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# Signature of Quantum Chaos in SQUID’s

## Abstract

Spectral statistics in band structures is studied in a realistic model describing superconducting quantum interference devices (SQUID’s). By controlling an external magnetic flux, the level statistics may show a crossover from the GUE to the GOE. Effects of secondary discrete symmetries seen in specific regions of the first Brillouin zone are also discussed.

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Recent development in physics of quantum chaos has its origin in studies of spectral statistics of quantum systems whose corresponding classical dynamics exhibits chaos. It is now well known that statistical properties of energy spectra are universal in various quantum systems including, e.g., atoms, nuclei, and electron billiards as well as classical wave-mechanical systems such as microwave cavities . Recently, spectral statistics in band structures in extended periodic systems has been studied for driven systems , electronic systems  and photonic crystals . Band structures have also been studied in the context of avoided band crossings . Most of these band-structured systems, however, are sensitive to the accompanying impurities and/or inhomogeneity. It is highly desirable to find corresponding systems robust against the extrinsic randomness.

In this Letter, we consider superconducting quantum interference devices (SQUID’s), whose periodic features are described by a few macroscopic variables called superconducting phases. We here focus on small SQUID’s with three junctions where a two-dimensional periodic potential for the phases can be realized. Because of the macroscopic nature of the phases, the potential is robust against impurities and/or inhomogeneities of the system. This feature is of great advantage to study the spectral statistics; This is particularly in contrast to the two-dimensional electron systems where impurity scattering and inhomogeneity are unavoidable. The SQUID system also has the advantage of controllability. Potential shapes for the phases can be controlled by an external magnetic flux, and the Bloch wave-numbers can be chosen by voltage gates. In the limited context of application to quantum computations, one is concerned only with the lowest few quantum levels . Moreover generally, however, if level spectroscopy at a high-energy region will become possible, this system would give a good stage for studies of quantum chaos in band structures.

Already we investigated the classical phase dynamics of SQUID’s with two junctions and discovered the mysterious normal diffusion phenomena there: The diffusion coefficient was found to take a fractal-like feature . SQUID’s with two junctions, however, were on scale of $`100\mu \mathrm{m}`$ and thereby classical. On the contrary, SQUID’s with three junctions considered in this Letter is on scale of $`1\mu \mathrm{m}`$ and their quantization is highly desirable to elucidate a quantum signature of the underlying mysterious normal diffusion phenomena.

The configuration of the SQUID system is shown in Fig. 1 (a), while the equivalent circuit is shown in Fig. 1 (b). The loop of superconductor includes three Josephson junctions denoted with $`\times `$ in the circuit. The Josephson energy and capacitance of the $`i`$-th junction are denoted with $`E_{\mathrm{J}i}`$ and $`C_i`$, respectively. The two upper superconducting islands are coupled to the voltage gates through the capacitances, $`C_{\mathrm{g1}}`$ and $`C_{\mathrm{g2}}`$, respectively. The states of this SQUID are controlled by an external flux penetrating through the loop, $`\mathrm{\Phi }_{\mathrm{ext}}`$ and by gate voltages, $`V_i`$’s.

By controlling fabrication conditions, both the Josephson energies and capacitances can be varied. In this Letter, for simplicity we assume $`E_{\mathrm{J1}}=E_{\mathrm{J2}}=E_{\mathrm{J3}}(E_\mathrm{J})`$. We also assume $`C_1,C_2,C_3C_{\mathrm{g1}}=C_{\mathrm{g2}}(C_\mathrm{g})`$, where the junction capacitances can be neglected. These assumptions are not essential to the discussion of the classical-quantum correspondence through spectral statistics. We assume these conditions because it is convenient to study effects of discrete symmetries such as parity.

Behaviors of the Josephson junction are described by the superconducting phase difference at the junction. We denote the phase difference at each junction with $`\varphi _i`$. The directions to define these differences are shown by the arrows in Fig. 1 (a). Then, the Hamiltonian of this SQUID consists of three parts:

$$H=H_\mathrm{C}+H_\mathrm{J}+H_\mathrm{L},$$
(1)
where $`H_\mathrm{C}`$, $`H_\mathrm{J}`$ and $`H_\mathrm{L}`$ are a charging energy, a junction energy and an inductance energy, respectively. First, we show that the latter two parts correspond to a potential energy for the phase differences. The junction energy is determined by the phase differences as

$$H_\mathrm{J}=E_\mathrm{J}\mathrm{cos}\varphi _1E_\mathrm{J}\mathrm{cos}\varphi _2E_\mathrm{J}\mathrm{cos}\varphi _3,$$
(2)
while the inductance energy is determined by the persistent current along the loop, and given as

$$H_\mathrm{L}=\frac{\mathrm{\Phi }_0^2}{2L}\left(\varphi _1\varphi _2\varphi _32\pi \frac{\mathrm{\Phi }_{\mathrm{ext}}}{\mathrm{\Phi }_0}\right)^2.$$
(3)
Here, $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0=h/2e`$ is a unit flux, and $`L`$ is an inductance determined by the size and shape of the loop. Here, we consider a small loop with a small inductance satisfying $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0^2/2LE_\mathrm{J}`$. Such SQUID can be easily realized experimentally by fabricating the superconducting loop with the size of order of micrometers. In this small SQUID, the inductance energy approximately gives a constraint $`\varphi _1\varphi _2\varphi _32\pi \mathrm{\Phi }_{\mathrm{ext}}/\mathrm{\Phi }_0=0`$ on the phases. By using this constraint, the potential energy for the phases are obtained as

$$H_\mathrm{J}=E_\mathrm{J}\mathrm{cos}\varphi _1E_\mathrm{J}\mathrm{cos}\varphi _2E_\mathrm{J}\mathrm{cos}(\varphi _1\varphi _22\pi f),$$
(4)
where $`f=\mathrm{\Phi }_{\mathrm{ext}}/\mathrm{\Phi }_0`$ is a normalized external flux. This two-dimensional periodic potential has a square unit cell defined by $`0\varphi _12\pi `$ and $`0\varphi _22\pi `$.

On the other hand, the charging energy $`H_\mathrm{C}`$ is described by the charges of the junctions. We denote the charge induced at the $`i`$-th gate capacitance by $`Q_i=2en_i`$, where $`n_i`$ is the number of the induced Cooper-pair. It is known that the number of the Cooper pairs, $`n_i`$ is conjugate to the phase difference $`\varphi _i`$ and the following exchange relation satisfies:

$$[\varphi _i,n_j]=\mathrm{i}\delta _{ij},(1i,j2).$$
(5)
Since the junction capacitances are neglected, the charging energy is calculated as

$$H_\mathrm{C}=\frac{1}{2C_\mathrm{g}}(Q_1^2+Q_2^2)+V_1Q_1+V_2Q_2.$$
(6)
This energy is rewritten by using the numbers of Cooper-pairs as

$$H_\mathrm{C}=4E_\mathrm{C}(n_1n_1^{})^2+4E_\mathrm{C}(n_2n_2^{})^2,$$
(7)
where $`E_\mathrm{C}=e^2/2C_\mathrm{g}`$, and $`n_i^{}=C_\mathrm{g}V_i/2e`$ is a normalized gate voltage. This gives a kinetic energy for the phases.

Here, note that the gate voltages can control the Bloch wave-numbers. This can be checked by considering the wave function $`\mathrm{\Psi }(\varphi _1,\varphi _2)`$ satisfying the periodic condition for both $`\varphi _1`$ and $`\varphi _2`$. For the alternative wave function $`\xi (\varphi _1,\varphi _2)`$ defined by $`\mathrm{\Psi }(\varphi _1,\varphi _2)=e^{\mathrm{i}n_1^{}\varphi _1\mathrm{i}n_2^{}\varphi _2}\xi (\varphi _1,\varphi _2)`$, the kinetic part of the Hamiltonian for $`\xi (\varphi _1,\varphi _2)`$ is modified as

$$\stackrel{~}{H}_\mathrm{C}=4E_\mathrm{C}n_1^2+4E_\mathrm{C}n_2^2,$$
(8)
while the wave function $`\xi (\varphi _1,\varphi _2)`$ satisfies the following Bloch theorem

$$\xi (\varphi _1+2\pi m_1,\varphi _2+2\pi m_2)=e^{\mathrm{i}m_1n_1^{}+\mathrm{i}m_2n_2^{}}\xi (\varphi _1,\varphi _2).$$
(9)
Hence, the normalized voltages, $`n_i^{}`$’s correspond to the Bloch wave-numbers for the Hamiltonian $`\stackrel{~}{H}=\stackrel{~}{H}_\mathrm{C}+H_\mathrm{J}`$. We find that the feature of classical phase dynamics for $`\stackrel{~}{H}`$ leads to the same mysterious normal diffusion phenomena in SQUID’s with two junctions . (We suppress the classical result in this Letter.)

The energy spectrum of the SQUID is obtained by diagonalizing the Hamiltonian $`H=H_\mathrm{C}+H_\mathrm{J}`$ for fixed values of $`n_1^{}`$ and $`n_2^{}`$. We adopt the charge eigenstates as the base wavefunctions. Then, it is convenient to rewrite the Hamiltonian by introducing an annihilation operator $`b_i=e^{\mathrm{i}\varphi _i}`$ satisfying an exchange relation $`[n_i,b_j]=b_i\delta _{ij}`$ as

$`H`$ $`=`$ $`4E_\mathrm{C}(n_1n_1^{})^2+4E_\mathrm{C}(n_2n_2^{})^2`$ (10)
$``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{E_\mathrm{J}}{2}}(b_1+b_1^{}){\displaystyle \frac{E_\mathrm{J}}{2}}(b_2+b_2^{}){\displaystyle \frac{E_\mathrm{J}}{2}}(b_1b_2^{}e^{2\pi \mathrm{i}f}+b_2b_1^{}e^{2\pi \mathrm{i}f}).`$
The charging energy gives diagonal parts, while the junction energy off-diagonal parts. Here, we should note that if $`f`$ is an integer or half-integer, the Hamiltonian can be represented by a real matrix.

In this Letter, we take $`E_\mathrm{C}=0.002E_\mathrm{J}`$, and consider the case of $`f=0.5`$ and $`f=0.25`$. The classical phase dynamics based on Eq. (1) shows chaotic behaviors in the dominant region of the corresponding Poincare section, when the energy is taken between the saddle-point potential energy $`E_{\mathrm{sad}}`$ and the potential-top energy $`E_{\mathrm{top}}`$. Here, the spectral properties are studied in the range $`E_{\mathrm{sad}}EE_{\mathrm{sad}}+0.75(E_{\mathrm{top}}E_{\mathrm{sad}})`$. The ordinary unfolding procedure is performed to obtain the level statistics . Depending on the Bloch wave-numbers, $`n_1^{}`$ and $`n_2^{}`$, the energy spectra show various statistics: the Poisson-like, GOE, and GUE statistics. To see this wave-number dependence, we fit the spectra to the Izrailev distribution

$$P(S)=A\left(\frac{\pi S}{2}\right)^\beta \mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{1}{16}\beta \pi ^2S^2\left(B\frac{1}{4}\pi \beta \right)S\right],$$
(11)
which interpolates among different universality classes by the parameter $`\beta `$. The parameters, $`A`$ and $`B`$ are normalization constants. One can recover the Poisson distribution for $`\beta =0`$, while it agrees with the GOE (GUE) distribution for $`\beta =1`$ ($`\beta =2`$) on the 5 percent level. Although the Izrailev distribution is originally proposed for localization problems, we here use it for qualitative characterization of the spectra.

The density plots of the fitted values of $`\beta `$ in the first Brillouin zone (FBZ) of the $`n_1^{}`$-$`n_2^{}`$ plane are shown in Fig. 2. In the case of $`f=0.25`$, the spectra shows the GUE distribution ($`\beta =2`$) except for the symmetry lines, $`n_1^{}=n_2^{}`$ and $`n_1^{}=n_2^{}`$, and the points, $`(n_1^{},n_2^{})=(\pm 0.5,0)`$ and $`(0,\pm 0.5)`$. In the case of $`f=0.5`$, the spectra shows the GOE distribution ($`\beta =1`$) except the same symmetry lines and points. Let us first discuss the universality class of the region, which is on neither the symmetry lines nor points. In the case of $`f=0.25`$, the Hamiltonian includes the imaginary number in the last term in (10). Hence, it is expected that the time-reversal symmetry is broken, and the level statistics is governed by the GUE. Actually, the nearest neighbor distribution $`P(S)`$ and spectral rigidity $`\mathrm{\Delta }_3(L)`$ agree well with the GUE statistics as shown in Fig. 3. In the case $`f=0.5`$, the Hamiltonian can be expressed by a real symmetric matrix as seen in (10). Hence, the system exhibits the time-reversal symmetry, and the level statistics belongs to the GOE. Actually, the result for $`P(S)`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }_3(L)`$ agrees with the GOE statistics as shown in Fig. 4. Since the value of $`f`$ can be varied by the external magnetic flux, the universality class can be easily controlled in this SQUID system.

