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# A modular PC based silicon microstrip beam telescope with high speed data acquisition

## 1 Introduction

For the testing of newly developed detector systems, testbeam facilities are suitable and frequently used. They create experimental conditions which are closer to a high energy physics experiment than the conditions in the laboratory while permitting access to important experimental parameters. In order to measure properties like efficiency and spatial resolution of a device under test (DUT), a precise reference measurement of the incident particle tracks is required. This is the task for a beam telescope  measuring intercept and angle for incident particles on an event by event basis. In order to achieve position resolutions in the $`\mu \mathrm{m}`$ and $`\mu \mathrm{rad}`$ scale silicon microstrip detectors are commonly used for such telescopes, providing a number of space points for track interpolation. Such microstrip based telescope systems suffer from limited event rate due to their large number of readout channels and their system architecture. Additionally, to synchronize such a system is difficult, and merging a given DUT readout into the system’s data acquisition (DAQ) is a major task.
As beam time is often limited, speed is also an important requirement for a telescope system, especially when semiconductor detector devices with a structure size in the $`\mu \mathrm{m}`$ scale, for instance ATLAS pixel devices, are to be tested. The time needed to collect a significant number of events for every sensor element strongly depends on the readout speed of the telescope, as the DUT readout is very fast.
In this paper, the concept of a fully PC-based beam telescope system, henceforth referred to as BAT111An acronym for Bonn ATLAS Telescope., is presented, which combines good track measurement accuracy with high event rate and easy DUT integration.

## 2 System overview

Figure 1 shows a typical BAT setup consisting of four detector modules, a trigger logic unit (TLU), the data acquisition PC and a DUT. All components are connected via the purely digital ”blueboard bus” (BB) . Furthermore, the ”timing bus” connects BAT modules, DUT and TLU.
A raw trigger signal indicating an event is provided by the coincidence of two scintillation counters. The coincidence signal is fed into the TLU, which then decides if a trigger is to be given according to the module’s status information accessible on the timing bus. If so, the TLU generates the trigger signal and distributes it to the modules.
After receiving a trigger, each module acquires, digitizes and preprocesses event data autonomously and independent from an external sequencer logic. The event data is stored in a module-internal memory. When a certain amount of data is accumulated in a module’s memory, the corresponding module alerts the data acquisition PC to read the entire data memory content of this module.
The DAQ processes running on the PC collect all data from the different modules, assemble the data which belong to one event and store it on the hard disk. Part of the data is processed, the results are made available to the user for monitoring purposes.
Several ways of integrating a DUT are feasible. The DUT can be connected directly to the BB, as shown in figure 1. For this purpose, a flexible BB interface is available. For integration of a given VME based DUT and supplementary measurement equipment, a VME crate can be attached to the DAQ PC using a commercially available PC to VME interface. And in case an embedded PC or a VME CPU is to be used for DAQ, a BB to VME interface has been developed for fully VME based operation of the entire telescope.

## 3 Module hardware

A BAT module consists of a sensor assembly, an analog telescope card (ATC) and a digital telescope card (DTC). An overview over a module’s constituents and their interconnection is given in figure 2. A photograph of a fully assembled module is shown in figure 3.

The sensor assembly consists of the sensor and 2 $`\times `$ 5 front end ICs. The sensor is a commercially available double sided, AC-coupled silicon strip detector type S6934 with integrated polysilicon bias resistors manufactured by Hamamatsu photonics . The n-side strips are isolated by $`\mathrm{p}^+`$-stop implantations. Implant and readout strip pitch are 50 $`\mu \mathrm{m}`$ on both sides, the nominal stereo angle is 90. The sensitive area is $`3.2\times 3.2\mathrm{cm}^2`$ corresponding to 640 strips on each side.
The front end IC used is the VA2 manufactured by IDE AS, Oslo . The VA2 is a 128 channel charge sensitive preamplifier-shaper circuit with simultaneous sample and hold, serial analog readout and calibration facilities. Five VA2 ICs are needed to provide readout for one detector side. They are mounted on a so-called BELLE hybrid , a ceramic carrier with an attached PCB providing support for the VAs and distributing supply, bias and digital control to them. As VAs on the hybrid are operated in a daisy chain, a hybrid is read out like one large 640 channel VA. Sensor and hybrids are fixed to a ceramic support structure, which is attached to a solid aluminum frame for handling.
The ATC is divided into two identical compartments supporting one BELLE hybrid each. A hybrid’s compartment provides the supply voltages, bias voltages and bias currents required by the hybrid. A fast ADC circuit is used for digitization of the VA2 output data, and an additional multi-channel ADC allows observation of the most important hybrid parameters during operation.
Only digital signals are transferred between ATC and DTC via digital couplers. The central functional building block of the DTC is the readout sequencer. Implemented into the main FPGA, this circuit generates the control sequence needed to acquire and digitize the analog FE data. Both hybrids are read out simultaneously. The readout sequencer also controls the data preprocessing logic. Furthermore, the DTC holds a large FIFO for on-module data buffering and a RAM for storing data preprocessing information. A second FPGA circuit controls access to the BB and the timing bus. It is also capable of sending interrupt requests (IRQs) on the BB to the PC. Each module has its own power supply, providing three independent voltage sources needed to operate the ATC compartments and the DTC. The power supply also generates the detector bias voltage. The powering and grounding scheme of a telescope module is shown in figure 4.

## 4 Data acquisition

### 4.1 Structure

The data acquisition of the BAT is implemented as a two-level process. The primary level DAQ (DAQ I), controlled by the readout sequencers in every module, is simultaneously performed inside each module directly after receiving a trigger signal. The secondary level DAQ (DAQ II) is PC controlled and common for all modules. Both DAQ levels running independently reduces the effective system dead time to the DAQ I runtime (see also section 5). The telescope DAQ structure is shown in figure 5. An example for DAQ I and DAQ II interaction is shown in figure 6.

### 4.2 Primary level DAQ: Digitizing and preprocessing

When receiving a trigger, a module’s readout sequencer acquires and digitizes the data residing in the front end ICs and operates the data preprocessing logic, which performs pedestal correction, hit detection and zero suppression. Pedestal correction is done by subtracting an individual pedestal value for each channel. Hits are detected by applying an individual threshold to the pedestal corrected data. Pedestal and threshold values have to be determined and stored beforehand in the DTC RAM. Zero suppression is done by storing only clusters consisting of the information of the 5 neighboring channels around the hit channel in the DTC FIFO. Enlarged clusters are stored for two or more hit channels in close proximity. Multiple clusters per event are possible. The data volume for an event with one hit cluster is 32 byte in total. Compared to a typical event size of 2.5 kByte for common telescope systems , the amount of data is reduced by a factor 1/80.
After finishing preprocessing an event, end of event data (EOD) is written to the FIFO, which transmits a module internal trigger number count and the so-called common mode count (CMC) value. The CMC value is used to calculate and correct the common mode fluctuation amplitude for this event in on- or offline analysis. DAQ I has finished processing an event as soon as a complete module event data block (MED) including cluster data and EOD has completely been written to the FIFO.

### 4.3 Secondary level DAQ: Data readback and event building

While DAQ I is active, MEDs keep accumulating in the modules’ FIFOs until a certain threshold fill level is exceeded. A module internal interrupt generator generates an IRQ, forcing DAQ II to become active.
DAQ II, responsible for data transfer to the PC, is controlled by the producer task, which runs on the data acquisition PC. It controls one shared buffer, a FIFO like structure in PC RAM, for every module. When detecting an IRQ from a certain module, the producer transfers the data from this module’s buffer FIFO to the corresponding shared buffer. DAQ I operation is not affected by this data transfer and continues to process events. The writer software process collects and assembles MEDs belonging to the same event from the different shared buffers and stores them on the hard disk.
The modules’ threshold fill level can be adjusted with respect to the beam intensity. A single event operation mode for low beam intensities is also available.

## 5 Trigger logic

As each module takes data autonomously, trigger control is necessary to prevent the trigger synchronization from getting lost. Every device is therefore connected to the trigger logic implemented in the TLU, receives its trigger signal from the TLU and has a dedicated busy line on the timing bus, which indicates DAQ I activity. The TLU generates a gate signal for the raw trigger from the coincidence of all devices’ busy signals, which only sends triggers if all devices are not busy. The system’s dead time is therefore determined by the busy signal from the slowest device. The timing of gate and busy signals is shown in figure 6.

## 6 Software

The DAQ PC is a commercial PC equipped with a dual Pentium II processor running the Windows NT 4.0 operating system and the DAQ software package written in C++. It is connected to the BB via a BB to PCI interface card . In addition to the DAQ processes mentioned, online monitoring processes allow an overview about the device performance during operation. An overview over the different processes and their tasks is given in figure 7.

## 7 System performance

### 7.1 Event rate

The mean event rate of the telescope system is determined by the dead time of the slowest device, being the BAT modules in most applications due to their serial readout. A BAT module’s dead time $`t_{\mathrm{dt}}`$ is dominated by the DAQ I runtime222The readout sequencer has to read 640 channels with a serializer clock frequency of $`5\mathrm{MHz}`$., which is 132 $`\mu `$s. The event rate actually observed also depends on the trigger coincidence rate $`\mathrm{\Phi }_\mathrm{T}`$, and is given by:

$$\frac{1}{v_e^{max}}=t_{dt}+\frac{1}{\left(1e^{\mathrm{\Phi }_\mathrm{T}}\right)}$$
(1)
assuming Poisson statistics. The dependence of event rate and trigger coincidence rate is shown in figure 8.

At the H8 testbeam at CERN, a system consisting of 4 BAT modules and one BB based DUT has been operated with an effective event rate of $`4.5\mathrm{kHz}`$. This is an event rate larger than the event rate of conventional VME-based systems by factors of 40  to 75 .

### 7.2 Analog performance

Figure 9 shows a hit map and source profiles of a 90Sr $`\beta `$ source scan using a PIN diode as trigger device. Only one dead channel on the N-side and a few noisy channels on the P-side are observed. The system operates stably. No pedestal drift was observed during a 32-hour run. Thus taking pedestals only once at the beginning of each run is sufficient. Common mode noise is also tolerable.

