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# Fluctuations of energy injection rate in a shear flow

## 1 Introduction

Turbulent flows are a characteristic example for a dissipative macroscopic system that is driven steadily far from equilibrium. Energy of motion is dissipated continuously due to friction between the fluid parcels and has to be fed in by some kind of stirring or a large scale shear gradient in order to sustain the turbulent state . Although this picture is as old as turbulence research itself, not much is known about the interplay between the rates of energy dissipation and energy input. Several recent experimental efforts have focussed on studies of the energy input rate into turbulent systems: Ciliberto and Laroche  extracted the buoyant energy input in turbulent Rayleigh-Bénard convection, Goldburg et al.  measured the power transfered to a liquid crystal in a chaotic regime above the electrohydrodynamic instability, Pinton et al. and Cadot et al. studied the injection rate statistics with von Karman swirling flow experiments .

On the level of a macroscopic description energy dissipation in a turbulent flow is always positive, reflecting the irreversibiliy of the dynamics through a direct relation between dissipation and entropy production. While in the mean energy dissipation and energy uptake are equal, the fluctuations of energy uptake are much less constraint and can take both signs.

Fluctuations of the energy dissipation have recently attracted attention in connection with the observation that in the case of reversible non-equilibrium systems both signs for the entropy production are possible, but that the entropy reduction is exponentially suppressed compared to entropy production  (for a comprehensive review see ). For hydrodynamic systems these ideas do not strictly apply, since the Navier-Stokes equation is not reversible. But the study of Farago  shows that even in the absence of that symmetry, as e.g. for a Brownian particle, interesting relations among fluctuations can arise.

It is possible to modify the macroscopic equations, as in constrained Euler ensembles  or in isokinetic Navier-Stokes ensembles , in order to arrive at a reversible macroscopic dynamics. However, we will in the following adopt the traditional Navier-Stokes equation as our starting point, take the energy uptake as observable, as in the experiments mentioned above, and embark on a numerical study of the statistics of local energy input in a turbulent shear flow and especially on the ratios of the probability density functions (PDF) for negative and positive energy injection. We will also study the relation between extremal injection events and coherent structures. The results presented here connect to and complement studies of volume averaged fluctuation statistics in hydrodynamic systems, including observations on thermal convection , swirling flows , or GOY shell models .

The specific system we study here is a hydrodynamic shear flow driven by volume forces. The system is a macroscopic version of the microscopic molecular dynamics simulations of shear flows in Evans et al. . The main differences between the microscopic and the macroscopic model are irreversibility and the absence of a thermostat in the latter. The flow is incompressible and a statistically stationary turbulent state is sustained by driving with a steady volume force $`𝐅=F_x(y)𝐞_x`$. The Navier-Stokes equation then reads

$`{\displaystyle \frac{𝐮}{t}}+(𝐮)𝐮`$ $`=`$ $`p+\nu ^2𝐮+𝐅,`$ (1)
$`𝐮`$ $`=`$ $`0.`$ (2)
$`𝐮(𝐱,t)`$ is the velocity field, $`p(𝐱,t)`$ the kinematic pressure, and $`\nu `$ the constant kinematic viscosity. The equations of motion are solved by means of a pseudospectral method in a volume $`V`$ with periodic boundary conditions in $`x`$ (streamwise) and $`z`$ (spanwise) directions and with free-slip boundary conditions in shear direction $`y`$ (for more details see ). The rectangular slab has an aspect ratio of $`2\pi :1:2\pi `$. The spectral resolution is $`N_x\times N_y\times N_z=256\times 65\times 256`$ for all runs and the number of degrees of freedom (or independent Fourier modes) is about $`2.510^6`$. With $`U_0`$ the amplitude of the laminar shear profile, $`𝐮_0=U_0\mathrm{cos}(\pi y/L_y)𝐞_x`$, and $`L_y`$ the width of the slab, we can define a Reynolds number $`Re=U_0L_y/\nu `$; for our simulations it takes values between 500 and 6000.

## 2 Energy balance

We want to study the changes in the total kinetic energy density of the fluid, $`e(𝐱,t)=𝐮(𝐱,t)^2/2`$. Its evolution is governed by

$$_te+_j(u_je\nu u_i_ju_i+u_ip\delta _{ij})=u_iF_i\nu (_iu_j)^2.$$
(3)
For the energy balance of the volume averaged kinetic energy, $`E(t)=𝐮^2_V/2`$ the second term on the left hand side of (3) does not contribute as it contains a total divergence of a current whose surface integral vanishes for the given boundary conditions. The balance for the volume averaged kinetic energy thus reads

$`{\displaystyle \frac{E}{t}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{V}}{\displaystyle _V}u_xF_x\text{d}V{\displaystyle \frac{\nu }{V}}{\displaystyle _V}(𝐮)^2\text{d}V=ϵ_{in}(t)ϵ(t).`$ (4)
The energy dissipation rate $`ϵ(t)`$, and its local version $`ϵ(𝐱,t)=(\nu /2)(_iu_j+_ju_i)^2`$, are positive semi-definite (though zero values never occur in practice). Thus, energy is steadily taken out of the system. In contrast to thermostatted systems , the energy injection rate $`ϵ_{in}(t)`$ is not synchronized to $`ϵ(t)`$, the system is able to store energy for intermediate time intervals and the kinetic energy content, $`E(t)`$, fluctuates in time.

For the volume forces studied here the local energy injection rate becomes

$$ϵ_{in}(𝐱,t)=u_x(𝐱,t)F_x(y)=\frac{\nu \pi ^2U_0}{L_y^2}\mathrm{cos}(\pi y/L_y)u_x(𝐱,t),$$
(5)
where $`u_x(𝐱,t)`$ is the streamwise velocity component. Energy that is given back to the source corresponds to negative values of $`ϵ_{in}`$.

The variances of the fluctuations in the kinetic energy are shown for different values of the Reynolds number in Fig. 1. In addition to the volume average $`_V`$ we will also use averages over planes at fixed $`y`$ and over time or combinations of spatial and temporal averages which are thought as statistical ensemble averages. Those averages will be indicated by $`_A`$ and $`_T`$, respectively. The fluctuations of volume averaged kinetic energy (left panel of Fig. 1) decrease with increasing Reynolds number. This is an indication that the increasing number of degrees of freedom that become dynamically active with increasing Reynolds number tend to average out. In quantitative terms the number of active Fourier modes outside the viscous subrange (i.e. with wave lengths exceeding the Kolmorgorov scale $`\eta _K=(\nu ^3/ϵ)^{1/4}`$) is roughly $`N(L/\eta _K)^3Re^{9/4}`$ , so that, assuming a law of large numbers, we might expect $`\sigma _EN^{1/2}Re^{9/8}`$. Experiments in a closed swirling turbulent flow indicated a slope $`Re^{1/3}`$ . For the Reynolds number range accessible in our simulations no definite conclusion on either scaling can be drawn.

For the applied volume forcing the flow is not homogeneous in the shear direction, as indicated by the variations of average energy uptake with position in shear direction (right panel of Fig. 1). It is homogeneous in the downstream and the spanwise direction, so that for all statistical measures we can collect in one ensemble all points in the $`x`$-$`z`$-planes for fixed shear coordinate $`y`$.

The higher energy content of the largest scales and the prevalence of large coherent structures in shear flows  suggest that the energy uptake is dominated by large scale flows. In shear flows, the predominant structures are downstream vortices and streamwise streaks. One such event that is connected with a negative energy injection rate is shown in Fig. 2. We do observe fluid moving coherently into the opposite direction to the mean flow $`u_x_{A,T}(y)`$ which is plotted in the lower right panel of Fig. 2.

## 3 Statistical analysis of the energy injection rate

The energy input can be large, both positive and negative, but it cannot be arbitrarily large. Its volume average, $`ϵ_{in}(t)`$, can be related to the rms velocity fluctuations by a Cauchy-Schwartz inequality

$`|ϵ_{in}(t)_T|u_x^2_V^{1/2}F_x^2_V^{1/2}_T={\displaystyle \frac{\nu \pi ^2U_0}{\sqrt{2}L_y^2}}u_{x,rms}.`$ (6)
Fluctuations exceeding the external velocity scale $`U_0`$ are extremely unlikely, so that $`ϵ_{in}`$ is bounded by $`U_0^2`$. The local energy injection rate can be estimated using the maximum norm, with a similar bound $`U_0^2`$, but a different prefactor. For the numerical simulations both bounds turned out to be much too crude and much larger than both the maximal and the rms fluctuations of the downstream velocity. These bounds would thus become effective in the far tails of the probability distribution only.

We focus on the fluctuations of the instantaneous, pointwise energy injection $`ϵ_{in}(𝐱,t)`$. We expect that any kind of spatial or temporal average over regions and times longer than the corresponding correlation lengths and times would push the distributions closer to Gaussian shape. It is interesting to note that this does not seem to be the case in . But even there an instantaneous and local distribution should provide a more sensitive measure of possible deviations from a Gaussian shape. Since our system is invariant under translation in downstream and spanwise direction, but not in the normal direction, we study the distributions for planes parallel to the bounding surfaces separately. The probability density functions of the energy input rate in units of its ensemble average, $`ϵ_{in}_{V,T}`$, and for different positions between the plates are shown in Fig. 3.

The collapse of the PDF’s for different Reynolds numbers, rescaled by the volume averages, indicates a universality of the fluctuations of large scale injection (left panel of Fig. 3), as also observed in experiment . The PDF we find is similar to the one measured in  and much closer to Gaussian shape than the one in . As a measure of deviations we determine the normalized and centered moments $`M_n=(pp_{A,T})^n/(pp_{A,T})^2^{n/2}`$ where $`(pp_{A,T})^n=(pp_{A,T})^n\pi (p)\text{d}p`$ and $`p=ϵ_{in}/ϵ_{in}_{V,T}`$. In particular, the ones for $`n=4`$ and $`n=6`$ differ from the Gaussian values of $`3`$ and $`15`$ which are indicated by solid lines in the right panel of Fig. 3. However, the PDF also changes when going from the free-slip side planes at $`y_0/L_y=0`$ towards the center at $`y_0/L_y=1/2`$: the odd moments are smaller near the center, indicating a more symmetric PDF (see right panel of Fig. 3). The PDF is closest to Gaussian here.