Thus, the signature of quantum chaos has been obtained in the SQUID system. So, the main purpose of this Letter has been achieved. It, however, remains to explain the deviations from the expected universal class on the symmetry lines and points as seen in Fig. 2. We end this Letter by brief discussion on this secondary feature in the SQUID system.

First, we consider the case of $`f=0.25`$. We divide the regions where the deviation from the GUE statistics is seen into five parts: (A) the line $`n_1^{}=n_2^{}`$ ($`n_1^{}0`$), (B) the line $`n_1^{}=n_2^{}`$ ($`n_1^{}0`$), (C) the point $`(n_1^{},n_2^{})=(0,0)`$, (D) the points $`(n_1^{},n_2^{})=(\pm 0.5,0)`$, and (E) the points $`(n_1^{},n_2^{})=(0,\pm 0.5)`$. The deviation from the GUE statistics in each region can be explained by corresponding additional symmetries characterized by operators commuting with the Hamiltonian. In the region (A), it is crucial to consider the operator $`P_1`$ defined by $`|n_2,n_1=P_1|n_1,n_2`$, where $`|n_1,n_2`$ is the eigenkets of the Cooper-pair-number operator. It can be checked that the operator $`P_1T`$ commutes with the Hamiltonian on the line $`n_1^{}=n_2^{}`$, where $`T`$ is the time-reversal operator. Then, the spectral statistics is governed by the GOE statistics by the discussion of the false time-reversal symmetry . Similarly, in the region (B), the mirror-reversal operator $`P_2`$ defined by $`|n_2,n_1=P_2|n_1,n_2`$ commutes with the Hamiltonian. Then, the eigenkets can be classified into two kinds by the parity defined as the eigenvalue of the operator $`P_2`$. The spectrum taken only for even(odd) states is expected to show the level repulsion. The level correlation between odd and even states is, however, suppressed because the matrix elements of the Hamiltonian $`\psi _i|H|\psi _j`$ is zero when $`\psi _i`$ and $`\psi _j`$ have different parity. As a result, the spectrum become the mixture of two independent GUE statistics. This mixed level statistics is denoted in this Letter with $`2`$-GUE . In the region (C), both $`P_1T`$ and $`P_2`$ commutes with the Hamiltonian. Then, the spectrum becomes the mixture of the two independent GOE statistics ($`2`$-GOE). In the region (D), a kind of the mirror reversal symmetries exists. The symmetry operator $`P_3`$ is defined as $`|1n_1,n_2=P_3|n_1,n_2`$, and $`P_3T`$ commutes with the Hamiltonian. Then, the spectral statistics obeys the GOE by the same reason as the region (A). Similarly, in the region (E), $`P_4T`$ commutes with the Hamiltonian, where $`P_4`$ is defined as $`|n_1,1n_2=P_4|n_1,n_2`$. Hence, the level statistics is described by the GOE.

Next, we consider the case of $`f=0.5`$. The deviation from the GOE statistics is observed near the same lines and points as the case of $`f=0.25`$. The explanation of this deviation is quite parallel to the previous paragraph. In the region (A) and (B), the operator $`P_1`$ and $`P_2`$ commute with the Hamiltonian, respectively. Hence in these regions, the level spectrum becomes the mixture of two independent GOE statistics ($`2`$-GOE). In the region (C), because both $`P_1`$ and $`P_2`$ commute with the Hamiltonian, the spectrum obeys the $`4`$-GOE statistics. In the region (D) and (E), the spectrum is described by the $`2`$-GOE statistics, since $`P_3`$ and $`P_4`$ commute with the Hamiltonian, respectively.

In summary, spectral statistics in band structures has been discussed in a realistic SQUID model. This system can change the Bloch wave-numbers by controlling the gate voltages. The normalized external flux $`f`$ can control the time-reversal symmetry of the system, and the crossover from the GUE to the GOE can be observed by varying $`f`$. By taking the circuit parameters as symmetric, the effect of the secondary discrete symmetries can also be discussed. On specific lines and points in the first Brillouin zone, the spectra may obey different statistics determined by the operator characterizing the discrete symmetry of the system. We expect that this work can be a starting point to consider the quantum chaos in a well-controlled system. A variety of dynamical features of quantum chaos can also be observed in the quantum dynamics by using the excellent ability of quantum manipulation and measurement in the SQUID system, which will be investigated in due course.

The authors thank A. Terai for useful discussion and critical reading of the manuscript.


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# Spontaneous creation of discrete breathers in Josephson arrays

## Abstract

We report on the experimental generation of discrete breather states (intrinsic localized modes) in frustrated Josephson arrays. Our experiments indicate the formation of discrete breathers during the transition from the static to the dynamic (whirling) system state, induced by a uniform external current. Moreover, spatially extended resonant states, driven by a uniform current, are observed to evolve into localized breather states. Experiments were performed on single Josephson plaquettes as well as open-ended Josephson ladders with 10 and 20 cells. We interpret the breather formation as the result of the penetration of vortices into the system.

Discrete breathers (DBs) are spatially localized, time-periodic excitations of spatially uniform nonlinear lattices. After initial theoretical studiesAubry (1997); Flach and Willis (1998), they were observed in experiments in a variety of systemsSwanson et al. (1999); Schwarz et al. (1999); Trías et al. (2000); Binder et al. (2000a). In arrays of superconducting Josephson junctions, so-called Josephson ladders (JL), DBs can be excited in a controlled wayTrías et al. (2000); Binder et al. (2000a); Mazo et al. (1999). Experiments carried out in JLs ranging from one cell up to several tens of cells revealed a large variety of possible DB statesBinder and Ustinov (2002), studied their region of existence and the resonant interaction of the nonlinear DB excitation with small-amplitude linear wavesSchuster et al. (2001); Pignatelli and Ustinov (2003).

DB states in JL are usually excited from the uniform static state of the lattice by using additional currents (i.e., local forces) which are removed after the DB creation. This well-controlled procedure helps to study DB properties systematically. In this paper we report that DB can be also excited without applying any local forces to the lattice. We present several scenarios where DB states are observed to form spontaneously. The DB formation may occur either from the initially static system state, or as a “breakdown” of spatially extended whirling states that are in resonance with the cavity eigenfrequency.

Within the RCSJ (resistively and capacitively shunted junction) model Barone and Paternó (1982), a Josephson junction (JJ) has a simple mechanical analog, which is a pendulum. In this analog, the difference $`\phi `$ of the superconducting phases across the JJ corresponds to the tilting angle of a pendulum. The current sent across the JJ is represented by a torque $`\gamma `$ applied to the pendulum. Both JJ and pendulum are subject to a velocity dependent friction force $`\alpha \dot{\phi }`$ with damping constant $`\alpha `$. Finally, the JJ or pendulum phase moves in a cosine potential due to the Josephson energy or gravitation, respectively, which leads to a force proportional to $`\mathrm{sin}\phi `$. The dynamical equation governing the phase motion can in either case be written in normalized units as

$$\ddot{\phi }+\alpha \dot{\phi }+\mathrm{sin}\phi =\gamma .$$
(1)
The (approximate) time-averaged solutions $`\phi `$ and $`\dot{\phi }`$ of this equation may have several simple forms. For $`\gamma >1`$, Eq. (1) has only a *whirling* solution with $`\dot{\phi }=\gamma /\alpha \phi =(\gamma /\alpha )t`$. For the intermediate range $`4\alpha /\pi \gamma 1`$, a *static* solution with $`\phi =\mathrm{arcsin}\gamma `$ coexists with the whirling solution. For $`\gamma <4\alpha /\pi `$, only the static solution survives. Small-amplitude *oscillations* of $`\phi `$ may be considered as perturbations to the time-averaged solutions. Due to the Josephson law, the time derivative of the phase is proportional to the voltage drop across the JJ. For the whirling solution, the normalized voltage $`v`$ is therefore proportional to the current, $`v=\dot{\phi }=(1/\alpha )\gamma `$, and the inverse of the damping $`\alpha `$ is simply the (normalized) ohmic resistance $`r`$ of the JJ, $`r=1/\alpha `$. The real current $`I`$ is normalized to the maximum current allowing for the static state $`I_c`$, hence $`\gamma =I/I_c`$, for convenience.

A JL is a single row of a two-dimensional rectangular Josephson junction array (see Fig. 1b). The JJs are connected via superconducting leads. JJs on the spars of the ladder will be referred to as the “vertical” junctions, those along the rungs as “horizontal” junctions. The vertical JJs are all identical and have an area of $`A_v`$, likewise all horizontal JJs are identical but have an area $`A_h`$. A single cell of the ladder consists of two vertical and two horizontal JJs. Many of the properties from the extended Josephson ladder are preserved in a single cell with only one horizontal JJ (Fig. 1a). This system is the simplest possible Josephson array permitting DB-like excitations. The anisotropy $`\eta `$ is defined as the ratio of the horizontal and vertical JJ areas, $`\eta =A_h/A_v`$. The JJ phases inside a cell are coupled due to the magnetic flux quantization and via a circulating inductive current. Every cell has a self-inductance $`L`$. A simple modelGrimaldi et al. (1996) describing the phase dynamics of the JL neglects mutual inductances between cells and is similar to the discrete sine-Gordon model.

The vertical JJs form an array of rotors (pendulums). These JJs can be driven by a uniform bias current. Technically, this is achieved by using a single current source which feeds a comb of parallel resistors $`R_B`$ (see Fig.1b). If the resistance $`R_B`$ is large enough, the currents through all vertical branches are identical. If the normalized current $`\gamma `$ per vertical JJ is large compared to unity, all vertical JJs rotate. This is the so-called homogeneous whirling state (HWS). In contrast, if the current is small, all JJs remain in the static state (SS). In the region $`4\alpha /\pi <\gamma <1`$, the ladder may have some vertical JJs in the whirling state, while the remaining JJs are in the static state. In the standard terminology, this localized state is called roto-breather state (RB). Because of to the JL geometry, localized voltage states always have to conform to Kirchhoff’s voltage law. Hence a single vertical rotating JJ has to be accompanied by one or more horizontal JJs in the whirling state. A large variety of different RB states is possible, as it has been observed in experimentBinder et al. (2000b); Binder and Ustinov (2002).

The SS of the ladder is influenced by an externally applied magnetic flux $`\mathrm{\Phi }_{\text{ext}}=B_{\text{ext}}A`$ (due to a magnetic field $`B_{\text{ext}}`$ threading the cell area $`A`$). The magnetic field leads to a screening (Meissner) current flowing around the JL. The field may penetrate into the ladder, leading to vortices in the screening current distribution. A measurement of the maximum critical current $`\gamma _c`$ of the S state reveals information on the magnetic field penetration into the ladder. In Ref. Binder et al., 2000c, the existence region of the S state of a Josephson ladder was investigated and compared to theoretical predictionsBarahona et al. (1998). Deviations were found for close to half-integer frustration and attributed to the presence of meta-stable states. In this paper, we present similar measurements of $`\gamma _c`$ vs. magnetic field and will argue that they are related to the creation of DBs.

When the ladder is in the HWS, all vertical JJ phases rotate at an identical average frequency $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$, while the horizontal JJs do not rotate. This is accompanied by a uniform voltage drop across the vertical JJs. Superimposed phase oscillations are strongly enhanced if the rotation frequency $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ matches one eigenfrequency of the cavity formed by the finite ensemble of cells. The enhanced oscillations lead also to an enhanced damping. A suitable experiment is to measure the differential resistance (which is inversely proportional to the damping) of the JL. It is defined as the ratio of voltage change induced by current variation. The matching frequencies (voltage positions) are characterized by steps in the current vs. voltage characteristics. Such resonances of the HWS with cavity modes have been studied by Caputo *et al.*Caputo et al. (1999). A similar behavior was observed when frequency components of a localized RB state coincide with one of the cavity eigenfrequenciesSchuster et al. (2001); Pignatelli and Ustinov (2003). We will show experiments where the HWS resonances are found to enforce the creation of symmetry-broken RB states.

