sample, it was possible to extract the internal jet structure of gluon jets. The prediction of QCD, that gluon jets are broader, and contain more subjets, is nicely confirmed.

Figure 15: Summary of $`\alpha _s`$ measurements at HERA (given at the $`Z`$ mass), using inclusive DIS data and NLO QCD fits, inclusive jets and dijets, and jet shape and subjet multiplicity. Also shown are the world average values (PDG 2000, S. Bethke).

The internal jet structure is sensitive to $`\alpha _s`$ beyond leading order. This sensitivity is demonstrated in Fig. 14 a and b, where the integrated jet shape (for $`r=0.5`$) and mean subjet multiplicity is shown as functions of $`E_{T,jet}`$. Note that the jets become narrower, and that the mean subjet multiplicity decreases as $`E_{T,jet}`$ increases. The NLO QCD calculation describes both jetshape and mean subjet multiplicity well, but the calculation also varies strongly with different values of $`\alpha _s`$. It is thus clear that the jet substructure data can be used to determine $`\alpha _s`$. The method is similar to the one used in the QCD analysis of the inclusive and dijet data described above. External sets of PDFs are used, and the implicit dependence on $`\alpha _s`$ in these sets is properly taken account of in the fitting.

The results of the $`\alpha _s`$ determination using the jet substructure are shown in Fig. 15, together with other $`\alpha _s`$ measurements from HERA. These new measurements agree well with the others, which is proof of the consistency of the NLO QCD calculations also where the internal jet structure is concerned.

A general remark about the measurements in Fig. 15 can be made: The experimental errors in these measurements are small and comparable to the error on the world averages. The total errors on the $`\alpha _s`$ measurements at HERA are in fact everywhere dominated by the theoretical uncertainty. As already noted above, this situation is expected to change when NNLO calculations become available.

## The Three-Jet Final State in DIS

Figure 16: a) Inclusive three-jet cross section vs. $`Q^2`$. Also shown is the ratio of data to theoretical prediction. b) Ratio of inclusive three-jet and dijet cross sections vs. $`Q^2`$. LO and NLO QCD calculations are also shown. including the effects of variation in the latter of $`\alpha _s(M_Z)`$, renormalization scale $`\mu _r`$ and proton gluon density.

While the inclusive jet and dijet cross sections are directly sensitive to QCD effects of order $`𝒪(\alpha _s)`$, the three-jet cross section in DIS is already proportional to $`\alpha _s^2`$ in leading order in perturbative QCD. This higher sensitivity to $`\alpha _s`$ and the greater number of degrees of freedom of the three-jet final state allow the QCD predictions to be tested in more detail in three-jet production. The H1 collaboration has recently presented a study of DIS three-jet events, covering the kinematic range $`5<Q^2<5000`$ GeV2 and three-jet masses $`25<M_{3jet}<140`$ GeV. The $`Q^2`$ dependence of the cross section is shown in Fig. 16a, together with QCD LO and NLO calculations, the latter with and without hadronic corrections. The NLO calculation, which is due to the recently available program NLOJET, describes the data well over the whole kinematic range, as is also seen in the ratio of data to theory. In the latter plot are also shown the theory uncertainty due to variation of the gluon density, the renormalization scale $`\mu _r=\overline{E}_T`$ and $`\alpha _s`$. As seen, at large $`Q^2>50`$ GeV2 the $`\alpha _s`$ variation gives the largest uncertainty.

Since both dijet and three-jet production is dominated by gluon induced processes, the uncertainty of the gluon density can be minimized by taking the ratio $`R_{3/2}`$ of three-jet

and dijet cross sections, at the same values of $`x`$ and $`M_{njet}`$. It can be shown, using the QCD calculations, that dijet and three-jet production involves the same gluon fraction, at similar $`Q^2`$ values. Furthermore, many experimental and systematic errors cancel in the ratio. As is evident in Fig. 16b, $`R_{3/2}`$, which is directly proportional to $`\alpha _s`$, is experimentally measured and theoretically calculated with small uncertainties over the whole $`Q^2`$ range. Thus, given better statistics, a very sensitive test of QCD will be possible with the three-jet data, including a precision measurement of $`\alpha _s`$.

Figure 17: Normalized distributions of $`\mathrm{cos}\theta _3`$ and angle $`\psi _3`$ in the three-jet CMS at low $`Q^2`$ and high $`Q^2`$. Solid and dashed curves show NLO and LO QCD calculations, dotted curves show a three-jet phase space model.

The topology of the three-jet final state offers a test of QCD through the angular distributions of $`\theta _3`$ and $`\psi _3`$, where $`\theta _3`$ is the angle between the highest energy jet and the proton beam, and $`\psi _3`$ is the angle between the two planes formed by the highest energy jet and the proton beam, and by the three jets, respectively. These angles are shown in Fig. 17, for two $`Q^2`$ ranges. Both LO and NLO QCD calculations describe these normalized distributions well, while a phase space model fails the description. The distributions show that the jets tend to be aligned with either the photon or

the proton, i.e. the Bremsstrahlung nature of the process (coherence property of QCD) is confirmed. Similar distributions were previously also observed by the ZEUS collaboration in three-jet photoproduction.

## Conclusions

The DIS data are well described by NLO QCD and the DGLAP evolution, over a large range of $`Q^2`$ and Bjorken-$`x`$. This is true for the inclusive DIS cross section, with the structure functions $`F_2`$ and $`F_L`$, as well as for the inclusive jet production and the exclusive dijet and three-jet production and for the internal structure of jets.

In many areas the data have reached a high experimental precision, and progress in the tests of perturbative QCD depends crucially on further progress in the theory, where the NNLO calculations for the DIS processes are awaited. This is particularly true for the precision determination of $`\alpha _s`$ at HERA, using DIS data, where the experimental precision is already at level with the error on the world average, and is expected to improve even further.

