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# Volatility in Financial Markets: Stochastic Models and Empirical Results

## 1 Introduction

Volatility of financial time series is a key variable in the modeling of financial markets. It controls all the risk measures associated with the dynamics of price of a financial asset. It also affects the rational price of derivative products. In this paper we consider some stochastic volatility models proposed in the financial literature by investigating their ability in modeling statistical properties detected in empirical data. Specifically, we investigate the probability density function (pdf) of historical volatility for 100 highly capitalized stocks traded in the US equity markets. We observe that widespread volatility models such as the Hull and White model  and the lognormal model fail in describing the volatility pdf when we ask the model to describe both low and high values of volatility. Our results show that a lognormal pdf better describes low values of volatility whereas the Hull and White pdf gives a better approximation of the empirical pdf for large values.

## 2 Volatility models

The volatility $`\sigma `$ of a financial asset is a statistical quantity which needs to be determined starting from market information . It is the standard deviation of asset return (or, almost equivalently, of logarithm price changes of the asset). Different methodologies are used to infer volatility estimation from market data ranging from a direct calculation from past return data (historical volatility) to the computation of the volatility implied in the determination of an option price computed using the Black and Scholes formula  or some variant of it. There is a large empirical evidence that volatility is itself a stochastic process. In the present study we aim at comparing the theoretical predictions for the pdf of the volatility $`\sigma `$ obtained with two different stochastic volatility models with empirical observations obtained for the 100 most capitalized stocks traded in US equity markets (mostly the New York Stock Exchange and the NASDAQ). The first model we consider is the Hull and White model . In this model, the variance rate $`v\sigma ^2`$ is described by the Ito’s equation

$$dv=a(bv)dt+\xi v^\alpha dz_v$$
(1)
where $`a`$ and $`b`$ are parameters controlling the mean reverting nature of the stochastic process, $`\xi `$ is controlling its diffusive aspects and $`z_v`$ is a Wiener process. The stochastic process is reverting at a level $`b`$ at a rate $`a`$. The exponent $`\alpha `$ has been set to 1 in the investigation of Hull and White  and to 1/2 in the investigation of Heston . In the present study we investigate the Hull and White model with $`\alpha =1`$. The Ito’s equation of this model for the volatility $`\sigma `$ is

$$d\sigma =\frac{1}{2\sigma }\left\{\left[a(b\sigma ^2)\frac{1}{2}\xi ^2\sigma ^2\right]dt+\xi \sigma ^2dz_\sigma \right\}$$
(2)
This equation has been obtained starting from Eq. (1) and using Ito’s lemma. The Hull and White model has associated a stationary pdf of the volatility which has the form

$$P(\sigma )=2\frac{\left(ba/\xi ^2\right)^{1+a/\xi ^2}}{\mathrm{\Gamma }(1+a/\xi ^2)}\frac{\mathrm{exp}(ba/\xi ^2\sigma ^2)}{\sigma ^{2a/\xi ^2+3}}$$
(3)
This pdf has a power-law tail for large values of $`\sigma `$. A power-law tail in the empirical volatility pdf has been observed in Ref.  for large values of the volatility. Another model is the lognormal model of volatility . An Ito’s stochastic differential equation associated with a lognormal pdf is

$$d\sigma =a(b\mathrm{ln}\sigma )dt+\xi \sigma ^{1/2}dz_\sigma $$
(4)
where $`a`$, $`b`$ and $`\xi `$ are control parameters of the model. The two models are characterized by quite different pdfs especially for large values of the volatility where the Hull and White pdf shows a power-law behavior. The present study aims at detecting the regions of validity of these two models in empirical data.

## 3 Empirical Results

With this goal in mind, we investigate the statistical properties of volatility for the 100 most capitalized stocks traded in US equity markets during a 4 year time period. The empirical data are taken from the trade and quote (TAQ) database, maintained by the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). In particular, our data cover the whole period ranging from January $`1995`$ to December $`1998`$ ($`1011`$ trading days). This database contains all transactions occurred for each stock traded in the US equity markets. The capitalization considered is the one recorded on August 31, $`1998`$. For each stock and for each trading day we consider the time series of stock price recorded transaction by transaction. Since transactions for different stocks do not happen simultaneously, we divide each trading day (lasting $`6^h30^{}`$) into $`12`$ intervals of $`1950`$ seconds each. In correspondence to each interval, we define $`12`$ (intraday) stock’s prices proxies $`S(k)`$ – with $`k=1,\mathrm{},12`$ defined as the transaction price detected nearest to end of the interval (this a one possible way to deal with high-frequency financial data ).

We choose 12 intraday intervals since this value ensures that at least one transaction is in average observed in each interval for all considered stocks in the present study. For each stock we can thus compute a historical daily volatility as $`\sigma (t)=\sqrt{11}\mathrm{std}[\mathrm{ln}(S(k+1)/S(k))]`$, where $`\mathrm{std}[]`$ indicates the standard deviation of the argument of the function. Hence, for each stock we have $`1011`$ values of daily volatility. These volatility data have then been analyzed to compute the volatility pdf for each stock. The 100 empirical pdfs we obtain are then fitted with the theoretical pdfs of the considered models. Due to the limited number of records used to estimate the empirical pdfs (1011 records per stock) the results of our fittings are not able to indicate strengths and weaknesses of the two models. For this reason we rescale the volatility value of each stock $`\sigma `$ to its mean value $`<\sigma >`$ and we investigate the pdf of the normalized variable $`\sigma _n=\sigma /<\sigma >`$ for the ensemble of 100 stocks. In this way we obtain an empirical pdf which is quite accurate being based on the recording of 101,100 events. The best fittings of this empirical pdf with Eq. (3) and with a lognormal pdf are shown in Fig. 1. It should be noted that the form of Eqs (2) and (4) implies that the three control parameters of these equations reduce to two independent fitting parameters. For the lognormal pdf the fitting parameters can be chosen as the mean and the variance whereas for the Hull and White model the fitting parameters can be written as $`2a/\xi ^2+3`$ and $`ba/\xi ^2`$. The top two panels show the best fittings of the lognormal pdf. The lognormal pdf describes very well low values of volatility in the interval $`0<\sigma _n2`$ but completely fails in describing large values $`\sigma _n>2`$. In particular a lognormal pdf underestimates large values of volatility. The bottom two panels show the best fits obtained with the Hull and White pdf. In this case the volatility low values are only approximately well described by the theoretical pdf. Moreover, for large values of volatility, the best fit overestimates by approximately a factor two empirical results. Both the lognormal model and the Hull and White models fail in describing well the normalized volatility over a relatively wide range of volatility values ($`0<\sigma _n<10`$). This implies that there is still room for the improvement of volatility models down to the basic aspect of well describing the asymptotic pdf of volatility over a realistically wide range. For example, we have verified that a volatility model described by the Ito’s equation

$$d\sigma =a(b\sigma )dt+\xi \sigma dz_v$$
(5)
is characterized by a pdf which has intermediate properties to the ones of the pdfs of the two volatility models investigated in this paper. This model predicts a pdf of the volatility which has the form

$$P(\sigma )=\frac{\left(ba/\xi ^2\right)^{1+a/\xi ^2}}{\mathrm{\Gamma }(1+a/\xi ^2)}\frac{\mathrm{exp}(ba/\xi ^2\sigma )}{\sigma ^{a/\xi ^2+2}}$$
(6)
This pdf has also a power-law tail for large values of $`\sigma `$ but it predicts a different shape for low values of $`\sigma `$ . The two independent fitting parameters of this pdf can be written in terms of $`a/\xi ^2`$ and $`ba/\xi ^2`$. In Fig. 2 we show the best fit with the pdf of Eq. (6). The agreement with empirical data is rather good in a volatility range from $`\sigma _n=0.5`$ to $`\sigma _n=10`$.

In summary, we report on a comparison of two widespread theoretical models of volatility with empirical data obtained by collecting together the volatility of 100 most capitalized stocks traded in US equity markets. The comparison is focused on the shape of the asymptotic pdf of volatility. Two widespread models (lognormal and Hull and White) fail in describing the pdf over a relatively wide volatility range. We show that the model of Eq. (5) improves the overall description of the pdf especially for values of normalized volatility $`\sigma _n>0.5`$. Further research attempts are needed to select the most appropriate Ito’s model able to describe volatility both under the aspects of the pdf and under the dynamics aspects of the nature and form of volatility auto-correlation function. Indeed, there is a growing evidence that the volatility autocorrelation function is long-range correlated  and this key aspect is not taken into account in most of the widespread models of volatility (as the ones considered in the present study) which are typically characterized only by short-range time memory.

The authors thank INFM, MIUR and ASI for financial support. This work is part of the FRA-INFM project ’Volatility in financial markets’.


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# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

Isotopic effects and chemical equilibrium in nuclear reactions are receiving increasing attention because they give a new insight into the nuclear matter properties at extreme conditions. This is of high current interest, in particular, for astrophysical applications. Reaction of multifragmentation of excited nuclei is very promising in this respect since it can be considered as manifestation of liquid-gas type phase transition in nuclei, therefore, it can directly address the nuclear matter behavior at subnuclear densities. A number of theoretical and experimental results was already reported on this subject \[1–6\]. Special interest to this problem arose after discovering the nuclear caloric curve based on the fragment isospin properties  and observation of similar isotopic temperatures in many experiments.

## 2 Statistical approach

It is commonly accepted that the detailed balance principle is responsible for the chemical equilibrium between fragments of different sizes. Within statistical models, this can be written as a relationship between their chemical potentials. In the finite size systems we can directly implement this principle by taking into account all partitions with corresponding weights. For the case of the nuclear multifragmentation, both methods give very close results concerning the fragment isospin.

