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# Calculation of the Phase Field of a Vortex Pair on the Surface of a Multiplly Connected Substrate

## Abstract

The vortex pair phase field is calculated, through a solution of the Laplace equation, for a superfluid film adsorbed on the surface of a model 3D connected porous medium. A number of different vortex-antivortex pair configurations are considered as functions of the porosity or an aspect ratio of the model porous structure. The calculated results give the energy of a pair for motion of the vortex cores around a pore or a solid rod as well as for the string configuration corresponding to a linear separation of the vortex pair through the porous medium.

Superfluidity, Kosterlitz-Thouless, Bose, film, porous, multiplly connected, pore vortex

The superfluid properties of thin $`{}_{}{}^{4}\text{H}e`$ films adsorbed on 3-D connected porous media have been studied for many years. These systems present a number of interesting physical phenomena: dilute bose gas behavior for low density $`{}_{}{}^{4}\text{H}e`$ adsorbed in Vycor glass Reppy et al. (2000); 3-D critical behavior observed for a wide range of systemsBerthold et al. (1977); and 2-D and 3-D crossover behavior as a function of system structure and pore size. Helium films adsorbed on large-scale flat substrates are known to exhibit the classic 2-D Kosterlitz-Thouless phase transition Kosterlitz and Thouless (1973); Bishop and Reppy (1978); Ambegaoka et al. (1980). In the case of $`{}_{}{}^{4}\text{H}e`$ films adsorbed on the 3-D connected substrate provided by a porous medium, it is clear that one is not dealing with ideal 2-D system; yet there remains the interesting question as to what extent vestigial aspects of 2-D K-T behavior may still be present in the superfluid behavior of the system Shirahama et al. (1990). This question has attracted the attention of a number of theorists, the first being Minoguchi and Nagaoka (MN) Minoguchi and Nagaoka (1988) who argued for the existence of a 3-D superfluid phase transition for 3-D connected films and discussed vortex dynamics and the interrelation between 2-D and 3-D superfluid transitions. These authors pointed out that the energy of a vortex antivortex pair would have a string-like character with the energy growing linearly for large vortex separations. Subsequently, Machta and Guyer (MG) Machta and Guyer (1988, 1989) considered the 3-D porous media problem as well as the case of a film on a cylinder with infinite length. These authors, MN and MG, arrived at two main conclusions. First, that vortex pairs are confined by the string interaction and consequently a true vortex unbinding transition of the 2-D K-T type does not occur in a 3-D connected porous medium; and second, that the 3-D connectivity of the system enforces 3-D X-Y critical behavior at the superfluid transition. Gallet and Williams Gallet and Williams (1989) were the first to emphasis that the string created by two vortices moving apart in the porous medium will not only create circulation around the solid surface over which the pair separates, but also around any loops through which a member of the pair moves. In all of the above papers the real complexity of the 3-D connected system is avoided through simplifying assumptions.

In the present work we extend the work of the previous authors with a more realistic calculation of the energies for quantized vortex pairs taking into account the details of the 3-D porous structure. Following MN and MG, we employ the “Jungle Gym” model for the porous medium. The original model consisted of a cubic structure composed of cylindrical rods with radius $`r_0`$. In our case, we shall construct the lattice with rods of square cross section.

Figure 1 shows a view of our lattice structure. An aspect ratio for this structure is given by, $`\gamma =l\mathrm{/}a`$ where $`l`$ is the lattice parameter (distance between nodes) and $`a`$ is the width of the square rods. The ratio of the open pore volume to the total volume for a unit cell of the lattice defines the porosity, $`P=1\left(3\gamma 2\right)\mathrm{/}\gamma ^3`$. The open volume of the pores forms a complementary cubic structure with the same lattice parameter and an aspect ratio, $`\stackrel{~}{\gamma }=l\mathrm{/}\stackrel{~}{a}=\gamma \mathrm{/}\left(\gamma 1\right)`$, where $`\stackrel{~}{a}=la`$, is the length of a rod or the edge length of a pore. In making a comparison to the MG model, we shall initially choose a lattice parameter, $`l=\left(2+\pi \mathrm{/}2\right)r_0`$ and set $`a=\pi r_0\mathrm{/}2`$. With this choice the length of the rods will be, $`\stackrel{~}{a}=2r_0`$ and the porosity has a value close to 0.59.

In the present calculation the vortex pair phase field is computed on a 4$`\times `$4$`\times `$4 cubic lattice with 64 surface and interior lattice nodes and 192 rods. Periodic boundary conditions can be imposed that insure that the gradient in the phase normal to the surface of the cube is zero, i.e., the flow field induced by the vortex pair is restricted to the interior of the cube. A more ambitious project would be to perform these calculations on a larger lattice; for instance, one might take a 6$`\times `$6$`\times `$6 cubic structure with 216 nodes and 648 rods to be considered in the calculation.

We shall assume that a uniform superfluid film with density per unit area, $`\rho `$, covers the surface of the lattice. In the present calculation, we will take into account the actual structure of the lattice in calculating the phase and superfluid flow fields for various configurations of a vortex-antivortex pair located on the surface of the lattice. For simplicity we start with the cores located close together on a single lattice rod. This rod will be chosen as close to the center of the lattice as possible given the discrete nature of the structure. The surface of the rod can be unfolded as illustrated in Figure 1. A coordinate $`\eta `$ indicates the distance between the vortex cores along the axis of the rod while $`\xi `$ gives the distance in the perpendicular direction (along the perimeter of the rod). In the figure the vortex and antivortex cores are shown placed symmetrically about the center of the rod. The rod containing the vortex pair has a common boundary with four other adjacent rods and the phase field must be matched continuously across the common edges.

At the start of the calculation, the initial position of the vortex pair is specified to be close together on an interior rod. The quantum phase, $`\varphi `$, is calculated as a function of position on the surface of the lattice by a numerical solution of Laplace’s equation on 64$`\times `$64 grid on each rods while maintaining phase continuity across the matching edges of adjacent rods. Once the phase field is known, the superfluid velocity is obtained from the relation, $`𝐯(𝐫)=(\mathrm{}/m_4)\varphi (𝐫)`$ and the total energy from an integration of $`(1/2)\rho 𝐯^2`$ over the surface of the lattice.

In Figure 2, three different configurations for a vortex pair are shown. In the first panel, 2a, the vortices are located on the rod labeled 1 and are separated by a distance, $`\eta `$ = $`\stackrel{~}{a}/2`$. Phase values between 0 and $`2\pi `$ for this pair configuration are indicated by the color scheme. In panel 2b the color scale indicates the superfluid energy distribution. When the vortex pair is restricted to a single rod there is very little flow on the adjacent rods. When the vortices are moved futher apart, until they are located at the corner intersection of the rods, the vortex flow field spills over onto the surfaces of the adjacent rods. In 2c the vortices are shown at the mid point of rods 2 and 4. The vortices now face each other across the pore. As the vortices are moved apart, it is useful to keep track of the virtual core associated with the vortex-antivortex pair. The core will form a closed loop intersecting the surface of the rods at the position of the vortices. The core then has two parts; one within the interior of the solid rods and another portion within the space of the open pores. When the separation is further increased to $`\eta =4\stackrel{~}{a}`$ , the two elements of the pair will then overlap and the virtual core of the vortices will lie entirely within the rods. We are now left with a “core” vortex configuration, with a four-fold symmetric flow largely restricted to the circumference of the rods, 1 to 4. We shall call this flow configuration the $`\eta `$ \- ring and describe the phase configuration in Figure 2d.

