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# References

RUNHETC-2003-07

Compactification with Flux and Yukawa Hierarchies.
B.S. Acharya111bacharya@physics.rutgers.edu
Department of Physics,
Rutgers University,
126 Freylinghuysen Road,
NJ 08854-0849.

Abstract

Flux compactifications of $`M`$ theory on certain $`G_2`$-manifolds have vacua in which all moduli are determined. These vacua have discrete parameters - the flux quanta. Small changes in these quanta produce small changes in the moduli and these can lead to large changes in the Yukawa couplings between Higgses, quarks and leptons. We argue that a large number of vacua exist with a wide variety of Yukawa hierarchies.

$`M`$ theory vacua in which the seven extra dimensions form a $`G_2`$-manifold $`X`$ admit a low energy description in terms of an $`𝒩`$ $`=1`$ supergravity theory. If $`X`$ is smooth, the gauge group is abelian and there are no light charged particles. The theory has $`b_3(X)`$ moduli fields $`s^i`$ whose values determine the metric of $`X`$.222$`b_3(X)`$ is the number of linearly independent, harmonic, rank 3 antisymmetric tensor fields on $`X`$. In known examples $`b_3(X)`$ ranges from $`2`$ to $`𝒪(10^2)`$, but examples probably exist with much larger numbers of moduli.

When $`X`$ develops certain kinds of singularities, more interesting physics emerges. For example, if $`X`$ develops an orbifold singularity along a 3-dimensional submanifold $`Q`$, then non-Abelian gauge fields are supported at $`Q`$ (times the four dimensional macroscopic spacetime) . These were further studied in  and elsewhere.

If, in addition, $`X`$ contains a certain kind of conical singularity at a point $`p`$ $`Q`$, then chiral matter fields are supported at $`p`$ (again times the four dimensional spacetime)333See  for some generalisations of the results in . These are charged under the gauge group supported at $`Q`$. Various aspects of the phenomenology of these compactifications in the context of high scale unification have been described in .

Note that in principle, $`X`$ could have many $`Q`$’s and hence many gauge groups and matter representations leading to a vast number of possibilities for the low energy physics. This already suggests the existence of many $`M`$ theory vacua with a low energy standard model gauge group and field content but with presumably different couplings.

Low energy $`M`$ theory physics is well approximated by d=11 supergravity. The bose fields of this theory are the metric $`g`$ and a 3-form field $`C`$, with field strength $`G`$. When $`X`$ develops the singularities discussed above the action is supplemented with additional gauge and matter fields which are localised at the singularities.

We recently showed that if there is a $`Q`$ which admits a complex flat gauge field whose Chern-Simons invariant is not real and suitably large, then compactifications with non-zero $`G`$-flux exist for which the potential has a minimum in which all the moduli fields $`s^i`$ are fixed 444We will assume that such $`G_2`$-manifolds exist. In our opinion, this is a relatively mild assumption.. Whilst this mechanism utilises the gauge fields on $`Q`$ and its superpartners in an essential way, it does not require invoking any dynamics of the charged matter fields and hence does not require the low energy theory to contain any realistic particle physics.

This is just as well, because the vacuum in the minimum is supersymmetric with a negative cosmological constant $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_0`$. If the singularities of $`X`$ are such that they produce a particle physics sector which dynamically breaks supersymmetry, then there will be an additional contribution to the cosmological constant, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_1`$, which we will assume is positive.

In principle, therefore, these models could have positive cosmological constants.

Since we are yet to have a good understanding of the supersymmetry breaking dynamics this is somehwat difficult to evaluate, as are many other phenomenological questions. However, we feel that it is nonetheless worthwhile to consider certain phenomenological aspects of these models before supersymmetry breaking. After all, if the supersymmetry breaking is “soft” enough, it may be that some of what we learn prior to breaking it persists when it is broken. Another rationale for this is simple: since we have found a vacuum selection principle, we ought to attempt to put it to some use555In a cosmological setting we are asserting that the universe is close to the minimum of the scalar potential. Its not atall clear that this is the right thing to do.!

Because of our lack of understanding of supersymmetry breaking this “phenomenology” will necessarily be crude.

For example, as we discussed in , in order to obtain a realistic cosmological constant, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_0`$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_1`$ have to be equal to many orders of magnitude. Without explaining how this could possibly be, we can try to learn something by imposing that they have the same order of magnitude. For example, if $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_1`$ is of order $`(TeV)^4`$, then the eleven dimensional Planck scale is of order $`10TeV`$ and we would have “large extra dimensions” as in . More generally, one can show using the formulae in  that if $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_1`$ is $`m^4`$ then $`M_p`$ and $`m`$ are equal to within an order of magnitude for certain choices of flux, so the scale at which $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_1`$ is generated is at or around the eleven dimensional Planck scale. So, in a unification scenario with “small extra dimensions”, the particle physics contribution to the cosmological constant will have to be generated at a high scale, close to $`M_{GUT}`$. This already suggests a departure from conventional wisdom. Firstly the standard lore suggests that the highest scale of supersymmetry breaking (which occurs in certain models of gravity mediated supersymmetry breaking) is $`10^{13}GeV`$, whereas in the high scale unification based on $`G_2`$-manifolds the fundamental Planck scale is several orders of magnitude higher, not one. In reality this observation probably means that $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_0`$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_1`$ are not of the same order in these models atall.

However, even if we do not solve the cosmological constant problem, we may have more success in explaining other observed features of our universe. In this paper we will show that the $`M`$ theory vacua with flux described in  naturally predict hierarchies of Yukawa couplings prior to supersymmetry breaking. In fact, we will see that by tuning the discrete parameters, one can obtain models with a wide variety of Yukawa hierarchies.

 emphasised the fact that couplings depend on flux quanta from a general point of view. Here we will be able to be more specific.

Including supersymmetry breaking dynamics is unlikely, in our opinion, to change the conclusion that a wide variety of vacua exist with a wide variety of Yukawa couplings. If so, the conclusion of this paper will be that there are many vacua of $`M`$ theory which contain the field content of the standard model at low energies, but with the incorrect masses and couplings. Moreover some of these vacua do have the correct couplings.

The vacua under discussion have many discrete parameters. For each modulus field we have to specify an integer $`N_i`$ which labels the amount of $`G`$-flux in a particular direction in the cohomology lattice of $`X`$. Changing the flux quanta $`N_i`$ changes the value of the $`s^i`$ in the minimum of the potential. So there are actually many different vacua, with many different values of the moduli.

If $`Q`$ is the 3-manifold which supports the standard model gauge group, then the quark, lepton and Higgs fields are supported at points $`p_i`$ on $`Q`$. Because in general, the $`p_i`$ are distinct in the extra dimensions, there can be no local interactions between charged matter particles in these vacua. Instead, nonlocal interactions are generated by Euclidean membrane instantons666In the smooth case, these have been studied in  whose world volumes are 3-manifolds $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ which pass through the points $`p_i`$. For example, if $`p_1,p_2`$ and $`p_3`$ support a Higgs field $`H`$, and charged chiral fermion fields $`\psi _1`$ and $`\psi _2`$, then a Yukawa coupling

$$L\lambda H\psi _1\psi _2$$
(1)
can be generated if $`X`$ contains a 3-manifold $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ passing through the three points. The Yukawa coupling constant $`\lambda `$ will be exponentially small in the volume of $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$

$$\lambda e^{2\pi Vol(\mathrm{\Sigma })}$$
(2)
In particular, since we expect the Yukawa couplings to be generated through superpotential interactions, we expect that $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ is a supersymmetric 3-cycle in $`X`$ (as is $`Q`$). This implies that

$$Vol(\mathrm{\Sigma })=a_is^i$$
(3)
ie is linear in the moduli. So we see from these simple observations that small changes in the moduli can produce large changes in Yukawa couplings.

As we will see, choices of flux quanta exist in which the hierarchies of Yukawa couplings in these vacua are roughly compatible with the observed Yukawa couplings of the standard model. Many more vacua could also exist in which the hierarchies of Yukawa couplings are unlikely to be correct.

In  we found that in the vacuum, the moduli fields satisfied the relation

$$_XG\phi =\mathrm{\Sigma }_i2\pi N_is^i=\frac{7}{5}c_2$$
(4)
Where $`G`$ is the four-form flux and $`\phi `$ is the moduli dependent 3-form $`G_2`$-structure on $`X`$. $`c_2`$ is the imaginary part of the Chern-Simons invariant associated with the superpotential induced by the gauge fields and superpartners. $`c_2`$ is a non-zero constant in the vacua under consideration.

This equation shows that if, say, $`N_1`$ is increased, $`s^1`$ must decrease. For simplicity we will assume that each Yukawa coupling comes from one supersymmetric 3-cycle and further that the volume of each such 3-cycle is one of the $`s^i`$ ie that the 3-cycles which give rise to the Yukawa couplings actually form part of a basis for the homology of $`X`$. These assumptions do not affect the results.

Then the $`i`$’th Yukawa coupling is of order

$$\lambda _iexp(\frac{1.4c_2}{b_3(X)N_i})$$
(5)
where $`b_3(X)`$ is the number of independent flux quanta.

Moreover, the ratio of two Yukawa couplings is

$$\frac{\lambda _i}{\lambda _j}exp(1.4c_2\frac{N_jN_i}{b_3(X)N_iN_j})$$
(6)
Note that these formulae should be interpreted as giving the Yukawa couplings at the eleven dimensional Planck scale $`M_p`$. In a given model we have to renormalise these couplings to, say, the electroweak scale in order to compare with experiment. This really depends upon the details of the model if the Planck scale is high. However, as we will show below, choices of flux exist which can easily produce a large variety of hierarchies of couplings at the Planck scale, so if a given compactification requires a particular hierarchy, then choices of flux exist which could produce it.

