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# Mixed Kaon Condensation in CFL Matter

## I Introduction

It is now understood that at asymptotically large densities, the ground state of 3-flavor, massless QCD is the Color-Flavor Locked (CFL) configuration . In this phase, quarks of all three flavors near the (shared) Fermi surface undergo BCS-like pairing due to the attractive one gluon exchange potential. The resulting condensate breaks the $`U(1)_B`$ symmetry associated with conserved baryon number, and also breaks the original $`SU(3)_{color}\times SU(3)_L\times SU(3)_R`$ symmetry down to the diagonal subgroup, $`SU(3)_{C+L+R}`$, causing the gauge bosons of the original $`SU(3)_{color}`$ group to become massive. However, a linear combination of the eighth gluon and the gauge boson of the $`U(1)_Q`$ symmetry (the photon) remains massless; this unbroken gauge symmetry will be referred to as $`U(1)_{\stackrel{~}{Q}}`$, denoting physically a “rotated” electromagnetism.

It was originally suggested that due to the large value of the gap the number densities of the three quark flavors would remain equal even when perturbations (non-zero quark masses and charge chemical potential) were included, since the energy cost of breaking pairs exceeded the energy gained by allowing the Fermi spheres for different flavors to relax past one another . It was soon realized, however, that there exists an energetically cheaper mechanism by which the CFL phase could relax under the influence of stresses: meson condensation . For example, turning on a realistic mass for the strange quark encourages the system to reduce the strangeness density relative to the density of up- and down-type quarks. Kaon condensation allows the strangeness density to be decreased without the costly breaking of pairs in the CFL background.

The phase diagram for CFL + meson condensates was explored in detail in Ref. . It was found there that the symmetric CFL phase was favored only when the chemical potential for electric charge satisfied $`|\mu _Q|10MeV`$ and the quark chemical potential was many orders of magnitude greater than that expected in neutron star cores. At realistic densities, the ground state at zero lepton chemical potential ($`\mu _\nu `$) involves a condensate of $`K^0`$ while at very high $`\mu _\nu `$ it is the positively charged kaon $`K^+`$ which condenses. This ensures overall electric charge neutrality in the presence of a dense background of electrons.

At intermediate $`\mu _\nu `$ it was found that a homogeneous mixed phase consisting of both $`K^0`$ and $`K^+`$ condensates was most effective in lowering the free energy. This mixture sits at a free energy saddle point in the hadronic sector configuration space, but this saddle point becomes a global minimum when one includes the free energy contribution of leptons and imposes local electric charge neutrality.

One may expect, however, that this homogeneous mixed phase could be unstable toward the formation of a heterogenous mixed phase in which the meson condensate rotates toward the $`K^0`$ condensed phase in certain regions of space, and toward the $`K^+`$ phase in others. This would violate the original assumption of local electric charge neutrality, since the $`K^+`$ regions would become positively charged and the $`K^0`$ regions would become negatively charged. This is allowed so long as the volume fractions of the two phases are such as to conserve charge globally. The question of stability is then the question of whether the cost associated with surface and Coulomb energies can be made less than the energy gained by allowing the meson fields to slide down from the saddle point to regions of lower potential.

This is the issue addressed in this paper, which is organized as follows. After a quick review of the chiral Lagrangian formalism used to describe mesonic excitations above the symmetric CFL ground state, we argue that the standard approach to studying possible mixed phases (involving some version of the thin wall approximation) will not be appropriate in this case. We then present the results of a small-fluctuation stability analysis of the homogeneous $`K^0/K^+`$ mixed phase to derive the dispersion relations for the low-lying excitations and discuss their implications to neutron star cooling and other possible phenomenological issues.

## II Meson Condensation in CFL Matter

Because of the identity between the symmetry breaking pattern in the vacuum structure of QCD and the symmetry breaking pattern in the CFL phase at high density, it is appropriate to use the same chiral Lagrangian description one uses to parametrize small excitations about the QCD vacuum to parametrize small fluctuations about the $`SU(3)`$-symmetric CFL phase.

These low energy excitations are parametrized by $`\mathrm{\Sigma }=e^{2i\pi /f_\pi +\eta ^{^{}}/f_A}`$ and $`B=e^{\beta /f_B}`$ (with $`\pi =\pi ^aT^a`$) where $`\pi _a`$’s are the pseudo-scalar octet of Goldstone bosons which arise from the breaking of chiral symmetry and $`T_a`$’s are Gell-Mann matrices. $`\eta ^{^{}}`$ and $`\beta `$ are Goldstone bosons due to breaking of the $`U(1)_A`$ (assumed to be a valid symmetry of the theory at high density) and $`U(1)_B`$ symmetries, respectively. Under the original symmetry of $`SU(3)_L\times SU(3)_R\times U(1)_B\times U(1)_A`$ the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ field transforms as $`(3,\overline{3})_{0,4}`$.

The quark mass matrix $`M=\mathrm{d}iag(m_u,m_d,m_s)`$ induces mass differences between the members of the octet and transforms as $`(3,\overline{3})_{0,2}`$. Due to $`U(1)_A`$ charges only even powers of $`M`$ are present in the effective Lagrangian. To the leading order, only the combination $`\stackrel{~}{M}=|M|M^1=\mathrm{d}iag(m_dm_s,m_um_s,m_um_d)`$ that transforms as $`(\overline{3},3)_{0,4}`$ contributes to explicit mass terms via the operator $`\mathrm{T}r\mathrm{\Sigma }\stackrel{~}{M}`$. The operator $`X=M^{}M/2\mu `$ acts as a chemical potential for flavor symmetries . Here $`\mu `$ represents the quark chemical potential. The leading order chiral Lagrangian for the octet is then:

$$=f_\pi ^2\left[\frac{1}{4}\mathrm{T}r\left(D_0\mathrm{\Sigma }D_0\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}v^2\mathrm{T}r\stackrel{}{}\mathrm{\Sigma }\stackrel{}{}\mathrm{\Sigma }\right)+\frac{a}{2}\mathrm{T}r\stackrel{~}{M}(\mathrm{\Sigma }+\mathrm{\Sigma }^{})+\frac{b}{2}\mathrm{T}rQ\mathrm{\Sigma }Q\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}\right]$$
(1)
where $`v^2=1/3`$ is the (squared) in-medium meson velocity. The covariant derivative is given by

$$D_0\mathrm{\Sigma }=_0\mathrm{\Sigma }i[\stackrel{~}{\mu },\mathrm{\Sigma }]$$
(2)
where $`\stackrel{~}{\mu }=\mu _QQ+X`$ and $`\mu _Q`$ is the chemical potential for electric charge and $`Q=\mathrm{d}iag(2/3,1/3,1/3)`$. The coefficient $`a`$ has been computed in Ref.  and is given by $`a=\frac{3\mathrm{\Delta }^2}{\pi ^2f_\pi ^2}`$. The coefficient $`b`$, which accounts for charge-dependent differences in the meson masses, has been previously estimated by dimensional analysis to be of order $`b\frac{\alpha \mathrm{\Delta }^2}{4\pi }`$ where $`\alpha `$ is the fine structure constant corresponding to the unbroken $`U(1)_{\stackrel{~}{Q}}`$ in the CFL phase.  The parameter $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ denotes the value of the gap, which we will always approximate by $`\mathrm{\Delta }=100MeV`$.

The free energy density arising from Eq.(1) relative to the free energy energy density of the symmetric CFL phase is:

$$\mathrm{\Omega }=\frac{f_\pi ^2}{4}\left[\mathrm{T}r[\stackrel{~}{\mu },\mathrm{\Sigma }][\stackrel{~}{\mu },\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}]+v^2\mathrm{T}r\stackrel{}{}\mathrm{\Sigma }\stackrel{}{}\mathrm{\Sigma }2a\mathrm{T}r\stackrel{~}{M}(\mathrm{\Sigma }+\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}2)b\mathrm{T}r[Q,\mathrm{\Sigma }][Q,\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}]\right]$$
(3)
where $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ is an $`SU(3)`$ matrix characterizing the direction of the condensate in internal space. As shown in Ref.  all stationary points of the free energy for spatially homogeneous configurations will satisfy the matrix equation

$$0=\left[\stackrel{~}{\mu }\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}\stackrel{~}{\mu }\mathrm{\Sigma }a\stackrel{~}{M}\mathrm{\Sigma }bQ\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}Q\mathrm{\Sigma }\right]h.c.$$
(4)
This equation has two solutions corresponding to minima of Eq. (3). The first such minimum corresponds to a $`K^0`$ condensate and is parametrized by

$$\mathrm{\Sigma }=\mathrm{e}xp\left[i\theta _{K^0}\left(\begin{array}{ccc}0& 0& 0\\ 0& 0& 1\\ 0& 1& 0\end{array}\right)\right]$$
(5)
where $`\theta _{K^0}`$ is given by

$$\mathrm{c}os\theta _{K^0}=\frac{M_{K^0}^2}{\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^0}^2}.$$
(6)
Where $`M_{K^0}^2=\mathrm{a}(m_d+m_s)m_u`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^0}^2=(m_s^2m_d^2)/2\mu `$ . (The minimum exists whenever this angle is real.) Similarly, there exists a local minimum of the free energy corresponding to a pure $`K^+`$ condensate:

$$\mathrm{\Sigma }=\mathrm{e}xp\left[i\theta _{K^+}\left(\begin{array}{ccc}0& 0& 1\\ 0& 0& 0\\ 1& 0& 0\end{array}\right)\right]$$
(7)
where $`\theta _{K^+}`$ is given by

$$\mathrm{c}os\theta _{K^+}=\frac{M_{K^+}^2b}{\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^+}^2b}$$
(8)
where $`M_{K^+}^2=\mathrm{a}(m_u+m_s)m_d`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^+}^2=\mu _Q+(m_s^2m_u^2)/2\mu `$ and again the solution only exists when $`\theta _{K^+}`$ is real.