We now examine the change in the kinetic energy of the flow field as the pair separates along $`\eta `$ direction. In Figure 3a we show a plot of the total energy as a function of the vortex-antivortex separation distance $`\eta `$. In setting the energy scale, a superfluid mass per unit area is taken to be, $`\rho =3.49\times 10^9gm/cm^2`$, so that a K-T transition causes at 1K in the case of the infinitely spreaded $`{}_{}{}^{4}He`$ film. The infinite cylinder calculation of MGMachta and Guyer (1989) is shown for comparison. It is interesting that these two calculations agree rather well even as the vortex pair passes a corner in the lattice structure.

We shall now consider pair separation in the $`\xi `$ direction, perpendicular to $`\eta `$, along the perimeter direction of the rod. The initial configuration is taken with the pair located at the center of the rod ($`\eta =0`$) separated by a short distance in the $`\xi `$ direction and the vortex pair moves on in the $`\xi `$ direction. When the separation is the perimeter distance, $`\xi =2\pi r_0`$, the pair will have encircled the rod and the cores will overlap and leave behind a continuous flow field along the axis of the rod. Figure 4 shows the phase field on the surface of the lattice as the vortex pair expands in the $`\xi `$ direction. The development of the energy as a function of the separation parameter, $`\xi `$, is shown in panel b of Figure 3. The logarithmic dependence of the pair energy for a vortex-antivortex pair in 2-D is also shown as a function of pair separation. An interesting feature of the energy dependence is that a maximum occurs in the total energy shortly before the pair annihilates on the far side of the rod. After the annihilation, the system is left in a symmetric flow state similar to the flow pattern of a vortex ring in 3-D space; in the present case, however, the flow is restricted to the surface of the lattice. This remaining flow configuration had been called the “pore” vortex ring structure with the virtual vortex core threading the pores immediately surrounding the rodMachta and Guyer (1988). Here, we call this type of a pore vortex ring the $`\xi `$ \- ring.

A third configuration, shown in Figure 5, deserves consideration. The starting configuration is similar to the first case considered, with the vortices displaced in the $`\eta `$ direction. We shall take the initial position of the vortices on the edge of the rod rather than in the middle of one face. Now, as $`\eta `$ increases, the vortices can move in a straight line along the junction between rods and so on to the rods beyond. When a pair is separated with the elements moving past a junction in the lattice, from one rod to another, circulation is created not only around rods which have virtual core within but also about any loop in the lattice threaded by a single line of the core. Thus the energy of a separating vortex pair does not only grow linearly with separation in the string fashion but increases in a step-like fashion whenever a vortex moves through a pore. The result is an even stronger “confinement” Minoguchi and Nagaoka (1988) than results from the simple string interaction.

We have also calculated the ring energies for different values of $`\gamma `$ (or porosoity). The results are shown in Figure 6. E$`{}_{}{}^{\xi }{}_{ring}{}^{}`$ is the $`\xi `$ \- ring energy while E$`{}_{}{}^{\eta }{}_{ring}{}^{}`$ the $`\eta `$ \- ring energy. From symmetrical point of view, E$`{}_{}{}^{\eta }{}_{ring}{}^{}`$ for 30% porosity is E$`{}_{}{}^{\xi }{}_{ring}{}^{}`$ for 70% porosity and vice versa; in other words E$`{}_{}{}^{\eta }{}_{ring}{}^{}`$ for a certain $`\gamma `$ is E$`{}_{}{}^{\xi }{}_{ring}{}^{}`$ for the same $`\stackrel{~}{\gamma }`$ value as $`\gamma `$. For small values of $`\gamma `$, the $`\eta `$ \- ring energy is nearly a logarithmic function of $`\gamma `$, while for large $`\gamma `$, it approaches a nearly linear dependence of $`\gamma `$. $`\gamma =1`$ corresponds to the case that $`l=a`$; namely, there is no pore then no film let in the system. For comparison with this energy dependence it is worth considering a constant flow just on the surface of four adjacent rods forming a pore. We shall assume the magnitude of the velocity is fed by the phase difference of $`2\pi `$; i.e. $`v=h/4am_4`$. With this velocity, the total energy E $`=4\times \left[(\rho /2)v^2\right]\times 4a\stackrel{~}{a}=12.6(\gamma 1)`$ (K), where we have again set $`\rho =3.49\times 10^9gm/cm^2`$ in setting the energy scale. This energy function is a little smaller than E$`{}_{}{}^{\eta }{}_{ring}{}^{}`$ but parallel for large values of $`\gamma `$. This difference is caused by the fact that the actual velocity distribution is not constant because of the 3D connectivity.

The energy dependence tells us whether a pore vortex ring could be excited or not. Around $`\gamma =2`$, both E$`{}_{}{}^{\eta }{}_{ring}{}^{}`$ and E$`{}_{}{}^{\xi }{}_{ring}{}^{}`$ are too high to be excited and a pore vortex ring would be rarely excited. Because we now know the energy behaves like a cylinder case in both $`\xi `$ and $`\eta `$ direction until it approaches the maximum, we could constract the renomalization calculation by an imitation energy function, which expresses a vortex string energy for both axes. The study would be closely connected to the experimental study on the Vycor glass substrate Berthold et al. (1977) as well as on the other Porous glass substrates Shirahama et al. (1990). As $`\gamma `$ increases, the porosity becomes higher and a pore vortex ring comes to be excited more easily. Then some simple mean field theory would better describe the physical property of the system like $`{}_{}{}^{4}He`$ film on aero gel Crowell et al. (1995).

The authors thank many people. We thank Prof. J.D. Reppy for fruitful discussions and suggestions. The colored graph was described using the basic graphics class library for C by Mr. K. Yamadagra (1998-).


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# Effects on Higgs Boson Properties From Radion Mixing

## Abstract

We discuss how mixing between the Standard Model Higgs boson, $`h`$, and the radion of the Randall-Sundrum model can lead to significant shifts in the expected properties of the Higgs boson. In particular we show that the total and partial decay widths of the Higgs, as well as the $`hgg`$ branching fraction, can be substantially altered from their SM expectations, while the remaining branching fractions are modified less than $`\begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}5\%`$ for most of the parameter space volume. Precision measurements of Higgs boson properties at at a Linear Collider are shown to probe a large region of the Randall-Sundrum model parameter space.

preprint: SLAC-PUB-9278

The Randall-Sundrum (RS) modelrs  offers a potential solution to the hierarchy problem that can be tested at present and future acceleratorsdhr . In this model the Standard Model (SM) fields lie on one of two branes that are embedded in 5-dimensional AdS space described by the metric $`ds^2=e^{2k|y|}\eta _{\mu \nu }dx^\mu dx^\nu dy^2`$, where $`k`$ is the 5-d curvature parameter of order the Planck scale. To solve the hierarchy problem the separation between the two branes, $`r_c`$, must have a value of $`kr_c1112`$. That this quantity can be stabilized and made natural has been demonstrated by a number of authorsgw  and leads directly to the existence of a radion($`r`$), which corresponds to a quantum excitation of the brane separation. It can be shown that the radion couples to the trace of the stress-energy tensor formed from the SM fields on the TeV brane with a strength $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ of order the TeV scale, i.e., $`_{eff}=rT_\mu ^\mu /\mathrm{\Lambda }`$. (Note that $`\mathrm{\Lambda }=\sqrt{3}\mathrm{\Lambda }_\pi `$ in the notation of Ref.dhr .) This leads to gauge and matter couplings for the radion that are qualitatively similar to those of the SM Higgs boson. The radion mass ($`m_r`$), which is generated by the brane separation stabilization mechanism, is expected to be significantly below the scale $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ implying that the radion may be the lightest new field predicted by the RS model. One may expect on general grounds that this mass should lie in the range of a few $`\times 10`$ GeV $`m_r\mathrm{\Lambda }`$. The phenomenology of the RS radion has been examined by a number of authorsbig  and in particular has been recently reviewed by KribsKribs .

