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# Electronic Structure of B-2𝑝 State in AlB2 Single Crystal: Direct Observation of 𝑝𝜎 and 𝑝𝜋 Density of States

Since the discovery of superconductivity in MgB2 with a transition temperature, $`T_\mathrm{c}`$, of 39 K by Nagamatsu et al., a large number of research studies from experimental and theoretical points of view have been performed on this compound and on a series of isostructural diborides. In a previous paper, we reported a large partial density of states (PDOS) of B-2$`p`$ orbitals near the Fermi energy, $`E_\mathrm{F}`$, in MgB2 by soft X-ray emission (XES) and absorption spectroscopies (XAS) near the B-$`K`$ edge. This result is consistent with the results of band calculations, which suggest the holes in $`p\sigma `$ bands between B-B in a honeycomb plane play important roles in the superconductivity of MgB2. Although there are many experimental results that suggest MgB2 is considered as an $`s`$-type superconductor with a strong electron-phonon coupling, the reason for the high value of $`T_\mathrm{c}`$ as a conventional BCS-type superconductor is not clear. An efficient step towards understanding the mechanism of superconductivity in MgB2 is to clarify the difference between this material and other materials which have the same crystal structure but are not superconductors. An example of such materials is AlB2. From a theoretical point of view, first principles band calculations reveal that a large difference between MgB2 and AlB2 is that the Fermi level intersects the $`2p\sigma `$ band in the former, while it does not in the latter, suggesting that the $`p\sigma `$ band plays an important role in the occurrence of superconductivity in MgB2. However, until now, a direct experimental confirmation that such band-calculation predictions are indeed correct has not yet been reported.

To clarify this point, here we directly observe the PDOS of B-2$`p\sigma `$ and 2$`p\pi `$ bands in AlB2 by performing polarization-dependent XES and XAS on a single crystalline compound. The single-crystalline AlB2 samples were prepared by the Al-flux method. Mixtures of Al (purity, 4N) and B (purity, 4N5) powders were placed in an Al2O3 crucible and heated in an Ar gas atmosphere up to 1000C, and then cooled slowly to 660C. The synthesized AlB2 single crystals were separated from the solidified melts by dissolving the Al flux with sodium hydroxide solution. The obtained crystals resemble a hexagonal plate with the edge length (in $`ab`$-plane) of about 1$``$2 mm and with the thickness of about 10 $`\mu `$m along the $`c`$-axis. Before XES and XAS measurements, the crystal was polished in order to remove Al-flux on the surface of the specimen and mounted on a Au plate with Ag paste. The XES measurements were performed at the undulator beamline BL-2C in KEK-PF. The incident photon energy is about 400 eV. Emitted photons were detected using the MCP detector combined with the 1200 lines/mm grating. The energy resolution of the spectrometer with the slit width of 20 $`\mu `$m was estimated as about $`\mathrm{\Delta }E`$0.2 eV at the energy of $`E`$=200 eV. Polarization dependence of emission spectra on the angle between the $`c`$-axis and the detector-direction $`\theta `$ was measured at room temperature (Fig.1). The XAS measurements were performed at BL-19B in KEK-PF by the total fluorescence yield (TFY) method. The energy resolution of the incident photon was about 0.2 eV. The geometry of XAS measurement was the same as that of the XES measurement.

In our experimental geometry, the fluorescence intensity with the incidence angle $`\theta `$, $`I^{fluo}(\theta )`$, is expressed using PDOS components parallel to the $`p\sigma `$ and $`p\pi `$ orbitals, $`I_{p\sigma }^{fluo}`$ and $`I_{p\pi }^{fluo}`$ because of the dipole transition (radiation) from B-2$`p`$ to 1$`s`$ states;

$$I^{fluo}(\theta )=[1+\mathrm{cos}^2(\theta )]I_{p\sigma }^{fluo}+\mathrm{sin}^2(\theta )I_{p\pi }^{fluo}.$$
(1)
Therefore, an ideal XES spectrum $`I^{fluo}(0^{})`$ contains only the $`p\sigma `$ component, and $`I^{fluo}(90^{})`$ contains both the $`p\sigma `$ and $`p\pi `$ components with equal weight.

We first show the theoretical PDOS of $`p\sigma `$ and $`p\pi `$ orbitals of MgB2 and AlB2 derived from band calculation (Fig. 2). It is found that the overall feature of PDOS of MgB2 is almost the same as that of AlB2, i.e., the rigid band model roughly represents these materials. This is consistent with the previous XAS and XES results for the polycrystalline samples. To be more precise, the detailed form of PDOS of MgB2 is sharp in comparison with that of AlB2, i.e., the peak of the $`p\sigma `$ band of MgB2 at $`E=`$2 eV is relatively sharp compared with that of AlB2 at $`E=`$4.5 eV. This is due to a reduction of two-dimensionality of B-$`p`$ bands in AlB2, which is consistent with the decrease of the lattice-constant ratio from MgB2 ($`c/a`$=1.14) to AlB2 ($`c/a`$=1.08). As mentioned in the introduction, an important difference between MgB2 and AlB2 predicted theoretically is that the Fermi energy lies within the $`p\sigma `$ band in the former, but not in the latter.

We now move on to the experimental results. Figure 3 shows the partial density of states (PDOS) of B-2$`p\sigma `$ and 2$`p\pi `$, $`I_{p\sigma }^{fluo}`$ and $`I_{p\pi }^{fluo}`$, derived from observed $`I^{fluo}(20^{})`$ and $`I^{fluo}(45^{})`$. A self-absorption correction was applied to the observed XES spectra before the derivation of $`I_{p\sigma }^{fluo}`$ and $`I_{p\pi }^{fluo}`$. The area intensities of $`I_{p\sigma }^{fluo}`$ and $`I_{p\pi }^{fluo}`$ are normalized to unity in the energy region below 188 eV, and the 2$`I_{p\sigma }^{fluo}`$ and $`I_{p\pi }^{fluo}`$ are shown in the figure. The value of $`E_\mathrm{F}`$ is about 187.5 eV which is about 1.5 eV higher than the value of MgB2 (186 eV), which is in good agreement with the previous report for the polycrystalline AlB2 sample. It is clearly seen that there is almost no PDOS in $`p\sigma `$ orbitals of AlB2 near $`E_\mathrm{F}`$. Furthermore, there is a considerable amount of PDOS in $`p\pi `$ orbitals of AlB2 around $`E_\mathrm{F}`$.

Figure 4 shows the PDOS of B-2$`p\sigma `$ and $`p\pi `$, 2$`\times I_{p\sigma }^{abs}`$ ($``$) and $`I_{p\pi }^{abs}`$ ($``$), derived from observed absorption spectra $`I^{abs}(20^{})`$ and $`I^{abs}(70^{})`$. Similarly to the XES spectra, the self absorption correction was applied before their derivation, and the normalized absorption intensity $`I^{abs}(\theta )`$ is expressed as follows;

$$I^{abs}(\theta )=\mathrm{sin}^2(\theta )I_{p\sigma }^{abs}+\mathrm{cos}^2(\theta )I_{p\pi }^{abs}.$$
(2)
In PDOS of $`p\pi `$ \[Fig. 4(a)\], there is large absorption at about 194 eV in contrast to no sharp absorption in $`p\sigma `$-PDOS, which is assigned to the $`p\pi `$ resonance state on the sample surface. In both figures (Figs. 3 and 4), the theoretical PDOS of AlB2 are shown again by the dotted line ($`p\sigma `$) and the solid line ($`p\pi `$). It is found that the theoretical PDOS reproduces the observed PDOS well, for both the empty and occupied states. We have clearly observed a pseudo-gap of about 3 eV around 187-190 eV in the B-2$`p\sigma `$ orbital in sharp contrast to the broad metallic state of the B-2$`p\pi `$ orbital. The pseudo-gap is attributed to the bonding and anti-bonding state separation due to the strong covalent nature of $`p\sigma `$ orbitals. However, there is a small difference in the value of $`E_\mathrm{F}`$ between the experimental and theoretical PDOS. The band calculation predicts the energy of $`p\sigma `$-shoulder at about –1.8 eV below the Fermi level. However the observed energy of the shoulder (186.3 eV) locates –1.2 eV below the Fermi level (187.5 eV), i.e., the observed Fermi energy $`E_\mathrm{F}`$ is 0.6 eV lower than the theoretical prediction. The reason for this difference is considered to be the lack of Al atoms from the stoichiometry. The observed pseudo-gap in $`p\sigma `$-PDOS at around the Fermi energy suggests the strong covalent bonding feature of boron forming the 2D honeycomb plane as reported by maximum entropy method (MEM)/Rietvelt analysis. We considered that the layered B-honeycomb plane is the fundamental structure of AlB2. There is a small difference in electronegativity between Al and B atoms, so electrons transfer from Al to B atoms in AlB2 compound. Vacancies of Al atoms in AlB2 reduce the number of electrons of B-2$`p`$ orbitals, thus the Fermi levels shifts down. If we assume that the decrease of the states below $`E_\mathrm{F}`$ is due to an Al vacancy, the vacancy concentration $`x`$ of Al1-xB2 is estimated to be about 0.07. The theoretical band calculation suggests that the heat of formation of AlB2 is lower than that of MgB2, which suggests the compound which has a lower number of electrons of the cation than the stoichiometric AlB2 is more stable. The present result is consistent with this prediction.