Between the two minima just mentioned, there exists a free energy saddle point configuration involving a mixed condensate of $`K^0`$ and $`K^+`$. Parameterizing the condensate by

$$\mathrm{\Sigma }=\mathrm{e}xp\left[i\theta _{SP}\left(\begin{array}{ccc}0& 0& \mathrm{s}in\varphi \\ 0& 0& \mathrm{c}os\varphi \\ \mathrm{s}in\varphi & \mathrm{c}os\varphi & 0\end{array}\right)\right]$$
(9)
one finds a solution to Eq. (4) with angles satisfying:

$$\mathrm{c}os\theta _{SP}=\frac{M_{K^0}^2}{\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^0}^2}+\frac{\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^+}(\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^+}\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^0})}{b\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^0}}\left[\left(\frac{M_{K^+}^2\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^+}^2}{\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^+}}\right)\left(\frac{M_{K^0}^2\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^0}^2}{\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^0}}\right)\right]$$
(10)
and

$$\mathrm{s}in^2\varphi =\frac{\left(\frac{M_{K^0}^2}{\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^0}^2}\mathrm{c}os\theta _{SP}\right)}{\left(1\frac{\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^+}}{\stackrel{~}{\mu }_{K^0}}\right)\left(1\mathrm{c}os\theta _{SP}\right)}$$
(11)
where as usual the solution is only a stationary point of the free energy if the angles $`\theta _{SP}`$ and $`\varphi `$ are real.

It was found in Ref.  that this saddle point configuration becomes the true minimum of the free energy when one includes leptonic contributions to the free energy and imposes local electric charge neutrality (i.e., homogeneity) on the system. In practice, this means that for a given quark chemical potential $`\mu `$ and lepton chemical potential $`\mu _\nu `$, the chemical potential for electric charge is determined by the constraint that the electron number density equal the number density of $`K^+`$ in the meson condensate:

$$\frac{(\mu _\nu \mu _Q)^3}{3\pi ^2}=\frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_{meson}}{\mu _Q}$$
(12)
where $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{meson}`$ is given by Eq. (3).

## III Heterogenous Meson Condensation

It is well-known that the imposition of local electric charge neutrality is often unwarranted, and may hide a lower-energy configuration in which overall charge neutrality results from the cancellation of charge among regions of non-zero local charge density . If this occurs, the resulting crystalline mixed phase may dramatically affect both the equation of state and various transport properties of the neutron star .

It is natural to wonder whether the assumption of local charge neutrality mentioned in the previous section was overly restrictive. We begin our analysis of this question by assuming that an inhomogeneous mixed phase of $`K^0`$ and $`K^+`$ condensed regions is indeed favored, and studying the nature of the boundary layer between two adjacent regions. For now we ignore electrostatic energy contributions and Coulomb screening effects. Following the approach of Ref.  we consider a planar boundary and fix the condensates to point in the $`K^0`$ and $`K^+`$ directions at $`\pm \mathrm{}`$ respectively. We then implement a relaxation procedure which allows the fields to interpolate between the two fixed boundaries in a way that minimizes the total free energy of the surface. Pressure equilibrium across the boundary imposes a constraint which fixes the value of $`\mu _Q`$. The resulting boundary profile, parametrized by the angles $`\theta `$ and $`\varphi `$ of Eq. (9), for a quark chemical potential $`\mu =400MeV`$ is shown in Fig. 1.

The notable feature is the large thickness of the energetically favored boundary. One can understand it by comparing the two terms contributing to the excess free energy of the boundary: the gradient terms associated with spatial changes in the field configurations, and the “bulk” terms which tally the cost of being away from a free energy minimum while one traverses the boundary. Since the height of the free energy barrier between the two minima is very small (of order $`10^3MeV^4`$), a very thick boundary is required in order to make the two contributions comparable, and hence to minimize the overall surface tension. In the example shown, the surface tension turns out to be the quite small value $`\sigma =0.082MeV/fm^2`$.

However, a boundary layer between $`K^0`$ and $`K^+`$ regions with thickness of several hundred $`fm`$ is not allowed physically, since the Debye screening length of all charged species is much smaller than this length scale. Any structure of this enormous size would be warped out of existence as charge flowed in response to the large electric fields. We can estimate the role of screening by considering the energetics of a single charged droplet of the charged, lower-energy-density phase immersed in a background of the original phase. Ignoring for the moment the Coulomb contribution to the energy, we find

$$E(R)\frac{4}{3}\pi \mathrm{\Delta }ϵR^3+4\pi \sigma R^2$$
(13)
where $`\mathrm{\Delta }ϵ0`$ is the bulk (free) energy density difference of the two phases. Any droplet larger than $`R_{crit}3\sigma /|\mathrm{\Delta }ϵ|`$ will be energetically favored compared to the homogeneous phase, and the volume and surface terms in the energy are of comparable size for droplets of radius near $`R_{crit}`$. In order for the droplet to be stable against charged particle flow (Debye screening), the Coulomb contribution to $`E(R)`$ must be a small correction to the terms already written. Estimating the Coulomb term by $`E_C(R)\alpha \rho _Q^2R^5`$ (where $`\rho _Q`$ is the electric charge density of the droplet) then gives

$$\alpha \frac{|\mathrm{\Delta }ϵ|^3}{\sigma ^2\rho _Q^2}$$
(14)
as the condition for the existence of a charge-separated mixed phase. In the present case, the right hand side is of order $`10^8`$ and a stable heterogenous mixed phase (in which each phase sits at one of the local minima of the free energy density) is clearly ruled out for the physical value $`\alpha 1/137`$.

If a heterogenous mixed phase is formed, then, it will have to involve only smaller departures from the homogeneous saddle point configuration. The condensate may “slide down” toward the $`K^0`$ configuration in one region of space, and similarly “slide down” toward the $`K^+`$ configuration in an adjacent region, but it cannot slide all the way down to the free energy local minimum. And without any definite guess as to the bulk field configurations in each region, it is difficult to study the energetic favorability of possible mixed phases in the standard way – that is, by taking an ansatz for the mixed phase configuration, treating the boundary as “thin”, varying with respect to appropriate parameters (droplet size, etc.), and comparing the total free energy to the free energy of the homogeneous phase.

We therefore take a somewhat different approach and study the stability of small perturbations to the homogeneous saddle point configuration. Any unstable modes will signal the instability of the homogeneous phase toward the production of some (largely unspecified) heterogenous mixed phase.

We present the full results of our analysis of the excitation spectrum in the next section; here we will simply quote those results which are relevant to the question of the stability of the homogeneous mixed phase. As we show in detail in Sec. IV the kaonic excitations about the homogeneous, charge neutral configuration consist of two massive kaons, one massless Goldstone boson arising from the breaking of $`U(1)_Y`$, and a massive in-medium longitudinal photon (which acquired a mass through the Higgs mechanism by eating one of the kaonic degrees of freedom). Plane-wave oscillations of this longitudinal photon degree of freedom represent longitudinal charge density waves – just the sort of excitations which will be unstable if the homogeneous phase can lower its energy by forming a charge-separated mixed phase.

In Fig. 2 we show the dispersion relation for this mode as the electric charge $`\alpha `$ is varied. The longitudinal charge density wave is clearly a stable, massive mode until $`\alpha `$ is reduced many orders of magnitude below the physical value. Note that the critical value of $`\alpha `$ is not too far from the naive estimate made above based on consideration of macroscopic droplet properties. Also, the static plasma wave is most unstable for wave vectors $`|𝐤|1MeV`$ which corresponds to charged structures with a size of $`D1/|𝐤|200fm`$. This is again comparable to the size expected from the minimal-surface-tension boundary constructed above and shown in Fig. 1 – and is safely smaller than the charged particle Debye screening lengths for such tiny $`\alpha `$. We conclude that in real high density matter where $`\alpha 1/137`$ the homogeneous $`K^+/K^0`$ mixed phase is indeed stable against the production of a heterogenous, charge-separated configuration. The energetic cost of Coulomb and surface/gradient energy wins out over the energy savings associated with lowering the bulk energy densities.

## IV Excitation Spectrum

Having established that the homogeneous $`K^+/K^0`$ mixed is indeed the true ground state of matter at high density and nonzero neutrino chemical potential, we are now interested in finding the normal modes and dispersion relations for excitations above the ground state. The homogeneous background condensate is given by

$$\mathrm{\Sigma }_0=\mathrm{e}xp\left[i\theta _{SP}\left(\begin{array}{ccc}0& 0& \mathrm{s}in\varphi \\ 0& 0& \mathrm{c}os\varphi \\ \mathrm{s}in\varphi & \mathrm{c}os\varphi & 0\end{array}\right)\right]$$
(15)
where the angles are given by Equations (10) and (11). In order to parameterize small fluctuations about this state, we write the condensate as

$$\mathrm{\Sigma }=\xi _0\widehat{\mathrm{\Sigma }}\xi _0$$
(16)
where $`\xi _0=\mathrm{\Sigma }_0^{1/2}`$ and

$$\widehat{\mathrm{\Sigma }}=\mathrm{e}xp(2i\widehat{\pi }/f_\pi ).$$
(17)
Here $`\widehat{\pi }=\widehat{\pi }_aT_a`$ characterizes small rotations away from the homogeneous saddle point configuration given by $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_0`$. This helpful parameterization was suggested by David Kaplan.