The statistical multifragmentation model (SMM) is applied for the following analysis. This model has been developing since long ago and is successful in describing experimental data (see, e.g., references in ). Presently, many other statistical models are based on similar conceptions, therefore, the demonstrated physical results are representative for the whole statistical approach. The SMM assumes statistical equilibrium of highly excited nuclear systems at a low-density freeze-out stage $`\rho \stackrel{<}{}\rho _0/3`$ ($`\rho _0`$0.15 fm-3 is the normal nuclear density) . The SMM includes also the low energy de-excitation decay modes and predicts a natural transition to the multifragmentation regime from the compound nucleus decay . All breakup channels (partitions) composed of nucleons and excited fragments are considered and the conservation of mass, charge, momentum and energy is taken into account. In the microcanonical treatment the statistical weight of decay channel j is given by $`W_\mathrm{j}expS_\mathrm{j}`$, where $`S_\mathrm{j}`$ is the entropy of the system in channel j which is a function of the excitation energy $`E_\mathrm{x}`$, mass number $`A_\mathrm{s}`$, charge $`Z_\mathrm{s}`$ and other parameters of the source. Different breakup partitions are sampled according to their statistical weights uniformly in the phase space. After breakup, the fragments propagate independently in their mutual Coulomb field and undergo secondary decays. The deexcitation of the hot primary fragments proceeds via evaporation, fission, or Fermi-breakup . At the freeze-out density the SMM treats hot fragments ($`A`$, $`Z`$ are mass number and charge of the fragments) as nuclear matter pieces: Light fragments with $`A4`$ are considered as stable particles (”nuclear gas”) with masses and spins taken from the nuclear tables. Fragments with $`A>4`$ are treated as heated nuclear liquid drops, and their individual free energies $`F_{AZ}`$ are parameterized as a sum of the bulk, surface, Coulomb and symmetry energy contributions

$$F_{AZ}=F_{AZ}^B+F_{AZ}^S+E_{AZ}^C+E_{AZ}^{sym}.$$
(1)
The standard expressions  for these terms are: $`F_{AZ}^B=(W_0T^2/ϵ_0)A`$, where the parameter $`ϵ_0`$ is related to the level density, and $`W_0`$=16 MeV is the binding energy of nuclear matter; $`F_{AZ}^S=B_0A^{2/3}(\frac{T_c^2T^2}{T_c^2+T^2})^{5/4}`$, where $`B_0`$=18 MeV is the surface coefficient, and $`T_c`$=18 MeV is the critical temperature of nuclear matter; $`E_{AZ}^C=cZ^2/A^{1/3}`$, where $`c`$ is the Coulomb parameter obtained in the Wigner-Seitz approximation, $`c=(3/5)(e^2/r_0)(1(\rho /\rho _0)^{1/3})`$, with the charge unit $`e`$ and $`r_0`$=1.17 fm; $`E_{AZ}^{sym}=\gamma (A2Z)^2/A`$, where $`\gamma `$=25 MeV is the symmetry energy parameter. These parameters are those of the Bethe-Weizsäcker formula and correspond to the assumption of isolated fragments with normal density in the freeze-out volume, an assumption found to be quite successful in many applications. It is to be expected, however, that in a more realistic treatment primary fragments will have to be considered not only excited but also expanded and still subject to a residual nuclear interaction between them. These effects can be accounted for in the fragment free energies by changing the corresponding liquid-drop parameters, provided such modifications are also indicated by the experimental data. For example, for the symmetry energy, this information may be obtained from the isoscaling phenomenon. An unresolved problem for all statistical models on the marked is the flow development observed at very high excitation energies. However, it seems not crucial for the isospin studies, since the flow influences mainly the kinetic energies of fragments and, possibly, their charge distributions. As far as the charge distributions are described, the isotope composition of the fragments can be reliably addressed within the statistical approach.

## 3 Evolution of the fragment isospin

The crucial questions to be answered are: 1) what is the isospin distribution for fragments with fixed $`A`$ (or $`Z`$), 2) how does the isospin of fragments change with the isospin of the thermal source, 3) how does the fragment isospin change with excitation energy of the source, when the fragment charge distribution evolves. In the grand canonical approximation , the mean multiplicity of fragments is given by

$$N_{AZ}=g_{AZ}\frac{V_f}{\lambda _T^3}A^{\frac{3}{2}}\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{F_{AZ}\mu A\nu Z}{T}\right],$$
(2)
where $`g_{AZ}`$ is the degeneracy factor, $`\lambda _T`$ is the nucleon thermal wavelength, $`V_f`$ is the ”free” volume, and $`\mu `$ and $`\nu `$ are the chemical potentials responsible for the mass and charge conservation in the system, respectively . As shown in Ref. , the average charge $`Z_A`$ of fragments with mass $`A`$ and the width $`\sigma _Z^A`$ of their charge distribution can be written as

$$Z_A\frac{(4\gamma +\nu )A}{8\gamma +2cA^{2/3}},\sigma _Z^A\sqrt{\frac{AT}{8\gamma }}.$$
(3)
The symmetry energy, Coulomb interaction and the chemical potential $`\nu `$ are directly responsible for the isospin of the produced fragments. As seen from Eq. (3), the neutron content of the fragments increases with their mass number, because of the Coulomb term. This trend exists in the stable nuclei and it presents also in multifragmentation experimental data.

One can see it from Fig. 1, where the neutron to proton ($`N/Z`$) ratio of fragments observed by ALADIN  at multifragmentation of Au-like sources is shown. The agreement of the SMM calculations with the data is obtained simultaneously with a very good description of the fragment partitions , this is an important requirement for this kind of analysis.

An intuitive expectation that the fragments produced from a neutron rich source are also neutron rich was confirmed in many experiments (see, e.g., ). It is fully consistent with the statistical predictions: As calculations show  the chemical potential $`\nu `$ decreases with the neutron excess of the source, therefore, this effect for intermediate mass fragments (IMF, charges Z=3–20) is explained by Eq. (3).

In Fig. 2 the $`N/Z`$ ratio of the fragments together with their mass distributions are shown. The calculations were done with the microcanonical Markov-chain SMM version  to take into account the mass and charge conservation explicitly. The results are consistent with the grand canonical ones (see also ), however, one can see that the finite-size effects favor the saturation of the $`N/Z`$ ratio of very large fragments with $`A>A_\mathrm{s}/2`$. This deviation from Eq. (3) is important for low multiplicity channels at small $`E_\mathrm{x}`$.

The SMM predicts an interesting behavior of fragment isospin with changing fragment charge distribution. In Fig. 2 one can also see the evolution of the $`N/Z`$ ratio and mass distribution of fragments in the excitation energy range $`E_\mathrm{x}`$=3–8 MeV/nucleon. It is seen that the fragment mass distribution evolves from the U–shape, at the multifragmentation threshold $`E_\mathrm{x}`$=$`E_{th}3`$ MeV/nucleon, to an exponential fall-off at high energies. During this evolution the temperature reaches a ”plateau” and is nearly constant . As the energy increases the N/Z ratio of primary IMFs’ increases, too. The reason is that the heaviest neutron-rich fragments are destroyed at increasing excitation energy, and most of their neutrons are bound in IMFs, since the number of free neutrons is still small at this stage. Generally, the $`N/Z`$ ratios of fragments decrease after their secondary deexcitation (e.g., compare Fig. 1 and Fig. 2). If the temperature increases considerably with the excitation energy (in the energy region of small $`E_\mathrm{x}<E_{th}`$) the $`N/Z`$ ratios of final cold fragments can decrease with the energy. However, when the temperature reaches the ”plateau” the internal excitation energy of hot fragments does not change (see Eq. (1)) and the final isotope composition becomes proportional to the primary fragment isospin. In this case, the effect of increasing the $`N/Z`$ ratio of IMFs can survive after the secondary deexcitation. The experimental data  show that this effect exists and is consistent with the SMM predictions. Therefore, it is a good tool for probing the freeze-out conditions and verification of the chemical equilibrium.

It is important that the demonstrated isospin evolution takes place in the energy range which is usually associated with a liquid-gas type phase transition in finite nuclei . The realistic statistical model, designed to reproduce the experiment, does not support conclusions of some mean-field approaches (see Ref. ) about separation of the nuclear matter into a neutron-rich gas and isospin symmetric ”liquid” matter during the phase transition. On the contrary, the chemical equilibrium in finite nuclear systems suggests few free neutrons and neutron-rich big fragments at the freeze-out stage. That is consistent with experimental observations.

## 4 Isoscaling

By using the chemical equilibrium conception as a guideline one can extract more information about fragments and nuclear matter properties from the analysis of experimental data. The scaling properties of cross sections for fragment production with respect to the isotopic composition of the emitting systems were studied long ago in light-ion induced reactions . Recently, the isoscaling was also reported for heavy-ion reactions . It is constituted by the exponential dependence of the production ratios $`R_{21}`$ for fragments with neutron number $`N`$ and charge $`Z`$ in reactions with different isospin asymmetry:

$$R_{21}=\frac{Y_2(N,Z)}{Y_1(N,Z)}=Cexp(N\alpha +Z\beta ),$$
(4)
with three parameters C, $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$. Here $`Y_2`$ and $`Y_1`$ denote the yields from the more neutron rich and the more neutron poor reaction system, respectively. In some reactions, the parameters $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$ have the tendency to be quite similar in absolute magnitude but of opposite sign . This suggests an approximate scaling with the third component of the isospin $`t_3`$=$`(NZ)/2`$:

$$R_{12}=\frac{Y_1(N,Z)}{Y_2(N,Z)}=Cexp(t_3\beta _{t3}).$$
(5)
As an example, the isotope ratios measured in five pairs of reactions induced by light particles from protons of 0.66 GeV to $`\alpha `$-particles of 15.3 GeV incident energy on 112Sn and 124Sn targets, and normalized with respect to the ratio for 6Li, are shown in Fig. 3 (see Ref. ). The parameter $`\beta _{t3}`$ decreases from 1.08 to 0.68 with increasing energy. The inverse scaling parameter 1/$`\beta _{t3}`$ is found to increase approximately in proportion to the isotope temperature deduced from the yields of He and Li isotopes.

