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# Quantum Gravity on 𝑑𝑆₃

## I Introduction

It is well-known that for a timelike observer in de Sitter space, there exists a horizon, and regions of spacetime beyond it are not accessible to this observer. The thermodynamics of such a cosmological horizon is very similar to that of black hole horizons gh . In particular, there is an entropy associated with the de Sitter spacetime, which is a measure of the information loss (for the timelike observer) across the cosmological horizon. There have been several attempts to describe this entropy - for example, in terms of microscopic degrees of freedom at the cosmological horizon ms ; flin  or in a Chern-Simons formulation banados ; park . In fact, in park , the entropy of a general Kerr-de Sitter space is computed. More recently, de Sitter entropy has been computed using a CFT at past or future infinity vb ; myung ; kabat  motivated by the dS/CFT correspondence strominger ; klemm . It is shown in leshouches  that the asymptotic symmetry group of quantum gravity in $`dS_3`$ is the Euclidean conformal group in two dimensions. This has led to the proposal of a correspondence between quantum gravity in $`dS_3`$ and a CFT at asymptotic infinity. In vb , the entropy of $`dS_3`$ is computed by applying Cardy’s formula for the growth of states in the asymptotic CFT - but as discussed there, there are many subtleties involved. Further, it is not clear how the entropy associated with information loss across the horizon is described by states at asymptotic infinity.

We study quantum gravity on $`dS_3`$ using the Chern-Simons formulation of Euclidean gravity in three dimensions which is described in section 3. Euclidean $`dS_3`$ has the topology of a three-sphere - we show, however, that the topology of the space that is relevant for studying the degrees of freedom that contribute to entropy is that of a solid torus. The degrees of freedom could be thought of as living on the boundary torus. Such a picture of entropy arising from degrees of freedom associated with the boundary has been studied earlier in the context of black holes in several approaches, for example ponzano ; bal ; carl ; gsv ; gks . Three dimensional Euclidean gravity with a positive cosmological constant can be described by two $`SU(2)`$ Chern-Simons theories achtow ; witten . Then, $`SU(2)`$ Wess-Zumino conformal field theories are naturally induced on the boundary witten1 . The quantum degrees of freedom corresponding to the de Sitter entropy are described by these conformal field theories. In Section 4, we derive an exact expression for the canonical partition function for $`dS_3`$ in a Euclidean path integral approach. Considerations of gauge invariance necessitate a discrete sum in the partition function over point mass configurations as well, upto a certain maximum value of the mass. The significance of this discrete sum in the partition function will be discussed in Section 5. The partition function gives the correct semi-classical entropy for de Sitter space. The next-order correction to the entropy is logarithmic in the horizon ”area” majumdar . In the last section, we comment on the logarithmic correction to the semi-classical entropy. We compare the coefficient of this correction with that obtained using the dS/CFT correspondence and find that they agree. We also make a detailed comparison with similar logarithmic terms in the entropy of the BTZ black hole. The comparison suggests a connection between the regime considered in the black hole parameter space, and the coefficient of the logarithmic correction.

## II de Sitter gravity as a Chern-Simons theory

The gravity action $`I_{grav}`$ in three dimensions written in a first-order formalism (using triads $`e`$ and spin connection $`\omega `$) is the difference of two Chern-Simons actions. For Lorentzian gravity with a positive cosmological constant,

$`I_{\text{grav}}=I_{\text{CS}}[A]I_{\text{CS}}[\overline{A}],`$ (1)
where

$`A=\left(\omega ^a+{\displaystyle \frac{i}{l}}e^a\right)T_a,\overline{A}=\left(\omega ^a{\displaystyle \frac{i}{l}}e^a\right)T_a`$ (2)
are $`\text{SL}(2,𝐂)`$ gauge fields (with $`T_a=i\sigma _a/2`$). Here, the positive cosmological constant $`\mathrm{\Lambda }=(1/l^2)`$. The Chern-Simons action $`I_{\text{CS}}[A]`$ is

$`I_{\text{CS}}={\displaystyle \frac{k}{4\pi }}{\displaystyle _M}\text{Tr}\left(AdA+{\displaystyle \frac{2}{3}}AAA\right)`$ (3)
and the Chern-Simons coupling constant is $`k=l/4G`$.

Now, for a manifold with boundary, the Chern-Simons field theory is described by a Wess-Zumino conformal field theory on the boundary. Under the decomposition

$`A=g^1dg+g^1\stackrel{~}{A}g,`$ (4)
the Chern-Simons action (3) becomes elit , ogura

$`I_{\text{CS}}[A]=I_{\text{CS}}[\stackrel{~}{A}]+kI_{\text{WZW}}^+[g,\stackrel{~}{A}_z],`$ (5)
where $`I_{\text{WZW}}^+[g,\stackrel{~}{A}_z]`$ is the action of a chiral $`SU(2)`$ Wess-Zumino model on the boundary $`M`$,

$`I_{\text{WZW}}^+[g,\stackrel{~}{A}_z]`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\pi }}{\displaystyle _M}\text{Tr}\left(g^1_zgg^1_{\overline{z}}g2g^1_{\overline{z}}g\stackrel{~}{A}_z\right)`$ (6)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{12\pi }}{\displaystyle _M}\text{Tr}\left(g^1dg\right)^3.`$
The ‘pure gauge’ degrees of freedom $`g`$ are now true dynamical degrees of freedom at the boundary.

We are interested in quantum gravity on $`dS_3`$. Global $`(2+1)d`$ de Sitter spacetime is described by the metric

$`ds^2=l^2d\tau ^2+l^2\mathrm{cosh}^2\tau d\mathrm{\Omega }^2`$ (7)
Equal time sections of this metric are two-spheres, and there are no globally timelike Killing vectors. However, there does exist a timelike Killing vector in certain patches of this spacetime. Figure 1 shows the Penrose diagram of global de Sitter space with these patches - II and IV. These regions are causally disconnected and the timelike Killing vector flows in opposite directions in these two patches. Each of these patches is bounded by the cosmological horizon, and described by the metric

$`ds^2=N^2dt^2+N^2dr^2+r^2d\varphi ^2`$ (8)
where

$`N^2=(1{\displaystyle \frac{r^2}{l^2}}),`$ (9)
and $`0rl`$. $`\varphi `$ is an angular coordinate with period $`2\pi `$. Since this metric is static, the patches II and IV are referred to as static patches. The cosmological horizon in these coordinates is therefore at $`r=l`$. Constant $`t`$ surfaces are discs $`D_2`$, and the topology of the patch is $`D_2R`$.

Using (2), the connection $`A^a`$ corresponding to the metric (8) may be written as:

$`A^0`$ $`=`$ $`N(d\varphi +{\displaystyle \frac{i}{l}}dt)`$
$`A^1`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{i}{lN}}dr`$
$`A^2`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{r}{l^2}}dt+{\displaystyle \frac{ir}{l}}d\varphi `$ (10)
## III Euclidean de Sitter space

The Euclidean gravity action is the difference of two $`SU(2)`$ Chern-Simons actions - where the connections corresponding to the two actions are real and given by $`A=\left(\omega ^a+\frac{1}{l}e^a\right)T_a`$ and $`B=\left(\omega ^a\frac{1}{l}e^a\right)T_a`$.

As is well-known, the static patch of de Sitter space (either patches II or IV in Fig. 1) represents the spacetime completely accessible to the timelike observer - whose observable universe is bounded by a cosmological horizon. Entropy of de Sitter space is associated then with loss of information across the horizon. Thus, the relevant space for a computation of de Sitter entropy is the static patch of de Sitter space. Similar ideas about the relevance of the static patch (or the ”causal diamond”) to de Sitter entropy were suggested in bousso . In ms , the entropy associated with de Sitter space was computed using the Lorentzian static patch. This, as we saw, has the topology $`D_2R`$, (where $`R`$ is the time direction) and the degrees of freedom corresponding to the entropy in this computation resided on the boundary cylinder.

We would like to compute de Sitter entropy in a Euclidean picture. As we shall see, we reproduce the entropy as in previous Lorentzian computations - but also get new results on the nature of quantum fluctuations in de Sitter space. We therefore consider the Euclidean continuation of the metric on the static patch (8). This is obtained by taking $`t_E=it`$. The metric is

$`ds^2=N^2dt_E^2+N^2dr^2+r^2d\varphi ^2`$ (11)
where $`N`$ is given by (9). In addition, for regularity of the metric, we make the Euclidean time periodic with its period $`\beta =2\pi l`$. Here, $`0rl`$. The periodicity of the Euclidean time now changes the topology of each of the static patches II and IV from the Lorentzian $`D_2R`$ to $`D_2S^1`$ \- where the $`S^1`$ direction is the compactified Euclidean time. This is nothing but a solid torus - and in the Euclidean picture, we expect the degrees of freedom corresponding to de Sitter entropy to be associated with this solid torus.

Thus we are interested in the Euclidean gravity partition function studied through two $`SU(2)`$ Chern-Simons theories on a solid torus. Corresponding to the metric (11), the connections for the two $`SU(2)`$ Chern-Simons theories are given by:

$`A^0`$ $`=`$ $`N(d\varphi +{\displaystyle \frac{1}{l}}dt_E)`$
$`A^1`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{lN}}dr`$
$`A^2`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{r}{l^2}}dt_E+{\displaystyle \frac{r}{l}}d\varphi `$ (12)
$`B^0`$ $`=`$ $`N(d\varphi +{\displaystyle \frac{1}{l}}dt_E)`$
$`B^1`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{lN}}dr`$
$`B^2`$ $`=`$ $`({\displaystyle \frac{r}{l^2}}dt_E+{\displaystyle \frac{r}{l}}d\varphi )`$ (13)
## IV Partition function for quantum gravity in de Sitter space

We use the Chern-Simons formulation of gravity to construct a partition function for gravity in de Sitter space. We saw in the last section that the manifold of interest is a solid torus. This is also the topology of the Euclidean BTZ black hole. This enables us to use the construction developed in gks  for Euclidean BTZ black holes here too.