In order to account for the Coulomb energy associated with possible charge separation, we must include the coupling of our meson fields to the gauge field associated with the unbroken $`U(1)_{\stackrel{~}{Q}}`$. This is accomplished by promoting the electric charge chemical potential to the role of a space- and time-dependent field. (For the following analysis, we will work in the Coulomb gauge $`\stackrel{}{}𝐀=0`$ in which, to quadratic order in the Lagrangian, the transverse photon modes decouple from the hadronic excitations. Hence for our purposes we only need to keep track of the electrostatic potential. The transverse photon modes will acquire a mass via the Higgs mechanism in the standard way.) In particular, since we are concerned only with small perturbations about the homogeneous phase, we replace

$$\mu _Q\mu _Q+\delta A_0(𝐱,t)$$
(18)
where $`\mu _Q`$ is the constant value found by requiring the homogeneous phase to be electrically neutral, and $`\delta A_0`$ characterizes local fluctuations in the electrostatic potential. Note that from now on, we ignore the distinction between $`Q`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{Q}`$ charges. This is expected to be physically accurate for accessible densities, where the mixing angle between the new and old electromagnetism is small .

Substituting Equations (16) and (18) into our Lagrangian, and keeping only terms bilinear in fields we arrive at:

$``$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{T}r\left(_t\widehat{\pi }_t\widehat{\pi }v^2(\stackrel{}{}\widehat{\pi })^2\right)i\mathrm{T}r_t\widehat{\pi }\left([\mu _R,\widehat{\pi }]+[\mu _L,\widehat{\pi }]\right)`$ (23)
$`+f_\pi q\delta A_0\mathrm{T}r_t\widehat{\pi }(Q_RQ_L)if_\pi q\delta A_0\mathrm{T}r\left([Q_R,\mu _L][Q_L,\mu _R]\right)\widehat{\pi }`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}f_\pi ^2q^2\delta A_0^2\mathrm{T}r(Q_RQ_LQ^2)\mathrm{T}r[\mu _L,\widehat{\pi }][\mu _R,\widehat{\pi }]`$
$`a\mathrm{T}r(M_L+M_R)\widehat{\pi }^2+b\mathrm{T}r[Q_L,\widehat{\pi }][Q_R,\widehat{\pi }]`$
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(\stackrel{}{}\delta A_0)^2{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\delta A_0^2\mathrm{\Pi }_{elec}^{00}(\omega ,k)`$
where we have defined:

$`\mu _R`$ $`=`$ $`\xi _0\stackrel{~}{\mu }\xi _0^{}`$ (24)
$`\mu _L`$ $`=`$ $`\xi _0^{}\stackrel{~}{\mu }\xi _0`$ (25)
$`M_R`$ $`=`$ $`\xi _0^{}\stackrel{~}{M}\xi _0^{}`$ (26)
$`M_L`$ $`=`$ $`\xi _0\stackrel{~}{M}\xi _0`$ (27)
$`Q_R`$ $`=`$ $`\xi _0Q\xi _0^{}`$ (28)
$`Q_L`$ $`=`$ $`\xi _0^{}Q\xi _0.`$ (29)
(Note that the definitions of $`M_R`$ and $`M_L`$ differ from the other two cases.) In the last line of Eq. (23) the first term represents the electrostatic field energy, while the second accounts for the coupling of the background electron bath to the electric potential.

The factor $`\mathrm{\Pi }_{elec}^{00}(\omega ,𝐤)`$ is the contribution to the temporal photon mass (squared) arising from the background electron gas. The leading-order (gauge-invariant) contribution to this quantity can be written down exactly for the case of a degenerate, relativistic electron gas . It is:

$$\mathrm{\Pi }_{elec}^{00}(\omega ,𝐤)=k_D^2\left(\frac{\omega }{2|𝐤|}\mathrm{l}n\left|\frac{\omega +|𝐤|}{\omega |𝐤|}\right|1\right)$$
(30)
where $`k_D^2=\frac{q^2\mu _e^2}{2\pi ^2}`$ is the (squared) electron Debye screening length. We have omitted a possible imaginary part which describes Landau damping. We expect this damping to become important only for $`|𝐤|\mu _e`$. Note that in the static limit $`\omega |𝐤|`$ the electron Debye contribution to the photon mass squared becomes simply the constant $`k_D^2`$. This was the approximation used in the previous section when studying the stability of the homogeneous configuration. In the present section, we retain the full expression. The effect of the electrons for $`|𝐤|k_D`$, it turns out, is merely to increase the effective mass of the temporal photon by $`12MeV`$ above the mass it gets via the Higgs mechanism.

It is now possible to use symmetries to determine the superselection rules, and make a separate (sparse) ansatz for $`\widehat{\pi }`$ for each non-interacting group of excitations. The simplest such group is the charged pions, $`\pi ^+`$ and $`\pi ^{}`$. We will show the details of this calculation for pedagogical purposes and omit them in the physically more interesting case of kaonic excitations, which we treat next. Writing the pion fields in terms of their real and imaginary parts we have:

$$\widehat{\pi }=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}\left(\pi _1T_1+\pi _2T_2\right)$$
(31)
where $`T_a`$ are $`SU(3)`$ generators with $`\mathrm{T}r(T_aT_b)=(1/2)\delta _{ab}`$. Inserting Eq. (31) into the Lagrangian Eq. (23) and taking appropriate derivatives yields three coupled Euler-Lagrange equations for the fields $`\pi _1^\pm `$, $`\pi _2^\pm `$, and $`\delta A_0`$. Taking a plane wave ansatz for each field

$$\left(\begin{array}{c}\pi _1(𝐱,t)\\ \pi _2(𝐱,t)\\ \delta A_0(𝐱,t)\end{array}\right)\left(\begin{array}{c}\pi _1\\ \pi _2\\ \delta A_0\end{array}\right)e^{i(𝐤𝐱\omega t)}$$
(32)
then gives a homogeneous linear system in the three field amplitudes. The solutions of this system represent the normal modes and dispersion relations. Since there is no term in the Lagrangian that depends on $`\delta A_0/t`$, the equation of motion for $`\delta A_0`$ – Poisson’s equation – should be interpreted as a constraint. (We are working in Coulomb gauge, where this is standard.) Hence, the system of three linearized equations of motion will have only two normal modes. The dispersion curves for these two modes (which are almost pure $`\pi ^{}`$ and $`\pi ^+`$ respectively) are shown in Fig. 3.

Because we are expanding about a background condensate consisting of both $`K^0`$ and $`K^+`$, the neutral kaonic excitations may mix with the charged kaons. In order to find the normal modes and dispersion relations, we proceed as before, writing

$$\widehat{\pi }=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}\left(K_1^0T_6+K_2^0T_7+K_1T_4+K_2T_5\right)$$
(33)
and substituting this ansatz into the quadratic Lagrangian. Requiring harmonic dependence on $`x`$ and $`t`$ as before gives a coupled system of five equations of motion for the field amplitudes. The dispersion relations for the four normal modes are shown in Fig. 4.

There is one exactly massless mode which can be identified as the Goldstone boson arising from the fact that the $`K^0/K^+`$ condensate breaks the $`U(1)_Y`$ hypercharge symmetry of the original theory. (Weak interactions, however, will give a small mass to this particle .) This Goldstone boson corresponds to $`K_2^0`$ in our above ansatz, i.e., it consists of harmonic fluctuations in the imaginary part of the neutral kaon fields (as expected). There are also two massive modes (with masses of about $`32MeV`$ and $`48MeV`$). The lighter of these is predominantly a $`K^0`$ with a small admixture of $`K_1^0`$ and $`K_1`$, while the heavier is mostly a $`K^{}`$ with a small admixture of $`K^0`$. Finally, the temporal photon mode (consisting, as expected, of the imaginary part of the charged kaon field plus a sizable electric field) weighs in with a mass of about $`8MeV`$. As discussed previously, this mode (which came from the photon eating the would-be-Goldstone-boson from the breaking of $`U(1)_{\stackrel{~}{Q}}`$) corresponds physically to a plane-wave plasma oscillation of the (rotated) electric charge density. Note again that the background condensate breaks the usual superselection rules and allows the excitations to be coherent mixtures of states with different hypercharges and (rotated) electric charges.

## V Discussion

We have shown that the homogeneous $`K^0/K^+`$ condensate in CFL matter at non-zero $`\mu _\nu `$ is stable against the production of a heterogenous, charge-separated mixed phase. Due to the very short potential energy barrier between the pure $`K^0`$ and $`K^+`$ phases, the cost of surface and Coulomb energies is too large for charge separation to be energetically favorable. Although we have focussed our discussion on a single point in the $`\mu `$-$`\mu _\nu `$ phase diagram, the stability of the homogeneous phase persists throughout the $`CFLK^0/K^+`$ region identified as the ground state in Ref. . (As pointed out in Ref. , the Coleman-Weinberg mechanism  may produce a small additional incentive favoring the production of charge-separated domains. However, this incentive appears to be either absent or negligible for realistic densities relevant to neutron star cores.)

The normal modes and excitation spectra we discussed in the previous section may be relevant for future calculations of the neutrino scattering rates in the cooling neutron star. Of special importance in this context is the relatively light ($`m_\gamma 10MeV`$) photon mode. Since this excitation involves a spatially fluctuating density of electrons and charged and neutral kaons, one may expect large cross sections for neutrino scattering. The physics here is similar to that discussed in Ref.  where it is shown that coherent neutrino scattering from droplets of kaonic matter (whose weak charge density differs significantly from the hadronic background) will dramatically affect neutrino scattering rates and hence potentially observable neutrino light curves from supernovae. Equivalently in our problem, one expects that due to the spatial oscillation of the electron and kaon densities, the cross section for neutrino - photon scattering will be large and that the copious presence of such excitations for $`T\stackrel{>}{}\text{ }m_\gamma 8MeV`$ may significantly increase the time required for neutrinos to diffuse out of the proto-neutron star. One might hypothesize that only the relatively early-time neutrino light curve would be thereby stretched out in time since, if the dominant contribution to neutrino scattering rates indeed comes from these longitudinal photon excitations, there will be a relatively sudden change in the density of “targets” as the core temperature drops below $`m_\gamma `$.

