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# Long Term X-ray Variability in GX13+1: Energy Dependent Periodic Modulation

## 1 Introduction

The low mass X-ray binary GX13+1 is a bright persistent source which exhibits X-ray bursts (Fleischman 1985, Matsuba et al. 1995). Counterparts have been identified in the infra-red (Naylor, Charles & Longmore 1991, Garcia et al. 1992) and radio (Grindlay & Seaquist 1986) wavebands. The X-ray and radio fluxes of GX13+1 are not correlated (Garcia et al. 1988). The IR counterpart has been seen to vary on timescales of days to tens of days but no definite orbital period has been found (e.g. Charles & Naylor 1992, Groot et al. 1996, Bandyopadhyay et al. 2002). However Groot et al. (1996) did find maximum power at a period of 12.6 days from observations spanning 18 days. From IR spectroscopy Bandyopadhyay et al. (1999) derive a spectral type of K5III for the mass donating star. This classification implies a mass of 5M (Allen 1973) and so the mass-donor is the primary star.

GX13+1 is usually classified as an “atoll” source but has some characteristics such as the properties of its quasi-periodic oscillations (QPOs) which make it more similar to a “Z” source (Homan et al. 1998 and references therein). Schnerr et al. (2003) find that while GX13+1 follows a track in an X-ray color-color diagram on timescales of hours apparently similar to atoll sources, the count rate and power spectrum change in ways unlike any other atoll or Z source. X-ray observations of GX13+1 with CCD detectors have revealed the presence of a number of features that are attributed to iron (Ueda et al. 2001, Sidoli et al. 2002). These include an emission line near 6.4 keV, an absorption line at 7.0 keV and a deep absorption edge at 8.83 keV. Previously the only other X-ray binaries which had shown such iron absorption lines were the “superluminal” black hole candidates GRO J1655-40 (Ueda et al. 1998, Yamaoka et al. 2001) and GRS 1915+105 (Kotani et al. 2000, Lee et al. 2002).

From one year of observations with the All Sky Monitor (ASM) on board the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer (RXTE) a modulation of the soft (1.3 - 4.8 keV) flux at a period of 24.7 $`\pm `$ 1 day was reported (Corbet 1996; hereafter C96). Subsequent ASM observations, however, apparently failed to find confirmation of this periodic modulation. Bandyopadhyay et al. (2002) examined 5 years worth of ASM data and concluded that while there was evidence for quasi-periodicity on a timescale of 20-30 days this modulation was not consistently present.

Here RXTE ASM light curves of GX13+1, covering just under seven years, are analyzed separated into three energy bands and different methods for dealing with variable data quality are investigated. It is concluded that the X-ray flux does indeed show a persistent modulation at a period of 24 days as initially reported.

## 2 Observations

The RXTE ASM (Levine et al. 1996) consists of three similar Scanning Shadow Cameras, sensitive to X-rays in an energy band of approximately 1.5-12 keV, which perform sets of 90 second pointed observations (“dwells”) so as to cover $``$80% of the sky every $``$90 minutes. Light curves are available in three energy bands: 1.5 to 3.0 keV (“soft”), 3.0 to 5 keV (“medium”), and 5 to 12 keV (“hard”). The Crab produces approximately 75 counts/s in the ASM over the entire energy range. Observations of blank field regions away from the Galactic center indicate that background subtraction may produce a systematic uncertainty of about 0.1 counts/s (Remillard & Levine 1997).

Two standard ASM light curve products are routinely available - one with flux measurements from individual dwells which preserves the 90s time resolution, and one which gives averages of all dwells performed during each day. The ASM light curve of GX13+1 considered here covers approximately 6.7 years (MJD 50094 to 52536). The overall light curve of GX13+1 as obtained with the RXTE ASM is shown in Figure 1. The mean flux for the entire ASM energy range is 23 counts/s and no long term trend is obvious from the full energy-range light curve.

In C96 it was reported that the overall flux level of GX13+1was anti-correlated with the hardness ratio. However, further investigation suggests that the major contribution to this apparent effect is gain changes in two of the three SSCs that comprise the ASM. These instrumental effects cause slow drifts in hardness ratios dependent on source spectrum with only sources with spectra identical to the Crab showing no change (Remillard private communication). A change in the channel definitions used to define the three energy bands also occurred at MJD 51548.625. This can give discontinuous jumps in the count rates in different energy bands again dependent on source spectrum. These two instrumental effects can both be seen in Figure 1. The approximately linear trends in the soft and medium energy bands give exactly the apparent hardness-ratio/intensity correlation reported in C96. The anti-correlation reported in C96 is thus at least primarily an instrumental artifact. In order to remove these trends from the lower energy bands which, in addition to giving apparent hardness ratio changes, result in spurious low-frequency power in a periodogram, the low and medium energy bands were corrected by fitting two linear trends to the light curves before and after MJD 51548 and subtracting these. The high energy light curve does not have an obvious trend and so no correction was needed.

## 3 Analysis and Results

To investigate long term flux variability it is often convenient to use the daily averaged ASM light curves rather than the dwell light curves. The error on these flux measurements can vary significantly due to, for example, the different number of dwells covering a source from day to day. The errors on flux measurements in individual dwells can also vary depending on factors such as the location of the source in each SSC’s field of view, proximity to the position of the Sun, and the number and brightness of other sources in the field of view. When searching for periodic modulation in faint sources, for example, it can thus be advantageous to weight data points contributions to a power spectrum. In weak sources this weighting may reveal periodic modulation not otherwise easily detectable (e.g. Corbet, Finley & Peele 1999, Corbet et al. 1999). However, this procedure is not appropriate if the variations in source flux are significantly larger than typical data point errors. For the full energy range daily averaged light curve of GX13+1 the standard deviation of the data points is 2.8 counts/s and the mean error on measurements is 0.7 counts/s. A simple direct weighting of all data points may thus not be appropriate for an analysis of GX13+1. The light curve does, however, contain some points with exceptionally large error bars because, for example, the points were obtained with only a very small number of dwells or the observations were obtained when the source was at a small angular distance from the Sun. Another simple technique was therefore considered to improve signal to noise in period searches. While the data contributions to the power spectrum are not weighted, some points with errors larger than an arbitrary value are completely excluded from the calculation of the power spectrum. How this arbitrary value is chosen is discussed below.

A further complication in weighting the data points is that the variation in the number of dwells per day is significantly non-random. The number of ASM observations made per day of GX13+1 was investigated and a very strong modulation at a period of 52.6 days was found (Figure 2). This periodicity is also found in the size of the error bars on the daily averaged flux measurements. This 52.6 day periodicity is probably linked to the precession period of RXTE’s orbit. Note that, even if unweighted techniques are used to extract power spectra, if the dwell light curve is used instead of the daily averaged light curve, then a similar weighting will effectively result.

In order to compare these different techniques for searching for periodic signals in the variable quality ASM data the effects of weighting and screening the data were investigated. In Figure 3 power spectra of the light curve of GX13+1 calculated in five different ways are shown. The techniques employed were:
(a) using unweighted daily averages
(b) weighted daily averages
(c) unweighted daily averages with points with large error bars removed
(d) weighted dwell data
(e) unweighted dwell data

It can be seen that the unweighted procedure (a) shows a peak at near 24 days that is stronger compared to the weighted procedure (b). This peak strongly increases in significance when the points with large error bars are excluded (c). The power spectra obtained from the dwell data (d and e) show similar shapes to the weighted power spectrum with the weighted dwell data (d) almost identical to (b).

To obtain the screened unweighted power spectrum (c) data points were removed based on the size of the error bars and the power spectrum calculated. This technique is based on the assumption that the peak exhibited in the unweighted power spectrum arises from a real modulation present in the data and that the parameters of this modulation can best be measured by utilizing a subset of the data which gives the highest overall signal to noise ratio. The filtering procedure was repeated with different data exclusion thresholds until the maximum ratio of signal peak at $``$24 days to average power was obtained. The distribution of error bar sizes in shown in Figure 4 with the optimum screening threshold of an error of 1.4 counts/s marked. The peak of the error bar distribution is at approximately 0.4 cts/s which is considerably less than the mean error of 0.7 cts/s noted above which reflects the contribution of an extended tail on the distribution. It was found that only a relatively small number of points had to be excluded (8.2% of the original 1897 points). These excluded points all come from the extended tail and the “core” of the data is completely included. Thus, the presence of a strong peak at 24 days is unlikely to be an artifact of this screening procedure.

The power spectra of each of the ASM energy bands were next investigated individually. For each band data points were again reiteratively filtered by the size of their error bars to maximize the signal near 24 days. The fraction of data excluded was 22%, 15% and 4.5% for the soft, medium, and hard bands respectively with associated screening thresholds were 0.5, 0.5 and 1.0 counts/s. For comparison the mean and distribution peak of the errors in each band were: 0.4 and 0.19 (soft), 0.35 and 0.17 (medium), and 0.39 and 0.22 (hard). The larger fraction of data excluded for the softer bands might be due to the relatively larger effects of solar contamination at low energies as the soft energy band in particular light curve exhibits very large error bars when the GX13+1 is close to the position of the Sun. However other unknown effects might also be involved. Figure 5 shows the resulting power spectra in terms of relative power. That is, the power spectra are normalized by the mean flux in each energy band and so show relative modulation. Figure 6 shows details of the power spectra near the 24 day period but plotted as absolute modulation.