Figure 10 shows a typical pulse height distribution together with the noise histogram of N- and P-side of the same module. One ADC count corresponds to an ENC of 20 $`e^{}`$ on P and 24 $`e^{}`$ on N-side, as can be calculated from the position of the peak in the respective pulse height distribution. Thus, the mean ENC value for all channels is 706 $`e^{}`$ for the N-side and 340 $`e^{}`$ for the P-side. Comparing these values with the most probable charge deposition for a minimal ionizing particle in 300 $`\mu `$m thick silicon, which is 23300 $`e^{}`$, yields signal to noise ratios of 33 for the N- and 69 for the P-side, which is comparable to the results obtained with other telescope systems .

Figure 11 shows the correlation between the pulse heights observed on N- and P- side of the detector for an event. The pulse height correlation can be used to solve strip data ambiguities, which can occur at high beam intensities.

Charge sharing between detector strips can be used for a more exact reconstruction of the position of a hit on a module, as the BAT provides analog cluster readout. The normalized pulse heights of the three central strips of a cluster can conveniently be displayed in the form of a triangle plot (figure 12). Using the different normalized amplitudes of the three central strips of a cluster as distances from the sides of an equilateral triangle, the triangle plot is a way to display the distribution of the signal charge among the three central channels. Events in which most of the charge is deposited in the central cluster channel lie at the top of the triangle, events in which the charge is divided between two cluster channels lie on the sides of the triangle. Events with significant amounts of charge on all three central channels lie in the central area of the triangle.

Entries outside the triangle area are due to ”negative” signal amplitudes after pedestal subtraction caused by noise. In most cases the charge is deposited only in the central cluster strip or in two strips. Charge distribution over three or more channels, mostly due to $`\delta `$-electrons, are rare; thus an algorithm using only two cluster charges for reconstruction is appropriate. The commonly used $`\eta `$-algorithm  uses the pulse heights of the two central cluster channels which carry the largest signals within the cluster:

$$\eta =\frac{c_1}{\left(c_1+c_2\right)}$$
(2)
with $`c_1,c_2`$ being the amplitude of the left and the right central cluster channel. Assuming a uniform distribution of hits and charge sharing independent from the total pulse height, the integral of the $`\eta `$-distribution can be used to calculate a position correction value $`\mathrm{\Delta }x`$ by

$$\mathrm{\Delta }x(\eta )=\frac{p}{N_0}_0^\eta \frac{dN}{d\eta ^{}}𝑑\eta ^{}$$
(3)
with $`p`$ being the strip pitch and $`N_0`$ the total number of entries in the $`\eta `$ distribution histogram. The correction value is then added to a reference position to obtain the absolute position of the hit. Typical $`\eta `$ distributions for a single module are displayed in figure 13. The differences in shape of the $`\eta `$ distribution between N- and P- side are mostly due to different interstrip capacitances on the detector sides. The asymmetry of the distribution for one detector side is due to parasitic capacitances in the analog readout of the strips. They can be corrected by applying a deconvolution algorithm. Their influence on the spatial resolution of the detectors is, however, small.

### 7.3 Spatial resolution

The telescope tracking performance has been studied using test beam data taken with a 180 GeV/$`c`$ pion beam at the CERN H8 testbeam at the SPS. The raw event data is processed by a program developed by the Milano ATLAS group which performs event reconstruction and alignment of the telescope planes.
A straight line fit is applied to the strip hits, and the residuals between the hits and the fitted track are computed for the strip planes. Then, an analytical alignment algorithm is applied to the strip planes, which minimizes the residuals and their dependence on position and angle of the tracks. The alignment and the tilt angle are calculated for all strip planes using the first strip plane as reference plane. Examples of the resulting residual distributions for the strip planes in one direction after alignment are presented in figure 14, showing the quality of the alignment algorithm. The distributions are properly centered around zero, which indicates the absence of systematic errors. Their widths, which are determined by the intrinsic resolution of the strip planes, multiple scattering and the alignment algorithm, lie between 6.3 and 4.2 $`\mu `$m.
As the data from the strip planes, however, is used in the track fit, the width of the strip plane residuals can not be taken to determine the spatial resolution of the telescope. For this purpose, the residual distributions in the DUT planes have to be considered.
The telescope setup included two DUTs, which were hybrid pixel detectors. Sensor and front end electronics were developed by the ATLAS pixel collaboration . The sensor has no inefficient area, the pixel cell size was $`50`$ $`\mu `$m $`\times `$ $`400`$ $`\mu `$m corresponding to the pixel pitch, and the front end electronics provides for zero-suppressed readout, reporting both pixel position and charge deposition for those pixels only, for which the charge deposition exceeds a certain threshold.
The spatial resolution of the telescope system was measured using the residuals between the position determined from the DUT data and the extrapolation to the DUT plane of the tracks fit to the strip data. For this purpose, the relative alignment of the DUT to the strip planes is calculated. Events with a $`\chi ^2`$-probability of the track fit greater than 0.02 were selected from data taken with the beam along the normal to the pixel plane. In figure 15, the residuals along the short ($`50`$ $`\mu `$m) pixel cell direction are shown for events, for which only one pixel reported a hit (upper histogram) and events, for which two neighboring pixels reported a hit (lower histogram). The reconstructed position on the DUT of the single pixel hits is the centre of the hit pixel cell, while for two pixel hits an interpolation algorithm is used to determine the hit position using the charge deposition information . The latter distribution can be used to give an estimation of the telescope resolution.

A gaussian fit to the two pixel residual distribution yields $`\sigma =5.5\mu `$m. This is the convolution of the telescope resolution and the pixel detector intrinsic resolution. The latter can be estimated as follows. As tracks are uniformly distributed, the width $`L`$ of the region in which charge division between two pixels occurs can be estimated using the ratio between the number of two pixel and one-pixel hits. This yields $`L10`$ $`\mu `$m. The expected r.m.s. of the residual distribution for these tracks is $`\sigma =L/\sqrt{12}=2.9`$ $`\mu `$m. Thus, the width of the actual residual distribution is dominated by the telescope resolution, which can be estimated conservatively to be better than $`\sigma =\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}5.5}\mu `$m in the DUT plane.

## 8 Summary

A high speed modular PC based beam telescope using double sided silicon microstrip detectors with on module data preprocessing has been built and successfully taken into operation. Telescope hard- and software are capable of stand-alone operation and easy to handle; integration of an additional ”device under test” is straightforward. Pedestal subtraction, hit detection and zero suppression are done inside every module, reducing the data volume by a factor of 1/80. With its two level data acquisition scheme, the system can process event rates up to 7.6 kHz. The telescope is a factor of 75 (40)  () faster than conventional VME based systems while providing comparable performance. Signal to noise ratios of up to 70 were achieved. The spatial resolution in the DUT plane has been determined to be better than $`5.5\mu `$m.

We gratefully acknowledge the help obtained from Walter Ockenfels and Ogmundur Runolfsson when encountering problems concerning mechanics, case design and handling and bonding of silicon detectors. We would also like to thank the members of the ATLAS pixel collaboration, in particular John Richardson from LBNL, Berkeley, and Attilio Andreazza, Francesco Ragusa and Clara Troncon from the Milano ATLAS group, for providing help and know-how in testbeam data taking and data analysis.


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# New Views of Cosmology and the Microworld

## 1 Introduction

The aim of particle physics is to understand the fundamental laws of nature. The primary tools in this endeavor have been and continue to be accelerator experiments which provide controlled environments for precise experiments. However, this avenue may have limitations, especially considering that many of the most promising ideas for new physics beyond the standard model—e.g., grand unification and quantum gravity—can be tested only at energies many orders of magnitude greater than those accessible by current and planned accelerators.

We have recently seen an increased effort to develop cosmological and astrophysical tools to search for and/or constrain new physics beyond the standard model. These efforts do have precedents: Newton’s law of universal gravitation was motivated by planetary orbits. Helium was first discovered in the solar spectrum. Positrons and muons were both discovered in cosmic-ray experiments. For several years before the advent of LEP, big-bang nucleosynthesis provided the only bound to the number of light neutrinos (e.g., Ref. ). Cosmology for a long time provided by far the most stringent upper limits to stable-neutrino masses.

The promise of using astrophysics to study fundamental physics has also been realized more recently, most notably with the evidence for inflation from the cosmic microwave background (CMB), evidence for an accelerated cosmological expansion, and atmospheric and solar neutrinos.

At the Snowmass 2001 workshop on the future of high-energy physics, a working group (P4) was convened to identify opportunities for advances at the interface of particle physics, astrophysics, and cosmology. This working group covered a broad range of topics, subdivided into eight topical groups: (1) dark matter and relic particles; (2) gamma rays and X-rays; (3) the CMB and inflation; (4) structure formation and cosmological parameters; (5) cosmic rays; (6) gravitational radiation; (7) neutrino astrophysics; and (8) the early Universe and tests of fundamental physics. Recent advances in these areas include the following:

(1) CMB measurements have now mapped the location of the first acoustic peak in the CMB power spectrum, which determines the geometry, and found that the total energy density of the Universe (in units of the critical density) is $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{tot}}=1.00_{0.02}^{+0.03}`$, providing for the very first time strong evidence that of the three possibilities (open, closed, or flat), the spatial geometry of the Universe is flat. These CMB experiments moreover support the hypothesis that large-scale structure grew from primordial density fluctuations that look much like those predicted by inflation.

(2) The discrepancy between a matter density $`\mathrm{\Omega }_m0.3`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{tot}}1`$ provides independent corroboration of the remarkable recent supernova evidence that suggests that $`70\%`$ of the energy density of the Universe is in the form of some mysterious and theoretically unanticipated negative-pressure “dark energy”.

(3) CMB data verify, through a completely independent avenue, the big-bang nucleosynthesis prediction that baryons make up only $``$5% of the critical density. When combined with dynamical and CMB evidence for a nonrelativistic-matter density of 30% of critical, we infer that 25% of the total density of the Universe must be in the form of nonbaryonic dark matter (the best bet being supersymmetric particles or axions).

