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# WMAP and Supergravity Inflationary Models

## I Introduction

The first year WMAP data has confirmed the “concordance” values of the cosmological parameters with unprecedented accuracy and given important information on the primordial spectrum of density perturbations Bennet ; Spergel . Their results favor gaussian, purely adiabatic fluctuations and a spectral index that runs from $`n_s>1`$ on large scales to $`n_s<1`$ on small scales. Moreover, WMAP has confirmed earlier COBE DMR observations that there is a lower amount of power on the largest scales when compared to that predicted by the standard $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$CDM models.

Although these results are not yet firmly established (for an analysis of WMAP results which finds no evidence of running see Ref. BargerSeljak ), it seems worthwhile to reexamine inflationary models in light of WMAP results, as they may give us further insight into the very early universe. Supergravity inflationary models are particularly important as supersymmetry (or its local version, supergravity) is the only known way to avoid the hierachy problem, i.e. the fact that the high energy scale of inflation communicates to other sectors of the theory driving the electroweak scale much above its observed value via radiative corrections.

However, supergravity inflationary models also suffer from a kind of hierarchy problem as supersymmetry is broken by the large cosmological constant during inflation giving all scalars, including the inflaton, a soft mass of the order of the Hubble parameter Bertolami . As a result, the curvature of the inflaton potential, as measured by the $`\eta `$ slow-roll parameter, becomes too large to allow for a sufficiently long period of inflation to take place - the so-called $`\eta `$ problem.

Recently, it has been shown that this problem can be avoided within the Randall-Sundrum Type II braneworld scenario Randall , at least for a class of supergravity models in which the evolution of the inflaton dynamics is controlled by a single power at the point where the observed density fluctuations are produced and the inflationary potential can, therefore, be approximately given by

$$V\mathrm{\Delta }^4\left[1+c_n\left(\frac{\varphi }{M}\right)^n\right],$$
(1)
where $`M=M_P/\sqrt{8\pi }`$ is the reduced Planck mass. In the braneworld context, the Friedmann equation acquires an additional term quadratic in the energy density Binetruy

$$H^2=\frac{8\pi }{3M_P^2}\rho \left[1+\frac{\rho }{2\lambda }\right],$$
(2)
where $`\lambda `$ is the brane tension, which relates the four and five-dimensional Planck scales through

$$M_P=\sqrt{\frac{3}{4\pi }}\frac{M_5^3}{\sqrt{\lambda }}.$$
(3)
It is precisely the new parameter $`M_5`$ that plays a crucial role in the resolution of the $`\eta `$-problem in supergravity inflation. As shown in Ref. Bento2 , for the case where the first term in Eq. (1) is dominant and $`n=2`$ or $`n=3`$, this problem can be avoided provided the five-dimensional Planck mass satisfies, respectively, the condition $`M_5\text{ }<10^{16}\text{GeV}`$ and $`M_51.1\times 10^{16}\text{GeV}`$. The case where the second term is dominant and $`n=2`$, corresponding to chaotic inflation, has been studied in Refs. Maartens ; Bento1 , where it is shown that it is possible to achieve successful inflation with sub-Planckian field values, thereby avoiding well known difficulties with higher order non-renormalizable terms.

In this paper, we reexamine this class of supergravity models for the quadratic and cubic cases in light of WMAP results. The case of chaotic inflation has already been analysed in Ref. Liddle1 , with the conclusion that the quadratic potential is allowed at two-sigma for any value of the brane tension and the quartic potential is very constrained, particularly in the case where the inflationary energy scale is close to the brane tension. Here we concentrate on the case where the first term in Eq. (1) is dominant. We find that although the running of the scalar spectral index is within the bounds determined by WMAP for both the quadratic and cubic models and for a wide range of potential parameters, a spectral index running from $`n_s>1`$ on large scales to $`n_s<1`$ on small scales is not possible in either case as precisely the opposite trend is found.

## II Quadratic potential

We first consider the case where the potential is quadratic in the inflaton field, $`\varphi `$, and we rewrite it as

$$V=V_0+\frac{1}{2}m^2\varphi ^2,$$
(4)
and assume that the first term is dominant.

In supergravity, effective mass squared contributions of fields are given by

$$\frac{1}{2}m^2=8\pi \frac{V_0}{M_P^2}3H^2,$$
(5)
since the horizon of the inflationary De Sitter phase has a Hawking temperature given by $`T_H=H/2\pi `$ Bertolami .

Contributions like the ones of Eq. (5) lead to $`\eta M_P^2V^{\prime \prime }/8\pi V2`$ ; however, the onset of inflation requires $`\eta 1`$. Within the braneworld scenario, however, $`\eta `$ and the remaining “slow-roll” parameters $`ϵ`$ and $`\xi `$, are modified, at high energies, by a factor proportional to $`\lambda /V`$ Maartens

$`ϵ`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{M_P^2}{16\pi }}\left({\displaystyle \frac{V^{}}{V}}\right)^2{\displaystyle \frac{1+V/\lambda }{(1+V/2\lambda )^2}},`$ (6)
$`\eta `$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{M_P^2}{8\pi }}\left({\displaystyle \frac{V^{\prime \prime }}{V}}\right){\displaystyle \frac{1}{1+V/2\lambda }},`$ (7)
$`\xi `$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{M_P^4}{(8\pi )^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{V^{}V^{\prime \prime \prime }}{V^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(1+V/2\lambda )^2}}.`$ (8)
In the high energy approximation, $`V\lambda `$, we obtain, for this model

$`ϵ`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{M_P^2}{8\pi }}{\displaystyle \frac{m^4\varphi ^2}{V_0^2\alpha }},`$ (9)
$`\eta `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{4}{\alpha }},`$ (10)
$`\xi `$ $`=`$ $`0,`$ (11)
where we have also used the approximation $`VV_0`$ during inflation and the definition $`\alpha V_0/\lambda `$. As shown in Ref. Bento2 , if $`\alpha `$ is sufficiently large, the $`\eta `$-problem is automatically solved by the brane correction.

The number of $`e`$-folds during inflation, $`N`$, in the braneworld scenario, is given by Maartens

$$N\frac{8\pi }{M_P^2}_{\varphi _I}^{\varphi _F}\frac{V}{V^{}}\left[1+\frac{V}{2\lambda }\right]𝑑\varphi ,$$
(12)
in the slow-roll approximation. We see that, as a result of the modification in the Friedmann equation, the expansion rate is increased, at high energies, by a factor $`V/2\lambda `$. For this model, we get, in the high-energy approximation,

$`N=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha }{4}}\mathrm{log}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\varphi _I}{\varphi _F}}\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{2\pi \alpha }{M_P^2}}(\varphi _I^2\varphi _F^2)`$ (13)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{16\pi ^2\alpha }{M_P^4}}(\varphi _I^4\varphi _F^4).`$
Notice that, for sub-Planckian field values, the second and third terms are negligible. The value of $`\varphi `$ at the end of inflation can be obtained from the condition

$$\mathrm{max}\{ϵ(\varphi _F),|\eta (\varphi _F)|\}=1.$$
(14)
However, we shall consider $`\varphi _F=\beta M`$ as a free parameter since quadratic potentials of the type we are studying arise typically in the context of hybrid inflation, once some other field is held at the origin by its interaction with $`\varphi `$. In these scenarios, inflation may end due to instabilities triggered by the dynamics of the other field and, therefore, the amount of inflation strongly depends on the value of the inflaton field at the end of inflation, $`\varphi _F`$, at the time the instabilities arise. Actually, these instabilities are necessary in order to end inflation as $`ϵ1`$ for $`\alpha 1`$ and sub-Planckian field values.

The amplitude of scalar perturbations is given by Maartens

$$A_s^2\left(\frac{512\pi }{75M_P^6}\right)\frac{V^3}{V^2}\left[1+\frac{V}{2\lambda }\right]^3|_{k=aH},$$
(15)
where the right-hand side should be evaluated as the comoving wavenumber equals the Hubble radius during inflation, $`k=aH`$. Thus the amplitude of scalar perturbations is increased relative to the standard result at a fixed value of $`\varphi `$ for a given potential. Using the high energy approximation and $`VV_0`$ in Eq. (15), we obtain

$$A_s^2\frac{1600\pi }{75}\frac{V_0^6}{\lambda ^3m^4}\mathrm{exp}\left(\frac{8N_k}{\alpha }\right),$$
(16)
where $`N_k`$ is the number of e-folds between the time the scales of interest leave the horizon and the end of inflation.

The scale-dependence of the perturbations is described by the spectral tilt Maartens

$$n_s1\frac{d\mathrm{ln}A_s^2}{d\mathrm{ln}k}6ϵ+2\eta ,$$
(17)
which, for this model, gives

$$n_s=1192\frac{\beta ^2}{\alpha ^2}\mathrm{exp}\left(\frac{8N_k}{\alpha }\right)+\frac{8}{\alpha }.$$
(18)
The “running” of the scalar spectral index is given by

$$\alpha _s\frac{dn_s}{d\mathrm{ln}k}=16ϵ\eta 24ϵ^22\xi ,$$
(19)
and we get

$$\alpha _s=512\frac{\beta ^2}{\alpha ^2}\mathrm{exp}\left(\frac{8N_k}{\alpha }\right)\left[13\mathrm{exp}\left(\frac{8N_k}{\alpha }\right)\right].$$
(20)
The amplitude of tensor perturbations is given by Langlois

$$A_t^2=\frac{64}{150\pi M_P^4}V\left(1+\frac{V}{2\lambda }\right)F^2|_{k=aH},$$
(21)
where

$$F^2=\left[\sqrt{1+s^2}s^2\mathrm{sinh}^1\left(\frac{1}{s}\right)\right]^1,$$
(22)
and

$$s\left[\frac{2V}{\lambda }\left(1+\frac{V}{2\lambda }\right)\right]^{1/2}.$$
(23)
In the low energy limit ($`s1`$), $`F^21`$, whereas $`F^23V/2\lambda `$ in the high energy limit. Defining (we choose the normalization of Ref. Peiris )

$$r_s16\frac{A_t^2}{A_s^2},$$
(24)
we obtain

$$r_s0.06\frac{M_P^4m^4\lambda \beta ^2}{V_0^3}\mathrm{exp}\left(\frac{8N_k}{\alpha }\right).$$
(25)
WMAP bounds on the above inflationary observables are, for this class of models (case $`\eta >3ϵ`$, class D in Ref. Peiris )

$`0.99<n_s<1.28,0.09\alpha _s0.03,`$
$`r_s1.10.`$ (26)
These bounds refer to the scale best probed by the CMB observations i.e. $`k=0.002`$ Mpc-1; accordingly, we set $`N_k(k=0.002)=N_{}`$. On the other hand, bounds on $`n_s`$ from other experiments are less blue, e.g. the combined data sets from BOOMERANG, CBI, DASI, DMR, MAXIMA, TOCO and VSA give comb :

$$0.955<n_s<1.05.$$
(27)
In Figure 1, we show contours of the observational bounds on the inflationary observables $`n_s`$, $`r_s`$ and $`\alpha _s`$ in the ($`\alpha `$, $`\beta `$) parameter space, for different values of $`N_{}`$; in these plots, we have taken the bounds of Eq. (26) except for the upper bound on $`n_s`$, for which we took the bound of Eq. (27) instead since such a blue spectrum is not to be expected. We also plotted the $`\alpha _s=0`$ contour, which shows that $`\alpha _s`$ is required to be positive for this model. The shaded area corresponds to the allowed region in parameter space. We would also like to mention that we have checked that it is possible to obtain sufficient inflation with sub-Planckian field values e.g $`N=70`$ for $`\varphi _I=0.2M_P`$ and $`\alpha ,\beta `$ within the range specified in Figure 1.

