text:
# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

Maybe the central task of the whole economical science is the clever administration of the resources of a society in order for everyone to fullfill their material needs. It is thus interesting the question of to what extent one could, in principle, distribute richness with equity. At first sight, it seems perfectly conceivable (altough higly uthopic) a society in wich everyone access exactly the same ’ammount of richness’. Is there some conceivable bound to get such a setting? Well, suppose we begin distributting goods to N people: there is just one ’configuration’ in wich everyone receives exactly the same ammount of any good. If one decide being unfair by beneffiting just someone, there are N ways to do so (one for every beneffited person). One can see that as we increase the ’unfairness’, the number of possible configurations grow fastly. Thus, if we ’prepare the system’ to be fair at the begining, by exchange it will disorder with litle probability of reordering. This reasoning puts a bound also on the unfairness: a few too welth people and the rest with nothing is again an ordered state.

Here we will give the detailed mathematics for a ’dilute’ society, for wich the following postulates holds:

1. The population N remains fixed
2. There is a fixed ammount of richness, R
3. There are only individual patrimonia

Under these simplifications, we will find that we can find the probability distribution for individual wealthiness, giving a precise meaning to the above discussion. We will find the number of states for detailed distributions giving rise to the same global state (overall ’unfairness’). Those who know statistical mechanics will find a very close resemblance with ideal gases. Notice, however, that the following is not an analogy: everything is derived under the given and a few more assumptions. That much of the derivations are formally identical is quite amusing, but not that surprising once one realizes that both are statistics on the ways one can distribute something indestructible among a fixed number of ’objects’.

The conclussions drawn from this model are quite limited: richness is created and destroyed, populations change and in complex societies large ammounts of resourses belongs to ’composite objects’ like associations, corporations or even the whole society (’large range interactions’). Even more seriously, actual societies are away from statistical equilibrium: there is a typical ’relaxation time’ needed for the society to exchange goods untill it gets to an equilibrium, but growth (especially sectorial growth) ussually happens in shorter periods, so equilibrium is not reached. We know from other disciplines that systems far away from equilibrium can get extremely striking complexity (life being a paradigmatic thermodynamical example). Anyway, analyzing what happens at equilibrium is the mandatory begining, and very important conclussions are available at this primitive stage.

## 2 Partition of resourses: the distribution function

For clarity, we will suppose that each individual can have any patrimonium from a discrete set $`r_1,r_2,\mathrm{},r_k`$. Every $`r_i`$ could be composed of many combinations of different goods, say there are $`g_i`$ such combinations for each $`r_i`$. We also suppose that any ’microscopical state’ (any specific combination of goods) is accesible with equal probability for every individual (’fair rules’). We will call $`n_i`$ to the number of people owning $`r_i`$ each. Recall that the total population is $`N`$ and the total wealthiness is $`R`$. We have the bounds

$$N=n_1+n_2+\mathrm{}+n_k$$
(1)
$$R=n_1r_1+n_2r_2+\mathrm{}+n_kr_k$$
(2)
We will count the total number of configurations and find which is the most probable distribution (that is, the $`n(r)`$ having the maximum amount of states). First, notice that we can fill the state $`r_1`$ with one person in $`Ng_i`$ ways, then we have $`N1`$ remaining persons to accomodate. Once $`n_i`$ persons have been placed into an $`r_i`$ we must remember to divide by the $`n_i!`$ ways one does so, and we are left with

$$\mathrm{\Omega }=\frac{N!g_1^{n_1}\mathrm{}g_k^{n_k}}{n_1!\mathrm{}n_k!}$$
(3)
We now suppose that there are lots of $`n_i`$’s at each $`r_i`$ level, and we take them to be continuous. For each $`r_i`$ we will find an $`n_i`$ (we will call it $`n(r_i)`$) wich maximizes 3 subject to the bounds 1 and 2. In order to do so, we introduce the bounds as Lagrange multipliers, and extremize

$$S=ln(\mathrm{\Omega })+\alpha (Nn_1n_2\mathrm{}n_k)+\beta (Rn_1r_1n_2r_2\mathrm{}n_kr_k)$$
(4)
In $`ln(\mathrm{\Omega })`$ we use Stirling formula. We get then

$$\frac{S}{n_i}=ln(g_i)ln(n_i)\alpha \beta r_i=0$$
(5)
while the conditions $`\frac{S}{\alpha }`$ and $`\frac{S}{\beta }`$ just imposes the bounds. Thus we have got a Boltzman-like distribution for richness

$$n(r)=g_ie^\alpha e^{\beta r}$$
(6)
with $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$ determined by the conditions

$$N=e^\alpha \underset{r}{}e^{\beta r}$$

$$R=e^\alpha \underset{r}{}re^{\beta r}$$

## 3 Particular models

Lets consider some concrete distributions in order to see what do we have here. The above distribution will be considered continuous, that is, n(r) means that there are $`n(r)dr`$ individuals with patrimonia between $`r`$ and $`r+dr`$. Then, since the probability is exponentially damped, we will forget to bound r and we will take it to range between zero and infinity (in fact, it couldnt exeed $`R`$, but the probability of being $`R`$ while one expect it to be about $`R/N`$ is about $`e^N`$, that is, astronomically small). We do this because it is much easier to calculate. The distribution is thus

$$n(r)=g(r)e^\alpha e^{\beta r}$$

In order to give a $`g(r)`$ we will consider that we have $`m`$ goods whose unitary price is much cheaper that the mean wealthy (we will clarify this somewhat dark condition below) so we can think that we have a continuum of goods. For a given $`r`$ we have an indifference hipersurface such that $`r=r_1+\mathrm{}+r_m`$ ($`r_i`$ being the price of the ammount of the i-th good owned by the individual). So, g(r) is proportional to the (m-1)-dimmensional volume of the hypersurface: $`S(r)=\sqrt{m}r^{m1}`$. That surface is an hyperplane bounded by the walls defined by $`r_i=0`$, and its ’volume’ is of the form $`Cr^{m1}`$. So we take as our distribution

$$n(r)=Cr^{m1}e^\alpha e^{\beta r}$$
(7)
Let us first solve for the parameters $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$. We have

$$N=Ce^\alpha _0^{\mathrm{}}r^{m1}e^{\beta r}𝑑r$$

$$R=Ce^\alpha _0^{\mathrm{}}r^me^{\beta r}𝑑r$$

This gives the result

$$n(r)=\frac{N}{(m1)!}\left(\frac{m}{\overline{r}}\right)^mr^{m1}e^{mNr/R}$$
(8)
where $`\overline{r}=R/N`$ is the mean rent per capita. From 8 we can tell what is the condition for low unitary prices: we mean that every price should be much lower than $`\frac{R}{mN}`$. If one has many prices independent of $`R`$, as $`R`$ grows we should include more and more goods, so $`m`$ depends indeed on $`R`$. We see that the more goods available, the more peaky will the distribution be. As $`m`$ grows, the position of the peak approach from below the rent per capita $`R/N`$. The variance for the individual rent (that is rougly the dispersion of income) is

$$\mathrm{\Delta }r=\frac{1}{\sqrt{m}}\frac{R}{N}$$
(9)
## 4 General Discussion

For computational ease, we solved for an artificially simple example in wich any good could be obtained from any combination summing the same price. In general, however, one should have an ’indifference manifold’ whose volume will in general depend on the income. What is important for the calculations above is the ’dispersion relation’ connecting the individual rent and the volume of the indifference manifold. If it follows a power law $`V=Cr^m`$, all the above applies includding the calculation for the dispersion. It shows that equity will grow if the elasticity $`m`$ grows.

We have shown that a closed economy at equilibrium cannot be perfectly fair. Anyway, a complex society with large individual rent and large diversity can reach a state quite close to equity. On the other hand, subsistence economies in wich only a few goods are exchanged are mostly compossed of poor individuals.

An important remark on fluctuations is in order here: the ’ocupation density’ $`d=n(r)/N`$ will indeed fluctuate around the distribution found, and one should wonder how often it will differ appreciably from that distribution. If the answer is ’very often’, then all the analysis done is nearly useless. The answer is found by calculating the standard deviation $`\mathrm{\Delta }d`$, which is found to be $`d/\sqrt{N}`$. One could be tempted to take $`N=6000000000`$, but it must be remembered that larger populations have larger time relaxations, depending on the intensity of the trade exchange. That time for an entire continent would probably be many years, so normal succeses impeed reaching equilibrium. Where interchange is strong enough in order to have a somewhat small relaxation time is inside a country, a city, etc where population is tipically a few million people, so fluctuations in $`d`$ can be estimated in $`10^3`$ of $`d`$, wich is quite small. However, economies are continuously changing, and are surely much away from equilibrium.


format: text

text:
# 𝑓_𝐵 from finite size effects in lattice QCDTalk given at Lattice 2002 by R.P.

## 1 Introduction

Lattice QCD evaluations of quantities characterised by two scales with a large hierarchy require in general a very high lattice resolution and a sizeable total physical volume to correctly account the dynamics of the small distance scale and to dispose of the finite size effects related to the large distance scale. A good example is provided by the pseudoscalar $`B`$ meson decay constant , where the small distance scale is represented by the inverse of the bottom quark mass and the large distance scale by the radius of the $`B`$ meson, related in turn to the inverse of the light quark mass. A straight evaluation of the decay constant would require lattices with $`N=80^4`$ points or more, exceeding the present generation computers capabilities, and, in the case of unquenched simulations, the ones of the next generation. One resorts to approximate calculations based on extrapolations from the static limit or on non–relativistic formulations of standard QCD. All the available methods introduce systematic errors related to extrapolation fits and/or to the use of effective Lagrangians.

