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# Significance of the Renormalization Constant of the Color Gauge Field

## I Introduction

The color degree of freedom has been introduced into the quark model in order to save the connection between spin and statistics for quarks and strong interactions are considered to be invariant under the color $`SU(3)`$ group. This new degree of freedom is hardly recognizable, however, since all the familiar hadrons belong to the singlet representations of the color $`SU(3)`$ group as far as we are aware. Hadrons belonging to non-singlet representations of this group, if any, would be realized only at very high energies. In fact, quarks belonging to the triplet representation have never been observed to date, thereby suggesting that an isolated quark is, in principle, not subject to observation. This is the hypothesis of quark confinement. It indicates one of the most characteristic features of strong interactions to favor neutralization of color by realizing only color singlet states and suggests a strong resemblance to electromagnetic interactions that also favor neutralization, though not completely, because of repulsion between like charges and attraction between unlike charges. This forms a marked contrast with gravitational interactions which are always attractive and do not lead to neutralization.

This analogy led Nambu  to suspect that strong interactions are mediated by a gauge field coupled to the color charge. The quanta of the color gauge field are the color octet gluons. By now it is believed that no isolated colored particles are observable and we have promoted the hypothesis of quark confinement to that of color confinement. In other words, color confinement has guided us to the color gauge theory of strong interactions or QCD. There is a considerable difference, however, in the degree of neutralization between QED and QCD.

First, let us consider the multipole interactions between two electrically neutral systems, which are given by the van der Waals potential

$`V_{\mathrm{vdW}}(r)r^6.`$ (1)
This shows that the electric field exerted by a neutral system can penetrate into the vacuum without any sharp cut-off.

The situation is completely different in QCD. Let us consider the interaction between two color singlet hadrons, for instance, nucleon-nucleon scattering. In the language of dispersion relations, the potential between them is given by the pole contributions in the crossed channels. The least massive color singlet particle that can be exchanged between them is the pion and the resulting nuclear forces are represented by the Yukawa potential

$`V_\mathrm{Y}(r){\displaystyle \frac{e^{\mu r}}{r}},`$ (2)
where $`\mu `$ denotes the pion mass. This is a consequence of color confinement in that isolated quarks and gluons are excluded in the crossed channels.

By comparing these two potentials we recognize that the flux of the color gauge field exerted by color singlet nucleons cannot penetrate into the confining vacuum as demonstrated by the presence of a sharp cut-off at the pion Compton wave length as the penetration depth. In this way we realize that the Yukawa mechanism of generating nuclear forces leaves a strong resemblance to the Meissner effect in the type II superconductor.

The hypothesis of color confinement also implies that the color $`SU(3)`$ invariance be exact. Otherwise, an originally color singlet ground state would induce colored states through the symmetry-breaking perturbation resulting in the leakage of the unconfined color. Thus unbroken color gauge symmetry is an important condition for confinement and we shall take it for granted in what follows.

So far we have been guided by color confinement to reach the concept of color gauge field, but we shall also prove the converse that color confinement follows from QCD in return. For this purpose we first show that a sufficient condition for color confinement is given by

$`Z_3^1=0,`$ (3)
where $`Z_3`$ denotes the renormalization constant of the color gauge field. Then we prove that this condition is actually satisfied in a certain class of gauges provided that the color gauge symmetry is unbroken and asymptotic freedom is respected.

## II Formulation of QCD

Let us start from the familiar Lagrangian density for QCD,

$`L=L_{\mathrm{inv}}+L_{\mathrm{gf}}+L_{\mathrm{FP}},`$ (4)
where

$`L_{\mathrm{inv}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}F_{\mu \nu }F_{\mu \nu }\overline{\psi }\left(\gamma _\mu D_\mu +m\right)\psi ,`$ (5)
$`L_{\mathrm{gf}}`$ $`=`$ $`A_\mu _\mu B+{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha }{2}}BB,`$ (6)
$`L_{\mathrm{FP}}`$ $`=`$ $`i_\mu \overline{c}D_\mu c.`$ (7)
We have suppressed the color and flavor indices above. The first term in (4) is the gauge-invariant piece, the second one the gauge-fixing term and the last one the Fadeev-Popov ghost term expressed in the conventional notation. The Faddeev-Popov ghost fields $`c`$ and $`\overline{c}`$ are anticommuting quantities.

The BRS transformations are introduced for the quark and gauge fields by replacing the infinitesimal gauge function by either $`c`$ or $`\overline{c}`$ in their gauge transformation, and they are denoted by $`\delta `$ or $`\overline{\delta }`$, correspondingly. The BRS transformations for other auxiliary fields $`B`$, $`c`$ and $`\overline{c}`$ are defined so as to leave the total Lagrangian invariant. The conserved BRS charges denoted by $`Q_\mathrm{B}`$ and $`\overline{Q}_\mathrm{B}`$ are related to the BRS transformations of an operator $`F`$ through

$`ϵ\delta F=i[ϵQ_\mathrm{B},F],ϵ\overline{\delta }F=i[ϵ\overline{Q}_\mathrm{B},F],`$ (8)
where $`ϵ`$ is a Grassmann variable which anticummutes with $`c`$ and $`\overline{c}`$. We shall skip the BRS transformations of individual fields since they are well-known.

In terms of the BRS transformations the equation for the gauge field is given by

$`_\mu F_{\mu \nu }+gJ_\nu =i\delta \overline{\delta }A_\nu ,`$ (9)
where $`J_\nu `$ denotes the color current density and $`g`$ the gauge coupling constant.

The propagation function of the color gauge field is given by the vacuum expectation value of the time-ordered product of two gauge fields,

$`A_\mu ^a(x),A_\nu ^b(y)=\delta _{ab}{\displaystyle \frac{i}{(2\pi )^4}}{\displaystyle d^4ke^{ik(xy)}D_{\mu \nu }(k)},`$ (10)
where $`a`$ and $`b`$ are color indices, and

$`D_{\mu \nu }(k)=\left(\delta _{\mu \nu }{\displaystyle \frac{k_\mu k_\nu }{k^2iϵ}}\right)D(k^2)+\alpha {\displaystyle \frac{k_\mu k_\nu }{(k^2iϵ)^2}}.`$ (11)
The function $`D(k^2)`$ obeys the Lehmann representation ,

$`D(k^2)={\displaystyle 𝑑m^2\frac{\rho (m^2)}{k^2+m^2iϵ}}.`$ (12)
The renormalization constant of the gauge field $`Z_3`$ is given by Lehmann’s theorem  by

$`Z_3^1={\displaystyle 𝑑m^2\rho (m^2)}.`$ (13)
## III Indefinite Metric and Subsidiary Conditions

When a gauge field is quantized in a covariant gauge, introduction of indefinite metric is inevitable since it is inherited from the Minkowski metric through the gauge field that transforms as a four-vector. In order to eliminate indefinite metric from physical interpretations of the gauge theory, subsidiary conditions are introduced in order to select observable physical states.

In QED the subsidiary condition called the Lorentz condition is given by

$`B^{(+)}(x)|\alpha =0,`$ (14)
where $`|\alpha `$ denotes a physical state and the superscript $`(+)`$ refers to the positive frequency part. In QED described by the Lagrangian (4) the Faddeev-Popov ghost fields $`c`$ and $`\overline{c}`$ turn out to be free fields and we may also require their absence to define a physical state $`|\alpha `$ by

$`c^{(+)}(x)|\alpha =\overline{c}^{(+)}(x)|\alpha =0.`$ (15)
Thus the subsidiary conditions in QED are given by (14) and (15). It is not difficult, however, to verify that the above conditions are equivalent to those given by (15) and (16):

$`Q_B|\alpha =0.`$ (16)
We are aware of the fact that (16) is the only possible form of the subsidiary condition that can be employed in non-Abelian gauge theories since the auxiliary fields $`B`$, $`c`$ and $`\overline{c}`$ are no longer free fields in this case.

4. Interpretation of Confinement

In discussing confinement there are two important questions to be answered. First, we have to answer the question of what confinement means. Once this question is settled we have to prove that it is a consequence of QCD in the second stage. In this section we shall answer the first question.

In order to give an interpretation of confinement, we shall look for a known example of confinement within the framework of known theories. We easily find a simple example in QED. Namely, longitudinal and scalar photons are never subject to observation and they provide simple examples of confined particles. They are confined since they fail to satisfy the Lorentz condition or they belong to zero-norm states. In other words these unphysical photons are confined by metric cancellation.

By generalizing this argument to QCD we may assume that quarks and gluons or generally colored particles are confined just because they fail to satisfy the subsidiary condition (16),

$`Q_B|\text{quark}0,Q_B|\text{gluon}0.`$ (17)
From the definition of the physical states (16) in QCD we expect

$`\beta |\delta \overline{\delta }A_\nu (x)|\alpha =0,`$ (18)
when both $`|\alpha `$ and $`|\beta `$ are physical. So we shall show

$`\text{quark}|\delta \overline{\delta }A_\nu (x)|\text{quark}0,`$ (19)
$`\text{gluon}|\delta \overline{\delta }A_\nu (x)|\text{gluon}0,`$ (20)
for the purpose of proving (17).

By making use of the field equation (9) and the resulting Ward-Takahashi identities, we can verify that Eqs. (19) follows from

$`_\mu \delta \overline{\delta }A_\mu ^a(x),A_\nu ^b(y)=0.`$ (21)
This is a sufficient condition for color confinement, but it is violated when the color symmetry is spontaneously broken as suggested in the introduction by an intuitive argument. Also, in QED Eq. (21) is not satisfied but it is replaced by

$`_\mu \delta \overline{\delta }A_\mu ^a(x),A_\nu ^b(y)=_\nu \delta ^4(xy),`$ (22)
so that there is no charge confinement.

Furthermore, it can be shown on the basis of renormalization group and an analysis of the Goto-Imamura-Schwinger term that Eq. (3) is a sufficient condition for Eq. (21). Thus the problem of color confinement reduces to that of evaluating the renormalization constant of the color gauge field .

## IV Evaluation of $`Z_3`$

It is worth emphasizing that $`Z_3`$ can be evaluated exactly in QCD by means of renormalization group. In the renormalization group approach we study the dependence of the parameters characterizing the theory, such as the gauge coupling constant $`g`$ and the gauge parameter $`\alpha `$, on the scale change of the renormalization point $`\mu `$. These parameters are called the running coupling constant and the running gauge parameter as functions of $`\mu `$ and are denoted by $`\overline{g}`$ and $`\overline{\alpha }`$. The asymptotic values of these running parameters in the limit of $`\mu \mathrm{}`$ are denoted by $`g_{\mathrm{}}`$ and $`\alpha _{\mathrm{}}`$, respectively. It should be stressed that these asymptotic values can be identified with their unrenormalized ones.

In QED, Gell-Mann and Low  reached the conclusion that the unrenormalized coupling constant $`e_{\mathrm{}}^2/4\pi `$ may behave in either of two ways:

* It may really be infinite as perturbation indicates;
* It may be a finite number independent of $`e^2/4\pi `$.

In gauge theories such as QED and QCD, we generally have the relation

$`Z_3^1={\displaystyle \frac{\alpha }{\alpha _{\mathrm{}}}}.`$ (23)
Now asymptotic freedom in QCD is represented by

$`g_{\mathrm{}}=0,`$ (24)
and in this case the asymptotic limit of the gauge parameter can assume one of the following three alternative values:

$`\alpha _{\mathrm{}}=\mathrm{},\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0},\alpha _0,`$ (25)
where

$`\alpha _0={\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}}\left(13{\displaystyle \frac{4}{3}}N_f\right)`$ (26)
for the system consisting of gluons and $`N_f`$ flavors of quarks.