To illustrate these points, let us assume that the effective field theory is such that the Yukawa couplings of the light fermions are not renormalised too much between $`M_p`$ and say $`1GeV`$. The Yukawa coupling of the electron is then roughly $`10^6`$. So if $`\lambda _1`$ is this coupling, then $`\frac{c_2}{b_3(X)N_1}`$ $`9.8`$. If, for example, $`\frac{c_2}{b_3(X)}=3026`$, then choosing $`N_1=307`$ makes $`\lambda _1`$ the right order of magnitude. Then, if $`\lambda _2`$ is the Yukawa coupling of the muon, which is about two orders of magnitude larger we can take a flux vacuum in which $`N_2=460`$. The difference between $`N_1`$ and $`N_2`$ is of order 150, so by choosing values of $`N_2`$ closer to $`N_1`$ we have a lot of freedom to tune the ratio of couplings. So, if the effective field theory is such that the required Yukawas at the Planck scale are much closer than those observed at low energies, this can easily be achieved. Finally, we should mention that since the Yukawa coupling of the top quark is so large, that a fairly large flux might be necessary, which produces an order one contribution in $`M`$ theory.

Some comments are in order. If $`c_2`$ is lowered, then the gap between $`N_1`$ and $`N_2`$ is lowered, and consequently the range of possible values of $`\frac{\lambda _2}{\lambda _1}`$ decreases. So, for manifolds with low $`c_2`$, the number of possible vacua with the correct masses decreases. This suggests that as $`c_2`$ is lowered the predictive power of the theory increases since the number of models that one has to analyse goes down. We remind the reader that lowering $`c_2`$ decreases the size of the extra dimensions and therefore increases $`M_p`$.

But if $`c_2`$ is large enough we see that before taking into account any supersymmetry breaking dynamics, many vacua exist with a wide variety of Yukawa hierarchies.

The vacua with different choices of flux are “related” via domain wall nucleation. In this case, if $`G_1`$ and $`G_2`$ are two different choices of $`G`$-flux then the domain wall connecting them is an $`M5`$-brane which wraps the 3-manifold $`D`$ in $`X`$ whose homology class is dual to the difference of the two $`G`$-fluxes:

$$[D]=G_1G_2$$
(7)
Bousso and Polchinski have argued that since $`X`$ could have many 3-cycles that it is likely that vacua exist for which the value of the cosmologial constant is consistent with observation . As we have already mentioned, before taking into account any supersymmetry breaking dynamics, the cosmological constant is negative, regardless of the flux quanta. However, it may be that the arguments of  are valid after supersymmetry breaking.

From our discussion here, we can see that, even though we have to tune the flux quanta carefully to obtain the correct fermion masses, we only have to tune a few fluxes, and not hundreds. Therefore, accepting the the arguments in 777For a further discussion see ., we might conclude that vacua exist with the correct cosmological constant and fermion masses. However, fine tuning of many more fluxes may be required to obtain the correct superpartner masses, say and other couplings of nature. This is difficult to estimate since we do not understand superymmetry breaking well enough. But it may turn out that the arguments of  could be invalidated, since even though universes with the correct cosmological constant exist, it could be unlikely that they would have the correct particle masses and interactions.

 describe supersymmetric Type IIB string flux vacua with negative $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ and fixed moduli. Studies of these vacua are likely to lead to similar sorts of conclusions to those drawn here. These and more general questions have been addressed recently in  which takes a more statistical approach to the problem of “standard model vacua” of string and $`M`$ theory.

Acknowledgements. We would like to thank the Theorists at MIT for stimulating the discussion from which this paper was conceived, Thomas Dent, Mike Douglas, Steve Gubser and Greg Moore.


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# Transitions of two baryons to the H dibaryon in nuclei

## I Introduction

The H dibaryon corresponds to the most symmetric color-spin representation of six quarks ($`uuddss`$). It is a flavor singlet state with charge 0, strangeness -2 and spin-isospin-parity $`I(J^P)=0(0^+)`$. The existence of the H was predicted by Jaffe in 1977 jaffe  in the framework of the quark-bag model. Its mass was originally estimated to be around 2150 MeV, making it stable toward strong decay to two $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ particles. Since then, there have been many theoretical efforts to determine its mass and production cross section and, on the experimental side, many inconclusive or unsuccessful attempts to produce and detect it.

Our work is prompted by the possibility that the H is lighter than two nucleons. This is motivated by several lines of reasoning based on hadron phenomenology and non-perturbative QCD modelingf:stableH . The interpretation of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }(1405)`$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }(1520)`$ as bound states of gluon plus $`uds`$ quarks in a flavor-singlet color-octet state, suggests the H has properties similar to a glueball and $`m_H1.31.8`$ GeVkf:Lam1405 ; f:stableH . Adding current quark masses to the original Skyrme model calculation with massless quarksbalachandran:skyrmeH ; f:stableH  gives $`m_H1.8`$ GeV. Finally, an instanton-liquid calculation gives $`m_H=1780`$ MeVkochelev:H .

Being tightly bound, the H is expected to be a spatially compact state. Analogy with the glueball and instanton-liquid results suggest $`r_Hr_G(1/31/2)r_\pi (1/61/4)r_N`$ f:stableH ; shuryak:RG . In the absence of an unquenched, high-resolution lattice QCD calculation capable of a reliable determination of the H mass and size, we will take $`r_H/r_N=1/f`$ with $`f`$ treated as a parameter expected to be in the range 4-6. For a more detailed discussion of motivation and properties of a stable H, and a review of experimental constraints on such an H, see ref. f:stableH .

In this paper we focus on two types of experimental constraints on the transition of two baryons to an H in a nucleus, $`A_{BB}A_H^{}X`$. Experiments observing single $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ decays from double $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hypernuclei $`A_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}`$ags ; kek2  indicate that $`\tau (A_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}A_H^{}X)\stackrel{<}{}\tau _\mathrm{\Lambda }=310^{10}`$ sec. In addition, if the H is lighter than two nucleons, nuclei are unstable toward $`\mathrm{\Delta }S=2`$ weak decays producing the H particle in the final state. To estimate the rates for these processes requires calculating the overlap of initial and final quark wavefunctions in a nucleus. We will model that overlap using an Isgur-Karl harmonic oscillator model for the baryons and H, and the Bethe-Goldstone wavefunction for a nucleus. Our results will be expressed in terms of the parameter $`f=r_N/r_H`$ and the nuclear hard core radius. We will find that the stability of nuclei is the more stringent constraint on the properties of a stable H, but is acceptably small if the H is sufficiently compact: $`r_H\stackrel{<}{}1/4r_N`$ depending on mass and nuclear hard core radius. Adequate suppression of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(A_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}A_H^{}X)`$ requires $`r_H\stackrel{<}{}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1}/3r_N`$, whether H is stable or not. Thus a byproduct of this investigation is that the conventional H with mass $`2m_N<m_H<2m_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ may still be viable in spite of the observation of double-$`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hypernuclei, consistent with the conclusion of ref. kahana .

This paper is organized as follows. In section II we describe in greater detail the two types of experimental constraints on the conversion of baryons to an H in a nucleus. In section III we calculate lifetimes for these transitions, using a non-relativistic harmonic oscillator quark model and a phenomenological treatment of the weak interactions. The results are summarized in section IV.

## II Experimental constraints

### II.1 Stability of nuclei

There are a number or possible reactions by which two nucleons can convert to an H in a nucleus. The initial state is most likely to be $`pn`$ or $`nn`$ in a relative s-wave, because in other cases the Coulomb barrier or relative orbital angular momentum suppresses the overlap of the nucleons at short distances which is necessary to produce the H. If $`m_H\stackrel{<}{}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}m_Nnm_\pi `$111Throughout, we use this shorthand for the more precise inequality $`m_H<m_Am_A^{}m_X`$ where $`m_X`$ is the minimum invariant mass of the final decay products., the final state can be $`H\pi ^+`$ or $`H\pi ^0`$ and $`n1`$ pions with total charge 0. For $`m_H\stackrel{>}{}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1740}`$ MeV, the most important reactions are $`pnHe^+\nu _e`$ or the radiative-doubly-weak reaction $`nnH\gamma `$.

The most sensitive experiments to place a limit on the stability of nuclei are proton decay experiments. Super Kamiokande (SuperK), places the most stringent constraint due to its large mass; it is a water Cerenkov detector with a 22.5 kiloton fiducial mass, corresponding to $`810^{32}`$ oxygen nuclei. SuperK is sensitive to proton decay events in over 40 specific proton decay channelsSuperK . Since the signatures for the transition of two nucleons to the H are substantially different from the monitored transitions, a specific analysis by SuperK is needed to place a limit. We will discuss the order-of-magnitude of the limits which can be anticipated.

Detection is easiest if the H is light enough to be produced with a $`\pi ^+`$ or $`\pi ^0`$. The efficiency of SuperK to detect neutral pions, in the energy range of interest (KE = 0-$`300`$ MeV), is around 70 percent. In the case that a $`\pi ^+`$ is emitted, it can charge exchange to $`\pi ^0`$ within the detector, or be directly detected as a non-showering muon-like particle with similar efficiency. More difficult is the most interesting mass range $`m_H\stackrel{>}{}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1740}`$ MeV, for which the dominant channel $`pnHe^+\nu `$ gives an electron with $`E(2m_Nm_H)/2\stackrel{<}{}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}70}`$ MeV. With a rate of order $`\alpha `$ smaller, the $`nnH\gamma `$ channel would give a monochromatic photon with energy $`(2m_Nm_H)\stackrel{<}{}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}100}`$ MeV.

We can estimate SuperK’s probable sensitivity as follows. The ultimate background comes primarily from atmospheric neutrino interactions: $`\nu NN^{}(e,\mu ),\nu NN^{}(e,\mu )+n\pi ,\nu N\nu N^{}+n\pi `$, which has a rate of about 100 $`\mathrm{kton}^1\mathrm{yr}^1`$. Without a strikingly distinct signature, it would be difficult to detect a signal rate significantly smaller than this, which would imply SuperK might be able to achieve a sensitivity of order $`\tau _{A_{NN}A_H^{}X}\stackrel{>}{}\mathrm{few10}^{29}`$ yr. Since the H production signature is not more favorable than the signatures for proton decay, the SuperK limit on $`\tau _{A_{NN}A_H^{}X}`$ can at best be $`0.1\tau _p`$, where $`0.1`$ is the ratio of Oxygen nuclei to protons in water. Detailed study of the spectrum of the background is needed to make a more precise statement. We can get a lower limit on the SuperK lifetime limit by noting that the SuperK trigger rate is a few HzSuperK , putting an immediate limit $`\tau _{OH+X}\stackrel{>}{}\mathrm{few10}^{25}`$ yr, assuming the decays trigger SuperK.