The running of $`\alpha _s`$ in accordance with the RGE is seen within each single experiment, and in both hard scales, $`Q`$ and $`E_{T,jet}`$.

Some areas, like jets at highest $`Q^2`$ and $`E_{T,jet}`$, and the three-jet final state, are still statistically limited. The HERA II running period will bring a huge improvement of statistics in the coming years. However, in the analyses described in this report, the experiments have in many cases so far only used the data taken in 1995-97, which constitute only about 1/3 of the total HERA I data. The remaining 2/3 of the HERA I data, from the years 1998-2000, is currently being recalibrated and reprocessed, and will soon be available.

## Acknowledgments

It is a pleasure to thank the organizers for the warm and joyful atmosphere in a most interesting and remarkably well prepared conference. I also wish to thank my colleagues in H1 and ZEUS, for providing the data and results presented in this report and for all their help given to me.


text:
# A random matrix approach to decoherence

## 1 Introduction

The discussion of decoherence phenomena has been centered around problems of quantum optics and atomic physics, which usually implied the use of smooth, often Gaussian, wave packets. Yet recent ideas on how to process quantum information changed that situation to some extent. Indeed in this context it is desirable to store a maximal amount of information in product states of qubits, such that it can be processed by unitary time evolution. During the process, the relevant states are changed in a complicated way. Hence, they will most certainly resemble random states much more than Gaussian wave packets. As the conservation of coherence is essential for any quantum information application, we have a clear interest in understanding decoherence of random states in such situations. The standard tool in this context is the study of “fidelity” which involves a change in the Hamiltonian, and a number of interesting results are available .

The fundamental question, how the integrability or chaoticity of the corresponding classical system i.e. “quantum chaos” affects the process of decoherence (see e.g. ), appears in a different light, because the behaviour of random states becomes relevant. We shall focus on this aspect, concentrating our interest on the effects of the chosen dynamics. At first glance, the semi-classical context implicit in this view may seem odd after the reference to quantum computing, but note that in many-body systems some effects of the chaotic dynamics tend to survive even for very low lying states , where semi-classical arguments certainly do not apply.

In a recent letter  we proposed to discuss decoherence in a random matrix model, in order to separate effects of the Hamiltonian from those of the choice of the initial pure state. Such a model is ideally suited to discuss the behaviour of random states. In this context we do not embrace the scheme of fidelity analysis , but simply follow decoherence as a function of time for a fixed Hamiltonian. We introduce decoherence by performing partial traces over a subsystem instead of considering non-unitary time evolution. What we show, could therefore more strictly be considered as a study of the progress of entanglement of a product wave function under an integrable or chaotic time evolution.

In section 2 we present our random matrix model, which allows for a variety of situations both with respect to the nature of the subsystems and the coupling strength between them. Note that models based on random matrix theory (RMT) have been used to discuss dissipation (see  and references therein), but these aspects will not be discussed here. In section 3 we shall analyze a special situation of strong coupling between the two subsystems. Though not particularly relevant for quantum computation, it has the advantage of a transparent mathematical structure which allows to obtain non-perturbative analytic results. These are compared to numerical calculations in section 4. As it turns out, the results are typical for other situations as well. In particular for weak coupling, analyzed numerically in the second part of section 4, we are lead to essentially the same conclusions as in the strong coupling case. Our approach to the problem with (largely) random wave functions actually separates rather nicely the effects of the dynamics from those of the functions considered, and in section 5 we shall conclude with some considerations on this point, as well as with a comparison of our findings with those of Refs. .

## 2 The random matrix model

Properties of chaos and integrability of a classical system manifest themselves both in the spectrum and in the wave functions of the corresponding quantum system. While the former is invariant the latter are basis dependent. This does not mean that the latter are irrelevant in a semi-classical context; they certainly reflect the special features of the dynamics such as KAM tori or short periodic orbits. However, while localized wave packets may feel a strong influence on their dynamics, random wave functions would be rather insensitive to such localized features.

To construct our RMT model we start from the standard quantum chaos conjecture, that the classical ensembles  (e.g. the Gaussian orthogonal ensemble (GOE) for time reversal invariant systems) describe the universal features of a quantum system, whose classical counterpart is chaotic . For classically integrable systems we expect a random quantum spectrum if we exclude harmonic oscillators . The random spectrum can be combined with the orthogonal invariance to give the so called Poisson orthogonal ensemble (POE) , extending in this way the classical ensembles to the integrable case. This concept provides the ideal tool to describe the evolution of random wave functions, which is one of the main purposes of the present work.

Consider a Hamiltonian consisting of three terms $`H=H^{(0)}+\lambda V^{(1,2)}`$ with $`H^{(0)}=h^{(1)}+h^{(2)}`$, where the two terms of $`H^{(0)}`$ act on different degrees of freedom of the system; we may refer to them as the central system and the environment. Note that the $`h^{(i)}`$ may act on one or several degrees of freedom each, and the interaction $`V^{(1,2)}`$ may or may not induce chaos. Indeed the total system may be integrable and separable in a different set of coordinates.

Taking this Hamiltonian as a quantum operator we shall denote by $`_1`$ and $`_2`$ the Hilbert spaces of the central system and the environment with dimensions $`n`$ and $`m`$ , on which $`h^{(1)}`$ and $`h^{(2)}`$ respectively act. The total Hamiltonian $`H`$ acts on the product space $`=_1\times _2`$ with dimension $`N=nm`$. We write the basis states of $`_1`$ as kets with Latin letters such as $`|i`$ and those of $`_2`$ as kets with Greek letters such as $`|\mu `$. The states $`|i,\mu =|i|\mu `$ with indices conveniently written as pairs, form an eigenbasis of $`H^{(0)}`$. $`H`$ is diagonal in a different basis, which we enumerate by a single index $`\alpha `$. Thus $`H_{i\mu ,i^{}\mu ^{}}=_\alpha O_{i\mu ,\alpha }E_\alpha O_{i^{}\mu ^{},\alpha }`$ where $`E_\alpha `$ denotes elements of the diagonal energy matrix $`E`$ and $`O`$ the orthogonal transformation between the two bases.