(4) The sensitivities of experiments to directly detect supersymmetric and axion dark matter have been improved by several orders of magnitude and are now probing the cosmologically-relevant regions of parameter space.

(5) Neutrinos from astrophysical sources (atmospheric and solar neutrinos) have provided convincing evidence for neutrino oscillations and thus demonstrate that very concrete advances in fundamental physics can occur with astrophysical sources.

Here I summarize a few of the topics of the Snowmass P4 working group, focusing on several subjects that I find particularly interesting and providing updates in several cases where there has been progress during the past year.

## 2 Particle Dark Matter

Almost all astronomers will agree that most of the mass in the Universe is nonluminous. Dynamics of clusters of galaxies have long suggested a universal nonrelativistic-matter density $`\mathrm{\Omega }_m0.10.3`$ (in units of the critical density). It has also been appreciated for a long time that if there were no matter beyond the luminous matter we see, the duration of the epoch of structure formation would be very short, thereby requiring fluctuations in the CMB considerably larger than those observed.

However, the most robust observational evidence for the existence of dark matter has always involved galactic dynamics. There is simply not enough luminous matter observed in spiral galaxies to account for their observed rotation curves (for example, that for NGC6503 shown in Fig. 1; from Ref. ). These rotation curves imply the existence of a diffuse halo of dark matter that vastly outweighs and extends much further than the luminous component. Summing the contributions from all galaxies, we infer that dark matter associated with galaxies contributes $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{halo}}\begin{array}{c}>\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}0.1`$. On the other hand, big-bang nucleosynthesis suggests a baryon density $`\mathrm{\Omega }_b\begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}0.1`$ (Ref. ). Thus, the bulk of the halo must be nonbaryonic. In the past few years, the existence of nonbaryonic dark matter has received independent and precise confirmation with new CMB results alluded to above. There is simply no good fit to the CMB power spectrum without nonbaryonic dark matter. The data require a nonbaryonic-dark-matter density $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{dm}}h^2=0.13\pm 0.04`$ (and $`h`$ is the Hubble parameter in units of 100 km sec-1 Mpc-1).

So, what could this dark matter be? A neutrino species of mass $`𝒪(10\mathrm{eV})`$ could provide the right dark-matter density, but N-body simulations of structure formation in a neutrino-dominated Universe do a poor job of reproducing the observed structure. Furthermore, it is difficult to see (essentially the Pauli principle) how such a neutrino could make up the halo dark matter. It appears likely then that some exotic particle dark matter is required.

For the past two decades, the two leading candidates from particle theory have been weakly-interacting massive particles (WIMPs), such as the lightest superpartner (LSP) in supersymmetric extensions of the standard model, and axions.

### 2.1 Weakly-Interacting Massive Particles

Suppose that in addition to the known particles of the standard model, there exists a new stable weakly-interacting massive particle (WIMP), $`\chi `$. At sufficiently early times after the big bang, when the temperatures are greater than the mass of the particle, $`Tm_\chi `$, the equilibrium number density of such particles is $`n_\chi T^3`$, but for lower temperatures, $`Tm_\chi `$, the equilibrium abundance is exponentially suppressed, $`n_\chi e^{m_\chi /T}`$. If the expansion of the Universe were slow enough that thermal equilibrium were always maintained, the number of WIMPs today would be infinitesimal. However, the Universe is not static, so equilibrium thermodynamics is not the entire story.

At high temperatures ($`Tm_\chi `$), $`\chi `$’s are abundant and rapidly converting to lighter particles and vice versa ($`\chi \overline{\chi }l\overline{l}`$, where $`l\overline{l}`$ are quark-antiquark and lepton-antilepton pairs, and if $`m_\chi `$ is greater than the mass of the gauge and/or Higgs bosons, $`l\overline{l}`$ could be gauge- and/or Higgs-boson pairs as well). Shortly after $`T`$ drops below $`m_\chi `$ the number density of $`\chi `$’s drops exponentially, and the rate for annihilation of $`\chi `$’s, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }=\sigma vn_\chi `$—where $`\sigma v`$ is the thermally averaged total cross section $`\sigma `$ for annihilation of $`\chi \overline{\chi }`$ into lighter particles times relative velocity $`v`$—drops below the expansion rate, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }\begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}H`$. At this point, the $`\chi `$’s cease to annihilate efficiently, they fall out of equilibrium, and a relic cosmological abundance remains. The equilibrium (solid curve) and actual (dashed curve) abundances of WIMPs per comoving volume are plotted in Fig. 2 as a function of $`xm_\chi /T`$ (which increases with increasing time). As the annihilation cross section is increased the WIMPs stay in equilibrium longer, so we are left with a smaller relic abundance when they do finally freeze out. An approximate solution to the Boltzmann equation yields the cosmological WIMP abundance (in units of the critical density $`\rho _c`$),

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_\chi =\frac{m_\chi n_\chi }{\rho _ch^2}\left(\frac{3\times 10^{27}\mathrm{cm}^3\mathrm{sec}^1}{\sigma _Av}\right)h^2.$$
(1)
The result is to a first approximation independent of the WIMP mass and is fixed primarily by the annihilation cross section.

The WIMP velocities at freeze-out are typically some appreciable fraction of the speed of light. Therefore, from Eq. (1), the WIMP will have a cosmological abundance of order unity today if the annihilation cross section is roughly $`10^9`$ GeV-2. Curiously, this is the order of magnitude one would expect from a typical electroweak cross section,

$$\sigma _{\mathrm{weak}}\frac{\alpha ^2}{m_{\mathrm{weak}}^2},$$
(2)
where $`\alpha 𝒪(0.01)`$ and $`m_{\mathrm{weak}}𝒪(100\mathrm{GeV})`$. The numerical constant in Eq. (1) needed to provide $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\chi 1`$ comes essentially from the age of the Universe. But why should the age of the Universe have anything to do with the age of the Universe? This unanticipated coincidence suggests that if a new, as yet undiscovered, stable massive particle with electroweak interactions exists, then it should have a relic density of order unity and is therefore a natural dark-matter candidate. This has been the argument driving the massive experimental effort to detect WIMPs.

The first WIMPs considered were massive Dirac or Majorana neutrinos with masses in the range of a few GeV to a few TeV. (Due to the Yukawa coupling which gives a neutrino its mass, the neutrino interactions become strong above a few TeV, and it no longer remains a suitable WIMP candidate.) LEP ruled out neutrino masses below half the $`Z^0`$ mass. Furthermore, heavier Dirac neutrinos have been ruled out as the primary component of the Galactic halo by direct-detection experiments (described below), and heavier Majorana neutrinos have been ruled out by indirect-detection experiments (also described below) over much of their mass range. Therefore, Dirac neutrinos cannot comprise the halo dark matter; Majorana neutrinos can, but only over a small range of fairly large masses.

A much more promising WIMP candidate comes from electroweak-scale supersymmetry (SUSY). SUSY was hypothesized in particle physics to cure the naturalness problem with fundamental Higgs bosons at the electroweak scale. Coupling-constant unification at the GUT scale seems to be improved with SUSY, and SUSY is an essential ingredient in theories that unify gravity with the other three fundamental forces.

The existence of a new symmetry, $`R`$-parity, in SUSY theories guarantees that the lightest supersymmetric particle (LSP) is stable. In the minimal supersymmetric extension of the standard model (MSSM), the LSP is usually the neutralino, a linear combination of the supersymmetric partners of the photon, $`Z^0`$, and Higgs bosons. Another possibility are sneutrinos, but these particles interact like neutrinos and have been ruled out over most of the available mass range. Given a SUSY model, the cross section for neutralino annihilation to lighter particles, and thus the relic density, can be calculated. The mass scale of supersymmetry must be of order the weak scale to cure the naturalness problem, and the neutralino will have only electroweak interactions. Therefore, it is to be expected that the cosmological neutralino abundance is of order unity. In fact, with detailed calculations, one finds that the neutralino abundance in a very broad class of supersymmetric extensions of the standard model is near unity and can therefore account for the dark matter in our halo.

This is illustrated in Fig. 3 where the cosmological abundance $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\chi `$ (times $`h^2`$) is plotted versus the neutralino mass $`m_\chi `$. Each point represents one supersymmetric model, or equivalently, one choice of the MSSM parameters. Models with $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\chi h^2\begin{array}{c}>\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}1`$ are excluded if the Universe is at least 10 Gyr old, while those with $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\chi h^2\begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}0.025`$ are cosmologically consistent, but probably give too few neutralinos to account for the dark matter in galactic halos. The numerous models in which the neutralino abundance is between these two limits provide excellent dark-matter candidates.

### 2.2 Direct Detection of WIMPs

SUSY particles are now the primary targets of the next generation of accelerator experiments. However, one can also try to detect neutralinos in the Galactic halo. In order to account for the dynamics of the Milky Way, the local dark-matter density must be $`\rho _00.4\mathrm{GeV}/\mathrm{cm}^3`$, and whatever particles or objects make up the dark-matter halo must be moving with a velocity dispersion of 270 km/sec.

Perhaps the most promising technique to detect WIMPs is detection of the $`𝒪(30\mathrm{keV})`$ nuclear recoil produced by elastic scattering of neutralinos from nuclei in low-background detectors. A particle with mass $`m_\chi 100`$ GeV and electroweak-scale interactions will have a cross section for elastic scattering from a nucleus which is $`\sigma 10^{38}\mathrm{cm}^2`$. If the local halo density is $`\rho _00.4`$ GeV cm-3, and the particles move with velocities $`v300`$ km sec-1, then the rate for elastic scattering of these particles from, e.g., germanium which has a mass $`m_N70`$ GeV, will be $`R\rho _0\sigma v/m_\chi /m_N1`$ event kg-1 yr-1. If a $`100`$-GeV WIMP moving at $`v/c10^3`$ elastically scatters with a nucleus of similar mass, it will impart a recoil energy up to 100 keV to the nucleus. Therefore, if we have 1 kg of germanium, we expect to see roughly one nucleus per year spontaneously recoil with an energy of $`𝒪(30\mathrm{k}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V})`$.