From Figures 5 and 6 the following conclusions can be drawn: (i) some signal is present in all three energy bands near 24 days. However, significant independent detection of the signal could only be made in the hard (5 to 12 keV) and summed energy bands. (ii) The greatest relative modulation occurs in the soft band (1.5 to 3 keV). There are, however, other peaks in the soft power spectrum of almost comparable size to the signal near 24 days. (iii) The greatest absolute modulation occurs in the hard band (5 to 12 keV).

The periodic modulation in each energy band was quantified by fitting sine waves to the light curves and the results of these fits are given in Table 1. Note that the periods derived from each energy band are all consistent within the errors with the value found from the summed energy band of 24.07 $`\pm `$ 0.02 days. This gives additional confidence that a real period has been detected. This period is also consistent with the value reported in C96 of 24.7 $`\pm `$ 1 days. The phase of maximum flux, however, differs between the soft (1.5 to 3 keV) and medium (3 to 5 keV) energy bands (which are consistent with each other) and the hard (5 to 12 keV) band which trails by 4.8 $`\pm `$ 0.7 days ($`\mathrm{\Delta }\varphi =0.20\pm 0.03`$). This phase difference is also clearly seen directly in the folded light curves (Figure 7). Due, at least in part, to this energy dependent phase difference the folded hardness ratio is also seen to be modulated on the 24 day period. These folded light curves are rather smooth thus justifying the parameterization using sine wave fits.

To investigate the coherency of the modulation the width of the peak in the power spectrum was compared to that of a transform of a sine wave sampled with the same frequency as the actual data. For the peak in the transform of the summed energy bands we find a FWHM of 0.00031 day-1 and the peak in the periodogram of the pure sine wave has a FWHM of 0.00033 day-1. The width of the power spectrum peak is thus fully consistent with coherency.

In order to further investigate the stability of the $``$24 day period we calculated power spectra for each energy band using a sliding box to investigate subsets of the data. Figure 8 shows that while the strength of the modulation is variable all data segments for the hard and summed energy bands show some signal near 24 days. This variability, along with the problem of determining the optimal method to calculate the power spectra, has probably contributed to the previous difficulty in determining the reality and properties of the modulation in GX13+1 (Bandyopadhyay et al. 2002).

### 3.1 Comparison with Other Systems

In order to compare the properties of GX13+1 the RXTE ASM light curves of several other sources were also investigated. These were the “GX atoll” sources (Hasinger & van der Klis 1989) which are not known to be pulsars or transient black hole systems: GX3+1, GX9+1 and GX9+9. In each case power spectra were constructed from the daily averaged light curves both with and without weighting. Some sources showed smooth variations on long timescales caused by intrinsic variability rather than the ASM instrumental effects noted in Section 2. Quadratic fits were therefore subtracted from the lightcurves before the power spectra were calculated. The resulting power spectra are shown in Figure 9. In the weighted power spectra GX3+1 shows prominent peaks at 51.3 and 54.0 days. These are both close to the sampling period of 52.6 days for GX13+1. Thus these peaks may be an artifact. GX9+1 shows no significant peaks in the weighted power spectrum. GX9+9 shows peaks at 51.6 and 54.6 days which are again close to the 52.6 day sampling period for GX13+1.

In the unweighted power spectra the peaks near 52 days disappear for both GX3+1 and GX9+9. For GX9+1 a modest peak appears in the unweighted power spectrum at 59.5 days. However, when the data screening technique was employed for this source, it was found that exclusion of data actually reduced the relative height of the peak. This suggests that this peak in GX9+1 may be spurious. Thus none of the other “GX atoll” sources show the same type of timing properties in the RXTE ASM as GX13+1.

## 4 Discussion

Periodic modulation in X-ray binaries is known to arise from three types of underlying physical processes: neutron star rotation period, binary orbital period, and super-orbital modulation by a less clear physical mechanism (White, Nagase & Parmar 1995). Since neutron star rotation can be excluded because of the length of the period, two likely possibilities remain for GX13+1 of orbital or super-orbital modulation. The modulation found for GX13+1 is unusual with no directly comparable modulation found for other bright low mass X-ray binaries observed with the RXTE ASM.

Modulation of X-ray flux from low-mass X-ray binaries on the orbital period is only seen for high inclination systems. In only a few cases (e.g. EXO 0748-676, Wolff et al. 2002 and references therein) are eclipses seen in bright sources as the mass-donating star occults the central X-ray source. X-ray dipping is seen for a number of sources with moderate inclination. These dips are caused by vertical structure in the accretion disk and are tied to the orbital period but are irregular in their morphology and phasing. Spectral changes are typically seen during the dips with the spectrum becoming harder. For still lower inclination systems X-ray modulation on the orbital period typically cannot be seen but optical modulation may be observed (e.g. van Paradijs & McClintock 1995) as varying aspects of the X-ray heated mass-donating star are observed. In all cases modulation on the orbital period should be intrinsically coherent as it is locked to the orbital period, but deviations from strict periodicity can arise due to, for example, changes in the phase at which dipping occurs.

Super-orbital modulation has been seen in several systems with the strongest effects demonstrated by the high mass systems SMC X-1 and LMC X-4 and the intermediate mass system Her X-1 (e.g. Ogilvie & Dubus 2001). For low mass systems periodic super-orbital modulation appears to be rare and the best evidence for such modulation may come from X1820-30 which has a 172 day period (e.g. Chou & Grindlay 2001 and references therein). Since super-orbital modulation is likely not tied to an underlying good clock such as orbital modulation, but may instead be caused by a mechanism such as accretion disk precession forced by radiation pressure (e.g. Ogilvie & Dubus 2001 and references therein), modulation may have low coherence. In Cyg X-2, which initially appeared to show a “clean” 78 day super-orbital periodicity (Wijnands, Kuulkers, & Smale 1996), the modulation was later found to be more complex with the excursion times between X-ray minima characterized as a series of integer multiples of the 9.8 binary orbital period (Boyd & Smale 2001).

If the modulation that is observed in GX13+1 is orbital in origin then a requirement is that the mass-donating star must not overfill the predicted Roche lobe size. Bandyopadhyay et al. (1999) find that a mass donor of spectral type K5III, as found from their IR spectroscopy, would fill the Roche lobe if the orbital period is about 25 days. If this spectral type is correct then it implies that the modulation observed would have to be orbital in nature.

The folded light curves (Figure 7) show a smooth modulation over the entire 24 day period. This indicates that the flux is being affected at all phases rather than the periodicity being caused by, for example, a sharp eclipse or dips restricted to a limited phase range. Although Accretion Disk Corona (ADC) sources, where the central X-ray source is not observed directly, can exhibit rather broad modulation the ADC sources have low X-ray luminosities and so are unlike GX13+1 which is estimated to have a luminosity of 4 $``$ 6 $`\times `$ 1037 (d/7 kpc)2 ergs s-1 (1 - 20 keV, Matsuba et al. 1995).

The mechanism for the periodic modulation in GX13+1 is unclear. However, the “cleaner” modulation observed in the hard ASM energy band may be related to the unusual high energy features reported by Ueda et al. (2001) and Sidoli et al. (2002). The periodic modulation might be caused by material located in different parts of the binary system, such as different parts of accretion disk structure, at different energies. Note that Smith, Heindl, & Swank (2002) find from monitoring observations with the RXTE Proportional Counter Array orbital periods of 12.7 and 18.5 days for the black hole candidates 1E 1740.7-2942 and GRS 1758-258. Thus the presence of a long orbital period for GX13+1 may be another common factor, along with the iron spectral features, between GX13+1 and some black hole systems.

It is noted that Schnerr et al. (2003) interpret their unusual timing and spectral results for GX13+1 as showing the presence of an additional source of hard variable emission. This component could plausibly be identified with the periodic component of the flux that is seen most clearly in the hard band with the RXTE ASM. Schnerr et al. (2003) propose that this hard component might come from a jet and that variability could be caused by precession of the jet or to variations in jet activity itself. However, the periodicity seen in the hard component suggests that precession is unlikely to drive this variability. However, variable occultation of part of the jet by, for example, structure in the accretion disk could account for the variability if the system inclination is sufficiently high.

It may be that a portion of the hard flux does originate in a physically separate region of the system such as a jet, while softer emission comes from the inner accretion disk and/or the surface of the neutron star. If so, this could account for the different timing properties of GX13+1 found at different energies.

## 5 Conclusion

The X-ray light curve of GX13+1 shows strong evidence for the presence of a periodicity near 24 days with modulation properties that are energy dependent. The most likely origin for this is some type of orbital modulation if the mass donor is a Roche-lobe filling K5III star.

Because of the unusual nature of this modulation and the somewhat non-standard technique used to maximize the signal in the ASM data it would be desirable to confirm the 24 day period through other observations and determine whether the modulation is present at other wavelengths. Unfortunately no other high-quality long term observations appear to exist. Although GX13+1 was observed by the all-sky monitors on both Ariel V and Vela 5 the sensitivity of these experiments was significantly less than that of the RXTE ASM. The Ginga all-sky monitor, which was more sensitive than the Ariel V and Vela 5 instruments, did not include GX13+1 in the objects for which light curves were produced (S. Kitamoto, private communication). Infra-red light curves have been obtained by several groups (Charles & Naylor 1992, Groot et al. 1996, Wachter 1996, Bandyopadhyay et al. 2002). While these show modulations on timescales of tens of days, which could be consistent with a 24 day period, the observations do not cover sufficient durations to demonstrate whether the 24 day period is also exhibited in the infra-red.

The best prospect for confirmation of the 24 day period may come from further RXTE observations. If the RXTE ASM continues to operate for at least a few more years then the additional observations obtained will form a statistically independent data set that can be investigated for the presence of the 24 day period.