We next turn to the logarithm of the ratio of the probabilities for positive and negative injection rates, $`\mathrm{log}[\pi (p)/\pi (p)]`$, where $`p`$ is again a particular value of the dimensionless instantaneous and local dissipation, $`ϵ_{in}(𝐱,t)/ϵ_{in}_{V,T}`$. In Fig. 4 we show

$`C_0(p)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{p}}\mathrm{log}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{\pi (p)}{\pi (p)}}\right].`$ (7)
A constant $`C_0`$ indicates a linear exponential relation between the probabilities of positive and negative energy injection.

As is well known the slope $`C_0`$ can be related to the mean and the variance in a Gaussian model for the fluctuations. Clearly the logarithmic ratio of the probability density functions is then automatically linear. If the distribution has the form

$$\pi (p)=N\mathrm{exp}((p\overline{p})^2/2\sigma ^2),$$
(8)
with normalization factor $`N`$, then

$$C_0=2\frac{\overline{p}}{\sigma ^2}=2\frac{ϵ_{in}_{A,T}ϵ_{in}_{V,T}}{ϵ_{in}^2_{A,T}ϵ_{in}_{A,T}^2}.$$
(9)
In Fig. 4, we have also indicated the $`C_0`$ value as given by (9) by dashed lines. For the PDF close to the center of the flow this estimate agrees with the value from the PDF of the data, but near the side planes deviations become visible. Here the strength of energy input is largest on average and coherent flow structures are most prominent. In all cases our $`C_0`$ is larger than unity. A $`C_0`$ larger than unity was also found in Farago’s model of Brownian particle motion where probabilities of time averaged energy injection rates were considered .

## 4 Concluding remarks

We have studied the fluctuations of the energy injection rate in a turbulent shear flow for various Reynolds numbers. The mean value of the energy input rate and the shape of its probability distribution varies across the shear flow. The results do not depend much on the Reynolds number and the probability density functions collapse when rescaled by the mean value of $`ϵ_{in}`$. The probabilities for positive and negative energy injection are exponentially related over a range of more than twice the mean values. However, the constant in the exponent varies across the layer. Thus, while there are some indications for an exponential relation between positive and negative energy uptake, the quantitative behaviour depends on the position across the layer.

It is still an open, but interesting, question whether the energy injection rate (smoothed in time or not) can be considered as a macroscopic substitute for the entropy production rate, and whether fluctuation relations for it can be found. As mentioned in the introduction, the Navier-Stokes equation is perhaps closest in its global features to the Brownian particle studied by Farago . That model predicts a crossover to another slope for large energy uptake, but the statistical uncertainties in our numerical data are too large to study this. Other systems that might provide guidance for what to expect in the fluctuation statistics are thermostatted Lorentz gases where time reversibility is broken by a magnetic field .

Further avenues worth exploring include the relation between coherent structures and energy uptake or energy blocking (as in Fig. 2), and the implications for backscatter effects in turbulent flows, i.e., the phenomenon that locally energy does not cascade down to smaller but up to larger scales. This might be important for subgrid-scale modelling within large-eddy simulations .

Acknowledgements

We thank J. Davoudi, J. R. Dorfman, G. Gallavotti, W. I. Goldburg, W. Losert, L. Rondoni, T. Tel and J. Vollmer for useful discussions. The computations were done on a Cray SV1ex at the John von Neumann-Institut für Computing at the Forschungszentrum Jülich and we are grateful for their support. This work was also supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft.


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# Nuclear model effects in Charged Current neutrino–nucleus quasielastic scattering

## Acknowledgements

This work was partially supported by DGI (Spain): BFM2002-03315, FPA2002-04181-C04-04 and BFM2000-0600 and by the Junta de Andalucía. C.M. acknowledges MEC (Spain) for a postdoctoral stay at University of Sevilla (SB2000-0427). M.C.M. acknowledges support from a fellowship from the Fundación Cámara (University of Sevilla).


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# 1 Reconstruction of the field geometry from synthetic spectra

## 1 Reconstruction of the field geometry from synthetic spectra

We use a pre-computed database of 46 800 synthetic flux and polarization spectra for field strengths of 1–400 MG and a wide range of effective temperatures to generate synthetic Zeeman spectra, which we subject to an automatic optimization scheme with the aim to recover the parameters describing the original magnetic field configuration. We adopt input field geometries which involve the sum of non-aligned dipole and quadrupole components. We also provide for off-centre shifts of the configuration. By adding Gaussian noise we create input spectra with $`S/N`$ = 100 and 20, respectively.

Off-centred dipole-quadrupole combinations are reliably recovered even for $`S/N=20`$ by our code, which can handle up to 12 free parameters but becomes inefficient if higher multipoles are included. The poor convergence is caused by the complexity of the $`\chi ^2`$-landscape, which develops an increasing number of secondary minima for more complex field geometries (for a detailed investigation, see Euchner et al., 2002). We find that a given set of phase-resolved Zeeman spectra can be reproduced within the noise by quite different formal representations of the field, which, however, all seem to describe rather similar actual field geometries. We are confident, therefore, that observed phase-resolved Zeeman spectra can provide quite definite information on the field structure.

## 2 The magnetic field of EF Eridani

The magnetic field structure over the surface of accreting white dwarfs in cataclysmic binaries becomes accessible to observation only in states of low or switched-off accretion. Following the first detection of Zeeman lines in the polar EF Eridani ($`P_{\mathrm{orb}}`$ = 81 min) by Wheatley & Ramsay (1998), we obtained phase-resolved flux and circular polarization spectra of this object with FORS1 at the ESO VLT on 22 Nov 2000. Fig. 1 shows the spectra collected in four almost equal phase bins after removal of a slight rotational temperature variation. There is no obvious variation of the Zeeman structures with phase. Fits of inclined multipole field models with the angle $`\beta `$ between magnetic and rotational axis left free yielded $`\beta `$ 0. The lack of phase dependence of the Zeeman features further suggests that the tesseral/sectoral multipole components are weak. We fitted the mean flux and polarization spectra, therefore, with an expansion including only the zonal ($`m=0`$) components up to a maximum degree $`l=l_{\mathrm{max}}`$.

Fig. 2 shows the dipole+quadrupole fit ($`l_{\mathrm{max}}=2`$), which is substantially better than the pure dipole (not shown). Fig. 3 depicts the result for the expansion up to $`l_{\mathrm{max}}=5`$. The dipole is replaced by large coefficients for the higher-order multipole components which substantially improve the fit. While the higher-order multipole fit accounts for many of the observed details – all the wiggles in the blue are genuine Zeeman features – there are still noticeable discrepancies: (i) the observed lack of circular polarization around 5700 Å requires that a larger fraction of the $`B`$ 40 MG field occurs at negative $`\mathrm{cos}\psi `$ (angle between line of sight and field direction), and (ii) the observed narrow spectral feature at 5120 Å can be fitted by additional field contributions with $`B`$ between 60 and 100 MG pointing away from the observer, possibly generated by a steeper rise of $`B`$ towards the lower (unseen) pole than provided by the model.

We conclude that the magnetic field of EF Eri deviates strongly from a centred dipole, but do not pretend to have arrived at a definitive solution for its field structure.


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# Testing integrability with a single bit of quantum information

## I Overview

After an initial triumph at solving mathematical problems (see NC2000  for an overview), a large fraction of the researches in the field of quantum information processing has shifted to its original motivation: the simulation of quantum systems Feynman1982 . It is now well established Lloyd1996 ; OGKL2001 ; SOGKL2002  that the evolution produced by certain classes of Hamiltonians can be simulated efficiently on a universal quantum processor. However, extracting useful information from the physical simulation is a problem who’s complexity has been underestimated. Indeed, the ability to simulate the dynamics of a system does not grant one with the ability to evaluate efficiently all physical quantities of interest. These quantities (e.g. spectral properties) are usually measured experimentally on a (exponentially) large number of physical systems — macroscopic samples. A direct quantum simulation, on the other hand, can only reproduce the statistical output of a single quantum system which yields drastically less information than what is learned from costly classical simulations. Thus, it is not clear at this point whether quantum simulators can always outperform their classical analogues.

Some of these spectral properties play a central role in the study of quantized chaotic systems. One particular question of interest is whether the classical limit of a quantum system exhibits regular or chaotic motion. It has became widely accepted (see Haake2001 ; Stockmann1999  and references therein) that the answer to this question is hidden in some spectral properties of the system, which can be reproduced by those of canonical random matrices with the appropriate symmetries. Given a description of the Hamiltonian of the system, the best known algorithms evaluating these “signatures of chaos” require classical computing resources which grow at least as fast as $`N^2`$, the square of the dimension of the Hilbert space of the system under study. Indeed, a close inspection of these algorithms show that they require either matrix multiplication, diagonalization, or evaluation of a determinant Haake2001 . Since such a growth is intractable on any conventional computer (remember that $`N`$ grows exponentially with the size of the physical system), it is quite natural to try to tackle this problem with a quantum computer. In recent years, this interest has lead to the demonstration that the standard model of quantum computation can simulate efficiently the dynamics of a few quantized chaotic models Shack1998 ; GS2001 ; BCMS2001 ; unfortunately, none of these proposals indicate how to circumvent the measurement problem mentioned above.

Recent work by Emerson et al. ewlc2002  proposes to study statistical properties of the system’s eigenvectors relative to a perturbation as a signature of chaos. They also provide an efficient procedure to measure these statistics using the standard model of quantum computation. Their motivation for this work was to test the validity of the signature. Indeed, it is not clearly established that this signature is universal, perturbation independent and, most importantly that the decay time does not scale with the size of the system.

Here, we concentrate on a different model (presumably weaker): deterministic quantum computation with a single pseudo pure bit (DQC1) which was introduced in KL1998 . In this setting, the initial state of the $`K+1`$ qubits computer is $`\rho =\left\{\frac{1ϵ}{2}1\mathrm{l}+ϵ|00|\right\}\frac{1}{2^K}1\mathrm{l}`$ where $`0<ϵ1`$ is a constant. Note that, from a computational complexity point of view, this is equivalent to a model where the state of the first qubit is pure while the other ones are completely random; we shall therefore assume that $`ϵ=1`$ in the remaining of the paper. The final answer is given by a finite accuracy evaluation of the average value of $`\sigma _z`$ on the first qubit. As for the dynamics, we assume that we are gifted with the ability to exert coherent control over one and two qubits at a time. This model is of particular interest since it is weaker than the computational model offered by liquid state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) quantum computing Cory2000 . Such a computing device, we shall show, can test for integrability using $`O(N)`$ physical resources, given that the dynamics of the system of interest is efficiently simulatable on the standard model of quantum computation without ancillary pure qubits (or, more precisely, with no more than $`O(\mathrm{log}K)`$ ancillary pure qubits).