In order to compute the de Sitter partition function, we first evaluate the Chern-Simons path integral on a solid torus. This path integral has been discussed in elit , lab1 , lab2  and hayashi . Through a suitable gauge transformation, the connection is set to a constant value on the toroidal boundary. In terms of coordinates on the toroidal boundary $`x`$ and $`y`$ with unit period, we can define $`z=(x+\tau y)`$ such that

$`{\displaystyle _a}𝑑z=1,{\displaystyle _b}𝑑z=\tau `$ (14)
where $`a`$ is the contractible cycle and $`b`$ the non-contractible cycle of the solid torus and $`\tau =\tau _1+i\tau _2`$ is the modular parameter of the boundary torus. Then, the connection can be written as lab1 :

$`A=\left({\displaystyle \frac{i\pi \stackrel{~}{u}}{\tau _2}}d\overline{z}+{\displaystyle \frac{i\pi u}{\tau _2}}dz\right)T_3`$ (15)
where $`u`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{u}`$ are canonically conjugate fields and obey the canonical commutation relation:

$`[\stackrel{~}{u},u]={\displaystyle \frac{2\tau _2}{\pi (k+2)}}`$ (16)
Since $`A`$ is an $`SU(2)`$ connection, $`\stackrel{~}{u}=\overline{u}`$, where $`\overline{u}`$ is the complex conjugate of $`u`$. For the case of the BTZ black hole, the information about the black hole parameters $`M`$ and $`J`$ is contained in the non-trivial holonomy of the connection $`A`$ around the non-contractible cycle $`b`$. In the de Sitter case the Euclidean time is associated with the non-contractible $`b`$ cycle of the solid torus. This is so because the Euclidean continuation of the Lorentzian static patch $`D_2R`$, with $`R`$ as world line of the timelike observer sitting at the center of the disc involves, besides a Wick rotation, a compactification of this line to obtain a solid torus. The holonomy of the connection around the non-contractible cycle is therefore related to the period $`\beta `$ of the Euclidean time. Similarly, the holonomy around the contractible cycle is related to the periodicity of the $`\varphi `$ coordinate. Traces of the holonomies around the contractible $`a`$ cycle and non-contractible $`b`$ cycle from connections in (12) are:

$`Tr(H_a)=2\mathrm{cos}(\mathrm{\Theta }),Tr(H_b)=2\mathrm{cos}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\beta }{l}}\right)`$ (17)
Classical de Sitter space corresponds to a value of $`\mathrm{\Theta }=2\pi `$. Now in order that the gauge fields (15) exhibit the same holonomies as above, we have

$`A_z={\displaystyle \frac{i\pi }{\tau _2}}\stackrel{~}{u},A_{\overline{z}}={\displaystyle \frac{i\pi }{\tau _2}}u`$ (18)
with

$`u={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2\pi }}\left(\mathrm{\Theta }\tau {\displaystyle \frac{\beta }{l}}\right),\stackrel{~}{u}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2\pi }}\left(\mathrm{\Theta }\overline{\tau }{\displaystyle \frac{\beta }{l}}\right)`$ (19)
Next we write the Chern-Simons path integral on a solid torus with a boundary modular parameter $`\tau `$. For a fixed boundary value of the connection, i.e. a fixed value of $`u`$, this path integral is formally equivalent to a state $`\psi _0(u,\tau )`$ with no Wilson lines in the solid torus. The states corresponding to having closed Wilson lines (along the non-contractible cycle) carrying spin $`j/2`$ ($`jk`$) representations in the solid torus are given by elit , lab1 , lab2 , hayashi :

$`\psi _j(u,\tau )=\mathrm{exp}\left\{{\displaystyle \frac{\pi k}{4\tau _2}}u^2\right\}\chi _j(u,\tau ),`$ (20)
where $`\chi _j`$ are the Weyl-Kac characters for affine $`\text{SU}(2)`$ which can be expressed in terms of the well-known Theta functions as

$`\chi _j(u,\tau )={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Theta }_{j+1}^{(k+2)}(u,\tau ,0)\mathrm{\Theta }_{j1}^{(k+2)}(u,\tau ,0)}{\mathrm{\Theta }_1^2(u,\tau ,0)\mathrm{\Theta }_1^2(u,\tau ,0)}}`$ (21)
where Theta functions are given by:

$`\mathrm{\Theta }_\mu ^k(u,\tau ,z)=\mathrm{exp}(2\pi ikz){\displaystyle \underset{n𝒵}{}}\mathrm{exp}2\pi ik\left[(n+{\displaystyle \frac{\mu }{2k}})^2\tau +(n+{\displaystyle \frac{\mu }{2k}})u\right]`$ (22)
As in the computation in gks  for the BTZ black hole, the de Sitter partition function is constructed from the boundary state $`\psi _0(u,\tau )`$. The construction is motivated by the following observations :

(a) In the Chern-Simons functional integral over a solid torus, we shall integrate over all gauge connections with fixed holonomy $`H_b`$ around the non-contractible cycle. This corresponds to the partition function with fixed period $`\beta `$ of the Euclidean time, that is, fixed inverse temperature. This in turn means we are dealing with the canonical ensemble. The variable conjugate to this holonomy is the holonomy around the other (contractible) cycle, which is not fixed any more to the classical value given by $`\mathrm{\Theta }=2\pi `$ for de Sitter space. We must sum over contributions from all possible values of $`\mathrm{\Theta }`$ in the partition function. This corresponds to starting with the value of $`u`$ for the classical solution, i.e. with $`\mathrm{\Theta }=2\pi `$ in (17), and then considering all other shifts of $`u`$ of the form

$`uu+\alpha \tau `$ (23)
where $`\alpha `$ is an arbitrary number. This is implemented by a translation operator of the form

$`T=\mathrm{exp}\left(\alpha \tau {\displaystyle \frac{}{u}}\right)`$ (24)
However, this operator is not gauge invariant. The only gauge-invariant way of implementing these translations is through Verlinde operators of the form

$`W_j={\displaystyle \underset{n\mathrm{\Lambda }_j}{}}\mathrm{exp}\left({\displaystyle \frac{n\pi \overline{\tau }u}{\tau _2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{n\tau }{k+2}}{\displaystyle \frac{}{u}}\right)`$ (25)
where $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_j=j,j+2,\mathrm{},j2,j`$. This means that all possible shifts in $`u`$ are not allowed. The only possible shifts allowed by gauge invariance are:

$`uu+{\displaystyle \frac{n\tau }{k+2}}`$ (26)
where $`n`$ is always an integer taking a maximum value of $`k`$. Thus, the only allowed values of $`\mathrm{\Theta }`$ are $`2\pi (1+\frac{n}{k+2})`$. We know that acting on the state with no Wilson lines in the solid torus with the Verlinde operator $`W_j`$ corresponds to inserting a Wilson line of spin $`j/2`$ around the non-contractible cycle. Thus, taking into account all states with different shifted values of $`u`$ as in $`(\text{26})`$ means that we have to take into account all the states in the boundary corresponding to the insertion of such Wilson lines. These are the states $`\psi _j(u,\tau )`$ given in (20).

(b) In order to obtain the final partition function, we must also integrate over all values of the modular parameter $`\tau `$, i.e. over all inequivalent tori with the same holonomy around the non-contractible cycle. The integrand, which is a function of $`u`$ and $`\tau `$, must be the square of the partition function of a gauged $`SU(2)_k`$ Wess-Zumino model corresponding to the two $`SU(2)`$ Chern-Simons theories. It must be modular invariant – modular invariance corresponds to invariance under large diffeomorphisms of the torus. The partition function is then of the form

$`Z={\displaystyle 𝑑\mu (\tau ,\overline{\tau })\left|\underset{j=0}{\overset{k}{}}a_j(\tau )\psi _j(u,\tau )\right|^2}`$ (27)
where $`d\mu (\tau ,\overline{\tau })=\frac{d\tau d\overline{\tau }}{\tau _2^2}`$ is the modular invariant measure, and the integration is over a fundamental domain in the $`\tau `$ plane. Coefficients $`a_j(\tau )`$ must be chosen such that the integrand is modular invariant.

As discussed in gks , these coefficients are given by $`a_j(\tau )=(\psi _j(0,\tau ))^{}`$ so that the partition function is uniquely fixed to be

$`Z_{dS}={\displaystyle 𝑑\mu (\tau ,\overline{\tau })\left|\underset{j=0}{\overset{k}{}}(\psi _j(0,\tau ))^{}\psi _j(u,\tau )\right|^2}`$ (28)
This is an exact expression for the canonical partition function of quantum gravity on $`dS_3`$. We now proceed to compute the partition function by substituting in the expression above the values of $`u`$ and $`\overline{u}`$ from (19) with $`\mathrm{\Theta }=2\pi `$. We work in the regime where $`k`$ (and therefore $`l`$) is large. Also, we must perform an analytic continuation to get the Lorentzian result - this is done by taking $`GG`$, and $`\beta i\beta `$. For the regime when $`k`$ is large, the leading contribution to the sum in the integrand comes from $`j=0`$ as in gks . The $`\tau _2`$ integral can in fact be done exactly. We have

$`Z_{dS}={\displaystyle _{1/2}^{1/2}}𝑑\tau _14\pi e^{\beta k/2l}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{f(\tau _1)}}K_1(k/2f(\tau _1))`$ (29)
where $`f(\tau _1)=\sqrt{\frac{\beta ^2}{l^2}4\pi ^2\tau _1^2}`$, and $`K_1`$ is the Bessel function of imaginary argument. Using the approximation for the Bessel function with large argument

$`K_1(z)=\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{\pi }{2z}}}e^z[1+O({\displaystyle \frac{1}{z}})+\mathrm{}]`$ (30)
with the replacement $`\beta =2\pi l`$ for de Sitter space, we get, in the large $`k`$ regime :

$`Z_{dS}=4\sqrt{\pi }{\displaystyle \frac{4G}{2\pi l}}e^{2\pi l/4G}`$ (31)
The form of the partition function indicates that at leading order, it is of the form $`e^S`$, where $`S=\frac{2\pi l}{4G}`$ is the semi-classical entropy. Since this is the partition function in the canonical ensemble, we would have expected an additional term $`e^{i\beta E}`$ where $`E`$ is the energy of de Sitter space. The notion of energy in asymptotically de Sitter spaces needs to be defined carefully, due to the absence of a global timelike Killing vector. The energy $`E`$ that emerges in our formalism is defined on the horizon, and not at asymptotic infinity, as has been done, for e.g in vb . Our result seems to indicate that that energy $`E`$ is zero for de Sitter space. Such a result coincides with the definition of energy as given by Abbott and Deser AD . The canonical partition function at leading order is therefore the same as the density of states. The multiplicative prefactor in (31) is the leading correction to the semi-classical result. The entropy is therefore

$`S=(2\pi l)/4G\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{2\pi l}{4G}}+\mathrm{}\mathrm{}..`$ (32)
The leading term is the semi-classical Bekenstein-Hawking entropy that is proportional to the horizon “area”. The second term is the leading correction that is logarithmic in area. In the following sections, we discuss in detail the results we have obtained - on the nature of the quantum fluctuations, and the logarithmic correction we have seen above.

## V The nature of the quantum fluctuations

In our set-up, from the choice of ensemble and considerations of gauge invariance, the partition function (28) involved insertion of closed Wilson lines of spins $`j/20`$, $`jk`$. These correspond to defects centered at the origin of the $`\varphi `$ coordinate in (11), i.e around the worldline of the timelike observer. As is well-known, such defects correspond to point masses in $`dS_3`$ deser . A point mass in $`dS_3`$ can be described in static coordinates by the metric

$`ds^2=N^2dt^2+N^2dr^2+r^2d\varphi ^2`$ (33)
where now

$`N^2=(8GM{\displaystyle \frac{r^2}{l^2}}),`$ (34)
and $`0rr_+`$ with $`r_+=l\sqrt{8GM}`$ as the radius of the cosmological horizon. Let us consider the static patch metric (33) of $`dS_3`$. Near $`r=0`$, the origin of the $`\varphi `$ coordinate, it looks like Minkowski space. Then metric (33) near $`r=0`$ can be rewritten as the Minkowski metric

$`ds^2=dt_1^2+dr_1^2+r_1^2d\varphi _1^2`$ (35)
where $`t_1=\sqrt{8GM}t`$, $`r_1=r/\sqrt{8GM}`$ and $`\varphi _1=\sqrt{8GM}\varphi `$. But since $`\varphi `$ had a periodicity $`2\pi `$, $`\varphi _1`$ has a periodicity $`2\pi \sqrt{8GM}`$. Thus the deficit angle at $`r=0`$ is $`2\pi (1\sqrt{8GM})`$, i.e $`2\pi (1\frac{r_+}{l})`$. When $`r_+=l`$, the deficit is zero, and we have de Sitter space.