We distinguish between strong and weak interaction. The interaction strength is usually discussed in terms of the spreading width, which indicates the width of the distribution of the expansion coefficients of the eigenstates of $`H`$ in terms of those of $`H^{(0)}`$. This spreading width is a semi-classical quantity in the sense that it can be calculated from a phase space integral . It is closely related to the width of the LDOS (the density of the eigenstates of $`H_0`$ expressed in terms of those of $`H`$) If the spreading width is small, i.e. if the eigenstates of $`H_0`$ contain a dominant amplitude in the eigenbasis of $`H`$ we clearly have a weak coupling case, where perturbative calculations should yield the correct answer. A detailed study will be published elsewhere, but we shall give some numerical results in section 4.

We now determine appropriate matrix ensembles for the three terms in the Hamiltonian. As mentioned before, $`h^{(1)}`$ could describe the central system and $`h^{(2)}`$ the environment, e.g. the heat bath. In any case both $`h^{(1)}`$ and $`h^{(2)}`$ could pertain to either of the above ensembles, the GOE or the POE, and $`V^{(1,2)}`$ could typically be symmetric with independent Gaussian distributed matrix elements.

Finally we must specify the initial states. As mentioned before, we are interested in states of complicated structure, but require that they were initially pure. Hence we choose two random states in $`_1`$ and $`_2`$ and define the initial state as the product state of both. The probability measure for the random states is the orthogonally invariant one.

The situation first studied by Zurek and coworkers  could be simulated as a weak coupling case using a GOE with high level density for $`h^{(2)}`$ and a GOE or a POE respectively for $`h^{(1)}`$. However, we would have to use initially smooth wave packets. In this respect the states, whose evolution is discussed here, are entirely different.

## 3 Purity decay in the strong coupling regime

In the case of strong coupling $`h^{(1)}`$ and $`h^{(2)}`$ determine the factor spaces $`_1`$ and $`_2`$ only. Their spectral properties are irrelevant except for their relative spectral density in the energy region where the wave packet lives. The total Hamiltonian which is essentially equal to the interaction $`V^{(1,2)}`$ will be given by the GOE for chaotic systems and by the POE for integrable ones. Both ensembles are given by matrices of the form $`OEO^\tau `$, where $`E`$ is a diagonal energy matrix, and $`O`$ is a orthogonal matrix distributed according to the Haar measure of the orthogonal group. For the GOE the distribution of the energies has complicated correlations and a semi circle density, while they are independently Gaussian distributed for the POE.

As the level density has no relation to the chaoticity or integrability of the system, we shall unfold both spectra to have uniform density with the variance $`E_\alpha ^2`$ normalized to one in the ensemble average. As a consequence, the length of the spectrum is $`2\sqrt{3}`$ and the average level spacing is $`d=2\sqrt{3}/N`$. One reason to fix the energy scale in this way is, that the variance is easy to control even in the weak coupling regime. Note that decoherence depends on the behaviour of the level density as a function of energy. Our random matrix model allows also to choose this behaviour differently, e.g. as dictated by the classical or quantum Hamiltonian.

The case of strong coupling both for integrable and chaotic systems was modeled in  with two-dimensional anharmonic oscillators, and the systems considered in  might be close to this domain. We shall also use equidistant ”picket fence” spectra to complete the range of possible spectral correlations. The latter is important, because the spectra of low dimensional systems are much stiffer  than the universal random matrix ensembles would predict.

The dimensions $`n,m`$ and $`N`$ of our Hilbert spaces are chosen finite. If we think of Hamiltonians with infinite spectra this truncation is the only reference we make to a choice of the initial wave function.

The entanglement of the two subsystems will be measured in terms of the purity defined as

$$I(t)=\mathrm{Tr}_1[\mathrm{Tr}_2(\rho (t))]^2=\mathrm{Tr}_2[\mathrm{Tr}_1(\rho (t))]^2.$$
(1)
Here $`\mathrm{Tr}_1`$ indicates the trace with respect to the first (Latin) index and $`\mathrm{Tr}_2`$ the one over the second (Greek) index. The definition of the purity $`I`$ is related to the idempotency defect or linear entropy, defined as $`1I`$ .

We are interested in the time-evolution of an initially pure, i.e. non-entangled state. Therefore we construct the initial density matrix $`\rho _{i\mu ,i^{}\mu ^{}}(0)`$ from a “product state” which is pure with respect to both pairs of indices, and we have $`I(0)=\mathrm{Tr}_1[\mathrm{Tr}_2(\rho (0))]^2=1`$. Denoting by $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ the diagonal matrix with entries $`\mathrm{\Delta }_\alpha =\mathrm{exp}[\mathrm{i}tE_\alpha ]`$ ($`\mathrm{}`$ is set equal to one), we find in the basis of double indices $`\rho (t)=O\mathrm{\Delta }O^\tau \rho (0)O\mathrm{\Delta }^{}O^\tau `$ and by consequence

$$I(t)=\mathrm{Tr}_1[\mathrm{Tr}_2(O\mathrm{\Delta }O^\tau \rho (0)O\mathrm{\Delta }^{}O^\tau )\mathrm{Tr}_2(O\mathrm{\Delta }O^\tau \rho (0)O\mathrm{\Delta }^{}O^\tau )].$$
(2)
We take the averages involving energies and the averages involving states separately for different terms of the sum. In principle we do not need to specify $`\rho (0)`$ in more detail. After performing the averages, the result must be independent of the two factor states used to construct $`\rho (0)`$. This is due to the orthogonal invariance of the total Hamiltonian $`H`$ used, and the invariance of the purity with respect to independent orthogonal transformations in the factor spaces. Hence, without loss of generality we may set $`\rho (0)_{11,11}=1`$ with all other matrix elements being zero. With this initial condition we obtain the ensemble averaged purity

$$I(t)=\underset{\alpha ,\beta ,\gamma ,\delta }{}A_{\alpha ,\beta ;\gamma ,\delta }B_{\alpha ,\beta ;\gamma ,\delta }$$
(3)
in terms of the two averages