In order to do so, we must first relate the theory underlying the spectral property at the heart of our study; this is done in Sec. II. We then show how it can be evaluated with $`O(N)`$ physical resources in the DQC1 model. In Sec. IV, we present numerical results for canonical random matrices as well as for a physical map, the nonlinear kicked top. Finally, we conclude with a summary of our results and discussion of possible extensions.

## II Level distribution

In the theory of quantum chaos, a key role is played by the statistics of eigenvalues Haake2001 ; Stockmann1999 . In the case of systems with a periodically time varying Hamiltonian the central dynamical object is the Floquet operator, $`\widehat{F}=\stackrel{~}{T}[\mathrm{exp}\{i_0^TH(t)𝑑t\}]`$, that maps the state from one time to a time exactly one modulation period $`T`$ later, $`\stackrel{~}{T}`$ is the time ordering operator. The eigenvalues of $`\widehat{F}`$ lie on the unit circle and may be parameterized in terms of eigenphases, or quasi-energies, as $`\widehat{F}|\varphi _j=e^{i\varphi _j}|\varphi _j`$.

The random matrix conjecture asserts that the statistics of eigenvalues of chaotic systems (dynamical systems and maps) is typically well modeled by the statistics of the eigenvalues of random matrices (hermitian Hamiltonians and unitary Floquet operators) with the appropriate symmetries Haake2001 ; Stockmann1999 . While many important mathematical results underpin the conjecture, a rigorous proof is lacking and support rests on a very large accumulation of numerical results.

An integrable system, by definition, possesses as many symmetries — constant of motion — as degrees of freedom. One can thus write the system’s Hamiltonian as the direct sum of independent Hamiltonians acting on smaller subspaces; one for each values of the constants of motion. Some spectral properties of these Hamiltonians can thus be reproduced by those of matrices that are the direct sum of independent random Hermitian operators. The distribution characterizing the entire spectrum is therefore given by the superposition of many independent spectra; as a consequence, the correlations between levels vanish. Thus, one might expect that the nearest neighbors level spacing distribution (LSD) follow a Poisson law $`prob(\varphi _{j+1}\varphi _j=S)=P(S)e^{\mathrm{\Gamma }S}`$, a straightforward consequence of their statistical independence. This is indeed observed experimentally, numerically, and most importantly can be derived formally BT1977 .

On the other hand, chaotic systems possess no or just a few symmetries. It can be shown Haake2001  that the LSD — aside from the systematic degeneracy following the symmetries — obeys a power law $`P(S)S^\beta e^{\alpha S^2}`$. The parameter $`\beta `$ characterizes the symmetries of the system; it is equal to $`1`$ when the system possesses a time reversal symmetry and some geometric invariance, $`2`$ when it has no symmetries, and $`4`$ when it has a time reversal symmetry with Kramer’s degeneracy. Similarly, we will refer to the Poisson ensemble — the characteristic ensemble of integrable systems — as $`\beta =0`$.

The exact form of the LSD is not relevant to us; we shall capitalize on the crucial distinct behavior of $`P(S0)`$ for chaotic and regular systems. In the former case, $`P(S)`$ reaches a minimum at $`S=0`$: the levels tend to repel each other. In the latter case, $`P(S)`$ is maximal at $`S=0`$, a consequence of the levels statistical independence called clustering.

With these considerations, one can predict the behavior of the ensemble average form factors

$$T_n=\left|Tr\{\widehat{F}^n\}\right|^2=\left|\underset{j=1}{\overset{N}{}}e^{in\varphi _j}\right|^2$$
(1)
from which most spectral properties can be extracted. For regular systems, $`Tr\{\widehat{F}\}=_je^{i\varphi _j}`$ behaves like the end point of a random walk in the complex plane: each step having unit length and uncorrelated random orientation $`\varphi _j`$. After $`N`$ steps, the average distance from the origin is expected to be $`\sqrt{N}`$ so we should find $`\overline{T_1}=N`$. For times $`n>1`$, the analysis is identical; if the angles $`\{\varphi _j\}`$ are statistically independent, then so are $`\{\varphi _j^{(n)}=n\varphi _j\mathrm{𝗆𝗈𝖽}(2\pi )\}`$, $`n`$ taking positive integer values. We conclude that the ensemble average form factors of integrable systems should be time independent and equal to $`N`$.

For chaotic systems, more elaborate calculations are required for the ensemble average form factors. They can be found in Haake2001 ; here we shall simply give an approximate result for $`0<n<N`$ (accuracy of order $`10^2`$) known as the Wigner surmises:

$$\overline{T_n}=\{\begin{array}{cc}2nn_{m=1}^n\frac{1}{m+(N+1)/2}\hfill & \mathrm{for}\beta =1\\ n\hfill & \mathrm{for}\beta =2\\ n+\frac{n}{2}_{m=1}^n\frac{1}{N+1/2m}\hfill & \mathrm{for}\beta =4\end{array}.$$
(2)
Although simple arguments could not have indicated the exact behavior of these form factors, we could have guessed their general form: they are initially very small $`\overline{T_1}N`$, and, as $`n`$ grows, they reach the same value as the Poisson ensemble. Here, $`Tr\{\widehat{F}\}`$ is analog to a anti-correlated random walk in the complex plane composed of $`N`$ unit steps. As a consequence of level repulsion, each steps tend to be oriented in different directions; the probability of finding two steps oriented within an angle $`ϵ`$ decreases as $`ϵ^{\beta +1}`$. Thus, the distance from the origin after $`N`$ of these anti-correlated steps should definitely be smaller than $`\sqrt{N}`$ which is the expected value for uncorrelated steps. As $`n`$ grows, the phases $`n\varphi _j\mathrm{𝗆𝗈𝖽}(2\pi )`$ get wrapped around the unit circle; the effect is analogue to superposing $`n`$ independent spectral distributions, blurring out the correlations. When $`nN`$, one should thus expect a behavior similar to the Poisson ensemble.

It should be noted that the few symmetries of a chaotic system may slightly affect the predictions of Eq. 2. The average $`\overline{T_n}`$ were evaluated for fixed values of the constant of motion. In what follows, we shall often neglect this point for sake of simplicity. Nevertheless as long as the number of invariant subspaces is small ($`\sqrt{N}`$) this omission will not affect our conclusions. For example, if a chaotic system possesses a symmetry which breaks its Hilbert space into $`k`$ equal invariant subspaces, the small $`n`$ behavior $`\overline{T_n}n`$ will be transformed into $`\overline{T_n}k^2nN`$, which is all that really matters to us. One can circumvent this issue when some exact symmetries of the system are known: it suffices to simulate the dynamics of the system within an invariant subspace.

In the light of this analysis, it may seem that form factors constitute a powerful tool to distinguish between classically regular and chaotic systems. In particular, $`T_n`$ should clearly identify each regime for small values of $`n`$. Nevertheless, the form factor $`T_n`$ of a fixed Floquet operator $`\widehat{F}`$ will generally fluctuate about the ensemble average $`\overline{T_n}`$. Thus, we seek a signature of an ensemble property on a single element drawn from this ensemble.

The solution is to use a version of the ergodic theorem. If we normalize out the explicit time dependence of the form factors, an average over a time interval $`\mathrm{\Delta }n`$ reproduces the effect of an ensemble average. More precisely, one can show Haake2001  that

$$T_n/\overline{T_n}=\frac{1}{\mathrm{\Delta }n}\underset{n^{}=n\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }n}{2}}{\overset{n+\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }n}{2}}{}}T_n^{}/\overline{T_n^{}}$$
(3)
converges to $`1`$ with a variance $`\sigma ^2`$ bounded by $`1/\mathrm{\Delta }n`$. For large $`N`$, we can thus use the first $`\mathrm{\Delta }nN`$ form factors to determine whether the Floquet operator belongs to a polynomial or Poisson ensemble. Since the value of $`\overline{T_n}`$ — hence the matrix ensemble — are needed to compute Eq. 3, we shall proceed by hypothesis testing: for which choice of $`\overline{T_n}`$ ($`\overline{T_n}=N`$ regular, $`\overline{T_n}n`$ chaotic) does Eq. 3 converge to 1? In other words, we need to determine which of the two variables

$$t_0=\frac{1}{\mathrm{\Delta }n}\underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{\Delta }n}{}}\frac{T_n}{N}\mathrm{or}t_1=\frac{1}{\mathrm{\Delta }n}\underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{\Delta }n}{}}\frac{T_n}{n}$$
(4)
is most probably drawn from a distribution centered at $`1`$ with $`1/\sqrt{\mathrm{\Delta }n}`$ standard deviation. If we restrict our attention to a regime where $`\mathrm{\Delta }nN`$, both hypothesis cannot have high probabilities simultaneously 111It is important to note that $`\mathrm{\Delta }n`$ needs not to increase with $`N`$, in fact it is quite the opposite. The probability of error scales like the overlap of two Gaussian distributions of width $`\sigma =1/\mathrm{\Delta }n`$ and centered about points $`\mu _1`$ and $`\mu _2N\mu _1`$: clearly, this overlap decreases with $`N`$.. On the other hand, when the probabilities of both hypothesis are low, the test is inconclusive. Nevertheless, remember that the presence of symmetries in a chaotic system shifts the value of the distribution by a factor $`k^2`$ where $`k`$ is the number of invariant subspaces. For $`k^2N`$, this should be clearly distinguishable from the value of a regular system. This should not be seen as a bug but a feature of our approach allowing one to estimate $`k`$, the number of invariant subspaces.

Applying this test to a particular dynamical system would require one to compute the spectrum of the Floquet operator. If one were to try and simulate a dynamical map on a quantum computer with $`K`$ qubits, a direct computation would require determining all $`N=2^K`$ eigenvalues. In the next section we will construct a quantum circuit that would enable the form factors themselves to be extracted with $`O(N)`$ physical resources thus allowing a direct test of non-integrability that circumvented the need to explicitly compute all eigenvalues.

## III Quantum algorithm

The DQC1 algorithm evaluating the form factor is based on the idea reported in MPSKLN2002  of using a quantum computer as a spectrometer. The circuit is shown at Fig. 1 where $`K=\mathrm{log}_2N`$.