While SuperK limits depend on specific decay channels, three other experiments potentially establish limits on the proton lifetime which are independent of the decay channelpdb . They place weaker constraints on the lifetime, due to their smaller size, but are of interest because they measure the stability of nuclei directly. The experiments of Dix et al.dix  and Evans et al.evans  are not sensitive to two nucleon transitions and thus are not applicable to nuclei disintegrating with the emission of an H.

The experiment of Flerov et. al.flerov  could in principle be sensitive to such transitions. It searched for decay products from $`\mathrm{Th}^{232}`$, above the Th natural decay mode background of 4.7 MeV $`\alpha `$ particles, emitted with the rate $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\alpha =0.710^{10}\mathrm{yr}^1`$. The conversion of two nucleons in $`\mathrm{Th}^{232}`$ could result in the following decay chains:
$`\mathrm{Th}_{pp}^{232}\mathrm{Ra}_H^{230}X;`$$`\text{}+\beta (0.99MeV)`$ $`\mathrm{Th}_{pn}^{232}\mathrm{Ac}_H^{230}X;`$$`\text{}+\beta (2.7MeV)`$ $`\mathrm{Th}_{nn}^{232}\mathrm{Th}_H^{230}X;`$$`\text{}+\alpha (4.7MeV).`$
However in general the transitional nuclear state, denoted e.g., $`\mathrm{Ra}_H^{230}`$, would have additional more complicated decay chains through excited states. Note that the H does not bind to nucleifz:nucbind ; it simply recoils with some momentum imparted in its production. The Flerov et alflerov  experiment must have cuts to remove the severe background of 4.7 MeV $`\alpha `$’s. If these cuts do not remove the events with production of an H, it would imply the limit $`\tau _{\mathrm{Th}^{232}H+X}>10^{21}`$ yr. Unfortunately ref. flerov  does not discuss these cuts or the experimental sensitivity in detail. An attempt to correspond with the experimental group, to determine whether their results are applicable to the H, was unsuccessful.

### II.2 Double $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hyper-nuclei detection

There are five experiments which have reported positive results in the search for single $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ decays from double $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hypernuclei. We will describe them briefly. The three early emulsion based experiments prowse ; danysz ; kek  suffer from ambiguities in the particle identification, and therefore are considered less reliable. In the latest emulsion experiment at KEK kek2 , a double hypernucleus event has been observed and interpreted with good confidence as the sequential decay of $`\mathrm{He}_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}^6`$ emitted from a $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{}`$ hyperon nuclear capture at rest. The binding energy of the double $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ system is obtained in this experiment to be $`B_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}=1.01\pm 0.2`$ MeV, in significant disagreement with the results of previous emulsion experiments, finding $`B_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}4.5`$ MeV.

The synchrotron based experiment ags  used the $`(K^{},K^+)`$ reaction on a $`\mathrm{Be}^9`$ target to produce S=-2 nuclei. That experiment detected pion pairs, coming from the same vertex in the Be target. Each pion in a pair indicates one unit of strangeness change from the (presumably) di-$`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ system. Peaks in the two pion spectrum have been observed, interpreted as corresponding to two kinds of decay events. The pion kinetic energies in those peaks are (114,133) MeV and (104,114) MeV. The first peak can be understood as two independent single $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ decays from $`\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ nuclei. The energies of the second peak do not correspond to known single $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ decay energies in hyper-nuclei of interest. The proposed explanationags  is that they are pions from the decay of the double $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ system, through some specific He resonance. The required resonance has not yet been observed experimentally, but its existence is considered plausible. This experiment does not suffer from low statistics or inherent ambiguities, and one of the measured peaks in the two pion spectrum suggests observation of consecutive weak decays of a double $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hyper-nucleus. The binding energy of the double $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ system $`B_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}`$ could not be determined in this experiment.

The KEK and BNL experiments demonstrate quite conclusively, in two different techniques, the observation of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ decays from double $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hypernuclei. Therefore $`\tau _{A_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}A_H^{}X}`$ cannot be much less than $`10^{10}`$s. (To give a more precise limit on $`\tau _{A_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}A_H^{}X}`$ requires a detailed analysis by the experimental teams, taking into account the number of hypernuclei produced, the number of observed $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ decays, the acceptance, and so on.) As will be seen below, this constraint is readily satisfied if the H is compact: $`r_H\stackrel{<}{}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1}/3r_N`$.

## III BB to H transition rates in nuclei

As discussed in the introduction, the H may be considerably more compact than a nucleon which would suppress its production from a two baryon initial state, due to the small overlap of the initial and final wave functions in position space. We will estimate this suppression using the non-relativistic harmonic oscillator quark model. Additional suppression comes from the hard core repulsion in the nucleon-nucleon wave function in the nucleus. To take that into account, we use the Bethe-Goldstone relative wave function of two baryons in a nucleus.

The matrix element for the transition $`A_{NN}A_H^{}X`$ is calculated in the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ pole approximation, as a product of matrix elements for two subprocesses: a transition matrix element for formation of the H from a $`\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ system, $`||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }HX}`$, times the amplitude for a weak doubly-strangeness-changing transition, $`||_{NN\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}`$. The suppression in the spatial wavefunction overlap enters the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H`$ transition. We calculate this part of the transition amplitude first. The estimate of $`||_{NN\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }X}`$ based on weak interaction phenomenology is given afterwords.

### III.1 Calculation of $`||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}`$

We calculate $`||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}`$ in position space as the overlap of the H and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ wave functions in the Isgur-Karl (IK) non-relativistic harmonic oscillator quark modelfaiman ; bhaduri . We take the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ spatial wavefunction to be the same as the nucleon’s. For now we are concerned with the dynamics of the process and we defer discussion of the suppression from the spin-flavor part of the transition amplitude.

The IK model was designed to reproduce the masses of the observed resonances and it has proved to be successful in calculating baryon decay rates faiman . In the IK model, the quarks in a baryon are described by the Hamiltonian

$$H=\frac{1}{2m}(p_1^2+p_2^2+p_3^2)+\frac{1}{2}K\mathrm{\Sigma }_{i<j}^3(\stackrel{}{r}_i\stackrel{}{r}_j)^2$$
(1)
where we have neglected constituent quark mass differences. The wave function of baryons can then be written in terms of the relative positions of quarks, while the center of mass motion is factored out. The relative wave function in this model isfaiman ; bhaduri

$$\mathrm{\Psi }_B(\stackrel{}{r}_1,\stackrel{}{r}_2,\stackrel{}{r}_3)=N_B\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{\alpha _B^2}{6}\mathrm{\Sigma }_{i<j}^3(\stackrel{}{r}_i\stackrel{}{r}_j)^2\right]$$
(2)
where $`N_B`$ is the normalization factor, $`\alpha _B=\frac{1}{\sqrt{<r_B^2>}}=\sqrt{3Km}`$, and $`<r_B^2>`$ is the baryon mean charge radius squared. Changing variables to

$$\stackrel{}{\rho }=\frac{\stackrel{}{r_1}\stackrel{}{r_2}}{\sqrt{2}},\stackrel{}{\lambda }=\frac{\stackrel{}{r_1}+\stackrel{}{r_2}2\stackrel{}{r_3}}{\sqrt{6}}$$
(3)
reduces the wave function to two independent harmonic oscillators. In the ground state

$$\mathrm{\Psi }_B(\stackrel{}{\rho },\stackrel{}{\lambda })=\left(\frac{\alpha _B}{\sqrt{\pi }}\right)^3\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{\alpha _B^2}{2}(\rho ^2+\lambda ^2)\right].$$
(4)
One of the deficiencies of the IK model is that the value of the $`\alpha _B`$ parameter needed to reproduce the mass splittings of lowest lying $`\frac{1}{2}^+`$ and $`\frac{3}{2}^+`$ baryons corresponds to a mean charge radius squared for the proton of $`<r_{ch}^2>=\frac{1}{\alpha _B^2}=0.49`$ fm. This is distinctly smaller than the experimental value of 0.86 fm. Our results depend strongly on the choice of $`\alpha _B`$ and therefore we should keep in mind this problem. Another concern is the applicability of the non-relativistic IK model in describing quark systems, especially in the case of the tightly bound H. With $`r_H/r_N=1/f`$, the quark momenta in the H are $`f`$ times higher than in the nucleon, which makes the non-relativistic approach more questionable than in the case of nucleons. Nevertheless we adopt the IK model because it offers a tractable way of obtaining a qualitative estimate of the effect of the small size of the H on the transition rate, and there is no other alternative available at this time.