Additional constraints on models that could account for the periodic modulation may come from an investigation of whether the high energy spectral features also vary on the 24 day period. Extended IR observations would be valuable as they may show whether the 24 day period exists at these wavelengths and so constrain the system inclination.

I thank R.A. Remillard for useful comments on the properties of the RXTE ASM and S. Kitamoto for information on the Ginga ASM.

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# Optical Flash of GRB 990123: constraints on the physical parameter of the reverse shock

## 1 Introduction

BeppoSAX ushered in 1999 with the discovery of a super-bright $`\gamma `$-ray burst, GRB 990123. This GRB was intensively studied by many groups world wide. At that time this burst was notable for the richness of new results: the discovery of prompt optical emission by ROTSE (Akerlof et al. 1999), the discovery of the brightest optical afterglow and its redshift $`z=1.6004`$ leads to a huge energy release of $`1.6\times 10^{54}`$ergs in $`\gamma `$rays alone (Briggs et al. 1999; Kulkarni et al. 1999a), and a break in the optical afterglow light curve (Fruchter et al. 1999; Castro-Tirado et al. 1999), and the radio flare (Kulkarni et al. 1999b). In the past three years, all of these phenomena have been discussed in great detail. For instance, the steepening of the $`r`$-band light curve from about $`t^{1.1}`$ to $`t^{1.8}`$ after two days might be due to a jet which has transited from a spherical-like phase to sideways expansion phase (Rhoads 1999; Sari, Piran $`\&`$ Halphern 1999; Huang et al 2000 a, b, c, d; Wei $`\&`$ Lu 2000). The steeping might also be due to a dense medium which has slowed down the shock quickly to a non-relativistic one (Dai $`\&`$ Lu 1999).

The most natural explanation for the strong optical emission accompanying GRB 990123 is the synchrotron emission from a reverse shock propagating into the fireball ejecta after it interacts with the surrounding gas (Sari $`\&`$ Piran 1999; Mészáros $`\&`$ Rees 1999). Under this framework, the light curve of GRB optical flash in a homogenous medium or in a stellar wind and its corresponding Synchrotron self-Compton emission have been discussed in great detail (Kobayashi 2001; Wang, Dai $`\&`$ Lu 2001 a, b; Wu et al. 2002; Fan et al. 2002). Several authors attempted to constrain the intrinsic parameters, such as the Lorentz factor of the shocked fireball ejecta relative to the unshocked fireball ejecta ($`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{rs}`$)(Wang, Dai $`\&`$ Lu 2000; Sari $`\&`$ Piran 1999). It should be noted, however, that these estimates were made before accurate burst parameters for GRB 990123 were known, and consequently they include approximations and parameters from other GRB afterglows. Recently, by fitting the multi-frequency afterglow light curves, physical parameters for eight GRBs, including GRB 990123 have been reported (Panaitescu $`\&`$ Kumar 2001, hereafter PK01). This fitting has provided us the possibility to study this unique event more quantitatively. With these parameters Soderberg $`\&`$ Ramirez-Ruiz (2002, hereafter SR02) have estimated the prompt reverse shock emission to be expected for these eight bursts.

After a careful calculation with the parameters for GRB 990123 (we assume these parameters in the optical flash are the same as those in the late afterglow), in section 2 we find the shell is thick and we provide the adjusted light curve for the thick shell case which coincides with the observation. In section 3, we find the theoretical peak flux of the optical flash accounts for only $`3\times 10^4`$ of the observed, if it is the reverse shock which accounts for the optical flash. In order to compensate this great divergency, the physical parameters of the electron energy ratio and magnetic field energy ratio $`ϵ_e`$, $`ϵ_B`$ in the optical flash phase should be much different from those in the late afterglow phase. In the final section we make some discussions and give our conclusions.

## 2 Light curves of the reverse shock emission for the thick shell case

By fitting multi-frequency afterglow light curves, physical parameters for 8 GRBs have been reported in PK01. Best fitted parameters for GRB 990123 are: initial jet energy in afterglow phase $`E_{j,50}=1.5_{0.4}^{+3.3}`$ , initial opening angle $`\theta _0=2.1_{0.9}^{+0.1}\mathrm{deg}`$, environment number density $`n_{0,3}=1.9_{1.5}^{+0.5}`$, $`ϵ_{e,2}=13_4^{+1}`$, $`ϵ_{B,4}=7.4_{5.9}^{+23}`$, and the electron distribution power-law index $`p=2.28_{0.03}^{+0.05}`$.

The thin shell deceleration time, $`t_\gamma `$ can be estimated by $`t_\gamma 3E_{52}^{1/3}n_{0,5}^{1/3}\eta _{300}^{8/3}`$ (Kobayashi 2000), where the parameters are scaled as $`E_{52}=E/10^{52}`$, $`n_{0,5}=n_0/5cm^3`$, $`\eta _{300}=\eta /300`$, $`\eta `$ is the initial Lorentz factor of the fireball at the end of the Gamma-ray burst, here we take its best estimated value $`\eta =900`$ (SR02), $`E`$ is the isotropic energy of the fireball in afterglow. With these parameters mentioned above we have $`t_\gamma 8\mathrm{s}<\mathrm{\Delta }/\mathrm{c}20\mathrm{s}`$, where $``$ is the shell width. Therefore the shell is thick but not thin. In fact if the shell is thin, the reverse shock will be in sub-relativistic. However it is generally suggested that $`\eta 900`$ to $`1200`$ (Wang, Dai $`\&`$ Lu 2000; SR02), and at the reverse shock crossing time $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$, the Lorentz factor of the fireball $`300`$ (PK01), i.e. $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{rs}5/3`$ to $`2`$ which is mid-relativistic, so the shell should be thick. This conclusion coincides with the result of Wang, Dai $`\&`$ Lu (2000). Some authors argued that if the shell was thick, the theoretic light curve would be much different from what one observed (Sari $`\&`$ Piran 1999; Kobayashi 2000; SR02). Below we investigate that problem.

In the thick shell case, the reverse shock crosses the shell at $`T\mathrm{\Delta }/c`$. At the reverse shock crossing time $`T`$ the break frequency $`\nu _m`$ and the peak flux are

$$\nu _m=10^{13}(\frac{p2}{p1})^2(\frac{ϵ_e}{0.1})^2(\frac{ϵ_B}{10^3})^{1/2}(\frac{n}{10^2})^{1/2}(\frac{\mathrm{\Gamma }_A}{300})^2(\mathrm{\Gamma }_{rs}1)^2\frac{1}{(1+z)}\mathrm{Hz},$$
(1)
$$F_{\nu m}=1.2\times 10^2(\frac{D}{10^{28}})^2\frac{N_e}{10^{52}}(\frac{\mathrm{\Gamma }_A}{300})^2(\frac{n}{10^2})^{1/2}(\frac{ϵ_B}{10^3})^{1/2}(1+z)\mathrm{Jy},$$
(2)
where the relations $`\gamma _m=(p2)/(p1)(m_p/m_e)ϵ_e(\mathrm{\Gamma }_{rs}1)`$ for $`p>2`$, $`F_{\nu m}=\frac{N_e\mathrm{\Gamma }_AP_{\nu m}(1+z)}{4\pi D^2}`$, $`P_{\nu m}=\varphi _p\frac{\sqrt{3}e^3B}{m_ec^2}`$ and $`B=3.9\times 10^2n_1^{1/2}(ϵ_B/10^2)^{1/2}\mathrm{\Gamma }_A`$ have been used, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_A`$ is the Lorentz factor of the shocked shell, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{rs}`$ is approximated by $`(\mathrm{\Gamma }_A/\eta +\eta /\mathrm{\Gamma }_A)/2`$ for $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_A`$, $`\eta 1`$, $`N_e`$ is the total number of electrons in the shell, $`D`$ is the luminosity distance (we assume $`H_0=65\mathrm{k}\mathrm{m}`$ $`\mathrm{s}^1`$ $`\mathrm{Mpc}^1`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.3`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{}=0.7`$), $`z`$ is the redshift of the burst, $`\varphi _p`$ is a function of $`p`$, whose value is $`0.6`$ for $`p2.28`$ (Wijers $`\&`$ Galama 1999).

The scalings before and after $`T`$ in the homogenous medium case have been discussed by Kobayashi (2000). A difference between Kobayashi’s and our scalings is: at early times the reverse shock is Newtonian (Kobayashi assumed it was relativistic), so $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{rs}1\mathrm{\Gamma }_A^2f^1`$, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_A\eta `$ (Sari $`\&`$ Piran 1995). In the thick shell case: the spreading is not important, then $`f\frac{n_4}{n_1}R^2`$. Noting $`R2\mathrm{\Gamma }_A^2tc`$, we have $`ft^2`$, i.e. $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{rs}1t^2`$. Substituting this relation into equation (1) we obtain $`\nu _mt^4`$. Noting $`N_e(t)t`$ (Kobayashi 2000) and substituting this relation into equation (2), we have $`F_{\nu m}t`$. For $`\nu _m<\nu <\nu _c`$ we have $`F_\nu t^{2(p1)}F_{\nu m}t^{2p1}`$.