By hypothesis, we are able to efficiently simulate the dynamics of the system under study so the gate $`\widehat{F}^n`$ only requires a polynomial (in $`n`$ and $`K`$) number of elementary gates to be constructed. Here, it is not $`\widehat{F}^n`$ we wish to implement but a coherently controlled version of it, i.e. a linear gate acting on $`K+1`$ qubits which applies $`\widehat{F}^n`$ to the last $`K`$ qubits when the first qubit is in state $`|1`$ and doesn’t do anything when it is in state $`|0`$. Given the circuit for $`\widehat{F}^n`$, standard techniques can be used to construct a controlled version of it at polynomial cost BBCDMSSSW1995 .

It should also be emphasized that the $`K`$ qubits on which the Floquet operator is applied generate a Hilbert space of dimension $`2^K`$ which might be larger than the simulated system’s Hilbert space. Thus, when applying $`\widehat{F}`$ to those qubits, one really applies $`\widehat{F}U`$ where ideally $`U`$ is the identity operator on $`2^KN`$ states; it can be any other unitary operator as long as its trace can be evaluated. The effect of these extra dimensions will be to add a contribution $`Tr\{U\}/N`$ to the output signal which should be systematically subtracted as we shall henceforth assume.

The output of this computation will be the real and imaginary part of $`(Tr\{\widehat{F}^n\})/2^K`$ when the last rotation is made about axis $`k=x`$ and $`k=y`$ respectively. Thus, our task is to distinguish between a signal whose amplitude is of order $`1/N`$ (chaotic dynamics) and one of order $`1/\sqrt{N}`$ (regular dynamics) which can be achieved using $`O(N)`$ physical resources. In the special case of NMR quantum computing, one can for example increase the size of the sample by a factor $`N`$ as the size of the system increases, or simply repeat the procedure $`N`$ times and sum up the outputs. We thus get a quadratic advantage over all known classical algorithms.

## IV Numerical results

### IV.1 Random Matrices

Before applying our general proposal to a physical model, we give a numerical example illustrating the main results used from random matrix theory: the ergodic theorem of Eq. 4. In order to estimate the average and variance of $`t_0`$ and $`t_1`$ in a given universal matrix ensemble, we draw many random matrices $`U^{(k)}`$ from the ensemble and numerically evaluate each quantity. As an example, we have generated 50 random matrices from the $`\beta =2`$ ensemble — the set of unitary matrices with no symmetries. This is illustrated on Fig. 2, where the matrices are of size $`600\times 600`$. For each random matrix $`U^{(k)}`$ drawn from this ensemble, we can compute $`t_1(U^{(k)})`$ as functions of $`\mathrm{\Delta }n`$. Two such curves (dashed) are plotted on Fig. 2. By applying this procedure to many samples (here 50), we can estimate the average of $`t_1`$ and its fluctuations:

$$t_1=\frac{1}{50}\underset{k=1}{\overset{50}{}}t_1(U^{(k)}),(t_1)^2=\frac{1}{50}\underset{k=1}{\overset{50}{}}[t_1(U^{(k)})]^2.$$
(5)
The average $`t_1`$ and mean deviation $`\sigma =\sqrt{(t_1)^2t_1^2}`$ are also plotted on Fig. 2 (heavy and light full line respectively): as expected, $`t_1`$ converges to 1 as $`1/\sqrt{\mathrm{\Delta }n}`$. The same procedure can be applied to $`t_0`$; nevertheless, since $`t_1`$ does converge to 1 in this ensemble, $`t_0`$ obviously does not since it differs by a factor of roughly $`N/\mathrm{\Delta }n20`$ for the range of $`\mathrm{\Delta }n`$ we have studied. Of course, this difference would vanish when $`\mathrm{\Delta }n`$ approaches $`N`$ since the form factor of any universal ensemble converge to those of the Poisson ensemble (see Sec. II); this is why we must restrict our study to $`\mathrm{\Delta }nN`$. The same conclusions can be reached for the other ensembles characterizing chaotic systems, i.e. $`\beta =`$1, 2, and 4.

Similarly, had the matrices $`U^{(k)}`$ been drawn from the $`\beta =0`$ ensemble — the set of matrices characterizing regular systems — we would have observed $`t_0`$ converging to $`1`$ as $`1/\sqrt{\mathrm{\Delta }n}`$ while $`t_1`$, smaller by a factor of roughly $`\mathrm{\Delta }n/N`$, would roughly vanished. From these considerations, the hypothesis test “$`t_0`$ converges to 1” versus “$`t_1`$ converges to 1” allows us to discriminate between random matrices drawn from $`\beta =0`$ and those drawn from one of the $`\beta =`$ 1, 2, or 3, with a probability of error decreasing as $`1/\sqrt{\mathrm{\Delta }n}`$. Thus, as long as the random matrix conjecture holds, it should also allow to discriminate between regular and chaotic motion.

### IV.2 Kicked Top

We now focus our attention on a physical model of great interest for its good agreement with random matrix theory: the nonlinear kicked top. We write the Floquet operator in its most general form following Haake Haake2001 , $`\widehat{F}=U_zU_yU_x`$ with

$$U_k=\mathrm{exp}\left\{i\frac{\tau _kJ_k^2}{2j+1}i\alpha _kJ_k\right\}$$
(6)
where the $`J_k`$, $`k=x,y,`$ and $`z`$, are the canonical angular momentum operators. We conveniently define a parameter vector $`𝐩=(\alpha _x,\alpha _y,\alpha _z,\tau _x,\tau _y,\tau _z)`$. Some authors use a restricted form of this Floquet operator where only $`\tau _z`$ and $`\alpha _y`$ are non-zero. Since $`[\widehat{F},𝐉^2]=0`$, the value of the angular momentum $`j`$ — which appears in Eq. 6 — is conserved. The dimension of the Hilbert space is simply given by $`N=2j+1`$.

By adequately choosing the parameters $`𝐩`$, the kicked top can be either in a regular or chaotic regime, see Haake2001  for more details. Thus, we can evaluate $`t_0`$ and $`t_1`$ of Eq. 4 in both regimes and verify that they indeed allow to discriminate between them. This is presented on Figs. 3 and 4 for different values of the total angular momentum $`j`$. On Fig. 3, the system is in a regular regime; we have only plotted $`t_0`$ since $`t_1`$ is larger by a factor proportional to $`j`$ so clearly does not converge to 1. Similarly, only the value of $`t_1`$ is exhibited of Fig. 4. Notice that while the ergodic averaging decreases the fluctuations, it is not essential to discriminate between regular and chaotic. Indeed, the scale of the fluctuation is extremely small compared to $`j`$ which is the factor by which $`t_0`$ and $`t_1`$ differ.

The analogy with a random walk in the plane can also be illustrated graphically. On Fig. 5 we have plotted the sum of the eigenvalues vectorially. The apparent structure of the vectors is purely artificial, the eigenphases were ordered in increasing order (the sum of vectors is obviously a commutative operation); we have chosen this ordering to facilitate the presentation.

The effect of LSD are striking on Fig. 5. The light vectors (chaotic regime) are arranged in an almost perfect circle; eigenphases tend to be equally separated. On the other hand, the heavy vectors (regular regime) are quite often aligned in an almost straight line; a manifestation of level clustering. As a consequence, the heavy vectors end up further apart from the origin than do the light vectors; on average, these distances differ by a factor $`\sqrt{N}`$.

Finally, we can use the form factor to study the transition between regular and chaotic motion. To do so, we let the parameter vector continuously vary from its regular value to its chaotic value: $`𝐩=(1ϵ)𝐩_r+ϵ𝐩_c`$ (see figure captions 3 and 4). For $`ϵ=0`$, the expected value of $`t_0`$ is 1. As $`ϵ`$ increases, the system enters a chaotic regime; when chaos has fully developed, $`t_0`$ should vanish as $`1/N`$. This is indeed observed on Fig. 6, where we have plotted $`t_0`$ as a function of $`ϵ`$ for different system sizes. Moreover, the results indicate that the transition to chaos becomes more sensible as the size of the system increases.

## V Conclusion

We have shown that, using a single bit of quantum information, we can test whether the spectrum of a unitary matrix obeys a Poisson or polynomial law. Under the random matrix conjecture, this can be used to determine whether the system has a regular or chaotic behavior in its classical limit. The idea relies on estimating the averaged form factor using the ergodic theorem which roughly states that a time average can reproduce an ensemble average. The form factors in a regular and chaotic regime differ by a factor of $`\sqrt{N}`$ and the output signal of our computation decreases as $`1/N`$: the required physical resources thus scale as $`N`$. This is a quadratic improvement over all known classical algorithms. We are currently investigating a different signature of quantum chaos which might not suffer from this signal loss and hence, could offer an exponential speed up.

This result gives a new insight on the nature of the potential computational speed up offered by quantum mechanics. In particular, it provides a strong argument towards the computational power of mixed states quantum computing.

We acknowledge Harold Ollivier for stimulating discussions and careful reading of this manuscript, and Howard Wiseman for pointing out an error in an earlier version of this work. DP is financially supported by Canada’s NSERC, and RL by NSERC and CIAR.


text:
# Limitations on building single-photon–resolution detection devices

## Abstract

Single-photon resolution (SPR) detectors can tell the difference between incoming wave packets of $`n`$ and $`n+1`$ photons. Such devices are especially important for linear optical quantum computing with projective measurements. However, in this paper I show that it is impossible to construct a photodetector with single-photon resolution when we are restricted to single-photon sources, linear optical elements and projective measurements with standard (non-photon-number discriminating) photodetectors. These devices include SPR detectors that sometimes fail to distinguish one- and two-photon inputs, but at the same time indicate this failure.

Linear optical quantum computing and quantum communication gained considerable momentum with the work of Knill, Laflamme and Milburn klm01 . They showed that linear optics and projective measurements can efficiently implement quantum computations without the use of Kerr nonlinearities, which are typically very weak. Two key ingredients of linear optical quantum computing (LOQC) are the faithful creation of basic quantum states, such as single-photon states, and the reliable detection of optical output states.

Recently, several groups have demonstrated single-photon sources in quantum-dot microcavities and magneto-optical traps santori02 ; kuhn02 ; pelton02 . The importance of these experiments for linear optical quantum computing can hardly be overstated, even though the road to high-visibility interference between independent sources is still long and arduous. Furthermore, Hockney, Dowling and I assessed the quality of single-photon sources by defining the suitability of a source with respect to a given application hockney03 . In this paper, I turn my attention to the other essential component of LOQC: a photodetector with single-photon resolution.