In the partition function (28), there is a discrete sum over deficits in the $`\varphi `$ coordinate - from (26), the deficits are of the form $`2\pi \frac{n}{k+2}`$ where $`n`$ is an integer taking the maximum value of $`k`$. $`n=0`$ corresponds to de Sitter space, i.e no deficit. Thus from the discussion above, we see that $`(1\frac{r_+}{l})=\frac{n}{k+2}`$. The maximum deficit possible is $`n=k`$. Thus there seems to be a maximum allowed value for the ”mass” of the point particle, $`M`$. Interestingly, this relation also implies that $`r_+`$, and therefore the mass of the point particle takes only a discrete number of values, labelled by the integer $`n`$. Though classically all values of deficit angle between $`0`$ and $`2\pi `$ are allowed, gauge invariant quantization allowed only discrete set of values.

There is another interesting observation : In the computation of the de Sitter partition function (28), we set $`\mathrm{\Theta }=2\pi `$ \- which corresponds to de Sitter space. Thus the partition function describes quantum fluctuations on the de Sitter background. We could instead choose any value of $`\mathrm{\Theta }`$ from $`0`$ to $`2\pi `$. Then the partition function would correspond to fluctuations around a background with the corresponding point mass. What does that partition function look like? The exercise done in the previous section can be repeated for this case - and surprisingly, the leading answer is the same! Quantum fluctuations of any such background are point masses taking the same set of discrete values as above. The dominant contribution to the partition function again comes from spin $`j=0`$, which corresponds to empty de Sitter space. Doing the computation carefully (taking into account the changed value of the temperature), we find that to the leading order, the entropy is the same as that of de Sitter space, i.e $`S=(2\pi l)/4G`$. However, the logarithmic corrections to the entropy are more complicated now and carry the information about the point mass parameter. All this strongly suggests a quantization of point mass configurations in a quantum theory of gravity on $`dS_3`$. Also, since the leading contribution to the entropy always comes from empty de Sitter space, this presents an explicit realisation of the entropy bound of Bousso bousso  in three dimensions.

## VI The log(area) correction to the semi-classical entropy

We note that in the expression for entropy (32), the correction to the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy is logarithmic in area, with a coefficient $`1`$. The logarithmic correction has been observed in many computations of black hole entropy in quantum gravity. It was first computed for the (3+1)-d Schwarzschild black hole in the quantum geometry formulation of gravity - where, for a large massive black hole, the next order log(area) correction had a numerical coefficient, $`3/2`$ majumdar . Subsequently, this correction (with the same numerical coefficient!) has been seen in computations of the (2+1)-d BTZ black hole entropy in various approaches majumdar , gks , leading to the question of whether this coefficient is universal. Below, we clarify several issues related to the universality of this coefficient. Incidentally, the logarithmic correction with a different coefficient was seen in a one-loop computation of the correction to the entropy of the BTZ black hole (of small horizon area) due to a scalar field sm . However, our discussion of the logarithmic coefficient is the correction due to quantum gravity fluctuations, and distinct from corrections due to scalar fields or other matter coupled to the black hole.

The computation of BTZ black hole entropy in gks  was done in the same (Chern-Simons) formulation as the de Sitter case, and the numerical coefficient of the logarithmic term was $`3/2`$, whereas for the de Sitter case, it is $`1`$. This is somewhat puzzling at first glance. The black hole entropy was computed in the regime $`r_+>>l`$, where $`r_+`$ is the black hole horizon radius and $`l`$ is the $`AdS`$ radius of curvature. Then, there was an integral over the modular parameter similar to (28). The saddle-point for $`\tau _2`$, the imaginary part of the modular parameter occured when $`\tau _2=r_+/l`$. Thus this was the regime when $`\tau _2`$ was large. An interesting observation was made in gks  that replacing $`r_+/l`$ in the black hole partition function by $`l/r_+`$, where now $`r_+<<l`$, the $`AdS`$ gas partition function was obtained, with the coefficient of the correction being $`+3/2`$. This corresponds to a situation where the modular parameter $`\tau _2=r_+/l`$ is small. What happens when $`r_+l`$, i.e $`\tau _21`$? In fact, this is very similar to the de Sitter case, since the de Sitter horizon radius is exactly $`l`$! The computation follows similar lines and leads to similar results. It can in fact be verified directly from (28) that the saddle-point is at $`\tau _2=1`$. Here, we see that the coefficient of the logarithmic correction is $`1`$. Thus, the coefficient of the correction seems to depend on the regime one is looking at. When, as in the above case, there are two independent length parameters $`l`$ and $`r_+`$, only for $`r_+>>l`$ do we get the coefficient $`3/2`$.

Summarising our result for BTZ black hole we find:

$`Forr_+>>lS`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2\pi r_+}{4G}}{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}\mathrm{log}({\displaystyle \frac{2\pi r_+}{4G}})+\mathrm{}`$
$`r_+=lS`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2\pi r_+}{4G}}\mathrm{log}({\displaystyle \frac{2\pi r_+}{4G}})+\mathrm{}`$
$`r_+<<lS`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2\pi l^2}{4r_+G}}+{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}\mathrm{log}({\displaystyle \frac{r_+}{l}})+\mathrm{}`$ (36)
where the last expression in (36) for $`r_+<<l`$ is the entropy of the AdS gas.

The above results are reminiscent of a duality proposed in corichi  between the Euclidean BTZ black hole and Lorentzian de Sitter spaces. There, the classical holonomy of the connection in the black hole case was related to the ratio $`r_+/l`$. From the duality, this was also the holonomy of the connection in a de Sitter space with a point mass, the mass being related to the parameter $`r_+`$. In particular, vacuum de Sitter space corresponds to $`r_+=l`$. Although this duality is only at the level of actions (for a Lorentzian theory with positive $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ and a Euclidean one with negative $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$), we find here that a BTZ black hole with horizon radius $`r_+=l`$ and vacuum de Sitter space have the same entropy - both at the leading and sub-leading order!

Let us examine (29) closer to understand how the coefficient of the logarithmic correction in the de Sitter case is $`1`$. Using the asymptotic expansion of the Bessel function (30), we see that the $`\tau _2`$ integration contributes a logarithmic term with a coefficient $`1/2`$. The $`\tau _1`$ integration also contributes the same and the coefficient is thus $`1`$.

Entropy of de Sitter space can also studied from an alternative point of view by using dS/CFT correspondence strominger . In this framework all the information about quantum gravity in the bulk is expected to be contained in the conformal field theory at past or future infinity. The CFT is described by considering all possible metric fluctuations keeping the asymptotic behaviour to be de Sitter space. It consists of two copies of Virasaro algebras, each with central charge $`c=3l/2G`$. As shown in park ; vb ; myung , the eigenvalues of the Virasoro generators $`L_0`$ and $`\overline{L}_0`$ for de Sitter space are both equal to $`l/8G`$. Using the Rademacher expansion for modular forms, one can generalize the Cardy formula for growth of states in a CFT beyond the leading term. In bsen , the sub-leading correction to the entropy of a BTZ black hole was determined from this generalisation. We use these results to find the sub-leading corrections to the de Sitter entropy from the dS/CFT correspondence. From bsen , the entropy obtained from a CFT with a given the central charge $`c`$ and eigenvalue of the Virasoro generator $`L_0=N`$, is given by

$`S_1=S_03/2\mathrm{log}S_0+\mathrm{log}c+\mathrm{}\mathrm{}.`$ (37)
where $`S_0=2\pi \sqrt{\frac{c}{6}(N\frac{c}{24})}`$. This is the contribution from the Virasoro generator $`L_0`$. There is a similar contribution $`S_2`$ associated with the Virasoro generator $`\overline{L}_0`$, given by replacing $`N`$ in the above by $`\overline{N}`$, the eigenvalue of $`\overline{L}_0`$.

Substituting $`c=3l/2G`$ and $`N=\overline{N}=l/8G`$ in the above, we see that

$`S=S_1+S_2=2\pi l/4G\mathrm{log}{\displaystyle \frac{2\pi l}{4G}}+\mathrm{}.`$ (38)
with the same coefficient $`1`$ for the logarithmic correction as that obtained from the gravity partition function (31) in (32). Here, the contribution from each of $`S_1`$ and $`S_2`$ to the logarithmic correction was $`1/2\mathrm{log}\frac{2\pi l}{4G}`$.

Thus, the quantum gravity calculation of de Sitter entropy and the entropy computation from the asymptotic CFT agree even in the sub-leading correction to the Bekenstein-Hawking term.

## VII Acknowledgement

$`V.S`$ would like to acknowledge support of a fellowship from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.


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# Structure in the Dusty Debris around Vega1footnote 11footnote 1Based on observations carried out with the IRAM Plateau de Bure Interferometer. IRAM is supported by INSU/CNRS (France), MPG (Germany) and IGN (Spain).

## 1 Introduction

The Infrared Astronomical Satellite (IRAS) measured a far-infrared flux from the vicinity of the main sequence star Vega greatly in excess of the photospheric emission (Aumann et al. 1984). We now know that main sequence stars with excess infrared emission, the “Vega-excess” stars, are common, and that this phenomenon represents circumstellar dust particles heated by stellar radiation (see the reviews by Backman & Paresce 1993, Lagrange, Backman & Artymowicz 2000, and Zuckerman 2001). Because dust destruction by Poynting-Robertson (P-R) drag and sublimation happens on a timescale shorter than main-sequence lifetimes, the dust orbiting Vega-excess stars must be continually replenished by the collisions of larger orbiting bodies, possibly analogous to Kuiper Belt objects.