$`A_{\alpha ,\beta ;\gamma ,\delta }=\mathrm{\Delta }_\alpha \mathrm{\Delta }_\gamma \mathrm{\Delta }_\beta ^{}\mathrm{\Delta }_\delta ^{}=\mathrm{exp}[\mathrm{i}t(E_\alpha +E_\gamma E_\beta E_\delta )]`$ (4)
$`B_{\alpha ,\beta ;\gamma ,\delta }={\displaystyle \underset{\mu ,\nu ,i,j}{}}O_{i\mu ,\alpha }O_{11,\alpha }O_{11,\beta }O_{j\mu ,\beta }O_{j\nu ,\gamma }O_{11,\gamma }O_{11,\delta }O_{i\nu ,\delta }.`$ (5)
The averages are connected only because one may force indices to be equal and thus reduce the other to a special case; as we shall see below five different terms exist. Note that we omitted the average symbols on the purity itself for convenience.

The obviously relevant time scales are the Heisenberg time $`d^1=N/(2\sqrt{3})`$, and the inverse length of the spectrum, which is $`1/(2\sqrt{3})`$. Using these we obtain four different regimes for the time evolution, because of the modulus operation inherent in the exponential $`\mathrm{exp}[\mathrm{i}Ht]`$:

* Short times, $`t1`$: Here, perturbation theory can be applied, and we will find the expected $`t^2`$ dependence with a factor given to leading order by the variance of the energy eigenvalues $`E_\alpha ^2=1`$.
* First filling of the unit circle at $`t=\pi /\sqrt{3}`$: We will find a quadratic minimum for the purity with value $`I_{\mathrm{min}}=1/n+1/m+0(N^1)`$.
* Long times, $`2\pi /dt\pi /\sqrt{3}`$: In this region, the spectrum has winded many times around the unit circle. This acts as a random number generator eliminating correlations. Hence we will obtain a result similar to the one for 2) though sub-leading terms may be different.
* Poincaré recurrence at $`t=2\pi /d`$: At this point, a picket fence spectrum will cause exact recurrence, while even for a GOE spectrum the recurrence is essentially wiped out. Yet for low-dimensional systems with their long-range stiffness  and for models involving harmonic oscillators this part may well be important.

First we shall calculate the energy average $`A_{\alpha ,\beta ;\gamma ,\delta }`$. The result does not depend on the values of the indices, but only on whether certain indices are equal or not. If two indices of the energies coincide, we get either $`0`$ if they have opposite signs or twice the energy if their signs are equal. It may readily be seen that five terms are possible (the rightmost equality is valid for a random spectrum only):

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill S_1(t)=\mathrm{exp}[\mathrm{i}t(E_1E_2+E_3E_4)]& =f^4(t)\hfill \\ \hfill S_2(t)=\mathrm{exp}[\mathrm{i}t(E_1E_2)]& =f^2(t)\hfill \\ \hfill S_3(t)=\mathrm{exp}[\mathrm{i}t(2E_1E_2E_3)]& =f(2t)f^2(t)\hfill \\ \hfill S_4(t)=\mathrm{exp}[\mathrm{i}t\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}0}]& =1\hfill \\ \hfill S_5(t)=\mathrm{exp}[2\mathrm{i}t(E_1E_2)]& =f^2(2t).\hfill \end{array}$$
(6)
The first equality in each line determines the special case at hand and the second one gives the result for a random spectrum. There $`f(t)=\mathrm{sin}(\sqrt{3}t)/(\sqrt{3}t)`$ is the Fourier transform of the level density, which we assumed to be uniform. For GOE spectra the evaluation is more difficult, but some general considerations hold for any kind of spectrum. For long times all terms except $`S_4`$ go to zero. For short times, on the other hand, $`S_1`$ dominates because it has the largest weight. We now consider the four time regimes:

In the short time limit we expand the exponential. Due to the symmetry of the energy distribution, the linear terms in $`t`$ vanish while quadratic ones survive. These are of two types. Each exponential associated with a given index has a quadratic term, and indices in the linear terms of two exponentials may coincide. This implies that we only need the well-known averages over monomials of fourth order in the group elements  to obtain

$$I(t)12E_\alpha ^2t^2[1(n+m+1)/(N+2)].$$
(7)
In the last factor we seem to have a $`1/N`$ correction. Yet if $`n`$ and $`m`$ grow as $`\sqrt{N}`$ the correction is of order $`1/\sqrt{N}`$. If one of the two dimensions is kept constant, the other becomes proportional to $`N`$, and the second term is of order 1. Terms resulting from correlations of the energies are truly of order $`1/N`$ and were omitted.

The next time scale is that of the first filling of the unit circle, for which the first minimum of the function $`f^2(t)`$ is reached. We have a complicated interplay of different terms and it seems that we would need the average over the orthogonal group $`B_{\alpha ,\beta ;\gamma ,\delta }`$ completely. However, this can be avoided using the following trick: For uniform density of the spectrum the energy eigenvalues are essentially the eigenphases of a circular ensemble. For the case of GOE fluctuations the corresponding ensemble is known as the circular orthogonal ensemble (COE) , which is the ensemble of unitary symmetric $`N\times N`$ matrices $`S`$. This ensemble has a unique invariant measure. By identifying the energies with eigenphases of a COE the only approximation we make, is that we neglect the correlations that exist between the ends of the spectrum for COE. In terms of $`S`$ we obtain

$$I_{\mathrm{min}}\mathrm{Tr}_1[\mathrm{Tr}_2(S\rho (0)S^{})\mathrm{Tr}_2(S\rho (0)S^{})].$$
(8)
where $`S_{i\mu ,j\nu }=_\alpha O_{i\mu ,\alpha }\mathrm{exp}[\mathrm{i}E_\alpha (2\pi /\mathrm{\Gamma })]O_{j\nu ,\alpha }`$. The ensemble average originally given as one over states and spectra is thus given in terms of averages over four symmetric unitary COE matrices, two of which are complex conjugate. Such averages are calculated in  and we obtain

$$I_{\mathrm{min}}\frac{(n+m)N^2+\left[3(n+m)+2\right]N2(n+m1)}{N(N+1)(N+3)}.$$
(9)
As we shall see below this is slightly lower than the long time limit, while for the integrable (POE) case the long time limit and the value $`I_{\mathrm{min}}`$ coincide. We shall calculate the long time limit next.