Most detectors that are currently used in optical quantum communication and computation experiments cannot tell the difference between one or more photons. Single-photon resolution (SPR) detectors are devices that can distinguish between wave packets containing $`n`$ and $`n+1`$ photons kok01 ; haderka03 . They are important because the LOQC research program relies heavily on projective measurements, which in turn involve photon-number measurements lee02 ; kok02 . We therefore need a way to efficiently distinguish between different photon number states. Very often, the output of an optical gate is significantly different when postselected on a single-photon or a two-photon detection outcome. Perhaps the most dramatic example of this is the teleportation experiment by Bouwmeester et albouwmeester97 , in which the lack of single-photon resolution reduces the non-postselected fidelity of the teleported output state to a value lower than the clasical limit braunstein98 ; kok00 . As a consequence, postselection was needed. Recently, Pan et al. modified the pair-production rates of the two down-converters in this experiment, such that the non-postselected output fidelity surpasses the classical limit zeilinger03 .

However, it may not always be possible to modify the quantum gate in such a way that non-SPR detectors can be used, and we really would like to have cheap, reliable, and efficient SPR detection devices. But the current experimental detectors with single-photon resolution are expensive and operate at low temperatures takeuchi99 . In this paper, I will therefore investigate whether we can build an SPR detector with single-photon sources, linear optics and ordinary photodetection without single-photon resolution. It turns out that such a device is impossible.

Before I proceed with the proof of this statement, I will first simplify the task of the SPR detection device. For many applications it is good enough to distinguish between zero-, one- and two-photon states, rather than the general $`n`$\- and $`(n+1)`$-photon states. Consequently, I will consider only devices that can tell the difference between one- and two-photon states. After all, showing that such a device does not exist immediately excludes the possibility of a general SPR detection device. Also, the SPR device does not have to work with 100% efficiency to be useful (ordinary photodetectors do not, and they are very useful). I will only require that a failure to distinguish between a one- and two-photon input state results in an unambiguous detector signature indicating this failure. This excludes the so-called detector cascade kok01 ; haderka03 , which splits the incoming mode into many outgoing modes to render the probability of finding two photons in the same detector arbitrarily small. However, we can never be certain that two photons didn’t enter the same output mode, and as a consequence, there is no unambiguous detector signature that indicates failure. Here, I will prove that we cannot make an SPR device with a finite number of optical modes that always signals a possible failure unambiguously.

So far, I have been rather vague about the resources that I include for building an SPR device, so I will now specify them in more detail. A schematic drawing of the prospective SPR device is shown in Fig. 1, and consists of $`M`$ input modes, one of which is the mode we want to detect. Without loss of generality, we can choose this to be mode 1. The other modes contain $`N1`$ auxiliary photons. So for a single-photon input state, a total of $`N`$ photons are distributed over $`M`$ modes according to $`\stackrel{}{n}=(n_2,\mathrm{},n_M)`$, with $`n_i`$ and $`_in_i=N1`$.

The $`M`$ modes are then transformed by a unitary transformation $`U`$ into $`M`$ output modes. Every annihilation operator $`\widehat{a}_i`$ corresponding to input mode $`a_i`$ then becomes a sum of annihilation operators $`\widehat{b}_k`$ that correspond to the output modes $`b_k`$:

$$\widehat{a}_i\underset{k=1}{\overset{M}{}}U_{ik}\widehat{b}_k.$$
(1)
Here, we write the transformation in terms of the annihilation operators, but we could also have used the creation operators $`\widehat{a}_i^{}`$ and $`\widehat{b}_k^{}`$. The commutation relations are the usual:

$`[\widehat{a}_i,\widehat{a}_j^{}]`$ $`=`$ $`[\widehat{b}_i,\widehat{b}_j^{}]=\delta _{ij}`$ (2)
$`[\widehat{a}_i,\widehat{a}_j]`$ $`=`$ $`[\widehat{b}_i,\widehat{b}_j]=[\widehat{a}_i^{},\widehat{a}_j^{}]=[\widehat{b}_i^{},\widehat{b}_j^{}]=0,`$ (3)
and all the other commutators vanish. The fact that Eq. (1) does not mix creation and annihilation operators is due to the exclusion of squeezing in the $`M`$-port $`U`$.

In principle, we can include feed-forward techniques in the transformation $`U`$. An initial unitary transformation $`U_0`$ is then followed by a detection of a subset of the outgoing modes. Based on the outcome of this detection, a second unitary transformation $`U_1`$ is applied to the remaining undetected modes. Again, we detect a subset of the outgoing modes. This procedure repeats itself until all the modes are detected. However, this technique improves only the efficiency, and does not increase the versatility of the device, because for every successful set of detector signatures and unitary transformations $`U_0,U_1,\mathrm{}`$, we can postpone the intermediate detection events to the very end kok00b .

All the outgoing modes are detected with photodetectors that lack single-photon resolution. This amounts to a Projection Operator Valued Measure (POVM) of finding a click $`\widehat{E}_1`$ and finding no click $`\widehat{E}_0`$ kok00 :

$`\widehat{E}_0`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{n=0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}(1\eta ^2)^n|nn|`$ (4)
$`\widehat{E}_1`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{n=0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}[1(1\eta ^2)^n]|nn|,`$ (5)
where $`\eta `$ is the quantum efficiency of the detector (that is, every incoming photon triggers the detector with probability $`\eta ^2`$). Since the objective of the proof is to show that SPR detectors cannot be constructed with linear optics and non-photon-resolution detectors, I can choose $`\eta 1`$. This corresponds to perfectly efficient detectors. If we can’t do it with these, we certainly can’t do it with less sensitive detectors. The POVM thus becomes

$$\widehat{E}_0=|00|\text{and}\widehat{E}_1=\underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}|nn|.$$
(6)
The detector signature of the SPR device that should differentiate between one and two input photons is a string $`\stackrel{}{d}=(d_1,\mathrm{},d_M)`$, where $`d_i\{\text{‘click’},\text{‘no click’}\}`$. Any detector signature therefore belongs to one and only one of three sets: the set of signatures that indicate a single photon in the input mode, the set of signatures that indicate two photons, and the set of signatures that indicate a detector failure. This leads to the following criteria:

There are two ways to distinguish one- and two-photon input states: (1) for at least one detector, the output can be a click when one photon enters the device, but does never click when two photons enter the device; (2) for at least one detector, the output can be a click when two photons enter the device, but does never click when only one photon enters the device. For convenience, let’s call these two methods type I and type II SPR detectors, respectively. I will now prove that it is impossible to distinguish between one- and two-photon input states using either type.

In order to develop a feel for the mechanism of the proof, I will first consider the simplest nontrivial interferometric setup. Suppose that $`a_1`$ is the input mode that we want to detect, and that there is only a single auxiliary photon in mode $`a_2`$. The two input modes are transformed according to

$$\widehat{a}_1\alpha \widehat{b}_1+\beta \widehat{b}_2\text{and}\widehat{a}_2\gamma \widehat{b}_1+\delta \widehat{b}_2.$$
(7)
A single-photon input with one auxiliary photon then yields the polynomial

$$\widehat{a}_1\widehat{a}_2\alpha \gamma \widehat{b}_1^2+(\alpha \delta +\beta \gamma )\widehat{b}_1\widehat{b}_2+\beta \delta \widehat{b}_2^2,$$
(8)
whereas two input photons yield

$`\widehat{a}_1^2\widehat{a}_2`$ $``$ $`\alpha ^2\gamma \widehat{b}_1^3+(2\alpha \beta \gamma +\alpha ^2\delta )\widehat{b}_1^2\widehat{b}_2`$ (10)
$`+(2\alpha \beta \delta +\beta ^2\gamma )\widehat{b}_1\widehat{b}_2^2+\beta ^2\delta \widehat{b}_2^3.`$
If the detection device is not to fire at a two-photon input, all the terms involving $`\widehat{b}_1`$ must have zero coefficients (we can choose $`\widehat{b}_1`$ without loss of generality). We start with the leading term $`\widehat{b}_1^3`$.

For the polynomial in Eq. (10) to have no $`\widehat{b}_1^3`$ contribution, we need to put $`\alpha ^2\gamma =0`$, which implies either $`\alpha =0`$ or $`\gamma =0`$. Secondly, we require that $`2\alpha \beta \delta +\beta ^2\gamma =0`$. If $`\alpha `$ and $`\gamma `$ are not zero simultaneously, we also arrive at the conclusion that $`\beta =0`$ or $`\delta =0`$. With these restrictions, it is no longer possible to choose $`(\alpha ,\beta ,\gamma ,\delta )`$ such that the single-photon input of Eq. (8) retains a non-zero amplitude in the mode $`b_1`$.

The general mechanism of the theorem is therefore as follows: consider first an SPR device of type I. By requiring zero amplitudes in mode $`b_1`$ in the case of a two-photon input state (plus the auxiliary photons), we force the coefficients of the Bogoliubov transformation to zero. Putting coefficients to zero will in turn force us to put other coefficients to zero. This generates a contradiction with the non-zero $`b_1`$-amplitude in the case of a single-photon input state. I then repeat the same argument for type II SPR devices.

First, I will consider state discrimination with a type I SPR detector, that is, for at least one detector the output can be a click when one photon enters the device, and does never click when two photons enter the device. I again place this detector in output mode $`b_1`$. Suppose further that we have $`N1`$ auxiliary photons in modes $`a_2,\mathrm{},a_M`$, distributed according to $`\stackrel{}{n}=(n_2,\mathrm{},n_M)`$. The transformation of the input modes is then given by

$$\widehat{a}_j\underset{k=1}{\overset{M}{}}\alpha _{jk}\widehat{b}_k,$$
(11)
where $`M`$ is the total number of optical input modes, and the matrix elements $`\alpha _{jk}`$ constitute a unitary matrix.