To summarize, we have performed direct measurement of partial density of states (PDOS) of B-$`2p`$ bands in single-crystalline AlB2 using polarization-dependent XES and XAS. We have clearly observed a pseudo-gap of about 3 eV in the B-2$`p\sigma `$ orbital in sharp contrast to the broad metallic state of the B-2$`p\pi `$ orbital. Although the experimentally observed PDOS is in excellent agreement with the band calculation results, the Fermi level in the former is found to be lower by about 0.6 eV than in the latter. Nevertheless, the Fermi level still lies well above the $`p\sigma `$ band, providing a direct confirmation that there are no $`p\sigma `$ holes in AlB2. Conversely, considering the fact that AlB2 is not superconducting, our result indirectly supports scenarios that the $`p\sigma `$ holes play an important role in the occurrence of superconductivity in MgB2.

We express our thanks to Professor J. Akimitsu of Aoyama Gakuin University for useful discussions. We also thank to Mr. T. Takeuchi and Ms. A. Fukushima of ISSP for their technical support in the spectroscopic measurements. T.O. gratefully acknowledges the support by a Grant-in-Aid for COE Research (No.13CE2002) of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology of Japan. This experiment was performed under the approval of the Photon Factory Advisory Committee (Proposal No. 2001U004).


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# Untitled Document

The power of entangled quantum channels

Seth Lloyd

MIT Department of Mechanical Engineering

All communication channels are at bottom quantum mechanical. Quantum mechanics contributes both obstacles to communication in the form of noise, and opportunities in the use of intrinsically quantum representations for information. This paper investigates the trade-off between power and communication rate for coupled quantum channels. By exploiting quantum correlations such as entanglement, coupled quantum channels can communicate at a potentially higher rate than unentangled quantum channels given the same power. In particular, given the same overall power, $`M`$ coupled, entangled quantum channels can send $`M`$ bits in the same time it takes a single channel to send a single bit, and in the same time it takes $`M`$ unentangled channels to send $`\sqrt{M}`$ bits.

As communication technologies push down to the quantum level, a considerable effort has been made to uncover the physical limits to the communication process. Much progress has been made in investigating the physical limits to the bosonic communications channel (1-22) (e.g., quantum optical communication (1)) and to quantum communications in general (23-26). Quantum systems can be correlated with eachother in ways that classical systems cannot, a feature known as entanglement. It has been speculated that entanglement might be used enhance the capacity of quantum channels as compared to classical channels (24-28). Perhaps the best known example of the use of entanglement to enhance communication capacity is that of super-dense coding (25), in which two parties who initially possess an entangled state can send two bits of classical information by sending a single quantum bit. In addition, shared prior entanglement may enhance the transmission capacity of quantum channels in the presence of noise (28). In general, the enhancement in channel capacity that can be attained using entanglement is not known. This letter investigates the situation in which channels are coupled via a nonlinear dynamics to induce an entangled state in the process of transmission. For fixed power, I show that $`M`$ coupled, entangled quantum channels can transmit information at a rate $`\sqrt{M}`$ times greater than $`M`$ uncoupled, unentangled channels.

To see that quantum mechanics can in principle attain large gains in channel capacity for power-limited parallel channels by entangling them, first review the case of unentangled parallel quantum channels. In particular, it is well established (1-22) that the broadband bosonic channel with power $`P`$ can transmit no more than $`C_1=\alpha \sqrt{P/\mathrm{}}`$ bits per second, where $`\alpha =\sqrt{\pi /3}(1/\mathrm{ln}2)`$. As a consequence (1), if the power is spread amongst $`M`$ unentangled broadband bosonic channels, each with power $`P/M`$, the rate of communication is $`C_M^C=\sqrt{M}C_1`$. By contrast, as I now show, $`M`$ entangled quantum channels using power $`P`$ can send information from A to B at a rate $`C_M^Q=\beta M\sqrt{P/\mathrm{}}MC_1=\sqrt{M}C_M^C,`$ where $`\beta =\sqrt{2/\pi (12^M)}`$. That is, for a fixed power, entangled channels can in principle outperform unentangled channels by a wide margin for large $`M`$. Perhaps more remarkably, $`M`$ entangled channels can send $`M`$ bits in the same time and using the same overall power that it takes a single channel to send a single bit. A summary of these results is shown in figure 1. Not surprisingly, producing the necessary entangling dynamics for $`M`$ quantum channels is likely to prove difficult. As will be shown, however, simple demonstrations of the power of a small number of entangled channels can be performed using existing techniques of quantum information processing. And since the potential gains are large, the attempt to entangle $`M`$ channels may be worth the effort.

Quantum channels are physical systems linking sender and receiver. A quantum channel can be a fiber-optic cable, a wire connecting two bits in a computer, or a tunneling barrier connecting two quantum bits in a quantum computer. To calculate their limits requires a treatment of the channels’ dynamics, together with their interaction with sender and receiver. The calculation of the limits to the bosonic channel is detailed and relies on the physics of quantum electrodynamics (1). Here, a simpler and easily generalizable channel model is analyzed — the ‘qubit’ channel.

The qubit channel transmits a quantum bit from A to B. Suppose that A and B each possess a two-state quantum system, or ‘qubit.’ A’s qubit holds the quantum state $`|\psi `$ which is to be transmitted to B, whose qubit is initially in the state $`|0`$. The two states $`|0`$ and $`|1`$ of the qubits are assumed to be degenerate, so that no energy is required to store the qubit. The qubit channel can be used either to transmit classical information – $`|\psi =|0`$ or $`|1`$ – or to transmit quantum information – $`|\psi =\alpha |0+\beta |1`$. The dynamics of the channel should transfer the information from A’s qubit to B’s qubit. After the transfer has taken place, B’s qubit is in the state $`|\psi `$ and A’s qubit is in a standard state such as $`|0`$. The sole restriction placed on dynamics of the channel is that it obeys the rules of quantum mechanics: the time evolution of A’s qubit and B’s qubit, together with their environment and whatever interaction they use to transfer the information, is a unitary, Hamiltonian dynamics. (Note that an arbitrary strictly positive time evolution can be embedded in such dynamics (29).) This requirement alone allows the establishment of a bound for the rate of information transmission down the qubit channel given limited power.

To derive this bound, note that the average overlap $`|0|\psi |^2`$ of A and B’s initial state with their final state is $`1/2`$. Accordingly, each time the channel is used, the total state of A and B together with environment must evolve by an average angle in Hilbert space of at least $`\pi /2`$. That is, to transmit a 0 requires no transformation of B’s qubit, but to transmit a 1, B’s qubit must be rotated by $`\pi `$. The Margolus-Levitin theorem then implies that when B’s qubit is rotated by $`\pi `$, the average energy of the complete system above its ground state is $`E\pi \mathrm{}/2\mathrm{\Delta }t`$, where $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ is the time over which the transfer takes place (30). If a 1 is sent half the time, the average power associated with applying energy $`E`$ for time $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ is $`P=E/\mathrm{\Delta }t\pi \mathrm{}/4\mathrm{\Delta }t^2`$. Consequently, the rate at which a bit can be reliably transferred from A to B is

$$C_{1q}=1/\mathrm{\Delta }t=(2/\sqrt{\pi })\sqrt{P/\mathrm{}}.$$
$`(1)`$
Equation (1) applies to the reliable transmission of a single bit. If one accepts unreliable or noisy transfer, then the transfer time can be less than $`\mathrm{\Delta }t=\pi \mathrm{}/4E`$, as one does not have to rotate the state of A and B by the full angle $`\pi `$ to transform them into an orthogonal state. This feature, together with the use of error correcting codes, can be used to enhance the rate of transfer of information for a given energy (31). In addition, if one is willing to send less than a full bit of information by sending a 0 with a higher probability, one can decrease the energy per transmission time $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$.

The first obvious point to note about equation (1) is that the power-limited capacity of the qubit channel is very similar to the power-limited capacity of the broadband bosonic channel. The capacity of the qubit channel and the bosonic channel differ by only a constant of order unity. At first, this might seem surprising. After all, the broadband bosonic channel has an infinite number of temporal modes, each of which in turn has an infinite number of states. In contrast, the qubit channel has only two qubits, each of which has only two states. The capacity of the bosonic channel is attained in the limit of infinite time by preparing energy eigenstates with a thermal distribution that satisfies the integrated power constraint. In contrast, as will be seen below, the qubit channel operates by sending one bit dynamically in time $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ while respecting the power constraint. The two channels – bosonic and qubit – could hardly look more different. Why then do they exhibit almost the same channel capacity, including the same dependence on power?

The answer is that both of these channel capacities are attained by creating distributions of states with the maximum spread in energy given the overall power constraint — they are both broadband systems (1, 30). In addition, the bosonic channel attains its maximum capacity in the limit where approximately one bit is transmitted for each quantum sent down the channel: at its capacity limit, the bosonic channel closely resembles the qubit channel. To see broadband nature of the qubit channel, examine how the channel capacity limit can be attained.