On general grounds of covariance, the radion may mix with the SM Higgs field on the TeV brane through an interaction term of the form

$$S_{rH}=\xi d^4x\sqrt{g_w}R^{(4)}[g_w]H^{}H,$$
(1)
where $`H`$ is the Higgs doublet field, $`R^{(4)}[g_w]`$ is the Ricci scalar constructed out of the induced metric $`g_w`$ on the SM brane, and $`\xi `$ is a dimensionless mixing parameter assumed to be of order unity and with unknown sign. The above action induces kinetic mixing between the ‘weak eigenstate’ $`r_0`$ and $`h_0`$ fields which can be removed through a set of field redefinitions and rotations. Clearly, since the radion and Higgs boson couplings to other SM fields differ this mixing will induce modifications in the usual SM expectations for the Higgs decay widths and branching fractionsus .

To make unique predictions in this scenario we need to specify four parameters: the masses of the physical Higgs and radion fields, $`m_{h,r}`$, the mixing parameter $`\xi `$ and the ratio $`v/\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, where $`v`$ is the vacuum expectation value of the SM Higgs $`246`$ GeV. Clearly the ratio $`v/\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ cannot be too large as $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_\pi `$ is already bounded from below by collider and electroweak precision datadhr ; for definiteness we will take $`v/\mathrm{\Lambda }0.2`$ and $`1\xi 1`$ in what follows although larger absolute values of $`\xi `$ and wider ranges of $`v/\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ have been entertained in the literature. The values of the two physical masses themselves are not arbitrary. When we require that the weak basis mass-squared parameters of the radion and Higgs fields be real, as is required by hermiticity, we obtain an additional constraint on the ratio of the physical radion and Higgs masses which only depends on the product $`|\xi |\frac{v}{\mathrm{\Lambda }}`$. Explicitly one finds that either $`\frac{m_r^2}{m_h^2}1+2\mathrm{sin}^2\rho +2|\mathrm{sin}\rho |\sqrt{1+\mathrm{sin}^2\rho }`$ or $`\frac{m_r^2}{m_h^2}1+2\mathrm{sin}^2\rho 2|\mathrm{sin}\rho |\sqrt{1+\mathrm{sin}^2\rho }`$ where $`\rho =\mathrm{tan}^1(6\xi \frac{v}{\mathrm{\Lambda }})`$. This disfavors the radion having a mass too close to that of the Higgs when there is significant mixing; the resulting excluded region is shown in Fig. 1. These constraints are somewhat restrictive; if we take $`m_h=125`$ GeV and $`\xi \frac{v}{\mathrm{\Lambda }}=0.1(0.2)`$ we find that either $`m_r>205(254)`$ GeV or $`m_r<76(61)`$ GeV. This lower mass range for the radion is somewhat disfavored by direct LEP searches as also can be seen from Fig. 1. Here we have assumed that $`v/\mathrm{\Lambda }=0.2`$ and converted the LEP Higgs search boundssop  into ones for the radion using the appropriate set of rescaling factors. While most of the region is excluded for these values of the parameters, the parameter space for a light radion is certainly not closed. Furthermore, as we decrease the assumed value of $`v/\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, the size of the allowed region grows since the radion couplings to the $`Z`$ are rapidly decreasing. One may argue, however, that a somewhat more massive radion is more likely than one in the remaining allowed region in the lower part of Fig. 1.

Let us now turn our attention to the properties of the Higgs boson in this model. Following the notation of Giudice et al.big , the coupling of the physical Higgs to the SM fermions and massive gauge bosons $`V=W,Z`$ is now given by

$$=\frac{1}{v}(m_f\overline{f}fm_V^2V_\mu V^\mu )[\mathrm{cos}\rho \mathrm{cos}\theta +\frac{v}{\mathrm{\Lambda }}(\mathrm{sin}\theta \mathrm{sin}\rho \mathrm{cos}\theta )]h,$$
(2)
where the angle $`\rho `$ is given above and $`\theta `$ can be calculated in terms of the parameters $`\xi `$ and $`v/\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ and the physical Higgs and radion masses. Denoting the combinations $`\alpha =\mathrm{cos}\rho \mathrm{cos}\theta `$ and $`\beta =\mathrm{sin}\theta \mathrm{sin}\rho \mathrm{cos}\theta `$, the corresponding Higgs coupling to gluons can be written as $`c_g\frac{\alpha _s}{8\pi }G_{\mu \nu }G^{\mu \nu }h`$ with $`c_g=\frac{1}{2v}[(\alpha +\frac{v}{\mathrm{\Lambda }}\beta )F_g2b_3\beta \frac{v}{\mathrm{\Lambda }}]`$ where $`b_3=7`$ is the $`SU(3)`$ $`\beta `$-function and $`F_g`$ is a well-known kinematic function of the ratio of masses of the top quark to the physical Higgs. Similarly the physical Higgs couplings to two photons is now given by $`c_\gamma \frac{\alpha _{em}}{8\pi }F_{\mu \nu }F^{\mu \nu }h`$ where $`c_\gamma =\frac{1}{v}[(b_2+b_Y)\beta \frac{v}{\mathrm{\Lambda }}(\alpha +\frac{v}{\mathrm{\Lambda }}\beta )F_\gamma ]`$, where $`b_2=19/6`$ and $`b_Y=41/6`$ are the $`SU(2)\times U(1)`$ $`\beta `$-functions and $`F_\gamma `$ is another well-known kinematic function of the ratios of the $`W`$ and top masses to the physical Higgs mass. (Note that in the simultaneous limits $`\alpha 1,\beta 0`$ we recover the usual SM results.) From these expressions we can now compute the change of the various decay widths and branching fractions of the SM Higgs due to mixing with the radion.

Fig. 2 shows the ratio of the various Higgs widths in comparison to their SM expectations as functions of the parameter $`\xi `$ assuming that $`m_h=125`$ GeV with different values of $`m_r`$ and $`\frac{v}{\mathrm{\Lambda }}`$. We see several features right away: ($`i`$) the shifts in the widths to $`\overline{f}f/VV`$ and $`\gamma \gamma `$ final states are very similar; this is due to the relatively large magnitude of $`F_\gamma `$ while the combination $`b_2+b_Y`$ is rather small. ($`ii`$) On the otherhand the shift for the $`gg`$ final state is quite different since $`F_g`$ is smaller than $`F_\gamma `$ and $`b_3`$ is quite large. ($`iii`$) For relatively light radions with a low value of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ the Higgs decay width into the $`gg`$ final state can come close to vanishing due to a strong destructive interference between the two contributions to the amplitude for values of $`\xi `$ near -1. ($`iv`$) Increasing the value of $`m_r`$ has less of an effect on the width shifts than does a decrease in the ratio $`\frac{v}{\mathrm{\Lambda }}`$.