Using Eq. (11), the input of the SPR detection device in the presence of a two-photon input state is transformed into the following polynomial:

$$\widehat{a}_1^2\underset{m=2}{\overset{N}{}}\widehat{a}_m^{n_m}\left(\underset{k=1}{\overset{M}{}}\alpha _{1k}\widehat{b}_k\right)^2\underset{m=2}{\overset{N}{}}\left(\underset{j=1}{\overset{M}{}}\alpha _{mj}\widehat{b}_j\right)^{n_m}.$$
(12)
Again, we need to suppress the amplitudes of all the terms that involve a factor $`\widehat{b}_1^k`$. We start with the leading term $`\widehat{b}_1^{N+1}`$. There is only one term that leads to all the photons ending up in mode $`b_1`$, and its coefficient must be forced to zero:

$$\alpha _{11}^2\alpha _{21}^{n_2}\mathrm{}\alpha _{M1}^{n_M}=0.$$
(13)
This means that $`\alpha _{p1}=0`$ for at least one $`p\{1,\mathrm{},M\}`$ with non-zero $`n_p`$. It is easy to see that in order to make an SPR detector work, we need as many different matrix elements $`\alpha _{ij}`$ as possible. We can therefore choose $`n_i=1`$ for $`i\{2,\mathrm{},N\}`$, where now $`N<M`$.

Subsequently, consider the amplitude of $`\widehat{b}_1^N\widehat{b}_l`$ for any $`l\{2,\mathrm{},M\}`$. This stray photon in mode $`b_l`$ can either originate from the input mode or from one of the auxiliary modes, and the coefficient is given by

$$\alpha _{1l}\alpha _{11}\mathrm{}\alpha _{N1}+\alpha _{11}\underset{j=1}{\overset{N}{}}\alpha _{11}\mathrm{}\alpha _{j1,1}\alpha _{jl}\mathrm{}\alpha _{N1}.$$
(14)
This leads to

$$\alpha _{11}\underset{j=1}{\overset{N}{}}(1+\delta _{j1})\alpha _{11}\mathrm{}\alpha _{j1,1}\alpha _{jl}\mathrm{}\alpha _{N1}=0.$$
(15)
If $`\alpha _{p1}=0`$, then only one term remains:

$$\alpha _{11}\mathrm{}\alpha _{pl}\mathrm{}\alpha _{N1}=0,$$
(16)
and this forces a second matrix element $`\alpha _{q1}`$ or $`\alpha _{pl}`$ to zero. Since this holds true for all $`l`$, we only have to consider the case where $`q:\alpha _{q1}=0`$, or $`l:\alpha _{pl}=0`$. After all, if only some $`\alpha _{pl}`$ are zero, there must be a $`\alpha _{q1}=0`$, and there is therefore no need for $`\alpha _{pl}=0`$. However, setting all $`\alpha _{pl}`$ zero is equivalent to removing the $`p^{\mathrm{th}}`$ input photon. Since we set this proof up for an arbitrary number of auxiliary photons, we only have to consider $`\alpha _{q1}=0`$.

The next term in Eq. (10) the coefficient of which has to be zero, is $`\widehat{b}_1^{N1}\widehat{b}_n\widehat{b}_n^{}`$. With $`\alpha _{p1}=0`$ and $`\alpha _{q1}=0`$, the remaining term is

$$\alpha _{11}\mathrm{}\alpha _{pn}\mathrm{}\alpha _{qn^{}}\mathrm{}\alpha _{N1}=0,$$
(17)
and this leads to the conclusion that there must be an $`\alpha _{r1}=0`$.

We can repeat this process such that for each $`k`$ in the terms involving $`\widehat{b}_1^k`$, we find an $`\alpha _{r1}=0`$. There are $`N+1`$ terms with an overall factor $`\widehat{b}_1^k`$, but there are only $`N`$ terms $`\alpha _{r1}`$. We thus have forced all $`\alpha _{r1}`$ to zero, and the single-photon input will also have a zero amplitude in mode $`b_1`$:

$$\widehat{a}_1\underset{m=2}{\overset{N}{}}\widehat{a}_m\underset{m=1}{\overset{N}{}}\left(\underset{j=1}{\overset{M}{}}\alpha _{mj}\widehat{b}_j|_{\alpha _{m1}=0}\right).$$
(18)
Since I explicitly constructed the SPR detection device to signal the presence of a single photon in mode $`b_1`$, Eq. (18) contradicts the premise. Hence, an SPR detector of type I is impossible.

Secondly, I consider the type II SPR detector, that is, for at least one detector, the output is a click when two photons enter the device, and no click when only one photon enters the device. The impossibility proof runs along the same lines as the previous proof. With a single photon in the input mode, the output before the detectors is then

$$\widehat{a}_1\underset{m=2}{\overset{N}{}}\widehat{a}_m\underset{m=1}{\overset{N}{}}\left(\underset{j=1}{\overset{M}{}}\alpha _{mj}\widehat{b}_j\right).$$
(19)
Here, I have already used the fact that all $`N1`$ auxiliary photons should be distributed over different modes. Following the same line of reasoning, all the $`N`$ matrix elements $`\alpha _{r1}`$ with $`r\{1,\mathrm{},N\}`$ are forced to zero by the $`N`$ different $`k`$-terms proportional to $`\widehat{b}_1^k`$. Again, this excludes the possibility for two input photons to trigger the detector in output mode 1. Therefore, an SPR detector of type II is impossible as well, which means that single-photon–resolution detection devices with auxiliary photon-number input states, linear optics and projective measurements are impossible.

As I mentioned before, a detector cascade can succeed with arbitrary large probability of success where the above SPR device fails. Braunstein and I have shown in Ref. kok01  that such cascades need a large number of output modes, and that they are very sensitive to detector losses. Notwithstanding these difficulties, Haderka et al. have made significant experimental progress towards a working detector cascade. Nevertheless, I believe this theorem is an interesting property of linear optics with the projective measurements I presented here, and it might be useful in guiding our intuition when we try to develop interferometers that are to perform special tasks in linear optical quantum computing and communication.

This work was carried out at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. I would like to thank Bill Munro for stimulating discussions and valuable comments, and Jonathan Dowling for carefully reading this manuscript. I also acknowledge the United States National Research Council. Part of this research was carried out in the Centre for Quantum Computer Technology at the University of Queensland, Australia.


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# NGC 1245 - an intermediate age open cluster

## 1 Introduction

The open star cluster system of our Galaxy is one of the important constituent of the disk of the Galaxy. The open star clusters are formed from molecular clouds at the sites of star formation. In general, the open star clusters are found very close to the plane of the galaxy, typical scale height being, 100 – 200 pc. Some open clusters are found to be located away from the disk of the Galaxy, more than the scale height. NGC 1245 is an intermediate age star cluster situated close to the Perseus spiral arm and is located 444 pc below the plane of the Galaxy. The location of this cluster and its irregular appearance got us interested in this cluster. NGC 1245 (RA = 3h 11.2m; Dec = +47 4) is located away from the center of the Galaxy (l=146.6; b=-8.9). This intermediate age cluster might belong to the old disk population with a larger scale height of about 500 pc. The intermediate age clusters located far away from the galactic plane could also throw some light about the old disk or the thick disk population of the Galactic disk.

This cluster has been studied previously by Hoag et al. (1961) and Chincarini (1964). The cluster finding chart presented by Hoag et al. (1961) shows that the cluster seems to lack stars near the cluster center. Another study of this cluster based on CCD BV photometry is done by Carraro & Patat (1994). They obtain a colour excess E(B$``$V) = 0.26 mag and an apparent distance modulus (m$``$M) = 13.20 mag. Wee & Lee (1996) have carried out Washington CCD photometry of this cluster and found that this cluster is not metal rich, given in the Lyngå (1987) catalogue. A comparison with the photographic data given at the site WEBDA, indicates that there may be calibration problems in Carraro & Patat data. This has also been indicated by Wee & Lee (1996). Therefore, we present a new set of CCD photometry for the stars in the region of NGC 1245. The cluster colour-magnitude diagrams (CMDs) are used to estimate the reddening, age and distance to the cluster. The synthetic CMDs are used to estimate luminosity functions in order to compare with the observed ones and also to estimate the present day mass function of the cluster.

## 2 Observation and data analysis

The cluster was observed from the 2.34m Vainu Bappu Telescope at Kavalur, India during the 1-4 Jan 2000 observing run. The observational log is presented in Table 1. We used a 1K x 1K CCD camera at the prime focus, with an image scale of 0.”63 arcsec/pix. The night of observation was not photometric and hence we used the stars observed by Hoag et al. (1961) as calibration stars. The CCD data were calibrated using IRAF data reduction package. The instrumental magnitudes were estimated using the DAOPHOT II package. The zero point errors are of the order of 0.02 mag. The V magnitude and (B$``$V) colour are estimated for 916 stars. The present data is compared with the CCD data of Carraro & Patat (1994) and the results are shown in Figure 1. The differences are computed as present data minus Carraro & Patat (1994) data, and the difference is plotted against the respective magnitude or colour. The average value of $`\delta V`$ is found to be 0.01 mag, with $`\sigma `$ = 0.04 mag, and the average value of $`\delta (BV)`$ is 0.04 mag, with $`\sigma `$ = 0.02 mag. The colour plot shown in the bottom panel of figure 1 shows that the colour difference has a colour dependence, indicating colour calibration problems with Carraro & Patat (1994) data.

## 3 Data incompleteness

In general, the incompleteness in the photometric data is a function of stellar crowding and stellar magnitudes. In the case of open clusters, the crowding is very minimal and hence the incompleteness is mainly a function of the stellar magnitudes. We estimated the completeness of the photometric data in both B and V passbands in the long exposure frames. The completeness in the data changes slightly from the center of the frame to the periphery. Hence the data completeness for the cluster and the field region are tabulated in table 2.

The observed region of the cluster is shown in Figure 2. The cluster center as found by Carraro & Patat (1994) is denoted by a big open circle. We used this as the cluster center and re-estimated the cluster center using all the observed stars. The center thus found is marked by a cross. It can be clearly seen from the cluster plot that the brighter cluster members are confined within a radius of around 400 pixels. Thus we have assumed that the cluster occupies the area within the dashed lines and the region outside the dashed box represents the field region. We estimate the field star contamination in the cluster region using the data in this region.

## 4 Structure of the cluster

From the cluster plot as shown in Figure 2, it can be seen that the cluster seems to lack stars near the center and also, the stars seem to be distributed in an annulus. The cluster center as found by Carraro & Patat (1994) is denoted by a big open circle. We used this as the cluster center and re-estimated the cluster center using all the observed stars. The center thus found is marked by a cross. We estimate the radial density profile (RDP) to study the radial density structure of the cluster. The stellar density are estimated in radial bins from the center. We computed the RDP for radial bins of 0.5 and 1 arcmin. RDP were estimated including all stars and also for stars brighter than 17 mag. Two reasons for considering only brighter stars: (a) to estimate the statistical significance of the apparent paucity of bright stars near the cluster center and (b) brighter star RDP could be used to identify the presence of mass segregation in the cluster. When estimating the RDP for all stars, the incompleteness in the data is incorporated. The radial density profiles are shown in Figure 3, the density in the left panels is estimated using a radial bin of 1 arcmin and that in the right panels using 0.5 arcmin. The top panels show the RDP computed using all the stars and the lower panels show the RDP computed using stars brighter than 17.0 mag.