We fix the wave function for the H particle starting from the same Hamiltonian (1), but generalized to a six quark system. For the relative motion part this gives

$$\mathrm{\Psi }_H=N_H\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{\alpha _H^2}{6}\underset{i<j}{\overset{6}{}}(\stackrel{}{r_i}\stackrel{}{r_j})^2\right].$$
(5)
The space part of the matrix element $`<A_H^{}|A_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}>`$ is given by the integral

$$\underset{i=1}{\overset{6}{}}d^3\stackrel{}{r}_i\mathrm{\Psi }_\mathrm{\Lambda }^a(1,2,3)\mathrm{\Psi }_\mathrm{\Lambda }^b(4,5,6)\mathrm{\Psi }_H(1,2,3,4,5,6).$$
(6)
We can rewrite this in a more convenient form, changing variables to

$$\stackrel{}{r}_1,\stackrel{}{r}_2,\stackrel{}{r}_3,\stackrel{}{r}_4,\stackrel{}{r}_5,\stackrel{}{r}_6\stackrel{}{\rho }^a,\stackrel{}{\lambda }^a,\stackrel{}{\rho }^b,\stackrel{}{\lambda }^b,\stackrel{}{a},\stackrel{}{R}_{CM}$$
(7)
where $`\stackrel{}{\rho }^{a(b)}`$ and $`\stackrel{}{\lambda }^{a(b)}`$ are defined as in eq (3), with $`a(b)`$ referring to coordinates $`1,2,3(4,5,6)`$. (Since we are ignoring the flavor-spin part of the wavefunction, we can consider the six quarks as distinguishable and not worry about fermi statistics at this stage.) We also define the center-of-mass position and the separation, $`\stackrel{}{a}`$, between initial baryons $`a`$ and $`b`$:

$$\stackrel{}{R}_{CM}=\frac{\stackrel{}{R}_{CM}^a+\stackrel{}{R}_{CM}^b}{2},\stackrel{}{a}=\stackrel{}{R}_{CM}^a\stackrel{}{R}_{CM}^b.$$
(8)
Using these variables, the H ground state wave function becomes

$`\mathrm{\Psi }_H`$ $`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{3}{2^3}}\right)^{1/4}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\alpha _H}{\sqrt{\pi }}}\right)^{15/2}`$
$`\times `$ $`\mathrm{exp}[{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha _H^2}{2}}(\stackrel{}{\rho ^a}^2+\stackrel{}{\lambda ^a}^2+\stackrel{}{\rho ^b}^2+\stackrel{}{\lambda ^b}^2+{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}\stackrel{}{a}^2)]`$
and the overlap of the space wave functions is given by

$$||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}=\underset{i=a,b}{}d^3\rho ^id^3\lambda ^id^3a\psi _H\psi _\mathrm{\Lambda }^a\psi _\mathrm{\Lambda }^b\psi _{nuc}$$
(10)
where the center of mass dependence has been factored out, $`\psi _\mathrm{\Lambda }^{a,b}=\psi _\mathrm{\Lambda }^{a,b}(\stackrel{}{\rho }^{a,b},\stackrel{}{\lambda }^{a,b})`$, and $`\psi _{nuc}=\psi _{nuc}(\stackrel{}{a})`$ is the relative wavefunction function of the two $`\mathrm{\Lambda }^{}s`$ in the nucleus. The integration over the center of mass position of the system gives a 3 dimensional momentum delta function. In the case of pion or lepton emission, plane waves of the emitted particles should be included in the integrand. For brevity we use here the zero momentum transfer, $`\stackrel{}{k}=0`$ approximation, which we have checked holds with good accuracy; this is not surprising since typical momenta are $`\stackrel{<}{}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0.3}`$ GeV.

To describe two $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$’s or nucleons in a nucleus we will use solutions of the Bruecker-Bethe-Goldston equation describing the interaction of a pair of fermions in an independent pair approximation; see, e.g., walecka . The two particle potential in a nucleus is poorly known at short distances. Measurements (the observed deuteron form factors, the sums of longitudinal response of light nuclei,…) only constrain the two-nucleon potentials and the wave functions they predict at internucleon distances larger than $`0.7`$ fm pandharipande . The Bethe-Goldstone equation can be solved analytically when a hard-core potential is used. While the hard-core form is surely only approximate, it is useful for our purposes because it enables us to isolate the sensitivity of the results to the short-distance behavior of the wavefunction. We stress again, that more “realistic” wavefunctions are in fact not experimentally constrained for distances below 0.7 fm. Rather, their form at short distance is chosen for technical convenience or aesthetics.

For the s-wave, the B-G wavefunction is

$$\mathrm{\Psi }_{BG}(\stackrel{}{a})=\{\begin{array}{cc}N_{BG}\frac{u(k_Fa)}{k_Fa}\hfill & \text{for }a>\frac{c}{k_F}\hfill \\ 0\hfill & \text{for }a<\frac{c}{k_F}\hfill \end{array}$$
(11)
where $`\frac{c}{k_F}`$ is the hard core radius. The function $`u`$ vanishes at the hard core surface by construction. It then rapidly approaches the unperturbed value $`1`$, crossing over that value at the so called “healing distance”. Expressions for $`u`$ and $`N_{BG}`$ can be found in walecka .

After performing the Gaussian integrals analytically, the overlap of the space wave functions becomes

$`||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{2f}{1+f^2}}\right)^6\left({\displaystyle \frac{3}{2^3}}\right)^{1/4}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\alpha _H}{\sqrt{\pi }}}\right)^{3/2}`$
$`\times `$ $`N_{BG}{\displaystyle _{\frac{c}{k_F}}^{\mathrm{}}}d^3a{\displaystyle \frac{u(k_Fa)}{k_Fa}}e^{\frac{3}{4}\alpha _H^2a^2}`$
where the factor 1/4 comes from the probability that two nucleons are in a relative s-wave, and $`f`$ is the previously-introduced ratio of nucleon to H radius; $`\alpha _H=f\alpha _B`$. Since $`N_{BG}`$ has dimensions $`V^{1/2}`$ the spatial overlap $`||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}`$ is a dimensionless quantity, characterized by the ratio $`f`$, the Isgur-Karl oscillator parameter $`\alpha _B`$, and the value of the hard core radius. It is shown in Fig. 1 for a range values of hard-core radius and $`f`$, using the standard value of $`\alpha _B`$ for the IK modelbhaduri .

Figure 1: Log10 of $`||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}^2`$ versus hard core radius in fm, for ratio $`f=R_N/R_H=`$ 4, 5, 6, 7.

### III.2 Lifetime of doubly-strange nuclei

We can now estimate the decay rate of a doubly-strange nucleus:

$`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{A_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}A_H^{}\pi }`$ $``$ $`K^2(2\pi )^4{\displaystyle \frac{m_q^2}{2(2m_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }})}}`$
$`\times `$ $`\mathrm{\Phi }_2||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}^2.`$
where $`\mathrm{\Phi }_2`$ is the two body phase final space factor, defined as in pdb , and $`m_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}`$ is the invariant mass of the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$’s, $`2m_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$. The factor $`K`$ contains the transition element in spin flavor space. It can be estimated by counting the total number of flavor-spin states a $`uuddss`$ system can occupy, and taking $`K^2`$ to be the fraction of those states which has the correct quantum numbers to form the H. That gives $`K^21/1440`$. Thus we obtain the lifetime estimate

$$\tau _{A_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}A_H^{}\pi }\frac{1.4}{K^2||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}^2}10^{21}\mathrm{s},$$
(14)
where the phase space factor was calculated for $`m_H=1.5`$ GeV.

Fig. 2 shows $`||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}^2`$ in the range of $`f`$ and hard-core radius where its value is in the neighborhood of the experimental limits. Evidently, $`||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}^2\stackrel{<}{}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}10}^8`$ is satisfied even for relatively large H, e.g., $`r_H\stackrel{<}{}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1}/3r_N`$ for the canonical choice 0.4 fm for hard-core radius. This suppresses $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(A_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }}A_H^{}X)`$ sufficiently that some $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$’s in a double-$`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hypernucleus will decay prior to formation of an H. Thus the observation of single $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ decay products from double-$`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hypernuclei cannot be taken to exclude the existence of an H with mass below $`2m_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ unless it can be demonstrated that $`r_H1/3r_N`$.

Figure 2: Log10 of $`||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}^2`$ versus hard core radius in fm, for f=2, 3, 4.

### III.3 Calculation of the $`||_{BB\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }X}`$ matrix element

Transition of a two nucleon system to $`\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ requires two strangeness changing weak reactions. Possible $`\mathrm{\Delta }S=1`$ sub-processes to consider are a weak transition with emission of a pion or lepton pair and an internal weak transition. These are illustrated in Fig. 3 for a three quark system. We estimate the amplitude for each of the sub-processes and calculate the overall matrix element for transition to the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ system as a product of the sub-process amplitudes.

Figure 3: Some relevant weak transitions for $`NNHX`$

The matrix element for weak pion emission is estimated from the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }N\pi `$ rate:

$$||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }N\pi }^2=\frac{1}{(2\pi )^4}\frac{2m_\mathrm{\Lambda }}{\mathrm{\Phi }_2}\frac{1}{\tau _{\mathrm{\Lambda }N\pi }}=0.8\times 10^{12}\mathrm{GeV}^2.$$
(15)
By crossing symmetry this is equal to the desired $`||_{N\mathrm{\Lambda }\pi }^2`$, in the approximation of momentum-independence which should be valid for the small momenta in this application. Analogously, for lepton pair emission we have

$$||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }Ne\nu }^2=\frac{1}{(2\pi )^4}\frac{2m_\mathrm{\Lambda }}{\mathrm{\Phi }_3}\frac{1}{\tau _{\mathrm{\Lambda }Ne\nu }}=3.0\times 10^{12}.$$
(16)
The matrix element for internal conversion, $`(uds)(udd)`$, is proportional to the spatial nucleon wave function when two quarks are at the same point:

$$||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }N}<\psi _\mathrm{\Lambda }|\delta ^3(\stackrel{}{r}_1\stackrel{}{r}_2)|\psi _N>\frac{G_F\mathrm{sin}\theta _c\mathrm{cos}\theta _c}{m_q},$$
(17)
where $`m_q`$ is the quark mass introduced in order to make the 4 point vertex amplitude dimensionlessyaouanc . The expectation value of the delta function can be calculated in the harmonic oscillator model to be

$$<\psi _\mathrm{\Lambda }|\delta ^3(\stackrel{}{r}_1\stackrel{}{r}_2)|\psi _N>=\left(\frac{\alpha _B}{\sqrt{2\pi }}\right)^3=0.4\times 10^2\mathrm{GeV}^3.$$
(18)
The delta function term can be also inferred phenomenologically in the following way, as suggested in yaouanc . The Fermi spin-spin interaction has a contact character depending on $`\stackrel{}{\sigma _1}\stackrel{}{\sigma _2}/m_q^2\delta (\stackrel{}{r}_1\stackrel{}{r}_2)`$, and therefore the delta function matrix element can be determined in terms of electromagnetic or strong hyperfine splitting:

$`(m_{\mathrm{\Sigma }^0}m_{\mathrm{\Sigma }^+})(m_nm_p)=\alpha {\displaystyle \frac{2\pi }{3m_q^2}}<\delta ^3(\stackrel{}{r}_1\stackrel{}{r}_2)>`$ (19)
$`m_\mathrm{\Delta }m_N=\alpha _S{\displaystyle \frac{8\pi }{3m_q^2}}<\delta ^3(\stackrel{}{r}_1\stackrel{}{r}_2)>.`$ (20)
where $`m_q=`$ taken to be $`m_N/3`$ is the quark mass. Using the first form to avoid the issue of scale dependence of $`\alpha _S`$ leads to a value three times larger than predicted by the method used in eqn 18, namely:

$$<\psi _\mathrm{\Lambda }|\delta ^3(\stackrel{}{r}_1\stackrel{}{r}_2)|\psi _N>=1.2\times 10^2\mathrm{GeV}^3.$$
(21)
We average of the expectation values (18) and (21) and find

$$||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }N}^2=4.4\times 10^{15}.$$
(22)
In this way we have roughly estimated all the matrix elements for the relevant sub-processes based on weak-interaction phenomenology.