A simple example of an interaction that attains the qubit capacity limit is the application of a ‘swap’ operation: $`S=_{ij=0}^1|ij_{AB}ji|`$. $`S`$ is a unitary transformation that swaps the quantum information in A’s qubit with the quantum information in B’s qubit. Note that $`S^2=1`$: two applications of $`S`$ returns the bits to their original states. Consequently,$`S`$ is Hermitian and has eigenvalues $`\pm 1`$. Note also that $`e^{i\theta S}=\mathrm{cos}\theta i\mathrm{sin}\theta S`$.

Now analyze the power needed to apply a swap operation. Apply the Hamiltonian $`\stackrel{~}{S}=\pi \mathrm{}(1S)/2\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ to A and B’s qubits for time $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$. It is straightforward to verify that $`e^{i\stackrel{~}{S}\mathrm{\Delta }t/\mathrm{}}=S`$. So applying $`\stackrel{~}{S}`$ for time $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ swaps the qubits. The average energy of A and B and the apparatus that swaps the qubits is

$$E=(\psi |_A0|_B)\stackrel{~}{S}(|0_A|\psi _B)=\pi \mathrm{}(1|0|\psi |^2)/2\mathrm{\Delta }t.$$
$`(2)`$
Averaging over states $`|\psi `$ gives an energy $`E`$ that saturates the Margolus-Levitin bound. Swap attains the power/capacity limit of equation (1) above.

The ‘swap’ picture of quantum information transmission assumes a direct transfer of A’s qubit to B. A similar picture holds in which A’s and B’s qubits are coupled by an intervening chain of qubits $`A_1B_1A_2B_2\mathrm{}A_nB_n`$, where A has access to $`A_1`$ and B has access to $`B_n`$. Here, quantum information can be sent along the chain by swapping $`A_i`$ with $`B_i`$ over a time $`\mathrm{\Delta }t/2`$, then swapping $`B_i`$ with $`A_{i+1}`$, and repeating until the qubit has been moved from A to B. In this case, the time taken to send a qubit from A to B is $`n\mathrm{\Delta }t`$, and the average energy employed is $`2nE`$, giving an average power of $`2P=2E\mathrm{\Delta }t`$. The rate at which information is sent down the channel is still 1 bit in time $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$. Accordingly, the transmission of information from A to B by repeated swapping down a chain of qubits comes within $`\sqrt{2}`$ of the the power/capacity limit of (1). In fact, a variety of Hamiltonians (e.g., $`H=S_{A_1B_1}+S_{B_1A_2}+\mathrm{}S_{A_nB_n}`$) can be used to propagate ‘spin waves’ down the qubit chain at rates on the order of the power/capacity limit (1). The similarity of the power/capacity tradeoff for chains of qubits and for bosons should not be surprising as the physics of spin wave propagation is closely related to the physics of wave propagation in the multi-mode bosonic channel.

Now investigate the case of multiple quantum channels. It is here that entanglement leads to a significant enhancement in power-limited transmission rate. Clearly, $`M`$ parallel quantum channels can transmit information at a rate $`\sqrt{M}`$ greater than a single quantum channel using the same power $`P`$ merely by dividing the power equally amongst the channels (1). Each channel now transmits at a rate $`(2/\sqrt{\pi })\sqrt{P/M\mathrm{}}`$ giving an overall rate of transmission $`C_M^C=(2M/\sqrt{\pi })\sqrt{P/Mh}=(2/\sqrt{\pi })\sqrt{MP/h}=\sqrt{M}C_1^C`$. This rate enhancement for parallel unentangled channels holds for both the bosonic channel and for the qubit channel. Because of the square root dependence of transmission rate on power, both the qubit and broadband bosonic channel are more efficient at a lower power. As a result, one improves performance by dividing up information and power among the different channels.

If one is able to apply operations that entangle the channels, one can do even better, as I now show. The goal of the $`M`$-channel transfer is to enact the $`2M`$-qubit analog of the swap above:

$$S_{1\mathrm{}M}=\underset{i_1j_1\mathrm{}i_Mj_M=0}{\overset{1}{}}|i_1j_1_{AB_1}j_1i_1|\mathrm{}|i_Mj_M_{AB_M}j_Mi_M|.$$
$`(3)`$
The $`2M`$ qubit swap $`S_{1\mathrm{}M}`$ swaps A’s $`M`$ qubits with B’s M qubits and has the same properties as the 2-qubit swap above (Hermitian, squares to one, etc.). As above, define the Hamiltonian $`\stackrel{~}{S}_{1\mathrm{}M}=\pi \mathrm{}(1S_{1\mathrm{}M})/2\mathrm{\Delta }t`$. Applying the Hamiltonian $`\stackrel{~}{S}_{1\mathrm{}M}`$ for a time $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ then swaps A’s qubit string with B’s qubits. The average energy during the $`M`$-qubit swap is $`E=\pi \mathrm{}(1|0|\psi |^2)/2\mathrm{\Delta }t,`$ as in equation (2) above. Now, however, $`|0|\psi |^2=1/2^M`$ for a randomly selected $`|\psi `$. Accordingly, the time taken to transfer A’s bit to B using power $`P`$ is given by

$$1/\mathrm{\Delta }t=\sqrt{2(12^M)P/\pi \mathrm{}},$$
$`(4)`$
which is the $`M`$-channel analog of the limit (1). The time taken to perform the transfer using power $`P`$ attains the limit (4), but now for the transfer of $`M`$ bits rather than a single bit.

Application of the Hamiltonian $`S_{1\mathrm{}M}`$ transfers $`M`$ bits down $`M`$ parallel qubit channels using essentially the same energy $`E\mathrm{}/\mathrm{\Delta }t`$, the same power $`P\mathrm{}/\mathrm{\Delta }t^2`$, and in the same time $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ it takes a single channel to transmit a single bit. Similar results hold for the transmission of $`M`$ qubits down $`M`$ chains of $`n`$ qubits, as above: the transmission time in this case is $`n`$ times as long, but the power is the same as the single bit case, while the number of bits per second is $`M`$ times the single qubit channel rate.

It is easy to verify that during the transfer, the $`M`$ qubit channels are mutually entangled. For example, if A’s input state is $`|b_M=|b_1\mathrm{}b_M`$, then at time $`\mathrm{\Delta }t/2`$ (halfway through the controlled flipping operation) A and B’s qubits are in the state

$$(e^{i\pi /4}/\sqrt{2})\left(|b_1\mathrm{}b_M_A|00\mathrm{}0_B+i|00\mathrm{}0_A|b_1\mathrm{}b_M_B\right).$$
$`(5)`$
The fact that the channels are entangled during the course of transmission has implications for the sensitivity of the entangled channel to noise. On the one hand, entangled states of the form (5) are typically $`\sqrt{M}`$ times more sensitive to decoherence than unentangled states. On the other hand, this sensitivity to decoherence can actually be an advantage in sending information. Suppose that $`A`$ never sends the state $`00\mathrm{}0`$. If the multiple channel is decohered in the course of transmission, then B either receives $`00\mathrm{}0`$ or the correct message $`b_1\mathrm{}b_M`$. If he receives $`00\mathrm{}0`$, he just waits and measures again until he receives $`b_1\mathrm{}b_M00\mathrm{}0`$. That is, decoherence on its own gives no errors for the transmission of classical information down the entangled channels. In fact, as noted in (31), decoherence can actually enhance the rate of transmission for a fixed power.

Transferring $`M`$ bits down $`M`$ unentangled quantum channels using the same power as a single qubit channel takes $`\sqrt{M}`$ times longer than transferring the information down coupled, entangled channels. Unentangled transfer corresponds to the application of $`M`$ two-qubit swap operations with Hamiltonian $`\stackrel{~}{S}_1+\mathrm{}\stackrel{~}{S}_M`$ as opposed to the $`2M`$-qubit swap Hamiltonian $`\stackrel{~}{S}_{1\mathrm{}M}`$, and takes $`\sqrt{M}`$ times the energy of the entangled swap. As a result, the coupled, entangled channels have a capacity of at least $`\sqrt{M}`$ times the capacity of the uncoupled, unentangled channels.

Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of this result is that the use of entanglement allows the transfer of $`M`$ bits in the same time and using the same power that it takes to transfer a single bit. Does entanglement truly allow one to get ‘something for nothing’ as this result suggests? What is the catch? After all, previous investigations of the use of entanglement in uncoupled quantum channels have found at best modest increases in channel capacity (23-27) (with the possible exception of noisy quantum channels (28)).

In fact, entanglement does indeed allow the capacity increase derived above. To find the absolute upper bound on the capacity of coupled quantum channels will require the detailed application of Kholevo’s theorem (23, 1). However, the Margolus-Levitin theorem (30) is very general, and suggests that the absolute limit on coupled channel capacity differs from (3) by at most a constant of order unity. In a certain sense, that it is just as easy in terms of power and energy to rotate $`2M`$ bits from one state to another as it is to rotate 2 bits from one state to another should not be surprising: no two states in Hilbert space are more than angle of $`\pi `$ apart. Accordingly, if one can effect arbitrary evolutions on the $`M`$-qubit channel Hilbert space, $`M`$ bits can be transferred using the same power and time as one bit. The situation is summarized in figure 2. Effectively, the coupling between the channels allows them to transmit information in the form a ‘super-boson’ with $`2^M`$ internal states. The $`\sqrt{M}`$ enhancement afforded by exploiting entanglement is typical of quantum information processing and arises from essentially the same source as the $`\sqrt{M}`$ enhancements in quantum search (32) and quantum positioning (33).