Imaging and photometry of Vega-excess stars suggest that these systems commonly contain clouds of dust and debris shaped like disks or rings (e.g. Smith & Terrile 1984, Jayawardhana et al. 1998, Koerner et al. 1998). Some images contain hints that massive planets may help to sculpt the clouds; many are evacuated interior to a radius of 10 to 80 AU. Recent observations at 850 $`\mu `$m with the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope (JCMT) have provided the first detailed images of the dust emission around several of these stars, including Vega (Holland et al. 1998, Greaves et al. 1999, Dent et al. 2000). At $`14^{\prime \prime }`$ resolution, the 850 $`\mu `$m images of Vega, $`ϵ`$ Eridani, Fomalhaut, and $`\beta `$ Pictoris reveal emission peaks offset from the stars. The origin of these peaks is not clear. Some authors have modeled them as concentrations of dust trapped by planets, assuming planets on roughly circular orbits (Liou & Zook 1999, Ozernoy et al. 2000)

Millimeter wavelength interferometry offers a way to obtain high-resolution information on the emission structures around nearby Vega-excess stars, including the central cavities and mysterious offset emission peaks. Vega, an A0V star just 7.76 pc away, is positioned favorably in the northern sky for existing millimeter wavelength interferometers, and it appears to be viewed nearly pole-on, which simplifies the interpretation of its images (Gulliver et al. 1994). Recently, Koerner, Sargent & Ostroff (2001) presented an image of Vega at 1.3 mm from the Owens Valley Radio Observatory (OVRO) that resolves several emission peaks confined to a circumstellar ring. In this Letter, we present new interferometric observations of Vega with better sensitivity that reveal intriguing asymmetries in the locations of the emission peaks. These asymmetries may be the dynamical signature of a planet of a few Jupiter masses in a highly eccentric orbit.

## 2 Observations

We observed Vega in the 1.3 mm and 3 mm bands simultaneously with the IRAM Plateau de Bure interferometer (PdBI). Table 1 summarizes the observational parameters. The total integration time on source was about 23 hours, in excellent weather with precipitable water vapor content less than 3 mm and r.m.s. phase errors less than $`30^{}`$ at 1.3 mm. Flux densities were set with reference to the standard source MWC349, and the systematic uncertainties in the flux scale are estimated to be about 20%.

## 3 Results

### 3.1 1.3 mm continuum

Figure 1 shows three 1.3 mm images of the Vega field that emphasize features in the visibility data of different spatial extent and surface brightness.

Figure 1a shows a high resolution view ($`2\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}8\times 2\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}1`$), which is dominated by emission from the stellar photosphere at a position consistent with the image center (see Downes et al. 1999 for a discussion of astrometric errors). A least squares point source fit to the visibility data gives flux density $`1.7\pm 0.13`$ mJy. Given the systematic uncertainties in the flux scale, the measured flux density is consistent with the 2.3 mJy expected from an extrapolation to longer wavelengths of the photospheric model of Cohen et al. (1992). The uncertainties also accommodate a small contribution from warm dust within 5 AU of the star, suggested by near-infrared interferometry (Ciardi et al. 2001). The detection of the unresolved star provides an excellent internal check on the calibration and data quality.

Figure 1b shows a lower resolution image obtained by applying a taper to the visibility data to increase the surface brightness sensitivity ($`4\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}8\times 4\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}4`$). Two additional emission peaks become apparent, one offset $`8\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}0`$ to the southwest of the star (position angle $`224^{}`$), and the other offset $`9\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}5`$ to the northeast of the star (position angle $`13^{}`$). The uncertainties in the peak locations and position angles are $`\pm 0\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}5`$ and $`\pm 10^{}`$, respectively. The northeast-southwest orientation of the peaks corresponds closely to the orientation of the barely resolved structure in the JCMT image at 850 $`\mu `$m (Holland et al. 1998), and the positions of the peaks are similar to the main significant features in the OVRO image at 1.3 mm (Koerner et al. 2001). The OVRO image shows two additional peaks along an arc northeast of the star that are not apparent in the PdBI data. The origin of this difference is not clear, but it may reflect the inherent difficulties in low signal-to-noise imaging of extended emission near the edge of the field of view. More data with better sensitivity are needed to verify the reality of these extra features.

Figure 1c shows an image made with a more extreme taper ($`5\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}3\times 4\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}6`$ p.a. $`15^{}`$), after subtracting from the visibility data the point source contribution of the central star. This image best isolates the two offset emission peaks. The fluxes obtained from fitting two elliptical Gaussians to the visibilities are $`7.1\pm 1.4`$ mJy and $`4.3\pm 1.0`$ mJy for the northeast peak and southwest peak, respectively. The quoted uncertainties include the formal errors in the fits and corrections for primary beam attenuation, but not the systematic errors in the flux scale. The summed flux in the peaks of $`11.4\pm 1.7`$ mJy is consistent with that measured from the OVRO image, and it represents a sizeable fraction of the total dust emission in the system by extrapolation from the 850 $`\mu `$m data. Assuming standard dust mass opacities (see Holland et al. 1998), the mass of emitting dust in each peak is less than 0.3 lunar masses.

### 3.2 3.3 mm continuum

No significant emission at 3.3 mm is detected from either the star or the offset peaks, with an r.m.s. noise level of 0.13 mJy in a $`7\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}8\times 4\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}8`$ beam. These upper limits are consistent with a $`\nu ^2`$ blackbody spectrum for the star and a steeper spectrum for the dust peaks.

### 3.3 CO J=2–1 line

The channel maps shows no evidence for CO J=2–1 line emission. The limit is 0.05 K ($`3\sigma `$) in a 12 km s-1 velocity bin and $`2\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}8\times 2\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}1`$ beam. This limit rules out beam dilution as an explanation for previous nondetections of CO emission (Dent et al. 1995). As discussed by Kamp & Bertoldi (2000), the CO molecules in the Vega environment are likely destroyed by photodissociation, and the CO emission does not reliably trace molecular gas content.

## 4 Discussion

The new high resolution 1.3 mm imaging is consistent with the inference from previous observations that the Vega debris takes the form of a clumpy ring viewed nearly pole-on.

Several explanations for the emission peaks are viable. They could conceivably represent dust clouds released by recent collisions of planetesimals. The collisions would have to be recent since such clouds would disperse in $``$10–100 orbital periods, and the planetesimals must be massive enough that their collisions release a substantial fraction of a lunar mass in dust. It has been suggested that the emission peaks may represent planets which appear larger than they are because they have somehow retained circumplanetary disks (Holland et al. 1998). The presence of two emission peaks in the Vega system would call for two such planets (or one planet and one cloud). Alternatively, the peaks could be due to unrelated background galaxies, though this is very unlikely given recent source counts (Blain et al. 1999, Chapman et al. 2002).

A more likely scenario is that the two emission peaks represent dust clumps created by the dynamical influence of an unseen planet or planets. For example, in our Solar System, the Earth (and probably Neptune) temporarily traps interplanetary dust as it spirals inward via P-R drag in a series of first-order mean motion resonances (MMRs) to produce a ring of enhanced dust density along the Earth’s orbit (Dermott et al. 1994, Liou & Zook 1999). Astrometric limits exclude a companion to Vega more massive than 12 Jupiter masses with a period less than 7 years (Gatewood & de Jonge 1995), and imaging searches near Vega have failed to detect objects as bright as 12 Jupiter mass brown dwarfs (Holland et al. 1998). However, a less massive companion– still massive enough to thoroughly reorganize a debris cloud– may yet have escaped detection.

Most of the known extrasolar planets do not resemble Earth or Neptune; they are more massive than Saturn and often have significant orbital eccentricities (Marcy & Butler 2000). Models of Jupiter mass planets on eccentric orbits interacting with inward-spiraling dust particles suggest that such a planet often does not create a ring, but may create a pair of orbiting dust clumps (Kuchner & Holman 2001). The two dust enhancements are generally not co-linear with the star, and typically one is farther from the star than the other. We suggest that if the emission peaks in the PdBI images of Vega represent dust concentrations created by the dynamical influence of a planet, then their asymmetries point to a Jupiter mass planet with an eccentric orbit.

Low mass planets and planets with nearly circular orbits trap dust in resonances near the planet (Roques et al. 1994, Ozernoy et al. 2000). For a Jupiter mass planet with an eccentric orbit, more distant resonances may trap significant quantities of dust. The principal resonances, where the planet orbits roughly $`n`$ times for every one orbit of the particle, are the strongest of the distant MMRs. The 2:1, 3:1, 4:1, and 5:1 resonances are located at semimajor axes $`a`$1.59, 2.08, 2.52, 2.92 times the semimajor axis of the planet’s orbit, respectively.

Dust approaching a massive, eccentric planet is typically trapped in the exterior principal resonances with resonant arguments of the form:

$$\sigma =(k+1)\lambda \lambda _p(k1)\varpi \varpi _p,$$
(1)
where $`k=1,2,3,\mathrm{}`$, $`\lambda `$ and $`\lambda _p`$ are the mean longitudes, and $`\varpi `$ and $`\varpi _p`$ are the longitudes of periastron of the particle and planet, respectively. Take the longitude of periastron of the planet as the reference angle ($`\varpi _p0`$). In these resonances, $`\sigma `$ oscillates about zero. These terms share a peculiar property. When a particle is at periastron ($`\lambda =\varpi `$), $`\sigma =2\varpi \lambda _p0`$. So, when the planet has mean longitude $`\lambda _p`$, trapped particles with longitudes of periastron at $`\varpi =\lambda _p/2`$ and $`\varpi =\lambda _p/2+\pi `$ must be near periastron. This resonance condition creates two dust concentrations which appear to revolve around the star at half the planet’s orbital frequency. The patterns from different resonances (e.g. 3:1 and 4:1) occur at the same longitude and reinforce each other. The concentrations are only wave-like patterns in the dust distribution; the actual particles orbit more slowly than the pattern. Secular and resonant effects on the particles’ eccentricities and longitudes of periastron create the asymmetries between the two concentrations of dust.

To illustrate how a cloud of particles in these principal resonances might appear, we created a model image by numerically integrating the orbits of 500 test particles under the influence of gravity from Vega and a single planet, radiation pressure, and P-R drag. We performed the integration with a symplectic $`n`$-body map (Wisdom & Holman 1991) to which we added terms representing radiation pressure and P-R drag, a dissipative force (Cordeiro et al. 1996, Mikkola 1998, Kehoe 2000).

The effect of stellar radiation on dust particles is parameterized by $`\beta `$, the ratio of the radiation pressure force to the gravitational force (Burns et al. 1979). For spherical particles with density 2 g cm-3 orbiting Vega ($`M_0=2.5M_{}`$, $`L_0=60L_{}`$), $`\beta =6.84/s`$, where $`s`$ is the particle radius in $`\mu `$m. The IRAS spectral energy distribution of Vega suggests that particles smaller than $`80\mu `$m contribute little to the emission. For this model, we chose $`\beta =0.01`$, which corresponds to a particle size of $`685\mu `$m.

The planet was given a mass of 3 Jupiter masses, an orbit with a semimajor axis of 40 AU, and an orbital eccentricity of 0.6. The test particles were placed near 108 AU from Vega with small free eccentricity ($`e0.2`$) and small free longitude of periastron ($`\varpi \varpi _p`$). The particles were also given slight initial inclinations ($`i4^{}`$) and random longitudes of ascending node. The integrations ran for $`4\times 10^8`$ years, the estimated age of Vega, using a step size of 5 years. A typical millimeter sized particle was ejected by the planet in $`10^8`$ years after capture into resonance.