For $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{rs}1`$, $`(\mathrm{\Gamma }_{rs}1)^2\mathrm{\Gamma }_A^2\eta ^2/4`$, equation (1) reduces to $`\nu _m\mathrm{constant}`$, as the case suggested by Kobayashi (2000). Combining Kobayashi’s results and ours we get the flux at a given frequency $`\nu `$, for $`\nu _m<\nu <\nu _c`$

$$F_\nu (t<T)\{\begin{array}{ccc}t^{2p1},\hfill & \mathrm{for}\mathrm{\Gamma }_{rs}11,\hfill & \\ t^{1/2},\hfill & \mathrm{for}\mathrm{\Gamma }_{rs}11,\hfill & \end{array}$$
(3)
$$F_\nu (t>T)t^{(73p+21)/96}.$$
(4)
The observed optical light curve of GRB 990123 at early times shows a fast rise and a slower decay, whose power-law indices are 3.3 and -2.0 respectively. On the other hand, for $`p=2.28`$ we have $`2p1=3.56`$ and $`(73p+21)/96=1.95`$, then we expect that the light curve rises faster at early times (for a power-law index 3.56) then slowly (for a power-law index 0.5) before it reaches its peak. Unfortunately, the lack of data for the optical flash prevents us to check it more quantitatively. By now we have successfully explained the fast rise of $`t^{3.3}`$ and slow decay of $`t^{2.0}`$ in the thick shell case.

## 3 The expected peak flux of the optical flash

With the best fit parameters of GRB 990123 afterglow for a homogeneous medium with $`90\%`$ confidence level, we have (see in PK01 ): $`M_{jet}0.28\times 10^6M_{}`$, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_0300`$. Correspondingly, $`N_e`$ and $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_A`$ in equation (2) are $`N_e5\times 10^{53}`$, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_A300`$ respectively. The synchrotron spectrum for $`\nu _m<\nu _{obs}<\nu _c`$ is given by

$$F_{obs}=F_{\nu m}(\nu _{obs}/\nu _m)^{\frac{(p1)}{2}}.$$
(5)
Substituting equations (1) and (2) into equation (5) we have

$$F_{obs,peak}=0.012\times [0.14(\frac{p2}{p1})(\frac{ϵ_e}{0.1})(\mathrm{\Gamma }_{rs}1)]^{p1}[(\frac{ϵ_B}{10^3})(\frac{n}{10^2})]^{\frac{p+1}{4}}(\frac{D}{10^{28}})^2\frac{N_e}{10^{52}}(1+z)^{\frac{3p}{2}}(\frac{\mathrm{\Gamma }_A}{300})^{p+1}\mathrm{Jy}.$$
(6)
When $`\nu _{obs}=5\times 10^{14}\mathrm{Hz}`$, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{rs}11`$ and other best fitted parameters of GRB 990123 have been taken into calculation, we have $`F_{obs,peak}=3\times 10^4`$Jy, which is much less than what we observed, $`F_{peak}1`$Jy (Akerlof et al. 1999).

One may argue that if the optical flash was born in a dense envelope, for instance $`n40\mathrm{c}\mathrm{m}^3`$, the divergency will disappear. However, there is no more evidence for that. Another way is to assume that the physical parameters in the optical flash are different from those in the late afterglow, for example $`ϵ_e0.61`$, $`ϵ_B0.39`$ ($`n`$ is the same as that in afterglow phase ) can compensate this discrepancy safely. But this means in different phases (the GRB, very early afterglow and the late afterglow) the physical parameters may be much different. In fact, as early as in 2000, it has been proposed that the high energy spectral power-law indices ($`\beta `$) for GRBs 970508, 990123, 990510, 991216 are -1.88, -2.30, -2.49, -2.00 respectively (Fenimore $`\&`$ Ramirez-Ruiz 2000), i.e., corresponding $`p`$ in the GRB phase are 1.76, 2.60, 2.98, 2.00 respectively. However the best fitted $`p`$ in the afterglow phase are 2.18, 2.28, 1.83, 1.36 respectively for these four GRBs (PK01). Obviously they are quite different.

Dai $`\&`$ Lu (1999) have proposed the dense medium model to explain the afterglow decay of GRB 990123. The parameters derived from that model are $`ϵ_e0.1`$, $`ϵ_{B,6}0.02`$, $`n3\times 10^6`$. In this case, if we set $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_A300`$, $`N_e=E_{iso,\gamma }/\mathrm{\Gamma }_0m_pc^2`$, $`p=2.3`$, we have $`F_{obs,peak}1\mathrm{J}\mathrm{y}`$. However, according to the jump conditions of the shock, the Lorentz factor of the shocked shell should approximately equal to that of shocked ISM. The Lorentz factor of the forward shocked ISM could be obtained from the standard afterglow model (e.g. Sari, Piran $`\&`$ Narayan 1998): $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{A,fs}(t)6(\frac{E_{52}}{n})^{1/8}(\frac{t_d}{(1+z)})^{3/8}`$. For $`E_{52}22`$ and $`n3\times 10^6`$, we have $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{A,rs}(50s)=\mathrm{\Gamma }_{A,fs}(50s)32`$, which is much below 300. From equation (6), such small $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{A,rs}`$ will lead to a much smaller $`F_{obs,peak}`$ than the observed. This negative result favors our opinion that these parameters for later forward and early reverse shocks are different, at least in the case of GRB 990123.

## 4 Summary and discussion

With the parameters for GRB 990123 provided in PK01, we have shown that the shell is thick but not thin. The adjusted light curve for the thick shell case can account for the observed light curve of the optical flash of GRB 990123. However the expected peak emission flux is much less than the observed. The parameters derived from the dense medium model by Dai $`\&`$ Lu (1999) have been considered, too, but the expected peak emission is still much less than observation. If the optical flash was really produced by the reverse shock, the parameters $`ϵ_B`$, $`ϵ_e`$, even $`p`$ in optical flash should be much different from that in the late afterglow. Unfortunately there is no enough data for us to study it more quantitatively. New observations are needed to provide us a chance to understand optical flashes in more detail.

With eight GRBs’ parameters, SR02 have estimated the reverse shock peak emission for seven bursts—for reasonable assumptions about the velocity of the source expansion, a strong optical flash $`m_V9`$ was expected from the reverse shock, then the best observational prospects for detecting these prompt flashes are high-lightened. It is easy to see that equation (6) in this note provides similar results. For instance: for GRB 000926, we have $`F_{obs,peak}0.2(\mathrm{\Gamma }_{rs}1)^{p1}\mathrm{Jy}`$. Surprisingly, although many researchers have tried their best, there is no more optical flashes that have been observed (Akerlof et al. 2001; Kehoe et al. 2001). SR02 suggested that the dust obscuration seemed to be the most likely reason for non-detection. However, considered the discrepancy between the observed peak flux and the theoretically expected value, the reverse shock emission might be insignificant, more reliable model to explain that ”unique” observation is needed.

We would like to thank D. M. Wei , X .Y. Wang, X. F. Wu and Z. Li for valuable discussion. This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, the National 973 project (NKBRSF G19990754), the Special Funds for Major State Basic Research Projects, and the Foundation for the Author of National Excellent Doctoral Dissertation of P. R. China (Project No: 200125).


text:
# Mid-rapidity ϕ meson production at √𝑠_{𝑁𝑁} = 200 GeV Au+Au and pp collisions from STAR

## 1 Introduction

Strangeness production in Relativistic Heavy Ion Collisions may provide detailed information on the collision dynamics . The enhanced production of strangeness in nucleus-nucleus collisions is predicted to be a signature that the collisions go through a deconfined stage - namely the quark gluon plasma (QGP) . The $`s\overline{s}`$ quark content for the $`\varphi `$ meson is of particular interest: The production of $`\varphi `$ meson may be sensitive to strangeness enhancement . The possible mass and decay width modification of $`\varphi `$ meson due to the expected partial chiral symetry restoration and in medium effect in the hot and dense matter has been a topic of both theoretical and experimental investigations . The $`\varphi `$ meson may retain the information from the early partonic stage of the collisions since it is expected that $`\varphi `$ meson interacts weakly with nonstrange hadrons during the hadronic stage . Finally, the comparison of the production of $`\varphi `$ meson in Au+Au and pp collisions at the same beam energy may yield knowledge on the production mechanisms of $`\varphi `$ meson and the evolution dynamics of the colliding system.

## 2 Experiment and Data Analysis

The results on $`\varphi `$ meson production at $`\sqrt{s_{NN}}`$ = 130 GeV from the STAR detector have been reported . The data presented here was taken by the STAR detector  during the second run of RHIC collider in the year 2001. The main components of the STAR detector used in this analysis are a large acceptance Time Projection Chamber (TPC) , a Central Trigger Barrel (CTB) and two Zero Degree Calorimeters. The TPC is placed in an uniform magnetic field as the tracking device for charged particles. The CTB and ZDC are used for triggering. In this analysis about 2.1M events from minimum bias trigger data and 0.5M events from central trigger data in Au+Au collisions and 4M events from minimum bias trigger data in pp collisions are used after all event selection cuts .

The particle identification is achieved by correlating the measured energy loss ($`dE/dx`$) of the particle in the TPC gas with its momentum. In this analysis, a track is selected as a kaon candidate as long as its $`dE/dx`$ is within $`2\sigma `$ of the kaon Bethe-Bloch curve. Due to limited resolusion of the detector, the pion and kaon dE/dx bands merge at momentum greater than 0.7 GeV, resulting in the pion contamination in the kaon candidates. The centrality in Au+Au collisions is defined by the fraction of the total inelastic hadronic cross-section, i.e. by dividing the raw charged hadron multiplicity distribution into centrality classes. For the $`\varphi `$ analysis, the centrality division for the Au+Au collisions is: top 5% from central trigger data and top 10%, 10-30%, 30-50%, 50-80% from minimum bias trigger data.