We discuss a novel approach based on the study of the dependence upon the heavy quark mass of finite size effects for the pseudoscalar decay constant of heavy flavoured mesons (see  for details). The basic assumption is that the finite size effects are mainly related to the light quark mass and rather insensitive to the one of a sufficiently heavy quark. We discuss the general features of the method assuming the continuum limit has been taken. The relevant quantity is the ratio $`\sigma f_B(2L)/f_B(L)`$ of the pseudoscalar constants at different volumes, where $`f_B(L)`$ is the value of the decay constant on a volume with linear size $`L`$. The dimensionless $`\sigma `$ depends on general grounds upon three dimensionless variables: $`m_{\mathrm{}}L`$, $`m_hL`$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{QCD}L`$. For a sufficiently large heavy quark mass $`m_h`$, the dependence is basically dominated by the light quark and the expansion for large $`m_h`$ takes the form

$$\sigma =\sigma (m_{\mathrm{}}L,\mathrm{\Lambda }_{QCD}L)+\frac{C(m_{\mathrm{}}L,\mathrm{\Lambda }_{QCD}L)}{m_hL}.$$
(1)
A simple phenomenological ansatz for $`\sigma `$ can be made based on the concept of a reduced mass constructed out of the heavy and light quark masses

$$\sigma =\sigma (m_{red}L,\mathrm{\Lambda }_{QCD}L),$$
(2)
where $`m_{red}=(\mu _1\mu _2)/(\mu _1+\mu _2)`$. The quantity $`\mu _i`$ is a function of the quark mass, but not only: indeed, for very light masses, finite size effects are regulated by the physical meson size, which is expected to remain finite when the light quark mass approches zero.

A crucial question is the threshold value of the quark mass on a given volume where the large $`m_h`$ expansion becomes reliable. As we will show, this value falls in a mass range of the order of a couple of GeV in the renormalization invariant mass scheme, where the calculation on a single lattice is affordable. Under these circumstances, the strategy to obtain $`f_B`$ is the following. One first performs a calculation on a lattice where the resolution is suitable for $`b`$ quark propagation, but the total volume is unavoidably a small one. This sets $`f_B`$ on a finite volume. In order to connect to the large volume results, one needs the step scaling function $`\sigma `$ for values of heavy quark masses generally lower than those of the simulation where the finite size value of $`f_B`$ was obtained. The possibility of extrapolating $`\sigma `$ to heavier masses depends upon the validity of the asymptotic expansion: in a favourable case, as is the real one, one can evaluate the finite size effects in a reliable way, connecting, by a repeated iteration of the procedure, small volume values of $`f_B`$ to the ones on large volumes,

$$f_B^{phys}=f_B(L_0)\sigma (L_0)\sigma (2L_0)\mathrm{},$$
(3)
and the recursion stops on a volume where $`\sigma 1`$ within a required precision. The continuum limit is obtained by extrapolating to zero lattice spacing the step scaling function obtained at fixed physical quantities.

We use the Schrödinger Functional framewrok to compute the pseudoscalar decay constants and we fix the lattice scale in terms of $`r_0`$ . Meson masses, on different volumes, are tuned by fixing the physical value of the Renormalization Group Invariant quak masses .

## 2 Results and Discussion

The results are obtained at finite lattice spacing. The size of the smallest volume follows from the decision of making our estimate for the finite size $`f_B`$ on a $`48\times 24^3`$ lattice with a cutoff of about $`a_0^112\mathrm{GeV}`$. The value of the bare coupling for this lattice spacing has been obtained from a fit in ref. . The procedure fixes $`\beta (a_0)=7.3`$ and the physical volume $`L_0=0.4`$ fm. On this lattice, we simulate heavy quark masses up to $`0.3`$ in lattice units, corresponding to bare physical masses slightly above $`4`$ GeV. Indeed, as a general caution against large lattice artifacts, at all $`\beta `$ values we take the maximum heavy quark mass in lattice units of the order of $`0.3`$. The first $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ (we distinguish between the continuum step function $`\sigma `$ and the one at finite lattice spacing $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$) goes from the volume of $`0.4`$ fm to the one of $`0.8`$ fm. In terms of lattice points, we go from $`12`$ to $`24`$, and we have to match the starting volume of $`0.4`$ fm with a resolution which is half of the one used for a correct estimate of the bottom quark propagation. According to our caveat, it follows that the maximum bare quark mass that we can achieve is correspondingly halved, i.e. of about a couple of GeV at a bare coupling $`\beta =6.737`$. We make a further iteration with a second $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ going from $`0.8`$ fm to $`1.6`$ fm, where our investigation of heavy quark masses stops at the order of the charm quark mass. The corresponding bare coupling is $`\beta =6.211`$. The finite volume effects for this second evolution step are small enough to make the neglection of the residual volume effects a safe assumption, that however can be tested explicitly.

The plots in Figs. 1 and 2 show the dependence of $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ upon the heavy RGI quark mass $`M_{RGI}^h`$ for the two volume jumps and provide evidence for a plateau of insensitivity to heavy quark masses: the data have been obtained from a linear extrapolation in $`M_{RGI}^{\mathrm{}}`$ to the down and strange RGI quark masses reported in . These figures, with the figures of ref., support the procedure proposed.

The statistical errors are computed by a jacknife method (see ref.  for details). The finite size value of $`f_B`$ is obtained by a calculation on the highest resolution lattice and the RGI bottom quark mass is obtained from the equation

$$M=\widehat{Z}_M(g_0)m_{WI}(g_0)$$
(4)
In order to obtain the renormalisation constant $`Z_M(g_0)`$ at $`\beta =7.3`$ and $`\beta =6.737`$, we have used a safe interpolation of the pseudoscalar renormalisation constant $`Z_P(g_0,\mu )`$ at a value of $`\mu `$ three times the reference value used in eq. (6.8) of ref. . The value for $`f_B`$ that we obtain is

$$f_B(0.4\mathrm{fm})=483(4)\mathrm{MeV}$$
(5)
By using the values of $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ for the $`b`$ quark at constant RGI mass

$$\mathrm{\Sigma }_{0.40.8}^{bd}=0.401(4),\mathrm{\Sigma }_{0.81.6}^{bd}=0.88(4)$$
(6)
we obtain our estimate of $`f_B`$ on the large volume:

$$f_B^{phys}=170(11)\mathrm{MeV},$$
(7)
where the error quoted in the previous equation is statistical only. In this the written version of the talk we include our estimate of the sistematic errors that can be partly ascribed to specific approximations used in the present computation that can be eventually removed, and partly to the uncertainty in the extrapolation in the heavy quark mass of finite size effects, inherent to the method proposed. The overall error on the number $`f_B`$ coming from the removable systematic uncertainties is of about $`13`$% and of at most $`23`$% from the ones deriving from the unavoidable extrapolation in the heavy quark mass, leading to a global uncertainty of about $`25`$ MeV of which about $`20`$ are removable while $`5`$ stay with the method:

$$f_B^{phys}=170(11)(5)(22)\mathrm{MeV}.$$
(8)
In the same way we obtain

$$f_{B_s}^{phys}=192(9)(5)(24)\mathrm{MeV}.$$
(9)
We quote also the results of the ratios

$$\frac{f_{B_s}^{phys}}{f_B^{phys}}=1.13(2)(1)\frac{f_{D_s}^{phys}}{f_D^{phys}}=1.10(1)(1)$$
(10)
that were asked at the end of the talk.

The method proposed can be generalized to problems characterised by two very different mass scales, if the decoupling of the large mass scale from the low scales of non-perturbative QCD dynamics holds true. This appears to be the case in the example discussed and is somehow supported by the wide success of the predictions of perturbative QCD calculations for hard processes that are insensitive to the dressing mechanism of quarks and gluons into standard hadronic final states.


text:
# Pillow Degenerations of 𝐾3 Surfaces

## 1 Introduction

In this article we construct a specific projective degeneration of $`K3`$ surfaces of degree $`2g2`$ in $`^g`$ to a union of $`2g2`$ planes, which meet in such a way that the combinatorics of the configuration of planes is a triangulation of the $`2`$-sphere. Abstractly, such degenerations are said to be Type III degenerations of $`K3`$ surfaces, see , , . Although the birational geometry of such degenerations is fairly well understood, the study of projective degenerations is not nearly as completely developed.

In , projective degenerations of $`K3`$ surfaces to unions of planes were constructed, in which the general member was embedded by a primitive line bundle. The application featured there was a computation of the rank of the Wahl map for the general hyperplane section curve on the $`K3`$ surface.

In this article we construct degenerations for which the general member is embedded by a *multiple* of the primitive line bundle class. The construction depends on two parameters, and we intend in follow-up work to use these degenerations to compute braid monodromy for Galois coverings, in the style of  and . We hope that the freedom afforded by the additional discrete parameters in the construction will yield interesting phenomena related to fundamental groups.

The specific degenerations which we construct can be viewed as two rectangular arrays of planes, joined along their boundary; for this reason we have given them the name “pillow” degenerations. They are described in Section 3. Following that, in Section 4, we study the degeneration of the general branch curve (for a general projection of the surfaces to a plane) to a union of lines (which is the “branch curve” for the union of planes). In particular when the general branch curve is a plane curve having only nodes and cusps as singularities, we describe the degeneration of the nodes and the cusps to the configuration of the union of lines. This is critical information in the application to the computation of the braid monodromy.

We are not aware of a modern reference for the statement that the general branch curve for a linear projection of a surface to a plane has only nodes and cusps as singularities. In this article we will operate under the assumption that this “folklore” statement is true and proceed. The reader may wish to consult  for further information. We have included a short section at the beginning of the article deriving the characters of a general branch curve (degree, number of nodes and cusps) for the convenience of the reader, under this assumption.

The authors are grateful to the NATO Scientific Affairs Division, the Ministry of Science of Israel, the Emmy Noether Research Institute of Mathematics at Bar-Ilan University, and EAGER (the European Union Research Network in Algebraic Geometry), for financial support for the Workshop in Eilat at which this article was completed.

## 2 Characters of a General Branch Curve

Here we briefly develop the formulas for the degree and number of nodes and cusps on a general branch curve $`B`$ for a general projection of a smooth surface $`S^N`$ to a general plane $`^2`$, assuming that these are the only singularities. These formulas are not new, see for example , , but these standard references do much more, in either outdated notation or with much more advanced techniques, than are necessary for this more modest computation. Hence we thought it useful to include it here for completeness and for the convenience of the reader. The reader may also want to consult , , , and  for additional insight.

Denote by $`\pi :S^2`$ such a general projection. Let $`K`$ and $`H`$ be the canonical and hyperplane classes of $`S`$ respectively. Let $`d`$ be the degree of $`S`$ and $`g(H)`$ the genus of a smooth hyperplane divisor. The intersection numbers $`KH`$ and $`H^2`$ are related to $`d`$ and $`g`$ by

$$d=H^2\text{ and }\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}\hspace{0.33em}\hspace{0.33em}2}g(H)2=H^2+KH.$$
(2.1)
The degree of the finite map $`\pi `$ is equal to the degree $`d`$ of the surface $`S`$. The degree $`b`$ of the branch curve may be easily computed by noting that the pull-back of a line in $`^2`$ is a hyperplane divisor; hence the Hurwitz formula gives

$$2g(H)2=d(2)+\mathrm{deg}(B)$$

from which it follows that

$$b=\mathrm{deg}(B)=2d+2g(H)2=3d+KH.$$
(2.2)
Let $`RS`$ denote the ramification curve, and denote by $`R_0`$ the residual curve (equal set-theoretically to the closure of $`\pi ^1(B)R`$). $`R`$ is a smooth curve, and the mapping $`\pi `$, restricted to $`R`$, is a desingularization of $`B`$.