The deviation from the SM expectations for the various branching fractions, as well as the total width, of the Higgs are displayed in Fig. 3 as a function of the mixing parameter $`\xi `$. We see that the gluon branching fraction and the total width may be drastically different than that of the SM. As we will see below the former will affect the Higgs production cross section at the LHC. However, the $`\gamma \gamma `$, $`f\overline{f}`$, and $`VV`$, where $`V=W,Z`$ branching fractions receive small corrections to their SM values, of order $`\begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}510\%`$ for almost all of the parameter region. Observation of these shifts will require the accurate determination of the Higgs branching fractions obtainable at an $`e^+e^{}`$ Linear Collider (LC)bat  from which constraints on the radion model parameter space may be extracted as will be discussed below. These small changes in the $`ZZh`$ and $`hb\overline{b}`$ couplings of the Higgs boson can also lead to small reductions in the Higgs search reach from LEPII. This is shown in Fig. 4 for several sets of parameters; except for extreme cases this reduction in reach is rather modest.

At the LHC the dominant production mechanism/signal for the light Higgs boson is via the gluon-gluon fusion through a triangle graph with subsequent decay into $`\gamma \gamma `$. Both the production cross section and the subsequent $`\gamma \gamma `$ branching fraction are modified by mixing as shown in Fig. 5. This figure shows that the Higgs production rate in this mode at the LHC is always reduced in comparison to the expectations of the SM due to the effects of mixing. For some values of the parameters this reduction can be by more than an order of magnitude which could seriously hinder Higgs discovery via this channel at the LHC.

Once both data from the LHC and LC become available the radion parameter space can be explored using both direct as well as indirect searches. For example, as discussed above, precision measurements of the Higgs boson couplings at these machines can be used to constrain the model parameter space beyond what may be possible through direct searches only. For purposes of demonstration let us assume that the LHC/LC measure these couplings to be consistent with the expectations of the SM. We then can ask what regions in the $`\xi m_r`$ plane would remain allowed in this case as the ratio $`v/\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is varied. For this analysis we use the constraints from bat  and assume $`m_h=125`$ GeV; the results are shown in Fig. 6. Here we see that if such a set of measurements were realized a large fraction of the parameter space would be excluded. Direct searches at LHC/LC would completely cover the lower portion of the remaining parameter space shown in the figure leaving only the high mass radion as a possibility under these circumstances.

So far we have only considered the case where the SM fermion are confined to the TeV brane. It is possible instead to place the SM gauge and fermion fields in the RS bulkdhr  which can lead to alterations in the radion couplings to these fields. Mixing with the Higgs could then lead to variations somewhat different than those discussed above. This possibility has been discussed in detail in rizzo  from which Fig. 7 originates. Here we see the results analogous to those shown in the left panel of Fig. 2; note that in the case of bulk fields the expectations of the partial width shifts for fermions and massive vector fields are no longer degenerate. Qualitatively, however, the overall shifts in the Higgs boson couplings due to its mixing with the radion are found to be insensitive to whether or not the SM fields are in the RS bulk.

In summary, we see that Higgs-radion mixing, which is present in some extra dimensional scenarios, can have a substantial effect on the properties of the Higgs boson. These modifications affect the widths and branching fractions of Higgs decay into various final states, which in turn can alter the expectations for Higgs production at both LEP and the LHC. For some regions of the parameters the size of these width and branching fraction shifts may require the precision of a Linear Collider to study in detail.

###### Acknowledgements.

The author would like to thank JoAnne Hewett for her collaboration on this work. He would also like to thank Frank Petriello for related discussions.


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# The high-energy gamma-ray fluence and energy spectrum of GRB 970417a from observations with Milagrito

## 1 Introduction

Some of the most important contributions to our understanding of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) have come from observations of afterglows over a wide spectral range. Comparisons between these observations and predictions of GRB afterglow properties both as a function of time and of wavelength have provided stringent tests of GRB models van Paradijs, Kouveliotou & Wijers (2000). However, far less is known about the multiwavelength spectrum during the prompt phase of GRBs because of its very short duration.

Almost all GRBs have been detected in the energy range between 20 keV and 1 MeV Fishman (1995). A few have been observed above 100 MeV by EGRET Schneid et al. (1992); Sommer et al. (1994); Hurley et al. (1994); Schneid et al. (1995) indicating that at least some GRB spectra extend up to hundreds of MeV. However, the upper extent of GRB energy spectra is unknown. There may be a second (higher energy) component of emission, similar to that seen in several TeV sources Dermer, Chiang & Mitman (1999); Pilla & Loeb (1998).

The Milagro gamma-ray observatory, which began full operations in January 2000, is a wide field-of-view instrument that operates with a duty cycle near 100 %. It is particularly well suited to extending observations of the prompt phase of GRBs up to TeV energies. A prototype of Milagro, Milagrito Atkins et al. 2000a , found evidence for TeV emission from one of the 54 gamma-ray bursts observed by BATSE that were within the Milagrito field of view with a probability of $`1.5\times 10^3`$ of being a background fluctuation Atkins et al. 2000b . An excess of events was observed from the direction of GRB 970417a during the time BATSE observed emission. In this paper, we use additional data from Milagrito to examine the fluence and spectrum of the possible high-energy emission of GRB970417a.

Milagrito detected secondary particles reaching the ground produced by the interaction of TeV gamma rays in the atmosphere. The Milagrito detector consisted of a single layer of 228 photomultiplier tubes (PMT) placed on a 2.8 m $`\times `$ 2.8 m grid approximately 1 meter below the surface of a large covered pond of water Atkins et al. 2000a . An air shower was registered when relativistic charged particles, radiating Cherenkov light in the water, caused $``$ 100 PMTs to detect light within a 200-ns time interval. The direction of the gamma ray initiating the shower was reconstructed from the relative timing of the PMT signals.

It is very difficult to obtain information on the energy of the individual events contributing to the TeV gamma-ray excess observed with Milagrito. While the observed number of shower particles is related to the energy of the primary gamma-ray, it also depends on the height in the atmosphere of the first interaction and on the distance of the shower core from the pond. The area of Milagrito was small relative to the lateral extent of a typical shower, so it is usually not possible to determine the location of the core. Consequently, the number of PMTs hit in the pond is only weakly related to the energy of the gamma-ray primary. Also, the trigger required 100 of the 228 PMTs to register a signal, so there is very little dynamic range over which to identify a variation due to different source spectra.

Instead, information about the distribution of the gamma-ray energies can be obtained using additional information about the summed count rates of the individual PMTs in the pond. Very-high-energy (VHE) gamma rays of too low an energy to trigger the detector can give rise to an increase in these rates. Measurement of the rates therefore allows constraints to be placed on the spectrum of the putative TeV gamma-ray flux observed from GRB970417a.