In QED the renormalized coupling constant $`e^2/4\pi `$ is fixed and only one of the two alternative cases (a) and (b) is realized. In QCD, however, which one of the three possible values in (25) is realized depends on the initial choice of the two parameters $`g`$ and $`\alpha `$. Although $`g`$ is fixed as $`e`$ is, the choice of $`\alpha `$ is quite arbitrary. We can always find a domain of $`\alpha `$ for a given value of $`g`$ in which $`\alpha _{\mathrm{}}=\mathrm{}`$ is realized and consequently the sufficient condition for confinement (3) is satisfied. Indeed, for small values of $`g^2`$ this domain is given by

$`\alpha <\text{Min}(\alpha _0,0).`$ (27)


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# Sgr A* Companion S0-2: A Probe of Very High-Mass Star Formation

## 1 Introduction

Almost a decade of high resolution infrared observations of the Galactic center have revealed at least three stars that show substantial proper-motion acceleration due to the supermassive black hole (BH) associated with Sgr A\* (Eckart & Genzel, 1996; Ghez et al., 1998; Schodel et al., 2002; Ghez et al., 2003). The most striking of these is S0-2, which has a peribothron of only $`q=125\mathrm{AU}`$ and a period of only $`P=15`$yr. S0-2 has a number of important potential applications. For example, by combining radial-velocity and astrometric observations of S0-2 one could measure the mass, the distance, and the three components of motion of Sgr A\* (Salim & Gould, 1999), which is believed to lie almost exactly at the Galactic center.

However, the most remarkable characteristic of the Sgr A\*/S0-2 “visual binary” is that it exists at all (Ghez et al., 2003). S0-2 cannot have formed in place: the gas cloud from which it would have condensed could never have been larger than $`(m_1/M_{})^{1/3}\mathrm{AU}`$ or it would have been tidally disrupted. Here $`m_1`$ is the mass of S0-2. Hence, it must have formed at a much larger distance from Sgr A\* and was either originally on a highly eccentric orbit that took it within $`125\mathrm{AU}`$ of Sgr A\* or was perturbed onto such an orbit. Then, it would have had to have been perturbed again at peribothron to bring its eccentricity from $`(1e)1`$ to $`(1e)0.13`$. It is this last step that is problematic.

Spectra at 2$`\mu `$m taken by Ghez et al. (2003) exhibit Br$`\gamma `$ and HeI absorption lines and lack a CO bandhead. These features suggest that S0-2 is a O8-B0 dwarf star and so is massive, $`m_115M_{}`$, and young, $`10`$Myr. The youth of the star puts a strong limit on the length of time available to scatter the star into its current orbit since formation. The dynamical friction time for such a star in an orbit of semi-major axis $`a10^4\mathrm{AU}`$ where it might plausibly form, would be $`t_{\mathrm{df}}300\mathrm{Myr}(a/10^4\mathrm{AU})^{1/4}`$, even assuming that the stellar profile continued as a power law down to very small radii, as suggested may be the case by Alexander (1999). Since several dynamical friction times would be required to achieve the orbit of S0-2, this appears impossible111 If the central region is populated by a cluster of stellar-mass black holes as argued by Miralda-Escudé & Gould (2000), then the local mass density is a factor $`7`$ lower, and hence the relaxation time is a factor $`7`$ longer. .

In this paper we propose that the orbit of SO-2 was a result of the disruption of a massive-star binary in the tidal field of the massive black hole at the Galactic center. When the binary disrupts, one star is ejected with energy greater than its incoming energy, leaving the other star, SO-2, in a bound orbit with the black hole. In § 2, we show analytically that for this mechanism to work, the former binary companion of S0-2 must have been very massive, of order $`100M_{}`$. In § 3, we confirm this estimate by numerical simulation, showing that the primary star must be $`m_260M_{}`$. In § 4, we discuss how the detection of additional short-period ($`P100`$yr) “low”-eccentricity ($`e0.95`$) companions to Sgr A\* could be used to probe very high-mass star formation in the inner pc of the Galactic center. In Appendix A, we discuss the mechanisms by which such massive binaries might be fed to Sgr A\*.

## 2 Analytic Estimates

The specific binding energy of S0-2 today is

$$E_b=\frac{GM_{\mathrm{bh}}(1e)}{2q}$$
(1)
where $`e=0.87`$ and $`q=125\mathrm{AU}`$ are the eccentricity and peribothron of its orbit, and $`M_{\mathrm{bh}}=3\times 10^6M_{}`$ is the mass of Sgr A\*. If S0-2 started out as part of a binary on a very low specific-energy (i.e., roughly parabolic) orbit with peribothron $`q`$, then to become bound with $`E_b`$, it would have to have been ejected from the binary with a velocity

$$\mathrm{\Delta }v=\frac{E_b}{v}=\sqrt{\frac{GM_{\mathrm{bh}}}{8q}}(1e)210\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1,$$
(2)
where $`v=(2GM_{\mathrm{bh}}/q)^{1/2}`$ is the velocity of the binary center of mass at peribothron. If we now equate $`\mathrm{\Delta }v`$ with the internal velocity of S0-2 relative to the binary’s center of mass,

$$\mathrm{\Delta }v=\sqrt{\frac{Gm_{\mathrm{tot}}}{a_{\mathrm{bin}}}}\frac{m_2}{m_{\mathrm{tot}}},$$
(3)
where $`m_1`$ and $`m_2`$ are the masses of S0-2 and its former companion, $`m_{\mathrm{tot}}=m_1+m_2`$, and $`a_{\mathrm{bin}}`$ is the binary’s semi-major axis, we obtain

$$a_{\mathrm{bin}}=q\frac{8}{(1e)^2}\frac{m_2^2}{M_{\mathrm{bh}}m_{\mathrm{tot}}}.$$
(4)
Finally, we assume that the binary can be broken apart tidally when the accelerations are related by,

$$\frac{2GM_{\mathrm{bh}}a_{\mathrm{bin}}}{q^3}=\eta \frac{Gm_{\mathrm{tot}}}{a_{\mathrm{bin}}^2},$$
(5)
where $`\eta 1`$ is a parameter. We then find,

$$\frac{m_2^3}{m_{\mathrm{tot}}^2}=\frac{\sqrt{\eta }}{32}(1e)^3M_{\mathrm{bh}}200\sqrt{\eta }M_{},$$
(6)
and

$$a_{\mathrm{bin}}\frac{m_2}{m_{\mathrm{tot}}}=\frac{\sqrt{\eta }}{4}(1e)q4\sqrt{\eta }\mathrm{AU}.$$
(7)
Equation (6) allows us to estimate the mass of the primary star and equation (7) the binary’s semi-major axis. Note that in the limit, $`m_2m_1`$, the left-hand sides of equations (6) and (7) become $`m_2`$ and $`a_{\mathrm{bin}}`$, respectively. On the other hand, for a roughly equal mass ratio, $`m_1m_2800\eta ^{1/2}M_{}`$. Such a massive S0-2 would be much brighter than is observed. Hence, we will generally work in the regime $`m_2m_1`$.

Equation (6) implies that the former companion of S0-2 was quite massive, with mass of order several hundred solar masses. However, since this equation contains the parameter $`\eta `$, which depends on the specific internal orbital parameters of the binary, numerical simulations are required to determine the actual range of plausible masses for the companion.

## 3 Numerical Estimates

### 3.1 Single Encounters

We conduct a series of simulations, in each of which the masses $`m_1`$ and $`m_2`$ are held fixed, but all of the other binary parameters are allowed to vary. The three binary orbital orientation angles and the orbital phase are randomly chosen. The binary eccentricity is drawn uniformly in $`e_{\mathrm{bin}}^2`$ (but capped $`e_{\mathrm{bin}}<0.95`$), and the semi-major axis is drawn uniformly in $`\mathrm{log}a`$ for $`1\mathrm{AU}<a<10\mathrm{AU}`$. We find that collisions leading to secondary orbits with the properties of SO-2’s orbit, $`q=125\mathrm{AU}`$ and $`e=0.87`$, have initial peribothra that are about 5 AU larger, i.e., $`q_{\mathrm{init}}130\mathrm{AU}`$. All simulated collisions therefore begin with the binary on a parabolic orbit with $`q_{\mathrm{init}}`$ at this value. Each set of simulations contains 20,000 integrations of the entire encounter between the massive-star binary and the massive black hole.

For each set of simulations (determined by choice of $`m_1`$ and $`m_2`$) we examine the cumulative distributions of three binary input parameters ($`a_{\mathrm{bin}}`$, $`e_{\mathrm{bin}}`$, and $`\mathrm{cos}i_{\mathrm{bin}}`$) for the subset of collisions that lead to an S0-2-like orbit, namely $`0.86e<0.88`$. We also examine the final peribothra $`q`$ of these orbits to ensure that they are consistent with the observed value for S0-2. Figure 1 shows the results for the 137 collisions meeting this condition for the simulation with $`m_1=15M_{}`$ and $`m_2=150M_{}`$. Results for other mass combinations look similar.

The first point to note from Figure 1 is that less than 1% of the 20,000 simulated collisions lead to S0-2 type orbits. Of course, this is partly because we have defined the acceptable eccentricity range extremely narrowly. However, many binaries simply do not break up, or if they do, they leave S0-2 in a marginally bound or unbound orbit. We return to this issue in § 3.2

Of the parabolic collisions that do yield S0-2-like orbits, the distribution of binary eccentricities is consistent with being uniform in $`e_{\mathrm{bin}}^2`$, which is the same as the parent distribution of all collisions. Hence, the probability of producing an S0-2-like orbit does not strongly depend on $`e_{\mathrm{bin}}`$. By contrast, this probability depends strongly on the binary’s inclination $`i`$, with prograde orbits $`(\mathrm{cos}i_{\mathrm{bin}}1)`$ being much preferred over retrograde orbits $`(\mathrm{cos}i_{\mathrm{bin}}1)`$. This is plausible, since it is easier to disrupt a prograde than retrograde binary.

As predicted by equation (7), successful collisions have $`a_{\mathrm{bin}}4\mathrm{AU}`$. There are essentially no successes for $`a_{\mathrm{bin}}<2\mathrm{AU}`$. The decline in success toward higher semi-major axis seems to be less severe than the decline toward lower values. For this reason, we have conducted additional simulations with input distributions uniformly distributed of $`1\mathrm{AU}<a_{\mathrm{bin}}<100\mathrm{AU}`$. We find that only about 10% of successful collisions have $`a_{\mathrm{bin}}>10\mathrm{AU}`$, with the overwhelming majority of these having $`a_{\mathrm{bin}}<30\mathrm{AU}`$.

Finally, we find that the distribution of final peribothra is sharply peaked near $`q124\mathrm{AU}`$. This shows that it is unnecessary to simulate a broad range of $`q_{\mathrm{init}}`$ because only those binaries with $`q_{\mathrm{init}}130\mathrm{AU}`$ have the potential to yield S0-2-like orbits.