Notice that the contour corresponding to the upper bound on $`\alpha _s`$ is too small to be visible in Figure 1, hence we show it in Figure 2, for $`N_{}=55`$ (similar behavior is obtained for other values of $`N_{}`$), which makes it clear that this bound plays an important role in constraining the parameter space. We obtain lower bounds on $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$, namely $`\alpha >39.23`$, pratically independent of $`N_{}`$, whereas the lower bound on $`\beta `$ ranges from $`2.2\times 10^3`$ to $`1.7\times 10^4`$ as $`N_{}`$ ranges from 50 to 75.

In Figures 2 and 3, we have superposed contours of the scale $`M_5`$, as derived from Eqs. (16) and (3), where we have used the COBE normalization i.e. $`A_s=2\times 10^5`$ for $`N_k=N_{}=55`$. As the allowed region is quite narrow for low values of $`\alpha `$, it allows us to find an upper bound on $`M_5`$, $`M_5\text{ }<0.0194`$ M, which we have checked is almost independent of $`N_{}`$. Combining the above results, we find a lower bound on the scale $`V_0`$, namely $`V_0^{1/4}\text{ }<2.1\times 10^3`$ M.

Notice that we have chosen to vary $`N_{}`$ since, although a wide variety of assumptions about $`N_{}`$ can be found in the literature, the determination of this quantity requires a model of the entire history of the Universe. However, while from nucleosynthesis onwards this is now well established, at earlier epochs there are considerable uncertanties such as the mechanism ending inflation and details of the reheating process. This issue was recently reviewed in Ref. Liddle2  (see also Ref. Dodelson  for similar results), where a model-independent upper bound was derived, namely $`N_{}<60`$; in fact, $`N_{}=55`$ is found to be a reasonable fiducial value with an uncertainty of around 5 around that value; however, the authors stress that there are several ways in which $`N_{}`$ could lie outside that range, in either direction. Moreover, in the braneworld context, one expects $`N_{}`$ to depend on the brane tension. Actually, one expects to obtain larger values of $`N_{}`$ because, in the high-energy regime, the expansion laws corresponding to matter and radiation domination are slower than in the standard cosmology, which implies a greater change in $`aH`$ relative to the change in $`a`$, therefore requiring a larger value of $`N_{}`$. This is confirmed by the results of Ref. Wang , where the bound $`N_{}<75`$ is found for brane inspired cosmology.

We have studied the dependence of $`n_s`$ on $`k`$ to see whether $`n_s`$ can vary from $`n_s>1`$ to $`n_s<1`$ from large to small scales. From the condition $`k=aH`$, assuming that H is approximatly constant during inflation, we obtain the relation

$$\mathrm{exp}(N_k)=\frac{k_F}{k},$$
(28)
where $`k_F`$ is the value of $`k`$ at the end of inflation. Inserting this relation is Eq. (18), we obtain

$$n_s1+\frac{8}{\alpha }192\frac{\beta ^2}{\alpha ^2}\left(\frac{k_F}{k}\right)^{8/\alpha },$$
(29)
from which we conclude that, for $`\alpha ,\beta `$ fixed, $`n_s`$ increases with $`k`$. Hence, it is not possible to obtain the desired behaviour, i.e. $`n_s`$ decreasing from $`n_s>1`$ to $`n_s<1`$ as $`k`$ increases.

## III Cubic potential

We shall now consider the case where, due to some cancellation mechanism Adams , the quadratic term is absent and the potential is cubic in $`\varphi `$:

$$V=\mathrm{\Delta }^4\left[1+\gamma \left(\frac{\varphi }{M}\right)^3\right].$$
(30)
As mentioned before, we shall assume that the first term is dominant. The parameter $`\gamma `$ is expected to be of order unity and negative Adams ; the model of Ref. Ross  corresponds to precisely this case, with $`\gamma =4`$.

We start by computing the slow-roll parameters:

$`ϵ`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{18\gamma ^2}{\alpha }}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\varphi }{M}}\right)^4,`$
$`\eta `$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{12\gamma }{\alpha }}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\varphi }{M}}\right),`$
$`\xi `$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{72\gamma }{\alpha ^2}}\varphi ^2,`$ (31)
where $`\alpha \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }^4}{\lambda }`$.

The value of $`\varphi `$ at the end of inflation can be obtained from Eq. (14); we get, from $`|ϵ|1`$

$$\varphi _F\left(\frac{\alpha }{18\gamma ^2}\right)^{1/4}M,$$
(32)
while, from $`|\eta |1`$, we obtain

$$\varphi _F\left(\frac{\alpha }{12|\gamma |}\right)M.$$
(33)
Hence, the prescription to be used depends on the value of $`\alpha `$. For $`\gamma =4`$, we see that the two prescriptions coincide for $`\alpha 26`$.

The number of $`e`$-foldings, $`N`$, is given by:

$$N=\frac{\alpha M}{6|\gamma |}\left[\frac{1}{\varphi _I}\frac{1}{\varphi _F}\right].$$
(34)
Therefore, sufficient inflation to solve the cosmological horizon/flatness problems, that is $`N>70`$, is achieved, for instance for $`\gamma =4`$, if $`\varphi _I<7.5\times 10^2M_P`$.

For $`A_s`$, we obtain, in the high energy regime,

$$A_s^2\frac{\alpha ^4\lambda }{5400\pi ^2\gamma ^2\varphi _k^4},$$
(35)
where $`\varphi _k`$ is the value of $`\varphi `$ at horizon-crossing. The scalar spectral index and its running can be readily computed from the slow-roll parameters, Eq. (31), via Eqs.(17) and (19). Notice that the inflationary observables can, of course, be written as a function of $`N_{}`$, as for the quadratic model, using Eq. (34) with $`\varphi _I=\varphi _k`$, but one has to bear in mind that the prescription to use for $`\varphi _F`$ depends on $`\alpha `$.

WMAP bounds on the inflationary observables are, for this class of models (case $`\eta <0`$, class A in Ref. Peiris )

$`0.94<n_s<1.00,0.02\alpha _s0.02,`$
$`r_s0.14,`$ (36)
again for the scale $`k=0.002`$ Mpc-1. In Figure 4, we show contours of the inflationary observable $`n_s`$, $`\alpha _s`$ in the ($`\alpha ,N_{}`$) plane. We have checked that neither $`\alpha _s`$ nor $`r_s`$ give further constraints on the parameter space. We also show contours corresponding to different values of $`M_5`$, as given by Eq. (35), again COBE normalized. The upper left panel corresponds to the results for the low energy regime, $`V\lambda `$, where the brane corrections are negligible, and the remaining three panels correspond to the high energy regime, $`V\lambda `$, for different values of $`\gamma `$.

We see that it is the lower bound on $`n_s`$ that most constrains the model and, clearly, $`n_s=1`$ cannot be obtained. It is also clear that, for the model to work, $`N_{}>65`$ is required if brane corrections are not included and $`N_{}>60`$ if those corrections are included; in the latter case, however, this bound increases outside the range $`300\text{ }<\alpha \text{ }<100`$, for $`\gamma =4`$ (this range is slightly $`\gamma `$-dependent, see Figure 4). Moreover, the running parameter is always negative although it can be quite small. Finally, $`0.042M\text{ }<M_5\text{ }<0.025M`$, for $`\gamma =4`$ (however, these bounds do not change significantly with $`\gamma `$, see Figure 4.

Clearly, the spectral index cannot run from $`n_s>1`$ on large scales to $`n_s<1`$ on small scales, since $`n_s(k)<1`$ for this model.

In Ref. Bento2 , a very strict bound on $`\alpha `$ was derived for this model from the requirement that the reheating temperature is small enough to avoid the gravitino problem. We should like to point out that there was a numerical error in that computation and, in fact, the bound is much weaker and pratically meaningless.

## IV Conclusions

We have analysed the implications of WMAP results, in particular the bounds on the inflationary observables, for a class of supergravity inflationary models, Eq. (1) with $`n=2,3`$. We find that, for the quadratic potential, the main constraints come from the WMAP’s bounds on $`n_s`$ and upper bound on $`\alpha _s`$. We have obtained lower bounds on parameters $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$, namely $`\alpha \text{ }>39`$ (pratically independent of $`N_{}`$) and the lower bound on $`\beta `$ ranges from $`2.2\times 10^3`$ to $`1.7\times 10^4`$ as $`N_{}`$ varies between 50 and 75. We have also found an upper bound on $`M_5`$, $`M_5\text{ }<0.0194`$ M, pratically independent of $`N_{}`$. Moreover, we conclude that $`\alpha _s>0`$ is required for this model.

For the cubic potential, in the low energy regime i.e. without the brane correction, a relatively high value of $`N_{}`$, $`N_{}>65`$, is required so as to meet WMAP’s lower bound on $`n_s`$. In the high energy regime, when brane corrections are significant, the allowed region in the ($`\alpha ,N_{}`$) parameter space changes with $`\gamma `$ and the main constraints come from WMAP’s lower bound on $`n_s`$. Moreover, we find that $`\alpha _s<0`$ for this model

We have also studied whether it is possible to obtain a running spectral index such that $`n_s>1`$ on large scales and $`n_s<1`$ on small scales and concluded that this is not possible for either model.