We performed the first group of experiments on a single cell, having the central hole area $`A=4\times 4`$ $`\mu `$m2, with three small underdamped Nb/Al-AlOx/Nb JJs HYPRES Inc., Elmsford, NY 10523 , Fig. 1a. The vertical JJs have an area $`A_v=6\times 6`$ $`\mu `$m2, while the horizontal JJ has an area $`A_h=3\times 4`$ $`\mu `$m2. The anisotropy of the system is then $`\eta =A_h/A_v=0.33`$. At $`4.2\mathrm{K}`$ the parameter of self-inductance evaluated by measurement of a SQUID of the same geometry, is $`\beta _L=2\pi LI_{cv}/\mathrm{\Phi }_0=0.98`$. Measurements were done in a temperature range between $`4.2\mathrm{K}`$ and $`6.3\mathrm{K}`$. At each temperature position the damping $`\alpha =\pi \gamma _r/4`$ and the critical current density $`j_c`$ are evaluated from the current-voltage characteristic of HWS. At $`T=4.2`$ K, $`\alpha 0.03`$ and $`j_c=126`$ A/cm2. The bias current $`I`$ is introduced via two parallel external resistors, $`R_B=1.5`$ k$`\mathrm{\Omega }`$, see Fig. 1, so that the bias currents on the two vertical branches are equal. For convenience, the experimental data are shown in the normalized units of the bias current $`\gamma =I/I_{cv}`$ and frustration $`f=\mathrm{\Phi }_{\text{ext}}/\mathrm{\Phi }_0`$, where $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0`$ is the flux quantum.

We ramped up the bias current $`\gamma `$ and registered a transition of the system to a resistive state by detecting a non-zero voltage at either junction V1 (this critical value of $`\gamma `$ we call $`\gamma _c^1`$) or junction V2 (we call it $`\gamma _c^2`$). The measured dependence of $`\gamma _c^1`$ and $`\gamma _c^2`$ on the external magnetic field is, as expected Barone and Paternó (1982), periodic, see Fig. 2. Around $`f=\pm 0.5`$, the behavior of the two vertical JJs is found to differ and spontaneous formation of broken-symmetry states Pignatelli and Ustinov (2003) is observed. In Fig. 2 the experimental data at $`T5.5`$ K are shown. In the range of frustration $`0.7f0.5`$ and $`0.3f0.5`$, where large clockwise mesh currents are induced, the junction V1 remains in the SS while the junction V2 switches to the resistive state. The junction V1 switches to the resistive state at a higher current about $`\gamma 0.8`$ that limits the existence of this broken-symmetry breather state Fistul et al. (2002); Pignatelli and Ustinov (2003). As expected, the maximum value of the bias current that allows for the existence of the breather state does not depend on the frustrationPignatelli and Ustinov (2003). In the range $`0.5f0.3`$ and $`0.5f0.7`$, large counterclockwise mesh currents are induced. The junction V1 switches first and the second possible breather state is spontaneously induced. The range of frustration, where the magnetic field induced breather states are observed, broadens with temperature.

At temperatures higher than $`4.2\mathrm{K}`$, the HWS current-voltage characteristic in presence of external frustration showed the well-known resonance due to the interaction with the electromagnetic oscillatory modes of the cell Barahona et al. (1997); Caputo et al. (1999, 2001). At $`T5.5\mathrm{K}`$, for some values of frustration about 0.5, the interaction of the HWS with the oscillatory modes of the cell led the system to switch from the top of the resonance towards a RB state, see Fig. 3.

The second group of experiments has been performed with open-ended JLs. Measurements of the critical current $`\gamma _c^i`$ needed to force the vertical JJ $`i`$ to the finite voltage state are presented in Fig. 4. The sample consisted of 20 cells, with parameters $`\eta =0.5`$, $`\beta _L1.2`$ and $`\alpha 0.03`$. The sample layout is similar to the one presented in Ref. Binder et al., 2000c. The measurement was performed at a temperature of $`4.2\mathrm{K}`$.

The pattern of the depinning current $`\gamma _c^i`$ is periodic in frustration, with the period corresponding to a magnetic flux of $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0`$ per cell. Around integer values of $`f`$, the critical currents for left, center, and right positions in the ladder coincide. After the depinning, for $`\gamma \gamma _c^i`$, the HWS is formed. For $`f0.5`$, the critical currents $`\gamma _c^i`$ differ for voltages measured on different positions in the ladder. At $`0.35<f<0.25`$, the right and central vertical JJs of the ladder start to rotate at a lower value of $`\gamma `$ than the left part of the ladder. For $`0.65<f<0.35`$, the central part depins at the lowest value of the current, the right part at an intermediate current, and the left part at the highest value of the current. For $`0.75<f<0.65`$ the center and left parts depin for a low current and the right part depins at a higher current.

By definition, a breather state is formed when one part of the vertical JJs in the ladder rotates while the rest of it remains in the SS. Hence in the described frustration regions around $`f0.5`$, breathers are found. They form solely due to an external magnetic field. Because of the limited number of voltage probes in our long ladder, we were not able to exactly identify the precise number of rotating JJs in the breather states which were formed, but could clearly distinguish them from the HWS.

Our observations can be qualitatively explained in the following way. When the HWS has formed for large $`\gamma `$ and finite frustration $`f`$, magnetic flux penetrates into the system via the boundary cells. When $`\gamma `$ is reduced to zero, the ladder settles in the SS, which may be a meta-stable state or the system ground state. Above some critical value of the frustration $`f`$, this state consists of a nonzero amount of vorticesBarahona et al. (1998). For small bias currents $`\gamma `$, the vortices are pinned due to the lattice discreteness. However, when the vortices start to move, they may ultimately bump into the ladder boundary. This will eventually force the boundary JJ to the whirling state, with the rest of the ladder remaining in the static state. The low value of $`\eta `$ is crucial for this behavior. Preliminary numerical simulations have shown this kind of behavior for typical experimental parametersSchuster . For longer systems, it is also expectable and observed that moving vortices may be expelled via one of the horizontal JJs before reaching the boundary. When a vortex passes “through” a horizontal junction, this phase may be left rotating, again leading to the formation of a RB. A series of DBs may be left behind a moving vortex. This has been observed also in the simulations presented in Ref. Trías et al., 2002. We conclude that the depinning transitions for JLs with low anisotropy $`\eta `$ can lead to the formation of *localized whirling (RB) states*.

We also observed the creation of a RB state from a *resonant* HWS in JLs. These experiments were performed with a 10 cell open-ended JL of anisotropy $`\eta =0.49`$. Other parameters during the measurement were $`\beta _L0.35`$ and $`\alpha 0.03`$. In the presence of the external magnetic field, we observe resonant steps on the current-voltage characteristics of the ladder, as shown in Fig. 5. They are occur when the vertical JJ rotation frequency $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ matches one of the cavity eigen-frequencies, as discussed in Ref. Caputo et al., 1999. When the homogeneous current is increased at a resonance, the amplitude of the cavity oscillations increases. If the driving current becomes too large, the resonant state cannot be maintained anymore and the non-resonant HWS (now with a larger rotation frequency) is retained. This hysteretic process is usually repeatable for an arbitrary number of times. However, in some rare but reproducible cases, we observed a transition from such a resonant, spatially homogeneous state towards a localized RB state. The localized state RB can be identified as before by a zero voltage drop across some vertical JJs in parallel with a finite voltage drop across another group of vertical JJs. In Fig. 5, the voltage switching, and hence the RB formation happens in the region emphasized by the circle, around $`I=21.4\mu \mathrm{A}`$. During further increase of the current the RB voltage stays constant, apart from some tiny jumps. We thus observe here that a *resonant* RB state is formed from the resonant HWS. Ultimately, the RB voltage switches to a high value (at $`I25\mu \mathrm{A}`$). Here the breather state is still present, but is non-resonant. The tiny voltage jumps along the RB resonance may indicate either transitions between different excited modes or a change in the RB size, which could not be detected in this experiment due to the limited number of voltage probes. The described transition occurs for a very narrow range of magnetic field.

In summary, we reported here on the spontaneous creation of discrete breather states in single Josephson plaquettes and Josephson ladders. The excitation of breather states is observed during the transition from the static to the whirling state of the array, resulting from a ramp of an externally applied homogeneous bias current. In another regime, the breather states are created from the resonant uniformly whirling state of the array. The spontaneous creation appears in the presence of an external magnetic field close to half-integer frustration, which leads to large screening currents. The observed behavior may be related to the appearance of symmetry-broken states in two-dimensional Josephson arraysAbraimov et al. (1999). An analysis of the described phenomena could provide more insight in the physical relevance of localized voltage states in Josephson coupled systems.


text:
# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

Tachyon condensation is one of most interesting and important subject in the recent development in string theory. After the connection between the open string tachyon field and unstable D-branes was conjectured by Sen, our understanding of dynamics of D-branes has been greatly deepened. Having looked at this success, many people anticipate that the closed string tachyon field also has clues to non-perturbative dynamics of string theory. Although the role of closed string tachyon condensation in string theory is not as clear as that of open string, several ideas have been proposed. In , relation between instability of fluxbranes and closed string tachyon condensation is discussed. In , it is suggested that condensation of tachyonic twisted modes localized at fixed points of non-supersymmetric orbifolds like $`𝐂/𝐙_n`$ and $`𝐂^2/𝐙_n`$ give rise to deformations of geometries of the background spacetimes. Configurations bringing with localized tachyons are also discussed in many works.

In this paper, we study localized tachyonic modes on a type 0 NS5-brane. Type 0 string theory includes the closed string tachyon field in the bulk. In order to remove the instability associated with it, we compactify one spacelike direction of the background spacetime on $`𝐒^1`$ with a twisted boundary condition for left-moving worldsheet fermions. Because the bulk tachyon field changes its sign under this twist, it becomes massive when the compactification radius is sufficiently small. We will show in this paper that even in such a situation there are localized tachyonic modes on an unwrapped NS5-brane and it decays into a bubble of nothing.

One way to obtain a spectrum of fields localized on an NS5-brane is to analyze fluctuations around a corresponding classical solution of the Einstein equation. In , a type 0 NS5-brane is mapped to a type 0 Kaluza-Klein monopole by using type 0/type 0 T-duality, and a non-chiral spectrum on an NS5-brane is obtained as zero-modes of massless fields in type 0 string theory.

In Section 2 and 3, we adopt a similar way to show the existence of a tachyonic mode on an NS5-brane. Because we assume twisted boundary condition on $`𝐒^1`$ for the bulk tachyon, T-duality maps an unwrapped type 0 NS5-brane into type II string theory with a spacetime geometry similar to a two-centered Kaluza-Klein monopole. We describe it in detail in the next section, and show in Section 3 that it decays with creating a bubble of nothing at the center of the manifold.

In Section 4, we analyze fluctuations of the closed string tachyon field on an NS5-brane classical solution and show that there exist localized tachyonic modes, however small the compactification radius. We will find that its tachyonic mass is of the same order with what obtained in Section 3 and we conjecture that the closed string tachyon condensation on an NS5-brane is responsible for the instability of the geometry.

The last section is devoted for discussions. We mention there about similarity and difference between our geometry and monopole-anti monopole pair creation studied in other works.

## 2 Construction of a composite manifold

In this section we construct a four-dimensional manifold such that $`𝐑^6\times `$ is the T-dual of a unwrapped type 0 NS5-brane by combining two hyper-Kähler manifolds. It is known that there are two smooth four-dimensional hyper-Kähler manifolds with locally $`SU(2)\times U(1)`$ isometry. The word ‘locally’ means that at this point we do not distinguish $`SO(3)`$ and $`SU(2)`$. One of two manifolds is Taub-NUT manifold ($`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}`$) and the other is Eguchi-Hanson manifold ($`𝒩_{\mathrm{EH}}`$). By looking at the global structure of these manifolds, we find that isometry of $`𝒩_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ is $`SO(3)\times U(1)`$ while that of $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}`$ is $`SU(2)\times U(1)`$. Correspondingly, isometry orbits for generic points are topologically $`𝐒^3/𝐙_2`$ for $`𝒩_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ and $`𝐒^3`$ for $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}`$. These four-dimensional manifolds are parameterized by three angular coordinate on $`𝐒^3`$ or $`𝐒^3/𝐙_2`$ and radius $`r`$. We define the coordinate $`r`$ as a geodesic distance from the center of the manifolds. (The “center” means NUT for $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}`$ or bolt for $`𝒩_{\mathrm{EH}}`$.)

In what follows, we construct a “composite manifold” $``$ by pasting the large $`r`$ part of $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}`$ and the small $`r`$ part of $`𝒩_{\mathrm{EH}}`$. In order for two manifolds to join smoothly, the topology of their sections must be the same and the metrics of two manifolds should be appropriately deformed so as to interpolate inside and outside smoothly. To obtain the same topology of the sections of two manifolds, we will use $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}/𝐙_2`$ rather than $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}`$ itself. ($`𝐙_2`$ is the center of the $`SU(2)`$ factor in the isometry group.) Then, both the sections are $`𝐒^3/𝐙_2`$, and these can be represented as an $`𝐒^1`$ fibration over $`𝐒^2`$ (Hopf fibration) with first Chern class $`2`$. Although the orbifold $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}/𝐙_2`$ is singular at its center, it does not matter because we will only use the large $`r`$ part of the manifold.