Figure 2 shows the number of successful collisions (again defined by $`0.86e<0.88`$) as a function of the “mass function” $`m_fm_2^3/m_{\mathrm{tot}}^2`$ for 15 simulations with $`m_1/M_{}=7.5`$, 15, and 30, and $`m_2/M_{}=50`$, 75, 100, 150, and 200. Note that, in conformity with equation (6), the number of successful collisions is approximately a function of $`m_f`$ rather than of the two component masses separately. Also in conformity with equation (6) is the fact that this function peaks at $`m_f200M_{}`$. There are essentially no successful collisions for $`m_f40m_{}`$ which, for $`m_115M_{}`$, corresponds to a minimum mass for the former companion of $`m_260M_{}`$.

As mentioned above, the absolute rate of successful collisions is quite small. Part of the problem is our extremely narrow definition of “success”: of course the a priori probability of exactly reproducing the a posteriori known orbit of S0-2 is vanishingly small. One might plausibly argue that if S0-2 had any orbit with $`q=125\mathrm{AU}`$ and $`e<0.9`$ it might well have been measured. Such broadened acceptance would increase the number of “successes” by about a factor 4 near the peak. The resulting fraction of successes is still fairly low.

### 3.2 Repeated Encounters

One should keep in mind, however, that the orbital parameters of the incident binary can be significantly changed even if it is not disrupted. As discussed in Appendix A, we expect that the incoming binary would not actually be on a parabolic orbit but rather on a highly elliptical one with a semi-major axis $`a10^4\mathrm{AU}`$, at which location a dense young cluster would be tidally disrupted. This induces only a slight ($`5.4\%`$) reduction in the energy requirements of the collision. Within the formalism of § 2, the effect is equivalent to decreasing $`(1e)`$ by 5.4%, or increasing $`e`$ from 0.87 to 0.877. This reduces the overall mass scale for $`m_f=m_2^3/m_{\mathrm{tot}}^2`$ by a factor $`(10.054)^30.85`$ (see eq. ). Given the high mass scale of this equation and of Figure 2, this reduction is welcome, but modest.

However, this finite semi-major axis has another important effect: the binary re-encounters Sgr A\* on timescales of $`10^3`$ yrs. When it does so, it preserves all the binary parameters it acquired in the last collision, save the internal orbital phase relative to the phase of the orbit around Sgr A\*, which is effectively randomized. Hence, thousands of such encounters may take place, which increase the chance that the binary will be disrupted. Partly, the internal binary orbit changes each time. However, even if the orbit is left unchanged, the mere randomizing of the internal orbital phase permits a new opportunity for a disruptive encounter.

To explore this effect, we simulate repeat encounters by binaries in orbit around Sgr A\*, continuing the simulation until the binary is disrupted or until it completes 1000 orbits. In order to permit efficient computation, we place the binaries in orbits with semi-major axis $`a=3000\mathrm{AU}`$. Then, in order to be able to compare directly with the previous simulations we consider as a success, collisions with the same energy change, that is, with final orbits having eccentricity $`e=0.847`$. Finally, to minimize the role of Poisson fluctuations, we focus on the relative number successes from the entire (up to 1000 orbit) simulation with the number coming from the first encounter. For $`m_1=15M_{}`$ and $`m_2=75M_{}`$, the 1000-orbit simulations doubles the number of successes, while for $`m_2=100M_{}`$ the improvement rises to about a factor 2.5.

About 90% of the post-first-orbit successes occur within the first 100 orbits, and none past 200 orbits, indicating that our 1000-orbit simulations were quite adequate. The great majority of additional successes have initial semi-major axes $`1\mathrm{AU}<a_{\mathrm{bin}}<2.5\mathrm{AU}`$. Of those that do not, all but one are in retrograde orbits. That is, the additional successes arise because binaries with unfavorable parameters are gradually perturbed into a more favorable regime. Given the enhanced probability for binaries with $`a_{\mathrm{bin}}`$ in the lowest range simulated, we conduct an additional simulation with $`m_2=100M_{}`$ and $`0.1\mathrm{AU}<a_{\mathrm{bin}}<1\mathrm{AU}`$. However, we find very few successful collisions from this range.

In brief, allowing for multiple encounters in repeated orbits roughly doubles the number of successful encounters, i.e., those leaving the secondary in an orbit similar to SO-2.

## 4 Discussion

S0-2 is the only close companion of Sgr A\* with well-determined orbital parameters and a high quality spectroscopic identification. However, there could be many other remnants of disrupted massive-star binaries still waiting to be discovered. We found from our numerical integrations that binaries were more often disrupted leaving a star in a bound orbit with an eccentricity exceeding that of SO-2. We argued in § 3 that the binary from which S0-2 was ejected had a mass function of at least $`m_fm_2^3/m_{\mathrm{tot}}^240M_{}`$. However, from equation (6), binaries of this $`m_f`$ should typically eject stars into orbits with eccentricity $`e0.92`$. For orbits with the same $`q=125\mathrm{AU}`$ as S0-2, this would imply a period longer by a factor $`[(10.87)/(10.924)]^{3/2}2.2`$, i.e., more than 30 years. While such a star may have already been identified in near-infrared images, it would not yet be known whether the star would experience close approaches to Sgr A\*. For example, the stars S1, S2 and S8 have estimated orbital periods of around 2000 years. However, their eccentricities are not well constrained (Eckart et al., 2002). Similarly, stars with the same eccentricity as S0-2 but having larger peribothra would also have periods too long for one to have yet determined their orbits. Hence, there may well be a substantial population of highly eccentric young stars orbiting Sgr A\* that were injected into their present orbits by the disruption of massive-star binaries. If so, these remnants could be used to probe statistically the recent formation of very massive stars in the Galactocentric region, even though the massive stars themselves have long since perished.

We thank Jordi Miralda-Escudé and Dan Watson for stimulating discussions. Work by AG was supported by grant AST 02-01266 from the NSF.
APPENDIX

## Appendix A Feeding Delicacies to the Monster

What mechanism might feed a substantial number of massive-star binaries to orbits with peribothra $`q_{\mathrm{init}}130\mathrm{AU}`$ from which Sgr A\* can “grab” an S0-2-like star? From § 3, only $`5\%`$ of binaries with semi-major axes in the decade $`1\mathrm{AU}<a_{\mathrm{bin}}<10\mathrm{AU}`$ are devoured in this manner. Moreover, only a small fraction, perhaps $`O(10\%)`$, of massive stars will have a companion that is several times lighter orbiting with $`a_{\mathrm{bin}}`$ in this range. Hence, perhaps only $`0.5\%`$ of massive stars passing within $`q130\mathrm{AU}`$ will inject lighter companions into S0-2-like orbits. Since massive stars are fairly rare and the phase space permitted for S0-2 progenitors is quite small, it would seem necessary that these progenitors be preferentially funneled into this phase space if the collisions discussed in §§ 2 and 3 are to plausibly account for the existence of S0-2.

Gerhard (2001) suggested that the HeI stars in the central parsec of the Galactic center were born in a $`10^410^6M_{}`$ cluster that was formed more than 30pc away from Sag A\* (like the Arches and Quintuplet clusters). The cluster sank inward to Sag A\* due to dynamical friction and was tidally disrupted by the massive black hole, thus leaving massive stars within the central parsec. Consider a cluster of mass $`M_{\mathrm{cl}}`$ and velocity dispersion $`\sigma _{\mathrm{cl}}`$ that has been formed outside the central pc of the Galactic center. By the virial theorem, it will have an effective radius $`R_{\mathrm{cl}}GM_{\mathrm{cl}}/\sigma _{\mathrm{cl}}^2`$. The cluster will sink by dynamical friction until it is tidally ripped apart at a separation from Sgr A\*, $`r_d`$,

$$r_dR_{\mathrm{cl}}\left(\frac{M_{\mathrm{bh}}}{M_{\mathrm{cl}}}\right)^{1/3}\frac{GM_{\mathrm{bh}}^{1/3}M_{\mathrm{cl}}^{2/3}}{\sigma _{\mathrm{cl}}^2}=1.7\times 10^4\mathrm{AU}\left(\frac{M_{\mathrm{cl}}}{10^4M_{}}\right)^{2/3}\left(\frac{\sigma _{\mathrm{cl}}}{60\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1}\right)^2.$$
(A1)
For a star from this disrupted cluster to come within $`q_{\mathrm{init}}`$ of Sgr A\*, it must have angular momentum $`J<(2GM_{\mathrm{bh}}q_{\mathrm{init}})^{1/2}`$, and therefore transverse velocity $`v_{}<(2GM_{\mathrm{bh}}q_{\mathrm{init}})^{1/2}/r_d`$. Hence,

$$\frac{v_{}}{v_{\mathrm{circ}}}\frac{2\sigma _{\mathrm{cl}}}{v_q}\left(\frac{M_{\mathrm{bh}}}{M_{\mathrm{cl}}}\right)^{1/3}=0.12\left(\frac{M_{\mathrm{cl}}}{10^4M_{}}\right)^{1/3}\frac{\sigma _{\mathrm{cl}}}{60\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1}$$
(A2)
where $`v_{\mathrm{circ}}=(GM/r_d)^{1/2}`$ is the circular speed at breakup and $`v_q=6450\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ is the velocity at peribothron. Hence, if the cluster is on a roughly circular orbit when it is disrupted, then essentially none of its stars will have a close passage to Sgr A\*.

On the other hand, if the cluster is on a roughly radial orbit, then a fraction $`f1\mathrm{exp}[(qv_q/r_d\sigma _{\mathrm{cl}})^2/2]`$ will have close passages. That is,

$$f\mathrm{ln}(1f)0.35\left(\frac{M_{\mathrm{cl}}}{10^4M_{}}\right)^{4/3}\left(\frac{\sigma _{\mathrm{cl}}}{60\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1}\right)^2,$$
(A3)
so that for parameters that are plausible for a cluster formed in the deep gravitational well of the Galactic center, a substantial fraction of its members could come within $`q_{\mathrm{init}}130\mathrm{AU}`$ following a radial-orbit disruption. In the above example, a massive-star cluster with $`M_{\mathrm{cl}}10^4M_{}`$ would contain of order $`10^2`$ $`100M_{}`$ stars. Of these 1/3 would come within $`q=130\mathrm{AU}`$ of Sgr A\* and as estimated above, of order 0.5% of these might kick out companions onto S0-2-like orbits. Over the lifetime of S0-2, several such clusters might form and disrupt. Assuming that these clusters were on radial orbits, they are a plausible source of S0-2-like stars.

The final question then is whether it is plausible that such clusters will find themselves on radial orbits. To address this question, we first show that for a power-law density profile $`\rho r^\nu `$ in a background Kepler potential, dynamical friction will tend to circularize orbits for $`\nu >3/2`$ and make them more eccentric for $`\nu <3/2`$. Since the maximum bound velocity in a Kepler potential is $`v_{\mathrm{max}}(r)=(2GM_{\mathrm{bh}}/r)^{1/2}`$, the amount of available phase-space scales as $`[v_{\mathrm{max}}(r)]^3r^{3/2}`$. Hence, for $`\nu =3/2`$, the phase-space density $`f(u,r)`$ is a constant, $`f_0`$, throughout the potential. The Chandrasekhar formula for the drag acceleration on a particle of mass $`m`$ and velocity $`𝐯`$ is then $`𝐚=k𝐯`$, where

$$k=\frac{4\pi G^2m_{\mathrm{amb}}m}{v^3}_0^v𝑑u4\pi u^2f(u,r)\mathrm{ln}\mathrm{\Lambda }=\frac{16\pi ^2G^2m_{\mathrm{amb}}mf_0}{3}\mathrm{ln}\mathrm{\Lambda },$$
(A4)
and where $`m_{\mathrm{amb}}`$ is the mean mass of the ambient particles. Since $`\mathrm{ln}\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ depends only very weakly on radius, $`k`$ is essentially independent of radius.