For $`t1`$, the process of stretching and taking modulo $`2\pi `$ is a reasonably efficient randomizer for a fluctuating set of numbers with correlations such as a GOE spectrum. Therefore the eigenphases on this time scale are random both for the GOE and the POE. Thus only the fourth term survives, where the indices of energies in conjugate terms coincide. The energy dependence, and therefore the time dependence, drops out and we are left with averages over the orthogonal group. Only two-vector terms i.e. averages over elements from two rows of the matrix occur. These have been calculated , and we find

$$I_{\mathrm{}}=\frac{(n+m)N^3+3[4(n+m)+3]N^2+[35(n+m)+57]N+48}{(N+1)(N+2)(N+4)(N+6)}.$$
(10)
For the POE this result holds equally at time $`t=\pi /\sqrt{3}`$, which we have discussed above for the GOE, though it will oscillate for larger times. The value for the GOE lies slightly below the one for POE. What we see is a weak signature of the correlation hole, characteristic of chaotic systems.

When evaluating the large $`N`$ limit of these expressions, we have to take into account the $`n`$ and $`m`$ always occur in the form $`(n+m)`$. As $`N=nm`$ goes to infinity, $`n+m`$ can behave as any power $`N^q`$, with $`1/2q1`$. The two extremes are realized if $`n`$ and $`m`$ increase simultaneously, such that the ratio $`n/m`$ remains constant, or if one is fixed such that the other becomes proportional to $`N`$. Keeping this in mind we can still expand both expressions and find that the first minimum for the GOE case will always be slightly lower, but the difference will diminish as $`1/N^2`$, while purity itself will either diminish as $`1/\sqrt{N}`$ or reach a constant value $`1/n`$ or $`1/m`$. We can therefore conclude that the effects of spectral correlations are quite insignificant except for the smallest dimensions in both subsystems.

For times of the order of the Heisenberg time we expect a very different behaviour. More precisely, if $`t=2\pi /d=N\pi /\sqrt{3}`$, we have exact revival in the case of the a picket fence spectrum, while there will be no particular signature for a random spectrum. In the case of GOE fluctuations one should consider the width of the $`k`$th neighbour spacing distribution. It is known to increase logarithmically. For $`k=1`$ it has a width of $`1.25d`$ and for $`k=8`$ its width already is $`1.85d`$ . Due to the increasing broadness, we will see no Poincaré revival in the case of a GOE spectrum either. We should though note two facts: First we will find an additional partial revival at half the time mentioned for a picket fence spectrum, because of the terms $`S_3(t)`$ and $`S_5(t)`$, which contain eigen-energies with a factor two. Second, and more important, the long-range stiffness of spectra in low-dimensional systems  implies a saturation of the width of the $`k`$th neighbour spacing distribution and could therefore lead to recurrence effects.

## 4 Numerical results

First we consider a strong coupling situation with small dimensions, where all the effects we predict are most notable. For this purpose we choose the case $`n=m=4`$ and show the corresponding time evolution of purity in Fig. 1. The results are displayed for spectra with random and GOE like fluctuations as well as picket fence spectra. The ensemble size is $`210^6`$. As expected, at the beginning all curves are equal, and therefore we choose a scale where the quadratic dependence at the origin is not visible. The theoretical predictions are well fulfilled. The first minimum occurs at $`t=\pi /\sqrt{3}`$ for all spectral ensembles. Its depth for GOE correlations coincides with the COE result indicated by a cross, while both the GOE and the POE case take the asymptotic value given by a dotted line. In the POE case, the oscillations are essentially due to the form of $`f(t)=\mathrm{sin}(\sqrt{3}t)/(\sqrt{3}t)`$ (cf. eq. (6)). However, the GOE and picket fence cases follow this behaviour in a similar fashion. It is essentially a “diffraction” effect due to the sharp cutoff of the level density. E. g. for a semi-circle density the effect is attenuated, and for a Gaussian density it disappears. Therefore the experimental significance of these oscillations is limited to special situations, but the rapid decay on the time scale indicated does not depend on this fact. The first minimum is lower for GOE like fluctuations and for picket fence spectra than for random spectra, though the effect is only a few percent. The results coincide with our theoretical predictions both at the minimum and in the asymptotic region. This is also true for the recurrences, which are only seen for picket fence spectra both at $`t=N\pi /\sqrt{3}`$ and more weakly at $`t=N\pi /(2\sqrt{3})`$.

If we neglect oscillations, the rise of purity after the first minimum follows roughly that of the Fourier transform of the two-point function with appropriate scaling. This is not surprising, because we may expect that a cluster expansion of the correlations relevant for the difference from the random case is dominated by the two-point function. Yet it is important to note that the differences between the POE and GOE case lie within a few percents for such small dimensions. If $`n`$ or $`m`$ is increased any further, the differences become practically invisible. In  we show a figure for $`n=m=10`$, which confirms this fact. We conclude that decoherence of random states is insensitive to chaos or integrability, except for very small systems.