Suppose that $`B`$ has $`n`$ nodes and $`k`$ cusps and no other singularities. Over a general smooth point of $`B`$, the map $`\pi `$ has $`d1`$ preimages, one on the ramification curve and $`d2`$ on the residual curve. Over each node of $`B`$, the ramification curve $`R`$ has two smooth branches, and over each cusp, $`R`$ has one smooth branch. Over a node of $`B`$, the residual curve $`R_0`$ meets $`R`$ once transversally at each branch of $`R`$, and otherwise has $`d4`$ nodes of its own. Over a cusp of $`B`$, the residual curve $`R_0`$ meets $`R`$ twice at the point of $`R`$ lying over the cusp, and is smooth there; it otherwise has $`d3`$ cusps of its own. In any case, over either a node or a cusp of $`B`$, there are only $`d2`$ preimages, instead of the $`d1`$ preimages over a general point of $`B`$. Therefore, computing Euler numbers, we see that

$$e(RR_0)=e(\pi ^1(B))=(d1)e(B)(n+k).$$
(2.3)
The genus of the ramification curve $`R`$, being a desingularization of the branch curve $`B`$, is

$$g(R)=(b1)(b2)/2(n+k)$$

using Plücker’s formulas. Its Euler number is therefore

$$e(R)=22g(R)=2(n+k)b^2+3b.$$

Since $`R`$ and $`B`$ differ, topologically, only over the nodes, we see that the Euler number of $`B`$ is

$$e(B)=e(R)n=n+2kb^2+3b.$$

Letting $`e(S)`$ be the Euler number of the surface $`S`$, we see that

$$e(S)=d[e(^2)e(B)]+e(RR_0)$$

$$=3dde(B)+(d1)e(B)(n+k)\text{using \hspace{1em}(}\text{2.3}\text{)}$$

$$=3de(B)nk$$

$$=3d[n+2kb^2+3b]nk$$

$$=3d+b^23b2n3k,$$

so that

$$2n+3k=3d+b^23be(S).$$
(2.4)
Pulling back $`2`$-forms via $`\pi `$, we have the standard formula that

$$K_S=\pi ^{}(K_^2)+R=3H+R$$

and since $`bH=\pi ^{}(B)`$, we see that

$$2R+R_0=\pi ^{}(B)=bH,$$

so that, as classes on $`S`$,

$$R=K+3H\text{ and }R_0=bH2R=2K+(b6)H.$$

Since $`R`$ and $`R_0`$ meet transversally at each of the two points of $`R`$ over a node, and meet to order two at the point of $`R`$ lying over a cusp, we see that $`RR_0=2(n+k)`$. Therefore $`2n+2k=RR_0=(K+3H)(2K+(b6)H)`$; multiplying this out gives

$$2n+2k=2K^2+(b12)KH+(3b18)H^2.$$
(2.5)
Subtracting (2.5) from (2.4) gives

$$k=3d+b^23be(S)+2K^2(b12)KH(3b18)d$$

and then one can solve either expression for the number of nodes. Simplifying the expressions somewhat leads to the following.

###### Proposition 2.6

Let $`S`$ be a smooth surface of degree $`d`$ in $`^N`$, and let $`\pi :S^2`$ be a general projection. Let $`K`$ and $`H`$ be the canonical and hyperplane classes of $`S`$, respectively. Let $`B`$ be the branch curve of the projection $`\pi `$, which is assumed to be a plane curve of degree $`b`$ with $`n`$ nodes, $`k`$ cusps, and no other singularities. Then:

1. $`\mathrm{deg}(\pi )=\mathrm{deg}(S)=d=H^2`$.
2. The degree of the branch curve $`B`$ is $`b=3d+KH`$.
3. The number of nodes of the branch curve $`B`$ is

$$n=3K^2+e(S)+24d+\frac{b^2}{2}15b.$$
4. The number of cusps of the branch curve $`B`$ is

$$k=2K^2e(S)15d+9b.$$
5. Under a general projection of the branch curve $`B`$ to a line, the number $`t`$ of turning points (simple branch points) is

$$t=e(S)3d+2b.$$

The last computation of turning points is obtained from the Hurwitz formula, applied to the ramification curve $`R`$, noting that there are simple branch points for such a projection at the points of $`R`$ lying over the cusps of $`B`$ also.

###### Example 2.7 (Veronese Surfaces)

Let $`S`$ be the $`r^{th}`$ Veronese image of $`^2`$. In this case, if $`L`$ denotes the line class of $`S`$, then $`L^2=1`$, $`K=3L`$, and $`H=rL`$; hence $`K^2=9`$, $`KH=3r`$, and $`d=H^2=r^2`$. The Euler number $`e(S)=3`$. Therefore

$$\begin{array}{c}b=3r(r1);n=3(r1)(r2)(3r^2+3r8)/2;\\ k=3(r1)(4r5);t=3(r1)^2.\end{array}$$

###### Example 2.8 (Rational Normal Scrolls)

Let $`S`$ be a rational normal scroll, e.g. $`^1\times ^1`$ embedded by the complete linear system $`H`$ of type $`(1,r)`$. The canonical class is of type $`(2,2)`$, so that $`K^2=8`$, $`KH=2r2`$, and $`d=H^2=2r`$. The Euler number $`e(S)=4`$. Therefore

$$b=4r2;n=4(r1)(2r3);k=6r6;t=2r.$$

###### Example 2.9 (Del Pezzo Surfaces)

Let $`S`$ be a Del Pezzo Surface of degree $`d`$ in $`^d`$, for $`3d9`$. Then $`S`$ is isomorphic to the plane blown up at $`9d`$ points; if $`L`$ denotes the class of a line, and $`E`$ the sum of the classes of the $`9d`$ exceptional divisors, then $`L^2=1`$, $`LE=0`$, and $`E^2=d9`$; also $`K=3L+E`$, and $`H=K`$, so that $`K^2=H^2=d`$, and $`KH=d`$. The Euler number $`e(S)=12d`$. Therefore

$$b=2d;n=2(d2)(d3)=2d^210d+12;k=6(d2);t=12.$$

###### Example 2.10 ($`K3`$ Surfaces)

Let $`S`$ be a $`K3`$ surface of degree $`d=2g2`$ in $`^g`$. The canonical class is trivial, so that $`K^2=KH=0`$. The Euler number $`e(S)=24`$. Therefore

$$\begin{array}{c}b=6g6;n=6(g2)(3g7)=18g^278g+84;\\ k=24(g2);t=6g+18.\end{array}$$

## 3 Construction of the Pillow Degeneration

A non-hyperelliptic $`K3`$ surface of genus $`g3`$ can be embedded by the sections of a very ample line bundle as a smooth surface of degree $`2g2`$ in $`^g`$. When the line bundle generates the Picard group of the $`K3`$ surface, the embedded $`K3`$ surface can be degenerated to a union of $`2g2`$ planes in a variety of ways (see for example ). In this section we will describe a degeneration, which we call the *pillow* degeneration, which smooths to a $`K3`$ surface whose Picard group is generated by a sub-multiple of the hyperplane class.

Fix two integers $`a`$ and $`b`$ at least two; set $`g=2ab+1`$. The number of planes in the pillow degeneration is then $`2g2=4ab`$.

This projective space has $`g+1=2ab+2`$ coordinate points, and each of the $`4ab`$ planes is obtained as the span of three of these. The sets of three are indicated in Figure 1, which describes the bottom part of the ”pillow” and the top part of the ”pillow”, which are identified along the boundaries of the two configurations. The reader will see that the boundary is a cycle of $`2a+2b`$ lines.

Note that no three of the planes meet in a line. Also note that the set of bottom planes lies in a projective space of dimension $`ab+a+b`$, as do the set of top planes; these two projective spaces meet exactly along the span of the $`2a+2b`$ boundary points, which has dimension $`2a+2b1`$. Finally note that the four corner points of the pillow degeneration (labeled $`1`$, $`a+1`$, $`a+b+1`$, and $`a+2b+1`$) are each contained in three distinct planes, while all other points are each contained in six planes. This property, that the number of lines and planes incident on each of the points is bounded, is important for the later computations, and is a feature of the pillow degeneration that is not available in other previous degenerations.

We will call such a configuration of planes a *pillow of bidegree $`(a,b)`$*.

###### Theorem 3.1

For any $`a`$ and $`b`$ at least $`2`$, the pillow of bidgree $`(a,b)`$ is a degeneration of a smooth $`K3`$ surface of degree $`4ab`$ in a projective space of dimension $`g=2ab+1`$. If $`c=g.c.d(a,b)`$, then the general such $`K3`$ surface will have Picard group generated by a line bundle $`L`$ such that $`cL`$ is the hyperplane bundle.

The proof of the Theorem will be made in three steps. First we will exhibit a degeneration of the $`K3`$ surface to a union of two rational surfaces, each isomorphic to $`^1\times ^1`$, embedded via the sections of the linear system of bidegree $`(a,b)`$. These two rational surfaces will meet along an elliptic normal curve which is anticanonical in each. Secondly we will simultaneously degenerate each rational surface to a union of $`ab`$ quadrics, resulting in a total of $`2ab`$ quadrics. Finally we will degenerate each quadric to a union of two planes.

Proof: (Step One:) Note that the sections of the linear system of bidegree $`(a,b)`$ embed $`^1\times ^1`$ as a surface in a projective space of dimension $`ab+a+b`$. Choose an anticanonical divisor (of bidegree $`(2,2)`$) which is a smooth elliptic curve; it is mapped by the above embedding to an elliptic normal curve in a subspace of dimension $`2a+2b1`$.

In our original ambient space of dimension $`2ab+1`$, choose two subspaces of dimension $`ab+a+b`$ which meet along a subspace of dimension $`2a+2b1`$. Make the above identical construction of the $`^1\times ^1`$ in each of the two subspaces, taking care to have the two elliptic normal curves identified in the intersection subspace.