Also, as discussed in Ref. , the breaking of various $`U(1)`$ symmetries (hypercharge and rotated electromagnetism) by the mixed kaon condensate will allow for the presence of global and/or gauged vortices and vortons. The present work, in determining the in-medium masses for the various kaonic excitations, thereby also fixes certain properties of kaonic vortices, e.g., the distance scale over which a superconducting $`K^+`$ condensate at the center of a $`K^0`$ vortex will fall off with distance. The in-medium masses of the various components of the (rotated) photon will also be relevant for a detailed description of the spatial dependence of the electric and magnetic fields surrounding such vortices. These vortices may also affect the cooling history of young neutron star through their neutrino opacities and magnetic properties.

A more detailed treatment of the various particle-like and topological excitations above the homogeneous $`K^0/K^+`$ condensate, and especially their effects on neutrino scattering and diffusion, will be left for future work.

Acknowledgements

We thank David Kaplan, Guy Moore, and Sanjay Reddy for proposing this problem to us, and for many helpful discussions along the way. The work is supported in part by the US Department of Energy grant DE-FG03-00ER41132.


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# On the Asymmetries of Extended X-ray Emission from Planetary Nebulae

## 1 Introduction

Models of the formation of PNs have long predicted that these objects, representing very late stages in the deaths of intermediate-mass (1-8 $`M_{}`$) stars, should emit X-rays. Such emission should arise in shocks at the interface between an active wind from the PN core (or its companion) and material ejected when the progenitor was on the asymptotic giant branch (AGB). Thus, extended X-ray emission, if present, likely traces the very processes responsible for sculpting PNs (for recent discussions of PN shaping mechanisms see, e.g., Frank 1999; Gardiner & Frank 2001; Kastner, Soker, & Rappaport 2000a; and Soker & Rappaport 2000).

The Chandra X-ray Observatory (CXO), with its unprecedented spatial resolution, has now provided the first conclusive evidence of such extended X-ray emission from nebular gas, in the form of striking X-ray imagery of the young PNs BD $`+30^{}3639`$ (Kastner et al. 2000b, hereafter KSVD), NGC 7027 (Kastner, Vrtilek, & Soker 2001, hereafter KVS), and NGC 6543 (Chu et al. 2001). Observations of the PN NGC 7009 by XMM-Newton, which combines high sensitivity with good spatial and spectral resolution, also reveal marginally extended X-ray emitting gas (Guerrero, Chu, & Gruendl 2002). The PN NGC 7293 (the Helix), known to exhibit relatively hard X-ray emission, does not display evidence for extended emission in CXO imaging (Guerrero et al. 2001); instead, this PN and NGC 6543 contain point-like X-ray sources with temperatures of a few times $`10^6`$ K, possibly due to magnetic activity on companions to their central stars (Guerrero et al. 2001; Gruendl et al. 2001; Soker & Kastner 2002).

While revealing the diffuse nature of the X-ray emission from some PNs, these first CXO and XMM-Newton observations of PNs are notable and surprising in several respects. Of particular interest is the result that the X-ray morphologies of the young PNs BD $`+30^{}3639`$ and NGC 7027 are decidely asymmetric, much more so than their optical nebulosities. Although the extended emission detected in the CXO images of these PNs (and NGC 6543 and 7009) underscores the importance of strong shocks in shaping planetaries, the asymmetric structures observed by CXO in BD $`+30^{}3639`$ and NGC 7027 cannot be easily explained in terms of “fossil,” spherical AGB envelopes acted on by isotropic white dwarf winds. However, as BD $`+30^{}3639`$ and NGC 7027 are also among the youngest, dustiest, and most molecule-rich of known PNs, it is important to assess the extent to which their observed X-ray asymmetries represent intrinsic plasma density or temperature structure inhomogeneities rather than, e.g., the effects of intervening X-ray absorption.

In this paper, we explore the origin of asymmetries of extended X-ray emission from PNs (in a companion paper, Soker & Kastner 2003, we examine models to explain the observed X-ray luminosities and temperatures of PNs). In particular, we consider the role of nonuniform intranebular extinction in determining the X-ray morphologies of BD +303639, NGC 7027, and NGC 6543. In doing so, we take advantage of the subarcsecond imaging potential of CXO and the energy resolution of CXO’s Advanced CCD Imaging Spectrometer (ACIS). In §2 we present archival optical and near-infrared images of BD +303639 and NGC 7027 that are useful in deducing their distributions of intranebular extinction, and we summarize the application of a sub-pixel image restoration technique to CXO images of these nebulae and NGC 6543. Results, including presentation of super-resolved, energy-band images of all three PNs and comparisons of their X-ray surface brightnesses and spatial distribution of intranebular extinction (as inferred from the optical/near-IR data), are presented in §3. In §4, we discuss our main findings, and §5 contains a summary.

## 2 Observations and data processing

### 2.1 Optical and Infrared

Images of BD +303639 in the transitions of H$`\alpha `$ (0.6563 $`\mu `$m) and P$`\alpha `$ (1.87 $`\mu `$m) utilized in the present analysis (§3) were obtained with the Hubble Space Telescope using the WFPC2 and NICMOS cameras, respectively. These images appear in Fig. 1. The H$`\alpha `$ and P$`\alpha `$ images were first presented in Sahai & Trauger (1998) and Latter et al. (2000a), respectively; in addition, HST narrow-band images covering many diagnostic emission lines were presented in Arnaud et al. (1996) and Harrington et al. (1997). The reader is referred to these papers for details concerning the structure and physical conditions of BD +303639 as ascertained from HST imaging. As is readily apparent from Fig. 1, however, the inner nebula consists of a bright elliptical shell with major and minor axes of $`4^{\prime \prime }`$ and $`3^{\prime \prime }`$, respectively (this inner nebula is surrounded by a much larger, fainter H$`\alpha `$ halo; Sahai & Trauger 1998). There is a strong gradient in extinction across this region of the nebula, with many conspicuous knots and clumps of denser gas apparent in projection against the bright elliptical shell (Harrington et al. 1997).

Images of NGC 7027 in the transitions of Br$`\gamma `$ (2.16 $`\mu `$m) and Br$`\alpha `$ (4.05 $`\mu `$m) utilized in the present analysis (§3) were obtained with the National Optical Astronomy Observatories111National Optical Astronomy Observatory is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc. (AURA), under cooperative agreement with the National Science Foundation. 4 m telescope and Cryogenic Optical Bench (COB) at Kitt Peak National Observatory in 1995 September (for details concerning COB imaging on the 4 m, see Weintraub et al. 1996). These images appear in Fig. 2. Like BD +303639, NGC 7027 displays a bright, elliptical shell, with a fainter surrounding halo; the major and minor axes of the shell are $`10^{\prime \prime }`$ and $`7^{\prime \prime }`$, respectively. While extensive near-infrared imagery of NGC 7027 has been obtained in the 2–3 $`\mu `$m wavelength range (e.g., Graham et al. 1993; Kastner et al. 1994, 1996; Latter et al. 2000b; Cox et al. 2002), the Br$`\alpha `$ image presented here represents the longest wavelength image of the nebula presently available at $`1^{\prime \prime }`$ resolution. As we demonstrate in §4, this image is valuable for examining, at high spatial resolution, highly obscured regions of the nebula.

### 2.2 X-ray

BD $`+30^{}3639`$ and NGC 7027 were observed by CXO in 2000 March and 2000 June, with net integration times of 18.8 ks and 18.2 ks, respectively. Both PNs were imaged with the central back-illuminated CCD in the ACIS array (ACIS-S3). These observations were first presented in KSVD and KVS. NGC 6543 was observed with ACIS-S3 for 46.0 ks in 2000 May (Chu et al. 2001). In this paper, we make use of these CXO/ACIS-S3 event data as reprocessed by the Chandra X-ray Center (CXC) in 2000 December for BD $`+30^{}3639`$ and in 2001 January for NGC 7027 and NGC 6543 (Figs. 3, 4, & 5, respectively).

#### 2.2.1 Event position refinement

The FWHM of the core of the point spread function (PSF) of the CXO High Resolution Mirror Assembly (HRMA) is nearly equivalent to the ACIS-S3 pixel size, $`0.49^{\prime \prime }`$.222See Chandra X-ray Observatory Proposer’s Guide, V. 4 (http://cxc.harvard.edu/udocs/docs/POG/MPOG/index.html), §5.4. Because (1) the telescope position is dithered across the source during an observation and is known to an accuracy of better than $`0.3^{\prime \prime },`$333Chandra X-ray Observatory Proposer’s Guide, V. 4, §4.2.3. (2) the charge cloud size generated by an incident photon is much smaller than the ACIS pixel size (Tsunemi et al. 2001), and (3) the ACIS flight software records the distibution of charge among pixels for each candidate X-ray event (encoded as “FLTGRADE,” the bitmap value of pixels above the “split threshold”444Chandra X-ray Observatory Proposer’s Guide, V. 4, §6.3.), it is possible (in principle) to reconstruct the position of each detected X-ray to sub-pixel accuracy (e.g., Tsunemi et al.). We have thus applied event position corrections to the reprocessed data obtained for BD $`+30^{}3639`$, NGC 7027, and NGC 6543, following the general method outlined in Tsunemi et al., as implemented, refined, and tested by Li et al. (2002). That is, we move the position of a photon from the default (pixel center) to its inferred landing location in detector coordinates, according to the event grade (see below). We then use the telescope pointing and spacecraft roll angle history for the observation to project the revised event locations to sky coordinates.