Each metric of two manifolds $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}/𝐙_2`$ and $`𝒩_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ includes one scale parameter. We denote them by $`a_{\mathrm{TN}}`$ and $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$, respectively. For $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}/𝐙_2`$, $`a_{\mathrm{TN}}`$ represents the radius of $`𝐒^1`$ fiber at $`r=\mathrm{}`$. On the other hand, $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ represents the size of $`𝐒^2`$ at the bolt (the place where $`𝐒^1`$ fiber shrinks to a point) of $`𝒩_{\mathrm{EH}}`$. Let us consider a situation where $`a_{\mathrm{TN}}`$ is much larger than $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$. In this situation, there is an intermediate scale $`a_0`$ satisfying $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}a_0a_{\mathrm{TN}}`$. If we look at the intermediate region $`ra_0`$, both these manifolds are approximately $`𝐑^4/𝐙_2`$. Therefore, we can construct a composite manifold $``$ by combining $`ra_0`$ part of $`𝒩_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ and $`a_0r`$ part of $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}/𝐙_2`$. Of cause we need to deform two manifolds to obtain a smooth manifold. But the deformation becomes smaller as the ratio $`a_{\mathrm{TN}}/a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ becomes larger.

If we start from an orbifold $`𝐑^4/𝐙_2`$ around the intermediate region and extend it to interior $`𝒩_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ or to exterior $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}/𝐙_2`$, we can choose one of two “orientations”. One way to see this is to look at the relation between isometry of the intermediate region and that of the internal or external region. The isometry of $`𝐑^4/𝐙_2`$ is $`SO(3)_R\times SO(3)_L`$. By the extension to the internal or external region, this symmetry is broken to $`SO(3)\times U(1)`$. There are two choices of an unbroken $`SO(3)`$ from $`SO(3)_L\times SO(3)_R`$ and these correspond to two orientations of extension. We refer to an extension as “left-handed” if it preserves $`SO(3)_L`$, and the opposite extension as “right-handed”. Because we have two choices for both internal and external extensions, we obtain four different composite manifolds. However, we are interested only in the relative orientation and there are two essentially different composite manifolds.

Each constituent manifold $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}/𝐙_2`$ or $`𝒩_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ possesses three complex structures $`I^{(a)}`$ ($`a=1,2,3`$) satisfying $`I^{(a)}I^{(b)}=\delta _{ab}+ϵ_{abc}I^{(c)}`$. We call a set of these three complex structures hyper-Kähler structure. It is important to know if it is possible to preserve the hyper-Kähler structure on the composite manifold after an appropriate deformation of the metric. To obtain some information about this problem, let us think of the relation between isometries and hyper-Kähler structures. An important property of the hyper-Kähler structure on $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}/𝐙_2`$ and that on $`𝒩_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ is that the former belongs to $`\mathrm{𝟑}`$ of $`SO(3)`$ isometry while the latter is an $`SO(3)`$ singlet. From this fact, we can make a guess as follows. If a composite manifold consists of two manifolds with the same orientation (left-handed$`+`$left-handed or right-handed$`+`$right-handed), the same $`SO(3)`$ is preserved by the internal and external regions. This means that two parts of the manifold respect different hyper-Kähler structures. Therefore, the entire manifold would not possess any hyper-Kähler structure. We call this manifold $`SO(3)`$-symmetric composite manifold and denote it as $`_{SO(3)}`$. On the other hand, if the orientations of the internal and external parts are opposite (left-handed$`+`$right-handed or right-handed$`+`$left-handed), although the two parts respect the different $`SO(3)`$ isometries, these respect the same hyper-Kähler structure. This strongly suggests the existence of an appropriate deformation of metric preserving a hyper-Kähler structure. Indeed, we can identify this manifold with a two-centered Taub-NUT manifold and the parameter $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ determines the distance between the two centers. We call this manifold hyper-Kähler composite manifold and denote it as $`_{\mathrm{HK}}`$.

We can represent $`_{SO(3)}`$ and $`_{\mathrm{HK}}`$ as $`𝐒^1`$ fibrations on asymptotically flat three-dimensional base manifolds. In the hyper-Kähler case, as we mentioned above, the manifold $`_{\mathrm{HK}}`$ is a two-centered Taub-NUT, and the base manifold is $`𝐑^3`$. For $`SO(3)`$-symmetric manifold $`_{SO(3)}`$, the base manifold is parameterized by two angular coordinates on $`𝐒^2`$ (base manifold of Hopf fibration of $`𝐒^3/𝐙_2`$) and the radius of the $`𝐒^2`$. Because the radius is bounded below by $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$, the base manifold is $`𝐑^3`$ with solid $`𝐒^2`$ with radius $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ omitted. This is a “bubble of nothing”.

Let us consider compactifications of type II string theory on these composite manifolds. As we mentioned above, the composite manifolds $`_{SO(3)}`$ and $`_{\mathrm{HK}}`$ have the same asymptotic form at large $`r`$. They are $`𝐒^1`$-fibrations over flat $`𝐑^3`$. Because the $`𝐒^1`$-cycles are shrinkable in both manifolds, the boundary conditions around the $`𝐒^1`$ for fermions are uniquely determined. We can easily show that it is periodic for $`_{\mathrm{HK}}`$ and anti-periodic for $`_{SO(3)}`$. By the T-duality along the $`𝐒^1`$, these configurations are transformed to $`𝐒^1`$ compactified type II theory ($`_{\mathrm{HK}}`$) and $`𝐒^1`$ compactified type 0 theory ($`_{SO(3)}`$). The central parts of the manifolds are mapped to unwrapped NS5-branes in both cases. A detailed consideration of the relation of compactification radii, string winding numbers and Kaluza-Klein momenta shows that the number of NS5-branes is two for $`_{\mathrm{HK}}`$ and one for $`_{SO(3)}`$. By taking advantage of this duality, we analyze the stability of a type 0 NS5-brane in the next section.

## 3 Gravitational instability

In this section we analyze the stability of the $`SO(3)`$-symmetric composite manifold $`_{SO(3)}`$, which is the T-dual to a type 0 NS5-brane. We keep the parameter $`a_{\mathrm{TN}}`$ fixed as a boundary condition because it represents the radius of the $`𝐒^1`$ fiber at $`r\mathrm{}`$. The other scale parameter $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ is treated as a deformation parameter of the manifold. We assume here that the background geometry is $`𝐑^6\times _{SO(3)}`$, the dilaton is constant, and all the other fields vanish. By taking a certain ansatz for the metric of the composite manifold, and computing Einstein-Hilbert Lagrangian, we can define an effective potential $`V(a_{\mathrm{EH}})`$ and the configuration turns out to be unstable. Therefore, the parameter $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ plays a role of a tachyon field localized near the center of the manifold. Because $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ also represents the radius of a bubble, we conclude that a type 0 NS5-brane decays into a bubble of nothing.

For each value of $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$, we have a pair of $`𝒩_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ and $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}/𝐙_2`$. Thanks to the $`SO(3)\times U(1)`$ isometry, the metrics of both manifolds are written in the following form.

$$ds^2=dr^2+f^2(r)(\sigma _x^2+\sigma _y^2)+g^2(r)\sigma _z^2,$$
(1)
where $`\sigma _x`$, $`\sigma _y`$, and $`\sigma _z`$ are the Maurer-Cartan one-forms on $`SO(3)`$ group manifold defined by

$`\sigma _x`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{cos}\psi d\theta \mathrm{sin}\psi \mathrm{sin}\theta d\varphi ,`$
$`\sigma _y`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{sin}\psi d\theta +\mathrm{cos}\psi \mathrm{sin}\theta d\varphi ,`$
$`\sigma _z`$ $`=`$ $`d\psi \mathrm{cos}\theta d\varphi .`$ (2)
The ranges of angular coordinates are

$$0\theta \pi ,0\varphi 2\pi ,0\psi 2\pi .$$
(3)
In the case of $`SU(2)`$ group manifold, the period of $`\psi `$ is $`4\pi `$. Now this is halved due to the $`𝐙_2`$ orbifolding. One way to determine the functions $`f(r)`$ and $`g(r)`$ for $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}/𝐙_2`$ and $`𝒩_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ is to solve the Einstein equation. However, it is more convenient to use the fact that the spin connection obtained from (1) admits a hyper-Kähler structure. Because hyper-Kähler structures of $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}/𝐙_2`$ and $`𝒩_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ are transformed under $`SO(3)`$ isometry in different ways, first-order differential equations for two manifolds are different.

$$f_{\mathrm{TN}}^{}=1\frac{g_{\mathrm{TN}}}{2f_{\mathrm{TN}}},g_{\mathrm{TN}}^{}=\frac{g_{\mathrm{TN}}^2}{2f_{\mathrm{TN}}^2},f_{\mathrm{EH}}^{}=\frac{g_{\mathrm{EH}}}{2f_{\mathrm{EH}}},g_{\mathrm{EH}}^{}=1\frac{g_{\mathrm{EH}}^2}{2f_{\mathrm{EH}}^2}.$$
(4)
By solving these equations, we obtain the following relations between $`f`$ and $`g`$ for each manifold. (See also Figure 1.)

$$g_{\mathrm{EH}}^2=f_{\mathrm{EH}}^2\left(1\frac{a_{\mathrm{EH}}^4}{f_{\mathrm{EH}}^4}\right),g_{\mathrm{TN}}^2=a_{\mathrm{TN}}^2\frac{\sqrt{1+\frac{4f_{\mathrm{TN}}^2}{a_{\mathrm{TN}}^2}}1}{\sqrt{1+\frac{4f_{\mathrm{TN}}^2}{a_{\mathrm{TN}}^2}}+1}.$$
(5)
Let us concretely give a metric interpolating $`𝒩_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ and $`𝒩_{\mathrm{TN}}/𝐙_2`$. As a simplest choice, we use the following metric which is obtained by simply connecting $`(f_{\mathrm{EH}},g_{\mathrm{EH}})`$ and $`(f_{\mathrm{TN}},g_{\mathrm{TN}})`$.

$`f(r)=f_{\mathrm{EH}}(r),g(r)=g_{\mathrm{EH}}(r)\text{for }0rr_0`$
$`f(r)=f_{\mathrm{TN}}(rr_1+r_0),g(r)=g_{\mathrm{TN}}(rr_1+r_0)\text{for }r_0r,`$ (6)
where $`r_0`$ and $`r_1`$ represent the radial coordinate at the intersection in Figure 1 and are defined by the following junction condition.

$$f_{\mathrm{EH}}(r_0)=f_{\mathrm{TN}}(r_1),g_{\mathrm{EH}}(r_0)=g_{\mathrm{TN}}(r_1).$$
(7)
Because our purpose is to show only the existence of a tachyonic mode, this special choice of the interpolating metric is sufficient. At $`r=r_0`$, $`f^{}`$ and $`g^{}`$ are not continuous and this manifold is singular. Indeed the scalar curvature for the metric (1)

$$R=2\frac{(f^2g)^{\prime \prime }}{f^2g}+\frac{g^3+4f^2g(1+f^2)+8f^3f^{}g^{}}{2f^4g},$$
(8)
diverges at $`r=r_0`$. However, this divergence has a $`\delta `$-function-like form and the Lagrangian

$$L=Nd^4x\sqrt{g}R,$$
(9)
is finite. The overall factor $`N`$ in (9) includes the dilaton factor $`e^{2\varphi }`$ and the five-dimensional spatial integral transverse to $`_{SO(3)}`$. Because the interpolating manifold is Ricchi flat for $`rr_0`$, and the second term in (8) is everywhere finite, only contribution to the Lagrangian comes from the first term in (8) at the singularity $`r=r_0`$ and we obtain

$$V(a_{\mathrm{EH}})=L=16\pi ^2N[(f^2g)^{}]_{r_0ϵ}^{r_0+ϵ}=16\pi ^2N(f(r_0)g(r_0))^2.$$
(10)
In the last step in (10), we used the relations (4). This is clearly non-positive. For large $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$, $`f`$ and $`g`$ at the junction point approach to $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ and $`a_{\mathrm{TN}}`$, respectively (See Figure 1). This implies that the potential is unbounded below. A solution of the junction condition (7) for small $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ is

$$f(r_0)g(r_0)\left(\frac{a_{\mathrm{TN}}^2a_{\mathrm{EH}}^4}{2}\right)^{1/6},f(r_0)g(r_0)\frac{a_{\mathrm{EH}}^2}{\sqrt{2}a_{\mathrm{TN}}}.$$
(11)
Substituting this into the potential (10), we obtain the following potential for small $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$.

$$V(a_{\mathrm{EH}})8\pi ^2N\frac{a_{\mathrm{EH}}^4}{a_{\mathrm{TN}}^2}.$$
(12)
In order to determine the mass of this mode, we need to know the kinetic term of the parameter $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$. Up to a numerical constant, it is determined to be $`L_{\mathrm{kin}}N(_ta_{\mathrm{EH}}^2)^2`$ by a dimensional analysis. Therefore, the potential (12) implies that the unstable mode parameterized by $`a_{\mathrm{EH}}`$ has a tachyonic mass

$$M^2\frac{1}{a_{\mathrm{TN}}^2}.$$
(13)
Although we cannot determine the numerical coefficient in (13) from the potential (12) because of the artificial choice of the metric, we can conclude that there exists at least one unstable mode with the non-vanishing tachyonic mass. Once we know this, the relation (13) is immediately obtained by a dimensional analysis and it is expected that (13) still holds if we carry out more detailed analysis of decay modes.