The catch is that enacting the necessary Hamiltonian $`\stackrel{~}{S}_{1\mathrm{}M}`$ is likely to prove experimentally difficult. Even for two qubit channels, enacting the Hamiltonian of equation (2) involves entangling four quantum bits, a difficult action using current technologies. One might hope to be able to build up this Hamiltonian time evolution using elementary quantum logic operations on two quantum bits at a time, but in this case most of the power advantage is lost, as the net angle rotated in Hilbert space becomes larger than $`\pi `$. To attain the $`\sqrt{M}`$ enhancement of channel capacity allowed by entanglement, an $`M`$-qubit entangling operation must be used. Such operations correspond to interaction operators of the form $`\sigma _x^1\sigma _x^2\mathrm{}\sigma _x^M`$ for spin qubits and $`a_{A1}a_{B1}^{}\mathrm{}a_{AM}a_{BM}^{}+H.C.`$ for particle modes. That is, $`M`$’th order nonlinear interactions are required to attain entanglement-enhanced channel capacity. Such interactions are hard to enact experimentally, although it is possible to use simple quantum logic and quantum communication devices to perform proof-of-principle demonstrations of entanglement-enhanced capacity for small $`M`$ (34-36). For example, suppose that A wants to use microwaves or light to load two bits onto the nuclear spins or hyperfine levels of B’s two atoms. The results derived above show that if A is able to manipulate entangling interactions between the two spins or atoms, the two bits can be loaded using $`\sqrt{2}`$ less power than in the case that the spins or atoms remain unentangled. Such a proof-of-principle experiment could be performed using nuclear resonance on two spins in a molecule, or using optical resonance on two interacting atoms in a trap. For larger $`M`$, enacting the proper entangling coupling is likely to prove experimentally difficult, but if such coupling can be enacted, substantial gains in quantum channel capacity can be obtained. Whether or not the potential gains afforded by entanglement can be realized in experimentally feasible quantum optical systems acting over significant distances remains an open question.

This paper has derived power/speed limits for the problem of transferring $`M`$ qubits reliably from A to B. By use of entanglement, the $`M`$ qubits can be transferred $`\sqrt{M}`$ times more rapidly for the same power as $`M`$ unentangled qubits. The absolute capacity of $`M`$ coupled, entangled qubit channels will have to be derived by the sophisticated application of Holevo’s theorem (27). Open questions include the fully relativistic treatment of entangling channels, the possibility of significant but lesser communication enhancements by the use of partial entanglement, and the effect of noise on entangling channels. But as this paper shows, entanglement in principle gives a significant increase in channel capacity.

Acknowledgements: The author would like to thank Vittorio Giovannetti, Lorenzo Maccone, Hermann Haus, Jeff Shapiro, and Franco Wong for inspiration and for helpful discussions.

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(31) A. Harrow, S. Lloyd, to be published.

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Figure captions:

Figure 1: Summary of the power/capacity tradeoff for entangled and unentangled channels.

1a) A single channel can transmit information at a rate $`\sqrt{P/\mathrm{}}`$, where $`P`$ is the power.

1b) Because the channels are more efficient at low power, $`M`$ unentangled channels can send information at a rate $`M\sqrt{P/M\mathrm{}}=\sqrt{M}\sqrt{P/\mathrm{}}`$.

1c) If the channels are coupled to entangle them in the course of transmission, they can send information at a rate $`M\sqrt{P/\mathrm{}}.`$

Figure 2: Explanation of the $`\sqrt{M}`$ enhancement from entanglement. No two states in Hilbert space are more than an angle $`\pi `$ apart. As a result, to send a state $`|\psi `$ from A to B in time $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ requires energy $`E\mathrm{}/\mathrm{\Delta }t`$, independent of the number of bits $`M`$ in $`|\psi `$. The direct path through Hilbert space passes through states in which the $`M`$ channels are maximally entangled. In contrast, the transmission path corresponding to unentangled states is $`\sqrt{M}`$ times longer.


text:
# Scaling of ISM Turbulence: Implications for HI

## 1. Introduction

The interstellar medium (ISM) is clumpy and turbulent (Larson 1981; Myers 1983; Scalo 1987; see also Lazarian, Pogosyan & Esquivel, this volume, henceforth LPE02) with an embedded magnetic field that influences almost all of its properties. This turbulence that ranges from AUs to kpc (Armstrong et al. 1995, Stanimirovic & Lazarian 2001, Deshpande et al. 2000) holds the key to many astrophysical processes (e.g., star formation, fragmentation of molecular clouds, heat and cosmic ray transport, magnetic reconnection).

All turbulent systems have one thing in common: they have large “Reynolds number” ($`ReLV/\nu `$; L=characteristic size of the system, V=velocity different over this size, and $`\nu `$=viscosity), the ratio of the time required for viscous forces to slow it appreciably ($`L^2/\nu `$) to the eddy turnover time of a parcel of gas ($`L/V`$). A similar parameter, the “magnetic Reynolds number”, $`Rm`$ ($`LV/\eta `$; $`\eta `$=magnetic diffusion), is the ratio of the magnetic field decay time ($`L^2/\eta `$) to the eddy turnover time ($`L/V`$). The properties of the flows on all scales depend on $`Re`$ and $`Rm`$. Flows with $`Re<100`$ are laminar; chaotic structures develop gradually as $`Re`$ increases, and those with $`Re10^3`$ are appreciably less chaotic than those with $`Re10^7`$. Observed features such as star forming clouds are very chaotic with $`Re>10^8`$ and $`Rm>10^{16}`$.

Let us start by considering incompressible hydrodynamic turbulence, which can be described by the Kolmogorov theory (Kolmogorov 1941). Suppose that we excite fluid motions at a scale $`L`$. We call this scale the energy injection scale or the largest energy containing eddy scale. For instance, an obstacle in a flow excites motions on the scale of the order of its size. Then the energy injected at the scale $`L`$ cascades to progressively smaller and smaller scales at a rate of eddies turning over, i.e. $`\tau _l^1v_l/l`$, with the energy losses along the cascade being negligible111This is easy to see as the motions at the scales of large eddies have $`Re1`$ and therefore the energy loss into heat is negligible over the eddy turnover time.. Ultimately, the energy reaches the molecular dissipation scale $`l_d`$, i.e. the scale where the local $`Re1`$, and is dissipated there. The scales between $`L`$ and $`l_d`$ are called the inertial range and it typically covers many decades. The motions over the inertial range are self-similar and this provides tremendous advantages for theoretical description.

The beauty of the Kolmogorov theory that it does provide a simple scaling for hydrodynamic motions. If the velocity at a scale $`l`$ from the inertial range is $`v_l`$, the Kolmogorov theory states that the kinetic energy ($`\rho v_l^2v_l^2`$ as the density is constant) is transferred to next scale within one eddy turnover time ($`l/v_l`$). Thus within the Kolmogorov theory the energy transfer rate ($`v_l^2/(l/v_l)`$) is scale-independent, and we get the famous Kolmogorov scaling $`v_ll^{1/3}`$ .

One-dimensional222Dealing with observational data, e.g. in LPE02, we deal with three dimensional energy spectrum $`P(k)`$, which, in isotropic turbulence, is related to $`E(k)`$ in the following way: $`E(k)=4\pi k^2P(k)`$. energy spectrum $`E(k)`$ is one of the most important quantities in turbulence theories. Note that $`E(k)dk`$ is the amount of energy between the wavenumber $`k`$ and $`k+dk`$. When $`E(k)`$ follows a power law, $`kE(k)`$ is the energy near the wavenumber $`k1/l`$. Since $`v_l^2`$ represents a similar energy, $`v_l^2kE(k)`$. Therefore, Kolmogorov scaling entails $`E(k)k^{5/3}`$ .

Kolmogorov scalings constitute probably the major advance of the microscopic turbulence theory of incompressible fluids. They allowed numerous applications in different branches of science (see Monin & Yaglom 1975). However, astrophysical fluids are magnetized and the application of the Kolmogorov scalings is not easy to justify. For instance, dynamically important magnetic field should interfere with eddies motions.

Paradoxically, astrophysical measurements reveal the Kolmogorov spectra (see LPE02). For instance, interstellar scintillation observations indicate electron density spectrum follows a power law over 7 decades of length scales (see Armstrong et al. 1995). The slope of the spectrum is very close to $`5/3`$ for $`10^6m`$ \- $`10^{14}m`$. At larger scales LPE02 summarizes the evidence of $`5/3`$ velocity power spectrum over pc-scales in HI. Solar-wind observations provide in-situ measurements of the power spectrum of magnetic fluctuations and Leamon et al. (1998) also obtained a slope of $`5/3`$. Is this a coincidence? What properties the magnetized compressible ISM is expected to have? These sort of questions we will deal with below.