The Tsunemi et al. (2001) method relies on rejection of all events except those with charge distributed among three or four pixels; these “corner split” events have better sub-pixel accuracy in both directions (horizontal and vertical) than single events and in one direction than two-pixel events, thereby maximizing the potential improvement in spatial resolution. However, corner splits constitute only about 10% of the total number of events for a typical ACIS-S3 observation of a soft source (e.g., Table 1). Thus, to boost the signal-to-noise ratio, Li et al. (2002) include single-pixel as well as two-pixel events for which the charge is split either horizontally or vertically. As we demonstrate below, the improvement in image quality remains significant for this more inclusive FLTGRADE selection. In calculating new photon landing positions in detector coordinates, Li et al. assume single pixel events correspond to photons absorbed at the event pixel center, 2-pixel vertical or horizontal split event photons land at the centers of the split boundaries, and the corner split event photons land at the split corners. Before applying this event position relocation algorithm, position randomization within an ACIS pixel (performed as part of the standard CXC event processing pipeline) must be reversed.

In Table 1 we summarize the event FLTGRADE distributions for BD +303639, NGC 7027, and NGC 6543. In compiling these statistics we have selected those events with nominal energies $`<3.0`$ keV (as determined from calibrations produced by the standard CXC ACIS processing pipeline) that lie within the BD +303639, NGC 7027, and NGC 6543 source regions as defined in KVS, KSVD, and Chu et al. 2001, respectively. It can be seen that our event selection criteria retain $`95`$% of events in the source regions (the selected events necessarily include a small percentage of background events).

## 3 Results

### 3.1 Sub-pixel image reconstruction

Results of application of subpixel event relocations to the PN event data are displayed in Figs. 3, 4, and 5. In each Figure, the original image — i.e., the image obtained by spatially binning the Level 1 event data provided via standard event processing by the CXC, after filtering on energy and FLTGRADE (§2.2.1) — is presented in the left-hand panel. Images constructed from “unrandomized” event positions are displayed in the center panels of each Figure; in both these unrandomized images and in the “original” images constructed from Level 1 events, the pixel size is set to the intrinsic pixel size of ACIS, $`0.49^{\prime \prime }`$. Finally, the right-hand panels of each Figure display images constructed after relocating events according to the subpixel event repositioning algorithm. These images were constructed for a pixel size of $`0.25^{\prime \prime }`$, which fully samples the HRMA PSF at the energy range characteristic of the three PNs (0.3 keV to 3.0 keV).

The comparisons between “original,” “unrandomized,” and “event relocated” images in Figs. 3, 4, and 5 illustrate the superior spatial resolution afforded by subpixel event repositioning. Perhaps the best example of such an improvement is the sharply decreased FWHM of the central point source in NGC 6543 (compare the left- and right-hand panels of Fig. 5): before correction we measure a FWHM of $`1.12^{\prime \prime }`$, and after correction we measure a FWHM of $`0.80^{\prime \prime }`$. Similarly, after event relocation is applied, the X-ray outline of BD +303639 and the bright region of emission at its eastern edge appear sharper (Fig. 3, right). The number of counts per pixel is quite small in the reconstructed image of NGC 7027, so some of the structure in this image is due to small number statistics. Nevertheless, features in the brighter regions of these images (e.g., the compact, bright region located northwest of the position of the central star) appear to correspond to features seen in optical and near-infrared images of this PN (§§3.2, 3.3).

The absolute astrometry of the reprocessed BD $`+30^{}3639`$ and NGC 7027 data is improved over that available to KSVD and KVS, due to refined aspect solutions. Hence we can use the reconstructed images of these nebulae to re-examine the correspondence of their X-ray and optical emitting regions. For BD +303639, the relative alignment of the P$`\alpha `$ image and the broad-band (0.3-3.0 keV) reconstructed image constructed from the reprocessed CXO event data agrees to within $`0.5^{\prime \prime }`$, based on comparison of the outlying CXO image contours with the elliptical shell seen in P$`\alpha `$ (Fig. 6). For NGC 7027, we have adjusted the position of the X-ray image by $`1^{\prime \prime }`$, to better align the positions of broad-band peak X-ray surface brightness with the bright elliptical shell in the Br$`\alpha `$ image (Fig. 7). The resulting overlays of reconstructed broad-band X-ray images on infrared images (Figs. 6, 7) indicate that (a) the central stars of both PNs are confirmed to lie very near the center of their X-ray nebulosities, and (b) unlike both NGC 7293 and NGC 6543 (Guerrero et al. 2001), neither BD $`+30^{}3639`$ nor NGC 7027 clearly contains an X-ray-bright central star (a possibility left open for NGC 7027 by the preliminary analysis of KVS).

### 3.2 Energy-resolved images

In Figs. 8, 9, and 10 we present, respectively, broad-band and energy-resolved images of BD +303639, NGC 7027, and NGC 6543. The energy-resolved images span the energy ranges $`E0.7`$ keV (hereafter “soft-band”), 0.7 keV $`<E1.2`$ keV (“medium-band”), and 1.2 keV $`<E3.0`$ keV (“hard-band”). Like the broad-band images, the energy-resolved images also have been reconstructed at sub-pixel resolution, with $`0.25^{\prime \prime }`$ pixels, via the algorithm described in the previous section. Our analysis of the sub-pixel event positioning algorithm suggests that the results of the algorithm are robust, regardless of the count rate of the source, since the algorithm operates on one photon at a time (Li et al. 2002). Hence, the subpixel reconstructions are reliable, despite the small number of counts (and, hence, low signal-to-noise ratio) in certain energy-resolved images (e.g., hard-band images of BD +303639 and NGC 6543, and all images of NGC 7027).

The results demonstrate that the diffuse X-ray emission morphologies of all three nebulae are highly energy-dependent within the 0.3-3.0 keV band. In all four images of BD +303639 it is apparent that the X-ray emission is brightest toward its eastern rim (Fig. 8); however, this asymmetry is much more profound in the medium- and hard-band images than in the soft-band image. In the soft-band image, the peak of the surface brightness of BD +303639 lies close to (though $`1^{\prime \prime }`$ east of) the position of the central star, while in the medium- and hard-band images, the nebula is much less centrally peaked. In these images, the (clumpy) emission from just inside the rims of the optical nebula appears generally stronger than the emission from the core region, and there is a compact bright region at the eastern rim.

In contrast to BD +303639, the soft-band emission from NGC 7027 is highly localized (Fig. 9). This emission is entirely confined to a region in the northwest of the nebula that appears as a “hole” in high-resolution optical images (see, e.g., Fig. 1 of KVS). Emission from the X-ray-emitting “lobe” projected northwest of the central star — a direction corresponding to blueshifted atomic and molecular gas (Cox et al. 2002) — dominates the nebula in both the soft- and medium-band images. In the hard-band image the emission is more balanced between the northwest (forward-facing) and southeast (rearward-facing) X-ray lobes, and the northwest X-ray lobe has a smaller opening angle than in the medium-band image. The outline of NGC 7027 in this hard-band image appears more or less axisymmetric or, perhaps, point-symmetric.

Fig. 10 demonstrates that all diffuse X-ray emission detected from NGC 6543 emerges at energies $`<1.2`$ keV; only the central star is detected in the hard-band image. This is consistent with the spectral analysis in Chu et al. (2001) and Guerrero et al. (2001), which indicates that the diffuse emission has a characteristic temperature $`10^6`$ K, while the unresolved central source is somewhat hotter, at $`2\times 10^6`$ K. In the medium-band image, the emission appears confined to the edges of the soft-band nebulosity, with a clump of brighter emission at the extreme northern edge of the X-ray-emitting region.

### 3.3 X-ray Surface Brightness vs. Optical/IR Extinction

Assuming Case B recombination, the hydrogen emission line ratios $`I_{H\alpha }/I_{P\alpha }`$ and $`I_{Br\gamma }/I_{Br\alpha }`$ are relatively insensitive to temperature in the regime of interest for planetary nebulae, $`T10^4`$ K (e.g., Osterbrock 1989, Table 4.2). Therefore, we can assume that deviations of the observed line ratios from their “canonical” Case B recombination values are due to extinction. Hence, assuming a standard interstellar dependence of extinction on wavelength (e.g., Osterbrock 1989, Table 7.2), we use the spatial distribution of the ratios $`I_{H\alpha }/I_{P\alpha }`$ and $`I_{Br\gamma }/I_{Br\alpha }`$, as derived from the ratios of images presented in §2.2, to infer visual extinction ($`A_V`$) as a function of position within BD +303639 (Fig. 11) and NGC 7027 (Fig. 12), respectively.

Harrington et al. (1997) and Robberto et al. (1993) employed techniques similar to the preceding, to infer the spatial distribution of $`A_V`$ for BD +303639 and NGC 7027, respectively. Their results are qualitatively similar to those derived here. The extinction across both nebulae can be quite large, however, and use of near-infrared images provides a better “lever arm” for deducing $`A_V`$ in very highly obscured regions. For example, the Robberto et al. extinction map of NGC 7027, constructed from optical hydrogen recombination line imaging, is limited to regions with $`A_V<5`$, whereas the $`A_V`$ map constructed from longer-wavelength hydrogen transitions available to COB (Fig. 12) remains sensitive to $`A_V15`$.