Over the course of a single orbital period $`P`$, an object with specific energy $`E`$ and specific angular momentum $`𝐋`$ will suffer mean rates of energy and angular momentum loss of

$$\frac{dE}{dt}=\frac{𝑑t𝐯𝐚}{P}=\frac{k}{P}𝑑tv^2=2kE$$
(A5)
and

$$\frac{d𝐋}{dt}=\frac{𝑑t𝐫\times 𝐚}{P}=\frac{k}{P}𝑑t𝐋=2k𝐋.$$
(A6)
Since $`1e^2=2L^2E/(GM_{\mathrm{bh}})^2`$, the evolution of the eccentricity can be written,

$$\frac{d\mathrm{ln}(1e^2)}{dt}=2\frac{dL/dt}{L}+\frac{dE/dt}{E}=2k+2k=0.$$
(A7)
For steeper profiles, the phase-space density is higher than average at pericenter, hence the additional drag there tends to circularize the orbit, while for shallower profiles the higher phase-space density at apocenter tends to make them more eccentric.

Over most radii, the stellar mass profile around Sgr A\* is a power law with $`\nu 1.8`$. Hence, there is a weak tendency to circularize orbits. If there were a core in the mass distribution of radius $`3^{\prime \prime }`$, corresponding to $`2500\mathrm{AU}`$, then this core region could drive clusters toward eccentric orbits. That is, once the peribothron fell below the core radius, the declining dynamical friction inside the core (relative to that due to a power law) would drive the orbits to greater eccentricity and so still lower peribothron.

However, from equation (A1), it is clear that this process could not continue very long before the cluster was disrupted, unless the cluster had rather extreme parameters. On the other hand, from equation (A2), the cluster orbit must be highly eccentric if a significant fractions of its disrupted contents is to reach $`q_{\mathrm{init}}`$. Dynamical friction by itself probably cannot produce such orbits. If a cluster had the required orbit to deliver S0-2 progenitors to Sgr A\*, it must have been born on it. This in itself is not implausible: it is certainly possible for clusters to form from colliding clouds of gas whose angular momenta roughly cancel. Whether this happens frequently or infrequently is today, however, a matter of speculation.


text:
# Untitled Document

Conformal Symmetry and Triviality

Talk given at the Meeting for the 60’th Birthday of t.u. at ITU on Jan. 6th, 2003

M.Hortaçsu *

Physics Department, Faculty of Sciences and Letters

ITU 80626 Maslak, Istanbul, Turkey

and

Feza Gürsey Institute, Çengelköy, 81220, Istanbul, Turkey

Abstract

We study examples where conformal invariance implies triviality of the underlying quantum field theory.

key words: rational critical indices, triviality, conformal symmetry

* hortacsu@itu.edu.tr

Having conformal symmetry in a quantum field theoretical model implies that the Lagrangian of the model does not possess any dimensional parameters. The mass term or any dimensional coupling constant is sufficient to break this symmetry. Since any cut-off term also means a dimensional parameter, the model should be free from infinities. It should not be necessary to renormalize the theory in any fashion.

The fulfillment of these restrictions still does not guarantee that the model has conformal symmetry. Unless the space-time dimensions equals two, we have to make sure that the two point Wightman function of the model should be /1 an integer power of

$$(xy)^2+iϵ(x_0y_0).$$

In two dimensions, this function is given as logarithm of $`(xy)^2+iϵ(x_0y_0)`$ for scalar fields. If we use a non-integer power of this term /2 the index comes out of the log function as a coefficient, still keeping the same form. In higher dimensions a power of the same function have to be used. If this power is not an integer, we can change the sign between the two terms in $`(xy)^2+iϵ(x_0y_0)`$ by a conformal transformation. If the power of this expression is an integer, we can seperate this term into its real ( Principal value) and imaginary (delta function) parts and show that under conformal transformations both terms transform covariantly, keeping the sign as it was before the transformation. If the power is not an integer, this seperation is not possible. In all these remarks we wanted to maintain conformal symmetry in the Wightman function sense.

It was shown /3 that if this power is a rational number, you can carry the local conformal symmetry to the global one in the covering space in the general sense. If the power is an irrational number, even this is not possible by using a countable number of sheets in the covering space.

In $`1+1`$ dimensions spin is a parameter which can take any value. The presence of conformal symmetry was shown to be present in Thirring model for discrete values of spin and coupling constant /4. Similar behaviour is also seen in the analysis of the conformal group in $`1+1`$ dimensions if one uses ”analytical representations” /5 .

The rational indices in physics also occur in statistical mechanical models when conformal symmetry is imposed. It is found that /6 the indices used in phase transitions should be discrete and rational if we want to satisfy the unitarity constraint. One can not extend this construction to relativistic quantum field theoretical models, though, and show the existence of non-trivial models in this field. The question is whether the rationality of the different powers (indices) that describes these models also makes these models trivial. Much work was done when the central charge $`c`$ is equal to unity. I do not recall work when $`c>1`$ in relativistic quantum field theoretical models using local fields, but this may be only due to my ignorance on this field.

Schroer /7 remarks that if a model is built in Minkowski space, imposing conformal symmetry on the model may result in making the model ”trivial”. He also points out to the fact that in anti-de Sitter (AdS) spaces, however, the Hamiltonian may be replaced by a generator of the symmmetry, which may make a non-trivial construction possible. He also remarks that this construction seems improbable 8. The connection between AdS spaces and conformal symmetry was shown in the early nineties /9. Maldecena made the subject popular a little later /10. As far as I know it is an open problem whether one can construct non-trivial generic models higher than two Lorentzian dimensions with global conformal symmetry. We all know that the only example in $`d=4`$, $`N=4`$ super Yang-Mills theory exists. We want to find other examples.

By ”triviality” we mean models where interactions vanish as the cut-off is removed. A famous example is the Baker-Kincaid paper on the $`\varphi ^4`$ model in four dimensions /11. Ken Wilson pointed out to similar phenomena in $`d=4`$ earlier /12. Klauder’s recent work shows that this problem is not completely solved yet /13 .

Additional references can be found in the thesis of Reenders /14, submitted to University of Groningen. Here it is shown how the Nambu-Jona-Lasinio model /15 goes to a trivial model , since the coupling constant is proportional to a negative power of the cut-off or the correlation length. It is essential that the space-time dimension is four or larger for this to occur. For $`d=3+1`$ , the coupling constant is proportional to a negative power of the logarithm of the cut-off. For higher dimensions, it is proportional to a negative power of the cut-off. As the cut-off or the correlation length goes to infinity, the interaction vanishes.

A related phenomenon was shown in quantum electrodynamics (QED) long ago /16. Here one shows how the virtual fermion-antifermion pairs form dipoles which screen the charge.

Gell-Mann and Low /17 stated that to have a non-trivial theory, the derivative of the coupling constant with respect to the cutoff,

$$\beta =\mathrm{\Lambda }\frac{dg}{d\mathrm{\Lambda }}$$

should have a non-trivial fixed point. The two /18 and approximate three-loop /19 calculations of QED were consistent with the triviality of the model. Attempts to go beyond perturbation theory /20 did not bring any results that contradict this fact. The fact that QED results are confirmed by experiments in an excellent manner makes many forget that QED is actually an asymptotic model.

Additional work on his problem was done by many groups. This work is described in Reenders’ thesis /14. Bardeen and co-workers 21 showed that in the ” quenched ladder” approximation of QED , the dimension of the four fermion operator is no longer six but four at a critical coupling. This fact makes it necessary to add Nambu-Jona-Lasinio type terms to the QED Lagrangian, since these terms have the same dimensions as the interaction of the model. Then the new model , named as gauged Nambu-Jona-Lasinio model , should replace QED for this range of values of the fermion-photon coupling constant. Groups led by Miransky /22, Appelquist /23 and Kogut /24 further studied this model and confirmed these results. Lattice calculations /24 also confirm that pure QED is trivial. Reenders studies the gauged Nambu-Jona-Lasinio model with internal symmetry using non-perturbative methods /26, and concludes that if there are more than 44 ( in another approximation 54 ) flavors of fermions, scalar and pseudo-scalar bound-states made out of fermions will prevent the total screening of the charge, resulting in a non-trivial conformal invariant model.

Similar examples of ”triviality” were studied in the eighties in fermionic models with some form of conformal symmetry /27 These models were quantized using $`\frac{1}{N}`$ methods resulting in effective lagrangians as

$$L_{eff}=\overline{\psi }\gamma ^\mu (_\mu meA_\mu )\psi .$$

The bosonic kinetic term wis generated by the one-loop correction, which also shows that the coupling constant goes to zero as the cut-off is removed. The question was whether inifinities in higher order calculations will cancel this zero, resulting in finite results for physical processes. Two and three loop calculations for several processes showed /28 that indeed a finite result was possible, but it was exactly equal to the naive- quark result. One could not obtain the logarithmic corrections.

One may deduce that imposing conformal symmetry makes these non-linear models ”trivial”. One may still add additional terms to these models, study the behaviour of their beta functions, and see if there are non-trivial fixed points of these models. I think this will be a worthwhile endeavor to follow up. Acknowledgement I thank Prof.Dr. A.Nihat Berker, the chairman of the physics department at ITU and Dr. S.Kayhan Ülker for organizing this meeting.

References

1. M.Hortaçsu, R. Seiler and B.Schroer, Phys. Rev.D 5, (1972)2519;

2. K.Higashijima and E.Itou, hep-th/0303090 (2003) ;

3. B.Schroer and J.A.Swieca, Phys. Rev. D 10 (1974) 480, B.Schroer, J.A.Swieca and A.H.Voelkel , Phys. Rev. D 11 (1975) 11;

4. M.Hortaçsu, Il Nuovo Cimento 17A (1973) 411;

5. G.Gürsey and S.Orfanidis, Phys. Rev.D 7 (1973) 2414;

6. D.Friedan, Z. Qui and S.Shenker, Phys. Rev. Lett. 52 (1984) 1575 ;

7. B.Schroer, Phys. Lett. B 506 (2001) 337;

8 B.Schroer, J. Phys. A: Math. Gen 34 (2001) 3638;

9. G.T.Horowitz and D.L.Welch, Phys. Rev. Lett. 71 (1993) 328; N.Kaloper, Phys. Rev. D 48 (1993) 2598;

10. J.Maldecena, Adv. Theo. Math. Phys. 2 (1998) 231;

11 G.A.Baker and J.M. Kincaid, Phys. Rev. Lett.  42 (1979) 1431; J. Statistical Phys. 24 (1981) 469 ;

12 K.G. Wilson, Phys. Rev. D 7 (1973) 2911;

13 J.Klauder, hep-th/0209177, v3-Dec.12, 2002;

14 M.Reenders, hep-th/9906034;

15 Y.Nambu and G.Jona-Lasinio, Phys. Rev. 122 (1961) 345;

16 L.D.Landau and I.Ya. Pomeranchuk, Doklady Akad. Nauk, 102 (1955) 489;

17 M. Gell-Mann and F.E.Low, Phys. Rev. 95 (1954) 1300;

18 R.Jost and J.M.Luttinger, Helv. Phys. Acta, 23 (1950) 201;

19 J.L.Rosner, Phys. Rev. Lett. 17 (1966) 1190;

20 K.Johnson, R. Willey and M. Baker, Phys. Rev. 163 (1967) 1699; M.Baker and K.Johnson, Phys. Rev. 183 (1969)1292, Phys. Rev. D 8 (1973) 1110; S.L. Adler , Phys. Rev. D 5 (1972) 3021; S.L.Adler, C.G.Callan, D.J.Gross and R. Jackiw, Phys. Rev. D 6 (1972) 2982; M. Baker and K.Johnson, Physica A 96 (1979) 120;

