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# Gauged Dimension Bubbles

## I Introduction

An inhomogeneous higher dimensional spacetime compactified to four dimensions (4d) can contain pockets, or, what may be referred to as “dimension bubbles”, where the extra dimensional scale factor becomes large enough that the spacetime has an effective dimensionality within the pocket that is higher than in the surrounding four dimensional spacetime outside of it. Here we consider a dimension bubble, arising from the dimensional reduction of a 5d theory, which encloses a 5d region and is surrounded by a region that is effectively 4d, i.e., the extra dimensional scale factor changes rapidly from the interior of the bubble to the exterior. The two regions are, from a 4d perspective, separated by a domain wall generated by a scalar field associated with the scale factor of the extra space dimension. Such a domain wall can result from a Rubin-Roth potential (which includes bosonic as well as fermionic Casimir energies–which can stabilize the compact extra dimension from collapsing due to the gravitational Casimir effect) along with a cosmological constant, or, in the case of more than one extra dimension, from higher dimensional Maxwell fields or their generalizations. For simplicity, we take the 4d spacetime to be Minkowski and the extra space dimension to be toroidally compact, so that the 5d spacetime has the topology of $`M_4\times S^1`$. (In this sense, the dimension bubbles studied here are simplifications of “gravitational bags”, previously analyzed by Davidson and Guendelman, which have an associated nontrivial spacetime geometry.) Although gravitational bags are static solutions where the surface tension pushing the bubble wall inward is equilibrated with a nontrivial pressure from the scalar field inside, the scalar field inside suffers from a singular behavior at the center of the geometry (although there is still finite energy due to a gravitational effect). There is, however, another way to stabilize the bubble which does not require a singular scalar field at the center of the geometry. The stabilization can be achieved if the inside of the bubble is filled with scalar bosons described by a complex scalar field $`\chi `$.

Previously, it was assumed that the $`\chi `$ field only possessed a global $`U(1)`$ symmetry giving rise to a conserved number charge $`Q`$. Here, we consider the case where the scalar field $`\chi `$ has a local $`U(1)`$ symmetry, i.e., a $`U(1)`$ “gauged dimension bubble”. Because the extra dimensional scale factor $`B(x)`$ can take drastically different values inside and outside of the bubble, the effective “dielectric function” of these two regions can also have drastically different values. As a result, there are nontrivial electromagnetic effects associated with the bubble wall and its 5d interior. In particular, the EM contribution to the mass $`M`$ of the bubble is reduced from what would be expected if the bubble interior were also 4d, that is, if the dilaton associated with the scale factor $`B`$ were constant everywhere. In addition, the bubble wall is found to be almost perfectly reflecting to photons, so that photons cannot pass through the wall from either direction. Entrapped photons can themselves stabilize a bubble from total collapse. The effects of the extra dimension therefore make the gauged dimension bubble an object that is quite different from other purely 4d nontopological solitons, such as gauged Q balls, charged vacuum bubbles, and Fermi balls, that have been studied previously.

We first present the dielectric approach to the study of electromagnetic effects of dimension bubbles, considering a bubble with a 5d interior (emerging from a 5d theory dimensionally reduced to 4d) as a specific prototype. This dielectric approach is then applied to the case of a charged bubble having a conserved number $`Q`$ of charged $`\chi `$ bosons trapped inside the bubble. Upon evaluating the various contributions to the bubble’s energy, the bubble’s equilibrium radius $`R`$ and mass $`M`$ can be obtained. We shall also make a couple of simplifying assumptions. First, we assume a thin walled bubble, i.e., the wall thickness $`\delta R`$, so that in a simplifying limit we may take the inner radius $`R_{}`$ and outer radius $`R_+`$ of the wall to coincide, $`R_{}`$, $`R_+R`$. It is within the wall that the scale factor $`B(x)`$ varies rapidly, and we assume that $`B`$ takes on different constant values in the interior and exterior regions, with the interior value being much greater than the exterior one, $`B_{in}B_{out}`$. This allows for an efficient mechanism of trapping the $`\chi `$ bosons inside the bubble, since the boson mass ($`m_\chi B^{1/2}`$), assumed to be small inside, becomes very large outside, $`m_{\chi ,in}m_{\chi ,out}`$, and a boson therefore experiences an enormous force $`\stackrel{}{F}m_\chi `$ exerted on it by the wall, keeping it in the interior of the bubble.