## 2 Observations with the Triggered Milagrito Data

The angular resolution of Milagrito was substantially better than that of BATSE. Thus it was decided a priori to perform a search for a TeV excess everywhere within the area of the BATSE 90% positional uncertainty (statistical+systematic) Briggs et al. (1999) for the T90 period reported by BATSE ($`7.9`$ s for GRB970417a). The search area from BATSE was tiled with an overlapping array of 1.6 radius circular bins (appropriate for the angular resolution of Milagrito) centered on points on a $`0.2^{}\times 0.2^{}`$ grid. The Poisson probability that the observed number of events was a fluctuation of the background was calculated for each bin. The bin with lowest probability of being a background fluctuation for GRB970417a contains 18 events. In the null hypothesis (in which we assume there is no signal), the best estimate of the background is $`3.46\pm 0.11`$ events. The Poisson probability of observing 18 events in a given bin with the background level of 3.46 is $`2.9\times 10^8`$. After accounting for the oversampling in this method, the chance probability of such an observation anywhere within the search region for GRB970417a is $`2.8\times 10^5`$ Atkins et al. 2000b . Since 54 gamma-ray bursts were examined for VHE emission, the probability that this excess was a chance coincidence was 1.5$`\times 10^3`$.

If we assume that the observation of GRB970417a is due to signal plus background events, then the best estimate of the background level in the signal region is different from that obtained assuming the null hypothesis. This is because the search method will tend to select the bin with an upward fluctuation of the background in addition to the signal. A Monte Carlo simulation was performed to find the average number of signal events that results in an excess of 18 events in the most significant bin, given a mean background level of 3.46. The result is that the average number of signal events in the most significant bin is $`13.3\pm 4.2`$ in this case: the remaining 4.7 events are background.

## 3 Observations using the Milagrito Scaler System

The Milagrito scaler system recorded the PMT counting rates once per second for two brightness thresholds. Low threshold, which is the rate at which the PMTs detected $``$0.25 photoelectrons or more, and high threshold, which is the rate at which the PMTs detected $``$ 5 or more photoelectrons. Here we discuss the results from the scalers recording the PMT rates above the low-discriminator threshold (about 0.25 photoelectrons). The PMT signals were processed in groups of 16 by the electronics Atkins et al. 2000a . Each of the 16 PMTs in a group was connected to one of four scalers. The connections were arranged so that no pair of nearest or diagonal neighbor PMTs were connected to the same scaler. Each of these scaler outputs was a logical OR of the signals from four PMTs. Consequently, if two or more PMTs connected to the same scaler were hit within about 30 ns of each other, only one output count was generated.

The analysis of the scaler data involves a search for a significant increase in the PMT scaler rates at the time of GRB970417a. Noisy channels were eliminated from the analysis to improve the sensitivity of the PMT singles-rate analysis. There were a few PMTs that were noisy and several PMTs that had large rate variations due to pinhole light leaks in the pond cover. GRB970417a occurred 82 minutes after sunrise at the Milagro site, so that light leaks cannot be ignored. Noisy PMTs were identified by examining the rms fluctuations in the count rates of each scaler channel. Figure 1 shows the distribution of $`D=\frac{rms}{\sqrt{<rate>}}`$ for the 60 scaler channels, for an hour-long period centered on the burst trigger time. $`D1`$ for channels in which the scaler counts follow a Poisson distribution, while noisy channels will have $`D>>`$ 1. The four channels with $`D>`$ 2 were excluded from further analysis. The remaining channels have $`<D>=1.4`$, somewhat larger than is expected for Poisson statistics.

The 56 scaler channels without excessive noise were added together to give the summed scaler rate as a function of time. Figure 2 shows the summed scaler rate for the 30-second interval centered on the start time of GRB970417a and the distribution of values of the summed scaler rate for 60 minutes around the time of the burst. No increase in the summed scaler rate is apparent at the time of GRB970417a.

We wish to look for an excess in the summed scaler rate during T90, as this was the interval over which the triggered excess was observed in Milagrito. The BATSE trigger time for GRB970417a was 50016.71 s on MJD 50555: the start of the T90 interval was offset by -1.024 s from the trigger time, and the duration of T90 was $`7.9`$ s. It is necessary to examine a 9-second time bin to fully contain the T90 interval as the scaler data were recorded once per second. Figure 3 shows the summed scaler data for 9-second intervals.

The summed scaler rate during the 9 seconds that contained the burst was 4.418 MHz, which is 0.5 standard deviations below the mean of 4.420 MHz. Thus there is no evidence for an increase in the summed scaler rate during T90 of GRB970417a. The 99.9% confidence level upper limit on the number of excess summed scaler counts due to gamma rays during T90 of GRB970417a has been calculated using the method described in Helene (1988), assuming that the distribution of summed scaler rates due to background is a Gaussian with the mean and standard deviation shown in Figure 3. This background distribution is significantly broader than expected from Poisson statistics due to correlations between hits. Monte Carlo studies show that this distribution is expected to be broadened due to correlations between the scaler channels as several PMTs can detect light from a single shower particle. This distribution also incorporates systematic fluctuations at a 9 second time scale. Using the above distribution to calculate the upper limit, these effects are taken into account. The result is that fewer than 67000 excess counts from the scalers were detected over T90 of the burst. This quantity is defined as $`N_{upper}`$(scaler).

## 4 Sensitivity of the Milagrito Detector

The scalers could register counts from showers that were too low in energy to trigger 100 PMTs in Milagrito. Thus the observation of an excess in the triggered data but not in the summed scaler rate would imply that the observed excess is not due solely to a large flux of low-energy gamma rays. A simulation of the energy-dependent response of the Milagrito trigger and of the summed scaler rate is needed to quantify the constraints on the gamma-ray flux. The simulation reflected the instrumental conditions at the time of the burst, including the fact that 9 PMTs were not operational at that time. The four noisy scaler channels were also discarded in the simulation of the scalers. For simulations of the triggered Milagrito data (summed scaler rate), showers were thrown at discrete energies from 50 (10) GeV to 50 TeV at zenith angles from 20-25 degrees. GRB970417a was at a zenith angle of 22 degrees for Milagrito.

If $`n_{total}`$ simulated showers are thrown with cores uniformly distributed over a sufficiently large area, $`A_{core}`$, so that there is only a negligible probability of showers outside that area triggering the detector, then the effective area, $`A_{trigger}`$, is given by:

$$A_{trigger}=A_{core}\times \frac{n_{trigger}}{n_{total}},$$
(1)
where $`n_{trigger}`$ is the number of simulated events that would trigger the detector. Similarly an effective area for the summed scalers is defined by:

$$A_{scaler}=A_{core}\times \frac{n_{scaler}}{n_{total}},$$
(2)
where $`n_{scaler}`$ is the number of simulated scaler counts that would be recorded by the detector. Note that more than one scaler count can result from a single shower. Table 1 and Figure 4 give the effective areas for triggers and scalers as functions of incident gamma-ray energy. Each simulated shower was used only once in deriving the effective areas.

If the effective area is convolved with a test input spectrum, the result is the expected distribution of gamma-ray energies for events detected by Milagrito for that spectrum. Figure 5 shows this distribution for triggers (top) and the summed scalers (bottom) assuming an input gamma-ray spectrum with a differential power law index of -2.4 and no upper energy cutoff. The scaler response extends to considerably lower energies, so that the contribution of the scalers becomes enhanced relative to the triggered data as one introduces and reduces an upper energy cutoff.