Concerning noticeable differences between the integrable and chaotic cases, the news get even worse, if we study the fluctuations of the purity as a function of time. Fig. 2 shows the GOE case for $`n=m=4`$ as above but including the standard deviation of the purity plotted as a band around its average. For illustration we have also included the first member of the ensemble into the figure. The standard deviation is big, and it is fair to say, that any medium and long time features shown by a particular initial state in a chaotic system are most likely fluctuations. The picture for a random spectrum is essentially the same and thus the same conclusion holds for a random wave function in an integrable system.

Calculations with larger dimensions show that the fluctuations of the purity diminish, but not as fast as the difference resulting from spectral correlations. This is shown to diminish with $`N^2`$.

Finally let us discuss some numerical results for weak coupling: We construct our ensembles in the eigenbasis of $`H^{(0)}`$. Then $`h^{(1)}`$ and $`h^{(2)}`$ are diagonal with elements taken from the spectrum of the GOE or the POE. In both cases, the spectra are unfolded to uniform density. The matrix elements of $`V^{(1,2)}`$ are Gaussian distributed random variables. As the diagonal elements are set to zero, we have: $`(V_{\alpha \beta }^{(1,2)})^2=1\delta _{\alpha \beta }`$. It is assumed, that the diagonal elements are effectively absorbed into the Hamiltonians $`h^{(1)}`$ and $`h^{(2)}`$.

The resulting level density of the total system becomes quite complicated. However, it is still a simple task to obtain its variance:

$$E_\alpha ^2=\frac{1}{N}\mathrm{Tr}H^2=e_i^2+e_\mu ^2+\lambda ^2(N1)$$
(11)
where $`e_i^2`$ and $`e_\mu ^2`$ denote the variances of the spectra of the subsystems, which are equal to one half. In what follows, the energy scale is again chosen such that $`E_\alpha ^2=1`$.

While the randomness of the initial states was irrelevant in the previous examples of strong coupling (due to the orthogonal invariance of the total Hamiltonian), here it makes an important difference. In distinction to eigenstates of $`H^{(0)}`$ or localized wave packets, we may expect that random initial states decohere faster. The reason is most easily understood looking at the LDOS. There a random initial state overlaps typically with many more eigenstates of the total system, as localized wave packets or eigenstates of $`H^{(0)}`$. In the course of time this leads to faster decoherence.

Again small dimensions provide us with some surprises: Fig. 3 shows results for the dimensions $`n=m=4`$. The average purity is displayed for three different combinations of spectra used in $`h^{(1)}`$ and $`h^{(2)}`$, namely for GOE–GOE, GOE–POE, and POE–POE. The coupling parameter is $`\lambda =0.03`$. We find that for short and intermediate times the three curves have the same behaviour, but the asymptotic values differ: In contrast to the intuitive picture, that decoherence should be strongest in the chaotic case, the asymptotic value of the purity is lowest for the POE–POE case, which corresponds to two integrable subsystems. We get an intermediate value for the GOE–POE case, and the highest value is obtained for the GOE–GOE case, corresponding to two chaotic subsystems.

Yet again the significance of this difference is limited. This becomes clear by means of Fig. 4. There we show again the standard deviation of the purity in a similar fashion as in Fig. 2. This is done for the GOE–GOE case from Fig. 3. In addition the purity curve for a single Hamiltonian from the ensemble is plotted. As can be seen in the figure, the size of the fluctuations of this curve is very well described by the standard deviation.

We see that the band is extremely wide and much bigger than the difference in the purity between the different combinations of spectral statistics. Note that the corresponding figure for the other two cases from Fig. 3 (not shown) yield the same conclusion.

In Fig. 5 we show again the average purity for the three different combinations of spectral statistics in the subsystems, but here the dimensions are $`n=m=10`$, and the coupling parameter is $`\lambda =0.01`$. The smaller coupling parameter (as compared to the previous case, where $`n=m=4`$) is meant to compensate approximately the increase of the total dimension $`N`$. Note that the variance of the spectrum of $`\lambda V^{(1,2)}`$, which may serve as a measure for the strength of the perturbation, increases linearly with $`N`$.

The results shown in Fig. 5, are very similar to the previous ones. However, the differences between the three curves at large times has diminished. Note that an increase of $`\lambda `$ would further reduce these differences. The standard deviations of the purity curves also diminish (not shown), but still exceed the differences in the asymptotic average values. Hence, there is probably no chance to see an effect of the different spectral statistics of the subsystems without doing averages over rather large samples. Nevertheless a detailed analysis of the different decays in weak coupling is an interesting open question.

## 5 Conclusions

The influence of integrability versus chaos of the dynamics of a system on the entanglement of a random product wave function was considered. The type of dynamics was expressed in terms of spectral statistics, as this is the only invariant property of quantum dynamics, which is sensitive to the above distinction. We conclude that the effect of the type of dynamics on random states is small, and vanishes rapidly with the dimension of the Hilbert spaces involved. For quantum information processing, where random states are typical, this means that the distinction between chaos and integrability is not relevant to the rate of entanglement of two subsystems and thus for the decoherence in the central system.

Some effects have been seen for small systems, and these are interesting in themselves. In particular we find very large fluctuations for individual purity decays. One may argue that the fluctuations seen for initial packets in the chaotic area of phase space in , could be interpreted as fluctuations, but clearly a large statistical calculation would be necessary.

A comparison with the work of Prosen and Žnidarič  is more difficult. As the Hamiltonian is disturbed we are looking at non-linear effects even in quantum mechanics. After all this is what the fidelity concept was designed for. In this context our result is important because, the reduction in the loss of fidelity, that is obtained in  for chaotic dynamics, does not imply increased decoherence in the forward time evolution scheme with a fixed Hamiltonian, as one might have inferred from the common concept, that chaos enhances decoherence.