This union $`R`$ of the two rational surfaces is a degeneration of an embedded $`K3`$ surface, by an argument identical to that presented for Theorems 1 and 2 of , which we will not repeat in detail here. Briefly, one first checks via standard calculations that $`H^0(N_R)`$ has dimension $`g^2+2g+19`$ and that $`H^1(N_R)=H^2(N_R)=0`$. Secondly, the natural map from $`H^0(N_R)`$ to $`H^0(T^1)`$ is seen to be surjective. This is sufficient to prove that $`R`$ represents a smooth point of its Hilbert scheme, whose general member is a smooth $`K3`$ surface of degree $`2g2`$.

(Step Two:) The second step can be achieved as in  by observing that each $`^1\times ^1`$ can be degenerated to a union of $`ab`$ quadrics by degenerating the first coordinate $`^1`$ to a chain of $`a`$ lines, and the second coordinate $`^1`$ to a chain of $`b`$ lines. In this degeneration the elliptic curve degenerates to a cycle of $`2(a+b)`$ lines. This degeneration is made simultaneously for each of the two $`^1\times ^1`$’s, resulting in a degeneration to a union of $`2ab`$ quadrics. This configuration of $`2ab`$ quadrics meet as in Figure 1, without the diagonal lines: if one removes the diagonal lines from Figure 1 we obtain $`2ab`$ rectangles, each indicating a quadric. Each of these quadrics meets the others along a cycle of four lines (two vertical and two horizontal).

(Step Three:) Finally degenerate each quadric to a union of two planes, as in Figure 1. These degenerations can be executed completely independently of course, and it is elementary to see that this can be done keeping the four lines along which any one of the quadrics meet the others fixed.

(Step Four:) Finally note that if $`c1`$, the pillow degeneration of bidegree $`(a,b)`$ is a degeneration of the $`c`$-uple embedding of the pillow degeneration of bidegree $`(a/c,b/c)`$. To see this, one uses the standard triangular degeneration of the Veronese embedding of the plane as described in .

The final point to check is that the general $`K3`$ surface in this $`19`$-dimensional family has Picard group generated by $`(1/c)H`$, where $`H`$ is the hyperplane class. Since we have a $`19`$-dimensional family of $`K3`$ surfaces, the only question to be decided is which sub-multiple of the hyperplane system is the generator of the general Picard group. The maximum possible is the g.c.d $`c`$. Since the pillow is a $`c`$-uple Veronese, the hyperplane class is at least a $`c`$-fold multiple, and since it cannot be any more, this shows that the Picard group is generated by $`(1/c)H`$. This completes the proof of the Theorem.

Q.E.D

Note that in this degeneration, the horizontal and vertical lines appear first, and the diagonal lines appear second.

## 4 The Degeneration of the Branch Curve

We assume that we are in a general enough situation that for a generic projection of a K3 surface of degree $`g`$ in $`^g`$ to a plane, the branch curve is a curve of degree $`6g6`$, having $`6(g2)(3g7)`$ nodes and $`24(g2)`$ cusps and no other singularities; these numbers were presented in Section 2. If one projects this branch curve onto a general line, the projection will have $`6g+18`$ simple branch points.

It is our goal in this section to describe how these nodes, cusps, and branch points degenerate in a pillow degeneration.

Firstly, since the pillow degeneration consists entirely of planes, under a general projection each plane will map isomorphically onto the target plane. Therefore the degenerate branch curve is composed of the $`3g3`$ planar lines which are the images of the $`3g3`$ double lines of the pillow degeneration where two planes meet. Each of the $`3g3`$ planar lines have multiplicity two in the limit branch curve.

We see therefore that the general branch curve (of degree $`6g6`$) degenerates as a curve to the $`3g3`$ planar lines, each doubled. Our next task is to describe the degeneration of the nodes, cusps and branch points of the general branch curve. In any case it is clear that these distinguished points of the general branch curve can only go to points of the $`3g3`$ planar lines.

Secondly, it is elementary to compute that there are $`(9/2)g^2(51/2)g+39`$ pairs of disjoint lines in the pillow degeneration. Each of these pairs of disjoint lines gives rise to an intersection of two planar line components of the limit branch curve. We refer to these points as *$`2`$-points* of the configuration of the $`3g3`$ planar lines.

In addition to these $`2`$-points, we have exactly four *$`3`$-points*, corresponding to the projection of the four points in the pillow degeneration where $`3`$ planes (and $`3`$ double lines) meet. Finally we have $`g3`$ *$`6`$-points* corresponding to the projection of the $`g3`$ points in the pillow degeneration where $`6`$ planes (and $`6`$ double lines) meet. At any one of these $`n`$-points ($`n=2`$, $`3`$, or $`6`$) exactly $`n`$ of the $`3g3`$ planar lines meet; moreover at no other point of the plane do any of these lines meet.

In the degeneration of the general branch curve to this configuration of $`3g3`$ double lines, each of the nodes, cusps, and branch points can degenerate either to a $`2`$-point, a $`3`$-point, a $`6`$-point, or a smooth point of one of the $`3g3`$ lines. With the above terminology, we can now describe how many nodes, cusps, and branch points degenerate to each of these types of points.

###### Theorem 4.1

In the pillow degeneration of a $`K3`$ surface of degree $`g`$ in $`^g`$, the nodes, cusps, and branch points of the general branch curve degenerate to the $`2`$-points, $`3`$-points, $`6`$-points, and other smooth points of lines according to the following table:

| Object | Number | Branch | Nodes | Cusps |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Type |  | Points |  |  |
| Lines | $`3g3`$ | $`0`$ | $`0`$ | $`0`$ |
| $`3`$-points | $`4`$ | $`9`$ | $`0`$ | $`6`$ |
| $`6`$-points | $`g3`$ | $`6`$ | $`24`$ | $`24`$ |
| $`2`$-points | $`\frac{9}{2}g^2\frac{51}{2}g+39`$ | $`0`$ | $`4`$ | $`0`$ |
| Totals: |  | $`6g+18`$ | $`18g^278g+84`$ | $`24(g2)`$ |

In particular no node, cusp, or branch point degenerates to a smooth point of any of the $`3g3`$ double lines of the limit branch curve.

Proof: We first look at the row of the table for the $`2`$-points. Since each of the planar lines have multiplicity two in the branch curve, this crossing point actually is a limit of $`4`$ nodes of the general branch curve (the $`4`$ nodes appearing as the four intersection points of two pairs of lines). No cusp or branch point of the general branch curve has this crossing point as a limit in general, since these points are created by the projection of unrelated disjoint lines in the union of planes in $`^g`$.

We now turn our attention to the images of the multiple points of the pillow degeneration where $`n`$ planes (and $`n`$ double lines) meet at one point. We assume that $`3n6`$ in what follows. (In the pillow degeneration we have $`n=3`$ or $`n=6`$ only.) Under the generic planar projection, such points go to intersections of $`n`$ of the corresponding planar lines. We will refer to these as *$`n`$-points* of the limit branch curve.

In order to analyze the number of nodes, cusps, and branch points of the general curve which go to these $`n`$-points, we make a local analysis near the multiple point of the union of planes. There are $`n`$ planes incident to this multiple point, and they together span a $`^n`$. Locally this collection of $`n`$ planes in $`^n`$ smooths to a Del Pezzo surface of degree $`n`$. In a generic projection for such a Del Pezzo, the branch curve has degree $`2n`$, with $`2(n2)(n3)`$ nodes and $`6n12`$ cusps; the number of simple branch points for this curve under generic projection to a line is $`12`$.

The limit branch curve corresponding to the degeneration of the Del Pezzo to the union of $`n`$ planes is a union of $`n`$ lines concurrent at a point $`p`$, the images of the $`n`$ lines through the multiple point.

A partial smoothing of the union of $`n`$ planes may be obtained by taking two adjacent planes and smoothing them to a quadric surface. The corresponding smoothing of the limit branch curve smooths exactly one of the $`n`$ lines to a conic, which is necessarily tangent to two adjacent lines. As the conic degenerates to the (double) line $`L`$, we see that no nodes of the general branch curve go to any point of $`L`$ which is not $`p`$, and no cusps do either. The conic has two general branch points for a projection to a line, and one of these branch points goes to $`p`$ and one does not.

This local analysis of this partial smoothing shows that in a complete smoothing to the Del Pezzo, no node can go to a point of any line except the concurrent point $`p`$, and neither can any cusp. Therefore all of the $`2(n2)(n3)`$ nodes degenerate to the concurrent point, and all of the $`6n12`$ cusps do too. Moreover, of the $`12`$ branch points for the general curve, all but $`n`$ of them go to the concurrent point $`p`$. (The other $`n`$ go to one on each line.)

In the cases $`n=3`$ and $`n=6`$ of interest in the pillow degeneration, the above analysis shows that arbitrarily close to a $`3`$-point there are $`9=123`$ branch points, and no nodes and $`6`$ cusps. Arbitrarily close to a $`6`$-point there are $`6=126`$ branch points, and $`24`$ nodes and $`24`$ cusps. This gives the entries in the $`3`$-point and $`6`$-point rows of the table.

If we now total the number of branch points, nodes and cusps which degenerate to these multiple points, we obtain the values in the last row of the table. Since these are exactly the number of branch points, nodes, and cusps of the general curve, we must have accounted for all of the branch points, nodes, and cusps already. In particular there are none left to degenerate to smooth points of the double lines.

This completes the proof of the Theorem.

Q.E.D


text:
# The attractors in sequence processing neural networksPublished in Int. J. mod. Phys. C11, 33(2000)

## I Introduction

The dynamic behavior of Hopfield model1, a global symmetric coupling neural network, is relatively simple: the system relaxes to a fixed point corresponding to a stable patterns2. The latest result of its maximal stored capacity $`\alpha _s`$ given by Volk3 is $`0.143\pm 0.002.`$ Because the synaptic connections in real biological neural networks have a highly degree of asymmetry and a real human idea consists of a set of patterns, many modification of Hopfield model have been designed4-6. In general, an asymmetric connection strength may arise to recall a series of patterns or even chaos behavior, and cannot be studied by conventional statistical methods because it disobeys detailed balance.

In this paper, we study the behavior of attractors in a sequence processing model5, a fully connected Ising spin model, through numerical simulation with deterministic parallel dynamics. Moreover, the robustness is examined by locating critical coupling degrees since the loss of synaptic connections in the human brain may occur because of brain damage7.