More precise calculations of the detection rate include the proper neutralino-quark interaction, the QCD and nuclear physics that turn a neutralino-quark interaction into a neutralino-nucleus interaction, and a full integration over the WIMP velocity distribution. Even if all of these physical effects are included properly, there is still some uncertainty in the predicted event rates that arises from current limitations in our understanding of, e.g., squark, slepton, chargino, and neutralino masses and mixings. Therefore, rather than make a single precise prediction, theorists generally survey the available SUSY parameter space. Doing so, one finds event rates between $`10^4`$ to 10 events kg-1 day-1 (Ref. ), as shown in Fig. 55 of Ref. , although there may be models with rates that are a bit higher or lower.

### 2.3 Energetic Neutrinos from WIMP Annihilation

Energetic neutrinos from WIMP annihilation in the Sun and/or Earth provide an alternative avenue for indirect detection of WIMPs. If, upon passing through the Sun, a WIMP scatters elastically from a nucleus therein to a velocity less than the escape velocity, it will be gravitationally bound to the Sun. This leads to a significant enhancement in the density of WIMPs in the center of the Sun—or by a similar mechanism, the Earth. These WIMPs will annihilate to, e.g., $`c`$, $`b`$, and/or $`t`$ quarks, and/or gauge and Higgs bosons. Among the decay products of these particles will be energetic muon neutrinos which can escape from the center of the Sun and/or Earth and be detected in neutrino telescopes such as IMB, Baksan, Kamiokande, MACRO, or AMANDA. The energies of these muons will be typically 1/3 to 1/2 the neutralino mass (e.g., 10s to 100s of GeV) so they will be much more energetic than ordinary solar neutrinos (and therefore cannot be confused with them). The signature of such a neutrino would be the Cerenkov radiation emitted by an upward muon produced by a charged-current interaction between the neutrino and a nucleus in the rock below the detector.

The annihilation rate of these WIMPs equals the rate for capture of these particles in the Sun, which can be calculated. The flux of neutrinos at the Earth depends also on the Earth-Sun distance, WIMP annihilation branching ratios, and the decay branching ratios of the annihilation products. The flux of upward muons depends on the flux of neutrinos and the cross section for production of muons, which depends on the square of the neutrino energy.

As in the case of direct detection, the precise prediction involves numerous factors from particle and nuclear physics and astrophysics, and on the SUSY parameters. When all these factors are taken into account, predictions for the fluxes of such muons in SUSY models seem to fall for the most part between $`10^6`$ and 1 event m-2 yr-1 (Ref. ), as shown in Fig. 57 of Ref. , although the numbers may be a bit higher or lower in some models. Presently, IMB, Kamiokande, Baksan, and MACRO constrain the flux of energetic neutrinos from the Sun to be $`\begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}0.02`$ m-2 yr-1 (Ref. ). Larger and more sensitive detectors such as super-Kamiokande and AMANDA are now operating, and others are being constructed.

### 2.4 Recent Results

There has been some controversy and excitement among dark-matter experimentalists in recent years. The DAMA collaboration has for several years seen an annual modulation in the event rate in their NaI detector, which they attribute to a WIMP. A WIMP can interact with nuclei either through a scalar interaction (where the WIMP-nucleus cross section scales with the nuclear mass), or through an axial-vector interaction (where the WIMP-nucleus cross section depends on something like the nuclear spin or magnetic moment). If the DAMA modulation is attributed to a WIMP with a scalar interaction with nuclei, then it implies a WIMP mass and WIMP-nucleon cross section in the region indicated in Fig. 4. For several years, null searches in the CDMS Ge detector ruled out most of this region. This past year, new null results from EDELWEISS and ZEPLIN seem to have now ruled out the entire DAMA parameter space.

But what if the WIMP has an axial-vector interaction? Both Na and I have a spin carried primarily by an unpaired proton. Although 73Ge also has a spin carried primarily by a proton, its isotopic abundance is only 7%. Thus, if the DAMA modulation is due to a WIMP with a spin-dependent interaction with protons, it would evade detection in CDMS (and probably also in EDELWEISS; a careful analysis is now in progress). In Ref. , however, we showed using the model-independent analysis of Refs.  that if the DAMA modulation were attributed to a WIMP-proton axial-vector interaction, then these WIMPs would accumulate efficiently in the Sun (which is made primarily of protons) and annihilate therein. The resulting flux of energetic neutrinos would have been well over an order of magnitude larger than the current upper bounds from Kamiokande, Baksan, and MACRO, as shown in Fig. 5. Alternatively, a small fraction of the nuclear spins in Na and I could be due to neutrons, and if so, the DAMA modulation could be explained by a WIMP with a spin-dependent interaction with neutrons. In this case, however, the WIMP-neutron interaction would have to be quite strong, and the WIMP would have already shown up in another of DAMA’s detectors that is made of Xe, as shown in Fig. 6, and probably also in ZEPLIN (a detailed analysis is now in progress).

### 2.5 WIMPs and Exotic Cosmic Rays

WIMPs might also be detected via observation of exotic cosmic-ray positrons, antiprotons, and gamma rays produced by WIMP annihilation in the Galactic halo. The difficulty with these techniques is discrimination between WIMP-induced cosmic rays and those from traditional astrophysical (“background”) sources. However, WIMPs may produce distinctive cosmic-ray signatures. As illustrated in Fig. 7, WIMP annihilation might produce a cosmic-ray-positron excess at high energies. There are now several balloon (e.g., BESS, CAPRICE, HEAT, IMAX, MASS, TS93) and satellite (AMS and PAMELA) experiments that have recently flown or are about to be flown to search for cosmic-ray antimatter. In fact, the HEAT experiment may already show some evidence for a positron excess at high energies.

WIMP annihilation will produce an antiproton excess at low energies, although Ref.  claims that traditional astrophysical sources can mimic such an excess. They argue that the antiproton background at higher energies ($`\begin{array}{c}>\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}`$few GeV) is better understood, and that a search for an excess of these higher-energy antiprotons would thus provide a better WIMP signature.

Direct WIMP annihilation to two photons can produce a gamma-ray line, which could not be mimicked by a traditional astrophysical source, at an energy equal to the WIMP mass. WIMPs could also annihilate directly to a photon and a $`Z^0`$ boson, and these photons will be monoenergetic with an energy that differs from that of the photons from direct annihilation to two photons. Resolution of both lines and measurement of their relative strengths would shed light on the composition of the WIMP. Ground-based experiments like STACEE or CELESTE or the GLAST satellite will seek this annihilation radiation.

It was recently argued that there may be a very dense dark-matter spike, with a dark-matter density that scales with radius $`r`$ as $`\rho (r)r^{2.25}`$ from the Galactic center, around the black hole at the Galactic center. If so, it would give rise to a huge flux of annihilation radiation. However, others have questioned whether this spike really arises.

### 2.6 Axions

The other leading dark-matter candidate is the axion. The QCD Lagrangian may be written

$$_{QCD}=_{\mathrm{pert}}+\theta \frac{g^2}{32\pi ^2}G\stackrel{~}{G},$$
(3)
where the first term is the perturbative Lagrangian responsible for the numerous phenomenological successes of QCD. However, the second term (where $`G`$ is the gluon field-strength tensor and $`\stackrel{~}{G}`$ is its dual), which is a consequence of nonperturbative effects, violates $`CP`$. From constraints to the neutron electric-dipole moment, $`d_n\begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}10^{25}`$ e cm, it can be inferred that $`\theta \begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}10^{10}`$. But why is $`\theta `$ so small? This is the strong-$`CP`$ problem.

The axion arises in the Peccei-Quinn (PQ) solution to the strong-$`CP`$ problem, which twenty-five years after it was proposed still seems to be the most promising solution. A global $`U(1)_{PQ}`$ symmetry broken at a scale $`f_{PQ}`$, and $`\theta `$ yields a dynamical field which is the Nambu-Goldstone mode of this symmetry. At temperatures below the QCD phase transition, nonperturbative quantum effects break explicitly the symmetry and drive $`\theta 0`$. The axion is the pseudo-Nambu-Goldstone boson of this near-global symmetry. Its mass is $`m_a\mathrm{eV}(10^7\mathrm{GeV}/f_a)`$, and its coupling to ordinary matter is $`f_a^1`$.

The Peccei-Quinn solution works equally well for any value of $`f_a`$. However, a variety of astrophysical observations and laboratory experiments constrain the axion mass to be $`m_a10^4`$ eV. Smaller masses would lead to an unacceptably large cosmological abundance. Larger masses are ruled out by a combination of constraints from supernova 1987A, stellar evolution, laboratory experiments, and a search for two-photon decays of relic axions.

Curiously enough, if the axion mass is in the relatively small viable range, the relic density is $`\mathrm{\Omega }_a1`$ and may therefore account for the halo dark matter. Such axions would be produced with zero momentum by a misalignment mechanism in the early Universe and therefore act as cold dark matter. During the process of galaxy formation, these axions would fall into the Galactic potential well and would therefore be present in our halo with a velocity dispersion near 270 km sec-1.

If $`m_a10^4`$ eV, the magnitude of the explicit symmetry breaking is incredibly tiny compared with the PQ scale, so the global PQ symmetry, although broken, must be very close to exact. There are physical arguments involving, for example, the nonconservation of global charge in evaporation of a black hole produced by collapse of an initial state with nonzero global charge, that suggest that global symmetries should be violated to some extent in quantum gravity. In order for the PQ mechanism to work for $`m_a10^4`$, the coupling of a generic global-symmetry-violating term from quantum-gravity effects must be extraordinarily small (e.g., $`\begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}10^{55}`$). Of course, we have at this point no predictive theory of quantum gravity, and several mechanisms for forbidding these global-symmetry violating terms have been proposed. Therefore, these arguments by no means “rule out” the axion solution. Rather, discovery of an axion would provide much needed clues to the nature of Planck-scale physics.