###### Acknowledgements.

M.C.B. acknowledges the partial support of Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (Portugal) under the grant POCTI/1999/FIS/36285. The work of A.A. Sen is fully financed by the same grant. N.M.C. Santos is supported by FCT grant SFRH/BD/4797/2001.


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# Scaling laws in the functional content of genomes

## Evaluating the functional gene-content of genomes

To estimate the number of genes in different functional categories each genome has to be functionally annotated. The main results presented in this paper were obtained using the Interpro  annotations of sequenced genomes available from the European Bioinformatics Institute . To map the Interpro annotations to high-level functional categories I used the Gene Ontology “biological process” hierarchy  and a mapping from Interpro entries to GO-categories both of which can be obtained from the gene ontology website . For each GO category I collect all Interpro entries that map to it or to one of its descendants in the “biological process” hierarchy. To minimize the effects of potential biases in the mappings from Interpro to GO I only use high-level functional categories that are represented by at least $`50`$ different Interpro entries. This leaves $`44`$ high-level GO categories.

A gene with multiple hits to Interpro entries that are associated with a GO category has a higher probability to belong to that category than a gene with only a single hit. To take this information into account, I assume that if a gene $`i`$ has $`n_i^c`$ independent hits to Interpro entries associated with GO category $`c`$, than with probability $`1\mathrm{exp}(\beta n_i^c)`$ the gene belongs to the GO category. The results are generally insensitive to the value of $`\beta `$ (see the appendix), and I used $`\beta =3`$ for the results shown below. The estimated number of genes $`n_c`$ in a genome for a given GO category is then the sum $`n_c=_i1\mathrm{exp}(\beta n_i^c)`$ over all genes $`i`$ in the genome.

Figure 1 shows the results for the categories of transcription regulatory genes (red), metabolic genes (blue), and cell-cycle related genes (green) for bacteria (panel A) and eukaryotes (panel B). Remarkably, for each functional category shown, we find an approximately power-law relationship (solid line fits)111These power-laws as a function of total gene number should be distinguished from the power-law distributions of gene-family sizes and other genomic attributes within a single genome .. That is, if $`n_c`$ is the number of genes in the category, and $`g`$ is the total number of genes in the genome, we observe laws of the form: $`n_c=\lambda g^\alpha `$, where both $`\lambda `$ and the exponent $`\alpha `$ depend on the category under study. In fact, such power-laws are observed for most of the $`44`$ high-level categories, and the estimated values of the exponents for several functional categories are shown in Table 1. Note that a potential source of bias in estimating these exponents is the occurrence of multiple genomes from the same or closely-related species in the data. As shown in the appendix, removing this “redundancy” from the data does not alter the observed exponents.

The power-law fits and $`99`$% posterior probability estimates for their exponents were obtained using a Bayesian procedure described in the appendix. To assess the quality of the fits, I measured, for each fit, the fraction of the variance in the data that is explained by the fit. In bacteria, $`26`$ out of $`44`$ GO categories have more than $`95`$% of the variance explained by the fit, $`38`$ categories have more than $`90`$% explained. In eukaryotes, $`26`$ categories have more than $`95`$% percent explained by the fit and $`32`$ have more than $`90`$% explained by the fit. However, with total gene number varying over less than two decades in bacteria, and the small number of data points in eukaryotes, one may wonder how one can claim that power-laws have been “observed”. First, the fact that I fit the data to power-laws should not be mistaken for a claim that the data can only be described by power-law functions. I only claim that the power-law is by far the simplest functional form that fits almost all the observed data. Second, when scatter plots such as those shown in Fig. 1 are plotted on linear as opposed to logarithmic scales, it is clear even by eye that the fluctuations in the number of genes in a category scale with the total number of genes in the genome. That is, the fluctuations in the data suggest that logarithmic scales are the “natural” scales for this data. This is further supported by the simple evolutionary model presented below.

One may also wonder to what extent the results are sensitive to the specific functional annotation procedure. I performed a variety of tests to assess the robustness of the results, i.e. the observed power-law scaling and the values of the exponents, to changes in the annotation methodology (see appendix). These involve using entirely independent annotations based on Clusters of Orthologous Groups of proteins (COG) , and a simple (crude) annotation scheme based on keyword searches of protein tables for sequenced microbial genomes from the NCBI website . As shown in the appendix, the observed power-law scaling, and the values of the exponents are generally insensitive to these and other changes in annotation methodology. It has to be noted, however, that all currently available annotation schemes, including the ones used here, predict function from sequence homology and thus at some level assume that functional homology can be inferred from sequence homology. The results reported here thus also depend on this assumption.

## Observed Exponents

Some functional categories, such as the large category of metabolic genes, occupy a roughly constant fraction of a genome’s gene-content, as evidenced by their exponent of $`1`$. However, many categories show significant deviations from this “trivial” exponent. Genes related to cell-cycle or protein biosynthesis have exponents significantly below $`1`$, whereas for transcription factors (TFs) the exponent is significantly above $`1`$. These trends are strongest in bacteria. There the exponent for TFs is almost $`2`$, implying that as the number of genes in the genome doubles, the number of TFs quadruples. This has some interesting implications for “regulatory design” in bacteria. It implies that the number of TFs per gene grows in proportion to the size of the genome (see  for a similar observation). This in turn implies that, in larger genomes, each gene must be regulated by a larger number of TFs and/or each TF must be regulating a smaller set of genes. An exponent of $`2`$ is also observed for two-component systems222Note that two-component systems were not in the list of $`44`$ high-level categories., which are the primary means by which bacteria sense their environment. This suggests that the relative increase in transcription regulators in more complex bacteria is accompanied by an equal relative increase in sensory systems.

The difficulties with gene prediction and annotation in eukaryotes, the small number of available genomes, and our lack of understanding of the role of alternative splicing across eukaryotic genomes make it premature to draw many conclusions from Fig. 1B. However, the main trends from Fig. 1A are reproduced: the super linear scaling of TFs, the sub linear scaling of cell-cycle genes, and the small exponents for DNA replication and protein biosynthesis genes.

The observed super linear scaling of TFs also has implications for our understanding of “combinatorial control” in transcription regulation. It is well established that in complex organisms, different TFs combine into complexes to affect transcription control. Therefore, a relatively small number of TFs can implement a combinatorially large number of different transcription regulatory “states”, which may correspond to particular external environments, developmental stages, tissues, combinations of external stimuli, etcetera. Each such regulatory state will be associated with a unique set of genes that are expressed in that state. If the number of such regulatory states were proportional to the total number of genes, then the number of TFs would increase much more slowly than the total number of genes. However, the scaling results show that, instead, the number of TFs increases more rapidly than the total number of genes. This thus implies that the number of regulatory states is also “combinatorial” in the total number of genes: a relatively small number of genes is used in different combinations to implement combinatorially many regulatory states.

The picture that emerges is not of TFs being used in different combinations to implement the regulatory needs of individual genes. But rather that, as one moves from simple to more complex organisms, the number of regulatory states grows so much faster than the total number of genes that, even with combinatorial control of transcription, the number of TFs grows much faster than the total number genes.

## Evolutionary model

One of course wonders about the origins of these scaling laws in genome organization, and I like to present some speculations in this regard. Assume that most changes in the number of genes $`n_c`$ in a functional category $`c`$ are caused by duplications and deletions. Then, $`n_c(t)`$ generally evolves according to the equation

$$\frac{dn_c(t)}{dt}=(\beta (t)\delta (t))n_c(t)=\rho (t)n_c(t),$$
(1)
with $`\beta (t)`$ and $`\delta (t)`$ respectively the duplication- and deletion-rate of the genes in this category at time $`t`$ in the evolutionary history of the genome. For simplicity of notation I have introduced the difference of duplication and deletion rates $`\rho (t)`$, which can be thought of as an “effective” duplication rate. This rate $`\rho (t)`$ is presumably proportional to the difference between the average probability that selection will favor fixation of a duplicated gene from this category and the average probability that selection will favor deletion of a gene from this category. Similarly, the total number of genes $`g(t)`$ obeys the equation

$$\frac{dg(t)}{dt}=\gamma (t)g(t),$$
(2)
with $`\gamma (t)`$ the overall effective rate of gene duplication in the genome at time $`t`$ in its evolutionary history. When we solve for $`n_c`$ as a function of $`g`$ we find

$$n_c=\lambda g^{\rho /\gamma },$$
(3)
where $`\rho `$ and $`\gamma `$ are the mean effective duplication rates of genes in category $`c`$ and the entire genome respectively, averaged over the evolutionary history of the genome, and $`\lambda `$ is a constant that depends on the boundary conditions. In order for all bacterial genomes to obey the same functional relation, the constant $`\lambda `$ and the ratios $`\rho /\gamma `$ have to be the same for all bacterial evolutionary lineages. Since all life shares a common ancestor, the boundary conditions for equations (1) and (2) are trivially the same for all bacterial lineages, implying that the constant $`\lambda `$ is indeed the same for all bacterial lineages. In summary, simply assuming that changes in gene-number occur mostly through duplications and deletions implies our observed power-law scaling if the ratios $`\rho /\gamma `$ are the same for all evolutionary lineages.

I thus propose that the explanation for the observed scaling-laws is that the ratios $`\rho /\gamma `$ are indeed the same for all bacterial lineages, i.e. these ratios of average duplication rates are “universal constants” of genome evolution. For instance, the exponent $`2`$ for TFs in bacteria indicates that, in all bacterial lineages, evolution selects duplicated TFs twice as frequently as duplicated genes in general. It seems likely that such universal constants are intimately connected to fundamental design principles of the evolutionary process. It is tempting to become even more speculative in this regard, and suggest that this factor of $`2`$ in duplication rate is related to switch-like function of transcription factors: with each addition of a transcription factor the number of transcription-regulatory states of the cell doubles. It is not entirely implausible to assume that with twice the number of internal states available, the probability of such a duplication being fixed in evolution is twice as large as the probability of fixing a duplicated gene that does not double the number of internal states of the cell.

Finally, as table 1 shows, there is still substantial uncertainty about the exact numerical values of the exponents given the current data, and many more genomes are needed to estimate these values more accurately. A survey of the NCBI genome database  shows that the number of sequenced genomes is increasing exponentially, with a doubling time of about $`16`$ months (Fig. 2).

This suggests that within a few years thousands of genomes will become available. With such an increase in available data it will become possible to look at much more fine-grained gene content statistics than the ones presented here. One can for instance imagine going beyond looking at single functional categories at a time, and investigate if there are correlations in the variations of gene number in more fine-grained functional categories. I believe that such investigations have the potential to teach us much about the functional design principles of the evolutionary process.