The $`\varphi `$ signal is built by calculating the invariant mass of every selected $`K^+`$$`K^{}`$ pair. The shape of the combinatorial background is calculated by event mixing technique . For the Au+Au data analysis, each event is mixed with another event in the same centrality class, while each event is mixed with four other events in the pp data analysis in order to get a better description of the background with higher statistics.

## 3 Results

The background subtracted $`K^+`$$`K^{}`$ pair invariant mass distribution averaged over 0.4 GeV/c $`p_T`$ 3.9 GeV/c is shown in fig. 1. The $`\varphi `$ peak is fit to a Breit-Wigner function plus a linear function representing the background in each $`p_T`$ bin. The measured mass for the $`\varphi `$ meson in both Au+Au and pp collisions is $`1019\pm 0.7`$ MeV/$`c^2`$, which is consistent with the $`\varphi `$ meson mass from the Particle Data Group . The measured width is also consistent with the $`\varphi `$ natural width convoluted with the resolution of the STAR detector. The residual background at mass region greater than 1.06 GeV/$`c^2`$ mainly comes from $`K_s^0`$ decay products when pions are misidentified as kaons. A small fraction of it may also come from $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ decays where both of its decay daughters are misidentified as kaons.

In order to obtain the resonance yield, detector acceptance and efficiency corrections were applied to the uncorrected number of $`\varphi `$ for each centrality and $`p_T`$ bin. The acceptance and efficiency corrections were done by embedding simulated kaons from $`\varphi `$ decays into real events using GEANT, and by passing them through the full reconstruction chain . The corrected $`\varphi `$ invariant multiplicity distributions at mid-rapidity ($`|y|<`$ 0.5) as a function of $`m_Tm_\varphi `$ are depicted in Fig. 2, where $`m_\varphi `$ = 1019.4 MeV/c2 is the average $`\varphi `$ mass reported in . The transverse momentum coverage for this measurement is 0.4 $`p_T`$ 3.9 GeV/$`c`$, which corresponds to 85$`\%`$ of the $`\varphi `$ yield at mid-rapidity. In Au+Au collisions, the spectra are fitted by an exponential function in $`m_Tm_\varphi `$ for all centrality bins. In pp collisions, the spectrum is better represented by a power law function in $`p_T`$. Thus the spectra shape changes from pp to Au+Au collisions. In Au+Au collisions, the inverse slopes extracted from the exponential function fit to the spectra do not depend strongly on the collision centrality.

The $`\varphi `$ yield ($`dN/dy`$) obtained from the fit to the spectra in Au+Au collisions as a function of the number of charged particles is shown in Fig. 3. The number of charged particles corresponds to the acceptance and tracking efficiency corrected charged particle multiplicity within $`|\eta |<`$ 0.5, where $`\eta `$ is the pseudorapidity. The measured $`\varphi `$ yield scales linearly with the number of charged particles produced in Au+Au collisions.

The $`\varphi `$ $`<p_T>`$ calculated from the fits to the spectra as a function of the number of charged particles is depicted in Fig. 4, where the solid triangle and the solid circles sketch the measurements in pp and Au+Au collisions, respectively. In this figure, the $`<p_T>`$ of $`\pi ^{}`$, K- and $`\overline{p}`$ from  are also plotted, where the open triangles represent the $`<p_T>`$ obtained in pp interactions and the open circles correspond to the $`<p_T>`$ measured in Au+Au collisions for different centralities. The $`<p_T>`$ of $`\pi ^{}`$, K- and $`\overline{p}`$ increases from peripheral to central collisions and from lighter to heavier particles. The $`\pi ^{}`$ $`<p_T>`$ increase from pp and most peripheral Au+Au collisions to the most central Au+Au collisions is about 10$`\%`$. In the case of K- and $`\overline{p}`$, the increase is about 25$`\%`$ and 60$`\%`$, respectively. This behavior is expected from collective flow with hadronic rescattering. The $`\varphi `$ meson has a very different behavior: Its $`<p_T>`$ increases from pp collisions to Au+Au collisions. However, there is little increase from peripherial Au+Au to central Au+Au collisions although its mass is even higher than that of $`\overline{p}`$. Some hadronic hydrodynamic calculations  predict collective flow expansion in proportion to particle mass, such as those exhibited by $`\pi ^{}`$, $`K^{}`$ and $`\overline{p}`$. The centrality dependence of $`<p_T>`$ for the $`\varphi `$ meson shows a distintive difference from that for the $`\pi ^{}`$, $`K^{}`$ and $`\overline{p}`$. This may indicate that the evolution dynamics of the $`\varphi `$ meson is less sensitive to hadronic rescattering.

## 4 Conclusions

We have presented rusults on $`\varphi `$ meson production at mid-rapidity in Au+Au and pp collisions at $`\sqrt{s_{NN}}`$ = 200 GeV. The spectrum in pp collisions is significantly different from that in Au+Au collisions. The spectra in Au+Au collisions weakly depend on the collision centralities. The extracted $`\varphi `$ yield is a linear function of the number of charged particles produced in the collision. The weak dependence of $`\varphi `$ $`<p_T>`$ on the centralities in Au+Au collisions is consistent with the expectation that $`\varphi `$ does not interact strongly with nonstrange hadronic matter.

## Note(s)

* E-mail: jgma@physics.ucla.edu


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# Measurement of Decay Parameters for Ξ⁻→Λ𝜋⁻ Decay

## Abstract

Based on 1.35 million polarized $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ events, we measure the parameter $`\varphi _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ to be $`1.61^{}\pm 2.66^{}\pm 0.37^{}`$ for the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}\mathrm{\Lambda }\pi ^{}`$ decay. New results for the parameters $`\beta _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ and $`\gamma _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ are also presented. Assuming that the CP-violating phase-shift difference is negligible, we deduce the strong phase-shift difference between the P-wave and S-wave amplitudes of the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }\pi `$ final state to be $`3.17^{}\pm 5.28^{}\pm 0.73^{}`$. This strong phase-shift difference reduces the theoretical uncertainty in estimating the level of CP violation in $`\mathrm{\Xi }`$-hyperon decay.

preprint: LBL-1034, IIT-HEP-03/1

Breakdown of $`CP`$ invariance is well known in the weak decays of the neutral $`K`$ meson  and has been recently established for the $`B`$ meson as well . A deeper understanding of this effect, which is evidence of a subtle difference between the dynamics of particles and antiparticles, is one of the central issues of current-day particle physics. Complementary to $`CP`$ violation in the mesons is a similar effect in the nonleptonic hyperon decays. This has been the subject of theoretical discussion  and ongoing experimental searches . Current models generally predict the breakdown of $`CP`$ symmetry in strange-baryon decays due to the different dynamics in the decay of a hyperon and its antiparticle. In general, observing such a $`CP`$-odd effect requires a strong phase-shift difference, which is the subject of this paper.

For the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}\mathrm{\Lambda }\pi ^{}`$ decay, the orbital angular momentum of the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }\pi ^{}`$ must be either $`L`$ = 0 (S-wave) or $`L`$ = 1 (P-wave) . We write the S- and P-wave amplitudes as :

$`S=|S|\mathrm{exp}[i(\delta _S+\eta _S)],P=|P|\mathrm{exp}[i(\delta _P+\eta _P)],`$ (1)
where $`\delta _S`$, $`\delta _P`$ are the strong rescattering phases and $`\eta _S`$, $`\eta _P`$ are weak $`CP`$-violating phases. The $`CP`$ asymmetry of the $`\mathrm{\Xi }`$ decay ,

$`A_\mathrm{\Xi }={\displaystyle \frac{\alpha _\mathrm{\Xi }+\alpha _{\overline{\mathrm{\Xi }}}}{\alpha _\mathrm{\Xi }\alpha _{\overline{\mathrm{\Xi }}}}},`$ (2)
with $`\alpha _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ ($`\alpha _{\overline{\mathrm{\Xi }}}`$) being a Lee-Yang parameter of the hyperon (antihyperon) decay , is given by:

$`A_\mathrm{\Xi }\mathrm{tan}(D)\mathrm{sin}(d_{CP}),`$ (3)
where $`D=\delta _P\delta _S`$ and $`d_{CP}=\eta _P\eta _S`$ are phase-shift differences. Theoretical estimates of $`D`$ vary between $`3^{}`$ and $`16^{}`$ . The model-dependent $`CP`$-violating phase shifts are generally estimated to be a couple of orders of magnitude smaller than the strong phase shifts . $`D`$ can thus be deduced from the decay parameter $`\beta _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ expressed as

$`\beta _\mathrm{\Xi }=\alpha _\mathrm{\Xi }\mathrm{tan}(D+d_{CP})\alpha _\mathrm{\Xi }\mathrm{tan}(D).`$ (4)
The parameter $`\beta _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ is conveniently determined in terms of a phase $`\varphi _\mathrm{\Xi }=\mathrm{tan}^1(\beta _\mathrm{\Xi }/\gamma _\mathrm{\Xi })`$, where $`\gamma _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ is another decay parameter of the decay such that $`\alpha _\mathrm{\Xi }^2+\beta _\mathrm{\Xi }^2+\gamma _\mathrm{\Xi }^2`$ = 1. The world average is $`\varphi _\mathrm{\Xi }=4^{}\pm 4^{}`$, taken over several measurements with the largest sample using 20,865 events . In this Letter we report a new measurement of $`\varphi _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ from a data set of 1.35 million polarized $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}\mathrm{\Lambda }\pi ^{}`$ decays.