Here we describe our approach which is complementary to that in Vazquez-Semadeni (this volume). The latter attempts to simulate the ISM in its complexity by including many physical processes (e.g. compression, self-gravity) simultaneously. As a downside of this, such simulations cannot distinguish between the consequences of different processes. We discuss a focused approach when only after obtaining clear understanding on the simplest level, the next level is attempted. Therefore, we first consider incompressible MHD turbulence (§2), then discuss the viscous damping of incompressible turbulence in §3, and then we consider the effect of compression in §4. We discuss implications of our new understanding of MHD turbulence for the problems of dust motion and cosmic ray scattering in §5.

## 2. Incompressible MHD Turbulence

### 2.1. Theory

Observations suggest that the random component of magnetic field is comparable with the regular component. Therefore, we consider the case that the rms velocity at the energy injection scale is comparable to the Alfven speed of the mean field. This means that we do not deal with the problem of magnetic field generation, or magnetic dynamo (see Kulsrud & Anderson 1992; Vishniac & Cho 2001; Maron & Cowley 2001).

An ingenious model very similar in its beauty and simplicity to the Kolmogorov one has been proposed by Goldreich & Sridhar (1995; hereinafter GS95) for incompressible MHD turbulence. Earlier theories by Iroshnikov (1963) and Kraichnan (1965) did not account for the anisotropy created by magnetic field. In GS95, however, it is noted that the motions mixing magnetic field lines happen essentially hydrodynamically and therefore the energy transfer rate is roughly $`\tau _{nl}^1k_{}v_k`$ where $`k_{}`$ is the wavevector component perpendicular to the local magnetic field. These mixing motions in the GS95 model are coupled with the wave-like motions parallel to magnetic field which results in critical balance condition $`k_{}V_Ak_{}v_k`$ , where $`k_{}`$ is the component of the wavevector parallel to the local magnetic field.

Conservation of energy in the turbulent cascade implies that the energy cascade rate $`\dot{ϵ}`$ ($`=v_l^2/\tau _{nl}`$) is constant:

$$\dot{ϵ}\frac{v_k^2}{\tau _{nl}}=\text{constant.}$$
(1)
Combining this with the critical balance condition we obtain an anisotropy that increases with the decrease of the scale $`k_{}k_{}^{2/3}`$ , and a Kolmogorov-like spectrum for perpendicular motions

$$v_kk_{}^{1/3},\text{ or, }E(k)k_{}^{5/3},$$
(2)
which is not surprising as magnetic field does not influence motions that do not bend it. At the same time, the scale-dependent anisotropy reflects the fact that it is more difficult for weaker small eddies to bend magnetic field.

GS95 shows the duality of turbulent motions. Those perpendicular to magnetic field are essentially eddies, while those parallel to magnetic field are waves. The critical balance condition couples the two types of motions.

### 2.2. Numerical simulations

Numerical simulations by Cho & Vishniac (2000) and Maron & Goldreich (2001) have confirmed GS95 theory, e.g. the Kolmogorov-type scaling333 Cho & Vishniac (2000) obtained $`E(k)k^{5/3}`$ and Maron & Goldreich (2001) $`E(k)k^{3/2}`$. and the scale-dependent anisotropy ($`k_{}k_{}^{2/3}`$), and helped to extend it. The important point that escaped earlier researchers was that the scale dependent anisotropy can be measured only in a local coordinate frame which is aligned with the locally averaged magnetic field direction (see Cho & Vishniac 2000). Further research in Cho, Lazarian, & Vishniac (2002a: hereinafter CLV02a) certified that in the local system of reference the mixing motions perpendicular to magnetic field are identical to hydrodynamic motions (compare Müller & Biskamp 2000).

Fig. 1 illustrates some of our results. The contours of the equal correlation obtained in Cho & Vishniac (2000) are shown in Fig. 1a and are consistent with the predictions of the GS95 model. Fig. 1c. shows that the semi-major axis ($`1/k_{}`$) is proportional to the 2/3 power of the semi-minor axis ($`1/k_{}`$), implying that $`k_{}k_{}^{2/3}`$. While one dimensional energy spectrum follows Kolmogorov spectrum, $`E(k)k^{5/3}`$, CLV02a showed that 3D energy spectrum is

$$P(k_{},k_{})=(B_0/L^{1/3})k_{}^{10/3}\mathrm{exp}\left(L^{1/3}\frac{k_{}}{k_{}^{2/3}}\right),$$
(3)
where $`B_0`$ is the strength of the mean field and $`L`$ is the scale of the energy injection. Velocity correlation from the 3D spectrum provides an excellent fit to the numerical data (Fig. 1b). This allows practical applications illustrated in §5.

All in all, it has been shown that the magnetized incompressible turbulence is both similar and dissimilar to the Kolmogorov turbulence. If we consider motions perpendicular to magnetic field, they are hydrodynamic-like. This entails the Kolmogorov-type spectrum reported by many observers. However, unlike Kolmogorov turbulence, the magnetized one is anisotropic with the degree of anisotropy increasing with the decrease of the scale. This entails much of a difference and requires substantial revisions of many earlier calculations.

### 2.3. Decay of turbulence

Turbulence plays a critical role in molecular cloud support and star formation and the issue of the time scale of turbulent decay is vital for understanding these processes. If MHD turbulence decays quickly, then serious problems face the researchers attempting to explain important observational facts, e.g. turbulent motions seen within molecular clouds without star formation (Myers 1999) and rates of star formation (Mckee 1999). Earlier studies attributed the rapid decay of turbulence to compressibility effects (Mac Low 1999). GS95 predicts and numerical simulations, e.g. CLV02a, confirm that turbulence decays rapidly even in the incompressible limit. This can be understood if mixing motions perpendicular to magnetic field lines are considered. As we discussed earlier, such eddies, as in hydrodynamic turbulence, decay in one eddy turnover time.

Below we consider the effect of imbalance on the turbulence decay time scale. Duality of the MHD turbulence means that the turbulence can be described by opposite-traveling wave packets. ‘Imbalance’ means that wave packets traveling in one direction have significantly larger amplitudes than those traveling in the other direction. In the ISM, many energy sources are localized both in space and time. For example, in terms of energy injection, stellar outflows are essentially point energy sources. With these localized energy sources, it is natural that interstellar turbulence be typically imbalanced.

Here we show results of the CLV02a study that demonstrates that imbalance does extend the lifetime of MHD turbulence (see Fig. 2a). We use a run on a grid of $`144^3`$ to investigate the decay time scale. We run the simulation up to t=75 with non-zero driving forces. Here $`t`$ is measured in the units of the large-scale eddy turnover time (L/V). Then at t=75, we turn off the driving forces and let the turbulence decay. At t=75, the turbulence consists of upward (denoted as $`+`$) and downward moving waves (denoted as $``$). To adjust the degree of initial imbalance, we either increase or decrease the energy of the upward moving components and, by turning off the forcing terms, let the turbulence decay. Note that the initial energy is normalized to 1. The y-axis is the normalized total (=up $`+`$ down) energy.

The dependence of the turbulence decay time on the degree of imbalance is an important finding. To what degree the results persist in the presence of compressibility is the subject of our current research. It is obvious that our results are applicable to incompressible, namely, Alfven motions. We show in §4 that the Alfven motions are essentially decoupled from compressible modes. As the result we expect that the turbulence decay time may be substantially longer than one eddy turnover time.

## 3. Viscous Damped MHD Turbulence

In hydrodynamic turbulence viscosity sets a minimal scale for motion, with an exponential suppression of motion on smaller scales. Below the viscous cutoff the kinetic energy contained in a wavenumber band is dissipated at that scale, instead of being transferred to smaller scales. This means the end of the hydrodynamic cascade, but in MHD turbulence this is not the end of magnetic structure evolution. For viscosity much larger than resistivity, $`\nu \eta `$, there will be a broad range of scales where viscosity is important but resistivity is not. On these scales magnetic field structures will be created through a combination of large scale shear and the small scale motions generated by magnetic tension. As a result, we expect a power-law tail in the energy distribution, rather than an exponential cutoff. To our best knowledge, this is a completely new regime of MHD turbulence.

In partially ionized gas, in general, and in HI, in particular, neutrals cause viscous damping on the scale of a fraction of a parsec. The magnetic diffusion in those circumstances is still negligible and pops in only at the much smaller scales $`100km`$. Thus exist a large range of scales where physics is different from that in the GS95 picture.

In Cho, Lazarian, & Vishniac (2002b), we numerically demonstrate the existence of the power-law magnetic energy spectrum below the viscous damping scale. We use a grid of $`384^3`$. We use physical viscosity for velocity. The kinetic Reynolds number is around 100. With this Reynolds number, viscous damping occurs around $`k7`$. Here, $`k7`$ means that the wave length (or, the size of an eddy) is $`1/7`$ of a side of the computational box. We use very small magnetic diffusion through the use of hyper-diffusion of order 3. To test for possible “bottle neck” effects we also did simulations with normal magnetic diffusion and reproduced our results but with a reduced dynamical range available.

In Fig. 2b, we plot energy spectra. The spectra consist of several parts. First, the peak of the spectra corresponds to the energy injection scale. Second, for $`2<k<7`$, kinetic and magnetic spectra follow a similar slope. This part is more or less a severely truncated inertial range for undamped MHD turbulence. Third, the magnetic and kinetic spectra begin to decouple at $`k7`$. Fourth, after $`k20`$, a new damped-scale inertial range emerges. In the new inertial range, magnetic energy spectrum follows $`E_b(k)k^1`$, implying rich magnetic structures below the viscous damping scale.