## Acknowledgments

We thank M. C. Nemes and H. A. Weidenmüller and T. Prosen for stimulating discussions and criticism as well as the A. v. Humboldt Foundation, the DGAPA (UNAM) project IN112200 and CONACyT project 25192E for financial support.


text:
# Introduction

## Introduction

Contemporary theories of fundamental interactions (SUSY GUT, Superstrings/M-theory and others) predict that fundamental physical constants change in the course of the Universe evolution. First of all, coupling constants vary with increasing energy transfer in particle interactions (corresponding to the so-called “running constants”). This effect has been proved by high-energy experiments in accelerators. For example, the fine-structure constant $`\alpha =e^2/\mathrm{}c`$ equals $`1/137.036`$ at low energies $`(E0)`$, but increases up-to $`1/128.896`$ for energy $`E90`$ GeV (Vysotsky et al. 1996). Such “running” of the constants has to be taken into account in any consideration of the very early Universe. Another prediction of the current theories is that the low-energy limits of the constants can vary during the cosmological evolution and take different values at different points of the space-time. There are several reasons for such variations. In multidimensional theories (Kaluza-Klein, “p-brane” models and others) variations of fundamental physical constants are a direct result of the cosmological evolution of extra-dimensional sub-spaces. In some theories (e.g. Superstrings) variations of the constants are a consequence of the evolution of the vacuum state (a vacuum condensate of some scalar field or “Quintessence”).

Clearly, experimental detection of such variations of the constants would be a great step forward in our description of Nature. Recently, Webb et al. (2001) announced the detection of a possible variation of the fine-structure constant, $`\mathrm{\Delta }\alpha /\alpha =(0.72\pm 0.18)\times 10^5`$, over a redshift range $`0.5<z<3.5`$. The method used by these authors is based on the measurement of the variation of a large number of transitions from different species. This decreases significantly the statistical errors. However, the estimate of the systematics becomes more complicated than in the method used earlier where only one species was considered (e.g. Ivanchik et al., 1999). In any case, this exciting result should be checked using some other method.

## Proton-to-Electron Mass Ratio

Here we test a possible cosmological variation of $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mu /\mu `$, where $`\mu `$ is the proton-to-electron mass ratio at the epoch $`z=2.33.0`$. It should be noted that a variation of $`\alpha `$, in principle, implies a variation of $`\mu `$, because any kind of interaction inherent to the particle gives a contribution to its observed mass. This means that any variation of the interaction parameters has to produce some variation of the particle mass, and consequently $`\mu `$. Unfortunately, the physical mechanism generating the masses of the proton and the electron is unknown up to date. Therefore, the exact functional dependence of $`\mu (\alpha )`$ is unknown too. Nevertheless, there are some models which permit to estimate the electromagnetic contribution to the mass of proton and electron (e.g. Gasser & Leutwyler, 1982) and dependence of $`m_p`$, $`m_e`$, and $`\alpha `$ on a scalar field which may changed during the evolution (e.g. Damour & Polyakov, 1994). There are model relations between cosmological variation of $`\alpha `$ and $`m_p`$ (e.g. Calmet & Fritzsch, 2001). In addition, a curious numerical relation may be mentioned: the dimensionless constant $`\mu =m_p/m_e`$ approximately equals the ratio of the strong interaction constant $`g^2/(\mathrm{}c)14`$ to the electromagnetic interaction constant $`\alpha =e^2/\mathrm{}c1/137`$, where $`g`$ is the effective coupling constant calculated from the amplitude of the $`\pi `$-meson–nucleon scattering at low energy.

At present, the proton-to-electron mass ratio is measured within the relative accuracy of $`2\times 10^9`$ and equals $`\mu =1836.1526670(39)`$ (Mohr & Tailor, 2000). Laboratory metrological measurements rule out considerable variation of $`\mu `$ on a short time scale, but do not exclude changes over the cosmological time, $`10^{10}`$ years. Moreover, one can not reject a priori the possibility that $`\mu `$ (as well as other constants) takes different values in widely separated regions of the Universe. This should be directly tested by means of astrophysical observations of distant extragalactic objects. Measurements of the wavelengths of absorption lines in high-redshift quasar spectra is a powerful tool to check directly the possible variation of the constants over the cosmological time (e.g. $`\mu `$ and $`\alpha `$) between present days and the epoch at which the absorption-spectrum has been produced, i.e.$`1013`$ Gyr ago.

Up to now the most stringent estimate of possible cosmological variation of $`\mu `$ was obtained by Potekhin et al. (1998), viz $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mu /\mu <(10\pm 8)\times 10^5`$.

## Sensitivity Coefficients

The method used here has been suggested by Varshalovich & Levshakov (1993) and is based on the fact that wavelengths of electron-vibro-rotational lines depend on the reduced mass of the molecule. It is essential that this dependence differs for different transitions. This makes it possible to distinguish the cosmological redshift of a line from the shift caused by a possible variation of $`\mu `$. The change in wavelength $`\lambda _i`$ due to variation of $`\mu `$ may be described (in the case $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mu /\mu <<1`$) by the sensitivity coefficient $`K_i`$ defined as

$$K_i=\frac{\mu }{\lambda _i}\frac{\text{d}\lambda _i}{\text{d}\mu }$$
(1)
Such coefficients were calculated for the Lyman and Werner bands of molecular hydrogen by Varshalovich & Levshakov (1993), and Varshalovich & Potekhin (1995). Thus, the measured wavelength $`\lambda _i`$ of a line formed in the absorption system at redshift $`z_{abs}`$ can be written as

$$\lambda _i=\lambda _i^0(1+z_{abs})(1+K_i\mathrm{\Delta }\mu /\mu ),$$
(2)
where $`\lambda _i^0`$ is the laboratory (vacuum) wavelength of the transition. This formula can be written in term of redshift $`z_i=\lambda _i/\lambda _i^01`$ as

$$z_i=z_{abs}+bK_i,$$
(3)
where $`b=(1+z_{abs})\mathrm{\Delta }\mu /\mu `$. In reality, $`z_i`$ is measured with some uncertainty which is caused by statistical errors of the astronomical measurements $`\lambda _i`$ and also errors of the laboratory measurements of the wavelengths $`\lambda _i^0`$. Thus, a linear regression analysis yields $`z_{abs}`$ and $`b`$ (consequently $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mu /\mu `$) with their statistical significance.