## II Model definition

We consider a sequence processing neural network model described by the following equations4-6

$$s_i\left(t+1\right)=\mathrm{sgn}\left(\underset{j}{}J_{ij}s_j\left(t\right)\right)$$
(1)
where Ising spin $`s_i\left(t\right)\{1,1\}`$ represents the firing state or resting state and $`\mathrm{sgn}\left(x\right)`$ is updating function corresponding with signum function which if $`x>0`$, we get $`1`$; if $`x<0`$, we get $`1`$. The neurons evolve their states simultaneously with deterministic parallel dynamics and the time step is $`1`$ in all our work.

The synaptic connection matrix $`𝐉`$ can be given by4,8

$$J_{ij}=\frac{1}{N}\underset{\mu =1}{\overset{q}{}}c_{ij}\xi _i^{\mu +1}\xi _j^\mu $$
(2)
for a diluted model consisting of $`N`$ neurons. The $`q`$ vectors $`\xi ^\mu =\{\xi _1^\mu ,\xi _2^\mu ,\mathrm{},\xi _N^\mu \}\{1,1\}^N`$ are randomly and independently stored patterns in neural networks. It means the stored patterns are organized in one $`q`$-period cycle. It can be introduced by definition $`\xi _i^{q+1}=\xi _i^1`$ in $`(2)`$. The dilution factors $`c_{ij}=0`$ or 1 are independent identically distributed random variables. They are selected by

$$\mathrm{if}zd,\mathrm{then}c_{ij}=1;\mathrm{else}c_{ij}=0$$
(3)
where $`z[0,1]`$ is a random number and $`d[0,1]`$ is the coupling degree of networks. For $`c_{ij}=1`$ or $`d=1`$, the model restore to a standard (Hopfield-Hebb) sequence processing model.

Comparing with standard Hopfield model, the synapses of equation $`\left(2\right)`$ are insufficient for the generation of stable fixed point in phase space, since they combine pattern $`\mu `$ with pattern $`\mu +1`$. Nevertheless, the transition from one pattern to another is so fast that it possible get into a stationary limit cycle for the modulo-$`q`$ checking of $`\mu `$ in $`\xi _i^\mu `$.

## III The performance parameters

For measuring the retrieving ability of this model, in a similar way to the definition in Hopfield models, the overlaps of state $`𝐬\left(t\right)`$ and the stored patterns with the initial arbitrary pattern $`𝐬\left(0\right)\{1,1\}^N`$is defined by

$$m^\mu \left(t\right)=\frac{1}{N}\underset{j=1}{\overset{N}{}}\xi _j^\mu s_j\left(t\right),\mu =1,\mathrm{},q$$
(4)
For example, in $`100`$ neurons with $`10`$ stored patterns in a cycle, we obtained a pattern sequence as $`8765432110987\mathrm{}`$ (see Fig. 1a). It is easy to find that the series is equal to a cycle of stored patterns with 10 patterns for different retrieving times.

There are another two important parameters for describing long time behaviors of networks: the cycle size $`p`$ and the relaxation time $`r`$. They are defined by9-11

$$p=\underset{n}{\mathrm{min}}\left[𝐬\left(t+n\right)=𝐬\left(t\right)\right]$$
(5)
$$r=\underset{n}{\mathrm{min}}\left[𝐬\left(p+n\right)=𝐬\left(n\right)\right]$$
(6)
Here, $`p`$ is the periodicity of attractors and $`r`$ is the time the system converging into the $`p`$-period cycles.

In fact, the values of $`p`$ and $`r`$ are dependent upon the initial patterns $`𝐬\left(0\right)`$ and the coupling matrix $`𝐉`$ or the stored patterns $`\xi ^\mu `$. So, for a given value $`p`$, we can choice many connection matrices through randomly generating a large number of stored patterns. Moreover, the average size of cycles and the average relaxation time can be defined by9,10

$$p=\frac{1}{M}\underset{n=1}{\overset{M}{}}p\left(n\right)$$
(7)
$$r=\frac{1}{M}\underset{n=1}{\overset{M}{}}r\left(n\right)$$
(8)
in which $`p\left(n\right)`$ and $`r\left(n\right)`$ are defined by $`(5)`$ and $`(6)`$ for the $`n`$-th sample.

Now, viewing the stored patterns series as a whole, our interest is the overlaps between $`𝐬\left(t\right)`$ and the stored cycle, not with a simple pattern in the stored series. As a special case, only for $`p=q`$, we introduced the average cycle overlaps

$$m\left(T\right)=\frac{1}{q}\underset{i=1}{\overset{q}{}}\mathrm{max}m^\mu \left(Tqi+1\right),\mu =1,\mathrm{},q,T=1,2,\mathrm{}$$
(9)
in which $`T`$ is the refreshed time scale. Figure 1b shows that the system plotted in Figure 1a is successful in forming $`m=1`$ for $`q=10`$, but there is a very small error with $`m=0.963`$ for $`q=20`$.

## IV Simulation results

For searching the features of period and relaxation time of attractors, we set the $`c_{ij}=1`$ corresponding to the standard sequence processing networks in fig. 2 to 4. We focus attention on the relations $`pvs.\alpha `$ and $`rvs.\alpha `$ in which the loading ratio $`\alpha `$ is defined by $`q=\alpha N`$. ¿From comparing the value of $`M`$, the numbers of samples, given by $`1000`$ or $`200`$, we find simulation results of $`pvs.\alpha `$ have only a very small error. Considering our computer device, the value of $`N`$ ranges from $`50`$ to $`150`$ and the value of $`M`$ is $`200`$ in the following calculation.

Obviously there is a turning point $`\alpha _c`$ dividing the curve of $`pvs.\alpha `$ into two parts (see Fig. 2). In the first part with $`\alpha <\alpha _c`$, we find stable behaviors of cycles with $`p\alpha N`$ equal to $`q,`$ the number of stored patterns. Beyond this point, the curve gradually changes into an exponential dependence of $`p/\left(\alpha N\right)\mathrm{exp}\left(A\alpha \right)`$. Here, $`A`$ is a constant in the range from $`8.26`$ to $`46.74`$ for $`N=50`$ to $`150`$. The value of $`p`$ increases so drastically that no results of $`\alpha >0.35`$ are plotted. Additionally, the $`\alpha _c`$ are in the range 0.13 to 0.17, and respectively the formation ratio $`k/M=0.80`$ to $`0.85`$, where $`k`$ is the number of $`q`$-period attractors with $`m0.90`$ and $`M=200`$ is the number of samples (see Fig. 3).

Figure 4 shows the average relaxation times in fully coupled networks. Similarly, an exponential dependence $`r\mathrm{exp}\left(B\alpha \right)`$ was observed with $`B=12.01`$, $`18.98`$ and $`29.07`$ for $`N=50`$, $`80`$ and $`120`$, respectively.

In order to investigate the robustness of networks within the limits of $`\alpha _c`$, simulation with diluted connection have been carried out through changing the values of coupling degree $`d`$ or setting $`c_{ij}`$ belong to $`\{0,1\}`$ randomly. In Fig. 5, in the same way as figure 2, it is easy to see that there exists a critical point $`d_c=0.15,0.35`$ and $`0.60`$ for $`\alpha =0.05`$, $`0.10`$ and $`0.15`$. For stronger dilution, the average periodicity grows towards a plateau higher than $`\alpha N`$.

In conclusion, for small systems with spin neurons, it can be seen that the ratio of the average size of attractors $`p`$ and the numbers of stored patterns is $`1`$ as long as the loading ratio $`\alpha >\alpha _c`$, and then it increases strongly following an exponential law $`\mathrm{exp}\left(A\alpha \right).`$ The more the system size increases, the more the ratio grows. From analyzing the average cycle overlaps $`m`$ (Fig. 3), there is a narrow quickly decreasing region near the turning point of periodicity. The maximal stored capacity5 at $`\alpha _s=0.23`$ for $`N=100`$, corresponding to $`k/M=0.66`$, is much larger than at $`\alpha _s=0.32`$ ( when $`k/M=0.005`$ ), under the condition that $`m0.90`$. Moreover, the average relaxation time depends exponentially on the loading ratio and it raises faster with larger systems.

Additionally, through the simulation of the coupling degree $`d`$ in networks, it is clear that there is a narrow transition region between small and large $`p/(\alpha N)`$ centered on an inflection point $`d_c`$. Moreover, the larger loading ratio corresponding to the larger value of $`d_c`$ means its robustness of stored information is more unstable. Beyond our expectation, one result is a stable large attractor for highly diluted systems, another is that possibly $`d_c`$ depends only on $`\alpha `$ for several different system sizes. This needs more detailed work in the future.

Above all, it is easy to see, not as in the asymmetric model given by Gutfreund et al., that the asymmetric factor is a major parameter9-12, that the loading ratio $`\alpha `$ is a very important factor in sequence processing networks. In fact, this difference from the definition of asymmetric connection strength by Gutfreund et al.

Fig. 1. (a) pattern overlaps and updating time for $`N=100`$ with $`10`$ stored patterns in a cycles. (b) the average cycle overlaps plotted against the refreshed time scale $`T`$.

Fig. 2. logarithm of $`p/\left(\alpha N\right)`$ against the loading ratio $`\alpha `$ for four different system size $`N`$.

Fig. 3. the formation ratio $`k/M`$ for $`m0.90`$ and $`M=200`$ against $`\alpha `$ for $`\alpha <\alpha _c`$ and $`N=50`$ to $`150`$.

Fig. 4. logarithm of $`r`$ against the loading ratio $`\alpha `$ for three different system size.

Fig.5. logarithm of $`p/\left(\alpha N\right)`$ against the coupling degree $`d`$ for loading ratio $`\alpha `$ for $`N=100`$.


text:
# GLAST DARK MATTER SEARCH

## Abstract

The GLAST Large Area Telescope , scheduled for launch in 2006, is a next generation space based gamma ray telescope which will improve in point source sensitivity by a factor of 30 over that of EGRET  below 10 GeV, and extend beyond EGRET up to 300 GeV. Thus GLAST offers a unique opportunity to discover WIMP dark matter through precision studies of gamma rays produced in pair annihilations. The most dense region of dark matter in our galaxy is currently thought to occur at the center; in particular, dark matter should concentrate within 3 pc of the putative supermassive black hole located at the SgrA\* radio source . In fact, the 2nd and 3rd EGRET catalogs contain a significant point source coincident with the Milky Way galactic center within a resolution of 12 arcminutes . The EGRET team has determined that the spectral and temporal characteristics of this point source are consistent with dark matter WIMP annihilations. More detailed analysis  has determined that the magnitude and spectrum of the EGRET source is consistent with relic WIMPs concentrated within 3 pc of the central supermassive black hole. Furthermore, the SgrA\* radio emission is consistent with the synchrotron radiation expected from electrons and positrons produced in WIMP annihilations. If true, then GLAST should be able to constrain the particle properties of the postulated WIMP with 1 month of data.