The isoscaling phenomenon arises naturally in a statistical fragmentation mechanism . As evident from Eq. (2), for two systems 1 and 2 with different total mass numbers ($`A_1`$ and $`A_2`$) and charges ($`Z_1`$ and $`Z_2`$) but with the same temperature and density, the ratio of fragment yields produced in these systems is given by Eq. (4) with parameters $`\alpha =(\mu _1\mu _2)/T`$ and $`\beta =((\mu _1\mu _2)+(\nu _1\nu _2))/T`$. In the SMM the isoscaling parameters reflect properties of the produced fragments, in particular, the widths of their charge (mass) distributions (see Eq. (3)). As shown in Ref.  the potential differences depend essentially only on the coefficient $`\gamma `$ of the symmetry term and on the isotopic compositions of the sources but not on the temperature:

$`\mu _1\mu _24\gamma ({\displaystyle \frac{Z_1^2}{A_1^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{Z_2^2}{A_2^2}}),`$
$`\nu _1\nu _28\gamma ({\displaystyle \frac{Z_1}{A_1}}{\displaystyle \frac{Z_2}{A_2}}).`$ (6)
This formula is a very good approximation (within 3%) in the grand-canonics, and it was confirmed for the multifragmentation region ($`T\stackrel{>}{}`$5 MeV) with the microcanonical Markov chain SMM calculations. Moreover, since the temperature can be found in an independent way, e.g. as the isotope temperature, Eq. (4) provides an effective way for determination of the symmetry energy coefficient $`\gamma `$ via experimental $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$ parameters.

A typical isoscaling obtained with the SMM is shown in Fig. 4. These calculations can be used to estimate quantitatively the influence of the secondary deexcitation on the observable parameters. The isoscaling parameters can change, and the corresponding correction to the extracted symmetry energy coefficient has to be applied. The full analysis was performed in Ref.  and the value $`\gamma 22.5`$ MeV was reported, which has a tendency to be smaller than the conventional value. Provided it can be substantiated by other data and analyses, this would indicate that the symmetry part of the fragment binding energy is slightly weaker than that of isolated nuclei. Fragments, as they are formed at breakup, may have a lower than normal density.

## 5 Conclusion

Conception of chemical equilibrium is very fruitful for the theoretical description of multifragmentation. The chemical equilibrium can be unambiguously verified by analyzing isospin content of the fragments and its evolution together with the fragment yields. A convincing proof of this condition is an excellent description of the fragment charge partitions and the isotope distribution of fragments obtained in different experiments within statistical models (e.g., see ). A remarkable trend characterizing the chemical equilibrium is an increase of the $`N/Z`$ ratio with the mass number of fragments . This is quite instructive because dynamical processes can lead to the opposite (”decreasing”) trend, as shown by M. Colonna and M.Di Toro in . Experimental observations of this trend may be obscured by the secondary deexcitation. However, by studying evolution of the $`N/Z`$ ratio of fragments with changing their charge distribution one can identify it for sure: The effect of increasing $`N/Z`$ of IMFs within the energy range of the phase transition, observed for the Au sources , can be explained in the case of the ”increasing” trend only. The chemical equilibrium conception can also provide a key for explanation of many other phenomena. For example, as shown in , the midrapidity emission of neutron-rich IMF in peripheral heavy-ion collisions can be explained as a result of the Coulomb proximity of the sources and the angular momentum influence within the statistical picture of the two (projectile-like and target-like) decaying sources. An important advantage of this conception is that it allows for obtaining direct experimental information about nuclear properties at the break-up. A well-known example is the isotope temperatures, extracted from experimental data . Another example is the isoscaling phenomenon, which is connected with the symmetry energy of nuclear matter. As shown here, the isoscaling gives a new way for probing the symmetry energy term of the fragments in the freeze-out volume. All these observations can be directly used in the astrophysical cases (supernovas, neutron stars), where the chemical equilibrium, is believed, to be established.

The author would like to thank W. Trautmann, C. Schwarz and J. Lukasik for stimulating discussions and help in preparation of this presentation.


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# Spontaneous rearrangement of the checkerboard charge order to stripe order in La1.5Sr0.5NiO4

## Abstract

The charge ordering in La1.5Sr0.5NiO4 has been studied with neutron diffraction technique. An interesting rearrangement of the charge ordering was observed as a function of temperature. With decreasing temperature, a checkerboard-type charge order is formed below $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^\mathrm{C}480`$ K. It is, however, taken over by the stripe-type charge order with an incommensurability twice as large as that of the spin order below $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{IC}}180`$ K. Surprisingly, the stripe phase persists up to $`x=0.7`$ for highly hole-doped samples of Nd2-xSrxNiO4 with $`0.45x0.7`$.

One of the most fascinating examples of charge ordering may be a so-called stripe order discovered in the high-$`T_c`$ superconducting cuprates.tranquada95  Recent studies have revealed that the stripe order cannot be simply attributed to the Coulomb interactions, but is a consequence of an interplay among spin, charge, and lattice degrees of freedom. A stripe order is also known to exist in the isostructural nickelates, although its stripe order is relatively static compared with that of the cuprates. In hole-doped nickelates La2-xSrxNiO4+δ, the static stripe order is observed for a wide hole concentration region $`0.15n_\mathrm{h}1/2`$,tranquada96 ; yoshizawa00  where $`n_\mathrm{h}=x+2\delta `$. In the stripe ordered state, the doped holes form charge stripes characterized by a modulation vector $`𝒈_{\mathrm{CO}}=(2ϵ,0,0)`$ in the orthorhombic lattice units ($`a_\mathrm{o}=\sqrt{2}a_\mathrm{t}`$). The Ni spins order antiferromagnetically with antiphase domain boundaries on the charge stripes. The modulation vector of the spin order thus becomes $`𝒈_{\mathrm{SO}}=𝑸_{\mathrm{AF}}\pm (ϵ,0,0)`$, where $`𝑸_{\mathrm{AF}}=(1,0,0)`$ is the wave vector for a simple antiferromagnetic order. The incommensurability $`ϵ`$ keeps a linear relation to $`n_\mathrm{h}`$ for $`n_\mathrm{h}1/2`$, $`ϵn_\mathrm{h}`$.tranquada96 ; yoshizawa00  The stripe order is most stable at $`ϵ=1/3`$ where it shows the highest charge and spin ordering temperatures and the longest correlation length. Moreover, $`ϵ`$ exhibits a systematic deviation from the linear relation around $`n_\mathrm{h}1/3`$ by approaching $`ϵ=1/3`$, which manifests the quite unique nature of the stripe order in the Sr-doped nickelate system.katsufuji99 ; kaji01

On the other hand, another well-known ground state of a hole doped system is a so-called checkerboard-type charge order. The doping concentration of 50% holes is ideal for the checkerboard charge order, and this charge order is widely seen in isostructural transition metal oxides with $`n_\mathrm{h}=1/2`$ such as manganites sternlieb96  and cobalates. zaliznyak00  Note that the $`ϵ=1/2`$-limit of the stripe order in nickelates coincides with the checkerboard charge order. Early electron diffraction and transport studies,chen93 ; cheong94  indeed, indicated the existence of a checkerboard charge order at $`n_\mathrm{h}=1/2`$. From our recent studies on the highly Sr-doped nickelate system, however, we failed to detect any superlattice peaks from the incommensurate or checkerboard charge order in the $`x=1/2`$ sample.yoshizawa00  Instead, we observed an incommensurate spin order with an incommensurability $`ϵ0.44`$ (see Fig. 2(c)).yoshizawa00  Surprisingly, the stripe order persists even at $`n_\mathrm{h}=1/2`$, and this result gives rise to a question whether the ground state of the nickelates at $`n_\mathrm{h}=1/2`$ is the checkerboard charge order or stripe charge order.

In the present study, we solve such a mystery of the charge ordering in the 50% doped nickelate, and demonstrate that the charge ordering shows an interesting rearrangement from a checkerboard charge order to a stripe order in the $`x=1/2`$ Sr-doped nickelate. We found that the checkerboard charge order is formed at $`T480`$ K, but a part of the system changes over to the stripe-type charge order with decreasing $`T`$. This complicated behavior is a consequence of a strong correlation of the couplings between charge and spin degrees of freedom.

Large single crystal samples were grown by the floating zone method. They were pre-characterized by resistivity measurements, and cut into the size of $`6\text{mm}\varphi \times 25\text{mm}`$ for the present neutron diffraction study. The neutron diffraction experiments were performed using triple axis spectrometer GPTAS installed at the JRR-3M reactor in JAERI, Tokai, Japan with a fixed incident neutron momentum of $`k_i=3.81\text{Å}^1`$. We chose a combination of horizontal collimators of 40-40-40-80 (from monochromator to detector), and set two PG filters before the inpile and after the sample positions to eliminate higher order contaminations. The temperature of the sample was controlled by a high temperature-type closed-cycle He gas refrigerator within an accuracy of 0.2 K. Although the crystal has a tetragonal structure (space group $`I4/mmm`$), we employ a larger unit cell of the size $`\sqrt{2}a_\mathrm{t}\times \sqrt{2}a_\mathrm{t}\times c_\mathrm{t}`$ relative to the simple $`I4/mmm`$ lattice.