## II The Model

### A Metric Ansatz and Dimensional Reduction

We begin with a 5d action of the general form

$$S_5=\frac{1}{2\kappa _{N(5)}^2}d^5x\sqrt{\stackrel{~}{g}_5}\left\{\stackrel{~}{R}_52\mathrm{\Lambda }+2\kappa _{N(5)}^2_5\right\}$$
(1)
that is defined on a 5d spacetime with a metric described by

$$ds^2=\stackrel{~}{g}_{MN}dx^Mdx^N=\stackrel{~}{g}_{\mu \nu }dx^\mu dx^\nu +\stackrel{~}{g}_{55}dy^2$$
(2)
Here, $`x^M=(x^\mu ,y)`$ is the set of coordinates on a 5d spacetime with topology of $`M_4\times S^1`$ that has a toroidally compact spacelike extra dimension $`x^5=y`$, which is assumed to be a linear coordinate lying within the range $`0y2\pi R`$. We use the indices $`M`$, $`N=0,\mathrm{},3,5`$ to label the coordinates of the 5d spacetime and the indices $`\mu `$, $`\nu =0,\mathrm{},3`$ to label the coordinates of the noncompact 4d spacetime. A zero mode Kaluza-Klein ansatz is assumed where the fields and metric are independent of $`x^5`$, i.e., $`\stackrel{~}{g}_{MN}=\stackrel{~}{g}_{MN}(x^\mu )`$ depends only on the 4d coordinates with $`_5\stackrel{~}{g}_{MN}=0`$. We also assume that the metric factorizes so that $`\stackrel{~}{g}_{\mu 5}=0`$. A dimensionless scale factor $`B(x^\mu )`$, with $`\stackrel{~}{g}_{55}=B^2`$, is associated with the extra dimension, along with an associated scalar field $`\phi `$ that is related to $`B`$ by

$$\phi =\frac{1}{\kappa _N}\sqrt{\frac{3}{2}}\mathrm{ln}B$$
(3)
The constant $`\kappa _N`$ is related to the 4d Planck mass $`M_P`$ by $`\kappa _N=\sqrt{8\pi G}=\sqrt{8\pi }M_P^1`$. The extra dimensional scale factor can then be written as $`B=e^{\sqrt{2/3}\kappa _N\phi }`$.

Determinants of the 4d and 5d parts of the original metric $`\stackrel{~}{g}_{MN}`$ are denoted by $`\stackrel{~}{g}=det\stackrel{~}{g}_{\mu \nu }`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{g}_5=det\stackrel{~}{g}_{MN}`$, respectively, so that $`\sqrt{|\stackrel{~}{g}_5|}=\sqrt{\stackrel{~}{g}}\sqrt{|\stackrel{~}{g}_{55}|}`$. In the action given by (1), $`\kappa _{N(5)}=\sqrt{8\pi G_5}`$ represents a 5d gravitational constant, $`\stackrel{~}{R}_5=\stackrel{~}{g}^{MN}\stackrel{~}{R}_{MN}`$ is the 5d Ricci scalar built from $`\stackrel{~}{g}_{MN}`$, $`_5`$ is a Lagrangian of the 5d theory, and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is a 5d cosmological constant. In order to pass to an effective 4d theory we define $`=(2\pi R)_5`$ and define $`\kappa _{N(5)}`$ in terms of $`\kappa _N`$ by $`\kappa _{N(5)}^2=(2\pi R)\kappa _N^2`$.

The 4d Jordan Frame metric is $`\stackrel{~}{g}_{\mu \nu }`$, the $`\mu \nu `$ part of the 5d metric $`\stackrel{~}{g}_{MN}`$. A 4d Einstein Frame metric $`g_{\mu \nu }`$ can be defined by $`g_{\mu \nu }=B\stackrel{~}{g}_{\mu \nu }=e^{\sqrt{2/3}\kappa _N\phi }\stackrel{~}{g}_{\mu \nu }`$ and the line element in (2) can be rewritten in terms of the Einstein Frame metric and extra dimensional scale factor as

$$\begin{array}{cc}ds^2\hfill & =B^1g_{\mu \nu }dx^\mu dx^\nu B^2dy^2\hfill \\ & =e^{\sqrt{2/3}\kappa _N\phi }g_{\mu \nu }dx^\mu dx^\nu e^{2\sqrt{2/3}\kappa _N\phi }dy^2\hfill \end{array}$$
(4)
Using (4), a dimensional reduction of the action given by (1) gives the effective 4d Einstein Frame action

$$S=d^4x\sqrt{g}\left\{\frac{1}{2\kappa _N^2}R+\frac{1}{2}(\phi )^2+e^{\sqrt{2/3}\kappa _N\phi }[\frac{1}{\kappa _N^2}\mathrm{\Lambda }]\right\}$$
(5)
where $`R=g^{\mu \nu }R_{\mu \nu }`$ is the 4d Ricci scalar built from the 4d Einstein Frame metric $`g_{\mu \nu }`$ and $`g=detg_{\mu \nu }`$.