The role of collisions among dust particles, ignored in our models, is uncertain. The optical depth of brightest dust concentration is $`10^3`$, which implies a collisional timescale of $`10^7`$ years. This is shorter than the P-R timescale of $`10^8`$ years for millimeter sized grains, so such grains could not migrate far from their source before a collision. However, this optical depth is not representative of the whole disk. Furthermore, for a steady-state size distribution that results from a collisional cascade, most of the mass is concentrated in the larger bodies while most of the area is concentrated in the smaller bodies (Dohnanyi 1969). Most collisions are not catastrophic. Grains that are broken up are fragmented by a particles with just enough mass to do so. Thus the collisional fragments have velocities nearly identical to the parent body (Wyatt et al. 1999). Therefore, the collisional timescale above is likely an underestimate. Nevertheless, if the collisional timescale is short, then this argues for source debris which is itself near or in a principal resonance. A resonant population of source bodies could be trapped by a migrating planet, as Neptune may have trapped the plutinos (Malhotra 1995). Here we consider only trapping via the migration of dust particles, in order to illustrate the basic geometry of the resonant structures.

We simulated snapshots of the dust cloud by creating histograms of the particle positions calculated for particular orbital phases of the planet, and converted these histograms, which model the dust column density, into simulated 1.3 mm emission images by multiplying them by the Planck emissivity for blackbody particles at the appropriate distance from Vega. The left panel of Figure 2 shows the simulated 1.3 mm emission where the planet is at mean anomaly $`100^{}`$. At this time, the planet is located 36.9 AU ($`4\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}8`$) west and 40.6 AU ($`5\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}2`$) north of Vega. The right panel of Figure 2 shows the result of imaging the model brightness distribution using the visibility sampling of the PdBI observations of Vega. The spatial filtering property of the interferometer tends to suppress the smooth components of the model brightness and to emphasize the peaks. The simulated image qualitatively reproduces the observed asymmetries. Figure 3 shows the same model, scaled to 850 $`\mu `$m using the observed spectral index, adding a 5 mJy point source to account for the star, convolved to match the resolution of the JCMT image of Holland et al. (1998). Like the JCMT image, this low resolution view of the model shows a central brightening extending in the northeast-southwest direction within a nearly circular boundary.

This numerical model is meant to be representative. A range of planet and dust parameters can capture the main features of the observations. In particular, the two dust concentrations would stand out more from the extended disk if the parent bodies that generate the dust were constrained to lie in the principal resonances. We defer a detailed description of the dynamics and an investigation of the planet parameters to future papers. If the planet mass is 3 Jupiter masses, then it may be as bright as 18th magnitude in H band (Burrows et al. 1997) and potentially accessible to direct imaging.

Planets found in radial velocity surveys at $`a<3`$ AU often follow eccentric orbits, but the asymmetric dust ring of Vega may be the first sign of a highly eccentric planet at $`a>30`$ AU. Thommes et al. (1999) have suggested that Neptune was scattered into a highly eccentric orbit early in the life of the Solar System, and subsequently, its eccentricity was damped by interactions with the primordial Kuiper Belt. Perhaps we are witnessing a similar phase in the evolution of the Vega system.

We acknowledge the IRAM staff from the Plateau de Bure and from Grenoble for carrying out the observations and for their help during the data reduction. We are especially grateful to Roberto Neri for his assistance. Partial support for this work was provided by NASA Origins of Solar Systems Program Grant NAG5-8195.


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# Storage of light: A useful concept?

## Abstract

We show both analytically and numerically that photons from a probe pulse are not stored in several recent experiments. Rather, they are absorbed to produce a two-photon excitation. More importantly, when an identical coupling pulse is re-injected into the medium, we show that the regenerated optical field has a pulse width that is very different from the original probe field. It is therefore, not a faithful copy of the original probe pulse.

Nonlinear optics, adiabatic approximation.
Recent experiments  on the extremely slow propagation of a pair of optical pulses in a resonant medium and the subsequent coherent regeneration of the “probe” pulse have generated much excitement in the fields of optical computing and quantum optics. The physical explanation offered to these extraordinary phenomena rests on the adiabatic theory developed a decade ago by Eberly and coworkers. To a large degree, the “dark-state polariton” theory  and all other recent works formulated around it are basically a field theoretical reformulation of the adiabatic approximation of pulse pair propagation in resonant media originally studied reasonably complete in the early 90’s. These new treatments have provided some further understanding of the process, especially from the view point of atomic spin wave excitation and atomic coherence. Two main results of the these works, however, do not, in our view, accurately describe the physical picture of such a highly nonlinear excitation process. In this letter, we show, based on the adiabatic theory, that the claim of the “revival of the probe pulse” in recent experiments  is not accurate. Indeed, we show that under the conditions of these experiments the original probe photons are neither “stopped” or “stored”. Rather, they are absorbed to produce two-photon excitation. Furthermore, we show that the “ retrieval of the probe pulse” is not achieved without restrictions being placed on the characteristics of the second coupling pulse used to regenerate the “probe” field. In fact, we show that the regenerated field has time-spectra characteristics that are very different from the original probe field. Therefore, “storage of light” is not an accurate description of the process. In addition, we show that all experimental observables can be well predicted with the usual treatment of combining classical electrodynamics and the three-state model without invoking a full field theoretical methodology. This is not surprising since when a detailed handling of spontaneous emission is not critical and the fields are not extremely weak, a mean-field approximation to the quantum treatment of the electromagnetic field is valid. Our analysis and results on the physical picture are unique and provide a clear understandings of the physical process. To the best of our knowledge the subtle understandings presented here on the “tapped light” problem are not contained in either the original studies or any of the subsequent studies, including all recent theoretical works, on the subject.

We start with a $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ system (Fig. 1) with the assumption that a probe laser ($`E_p`$, frequency $`\omega _p`$) is tuned on or near resonance with the $`|1>|2>`$ transition. In addition, a coupling laser ($`E_c`$, frequency $`\omega _c`$) is tuned so that exact two-photon resonance between states $`|1>`$ and $`|3>`$ is achieved. We therefore have the following atomic equations of motion

$`{\displaystyle \frac{A_1}{t_r}}`$ $`=`$ $`i\mathrm{\Omega }_pA_2,`$ (1a)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{A_2}{t_r}}`$ $`=`$ $`i\mathrm{\Omega }_p^{}A_1+i\mathrm{\Omega }_c^{}A_3+i\left(\delta +i{\displaystyle \frac{\gamma _2}{2}}\right)A_2,`$ (1b)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{A_3}{t_r}}`$ $`=`$ $`i\mathrm{\Omega }_cA_2,`$ (1c)
where $`A_j`$ and $`\gamma _j`$ are the $`jth`$ amplitude of the atomic wave function and decay rate, respectively, and we have made phase transformation to remove $`z`$ dependent phase factors. Also, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{p(c)}^{}=D_{21(23)}E_{p(c)}/(2\mathrm{})`$, $`\delta =\omega _p\omega _{21}`$, $`\omega _p\omega _c=\omega _{31}`$, and $`t_r=tz/c`$ is the retarded time which, in vacuum, is the combination of $`t`$ and $`z`$ that the laser field amplitudes depend on. Notice that we have included non-vanishing one-photon detuning $`0\delta <\mathrm{\Omega }_c`$, a feature that is not included in both the original adiabatic theory and those developed recently around the “dark-state polariton” theory.

In order to correctly predict the propagation of the probe and coupling laser pulses in a resonant medium, Eq.(1) must be solved simultaneously with Maxwell equations describing the propagation of the probe and coupling fields. For plane waves in the slowly varying amplitude approximation the Maxwell equations resume the form

$`\left({\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_p^{}}{z}}\right)_{t_r}`$ $`=`$ $`i\kappa _{12}A_1^{}A_2,`$ (2a)
$`\left({\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_c^{}}{z}}\right)_{t_r}`$ $`=`$ $`i\kappa _{32}A_3^{}A_2,`$ (2b)
where $`\kappa _{12(32)}=2\pi N\omega _{p(c)}|D_{12(32)}|^2/(\mathrm{}c)`$. The process involves first seeking, from Eq.(1), an adiabatic solution for the atomic response, and applying the result to Eq.(2) to self-consistently describe the propagation of the pulse pair within the adiabatic limit. Following this procedure, we thus obtain adiabatic solution to the atomic response

$`A_1(z,t_r)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_c^{}(z,t_r)}{\mathrm{\Omega }(z,t_r)}},`$ (3a)
$`A_2(z,t_r)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{i}{\mathrm{\Omega }_p}}{\displaystyle \frac{A_1}{t_r}}={\displaystyle \frac{i}{\mathrm{\Omega }_c}}{\displaystyle \frac{A_3}{t_r}},`$ (3b)
$`A_3(z,t_r)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_p^{}(z,t_r)}{\mathrm{\Omega }(z,t_r)}}.`$ (3c)
where $`\mathrm{\Omega }(z,t_r)=\sqrt{|\mathrm{\Omega }_p(z,t_r)|^2+|\mathrm{\Omega }_c(z,t_r)|^2}`$. As usual, with the adiabatic approximation used in a resonance situation, we must have $`\mathrm{\Omega }_c`$ already strong when $`\mathrm{\Omega }_p`$ starts to build up. One scenario where the adiabatic approximation would hold through the whole laser pulse is if the two lasers peak at the same time, but the pulse length of the coupling laser is much longer. This feature of the pulse lengths and the requirement $`|\mathrm{\Omega }_c\tau |>>1`$ through the pulse length, $`\tau `$, of the probe laser will make results based on the adiabatic approximation quite accurate.

With Eq.(3) as atomic response, we now solve Eq.(2) that now resumes the form of

$$\left(\frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_{p(c)}^{}}{z}\right)_{t_r}=\frac{\kappa _{12(32)}\tau }{\sqrt{|\tau \mathrm{\Omega }_c|^2+|\tau \mathrm{\Omega }_p|^2}}\frac{}{t_r/\tau }\left(\frac{\tau \mathrm{\Omega }_{p(c)}^{}}{\sqrt{|\tau \mathrm{\Omega }_c|^2+|\tau \mathrm{\Omega }_p|^2}}\right).$$
(4)
We first note that the quantity

$$F(z,t_r)=\frac{|\mathrm{\Omega }_p|^2}{\kappa _{12}}+\frac{|\mathrm{\Omega }_c|^2}{\kappa _{32}}$$
(5)
represents the sum of the photon fluxes at $`\omega _p`$ and $`\omega _c`$ divided by the concentration of the medium through which the waves propagate. Differentiate $`F`$ with respect to $`z`$ while holding $`t_r`$ fixed and apply Eq.(4), we immediately reach the conclusion that $`F`$ depends only on $`t_r`$. This permits one to evaluate $`F`$ by evaluating it at $`z=0`$, the entrance to the atomic vapor cell, e.g.

$$F(z=0,t)=\frac{|\mathrm{\Omega }_c(0,t)|^2}{\kappa _{32}}+\frac{|\mathrm{\Omega }_p(0,t)|^2}{\kappa _{12}}.$$
(6)
Therefore, whenever $`F(z,t_r)`$ occurs it can be replaced by $`F(0,t_r)`$, as determined in Eq.(6). The lack of dependence of this quantity on $`z`$ when the full set of equations is solved numerically is an important test for the validity of the adiabatic approximation.