21 W.A.Bardeen, C.N.leung and S.T.Love, Phys. Rev. Lett. 56 (1986) 1230, Nuclear Physics B  273 (1986) 649;

22 V.A.Miransky and K.Yamawaki, Mod. Phys. Lett. A 4 (1989) 129, Phys. Rev. D 55 (1997) 5051, additional information can be obtained from, V.A.Miransky, Dynamical Symmetry Breaking in Quantum Field Theories, World Scientific, Singapore (1993);

23 T.Appelquist, J.Terning and L.C.R. Wijewardhana, Phys. Rev D 44 (1991) 871;

24 A.Kocic, S.Hands, J.B.Kogut and E.Dagotto, Nucl. Phys. B 347 (1990) 217; A.Kocic, J.B.Kogut, M.P. Lombardo and K.C.Wang, Nucl. Phys.B  397 (1993) 409;

25 M.Gockeler, R.Horsley, V. Linke, P.E.L.Rakow, G.Schierholz and H.Stuben, Phys. Rev. Lett. 80 (1998) 4119;

26 M.Reenders, Phys. Rev.D 62 (20009 025001;

27 K.G. Akdeniz, M. Arık, M.Durgut, M.Hortaçsu, S.Kaptanoğlu, N.K.Pak, Phys. Lett. B 116 (1982) 34, 41, K.G. Akdeniz, M. Arık, M.Hortaçsu, N.K.Pak, Phys. Lett. B 124 (1983) 79;

28 M. Arık and M.Hortaçsu, J. Phys. G : Nuclear Phys. 9 (1983) L119.


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# Gamma-ray burst early optical afterglows: implications for the initial Lorentz factor and the central engine

## 1. Introduction

The standard Gamma-ray burst (GRB) afterglow model (Mészáros & Rees 1997a; Sari, Piran & Narayan 1998) invokes synchrotron emission of electrons from the forward external shock, and has been proven successful in interpreting the late time broadband afterglows. At these late times the fireball is already decelerated and has entered a self-similar regime, in which precious information about the early ultra-relativistic phase is lost. In the very early afterglow epoch, the emission from the reverse shock propagating into the fireball itself also plays a noticeable role, especially in the low frequency bands, e.g. optical or radio (Mészáros & Rees 1997a; Sari & Piran 1999b), and information about the fireball initial Lorentz factor could be in principle retrieved from the reverse shock data. For a long time, evidence for reverse shock emission was available only from GRB 990123 (Akerlof et al. 1999; Sari & Piran 1999a; Mészáros & Rees 1999; Kobayashi & Sari 2000). Recently, thanks to prompt localizations of GRBs by the High Energy Transient Explorer 2 (HETE-2) (e.g. Shirasaki et al. 2002; Crew et al. 2002) and rapid follow-ups by robotic optical telescopes (e.g. Fox 2002; Li et al. 2002; Fox & Price 2002; Park et al. 2002; Wolzniak et al. 2002), reverse shock emission has also been identified from GRB 021211 (Fox et al. 2003; Li et al. 2003; Wei 2003) and possibly also from GRB 021004 (Kobayashi & Zhang 2003a). It is expected that the Swift mission will record many GRB early optical afterglows after its launch scheduled in December 2003, which will unveil a rich phenomenology of early afterglows.

Here we propose a paradigm to analyze the early optical afterglow data, starting from tens of seconds after the gamma-ray trigger. By combining the emission information from both the forward and the reverse shocks, we discuss a way to derive or constrain the initial Lorentz factor of the fireball directly from the observables. The method does not depend on the absolute values of the poorly-known shock microphysics (e.g. the electron and magnetic equipartition parameters $`ϵ_e`$ and $`ϵ_B`$, and the electron power-law index $`p`$). We also categorize the early optical afterglows into two types and discuss the parameter regimes for both cases.

## 2. Forward and reverse shock comparison

We consider a relativistic shell (fireball ejecta) with an isotropic equivalent energy $`E`$ and an initial Lorentz factor $`\gamma _0`$ expanding into a homogeneous interstellar medium (ISM) with particle number density $`n`$ at a redshift $`z`$. Some GRB afterglows may occur in the progenitors’ stellar winds (e.g. Chevalier & Li 1999). The combined reverse vs. forward shock emission for the wind environment is easy to be distinguished from what is discussed here, and has been discussed separately (Kobayashi & Zhang 2003b).

For the homogeneous ISM case, in the observer’s frame, one can define a timescale when the accumulated ISM mass is $`1/\gamma _0`$ of the ejecta mass, i.e., $`t_\gamma =[(3E/4\pi \gamma _0^2nm_pc^2)^{1/3}/2\gamma _0^2c](1+z)`$. This is the fireball deceleration time if the burst duration $`T<t_\gamma `$ (the so-called thin-shell regime, Sari & Piran 1995). For $`T>t_\gamma `$, the deceleration time is delayed to $`T`$ (thick-shell regime). The critical condition $`T=t_\gamma `$ defines a critical initial Lorentz factor

$$\gamma _c125E_{52}^{1/8}n^{1/8}T_2^{3/8}\left(\frac{1+z}{2}\right)^{3/8},$$
(1)
where the convention $`Q=10^xQ_x`$ is used. So one has $`\gamma _0<\gamma _c`$ for the thin-shell case, and $`\gamma _0>\gamma _c`$ for the thick-shell case. When the reverse shock crosses the shell, the observer time and the ejecta Lorentz factor are (Sari & Piran 1995; Kobayashi, Piran & Sari 1999)

$`t_\times =\mathrm{max}(t_\gamma ,T),`$ $`\gamma _\times =\mathrm{min}(\gamma _0,\gamma _c),`$ (2)
where the first and second values in the above expressions correspond to the thin and thick shell cases, respectively. Since $`T`$ and $`z`$ can be directly measured, e.g. by Swift, and $`E`$ and $`n`$ could be inferred from broadband afterglow fitting (e.g. Panaitescu & Kumar 2001), $`\gamma _c`$ is essentially an observable in an idealized observational campaign. Some estimates (or fits) about the microphysics parameters ($`ϵ_e`$, $`ϵ_B`$, $`p`$, etc.) have to be involved when inferring $`E`$ and $`n`$, but $`\gamma _c`$ is insensitive to the inaccuracy of measuring $`n`$ and $`E`$. The correction to $`\gamma _c`$ is less than a factor of 2 even if the uncertainty of either $`E`$ or $`n`$ is by a factor of 100.

The forward shock synchrotron spectrum can be approximated as a four-segment power-law with breaks at the cooling frequency $`\nu _c`$, typical frequency $`\nu _m`$ and the self-absorption frequency $`\nu _a`$ (Sari et al. 1998). So is the reverse shock emission spectrum at $`t<t_\times `$. For $`t>t_\times `$, there is essentially no emission above $`\nu _c`$ for the reverse shock emission. For both shocks, the typical frequency, cooling frequency and the peak flux scale as $`\nu _m\gamma B\gamma _e^2`$, $`\nu _c\gamma ^1B^3t^2`$, and $`F_{\nu ,m}\gamma BN_e`$, where $`\gamma `$ is the bulk Lorentz boost, $`B`$ is the comoving magnetic field, $`\gamma _e`$ is the typical electron Lorentz factor in the shock-heated region, and $`N_e`$ is the total number of emitting electrons. Using similar analyses in Kobayashi & Zhang 2003a, we can derive

$`{\displaystyle \frac{\nu _{m,r}(t_\times )}{\nu _{m,f}(t_\times )}}`$ $``$ $`\widehat{\gamma }^2_B,`$ (3)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{\nu _{c,r}(t_\times )}{\nu _{c,f}(t_\times )}}`$ $``$ $`_{B}^{}{}_{}{}^{3},`$ (4)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{F_{\nu ,m,r}(t_\times )}{F_{\nu ,m,f}(t_\times )}}`$ $``$ $`\widehat{\gamma }_B,`$ (5)
where

$`\widehat{\gamma }{\displaystyle \frac{\gamma _\times ^2}{\gamma _0}}=\mathrm{min}(\gamma _0,{\displaystyle \frac{\gamma _c^2}{\gamma _0}})\gamma _c,`$ (6)
$`_B{\displaystyle \frac{B_r}{B_f}}=\left({\displaystyle \frac{ϵ_{B,r}}{ϵ_{B,f}}}\right)^{1/2},`$ (7)
and the subcripts ‘f’ and ‘r’ indicate forward and reverse shock, respectively. By deriving the second equation in eq.(7), we have taken into account the fact that the internal energy densities are the same in both the forward- and reverse-shocked regions, as evident in the standard hydrodynamical shock jump conditions. We have also assumed that the $`ϵ_e`$ and $`p`$ parameters are the same for both the forward and reverse-shocked regions111If these parameters are different, there will be an additional factor $`(_e_g)^2`$ on the right hand side of eq., where $`_e=ϵ_{e,r}/ϵ_{e,f}`$, $`_g=g_r/g_f`$, and $`g=(p2)/(p1)`$. If indeed $`_e`$ and $`_g`$ do not equal to unity, our whole discussion in the text can be modified straightforwardly., but with different $`ϵ_B`$’s (as parameterized by $`_B`$). The reason we introduce the $`_B`$ parameter is that in some central engine models (e.g. Usov 1992; Mészáros & Rees 1997b; Wheeler et al. 2000), the fireball wind may be endowed with “primordial” magnetic fields, so that in principle $`B_r`$ could be higher than $`B_f`$. We note that all the previous investigations have assumed the same microphysics parameters in both shocks.

The forward shock emission is likely to be in the “fast cooling” regime ($`\nu _{c,f}<\nu _{m,f}`$) initially and in the “slow cooling” regime ($`\nu _{c,f}>\nu _{m,f}`$) at later times (Sari et al. 1998). For the reverse shock emission, it can be deduced from eqs. (3, 4) and eq.(11) of Sari et al. (1998) that slow cooling ($`\nu _{c,r}>\nu _{m,r}`$) is generally valid as long as $`_B`$ is not much greater than unity.