## 4 Closed string tachyon condensation

In the previous section, we showed in the T-dual picture that a type 0 NS5-brane is unstable and decays to a bubble of nothing. It is natural to ask what is responsible for this instability on the type 0 side.

It is already shown in  that there are localized tachyonic modes on coincident unwrapped NS5-branes in type 0 theory compactified on $`𝐒^1`$. This result is obtained by solving the Klein-Gordon equation for the closed string tachyon field on the background. In , only the small compactification limit is considered and it is shown that the spectrum of the localized tachyonic modes is identical to the spectrum of twisted string modes at an $`𝐀_n`$ type singularity, which is T-dual to the NS5-branes. In the case of single NS5-brane, there is no tachyonic modes and the lightest localized modes are massless in the small radius limit.

The compactification radius $`R`$ in type $`0`$ theory is related to the parameter $`a_{\mathrm{TN}}`$ by the T-duality relation

$$a_{\mathrm{TN}}R=\frac{l_s^2}{2}.$$
(14)
Let us generalize the analysis of tachyonic modes on NS5-branes given in  to the case of $`R0`$. The metric of NS5-brane solution is

$$ds^2=\underset{i,j=0}{\overset{5}{}}\eta _{ij}dx^idx^j+H(dy^2+dr^2+r^2d\mathrm{\Omega }_2^2),e^{2\varphi }=\text{const}\times H,$$
(15)
where $`y`$ is compactified on $`𝐒^1`$ as $`yy+2\pi `$. Because we assume that the compactification radius is very small, we can use a smeared solution. For coincident NS5-branes with the total charge $`Q`$, the harmonic function $`H`$ is given by

$$H=R^2+\frac{l_s^2Q}{2r}.$$
(16)
The free part of the action of the closed string tachyon field is

$$S_{\mathrm{tachyon}}=d^{10}x\frac{\sqrt{g}}{2e^{2\varphi }}\left[(_\mu T)^2+M_T^2T^2\right].$$
(17)
Let us factorize the wave function of the tachyon field as

$$T=\psi (r,\theta ,\varphi )\mathrm{exp}i(k_yy+\underset{i=0}{\overset{5}{}}k_ix^i).$$
(18)
The Klein-Gordon equation for the tachyon field on the NS5-brane solution (15) is

$$\mathrm{\Delta }_3\psi (M_6^2M_T^2)H\psi =k_y^2\psi ,$$
(19)
where $`M_6^2=_{i,j=0}^5\eta _{ij}k^ik^j`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }_3`$ is the Laplacian on $`𝐑^3`$ with the metric $`ds^2=dr^2+r^2d\mathrm{\Omega }_2^2`$. Because of the twisted boundary condition, $`k_y`$ is quantized to be half odd integer. The Schrödinger equation has the same form with that for an electron in a hydrogen atom and is solved as

$`l_s^2M_6^2`$ $`=`$ $`2+4n\left[\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{k_y^2}{Q^2}}+\left({\displaystyle \frac{2nR^2}{Q^2l_s^2}}\right)^2}{\displaystyle \frac{2nR^2}{Q^2l_s^2}}\right]`$ (20)
$`=`$ $`2+{\displaystyle \frac{4n|k_y|}{Q}}{\displaystyle \frac{8n^2R^2}{Q^2l_s^2}}+𝒪\left({\displaystyle \frac{R^4}{l_s^4}}\right),`$
where we used $`M_T^2=2/l_s^2`$. The multiplicity of states is $`n^2`$ for each $`k𝐙+1/2`$ and $`n=1,2,3,\mathrm{}`$. In the case of single NS5-brane ($`Q=1`$), the mass of the lightest states $`(k,n)=(\pm 1/2,1)`$ is given by

$$M^2=\frac{8R^2}{l_s^4}+\frac{1}{l_s^2}𝒪\left(\frac{R^4}{l_s^4}\right)=\frac{2}{a_{\mathrm{TN}}^2}+\frac{1}{a_{\mathrm{TN}}^2}𝒪\left(\frac{l_s^2}{a_{\mathrm{TN}}^2}\right).$$
(21)
Thus, there are two localized tachyonic modes in the NS5-brane background (15). The tachyonic mass approaches to zero as $`Ra_{\mathrm{TN}}`$ decreases and is of the same order with (13). This strongly suggests that on the type 0 side what is responsible for the instability of an NS5-brane is the localized modes of the closed string tachyon field.

## 5 Discussions

In this paper, we analyzed an instability of type 0 NS5-branes in two ways. By analyzing the Kaluza-Klein monopole like geometry, which is T-dual to a type 0 NS5-brane, we obtained a tachyonic mass of a decay mode proportional to inverse square of the compactification radius $`a_{\mathrm{TN}}`$. This coincides up to a numerical coefficient with the result of the analysis of the closed string tachyon field on the NS5-brane classical solution.

In our analysis, to simplify the calculation, we used the metric determined by hand. Although it was sufficient to show the existence of at least one tachyonic mode, we need more careful treatment of fluctuation modes to determine the number of tachyonic modes and the numerical proportional constant in (13), and to compare it to the tachyonic mass (21) of the closed string modes on the NS5-brane background. For this purpose, technique developed for instanton calculus may be useful.

The geometry of $`_{SO(3)}`$ is quite similar to a monopole-anti monopole geometry studied in  and used for describing an instability of fluxbranes in . In  it is shown that four-dimensional Euclidean Schwarzschild black hole, which describes semi-classical instability of a Kaluza-Klein vacuum, is equivalent to a monopole-anti monopole pair in the Kaluza-Klein theory. This can be shown as follows. The isometry of four-dimensional Euclidean Schwarzschild black hole is $`SO(3)\times U(1)`$, which is identical to that of $`_{SO(3)}`$. If we define $`𝐒^1`$ fiber as orbits of the $`U(1)`$ factor of the isometry, the base manifold is $`𝐑^3`$ with a solid $`𝐒^2`$ omitted. This is completely the same situation with $`_{SO(3)}`$. On the other hand, if we use a diagonal $`U(1)`$ of the $`U(1)`$ factor of the isometry and a $`U(1)`$ subgroup of the $`SO(3)`$ factor, we obtain $`𝐒^1`$-bundle over $`𝐑^3`$ with two NUT singularities. The NUT charges for two singularities have opposite signs. Therefore, we can regard the geometry as a monopole-anti monopole pair. When we show that the charges have opposite signs, it is crucial that the black hole geometry has vanishing first Chern class when it is represented as an $`𝐑^2`$-bundle over $`𝐒^2`$. For $`_{SO(3)}`$, it is not the case. In order to represent $`_{SO(3)}`$ as a system of Kaluza-Klein monopoles, we use a $`U(1)`$ subgroup of $`SO(3)`$. There are two fixed points under the $`U(1)`$ and we obtain $`𝐒^1`$ fibration over $`𝐑^3`$ with two NUT singularities again. However, at this time, the NUT charges of two singularities are both $`+1`$. Therefore, the geometry is identified with a system of two monopoles. The expansion of the bubble may be understood as a repulsion of these two monopoles.

## Acknowledgements

I would like to thank H. Takayanagi and T. Takayanagi for helpful discussions. This research is supported in part by Grant-in-Aid for the Encouragement of Young Scientists (#15740140) from the Japan Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, and by Rikkyo University Special Fund for Research.


text:
# Particle acceleration in supernova remnants, the Bell-Lucek hypothesis and the cosmic ray “knee”.

## 1 Introduction

Bell & Lucek (2001) and Lucek & Bell (2000) have presented numerical simulations suggesting that the conventional process of particle acceleration in shocks, generally called diffusive shock acceleration, may also result in substantial amplification of the highly tangled magnetic field around the shock. The unusual strong magnetic field inferred in Cas A (e.g. Vink & Laming 2003) seems to confirm this prediction. We note in passing that this hypothesis provides a concrete physical mechanism for one of the many ideas of the late F Hoyle who speculated (Hoyle 1960) that strong interstellar shocks might convert mechanical energy into roughly equal amounts of magnetic field energy, cosmic ray energy and thermal energy. It is also closely related to the “plastic deformation” of the magnetic field discussed qualitatively by Völk and McKenzie (1981). Bell & Lucek (2001) suggest that this may enable strong supernova driven shocks in the interstellar medium to accelerate protons to energies well beyond what are conventionally held to be the maximum realistically attainable energies of a few times $`10^{14}\mathrm{eV}`$ (e.g. Lagage and Cesarsky, 1983).

The Bell-Lucek hypothesis is of great interest because it is one of the few suggestions as to how the cosmic ray particles of energies at and above the “knee”, located at a few times $`10^{15}\mathrm{eV}`$, could be made in the Galaxy. It is therefore important to determine what the expected form of the source energy spectrum would be and whether the slight break in the observed spectrum at the “knee” can be accounted for in this way. There are also interesting implications for gamma ray observations of SNRs with the next generation of imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes such as HESS. For an initial examination of this problem the so-called “box” models of particle acceleration (Drury et al. 1999) offer enough accuracy and have the great advantage of computational simplicity.

## 2 The Bell-Lucek hypothesis

Bell & Lucek point out that in the conventional diffusive shock acceleration picture the energy density in the accelerated particles at and near the shock front is extremely large, of order the total ram pressure of the incoming plasma, and thus much larger than the energy density of the magnetic field (the ratio of particle energy to field energy is of order the square of the shock Alfven Mach number). The standard treatment of resonant wave excitation, in which the perturbations of the field are treated as Alfven waves to lowest order and the interaction with the particles as a small perturbation, is thus very questionable. With the support of numerical simulations and simplified analytic models they suggest that in reality the field can be highly distorted by the particle pressure and wound up to the point where approximate equipartition holds.

If this amplified and distorted field is then used to estimate the particle diffusion in the shock neighbourhood, acceleration to substantially higher energies than in the conventional picture is obviously possible. Detailed estimates and simple dimensional analysis agree that the maximum particle rigidity is given, to order of magnitude, by the product of the field strength $`B`$, the shock radius $`R`$ and the shock velocity $`U`$. Thus, other things being equal, the increase is directly proportional to the increase in the field strength, which by the above argument is of order the Alfven Mach number of the shock $`_{\mathrm{sh}}`$. This can easily be $`_{\mathrm{sh}}10^3`$ for a young supernova remnant so that the effect is potentially very significant; acceleration to rigidities of a few $`10^{17}\mathrm{V}`$, rather than the $`10^{14}\mathrm{V}`$ normally estimated, is easily possible.

Ptuskin and Zirakashvili (2003) have performed a sophisticated analysis of the combined effects of field amplification and wave damping on particle acceleration in supernova remnants and conclude that indeed the upper cut-off to the accelerated spectrum can be quite strongly time-dependent. Our aim in this short paper is to carry out a first exploratory analysis of the effect this has on the overall spectrum and we therefore use the simple approach of assuming an equipartition field although this is clearly a rather crude approximation.

## 3 The “box” model

To get a first estimate of the effect of such a dynamically generated field on the acceleration we turn to the simplest treatment of shock acceleration, the so-called “box” model. In this the accelerated particles are assumed to be more or less uniformly distributed throughout a region extending one diffusion length each side of the shock, and to be accelerated upwards in momentum space at the shock itself with an acceleration flux

$$\mathrm{\Phi }(p)=\frac{4\pi }{3}p^3f(p)\left(U_1U_2\right),$$
(1)
per unit surface area where $`U_1`$ and $`U_2`$ are the upstream and downstream velocity and $`f(p)`$ is the phase space density of the accelerated particles (assumed to have an almost isotropic distribution). If the diffusion length upstream is $`L_1`$, and that downstream is $`L_2`$, then

$$L_1\frac{\kappa _1(p)}{U_1},L_2\frac{\kappa _2(p)}{U_2},$$
(2)
where $`\kappa _1`$ and $`\kappa _2`$ are the upstream and downstream diffusion coefficients. To a first approximation we assume that both $`L_1`$ and $`L_2`$ are small relative to the radius of the shock and that we can neglect effects of spherical geometry (in fact it is not too difficult to develop a spherical box model, but it unnecessarily complicates the argument) so that the box volume is simply $`A(L_1+L_2)`$ where $`A`$ is the surface area of the shock. The basic “box” model equation is then simply a conservation equation for the particles in the box; the rate at which the number in the box changes is given by the divergence of the acceleration flux in momentum space plus gains from injection and advection and minus advective losses to the downstream region.