We will present a theoretical model for this new regime and its consequences for stochastic reconnection (Lazarian & Vishniac 1999) in an upcoming paper (Lazarian, Vishniac, & Cho 2002). This model implies that the ordinary MHD cascade resumes after the neutrals and ions decouple. All the consequences of the new regime of the MHD turbulence have not been appreciated yet, but we expect that it will have a substantial impact on our understanding of the interstellar physics. In terms of H I the result means this small scale magnetic field might have some relation to the tiny-scale atomic structures (named by Heiles 1997), the mysterious H I absorbing structures on the scale from thousands to tens of AU, discovered by Deiter, Welch, & Romney (1976).

## 4. Compressible MHD Turbulence

While the GS95 model describes incompressible MHD turbulence well, virtually no widely-accepted theory exists in compressible MHD turbulence regime in spite of earlier theoretical attempts (e.g., Higdon 1984). Again valuable insights are available from numerical simulations focused on obtaining microphysical picture. In this section, we will show our numerical results (Cho & Lazarian 2002, in preparation).

In compressible regime, there are 3 different MHD modes - Alfven, slow, and fast modes. MHD turbulence can be viewed as interactions of these modes. Therefore, it is important to study coupling between different modes.

Alfven modes are the least susceptible modes to damping mechanisms (see Minter & Spangler 1997). Therefore, we mainly consider the transfer of energy from Alfven waves to compressible MHD waves (i.e. slow and fast modes). We carry out a simulation to check the strength of the coupling. We first obtain a data cube from a incompressible numerical simulation. Then we retain only Alfven modes and, using a compressible MHD code, let the turbulence decay. Fig. 3a shows time evolution of kinetic energy. Solid line represents kinetic energy of Alfven modes. It is clear that Alfven waves do not generate slow and fast modes efficiently. This means that Alfven modes poorly coupled with slow and fast modes. Therefore, we expect that Alfven modes follow the same scaling relation as in incompressible case. Indeed, Fig. 3b shows that Alfven energy spectra follow a Kolmogorov-like spectrum. The slow modes follow a bit steeper spectrum.

Fig. 3c shows that the anisotropy of Alfven waves, is compatible with the GS95 model. However, compressible modes do not necessarily show different behavior. For instance, Fig. 3d indicates that velocity of fast modes is almost isotropic.

## 5. Applications

How properties of turbulence change with the scale is extremely important to know for many astrophysical problems. Therefore we expect a wide range of applications of the established scaling relations. Here we show how recent breakthrough in understanding of MHD turbulence affects a few selected issues.

### 5.1. Cosmic ray propagation

The propagation of cosmic rays is mainly determined by their interactions with the electromagnetic fluctuations in interstellar medium. The resonant interaction of cosmic ray particles with MHD turbulence has been suggested by many authors as the main mechanism to scatter and isotropicize cosmic rays. The turbulence, that is normally considered is the isotropic turbulence with the Kolmogorov spectrum (see Schlickeiser & Miller 1998). We know that this is not a valid model. How should these calculations be modified?

The essence of the mechanism is rather simple. Particles moving with velocity $`v`$ interact with resonant Alfven wave of frequency $`\omega =k_{}v\mu +n\mathrm{\Omega }`$ ($`n=\pm 1,2\mathrm{}`$), where $`\mathrm{\Omega }=\mathrm{\Omega }_0/\gamma `$ is the gyrofrequency of relativistic particles, $`\mu `$ is the cosine of the pitch angle. From the resonant condition above, we know that the most important interaction occurs at $`k_{}\mathrm{\Omega }/v\mu (\mu r_L)^1`$, where $`r_L`$ is Larmor radius of the high-energy particles.

Adopting quasi-linear theory, we (Yan & Lazarian 2002a) calculated the scattering efficiency of both isotropic and anisotropic turbulence. The results are shown in Fig. 4a. We see that the scattering is substantially suppressed, compared to the Kolmogorov turbulence. This happens, first of all, because most turbulent energy in GS95 turbulence goes to $`k_{}`$ so that there is much less energy left in the resonance point $`k_{}=(\mu r_L)^1`$. Furthermore, $`k_{}k_{}`$ means $`k_{}r_L^1`$ so that cosmic ray particles surf lots of eddies during one gyration. The random walk decreases the scattering efficiency by a factor of $`(\mathrm{\Omega }/k_{}v_{})^{\frac{1}{2}}=(r_L/l_{})^{\frac{1}{2}}`$, where $`l_{}`$ is the turbulence scale perpendicular to magnetic field.

Thus the gyroresonance is not an effective way to provide scattering of cosmic rays if turbulence is injected on the large scales. Indeed, we discussed earlier that the turbulent eddies get more and more elongated as the energy cascades to smaller scales. However, if the turbulence energy is injected isotropically at small scales, the turbulence should be more isotropic and the scattering will be more efficient.

There is another property of turbulence that escaped the attention of earlier researchers. It is known that when cosmic rays stream at a velocity much larger than Alfven velocity, they can excite resonant MHD waves which in turn scatter cosmic rays. This is so called streaming instability. It is usually assumed that the instability can provide the confinement for cosmic rays with energy less than 100GeV (Cesarsky 1980). However, this is true only in an idealized situation when there is no background MHD turbulence. We discussed earlier that the rates of turbulent decay are very fast and therefore the excited perturbations should vanish quickly. In Yan & Lazarian (2002a) we find that the streaming instability is only applicable to particles with energy $`<0.15GeV,`$ which is less than the energy of most cosmic ray particles. So we don’t think self-confinement mechanism works as discussed by previous authors.

Another more efficient resonant process is the transit-time damping (TTD) invoking the fast MHD mode. However, in a hot plasma this mode gets Landau-damped before nonlinear cascading transfers the energy to the small scales. The slow rate of turbulent energy transfer for fast waves follows from the marginal coupling of fast waves that we discussed in §4. Thus the range of applicability of the TTD is limited.

All these findings bring more support to the alternative picture of cosmic ray diffusion advocated by Jokipii (see Kota & Jokipii 2000). In this picture the cosmic rays follow magnetic field lines, but the field is wandering. The rate of this wandering can be calculated from the established turbulence scaling.

### 5.2. Grain dynamics

Turbulence induces dust grain relative motions and causes grain-grain collisions. Those determine grain size distribution which affects most of the dust properties including absorption and H2 formation. Unfortunately, as in the case of cosmic rays, the earlier research appealed to hydrodynamic turbulence to predict grain relative velocities (see Kusaka et al. 1970; Volk et al. 1980; Draine 1985; Ossenkopf 1993; Weidenschilling & Ruzmaikina 1994).

The differences between the hydrodynamic and MHD calculations stem from (a) grain being charged and thus coupled with magnetic field, (b) anisotropy of MHD cascade, and (c) direct interaction of charged grains with magnetic perturbations. Effects (a) and (b) are considered in Lazarian & Yan (2002), while (c) is considered in Yan & Lazarian (2002b; in preparation). As the consequence of these studies the picture of the grain dynamics is substantially altered.

Consider grain charge first. If grain’s Larmor time $`\tau _L=2\pi m_{gr}c/qB`$ is shorter than gas drag time $`t_{drag}`$, grain perpendicular motions are constrained by magnetic field. Their velocity dispersion are determined by the turbulence eddy whose turnover period is $`\tau _L`$ instead of drag time (Draine 1985).

Accounting for the anisotropy of MHD turbulence it is convenient to consider separately grain motions parallel and perpendicular to magnetic field. The perpendicular motion is influenced by the Alfven mode, which has a Kolmogorov spectrum. The parallel motion is subjected to compressible modes with scaling $`v_{}k_{}^{1/2}`$. In addition we should account for turbulence damping via viscous forces. When the eddy turnover time is of the order of $`t_{damp}\nu _n^1k_{}^2`$, the turbulence is viscously damped. Thus grains sample only a part of the eddy before gaining the velocity of ambient gas if $`\tau _L`$ or $`t_{drag}<t_{damp}`$. The results are shown in Fig. 4b.

The direct interaction of the charged grains with turbulent magnetic field results in a stochastic acceleration that can potentially provide grains with supersonic velocities.

## 6. Summary

Recently there have been significant advances in the field of MHD turbulence:

1. The first self-consistent model (GS95) of incompressible MHD turbulence that is supported by both numerical simulations and observations has been suggested. The major predictions of the model are scale-dependent anisotropy ($`k_{}k_{}^{2/3}`$) and a Kolmogorov energy spectrum ($`E(k)k^{5/3}`$).

2. Simulations of compressible MHD turbulence show that there is a weak coupling between Alfven waves and compressible MHD waves and that the Alfven modes follow the Goldreich-Sridhar scaling. Fast modes, however, decouple and exhibit isotropy.

3. On the contrary to the general belief, in typical interstellar conditions, magnetic fields can have rich structures below the scale at which motions are damped by viscosity created by neutrals (ambipolar diffusion damping scale).