### B 4d (Einstein Frame) Effective Lagrangian

Consider a Lagrangian from the 5d theory of a $`U(1)`$ gauged scalar field $`\chi `$,

$$=(2\pi R)_5=\frac{1}{4}\stackrel{~}{F}^{MN}\stackrel{~}{F}_{MN}^{}+(\stackrel{~}{D}^M\chi )^{}(\stackrel{~}{D}_M\chi )V(|\chi |)$$
(6)
which gives rise to an effective 4d (EF) Lagrangian $`_4=B^1`$, and

$$\stackrel{~}{F}_{MN}^{}=_MA_N^{}_NA_M^{},D_M\chi =(_M+ie_0A_M^{})\chi $$
(7)
with $`e_0`$ and $`A_M^{}`$ being the charge parameter and gauge field potential, respectively, appearing in the original 5d Lagrangian, and tildes remind us that indices are raised and lowered with the metric $`\stackrel{~}{g}_{MN}`$, so that $`(\stackrel{~}{D}^M\chi )^{}(\stackrel{~}{D}_M\chi )=\stackrel{~}{g}^{MN}(D_M\chi )^{}(D_N\chi )`$. It is assumed that $`_5\chi =0`$ so that $`D_5\chi =ie_0A_5^{}\chi `$. We then have, with the assumption that $`_5A_\mu ^{}=0`$,

$$\frac{1}{4}\stackrel{~}{F}^{MN}\stackrel{~}{F}_{MN}^{}=\frac{1}{4}B^2F^{\mu \nu }F_{\mu \nu }^{}+\frac{1}{2}B^1(^\mu A_5^{}_\mu A_5^{})$$
(8)
Using $`\stackrel{~}{g}^{\mu \nu }=Bg^{\mu \nu }`$, $`\stackrel{~}{g}^{55}=B^2`$, the scalar field kinetic term is given by

$$\begin{array}{cc}(\stackrel{~}{D}^M\chi )^{}(\stackrel{~}{D}_M\chi )& =(\stackrel{~}{D}^\mu \chi )^{}(\stackrel{~}{D}_\mu \chi )+(\stackrel{~}{D}^5\chi )^{}(\stackrel{~}{D}_5\chi )\\ & =B\left|D_\mu \chi \right|^2e_0^2B^2A_5^2\left|\chi \right|^2\end{array}$$
(9)
The 4d EF effective Lagrangian $`_4=B^1`$ then becomes

$$\begin{array}{cc}_4\hfill & =\frac{1}{4}BF^{\mu \nu }F_{\mu \nu }^{}+\frac{1}{2}B^2(A_5^{})^2+\left|D_\mu \chi \right|^2\hfill \\ & e_0^2B^3A_5^2|\chi |^2B^1V(|\chi |)\hfill \end{array}$$
(10)
The $`\phi `$ \- dependent potential $`U(\phi )`$ (which contains, e.g., the Rubin-Roth potential, $`V_{RR}`$, and cosmological constant, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, terms), along with the $`\phi `$ kinetic term $`\frac{1}{2}(\phi )^2`$ and gravitational term $`\frac{1}{2\kappa _N^2}R`$ can be added to get a total 4d effective Lagrangian

$$\begin{array}{cc}_{eff}\hfill & =_4+\frac{1}{2\kappa _N^2}R+\frac{1}{2}(\phi )^2U\hfill \\ & =\frac{1}{2\kappa _N^2}R+\frac{1}{2}(\phi )^2\frac{1}{4}BF^{\mu \nu }F_{\mu \nu }^{}+\frac{1}{2}B^2(A_5^{})^2+\left|D_\mu \chi \right|^2W\hfill \end{array}$$
(11)
where we define a total effective potential

$$W=U(\phi )+B^1V(|\chi |)+e_0^2B^3A_5^2|\chi |^2$$
(12)
### C Dielectric Approach