$`{\displaystyle \frac{}{t}}\left[A(L_1+L_2)4\pi p^2f(p)\right]`$ $`+`$ $`A{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Phi }}{p}}=AQ(p)`$ (3)
$`+`$ $`AF_1(p)AF_2(p),`$
where $`Q(p)`$ is a source function representing injection at the shock (only important at very low energies), $`F_1`$ is a flux function representing advection of pre-existing particles into the system from upstream (normally neglected) and $`F_2`$ is the flux of particles advected out of the system and carried away downstream. The only complication we have to consider is that the box is time-dependent, with flow speeds, shock area and diffusion lengths all changing.

The escaping flux is determined simply by the advection across the downstream edge of the box, that is

$$F_2(p)=4\pi p^2f(p)\left(U_2\frac{L_2}{t}\right),$$
(4)
where we have to explicitly allow for the time varying size of the downstream region. Substituting this expression for $`F_2(p)`$ and neglecting the advection of prexisting particles (the $`F_1(p)`$ term) the box equation simplifies to:

$`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{A}}{\displaystyle \frac{A}{t}}\left(L_1+L_2\right)f`$ $`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{L_1}{t}}f+\left(L_1+L_2\right){\displaystyle \frac{f}{t}}+U_1f`$ (5)
$`+`$ $`\left(U_1U_2\right){\displaystyle \frac{p}{3}}{\displaystyle \frac{f}{p}}={\displaystyle \frac{Q}{4\pi p^2}}.`$
## 4 Incorporating the Bell-Lucek effect in the “box” models

Partial differential quations of this form always reduce, by the method of characteristics, to the integration of two ordinary equations, one for the characteristic curve in the $`(p,t)`$ plane

$$\frac{\mathrm{d}p}{\mathrm{d}t}=\frac{U_1U_2}{L_1+L_2}\frac{p}{3},$$
(6)
and one for the variation of $`f`$ along this curve

$`\left(L_1+L_2\right){\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{d}f}{\mathrm{d}t}}`$ $`+`$ $`f\left[\left(L_1+L_2\right){\displaystyle \frac{1}{A}}{\displaystyle \frac{A}{t}}+{\displaystyle \frac{L_1}{t}}+U_1\right]`$ (7)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{Q}{4\pi p^2}}.`$
Apart from at the injection momentum $`Q=0`$ and we can write the above equation as

$$\frac{\mathrm{d}\mathrm{ln}f}{\mathrm{d}t}=\frac{1}{A}\frac{A}{t}\frac{1}{L_1+L_2}\frac{L_1}{t}\frac{U_1}{L_1+L_2}.$$
(8)
But the shock area $`A`$ is a function only of time so that

$$\frac{A}{t}=\frac{\mathrm{d}A}{\mathrm{d}t},$$
(9)
and, although the upstream diffusion length does depend on both time and momentum, if we assume Bohm scaling for the two lengths so that

$$L\frac{\kappa }{U}\frac{pv}{UB},$$
(10)
(where $`v`$ is the particle velocity) we can write

$$\frac{1}{L_1+L_2}\frac{L_1}{t}=\vartheta \frac{\mathrm{d}\mathrm{ln}(U_1B_1)}{\mathrm{d}t},$$
(11)
where

$$\vartheta =\frac{L_1}{L_1+L_2},$$
(12)
(obviously $`0<\vartheta <1`$). Finally, noting that

$$\frac{U_1}{L_1+L_2}=\frac{3U_1}{U_1U_2}\frac{\mathrm{d}\mathrm{ln}p}{\mathrm{d}t},$$
(13)
and assuming that the shock remains strong, which yields a fixed compression ratio, we can simplify equation (8) to

$$\frac{\mathrm{d}\mathrm{ln}f}{\mathrm{d}t}=\frac{\mathrm{d}\mathrm{ln}A}{\mathrm{d}t}+\vartheta \frac{\mathrm{d}\mathrm{ln}(U_1B_1)}{\mathrm{d}t}\frac{3U_1}{U_1U_2}\frac{\mathrm{d}\mathrm{ln}p}{\mathrm{d}t},$$
(14)
which integrates trivially to relate the value of $`f`$ at the end of one of the characteristic curves, say at the point $`(p_1,t_1)`$, to the value at the start, say at $`(t_0,p_0)`$, as follows;

$$\frac{f(t_1,p_1)}{f(t_0,p_0)}=\left(\frac{A(t_1)}{A(t_0)}\right)^1\left(\frac{U_1(t_1)B_1(t_1)}{U_1(t_0)B_1(t_0)}\right)^\vartheta \left(\frac{p_1}{p_0}\right)^s$$
(15)
where

$$s=\frac{3U_1}{U_1U_2}$$
(16)
is the standard exponent of the steady-state power-law spectrum associated with shock acceleration.

This rather beautiful result shows how the standard test particle power-law is modified by a combination of effects as the box volume changes. As one would expect the amplitude varies inversely as the shock area and also decreases if the upstream diffusion length (at fixed energy) increases, but with an exponent between zero and one determined by the ratio of the upstream diffusion length to the total width of the diffusion region. It is very interesting that the result is not simply a variation inversely as the box volume, which one would naively expect from geometrical dilution. This reflects the fundamental asymmetry between the upstream and downstream regions, that upstream is empty outside the diffusion region whereas the entire downstream region is filled with accelerated particles.

If we assume pure Bohm scaling the other diffential equation is also integrable so that the problem is reduced entirely to quadratures (of course only within the various approximations we are making; but still a remarkable result). Bohm scaling implies that the mean free path is of order and proportional to the particle gyroradius, so that if the particle charge is $`e`$

$$L_1+L_2\alpha \frac{pv}{3eB_1U_1},$$
(17)
where $`\alpha `$ is a dimensionless parameter (probably of order ten). Substituting in the equation of the characteristic (equation (6))we get

$$v\frac{\mathrm{d}p}{\mathrm{d}t}=\frac{1}{\alpha }\left(U_1U_2\right)U_1eB_1,$$
(18)
and noting the relativistic identity between kinetic energy $`T`$, momentum $`p`$ and velocity $`v`$,

$$v=\frac{\mathrm{d}T}{\mathrm{d}p},$$
(19)
we can integrate this as

$$T_1T_0=\frac{e}{\alpha }_{t_0}^{t_1}\left(U_1U_2\right)U_1B_1𝑑t.$$
(20)
For relativistic particles the kinetic energy and the momentum are essentially interchangeable with $`T=c\sqrt{p^2+m^2c^2}mc^2cp`$.

These two integrals (equations (15)& (20)) together reduce the problem of calculating the final spectrum to that of determining the initial amplitude $`f(t_0,p_0)`$ which in turn depends on the injection rate and its time dependence.

## 5 The injection rate

There are two main approaches to the injection rate. The simplest, which is perhaps more consistent with the test particle approach, is to simply parametrise it by assuming that some fraction of the incoming thermal particles are “injected” as non-thermal particles at some suitably chosen “injection momentum” which separates the thermal particle population from the non-thermal. In other words one writes

$$Q(p,t)=\eta (t)n_1U_1\delta (pp_{\mathrm{inj}}(t)),$$
(21)
where $`n_1`$ is the upstream thermal particle number density, $`\eta 1`$ is the injection fraction, $`p_{\mathrm{inj}}`$ is the injection momentum and as usual $`\delta `$ is Dirac’s delta distribution. It should be clear that this is a parametrisation rather than a true injection model, however it, or equivalent parametrisations, have been very widely used, typically with $`\eta `$ taken to be a constant of order $`10^5`$ to $`10^4`$ for protons and $`p_{\mathrm{inj}}10m_pU_1`$ where $`m_p`$ is the proton mass. However there is no real justification for this apart from the fact that it seems to yield reasonable results in many cases.

With the above parametrisation the distribution function just above the injection energy can be simply determined by equating the acceleration flux to the injection flux,

$$\frac{4\pi p_{\mathrm{inj}}^3}{3}\left(U_1U_2\right)f(p_{\mathrm{inj}})=\eta n_1U_1,$$
(22)
giving

$$f(p_{\mathrm{inj}})=\frac{3}{4\pi p_{\mathrm{inj}}^3}\frac{U_1}{U_1U_2}n_1\eta .$$
(23)
The second approach adopts the idea, which can be traced back to the early work of Eichler, that the injection process is inherently extremely efficient but that various feedback processes operate to reduce it to the point where the accelerated particles carry a significant part of the energy dissipated in the shock. Probably the most sophisticated modern version of this idea is to be found in the papers by Malkov (eg Malkov 1998, Malkov et al 2000; see also Kang et al 2002). This, or something similar, is in fact required for the Bell-Lucek hypothesis to operate because it requires the accelerated particle energy density to be substantial and of order the ram pressure of the upstream flow. For a standard spectrum close to $`p^4`$ the energy is almost uniformly distributed per logarithmic interval over the relativistic part of the spectrum. This suggests taking a reference momentum in the mildly relativistic region, $`p_0mc`$, and determining $`f`$ by a relation of the form

$$\frac{4\pi p_0^3}{3}f(p_0)mc^2\beta \rho U_1\left(U_1U_2\right)$$
(24)
where $`\beta `$ is a number which depends logarithmically on the upper cut-off and which for supernova remnants is probably somewhere between $`10^1`$ and $`10^2`$.

It is important to note that both injection models are models for proton injection, the protons being the dynamically dominant species. Unfortunately very little is known about the factors controlling the injection of electrons and other minor species despite their importance for diagnostic tests. It is also very probable that the injection is nonuniform over the shock surface with a strong dependence on the angle between the mean background field and the shock normal (Völk et al, 2003).

## 6 Application to the Sedov solution

Let us now apply these ideas to the Sedov solution (also studied by Taylor and von Neumann) for a strong spherical explosion in a cold gas where the shock radius expands as $`Rt^{2/5}`$ and the shock velocity decreases as $`Ut^{3/5}`$. On the Bell-Lucek hypothesis the magnetic field also scales as the shock velocity, $`Bt^{3/5}`$ and thus the characteristic acceleration curves (equation(20)) are given by

$`T_1T_0`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle _{t_0}^{t_1}}(U_1U_2)U_1B𝑑t`$ (25)
$``$ $`{\displaystyle _{t_0}^{t_1}}t^{9/5}𝑑t`$
$``$ $`t_0^{4/5}t_1^{4/5}.`$
These curves, illustrated schematically in Fig. 1, all rise extremely steeply, representing an initial phase of rapid acceleration, turn over and then become asymptotically flat. Physically it is clear that, as the shock slows and the field drops, the high energy particles cease to be significantly accelerated and simply diffuse further and further in front of the shock. In fact in reality they should probably be thought of as decoupling from the shock and forming part of the general interstellar population at this point, but within the box model they simply fill a steadily growing upstream region. We will return to this point later.