There is a very weak coupling of an axion to photons through the anomaly. The axion can therefore decay to two photons, but the lifetime is $`\tau _{a\gamma \gamma }10^{50}\mathrm{s}(m_a/10^5\mathrm{eV})^5`$ which is huge compared to the lifetime of the Universe and therefore unobservable. However, the $`a\gamma \gamma `$ term in the Lagrangian is $`_{a\gamma \gamma }a\stackrel{}{E}\stackrel{}{B}`$ where $`\stackrel{}{E}`$ and $`\stackrel{}{B}`$ are the electric and magnetic field strengths. Therefore, if one immerses a resonant cavity in a strong magnetic field, Galactic axions that pass through the detector may be converted to fundamental excitations of the cavity, and these may be observable. Such an experiment is currently underway and has already begun to probe part of the cosmologically interesting parameter space (see Fig. 8), and it should cover most of the interesting region parameter space in the next few years. A related experiment, which looks for excitations of Rydberg atoms, is also seeking dark-matter axions. Although the sensitivity of this technique should be excellent, it can only cover a limited axion-mass range. The CERN Axion Solar Telescope (CAST) project is searching for $`m_aO(\mathrm{eV})`$ axions by looking for resonant conversion of thermal axions from the Sun into x rays. This mass range is available only if there are loopholes in the stellar-evolution calculations that nominally exclude these masses.

### 2.7 Self-Interacting Dark Matter?

N-body simulations of structure formation with collisionless dark matter show dark-matter cusps, density profiles that fall as $`\rho (r)1/r`$ with radius $`r`$ near the galactic center, while some dwarf-galaxy rotation curves indicate the existence of a density core in their centers. This has prompted some theorists to consider self-interacting dark matter. If dark-matter particles elastically scatter from each other in a galactic halo, then heat can be transported from the halo center to the outskirts; in this way, the cusp can be smoothed into a core. In order for this mechanism to work, however, the elastic-scattering cross section must be $`\sigma _{\mathrm{el}}10^{(2425)}(m_\chi /\mathrm{GeV})`$ cm2, roughly thirteen orders of magnitude larger than the cross section expected for WIMPs, and even further from that for axions. If the cross section is stronger, the halo will undergo core collapse, and if it is weaker, the heat transport is not sufficiently efficient to remove the dwarf-galaxy dark-matter cusp.

The huge discrepancy between the magnitude of the required scattering cross section and that for WIMPs and axions has made self-interacting dark matter unappealing to most WIMP and axion theorists (but see, e.g., Refs. ). However, theoretical prejudices aside, self-interacting dark matter now seems untenable observationally. If dark matter is collisional, dark-matter cores should equilibrate and become round. Non-radial arcs in the gravitational-lensing system MS2137-23 require a non-spherical core and thus rule out the scattering cross sections required to produce dwarf-galaxy cores. One possible loophole is that the scattering cross section is inversely proportional to the relative velocity of the scattering particles; this would lengthen the equilibration time in the core of the cluster MS2137-23. This possibility has now been ruled out, however, by x-ray observations of the giant elliptical galaxy NGC 4636 which shows a very dense dark-matter cusp at very small radii.

## 3 The Cosmic Microwave Background, Large-Scale Structure, and Inflation

### 3.1 Recent Progress in the CMB

In the past few years, the cosmic microwave background (CMB) has begun to provide perhaps the most exciting opportunity for learning about new physics at ultra-high-energy scales (for recent reviews, see, e.g., Refs. ). We have already seen spectacular advances in measurements of temperature fluctuations in the CMB that have led to major advances in our ability to characterize the largest-scale structure of the Universe, the origin of density perturbations, and the early Universe. In just the past few months we have seen the first detection of CMB polarization and a spectacular measurement of fluctuations from 10-degree to sub-degree angular scales. In the next few months we should see even more improvements from the MAP satellite, and even more with the launch of the Planck satellite in 2007.

The primary aim of these experiments has been to determine the CMB power spectrum, $`C_{\mathrm{}}`$, as a function of multipole moment $`\mathrm{}`$. Structure-formation theories predict a series of bumps in the power spectrum in the region $`50\begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}\mathrm{}\begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}1000`$, arising from oscillations in the baryon-photon fluid before CMB photons last scatter. The rich structure in these peaks allows simultaneous determination of the geometry of the Universe, the baryon density, Hubble constant, matter density, and cosmological constant, as well as the nature (e.g., adiabatic, isocurvature, or topological defects) and spectrum of primordial perturbations.

Within the past two years, three independent experiments that use different techniques, observing strategies, and frequencies have each measured the power spectrum in the range $`50\begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}\mathrm{}\begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}1000`$ (Refs. ), and the existence of the second and third peaks has now been confirmed, as shown in Fig. 9. These experiments represent a watershed event in cosmology, as they suggest for the first time that the Universe is flat and that structure grew from a nearly scale-invariant spectrum of primordial density perturbations. These two properties are robust predictions of inflation, a period of accelerated expansion in the very early Universe driven by the vacuum energy associated with some new, yet undetermined, ultra-high-energy physics. The new results from ARCHEOPS, shown in Fig. 10, overlap and also interpolate between the largest-angle measurements from COBE and the degree-scale experiments. The agreement with the earlier experiments is stunning.

Although these recent CMB tests suggest that we are on the right track with inflation, we still have no idea what new physics may have given rise to inflation. Plausible theoretical models place the energy scale of inflation anywhere from the Planck scale to the electroweak scale, and associate the inflaton (the scalar field responsible for inflation) with new fields that arise in string theory, GUTs, the Peccei-Quinn mechanism, supersymmetry breaking, and electroweak-scale physics, as shown in Fig. 11.

### 3.2 Inflation, Gravitational Waves, and CMB Polarization

Perhaps the most promising avenue toward further tests of inflation as well as determination of the energy scale of inflation is the gravitational-wave background. Inflation predicts that quantum fluctuations in the spacetime metric during inflation should give rise to a stochastic gravitational-wave background with a nearly-scale-invariant spectrum (defined to be the fourth root of the inflaton potential during inflation). Inflation moreover predicts that the amplitude of this gravitational-wave background should be proportional to the square of the energy scale of inflation.

These gravitational waves will produce temperature fluctuations at large angles. Upper limits to the amplitude of large-angle temperature fluctuations already constrain the energy scale of inflation to be less than $`3\times 10^{16}`$ GeV. However, since density perturbations can also produce such temperature fluctuations, observed temperature fluctuations cannot alone be used to detect the gravitational-wave background.

Instead, progress can be made with the polarization of the CMB. Both gravitational waves and density perturbations will produce linear polarization in the CMB, and the two polarization patterns differ. More precisely, gravitational waves produce polarization with a distinctive curl pattern that cannot be mimicked by density perturbations (at linear order in perturbation theory; see below). Moreover, inflation robustly predicts that the amplitude of this curl depends on the square of the energy scale of inflation.

Is this signal at all detectable? If the energy scale of inflation is much below the GUT scale, then the polarization signal will likely be too small to ever be detected. However, if inflation had something to do with GUTs—as many, if not most theorists believe—then the signal is conceivably detectable by a next-generation CMB experiment. Although the MAP satellite, launched just last month, is unlikely to have sufficient sensitivity to detect the curl component from inflationary gravitational waves, the Planck satellite, a European Space Agency experiment to be launched in 2007, should have sufficient sensitivity to detect the CMB curl component as long as the energy scale of inflation is greater than roughly $`5\times 10^{15}`$ GeV. However, Planck will not be the end of the line. An experiment that integrates more deeply on a smaller region of sky can improve the sensitivity to the inflationary gravitational-wave background by almost two orders of magnitude. Moreover, there are several very promising ideas being pursued now that could improve the detector sensitivity by more than an order of magnitude within the next decade. Putting these two factors together, it becomes likely that a CMB polarization experiment that probes inflationary energy scales to below $`10^{15}`$ GeV—and thus accesses the entire favored GUT parameter space—could be mounted on a ten-year timescale (if not sooner).

### 3.3 Cosmic Shear and the CMB

There is, however, another source of a curl component. Cosmic shear (CS)—weak gravitational lensing of the CMB due to large-scale structure along the line of sight—results in a fractional conversion of the gradient mode from density perturbations to the curl component. The CS-induced curl thus introduces a noise from which IGWs must be distinguished. If the IGW amplitude (or $`E_{\mathrm{infl}}`$) is sufficiently large, the CS-induced curl will be no problem. However, as $`E_{\mathrm{infl}}`$ is reduced, the IGW signal becomes smaller and will at some point get lost in the CS-induced noise. If it is not corrected for, this confusion leads to a minimum detectable IGW amplitude.

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

Refs.  show that if the gravitational-wave background is large enough to be accessible with the Planck satellite, then the cosmic-shear contribution to the curl component will not get in the way. However, to go beyond Planck, the cosmic-shear distortion to the CMB curl will need to be subtracted by mapping the cosmic-shear deflection with higher-order temperature-polarization correlations. Ultimately, if the energy scale is $`E_{\mathrm{infl}}\begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}2\times 10^{15}`$ GeV, then there will be an irreducible cosmic-shear-induced curl, even with higher-order correlations. Thus, if the energy scale of inflation is below this value, the gravitational-wave background will not be detectable with the CMB polarization. Either way, the cosmic-shear distortions to the CMB will be of interest in their own right, as they probe the distribution of dark matter throughout the Universe as well as the growth of density perturbations at early times. These goals will be important for determining the matter power spectrum and thus for testing inflation and constraining the inflaton potential.

### 3.4 CMB and Primordial Gaussianity

Another prediction of inflation is that the distribution of mass in the primordial Universe should be a realization of a Gaussian random process. This means that the distribution of temperature perturbations in the CMB should be Gaussian and it moreover implies a precise relation between all of the higher-order temperature correlation functions and the two-point correlation function. These relations can be tested with future precise CMB temperature and polarization maps. See Ref.  for a brief review.