## 5 Constraints on photon energies and the fluence from GRB970417a

The true spectrum of the gamma rays responsible for the observed excess from GRB970417a at TeV energies is unknown. However, constraints can be derived by requiring the photon energy spectrum and fluence to be consistent with the Milagrito observations. In particular, the spectrum convolved with the Milagrito response functions should reproduce the observed excess in the triggered data while not exceeding the upper limit, $`N_{upper}(scaler)`$, obtained in the scaler analysis.

### 5.1 Monoenergetic Spectrum

It is instructive to first consider the case of a monoenergetic gamma-ray spectrum. The number of triggered events produced by a monoenergetic flux, $`F(E)`$, in a burst lasting T seconds is given by:

$$N_{trig}=F(E)\times T\times A_{trig}(E),$$
(3)
where $`A_{trig}(E)`$ is the trigger effective area for incident gamma rays with energy $`E`$.

Similarly, the number of summed scaler counts produced by the flux $`F(E)`$ is given by:

$$N_{scalers}=F(E)\times T\times A_{scalers}(E).$$
(4)
It is common practice to describe the output of a GRB by its fluence, which is the integral of the flux over energy and time: thus the fluence for a steady monoenergetic flux at an energy $`E`$ is simply $`E\times T\times F(E)`$.

Figure 6 shows the fluence implied by the triggered-event excess observed in Milagrito assuming a monoenergetic spectrum for different energy gamma-rays. The fluence has a minimum of $`1.3\times 10^6`$ ergs/cm2 for a monoenergetic flux at 5 TeV. This is the minimum fluence that could be responsible for the triggered-event excess observed in Milagrito regardless of spectral shape. Also shown in Figure 6 is the expected number of excess summed scaler counts as a function of energy for a monoenergetic spectrum with the fluence necessary to produce the observed triggered-event excess. The horizontal line show $`N_{upper}`$(scaler)$`<`$67000, the 99.9% upper limit on the summed scaler excess derived above. Because the summed scaler excess must be less than $`N_{upper}`$(scaler), GRB970417a cannot have a monoenergetic flux with any energy below 650 GeV. The Milagrito observation cannot be due solely to gamma rays with energies below 650 GeV regardless of spectral shape.

### 5.2 Truncated power law Spectrum

In reality GRBs probably have an upper energy cutoff due to the intrinsic radiation emission mechanism at the source Baring & Harding (1997); Lithwick & Sari (2001), attenuation via pair production with intergalactic photon fields Primack, Bullock, Somerville & MacMinn (1999); Salamon & Stecker (1998), or both. As an example of how the analysis of the Milagrito result can be applied to a more realistic spectral shape, we assume that the photon spectrum is a truncated power law:

$$\frac{dN}{dE}=cE^\alpha ,E_{min}EE_{max}$$
(5)
$$\frac{dN}{dE}=0,E>E_{max},$$
(6)
where N is the number of photons at energy E, $`\alpha `$ is the spectral index, and c is a normalization factor. The number of events detected by Milagrito for this spectrum is given by:

$$N_{signal}=_{E_{min}}^{E_{max}}A_{eff}\frac{dN}{dE}𝑑E.$$
(7)
Inserting the Milagrito effective area for the summed scalers (triggered data) in this equation results in the predicted number of excess summed scaler counts (triggered events). Since 13.3 excess triggered events were observed, any combination of $`\alpha `$, $`E_{min}`$ and $`E_{max}`$ can be used in equation (7) to find c (the normalization constant) as a function of $`\alpha `$ and $`E_{max}`$), and thus the number of predicted summed scaler counts.

We take $`E_{min}=50GeV`$ so that the contribution to the observed Milagrito triggered event excess from the portion of the spectrum below this energy is negligible. We then allow $`\alpha `$ and $`E_{max}`$ to vary and search for combinations of $`E_{max}`$ and $`\alpha `$ that satisfy the requirement that the predicted number of summed scaler counts be less than $`N_{upper}`$(scaler). (Strictly speaking there is contribution to the summed scaler counts from events below 50 GeV, but this is small for the cases discussed below).

Figure 7 shows the combinations of spectral index and maximum energy that satisfy the condition that the number of summed scaler counts equals $`N_{upper}(scaler)`$. Regions above and to the left of this curve (lower energy cutoff or softer spectra) result in a summed scaler excess greater than 67000, and are thus inconsistent with the Milagrito observations. This plot shows that for a differential photon spectrum $`E^{0.5}`$ (a very hard spectrum), the spectrum must extend up to at least 1 TeV to be consistent with the Milagrito observations. For a spectral index of -2.4, more typical of what is observed from other VHE sources, the spectrum must extend to at least 5 TeV. Note that photon energies from GRB970417a must extend to higher energies for a truncated power-law spectrum than for a monoenergetic spectrum.

The results obtained here incorporate the effects of statistical and systematic fluctuations in the scaler rate. However, there may also systematic uncertainties in the calculation of the detector response. Previous studies have shown that the Monte Carlo simulation of the Milagrito detector correctly predicts the trigger rate from cosmic-ray protons, helium and CNO Atkins et al. (1999). This implies that the Milagrito effective area for cosmic rays is correctly modeled to within $`15\%`$, and that the energy scale of the response of Milagrito agrees with the simulation to within $`10\%`$. There may also be systematic errors associated with simulating shower proipagation, which could cause an additional small uncertainty for the flux from GRB970417a due to the triggering efficiency of cosmic-rays relative to gamma-rays. The simulation of the scaler response is subject to many of the same systematic errors as the triggered response of Milagrito. However, there are additional systematic uncertainties in the modeling of the scaler data since they are more sensitive to fluctuations in the tails of the air-shower distributions. It is difficult to quantify these additional systematic uncertainties, but we note that seasonal fluctuations of around 15% are observed in the scaler rates (but not the trigger rate). These seasonal fluctuations in the scaler rates are probably due to changes in the vertical density profile of the atmosphere. Overall we estimate the systematic uncertainty in the constraints on maximum energy to be around 35%.

## 6 Comparison with other observations of GRB970417a

GRB970417a was a weak, soft GRB as observed by BATSE. The fluence in the 50–300 keV range was $`1.5\times 10^7`$ ergs/cm2. The low fluence implies that spectral fits to these data are poorly constrained. A fit to a broken power law Band et al. (1993) yields a relatively low break-energy of $`58\pm 18`$ keV, with an undefined low energy spectral index and a soft power law above the break with a spectral index of $`2.67\pm 0.4`$ Connaughton (1999). A power law with no break fits the BATSE data equally well with a spectral index of $`2.36\pm 0.2`$ Kaneko (2000). In what follows, we use this spectral form for this burst, since the need for fewer parameters results in a more tightly constrained fit.

We have calculated upper limits for the fluence in the ranges 1–10 MeV and 10–100 MeV using data from the EGRET Total Absorption Scintillation Counter (TASC) detector. Figure 8 shows the spectral energy distribution for GRB970417a, including the fit BATSE spectrum, the upper limits from the EGRET TASC detector, and the VHE flux implied by the Milagrito observations assuming 3 possible spectral forms:

1) The square symbol assumes a monoenergetic flux at 5 TeV: this is the lowest VHE fluence compatible with the Milagrito observations.