### III.4 Nuclear decay rates

NN $``$ HX requires two weak reactions. For the process $`A_{NN}A_H^{}\pi \pi `$, the rate is thus approximately

$`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{A_{NN}A_H^{}\pi \pi }`$ $``$ $`K^2{\displaystyle \frac{(2\pi )^4}{2(2m_N)}}\mathrm{\Phi }_3`$
$`\times `$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{||_{N\mathrm{\Lambda }\pi }^2||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}}{(2m_\mathrm{\Lambda }m_H)^2}}\right)^2`$
where the denominator is introduced in the spirit of the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ pole approximation, to make the 4 point vertex amplitude dimensionless. The lifetime for this decay is

$$\tau _{A_{NN}A_H^{}\pi \pi }\frac{0.03}{K^2||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}^2}\mathrm{yr},$$
(24)
taking $`m_H=1.5`$ GeV in the phase space factor. For the process with one pion emission and an internal conversion, the rate estimate is

$`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{A_{NN}A_H^{}\pi }`$ $``$ $`K^2{\displaystyle \frac{(2\pi )^4}{2(2m_N)}}\mathrm{\Phi }_2`$
$`\times `$ $`(||_{N\mathrm{\Lambda }\pi }||_{N\mathrm{\Lambda }}||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H})^2`$
leading to the lifetime for $`m_H=1.5`$ GeV of

$$\tau _{A_{NN}A_H^{}\pi }\frac{2\times 10^3}{K^2||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}^2}\mathrm{yr}.$$
(26)
If $`m_H\stackrel{>}{}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1740}`$ MeV, pion emission in a nucleus is kinematically suppressed and the relevant final states are $`e^+\nu `$ or $`\gamma `$; we now calculate these rates, taking $`m_H=1.8`$ GeV. For the transition $`A_{NN}A_H^{}e\nu `$, the rate is

$`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{A_{NN}A_H^{}e\nu }`$ $``$ $`K^2{\displaystyle \frac{(2\pi )^4}{2(2m_N)}}\mathrm{\Phi }_3`$
$`\times `$ $`(||_{N\mathrm{\Lambda }e\nu }||_{N\mathrm{\Lambda }}||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H})^2.`$
In this case, the nuclear lifetime is

$$\tau _{A_{NN}A_H^{}e\nu }\frac{70}{K^2||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}^2}\mathrm{yr}.$$
(28)
For $`A_{NN}A_H^{}\gamma `$, the rate is approximated as

$`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{A_{NN}A_H^{}\gamma }`$ $``$ $`K^2(2\pi )^4{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha _{EM}m_q^2}{2(2m_N)}}`$
$`\times `$ $`\mathrm{\Phi }_2(||_{N\mathrm{\Lambda }}^2||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H})^2.`$
leading to the lifetime

$$\tau _{A_{NN}A_H^{}\gamma }\frac{210^3}{K^2||_{\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Lambda }H}^2}\mathrm{yr}.$$
(30)
One sees from Fig. 1 that a lifetime bound of $`\stackrel{>}{}\mathrm{few}10^{29}`$ yr is not a very stringent constraint on this scenario if $`m_H`$ is large enough that pion final states are not allowed. E.g., with $`K^2=1/1440`$ the rhs of eqn (28) is $`\stackrel{>}{}\mathrm{few}10^{29}`$ yr, for the a hard core radius of 0.45 fm and $`r_H1/5r_N`$ – in the middle of the range expected based on the glueball analogy. If $`m_H`$ is light enough to permit pion production, experimental constraints are much more powerful. $`m_H\stackrel{<}{}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1740}`$ MeV is disfavored but not excluded; the allowed region in the $`f`$-hard core radius plane may be reasonable, depending on how strong limits SuperK can give.

## IV Conclusions

We have considered the stability of nuclei and hypernuclei with respect to conversion to an H dibaryon. If the binding of the H dibaryon is strong, possibly resulting in $`m_H<2m_N`$ as conjectured in refs. f:stableH ; kf:Lam1405 , then the size of the H is expected to be much smaller than the size of a nucleon and comparable to the size of a glueball: $`r_Hr_G(1/61/4)r_N`$. We used the Isgur-Karl wavefunctions for quarks in baryons and the H, and the Bethe-Goldstone wavefunction for nucleons in a nucleus, to obtain a rough estimate of the wavefunction overlap for the process $`A_{BB}A_H^{}X`$. We find that observation of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ decays in double-$`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ hypernuclei does not exclude an H – stable or not – as long as $`r_H\stackrel{<}{}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1}/3r_N`$.

Combining our wavefunction overlap estimates with phenomenological weak interaction matrix elements, permits the lifetime for conversion of nuclei to H to be estimated. These estimates have uncertainties of greater than an order of magnitude: the weak interaction matrix elements are uncertain to a factor of a few, factors of order 1 were ignored, a crude statistical estimate for the flavor-spin overlap was used, mass scales were set to $`m_N/3`$, and most importantly, the calculation of the wavefunction overlap used models which surely oversimplify the physics. While the overlap is highly uncertain because it depends on nuclear wavefunctions and hadronic dynamics which are not adequately understood at present, the enormous suppression of H production which we found in this calculation forces us to conclude that an absolutely stable H is not excluded by these considerations.

SuperK can place important constraints on the conjecture of an absolutely stable H, or conceivably discover evidence of its existence, through observation of the pion(s), positron, or photon produced when two nucleons in an oxygen nucleus convert to an H. We estimated that SuperK could achieve a lifetime limit $`\tau \stackrel{>}{}\mathrm{few}10^{29}`$ yr. Until the properties of the H and the dynamics of production of the H in nuclei are better understood, this limit would be insufficient to rule out a stable H. However such a sensitivity would access the estimated lifetime range for $`m_H\stackrel{>}{}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1740}`$ MeV and $`r_H1/5r_N`$, and an experimental search is warranted.

The research of GRF was supported in part by NSF-PHY-0101738. GRF acknowledges helpful conversations with many colleagues, particularly G. Baym, A. Bondar, T. Kajita, M. May, M. Ramsey-Musolf, and P. Vogel. GZ wishes to thank Marko Kolanovic for useful advice and is grateful to Emiliano Sefusatti for many helpful comments.


text:
# Characteristics of the structure in the Galactic polarized radio background at 350 MHz

## 1 Introduction

The warm ionized gaseous component of the Galactic interstellar medium (ISM) shows structure in density and velocity on scales from AU to several kiloparsecs. The Galactic magnetic field is coupled to the motions of the ionized gas and has a comparable energy density, so that gas and magnetic field are in complex interaction. Detailed knowledge of the turbulent nature of the warm ISM and the structure in the Galactic magnetic field is essential for several fundamental studies of the Galaxy, including modeling of molecular clouds (e.g. Vázquez-Semadeni & Passot 1999, Ostriker et al. 2001), heating of the ISM (Minter & Balser 1997), star formation (e.g. Ferrière 2001), and cosmic ray propagation (Chevalier & Fransson 1984).

Small-scale structure in the warm ISM and magnetic field can be well studied using radio polarimetric observations, of the synchrotron background in the Milky Way (e.g. Brouw & Spoelstra 1976, Wieringa et al. 1993, Duncan et al. 1997, 1999, Uyanıker et al. 1999, Landecker et al. 2001, Gaensler et al. 2001), of pulsars (e.g. Rand & Kulkarni 1989, Ohno & Shibata 1993, Rand & Lyne 1994, Han et al. 1999) or of polarized extragalactic point sources (e.g. Simard-Normandin & Kronberg 1980, Clegg et al. 1992). At short wavelengths ($`\lambda 6`$ cm), Faraday rotation is negligible, so that the measured polarization directly traces the magnetic field in the emitting region. At longer wavelengths, Faraday rotation measurements give additional information on density and magnetic field structure along the entire line of sight. Furthermore, depolarization processes define a distance beyond which polarized radiation is significantly depolarized, which depends on wavelength. So high-frequency measurements probe the total line of sight through the Galaxy, whereas low-frequency polarization observations only trace the nearby part of the ISM.

Specific intriguing small-scale structures and discrete objects have been studied in diffuse polarization observations (Gray et al. 1998, Haverkorn et al. 2000, Uyanıker & Landecker 2002), but the spatial structures have also been analyzed statistically. Simonetti et al. (1984) and Simonetti & Cordes (1986) studied the structure in Galactic rotation measure $`RM`$ by comparing $`RM`$s of polarized extragalactic sources, and of separate components of the same source. The electron density seems to exhibit a power law structure function and therefore a power law angular spectrum (see also Armstrong et al. 1995, Minter & Spangler 1996). Recently, statistical analysis of the diffuse Galactic polarized foreground have been pursued in the form of angular power spectrum studies (Tucci et al. 2000, 2002, Baccigalupi et al. 2001, Giardino et al. 2002, Bruscoli et al. 2002), with the objective of estimating the importance of the Galactic ISM as a foreground contaminator for CMBR polarization observations (e.g. Seljak 1997, Prunet et al. 2000).