We first show the temperature ($`T`$) dependence of the in-plane resistivity within the $`ab`$ plane ($`𝒋c`$) of our La1.5Sr0.5NiO4 sample in Fig. 1. Though the resistivity is almost metallic at high temperature ($`\rho (600\text{K})2.5\times 10^3`$ $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$cm), it still increases monotonically as $`T`$ is lowered. A careful examination of the $`T`$ derivative of the resistivity, $`d\mathrm{log}\rho /dT`$ (inset) suggests that the $`T`$ dependence of the resistivity changes its slope twice: the first clearer change locates at $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^\mathrm{C}480`$ K, and the second crossover-like change occurs at $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{IC}}180`$ K. We note that the anomaly at $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^\mathrm{C}480`$ K is substantially higher than the anomaly reported in early studies of the resistivity and electron diffraction patterns,chen93 ; cheong94  and that the one at $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{IC}}180`$ K is recognized for the first time in the present study. It is possible that these anomalies in the resistivity corresponds to a two-step process of the charge localization, and they may indicate that two different types of charge ordering are formed below the temperatures of two respective anomalies.

In order to find signals due to possible charge orderings inferred by the anomalies of the resistivity, we surveyed reciprocal lattice positions around $`(h,k,0)`$ with $`h+k=\text{odd}`$, where superlattice peaks due to the checkerboard charge order are expected. Figures 2(a) and (b) show scan profiles along the  direction around $`(5,0,0)`$ and $`(4,3,0)`$ at several $`T`$’s. In Fig. 2 (c) is also shown a profile of a magnetic peak at $`(1,ϵ,0)`$ measured along the  direction at 10 K. In Figs. 2(a) and (b), quite sharp peaks appear at commensurate positions at $`(5,0,0)`$ and $`(4,3,0)`$ below $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^\mathrm{C}`$. These profiles clearly demonstrate that the checkerboard charge ordering is formed in our $`x=1/2`$ sample below $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^\mathrm{C}`$, consistent with the early electron diffraction experiment.chen93

More importantly, a pair of satellite peaks emerges below $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{IC}}`$ on both sides of the commensurate checkerboard charge order superlattice peaks with further lowering $`T`$, as indicated by arrows in Figs. 2(a) and 2(b) ($`h5\pm 0.13`$ and $`h4\pm 0.13`$, respectively). With use of the incommensurability of the magnetic reflections $`ϵ0.44`$, the satellite peaks are indexed as $`(h\pm 2ϵ,k,0)`$ with $`h+k=\text{even}`$. Thereby, we identify them as the charge and spin superlattice peaks from the stripe-type charge order with $`ϵ0.44`$. These observations lead us to conclude that the two types of charge order coexist at low temperatures in the Sr-doped nickelate with $`n_\mathrm{h}=1/2`$.

To determine correlation lengths within the NiO2 planes, the profiles of the charge order peaks in Fig. 2 are fitted to a Lorentzian form with the instrumental resolution. The correlation length for the checkerboard charge order becomes $`\xi _{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{C},h}40`$ Å at 300 K, but is reduced to $`20`$ Å at 10 K following the development of the stripe charge order below $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{IC}}`$. At 10 K, the correlation length of the stripe charge order $`\xi _{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{IC},h}`$ is $`20`$ Å. Both $`\xi _{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{C},h}`$ and $`\xi _{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{IC},h}`$ are nearly equal, but much shorter than the correlation length of the spin order $`\xi _{\mathrm{SO}}^h120`$ Å (10 K).yoshizawa00  It should be noted that $`\xi _{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{C},h}`$ is also very close to the literature value for the checkerboard charge order in La1.5Sr0.5CoO4, 26(2) Å.zaliznyak00  We also measured the profiles of the charge order peaks along the  direction to examine the stacking of the charge order (not shown). We found the scattering intensity of either type of charge ordering has a very weak $`l`$ dependence. The profile of the checkerboard order exhibits peaks at $`l=\mathrm{even}`$ positions, while that of the stripe order shows a weak bump at $`l=\mathrm{odd}`$. From the observed profiles, we estimate the out-of-plane correlation length of the checkerboard charge order $`\xi _{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{C},l}`$ is $`1`$ Å at 300 K and $`2`$ Å at 10K, while that of the stripe order $`\xi _{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{IC},l}`$ is $`3`$ Å at 10 K. For the checkerboard charge order, the stacking along the  direction and that along the  direction are equivalent, because the arrangement of the charges is isotropic within NiO2 planes. Quite short correlation length of the spin and charge stripe order between NiO2 planes is likely caused by a frustration of the stacking of the charge stripes.

In order to examine an ordering process of the two charge orders, the $`T`$ dependencies of the intensity of the commensurate peak at $`(5,0,0)`$ and the satellite peak at $`(4.13,3,0)=(52ϵ,3,0)`$ are depicted in Fig. 3. With decreasing $`T`$, the intensity at $`(5,0,0)`$ starts to grow around $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^\mathrm{C}480`$ K.com1  This temperature is in good agreement with the anomaly in the resistivity (Fig. 1), but is much higher than the charge ordering temperature reported in Ref. chen93, . Further decreasing $`T`$, the intensity reaches a maximum around $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{IC}}180`$ K, and then turns to decrease below $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{IC}}`$. The maximum of the commensurate component is well correlated with the onset of the satellite (incommensurate) components. The intensity of the satellite peak at $`(4.13,3,0)`$ gradually develops below $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{IC}}`$. Clearly, this temperature coincides with the second anomaly in the resistivity shown in Fig. 1. In addition, the stripe spin order sets in at much lower temperature $`T_\mathrm{N}80`$ K (see the inset of Fig. 3(b)). These $`T`$-dependent behaviors of the stripe charge and spin order manifest the marvelous stability of the stripe order at the commensurate hole concentration $`n_\mathrm{h}1/2`$ in the Sr-doped nickelate.

The robustness of the stripe order observed in the $`x=1/2`$ sample motivated us to investigate the higher doping region for $`x>1/2`$. From our preliminary neutron diffraction measurements on the Nd2-xSrxNiO4 system, we found that the well-defined stripe-type order persisted even in the samples with the Sr concentration as high as $`x=0.7`$. We also observed a weak signal of the checkerboard charge ordering in the $`x=0.6`$ sample. The observation of the stripe ordering for $`x1/2`$ is itself very unusual, and the nature of this stripe ordering deserves further experimental and theoretical studies.

In Fig. 4, we summarize the ordering temperatures $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{IC}}`$, $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^\mathrm{C}`$ and $`T_\mathrm{N}`$, and the incommensurability $`ϵ`$ of the stripe ordering in La2-xSrxNiO4+δ as well as Nd2-xSrxNiO4 as a function of the hole concentration $`n_\mathrm{h}`$. All of these values for the Nd samples are in excellent accord with those for the La samples. As reported previously,yoshizawa00  $`ϵ`$ shows a systematic deviation from the linear relation of $`ϵ=n_\mathrm{h}`$ around $`n_\mathrm{h}=1/3`$. Interestingly, we found that $`ϵ`$ saturates for $`x1/2`$ with the value $`ϵ0.44`$ as shown in the lower panel of Fig. 4. This result manifests that the stripe state is robust against the hole doping even for $`n_\mathrm{h}1/2`$, and may indicate that the electronic state for $`x>1/2`$ is similar to that of $`x=1/2`$. The details of the charge and spin ordering at $`x>1/2`$ will be reported elsewhere.ishizaka\_un

Next, we discuss the ordering process of the charge and spin ordering in $`x=1/2`$. The incommensurate charge ordering in $`x=1/2`$ can be understood in terms of a discommensuration picture of the stripe ordering introduced in our previous study.yoshizawa00  An example of the stripe order near $`n_\mathrm{h}=1/2`$ is illustrated in Fig. 5, based on the discommensuration picture. The checkerboard charge order consists of a matrix of the $`\times \times `$ pattern where arrows represent the spin direction on Ni2+ sites, while $`\times `$ and $``$ symbols denote the oxygen sites and a hole on the Ni sites, respectively. The width of the unit cell of this ordering pattern becomes $`a`$ as illustrated in Fig. 5(a). In the next step, a discommensuration will be introduced to such a pattern. For this purpose, an object of size $`3a/2`$ containing one hole (shaded areas in Figs. 5(b) and 5(c)) will be embedded for every three checkerboard units. The hole at each discommensuration region may occupy either a Ni site as $`\times \times \times `$ (Fig. 5(b)) or an oxygen site as $`\times \times `$ (Fig. 5(c)). It should be noted that one cannot determine whether a hole occupy a Ni site or an oxygen site in the discommensuration region only from the present study, although O-centered discommensuration may be preferred by the Coulomb repulsion between the holes. In any event, the introduction of the discommensuration leads to an incommensurate (stripe) charge ordering with the incommensurability $`ϵ=(3+1)/(2\times 3+3\times 1)=4/9=0.44`$, being consistent with our observations.

An important result of the discommensuration is the energy gain by the spin exchange interactions. For the checkerboard charge ordered state, the exchange interaction between the nearest neighbor sites is unique, and there is only the one between Ni2+ and Ni3+ ions. By contrast, when the charge order becomes incommensurate, other kinds of exchange interactions between Ni ions can be introduced in the discommensuration regions: the Ni-centered discommensuration yields Ni2+$``$Ni2+ bonds (Fig. 5(b)) while Ni2+$``$$`\mathrm{hole}`$$``$Ni2+ bonds are brought about by the O-centered discommensuration (Fig. 5(c)). Because the exchange interactions for these bonds are expected to be much stronger than that between Ni2+ and Ni3+,zaanen94  the energy gain due to the spin exchange interactions is larger in the stripe state, and favors the stripe order.

From these considerations, a possible scenario of the ordering process of the charge ordering in the 50%-doped nickelate is as follows: At high $`T`$ where the spin exchange interactions are disturbed by thermal fluctuations, small polarons are created through the electron-phonon coupling and they form the checkerboard order due to the Coulomb interactions between polarons.zaanen94  With decreasing $`T`$, however, the spin correlation develops, and eventually a large energy gain of the Ni2+$``$Ni2+ bonds stabilizes the stripe order by introducing holes into the checkerboard pattern. Although the checkerboard charge order is favored by charges, it is further disfavored by the spin exchange interactions. The latter favors the incommensurate ordering and results in the coexistence of the commensurate and stripe oredered regions at low temperatures in the nickelate system for $`x1/2`$. The present observation suggests the importance of the role of the spin exchange interactions in the charge ordering in the Sr-doped nickelate system.