## Appendix

### Results for Archaea

Figure 3 shows the number of transcription regulatory genes (red), metabolic genes (blue), and cell-cycle related genes (green) as a function of the total number of genes in archaeal genomes.

Note that the size of the largest archaeal genome differs from that of the smallest by only a factor of approximately $`3`$. Consequently, there is large uncertainty regarding the values of the exponents for archaea. The maximum likelihood values and $`99`$% posterior probability intervals are $`2.1`$ and $`[1.35.7]`$ for transcription regulatory genes, $`0.81`$ and $`[0.441.48]`$ for metabolic genes, and $`0.83`$ and $`[0.541.35]`$ for cell-cycle related genes.

### Power-law Fitting

The power-law fits in figure 1 were obtained using a Bayesian straight-line fitting procedure. For each GO-category, I log-transform the data such that each data point $`(x_i,y_i)`$ corresponds to the logarithm of the estimated total number of genes, and the logarithm of the estimated number of genes in the category respectively. I assume that these transformed data where drawn from a linear model

$$y=\alpha (x+ϵ)+\lambda +\eta ,$$

where $`\eta `$ and $`ϵ`$ are “noise” terms in the $`x`$\- and $`y`$-coordinates respectively and $`\lambda `$ in an unknown off-set. I assume that the joint-distribution $`P(\eta ,ϵ)`$ is a two-dimensional Gaussian with means zero and unknown variances and co-variance. That is, I use scale invariant priors for the variances, and will integrate these nuisance variables out of the likelihood. A uniform prior is used for the location parameter $`\lambda `$, and for the slope $`\alpha `$ I will use a rotation invariant prior:

$$P(\alpha )d\alpha =\frac{d\alpha }{(1+\alpha ^2)^{3/2}}.$$

The use of these priors guarantees that the results are invariant under all shifts and rotations of the plane.

Integrating over all variables except for $`\alpha `$, we obtain for the posterior $`P(\alpha |D)`$ given the data $`D`$:

$$P(\alpha |D)d\alpha =C\frac{(\alpha ^2+1)^{(n3)/2}d\alpha }{(\alpha ^2s_{xx}2\alpha s_{yx}+s_{yy})^{(n1)/2}},$$

where $`n`$ is the number of genomes in the data, $`s_{xx}`$ is the variance in $`x`$-values (logarithms of the total gene numbers), $`s_{yy}`$ the variance in $`y`$-values (logarithms of the number of genes in the category), $`s_{yx}`$ is the co-variance, and $`C`$ is a normalizing constant. The values of the exponents reported in table 1 are the values of $`\alpha `$ that maximize $`P(\alpha |D)`$, and the boundaries of the $`99`$% posterior probability interval around it.

For each fit, I also measure what fraction of the variance in the data is explained by the fit. That is, I compare the average distance $`d`$ of the points in the plane to their center of mass with the average distance $`d_l`$ of the points to the fitted line and define the fraction $`q=1d_l/d`$ as the variance in the data explained by the fit.

### Robustness of the results

I first checked that the total amount of available annotation information is not itself dependent on genome size. If the total amount of available annotation information were to vary with the number of genes in the genome, this could lead to biases in the estimated exponents. To exclude this possibility, I counted the total number of genes with any Interpro hits in each genome and found that, for both bacteria and eukaryotes, the fraction of genes in the genome with Interpro hits is about $`2/3`$, independent of the total number of genes in the genome. Consistent with this observation, when one fits power-laws to the number of genes $`n_c`$ in a GO-category $`c`$ as a function of the total number of annotated genes in the genome, one finds exponents that are very close to those founds for $`n_c`$ as a function of the total number of genes in the genome.

Second, I tested that the results are insensitive to the value of the parameter $`\beta `$. The default value $`\beta =3`$ gives a gene with a single Interpro hit a probability of $`1e^30.95`$ to belong to the category. This is reasonable because Interpro is designed to only report statistically significant hits. To assess the effect of changing $`\beta `$, results for $`\beta =1`$ were generated. For bacteria the change in fitted exponent is less than $`5`$% for $`26`$ of $`44`$ categories, and less than $`10`$% for $`39`$ categories. For eukaryotes the exponent changes by less than $`5`$% for all but $`3`$ categories. In all cases, the change in fitted exponent is significantly smaller than the $`99`$% posterior probability intervals associated with the exponents of the fits.

Third, I tested the robustness of the results against removal of potential “redundancies” in the data. For bacteria there are several examples where multiple genomes of the same species or genomes of very closely related species occur in the data, and one might suspect that these may bias the results in some way. To this end, I parsed the names of all bacterial species into a general and a specific part, e.g. for Escherichia Coli Escherichia is the general part and coli the specific part, for Listeria innocua Listeria is the general part and innocua the specific part, etcetera. Groups of genomes with the same general part were then collected together and for each group the gene numbers were replaced with a single average of total gene number and average gene counts in each of the functional categories. This reduces the size of the data set by about a third. Power-law fitting was then applied to this reduced set and the fitted exponents were compared with those of the full data set. The maximum likelihood exponent was changed by less than $`5`$% in $`31`$ out of $`44`$ categories. The largest observed change was an $`18`$% change in the exponent. All changes to the exponents were well within the $`99`$% posterior probability intervals.

More importantly, the results could depend on the use of Interpro, the Gene Ontology, and the mapping of Interpro entries to GO categories. To test the robustness of the results to biases inherent in Interpro annotation and/or the mapping from Interpro to Gene Ontology, I analyzed selected functional categories using two other annotation schemes.

The first is based on Clusters of Orthologous Groups of proteins (COG)  annotation of $`63`$ bacterial genomes that can be obtained from
ftp://ftp.ncbi.nih.gov/pub/COG/COG.
In this data set, proteins of the $`63`$ bacterial genomes are assigned to COGs, and the COGs have been assigned to functional categories. I used these assignments to count the number of genes in different functional categories according to the COG annotation scheme. A comparison of the exponents for COG functional categories and the exponents for the closest GO categories obtained using the Interpro annotations are shown in table 2.

The second alternative annotation scheme I used is based on simple keyword searches of protein tables for fully-sequenced bacterial genomes available from the NCBI ftp site:
ftp.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genomes/Bacteria.
Removing genomes for which little or no annotation exists, this leaves protein tables for $`90`$ bacterial genomes. Each protein in these protein tables is annotated with a short description line. The number of genes in different functional categories was counted by searching each description line for hits to a set of keywords that characterize the category. For instance, I chose the keywords “ribosom”, “translation”, and “tRNA” for the category “protein biosynthesis”, and the gene is counted as belonging to this category if any of these keywords occurs in its description line. For the other categories I used the following keywords: “transcription” for the category “transcription”; “transport”, “channel”, “efflux”, “pump”, “porin”, “export”, “permease”, “symport”, “transloca”, and “PTS” for the category “transport”; all combinations “X Y” with X being one of “ion”, “sodium”, “calcium”, “potassium”, “magnesium”, and “manganese”, and Y being one of “channel”, “efflux”, “transport”, and “uptake” for the category “ion transport”; ‘protease” and “peptidase” for the category “protein degradation”; “kinase” for the category “kinase”; and finally the phrases ‘DNA polymerase”, “topoisomerase”, “DNA gyrase”, “DNA ligase”, “replication”, “helicase”, “DNA primase”, “DNA repair”, “cell division”, and “septum” for the category “cell cycle”. The exponents resulting from this (crude) annotation scheme are also shown in table 2. As table 2 shows, there is good quantitative agreement between the exponents that are obtained with the different annotation schemes.


text:
# Decoherence as a Probe of Coherent Quantum Dynamics

## Abstract

The effect of decoherence, induced by spontaneous emission, on the dynamics of cold atoms periodically kicked by an optical lattice is experimentally and theoretically studied. Ideally, the mean energy growth is essentially unaffected by weak decoherence, but the resonant momentum distributions are fundamentally altered. It is shown that experiments are inevitably sensitive to certain nontrivial features of these distributions, in a way that explains the puzzle of the observed enhancement of resonances by decoherence \[Phys. Rev. Lett. 87, 074102 (2001)\]. This clarifies both the nature of the coherent evolution, and the way in which decoherence disrupts it.

The theory of coherent quantum transport in periodic potentials is basic to solid state physics, and to our understanding of various conductance phenomena in crystal lattices. After succeeding in isolating and manipulating single quantum objects such as ions or atoms, quantum opticians, as well as meso- and nanoscientists, have now started to build extended structures of atoms or ions of increasing complexity. A natural way of doing so is to arrange one, two, or three dimensional regular arrays of (cold or ultracold) atoms in optical lattices greiner2002 , which then can be considered as faithful realizations of strongly idealized, fundamental models of solid state theory. Beyond illustrating such theoretical models under clean and virtually perfectly controlled laboratory conditions, these experiments often also hold unexpected surprises (due to apparently innocent, real-life modifications of the original model), and promise highly rewarding technical applications in the future. Proposals that suggest using optical lattices for quantum information processing jaksch99  are but one example of this.

In all such respects, the impact of noise and decoherence is a crucial issue dittrich86 ; ammann98 ; buchleitner2002 , because decoherence is expected to impair manifestly quantum phenomena. The present Report addresses a striking, seeming violation of this rule, which was experimentally observed with kicked cold atoms subjected to a pulsed, one-dimensional, spatially periodic optical lattice darcy2001b . Here, a peculiar type of coherent quantum transport, called ‘quantum resonance’ izrailev79 ; WGF2003  is theoretically predicted for kicking periods rationally related to the propagation time of kicked atoms across the lattice constant. The mean kinetic energy of an atomic ensemble is then predicted to increase linearly with time, in sharp contrast to the behavior predicted for non-resonant values of the kicking period, where it saturates (in the process of ‘dynamical localization’ fishman93 , closely analogous to Anderson localization in one-dimensional disordered solids anderson58 ). In previous experiments, enhanced transport was indeed observed for the lowest-order resonances darcy2001b ; oskay2000 . When decoherence was added to the experiment by controlled spontaneous emission (SE), the energy growth at resonance was found to be significantly faster than could be accounted for by the heating effect of momentum transfer due to SE darcy2001b ; darcy2001a . This looks like incoherent magnification of a purely coherent, and non-classical, phenomenon.

In this Report we show how this counter-intuitive effect of decoherence can be resolved by inspection of the full atomic momentum distributions instead of merely their mean square (i.e., kinetic energy) values, as were considered in Ref. darcy2001b . Decoherence then acts as expected: it destroys the coherent dynamics underlying the quantum resonances and, in particular, certain nontrivial features of the momentum distributions WGF2003 . It is precisely this latter fact that produces the surprising enhancement of the mean energy values observed in the experiment darcy2001b ; WGF2003 .