It can be seen that the RDP in the top left panel is very smooth. This profile is very similar to the RDP presented by Nilakshi et al. (2002), in their figure 1. The top right panel shows a smooth profile outside 2 arcmin radius, but the profile shows fluctuation near the center. This dip in the RDP is not seen by Nilakshi et al. (2002) as they consider all stars with 1 arcmin radial bin and the dip is mainly seen in the RDP of stars brighter than 17 mag. The RDP are fitted with the function $`\rho (R)f_0/(1+(R/R_0)^2)`$, where $`R_0`$ is the core radius, at which the density $`\rho (R)`$, becomes half of the central density, $`f_0`$. These are also plotted in figure 3, shown as dotted lines. In the case of top-left panel, the fit is extremely good with a $`\chi ^2`$ value of 0.15. The core radius is found to be 4.75 arcmin. In the case of the lower-left panel, the fit to all the points turned out to be quite unsatisfactory, with a $`\chi ^2`$ value of 2.1. Instead, we fitted the function to the points except the one at 1 arcmin, then the $`\chi ^2`$ value was found to be 0.4. This fit gives a core radius of 3.1 arcmin, which is much lower than the value obtained when all stars were considered. If the fitted function were to extend to the inner radii, at 1 arcmin, the observed density is found to be lower than the computed density. The difference is about 1.6 $`\sigma `$. Hence RDP with 1arcmin radial bins for stars brighter than 17 mag suggest that the central 2 arcmin has less number of brighter stars than what is expected. The RDP computed with half arcmin radial bins also show the fluctuation in the number density of stars near the center. This is much more pronounced in the lower-left panel, where stars brighter than 17 mag are considered. The RDP model profile, computed for the lower-left panel is over plotted on the lower-right panel. The observed number density at 0.5 arcmin radius is seen to be lower than the value expected by the fit, lower by 2 $`\sigma `$. Hence this strengthens the point that the central density of bright stars is likely to be less than what is expected.

The dip in the RDP could also be due to choice of center of the cluster. The estimated cluster center is shown in figure 2. This center was shifted by 50 pixels (0.5 arcmin) in all the four directions and the RDP was re-estimated for stars brighter than 17 mag and with 0.5 arcmin bin. The central dip in the profile was observed in three of the four RDP with shifted centers. Three RDPs with shifted centers showed a central density dips which are more then 1 $`\sigma `$, indicating that the choice of the center is not the reason for the observed dip in the central density of stars brighter than 17 mag.

As this cluster is known to be an intermediate age cluster, the n-body relaxation within the cluster would have resulted in the segregation of brighter stars towards the center of the cluster. This would result in a steeper RDP for brighter stars. This may be the reason for obtaining a lower value of core radius for brighter stars. On the other hand, the bright star RDP is seen to be shallower than the fitted function in the central regions, though the statistical significance is not very high ( 2 $`\sigma `$). Also this result is independent of the errors in choosing the cluster center. Hence the apparent paucity of brighter stars near near the cluster center has 2 $`\sigma `$ significance.

## 5 Colour-Magnitude Diagram

The parameters of the cluster can be estimated using the CMD. The V vs (B$``$V) CMD is shown in Figure 4. The left side shows the CMD for the cluster region with 659 stars and the right side for the field region with 257 stars. The cluster CMD spans between V=13 – 19.5 mag and a few red giants are seen at V= 14 mag and (B$``$V) = 1.4 mag. A broad main-sequence (MS) is seen, with a large number of stars near the turn-off. One of the reasons for the scatter on the MS is the presence of differential reddening across the face of the cluster, apart from the presence of binaries. The differential reddening on the face of this cluster was noticed earlier by Carraro & Patat (1994). An estimate of this is required to obtain a more tight MS and thus to obtain more accurate estimation of the cluster parameters.

### 5.1 Differential reddening

In order to estimate the amount of differential reddening, we divide the cluster region into 9 equal regions. The CMDs for stars within each region are constructed and fitted with ZAMS to estimate the individual redding and distance modulus. The corresponding CMDs are shown in figure 5, fitted with ZAMS. The estimated values of reddening E(B$``$V) and the apparent distance moduli are also shown.

It can be seen that there is a significant amount of differential reddening across the face of the cluster with the minimum and the maximum values of reddening being 0.24 and 0.37 mag respectively. It must be noted that the values estimated for each region may also be an average in itself. Further refinement in the estimate is not possible as the number of stars per region becomes too small to reliably estimate reddening. Using the estimated individual reddening per region, the stars in each region are de-reddened and are also corrected for extinction. The cluster CMD after the above procedure is seen to have reduced scatter in the MS. This CMD is used for further analysis. The mean reddening towards the cluster is estimated to be E(B$``$V)=0.29 $`\pm `$ 0.05 mag and the absolute distance modulus is 12.4$`\pm 0.3`$ mag. This corresponds to a distance of 3020 pc, or 3 Kpc. The error involved in the estimation of distance modulus is 420 pc. The estimates of reddening and distance obtained here are in excellent agreement with the values obtained by Carraro & Patat (1994).

## 6 Cleaning the CMD

The CMD after the removal of the intra-cluster reddening has the following two defects. They are the presence of field stars and incompleteness in the stellar data. In order to overcome these problems, we used a statistical method. The method works as follows.

First, the CMDs of the field and the cluster regions are divided into various small boxes. These boxes have a width 0.25 mag in V and 0.2 mag in (B$``$V). The number of stars in each box is estimated. For each box, the data incompleteness values for the mean values of V and B magnitudes are estimated and the lower of the two values is adopted as the data incompleteness value for the box. Then the number of stars required to be added in each box in order to make the data complete, is calculated. These stars are then distributed randomly within the box. This procedure of adding extra stars in accordance with the incompleteness in the data in various regions of the CMD is done for both the cluster and the field CMDs. The area considered for field stars is less than cluster area and the cluster area is found to be 1.4 times more than the field area. Hence the number of stars in the field region needs to be multiplied by the above number to be able to compare the field CMD directly with the cluster CMD. Hence the extra stars arising out of the above factor is also randomly distributed within the boxes.

The next procedure is to remove the field stars from the cluster CMD, using a technique called zapping technique. A very similar procedure is used in the analysis of LMC clusters in Subramaniam & Sagar (1995). The cluster CMD contains cluster stars as well as field stars and these field stars are required to be removed to obtain a CMD with only cluster stars. In this method, for each star in the field CMD, the nearest star on the cluster CMD is removed. For a star in the field CMD, the same position on the cluster CMD is chosen and then the cluster CMD is searched for a star closest to this position by searching within a V vs (B$``$V) box and increasing the size of the box until a star is found. The range chosen to search for the star in the cluster CMD is a maximum of 1 mag in V and 0.5 mag in (B$``$V). This procedure is repeated for all the stars in the field CMD. Once all the thus identified field stars are removed from the cluster CMD corresponding to the stars in the field CMD, the resulting CMD can be considered to be devoid of field stars. This CMD is presented in figure 6.

As the procedure adopted here is a statistical one, the stars which have the maximum probability to be a field star in the cluster CMD are removed. Therefore the probability of the presence of field stars in the final CMD is very less, though a few field stars still may be present. A look at the CMD presented in figure 6 shows that the scatter seen at the top of the CMD remains the same, indicating that this truly is a cluster feature. The MS is quite narrow and much refined when compared to the cluster CMD, shown in figure 4. The noticeable feature on the MS is the clumpy distribution of stars along the V magnitude and the sharp decrease in the number of stars near the limiting magnitude of the present analysis, that is $`M_V`$ = 5.7 mag. The presence of a few stars near $`M_V`$ 3.0, 4.5 mag and $`(BV)_0`$ 1.0 mag can be noticed and these stars are most likely to be the left over field stars. On the whole this CMD can be assumed to consist only of cluster stars and hence this CMD is used for further analysis.

## 7 Estimation of Age

The CMD which is corrected for intra-cluster reddening, data incompleteness and field star contamination is used to estimate the age of the cluster. We used the isochrones from Girardi et al. (2000) for age estimation. Girardi et al. (2000) presented isochrones for Z= solar and Z=0.30 and also for sub-solar values of Z. The metallicity of the red giants in this cluster as estimated by Wee & Lee (1996) was \[Fe/H\] = -0.04$`\pm `$0.05 dex. This is very close to the solar value and hence we fit the solar metallicity isochrones. Girardi et al. (2000) isochrones for sub-solar value of Z is for 0.008 which is equivalent to \[Fe/H\] of -0.4 dex and this is very much less than that estimated for the cluster. Hence we use only the solar metallicity isochrones.

The isochrone fits for ages $`log(\tau )`$ = 8.9, 9.0 are shown in figure 7. Two stars are seen brighter and redder than most of the red giants. From the isochrone fit, it is difficult to consider them as cluster members. A few stars are seen brighter than the MS turn-off, some of these might be candidate blue-stragglers. Hence we estimate an age of 890 $`\pm `$ 100 Myr for the cluster. The age estimated by Carraro & Patat (1994) is 800 Myr, which is within the error of the present estimation.

## 8 Synthetic CMDs

It is seen that the cluster CMD is better understood when compared with a simulated or synthetic CMD made from the evolutionary models than with isochrones. A synthetic CMD in general distributes stars along the isochrone corresponding to the age of the cluster, in accordance with the time-scale of each evolutionary state in the CMD. This feature is very useful when comparing the locations and number of stars in the red giant clump, sub-giants and stars at the tip of the turn-off. This approach can also be used to estimate the mass function of stars in the cluster.