It would be interesting to compare the present stripe formation at $`x=1/2`$ with the appearance of the stripe phase in a cuprate with a very low hole concentration. Very recently, Matsuda et al. revealed that a lightly-doped La2-xSrxCuO4 with $`x<0.02`$ shows a phase separation between a non-doped Néel ordered region and a diagonal stripe-phase region with $`ϵ0.02`$.matsuda02  In the lightly-doped cuprates, the stripe with a modulation of $`ϵ0.02`$ emerges from the matrix of the non-doped Néel ordered state, while in the nickelate with $`x=1/2`$, the stripes emerge from the matrix of the checkerboard charge order, and result in an antiphase domain modulation with a propagation vector of $`1/2ϵ0.05`$. In this sense, the present results for the $`n_\mathrm{h}=1/2`$ nickelate can be regarded as a counterpart of the behavior of the cuprate with $`n_\mathrm{h}0.02`$. We would like to suggest that, in general, a stripe phase is magnetically favored more than the state with a homogeneous hole distribution even in the limiting case of 0% or 50% doping.

In conclusion, we observed in La1.5Sr0.5NiO4 a rearrangement of the checkerboard-type charge ordering to the stripe-type one. With decreasing $`T`$, a checkerboard charge order is formed below $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^\mathrm{C}480`$ K. This charge order is, however, taken over by the stripe-type charge order with an incommensurability twice as large as that of the spin order below $`T_{\mathrm{CO}}^{\mathrm{IC}}180`$ K. The stripe ordered phase survives up to $`x=0.7`$ in Nd2-xSrxNiO4. These results evidence the unusual robustness of the stripe order, and suggest the importance of the interactions between spins and charges in the Sr-doped nickelate system.

###### Acknowledgements.

The authors thank K. Chatani and K. Hirota for a loan of the high temperature-type closed cycle He gas refrigerator. This work was supported by a Grant-In-Aid for Scientific Research from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology, Japan and by the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO) of Japan.


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# Splitting of the superconducting transition in the two weakly coupled 2D 𝑋𝑌 models

## Abstract

The frequency $`\omega `$ and temperature $`T`$ dependent complex conductivity $`\sigma `$ of two weakly coupled 2D $`XY`$ models subject to the RSJ dynamics is studied through computer simulations. A double dissipation-peak structure in $`\text{Re}[\omega \sigma ]`$ is found as a function of $`T`$ for a fixed frequency. The characteristics of this double-peak structure, as well as its frequency dependence, is investigated with respect to the difference in the critical temperatures of the two $`XY`$ models, originating from their different coupling strengths. The similarity with the experimental data in Festin et al. \[Physica C 369, 295 (2002)\] for a thin YBCO film is pointed out and some possible implications are suggested.

The thermally excited two-dimensional (2D) vortex fluctuations drive the phase transition between the superconducting and normal state in many 2D systems. Such transition is of the Kosterlitz-Thouless (KT) type: below the KT transition temperature $`T_c`$ vortices are bound in pairs with total vorticity zero, and as the temperature is increased across $`T_c`$ from below these vortex pairs start to unbind . It means that the dominant characteristic physical features in a region close to the KT transition are associated with vortex pair fluctuations. One of the physical quantities which contain the information about the feature of vortex dynamics is the frequency $`\omega `$ dependent complex conductivity $`\sigma (\omega )`$ of the sample . In the presence of 2D fluctuation effects $`\sigma (\omega )`$ can be expressed as $`\sigma (\omega )=\rho _0(T)/i\omega ϵ(\omega )`$, where $`1/ϵ(\omega )`$ is the dynamic dielectric function which describes the effect of pair motion, and $`\rho _0(T)`$ is the bare superfluid density . The measurements of the superconducting transition by means of $`\sigma (\omega )`$ in a typical experiment for a fixed frequency should show a single peak in $`\text{Re}[\omega \sigma (\omega )]`$ at a frequency dependent temperature $`T_\omega `$. This peak represents dissipation losses while a sharp decrease in $`\text{Im}[\omega \sigma (\omega )]`$ at the same temperature is a consequence of the loss of a superfluid response. Indeed, such behaviors of $`\sigma (\omega )`$ have been confirmed in many experiments on 2D superconductors, as well as on high-$`T_c`$ superconductors .

The present investigation is inspired by the recent experimental results obtained by Festin et al.  for a $`1500`$ Å thin YBCO film: A very striking double peak structure in $`\text{Re}[\omega \sigma (\omega )]`$ is found; two rapid drops of $`\text{Im}[\omega \sigma (\omega )]`$ at different $`T`$ are observed. The data by Festin et al. are reproduced in Figs. 1 and 2. One possible explanation for the double peak is that the epitaxial grown YBCO film is split into an upper and lower part due to a slightly different oxygen contents . From this perspective the sample would consist of two weakly coupled parallel superconducting parts.

In order to investigate this scenario we use the two weakly coupled 2D $`XY`$ models, the Hamiltonian of which is written as

$`H`$ $`=`$ $`H_1+H_2+H_{\mathrm{int}},`$
$`H_1`$ $``$ $`J_1{\displaystyle \underset{ij}{}}\mathrm{cos}(\theta _i^{(1)}\theta _j^{(1)}),`$
$`H_2`$ $``$ $`J_2{\displaystyle \underset{ij}{}}\mathrm{cos}(\theta _i^{(2)}\theta _j^{(2)}),`$
$`H_{\mathrm{int}}`$ $``$ $`J_{}{\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}\mathrm{cos}(\theta _i^{(2)}\theta _i^{(1)}),`$
where $`H_1`$ and $`H_2`$ are the usual 2D $`XY`$ Hamiltonians with the coupling strengths $`J_1`$ and $`J_2`$ for the first (lower) and the second (upper) planes, respectively, the summation $`_{ij}`$ is over all nearest neighbor pairs in each plane, and $`H_{\mathrm{int}}`$ with the coupling strength $`J_{}`$ describes the coupling between the planes. To study the dynamics of the system, we use the equations of motion of the standard resistively-shunted junction (RSJ) dynamics subject to the periodic boundary condition and integrate the equations of motion using the second-order algorithm with the time step $`\mathrm{\Delta }t=0.05`$. We also apply the fast Fourier transformation method to speed up the calculations (see e.g., Ref.  for details).

The 2D $`XY`$ model on the square lattice undergoes a KT transition at $`T_c0.89J`$ , where $`J`$ is the Josephson coupling strength. Accordingly, two planes with different coupling constants then undergo two separate phase transitions at the different temperature $`T_c0.89J_1`$ and $`0.89J_2`$ when the interplane coupling vanishes. The main output from the simulation are the dynamic dielectric function $`1/ϵ(\omega )`$, and the helicity modulus $`\gamma `$, which basically measures the stiffness of the system to a twist in the phase of the order parameter and is proportional to the renormalized superfluid density $`\rho =\rho _0/ϵ(0)`$ . From a knowledge of $`1/ϵ(\omega )`$ and $`\rho _0`$ it is straightforward to analyze the behavior of the conductivity $`\sigma (\omega )`$.

In order to get realistic parameters for the two weakly coupled 2D $`XY`$ models in connection with the experimental result by Festin et al. one would like to have some reasonable estimates of the coupling constants $`J_1`$, $`J_2`$, and $`J_{}`$. We estimate $`J_1`$ and $`J_2`$ from the experimental data reproduced in Fig. 1. In order to do it we use the relation $`lim_{\omega 0}\text{Im}[\omega \sigma (\omega )]=\rho _0/ϵ(0)`$ and note that $`1/ϵ1`$ just below the transition and is 0 just above. Thus $`\rho _0J`$  may be roughly estimated by the two heights of the rapid drops in Fig. 1 for the curve corresponding to the smallest frequency. From this we get the ratio $`J_2/J_10.5`$ (ratio between the dashed vertical lines in Fig. 1). The corresponding curves for $`\mathrm{Re}[\omega \sigma (\omega )]`$ are shown in Fig. 2, where the characteristic double peaks at different temperatures are clearly exhibited. $`J_{}`$ can be estimated from the knowledge of the anisotropy parameter $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ defined as $`\mathrm{\Gamma }\sqrt{J_1/J_{}}`$ and found to be equal to $`7`$ for YBCO .

First we present the result for our model without coupling between the two planes. $`J_{}=0`$ corresponds to the case of no supercurrent flowing between the planes. Figures 3 and 4 show the behavior of $`\text{Re}[\omega \sigma (\omega )]`$ and $`\text{Im}[\omega \sigma (\omega )]`$ obtained from the simulations with $`J_1=1`$, $`J_2=0.5`$ and $`J_{}=0`$. The similarities to the experimental results in Figs. 1 and 2 are striking: $`\text{Re}[\omega \sigma (\omega )]`$ in Fig. 4 again displays two distinct peaks at different temperatures while $`\text{Im}[\omega \sigma (\omega )]`$ in Fig. 3 has two regions with increased drops as a function of $`T`$. Dashed line in Fig. 3 represents the behavior of $`\gamma `$ or equally the behavior of $`\text{Im}[\omega \sigma (\omega )]`$ in the limit $`\omega 0`$ which shows one drop at $`T_{c1}0.89`$ and another at $`T_{c2}0.45`$. These similarities between experiments and our simulations for the coupled 2D $`XY`$ models are further substantiated when one compares the frequency dependences: As the frequency is increased both $`T_{c1}`$ and $`T_{c2}`$ increase as is reflected in the positions of peaks in Figs. 2 and 4. The soundness of the method of estimation of the coupling constants $`J_1`$ and $`J_2`$ is illustrated in Fig. 3 where the helicity modulus is represented by the dashed line. Following the suggestion that $`J_2/J_1`$ can be estimated from the ratio between the dotted vertical lines we again get $`J_2/J_10.5`$. The quantitative differences between the data in Fig. 2 and the simulations in Fig. 4 is according to our interpretation due to the fact that the simulations cannot reach as low frequencies as the experiments (more precisely the ratio between the frequency and the microscopic frequency scale is larger in the simulations). A higher frequency broadens and smears the dissipation peaks. Since the interplane coupling in experiments presumably does not vanish, we have also investigated the influence of a small $`J_{}`$ in our model and found that a weak interplane coupling ($`0J_{}0.04`$) does not influence the qualitative features found above for $`J_{}=0`$.