In this paper, we study the statistical properties of the warm ISM and Galactic magnetic field by means of power spectra of Stokes parameters $`Q`$ and $`U`$, polarized intensity $`P`$ and rotation measure $`RM`$. We also derive the structure function of $`RM`$ to allow a comparison with earlier studies of $`RM`$ structure functions from polarized extragalactic sources. Furthermore, by careful selection of reliable $`RM`$ determinations (i.e. those with low $`\chi ^2`$ of the linear fit to $`\varphi (\lambda ^2)`$) in the calculation of structure functions, we can obtain an estimate of how much the structure functions (and power spectra) are influenced by low-quality $`RM`$s.

We use data from three regions, all at positive Galactic latitudes, in which we observed the diffuse polarized emission at frequencies around 350 MHz with the Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope (WSRT). The first two regions, each about 50 square degrees in size, in the constellations Auriga (Haverkorn et al. 2003a) and Horologium (Haverkorn et al. 2003b), are observed at multiple frequencies at a resolution of $``$ 5′. The third region is a part of the Westerbork Northern Sky Survey (WENSS, Rengelink et al. 1997), a high-resolution radio survey at 327 MHz of the northern hemisphere (Schnitzeler et al., in prep). For those parts of the WENSS survey that were observed at night, polarization data are usable. Here we discuss polarization data from the region with $`140\mathrm{°}l170\mathrm{°}`$ and $`0\mathrm{°}b30\mathrm{°}`$.

In Sect. 2 we describe the three sets of data that we analyze in this paper. In Sect. 3 angular power spectrum analysis is introduced, power spectra of the data are presented and discussed and literature on the angular power spectra is briefly summarized. Section 4 gives structure functions for $`RM`$ in the two multi-frequency measurements. In Sect. 5 the results are discussed, and finally in Sect. 6 some conclusions are stated.

## 2 The observations

### 2.1 Multi-frequency WSRT observations

We carried out low frequency radio polarimetry with the Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope (WSRT), in two regions of the sky at positive latitudes, in the constellations of Auriga and Horologium. Data were obtained simultaneously at 8 frequencies around 350 MHz, each with a bandwidth of 5 MHz. Due to radio interference and hardware problems, only data in 5 frequency bands could be used, viz. those centered at the frequencies 341, 349, 355, 360, and 375 MHz. The multi-frequency data allow the study of the frequency dependence of the polarization structure, and the determination of rotation measure $`RM`$. We use the technique of mosaicking (i.e. the telescopes cycle through a number of adjacent fields on the sky during a 12hr observation) to obtain a field of view that is larger than the primary beam. Mosaicking also suppresses instrumental polarization to below 1% (see Haverkorn 2002). Maps of the Stokes parameters $`I`$, $`Q`$, and $`U`$ were derived from the observed visibilities. $`RM`$s were computed straightforwardly from the linear relation between polarization angle $`\varphi `$ and $`\lambda ^2`$. Because the observed $`RM`$ values are small ($`|RM|10`$ rad m<sup>-2</sup>), there is no $`n\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}180}`$° ambiguity in $`\varphi `$, and $`RM`$s can be computed with $`|\varphi (\lambda _i)\varphi (\lambda _j)|<90\mathrm{°}`$ for adjacent wavelengths $`\lambda _i`$ and $`\lambda _j`$. We define a determination of $`RM`$ in a particular beam reliable if (1) the reduced $`\chi ^2`$ of the linear $`\varphi (\lambda ^2)`$-relation $`\chi _{red}^2<2`$, and (2) the polarized intensity averaged over wavelength $`P>20`$ mJy/beam (i.e. $`4\sigma `$).

The maximum baseline of the observations was 2700m, yielding a resolution of 1′, but smoothing of the Stokes $`Q`$ and $`U`$ data (using a Gaussian taper in the $`(u,v)`$-plane) was applied to obtain a better signal-to-noise. The taper has a value of 0.25 at a baseline value around 300m, where the exact values were chosen so that the beam size is identical at all 5 frequencies, viz. 5.0′$`\times `$5.0′ cosec $`\delta `$.

The first region, in the constellation Auriga, is centered on $`(l,b)=(161\mathrm{°},16\mathrm{°})`$ and is about $`9\mathrm{°}\times 7\mathrm{°}`$ in size. The left panel in Fig. 1 shows the polarized intensity $`P`$ at 349 MHz in the Auriga region at 5.0′ resolution. We do not show the original 1′ resolution map, because it is noise-dominated. The maximum polarized brightness temperature in the map is $`T_{b,pol}`$ 13 K, and the noise is about 0.45 K. Rotation measures in the Auriga region are shown in the right panel of Fig. 1 as circles superimposed on the grey scale map of $`P`$ at 349 MHz. The diameter of each circle indicates the value of the $`RM`$ at that position, where filled circles denote positive $`RM`$s, and open circles negative $`RM`$s. We show only the $`RM`$s that are reliably determined, and only one in four independent beams.

The region in the constellation Horologium, centered at $`(l,b)=(137\mathrm{°},7\mathrm{°})`$, was observed in the same way as the Auriga region, at the same five frequencies, and with the same taper applied. Fig. 2 shows the polarized intensity $`P`$ at 349 MHz in the left panel, and $`RM`$s in the form of overlaid circles in the right panel. $`RM`$s are coded in the same way as in Fig. 1. The maximum polarized brightness temperature is $`T_{b,pol}`$ 17 K, and the noise is a little higher than that in the Auriga field, about 0.65 K.

The polarized intensity is not corrected for noise bias $`P_{debias}=\sqrt{(Q_{obs}^2+U_{obs}^2)\sigma ^2}`$ (for $`P>\sigma `$). However, $`P`$ generally has a S/N $`>45`$, for which the debiasing does not alter the data by more than 2 - 3%. Furthermore, power spectra are not affected by debiasing except at zero frequency.

In both fields there is no small-scale structure visible in the map of total intensity Stokes $`I`$, despite the ubiquitous structure on arcminute and degree scales in $`P`$. Because the large-scale ($`1\mathrm{°}`$) component of $`I`$ cannot be measured with the WSRT due to missing short spacings, we used the Haslam et al. (1981, 1982) radio survey at 408 MHz to estimate the total intensity $`I`$ to be $``$ 34 K and $``$ 47 K in Auriga and Horologium, respectively. The polarized intensity $`P`$ shows structure up to $``$ 10 - 15 K on scales from arcminutes to degrees. Due to the lack of corresponding structure in $`I`$, the structure in polarized intensity cannot be due to small-scale synchrotron emission but must be due to other, instrumental and depolarization, mechanisms.

In a medium that emits synchrotron radiation and simultaneously causes Faraday rotation, the polarized emission is depolarized by so-called depth depolarization, due to the vector averaging of contributions from different parts of the line of sight. This, together with beam depolarization (due to angle structure within one synthesized beam), produces structure in $`P`$. Furthermore, the insensitivity of the interferometer to large-scale structure can cause additional structure in $`P`$. However, we have shown that this effect cannot be very important in these observations (Haverkorn et al. 2003c).

### 2.2 Polarization data from the WENSS survey

The Westerbork Northern Sky Survey (WENSS, Rengelink et al. 1997) is a low-frequency radio survey that covers the whole sky north of $`\delta =30`$° at 325 MHz to a limiting flux density of approximately 18 mJy (5$`\sigma `$) and with a resolution of 54′′$`\times `$54′′ cosec $`\delta `$.

Polarization data taken during the day are greatly affected by solar radiation, which is detected in sidelobes. Furthermore, ionospheric Faraday rotation rapidly changes during sunrise and sunset, causing a reduction of the apparent polarized intensity, and adding much noise. However, in mosaics observed (almost) entirely during night time, the polarization data are of good quality. As a result, we could make a “supermosaic” of a large region of $`30\mathrm{°}\times 35\mathrm{°}`$, which we will refer to as the WENSS polarization region. Details on the observations and correction for ionospheric Faraday rotation are given in Schnitzeler et al. (in prep).

Fig. 3 shows polarized intensity $`P`$ in the WENSS polarization region, resampled in Galactic longitude and latitude. For this analysis, a Gaussian taper with value 0.25 at a baseline of 500m was applied, which yields a resolution of $``$ 2.5′. In the figure, $`P`$ saturates at 35 mJy/beam, which coincides with a polarized brightness temperature of $``$ 17 K to $``$ 25 K, depending on declination. The average $`P2.6`$ mJy/beam. Note that these observations are taken in a single 5 MHz wide frequency band, so rotation measure data are not available.

## 3 Angular power spectrum analysis

### 3.1 Determination of the multipole spectral index

To quantify the structure in the polarization maps, we calculate angular power spectra $`PS(\mathrm{})`$ as a function of multipole $`\mathrm{}`$. A multipole $`\mathrm{}`$ is a measure of angular scales equivalent to wave number, and is defined as $`\mathrm{}180\mathrm{°}/\theta `$, where $`\theta `$ is the angular scale in degrees. The angular power spectrum $`PS`$ of a radiation field $`X`$ is the square of the Fourier transform of $`X`$: $`PS_X(\mathrm{})=|(X)|^2`$, where $``$ denotes the Fourier transform. Here, the observable $`X`$ can be either Stokes $`Q`$, Stokes $`U`$, polarized intensity $`P`$ or rotation measure $`RM`$. The power spectra were computed in two dimensions, and averaged over azimuth in radial bins. The multipole spectral index $`\alpha `$, defined as $`PS_X(\mathrm{})\mathrm{}^\alpha `$, is calculated from a log-log fit to the power spectrum. In the tapered data, multipoles with higher values of $`\mathrm{}`$ are affected by the tapering, and in the untapered data higher multipoles are dominated by noise. Multipoles with $`\mathrm{}200`$ correspond to angular scales $`\theta 1`$°, to which the WSRT is not sensitive.