The lightcurves can be derived by specifying the temporal evolution of $`\nu _m`$, $`\nu _c`$, and $`F_{\nu ,m}`$. To first order, in the forward shock (Mészáros & Rees 1997a) we have

$`\nu _{m,f}t^{3/2},`$ $`F_{\nu ,m,f}t^0`$ (8)
while in the reverse shock for $`t>t_\times `$ (Kobayashi 2000) we have approximately

$`\nu _{m,r}t^{3/2},`$ $`F_{\nu ,m,r}t^1`$ (9)
The optical-band lightcurve for the forward shock is well-described by the “low-frequency” case of Sari et al. (1998, their Fig.2b), characterized by a turnover of the temporal indices from 1/2 to $`1`$ at the peak time $`t_{p,f}`$ (at which $`\nu _{m,f}`$ crosses the observational band, e.g. the typical R-band frequency $`\nu _R`$). The optical lightcurve for the reverse shock emission is more complicated, depending on whether the shell is thin or thick, whether it is in the slow or fast cooling regime, and how $`\nu _R`$ compares with $`\nu _{m,r}(t_\times )`$ and $`\nu _{c,r}(t_\times )`$ (see Kobayashi 2000 for a complete discussion). For reasonable parameters, however, the cases of $`\nu _R>\nu _{c,r}`$ and $`\nu _R<\nu _{a,r}`$ are unlikely, and even if these conditions are satisfied, they do not produce interesting reverse shock signatures. Defining

$$_\nu \frac{\nu _R}{\nu _{m,r}(t_\times )},$$
(10)
and specifying the slow-cooling case (which is reasonable for a large sector of parameter regimes, see Kobayashi 2000), the reverse shock lightcurves are then categorized into four cases with various temporal indices separated by various break times. The four cases with their typical temporal power-law indices (in parentheses), which correspond to the thick and thin solid lines in Fig.2a and Fig.3a of Kobayashi (2000), are: (i) thin shell $`_\nu >1`$: $`(5,2)`$; (ii) thin shell $`_\nu <1`$: $`(5,1/2,2)`$: (iii) thick shell $`_\nu >1`$: $`(1/2,2)`$; (iv) thick shell $`_\nu <1`$: $`(1/2,1/2,2)`$. We note that in all four cases, the final temporal power-law index is $`2`$, corresponding to adiabatic cooling of the already accelerated electrons at $`t_\times `$, with $`\nu _R>\nu _{m,r}`$. Strictly speaking, by writing the final lightcurve as $`F_{\nu ,r}=F_{\nu ,m,r}(\nu /\nu _{m,r})^{(p1)/2}t^\alpha `$, and making use of eq.(9), we have

$$\alpha =\frac{3p+1}{4},$$
(11)
where $`p`$ is the power law index of the electrons in the reverse shock region. We can see that $`\alpha 2`$ for typical $`p`$ values. Going backwards in time, this well-known $`F_{\nu ,r}t^2`$ reverse shock lightcurve ends at $`t_\times `$ for $`_\nu >1`$ (with a rising lightcurve before that), but at the time when $`\nu _{m,r}`$ crosses $`\nu _R`$ for $`_\nu <1`$ (with a flatter declining lightcurve, $`F_{\nu ,r}t^{1/2}`$, before) (Fig.1).

We define as $`t_{p,r}`$ the time when the $`F_{\nu ,r}t^2`$ lightcurve starts and define the corresponding reverse shock spectral flux as $`F_{\nu ,p,r}`$ (Fig.1). The lightcurve point $`(t_{p,r},F_{\nu ,p,r})`$ is generally called the reverse shock peak, but strictly this is valid only when $`_\nu >1`$ (in which case $`t_{p,r}=t_\times `$). On the other hand, it is natural to define the forward shock peak at $`(t_{p,f},F_{\nu ,p,f})`$ (Fig.1), where $`F_{\nu ,p,f}=F_{\nu ,m,f}=`$constant (eq.). For practical purposes, it is illustrative to derive the ratio of the two peak times and that of the two peak fluxes by making use of eqs. (3), (5), (8), (9) and (11), i.e.

$$_t\frac{t_{p,f}}{t_{p,r}}=\{\begin{array}{cc}\widehat{\gamma }^{4/3}_{B}^{}{}_{}{}^{2/3}_\nu ^{2/3},\hfill & _\nu >1,\hfill \\ \widehat{\gamma }^{4/3}_{B}^{}{}_{}{}^{2/3},\hfill & _\nu <1,\hfill \end{array}$$
(12)
$$_F\frac{F_{\nu ,p,r}}{F_{\nu ,p,f}}=\{\begin{array}{cc}\widehat{\gamma }_B_\nu ^{2(\alpha 1)/3},\hfill & _\nu >1,\hfill \\ \widehat{\gamma }_B_\nu ^{2/3},\hfill & _\nu <1.\hfill \end{array}$$
(13)
Notice that we have intentionally defined both $`_t`$ and $`_F`$ to be (usually) larger than unity, and that these expressions are valid regardless of whether the shell is thin or thick. Since we are working on the “ratios” of the quantities for both shocks, the absolute values of the microphysics parameters do not enter the problem. Instead, our expressions involve relative ratios of these parameters, so that they cancel out in eqs.(12) and (13) if they are the same in both shocks, as we have assumed in this paper (except for $`_B`$).

## 3. A recipe to constrain the initial Lorentz factor

Reverse shock emission data have been used to estimate the initial Lorentz factor of GRB 990123 (Sari & Piran 1999a; Kobayashi & Sari 2000; Wang, Dai & Lu 2000; Soderberg & Ramirez-Ruiz 2002; Fan et al. 2002), but these studies depend on poorly-known shock microphysics parameters such as, e.g., $`ϵ_e`$, $`ϵ_B`$, $`p`$, etc. Here we introduce a simple method which avoids or at least reduces the dependence on such parameters.

We first consider an “idealized” observational campaign, which may be realized with Swift or a similar facility. We assume that the optical lightcurve is monitored starting early enough that both the reverse and forward shock “peaks”, i.e., $`(t_{p,r},F_{\nu ,p,r})`$ and $`(t_{p,f},F_{\nu ,p,f})`$ are identified, and that the fast-decaying reverse shock lightcurve index $`\alpha `$ is measured. As a result, $`_t`$, $`_F`$ and $`\alpha `$ are all known parameters. Since our method is most useful when both peaks are measured, we strongly recommend that the Swift UVOT instrument closely follow GRB early lightcurves until the forward shock peak is identified. With eqs.(12) and (13), we can directly solve for $`\widehat{\gamma }`$ and $`_\nu `$ for two $`_\nu `$ regimes, in terms of $`_t`$, $`_F`$ and $`\alpha `$, as well as a free parameter $`_B`$ (which is conventionally taken as unity). For $`_\nu >1`$ (in which case we see a rising lightcurve before $`t_{p,r}`$), we have

$`\widehat{\gamma }`$ $`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{_{t}^{}{}_{}{}^{(\alpha 1)}_{B}^{}{}_{}{}^{(2\alpha +1)/3}}{_F}}\right)^{\frac{3}{4\alpha 7}},`$ (14)
$`_\nu `$ $`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{_{t}^{}{}_{}{}^{3/2}_{B}^{}{}_{}{}^{3}}{_{F}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}}\right)^{\frac{3}{4\alpha 7}},`$ (15)
and for $`_\nu <1`$ (in which case we see a $`t^{1/2}`$ decaying lightcurve before $`t_{p,r}`$), we have

$`\widehat{\gamma }`$ $`=`$ $`_{t}^{}{}_{}{}^{3/4}_{B}^{}{}_{}{}^{1/2},`$ (16)
$`_\nu `$ $`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{_{t}^{}{}_{}{}^{3/2}_{B}^{}{}_{}{}^{3}}{_{F}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}}}\right)^{3/4}.`$ (17)
Finally, the initial Lorentz factor $`\gamma _0`$ can be determined from $`\widehat{\gamma }`$ through

$$\gamma _0=\{\begin{array}{cc}\widehat{\gamma },\hfill & \mathrm{thin}\mathrm{shell}\hfill \\ \gamma _c^2/\widehat{\gamma },\hfill & \mathrm{thick}\mathrm{shell}\hfill \end{array}$$
(18)
Since $`\gamma _c`$ is essentially a known parameter (and in the thin-shell case $`\gamma _0`$ is independent of $`\gamma _c`$), we can derive two $`\gamma _0`$ values (except for an unknown parameter $`_B`$) directly from the data, which correspond to the thin and thick shell cases, respectively. When $`t_\times `$ (which is usually the earliest transition point of the rising lightcurve and the falling lightcurve) is measured, we can disentangle whether the shell is thin or thick by comparing $`t_\times `$ with $`T`$, i.e., $`Tt_\times `$ corresponds to the thick shell case, while $`T<t_\times `$ corresponds to the thin shell case.

In reality, due to delay of telescope response, the reverse shock peak time might not be caught definetely (e.g. the case for GRB 021004 and GRB 021211). However, even in this case, one can always define a “pseudo reverse shock peak” by recording the very first data point in the observed $`t^2`$ lightcurve. Denoting this point as $`(\overline{t}_{p,r},\overline{F}_{\nu ,p,r})`$, one can similarly define

$$\overline{}_t\frac{t_{p,f}}{\overline{t}_{p,r}}_t,\overline{}_F\frac{\overline{F}_{\nu ,p,r}}{F_{\nu ,p,f}}_F.$$
(19)
Repeating the above procedure, one can derive $`\overline{\widehat{\gamma }}`$ and $`\overline{}_\nu `$ using (15) and (17), respectively, but with parameters $`_t`$ and $`_F`$ substituted by their “bar” counterparts. The $`\overline{\widehat{\gamma }}`$ and $`\overline{}_\nu `$ values, however, are only upper (or lower) limits for $`\widehat{\gamma }`$ and $`_\nu `$ for $`_\nu >1`$ (or $`_\nu <1`$). Usually we may be able to estimate $`t_{p,r}`$, and hence $`_t`$, from other constraints (e.g. $`t_{p,r}`$ has to be larger than $`T`$, etc.). In such cases, we can derive $`\widehat{\gamma }`$ and $`_\nu `$ from $`\overline{\widehat{\gamma }}`$ and $`\overline{}_\nu `$ with some correction factors involving $`(\overline{}_t/_t)1`$. Using eqs. (11), (12), (13), (19), and noticing $`\overline{}_F/_F=(\overline{}_t/_t)^\alpha `$ (as derived from $`F_{\nu ,r}t^\alpha `$), we have, for $`_\nu >1`$,

$`\widehat{\gamma }`$ $`=`$ $`\overline{\widehat{\gamma }}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\overline{}_t}{_t}}\right)^{\frac{3}{(4\alpha 7)}}\overline{\widehat{\gamma }},`$ (20)
$`_\nu `$ $`=`$ $`\overline{}_\nu \left({\displaystyle \frac{\overline{}_t}{_t}}\right)^{\frac{3(4\alpha 3)}{2(4\alpha 7)}}\overline{}_\nu ,`$ (21)
and for $`_\nu <1`$,

$`\widehat{\gamma }`$ $`=`$ $`\overline{\widehat{\gamma }}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\overline{}_t}{_t}}\right)^{\frac{3}{4}}\overline{\widehat{\gamma }},`$ (22)
$`_\nu `$ $`=`$ $`\overline{}_\nu \left({\displaystyle \frac{\overline{}_t}{_t}}\right)^{\frac{12\alpha 9}{8}}\overline{}_\nu .`$ (23)
With an estimated $`\widehat{\gamma }`$, one can again estimate $`\gamma _0`$ using (18). Notice that, however, unless one catches $`t_{p,r}`$, both solutions for $`_\nu >1`$ and $`_\nu <1`$ are possible and one needs additional information to break the degeneracy. To do this, some knowledge (but not the precise values) of the microphysics parameters is usually needed. With eqs.(2), (3), (10), and eq.(1) of Kobayashi & Zhang (2003a), one can derive

$$_\nu 500_{B}^{}{}_{}{}^{1}\gamma _{0,2}^2n^{1/2}ϵ_{B,2}^{1/2}ϵ_{e,1}^2\left(\frac{g}{1/3}\right)^2\frac{(1+z)}{2},$$
(24)
where $`g=(p2)/(p1)`$. We can see that generally $`_\nu >1`$, but the $`_\nu \stackrel{<}{}1`$ case is also allowed for some extreme parameters.