The similarity with the experimental data by Festin et al. implies that the YBCO film is split parallel to the surface into two superconducting parts both having transitions with 2D character but with different $`T_c`$. Since the coupling between the planes does not wash away the double peak transition one must infer that the coupling between the two sheets is very weak. One possible reason for the phase separation may lie in a combination of an inhomogeneous surface with a more homogeneous part closer to the substrate. This can lead to different oxygen contents in the two parts, which in turn results in slightly different lattice parameters causing a physical boundary between the two parts

A further consistency check on the scenario in terms of two coupled 2D superconducting parts comes from the peak ratio defined as the ratio $`\text{Re}[\omega \sigma (\omega )]/\text{Im}[\omega \sigma (\omega )]`$ taken at the dissipation peak maxima for a given $`\omega `$. For a 2D superconductor this peak ratio should vary between $`2/\pi 0.63`$ for small $`\omega `$ to 1 for larger $`\omega `$ . The inset in Fig. 2 gives the ratios estimated from the experimental data. The filled circles is for the large-$`T`$ peaks and these ratios are consistent with 2D vortex fluctuations close to the transition. The empty circles corresponds to the small-$`T`$ peaks where in accordance with an interpretation in terms of two transitions the zero level of $`\text{Im}[\omega \sigma (\omega )]`$ for the low-$`T`$ transition is estimated by a linear extrapolation of the large $`T`$-part towards lower $`T`$. An almost as good estimate is to approximate by the plateau between the transitions (horizontal line in Fig. 1). These peak ratios are also rather consistent with a 2D transition in the limit of small $`\omega `$ (peak ratios for the lowest-$`T`$ values). The small deviation for higher temperatures may be due to a convolution of the high and low $`T`$ parts of the transition.

Another question is at what thickness $`d`$ the division takes place. A rough estimate may be obtained by assuming that both sheets consist of identical material. In such a case $`J_1d_1n_S`$ and $`J_2d_2n_S`$ where $`d_{1(2)}`$ is the thickness of respective sheets and $`n_S`$ is the density of Cooper pairs for the material. Thus $`J_2/J_1d_2/d_1`$ and since we have found that $`J_2/J_10.5`$ from the data, we conclude that the boundary between the two parts should occur somewhere in the middle of the sample.

In summary we conclude from our numerical simulations of two weakly coupled $`XY`$ models that the double peak dissipation structure observed by Festin et al. is consistent with the interpretation that the sample consists of two parts with slightly different transition temperatures, and that these two parts are separated by a boundary which mainly runs parallel to the substrate.

The authors acknowledge Ö. Festin and P. Svedlindh for providing their experimental data. This work was supported in part by the Swedish Natural Research Council through Contract No. F 5102-659/2001.


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# I.

### I.

CP violation is one of most interesting and least known aspects of particle physics. The recent results of KTeV  and NA48  about $`\epsilon ^{}/\epsilon `$ have unambiguously shown the existence of CP violation in $`|\mathrm{\Delta }S|=1`$ transitions (the so-called direct CP violation) and ruled out superweak scenarios. The experimental measurements of $`\epsilon ^{}/\epsilon `$ are generally compatible with the theoretical expectations within the Standard Model (SM) . Nevertheless, the latter are affected by sizeable theoretical uncertainties, and it is difficult to constrain non-standard effects. At the moment the theoretical uncertainties on $`\epsilon ^{}/\epsilon `$ are so large that we cannot even exclude that this observable is completely dominated by new physics (NP) contributions. Given this situation, it is highly desirable to obtain new independent information about CP violation in $`|\mathrm{\Delta }S|=1`$ transitions.

Among direct-CP-violating observables, particularly interesting are those accessible in rare decays. In these processes the smallness of the SM contribution leads to identifying more easily a possible large NP effect, whereas the simplicity of the hadronic structure helps us to keep under control the theoretical uncertainties . An observable that satisfies these requirements is the charge asymmetry in $`K^\pm \pi ^\pm \mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}`$, defined as

$$\mathrm{\Delta }_{\mathrm{}}(s_0)=\frac{{\displaystyle _{q^2>s_0}}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{d}\mathrm{\Gamma }}{\mathrm{d}q^2}}(K^+\pi ^+\mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}){\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{d}\mathrm{\Gamma }}{\mathrm{d}q^2}}(K^{}\pi ^{}\mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{})\right]}{{\displaystyle _{q^2>s_0}}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{d}\mathrm{\Gamma }}{\mathrm{d}q^2}}(K^+\pi ^+\mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{})+{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{d}\mathrm{\Gamma }}{\mathrm{d}q^2}}(K^{}\pi ^{}\mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{})\right]},$$
(1)
where $`q^2=M_\mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}^2`$ is the dilepton invariant mass and $`\mathrm{}=e`$ or $`\mu `$.

This asymmetry is a pure direct-CP-violating observable. A non-zero $`\mathrm{\Delta }_{\mathrm{}}`$ is generated by the interference between the absorptive contribution of the long-distance amplitude and a CP-violating phase of short-distance origin . As we shall discuss below, the kinematical cut on the dilepton invariant mass ($`q^2>s_0`$) is a useful tool to maximize the CP-violating effect; indeed, the SM expectations of this asymmetry are given by

$$\left|\mathrm{\Delta }_e(4m_e^2)\right|_{\mathrm{SM}}\stackrel{<}{_{}}10^5\mathrm{and}\left|\mathrm{\Delta }_{e,\mu }(4m_\pi ^2)\right|_{\mathrm{SM}}\stackrel{<}{_{}}10^4.$$
(2)
The smallness of these figures leads to considering this observable as a good probe of possible NP effects. One of the most promising scenarios where sizeable non-standard CP-violating contributions could be generated is the supersymmetric (SUSY) extension of the SM with generic flavour couplings and minimal particle content. In particular, it has been recognized that in this context gluino-mediated penguin diagrams could naturally account for the observed value of $`\epsilon ^{}/\epsilon `$ . The purpose of this paper is to analyse the consequences that this scenario could have on $`\mathrm{\Delta }_{\mathrm{}}`$. We shall therefore assume that the CP-violating phase of the $`sd\mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}`$ amplitude is entirely dominated by gluino-mediated penguin diagrams or, to be more specific, by the contributions of the dimension-5 chromomagnetic and electromagnetic dipole operators (CMO and EMO). The couplings of these operators, determined by the mismatch between quarks and squarks mass matrices, appear also in $`\epsilon `$ and $`\epsilon ^{}`$. We will therefore extract the allowed range of these couplings from the measured values of $`\epsilon `$ and $`\epsilon ^{}`$ in order to analyse the possible effects on $`\mathrm{\Delta }_{\mathrm{}}`$.

Our conclusions are that, in the general case, SUSY effects are at most as large as the SM results in (2) and thus not particularly interesting. Only assuming a cancellation between two independent SUSY contributions to $`\epsilon ^{}`$, or in a fine-tuned scenario, is it possible to reach higher values. In any case, within the minimal SUSY extension of SM considered here, $`\mathrm{\Delta }_{\mathrm{}}`$ cannot exceed the $`10^3`$ level (independently of the $`q^2`$ cut). We will also show that this bound is very close to a model-independent limit on the charge asymmetry which was extracted, by means of isospin symmetry, from the present constraints on $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(K_L\pi ^0\mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{})`$.

This paper is organized as follows: we shall first discuss the amplitude decomposition of $`K^\pm \pi ^\pm \mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}`$ decays and the generic expression of the charge asymmetry; then we will introduce the effective Hamiltonian describing the SUSY short-distance contributions; finally we shall discuss the phenomenological constraints on the SUSY phases and the corresponding bounds for the charge asymmetry.

### II.

The charge asymmetry is produced by interference between the CP-conserving strong phase and the CP-violating weak phase of the decay amplitude. The latter is generated by the exchange of heavy particles (short-distance), the former is due to the $`K3\pi `$ intermediate state and thus belongs to the long-distance part of the amplitude ($`K^\pm 3\pi \pi ^\pm \mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}`$). As shown in , the decay width of $`K^\pm \pi ^\pm \mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}`$ is largely dominated by long-distance effects and, as long as CP violation is not considered, short-distance contributions can be neglected.

In the long-distance part of the $`K^\pm \pi ^\pm \mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}`$ amplitude the two leptons are always produced by a virtual photon ($`K^\pm \pi \gamma ^{}\pi ^\pm \mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}`$). Since we are interested in the interference between short- and long-distance terms, all short-distance contributions where the two leptons are not in a vector state can be neglected. We can therefore parametrize the decay amplitude in terms of a single vector form factor, $`W(z)`$, defined as

$$𝒜\left(K^\pm (k)\pi ^\pm (p)\mathrm{}^+(l^+)\mathrm{}(l^{})\right)=\frac{e^2G_F}{(4\pi )^2}W(z)(k+p)^\mu \overline{u}(l^+)\gamma _\mu v(l^{}),$$
(3)
where $`q=kp`$ and $`z=q^2/M_K^2`$. Integrating this amplitude over the phase space leads to

$$\frac{d\mathrm{\Gamma }}{dz}=\frac{\alpha ^2G_F^2M_K^5}{12\pi (4\pi )^4}\rho (z)|W(z)|^2,$$
(4)
where $`4r_{\mathrm{}}^2z(1r_\pi )^2`$, $`r_i=m_i/M_K`$ and $`\rho (z)=\sqrt{14r_e^2/z}(1+2r_e^2/z)\lambda ^{3/2}(1,z,r_\pi ^2)`$.