Let us consider, for simplicity, the case where $`\kappa _{12}=\kappa _{32}`$. Since $`\sqrt{|\mathrm{\Omega }_c|^2+|\mathrm{\Omega }_p|^2}`$ does not depend on $`z`$ when $`t_r`$ is held fixed, Eq.(4) can be recast into

$$\frac{}{z}\left(\frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_{p(c)}^{}\tau }{\sqrt{|\mathrm{\Omega }_c\tau |^2+|\mathrm{\Omega }_p\tau |^2}}\right)=\frac{\kappa _{12(32)}\tau }{|\mathrm{\Omega }_c\tau |^2+|\mathrm{\Omega }_p\tau |^2}\frac{}{t_r/\tau }\left(\frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_{p(c)}^{}\tau }{\sqrt{|\mathrm{\Omega }_c\tau |^2+|\mathrm{\Omega }_p\tau |^2}}\right).$$
(7)
Define

$`W_p`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_p^{}\tau }{\sqrt{|\mathrm{\Omega }_c\tau |^2+|\mathrm{\Omega }_p\tau |^2}}},W_c={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_c^{}\tau }{\sqrt{|\mathrm{\Omega }_c\tau |^2+|\mathrm{\Omega }_p\tau |^2}}},`$ (8a)
$`v(t_r)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle _{\mathrm{}}^{t_r/\tau }}\left(|\mathrm{\Omega }_c(0,t_r^{^{}})\tau |^2+|\mathrm{\Omega }_p(0,t_r^{^{}})\tau |^2\right)d\left({\displaystyle \frac{t_r^{^{}}}{\tau }}\right),u(z)={\displaystyle _0^z}\kappa _{12}\tau 𝑑z^{^{}},`$ (8b)
Equation (7) now becomes

$`{\displaystyle \frac{W_p}{u}}+{\displaystyle \frac{W_p}{v}}`$ $`=`$ $`0,`$ (9a)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{W_c}{u}}+{\displaystyle \frac{W_c}{v}}`$ $`=`$ $`0,`$ (9b)
where general “travelling wave” type solutions are immediately obtained as

$`W_p`$ $`=`$ $`F_p(vu),`$ (10a)
$`W_c`$ $`=`$ $`F_c(vu).`$ (10b)
The functions $`F_p`$ and $`F_c`$ are easily determined by evaluating at $`z=0`$ (so $`u=0`$). When the second coupling laser pulse is injected into the medium after a time delay, the predictions about the revival of the “probe” pulse are all contained in this solution. The tabulation of $`F_p`$ remains the same as long as only a second coupling pulse is sent into the medium at a later time. Notice that if $`|\mathrm{\Omega }_p(z,t_r)|^2<<|\mathrm{\Omega }_c(z,t_r)|^2`$, the population in state $`|3>`$ is always small and the coupling laser propagates as in vacuum. In this limit, with the replacement of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_c(z,t_r)=\mathrm{\Omega }_c(0,t_r)`$, Eq. (10) can still be used to determine $`\mathrm{\Omega }_p(z,t_r)`$ even for $`\kappa _{12}\kappa _{32}`$. This is the essence of the approximations applied in the works by Ref..

We now examine the wave propagation and “probe revival” with the field profiles

$`\mathrm{\Omega }_p(0,t)`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}e^{(\frac{t}{\tau })^2},`$ (11a)
$`\mathrm{\Omega }_c(0,t)`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{c0}\left(e^{0.2(\frac{t}{\tau })^2}+Re^{0.2(\frac{t}{\tau }x_0)^2}\right).`$ (11b)
Here, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{c0}`$ are real constants characterizing the peak amplitudes of the two half-Rabi frequencies before the pulses enter the resonant medium, $`R`$ is the ratio of the Rabi frequency at which the coupling laser recurs to its initial amplitude, and $`x_0=t_d/\tau `$ is the value of $`t_r/\tau `$ at which the peak of the coupling laser recurs.

We first consider the case where $`R=0`$ and the group velocity of the probe pulse is sufficiently small so that the coupling laser dies away before the probe pulse can propagate through the cell. When the coupling laser begins to die out, the intensity of the two lasers becomes proportional to each other, therefore the relation

$$v(t_r)|\mathrm{\Omega }_{c0}\tau |^2\sqrt{5\pi /2}+|\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}\tau |^2\sqrt{\pi /2}$$
(12)
is appropriate. Also, $`|\mathrm{\Omega }_p(0,t_r)|^2`$ has long been very small compared with $`|\mathrm{\Omega }_c(0,t_r)|^2`$. Thus, for $`t_r/\tau >3.0`$ we have, as a very good approximation

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_p^{}(z,t_r)\mathrm{\Omega }(0,t_r)F_p((|\mathrm{\Omega }_{c0}\tau |^2\sqrt{5\pi /2}+|\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}\tau |^2\sqrt{\pi /2})\kappa _{12}\tau z).$$
(13)
At such a late time during the pulse, the argument of $`F_p`$ depends only on the $`z`$ coordinate so that the time dependence of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_p^{}`$ is obviously exactly the same as that of $`\mathrm{\Omega }(0,t_r)`$. When $`|\mathrm{\Omega }_c(0,t_r)|`$ is several times larger than $`|\mathrm{\Omega }_p(0,t_r)|`$, as always is at such late times at $`z=0`$, this means that $`\mathrm{\Omega }_p^{}(z,t_r)`$ has the same time dependence as $`\mathrm{\Omega }_c^{}(0,t_r)`$ at such late times. Note that at late times $`\mathrm{\Omega }_p^{}(z,t_r)/\mathrm{\Omega }(z,t_r)=A_3(z,t_r)`$ is also independent of retarded time, indicating that as $`\mathrm{\Omega }_p(z,t_r)`$ approaches zero, the ratio of populations in $`|1>`$ and $`|3>`$ stays fixed. It is precisely this way of having two fields to go to zero with fixed ratio that preserves the the adiabatic approximation during the process. There must be a coherent superposition of states in $`|1>`$ and $`|3>`$, such that $`A_3(z,t_r)/A_1(z,t_r)=\mathrm{\Omega }_p^{}(z,t_r)/\mathrm{\Omega }_c^{}(z,t_r)`$. A similar relation holds when the second coupling laser pulse starts to build up. In order for the behavior to remain adiabatic, the probe laser half-Rabi frequency must build up proportional to the coupling laser, with the ratio of the two being the local ratio of $`A_3/A_1`$. This persists until the depletion of the population of $`|3>`$ forces the ratio to decrease at later $`t_r`$. By choosing $`z`$ such that $`2\kappa _{12}\tau z=|\mathrm{\Omega }_{c0}\tau |^2\sqrt{5\pi /2}+\sqrt{\pi /2}|\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}\tau |^2`$, we thus have the same argument of $`F_p`$ at $`z=0`$ and $`t_r=t=0`$, resulting $`F_p=\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}/\sqrt{|\mathrm{\Omega }_{c0}|^2+|\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}|^2}`$. This is the largest value that $`F_p`$ takes on, and at this depth into the medium the value of $`|A_3(z,t_r)|`$ matches its largest value at $`z=0`$. This population persists at large $`t_r`$ until very slow collisional effects destroy the coherence left behind in states $`|1>`$ and $`|3>`$. It is this long persistence of a coherent mix of populations in states $`|1>`$ and $`|3>`$ that leads to the regeneration of an optical field when a delayed second coupling pulse is injected into the medium. Of course, the number of atoms left in $`|3>`$ is (within the adiabatic approximation) equal to the number of photons in the original probe pulse.

We now investigate the case where $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{c0}\tau =20`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}\tau =5`$, $`\gamma _2\tau =0`$, $`\kappa _{12}\tau =\kappa _{32}\tau =200cm^1`$, and $`R=4`$. Based on our adiabatic theory, we predict a maximum population of $`|A_3|=1/\sqrt{17}`$ at a depth of 2.86 cm into the medium. This is indicated by the line of constant color in a contour plot of $`|A_3(z,t_r)|`$ (see Fig. 2a) leading from $`t_r=0`$ and $`z=0`$ out to the horizontal path at $`z2.86`$ cm. A corresponding surface plot for $`\mathrm{\Omega }_p\tau `$ as functions of $`t_r/\tau `$ at $`z=3`$ cm is given in Fig. 3a which shows the long asymmetric tail on $`\mathrm{\Omega }_p`$ as described above. In the region between $`2.5t_r/\tau 5`$ the ratio of the two half-Rabi frequencies is close to constant, averaging around 0.24. This ratio is also close to the adiabatic approximation for $`A_3`$ since $`|\mathrm{\Omega }_p|^2<<|\mathrm{\Omega }_c|^2`$. In the same region, however, there is no optical field left, indicating no photons are “stored” or “stopped”. Every probe photon is converted to the excitation of the state $`|3>`$ .

We now come to an important point, e.g. to show that the regenerated field has characteristics that are very different from that of the original probe pulse. That is, the regenerated field is not a faithful copy of the original probe pulse unless careful restrictions are placed on characteristics of the second coupling laser pulse. Recall that $`F_p`$ was determined from the functional dependence of the probe and coupling laser pulses at $`z=0`$, in particular, $`W_p(v(t))=A_3(0,t)`$, we thus have, during the recurring coupling laser pulse

$$v(t_r)=S+\frac{R^2}{2}|\mathrm{\Omega }_{c0}\tau |^2\sqrt{5\pi /2}\left(1+erf\left(\sqrt{2/5}\frac{(t_rt_d)}{\tau }\right)\right),$$
(14)
where $`S=|\mathrm{\Omega }_{c0}\tau |^2\sqrt{5\pi /2}+|\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}\tau |^2\sqrt{\pi /2}`$. Equation (14) is of central importance in the following analysis on the characteristics of the regenerated field. We first note that $`R`$ must be large enough so that $`v(t_r)\kappa _{12}\tau z_m>0`$. That is, $`R`$ must be large enough so that the group velocity of the regenerated photons are large enough to exit the cell before the laser induced transparency ends. Three time markers, therefore, are important for describing the regenerated field when it reaches the end of cell where $`z=z_m`$. The first marker is the earliest time at which $`F_p(0)=0`$. This time marker is determined by $`v(t_{r1})\kappa _{12}\tau z_m=0`$. At a later time the value of $`F_p(S/2)`$ will be equal to $`A_3(0,0)`$. This second marker represents the time when $`F_p`$, for the given set of parameters, reaches it maximum value at $`z_m`$, and it is determined by $`v(t_{rm})\kappa _{12}\tau z_m=S/2`$. Finally, the third marker is the time at which the regenerated pulse completes its exit from the cell, i.e. the time at which $`F_p(S)=0`$ and $`v(t_{r2})\kappa _{12}\tau z_m=S`$. When these relations are used in Eq.(14), we immediately obtain