These advances change a lot in our understanding of many fundamental interstellar processes, e.g. cosmic-ray propagation and grain dynamics. In terms of HI they show a way to account for the formation of structures at very small scales. More discoveries are surely to come!

#### Acknowledgments.

We thank Ethan T. Vishniac and Peter Goldreich for valuable discussions. We acknowledge the support of NSF Grant AST-0125544. This work was partially supported by National Computational Science Alliance under CTS980010N and AST000010N and utilized the NCSA SGI/CRAY Origin2000.

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text:
# The Infall of Gas onto the Galactic Disk

## 1. Introduction

Analytical models of Galactic chemical evolution invariably demand the existence of infalling (near?) pristine gas onto the disk in order to avoid the overproduction of low-metallicity stars - the so-called G-dwarf problem (Flynn & Morell 1997). Larson (1972) first suggested that this requisite star formation fuel might be associated with the population of High-Velocity Clouds (HVCs) seen moving at anomalous velocities with respect to differential Galactic rotation (Wakker & van Woerden 1997). Modern state-of-the-art chemical evolution models retain the need for this infalling fuel (e.g. Chiappini et al. 1997), although most do not necessarily target the HVCs as the most likely culprit. Tosi (1988) suggests that infalling fuel more metal-rich than $`>`$0.2 Z violates the present-day disk abundance constraints provided by HII regions, an hypothesis we are exploring with updated dual-infall (halo+disk phases) models (Chiappini et al. 2002).

Independent of these Galactic fuel arguments, a natural byproduct of hierarchical clustering galaxy formation scenarios (such as the currently favoured $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$CDM) is that the halo of our Milky Way should be populated with $``$500 satellites (Klypin et al. 1999), and accretion of gas should continue (at some level) to the present-day (as in the aforementioned analytical models). This prediction is more than an order of magnitude discrepant with that actually observed ($``$30 satellites). Blitz et al. (1999) and Braun & Burton (1999) have both recently revived the classic hypothesis due to Verschuur (1969), suggesting that HVCs are Local Group interlopers. This Local Group Infall scenario is based upon the assumption that the gas we see as an HVC traces an underlying (dominant) dark matter halo.

Do HVCs represent the reservoir of star formation fuel predicted to exist by analytical and numerical simulations of galaxy formation? Are they cosmological relics, waste byproducts related to tidal disruption of neighbouring dwarf galaxies, or supernova-driven ejecta from the disk? Whether they be cosmological, or related to star formation processes, HVCs represent crucial, yet mysterious, ingredients of galaxy formation. Under the former, the HI component of HVCs would contribute on the order of 1011 M to the Local Group, while the latter111Assuming typical distances of 4 kpc, and the integrated HI flux density from Table 3 of Wakker & van Woerden 1991. would correspond to order 107 M of HI in the halo.

In what follows, I present a summary of the present-day state-of-affairs in HVC research, highlighting several intriguing (if sometimes confusing and/or contradictory) pieces of the puzzle, and avenues of future research.

## 2. Weighing the Evidence

In terms of assessing the role played by HVCs - cosmological or Galactic structure222In reality, there is certainly a continuum of HVC populations; in fact, I would be surprised if there were not (c.f. Blitz 2001). \- there are numerous discriminants which can be employed to argue for or against either option. Unfortunately, virtually all of these discriminants are purely of an indirect nature in the sense that unless the property under discussion is highly extreme, its interpretation is subject to one or more caveats.

Examples of such indirect arguments include:

* Kinematic Distribution: While it is tempting to use the fact that the velocity dispersion of the HVC distribution function is lower in the Local Group (and Galactic) Standards of Rest than it is in the Local Standard of Rest (e.g. Blitz et al. 1999), to argue for an extragalactic HVC residency, Gibson et al. (2001a) have shown that this is argument is specious.
* Size-Linewidth Relationship: Combes & Charmandaris (2000) note that Galactic halo HVCs adhere to the molecular cloud size-linewidth relationship, and if the Braun & Burton (1999) Compact HVCs were at 20 kpc they would also follow this relationship. While possibly correct, this argument (by itself) is also specious (Gibson et al. 2001b).
* Connection to Local Star Formation: An unappreciated clue to the HVC puzzle is provided by the work of Schulman et al. (1997). Their VLA analysis of isolated spirals shows that the incidence of HVC activity is directly related to the magnitude of underlying star formation in the galaxy’s disk. This result is based upon only a handful of targets, but is not a prediction of the Blitz et al. (1999) model.
* Local Group Analogs: To date, extensive HI mapping of nearby Local Group analogs has not turned up evidence for extragalactic HVCs in these systems (Zwaan 2001). Similarly, the statistics of MgII and Lyman Limit absorbers in the spectra of background QSOs are in disagreement with the extragalactic HVC scenarios (Charlton et al. 2000). By definition, these other groups are not the Local Group (of course!), but unless one argues that the Local Group is somehow privileged, it is difficult to escape the obvious implications (c.f. Blitz 2001).
* Metallicities: HVC metallicities offer a potentially useful discriminant between competing theories for their origin. Very low metallicities ($`<`$0.01 Z) would argue against a recent Galactic disk event (such as a fountain), and support the Local Group building block scenarios of Blitz et al. (1999) and Braun & Burton (1999). Conversely, very high metallicities ($`>`$Z) would be consistent with a Galactic fountain, but incompatible with the infalling star formation fuel hypothesis (recall the metalllicity argument of Tosi 1988). It should not be surprising to read that the interpretation of intermediate metallicities would be somewhat more contentious!

To date, there are only a few HVCs for which accurate metallicities exist - none show evidence for metallicities below 0.1 Z, but neither do any show evidence for metallicities above 0.5 Z (Gibson et al. 2001b,c; Wakker 2001). In fact, only one HVC has been claimed to have a metallicity $`<`$0.2 Z \- Complex C (Wakker et al. 1999). Gibson et al. (2001c) have shown though that Complex C is not the simple 0.1 Z cloud that Wakker et al. thought it was. In fact, along one of the sightlines (Mrk 817), the sulfur and oxygen abundances are clearly in excess of $`>`$0.2 Z. Recall, that both elements are depleted only lightly onto dust and the ionisation corrections for both OI and SII are (effectively) impervious to ionisation corrections. In other words, the metallicity determinations along these sightlines are robust (modulo HI column density normalisation, derived from lower spatial resolution 21cm data). Adopting the most recent solar system abundance normalisation increases the inferred oxygen abundance for the Mrk 817 sightline to 0.31 Z (Gibson et al. 2001c).

Taken together, it is tempting to suggest that virtually all HVCs have metallicities in the narrow range 0.2$`<`$Z$`<`$0.3. At face value, this is the metallicity one would expect a priori for tidally-disrupted debris from the Large or Small Magellanic Clouds (Gibson et al. 2000) or from disk gas which originated at Galactocentric distances in excess of $``$1.5 r (Gibson et al. 2001b; Figure 2b). If disk gas could be diluted in metallicity by a factor of $``$2 during its putative passage through the halo even inner disk gas could be the ultimate source of HVCs.

Interpreting the known HVC metallicities is difficult. While we can apparently rule out simple, undiluted, Galactic fountains, we can also rule out the failed dwarf/Local Group formation remnant scenario (recall Figure 1 of Gibson et al. 2001b) as all HVCs appear to be at least 10$``$30$`\times `$ more metal-rich than the Local Group dwarf spheroidals.
* Connection to Galactic Gas: A danger with using digital tables of HVC properties (such as Wakker & van Woerden 1991 and Putman et al 2002) is that the user may not appreciate that arbitrary cuts in $`v_{\mathrm{LSR}}`$ may mask sinuous connections to low-velocity Galactic gas. As Cohen (1981) and Putman & Gibson (1999) have shown, such connections are not uncommon and clearly show that some HVCs are most definitely of a Galactic nature. Of course, this argument is not valid for all HVCs.
* Alternatives to $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$CDM: Perhaps the simplest way in which to eliminate any discrepancy between the predictions for $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$CDM satellite counts versus those observed is not to associate HVCs with the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$CDM halos, but to find a way to hide the halo baryons or eliminate the halos altogether. The former might include efficient feedback and/or photoionisation at high-redshift (Bullock et al. 2000; Chiu et al. 2001; Somerville 2001), while the latter might include variants to $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$CDM itself, such as Warm Darm Matter (Knebe et al. 2001), Self-Interacting Dark Matter (Davé et al. 2001), or Tilted Cold Dark Matter (Bullock 2001). The theorist in me enjoys the fevered investigations into CDM alternatives, while the observer remains ever skeptical …

There is really only one pure discriminant between these extra-Galactic and Galactic scenarios - knowledge of the distance to the population of HVCs. Unfortunately, the distances to all but a few HVCs are unknown. Doubly unfortunate is the fact that there is really only one way to derive an unequivocal HVC distance - the detection of the cloud in absorption against a background halo star of known distance.

* Absorption Line Distances: Seen in absorption against a range of blue halo stars, five HVCs clearly reside in the halo (Gibson et al. 2001a; Table 1). Of course, this technique can only be applied to clouds in the halo - even if a given HVC did reside outside the halo, there would be no sufficiently bright background star to use as the probe of the intervening cloud. Clearly these five HVCs are inconsistent with the Local Group Infall models of Blitz et al. (1999) and Braun & Burton (1999).