## Observations and Results of Analysis

To measure the possible variation of $`\mu `$ we use high resolution spectra (FWHM $``$ 7 km/s) of quasars obtained with UVES at the 8.2-m ESO VLT Kueyen telescope. Two H2 absorption systems were analysed at $`z_{\mathrm{abs}}=2.3377`$ in the spectrum of Q 1232+082 (Petitjean et al. 2000), and at $`z_{\mathrm{abs}}=3.0249`$ in the spectrum of Q 0347-382 (UVES commissioning data, see D’Odorico et al. 2001).

Absorption system of H2 at z=2.3377 in the spectrum of Q 1232+082
More than 50 lines of molecular hydrogen (with S/N $``$ 10-14) are identified in the range 3400-3800 Å. We have carefully selected lines that are isolated, unsaturated and unblended. In this system only 12 lines meet all these conditions (see Table 1). The accuracy on the observed wavelengths $`\lambda _i`$ calculated in accordance with Eq. (A14) from Bohlin et al. (1983) which takes into account the number of points within the profile of the spectral line, the spectral resolution and the S/N ratio. The average uncertainty of the determination of the line centers is $`\sigma (\lambda _i)5`$ mÅ. For the laboratory wavelengths we have used two independent sets of data: $`\lambda _i^0[M]`$ from Morton & Dinerstein, 1976; and $`\lambda _i^0[A]`$ from Abgrall et al., 1993 (see, also Roncin & Launay, 1994). Results of the linear regression analysis of $`z_i`$-to-$`K_i`$ are shown on Fig. 1 for both sets of laboratory wavelengths. They are the following: $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mu /\mu =(14.4\pm 11.4)\times 10^5`$ \[A\], and $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mu /\mu =(13.2\pm 7.4)\times 10^5`$ \[M\].

Absorption system of H2 at z=3.0249 in the spectrum of Q 0347-382
For the first time, this H2 system was found and investigated by Levshakov et al., 2001. More than 80 lines of molecular hydrogen (with S/N $``$ from 10 to 40) can be identified in the wavelength range 3600-4600 Å. We have reanalysed this spectrum independently. For our analysis 18 lines of H2 were selected which satisfied to the conditions mentioned above. The average uncertainty of the determination of the line centers is $`\sigma (\lambda _i)10`$ mÅ. Parameters of the lines are presented in Table 2. The results of the linear regression analysis of $`z_i`$-to-$`K_i`$ are shown on Fig. 2 for both sets of laboratory wavelengths. They are the following: $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mu /\mu =(5.8\pm 3.4)\times 10^5`$ \[A\], and $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mu /\mu =(12.2\pm 7.3)\times 10^5`$ \[M\]. It should be mention that three points on the bottom panel of Fig. 2 depart from the regression line more than $`3\sigma `$. Two of them corresponding to L 9-0 R(1) and W 1-0 R(1) transitions have the laboratory wavelengths marked by Morton & Dinerstein (1976) as a blended line and a line under weak continuum. The third point corresponding to W 3-0 Q(1) transition has deviations on the both panels. It may be a result of undetectable blending in the quasar spectrum. We do not reject these points because all of them satisfy to the above formulated conditions for the line selection from quasar spectra.

Combined Analysis
The combined analysis of the H2 lines from the two systems discussed above allows us to increase the statistical significance of the estimate because of increasing the number of lines involved and, what is more essential, broadening the interval of K-values. The results of linear regression analysis of $`\zeta _i`$ as a function of $`K_i`$ for all 30 lines from both systems are shown in Fig. 3. Here $`\zeta _i`$ is the reduced value of the line redshift:

$$\zeta _i=\frac{z_i\overline{z}}{1+\overline{z}},$$
(4)
where $`\overline{z}`$ is $`z_{abs}`$ corresponding to the absorption system and a particular set of laboratory wavelengths.

As a result of the combined analysis we obtained the following estimates (for two different sets of laboratory wavelengths):

$$\mathrm{\Delta }\mu /\mu =(5.7\pm 3.8)\times 10^5[A],$$

$$\mathrm{\Delta }\mu /\mu =(12.5\pm 4.5)\times 10^5[M].$$

The statistical uncertainties of the laboratory wavelengths are about $`1.5`$mÅ corresponding to an error of $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mu /\mu `$ about $`2\times 10^5`$ that is in agreement with the errors found from the regression.

## Conclusions

The above results may be considered as a glimpse on possible cosmological variation of $`\mu `$. Additional measurements are necessary to ascertain the conclusion.

In any case, we have obtained the most stringent estimate on a possible cosmological variation of $`\mu `$ between redshift zero and redshifts 2–3.

In order to improve the result, it is necessary to measure more H2 absorption systems at high redshift. The most suitable quasars for such analysis are PKS 0528-250, Q 0347-382, and Q 1232+082. Their observations with high resolution (FWHM $`7`$ km/s) and high S/N ratio ($`>30`$) will strengthen the conclusions.

In addition, better accuracy of laboratory wavelengths is also desirable because the contribution of laboratory statistical errors are comparable to the statistical errors of astronomical measurements.

Acknowledgments: The observations have been obtained with UVES mounted on the 8.2-m KUEYEN telescope operated by the European Southern Observatory at Parana, Chili. The authors thank C. Ledoux for primary reduction of the spectra and A. Potekhin for useful discussion. A. Ivanchik and D. Varshalovich are grateful for the support by the RFBR (01-02-06098, 99-02-18232). A. Ivanchik is grateful for the opportunity to visit the IAP CNRS.

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