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_p^{}(z_m,t_{rm})=R\mathrm{\Omega }_{c0}e^{(t_{rm}t_d)^2/(5\tau ^2)}\frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}\tau }{\sqrt{|\mathrm{\Omega }_{c0}\tau |^2+|\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}\tau |^2}}.$$
(15)
Notice that if $`R`$ is chosen to make the argument of $`F_p`$ at the time $`t_r=t_d`$ exactly the same as its value at $`z=0`$ and $`t_r=t=0`$, we then have

$$|\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}\tau |^2\sqrt{\pi /8}+|\mathrm{\Omega }_{c0}\tau |^2\sqrt{5\pi /8}(1+R^2)=\kappa _{12}\tau z_m,$$
(16)
and

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}^{}(z_m,t_d)=R|\mathrm{\Omega }_{c0}|\frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}\tau }{\sqrt{|\mathrm{\Omega }_{c0}\tau |^2+|\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}\tau |^2}}.$$
(17)
By determining the value of $`t_r`$ such that $`v(t_r)\kappa _{12}\tau z_m=0`$ or $`S`$, a range of time over which the regenerated pulse rises from zero and returns to zero at the exit of the cell may be obtained. We thus estimate the FWHM pulse length, in the unit of the original probe pulse length $`\tau `$, to be

$$\mathrm{\Delta }_{1/2}=\frac{\sqrt{5\pi /2}}{R^2}\left(1+\frac{1}{\sqrt{5}}\left|\frac{\mathrm{\Omega }_{p0}}{\mathrm{\Omega }_{c0}}\right|^2\right).$$
(18)
The key results shown in Eqs.(14-18) indicate that the regenerated field is not a replica of the original probe pulse. Therefore, the concept of “storage of light”, in the reported experimental studies , is not accurate. Furthermore, Eq.(15) clearly indicates that the instantaneous phase of the regenerated field is closely related to that of the second coupling pulse, in additional to the phase of the atomic coherence $`\rho _{32}`$, therefore, cannot be just that of the original probe pulse alone. In fact, if the probe laser has only penetrated a small fraction of the thickness of the vapor cell when the coupling laser pulse has passed by, then $`R`$ will turn out to be much larger than unity. This means that the width of the regenerated field is generally much smaller than the width of the initial probe pulse. Correspondingly, the bandwidth of the former will be much larger as can be seen from Fig. 3a. Both Fig. 2a and 3a show that in “reviving the probe pulse” every regenerated photon comes at the expense of flipping population from state $`|3>`$ to $`|1>`$. When the population of $`|3>`$ has been exhausted, there can be no further photon generated.

Extensive numerical calculations carried out by simultaneously solving Eqs.(1-2) have shown very good agreement with the adiabatic calculation described above. In Figs. 2b and 3b we show a contour plot of $`|A_3(z,t_r)|`$ and a surface plot of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_p^{}`$ for the same parameters given in Figs. 2a and 3a. From Fig. 3b, we notice that there is no probe field between $`t_r/\tau =2`$ and the arrival time of the second coupling pulse, i.e. there is no photon “left” or “stored” in the medium. All probe photons have been absorbed in producing the coherent excitation of the state $`|3>`$ as can be seen from Fig. 2b. The case with non-vanishing one-photon detuning in our adiabatic theory also produces a result that is in very good agreement with numerical calculations. Numerical calculations have also been vigorously tested by making use of the fact that with $`\gamma _2\tau =0`$, the sum of the squares of the three state amplitudes should be unity. In all numerical examples described in this paper the condition of unity was preserved through at least seven significant figures if $`\gamma _2\tau =0`$.

We have shown analytically and numerically that when $`0\delta <|\mathrm{\Omega }_c|`$, a coherent optical field with the frequency very close to that of the original probe can be regenerated by re-injecting a coupling pulse. Detailed analysis on the conditions and characteristics of this regenerated field, including the estimate of the pulse width, has shown that it is not the replica of the original probe pulse. We, therefore, caution the use of the concept of “storage of light” in the context of recently reported experiments, since there has no evidence that this is indeed the case . In fact, one can couple the states $`|1>`$ and $`|3>`$ with a coherent magnetic pulse to create the coherence required. Under this circumstance, if an optical pulse that couples the states $`|2>`$ and $`|3>`$, commonly referred to as the coupling pulse, is injected into the system, an optical pulse that couples the states $`|2>`$ and $`|1>`$, commonly referred to as the probe pulse, will be generated. The latter is most certainly not the replica of the magnetic pulse used to create the coherence.

References

* C. Liu et al., Nature (London) 409, 490 (2001).
* D.F. Phillips et al.,Phys. Rev. Lett. 86, 783 (2001).
* J. Oreg, F.T. Hioe and J.H. Eberly, Phys. Rev A29,690 (1984); J.R. Kuklinski, U. Gaubatz, F.T. Hioe, and K. Bergmann, Phys. Rev. A 40 R6749 (1989). See also, R. Grobe and J.H. Eberly, Laser Physics 5, 542 (1995); J.H. Eberly, A. Rahman, and R. Grobe, Laser Physics 6, 69 (1996); J.R. Csesznegi and R. Grobe, Phys. Rev. Lett. 79, 3162 (1997).
* M. Fleischhauer, Opt. Express 4, 107 (1999); M. Fleischhauer, S.F. Yelin, and M.D. Lukin, Opt. Communi. 179, 395 (1999); M. Fleischhauer and M.D. Lukin, Phys. Rev. Lett. 84, 5094 (2000).
* E.A. Cornell, Nature (London) 409, 461 (2001).
* Equation (7) can also be derived exactly from Eq.(3) for the case of slowly varying $`|A_2|^2`$ and not too large $`\gamma _2`$.
* These field profiles are reasonable description of the experiments reported. In fact, as long as the adiabatic conditions are observed different profiles will lead to the similar conclusions. In addition, numerical simulations have suggested that even in the region where the adiabatic conditions are in valid, a similar conclusion can still be reached, provided certain non-adiabatic restriction are observed.
* Figure 3a shows that all probe photons are converted to the excitation of the state $`|3>`$. If one can regenerate, from the excitation of the state $`|3>`$, photons with optical properties identical to that of the original probe filed, then it would be correct to claim the revival of the probe field. As we will show later, however, this is not the case in recent reported experiments.
* We emphasize that the purpose of the present study is to show that photons from the probe pulse are neither “stopped” or “stored” in the recently reported experiments . Our intension is to stimulate further studies for truly storage of the quantum information.

Figure captions

Figure 1. Energy level diagram showing relevant laser excitations.

Figure 2. Contour plot of $`A_3(z,t)`$. a. Adiabatic solution. b. Full numerical solution. Parameters used: $`\mathrm{\Omega }_p\tau =5`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_c\tau =20`$, $`\gamma _2\tau =0`$, $`\kappa _{12}\tau =\kappa _{32}\tau =200cm^1`$, $`R=4`$, $`t_d/\tau =11`$.

Figure 3. Surface plot of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_p(z,t)`$. a. Adiabatic solution. b. Full numerical solution. Parameters used: $`\mathrm{\Omega }_p\tau =5`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_c\tau =20`$, $`\gamma _2\tau =0`$, $`\kappa _{12}\tau =\kappa _{32}\tau =200cm^1`$, $`R=4`$, $`t_d/\tau =11`$.


text:
# References

SINP-TNP/02-06

Black Hole Decay as Geodesic Motion

Kumar S. Gupta111Email: gupta@theory.saha.ernet.in

Theory Division
Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics
1/AF Bidhannagar
Calcutta - 700064, India
Siddhartha Sen222Email: sen@maths.tcd.ie

School of Mathematics
Trinity College
Dublin , Ireland
and

Department of Theoretical Physics
Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science
Calcutta - 700032, India

## Abstract

We show that a formalism for analyzing the near-horizon conformal symmetry of Schwarzschild black holes using a scalar field probe is capable of describing black hole decay. The equation governing black hole decay can be identified as the geodesic equation in the space of black hole masses. This provides a novel geometric interpretation for the decay of black holes. Moreover, this approach predicts a precise correction term to the usual expression for the decay rate of black holes.

August 2003

PACS : 04.70.Dy, 04.60.-m

The discovery of a conformal group structure in the near-horizon region of a black hole has led to interesting developments in quantum gravity . The emergence of such a structure is closely related to the holographic nature of the system . Recently we have shown that by studying the algebraic structure of an operator that governs the near-horizon dynamics of a scalar probe in the background of a massive Schwarzschild black hole, the underlying conformal group structure can be explicitly revealed . Our analysis was based on the requirement of unitarity of the conformal theory and self-adjointness  of the associated near-horizon Hamiltonian . This led to the introduction of the self-adjoint extension of the near-horizon Hamiltonian, described by a real parameter $`z`$. In this approach, the holographic nature of the black hole is thus realized by the self-adjoint extension. It was also shown that for the formalism to be self-consistent, $`z`$ must be a small positive number. This constraint on $`z`$ essentially incorporates the correct boundary conditions required for holography.

In a subsequent paper  we showed that further confirmation of the near-horizon conformal structure emerged when $`z`$ was related to the mass $`M`$ of the Schwarzschild black hole as

$$z=\frac{a}{M^2},$$
(1)
where $`a`$ is a nonzero positive constant. For the Schwarzschild background it was found that $`a=\frac{1}{8}`$. For the moment we consider a general positive value of $`a`$. It should be stressed that our analysis is valid only for massive black holes, i.e. for small values of $`z`$. Once the identification given by Eqn. (1) is made, it was shown in Ref.  that our approach naturally leads to the characteristic logarithmic correction to the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy . It is known that such a logarithmic correction term is universally present in any calculation of black hole entropy within a conformal field theory framework .

In this Letter we demonstrate that our formalism  for analyzing the near-horizon conformal structure is also capable of describing black hole decay. For this purpose, we consider the space of all self-adjoint extensions which we denote by $``$. As indicated in Eqn. (1), the self-adjoint extension parameter $`z`$ is related to the mass $`M`$ of the black hole. $`M`$ can therefore be taken as a good coordinate to describe $``$. The central idea here is to study geodesic motion in the space of self-adjoint extensions. We find that within our formalism, there is a natural way to give the space $``$ a metric. The geodesic motion in $``$ is then calculated using this metric. We find that the equation for geodesic motion in $``$ agrees with the equation for black hole decay  for a suitable choice of the affine parameter. Once the affine parameter has been so chosen, our approach predicts a precise correction term in the equation for black hole decay arising from the logarithmic correction to the black hole entropy.