Our experimental system darcy2001a  is a realization of the paradigmatic Kicked Rotor (KR) model fishman93 ; graham92 , extensively used in investigations of classical chaotic dynamics and its quantum counterpart stockmann99 . After trapping and cooling in a magneto-optic trap (MOT), about $`10^7`$ cesium atoms are released and, falling freely under gravity, are exposed to pulses from a vertical standing wave of off-resonant laser light. This is red-detuned from the $`6^2\text{S}_{1/2}6^2\text{P}_{1/2}`$, $`(F=4F^{}=3)`$ D1 transition by $`\delta _L=2\pi \times 30`$ GHz, and has a wavelength $`\lambda _L=894.7`$ nm. On release, the atomic temperature is $`5\mu `$K, corresponding to a Gaussian momentum distribution with full width at half maximum (FWHM) 12$`\mathrm{}k_L`$, where $`k_L=2\pi /\lambda _L`$. The duration of each (square) pulse is $`t_p=500`$ ns, and the peak intensity in the standing wave is $`5\times 10^4`$ mW/cm2. Due to the ac Stark shift, these pulses result in $`\delta `$-function-like applications of a sinusoidal potential, with spatial period $`\lambda _L/2`$. Classically, the maximum impulse that this can impart is $`\mathrm{}G\varphi _d`$, where $`\varphi _d=\mathrm{\Omega }^2t_p/8\delta _L`$, and $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ is the Rabi frequency of the atoms at the intensity maxima of the light field. Quantum mechanically, it imparts momentum to the atoms in integer multiples of $`\mathrm{}G`$, where $`G=2k_L`$. Both the density distribution of the trapped atoms and the standing light wave intensity profile are Gaussian, each with FWHM $`1`$ mm, so the mean value of $`\varphi _d`$ as experienced by the atomic ensemble is $`0.8\pi `$. The standing wave passes through a voltage-controlled crystal phase modulator which can shift the position of the standing wave between consecutive pulses so that it effectively cancels the effect of gravity. Thus in the rest frame of the atomic ensemble the standing wave appears to be stationary, yielding KR dynamics with kicking period $`T`$ ($`t_p`$), despite the presence of gravity. Decoherence can be introduced by inducing SE in the atoms through application of an additional $`2\mu `$s pulse of laser light after each of the kicking pulses. This light is $`60`$ MHz red-detuned from the $`6^2\text{S}_{1/2}6^2\text{P}_{3/2}`$, $`(F=4F^{\prime \prime }=5)`$ D2 transition. The intensity of the pulse can be controlled so that the mean number of SE per atom per pulsing cycle, $`\overline{n}_{\text{SE}}`$, can be varied continuously. Finally, after application of the pulses, the atoms fall through a sheet of light resonant with the D2 transition, located $`0.5`$m below the point of release. This allows us to determine their momentum distribution by a time-of-flight (TOF) technique, with a resolution of $`\mathrm{}G`$.

In the absence of SE, the Hamiltonian that generates the time evolution of the atomic wave function may be written in the following dimensionless form

$$\widehat{H}(t)=\frac{\widehat{p}^2}{2}+\varphi _d\mathrm{cos}(\widehat{x})\underset{m=\mathrm{}}{\overset{+\mathrm{}}{}}\delta (tm\tau ),$$
(1)
where $`p`$ is momentum in units of $`\mathrm{}G`$, $`x`$ is position in units of $`G^1`$, and $`M`$ is the mass of the atoms. The units of energy and time are then $`\mathrm{}^2G^2/M`$ and $`M/\mathrm{}G^2`$, respectively. In such units the kicking period is $`\tau =\mathrm{}G^2T/M`$. This Hamiltonian is very close to that of the well-known $`\delta `$-kicked rotor, with the sole (but important, as discussed below) difference that our cold atoms are moving along a line rather than in a circle. Notwithstanding this, the dynamics of the atoms reflect characteristic properties of the quantum KR (whose corresponding classical phase space is mixed, consisting of regular and chaotic components, for non-vanishing kicking strength lichtenberg92 ). The nature of the quantum transport sensitively depends on the parameter $`\tau `$. If $`\tau =4\pi r/q`$, with $`r,q`$ integers, then the kicking period is rationally related to the propagation time of kicked atoms across the lattice constant, and quantum transport is typically enhanced by quantum resonance izrailev79 . If $`\tau /4\pi `$ is sufficiently irrational, then transport is inhibited by quantum interference, i.e., by dynamical localization fishman93 .

A conceptually simple way of experimentally testing this theoretical picture is to measure as a function of $`\tau `$ the mean kinetic energy of the atoms, henceforth to be referred to as ‘mean energy’, after a fixed interaction time of $`N`$ kicks. The result of such a measurement at $`N=30`$ in the absence of SE is shown in Fig. 1(a), with $`0.19\pi \tau 6.31\pi `$. The mean energies were extracted from a finite momentum window ($`60p60`$), and low-amplitude noise in the time-of-flight signal was eliminated by imposing a signal threshold estimated from the background noise level at high momenta. Figure 1(a) shows an underlying smooth, periodic dependence on $`\tau `$. This reflects the $`\tau `$-dependence of the localization length of the dynamically localized atomic sample shepelyansky87 . The structure superimposed on the basic periodic variation has particularly narrow peaks at $`\tau =2\pi ,4\pi ,6\pi `$. These are the main quantum resonances, with $`q=1,r=1`$ and $`q=2,r=1,3`$. Higher-order ($`q3`$) resonances were not unambiguously resolved within the given observation time. The present Report is therefore focused on the main resonances, and specifically at the surprising way in which they react to decoherence, as shown in Fig. 1(b). The mean energy growth at the resonances is clearly enhanced. In other words, resonant transport, which is due to constructive quantum interference, appears to be stabilized by decoherence (while the dynamical localization away from resonance is barely affected, confirming that we are in the regime of weak decoherence dittrich86 ). The apparent inconsistency of these experimental observations with what seems theoretically reasonable is resolved as follows.

An atom periodically kicked in space and time is described by a wave packet $`\psi (x)`$ composed of $`2\pi `$-periodic Bloch states $`\psi _\beta (x)`$, that is,

$$\psi (x)=_0^1𝑑\beta \mathrm{exp}(i\beta x)\psi _\beta (x),$$
(2)
where $`\beta `$ is the quasimomentum. In our units, it is given by the fractional part of the momentum $`p=n+\beta `$ ($`n`$). It is conserved in time, so the different Bloch states in (2) evolve independently of one another, and their momenta only change by integers. Under the resonance condition $`\tau =4\pi r/q`$, a special situation occurs for a specific, discrete subclass of values of $`\beta `$. Besides being periodic in coordinate space, the one-period evolution (Floquet) operator is then also periodic in momentum space, with the integer period $`q`$. This happens when $`\beta =m/2r`$, $`0m<2r`$, $`m`$ integer. The amplitudes of such waves at momentum states separated by $`q\mathrm{}G`$ (in physical units) exactly rephase after each kick darcy2001b ; here we specialize to $`q=1,2`$. This rephasing is analogous to the Talbot effect in optics, so we speak of these resonances as occurring at rational multiples of the half-Talbot time $`T_{1/2}=2\pi M/\mathrm{}G^2=66.7\mu `$s (for which $`\tau =2\pi `$). In much the same way as spatial periodicity enforces ballistic motion in physical space, the momentum periodicity which holds for special values of $`\beta `$ (i.e., $`\beta =1/2`$ for $`q=2`$, and $`\beta =0,1/2`$ for $`q=1`$) enforces ballistic propagation of the corresponding states in momentum space; thus their energy grows quadratically in time. The remaining Bloch components of the original wavepacket, with $`\beta `$ not in the ‘resonant’ class, undergo a quasiperiodic energy exchange with the driving field, leading to a finite spread of the associated ($`\beta `$-dependent) momentum distribution for all times. Upon incoherently averaging over the continuous set of quasimomenta which constitute the atomic ensemble, there is competition between quasi-periodic and ballistic propagation, and as $`N`$ increases the values of $`\beta `$ that populate the ballistic growth must match more closely the ideal resonant values. On the one hand, this leads to linear growth of the total mean energy, $`E\varphi _d^2N/4`$. On the other hand, a stationary momentum distribution $`P_s(n)=lim_N\mathrm{}P(n,N)`$ WGF2003 , given by

$$P_s(n)=\underset{n^{}}{}h(n^{})_\pi ^\pi \frac{d\xi }{2\pi }_0^{2\pi }\frac{d\alpha }{2\pi }J_{nn^{}}^2(f(\xi ,\alpha )),$$
(3)
emerges, where $`P(n,N)`$ is the coarse-grained momentum distribution of the ensemble after $`N`$ kicks. The coarse-graining is on the scale of unity ($`\mathrm{}G`$ in physical units) so as to yield a distribution in $`n`$, which is consistent with the finite-size binning of the experimentally detected momentum distribution. In Eq. (3), $`h(n^{})`$ is the initial (assumed smooth) momentum distribution, $`f(\xi ,\alpha )=\varphi _d\mathrm{sin}(\xi )\mathrm{csc}(\alpha )`$, $`\xi =\pi (2\beta 1)`$, and $`J_{nn^{}}`$ is a Bessel function of first kind and order $`nn^{}`$. The asymptotic distribution $`P_s(n)`$, shown in Fig. 2(a), is attained because the phases $`\alpha `$ of the nonresonant Bloch components of the original wavepacket, accumulated under the action of the time evolution operator, are effectively averaged.

For finite times, $`P(n,N)`$ exhibits a narrow, stationary peak centered around $`n=0`$, algebraic decay $`n^2`$ over intermediate momenta, and ‘ballistic wings’ due to the almost-resonant $`\beta `$ values, which move to higher momenta linearly in time. It is important to note that the central peak is narrower than the exponential distribution observed in dynamically localized atomic ensembles, and that the linear energy growth is observed at all times, in spite of the onset of the stationary distribution. There is no inconsistency here: the asymptotic limit to which the distribution tends has an $`n^2`$ fall-off at large $`n`$, and hence has an infinite mean energy (i.e., a divergent 2nd moment). The ballistic wings, also experimentally observed in Ref. oskay2000 , dominate the theoretically computed mean energy growth. As the wings are fed by the resonant-$`\beta `$ subclass, the resonant energy growth is ultimately due to conservation of the quasimomentum $`\beta `$ in the kicking process.