Our data come from Experiment 756 at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory . Polarized $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ hyperons with transverse momenta $`p_T`$ spanning 0.5 to 1.5 GeV/$`c`$ and momentum fraction $`x_F`$ from 0.3 to 0.7 were produced by the collision of unpolarized 800-GeV/$`c`$ protons incident upon a beryllium target at an angle with respect to the vertical axis. The secondary beam was momentum- and sign-selected by a curved collimator inside a dipole magnet. The current in the magnet was set to yield a field integral $`B𝑑l`$ of $`15.30\pm 0.15`$ T-m, as measured with a Hall probe, during collection of the data used in the present analysis.

The momenta of the proton and the pions from the decay sequence $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}\mathrm{\Lambda }\pi ^{},\mathrm{\Lambda }p\pi ^{}`$ were measured with eight planes of silicon strip detectors, nine multiwire proportional chambers, and two dipole analyzing magnets that deflected charged particles in the horizontal plane. The polarity of these magnets could be reversed by switching the direction of the applied current. The $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$triggers and veto scintillation counters have been described in . Data were taken for two sets of production angles averaging $`+2.4`$ and $`2.4`$ mrad, respectively, and the analyzing magnet currents were set to $`\pm `$2500A. The $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ polarization and magnetic moment from these data have been reported .

The events were analyzed off-line using a reconstruction program that determined tracks and kinematic variables from the chamber hits. Events were required to satisfy the three-track, two-vertex topology corresponding to a $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ decay-sequence hypothesis. The geometric $`\chi ^2`$ for the topological fit was required to be less than 100 for a mean of 30 degrees of freedom. The proton and pion from $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ decay were required to have a $`p\pi `$ invariant mass within 3.5 standard deviations (8 MeV/$`c^2`$) of the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$-decay peak at 1.116 GeV/$`c^2`$, and the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }\pi `$ invariant mass was required to be within 5 standard deviations (14 MeV/$`c^2`$) of the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$-decay peak at 1.321 GeV/$`c^2`$. The momenta of the reconstructed $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ candidates were required to be between 240 and 450 GeV/$`c`$. The $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ momentum was required to trace back to within 0.63 cm of the center of the beryllium target. The $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$-decay vertex was required to be downstream of the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$-decay vertex, and both vertices were required to be in a fiducial region 0.25 m downstream of the collimator exit and 0.31 m upstream of the multiplicity counter located at 23.31 m from the collimator exit.

The decay parameters are related to the experimental observables through the polarization and angular distribution of the daughter baryon. For $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}\mathrm{\Lambda }\pi ^{}`$, we have :

$`\stackrel{}{P}_\mathrm{\Lambda }={\displaystyle \frac{(\alpha _\mathrm{\Xi }+\stackrel{}{P}_\mathrm{\Xi }\widehat{\mathrm{\Lambda }})\widehat{\mathrm{\Lambda }}+\beta _\mathrm{\Xi }(\stackrel{}{P}_\mathrm{\Xi }\times \widehat{\mathrm{\Lambda }})+\gamma _\mathrm{\Xi }\widehat{\mathrm{\Lambda }}\times (\stackrel{}{P}_\mathrm{\Xi }\times \widehat{\mathrm{\Lambda }})}{1+\alpha _\mathrm{\Xi }\stackrel{}{P}_\mathrm{\Xi }\widehat{\mathrm{\Lambda }}}},`$ (5)
where $`\stackrel{}{P}_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is the polarization of the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hyperon in its rest frame, $`\widehat{\mathrm{\Lambda }}`$ is the momentum direction of the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ in the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$rest frame, and $`\stackrel{}{P}_\mathrm{\Xi }`$ is the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$polarization in the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$frame. The helicity-frame axes, specified event-by-event in the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$rest frame, are defined as

$`\widehat{X}={\displaystyle \frac{\stackrel{}{P}_\mathrm{\Xi }\times \widehat{\mathrm{\Lambda }}}{|\stackrel{}{P}_\mathrm{\Xi }\times \widehat{\mathrm{\Lambda }}|}},\widehat{Z}=\widehat{\mathrm{\Lambda }},\widehat{Y}=\widehat{Z}\times \widehat{X}.`$ (6)
Then, for the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }p\pi ^{}`$ decay, the angular distribution of the proton in the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ rest frame can be projected onto the helicity-frame axes to give

$`{\displaystyle \frac{dn}{d\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pZ}}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(1+\alpha _\mathrm{\Lambda }\alpha _\mathrm{\Xi }\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pZ}),`$ (7)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{dn}{d\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pX}}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(1+{\displaystyle \frac{\pi }{4}}\alpha _\mathrm{\Lambda }\beta _\mathrm{\Xi }P_\mathrm{\Xi }\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pX}),`$ (8)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{dn}{d\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pY}}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(1+{\displaystyle \frac{\pi }{4}}\alpha _\mathrm{\Lambda }\gamma _\mathrm{\Xi }P_\mathrm{\Xi }\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pY}),`$ (9)
where $`\theta _{pi}`$ is the angle between the proton momentum in the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ rest frame and the $`i`$th helicity-frame axis. The ratio of the slopes of the $`\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pX}`$ and $`\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pY}`$ distributions provides a measurement of $`\mathrm{tan}\varphi _\mathrm{\Xi }=\beta _\mathrm{\Xi }/\gamma _\mathrm{\Xi }`$.

Conservation of parity in the strong interactions dictates that any $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$polarization be normal to the production plane at the target. The precession angle $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ of this polarization relative to the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$momentum at the collimator exit, after the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$hyperons pass through the vertically directed magnetic field in the collimator, is given by

$`\mathrm{\Phi }={\displaystyle \frac{q}{\beta m_\mathrm{\Xi }c^2}}\left\{{\displaystyle \frac{\mu _\mathrm{\Xi }m_\mathrm{\Xi }}{\mu _Nm_p}}1\right\}{\displaystyle B𝑑l},`$ (10)
where $`q`$, $`\mu _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ and $`m_\mathrm{\Xi }`$ are the electric charge, magnetic moment and mass of the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ respectively, $`\beta `$ 1, $`\mu _N`$ is the nuclear magneton, and $`m_p`$ is the proton mass. As reported in , the polarization of $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ for this data set was confined in the horizontal plane and approximately 10$`\%`$ in magnitude. We used $`\mu _\mathrm{\Xi }=0.6505\pm 0.0025\mu _N`$  to determine $`\mathrm{\Phi }=16.68^{}\pm 0.86^{}`$ and hence the orientation of the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ polarization in the spectrometer. The helicity-frame axes defined in Eq. 6 were calculated from the reconstructed $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ momentum.

The slopes of the $`\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pX}`$ and $`\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pY}`$ distributions in Eqs. 8 and 9 were measured using the Hybrid Monte Carlo (HMC) method  which factored out the acceptances. Up to 200 HMC events were generated per real event for each distribution. These HMC events were uniformly distributed in $`\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pX}`$ ($`\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pY}`$), with the rest of the kinematic quantities such as decay vertices and momentum of the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ taken from the associated real event. The event was included in the measurement when ten of its associated HMC events satisfied all of the requirements used to simulate the triggers, the geometry and inefficiencies of the spectrometer. A $`\chi ^2`$ minimization based on the comparison of weighted HMC data with real events was used to determine the slope of each $`\mathrm{cos}\theta `$ distribution.

The data were analyzed separately as four streams: data taken at positive and negative production angles for each polarity of the analyzing magnets. The measured slope for a given distribution is comprised of the true slope plus a bias term . The bias, resulting from imperfections in the experimental apparatus and reconstruction effects not fully simulated in the analysis, is not sensitive to the reversal of the production angle. The polarization, however, changes sign when the production angle is reversed. The helicity-frame axes in Eq. 6 transform as $`\widehat{X}\widehat{X}`$, $`\widehat{Y}\widehat{Y}`$, and $`\widehat{Z}\widehat{Z}`$ when the polarization changes sign. A bias term in the $`X`$-direction ($`B_X`$) will thus reverse sign in the transformed helicity frame. If the slope measured for the positive (negative) production angle is $`S_+`$ ($`S_{}`$), the true slope and bias are extracted using

$`{\displaystyle \frac{\pi }{4}}\alpha _\mathrm{\Lambda }\beta _\mathrm{\Xi }P_\mathrm{\Xi }={\displaystyle \frac{S_++S_{}}{2}},B_X={\displaystyle \frac{S_+S_{}}{2}}.`$ (11)
Similar expressions can be written for $`\alpha _\mathrm{\Lambda }\gamma _\mathrm{\Xi }P_\mathrm{\Xi }`$ and the $`Y`$ bias ($`B_Y`$). Fig. 1 shows the $`\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pX}`$ and $`\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pY}`$ distributions for each stream and the corresponding weighted HMC fit. The HMC analysis was repeated with 26 different random number seeds and the results were averaged. Table I shows the extracted slopes and bias terms of the $`\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pX}`$ and $`\mathrm{cos}\theta _{pY}`$ distributions for each polarity of the analyzing magnet.

To show that we were able to determine the correct axes, we measured the slope $`\alpha _\mathrm{\Lambda }\alpha _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ of the distribution in Eq. 7. Our result, which does not include systematic studies, was $`\alpha _\mathrm{\Lambda }\alpha _\mathrm{\Xi }=0.305\pm 0.002`$, consistent with the world average . As a further check, we measured the magnitude of the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ polarization by projecting the angular distribution of the proton onto the laboratory axes and summing the components (a technique discussed in ). We then calculated $`\frac{\pi }{4}\alpha _\mathrm{\Lambda }\gamma _\mathrm{\Xi }P_\mathrm{\Xi }=0.043\pm 0.003`$, in agreement with the results in Table I and in .