A very important aspect of the curves is that they uniquely relate final energies (or equivalently momenta) to starting times. Asymptotically the relation is a simple power-law; for $`T_1T_0`$ and $`t_0t_1`$ we have simply

$$p_1T_1t_0^{4/5},t_0p_1^{5/4}.$$
(26)
Using this we can now translate the dilution factors from equation (15) to additional power-law terms in the final momentum. Explicitly, a given final momentum maps to a starting radius using a Sedov expansion-law:

$$R(t_0)t_0^{2/5}p_1^{1/2},$$
(27)
and thus the first term on the RHS of equation (15) translates to a $`p_1^1`$ factor:

$$\left(\frac{A(t_1)}{A(t_0)}\right)^1p_1^1.$$
(28)
The final momentum can also be mapped to a starting velocity, using again a Sedov expansion-law:

$$U(t_0)t_0^{3/5}p_1^{3/4}.$$
(29)
The magnetic field, which on the Bell-Lucek hypothesis scales as velocity, gives an additional $`p_1^{3/4}`$ factor, thus the second term on the RHS of equation (15) scales as:

$$\left(\frac{U_1(t_1)B_1(t_1)}{U_1(t_0)B_1(t_0)}\right)^\vartheta p_1^{3\vartheta /2}$$
(30)
Furthermore we need to determine the initial amplitude of $`f`$ from an injection model. First we use the $`\eta `$ parametrisation as discussed in section 5:

$$p_{\mathrm{inj}}=p_0U(t_0)p_1^{3/4},$$
(31)
together with

$$f_0\eta np_0^3.$$
(32)
Finally assuming a strong shock which, using the Rankine-Hugoniot conditions for a non-relativistic fluid, yields $`U_1/U_2=4`$ and $`3U_1/(U_1U_2)=4`$ and substituting the equations (28), (30), (31) and (32) into equation (15) one obtains a scaling-law for the particle distribution $`f(p_1)`$ at a fixed time $`t_1`$:

$`f(p_1)`$ $``$ $`\eta n_0p_0^3A(t_0)\left[U_1(t_0)B_1(t_0)\right]^\vartheta \left({\displaystyle \frac{p_1}{p_0}}\right)^4`$ (33)
$``$ $`\eta p_1^{3/4}p_1^1p_1^{3\vartheta /2}p_1^4.`$
If $`\eta `$ is constant, the slope is steepened from the canonical value of $`4`$ to

$$4.25+\frac{3\vartheta }{2}.$$
(34)
If we use the alternative “equipartition” argument as an injection model, meaning that $`f_0`$ should be dynamically determined in the mildly relativistic region, we have $`p_0mc`$ independent of $`p_1`$ and

$$f(p_0)U_1^2r^3p_1^{3/2},$$
(35)
which gives the following scaling-law for the particle distribution:

$$f(p_1)p_1^{3/2}p_1^1p_1^{3\vartheta /2}p_1^4.$$
(36)
In this approach the slope is given by

$$4+\frac{3\vartheta 1}{2}.$$
(37)
It is interesting that because of the strong injection at early times this model can even, if $`\vartheta <1/3`$, lead to a slight flattening of the spectrum. However, especially at high energies, it is unlikely that the upstream diffusion region could be so small and a modest steepening of the spectrum is more likely.

These results refer of course only to the asymptotic behaviour of the high energy part of the spectrum. As $`p_1`$ is decreased there comes a point where $`t_0`$ is no longer small relative to $`t_1`$. At this point all values of the final momentum map down to a small approximately constant region and the spectrum becomes simply the standard $`p^4`$ spectrum. This break occurs at the point to which efficient acceleration is possible at that stage in the remnant evolution, and decreases as the the remnant ages. Shock acceleration will terminate when the shock is beginning to weaken and the amplified field is only a few times the ambient field, which for ambient fields of a few $`\mu `$Gauss and typical SNR parameters places the break exactly in the “knee” region.

Figure 2 shows an example of the total spectrum for a Sedov-like shock, which was obtained by using equation (15).The injection mechanism for this example was taken according to the equations (22) and (23) and $`\vartheta =0.9`$. The spectrum clearly shows the smooth transition from the standard $`p^4`$ spectrum to the asymptotic spectral index given by equation (34).

## 7 Conlcusions

We have applied the Bell-Lucek hypothesis to a Sedov-like shock, using a simplified Box model. We showed that such a model exhibits a spectral break at an energy determined by the current acceleration cut-off below which one observes the standard shock acceleration spectrum, but above which a slightly different power-law continues to higher energies. For older remnants the break is expected to be in the “knee” region at rigidities of order $`10^{15}\mathrm{V}`$. The key point is that the dynamical field amplification both increases the maximum attainable energy and makes it a relatively strongly time-dependent quantity unlike the situation with no field amplification where, as is well known, there is only a very weak dependence of the cut-off energy on the remnant age, at least during the Sedov phase (the much more sophisticated analysis by Ptuskin and Zirakashvili, 2003, is relevant here).

While the spectrum at the shock is the more relevant quantity from the point of view of gamma-ray tests, in the context of cosmic ray propagation theory what one would really like is the effective source spectrum of an individual supernova integrated over its history. This, while obviously related to the spectrum discussed here, is a somewhat different quantity and harder to evaluate. However it is clear that here also one should expect a broken power-law with a relatively small break in the exponent at a rigidity corresponding to acceleration in a mildly amplified Galactic field.

Obviously further and more detailed work is needed, but it is very encouraging that even such a simple model can produce spectra remarkably close to the inferred cosmic ray source spectrum through the “knee” region. In fact we are not aware of any other acceleration model that can naturally produce a break of the right magnitude (about 0.5 in the exponent) at the right position (modulo major uncertainties in interstellar propagation at these energies of course).


text:
# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

Recently it has been shown experimentally that the quantum Hall (QH) phenomena can also appear in anisotropic systems. Indeed, large transport anisotropies at half fillings $`\nu =\frac{9}{2},\frac{11}{2},\mathrm{}`$ in high-quality two-dimensional electron gases (2DEG) in GaAs  are seen. The central observation is that the resistivity becomes strongly anisotropic close to half filling of the topmost Landau level. From a theoretical point of view, it is argued to be a signature of a novel Coulomb-induced charge-density-wave ground state whose existence had been predicted by Fogler et al.  and by Moessner and Chalker .

The aim of the present paper is to study the anisotropic effect in the QH systems by means of the matrix-model language. This can be done by extending Susskind–Polychronakos’s (SP) idea to coupled harmonic oscillators. In the SP approach it has been suggested to replace the classical configuration space of $`N`$ electrons by a space of two $`N\times N`$ hermitian matrices and the time component of the vector potential by a hermitian matrix. The confining potential plays an important rule, since it defines the Hamiltonian of the theory. Mainly, we are interested to investigate the Laughlin liquid by considering a confining potential that is not of parabolic type.

We develop an appropriate anisotropic model that generalizes the SP approach and investigate the basic features of these QH fluids. Making use of a unitary transformation, we end up with a diagonalized system that allows us to define creation and annihilation matrix operators. Calculating the area of the QH droplet of matrix variables, we obtain a filling factor $`\nu _{\mathrm{anis}}`$, which depends on an anisotropy parameter $`a(B)`$, thus generalizing the isotropic (Polychronakos) factor $`\nu _\mathrm{p}`$. We show that $`\nu _{\mathrm{anis}}`$ can be tuned to describe some special anisotropic filling factors, i.e. $`\frac{9}{2}`$ and $`\frac{11}{2}`$. We build up the ground state of our model as well as its excitations in terms of two different representations, those corresponding to variables before and after a suitable transformation.

In section 2, we define our model by considering an action, which involves a confining potential that is not of parabolic type. Rotating the system by an angle $`\phi =\frac{\pi }{2}`$, we define its new action and determine the Gauss law constraint as well as the equations of motion. Their solutions will be given and these will be used to find the corresponding solutions before the transformation in section 3. We study our model quantum mechanically by deriving the Hamiltonian and constructing a set of operators that lead to its quantization in section 4. Section 5 is devoted to building up the corresponding ground state as well as its excitations and determining the filling factor. Finally we close by emphasizing that under some conditions our ground state can be visualized similarly to the Laughlin states with $`\nu _\mathrm{p}=\frac{1}{k+1}`$.

## 2 Coupled matrix model

We start by recalling that Susskind  recently proposed an infinite non-commutative Chern-Simons matrix model for describing the Laughlin liquid . Subsequently, Polychronakos  suggested a regularized version of the Susskind model by introducing a bosonic field $`\psi `$ that is a boundary term. Basically it is a finite non-commutative Chern-Simons matrix model and allows us to reproduce the basic features of the Laughlin theory, i.e. the quantization at the filling factor

$$\nu _\mathrm{p}=\frac{1}{k+1}.$$
(1)
The level $`k`$ of the Chern-Simons term is identified with $`B\theta `$ by correspondence between the gauge fields and the matrix variables at a large number $`N`$ of particles. $`B`$ and $`\theta `$ are, respectively, magnetic field and non-commutativity parameter.

In what follows, we investigate the anisotropic effect in the QH systems by building up the ground state and determining its filling factor. This can be done by generalizing the SP action to the new action

$$S=\frac{B}{2}𝑑t\mathrm{Tr}\underset{a,b=1}{\overset{2}{}}\left\{ϵ^{ab}\left(\dot{X}_a+i[A_0,X_a]\right)X_b+2\theta A_0\omega X_a^2\right\}+\mu X_1X_2+\psi ^{}\left(i\dot{\psi }A_0\psi \right)$$
(2)
where $`A_0`$, $`X_1`$ and $`X_2`$ are classical hermitian-matrix-valued variables, $`ϵ^{ab}`$ is the fully antisymmetric tensor; $`\mathrm{Tr}`$ and $`[,]`$ denote operations in matrix space. $`\mu `$ is playing the role of a coupling parameter between two sectors parameterized by $`X_1`$ and $`X_2`$. We note that (2) is an extension of two coupled harmonic oscillators into matrix-model language. It is clear that by switching off $`\mu `$, we recover the SP model. This suggests that we are going to study a QH system of particles confined in an anisotropic potential

$$V(X_1,X_2)=\omega \left(X_1^2+X_2^2\right)+\mu X_1X_2$$
(3)
instead of a parabolic confinement with single frequency $`\omega `$.

As far as the action $`S`$ is concerned, the full symmetry is the gauge group $`U(N)`$. The matrix-model variables transform under this invariance as

$$X_aUX_aU^1,\psi U\psi .$$
(4)
The gauge field $`A_0`$ ensures the gauge invariance of the action, its equation of motion being the Gauss law constraint

$$𝒢[X_1,X_2]i\theta \left(\mathrm{𝟏}\frac{1}{B\theta }\psi \psi ^{}\right)=0$$
(5)
representing the non-commutative aspects of the theory. The equations of motion for the variables $`X_1`$ and $`X_2`$ are different from the isotropic model. We find

$$\dot{X}_1\omega X_2+\frac{\mu }{B}X_1=0,\dot{X}_2+\omega X_1\frac{\mu }{B}X_2=0$$
(6)
where the main difference with respect to the parabolic case is the presence of the third term in both equations. These will be solved in the next section after introducing a unitary transformation. Essentially, their solutions will determine the nature of the classical motion in the system.

## 3 Rotation into the principal-axis system

As (2) involves an interacting term, for a straightforward investigation of the basic features of the system we use an appropriate transformation. This can be done by defining new variables

$$Y_a=N_{ab}X_b$$
(7)
where the matrix

$$\begin{array}{c}(N_{ab})=\left(\begin{array}{cc}\mathrm{cos}\frac{\phi }{2}& \mathrm{sin}\frac{\phi }{2}\\ \mathrm{sin}\frac{\phi }{2}& \mathrm{cos}\frac{\phi }{2}\end{array}\right)\hfill \end{array}$$
(8)
is the unitary rotation of the elliptic system (3) into its principal-axis set with the mixing angle $`\phi `$. Clearly, $`\phi `$ should satisfy the constraint

$$\phi =\pi (n+1/2)$$
(9)
with $`n`$ an integer. Without loss of generality we fix $`n=0`$. In this case, $`S`$ transforms as

$$S^{}=\frac{B}{2}𝑑t\mathrm{Tr}\underset{a,b=1}{\overset{2}{}}\left\{ϵ^{ab}\left(\dot{Y}_a+i[A_0,Y_a]\right)Y_b+2\theta A_0\omega _aY_a^2\right\}+\psi ^{}\left(i\dot{\psi }A_0\psi \right)$$
(10)
where the frequencies $`\omega _1`$ and $`\omega _2`$ are

$$\omega _1=\omega +\frac{\mu }{B},\omega _2=\omega \frac{\mu }{B}.$$
(11)
Obviously $`S^{}`$ is also invariant under the gauge group $`U(N)`$ and the matrix-model variables transform as (4). The equations of motion of different matrix-model variables can be derived in the usual way. It is easily seen that for $`A_0`$, we get a Gauss law constraint analogous to (5)

$$𝒢^{}[Y_1,Y_2]i\theta \left(\mathrm{𝟏}\frac{1}{B\theta }\psi \psi ^{}\right)=0$$
(12)
where its trace part is given by

$$\psi ^{}\psi =NB\theta .$$
(13)
For the variables $`Y`$ we obtain

$$\dot{Y}_1+\frac{\omega _2}{B}Y_2=0,\dot{Y}_2\frac{\omega _1}{B}Y_1=0,$$
(14)
similar to those derived by Polychronakos , but involving different frequencies $`\omega _1`$ and $`\omega _2`$. Their solutions can be written as

$$Y_1=\frac{1}{2a}\left(Ce^{i\mathrm{\Omega }t}+C^{}e^{i\mathrm{\Omega }t}\right),Y_2=\frac{i}{2}a\left(Ce^{i\mathrm{\Omega }t}C^{}e^{i\mathrm{\Omega }t}\right)$$
(15)
where the frequency is $`\mathrm{\Omega }=\left(\omega _1\omega _2\right)^{\frac{1}{2}}`$ and $`a(B)>0`$ is fixed to be

$$a(B)=\left(\frac{B\omega +\mu }{B\omega \mu }\right)^{\frac{1}{4}}.$$
(16)
We call it anisotropy parameter and note that $`B\omega >\mu `$ must be chosen. In Figure $`1`$, we show how $`a(B)`$ depends on $`B`$ for some choices of $`\omega `$ and $`\mu `$. The $`N\times N`$ matrices $`C`$, $`C^{}`$ appearing in the above equations are defined by

$$C=aY_1+\frac{i}{a}Y_2,C^{}=aY_1\frac{i}{a}Y_2.$$
(17)
The equation of motion for the bosonic field, $`(\dot{\psi }=0)`$, can be solved to get

$$\psi =\sqrt{NB\theta }|v$$
(18)
where $`|v`$ is a constant vector of unit length. This can be used to show that $`C`$ and $`C^{}`$ satisfy the constraint

$$[C,C^{}]=2\theta \left(1N|vv|\right).$$
(19)
The matrices $`C`$, $`C^{}`$ determine the classical solution for the action (10) which is given as

$$(Y_1)_{mn}=y_n\delta _{mn},(Y_2)_{mn}=z_n\delta _{mn}\frac{i\theta }{y_my_n}(1\delta _{mn}),$$
(20)
solving the Gauss law constraint (12).