Experimental detection of these wings in the final atomic momentum distribution is extremely difficult, for several reasons. The most important of these for our present discussion is that the wings must not have moved beyond the cutoffs imposed by the signal-to-noise ratio. Though relatively small in terms of population, this experimental loss from the ballistic wings leads to a mean energy which is significantly less than the theoretical value. Our theoretical picture is compared with experimental data in Fig. 2(a), where experimental and numerical momentum distributions are shown at the quantum resonance $`\tau 2\pi `$ ($`T=66.5\mu `$s), after $`N=30`$ kicks. Note that our numerical simulation exhibits the ballistic wings of the distribution, which are swamped by the noise background in the experimental data. When processing such data, only momenta in the window $`[60,60]`$ were taken into account. Furthermore, the experimental distribution exhibits an asymmetry around $`n=0`$ which is not present in the theory. This is due to two effects: the first, and most important, is that of the lock-in amplifier and its associated low pass filter, used in the TOF measurement, which slightly distort the momentum distribution. The second is that the removal of gravity’s effect by the crystal phase modulator is imperfect; gravity breaks the symmetry of the system’s evolution and hence of the momentum distribution. Nevertheless, the experimental and theoretical results agree very well in the central part of the distribution. Other deviations of the experimental system from the ideal are: (i) pulses are not $`\delta `$-like as they have a finite duration $`t_p`$, (ii) random amplitude noise is introduced by laser power fluctuations ($`\pm 5`$%), and (iii) different atoms are subject to somewhat different values of $`\varphi _d`$ darcy2001a .

The addition of noise reshuffles the quasimomenta of the initial distribution, at a rate proportional to $`\overline{n}_{\text{SE}}`$, and thus destroys the conservation of quasimomentum. This reshuffling prevents atoms from remaining in the fast-travelling quasimomentum range for a long time; the formation of ballistic wings is thus inhibited. On the other hand, reshuffling gives all atoms a chance of sojourning a while in those quasimomentum ranges and hence experiencing a transient ballistic momentum growth. As a result, the distribution at moderate momenta broadens in time, at the expense of the ballistic wings. This is seen in Fig. 2(b): for $`\overline{n}_{\text{SE}}0.14`$, the momentum distribution is strongly broadened as it exhibits enhanced population of moderate momentum states.

The incoherent dynamics are amenable to analytical treatment WGF2003 , which shows that the distribution no longer approaches a stationary form. Instead, it evolves towards a continually broadening, diffusion-like Gaussian. The theoretically-obtained line shape compares very favorably to the experimental one, as shown in Fig. 2(b). Note that we chose $`\overline{n}_{\text{SE}}=0.1`$ for the analysis in order to achieve an optimal fit to the experimental data. The uncertainty in the intensity of D2 light experienced by the atoms, due to loss at the glass faces of the vacuum system and the exact shape of the $`2\mu `$s pulse, means that the experimental value of $`\overline{n}_{\text{SE}}`$ is $`(0.14\pm 0.04)`$, consistent with this best theoretical fit.

Analytically, the mean energy grows according to $`E(D/2+\varphi _d^2/4)N`$, where $`D\overline{n}_{\text{SE}}/12`$ is the diffusion coefficient associated with the momentum transfer due to SE WGF2003 . Since $`D`$ is rather small ($`0.01`$) for the cases considered here, the mean energy growth is almost the same as in the resonant case without decoherence, where the same expression for $`E`$ is obtained, except $`D=0`$ (see above). Hence weak decoherence destroys the conservation of quasimomentum, which lies at the very root of resonances, yet in the ideal model it only affects the resonant energy growth mildly. However, the theoretically almost identical energy growth is produced by quite different physical mechanisms, which react to the cutoffs inherent in experimental detection schemes in dramatically different ways. In the coherently-evolved case, the growth of the experimentally measured energy is strongly depressed as soon as the ballistic wings escape the detection windows. In the presence of noise, the energy growth is not due to the ballistic wings, but rather to diffusive broadening of the whole distribution, and is therefore dominated by the center. Hence the effect of finite experimental detection windows is much less severe and the measured mean energy remains closer to its ideal value up to a higher value of $`N`$. This leads to an apparent enhancement of the resonance peaks compared to the SE-free case. Such noise-induced signal enhancement is reminiscent of ‘stochastic resonance’, where the response of a system to some input signal is enhanced by stochastic activation bulsara96 . However, the hallmark of stochastic resonance is a maximum signal enhancement at an optimal, nonvanishing noise level. This has not so far been established in our present scenario.

In summary, we have shown that the linear growth with time of the mean energy at quantum resonance, inhibited in experiments by finite detection windows on finite time scales, is restored there by adding noise. This effect is ultimately rooted in the difference between atoms and rotors and is a striking, albeit indirect, demonstration of the peculiar nature of coherent resonant transport for kicked atoms, and how it is modified by photon recoil-induced decoherence.

We thank S.A. Gardiner and K. Burnett for stimulating and enlightening discussions. We acknowledge support from the UK EPSRC, The Royal Society, the EU TMR ‘Cold Quantum Gases’ network and QTRANS RTN1-1999-08400, the INFM-PA project Weak Chaos: theory and applications, the US-Israel Binational Science Foundation (BSF), and the Minerva Center of Nonlinear Physics of Complex Systems.


text:
# No dinosaurs in microcanonical gravitation: No special ”microcanonical phase transitions”

## Abstract

It is shown that the recently introduced singularities of the microcanonical entropy like ”microcanonical phase transitions”, and exotic pattern of the microcanonical caloric curve $`T(E)`$ like multi-valuednes or the appearance of ”dinosaur’s necks” are inconsistent with Boltzmann’s fundamental definition of entropy $`S=\mathrm{ln}[W(E)]`$ for a system at equilibrium even for extremely large systems as astro-physical ones.

In a recent paper Bouchet and Barrébouchet03  introduced a special class of ”microcanonical” phase transitions. These are defined by singularities of the microcanonical entropy or the microcanonical temperature. However, such singularities do not exist in the microcanonical thermodynamics, i.e. of a system at equilibrium, based on Boltzmann’s principle gross174  neither for small systems nor for the real large self-gravitating astrophysical ones.

The entropy as defined by Boltzmann’s principle

$$S(E)=\mathrm{ln}[W(E)]$$
(1)
as also the temperature

$$\beta (E)=T^1(E)=\frac{dS}{dE}$$
(2)
are single valued, smooth, and multiple differentiable for any finite $`N`$. Here $`W(E)`$ is the ($`6N1`$) folded integral which measures the geometric area of the microcanonical many-fold of points with the energy $`E`$ in the $`6N`$-dim. phase space. $`T(E)`$ is a single valued differentiable function at all energies as long as $`\beta >0`$, i.e. $`E`$ is finite. This clearly excludes all microcanonical ”hysteretic cyclings”, -zones, or ”dinosaur’s necks” as introduced by chavanis02b .

Chavanis argues in private communication that the ”hysteretic cycles” reflect possible meta-stable configurations which are important in astro-physics. This might well be so but is outside of any controllable and fundamental conception of statistics. The microcanonical ensemble $``$ is per definition the ensemble of all possible configuration in the $`6`$N-dim phasespace with the same energy. Its geometrical size is $`W=e^{S(E)}`$. Of course it is interesting and important to consider only those configurations $``$ which represent e.g. stars at densities up to the ignition of their hydrogen burning, when further gravitational collapse is halted for a while. This can be done by adding an upper limit to the local density as done e.g by ref. gross187 ; gross195 ; gross200 . $`(E)`$ is then still a compact manifold and similarly single valued multiple differentiable in $`E`$. Again there are no singularities and no ”dinosaurs”.


text:
# Pressure-induced electronic topological transitions in low dimensional superconductors

## 1 Introduction

High pressure research plays an important role in the study of superconducting materials. A surprisingly large number of elemental solids is found to be superconducting under extreme conditions , with the recent addition of nonmagnetic iron, with a critical temperature $`T_c2`$ K at pressures $`P=1530`$ GPa , and possibly of lithium ($`T_c=20`$ K, $`P=48`$ GPa) . The case of the “simple” alkali metals under pressure is actually quite interesting by itself. Following earlier theoretical suggestions of an electronic  or pairing  instability, recent experimental findings actually indicate a metal-insulator transition into a reduced-symmetry phase at $`P=45`$ GPa . Our recent proposal is that Friedel oscillations in the pair potential may justify phase oscillations between a symmetric phase and a low-symmetry dimerized structure as a function of pressure, with re-entrant metallicity occurring at higher pressures .

Here, we will focus on the pressure effects on the superconducting properties of the high-$`T_c`$ cuprates. These materials are characterized by CuO2 layers, where most of the physics relevant for high-$`T_c`$ superconductivity is believed to take place . As a consequence of their reduced dimensionality, hydrostatic pressure as well as uniaxial strain are expected to influence remarkably the superconducting properties of the cuprates. This is usually indicated by the magnitude and sign of the pressure derivative of $`T_c`$, $`dT_c/dP`$. While in the case of ‘conventional’, phonon-mediated superconductors one almost invariably has $`dT_c/dP<0`$, mainly as a result of lattice stiffening , the pressure dependence of $`T_c`$ in the cuprates is usually nonmonotonic, with a sign-changing $`dT_c/dP`$, and $`T_c`$ may even display kinks as a function of pressure .

Such a behaviour is usually related to an interplay among $`T_c`$, hole doping $`n`$, and pressure. Since hole doping is itself a function of pressure, one may generally write :

$$\frac{dT_c}{dP}=\frac{T_c}{P}+\frac{T_c}{n}\frac{dn}{dP},$$
(1)
where $`T_c`$ at ambient pressure follows a universal bell-shaped curve as a function of doping . Equation (1) shows that the actual value and sign of the total derivative $`dT_c/dP`$ is given by the competition of a hole-driven contribution, and an “intrinsic” contribution, $`T_c/P`$. The theoretical implications of such a pressure-dependent $`T_c`$, and in particular of a nonzero “intrinsic” contribution $`T_c/P`$, can help understanding the pairing mechanism of these unconventional superconductors.