The accretion of a collisionless collection of non-relativistic identical particles with asymptotic velocity $`v_0`$ onto a central star of mass M was first examined by Zel’dovich and Novikov . In particular, we can define a critical radius $`r_c=2GM/v_0^2`$. For distances $`r>>r_c`$, the density varies little from the asymptotic value; however, for $`r<<r_c`$ the gravitational potential of the cntral mass focuses the particles together, thus greatly increasing their density. Gondolo and Silk  re-analyzed this situation in the context of dark matter particles focusing near the putative supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy . For $`M=2.6\times 10^6`$ solar masses $`r_c=3`$ pc for an asymptotic particle dark matter velocity $`v_0=90`$ km/s. The density inside of 3 pc is high enough to produce observable signals from particle dark matter annihilation.

Multi-wavelength observational data from SgrA\* has been compiled by Narayan et al for comparison with various (non-dark matter) accretion models, shown in figure 1. Silk et al  has re-analyzed this data in terms of supersymmetric (SUSY) particle dark matter. A good fit to radio and gamma ray data has been found for typical particle dark matter paramaters. In figure 2 we show a comparison of EGRET data, SUSY model predictions, and GLAST sensitivity. With one month of data, GLAST should be able to probe most of the supersymmetric parameter space. The final GLAST data sample should obtain an accuracy of 10 arcseconds, which corresponds to 0.4 pc at the galactic center.


text:
# Mass gap in compact U(1) Model in (2+1) dimensions

## I Introduction

Compact U(1) lattice gauge theory in three-dimensions is the most well-understood nontrivial gauge theory. The theory exhibits some important similarities with QCD , such as confinement  and chiral symmetry breaking . Because of its simplicity, it has been a good testing ground for new methods and algorithmic approaches. While the Euclidean Path Integral Monte Carlo simulations  have been very successful in the study of non-perturbative lattice gauge theories and is currently the preffered technique for studying QCD at low energies, there there has been some progress in the development of analytic and numerical approaches in the Hamiltonian formalism. The Hamiltonian version of the model has been studied by many methods: some recent studies include series expansions , finite-lattice techniques, the t-expansion , and coupled-cluster techniques , as well as Quantum Monte Carlo methods. Quite accurate estimates have been obtained for the string tension and the mass gaps, which can be used as comparison for our present results. The finite-size scaling properties of the model can be predicted using an effective Lagrangian approach combined with a weak-coupling expansion , and the predictions agree very well with finite-lattice data . Here our aim is to use standard Euclidean path integral Monte Carlo techniques for an anisotropic lattice, and see whether useful results can be obtained in the anisotropic or Hamiltonian limit.

## II Compact U(1) Model in 3 Dimensions

The anisotropic Wilson gauge action for compact U(1) model in (2+1) dimensions has the form

$$S=\beta _s\underset{r,i<j}{}P_{ij}(r)+\beta _t\underset{r,i}{}P_{it}(r)$$
(1)
Where $`P_{ij}`$ and $`P_{it}`$ are the spatial and temporal plaquette variables respectively. In the classical limit

$`\beta _s`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{a_t}{e^2a_s^2}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{g^2}}\mathrm{\Delta }\tau `$ (2)
$`\beta _t`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{e^2a_t}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{g^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }}`$ (3)
where $`\beta =1/g^2`$ ($`g^2=ae^2`$ in (2+1)D)) and $`\mathrm{\Delta }\tau =a_t/a_s`$ is the anisotropy parameter, $`a_s`$ is the lattice spacing in the space direction, and $`a_t`$ is the temporal spacing. In the weak-coupling approximation, the above action can be written as

$$S=\beta \left[\mathrm{\Delta }\tau \underset{r}{}\underset{i<j}{}\left(1\mathrm{cos}\theta _{ij}(r)\right)+\frac{1}{\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }\underset{r,i}{}\left(1\mathrm{cos}\theta _{it}(r)\right)\right]$$
(4)
In the limit $`\mathrm{\Delta }\tau 0`$, the time variable becomes continuous and one obtains the Hamiltonian limit of the model (modulo a Wick rotation back to Minkowski space).

Among other features, antisymmetric mass gap is a fundamental quantity of interest in U(1) model. On an isotropic lattice, the model reduces to the simple continuum theory of non-interacting photons in the naive continuum limit at a fixed energy scale  but if one renormalizes or rescales in the standard way so as to maintain the mass gap constant, then one obtains a confining theory of free massive bosons. Göpfert and Mack proved that in the continuum limit the theory converges to a scalar free field theory of massive bosons. They found that in that limit the mass gap behaves as

$$am_D=\sqrt{\frac{8\pi ^2}{g^2}}\mathrm{exp}(\frac{\pi ^2}{g^2}v(0))$$
(5)
where $`v(0)=0.2527`$ is the Coulomb potential at zero distance for the isotropic case.

The behaviour of the mass gap in the anisotropic case will be similar to equation (5) Generalizing discussions by Banks et al and Ben-Menahem, we find that the exponential factor takes exactly the same form in the anisotropic case. The only difference is that the lattice Coulomb potential at zero spacing for general $`\mathrm{\Delta }\tau `$ is

$`v(0)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle _\pi ^\pi }{\displaystyle \frac{d^3k}{(2\pi )^3}}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }{4[\mathrm{sin}^2(k_0/2)+\mathrm{\Delta }\tau ^2(\mathrm{sin}^2(k_1/2)+\mathrm{sin}^2(k_2/2))]}}`$ (6)
$`=`$ $`\{\begin{array}{c}0.2527(\mathrm{\Delta }\tau =1)\\ 0.3214(\mathrm{\Delta }\tau =0)\end{array}`$ (9)
The above result is based on dilute gas approximation, which is justified in the Euclidean case, but not in the Hamiltonian limit.

The expected finite-size scaling behaviour of the mass gap near the continuum critical point in this model is not known; but Weigel and Janke have performed a Monte Carlo simulation for an O(2) spin model in three dimensions which should lie in the same universality class, obtaining

$$M1.3218/L$$
(10)
for the magnetic gap.

## III Monte Calro simulations and glueball masses

Using the anisotropic Wilson action, we perform Monte Carlo simulations on a finite lattice of size $`N_s^2\times N_\tau `$, where $`N_s`$ is the number of lattice sites in the space direction and $`N_\tau `$ in the temporal direction, with spacing ratio $`\mathrm{\Delta }\tau =a_t/a_s`$. By varying $`\mathrm{\Delta }\tau `$ it is possible to change $`a_t`$, while keeping the spacing in the spatial direction fixed. The details of the algorithm for updating are given elsewhere . The simulations were performed on lattices with $`N_s=16`$ sites in each of the two spatial directions and $`N_t=1664`$ in the temporal direction for a range of couplings $`\beta =13`$.

## IV Results and Discussion

Figure 1 shows the estimates for the glueball masses of $`0^{++}`$ and $`0^{}`$ channels against $`\beta `$ for the Euclidean case $`\mathrm{\Delta }\tau =1.0`$. As expected the masses are seen to vanish exponentially with $`\beta `$ as we approach the continuum limit (high $`\beta `$). To show the evidence of scaling behaviour of antisymmetric glueball masses , we used the predicted asymptotic form, equation 5, with an additional normalization constant;

$$M=am_D=c_1\sqrt{8\pi ^2\beta }\text{exp}\left(\pi ^2\beta v(0)\right)$$
(11)
where $`c_1=5.23\pm 0.11`$ when adjusted to fit the data. Figure 2 shows the predicted scaling behaviour. The solid line on the graph is a fit to the data over the range $`1.4\beta 2.25`$. The slope, $`2.48\pm 0.09`$, of the data matches the predicted asymptotic form very nicely, but the coefficient is too large by a factor of 5.2. It would again be interesting to explore whether this discrepancy could be due to quantum corrections. The finite-size scaling behaviour is shown by the dashed line in Figure 2. It can be seen that the Euclidean mass gap should not be effected by finite-size corrections until $`\beta 2.8`$.

To check the consistency of our method, we plot the dimensionless ratio of the the antisymmetric mass gap over the square root of the string tension against $`\beta `$ together with the results of Teper  in Figure 3. The agreement is excellent. The solid line gives the ratio of the fits in Figures 2 and Fig. (8) in , and shows how this ratio vanishes exponentially in the weak-coupling limit, whereas in four-dimensional confining theories it goes to a constant.

Figure 4 shows the behaviour of the glueball masses as function of $`\mathrm{\Delta }\tau ^2`$ for $`\beta =\sqrt{2}`$. The extrapolation to the Hamiltonian limit is performed by a simple cubic fit in powers of $`\mathrm{\Delta }\tau ^2`$. In the limit $`\mathrm{\Delta }\tau 0`$, we reproduce the earlier series estimates of Hamer et al for the $`0^{++}`$ and $`0^{}`$ states. The estimates of the antisymmetric mass gap, for various $`\beta `$, extracted from the extrapolation to the $`\mathrm{\Delta }\tau 0`$ limit are graphed as a function of $`\beta `$ in Figure 5. The solid line is a fit to the data for $`1.4\beta 2.25`$ of the form (5), with $`v(0)=0.3214`$ and $`c_1=5.50\pm 0.24`$, which is similar to the coefficient found in the Euclidean case. The fitting parameters, the slope, $`3.10\pm 0.16`$ and the intercept, $`3.61\pm 0.25`$, of the scaling curve are in excellent agreement with the results obtained from the other Hamiltonian studies and are listed in table I. The dashed line represents the finite-size scaling behaviour, equation (10), which we assume holds in the Hamiltonian limit also, for want of better information. It can be seen that the finite-size corrections are predicted to dominate for $`\beta 2.2`$, but the date are not accurate enough at weak couplings to establish whether this is really the case. Figure 6 shows the our Monte Carlo estimates for antisymmetric mass gap as a function of $`\beta `$. Also are shown the results from previous strong-coupling series extrapolations and quantum Monte Carlo calculations. It can be seen that our present results agree with previous estimates but are less accurate.