2) The lower (solid) line assumes a power law spectrum with differential photon index of -2.1.

3) The upper (dashed) line assumes a power-law spectrum with differential photon index of -2.1 and a sharp cutoff at 2 TeV.

## 7 Discussion

As shown above, if the excess triggered events observed by Milagrito were indeed associated with GRB970417a, then they must be due to photons of at least 650 GeV, the highest energy photons detected from a GRB. Figure 8 shows that the VHE fluence must be at least an order of magnitude greater than the sub-MeV fluence measured by BATSE. In the following, assuming that high-energy emission from GRB970417a was detected by Milagrito, this section explores some of the consequences of the observation.

The Milagrito observations at VHE energies are not consistent with a straightforward extrapolation of the spectrum measured by BATSE, so they would be the first evidence for the existence of a second (higher energy) emission component in a gamma-ray burst. We note that while the implied fluence at VHE energies is considerably larger than that measured by BATSE, the actual peak of the spectral energy distribution may lie below the energy range measured by BATSE. Thus, while it appears that the power in the high energy component is greater than that in the low energy component, this need not necessarily be the case since a low energy peak was not measured. However, this would be a very unusual GRB spectrum, as peak energies are typically between 100 keV and 1 MeV Preece et al. (2000).

The existence of a higher energy component of emission is predicted by many emission models. For models in which the sub-MeV emission is due to non-thermal emission from a population of relativistic electrons, a fraction of these photons can be upscattered to the GeV-TeV range via inverse Compton scattering Meszaros & Rees (1993); Chiang & Dermer (1999); Pilla & Loeb (1998). The emergence of this component is expected to be prompt and coincident with the synchrotron radiation seen in the keV-MeV range. Protons may also be accelerated to very high energies: GeV-TeV gamma rays can be produced by synchrotron radiation from these protons, or from decaying pions produced by high energy protons interacting with photons Boettcher & Dermer (1998).

The possible VHE detection of GRB 970417a has significant implications on the distance scale and energy production in the GRB. VHE gamma rays interact with lower-energy photons to produce electron-positron pairs Gould & Schreder (1966); Jelley (1966); Primack, Bullock, Somerville & MacMinn (1999); Salamon & Stecker (1998). Thus gamma rays from distant sources may suffer significant attenuation on the intergalactic background radiation fields as they traverse the Universe en route to Earth. There is an energy dependent horizon beyond which gamma rays cannot be detected. The magnitude of this effect is a function of gamma-ray energy, the density and spectrum of the background radiation fields, and the distance to the source. The observation of photons with energies of at least 650 GeV coupled with an estimate of the opacity for VHE photons would constrain the redshift of GRB 970417a. The results of Primack et al (1999) imply that the opacity of the Universe to 650 GeV photons is one at a redshift of $``$0.1. While it is possible that GRB 970417a may lie beyond this, it would then require an enormous source flux of VHE photons to produce the excess observed by Milagrito.

If the redshift of GRB970417a is less than 0.1, then with the exception of GRB980425 it is much closer than all of the GRBs with measured redshifts. However only long, bright bursts have been localized sufficiently well to allow the measurement of afterglows, so the sample of GRBs with measured redshifts may not be representative of the entire class of GRBs. While GRB970147a was a long burst, it was also dim and would not have been localized by past or current detectors.

There have been several attempts to extend information on the GRB redshift distribution to bursts without measured redshifts. Several authors have investigated the gamma-ray properties of bursts with known redshifts (and thus luminosities) to find observable gamma-ray parameters that may be indicators of the luminosity. The spectral evolution of pulse structures appears to be anticorrelated with peak luminosity (i.e. bursts with a long lag between low-energy and high-energy detection by BATSE are dimmer) Norris (2000) and bursts with a greater degree of variability appear to be more distant Fenimore (2001). Although GRB970417a was too dim at sub-MeV energies to allow the calculation of the variability parameter to be used as a luminosity indicator, it was included in a recent study of the lag-luminosity relation Norris (2002). However, because GRB970417a was both dim and of relatively short duration, the large uncertainty in the measured lag precludes obtaining a reliable estimate of its luminosity Norris 2002a . Other distance indicators are obtained from the global properties of GRBs due to deviations from Euclidean geometry for sources at cosmological distances. For example, Schmidt (2001) shows that GRBs with harder MeV spectra are more distant than those with soft spectra, and in fact the spectrum of GRB970417a, as measured by BATSE, is soft.

In addition to suffering attenuation via pair production in intergalactic space, VHE photons may also be absorbed in the source itself. The very rapid variability (small emission region) and high luminosity of GRBs implies a very large photon density. If the source is non-relativistic, the optical depth of high-energy photons is so large that the photons could not emerge. If the emission region is moving relativistically, then the pair production optical depth is decreased because the photon energies and densities in the rest frame of the emission region are lower than they appear to the observer Baring & Harding (1997); Lithwick & Sari (2001). Using the method of (Lithwick and Sari), we can use the requirement that the burst be optically thin to 650 GeV photons to place a lower limit on the Lorentz factor ($`\gamma `$) of the expansion. Assuming a variability timescale of 1 second, a broken power law spectral fit to the BATSE data and a redshift of 0.1 we find a lower limit to the Lorentz factor of 95 for GRB970417a. Therefore, unusually large Lorentz factors are not required for GRB970417a, primarily because the implied luminosity of such a nearby burst is low resulting in a relatively low photon density.

The future of these studies holds great interest. Milagro, a more sensitive detector than Milagrito, is now operating. SWIFT will launch in 2003 and is expected to detect and localize several hundred bursts per year. A large fraction of the SWIFT detections will have measured distances. Milagro will observe these nearby GRBs detected by SWIFT to determine the fraction of GRBs with TeV emission as well as the flux of that TeV emission.

Many people helped bring Milagrito to fruition. In particular, we acknowledge the efforts of Scott Delay, Gwelen Paliaga, Neil Thompson and Michael Schneider. This work was supported in part by the National Science Foundation, the U. S. Department of Energy (Office of High Energy Physics and Office of Nuclear Physics), Los Alamos National Laboratory, the University of California, and the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics.


text:
# Modeling radio mini–halos in cooling flow clusters

## 1. Introduction

Several clusters of galaxies show extended ($``$ Mpc size) synchrotron emission not directly associated with the galaxies but rather diffused into the intracluster medium (ICM): these radio sources are called radio halos. In some cooling flow clusters with a central dominant galaxy, the diffuse radio emission is extended on a smaller scale, forming the so–called mini–halos (Feretti & Giovannini 1996).
The radiative life–time of an ensemble of relativistic electrons losing energy by synchrotron emission and Inverse Compton (IC) scattering off the CMB photons is given by $`\tau (\text{yr})=24.3/[(B^2+B_{CMB}^2)\gamma ]`$, where $`B`$ is the magnetic field intensity (in G), $`\gamma `$ is the Lorentz factor and $`B_{CMB}=3.18(1+z)^2\mu `$G. In a cooling flow region (i.e. for distances $`r<r_c`$, the cooling radius) the compression of the thermal ICM is expected to produce a significant increase of the strength of the frozen–in intracluster magnetic field: $`Br^2`$ for radial compression (Soker & Sarazin 1990) or $`Br^{0.8}`$ for isotropic compression (Tribble 1993). Therefore, in absence of a reacceleration or continuous injection mechanisms, relativistic electrons injected at a given time in these intense fields (of order of some tens of $`\mu `$G, e.g. Ge & Owen 1993) should already have lost most of their energy and the radio emission would not be observable for more than $`10^{7÷8}`$ yr. This short lifetime contrasts with the diffuse radio emission observed in mini–halos, hence it seems plausible that the electrons have been reaccelerated.