There are two caveats about our method. First, it involves a value of $`_B`$ (the reverse to forward comoving magnetic field ratio), so one cannot determine $`\gamma _0`$ without specifying $`_B`$. The usual standard assumption is that $`_B=1`$; however, it may be $`>1`$, e.g. if the central engine is strongly magnetized. We note that there is another independent way to constrain $`\gamma _0`$. Generally if $`t_\times `$ can be measured one can directly derive (Sari & Piran 1999b)

$$\gamma _0\gamma _\times =\gamma _c\left(\frac{T}{t_\times }\right)^{3/8},$$
(25)
which gives the value (or a lower limit) of $`\gamma _0`$ for the thin or thick shell case, respectively. This is the case for GRB 990123. When such independent information about $`\gamma _0`$ is available, constraints on $`_B`$ may be obtained (see §5 for discussion of GRB 990123).

Second, in the above treatment we have adopted the strict adiabatic assumption so that $`F_{\nu ,m,f}`$ stays constant from $`t_\times `$ all the way to $`t_{p,f}`$. In principle, radiation loss during the early forward shock evolution may be important and ought to be taken into account. This introduces a correction factor $`f_{rad}(t_{p,f}/t_\times )^{(17/16)ϵ_e}`$ (Sari 1997), which depends on $`ϵ_e`$. Suppose the measured forward shock peak flux is $`F_{\nu ,p,f}`$(obs), then the real value of $`F_{\nu ,p,f}`$ to be used in the above method (e.g. to derive $`_F`$, eq.) should be $`F_{\nu ,p,f}=f_{rad}F_{\nu ,p,f}`$(obs). For typical values of $`ϵ_e`$, e.g., $`0.1`$, typically we have $`f_{rad}<2`$. Nonetheless, in detailed case studies, this correction factor should be taken into account.

## 4. Classification of early optical afterglows

Regardless of the variety of early lightcurves, the reverse shock $`F_{\nu ,r}t^2`$ emission component is expected to eventually join with the forward shock emission lightcurve. We can identify two cases (Fig.1). Type I (Rebrightening): The reverse shock component meets the forward shock component before the forward shock peak time, as might have been observed in GRB 021004 (Kobayashi & Zhang 2003a). Type II (Flattening): The reverse shock component meets the forward shock component after the forward shock peak time. GRB 021211 may be a marginal such case (Fox et al. 2003; Li et al. 2003; Wei 2003).

The condition for a flattening type is $`F_{\nu ,r}(t_{p,f})>F_{\nu ,p,f}`$. Using eqs.(12) and (13), noticing $`F_{\nu ,r}t^\alpha `$, the flattening or type-II condition turns out to be

$$\widehat{\gamma }<_{B}^{}{}_{}{}^{\frac{2\alpha +3}{4\alpha 3}}_{\nu }^{}{}_{}{}^{\frac{2}{4\alpha 3}}_{B}^{}{}_{}{}^{7/5}_{\nu }^{}{}_{}{}^{2/5}$$
(26)
for both $`_\nu >1`$ and $`_\nu <1`$, where the final expression is for the typical value $`\alpha =2`$. We can see that the type II condition is very stringent, especially when $`_B`$ is not much above unity. We expect that rebrightening lightcurves should be the common situation, unless the GRB central engines are typically strongly magnetized. When a flattening lightcurve is observed, it is likely that $`_\nu 1`$, i.e, the peak frequency for the reverse shock emission is well below the optical band. A very large $`_\nu `$ should usually involve very low luminosities in both the reverse and forward shock emission. This might be the case of GRB 021211, which could have been categorized as an “optically dark” burst if the early reverse shock emission had not been caught. Alternatively, a flattening case may be associated with a strongly magnetized central engine, since a higher $`_B`$ can significantly ease the type II condition. Finally, a large radiative loss (with $`ϵ_e`$ close to unity) may also at least contribute to a flattening lightcurve.

## 5. Case studies

Early optical afterglows have been detected from GRB 990123, GRB 021004 and GRB 021211. Unfortunately, none of these observations give us an “idealized” data set, i.e., none of these cases showed two distinctly identifiable peaks. Our method therefore cannot be straightforwardly applied to them. Nonetheless, we can use the correction factors mentioned in §3 to estimate $`\gamma _0`$ in these cases. We expect that Swift will provide ideal data sets for more bursts on which our method could be utilized directly.

1. GRB 990123: The basic parameters of this burst include222Hereafter we assume that the kinetic energy of the fireball in the deceleration phase is comparable to the energy released in gamma-rays in the prompt phase. (e.g. Kobayashi & Sari 2000 and references therein) $`E_{52}140`$, $`z=1.6`$, $`T_20.6`$, $`\alpha 2`$. This gives $`\gamma _c305n^{1/8}`$ (notice weak dependence on $`n`$). The reverse shock peak was well determined: $`(t_{p,r},F_{\nu ,p,r})(50\mathrm{s},1\mathrm{J}\mathrm{y})`$. The lightcurve shows $`_\nu >1`$. Since the early rising ligtcurve is caught, $`t_\times `$ is directly measured, i.e., $`t_\times t_{p,r}T`$. This is a marginal case, and $`\gamma _0\gamma _c300n^{1/8}`$ (eq.). Unfortunately, the forward shock peak was not caught. Assuming $`t_{p,f}0.1`$ d, one has $`_t170`$, and $`_F5000`$. The radiative correction factor is $`f_{rad}2`$ by adopting $`ϵ_e0.13`$ (Panaitescu & Kumar 2001). With this correction, one has $`\widehat{\gamma }(0.07_{B}^{}{}_{}{}^{5/3})^3`$ (eq.). By requiring $`\widehat{\gamma }300n^{1/8}`$, $`_B15n^{1/40}`$ is required. We conclude that GRB 990123 is giving us the first evidence for a strongly magnetized central engine.

2. GRB 021004: The parameters of this burst are (e.g. Kobayashi & Zhang 2003a and references therein) $`E_{52}5.6`$, $`z=2.3`$, $`T_21`$. We have $`\gamma _c190n^{1/8}`$. The forward shock peak is reasonably well measured, but the reverse shock peak is not caught. Using the first data point as modeled in Kobayashi & Zhang (2003a), we have $`\overline{}_t12`$, $`\overline{}_F2`$. Solving for $`\widehat{\gamma }`$ and $`_\nu `$, we get $`\widehat{\gamma }_0220_{B}^{}{}_{}{}^{5}`$ for $`_\nu >1`$ and $`\alpha 2`$ (in the asympototic phase), and $`\widehat{\gamma }6.5_{B}^{}{}_{}{}^{1/2}`$ for $`_\nu <1`$. The detailed modeling of the lightcurve suggests $`_\nu >1`$ and a thin shell, so that $`\gamma _0120`$ for $`_B1`$ (Kobayashi & Zhang 2003a).

3. GRB 021211: The basic parameters of this burst include $`E_{52}0.6`$, $`z=1.0`$, $`T_20.15`$, $`\alpha 1.8`$ (Li et al. 2003; Fox et al. 2003; and references therein), so that $`\gamma _c240n^{1/8}`$. Neither the forward nor the reverse shock peaks are identified. Assuming that the forward shock peak occurs close to the flattening break (marginal type-II flattening case), and taking the first data point of the early lightcurve, we get $`\overline{}_t20`$, $`\overline{}_F30`$. Since $`_\nu <1`$ is unlikely for a flattening (type-II) lightcurve (eq.), we get $`\widehat{\gamma }(0.4_{B}^{}{}_{}{}^{1.5})^{15}`$ with $`_\nu >1`$. For any reasonable $`\widehat{\gamma }`$, $`_B`$ has to be somewhat larger than unity. More information would be needed in order to estimate $`\widehat{\gamma }`$ and $`\gamma _0`$.

## 6. Conclusions and implications

We have discussed a straightforward recipe for constraining the initial Lorentz factor $`\gamma _0`$ of GRB fireballs by making use of the early optical afterglow data alone. Data in other bands (e.g. X-ray or radio) are generally not required. The input parameters are ratios of observed emission quantities, so that poorly known model parameters related to the shock microphysics (e.g. $`ϵ_e`$, $`p`$, etc.) largely cancel out if they are the same in both shocks. Otherwise, our method only invokes ratios of these parameters (e.g. $`_B`$, eq.) and the absolute values of the microphysics parameters do not enter the problem. This approach is readily applicable in the Swift era when many early optical afterglows are expected to be regularly caught.

Regular determinations of the initial Lorentz factors of a large sample of GRBs would have profound implications for our understanding of the nature of bursts. Currently only lower limits on $`\gamma _0`$ are available for some bursts (e.g. Baring & Harding 1997; Lithwick & Sari 2001). Since in various models some crucial GRB parameters (such as the energy peak in the spectrum) depend on the fireball Lorentz factor in different ways (see Zhang & Mészáros 2002b for a synthesized study), a large sample of $`\gamma _0`$ data combined with other information (which is usually easier to be attained in the Swift era) may allow us to identify the location and mechanism of the GRB prompt emission through statistical analyses. Searching for the possible correlation between the GRB prompt emission luminosities and Lorentz factors can allow tests for the possible GRB jet structures proposed in some models (e.g. Zhang & Mészáros 2002a).

We have also classified the early optical afterglow lightcurves into two types. The rebrightening case (type-I) is expected to be common. The flattening case (type-II) may be rare, and when detected, is likely to involve a low luminosity or a strongly magnetized central engine.

It is worth emphasizing that there is evidence that the central engine of GRB 990123 is strongly magnetized. A similar conclusion may also apply to GRB 021211. If from future data a strongly magnetized ejecta is commonly inferred, this would stimulate the GRB community to seriously consider the role of strong magnetic fields on triggering the GRB prompt emission as well as collimating the GRB jets. Recently, the gamma-ray prompt emission of a bright burst, GRB 021206, was detected by the RHESSI mission and reported to be strongly polarized (Coburn & Boggs 2003). This can be interpreted as evidence for a strongly magnetized ejecta. Our method leads to an independent and similar conclusion for another bright burst, GRB 990123. We also note that, since a strong reverse shock component is detected, the fireball could not be completely Poynting flux dominated (which should have greatly suppressed the reverse shock emission, Kennel & Coroniti 1984). In other words, the fireball does not have to be in the high-$`\sigma `$ regime (see Zhang & Mészáros 2002b for a discussion of various fireball regimes). A likely picture is a kinematic-energy-dominated fireball entrained with a strong (maybe globally organized) magnetic component.

This work is supported by NASA NAG5-9192, NAG5-9153 and the Pennsylvania State University Center for Gravitational Wave Physics, which is funded by NSF under cooperative agreement PHY 01-14375.


text:
# Extraction of 𝑁^∗ information from the limited 𝑝(𝛾,𝐾⁺)Λ data set

## Abstract

Nucleon resonance information is often obtained from fitting hadrodynamical model calculations to data, where model parameters such as resonance coupling constants are the free parameters in the fitting procedure. For reactions with a limited data set, such as $`p(\gamma ,K^+)\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, complications in the extraction of reliable $`N^{}`$ information occur not only through theoretical uncertainties, but also due to technical difficulties in the fitting procedure. In this article we outline a fitting strategy based on a genetic algorithm and illustrate the kind of ambiguities which can arise.