Now it is easily seen that the equations of motion (6) can be solved once we express, at $`\phi =\frac{\pi }{2}`$, $`X_a`$ in terms of the $`Y_a`$

$$X_1=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}\left(Y_1+Y_2\right),X_2=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}\left(Y_2Y_1\right).$$
(21)
Thus we end up with the classical solutions of two coupled harmonic oscillators.

## 4 Quantizing the theory

Upon quantization the matrix elements of $`X_a,Y_a`$ and the components of the field $`\psi `$ become operators. As usual, the quantum Hamiltonian $`H`$ can be derived from the relation

$$H=\dot{X}\frac{L}{\dot{X}}L$$
(22)
where $`\frac{L}{\dot{X}}`$ defines the conjugate momentum and $`L`$ is the Lagrangian corresponding to action (10). We find that $`H`$ can be written as a sum of a free and an interacting part

$$H=\mathrm{Tr}\left[\frac{B\omega }{2}\left(X_1^2+X_2^2\right)\mu X_1X_2\right]$$
(23)
which is nothing but the non-parabolic confining potential $`V`$. This means that the kinetic energy is negligible compared to $`V`$. With (23), we actually have two possibilities to get the Hamiltonian in terms of the matrices $`Y`$, either by transforming $`H`$ via (7) to obtain

$$H^{}=\omega _2\mathrm{Tr}\left(a^4Y_1^2+Y_2^2\right)$$
(24)
or by starting straightforwardly from (22), using $`S^{}`$ (10) to end up with (24). Let us remark that (24) clearly shows the anisotropy in $`H^{}`$, i.e. the motion in the two coordinate directions $`Y_{1,2}`$ has different frequencies. Fixing $`\omega _1=\omega _2`$, we recover the Polychronakos Hamiltonian.

The form of $`H^{}`$ is similar to the harmonic oscillator and can easily be diagonalized. We define two $`N\times N`$ matrices of creation and annihilation operators

$$C_{nm}=\sqrt{\frac{B}{2}}\left[a(Y_1)_{nm}+\frac{i}{a}(Y_2)_{nm}\right],C_{mn}^{}=\sqrt{\frac{B}{2}}\left[a(Y_1)_{nm}\frac{i}{a}(Y_2)_{nm}\right].$$
(25)
Their commutator can be evaluated by calculating from (10) that the operators $`Y`$ satisfy the commutation relation

$$[(Y_1)_{nm},(Y_2)_{n^{}m^{}}]=\frac{i}{B}\delta _{nm^{}}\delta _{n^{}m}.$$
(26)
This implies

$$[C_{nm},C_{n^{}m^{}}^{}]=\delta _{nm^{}}\delta _{n^{}m}$$
(27)
where $`n,m=1,\mathrm{},N`$. Other commutators vanish. After some algebra, we find that $`H^{^{}}`$ can be expressed in terms of $`C`$ and $`C^{}`$ as

$$H^{^{}}=\mathrm{\Omega }^{}\left(\widehat{N}+\frac{N^2}{2}\right)$$
(28)
where $`\mathrm{\Omega }^{}=4\mathrm{\Omega }/B`$ and the total number operator

$$\widehat{N}=\underset{n,m=1}{\overset{N}{}}C_{mn}^{}C_{nm}$$
(29)
is counting the $`N`$ particles forming the system under consideration.

## 5 Determining the ground states

Via the unitary transformation (8), we can also express $`H`$ in terms of the operators $`C`$, $`C^{}`$ and build up the anisotropic ground state of our model as well as its excitations and determine the corresponding filling factor. First one has to construct a physical state $`|\mathrm{\Phi }`$ obeying the Gauss law constraint (5). To proceed, we determine $`|\mathrm{\Phi }^{}`$ corresponding to $`H^{}`$ and go on to get $`|\mathrm{\Phi }`$.

The ground state satisfying $`𝒢^{}|\mathrm{\Phi }^{}=0`$ can be built as

$$|\mathrm{\Phi }^{}=\left[ϵ^{j_1\mathrm{}j_N}\psi _{j_1}^{}(\psi ^{}C^{})_{j_2}\mathrm{}(\psi ^{}C^{N1})_{j_N}\right]^k|0$$
(30)
where $`ϵ^{j_1\mathrm{}j_N}`$ are elements of the fully antisymmetric tensor. Its energy spectrum is

$$E_k=\mathrm{\Omega }^{}\left[\frac{k}{2}N(N1)+\frac{N^2}{2}\right].$$
(31)
Taking $`\mu =0`$, we recover the Hellerman–Van Raamsdonk ground state  constructed for the isotropic SP model.

Having the ground state $`|\mathrm{\Phi }^{}`$, it is natural to ask about its anisotropic fraction $`\nu _{\mathrm{anis}}`$. To answer this question, we first calculate the area $`A^{}`$ of the QH droplet of the matrices $`Y`$. This can be defined as

$$A^{}=\frac{\pi }{N}\mathrm{Tr}\left(Y_1^2+Y_2^2\right).$$
(32)
Mapping $`A^{}`$ in terms of the creation and annihilation matrix operators and evaluating the trace with respect to (30), we find in the large-$`N`$ limit

$$\nu _{\mathrm{anis}}=\frac{\nu _\mathrm{p}}{2}\left(a+\frac{1}{a}\right).$$
(33)
This relation is shown for some specific values of $`\omega `$ and $`\mu `$ in Figure $`2`$. In the limit $`a=1`$, $`\nu _{\mathrm{anis}}`$ coincides with $`\nu _\mathrm{p}`$.

For a state that in the isotropic system would correspond to the filling factor

$$\nu _\mathrm{p}(B)=2\pi \rho _0/B$$
(34)
where $`\rho _0`$ is the density, an anisotropic confining potential  will yield an apparent filling factor $`\nu _{\mathrm{anis}}`$ in dependence on $`a(B)`$, i.e. on $`B`$ according to (33). More precisely, the filling factor $`\frac{9}{2}`$ can be obtained from (33) by considering the following configuration

$$\nu =1,a=\frac{9}{2}\pm \frac{\sqrt{77}}{2},$$
(35)
while for the factor $`\frac{11}{2}`$, one can choose

$$\nu =1,a=\frac{11}{2}\pm \frac{\sqrt{117}}{2}.$$
(36)
More generally, the anisotropic Hall conductivity is

$$\sigma _\mathrm{H}=\frac{e^2}{\mathrm{}}\left(N+\frac{1}{2}\right)=\frac{e^2}{\mathrm{}}\nu _{\mathrm{anis}}$$
(37)
where $`N`$ is the total number of particles. Comparing (33) and (37), we find

$$a=\frac{1}{\nu _\mathrm{p}}\left(N+\frac{1}{2}\right)\pm \frac{1}{\nu _\mathrm{p}}\sqrt{\left(N+\frac{1}{2}\right)^2\nu _\mathrm{p}^2}.$$
(38)
The excited states for the anisotropic model can be constructed as

$$|\mathrm{\Phi }^{}_{\mathrm{ex}}=\underset{n=1}{\overset{N1}{}}(\mathrm{Tr}C^n)^{c_n}\left[ϵ^{j_1\mathrm{}j_N}\psi _{j_1}^{}(\psi ^{}C^{})_{j_2}\mathrm{}(\psi ^{}C^{N1})_{j_N}\right]^k|0$$
(39)
and their energies are

$$E_k(c_n)=\mathrm{\Omega }^{}\left[\frac{k}{2}N(N1)+\frac{N^2}{2}+\underset{n=1}{\overset{N}{}}nc_n\right]$$
(40)
where the $`c_n`$ are non-negative integers.

The anisotropic ground state $`|\mathrm{\Phi }`$ corresponding to the matrices $`X`$ can be obtained by expressing the matrices $`C`$, $`C^{}`$ in terms of those corresponding to $`X`$. They are defined by

$$A_{nm}=\sqrt{\frac{B}{2}}\left(X_1+iX_2\right)_{nm},A_{nm}^{}=\sqrt{\frac{B}{2}}\left(X_1iX_2\right)_{nm}.$$
(41)
By using the unitary transformation (7), (25) can be written as

$$C=\overline{\eta }\left(AiA^{}\right),C^{}=\eta \left(A^{}+iA\right)$$
(42)
where $`\eta `$ is given by

$$\eta =\frac{1}{2\sqrt{2}}\left\{\left(a\frac{1}{a}\right)i\left(a+\frac{1}{a}\right)\right\}$$
(43)
Inserting (42) into (30) and normalizing, we obtain

$$|\mathrm{\Phi }=\left\{ϵ^{j_1\mathrm{}j_N}\psi _{j_1}^{}\left[\eta \psi ^{}\left(A^{}+iA\right)\right]_{j_2}\mathrm{}\left[\eta ^{N1}\psi ^{}\left(A^{}+iA\right)^{N1}\right]_{j_N}\right\}^k|0.$$
(44)
Its filling factor can be obtained from the corresponding area

$$A=\frac{\pi }{N}\mathrm{Tr}(X_1^2+X_2^2).$$
(45)
Using the mapping (7), one can see that $`A`$ coincides with $`A^{}`$ (32), as it should so that the ground states (44) and (30) have the same fraction $`\nu _{\mathrm{anis}}`$.

The excited states of $`H`$ can be derived from (39) in the same way as (44), giving

$`|\mathrm{\Phi }_{\mathrm{ex}}={\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{N1}{}}}\left[\mathrm{Tr}\eta ^n\left(A^{}+iA\right)^n\right]^{c_n}`$ (46)
$`\left\{ϵ^{j_1\mathrm{}j_N}\psi _{j_1}^{}\left[\eta \psi ^{}\left(A^{}+iA\right)\right]_{j_2}\mathrm{}\left[\eta ^{N1}\psi ^{}\left(A^{}+iA\right)^{N1}\right]_{j_N}\right\}^k|0.`$
We close this section by noting that all the states obtained here coincide with those for the isotropic SP model if we set $`a(B)=1`$.

## 6 Concluding remarks

We emphasize that the resulting filling factor for the anisotropic system can be mapped onto the isotropic one (1) after making use of a second transformation . This can be done by defining the new matrices

$$W_1=aY_1,W_2=\frac{1}{a}Y_2.$$
(47)
In terms of these, the system becomes identical to the original rotationally symmetric matrix model proposed by Polychronakos . This has a circular droplet ground state with the standard filling factor. The transformation

$$X_1,X_2Y_1,Y_2W_1,W_2$$
(48)
is area-preserving, the first is a rotation by $`\frac{\pi }{2}`$ and the second is a dilation by ”$`a`$” in one direction and ”$`\frac{1}{a}`$” in the other. In this case, we end up with the filling factor (1).

In summary, we investigated the Laughlin liquids by considering a confining potential that is of anisotropic type. This can be done by applying matrix-model theory to two coupled harmonic oscillators and studying the Laughlin states of the FQHE. Our model is a generalization of that proposed by Susskind and Polychronakos and reproduces its basic features in the limit $`\mu =0`$. Our most important result shows that the filling factor is anisotropy dependent. This suggests that our model may be a good starting point for the interpretation of recent experiments in anisotropic 2DEG.

A direct connection of our model to the Calogero-Sutherland (CS) models  as in Refs.  would be highly beneficial. An interpretation of the anisotropy of $`X_1`$ and $`X_2`$ in such a mapping as two coupled CS models or as CS models with two types of particles might be possible. While such models exist , they are solvable only for special sets of parameters and the inclusion of a continuously varying $`\mu `$ appears quite challenging.

## Acknowledgments

We are very grateful to A.P. Polychronakos for helpful comments and to the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, Schwerpunktprogramm “Quantum-Hall-Effekt”, for financial support.