## 2. Model for electron reacceleration in cooling flows

The time evolution of the energy of a relativistic electron is determined by the competing processes of losses and reaccelerations (both related to the magnetic field) and it is important to study the efficiency of these processes in the cooling flow region as a function of $`x=r/r_c`$ (isotropic compression of the field is assumed):

$`\dot{\gamma }_{}`$ $`=`$ $`\beta \gamma ^2\chi 1.3\times 10^9\left[\left(B_c^2x^{1.6}+B_{CMB}^2\right)\gamma ^2+{\displaystyle \frac{n_c}{930}}x^{1.2}\right]`$ (1)
$`\dot{\gamma }_+`$ $`=`$ $`+\alpha _+\gamma =f(x)\gamma `$ (2)
where $`\beta `$ is the coefficient of synchrotron and IC losses, $`\chi `$ the Coulomb losses term, $`\alpha _+`$ the reacceleration coefficient, $`B_c=B(r_c)`$ and $`n_c`$ is the electron number density at $`r_c`$. Since the characteristic time of radiative losses is proportional to $`\gamma ^1`$, while that of reacceleration is independent of $`\gamma `$, the losses dominate the time evolution of the electrons for energies higher than $`\gamma _b`$, the break energy (Fig. 1, left panel). In our model (Gitti, Brunetti & Setti 2002) we assume that the relativistic electrons are continuosly reaccelerated by MHD turbulence via Fermi-like processes. This kind of reacceleration has the correct radial dependence on the parameters in the cooling flow region to naturally balance the radial behaviour of the radiative losses (Fig. 1, right panel). Under these assumptions, the stationary spectrum of the relativistic electrons is:

$$N(\gamma )(\gamma /\gamma _b)^2x^s\mathrm{exp}\left(2\gamma /\gamma _b\right)$$
(3)
which is essentially peaked at $`\gamma _b`$ and where we have parameterized the electron energy density as $`x^s`$, $`s`$ being a free parameter. The other free parameters in the model are $`B_c`$ and $`l_c`$, the leading MHD turbulence scale at $`r_c`$.

## 3. Model results for the Perseus cluster

The first observed and well studied case of radio mini-halo is that in the Perseus cluster (A426, at $`z=0.0183`$), which hosts also a massive cooling flow. The diffuse radio emission (see left panel in Fig. 2) has a total extension of $`15^{}`$ (comparable with that of the cooling flow region, $`r_c210`$ kpc), a steep spectrum with spectral index $`\alpha =1.4`$ (between 327 MHz and 609 MHz, $`S_\nu \nu ^\alpha `$) and its morphology is correlated with that of the cooling flow X-ray map (Ettori et al. 1998). On smaller scales ($`1^{}`$), Böhringer et al. (1993) showed evidence of interaction between the radio lobes of the central radiogalaxy 3C84 and the X–ray emitting intracluster gas. More recent results confirmed this interaction (Fig. 2, right panel) and support the interpretation of the holes in the X–ray emission as due to buoyant old radio lobes (Fabian et al. 2002). We notice that the spectral index in the lobes ranges from $`0.7`$ in the centre to $`1.5`$ in the outer regions of Fig. 2 (right panel), i.e. a value similar to the spectrum of the mini–halo extended over a scale $`10`$ times larger. Thus it is impossible to find a direct connection between the radio lobes and the mini–halo in terms of simple particle diffusion or buoyancy. The relativistic electrons of the mini–halo should then be reaccelerated and the morphological connection with the cooling flow suggests a leading role of the cooling flow itself in powering the reacceleration process.
Therefore, we have applied our model to the Perseus cluster, whose radio properties (brightness profile, integrated spectrum and radial spectral steepening) can be well reproduced assuming isotropic compression of the field (Gitti et al. 2002). In this case, the necessary energy rate to reaccelerate the relic population of electrons in a typical time of few $`10^9`$ yr is $`3\times 10^{42}`$ erg s-1, while the energy rate supplied by the cooling flow is of the order of $`10^{44}`$ erg s-1, so only a small fraction of it is required. The number of relativistic electrons in the cooling flow region is $`10^{62}`$. This is comparable to the number of the electrons in a typical radiogalaxy and may suggest an important role of the AGNs (and possibly of the central AGN) in the injecton of the electron relic population.

## 4. Why are radio mini-halos so rare?

In the framework of our model, large–scale turbulence in the cluster volume is required to balance the radiative losses of the electrons at $`r_c`$ (for Perseus we found $`\gamma _b(r_c)1500`$), however at the same time the turbulence can not be too high in order to avoid the disruption of the cooling flow. This scenario is similar to that of the extended radio halos where, however, higher energy electrons (with $`\gamma _b10^4`$) are required (e.g. Brunetti et al. 2001): this means that the turbulence efficiency would have to be correspondingly greater hence bringing to the disruption of a possible cooling flow, in agreement with the observed anti-correlation between radio halos and cooling flows.
Based on these considerations, we suggest that the physical conditions of the ICM in a cooling flow cluster with a radio mini–halo are intermediate between those which lead to the formation of extended radio halos, hosted by clusters without cooling flows, and those holding in cooling flows clusters without radio halos. This could explain, at least qualitatively, the rarity of radio mini–halos. In this scenario, where the energetics of the turbulence plays the main part in discriminating between the two opposite situations, Perseus may represent a borderline case: indeed there is evidence for a relatively recent merger event (Dupke & Bregman 2001) which may have left a fossil turbulence, not energetic enough to produce an extended radio halo, but sufficient for reaccelerating the electrons producing the mini–halo.

## 5. Abell 2626: a possible radio mini-halo candidate?

In order to extend the application of our model, we have undertaken the analysis of A2626 ($`z=0.0604`$). This cluster has a radio emission extended on a scale comparable to that of the cooling flow region (e.g. Rizza et al. 2000), and thus it is one of the best mini–halo candidates.
We present preliminary results for this cluster, obtained from VLA archive data at 1.5 GHz and 330 MHz at different resolutions. The 1.5 GHz map (Fig. 3, left panel) shows an unresolved core (with a flux density $`15`$ mJy, in agreement with Roland et al. 1985) and a diffuse emission extended by $`2^{}`$ ($`S_{1.5}27`$ mJy); we have estimated a polarization level $`<2`$ %. At 330 MHz we do not detect the emission of the core (for which we extimated an inverted spectral index $`0.6`$) while the flux density of the diffuse emission is $`S_{330}1`$ Jy. The spectral index of the diffuse emission between $`\nu =330`$ MHz and $`\nu =1.5`$ GHz is $`\alpha 2.4`$. These results indicate that the radio source observed in A2626 shows an amorphous structure which is likely to be not related to the central radiogalaxy. Thus it appears as a good candidate to apply our model for electron reacceleration in cooling flows. In Fig. 3 (right panel) we report a preliminary comparison between the observed flux densities and the total synchrotron spectrum predicted by our reacceleration model.

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