### 3.5 Structure Formation and Inflation

Large-scale galaxy surveys have become a reality, particularly with the advent of the Two-Degree Field and Sloan Digital Sky Surveys. We are now mapping the distribution of galaxies over huge volumes in the Universe. Moreover, just over two years ago, four independent groups reported detection of cosmic shear through the observation of ellipticity correlations in distant galaxies. In the future, cosmic-shear measurements will map the distribution of matter (rather than just the luminous matter probed by galaxy surveys) over large volumes of space .

If the big bang is a cosmic accelerator, subtle correlations in the debris from the explosion can provide valuable information on inflation, just as subtle correlations in jets in accelerator experiments can provide information about the collisions that give rise to them. The primary aims of galaxy surveys and cosmic-shear maps are determination of the power spectrum $`P(k)`$ of the cosmological matter distribution as a function of wavenumber (inverse distance) $`k`$. These measurements are important for the study of inflation, as inflation relates the amplitude and shape of the power spectrum $`P(k)`$ to the inflaton potential $`V(\varphi )`$ as a function of the value $`\varphi `$ of the inflaton. Measurements of $`P(k)`$ with the CMB at the very largest scales, to intermediate scales with galaxy surveys, to the smallest scales with subgalactic structure are now being pursued. Moreover, as discussed above, inflation predicts very precise relations between all of the higher-order correlation functions for the primordial mass distribution and its two-point correlation function, and these relations can also be tested with the observed distribution of mass in the Universe today. The growth of density perturbations via gravitational infall alters the precise structure of the correlation hierarchy from the primordial one. However, it does so in a calculable way so that the primordial distribution of density perturbations (Gaussian as predicted by inflation? or otherwise?) can be determined from the distribution observed in the Universe today.

Information about the primordial distribution of matter can also be obtained by studying the abundances and properties of the rarest objects in the Universe: clusters of galaxies today and galaxies at high redshift (see, e.g., Ref. ). Such objects form at rare ($`\begin{array}{c}>\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}3\sigma `$) high-density peaks in the primordial density field. Inflation predicts that the distribution of such peaks should be Gaussian. If the distribution is non-Gaussian—for example, skew-positive with an excess of high-density peaks—then the abundance of these objects can be considerably larger. In such skew-positive models, such objects would also form over a much wider range of redshifts and thus exhibit a broader range of properties (e.g., sizes, ages, luminosities, temperatures).

## 4 Dark Energy

In addition to confirming the predictions of big-bang nucleosynthesis and the existence of dark matter, the measurement of classical cosmological parameters has resulted in a startling discovery over the past few years: roughly 70% of the energy density of the Universe is in the form of some mysterious negative-pressure “dark energy”. Supernova evidence for an accelerating Universe has now been dramatically bolstered by the discrepancy between the total cosmological density $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{tot}}1`$ indicated by the CMB and dynamical measurements of the nonrelativistic-matter density $`\mathrm{\Omega }_m0.3`$.

As momentous as these results are for cosmology, they may be even more remarkable from the vantage point of particle physics, as they indicate the existence of new physics beyond the standard model plus general relativity. Either gravity behaves very peculiarly on the very largest scales, and/or there is some form of negative-pressure dark energy that contributes 70% of the energy density of the Universe. For this dark energy to accelerate the expansion, its equation-of-state parameter $`wp/\rho `$ must satisfy $`w<1/3`$, where $`p`$ and $`\rho `$ are the dark-energy pressure and energy density, respectively. The simplest guess for this dark energy is the spatially uniform, time-independent cosmological constant, for which $`w=1`$. Another possibility is quintessence or spintessence, a cosmic scalar field that is displaced from the minimum of its potential. Negative pressure is achieved when the kinetic energy of the rolling field is less than the potential energy, so that $`1w<1/3`$ is possible. (In fact, equations of state $`w<1`$, which violate the dominant-energy condition in general relativity, have now been considered as well.)

Although it is the simplest possibility, a cosmological constant with this value is strange, as quantum gravity would predict its value to be $`10^{120}`$ times the observed value, or perhaps zero in the presence of some symmetry. One of the appealing features of dynamical models for dark energy is that they may be compatible with a true vacuum energy which is precisely zero, to which the Universe will ultimately evolve.

The dark energy was a complete surprise and remains a complete mystery to theorists, a stumbling block that, if confirmed, must be understood before a consistent unified theory can be formulated. This dark energy may be a direct remnant of string theory, and if so, it provides an exciting new window to physics at the Planck scale.

The obvious first step to understand the nature of this dark energy is to determine whether it is a true cosmological constant, or whether its density evolves with time. This can be answered by determining the expansion rate of the Universe as a function of redshift. In principle this can be accomplished with a variety of cosmological observations (e.g., quasar-lensing statistics, cluster abundances and properties, the Lyman-alpha forest, galaxy and cosmic-shear surveys, etc.). However, the current best bet for determining the expansion history is with supernova searches, particularly those that can reach to redshifts $`z\begin{array}{c}>\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}1`$. Here, better systematic-error reduction, better theoretical understanding of supernovae and evolution effects, and greater statistics, are all required. Both ground-based (e.g., the DMT or WFHRI) and space-based (e.g., SNAP) supernova searches can be used to determine the expansion history. However, for redshifts $`z\begin{array}{c}>\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}1`$, the principal optical supernova emission (including the characteristic silicon absorption feature) gets shifted to the infrared which is obscured by the atmosphere. Thus, a space-based observatory appears to be advisable to reliably measure the expansion history in the crucial high-redshift regime.

Although supernovae provide perhaps the most direct probe of the expansion history, there are a number of other indirect probes as well. Rather than review them all, I simply discuss, as an example, one proposal made recently by N. Weinberg and me. Wide-angle cosmic-shear surveys of blank regions of the sky have already begun, and much larger surveys will soon to be undertaken. Individual galaxy clusters should be detectable in these cosmic-shear maps, but it is possible that proto-clusters, massive overdensities that are still in the process of undergoing gravitational collapse, will also appear in these surveys. Unlike virialized clusters (i.e., those that have undergone gravitational collapse), which emit copious amounts of x-ray radiation, these nonvirialized clusters should be x-ray underluminous, or appear dark in x-ray bands. We showed that the abundance of both virialized and dark clusters that will be detected in a given cosmic-shear survey, as well as the ratio of the two, will depend on the equation-of-state parameter $`w`$, as shown in Fig. 13. At least 50 square degrees will need to be surveyed in order for this test to be carried out.

Most discussions of observational probes of dark energy have involved the effects of quintessence on the expansion history. However, if a quintessence field exists, it may have some couplings to ordinary matter. If so, it could give rise to other observable.consequences. In particular, if the cosmological “constant” evolves with time (i.e., is quintessence), then there is a preferred frame in the Universe. Couplings of elementary particles to the quintessence field may thus give rise to small apparent violations of Lorentz and/or CPT symmetry (see, e.g., Ref. ). A variety of accelerator and astrophysical experiments can be done to search for such exotic signatures.

## 5 Summary and Conclusions

Particle astrophysics and cosmology now represent a very broad and active research front in non-accelerator probes of new physics beyond the standard model. Here I have reviewed dark-matter searches, the relation between observations of the cosmic microwave background, the current cosmological mass distribution, and the early Universe, and the dark-energy problem. There are a number of related topics that I did not discuss, such as neutrino astrophysics, the cosmology of extra large dimensions, cosmic rays, and the growing connections between gamma- and x-ray astrophysics and particle physics. At first, some degree of skepticism may be warranted when discussing astrophysics as a laboratory for advances in fundamental physics. On the other hand, there is no question that cosmology is now in the process of making incredible strides, and should continue to do so for the foreseeable future. Moreover, there are several precedents, including a very recent and very decisive one, for discovering new fundamental physics with astrophysical observations or sources. Whether these precedents will be followed in the future will ultimately only be determined with further vigorous cosmological experimentation.


text:
# Origin of the efficient light emission from inversion domain boundaries in GaN

## Abstract

Intentionally-produced inversion domain boundaries in GaN have been reported to be highly efficient shallow recombination centers. Here I report a rationale for this phenomenon based on ab initio density-functional calculations. I also propose a model, based on the existence of polarization in GaN, of the observation that a domain boundary acts as a rectifying junction under voltage applied between the two opposite-polarity surfaces.

Nitride semiconductors, and GaN in particular, are major competitors in the optoelectronics market at the high frequency end of the visible spectrum. Understandably, considerable attention has been devoted to the nature of recombination centers in In-alloyed GaN, both non-radiative (mainly threading dislocations) and radiative (allegedly, In-rich regions). Not nearly as much work exists on recombination centers in plain GaN. In recent times, extended defects originating from the formation of polarity domain boundaries, and known as inversion domain boundaries (henceforth IDB for brevity), have come into focus in this context. They have been studied theoretically idb-th , directly imaged by high-resolution TEM idb-tem  and piezoresponse force microscopy idb-pfm , and finally, intentionally produced in MBE epitaxial growth on patterned substrates idb-pl . By means of integrated PL topography idb-pl  it was observed that, unexpectedly, these IDBs exhibit a tenfold more intense light emission compared to plain Ga-face surface areas. The transition energy is about 30 meV below the normal emission, and unlike the latter, it is polarized in the plane of the defect. The IDBs thus qualify as highly efficient recombination centers. The first purpose of this paper is to report a rationale for this phenomenon, based on ab initio density-functional calculations. A further puzzling observation idb-rect  is that an IDB between metal contacts placed on the Ga-face and N-face surface regions, acts as a rectifying junction (direct bias being Ga-face to N-face). Here, I also propose a model of the latter behavior, based on the existence of permanent bulk polarization in GaN pol .