Because of the difficulty in applying the absorption line distance technique, a number of indirect distance determinants have been proposed, including:

* H$`\alpha `$ Distances: Under the (reasonable) assumption that $`>`$1% of the disk’s ionising escape into the halo, coupled with a model describing the photon sources’ distribution, as well as some knowledge of the covering fraction, topology, and line-of-sight orientation of a given HI screen, the measured H$`\alpha `$ emission measure from the screen can be inverted to provide a distance. The halo ionising radiation field model of Bland-Hawthorn et al. (1999,2001) is generally adopted; practical applications of the technique have been demonstrated by Bland-Hawthorn et al. (1998), Tufte et al. (1998), and Weiner et al. (2001). The technique has received a great deal of attention due to its potential application across a large fraction of the HVC population; that said, it has also been one of the more contentious issues in the field! Many of its shortcomings appear to have been rectified by the recent inclusion of spiral arms into the underlying disk model (Bland-Hawthorn et al. 2001). Weiner et al. (2001) suggest that the extant data is inconsistent with the Blitz et al. (1999) Local Group Infall model.
* Head-Tail Substructure: $``$20% of Compact HVCs show distinct head-tail structure, suggestive of interaction with an external medium. Quilis & Moore (2001) show that an ambient density in excess of $``$10-4 cm-3 is required to shape these clouds. Such densities are consistent with an upper halo location, but not an intergalactic one. That said, this argument only applies to a subset of HVCs.
* Pressure Arguments: Burton et al. (2001) employ thermal pressure arguments applied to Compact HVCs to claim that HVCs lie at distances of 400$`\pm `$280 kpc. As pointed out by Amiel Sternberg (cited in Gibson et al. 2001b), this result should strictly be interpreted as an upper limit (and not an equality), since Burton et al. only adopt the minimum pressure necessary to maintain the observed core/halo interface (as opposed to the range allowed by a multiphased mixture).
* Cohen Stream: The Cohen Stream (HVC 165$``$43$``$120), part of the Anti-Centre High-Velocity complex mapped in HI by Cohen (1981), spans 25 on the sky. This $``$120 km/s feature is not seen in H$`\alpha `$, but it does trace a parallel HI filament at $``$13 km/s, and so must be at a distance $`<`$300 pc.
* Search for Stars in HVCs: The search for stars within HVCs (and especially Compact HVCs) has begun in earnest. Programs are underway at LCO/KPNO (Grebel et al. 2000), the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (Willman et al. 2002), and via the use of archival POSS-II plates (Simon & Blitz 2002, in preparation) - to date, none of these studies have uncovered a stellar population associated with any HVC. A primary motivation for this work is the search for an excess of potential red giant branch tip stars (useful distance diagnostics) and (perhaps) even RR Lyrae.

## 3. The Future

An enormous effort is underway to map stellar sub-structure in the halo, and use this information to reconstruct the detailed physics governing the formation of the Milky Way (e.g. Ibata et al. 2001; Morrison et al. 2000; Helmi et al. 1999; Willman et al. 2002). It is crucial to remember that the halo is populated by not only stars, but a not insignificant reservoir of gas. This gas distribution needs to be painstakingly mapped, its origin(s) assessed, and the relevant physics explored - whether this physics is more aligned with cosmology or star formation is yet to be definitively demonstrated, but does not change the fact that HVCs are important clues to galaxy formation and/or galaxy evolution! Halo gas tomography is the most pressing area of HVC research.

With Mike Bessell, Tim Beers, Norbert Christlieb, and Joss Bland-Hawthorn, we have embarked on a long-term program using the 6dF Facility at the United Kingdom Schmidt Telescope to identify large numbers of suitable (distant) halo probes aligned with (potenially) foreground HVCs. Full three-dimensional mapping of halo HVCs is our ultimate goal. In conjunction with the stellar tomography provided by satellites such as FAME, DIVA, and (especially) GAIA, halo gas tomography will provide the ingredients necessary to undertake full baryonic reconstructions of the halo’s formation. These tests of near-field cosmology are poised to compete on an equal level with far-field cosmology over the coming decade.

High-resolution N-body and hydrodynamical simulations of both the interaction of HVCs with the Galaxy, and the Local Group’s formation, must continue for the foreseeable future. As Quilis & Moore (2001) demonstrate, there is much yet to be learned. With Daisuke Kawata, for example, we have been attempting to simulate the spatial and kinematic properties of Complex C using satellite perturbers (as a sort of “straw man” model) interacting with the Outer Arm of the Milky Way’s disk. We have actually been (reasonably!) successful in doing so, generating one realisation in which Complex C gas originated from within the disk (at $``$2 $`r_{}`$), but from the opposite side of the Galaxy. Gas was drawn from the disk by the close passage of the perturber and “pulled” over the Galaxy in its wake, to find itself now infalling onto the disk in the vicinity of the Outer Arm at $`\mathrm{}`$$``$90. The spatial, kinematical, and metallicity properties of Complex C are all recovered!333At the expense of doing some substantial damage to the gas disk in the inner regions of the Milky Way, but we’ll sweep that under the rug for another day (Gibson & Kawata 2001, in preparation)! In addition, we are pursuing very high mass resolution sticky-particle simulations of the Local Group’s formation with Kenji Bekki.

The availability of STIS and (soon) COS on HST, as well as FUSE, means that a concerted effort needs to be made in continuing to obtain metallicities and ionisation conditions of HVCs (and IVCs) using background QSO probes. Time Allocation Committees need to be made aware that not all HVCs are the same, and just because one or two clouds have well-determined metallicities does not mean that therefore all clouds have now been sampled! We have been successful in obtaining FUSE Cycle 2 time to study the anti-Local Group barycentre HVC 246$`+`$39$`+`$125, and have recently been awarded HST/STIS Cycle 11 time to study the Compact HVC 225$``$83$``$197 (to supplement our extant FUSE data on this sightline). Cloud abundance patterns remain a powerful tool for disentangling different origins scenarios (and determining the nucleosynthetic pollution history - e.g. have these clouds seen pollution from Type II or Type Ia supernovae?). Despite these successes, it is most definitely a challenge to convince TACs that HVCs are important clues to the formation mechanisms of galaxies!

Further searches for HVCs in nearby Local Group analogues must continue, as the initial results from Zwaan (2001) have been so intriguing. With D.J. Pisano, David Barnes, and Lister Staveley-Smith, we are using the narrowband filters with the mulitbeam facility at Parkes to Nyquist sample $``$1 Mpc2 around Local Group “clones” to an HI mass sensitivity of 3$`\times `$106 M (5$`\sigma `$). With Bärbel Koribalski, we are surveying (to a comparable sensitivity limit) an $``$100 sq.deg region of the Supergalactic Plane in the vicinity of the HVC (protogalaxy?) discovered by Kilborn et al. (2000), in order to search for low-level extended emission.

On an even more ambitious level, with Frank Briggs, Martin Zwaan, David Barnes, et al., we have been awarded 14 nights at Parkes as a pilot study to what we call HIPARK - a parked, transit-style, Parkes, survey. Ultimately, our goal is to drift-scan the same ($``$100 sq.deg) strip of sky over a continuous three-month period, down to a 6$`\sigma `$ limiting HI mass of 3$`\times `$104 M (at 1 Mpc)!444Or 3 M at 10 kpc!

Finally, a concerted effort must be made to either find stars associated with HVCs (they are enriched in metals, and if they are at Local Group-like distances, they almost certainly had to acquire those metals internally through star formation) or definitively refute their existence (which would argue for them being local, and enriched from their parent galaxy, whether that was the Milky Way, LMC, SMC, or some other disrupted dwarf). Many Time Allocation Committees have recognised the value of these searches, but that is most definitely not a universal sentiment! Deep wide-field imaging of a statistically significant number of Compact HVCs (and neighbouring blank sky) should be undertaken at 4-8m class facilities as soon as possible.

### Acknowledgments.

First, let me state my appreciation to Ken for all the little things he has done to help my career. Ken will leave an unprecedented legacy in not only science, but in the mentorship role he played for Stromlo students and postdocs (myself included) alike. He was one of the primary reasons I originally came to Australia in ’95, and one of the reasons I returned again (permanently) in ’00. Let me also take this opportunity to thank Mary Putman; I was fortunate in the extreme to have had such an excellent PhD student first time around! Thanks also to my various HVC collaborators, including Yeshe Fenner, Daisuke Kawata, Sarah Maddison, Cristina Chiappini, Francesca Matteucci, Bärbel Korbalski, Lister Staveley-Smith, Frank Briggs, Mary Putman, Joss Bland-Hawthorn, Phil Maloney, D.J. Pisano, Ken Freeman, David Barnes, Mark Giroux, Kenji Bekki, Martin Zwaan, Bart Wakker, John Stocke, Mike Shull, Ken Sembach, Mike Bessell, Tim Beers, and Norbert Christlieb. The financial support of both the Australian Research Council and the Victorian Partnership for Advanced Computing is acknowledged. Finally, my thanks to Gary Da Costa and the Organising Committee for providing travel assistance, and seeing to the seamless operation of a wonderful conference.

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