The visibilities from which a map is made are $`V_{map}(u,v)=V_{obs}(u,v)T(u,v)`$, where $`V_{obs}`$ are the observed visibilities, and $`T(u,v)`$ is the taper function. The calculated intensity of the tapered data is $`(V_{map})=(V_{obs})(T)`$, where $``$ is a Fourier transform and the asterisk denotes convolution. The power spectrum of the Stokes parameter $`X`$, $`PS(X)`$, is then:

$$PS_X(\mathrm{})=|(X)|^2=|(X_{obs})|^2T^2=PS_{X,obs}(\mathrm{})T^2$$
(1)
where $`X`$ is Stokes $`Q`$ or $`U`$. Although polarized intensity $`P`$ is derived from $`Q`$ and $`U`$ and thus not directly observed, correction for the taper in the same way as for $`Q`$ and $`U`$ power spectra is a good approximation. As an illustration, Fig. 4 shows the power spectrum of $`P`$ of the tapered data in the Auriga region at 341 MHz (solid line). The dotted line is the same spectrum, but corrected for the tapering according to Eq. (1). The power law behavior extends to $`\mathrm{log}(\mathrm{})3.6`$.

### 3.2 Power spectra from the multi-frequency WSRT studies

In Fig. 5, we show the power spectra of $`P`$ in the Auriga and Horologium regions at 5 frequencies, both for the tapered (upper curve) and untapered data (lower curve) in the same plot. The amplitudes of the power spectra of the tapered data are lower than those of the untapered data only because the intensities are expressed in mJy/beam. Because the beam widths are different for the two datasets, this gives a difference in the magnitude of $`P`$ in tapered and untapered data. The power spectra of $`RM`$ in the Auriga and Horologium field are given in Fig 6. Only tapered data give reliable enough $`RM`$ determinations to produce power spectra for them.

Figs. 7 and 8 show power spectra for the Stokes parameters $`Q`$ and $`U`$ in the Auriga and Horologium region respectively, again for tapered and untapered data. The corresponding multipole spectral indices $`\alpha `$, derived for a multipole range of $`400<\mathrm{}<1500`$, are given in Table 1.

At small scales (large $`\mathrm{}`$), the power spectra of the untapered data flatten out due to the noise in the maps, while the low-resolution data steepen due to the tapering, as illustrated in Fig. 4. At large scales, the $`Q`$ and $`U`$ power spectra of the tapered data show a decrease. This decrease could be due to the lack of large-scale structure (see Sect. 2.1), but then it is hard to explain why there is no such decline in $`P`$.

The power spectra of $`Q`$ and $`U`$ are steeper and have a larger amplitude than the power spectra of $`P`$. This could be caused by the presence of a Faraday screen in front of the emitting region. A Faraday screen will rotate the polarization angle, and so induce extra structure in $`Q`$ and $`U`$, while leaving $`P`$ unaltered. This results in a higher amplitude of the power spectrum. As the Faraday screen consists of foreground material, its angular size is large, steepening the spectrum. This effect was also noticed by Tucci et al. (2002).

The logarithmic slope of the power spectrum of polarized intensity is $`\alpha _P`$ 2.1 - 2.3 (Table 1), which is slightly higher than most earlier estimates from the literature (although those are taken at higher frequencies, see Sect. 3.4). However, note that the Auriga and Horologium regions were selected for their conspicuous structure in $`P`$, so we expect these regions to show more structure on large (degree) scales than the “average” ISM, and thus exhibit a steeper spectrum. The power spectra of $`Q`$ and $`U`$ in the Auriga region are somewhat steeper than in Horologium, indicating that the Horologium region probably contains more small-scale structure in the Faraday screen than the Auriga region.

The power spectra of $`RM`$ in Fig. 5 are shallower than the $`Q`$, $`U`$ or $`P`$ power spectra. In fact, we do not expect a direct correspondence between the multipole spectral indices of $`RM`$ and $`P`$ (or $`Q`$, $`U`$), as the former describes very directly the electron content and magnetic field in the ISM (integrated over the line of sight), whereas in the latter case the polarized radiation is modulated by Faraday rotation and depolarization.

### 3.3 Power spectra from the WENSS polarization region

In the WENSS polarization region, power spectra were evaluated for subfields, to study possible dependences of the multipole spectral index on Galactic longitude and/or latitude. The 11 subfields are shown in Fig. 9, superimposed on grey scale maps of $`P`$. The power spectra of polarized intensity $`P`$ are shown in Fig. 10, where the subfields are arranged as in Fig. 9. The power spectra in subfields 9, 10 and 11, at high Galactic latitude $`b`$, have a lower amplitude than the power spectra at lower $`b`$, which is consistent with the decreasing amount of $`P`$ at higher $`b`$ visible in Fig. 3.

The multipole spectral indices of the power spectra of $`P`$, $`Q`$ and $`U`$ are given in Table 2, and the dependence of $`\alpha _P`$ on Galactic longitude and latitude is shown in Fig. 11. The observed decrease of spectral index with increasing latitude (i.e. power spectra become flatter with increasing latitude) indicates a decrease in the amount of large-scale structure with increasing latitude. The dependence of spectral index on longitude is computed after rescaling of the data to a standard latitude of $`b=15`$°. The fitted slopes in Fig. 11, and slopes determined for $`\alpha _Q`$ and $`\alpha _U`$ in a similar way, are:

$$\{\begin{array}{cc}\alpha _P/b=0.051\pm 0.004\hfill & \alpha _P/l=0.001\pm 0.003\hfill \\ \alpha _Q/b=0.073\pm 0.004\hfill & \alpha _Q/l=0.008\pm 0.004\hfill \\ \alpha _U/b=0.066\pm 0.004\hfill & \alpha _U/l=0.005\pm 0.004\hfill \end{array}$$

In summary, the spectral index $`\alpha `$ in $`P`$, $`Q`$ and $`U`$ decreases with increasing Galactic latitude, and is consistent with no dependence of $`\alpha `$ on Galactic longitude. Although the small errors in the derived slopes suggest a good determination of the slope, the large spread of the data points in Fig. 11 indicates that a linear gradient is not the perfect model to describe the data.

The decrease of $`\alpha `$ with latitude indicates that there is more structure in polarization on larger scales at lower latitude. Thus, although small-scale structure in polarization is seen up to very high latitudes, even at frequencies as low as 350 MHz (Katgert & de Bruyn 1999), the amount of structure and its spectral index decrease with latitude, at least in this region of the sky. The region studied here may be special, as it is situated at the edge of a region of high polarization (the “fan region”, see e.g. Brouw & Spoelstra 1976), which is thought to have little structure in magnetic field and/or electron density compared to its surroundings. This high-polarization region extends to $`b20`$°, and its edge could be responsible for the decrease in structure on scales of $``$ 1°.

The spectral indices in the Auriga ($`b=16\mathrm{°}`$) and Horologium ($`b=7\mathrm{°}`$) regions are higher than implied by Fig. 11. This might be due to the way in which the Auriga and Horologium regions were selected, viz. because of their remarkable structure on degree scales.

### 3.4 Existing literature of power spectra from diffuse polarization

Much work has been done on the determination of power spectra of the diffuse Galactic synchrotron background, because the Galactic synchrotron radiation is a foreground contaminator in Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation (CMBR) polarization measurements at high frequencies $`\nu `$ 30 - 100 GHz. Power spectra of the diffuse polarized synchrotron background intensity have been determined from several radio surveys at frequencies from 408 MHz to 2.7 GHz, in many parts of the sky (Tucci et al. 2000, 2002, Baccigalupi et al. 2001, Giardino et al. 2002, Bruscoli et al. 2002).

These power spectra studies are based on the following surveys of polarized radiation:

* Dwingeloo 25m-dish survey (Brouw & Spoelstra 1976), of the region $`120\mathrm{°}<l<180\mathrm{°}`$ and $`b>10`$°(although undersampled). This is a multi-frequency survey at 408 MHz, 465 MHz, 610 MHz, 820 MHz and 1411 MHz, with increasing angular resolution of 2.3° to 0.5°.
* Parkes 2.4 GHz Galactic plane survey (Duncan et al. 1997), of the region $`238\mathrm{°}<l<5\mathrm{°}`$ and with $`|b|<5`$°, at some positions a few degrees higher, at a resolution of 10.4′.
* Effelsberg 2.695 GHz Galactic plane survey (Duncan et al. 1999), of the region $`5\mathrm{°}<l<74\mathrm{°}`$, and $`|b|<5\mathrm{°}`$, at a resolution of 4.3′.
* Effelsberg 1.4 GHz intermediate latitude survey (Uyanıker et al. 1999), which consists of 4 regions within $`45\mathrm{°}<l<210\mathrm{°}`$ and $`15\mathrm{°}<b<20\mathrm{°}`$ with an angular resolution of 10.4′.
* Australia Telescope Compact Array (ATCA) 1.4 GHz survey (Gaensler et al. 2001). This is a test region for the Southern Galactic Plane Survey (SGPS, McClure-Griffiths et al. 2001) at $`325.5\mathrm{°}<l<332.5\mathrm{°}`$, $`0.5\mathrm{°}<b<3.5\mathrm{°}`$, with a resolution of about 1′.

Power spectra of total intensity $`I`$ and polarized intensity $`P`$ were derived in these surveys for multipoles over a range of $`\mathrm{}10`$ to 6000.

Fig. 12 shows the variation of $`\alpha _P`$ with Galactic longitude, latitude and frequency, using the available data as detailed in Table 3. In the left plots, the lines show ranges in longitude (top) and latitude (bottom) over which $`\alpha _P`$ was computed. Solid lines give high multipole numbers ($`100<\mathrm{}<6000`$), dashed-dotted lines denote an intermediate multipole range ($`30<\mathrm{}<200`$) and the dotted lines give small multipoles ($`10<\mathrm{}<80`$). The WSRT data from the Auriga, Horologium en WENSS fields, discussed here, are given in asterisks. In the right plot, $`\alpha _P`$ against frequency is displayed. The connected points are from the same area observed at different frequencies from 408 MHz to 1411 MHz (in the Brouw & Spoelstra paper).

The first conclusion from Fig. 12 is that multipole spectral indices vary over the sky from $`\alpha 1`$ to 3, without showing a clear correlation with Galactic longitude, while only the WENSS subfields show a dependence of spectral index on latitude. However, all surveys have been done at different resolutions and frequencies, and the regions used to compute power spectra are of different sizes. This can explain why a possible dependence of $`\alpha `$ on latitude was not clearly seen in the other studies. The large variation in slopes of angular power spectra in $`P`$ indicates that interpretation of the slope is not straightforward, possibly due to large influence of depolarization mechanisms. Care must therefore be taken in extrapolating the results to higher frequencies.