By taking the ratio of the measured values of $`\frac{\pi }{4}\alpha _\mathrm{\Lambda }\beta _\mathrm{\Xi }P_\mathrm{\Xi }`$ and $`\frac{\pi }{4}\alpha _\mathrm{\Lambda }\gamma _\mathrm{\Xi }P_\mathrm{\Xi }`$, the phase $`\varphi _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ was determined to be $`1.28^{}\pm 3.86^{}`$ for the +2500A data and $`1.93^{}\pm 3.68^{}`$ for the -2500A data. The good agreement for two settings of the analyzing magnets provides a systematic check of the analysis method.

The measured $`\varphi _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ displays no significant dependence on either the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ momentum, $`p_\mathrm{\Xi }`$, or the transverse momentum, $`p_T`$ (Fig. 2). A study of the biases $`B_X`$ and $`B_Y`$ as a function of the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ momentum showed no significant dependence . Variation of some of the data-selection criteria allowed us to study systematic effects due to background, poorly measured events, goodness of the track-fitting, and resolution at the target. The systematic effect of the random number seed in the HMC program was investigated. In addition, we studied the effect of changing the precession angle on the measured $`\varphi _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ by varying the value of $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ by one standard deviation. Table II summarizes our estimates of the systematic uncertainties.

By averaging the measurements for the two settings of the analyzing magnet, and adding the systematic errors in quadrature, we obtain our final result:

$`\varphi _\mathrm{\Xi }=1.61^{}\pm 2.66^{}\pm 0.37^{},`$ (12)
where the first error is statistical and the second systematic. Our measurement is consistent with the current world average of $`4^{}\pm 4^{}`$  and with zero. Using

$`\beta _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ $`=`$ $`(1\alpha _\mathrm{\Xi }^2)^{\frac{1}{2}}\mathrm{sin}\varphi _\mathrm{\Xi },`$ (13)
$`\gamma _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ $`=`$ $`(1\alpha _\mathrm{\Xi }^2)^{\frac{1}{2}}\mathrm{cos}\varphi _\mathrm{\Xi },`$ (14)
where $`\alpha _\mathrm{\Xi }=0.458\pm 0.012`$ , we calculate

$`\beta _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ $`=`$ $`0.025\pm 0.042\pm 0.006,`$ (15)
$`\gamma _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ $`=`$ $`+0.889\pm 0.001\pm 0.007.`$ (16)
Both statistical and systematic errors on $`\beta _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ are dominated by the uncertainties in our measurement of $`\varphi _\mathrm{\Xi }`$, whereas the systematic error on $`\gamma _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ is due to the uncertainty in $`\alpha _\mathrm{\Xi }`$.

Using Eq. 4, the phase-shift difference in the $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$decay process is also deduced:

$`D+d_{CP}=3.17^{}\pm 5.28^{}\pm 0.73^{}.`$ (17)
This measurement is consistent with zero and indicates that the strong phase-shift difference of the final state in $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}\mathrm{\Lambda }\pi ^{}`$ decay is small, in agreement with recent calculations  but disagreeing with that of .

In conclusion, we have measured the parameter $`\varphi _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ using 1.35 million $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}\mathrm{\Lambda }\pi ^{}`$ decays. Our result has a precision that is $``$ 1.5 times better than the world average and $``$ 3.3 times better than the previous best single measurement . With this result, we obtain new values for $`\beta _\mathrm{\Xi }`$ and $`\gamma _\mathrm{\Xi }`$. The strong phase-shift difference deduced from this measurement is consistent with zero and thus imposes a limit on the level of $`CP`$ violation in $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}\mathrm{\Lambda }\pi ^{}`$ hyperon decay.

We would like to acknowledge support by the U.S. Department of Energy. K.B.L. was also partially supported by the Miller Institute. The excellent assistance of the Fermilab staff was essential for the completion of the experiment.


text:
# Nonlinear Rabi Oscillations of Excitons in Dense Quantum Dot System

## Abstract

Nonlinear optical response and optical coherence of excitons in semiconductor dense quantum dots in GaAs single quantum wells has been studied by using photon echo techniques. At low temperatures, the optical coherence is estimated to be 2 ns from the decay curve in the photon echo signal. Rabi oscillations are also observed. Unlike the results for a single quantum dot in the literature to date, the oscillation shows nonlinear behavior affected strongly by the pre-excited carrier density. The results can be explained by the theory of the local field correction originating from exciton-exciton interaction between the inter dots.

During the last decade, various results of optical coherent manipulation of excitons in semiconductors have been reported, such as: indirect 1 ; 2  and direct 3  observations of excitonic Rabi oscillations in higher dimensional semiconductor structures, manipulations of a one-qubit rotation of an exciton in a single quantum dot 4 ; 5 ; 6 ; 7 ; 8 , direct observations of excitonic Rabi oscillations in quantum dot ensemble 9 , and entanglement manipulation in quantum dot 10  and dot molecules 11 . These results open great opportunities for quantum information processing based on semiconductor devices which have potential advantages, including the ease of integration and the use of matured industrial technologies. In particular, excitons make a clear distinction from other two level systems for qubits in the sense that they can effectively interact with photons, that is the signal carrier wave to build a quantum communication network, by their large dipole moment 6 ; 7 ; 8 ; 9 ; 12 . The main obstacle is then to overcome the fast dephasing time of excitons due to the phonon scattering and the strong coupling with various charged excitations in solids via Coulomb interaction. There is, however, a dilemma such that while an exciton-exciton interaction is a key process for quantum gating, strong interaction usually causes fast dephasing. The coupling strength and the dephasing time also strongly depend on quantum confinement structures, such as quantum well, wire, dot and their shapes. To find the structures with long coherence time and strong coupling at the same time in semiconductors is an important problem for progress in both nanoscale semiconductor physics and development of quantum information technology.
We report the observation of excitonic nonlinear Rabi oscillations which exhibit the effect of strong exciton-exciton interaction and at the same time ultra-long coherence (2 ns) in a quantum dot system in GaAs/Al0.3Ga0.7As single quantum well structure. The observed dephasing time in our sample is much longer than the values reported in the literature 13 ; 14 ; 15 ; 16 ; 17 , in spite of the underlying strong interaction among excitons.
Our samples are GaAs/Al0.3Ga0.7As single quantum wells grown on (001)-GaAs substrates by molecular-beam epitaxy (MBE) whose well width are 110 Å and 90 Å. Since fluctuations exist in the well width with one or two monolayers in both samples, the heavy hole exciton splits into three states. In case of 110 Å well width sample, one is situated at the small luminescence peak around 1.540 eV in the macroscopic photo-luminescence (PL) spectrum, which comes from the two monolayer height region, and the other are the main luminescence peak which is in agreement with the lower peak of the macroscopic photo-luminescence excitation (PLE) spectrum (one monolayer height region) and the higher peak in the PLE spectrum, as shown in Fig. 1. The micro-PL spectrum shows many small peaks, corresponding to the individual excitonic transitions in each dot formed by the potential fluctuations due to the variations of the well width. This fact indicates that a dense quantum dot system is realized in the quantum well. The 90 Å well width sample also shows the same properties as the 110 Å well width sample.
The excitation light source is a cw mode-locked Ti:Sapphire laser pumped by a frequency-doubled Nd:YVO4 laser. The temporal duration of the generated pulse, $`\tau _L`$, is about 100 fs with the spectral width of $``$10 meV. The center of the excitation wavelength is resonant with the main luminescence peak of the single quantum well. The experiment is based on the photon echo technique using three pulses linearly polarized along the same direction. The signal intensity in the backward diffraction geometry in the direction $`k_3+k_2k_1`$ is detected as a function of the time delay, $`\tau _1`$, between the first and second pulses. All measurements are performed at 7 K.