In this Lecture, we will review our results concerning the interplay expressed by Equation (1), both for a bilayered cuprate  and for multilayered cuprates . In the case of a bilayered cuprate (Section 2), after recovering the universal nonmonotonic dependence of $`T_c`$ on hole doping, we will extract a phenomenological estimate of the “intrinsic” contribution $`T_c/P`$ by comparison with available experimental data for Bi2212. In the case of multilayered cuprates (Section 3), we will emphasize the role of a nonuniform hole-content distribution among inequivalent CuO2 layers. Two possible sources of inequivalence will be considered, namely a different proximity to the charge-reservoir layers, and the different number of adjacent CuO2 layers to which a given layer may be coupled by means of interlayer pair tunneling (ILT) . Later in Section 4, we will discuss the microscopic origin of the “intrinsic” pressure dependence of $`T_c`$ as due to the proximity to an electronic topological transition (ETT) , which takes place when some external agent (such as pressure) modifies the topology of the Fermi surface of an electronic system. We will eventually summarize in Section 5.

## 2 Interplay among $`T_c`$, hole doping, and pressure: bilayered cuprates

In Reference , we have analyzed a model Hamiltonian describing tightly bound interacting fermions in a bilayer complex:

$$H=\underset{𝐤\sigma }{}\xi _𝐤c_{𝐤\sigma }^{}c_{𝐤\sigma }+\frac{1}{N}\underset{\mathrm{𝐤𝐤}^{}}{}V_{\mathrm{𝐤𝐤}^{}}c_𝐤^{}c_𝐤^{}c_𝐤^{}c_𝐤^{},$$
(2)
where $`c_{𝐤\sigma }^{}`$ ($`c_{𝐤\sigma }`$) creates (destroys) a fermion with spin projection $`\sigma `$ along a specified direction, wave-vector $`𝐤`$ belonging to the first Brillouin zone (1BZ) of a tetragonal lattice containing $`N`$ $`𝐤`$-points, and band dispersion $`\xi _𝐤=ϵ_𝐤\mu `$, measured relative to the chemical potential $`\mu `$. As for the tight-binding dispersion relation, we assumed the form

$$ϵ_𝐤=2t[\mathrm{cos}(k_xa)+\mathrm{cos}(k_ya)]+4t^{}\mathrm{cos}(k_xa)\mathrm{cos}(k_ya)2t_z\mathrm{cos}(k_zc),$$
(3)
which retains in-plane nearest neighbour ($`t`$) and next-nearest neighbour ($`t^{}`$) hopping, as well as nearest neighbour interlayer single-particle hopping ($`t_zt`$). The interaction term in Equation (2) may be expanded over the different symmetry channels allowed by the $`C_{4v}`$ symmetry of the lattice. Assuming the interaction kernel to be separable, one has $`V_{\mathrm{𝐤𝐤}^{}}=_h\lambda _hg_𝐤^{(h)}g_𝐤^{}^{(h)}`$, where $`\lambda _h`$ are phenomenological coupling constants, $`g_𝐤^{(0)}=1`$ and $`g_𝐤^{(1)}=\frac{1}{2}[\mathrm{cos}(k_xa)+\mathrm{cos}(k_ya)]`$ correspond to $`s`$-wave symmetry, and $`g_𝐤^{(2)}=\frac{1}{2}[\mathrm{cos}(k_xa)\mathrm{cos}(k_ya)]`$ corresponds to $`d`$-wave symmetry .

A mean-field analysis of Equation (2) as a function of hole content allowed us to recover the universal, nonmonotonic doping dependence of $`T_c`$ at ambient pressure . This seems to be a generic feature of a dispersion relation like Equation (3), as we will comment later on in Section 4. While superconductivity sets in with a definite symmetry (either $`s`$\- or $`d`$-wave) at $`T=T_c`$, with $`d`$-wave prevailing for hole contents larger than or equal to optimal doping, symmetry mixing is allowed at low temperature and intermediate dopings . The role of the symmetry of the order parameter in determining the scale of $`T_c`$ in both high-$`T_c`$ superconductors and heavy fermion compounds has been discussed in References .

Such an analysis has been generalized for a nonzero applied pressure $`P`$. The effect of pressure is mainly that of decreasing the lattice constants $`a`$ and $`c`$, thus varying the band parameters $`t`$, $`t^{}`$, $`t_z`$, and of changing the hole content $`n`$, thus varying the chemical potential $`\mu `$. While the pressure dependence of the lattice parameters may be extracted from the available components of the isothermal compressibility tensor $`\kappa _i`$ ($`i=x,y,z`$), the pressure dependence of the overall hole content can be derived from available data for the Hall resistance as a function of pressure . Application of hydrostatic pressure results in widening of the electronic band, and in a decrease of the density of states, due to a reduction of the would-be Van Hove singularity (Fig. 1).

By comparison with the available pressure dependence of $`T_c`$ in Bi2212 , we could extract a phenomenological estimate of the “intrinsic” contribution $`T_c/P`$ to the total pressure derivative of $`T_c`$ in Equation (1) (Fig. 1). Such a contribution turns out to be nonnegligible, especially at lower pressures, and justifies a sign changing overall $`dT_c/dP`$ with increasing pressure.

## 3 Interplay among $`T_c`$, hole distribution, and pressure: multilayered cuprates

In order to study the case of multilayered cuprate compounds, such as the homologous series Bi2Sr2Can-1CunO2n+4+y (Bi-2:2:$`(n1)`$:$`n`$, whereof Bi2212 is the bilayered instance, with $`n=2`$), TlmBa2Can-1CunO2(n+1)+m+y (Tl-$`m`$:2:$`(n1)`$:$`n`$, with $`m=1,2`$), or HgBa2Can-1CunO2n+2+y (Hg-1:2:$`(n1)`$:$`n`$), we have to generalize the above model in order to take into account for the inequivalence among different layers. In Reference  we have considered basically two sources of inequivalence among different layers.

First of all, a different proximity to the ‘charge reservoir’ layers may induce a nonuniform hole-content *distribution* between inner and outer CuO2 layers. This may be taken into account by assuming a model electronic band in each layer as in Equation (3), but now with a chemical potential $`\mu ^{\mathrm{}}`$ depending on layer index $`\mathrm{}`$.

In addition to that, inner CuO2 layers are expected to be coupled more intensely to adjacent layers than outer layers. An intensely debated proposal for the origin of interlayer coupling in the cuprates is the interlayer pair tunneling (ILT) model .

The ILT mechanism of high-$`T_c`$ superconductivity has been proposed as a possible explanation for the observed high values of $`T_c`$ in the layered cuprates, as well as a number of other more difficult but related aspects of their complex phenomenology . The ILT mechanism relies on the fact that single-particle coherent tunneling between adjacent layers is suppressed, due to the so-called Anderson orthogonality catastrophe . Such an assumption amounts to set $`t_z=0`$ in Equation (3) above. On the other hand, coherent tunneling of Cooper *pairs* does not suffer from such restrictions, and thus enters the total Hamiltonian as a second order effect in the single particle hopping matrix element $`t_{}(𝐤)`$ . While within conventional models the superconducting state is accessed by lowering the potential energy of the electronic system, the main aspect of the ILT mechanism is that Josephson tunnelling of Cooper pairs between adjacent CuO2 layers allows the system to access the normal-state frustrated $`c`$-axis kinetic energy. However, the ILT mechanism has been recently deeply reconsidered, due to its apparent inconsistency with the observed $`c`$-axis electrodynamics .

In the presence of ILT between adjacent layers, the interaction term in Equation (2) should be modified as:

$$\frac{1}{N}V_{\mathrm{𝐤𝐤}^{}}\stackrel{~}{V}_{\mathrm{𝐤𝐤}^{}}^{\mathrm{}\mathrm{}^{}}=\frac{1}{N}V_{\mathrm{𝐤𝐤}^{}}\delta _{\mathrm{}\mathrm{}^{}}T_J(𝐤)\delta _{\mathrm{𝐤𝐤}^{}}(1\delta _{\mathrm{}\mathrm{}^{}})\theta (1|\mathrm{}\mathrm{}^{}|),$$
(4)
where $`\theta (\tau )`$ is the usual Heaviside step function, $`V_{\mathrm{𝐤𝐤}^{}}`$ is the in-plane potential, now allowing for $`d`$-wave pairing only, and $`T_J(𝐤)=t_{}^2(𝐤)/t`$ is the ILT effective interaction . A standard mean-field treatment of the ensuing Hamiltonian yields a system of *coupled* nonlinear equations for the gap function $`\mathrm{\Delta }_𝐤^{\mathrm{}}`$ on layer $`\mathrm{}`$ ($`\mathrm{}=1,\mathrm{}n`$). Therefore, linearization of these equations close to $`T_c`$ admit in principle $`n`$ solutions, $`T_c=T_c^{(\mathrm{})}`$, say, corresponding to an incipiently nonzero gap $`\mathrm{\Delta }_𝐤^{\mathrm{}}`$ on layer $`\mathrm{}`$. The ‘physical’ solution for the critical temperature $`T_c`$ is then simply $`T_c=\underset{\mathrm{}}{\mathrm{max}}T_c^{(\mathrm{})}`$, corresponding to the gap which first opens as $`T`$ decreases towards $`T_c`$.

The result of our numerical solutions of the equations for $`T_c^{(\mathrm{})}`$ are shown in Figure 2, where we have assumed a nonuniform hole-content distribution among inequivalent layers according to the point-charge model . Such a model estimates the hole contents within inner and outer layers as a function of overall doping $`\delta `$ by minimizing the total carrier energy in the layered complex, expressed as a sum of band energy, plus electrostatic energy, where the charge distribution within a given layer is described as localized on the constituent ions of the unit cell . From Figure 2, it turns out that, as a function of overall doping $`\delta `$ (which can be varied by means of applied pressure), a crossover takes place between superconductivity arising from inner and outer layers. These crossovers manifest themselves as *kinks* in the doping dependence (pressure dependence) of $`T_c`$, as is experimentally observed in many layered cuprate superconductors .

## 4 Effects of proximity to an electronic topological transition

Applied pressure can modify the properties of a bulk metal by changing the topology of its Fermi surface (FS), as was earlier recognized by I. M. Lifshitz . Lifshitz coined the term electronic topological transition (ETT) in order to describe the anomalies in several electronic properties at $`T=0`$ induced by a change of the connectivity number of the FS. An ETT can be driven by several external agents, such as isotropic pressure, anisotropic deformation, and the introduction of isovalent impurities. In all these cases, it is customary to employ a single critical parameter $`z=\mu ϵ_c`$, measuring the distance of the chemical potential $`\mu `$ from the critical value $`ϵ_c`$, corresponding to the transition. As $`z0`$, several normal state electronic properties, such as conductivity, specific heat, thermoelectric power, thermal expansion and sound absorption coefficients, exhibit an anomalous behaviour, characterized by the appearance of a step or a cusp-like $`z`$-dependence .