We constructed synthetic CMDs using the theoretical stellar evolutionary models presented by Girardi et al. (2000). We used solar metallicity models to create CMDs. The algorithm used to make synthetic CMDs are presented in Subramaniam & Sagar (1995) and also used in Subramaniam & Sagar (1999). We included the effects due to binaries with mass ratio between 0.75 – 1.25 and also the photometric errors in V and (B$``$V). Salpeter value for the mass function, which is 2.35 (Salpeter 1955), is assumed in general. But this value could be changed to obtain the best fit when comparing the LFs. A control parameter is required to create synthetic CMD, so that it can be directly compared with the observed CMD. For this, one can either use the number of red giants, or the number of stars near the tip of the MS, below the turn-off. Since the red giant clump in this cluster is not very well defined and it has less number of stars, we used the stars near the top of the MS for this purpose. In the observed CMD, there are 17 stars between 15 – 15.25 in V magnitude. This is used as the control number. Initially we used a value of 30% for the fraction of binary stars in the cluster, the resulting CMDs were seen to have too many stars near the evolved part of the CMD, close to the binary isochrone path. Hence the binary fraction was reduced and a value of 10% was found to be satisfactory. Carraro& Patat (1994) have assumed a value of 15% in their synthetic CMDs.

The synthetic CMD is shown in figure 8. The value of mass function assumed is 2.35 (Salpeter value). The synthetic CMD was initially created for an age of 890 Myr and it was found that the red giants were brighter than the ones on the observed CMD. Therefore, the age was increased to a value of 1 Gyr and the red giant magnitudes were found to match very well. Hence the synthetic CMD shown is for an age of 1 Gyr. It can be seen that the synthetic CMD mimics most of the features seen on the observed CMD. The vertical spread of the red giants is reproduced beautifully. A few stars are created on the AGB branch, but we do not see any such stars in the cluster CMD, except for the two bright and very red stars. A few stars are seen on the binary track, their number is again slightly more than what is observed, hence the value of 10% for the binary fraction could be considered as an upper limit. The stars brighter than the MS turn-off are obviously not reproduced in the synthetic CMDs, so are the stars assumed to be field stars, located on to the right and fainter end of the MS.

## 9 Luminosity Functions

As seen from the CMD of the cluster, the stellar distribution on the MS is very clumpy. In order to quantify the above, we computed the MS luminosity function (LF) by counting stars in magnitude bins on the $`M_V`$ axis. The observed cluster LF profiles are shown in the left panels of figure 9 in bold line, with statistical error at each point. The observed LF profile shows a lot of dips. At $`M_V`$ = 2.1, 3.1 and 4.4 magnitudes, the profile dips considerably. Around $`M_V`$ = 4.4, the number of cluster stars are found to be very minimal. The LF for a normal cluster shows an increase in the number of stars per magnitude bin from brighter magnitudes to fainter magnitudes, and this is not seen in the LF profile of NGC 1245. This is on and above the dips seen in the profile. To assess this point, we also computed the integrated luminosity function (ILF), which is cumulative in nature and hence hides smaller fluctuations. The observed ILF profile is shown in the right panel of figure 9 as bold line marked with statistical error at each point. A closer look at the ILF profile reveals that slight kinks exist at the same magnitude levels as seen in the LF profile. The ILF profile flattens for magnitudes fainter than $`M_V4.0`$ mag, which corresponds to the large drop in the number of stars as seen in the LF profile.

In order to compare the LF with those predicted by stellar evolutionary model, we have computed the LFs from synthetic CMDs. The LF and ILF computed from the synthetic CMDs are plotted in figure 9. These are shown as dotted, dashed and long dashed lines, corresponding to five different values of the mass function. It can be seen that the number of stars involved is very small, including the number of control stars used to create synthetic CMDs. This results in high statistical fluctuations in the number of stars created, which results in equally high fluctuation in the computed LFs. Therefore, to compute reliable LFs, we have taken an average of 50 runs of the synthetic CMD and this is assumed to reduce the statistical fluctuation. As indicated by the slope of the LF, CMDs were created for Salpeter value of the mass function and for values shallower than this. Hence the CMDs were created for the mass function values of 2.35, 2.10, 1.85, 1.60 and 1.35. The value of the mass function is indicated against each LF profile computed from synthetic CMDs.

The dips seen in the observed LF profile could be due to the gaps in the MS. We see that at $`M_V`$ = 2.1, no gap is noticed previously in the cluster MS. A slight dip in the simulated LFs is seen at this point, as also seen in the synthetic CMD shown in figure 8. On the other hand, at $`M_V`$ = 3.1, and $`(BV)_0`$ = 0.33, there is a well-known gap called the Bohm-Vitense gap. In some clusters, this is found at a value of $`(BV)_0`$ of 0.28 (Kjeldsen & Frandsen 1991), but recently some clusters were reported to have seen this gap at $`(BV)_0`$ of 0.33, like Hyades (de Bruijne et al. 2000 ). It is interesting to note that the simulated LFs also show a dip at this magnitude. The most significant gap at $`M_V`$ = 4.4 mag and $`(BV)_0`$ = 0.55 is also very well seen in the observed CMD (figure 6). In fact this gap is also seen in some old clusters like, NGC 6143, IC 4651, NGC 752 (Kjeldsen & Frandsen 1991). This luminosity corresponds to a mass of 1.15 $`M_{}`$. This gap is seen in the Hyades MS also, at $`M_V`$ $``$ 4.0 and $`(BV)`$ = 0.48 and this is mentioned as the second Bohm-Vitense gap (de Bruijne et al. 2000). It is of interest to note that this gap is seen in the simulated LF. Hence the point to be noted is that there are three significant dips seen in the cluster LF, which are more or less reproduced in the simulated LFs. Therefore, there is a good chance that the gaps and hence the dips in the cluster LF are real features. It is seen that the second Bohm-Vitense gap is more prominent than the first one in this cluster.

The mass function of the cluster can be computed from the observed LF. In this cluster, due to the dips present in the LF, an estimate of the mass function was not possible. The standard plot of log(M) vs log(N) shows very large scatter and hence a straight line fit to the data points was not possible. Hence we used the ILF to estimate the mass function by comparing it with the synthetic ILF. The magnitude range considered here is between $`M_V`$ = 1.5 – 5.8 magnitude. This range corresponds to a mass range of 2.2 – 0.9 $`M_{}`$. The lower mass range is limited by incompleteness in the data. From the figure it can be seen that the profile corresponding to the mass function value of 1.85 seems to fit the ILF profile better. The corresponding LF profile can also be seen to take the mean values of the observed LF. It should also be noted that, the ILF profiles for the other mass function values do not deviate very much from the observed profile at brighter magnitudes and the difference is seen mostly at the fainter ends. The observed ILF profile flattens out from the x=1.85 profile and almost touches x=1.35 profile at the fainter end at $`M_V4.0`$ mag. If we ignore this large dip at the end of the ILF, and consider the range $`M_V`$ = 1.5 – 4.0 mag, then the mass function value of 1.85$`\pm `$0.3 could be considered to fit the profile. The error in the mass function is estimated from the statistical errors in the observed profile, which happens to be within the nearby profiles corresponding to the values, 2.1 and 1.6, of the mass function slope. The effect of inclusion of the fainter stars would be to adopt a more flatter value of the mass function. Though the present estimate shows that the cluster possibly has a flatter mass function slope, an accurate estimate is not possible due to the large uncertainty seen in the fit.

Carraro & Patat (1994) found that the Salpeter value of mass function fitted the cluster ILF. The present analysis uses much more number of stars in the cluster than Carraro & Patat (1994). Since the cluster is found to have stars distributed spatially in an irregular clumps, a subsection of this cluster might not represent a true cluster sample. Hence, the present sample could be considered to be more complete. We shall discuss the possible reasons for a flatter present day mass function in the section for discussion.

## 10 Discussion

The estimation of cluster reddening and distance agrees quite well with those estimated by Carraro & Patat (1994). The cluster is found to be 1 Gyr old, by the synthetic CMD analysis, while Carraro & Patat (1994) found the cluster to be slightly younger than this. Wee & Lee (1996) estimated an age of 1.1$`\pm `$0.1 Gyr. The estimation of age by the synthetic CMD method is more reliable as it also considers the time-scale of evolution at each point on the CMD. Hence 1 Gyr could be considered as a more reliable age estimate.

The synthetic red giants are seen to be bluer than the cluster red giants. This is unlikely to arise from the error in choosing the cluster metallicity, as these red giants were found to be very close to solar metallicity. This problem may be due to the mixing length considered in the convective envelope of red giants in the model calculations, or due to error in colour-temperature relations.

The RDP is found to show that the cluster has a small deficiency of bright stars near the center of the cluster, which basically endorses the visual perception. As this cluster is 1 Gyr old, one can expect mass segregation to be present in the cluster. The core radius is estimated to be 4.75 arcmin when all stars were considered and 3.1 arcmin for stars brighter than 17.0 mag. For a distance of 3 Kpc, these correspond to 4.2 pc and 2.7 pc respectively. These values are higher than that estimated by Nilakshi et al. (2002). A smaller value for the cluster core for brighter stars, as estimated from RDP would probably point towards the presence of mass segregation.

In general, any star cluster in the Galaxy, experiences the tidal force of the Galaxy, this together with the n-body relaxation of the cluster, results in the cluster losing the low mass stars to the Galactic field. This process is accelerated due to many factors, such as dynamical friction, encounters with molecular clouds, star clusters etc. Hence over a time scale the number of low mass stars in the cluster decreases. Being an intermediate age cluster, this cluster is likely to have lost stars at the low mass end. The lost stars could also be present in the corona of the cluster. Recently Nilakshi et al. (2002) found that clusters in general have large corona and and the corona has a significant fraction of the cluster stars. The cluster area considered here is not very big and a region adjacent to the cluster region is considered as the field region. As mostly the low mass stars are spread out in the corona, the above two selection criteria could arise in under sampling and over subtracting stars at the low mass end. The flattening of the ILF at fainter magnitudes could be due to this. The present day mass function of the cluster is estimated to be 1.85, for the brighter end and it is flatter than the Salpeter Value. One needs to see whether this value changes significantly if stars in the corona are also included.

## 11 Results

The summary and results of the present analysis are as follows:

B,V CCD photometry of 916 stars are presented near the open cluster NGC 1245.

The cluster is estimated to be located at a distance of 3 Kpc, with an average reddening of E(B$``$V), 0.29$`\pm `$0.05 mag.

The age of the cluster is estimated to be 1$`\pm 0.1`$ Gyr using the models from Girardi et al. (2000) and synthetic CMDs.

The LF of the main-sequence shows dips, which might arise due to some known gaps in the main-sequence, including the Bohm-Vitense gap.

The cluster is found to have a flatter present day mass function compared to the Salpeter value of 2.35.

The apparent paucity of brighter stars seen near the cluster center is estimated to have a statistical significance of 2 $`\sigma `$.

## Acknowledgments

I thank the referee for comments and suggestions which improved the paper.