The distributions of $`A_V`$ are similar for the two nebulae, in that the largest values of extinction lie near the nebular perimeters, and extinction “holes” are observed toward the nebular interiors. Generally, however, we find $`A_V`$ within NGC 7027 (for which $`A_V`$ lies largely between the range $`1.5\stackrel{<}{}A_V\stackrel{<}{}15`$) to be a factor 3-4 larger than $`A_V`$ within BD +303639 (for which $`0.5\stackrel{<}{}A_V\stackrel{<}{}5`$). Also, the dark lane apparent in high-resolution optical images of NGC 7027 (e.g. KVS, their Fig. 1) appears as an enhancement of $`A_V`$ in Fig. 12. This is consistent with the hypothesis (KVS) that BD +303639 and NGC 7027 share a common structure — bipolar, with a dense equatorial region — but that NGC 7027 is viewed at intermediate inclination angle whereas BD +303639 is viewed nearly pole-on.

Notably, the X-ray surface brightnesses of both nebulae are strongly anticorrelated with the local value of $`A_V`$. In each case, the peak of X-ray emission lies very near the minimum in $`A_V`$, and little or no X-ray emission is observed toward regions of highest $`A_V`$. There is a gradient of $`A_V`$ in interior regions of BD +303639 (i.e., regions of the nebula interior to the bright shell seen in H recombination lines), such that there is greater extinction toward the southwestern side of the central star (a result independently obtained by Harrington et al. 1997), and there is an extinction “hole” 1-2′′ to the eastern side of the central star. The X-ray emission, correspondingly, is much brighter to the east than to the west of the star and, furthermore, the contours of X-ray surface brightness closely follow the $`A_V`$ distribution in detail (Fig. 11). In NGC 7027, the relationship between $`A_V`$ and X-ray surface brightness is also strong, with the lowest contours of X-ray emission very closely tracing the regions of large $`A_V`$ (Fig. 12). In particular, the “pinched waist” apparent in the X-ray emission morphology lies at the position of the enhancement of $`A_V`$ that appears to define the equatorial plane of the nebula. Also, the strongest X-ray emission from NGC 7027 lies very near — though slightly farther from the central star than — the extinction “hole” apparent to the northwest of the star.

We have also constructed an H$`\alpha `$/H$`\beta `$ line ratio map of NGC 6543 (not shown), from image data available in the HST archive. In stark constrast to the line ratio maps of BD +303639 and NGC 7027, from which the $`A_V`$ maps in Figs. 11, 12 and were constructed, the H ii line ratio map of NGC 6543 is smooth and featureless across its central, X-ray-emitting region, indicating that any extinction of the X-ray nebula is quite spatially uniform. Furthermore, the measured H$`\alpha `$/H$`\beta `$ ratio across this region, $`2.5\pm 0.3`$, agrees within uncertainty with the value expected for Case B recombination, $`2.8`$ (Osterbrock 1989). This result is consistent with the very small inferred extinction toward NGC 6543 as measured by Tylenda et al. (1992) and with the observation that X-ray absorption becomes detectable by CXO only for energies $`<0.4`$ keV (Chu et al. 2001).

## 4 Discussion

The comparisons of X-ray and extinction images in the preceding section reveal striking correspondences between the spatial distributions of $`A_V`$ and the X-ray surface brightnesses of BD +303639 and NGC 7027. These results suggest that intranebular extinction plays a very important role in determining the X-ray emission morphologies of young, dusty PNs. The close correspondence of regions of low extinction and bright X-ray emission in both BD +303639 and NGC 7027 suggests that some extended X-ray emission may remain undetected, making it difficult to draw conclusions as to the intrinsic shape (e.g., axisymmetric vs. elliptically symmetric) of their soft X-ray emitting regions.

Extinction alone cannot fully explain the strong departures from spherical symmetry and small-scale clumping of the X-ray emission from all three nebulae, however. If extinction were the sole contributor to the X-ray asymmetries of BD +303639 and NGC 7027, then we would expect these asymmetries to be more extreme at lower energy, where photons are easily absorbed, than at higher energy, where the X-rays are more highly penetrating. By way of analogy, we note that the near-infrared emission-line morphologies of both nebulae are substantially more symmetric and regular than their optical emission-line morphologies, a difference that can be ascribed to the large decrease in the probability of scattering or absorption of photons by intranebular dust in the near-infrared, relative to the optical regime.

In the X-ray imagery presented here, however, only NGC 7027 seems to display the expected trend of increasing symmetry with increasing energy — although even at high energy, its X-ray morphology differs sharply from its shell-like appearance in near-infrared emission-line images (Fig. 7). BD +303639 is observed to become clumpier and more one-sided as X-ray energy increases. The hard-band emission from NGC 6543, for which extinction effects are negligible in the bands considered here, is mostly confined to a small region of the north lobe. It seems, therefore, that strongly position-dependent variations in the physical conditions in the shocked gas are responsible, at least in part, for the asymmetric and/or clumpy X-ray-emitting regions of these PNs. Indeed, while it seems likely that intranebular extinction modulates the nebular X-ray surface brightnesses of BD +303639 and NGC 7027, we cannot as yet rule out other interpretations. For example, the regions of brightest X-ray emission may correspond to the smallest $`A_V`$ because the dust in these regions is being destroyed by the intense, high-energy radiation.

Soker & Kastner (2003) argue that the X-ray luminosities and temperatures of PNs can be explained by a model in which the diffuse emission is produced by a shocked, moderate speed ($`500`$ km s-1) post-AGB wind, or a wind emanating from a companion to the central post-AGB star, where the shocked gas has had time to expand and cool adiabatically. This wind and the distribution of previously ejected AGB material also should largely determine the spatial distribution of the X-ray emitting gas. The post-AGB or companion wind may be highly collimated, resulting in strong axial or point symmetries observable in X-rays. Other processes might then govern the temperature structure (and therefore spatial distribution) of X-ray-emitting gas in detail, with heat conduction from shock-heated to photoionized gas in the presence of magnetic fields and/or direct mixing of shock-heated and photoionized gas being the most likely candidates (Soker & Kastner 2003, and references therein). These temperature-moderating mechanisms may be more or less important in different nebulae.

The images presented here, combined with the global X-ray properties of PNs displaying diffuse X-ray emission (Soker & Kastner 2003, their Table 1), support this general model. That is, adiabatic cooling of a shocked, moderate-speed, post-AGB or companion wind should produce X-ray luminosities and temperatures in the general range observed ($`10^{32}`$ ergs s-1 and $`13\times 10^6`$ K, respectively). The detailed X-ray surface brightness distributions of NGC 6543 and NGC 7027 suggest, moreover, that collimated outflows are responsible for the detailed structure of their X-ray emitting regions.

In NGC 7027, which exhibits collimated outflows in near-infrared line emission (Cox et al. 2002), the action of such a highly directed (bipolar) fast wind from the central star — or, more likely, an as-yet undetected companion555It seems unlikely that a moderate-speed ($`400`$ km s-1), collimated wind could be driven by the present central star, as such a wind speed is much smaller than the escape velocity from a star of mass of $`0.7M_{}`$ and radius $`0.07R_{}`$ (Latter et al. 2000b). — would readily explain its axisymmetric appearance in the hard-band image (Fig. 9) and the apparent “breakout” of X-ray-emitting plasma beyond the bright rim of near-infrared emission from ionized gas (Fig. 7). Indeed, the morphology of high-velocity Br$`\gamma `$ emission is very similar to that of the X-ray emission (Cox et al.). Similarly, both the optical emission and the diffuse, soft X-ray emission from NGC 6543 appear to be point-symmetric (see Fig. 10 and Chu et al. 2001), suggestive of the action of collimated outflows (although Chu et al. ascribe the limb-brightened appearance of the X-ray emission from NGC 6543 to the effects of heat conduction or mixing of shocked plasma with photoionized gas).

BD +303639 may be an example of a PN in which heat conduction and/or mixing play a crucial role in determining X-ray morphology. Either mechanism would explain the bright, compact X-ray-emitting region at the eastern rim of the nebula, with heat conduction more naturally explaining its plasma abundances (Soker & Kastner 2003). However, BD +303639 and NGC 7027 bear strong resemblances in many fundamental respects (e.g., Soker & Kastner 2003) and, in particular, BD +303639 is also known to harbor collimated outflows (Bachiller et al. 2000). Hence the asymmetric appearance of BD +303639 at high energy, in comparison with NGC 7027, may be primarily the result of the different line-of-sight inclinations of these two nebulae (Masson 1989; KSVD; see, however, Bryce & Mellema 1999, who find that BD +303639 more closely resembles the elliptical PN NGC 40). It remains to demonstrate, however, how collimated outflows might produce the off-center X-ray bright spot in BD +303639, as the outflows detected by Bachiller et al. do not correspond spatially to this region of X-ray emission.

## 5 Summary and Conclusions

We have presented and analyzed reprocessed X-ray Chandra X-ray Observatory images of the planetary nebulae BD +303639, NGC 7027, and NGC 6543. To maximize the spatial resolution of the images, we employ an event relocation technique that takes full advantage of CXO’s exceptional spatial resolution; we estimate that the reconstructed images represent a $`30`$% improvement in PSF FWHM, over the original images. Energy-resolved images demonstrate that the morphologies of all three nebulae depend sensitively on energy. Whereas NGC 7027 appears clumpiest at low energy and more symmetric at higher energy, BD +303639 becomes more one-sided and asymmetric with increasing X-ray energy. Diffuse emission from NGC 6543 is dominated by soft X-rays, with its central point source dominant in the harder energy bands.