We start by recalling some of the basic results obtained in references  and  which shall be useful for our analysis. The action $`𝒮`$ for a massless scalar field coupled to a Schwarzschild black hole of mass $`M`$ in 3+1 dimensions is given by

$$𝒮=\frac{1}{2}\sqrt{|g|}g^{ij}_i\varphi _j\varphi ,$$
(2)
where the Schwarzschild metric in the spherical polar coordinates has the form

$$g_{ij}dx^idx^j=(1\frac{2M}{r})dt^2+(1\frac{2M}{r})^1dr^2+r^2d\mathrm{\Omega }^2.$$
(3)
In the near-horizon limit, the corresponding Klein-Gordon operator for the time-independent, zero frequency and zero angular momentum modes of a massless scalar field is given by

$$H=\frac{d^2}{dx^2}\frac{1}{4x^2},$$
(4)
where $`x=r2M`$ is the near-horizon coordinate. In order to study the quantum properties of $`H`$, we consider the equation

$$H\psi =\psi ,\psi (0)=0,$$
(5)
where $``$ is the eigenvalue and $`\psi L^2[R^+,dr]`$ is the associated wavefunction. $`H`$ belongs to the class of unbounded linear operators on a Hilbert space  and it admits a one-parameter family of self-adjoint extensions labelled by a $`U(1)`$ parameter $`e^{iz}`$, where $`z`$ is real. The normalized bound state eigenfunction and eigenvalue of Eqn. (5) are given by 333It may be noted that the results of our earlier analysis  as well as the present one depends only on the existence of the $`n=0`$ bound state of ref. .

$$\psi (x)=\sqrt{2Ex}K_0\left(\sqrt{E}x\right)$$
(6)
and

$$=E=\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{\pi }{2}\mathrm{cot}\frac{z}{2}\right]$$
(7)
respectively, where $`K_0`$ is the modified Bessel function. In our formalism, this solution is interpreted as bound state excitation of the black hole due to the capture of the scalar field.

As mentioned before, the requirement of near-horizon conformal symmetry places an important constraint on $`z`$ . To see this, consider a band-like region $`\mathrm{\Delta }=[x_0\delta /\sqrt{E},x_0+\delta /\sqrt{E}]`$, where $`x_0\frac{1}{\sqrt{E}}`$ and $`\delta 0`$ is real and positive. When $`z>0`$ and satisfies the condition $`z0`$, we see that $`x_00`$. Under this condition, $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ belongs to the near-horizon region of the black hole. At any point $`x\mathrm{\Delta }`$ the leading behaviour of the wavefunction is given by

$$\psi =A\sqrt{Ex},$$
(8)
where $`A=\sqrt{2}(\mathrm{ln2}\gamma )`$ and $`\gamma `$ is Euler’s constant. Taking a typical value of $`x=x_0`$, we can write the wavefunction as

$$\psi =AE^{\frac{1}{4}}Ae^{\frac{\pi }{4z}}$$
(9)
for $`z0`$. Substituting the value of $`z`$ from Eqn. (1) in Eqn. (9), the wavefunction can be written as a function of $`M`$ as

$$\psi (M)=Ae^{cM^2}Ag(M^2).$$
(10)
The function $`g(M^2)=e^{cM^2}`$ captures the $`M`$ dependence of the wavefunction and $`c=\frac{\pi }{4a}`$ is a positive constant. For the Schwarzschild background we have $`c=2\pi `$.

The wave function of a system is a natural object to examine in order to understand any symmetry that might be present in the system. To this end, consider the set $`G\{g(M^2)|M^2R\}`$. The elements of $`G`$ are the functions $`g`$ defined in Eqn. (10) with different values of $`M`$ corresponding to different elements of $`G`$. For any two elements of $`G`$ given by $`g(M_1^2)=e^{cM_1^2}`$ and $`g(M_2^2)=e^{cM_2^2}`$, we can define a composition law as $`g(M_1^2)g(M_2^2)g(M_1^2+M_2^2)G`$. Similarly, for any $`g(M^2)G`$, we can define the inverse element as $`g^1(M^2)g(M^2)G`$. With respect to the composition law defined above, the set $`G`$ has the structure of a continuous abelian group.

The presence of the continuous abelian group $`G`$ allows us to describe the way the black hole mass changes in a geometric fashion. To do this we need to construct a group invariant metric on the space $``$. There is a well known procedure for doing this. We begin with the observation that the group $`G`$ has a natural action on the space $``$. Under the action of $`G`$, a point $`M_0`$ transforms as $`M_0e^{cM^2}M_0`$. $`G`$ therefore acts as a group of transformations on the space $``$. On a continuous group $`G`$, the group invariant metric can be written as

$$ds^2=\mathrm{Trace}(g^1dg)^2.$$
(11)
In our case, $`G`$ is abelian and using Eqns. (10) and (11), we obtain the expression of the metric on $``$ as

$$ds^2=[d(\mathrm{log}g)]^2=4c^2M^2(dM)^2h_{MM}(dM)^2,$$
(12)
where $`h_{MM}=4c^2M^2`$.

We now have all the ingredients to calculate the geodesic equation of motion in $``$. For this purpose, consider a parametrised curve $`M(\lambda )`$ where $`\lambda R`$ is taken as the affine parameter. Using the metric in Eqn. (12), the geodesic equation of motion in $``$ can be written as

$$\frac{d^2M}{d\lambda ^2}+\mathrm{\Gamma }_{MM}^M\left(\frac{dM}{d\lambda }\right)^2=0,(\mathrm{no}\mathrm{sum}\mathrm{over}M),$$
(13)
where

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_{MM}^M=\frac{1}{2}h^{MM}\frac{dh_{MM}}{dM}=\frac{1}{2}\frac{d}{dM}(\mathrm{log}h_{MM})=\frac{1}{M}$$
(14)
and $`h^{MM}=h_{MM}^1=(4c^2)^1M^2`$. In terms of the variable $`v=\frac{dM}{d\lambda }`$, Eqn. (13) can be expressed as

$$\frac{dv}{dM}+\frac{v}{M}=0.$$
(15)
Integrating Eqn. (15) we get,

$$v=\frac{dM}{d\lambda }=\frac{\mathrm{constant}}{M}.$$
(16)
Eqn. (16) describes how the mass of the black hole changes with respect to the affine parameter $`\lambda `$ upto an overall undetermined constant. It is chosen to be given by $`\lambda =M^1t+b`$ where $`t`$ is time and $`b`$ is a constant, Eqn. (16) reduces to

$$\frac{dM}{dt}=\frac{k}{M^2},$$
(17)
where $`k>0`$ is a constant. The sign of the constant $`k`$ has been chosen based on the expectation that the back-reaction effects will cause the mass of the black hole to decrease in order to compensate for this energy loss . With these identifications, Eqn. (17) agrees with the standard result of black hole decay. The assumption of large black hole mass used in our formalism is a feature present in the usual approach to black hole decay as well . It may be noted that the decay rate obtained above is independent of the constant $`a`$ which appears in the relation between $`z`$ and $`M`$ in Eqn. (1). We thus have a robust description of the decay of black holes which is independent of the microscopic details of our formalism.

The idea outlined above can be applied elsewhere as well. There is, for instance, a well known example in non-relativistic quantum mechanics where the mass $`m`$ appears as a parameter in the projective representation of the Galilean Group . Interpreting the set of Galilean transformations as an abelian group on the space of masses and following the steps outlined above we get $`\frac{dm}{d\lambda }=\alpha `$, where $`\alpha `$ is a constant. Again, with the choice of $`\lambda =rt+s`$ where $`t`$ is time and $`r,s`$ are constants leads to $`\frac{dm}{dt}=\alpha r`$. Choosing $`\alpha =0`$ we see that this is consistent with conservation of mass.

In ref.  we showed that the near-horizon conformal structure leads to a logarithmic correction to the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy. We would now demonstrate that this logarithmic contribution to the entropy generates a corresponding correction term for decay rate of black holes. In our formalism, density of states for the black hole was related to the modulus square of the wavefunction as $`\rho |\psi |^2`$ . The logarithmic correction to the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy is given by $`\frac{3}{2}\mathrm{log}M^2`$. A change in the entropy due to this term would lead to a corresponding change in the density of states. Let $`\chi (M)`$ denote the effective wavefunction associated with this new density of states. In our formalism, we then have

$$|\chi (M)|^2e^{2cM^2\frac{3}{2}\mathrm{log}M^2},$$
(18)
which gives

$$\chi (M)\frac{1}{M^{\frac{3}{2}}}e^{cM^2}.$$
(19)
Next we observe that $`\chi (M)`$ can be written as

$$\chi (M)=p(M)g(M^2),$$
(20)
where $`p(M)=\frac{1}{M^{\frac{3}{2}}}`$. The set $`P=\{p(M)|M0\}`$ forms an abelian group with respect to the composition law $`p(M_1)p(M_2)=p(M_1M_2)`$ with $`p^1(M)=p(M^1)`$. The wavefunction $`\chi (M)`$ thus belongs to the direct product $`PG`$ which is again an abelian group. Following the analysis presented above, we can write the metric on $`PG`$ as

$$ds^2=(gp)^1d(gp),$$
(21)
where $`gG`$ and $`pP`$. In the limit of large black hole mass, this metric has the form

$$ds^24c^2M^2\left[1\frac{3}{4c^2M^2}\right].$$
(22)
The corresponding geodesic equation of motion gives

$$\frac{dv}{dM}+v\left[\frac{1}{M}+\frac{3}{4cM^3}\right]=0$$
(23)
where $`v=\frac{dM}{d\lambda }`$. Eqn. (23) can be integrated to give

$$vMe^{\frac{3}{8cM^2}}=\mathrm{constant}.$$
(24)
Recall that the affine parameter $`\lambda `$ has already been identified with $`M^1t+b`$. With this identification, and for large black hole mass, the decay rate of black hole is obtained as

$$\frac{dM}{dt}=k\left[\frac{1}{M^2}+\frac{3}{8cM^4}\right].$$
(25)
Note that using the same logic as discussed before, the constant in Eqn. (24) has been written as $`k`$ with $`k>0`$. Both terms in the r.h.s. of Eqn. (25) contribute to the decay with the same sign. The first term on the r.h.s. of Eqn. (25) is identical to what was already obtained before through appropriate identification of the affine parameter $`\lambda `$. The main result of this Letter is that once $`\lambda `$ is chosen in the fashion indicated here, the formalism naturally leads to a precise correction term for the black hole decay rate, determined solely by the logarithmic correction to the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy. Such a logarithmic term appears universally whenever the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy is calculated within a conformal field theory framework . It is thus expected that the correction obtained for the black hole decay should share this same universal property as well.

To summarize we note that the presence of a conformal structure in the near-horizon region of a black hole is a consequence of the holographic principle. In our formalism, the appropriate condition for realizing holography is encoded in the self-adjoint extension parameter $`z`$. The parameter $`z`$, or equivalently the black hole mass $`M`$, then has the natural interpretation as a moduli. It is known that the geodesic motion in the moduli space of certain physical system provides an appropriate description for the corresponding dynamics . Implementing this idea with an appropriate identification of the affine parameter is consistent with the standard description of black hole decay. Moreover, the approach then predicts a correction term to the black hole decay rate arising from the logarithmic correction to the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy. We are thus led to the surprising conclusion that even the decay of black hole can be given a novel geometric interpretation within the context of the holographic principle.

It has been claimed that the near-horizon conformal symmetry is associated with a large class of black holes in arbitrary dimensions . It seems plausible that probing the near-horizon geometry of these black holes would lead to an operator of the form of $`H`$, possibly with a different coefficient for the inverse square term . It is thus likely that the analysis presented above for the massive Schwarzschild black hole could be generalized to include other cases as well.