Referring to the discussion in Ref. , we decompose the form factor as

$$W(z)=W^{pol}(z)+\frac{1}{G_FM_K^2}W^{\pi \pi }(z).$$
(5)
Here $`W^{\pi \pi }(z)`$ denotes a non-analytic contribution, largely dominated by the dipion intermediate state, as a consequence of the small $`q^2`$ of the lepton pair, which exhibits a branch cut along the real axis starting at $`z=4r_\pi ^2`$. The polynomial term $`W^{pol}(z)`$ includes both long- and short-distance contributions. The latter are completely dominant in the real part of $`W^{pol}(z)`$, which can be fitted from experiments. Parametrizing the polynomial term as $`W^{pol}(z)=G_FM_K^2(a+bz)`$, consistently with a chiral expansion at the next-to-leading order , the values of $`a`$ and $`b`$ fitted by the BNL E865 Collaboration are reported in Table 1. On the other hand, the imaginary part of $`W^{pol}`$ can be produced only by the direct CP-violating weak phase of short-distance origin.

The function $`W^{\pi \pi }(z)`$ has already been computed in the literature  and we report it here for completeness:

$$W^{\pi \pi }(z)=\frac{1}{r_\pi ^2}\left[\alpha +\beta \frac{zz_0}{r_\pi ^2}\right]\mathrm{\Phi }(z)\chi (z),$$
(6)
where the values of $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$ (fitted from $`K3\pi `$ decays) are shown in Table 1, $`z_0=1/3+r_\pi ^2`$, $`\mathrm{\Phi }(z)=1+z/r_V^2`$ ($`r_V^22.5`$) and $`\chi (z)`$ is defined by111 $`\chi `$ satisfies the relation: $`\chi (0)=0`$; this condition follows from the possibility to include $`\chi (0)`$ into a redefinition of the polynomial form factor.

$$\chi (z)=\frac{4}{9}\frac{4}{3}\frac{r_\pi ^2}{z}\frac{1}{3}\left(1\frac{4r_\pi ^2}{z}\right)G(z/r_\pi ^2),$$
(7)
$$G(z/r_\pi ^2)=\{\begin{array}{cc}\sqrt{4r_\pi ^2/z1}\mathrm{arcsin}(\sqrt{z/4r_\pi ^2})& z4r_\pi ^2,\\ \frac{1}{2}\sqrt{14r_\pi ^2/z}\left(\mathrm{log}\frac{1\sqrt{14r_\pi ^2/z}}{1+\sqrt{14r_\pi ^2/z}}+i\pi \right)& z4r_\pi ^2.\end{array}$$
(8)
The interference between the CP-violating phase in $`W^{pol}`$ and the absorptive contribution to $`W(z)^{\pi \pi }`$ leads to the following difference between the widths of the charge-conjugated modes

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\mathrm{}}^+\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\mathrm{}}^{}=\frac{\alpha ^2G_F^2M_K^5}{12\pi (4\pi )^4}_{4r_l^2}^{(1r_\pi )^2}4\rho (z)\left[\mathrm{Im}(W(z)^{pol})\mathrm{Im}(W(z)^{\pi \pi })\right]𝑑z.$$
(9)
Obviously, in order to obtain an adimensional asymmetry we should normalize the width difference to the sum of the widths. However, we stress here the strong dependence of this observable from the dilepton invariant mass: owing to the kinematical threshold in the absorptive part, only when the two-pion intermediate state can be on shell is the asymmetry different from zero. This observation suggests the construction of integrated asymmetry setting a cut on $`q^2`$ above $`4m_\pi ^2`$, i.e. setting $`s_0=4m_\pi ^2`$ in Eq. (1). Since electron and muon channels have a very similar phase space for $`q^24m_\pi ^2`$, with such a cut the normalized asymmetry turns out to be very similar in the two modes. On the other hand, since most of the available phase space for the electron channel is below this cut, from the experimental point of view the muon channel appears a better candidate for the study of this asymmetry.

### III.

As discussed in the previous section, we look for short-distance contributions to the $`sd\mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}`$ amplitude, with the lepton pair in a vector state and possibly with a sizeable new weak phase. As shown in Ref. , in the presence of non-minimal flavour mixing, the largest SUSY contributions to this type of amplitude are produced by the dimension-5 CMO and EMO. All the other contributions are in fact naturally suppressed once the bounds from other processes are taken into account (barring accidental cancellations). The structure of the effective Hamiltonian necessary to describe these contributions reads

$$_{eff}=C_\gamma ^+Q_\gamma ^++C_\gamma ^{}Q_\gamma ^{}+C_g^+Q_g^++C_g^{}Q_g^{}+\mathrm{h}.\mathrm{c}.,$$
(10)
with the operators expressed in the following basis

$$Q_\gamma ^\pm =\frac{eQ_{\stackrel{~}{d}}}{16\pi ^2}\left(\overline{s}_L\sigma ^{\mu \nu }F_{\mu \nu }d_R\pm \overline{s}_R\sigma ^{\mu \nu }F_{\mu \nu }d_L\right),$$
(11)
$$Q_g^\pm =\frac{g}{16\pi ^2}\left(\overline{s}_L\sigma ^{\mu \nu }t^aG_{\mu \nu }^ad_R\pm \overline{s}_R\sigma ^{\mu \nu }t^aG_{\mu \nu }^ad_L\right).$$
(12)
Note that in this basis the operators have well defined properties under parity transformations: $`Q_i^+`$ induce parity-conserving transitions and $`Q_i^{}`$ parity-violating ones.

The Wilson coefficients of these operators induced by gluino exchange are given by

$$C_\gamma ^\pm (m_{\stackrel{~}{g}})=F(x)\frac{\pi \alpha _s(m_{\stackrel{~}{g}})}{m_{\stackrel{~}{g}}}\left[(\delta _{LR})_{21}\pm (\delta _{LR})_{12}^{}\right],$$
(13)
$$C_g^\pm (m_{\stackrel{~}{g}})=G(x)\frac{\pi \alpha _s(m_{\stackrel{~}{g}})}{m_{\stackrel{~}{g}}}\left[(\delta _{LR})_{21}\pm (\delta _{LR})_{12}^{}\right].$$
(14)
Here $`(\delta _{LR})_{ij}=(M^2)_{i_Lj_R}/m_{\stackrel{~}{q}}^2`$ denotes the off-diagonal entries of the down-type matrix in the super-CKM basis, and $`x=m_{\stackrel{~}{g}}^2/m_{\stackrel{~}{q}}^2`$ the ratio of gluino and (average) squark masses squared. The explicit expression of the loop functions $`F(x)`$, $`G(x)`$ can be found in . We have also considered the CMO, even if it does not participate at tree level, because of the large mixing between CMO and EMO induced by QCD interactions at the one-loop level. Taking into account the $`2\times 2`$ anomalous-dimension matrix of these operators , computed at lowest order, the Wilson coefficients evolved down to charm scales reads

$`C_\gamma ^\pm (m_c)`$ $`=`$ $`\eta ^2[C_\gamma (m_{\stackrel{~}{g}})+8(1\eta ^1)C_g^\pm (m_{\stackrel{~}{g}})],`$ (15)
$`C_g^\pm (m_c)`$ $`=`$ $`C_g^\pm (m_{\stackrel{~}{g}}),`$ (16)
where

$$\eta =\left(\frac{\alpha _s(m_{\stackrel{~}{g}})}{\alpha _s(m_t)}\right)^{\frac{2}{21}}\left(\frac{\alpha _s(m_t)}{\alpha _s(m_b)}\right)^{\frac{2}{23}}\left(\frac{\alpha _s(m_b)}{\alpha _s(m_c)}\right)^{\frac{2}{25}}=0.89\left(\frac{\alpha _s(m_{\stackrel{~}{g}})}{\alpha _s(500\mathrm{GeV})}\right)^{\frac{2}{21}}.$$
(17)
Starting from Eq. (15), we find it convenient to rewrite the Wilson coefficient of the EMO as

$$C_\gamma ^\pm (m_c)=\frac{\pi \alpha _s(m_{\stackrel{~}{g}})}{m_{\stackrel{~}{g}}}Y(x)\delta ^\pm ,$$
(18)
where

$$Y(x)=G(x)\eta ^2\left[\frac{F(x)}{G(x)}+8(1\eta ^1)\right],$$
(19)
$$\delta ^\pm =(\delta _{LR})_{sd}\pm (\delta _{LR})_{ds}^{}.$$
(20)
In order to identify the SUSY contribution to the polynomial form factor, we need to evaluate the EMO matrix element between $`K^+`$ and $`\pi ^+`$ external states:

$$\pi ^+|Q_\gamma ^+|K^+=2i\frac{eQ_{\stackrel{~}{d}}}{16\pi ^2}\frac{B_T}{M_K}p_\mu (\pi ^+)p_\nu (K^+)F^{\mu \nu }.$$
(21)
As is usually done in the literature, we have expressed the hadronic matrix element in terms of a suitable $`B_T`$ parameter , expected to be $`𝒪(1)`$, which encodes the non-perturbative dynamics. This parameter has recently been computed on the lattice , confirming the estimate $`B_T1`$ made in Ref. . We shall leave it as a parameter through all the paper, but for completeness we report here the recent lattice result

$$B_T(\mu =2\mathrm{GeV})=1.21\pm 0.09\pm 0.04_{0.00}^{+0.07}\text{[14]}.$$
(22)
Now using Eqs. (18)–(21) we can write the full matrix element of the Hamiltonian (10) relevant to $`K^\pm \pi ^\pm \mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}`$ decays

$$\pi ^\pm \mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}|_{eff}|K^\pm =\alpha \alpha _s\frac{Q_{\stackrel{~}{d}}}{4}\left[\frac{B_T}{M_Km_{\stackrel{~}{g}}}Y(x)\delta ^+\right]\times (k+p)^\mu \overline{u}(l^+)\gamma _\mu v(l^{}).$$
(23)
Then, according to the definition of $`W(z)`$ in Eq. (3), we obtain:

$`\mathrm{Im}(W_{\mathrm{SUSY}}^{pol})`$ $`=`$ $`\pi \alpha _s(m_{\stackrel{~}{g}}){\displaystyle \frac{Q_d}{G_F}}{\displaystyle \frac{B_T}{M_K}}{\displaystyle \frac{Y(x)}{\stackrel{~}{m}}}\mathrm{Im}(\delta ^+),`$ (24)
$`=`$ $`15.2\times \left({\displaystyle \frac{Y(x)}{Y_0(1)}}\right)\left({\displaystyle \frac{500\mathrm{GeV}}{\stackrel{~}{m}}}\right)\left({\displaystyle \frac{\alpha _s(m_{\stackrel{~}{g}})}{\alpha _s(500\mathrm{GeV})}}\right)B_T\mathrm{Im}(\delta ^+),`$ (25)
where $`Y_0(1)=Y(x=1;m_{\stackrel{~}{g}}=500\mathrm{GeV})=0.39`$. Inserting this result in Eq. (9) we can finally write:

$$\left|\mathrm{\Delta }_e(4m_\pi ^2)\right|=(1.0\pm 0.1)\left[\left(\frac{Y(x)}{Y_0(1)}\right)\left(\frac{500\mathrm{GeV}}{\stackrel{~}{m}}\right)\left(\frac{\alpha _s(m_{\stackrel{~}{g}})}{\alpha _s(500\mathrm{GeV})}\right)\right]\times B_T|\mathrm{Im}(\delta ^+)|,$$
(26)
where the error includes the uncertainty in the experimental parameters.

### IV.

Before starting a numerical analysis of the SUSY contribution to the charge asymmetry, we discuss here a more general upper bound on $`|\mathrm{Im}(W^{pol})|`$ (and thus on the charge asymmetry), which can be extracted from the experimental upper bound on $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(K_L\pi ^\pm \mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{})`$.

Isospin symmetry relates in a model-independent way the short-distance components of $`K^\pm \pi ^\pm \mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}`$ and $`K_L\pi ^\pm \mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}`$ amplitudes. Indeed, in both cases, the hadronic current is necessarily a $`\mathrm{\Delta }I=1/2`$ operator of the type $`\overline{s}\mathrm{\Gamma }d`$ (or $`\overline{d}\mathrm{\Gamma }s`$). In the $`K_L`$ case, the approximate CP-odd combination of $`K^0`$ and $`\overline{K}^0`$ states select the imaginary part of this amplitude, which can therefore be constrained by using the experimental bounds on $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(K_L\pi ^\pm \mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{})`$. Assuming that long-distance contributions to $`K_L\pi ^\pm \mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}`$ are negligible (which is certainly a good approximation if $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(K_L\pi ^\pm \mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{})`$ saturates its current experimental bound ), we can write

$$\left|\mathrm{Im}(W^{pol})\right|\left[\frac{12\pi (4\pi )^4}{\alpha G_F^2M_K^5}\frac{1}{\tau _L\rho (z)𝑑z}\mathrm{BR}(K_L\pi ^0\mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{})\right]^{\frac{1}{2}},$$
(27)
where $`\tau _L`$ is the mean lifetime of the $`K_L`$ and the integral on $`\rho (z)`$ extends to the whole phase space. Using this relation we obtain the following model-independent upper limits on the charge asymmetries of electron and muon modes222We report separately the bounds on electron and muon modes, obtained by the corresponding $`K_L\pi ^0\mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}`$ decay, in order to take into account possible violations of lepton universality. :

$`\left|\mathrm{\Delta }_e(4m_\pi ^2)\right|`$ $``$ $`43\times \sqrt{\mathrm{BR}(K_L\pi ^0e^+e^{})}1.0\times 10^3,`$ (28)
$`\left|\mathrm{\Delta }_\mu (4m_\pi ^2)\right|`$ $``$ $`82\times \sqrt{\mathrm{BR}(K_L\pi ^0\mu ^+\mu ^{})}1.6\times 10^3,`$ (29)
where the numerical values have been obtained using the experimental bounds BR$`(K_L\pi ^0e^+e^{})<5.8\times 10^{10}`$ and BR$`(K_L\pi ^0\mu ^+\mu ^{})<3.8\times 10^{10}`$ obtained by the KTeV Collaboration .

In Table 2 we compare the model-independent upper bounds for the charge asymmetries with SM and MSSM expectations, expressed in terms of the imaginary parts of the CKM factor $`\lambda _t=V_{ts}^{}V_{td}`$ and the SUSY parameter $`\delta ^+`$, respectively. Since $`\mathrm{Im}(\lambda _t)10^4`$, it is clear that the SM could only account for a few per cent of the general bounds. From this perspective it is particularly interesting to understand how large the SUSY contribution could be.

The bounds on $`\mathrm{Im}(\delta ^+)`$ \[and more in general on the $`\mathrm{Im}(\delta _{LR})_{ij}`$’s\] have been widely discussed in the recent literature (for extensive discussions, see Ref.  and references therein). In general there are two classes of bounds: those coming from $`|\epsilon |`$ and BR$`(K_L\pi ^0e^+e^{})`$ (direct bounds) and those extracted from $`\mathrm{Re}(\epsilon ^{}/\epsilon )`$ (indirect bounds). In the first case $`\mathrm{Im}(\delta ^+)`$ is directly involved, whereas in the second case – dealing with parity-violating transitions – only $`\mathrm{Im}(\delta ^{})`$ is directly involved. As clearly shown by Eq. (20), $`\delta ^+`$ and $`\delta ^{}`$ are naturally related: if we assume these two quantities to be of the same order of magnitude, then the measurement of $`\mathrm{Re}(\epsilon ^{}/\epsilon )`$ leads to a bound on $`|\mathrm{Im}(\delta ^+)|`$ of about $`10^5`$ . In this case the SUSY contribution to the charge asymmetries could be at most of the same order as the SM one. On the other hand, if we allow a fine-tuned scenario where $`|\mathrm{Im}(\delta ^+)||\mathrm{Im}(\delta ^{})|`$, then only the (weaker) direct limits from $`|\epsilon |`$ and BR$`(K_L\pi ^0e^+e^{})`$ have to be satisfied. The constraints from BR$`(K_L\pi ^0e^+e^{})`$ are equivalent to the model-independent bounds reported in Table 2 and thus they certainly allow for sizeable deviations with respect to the SM. In the case of $`|\epsilon |`$ there is a considerable uncertainty, induced by hadronic matrix elements: employing optimistic values for the latter (or allowing cancellations with other SUSY effects) it is possible to obtain bounds on $`\mathrm{Im}(\delta ^+)`$ above $`10^4`$ . Under these special circumstances the SUSY contribution to the charge asymmetry could become substantially larger than the SM one, reaching values close to the model-independent bounds.

Before concluding, we point out that an observable particularly useful from the experimental point is the differential asymmetry, defined by:

$$\delta \mathrm{\Delta }_{\mathrm{}}(z)=\frac{d\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\mathrm{}}^+(z)/dzd\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\mathrm{}}^{}(z)/dz}{d\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\mathrm{}}^+(z)/dz+d\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\mathrm{}}^{}(z)/dz}.$$
(30)
This observable could be particularly useful in an experimental set up where it is difficult to obtain a precise flux normalization and thus precise width measurements. In Figure 1 we plot $`\delta \mathrm{\Delta }_{\mathrm{}}(z)`$, normalized to the SUSY phase $`\mathrm{Im}(\delta ^+)`$, as a function of $`z`$.

### V.

In this letter we have analysed the charge asymmetry in $`K^\pm \pi ^\pm \mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{}`$ decays in the framework of supersymmetric models with minimal particle content and generic flavour couplings. We have shown that in general the expectations are of the same order of magnitude as in the SM case. Nevertheless, under special circumstances it is possible to relax the indirect constraints on the SUSY CP-violating phases and obtain results in the range $`10^4<\mathrm{\Delta }_{\mathrm{}}(4m_\pi ^2)\stackrel{<}{_{}}10^3`$, or above the SM expectation. We have also shown that under general assumptions $`\mathrm{\Delta }_{\mathrm{}}(4m_\pi ^2)`$ cannot exceed the $`10^3`$ level. This model-independent bound is derived, using isospin invariance, from the experimental constraints on $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(K_L\pi ^0\mathrm{}^+\mathrm{}^{})`$.

The first measurement of the charge asymmetry in the muon mode has recently been announced by the HyperCP collaboration :

$$\mathrm{\Delta }_\mu (4m_\mu ^2)=0.02\pm 0.11(\mathrm{stat})\pm 0.04(\mathrm{syst}).$$
(31)
Unfortunately at the moment the sensitivity is very far from the interesting region, still well above the model-independent bound. In view of possible improvements of this measure, we can summarize as follows the possible outcome of a non-vanishing result:

* $`\mathrm{\Delta }_{\mathrm{}}(4m_\pi ^2)\stackrel{<}{_{}}10^4`$ : we could conclude that the charged kaon system is well described by the SM. Moreover, we could put a new strong constraint on the SUSY phase $`\mathrm{Im}(\delta ^+)`$.
* $`10^4<\mathrm{\Delta }_{\mathrm{}}(4m_\pi ^2)\stackrel{<}{_{}}10^3`$ : we would have a clear signal of new physics, compatible with the results obtained within the Minimal Supersymmetric Model with generic flavour couplings.

## Acknowledgements

I wish to thank G. Isidori for interesting me to this subject and for useful discussions. I would also to acknowledge the TH Division of CERN where this work was completed.