With the aid of high-resolution optical and near-infrared H ii emission line images, we consider the extent to which nonuniform intranebular absorption affects the X-ray morphologies of these PNs. For both BD +303639 and NGC 7027, we find a strong anticorrelation between broad-band X-ray surface brightness and the degree of visual extinction, where the latter is inferred from the spatial distribution of H ii line ratios. We conclude that extinction plays an important role in the overall X-ray appearances of these young, dusty, molecule-rich PNs. The PN NGC 6543 has a much smaller and more spatially uniform degree of visual extinction than either BD +303639 or NGC 7027, however, so spatially variable absorption does not affect its X-ray morphology.

While extinction is important in determining the X-ray surface brightnesses of BD +303639 and NGC 7027, extinction alone cannot explain many important characteristics of the X-ray morphologies of these PNs. In particular, the highly asymmetric appearance of BD +303639 and the axisymmetric or point-symmetric appearances of NGC 7027 and NGC 6543 appear to point out intrinsic X-ray emission properties of these nebulae. We conclude that the action of collimated outflows likely dictates the X-ray appearances of at least two of three nebulae studied here, with heat conduction in the presence of magnetic fields potentially playing a more important role in the asymmetric surface brightness of BD +303639.

Additional spatially resolved CXO/ACIS and XMM-Newton observations of planetaries are required to better establish the relative importance of the various processes — e.g., collimated outflows, heat conduction, mixing of shock-heated and photoionized plasma — proposed to explain their X-ray morphologies as well as their X-ray luminosities and temperatures. We have demonstrated here that these observations must be accompanied by subarcsecond emission-line imaging in the optical and near-infrared, to unambiguously distinguish between intrinsic and extrinsic processes that can determine the energy-dependent X-ray morphologies of PNs.

The authors wish to thank two anonymous referees for many helpful comments and suggestions. J.H.K. and J.L. acknowledge support for this research provided by NASA/CXO grant GO0–1067X to RIT. N.S. acknowledges support from the US-Israel Binational Science Foundation.


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# Untitled Document

Monte Carlo simulations of Sznajd models

Dietrich Stauffer

Institute for Theoretical Physics, Cologne University

D-50923 Köln, Euroland

www.thp.uni-koeln.de; stauffer@thp.uni-koeln.de

The Sznajd model in less than a year has found several followers. An isolated person does not convince others; a group of people sharing the same opinions influences the neighbours much more easily. Thus on a square lattice, with variables +1 (Democrats) and –1 (Republicans) on every lattice site, a pair (or plaquette) of neighbours convinces its six (eight) nearest neighbours of its own opinion if and only if all members of the pair (plaquette) share the same opinion. The generalization to many possible states is used to explain the distribution of votes among candidates in Brazilian local elections.

Keywords: Consensus, lattices, cellular automata, elections

Review; published in Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation 5, No. 1, paper 4 (2002), available only electronically: jasss.soc.surrey.ac.uk


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# Separation of Gravitational-Wave and Cosmic-Shear Contributions to Cosmic Microwave Background Polarization

\[

## Abstract

Inflationary gravitational waves (GW) contribute to the curl component in the polarization of the CMB. Cosmic shear—gravitational lensing of the CMB— converts a fraction of the dominant gradient polarization to the curl component. Higher-order correlations can be used to map the cosmic shear and subtract this contribution to the curl. Arcminute resolution will be required to pursue GW amplitudes smaller than those accessible by Planck. The finite cutoff in CMB power at small scales leads to a minimum detectable GW amplitude corresponding to an inflation energy near $`10^{15}`$ GeV.

\]

Observation of acoustic oscillations in the temperature anisotropies of the cosmic microwave background (CMB; ) strongly suggests an inflationary origin for primordial perturbations . It has been argued that a new smoking-gun signature for inflation would be detection of stochastic background of inflationary gravitational waves (IGWs) . These IGWs produce a distinct signature in the CMB in the form of a contribution to the curl, or magnetic-like, component of the polarization . Since there is no scalar, or density-perturbation, contribution to these curl modes, curl polarization was considered to be a direct probe of IGWs.

There is, however, another source of a curl component. Cosmic shear (CS)—weak gravitational lensing of the CMB due to large-scale structure along the line of sight—results in a fractional conversion of the gradient mode from density perturbations to the curl component . The amplitude of the IGW background varies quadratically with the energy scale $`E_{\mathrm{infl}}`$ of inflation, and so the prospects for detection also depend on this energy scale. In the absence of CS, the smallest detectable IGW background scales simply with the sensitivity of the CMB experiment—as the instrumental sensitivity is improved, smaller values of $`E_{\mathrm{infl}}`$ become accessible . More realistically, however, the CS-induced curl introduces a noise from which IGWs must be distinguished. If the IGW amplitude (or $`E_{\mathrm{infl}}`$) is sufficiently large, the CS-induced curl will be no problem. However, as $`E_{\mathrm{infl}}`$ is reduced, the IGW signal becomes smaller and will get lost in the CS-induced noise. This confusion leads to a minimum detectable IGW amplitude .

In addition to producing a curl component, CS also introduces distinct higher-order correlations in the CMB temperature pattern. Roughly speaking, lensing can stretch the image of the CMB on a small patch of sky and thus lead to something akin to anisotropic correlations on that patch of sky, even though the CMB pattern at the surface of last scatter had isotropic correlations. By mapping these effects, the CS can be mapped as a function of position on the sky . The observed CMB polarization can then be corrected for these lensing deflections to reconstruct the intrinsic CMB polarization at the surface of last scatter (in which the only curl component would be that due to IGWs). In this Letter we evaluate how well this subtraction can be accomplished and study the impact of CS on experimental strategies for detection of IGWs.

To begin, we review the determination of the smallest detectable IGW amplitude in the absence of CS. Following Ref. , we consider a CMB-polarization experiment of some given instrumental sensitivity quantified by the noise-equivalent temperature (NET) $`s`$, angular resolution $`\theta _{\mathrm{FWHM}}`$, duration $`t_{\mathrm{yr}}`$ in years, and fraction of sky covered $`f_{\mathrm{sky}}`$. We then make the null hypothesis of no IGWs and determine the largest IGW amplitude $`𝒯`$, defined as $`𝒯=9.2V/m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4`$, where $`V=E_{\mathrm{infl}}^4`$ is the inflaton-potential height, that would be consistent at the $`1\sigma `$ level with the null detection. We then obtain the smallest detectable IGW amplitude $`\sigma _𝒯`$ from

$$\sigma _𝒯^2=\underset{l>180/\theta }{}\left(C_l^{BB,GW}/𝒯\right)^2(\sigma _l^{BB})^2,$$
(1)
where $`C_l^{BB,GW}`$ is the IGW contribution to the curl power spectrum, and

$$\sigma _l^{BB}=\sqrt{\frac{2}{f_{sky}(2l+1)}}\left(C_l^{BB}+f_{sky}w^1e^{l^2\sigma _b^2}\right),$$
(2)
is the standard error with which each multipole moment $`C_l^{BB}`$ can be determined. Here, $`w^1=4\pi (s/T_{\mathrm{CMB}})^2/(t_{\mathrm{pix}}N_{\mathrm{pix}})`$  is the variance per unit area on the sky for polarization observations when $`t_{\mathrm{pix}}`$ is the time spent on each of $`N_{\mathrm{pix}}`$ pixels with detectors of NET $`s`$, and $`\theta 203f_{\mathrm{sky}}^{1/2}`$ is roughly the width (in degrees) of the survey. In restricting the sum to $`l>180/\theta `$, we have assumed that no information from modes with wavelengths larger than the survey size can be obtained; in fact, some information can be obtained, and our results should thus be viewed as conservative .

The second term in Eq. (2) is due to instrumental noise, and the first is due to cosmic variance. In the absence of CS, and for the null hypothesis of no IGWs, we set $`C_l^{BB}=0`$, and the results for the smallest detectable IGW amplitude are shown as the solid curves in Fig. 1 for an experiment with detectors of comparable sensitivity to Planck’s (left) and a hypothetical experiment (right) with better sensitivity. The smallest detectable IGW amplitude $`𝒯`$ scales as $`s^2t_{\mathrm{yr}}^1`$. For large survey widths, it scales as $`\theta `$, but at survey widths smaller than $`5^{}`$ it increases because information from the larger-angle modes in the IGW-induced curl power spectrum is lost (cf. the IGW power spectrum in Fig. 2).

It is now easy to see how inclusion of CS affects these results. As discussed above, lensing of the gradient polarization at the surface of last scatter due to density perturbations leads to a CMB curl component with a power spectrum,

$$\stackrel{~}{C}_l^{BB}=\frac{1}{2}\frac{d^2𝐥_1}{(2\pi )^2}\left[𝐥_2𝐥_1\right]^2(1\mathrm{cos}4\varphi _{l_1})C_{l_2}^{\varphi \varphi }C_{l_1}^{EE},$$
(3)
where $`𝐥_2=𝐥𝐥_1`$ here and throughout, $`C_l^{EE}`$ is the power spectrum of the gradient component of polarization and $`C_l^{\varphi \varphi }`$ is the power spectrum of the projected lensing potential . The latter is defined in terms of the potential fluctuations, $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$, along the line of sight such that

$`\varphi (\widehat{𝐧})`$ $`=`$ $`2{\displaystyle _0^{r_0}}𝑑r{\displaystyle \frac{d_A(r_0r)}{d_A(r)d_A(r_0)}}\mathrm{\Phi }(r,\widehat{𝐧}r),`$ (4)
where $`r`$ is the comoving radial distance, or conformal look-back time, with $`r_0`$ at the last scattering surface, and $`d_A(r)`$ is the comoving angular diameter distance. The CS-induced curl power spectrum is shown as the dashed curve in Fig. 2.