, , and

Understanding the composite, quark-gluon structure of hadrons is a major topic in intermediate energy nuclear physics. One way to investigate this system is to study its excitation spectrum, as it is a direct consequence of the hadron’s composite character. At present, the experimental identification of the full excitation spectrum is far from complete, and most of our knowledge is based on analyses of pion induced or pion production reactions.

A complete understanding of the nucleon resonances can only be achieved by a full, coupled-channel analysis which incorporates reactions involving all possible initial and final states to which nucleon resonances can couple . Meson production reactions such as $`\gamma N\pi N`$, $`\pi \pi N`$, $`\eta N`$, $`\omega N`$, $`K\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, $`K\mathrm{\Sigma }`$, $`\mathrm{}`$, should be included, as well as Compton scattering and meson-induced production reactions. It is clear that a simultaneous description of all such reactions is an enormous task.

When the (photoinduced) meson production processes are treated at a hadronic level, the resonances are described by effective fields with independent quantities such as mass, strong decay widths and photo helicity amplitudes. Usually one determines these resonance parameters by fitting model calculations to the available data. The fitting procedures are therefore a necessary step in the extraction of resonance information from experimental measurements. However, by taking into account all known resonances in a full coupled-channel calculation, one would require a few hundred parameters to be determined. As a first step, a single-channel analysis of one particular reaction is essential to identify general features, and to simplify the problem by reducing it to one dependent on only a few tens of parameters.

The search for an optimum fit to the data, by a model depending on what is still a large number of parameters, is not straightforward. The situation is considerably worsened when reaction channels such as $`\omega N`$, $`K\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ or $`K\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ are examined, since only limited data sets are available. In these cases, one may encounter the situation where model parameters are not sufficiently constrained by the restricted data sets and similar qualities-of-fit are obtained with different sets of parameter values. In this paper, we highlight the issue by presenting a fitting procedure based on a genetic algorithm (GA) and commenting on some of the related ambiguities which arise in the complex fitting processes. We have chosen the $`p(\gamma ,K^+)\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ reaction as an example with a limited amount of published data, and where we can restrict the number of free parameters by employing a single-channel model.

In our model, the $`p(\gamma ,K^+)\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ reaction dynamics is described in terms of hadronic degrees of freedom by adopting an effective Lagrangian approach . The tree level Feynman diagrams contain the usual Born terms, the $`K^{}(892)`$ and $`K_1(1270)`$ $`t`$-channel mesons and two hyperon resonances $`S_{01}(1800)`$ and $`P_{01}(1810)`$ in the $`u`$-channel. All these terms constitute the so-called background. In the $`s`$-channel, the nucleon resonances $`S_{11}(1650)`$, $`P_{11}(1710)`$, $`P_{13}(1720)`$ and $`D_{13}(1895)`$ are included. Note that the $`D_{13}(1895)`$ is a candidate for a “missing” nucleon resonance . The finite extension of the meson-baryon vertices is implemented by the use of hadronic form factors . In Ref.  we stressed the difficulties associated with parameterizing the background diagrams in $`p(\gamma ,K^+)\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ calculations and presented results for three plausible background schemes. Subsequent work  showed that the $`p(e,e^{}K^+)\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ process is highly selective with respect to viable choices for dealing with the background diagrams. The model used here is the only one which we found to reproduce simultaneously the $`p(\gamma ,K^+)\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ and $`p(e,e^{}K^+)\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ data.

All the extracted resonance parameters $`G[N^{}]`$ are a product of an electromagnetic and a strong coupling. A description of the various types of resonance parameters $`G[N^{}]`$, their normalization and their connection to the Lagrangian structure is given in Ref. . To minimize the number of free parameters, one overall hadronic form factor cutoff mass for all Born terms and one for all resonance diagrams are introduced. Those coupling constants and cutoff masses constitute the free parameters of the model. In the present hadrodynamical model, this amounts to 22 free parameters which have to be determined by the data. We have used the SAPHIR data set  which contain 24 total cross section, 90 differential cross section and 12 recoil polarization asymmetry points, in the photon energy range from threshold up to 2 GeV. The fits are performed by minimizing $`\chi ^2`$. Finding the global $`\chi ^2`$ minimum in a 22-dimensional parameter space is not trivial since although some of the parameters are constrained to a specific range by physics arguments, in principle they are all unknown quantities.

In order to minimize the $`\chi ^2`$ function and extract $`N^{}`$ information from the $`p(\gamma ,K^+)\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ data, we have used a genetic algorithm. In this strategy, a set of solutions is randomly generated. Each solution $`𝐩`$ is an encoding of trial values of the free parameters, and is used to evaluate the $`\chi ^2\left(𝐩\right)`$ function which determines its “fitness”. The population is then “evolved” in a manner analogous to biological evolution, either by mixing values (“crossover”) or by changing values at random (“mutation”). The population gradually migrates to one or more better points in parameter space. Whilst these optima are not guaranteed to be global, GA research  has shown that “reasonable” solutions can be found very efficiently.

The output of the GA is the individual with the best fitness after a prescribed number of fitness function evaluations. The parameters associated with this individual are then used as input to the Minuit  package which employs a variation of the Davidon-Fletcher-Powell variable-metric minimization algorithm. In this way we take advantage of the wide search capabilities of the GA, but use the strength of a traditional optimizer to obtain final solutions.

To test whether global optima were being found, 50 GA plus Minuit calculations (run concurrently on a Linux-based PC farm) were carried out. Of these calculations, 38 resulted in Minuit converging with a $`\chi ^2`$ below 3.00. This was thought to be a reasonable value, since our previous work  had shown $`\chi ^2`$ values of just under 3.00 to be achievable. The range of the fitness of these solutions111From now on, we refer to “solutions” as meaning those in the converged set of 38. was 2.45 $`\chi ^2`$ 2.93, indicating a reasonable goodness-of-fit to the available data for each solution. This is apparent in Figs. 1, 2, and 3 where the model calculations for the total and differential cross section, and the recoil polarization asymmetry are plotted against SAPHIR data.

Given this similarity in the description of the available data, it is interesting to investigate how close these solutions of the minimization procedure are to each other in parameter space. In Fig. 4, resonance parameters for all the solutions are plotted. At a first glance, it appears that the resulting $`\chi ^2`$ surface in the free parameter space is extremely erratic and has a large number of local minima. The solutions for $`G[P_{11}(1710)]`$ show that the value could be anything within a wide range. On the other hand, the $`S_{11}(1650)`$ coupling constant exhibits clustering in one region, indicating that the value must be within a reasonably small range. Of great interest is the clustering exhibited in the $`G^{\left(1\right)}\left[P_{13}\left(1720\right)\right]`$ coupling constant. Here, there are three distinct clusters plus one isolated point. Furthermore, two clusters appear in the $`D_{13}`$ parameters. We are therefore unable to pin down clear-cut values for all $`N^{}`$ parameters. This clearly illustrates the shortcomings in extracting reliable resonance parameters from the available limited $`p(\gamma ,K^+)\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ data.

To study how the coupling constants are correlated, we have assigned each of the four clusters in the $`G^{\left(1\right)}\left[P_{13}\left(1720\right)\right]`$ parameter a distinct symbol. In Fig. 4, there appears to be a significant correlation between the $`P_{13}`$ parameter and the $`D_{13}`$ couplings. In the $`D_{13}`$, the ▲ and ▼ clusters form one subset, whilst the ★ and ✙ form another. Since the role of the $`D_{13}(1895)`$ in this $`p(\gamma ,K^+)\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ reaction is still under debate, we have split the solutions into two subsets according to this clustering in the $`D_{13}`$ parameters. The characteristics of the two subsets are summarized in Table 1.

As a further study, we show model predictions for the two subsets for some unmeasured observables. In Figs. 5 and 6 this is done for the photon beam asymmetry $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$, the beam-recoil asymmetry $`O_x`$ and the beam-target asymmetry $`E`$. Since none of these asymmetries for the $`p(\gamma ,K^+)\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ reaction are available yet, they do not represent constraints in the minimization procedure. Within each of the two subsets, the predicted kaon-angle dependence of $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$, $`O_x`$ and $`E`$ can be seen to follow similar trends (the dashed exception in Fig. 5 is the solitary ▼ solution).

More important discrepancies are observed when comparing the asymmetry distributions of the two subsets. The main difference appears to be a result of the value of the $`D_{13}(1895)`$ resonance parameters. It is interesting to note that the value of the $`G\left[P_{11}\left(1710\right)\right]`$ parameter appears to have only a small influence in the asymmetries. Reliable extraction of $`P_{11}\left(1710\right)`$ information from $`p(\gamma ,K^+)\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ data is therefore likely to be difficult, even when more (double) polarization asymmetries are available. The model predictions in Fig. 6 show that also the differences in the $`P_{13}`$ parameters between the ★ and ✙ solutions do not translate to significant differences in the plotted asymmetries. On the other hand, the calculation with the “odd” behavior in Fig. 5 is the solitary ▼ solution. Since this solution deviates from the ▲ cluster most strongly in the $`P_{13}`$ parameters, this shows a non-negligible influence of the $`P_{13}(1720)`$ resonance on the observables.

The calculations show that the present data can not discriminate between two main regions in parameters space. The clear differences in the asymmetries between the two subsets will require only modest statistical accuracy to distinguish experimentally. Therefore, the upcoming data for the photon beam asymmetry  and the double polarized asymmetries  will be vital in constraining the values of resonance coupling constants and understanding the reaction mechanism underlying $`K^+\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ production.

In conclusion, we have developed a fitting strategy based on a genetic algorithm in order to extract resonance information from $`p(\gamma ,K^+)\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ data. The advantages of the genetic algorithm are that the available parameter space is extensively sampled, and that the large number of calculations allows one to investigate any ambiguities in the solutions. The success of this strategy perhaps points to its use in problems with similar or larger numbers of free parameters.

The solutions obtained from the minimization runs result in model calculations in close agreement with the available data set. However, from a detailed exploration of the parameter values, it appears that not all solutions are contained in the same region of parameter space. For some of the variables, large deviations appear and no well defined value can be pinned down. This is particularly true for the $`P_{11}\left(1710\right)`$ coupling constant. For other $`N^{}`$ parameters, clustering in a specific area is observed. One stable cluster appears for the $`S_{11}\left(1650\right)`$ parameter and for the $`P_{13}\left(1720\right)`$ and $`D_{13}\left(1895\right)`$, a few isolated groups of solutions are identified. On the basis of these clusters in the $`N^{}`$ parameters, we were able to select two different subsets of solutions of the $`\chi ^2`$ minimization. Solutions within each subset produce more or less identical predictions for unmeasured polarization observables, but large differences were observed when comparing the two sets.

The calculations indicate that the extraction of reliable resonance information from a limited data set is by no means trivial, and has to be handled with the greatest of care. An important conclusion is that when using theoretical models to analyze the excitation spectrum of the nucleon based on a limited data set, the accuracy of predictions will be greatly affected by uncertainties stemming from the fitting process. Hence, employing a strategy which enables a thorough exploration of parameter space is essential. We have shown that the upcoming measurements of specific polarization asymmetries are essential to reduce the uncertainties resulting from the present limited data set.

Acknowledgments S.J. wants to thank the University of Glasgow, where part of this work was completed, for the hospitality during his stays.