ETTs are also possible in fermion systems characterized by a low effective dimensionality. This is possibly the case of the high-$`T_c`$ cuprates and of the $`\kappa `$-(BEDT-TTF)2-X organic salts . Figure 3 displays the typical Fermi lines of a high-$`T_c`$ cuprate superconductor, such as LSCO, in the first and adjacent Brillouin zones ($`\pi k_x,k_y2\pi `$). These correspond to $`\xi _𝐤=0`$ in Equation (3) (now with $`t_z=0`$ and $`t^{}/t=0.45`$). As the chemical potential $`\mu `$ increases from the bottom to the top of the band, an ETT is traversed as soon as the FS touches the borders of the 1BZ. Correspondingly, the Fermi line evolves from a closed, electron-like, to an open, hole-like, contour, with respect to the $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ point in the 1BZ. Exactly the same kind of patterns have been recently observed experimentally, by means of angular-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES), in LSCO as a function of doping . Close to the ETT, the band dispersion Equation (3) can be approximated by a locally hyperbolic dispersion relation, $`ϵ_𝐤ϵ_cp_1^2/(2m_1)p_2^2/(2m_2)`$, with $`p_1=k_x`$, $`p_2=k_y\pi `$, $`ϵ_c=4t^{}`$, and $`m_{1,2}=[2t(1\pm 2r)]^1`$, the fine details thereof being determined by the value of the next-nearest neighbours to nearest neighbours hopping ratio, $`r=t^{}/t`$ . In order to have a flat minimum in $`\xi _𝐤`$ around the $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ point, as is observed experimentally for the majority of the cuprates, the condition $`0<r<\frac{1}{2}`$ must be fulfilled. A universal, direct correlation between optimal doping $`T_c^{\mathrm{max}}`$ and the hopping ratio $`r`$ of several cuprate compounds has been earlier recognized by Pavarini *et al.* , thus showing that in-plane anisotropy, corresponding to a relatively large value of the hopping ratio $`r`$, enhances superconductivity.

The first and foremost effect of an ETT in the spectrum of a quasi-2D pure electronic system is that of producing a logarithmic Van Hove singularity in the density of states (DOS) each time the Fermi level traverses a saddle point in the dispersion relation . Due to the effect of impurities, however, such a singularity is smeared into a pronounced maximum with finite height . Moreover, two close singularities, such as those resulting from a pressure-induced tetragonal to orthorhombic distortion of the lattice in the cuprates are expected to merge into a single, broader maximum.

As a consequence of the presence of an ETT in the electronic spectrum, the gap magnitude $`\mathrm{\Delta }_0`$ at $`T=0`$ is characterized by a nonmonotonic dependence on the critical parameter $`z`$. Within a mean-field approach to a model Hamiltonian like Equation (2), we derived such a result, both analitically  and numerically , both in the $`s`$\- and in the $`d`$-wave case. In view of the fact that $`T_c\mathrm{\Delta }_0`$, as in any mean-field theory, such a finding is in agreement with the phenomenology of the high-$`T_c`$ cuprates . We could also estimate the maximum gap at $`T=0`$, which is expected to scale with $`T_c^{\mathrm{max}}`$, as the value of $`\mathrm{\Delta }_0`$ close to the ETT ($`z=0`$). Our analytical results for $`\mathrm{\Delta }_0(z=0)`$ as a function of the hopping ratio $`r`$ are shown in Figure 4. One can recognize the direct correlation between $`T_c^{\mathrm{max}}\mathrm{\Delta }_0(z=0)`$ and $`r`$, as argued by Pavarini *et al.* . Such a correlation results to be universal, in the sense that it does not depend on the symmetry of the order parameter and on the coupling strength, but rather looks like a generic consequence of the proximity to an ETT at $`T=0`$.

The “intrinsic” effect of applied pressure on $`T_c`$ has been probably singled out in the epitaxial strain experiments of Locquet *et al.* on LSCO thin films . These workers investigated the effect of tensile and compressive epitaxial strains on the transport properties of La2-xSrxCuO4 (LSCO) thin films, which were epitaxially grown on a SrLaAlO4 (SLAO) substrate, characterized by an in-plane lattice spacing slightly smaller than that of LSCO ($`a_{\mathrm{LSCO}}=3.777`$ Å, $`a_{\mathrm{SLAO}}=3.755`$ Å). It was shown that such an in-plane compressive strain increased $`T_c`$ up to $`49`$ K in slightly underdoped LSCO ($`x=0.11`$). This important finding is so much more interesting, since in the LSCO compound the hole concentration is mostly determined by the Sr content, together with a small oxygen non-stoichiometry, and seems to be little depending on pressure . In other words, the condition $`dn/dP=0`$ seems to apply to Equation (1), so that the total pressure derivative of $`T_c`$ can be attributed only to “intrinsic” effects.

Within a Ginzburg-Landau phenomenological model, we have discussed the dependence of $`T_c`$ on the microscopic strains for a tetragonal cuprate superconductor . For small strains, we found a monotonic increase of $`T_c`$ with increasing size of the CuO octahedron, whereas we found a nonmonotonic dependence of $`T_c`$ on either apical or in-plane microstrains, as well as on hydrostatic pressure, in agreement with the phenomenology of the high-$`T_c`$ cuprates . Moreover, under epitaxial strain $`\epsilon _{\mathrm{epi}}`$, we found a monotonically decreasing $`T_c`$ in the experimentally accessible range $`0.006\epsilon _{\mathrm{epi}}0.006`$, with a sharp maximum just below the lower bound of the range , in good qualitative and quantitative agreement with the experimental results for epitaxially strained LSCO .

From a microscopic point of view, a nonmonotonic strain dependence of the critical temperature in the high-$`T_c`$ cuprates may be interpreted as due to the proximity to an ETT. In spite of being induced by a change in the hole concentration, as is usually assumed, here we considered a change of topology of the Fermi line as due to a strain-induced variation of the band parameters, such as the next-nearest to nearest neighbours hopping ratio $`r=t^{}/t`$, at constant doping. Figure 5 shows how an ETT may be driven by a change in $`r`$, at constant hole doping $`\delta `$. One recognizes a nonmonotonic dependence of $`T_c`$ on strain, through the hopping ratio $`r`$, the maximum in $`T_c`$ being attained close to the ETT. One also recovers the direct correlation between $`T_c^{\mathrm{max}}`$ and the hopping ratio $`r`$ .

We have also studied the effects of the proximity to an ETT on several normal-state properties of the high-$`T_c`$ cuprates . In the normal state just above $`T_c`$, the effect of the fluctuations can contribute to a better understanding of the unconventional properties of these materials . In particular, most experimental findings can be interpreted as an effect of precursor pairing above $`T_c`$ in the pseudogap region (see, *e.g.,* , and references therein).

In the case of several transport properties in the normal state, such as the Ettinghausen effect, the Nernst effect, the thermopower, the electrical conductivity, and the Hall conductivity, the effect of fluctuations above $`T_c`$ can be embodied in the relaxation rate $`\gamma `$ of the order parameter within the time-dependent Ginzburg-Landau (TDGL) theory for a layered superconductor . In particular, a nonzero imaginary part of such a quantity can be related to an electron-hole asymmetry of the band structure , as is the case with a nonzero hopping ratio $`r=t^{}/t`$ in Equation (3). We have evaluated $`Im\gamma `$ close to an ETT, both numerically and analitically, in the relevant limits, as a function of the critical parameter $`z`$ and temperature . We found that $`Im\gamma `$ is a sign-changing function of $`z`$, with two peaks occurring on both sides of the ETT, whose absolute value increases with increasing $`r`$.

On one hand, the anomalous behaviour of $`Im\gamma `$ close to an ETT is a fingerprint of quantum criticality at $`T=0`$, and is suggestive of the fact that an ETT at $`T=0`$ may be the source of quantum critical fluctuations at the basis of the phase diagram of the high-$`T_c`$ cuprates . On the other hand, the direct correlation of $`|Im\gamma _{\mathrm{peaks}}|`$ on the hopping ratio $`r`$ is in agreement with the universal behaviour of the fluctuation Hall effect in the cuprates , and is again an indication that in-plane anisotropy enhances superconductivity.

## 5 Summary and concluding remarks

We have reviewed our results concerning the pressure dependence of the critical temperature $`T_c`$ in the high-$`T_c`$ cuprate superconductors. Within a mean-field approach to model Hamiltonians, we have evaluated $`T_c`$ as a function of hole content for a bilayered cuprate, and as a function of hole-content distribution for a multilayered cuprate, characterized by inequivalent layers. In the case of a bilayered cuprate, by comparison with available experimental data for Bi2212 under pressure ($`P=01.6`$ GPa), we were able to provide a phenomenological estimate of the “intrinsic” contribution $`T_c/P`$ to the total pressure derivative of $`T_c`$, $`dT_c/dP`$ . In the case of a multilayered cuprate, the crossover among the ‘critical temperatures’ associated to superconductivity setting in in inequivalent layers as a function of the overall hole content is in agreement with the observed kinks in $`T_c`$ as a function of pressure for these layered cuprates ($`P=040`$ GPa) .

We eventually proposed a microscopic interpretation of the observed pressure dependence of $`T_c`$, particularly of its “intrinsic” dependence, in terms of the proximity to an electronic topological transition. Instead of an ETT induced by a change in the hole content, as is usually assumed, we considered a strain-induced ETT, as is possibly the case in recent experiments in epitaxially strained LSCO . In this case, epitaxial strain may induce a change of the topology of the Fermi line by modifying the in-plane band parameters, at constant hole doping. Our results for the dependence of $`T_c`$ and the anomalous size of some fluctuation transport properties above $`T_c`$ on the hopping ratio $`r`$ is in agreement with the universal behaviour of the high-$`T_c`$ cuprates. In particular, an increase of the in-plane anisotropy enhances superconductivity.

I gratefully acknowledge Professor R. Pucci for having introduced me to the fields of superconductivity and high pressure research, and for his continuous support over the years. I also thank Professors F. Siringo, N. H. March, A. A. Varlamov, A. Sudbø for stimulating collaborations and for sharing their invaluable physical insight with me. I also acknowledge Dr. G. Piccitto for many relevant discussions and support. Some of the results reviewed in the present Lecture have been obtained in collaboration with G. Balestrino, P. Cermelli, F. Onufrieva, E. Piegari, P. Podio-Guidugli, R. Pucci, F. Siringo, A. A. Varlamov. This EHPRG Award Lecture is dedicated to my family.

## References