Being a wurtzite crystal, GaN possesses a singular polar axis labeled (0001) with the convention that the positive direction points from the cation to the anion, and an attendant permanent polarization vector oriented as (000$`\overline{1}`$). There exist two geometrically distinct crystal terminations, the (0001) or Ga-face and (000$`\overline{1}`$) or N-face, whereby a Ga (respectively, a N) atom would have a single “dangling bond” orthogonal to the surface. Two regions of opposite polarity, conveniently labeled Ga-face and N-face, meet at an IDB. There are at least two plausible models thereof, which were discussed earlier by Northrup et al. idb-th . In the first, cations and anions are exchanged in half of the crystal, giving rise to a geometrically undistorted interface, which however contains two (one N–N and one Ga–Ga) wrong bonds per cell nota . The second model, also known as IDB and found in Ref.idb-th,  to be decidedly favored energetically over the first, is obtained shifting one of the inverted half-cristals by half the cell length ($`c`$/2) along the singular axis. This enables all atoms to be correctly bonded, at the only cost of a modest distortion of the local bond angles, the largest single angle change being $``$109 to 90. In this work, I will be considering the latter model.

I calculate total energies, forces, stress, and electronic potential and density from first-principles, within density functional theory dft  in the Ceperley-Alder ca  local-density approximation to exchange and correlation, using the accurate all-electron frozen-core Projector-Augmented Waves (PAW) method paw  as implemented vasp-paw  in the Vienna Ab-initio Simulation Package (VASP) vasp . The plane wave cutoff is set at 290 eV. The partial wave expansions for N and Ga include angular momenta up to $`l`$=2 and $`l`$=3, respectively, with all on-site projectors included. Ga 3$`d`$ electrons are treated as valence. Accurate reciprocal-lattice grids are used, with no wrap-around aliasing allowed in Fourier transforms. Monkhorst-Pack k-space integration grids are used; for the bulk, converged results are obtained with the (4$`\times `$4$`\times `$4) mesh, tested up to the (12$`\times `$12$`\times `$12). The resulting crystal structure of GaN is $`a_{\mathrm{GaN}}`$=3.160 Å, $`c`$/$`a_{\mathrm{GaN}}`$ =1.626, $`u`$=0.3769, which matches closely (maximum deviation: 0.9 % for $`a_{\mathrm{GaN}}`$) the accepted experimental values $`a_{\mathrm{exp}}`$=3.189 Å, $`c`$/$`a_{\mathrm{exp}}`$=1.626, $`u`$=0.377 exp-gan  – one of the best descriptions of bulk structure ever achieved for GaN.

The IDB planar defect can be simulated in periodic boundary conditions via repeated supercells. I use a crystalline GaN orthorombic supercell comprised of 24 formula units (48 atoms), with linear dimensions (1, 1.626, 6 $`\sqrt{3}`$) in units of $`a_{\mathrm{GaN}}`$. After testing the ($`n`$$`\times `$1$`\times `$$`n`$) and ($`n`$$`\times `$2$`\times `$$`n`$) k-point meshes with $`n`$=2,4, and 8, I used the (4$`\times `$2$`\times `$4) for all the results reported here. The symmetry of the system is found to be almost exactly D2h, although this symmetry is not explicitly enforced. When it is, the k-space grid includes 4 special points in the supercell Brillouin reduced zone; otherwise the mesh comprises 8 points in the reduced zone.

Before relaxation, the formation energy of the IDB defect is 40 meV/Å2. To allow for possible defect-induced strains, the cell length in the $`y`$ direction (orthogonal to the defect plane) was adjusted, with the atomic geometries being constantly optimized to obtain residual force components below 0.01 eV/Å. The cell length does not change within numerical accuracy; some local relaxation occurs in the planes immediately adjacent the defect, all other atomic positions being unperturbed. Relaxation reduces the formation energy to 20 meV/Å2, a rather small value compared to the 114 meV/Å2 of two relaxed (10$`\overline{1}`$0) surfaces of GaN nonpolar , and agreeing well with the 25 meV/Å2 of Ref.idb-th .

I calculate the transition energies, using the so called $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$SCF principle sham , as the combination of (variational) total energies of the system with varying number of electrons

$$E_{\mathrm{gap}}=E_{\mathrm{tot}}(N+1)2E_{\mathrm{tot}}(N)+E_{\mathrm{tot}}(N1).$$
(1)
This expression is exact in the $`N\mathrm{}`$ limit, but it turns out to be pretty accurate also at finite $`N`$ to estimate the gap of crystals nota2 . The added charge is compensated by a uniform background. Since part of the excess charge localizes in the defect plane, I apply a correction $`\sigma ^2d_{\mathrm{cell}}/2\epsilon _r`$ ($`\sigma `$ the interface charge, $`d_{\mathrm{cell}}`$ the cell length, $`\epsilon _r`$ the static dielectric permittivity) to account for the spurious interaction of such sheet charges, screened by the static dielectric response of GaN. This correction is in the order of 10 $`\mu `$eV, i.e. fully negligible on the scale of other computational approximations (e.g. frozen core, LDA, etc.) and convergence errors.

The transition energy obtained for the bulk undefected cell is 3.49 eV, in good agreement with experiment. For the defected cell, the transition energy is also 3.49 eV, thus predicting a red shift of zero, compared to the experimental value of 30 meV. In the calculations the excess electron or hole are added separately to the system, and they do not interact in any way, so that excitonic effect are not described.

However, in view of the low experimental temperature, it is fairly natural to suppose that the observed shift may be of excitonic origin. Although electron-hole interaction is not included, it is possible to pinpoint the origin of the effect looking at the precursors of the exciton, i.e. the electron and hole densities and attendant self-consistent potential. Specifically, let us examine in Fig. 1 the self-consistent electronic potential of the defected cell in the neutral charge state (no extra charge), filtered through a macroscopic average macro  eliminating the periodic microscopic oscillations. As can be seen, the potential in the vicinity of the defect is such as to attract electrons with its weak but far-reaching side wings on the outer side of the defect core, and repelling them off the core itself; contrarywise, holes are attracted to the defect core. Both electrons and holes are thus expected to localize in the vicinity of the defect (which should enhance excitonic interactions).

This is confirmed by inspection of the excess electron and hole charge densities, obtained as density differences between charged and neutral cells. As can be seen vaspview  in Fig. 2, electrons accumulate just outside the defect and onto the central repulsive wall, whereas (although this is not especially clear from the picture) the hole density is enhanced in the defect core.

Inspection also helps rationalize the observed emission polarization in the defect plane. The electron density, mostly of cation $`s`$ character, is “planarized” within the two-dimensional lateral wells of the defect potential. The hole density away from the defect consists of a lobe along the $`y`$ direction: this is because the valence top state in GaN is a $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_9`$ doublet of $`p_xp_y`$ nature (the $`x`$ lobe is not visible, as the $`x`$ direction is orthogonal to the plane of the picture); near the defect the $`p_y`$ lobe pivots around the $`x`$ axis admixing some character of the $`p_z`$ singlet $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_6`$ which lies some 50 meV lower than $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_9`$ in unperturbed GaN. Overall this results in an enhanced directional overlap of the electron and hole functions.

A rationale for this admixture can be extracted from the following model (refer to Fig. 3).

Consider zincblende GaN, with its three-fold degenerate valence band top. Stretch a bond along one of the (111)-equivalent direction; the degeneracy is removed, and as in wurtzite the $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_6`$ singlet is lower than the $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_9`$ doublet. Now displace, say, the anion along the chosen (111) direction, and monitor the relative position of the states. What is observed is the situation schematized in Fig. 3: as the distortion progresses the $`p_z`$ singlet nears the doublet, becomes higher in energy (i.e. the band top), then merges back with the doublet into the threefold-degenerate valence top of the NaCl structure. The IDB embodies indeed a local NaCl-like geometry, with one of the $`a`$-plane bonds at right angles with the polar-axis bond. This distortion is the cause of the admixture of the two top valence states.

Another remarkable effect, observed by Stutzmann et al. idb-rect , is that an IDB acts as a rectifying junction when electrically biased by two contacts placed respectively on the adjacent Ga- and N-face regions, direct-bias being realized by the positive pole on the Ga-face region. This behavior can be qualitatively explained by the existence of an intrinsic macroscopic polarization in wurtzite pol , as schematized in Fig. 4. The two adjacent opposite-polarity regions possess opposite intrinsic polarization vectors. This results in fixed polarization charges at the upper and lower ends of the sample, and changing sign across the IDB junction. On the upper side, mobile charges or impurities from the vacuum neutralize the polarization charges on each of the regions. At the border between the latter, the compensating charges will mutually neutralize and deplete, creating a junction-like potential which opposes the current flow from Ga-face to N-face. Direct polarization with the positive pole on the Ga-face side will then cause a current flow from Ga-face to N-face. It is difficult to say whether this current will flow subsurface or otherwise. Certainly, however, the lower side of the polarized layer, a few $`\mu `$m below the surface, will not be involved. Thereby, charges from, or defects in the nucleation layer are assumed to neutralize permanently the polarization charge.

In summary I have given an interpretation of the observed enhanced light emission from inversion domain boundaries in GaN, and I have suggested a qualitative explanation of the rectification effect observed across the boundaries themselves.

I dedicate this work to the memory of my father Ugo Fiorentini. Support from the Italian Ministry of Research under the PRIN funding programme (years 2000 and 2001) is acknowledged.


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# References

## Abstract

I propose a new mechanism to account for the observed tiny but finite dark energy in terms of a non-Abelian Higgs theory, which has infinitely many perturbative vacua characterized by a winding number, in the framework of inflationary cosmology without introducing any tiny numbers.

Degenerate vacua as the origin of the dark energy

1Department of Earth and Space Science, Graduate School of Science,
Osaka University, Toyonaka 560-0043, Japan

One of the greatest mysteries of present-day cosmology is the origin of dark energy or vacuum-like component of cosmic energy indicated by the analysis of type Ia supernovae observations , whose magnitude is some 120 orders smaller than its natural value, the Planckian density . I propose a novel mechanism to account for the observed tiny but finite dark energy without introducing any small numbers in the framework of inflationary cosmology  making use of a non-Abelian Higgs theory which is a part of typical unified theories of elementary interactions.