Finally, Figure 7 displays the behaviour of the dimensionless mass ratio,

$$R_M=M(0^{++})/M(0^{})$$
(12)
for the Euclidean case $`\mathrm{\Delta }\tau =1`$. As in the (3+1)D confining theories, we may expect that quantities of this sort will approach their weak-coupling or continuum limits with corrections of $`O(1/a_{eff})`$, where $`a_{eff}`$ is the effective lattice spacing in ‘physical’ units when the mass gap has been renormalized to a constant. Hence for our present purposes we define $`a_{eff}`$ from equation (5) as

$$a_{eff}=\sqrt{8\pi ^2\beta }\mathrm{exp}(\pi ^2\beta v(0))$$
(13)
with $`v(0)=0.2527`$ for the Euclidean case. The mass ratio is plotted against $`a_{eff}`$ in Figure 6. At weak coupling, we expect the theory to approach a theory of free bosons so that the symmetric state will be composed of two $`0^{}`$ bosons and the mass ratio should approach two. Our results show that as $`a_{eff}`$ goes to zero, the mass ratio rises to around the expected value of $`2.0`$. A linear fit to the data from $`0.08a_{eff}0.35`$ gives an intercept However, we note that the last one of our estimates, together with two from Teper, lie considerably above $`R_M=2`$. In the bluk systems, of course, the ratio cannot rise above 2, because it is always possible to construct a $`0^{++}`$ state out of two $`0^{}`$ mesons. been included in the fit.

## Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Australian Research Council. We are grateful for access to the computing facilities of the Australian Centre for Advanced Computing and Communications (ac3) and the Australian Partnership for Advanced Computing (APAC).


text:
# Introduction

## Introduction

The mixing of UV and IR physics in noncommutative field theories is a intriguing phenomenon. One of the more spectacular manifestations of this mixing is the appearance of a so-called striped phase which breaks translational invariance in noncommutative $`\varphi ^4`$ theory. The prediction of this phase was based on a self-consistent Hartree treatment of one-loop diagrams  or a one-loop renormalization group approach . The purpose of the following note is to test the predictions using the non-perturbative framework of lattice computer simulations and at the same time test the viability of studying noncommutative field theories by numerical means. Here we consider the simplest possible such theory: a two-dimensional $`\varphi ^4`$ theory. Two-dimensional chiral and Yang-Mills theories have also been studied recently .

## The model

Our starting point is noncommutative scalar field theory with the action

$$S=\text{d}^2x\left[\frac{1}{2}(_\mu \varphi )^2+\frac{1}{2}m^2\varphi ^2+\frac{g^2}{4}\varphi ^4\right],$$
(1)
where $`\varphi ^4=\varphi \varphi \varphi \varphi `$ and where the star product is defined by

$`(\varphi _1\varphi _2)(x)`$ $`=`$ $`\text{e}^{\frac{i}{2}\theta ^{\mu \nu }_{x_\mu }_{y_\nu }}\varphi _1(x)\varphi _2(y)|_{x=y}`$ (2)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\pi ^2|det\theta |}}{\displaystyle \text{d}^2y\text{d}^2z\varphi _1(y)\varphi _2(z)\text{e}^{2i\theta _{\mu \nu }^1(xy)_\mu (xz)_\nu }}.`$ (3)
In particular we have

$$[x_\mu ,x_\nu ]_{}=x_\mu x_\nu x_\nu x_\mu =i\theta _{\mu \nu }=i\theta \epsilon _{\mu \nu }.$$
(4)
It is known how to map formally the noncommutative theory into a matrix theory by the Weyl map. Let $`\widehat{x}^\mu `$ and $`\widehat{y}^\nu `$ be Hermitean operators satisfying $`[\widehat{x}_\mu ,\widehat{y}_\nu ]=i\theta _{\mu \nu }`$, which is the operator analogy of (4). One can define the Weyl map by

$$\widehat{\varphi }=\text{d}^2x\varphi (x)\widehat{\mathrm{\Delta }}(x),\widehat{\mathrm{\Delta }}=\frac{\text{d}^2k}{(2\pi )^2}\text{e}^{ik_\mu \widehat{x}_\mu }\text{e}^{ik_\nu x_\nu }.$$
(5)
and in this way the action (1) can be represented (formally, with a suitable normalization of the trace and suitable assumptions concerning the fall off of the functions $`\varphi (x)`$ at infinity) as

$$S=\mathrm{Tr}\left(\frac{1}{2}[\widehat{}_\mu ,\widehat{\varphi }]^2+\frac{1}{2}m^2\widehat{\varphi }^2+\frac{g^2}{4}\widehat{\varphi }^4\right),$$
(6)
where $`\widehat{}_\mu `$ is an anti-hermitian derivative which together with $`\widehat{x}_\mu `$ satisfy

$$[\widehat{}_\mu ,\widehat{x}_\nu ]=\delta _{\mu \nu },[\widehat{}_m,\widehat{}_\nu ]=ic_{\mu \nu },[\widehat{x}_\mu ,\widehat{x}_\nu ]=i\theta _{\mu \nu }.$$
(7)
The operators (or matrices) in (7) are all infinite dimensional. However, the associated Heisenberg algebras of exponentials of $`\widehat{x}_\mu `$ (and $`\widehat{}_\mu `$) allow finite dimensional representations, as already noted by Weyl. This is the key to formulating the noncommutative theory on a finite periodic $`N\times N`$ lattice with lattice spacing $`a`$ (see  for a more general formulation). The algebra (7) is replaced by

$$\widehat{Z}_\mu \widehat{Z}_\nu =\text{e}^{2\pi i\mathrm{\Theta }\epsilon _{\mu \nu }}\widehat{Z}_\nu \widehat{Z}_\mu ,\widehat{D}_\mu \widehat{Z}_\nu \widehat{D}_\mu =\text{e}^{2\pi i\delta _{\mu \nu }/N}\widehat{Z}_\nu ,$$
(8)
where

$$\widehat{Z}_\mu =\text{e}^{2\pi i\widehat{x}_\mu /aN},\widehat{D}_\mu =\text{e}^{a\widehat{}_\mu },\mathrm{\Theta }=\frac{2\pi \theta }{a^2N^2}.$$
(9)
Periodicity on the lattice fixes the quantization of momentum $`p_\mu `$ and $`\theta `$

$$p_\mu a=k_\mu =\frac{2\pi m_\mu }{N},\theta =\frac{na^2N}{\pi }\left(\mathrm{\Theta }=\frac{2n}{N}\right),$$
(10)
where $`m_\mu 0,\mathrm{},N1`$, and $`n`$ is an integer. In the following we choose $`n=1`$ for simplicity.

A simple realization of the above scenario is obtained by choosing $`\widehat{Z}_\mu `$, $`\mu =1,2`$ to be the standard $`N\times N`$ shift and clock matrices $`(\widehat{Z}_1)_{jk}=\delta _{j+1,k}`$, $`(\widehat{Z}_2)_{jk}=(\text{e}^{4\pi i/N})^{j1}\delta _{jk}`$, $`\widehat{D}_1=(\widehat{Z}_2^{})^{(N+1)/2}`$, $`\widehat{D}_2=(\widehat{Z}_1)^{(N+1)/2}`$, the lattice size $`N`$ being odd.

In this way the lattice version of (3) becomes

$$\varphi _1(x)\varphi _2(x)=\frac{1}{N^2}\underset{y,z}{}\varphi _1(y)\varphi _2(z)\text{e}^{2i\theta _{\mu \nu }^1(xy)_\mu (xz)_\nu },$$
(11)
and the operator $`\widehat{\mathrm{\Delta }}`$ becomes an $`N\times N`$ matrix

$$\widehat{\mathrm{\Delta }}(x)=\underset{m_1,m_2=1}{\overset{N}{}}\left(\widehat{Z}_1^{m_1}\widehat{Z}_2^{m_2}\text{e}^{\pi i\mathrm{\Theta }m_1m_2}\right)\text{e}^{2\pi im_\mu x_\mu /aN}.$$
(12)
It generates an explicit map from the lattice field $`\varphi (x)`$ defined at the $`N\times N`$ lattice points $`x`$ to that $`N\times N`$ matrix $`\widehat{\varphi }`$ defined by (5),

$$\widehat{\varphi }=\frac{1}{N^2}\underset{x}{}\varphi (x)\widehat{\mathrm{\Delta }}(x),\varphi (x)=\frac{1}{N}\mathrm{Tr}\widehat{\varphi }\widehat{\mathrm{\Delta }}(x)$$
(13)
such that the action is given by (6) with $`N\times N`$ matrices and the partition function is

$`Z(R,G)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \text{d}\widehat{\varphi }\text{e}^{S[\widehat{\varphi }]}},`$ (14)
$`S[\widehat{\varphi }]`$ $`=`$ $`N\mathrm{Tr}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}{\displaystyle \underset{\mu }{}}\left(\widehat{D}_\mu \widehat{\varphi }\widehat{D}_\mu ^{}\widehat{\varphi }\right)^2+R\widehat{\varphi }^2+G\widehat{\varphi }^4\right].`$ (15)
The dimensionless lattice parameters are

$$R=\frac{1}{2}m^2a^2,G=\frac{1}{4}g^2a^2.$$
(16)
The ordinary (commutative) $`\varphi ^4`$ theory on the lattice has two different continuum limits when the space-time volume goes to infinity, one “trivial” associated with the fine tuning the approach to $`R=0`$ and $`G=0`$. It corresponds to the standard $`\varphi ^4`$ two-dimensional field theory where only normal ordering is needed to renormalize the theory. The other limit is associated with the phase transition between a phase in which the symmetry $`\varphi \varphi `$ is broken and a symmetric phase. It occurs for finite negative values of $`R`$ and finite positive values of $`G`$ and the continuum limit can be identified with the continuum limit of the Ising model, i.e. with a $`c=1/2`$ conformal field theory.