Figure 2 shows the dependence of the decay profiles of the photon echo signal for the 110 Å well width sample as a function of the time delay $`\tau _1`$ on the various input electric fields of the third pulse, $`E_3`$, when the input electric field of the first and second pulses are fixed at $`E_1=0.3E_0`$ and $`E_2=0.7E_0`$, respectively. Here, $`E_0`$ represents the maximum input electric field density of $``$ 2$`\times `$102 N/C/cm2. The time delay $`\tau _2`$ between the second and third pulses is set to 0.3 ps so that the excitation pulse order can be defined exactly. A dominant signal at zero time delay in each scan is due to the photon echo from the GaAs substrate and/or a non-resonant two-photon transition to the GaAs substrate and is unrelated to the quantum dots 18 ; 19 . After these dominant peaks, the echo signals exhibit unusual decay profiles up to 200 ps, i.e. slight increase in (a), (b), and (e) while rapid decease in (c), which differ from conventional exponential decay. This will be discussed later again. For longer delays, we can observe a slowly decaying signal with a time constant of $``$500 ps. This signal is due to the dephasing of the exciton coherence in the quantum dots. Assuming the presence of inhomogeneous broadening, the coherence time can be calculated to be $``$2 ns 20 , which corresponds to the homogeneous linewidth $``$0.65 $`\mu `$eV. The signal intensity and the decay profiles show the strong dependence on the input electric field of the third pulse. The signal intensity increases with $`E_3`$ between 0.25$`E_0`$ and 0.3$`E_0`$. As $`E_3`$ further increases, the signal turns to decrease, completely disappears at $`E_3`$=0.44$`E_0`$, and then appears again. This behavior strongly suggests the Rabi oscillations expected for the coherent population oscillations of a two-level system with increasing pumping electric field intensity.
Figure 3 shows the echo intensity for the 110 Å well width sample as a function of the input electric field, $`E_1`$ (a) or $`E_3`$ (b), at the fixed time delay $`\tau _1`$=100 ps and $`\tau _2`$=0.3 ps. In Fig. (a), the gray squares, the open and closed circles correspond to the cases of $`E_2`$=0.1$`E_0`$, $`E_2`$=0.3$`E_0`$ and $`E_2`$=0.7$`E_0`$, respectively, when $`E_3`$ is fixed at 0.3$`E_0`$. These show similar behavior on $`E_1`$, peaked around $`E_1`$=0.82$`E_0`$. In Fig. (b), the three cases $`E_2`$=0.1$`E_0`$ (gray squares) $`E_2`$=0.3$`E_0`$ (open circles), and $`E_2`$=0.7$`E_0`$ (closed circles) are compared, when fixing $`E_1`$=0.3$`E_0`$. It is clearly seen that the behavior on $`E_3`$ strongly depends on the second pulse intensity. The stronger the second pulse intensity is, the shorter the oscillation. The period and the amplitude in each scan are also found to be increasing with $`E_3`$. The observed nonlinear oscillation behavior is much different from that of an ideal two-level system 21 , where the amplitude and period of the Rabi oscillation cannot change for the input field intensity, and from the results reported in the previous works for a single dot 6 ; 8  and a well isolated dot system 9 . We have performed the same experiment on a dense quantum dot system in the 90 Å well sample. The coherence time shows ultralong properties (2 ns) that are the same as the 110 Å well width sample and the nonlinear Rabi oscillations are also observed.
One plausible origin of the nonlinear oscillation behavior is the exciton-exciton interaction. In fact, the Coulomb renormalization of Rabi frequency has already been observed in semiconductor multiple quantum wells 3  and in a well isolated dot system, the Rabi oscillations under the high excitation density is also modified by the biexciton effect, which corresponds to the exciton-exciton interaction (correlation) in intra dot 9 . We can first rule out the biexciton effect since the oscillatory structure is still observable under the co-circularly polarized excitation (bi-exciton transition forbidden configuration). Further, the excitation density estimated from the present input electric field and the dipole moment $`\mu `$=15 Debye, calculated from the dephasing time of 2 ns, stays in the weak regime. This effect, therefore, is most likely attributed to the local field correction originating from exciton-exciton (dipole-dipole) interaction between the inter dots. Actually, according to the theoretical work 27 , the local field effect modifies the Rabi oscillations. Using the rotating wave approximation, the self-consistent Maxwell-Bloch equations with local field correction in the resonant excitation can be written as 22 ; 23 ; 24

$`{\displaystyle \frac{u}{t}}`$ $`=`$ $`\epsilon wv`$ (1a)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{v}{t}}`$ $`=`$ $`\epsilon wu+\mathrm{\Omega }w`$ (1b)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{w}{t}}`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{\Omega }v`$ (1c)
where $`u`$ ($`v`$ ) and $`w`$ represent the real (imaginary) part of the polarization and the population inversion, respectively. $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ denotes the Rabi frequency defined by $`\mu `$$`E`$/$`\mathrm{}`$ using a dipole moment $`\mu `$ and an input electric field $`E`$. $`\epsilon `$ represents, in the unit of frequency, the coupling constant of the near-dipole-dipole local field parameter arising from the local field $`E_L`$=$`E`$+$`E`$near$``$$`E`$P. $`E`$near represents the dipole field at a point $`r`$ generated by a microscopic polarization $`p`$ at a point $`r`$i, and is given by $`E`$near=$`_i`${(3$`p`$$``$$`n`$)$`n`$$``$$`p`$}/(4$`\pi `$$`ϵ_b`$$`|`$$`r`$$``$$`r`$i$`|`$3) 25 . $`ϵ_b`$ and $`n`$ are the dielectric constant of the background and an unit vector in the direction $`rr`$i, respectively. $`E_P`$ is the average dipole field $``$$`N`$$`p`$/3$`ϵ_b`$ using a dipole density $`N`$ 25 . In the case where the isotropic three-dimensional dipole system, $`E`$near vanishes due to the symmetry 25  and the coupling constant is given by $`\epsilon `$=$`\mu ^2`$$`N`$/3$`ϵ_b`$$`\mathrm{}`$ 23 ; 24 . For low dimensional systems, such as the present case, the contribution of the dipole field generated by microscopic polarization to the local field becomes dominant. Assuming a dipole system on a simple isotropic two-dimensional square lattice with a lattice spacing $`d`$, the coupling constant can be calculated and approximately given by $`\epsilon `$=$`\mu ^2`$/4$`ϵ_b`$$`\mathrm{}`$$`d^3`$. The ratio of the coupling constant and the Rabi frequency $`\epsilon `$/$`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ in the present case is estimated to be $`>`$0.1 from the average input electric field 0.3$`E_0`$, the dipole moment $`\mu `$=15 Debye and the average dot spacing $`<`$14 nm. The average dot spacing is estimated from the two-dimensional dot density of our sample $`>`$5$`\times `$1011/cm2 determined from the spectrum and spatial resolution limit of our micro-PL system. Thus the coupling constant of the local field correction is not negligible order compared with $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$. Exciton dynamics in the present case may be described by the theory of the local field correction.
The solution of Eq. (1) without the external electric field, that is the Rabi frequency, is found as $`P(t)`$ = $`u`$+$`iv`$ $``$ $`\mathrm{exp}(i\epsilon wt)`$. Thus the local field correction takes part in the optical response, the polarization rotates in the phase plane ($`uv`$-plane) with a frequency of $``$$`\epsilon w`$. Assuming that polarization rotates slowly compared with the temporal pulse width, the effective Rabi frequency may be approximately written as

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{eff}}=\sqrt{\mathrm{\Omega }(\mathrm{\Omega }+\epsilon u_0)}$$
(2)
where $`u_0`$ represents the real part of the polarization just before the optical excitation. Thus the effective Rabi frequency increases with the real part of the pre-excited polarization, which is the positive value proportional to the square root of the pre-excited carrier density under the weak excitation regime. On the other hand, by applying the two-level model relating to the sinusoidal signal behavior 26 , the photon echo intensity may be described by $`I_{\mathrm{echo}}|\mathrm{sin}\theta _{\mathrm{eff3}}\times \mathrm{sin}\theta _{\mathrm{eff2}}\times \mathrm{sin}\theta _{\mathrm{eff1}}|^2`$, using the effective pulse area of $`\theta _{\mathrm{eff}i}`$ = $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{eff}i}\tau _L`$ when a square pulse is assumed. This qualitatively explains the difference between Fig. 3 (a) and (b), namely, the echo intensity is insensitive to the first pulse where there exists no pre-excited carrier, while it is strongly dependent on the third pulse, and the oscillation period becomes shorter with increase in the second pulse field $`E_2`$. This pulse order effect can not be explained by the detuning term, $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$, in an ideal two level system which gives the effective Rabi frequency $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{eff}}=\sqrt{\mathrm{\Omega }^2+\mathrm{\Delta }^2}`$ insensitive to the pre-excited carrier density.
Next, we focus on the nonlinear Rabi oscillations in Fig. 3 (b). The first terms in Eqs. (1a) and (1b) correspond to the detuning in an ideal two-level system, where the large (small) detuning causes the short (long) period and small (large) amplitude of the Rabi oscillations 21 . In our case, the detuning varies with the population inversion, that is the excited carrier density. Under the weak (high) excitation range of the third pulse, the small (large) population inversion $`w1`$ ($`w0`$) leads to the large (small) detuning. The amplitude and period of the observed Rabi oscillations, therefore, increase with the input electric field of the third pulse.
The unusual decay profiles up to 200 ps time delay as seen in Fig. 2 can also be explained in terms of the local field correction. The effective pulse area $`\theta _{\mathrm{eff}}`$, as mentioned before, depends on the real part of the pre-excited polarization which roughly evolves $`u_0\mathrm{sin}(\epsilon w_1\tau _1)`$ using the time delay $`\tau _1`$ and the population inversion $`w_1`$ after the first pulse. Under weak excitation of the first pulse, the population inversion takes a negative value, which results in the increase in the effective pulse area with the time delay $`\tau _1`$. In the case where $`n\pi <\theta _{\mathrm{eff3}}<(n+\frac{1}{2})\pi `$ ($`n`$ is integer) corresponding to Fig. 2 (a), (b), and (e), the larger effective pulse area of the third pulse for the longer time delay excites the system such that the echo intensity becomes stronger, leading to a slight increase in the echo intensity. On the other hand, in the region where $`(n\frac{1}{2})\pi <\theta _{\mathrm{eff3}}<n\pi `$ corresponding to Fig. 2(c), the larger third pulse weakens the echo intensity, causing more rapid decrease than the exponential decay.
Finally the problem of why the long coherence up to 2ns is possible even under the strong exciton-exciton interaction is still open. This problem may be essential for quantum information technology as well as fundamental semiconductor physics. It must be an important future work to measure coherence characteristics and coupling strengths for various dot systems whose dot spacing, shapes and arrangements are artificially controlled. Besides this further theoretical analysis on dephasing process including the strong dipole-dipole interaction is also necessary.
We have shown the photon echo data in the dense quantum dot system in the single quantum wells. We found that the excitonic coherence created by laser light maintains 2 ns. The nonlinear Rabi oscillations, which strongly depend on the input pulse configuration and the pre-excited carrier density, are also observed in this system. The nonlinear behavior can be well explained by the theory of the local field correction originating from the exciton-exciton interaction between the inter dots.
F. M. acknowledges for the partial support from a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research and Special Coordination Funds for Promoting Science and Technology from the STA (Science and Technology Agency) of Japan.