Inflation stretches preexistent inhomogeneities and yields an extremely large smooth domain in which the current Hubble volume is contained. It also provides a generation mechanism of density fluctuations which originate in the quantum nature of the inflation-driving scalar field . In calculating perturbations, we consider the field to be in the vacuum state and calculate its zero-point quantum fluctuations. This treatment should be an extremely good approximation, if not exact, as long as we focus on perturbation within currently observable Hubble volume. This is because, even if the scalar field was in some excited state initially, subsequent inflation would exponentially dilute the preexistent quanta. Thus for all the practical purposes we can regard that the quantum state of the scalar field is no different from the vacuum state in this context. That is to say, the vacuum state is dynamically selected as a result of cosmological inflation.

Next let us consider a non-Abelian gauge theory with a gauge group $`G`$ which has infinitely many perturbative vacuum states classified by the winding number $`n`$. Most gauge groups used in grand unified theories such as $`G=`$SU($`N`$), SO($`N`$), and Sp($`N`$) with $`N2`$ possess this property. For definiteness, however, we focus on the simplest theory with this property, $`G=`$SU(2), below. In these theories perturbative vacuum states with different winding numbers cannot be transformed from each other by a continuous gauge transformation  and there is an energy barrier between them. Quantum transition, however, is possible and described by an instanton solution which is an Euclidean solution joining two adjacent perturbative vacua with a finite Euclidean action $`S_0=8\pi ^2/g^2`$. Here $`g`$ is the gauge coupling constant .

As a result, the true vacuum state is expressed by a superposition of perturbative vacua, $`|n`$, as

$$|\theta =\underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}e^{in\theta }|n,$$
(1)
where $`\theta `$ is a real parameter . One can easily find that this state is a real eigenstate of the Hamiltonian $``$ by calculating the amplitude $`\theta ^{}\left|e^T\right|\theta `$ with the dilute instanton approximation , namely, adding contributions of $`m`$ instantons and $`\overline{m}`$ anti-instantons keeping in mind that each (anti-)instanton changes the winding number by $`(1)`$1.

$`\theta ^{}\left|e^T\right|\theta `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{n,n^{}}{}}{\displaystyle \underset{m,\overline{m}}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{m!}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{m}!}}\left(KVTe^{S_0}\right)^{m+\overline{m}}\delta _{m\overline{m},nn^{}}e^{in\theta in^{}\theta ^{}}`$
$`=`$ $`\mathrm{exp}\left(2KVTe^{S_0}\mathrm{cos}\theta \right)\delta \left(\theta \theta ^{}\right).`$
Here $`KVTe^{S_0}`$ represents contribution of a single instanton or anti-instanton where $`K`$ is a positive constant and $`VT`$ represents spacetime volume.

The above equality (S0.Ex1) implies that each $`\theta `$-vacuum $`|\theta `$ has a different energy density than the perturbative vacuum $`|n`$ by $`\mathrm{\Delta }\rho =2Ke^{S_0}\mathrm{cos}\theta .`$ Apparently the $`\theta =0`$ vacuum has the lowest energy, but one cannot conclude that this is the only vacuum state, because the other $`\theta `$-vacua are also stable against gauge-invariant perturbations . In fact, the factor $`K`$ is divergent due to the contribution of arbitrary large instantons in pure gauge theory . In order to obtain a physical cutoff scale, let us introduce an SU(2) doublet scalar field $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ with a potential $`V[\mathrm{\Phi }]=\lambda (|\mathrm{\Phi }|^2M^2/2)^2/2`$ following ’t Hooft . For $`M0`$, instead of the instanton solution of pure gauge theory we should use a constrained instanton solution which also connects adjacent perturbative vacua with a finite Euclidean action . Furthermore a gauge-invariant expression for the winding number can be found in the presence of a Higgs field . Then the prefactor is given by  $`K(8\pi /g^2)^4M^4/2`$ and the expectation value of the vacuum energy density in perturbative vacuum $`|n`$ and that in $`\theta `$-vacuum $`|\theta `$ are given by

$`n||n`$ $`=`$ $`\rho _\mathrm{d}+\rho _\mathrm{v}(\theta =0),`$ (3)
$`\rho _\mathrm{v}(\theta )\theta ||\theta `$ $`=`$ $`\rho _\mathrm{d}(1\mathrm{cos}\theta )+\rho _{\mathrm{v0}},`$ (4)
respectively. Here $`\rho _\mathrm{d}(8\pi /g^2)^4M^4e^{\frac{8\pi ^2}{g^2}}`$, and $`\rho _\mathrm{v}(\theta =0)\rho _{\mathrm{v0}}`$ is the vacuum energy density in the state $`|\theta =0`$. Since different vacuum states have different vacuum energy density, they behave differently in the presence of gravity. Hence any good solution to the conventional cosmological constant problem, namely why the vacuum energy density is vanishingly small compared with the Planck scale, should specify at which vacuum state the cosmological constant vanishes. Unfortunately, since there is no completely satisfactory solution to this long-standing problem yet, let us simply normalize the vacuum energy density to vanish in the CP-symmetric $`\theta =0`$ vacuum state and set $`\rho _{\mathrm{v0}}=0`$ for the moment just for definiteness111 We point out that the wormhole mechanism  is an example of proposed solutions to the conventional cosmological constant problem which predicts the vacuum energy density vanishes at $`\theta =0`$ vacuum .. As will be seen below, however, this choice is not essential and our mechanism can work even if the vacuum energy density vanishes at some other vacuum except at $`|\theta =\pi `$.

Now let us consider what quantum state is chosen by cosmological inflation in this non-Abelian-Higgs system. Let us assume the energy scale of the Higgs field, $`M`$, is much larger than the Hubble parameter during inflation, $`H`$, which is shown to be the case later. As in the case of singlet scalar field, sufficiently long inflation would homogenize the Higgs field configuration over an exponentially large domain with $`|\mathrm{\Phi }|=M/\sqrt{2}`$. This in turn means that the state with vanishing winding number $`|n=0`$ is practically realized as long as we concentrate on the scales within the current Hubble volume, because this is the only state with homogeneous scalar field configuration among many possible vacuum states, perturbative $`|n`$ or real $`|\theta `$. In terms of the energy eigenstates this state is expanded as

$$|n=0=_0^{2\pi }\frac{d\theta }{2\pi }|\theta ,$$
(5)
which consists of superposition of all possible real vacuum state $`|\theta `$ with equal weight.

While we can calculate the expectation value of vacuum energy density in this state as (3), it is more appropriate to discuss the probability distribution function (PDF) of vacuum energy because this state consists of superposition of energy eigenstates with different energy density . Using (5) we can easily calculate the PDF of vacuum energy density, $`P(\rho _\mathrm{v})`$, in this state as

$`P(\rho _\mathrm{v})`$ $`=`$ $`\delta \left(\rho _\mathrm{v}\rho _\mathrm{v}(\theta )\right)_\theta ={\displaystyle _0^{2\pi }}{\displaystyle \frac{d\theta }{2\pi }}\delta \left(\rho _\mathrm{v}\rho _\mathrm{d}(1\mathrm{cos}\theta )\right)`$ (8)
$`=`$ $`\{\begin{array}{cc}\frac{1}{\pi \left(2\rho _\mathrm{v}\rho _\mathrm{d}\rho _\mathrm{v}^2\right)^{1/2}}& \mathrm{for}0\rho _\mathrm{v}2\rho _\mathrm{d},\hfill \\ 0& \mathrm{otherwise}.\hfill \end{array}`$
It is sharply peaked at $`\rho _\mathrm{v}=0`$ corresponding to $`\theta =0`$ and $`\rho _\mathrm{v}=2\rho _\mathrm{d}`$ corresponding to $`\theta =\pi `$ and the probability to find $`\rho _\mathrm{v}2\rho _\mathrm{d}`$ is fairly large.

Thus, if the perturbative vacuum $`|n=0`$ is stable in the cosmological time scale, the PDF of the vacuum energy density is still given by (8) today in our universe which experienced inflation. Hence it is by no means surprising that we observe a finite dark energy around $`2\rho _\mathrm{d}`$ today.

We can easily match the predicted value, $`2\rho _\mathrm{d}`$, with the observed one, $`10^{120}M_G^4`$, by appropriately choosing $`M`$ and $`g`$, where $`M_G`$ is the reduced Planck scale. We also demand that the tunneling rate from $`|n=0`$, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }Ke^{\frac{16\pi ^2}{g^2}}`$, is small enough to guarantee that there is no transition within the current Hubble volume, $`H_0^3`$, in the cosmic age, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }H_0^4\stackrel{<}{}\text{ }1`$. Then we obtain

$$\pi /\alpha +2\mathrm{ln}\alpha =60\mathrm{ln}10+2\mathrm{ln}\left(M/M_G\right),\text{and}M\stackrel{>}{}\text{ }\alpha M_G,$$
(9)
where $`\alpha g^2/(4\pi )`$ is the coupling strength at the energy scale $`M/\sqrt{2}`$. If the above inequality is marginally satisfied, we find $`\alpha =1/44.4`$ and $`M=5\times 10^{16}`$GeV, which is much larger than the upper bound on both the amplitude of quantum fluctuation, $`H/(2\pi )`$, during inflation  and the reheat temperature after inflation . If, on the other hand, we take $`M=M_G`$ so that the cutoff scale of instanton is identical to the presumed field-theory cutoff, we find $`\alpha =1/47.`$

We note that it is not mandatory to assume that the vacuum energy density vanishes at the state $`|\theta =0`$. One may take other vacuum state to normalize the origin of the vacuum energy density. For example, if one assumes that $`\rho _\mathrm{v}`$ vanishes at $`|n`$ or $`|\theta =\pi /2`$, $`P(\rho _\mathrm{v})`$ will be peaked at $`\rho _\mathrm{v}=\pm \rho _\mathrm{d}`$ instead, which we may interpret that we live in a universe with $`\rho _\mathrm{v}\rho _\mathrm{d}`$. Then the values of the model parameters should only be slightly changed accordingly.

In conclusion, we have reached a striking conclusion that the observed tiny dark energy can be realized by the interplay of high energy unified gauge theory and inflationary cosmology. Furthermore by virtue of the exponential dependence of the cosmological constant on the action of the instanton, we can reproduce its observed value without introducing any tiny numbers.