In the noncommutative case the continuum limit of course requires an infinite lattice, i.e. we have to take $`N`$ to infinity. In addition we are interested in a limit in which the lattice spacing can be viewed as scaling to zero while the dimensionful parameter $`\theta `$ stays finite. Two possible scenarios appear possible:

If non-commutativity can be considered as a perturbation imposed on a commutative theory then a kind of “double scaling limit” of the matrix model (15) suggests itself:

$$N\mathrm{},a^2=\frac{\pi \theta }{N},a^2N^2=\pi \theta N.$$
(17)
Thus the physical space-time diverges like $`N`$ 111For other limits which allow for a finite physical space-time see . and we can write the matrix model action (15) as

$$S[\widehat{\varphi }]=N\mathrm{Tr}\left[\frac{1}{2}\underset{\mu }{}\left(\widehat{D}_\mu \widehat{\varphi }\widehat{D}_\mu ^{}\widehat{\varphi }\right)^2+\frac{\pi m^2\theta }{2N}\widehat{\varphi }^2+\frac{\pi g^2\theta }{4N}\widehat{\varphi }^4\right].$$
(18)
The noncommutative parameter $`\theta `$ only appears in the dimensionless combinations $`m^2\theta `$ and $`g^2\theta `$ and implicitly in factors of $`N`$ appearing in (18). This type of continuum limit seems to be most naturally associated with the trivial gaussian fixed point of the commutative theory. Note that this “double scaling” limit $`N\mathrm{}`$ is quite different from the usual planar limit of matrix models and thus also quite different from the double scaling limit of the 2d matrix models studied in the context of 2d quantum gravity.

If, on the other hand, non-commutativity alters the commutative theory profoundly one should follow the general strategy of non-perturbative lattice studies in order to identify a continuum limit: identify suitable physical observables usually related to a divergent correlation length of the lattice field. Fine-tuning the coupling constants such that the observables are constant when expressed in terms of the “physical” correlation length $`a\xi `$, where $`\xi `$ is the correlation length in lattice units, will then lead to a relation between the coupling constants and the lattice spacing $`a`$ eg. $`a\left(RR_c\right)^\nu `$ and allow us to identify the (potentially) non-perturbative renormalization of the coupling constants required to obtain a continuum theory. We can then potentially investigate another “double scaling” limit in which $`N\left(RR_c\right)^{2\nu }\theta `$ is held constant as $`N\mathrm{}`$ and $`RR_c`$. Such a phase transition would generalize the usual Ising transition of the commutative theory to the noncommutative case.

The first scenario has the attractive feature that we know ahead of time the value of the non-commutativity parameter $`\theta `$ and the dependence of lattice spacing on the matrix size $`N`$. We will show numerical evidence which supports scaling according to this scenario although we stress that the existence of such a double scaling limit does not rule out the possible existence of additional continuum limits based on the second scenario.

Susceptibilities (i.e. correlation functions integrated over all space-time points) have been used in conventional lattice field theory to identify the couplings associated with a divergent correlation length, and the critical indices associated with the susceptibilities lead to a classification of the continuum Euclidean field theories. Susceptibilities are suitable observables also in the noncommutative case. In fact one has

$$\text{d}^dx\varphi (x)\varphi (x)=\text{d}^dx\varphi (x)\varphi (x),$$
(19)
so they are maximally close to the commutative observables. Yet they may contain additional interesting information about the infrared behavior of the noncommutative propagators. In the computer simulations to be reported below we will indeed use (generalized) susceptibilities to identify potential phase transitions.

$`\chi _p`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle d^2xe^{ip.x}\varphi (x)d^2ye^{ip.y}\varphi (y)}`$
$`=`$ $`\overline{\varphi }(p)\overline{\varphi }(p)`$
Physically, they are just the (mod square) of the Fourier component of the noncommutative field.

## Stripes

The possibility of having a ground state which breaks translational invariance was first observed in . The quadratic part of the effective action, obtained from (1) by a one-loop self-consistent Hartree calculation, is

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }^{(2)}(p)=p^2+m_R^2+Ag^2\mathrm{ln}\mathrm{\Lambda }_p^2,\mathrm{\Lambda }_p^2=\frac{1}{\theta ^2p^2+1/\mathrm{\Lambda }^2}.$$
(20)
$`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ denotes a UV cut-off, $`m_R^2`$ the renormalized mass term and $`A`$ is some constant. The mixing of IR and UV modes is manifest in the form of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_p`$. In addition the momentum dependence of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_p`$ implies that $`\mathrm{\Gamma }^{(2)}(p)`$ can have a minimum for

$$p_c^2=Ag^2\frac{1}{\mathrm{\Lambda }^2\theta ^2}.$$
(21)
For sufficiently large coupling this analysis would predict that modes with momentum $`p=p_c`$ would be the first to become unstable as the mass parameter $`m_R`$ were tuned to zero. Thus any phase transition would then be driven by condensation of a non-trivial momentum component of the field. This is to be contrasted with the usual Ising transition in which the $`p=0`$ component of the field condenses to yield the broken symmetry phase. Using (16) and (17) this result can be written in lattice variables

$$\left(\frac{2\pi n_c}{N}\right)^2=AG\frac{1}{N^2}$$
(22)
Note that for small $`G`$ the matrix size $`N`$ has to be large ($`N>2\pi /\sqrt{AG}`$) in order for (22) to have a solution. Conversely, we might expect an exotic vacuum state to exist for any coupling in the continuum limit $`N\mathrm{}`$.

In two dimensions it is usually difficult to have a spontaneous breaking of a continuous symmetry like translation invariance. The fluctuations associated with the corresponding massless Goldstone boson will spoil any long range order. However, the arguments leading to this conclusion are strictly speaking not valid for non-local field theories and there exist explicit examples of non-local field theories in two dimensions which exhibit spontaneous symmetry breaking222One example is the so-called crumpling phase transition in crystalline membranes. Since noncommutative field theories are non-local and show a mixing of IR and UV properties one cannot rule out that the simple one-loop arguments given above in favor of a non-translational invariant ground state could still be valid. In fact the renormalization group treatment in  predicts this ground state even in two dimensions.

In the following we will look for signals indicating the appearance of a non-trivial ground state in the lattice system (15).

## The computer simulation

In these first explorative simulations we have used a simple metropolis algorithm for stimulating the matrix system (14)-(15). Specifically, the matrix field is updated by the addition of a random hermitian noise matrix $`\eta `$

$$\varphi \varphi +ϵ\eta $$
(23)
We tune $`ϵ`$ with $`N`$ so as to achieve an acceptance rate close to 50%. Most of our runs employed $`5\times 10^6`$ such matrix updates for a given set of values of the parameters $`m`$ and $`g`$. If we only consider the quadratic part of (15) the system is equivalent to an ordinary gaussian lattice field theory via the map (13) and this has been a useful check of the computer code.

Let us now turn to the actual simulation with the noncommutative $`\varphi ^4`$ term. We have looked in the ($`m`$,$`g`$) coupling constant space for signals of a nontrivial vacuum. We have not attempted to map the entire phase diagram but concentrated instead on the slice $`\theta =1.0`$ and $`g^2/4=1.0`$ with varying physical mass parameter $`m`$.

In Fig. (1) we show the generalized susceptibility $`\chi _k`$ corresponding to the (mod squared) Fourier component of the field $`\varphi (x)`$ on an $`N=9`$ lattice for various values of the lattice momentum

$$(k_1,k_2)=(\frac{2\pi m}{N},\frac{2\pi n}{N}),(p=k/a).$$
(24)
One sees a clear condensation of the usual $`p=(0,0)`$ mode for values of $`m^2<6`$. Contrast this with the Fig. (2) which shows the same set of (unsubtracted) susceptibilities for $`N=23`$. Now for $`m^2<6`$ we see that the dominant susceptibility corresponds to the lattice $`(1,0)`$ mode – the vacuum in this region of the parameter space shows a spatially varying order parameter as predicted by the one loop calculation - a striped phase. Since the system still possesses a symmetry under exchange of axes we find that the condensation takes place along either the 1-axis or 2-axis randomly as the mass is varied. Thus, in our plots we show the average $`<|\overline{\varphi }(n,m)|^2+|\overline{\varphi }(m,n)|^2>`$.

Another way to illustrate graphically the existence of this phase is by considering the transverse-averaged correlator in position space. Fig. (3) shows a plot of $`<\varphi (x_1)\varphi (0)>`$ for $`m^2=10.0`$. Notice that the correlator shows one complete oscillation within a lattice length. Since we are deep within the striped phase this correlator will essentially measure the behavior of the order parameter directly. Along the second direction the correlator is positive definite as shown in Fig. (4).

This behavior is what we would expect of a striped phase. For the smaller lattice $`N=9`$ we do not see any asymmetric behavior in the form of this position space correlator in the two directions, and indeed, as Fig. (5) indicates, the correlator is of conventional (positive definite) form over the entire lattice. This is consistent with the idea that for small $`N`$, there are no solutions to (20) and the minimum of the quadratic effective action is still found for mode $`(0,0)`$.

We have also examined the system for $`N=39`$. Fig. (6) and Fig. (7) show the corresponding correlators along the two lattice axes for $`m^2=10.0`$. From these two pictures we infer that the condensed mode is now $`(2,1)`$. Thus, rather than stripes we actually see a checkerboard-like arrangement for the vacuum state in this case. The fact that the lattice mode number increases with larger lattice size for fixed physical parameters is encouraging as this is the behavior that is required if this effect is to survive the large volume limit $`N\mathrm{}`$. Indeed, (20) indicates that the mode number $`n`$ should increase like $`n\sqrt{N}`$ for $`N\mathrm{}`$ to ensure that the physical momentum at which condensation occurs remains fixed.

## Discussion

We have shown that it is indeed possible to observe and investigate non-trivial phenomena like the appearance of “stripes” in noncommutative field theory within the non-perturbative framework of lattice simulations.

We have here looked at the very simplest model, a two-dimensional scalar field theory simply to verify that phenomena like the appearance of a “striped phase” can be observed. Our data show the appearance of such a phase in an appropriate double scaling limit. Notice that the issue of possible I.R divergences in two dimensions does not preclude such a study - the lattice regulates any such divergences automatically and the issue returns only when the continuum limit is taken. Our current data do not address this issue – much larger volumes must be simulated in order to determine whether this phase truly survives the large $`N`$ limit. Nevertheless, we feel that our simulations lend nonperturbative, albeit qualitative support to the analysis of  and . However, it is clearly of more interest to do this in higher dimensional theories. The lattice formalism has been developed  and just awaits use. Indeed, while this paper was in preparation we received a preprint  in which the same model was examined in $`2+1`$ dimensions with similar conclusions.

## Acknowledgements

J.A. acknowledges the support by the EU network on “Discrete Random Geometry”, grant HPRN-CT-1999-00161, by ESF network no.82 on “Geometry and Disorder” and by “MaPhySto”, the Center of Mathematical Physics and Stochastics, financed by the National Danish Research Foundation. S.C acknowledges the support of DOE grant DE-FG02-85ER40237 and thanks the Niels Bohr Institute for hospitality during the completion of this work.