Furthermore, spectral indices show an increase with frequency from 408 MHz to 1.4 GHz. This means that the power spectra become steeper, so the relative amount of small-scale structure decreases. This could be due to the large Faraday rotation at low frequencies. Typical $`RM`$s of 5 rad m<sup>-2</sup> are present in the Brouw & Spoelstra data (Spoelstra 1984), and will rotate polarization angles at 325 MHz by about 250°. Variations in $`RM`$ of a few rad m<sup>-2</sup> give angle variations of over 90°, which would cause beam depolarization if the angle variations occur on scales smaller than the beam (2.3° in this case). Beam depolarization only acts on scales of the synthesized beam, and therefore creates additional structure on small scales in $`P`$, which flattens the power spectrum. A $`\mathrm{\Delta }RM`$ of 5 rad m<sup>-2</sup> would cause a variation in polarization angle of about 40° at 820 MHz, and of no more than 10° at 1.4 GHz. So at frequencies above 1.4 GHz, a $`\mathrm{\Delta }RM`$ of 5 rad m<sup>-2</sup> would cause negligible beam depolarization. In addition, the resolution of the observations generally increases with increasing frequency, which would also cause a decrease in beam depolarization. This might explain why above 1.4 GHz the spectral index does not appear to be correlated with frequency. The fact that spectral indices in the two WSRT regions are much higher than would be expected from this argument can be due to the criteria used to select the two fields.

## 4 Structure functions

The disadvantage of using angular power spectra is that a regular grid of data is required. If the data are very irregularly spaced (e.g. in the case of data from pulsars or extragalactic point sources), it is better to use the structure function which in principle gives the same information, but can be calculated easily for irregularly spaced data. The structure function $`SF`$ of a radiation field $`X`$, as a function of distance lag $`d`$, is

$$SF_X(d)=\frac{_{i=1}^N(X(x_i)X(x_i+d))^2}{N}$$
(2)
where $`X(x_i)`$ is the value of field $`X`$ at position $`x_i`$ and $`N`$ is the number of data points. If the power spectrum of $`RM`$ is a power law with spectral index $`\alpha `$, then the structure function $`SF_{RM}`$ is

$$SF_{RM}(d)d^\mu \text{where}\mu =\{\begin{array}{cc}\alpha 2\hfill & \text{for }2<\alpha <4\hfill \\ 2\hfill & \text{for }\alpha >4\hfill \end{array}$$
(3)
(Simonetti et al. 1984). We determined the structure functions of $`RM`$ to compare with existing estimates of the structure function of Galactic $`RM`$ from polarized extragalactic point sources. As the determination of structure functions does not require a regular grid, we can compute the $`SF`$ including and excluding “bad” data points to examine how the structure functions of $`P`$ and $`RM`$ change. This will allow us to estimate the effect of “bad” data in the power spectra in $`P`$ and $`RM`$ computed in Sect. 3.

### 4.1 Structure functions of $`RM`$

Structure functions $`SF_{RM}`$ in the Auriga and Horologium regions are plotted against distance $`d`$ in degrees in the log-log plots in Fig. 13 (solid line), where error bars denote the standard deviation. The minimum distance shown is $`d`$ 7′. For the evaluation of the SF, only “reliably determined” $`RM`$ values are used, according to the definition in Sect. 2.1. Although the spectrum is consistent with a flat slope, there is some evidence for a break in the slope at $`d=0.3\mathrm{°}`$, primarily in the Horologium field. For larger angular scales, the SF is approximately flat in the Auriga region, with a tentative increase at the largest lags, and even decreasing in Horologium.

We can estimate the magnitude of the contribution of unreliably determined $`RM`$s by reevaluating the SF for the complete grid of $`RM`$ values, instead of only the reliable $`RM`$s. This estimate is important for a discussion of the power spectra of $`RM`$, which were evaluated over the complete dataset, including unreliably determined $`RM`$s. The structure function using the complete dataset is shown in the left panel of Fig. 13 as a dotted line. The structure function clearly has a lower amplitude if the unreliable $`RM`$ determinations are removed, but the slope of the structure function remains approximately the same.

### 4.2 Structure functions of $`P`$

We compute the structure function of polarized intensity, for both the complete grid of beams, and for those beams selected to have high $`P`$. In Fig. 14 we show structure functions of $`P`$ in the Auriga region for 5 frequencies, where again the error bars denote the standard deviation. The average logarithmic slope of the structure functions is $``$ 0.35 in the range $`0.2\mathrm{°}d1\mathrm{°}`$, and the spectrum flattens on larger scales, probably due to the insensitivity of the WSRT to structure on large angular scales. The solid line denotes the estimate based only on beams with $`P>4\sigma `$, and the dotted line gives the estimate based on all the data. The structure functions based on selected beams and those based on all data are not significantly different on small scales, and start deviating only for $`d0.7`$°. Although small deviations are created by selecting the best data, the overall slope of the structure function is hardly affected by the selection including only regions of high $`P`$. The relatively small effect of including bad data gives confidence that the determination of the logarithmic slope of the power spectra of $`RM`$ and $`P`$ is not significantly influenced by noisy data or poorly determined $`RM`$.

## 5 Discussion

To the authors knowledge, the results presented here are the first observational determinations of the power spectrum of rotation measure. What power spectrum is to be expected is unclear, as the $`RM`$ is a complex quantity depending on magnetic field structure and direction, electron density and the path length through the ionized ISM. There are indications that the electron density and $`RM`$ exhibit Kolmogorov turbulence (Minter & Spangler 1996, Armstrong et al. 1995).

An approximately flat structure function corresponds to structure of equal amplitude on all scales, similar to a noise spectrum. The break in $`SF_{RM}`$ at $`\delta \theta 0.3\mathrm{°}`$, if present, corresponds to a change in characteristics of the structure on scales of $``$ 3.9 pc, assuming a path length of 600 pc (Haverkorn et al. 2003d).

Minter & Spangler (1996) studied structure functions of $`RM`$ from polarized extragalactic sources and of emission measure ($`EM`$) from H$`\alpha `$ measurements, on the same angular scales as in our observations. They find a break in the slope of the structure function, which can be interpreted as a transition of 3D Kolmogorov turbulence ($`\mu =5/3`$, where $`\mu `$ is the slope of the structure function as defined in Eq. (3)) to 2D turbulence ($`\mu =2/3`$) in $`RM`$ on angular scales of $`\delta \theta 0.1\mathrm{°}`$, the scale of our resolution. They assume a total path length of 2000 pc, and conclude that the transition occurs at scales of $``$ 3.6 pc, consistent with the spatial scale at which we estimate the turnover point in the SF of the Auriga and Horologium regions. However, there is a large discrepancy between $`\mu `$ values found by Minter & Spangler ($`\mu =5/3`$ and $`2/3`$) and by us ($`\mu 0`$), which could be explained by the fact that they probe the complete line of sight through the medium of many kpc, whereas the $`RM`$ that we obtain is only produced in the nearest $``$ 600 pc. Therefore, it is possible that the nature of the turbulence changes from $`\mu =0`$ nearby (approximately in the Galactic stellar disk), to 2D and/or Kolmogorov-like turbulence at larger distances.

However, flat structure functions are also found by Simonetti et al. (1984), who have studied structure functions from $`RM`$s in three regions of the sky. Two of the three regions (around the North Galactic Pole and at $`180\mathrm{°}<l<220\mathrm{°}`$, $`10\mathrm{°}<b<50\mathrm{°}`$) are consistent with a flat structure function ($`\mu =0`$). (The third region is located along the Local arm and in the plane, at $`70\mathrm{°}<l<110\mathrm{°}`$ and $`45\mathrm{°}<b<5`$, and its structure function of $`RM`$ has a slope $`\mu 1`$.) The smallest angular scale they probe in these regions is about 2°. Clegg et al. (1992) study low-latitude extragalactic sources and also obtain flat structure functions, albeit with a much higher amplitude than that of the high-latitude extragalactic sources.

## 6 Conclusions

The multipole spectral index for polarized intensity $`P`$ is $`\alpha 2.2`$ in the Auriga and Horologium regions, and ranges from 0.7 to 1.8 for subfields in the WENSS polarization region. The multipole spectral index decreases with Galactic latitude (i.e. power spectra become flatter towards higher latitudes), but is probably constant with Galactic longitude.

In all regions, the power spectra of Stokes $`Q`$ and $`U`$ are steeper than the spectra of $`P`$. This is most likely due to the presence of a Faraday screen, which creates additional structure in $`Q`$ and $`U`$, but not in $`P`$. As the Faraday screen is located in front of the polarized emission, the structure induced by the screen will be on larger angular scales than that of the emission, which steepens the $`Q`$ and $`U`$ spectra. The derived power spectra of $`P`$ agree with earlier estimates, although all estimates show a large range of $`0.6\alpha _P3`$, possibly due to a large influence of depolarization mechanisms. This makes interpretation of the power spectra uncertain.

Structure functions of $`RM`$ in the Auriga and Horologium fields are consistent with flat spectra (i.e. a logarithmic slope of the structure function $`\mu =0`$), but may show a break close to 0.3°, which is at the same spatial scales as a break in the structure function in the $`RM`$s of extragalactic sources (Minter & Spangler 1996). The flat spectrum indicates a noise-like spectrum with equal amounts of structure on all scales.

The derived structure functions support the estimates of the power spectra, because they are based only on high-quality data, i.e. reliably determined $`RM`$, and $`P`$ with high S/N. Structure functions using all data do not show a significant difference with the structure functions of the selected data. This gives confidence that the power spectra determinations are not significantly affected by bad data points.

## Acknowledgements

We thank B. J. Rickett for helpful discussions and suggestions, and F. Heitsch for help in constructing and analyzing power spectra. The Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope is operated by the Netherlands Foundation for Research in Astronomy (ASTRON) with financial support from the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO). Computations presented here were performed on the SGI Origin 2000 machine of the Rechenzentrum Garching of the Max-Planck-Gesellschaft. MH acknowledges the support from NWO grant 614-21-006.