By the time these measurements are made, the cosmological parameters that determine this lensed curl power spectrum should be sufficiently well determined that this power spectrum can be predicted with some confidence. In that case, the CS-induced curl component can be treated simply as a well-understood noise for the IGW background. The smallest detectable IGW amplitude can then be calculated as above, but now inserting the lensed power spectrum, Eq. (3), in Eq. (2) for $`C_l^{BB}`$. The results are shown as the short-dash curves in Fig. 1. When lensing is included, the results no longer scale simply with $`f_{\mathrm{sky}}`$, $`s`$, or $`t_{\mathrm{yr}}`$, as there is now a trade-off between the instrumental-noise and CS-noise terms in Eq. (2). The left panel shows that the IGW sensitivity for an experiment with NET similar to Planck’s should not be affected by CS. This is because the IGW amplitudes that could be detectable by such experiments are still relatively large compared with the expected CS signal, especially at the larger angles that will be best accessed by Planck. However, CS will affect the ability of experiments more sensitive than Planck to detect unambiguously IGWs, as shown in the right panel. CS also shifts the preferred survey region to larger areas, as the IGW power spectrum peaks at larger angles than the CS power spectrum (cf. Fig. 2). Finally, note that if the CS curl is treated as an unsubtracted noise, it leads, assuming a no-noise polarization map, to a smallest detectable IGW amplitude, corresponding to an inflaton-potential height, $`V^{1/4}4\times 10^{15}`$ GeV.

Now we arrive at the main point of this Letter; i.e., how well can the CS-induced curl be subtracted by mapping the CS as a function of position on the sky? One possibility is that the primordial polarization pattern might be reconstructed from that observed by using CS maps obtained with correlations of galaxy ellipticities . However, the source galaxies for these CS surveys are at redshifts $`z1`$, while only a small fraction of the CS-induced curl comes from these redshifts, as indicated in Fig. 2. An alternative possibility is to use higher-order correlations in the CMB  to map the CS-induced curl all the way back to the surface of last scatter.

CS modifies the temperature and polarization pattern, giving rise to anisotropic correlations on small scales where the image of the CMB surface of last scatter is sheared by weak lensing. According to Ref. , the quantity, $`[T(\widehat{𝐧})T(\widehat{𝐧})]`$, provides the best quadratic estimator, given a temperature map, of the deflection angle at position $`\widehat{}n`$ on the sky. In Fourier space, we can write this quadratic estimator for the deflection angle as

$`\widehat{\alpha }(𝐥)={\displaystyle \frac{N_l}{l}}{\displaystyle \frac{d^2𝐥_1}{(2\pi )^2}\left(𝐥𝐥_1C_{l_1}^{\mathrm{CMB}}+𝐥𝐥_2C_{l_2}^{\mathrm{CMB}}\right)\frac{T(l_1)T(l_2)}{2C_{l_1}^{\mathrm{tot}}C_{l_2}^{\mathrm{tot}}}},`$ (5)
where $`C_l^{\mathrm{CMB}}`$ is the unlensed CMB power spectrum and $`C_l^{\mathrm{tot}}=C_l^{\mathrm{lensed}\mathrm{CMB}}+f_{\mathrm{sky}}w^1e^{l^2\sigma _b^2}`$ includes all contributions to the CMB temperature power spectrum. The ensemble average over CMB realizations, $`\widehat{\alpha }(𝐥)_{\mathrm{CMB}}`$, is equal to the deflection angle, $`l\varphi (𝐥)`$, when

$$N_l^1=\frac{1}{l^2}\frac{d^2𝐥_1}{(2\pi )^2}\frac{\left(𝐥𝐥_1C_{l_1}^{\mathrm{CMB}}+𝐥𝐥_2C_{l_2}^{\mathrm{CMB}}\right)^2}{2C_{l_1}^{\mathrm{tot}}C_{l_2}^{\mathrm{tot}}}.$$
(6)
It can also be shown  that $`N_l`$ is the noise power spectrum associated with the reconstructed deflection angle power spectrum,

$$\widehat{\alpha }(𝐥)\widehat{\alpha }(𝐥^{})=(2\pi )^2\delta _D(𝐥+𝐥^{})\left(l^2C_l^{\varphi \varphi }+N_l\right).$$
(7)
Here the ensemble average is taken independently over realizations of both the CMB and the intervening large-scale structure. In addition to these temperature estimators for the deflection angle, we also use analogous ones constructed from the polarization, as discussed in Ref. , although we do not reproduce those formulas here. The total noise in the estimator for the deflection angle can then be constructed by summing the inverses of the individual noise contributions. We thus determine the variance with which each Fourier mode of $`\varphi `$ can be reconstructed.

With the deflection angle obtained this way as a function of position on the sky, the polarization at the CMB surface of last scatter can be reconstructed (details to be presented elsewhere ). In the ideal case, there would be no error in the CS reconstruction leading to no residual lensing-induced curl component. Realistically, however, there will be some error in the CS reconstruction, from measurement error and also from cosmic variance, with a noise power spectrum, $`C_l^{\varphi \varphi ,\mathrm{noise}}`$, given by $`N_l/l^2`$. Since $`C_l^{\mathrm{lensed}\mathrm{CMB}}C_l^{\mathrm{CMB}}`$ along the damping tail of the CMB power spectrum, $`N_l`$ converges to a finite value such that beyond a certain small angular scale, additional information from CMB provides no further information on CS. This leads to a finite limit on lensing extraction and, subsequently, a limit for the amplitude of IGW contribution that can be separated from CS.

The lensing reconstruction from CMB data only allows the extraction of $`C_l^{\varphi \varphi }`$ to a multipole of $`1000`$ , but there is substantial contribution to the CS-induced curl component from lensing at smaller angular scales. We thus replace $`N_l/l^2`$ by $`C_l^{\varphi \varphi }`$ when the former exceeds the latter at large $`l`$. This provides an estimate to the noise expected in the reconstructed curl component that follows from implementing a filtering scheme where high-frequency noise in the CS reconstruction is removed to the level of the expected CS signal. The dot-dash curve in Fig. 2 shows the residual CS-induced curl component that remains after subtraction.

We can now anticipate the smallest IGW amplitude detectable by a CS-corrected polarization map by simply using this residual noise power spectrum in Eq. (3). Results are shown as dotted curves in Fig. 1. The left panel shows results as a function of survey size for an experiment with NET similar to Planck, while the right-hand panel shows results for experiments with better sensitivity and resolution. Since the dotted curves are just below the dashed curve in the left-hand panel of Fig. 1, we learn that Planck’s sensitivity will not be sufficient to warrant an effort to reconstruct the primordial curl and we would do just as well to simply treat the CS-induced curl as a noise component of known amplitude. We can expect to improve the discovery reach for IGWs by increasing the sensitivity and resolution. The right-hand panel of Fig. 1 shows results for a hypothetical experiment with $`s=1\mu \mathrm{K}\sqrt{\mathrm{sec}}`$ and angular resolutions of $`5^{}`$, $`2^{}`$ and $`1^{}`$. We now see there is a significant difference between the dashed curve and the dotted lines suggesting the increasing improvement with increasing resolution.

Finally, to indicate the ultimate limits of this class of experiments, the long-dash curve in Fig. 1 shows the results assuming perfect detectors (i.e., $`s=0`$). If there were no CS-induced curl, then we would have sensitivity to an arbitrarily small IGW amplitude, but the existence of a CS-induced curl provides an ultimate limit of $`V^{1/4}4\times 10^{15}`$ GeV, as discussed above. Correction for the effects of CS with the CS map inferred from higher-order correlations would allow us to access lower IGW amplitudes. If there is no instrumental-noise limitation, the sensitivity to an IGW signal is maximized by covering as much sky as possible, and the lowest accessible inflaton potential, $`10^{15}`$ GeV, is obtained with a nearly all-sky experiment.

To conclude, we have studied the IGW amplitudes accessible by mapping the curl component of the CMB polarization, taking into account the effects of a CS-induced curl that is either modeled as an unsubtracted noise or subtracted with a CS map obtained with higher-order correlations. We find that the CS reconstruction is unlikely to improve the IGW discovery reach of Planck. To go beyond Planck, however, a CS map will need to be constructed with temperature and polarization maps of higher sensitivity and resolution than Planck. An ultimate limit of roughly $`V^{1/4}10^{15}`$ GeV to the detectable IGW amplitude using the techniques considered here comes from the existence of finite CMB power on small angular scales. There are several possible ways this lower limit may be improved upon. First of all, we have used only the lowest-order temperature-polarization correlations to reconstruct the CS. The inclusion of the complete temperature-polarization four-point correlation functions and higher-order correlations may possibly improve the CS reconstruction. We have neglected reionization in our analysis. Reionization will boost the large-angle CMB polarization  improving the detectability of IGWs. Another improvement in this limit may be achieved by relaxing our assumption that power in the CMB drops exponentially at small scales. If the excess small-scale power recently detected by CBI  comes from high redshifts, then there will be more small-scale coherence patches with which to reconstruct the CS. In this case, it is imaginable that a far more precise CS map can be reconstructed, but this might require even better angular resolution and sensitivity.

During the preparation of the paper, we learned of other very recently completed work by Knox and Song  that performs a very similar calculation and reaches similar conclusions. This work was supported in part by NSF AST-0096023, NASA NAG5-8506, and DoE DE-FG03-92-ER40701. Kesden acknowledges the support of an NSF Graduate Fellowship and AC acknowledges support from the Sherman Fairchild Foundation.