The 4d Einstein Frame effective Lagrangian $`_{eff}`$ above contains a Maxwell term $`\frac{1}{4}BF^{\mu \nu }F_{\mu \nu }^{}`$ and a gauge covariant derivative $`D_\mu \chi =(_\mu +ie_0A_\mu ^{})\chi `$. Let us define a rescaled gauge field $`A_M=B_4^{1/2}A_M^{}`$, where $`B_4`$ (or $`B_5`$) denotes the value of $`B`$ in a region of 4d (or 5d) spacetime outside (or inside) of a dimension bubble, so that in a region of 4d spacetime the Maxwell term is properly normalized and assumes a canonical form, $`\frac{1}{4}B_4F^{\mu \nu }F_{\mu \nu }^{}=\frac{1}{4}F^{\mu \nu }F_{\mu \nu }`$, with

$$F_{\mu \nu }=_\mu A_\nu _\nu A_\mu ,A_\mu =B_4^{1/2}A_\mu ^{},A_5=B_4^{1/2}A_5^{}$$
(13)
The gauge covariant derivative operator $`D_\mu =(_\mu +ie_0A_\mu ^{})`$ can be written as

$$D_\mu =(_\mu +ie_0B_4^{1/2}A_\mu )=(_\mu +ieA_\mu )$$
(14)
where we have defined the 4d effective, or physical, charge

$$e=B_4^{1/2}e_0$$
(15)
We also define the “dielectric function”

$$\kappa (x^\mu )=\frac{B(x^\mu )}{B_4}$$
(16)
In terms of physical 4d quantities, the effective 4d Lagrangian in (11) now assumes the form

$$_{eff}=\frac{1}{2\kappa _N^2}R+\frac{1}{2}(\phi )^2\frac{1}{4}\kappa F_{\mu \nu }F^{\mu \nu }+\frac{1}{2}\kappa ^2B_4^3(A_5)^2+|D_\mu \chi |^2W$$
(17)
where

$$W=U(\phi )+\kappa ^1B_4^1V(|\chi |)+e^2\kappa ^3B_4^3A_5^2|\chi |^2$$
(18)
The function $`\kappa `$ is seen to play the role of a dielectric function, except that in this case it arises as a consequence of the possible position dependence of the extra dimensional scale factor $`B`$. Thus, from a 4d perspective, a region of effectively 5d spacetime is viewed as being endowed with a dielectric property described by $`\kappa `$. We also note that in a 4d region $`\kappa 1`$, and that $`\kappa _5=B_5/B_4>1`$, and, in particular, we assume that $`\kappa _51`$. Using the familiar results of electrostatics, we have that the normal component of the “displacement” field $`\stackrel{}{D}=\kappa \stackrel{}{E}`$ and the tangential components of the electric field $`\stackrel{}{E}`$ are continuous at an interface between two media with different dielectric constants.

### D Effective Potential, Vacuum, and $`\chi `$ Boson Mass

The total effective potential $`W`$ of the 4d theory is given by eq. (18). The vacuum state is obtained by minimizing $`W`$ with respect to $`\phi `$ (or $`\kappa `$), $`\chi `$, and $`A_5`$:

$$\begin{array}{cc}\frac{W}{\kappa }\hfill & =\frac{U}{\kappa }B_4^1\kappa ^2V3e^2B_4^3\kappa ^4A_5^2|\chi |^2=0,\hfill \\ & \\ \frac{W}{\chi ^{}}\hfill & =B_4^1\kappa ^1\frac{V}{\chi ^{}}+e^2B_4^3\kappa ^3A_5^2\chi =0,\hfill \\ & \\ \frac{W}{A_5}\hfill & =2e^2B_4^3\kappa ^3A_5|\chi |^2=0\hfill \end{array}$$
(19)
These equations are solved by $`A_5=0`$, $`V/\chi ^{}=0`$, and $`U/\kappa B_4^1\kappa ^2V=0`$. (Later we will consider the case for which $`V=\mu _0^2\chi ^{}\chi `$, giving $`\chi =0`$, $`V=0`$, $`U/\kappa =0`$, with $`A_5`$ undetermined, and we will assume that $`A_5=0`$.)

The 5d mass parameter for the $`\chi `$ field is denoted by $`\mu _0^2=(^2V/\chi ^{}\chi )|_{vac}`$, so that the effective $`\chi `$ boson mass in the 4d effective (EF) theory is given by

$$m_\chi ^2=\left(\frac{^2W}{\chi ^{}\chi }\right)_{vac}=\left[B^1\mu _0^2+e^2B_4^3\kappa ^3A_5^2\right]_{vac}$$
(20)
Assuming the vacuum value of $`A_5`$ to vanish, we have simply

$$m_\chi =B^{1/2}\mu _0=\kappa ^{1/2}\mu _4$$
(21)
where we define $`\mu _4=B_4^{1/2}\mu _0`$. In this effective 4d dilaton-Maxwell system, the effects of the scale factor (or dilaton $`\phi `$) become manifest in the 4d mass parameter $`m_\chi `$. In the 5d region of a dimension bubble interior, where $`\kappa 1`$, the mass $`\kappa _5^{1/2}\mu _4`$ becomes very small or negligible in comparison to the mass $`\mu _4`$ in the 4d region outside the bubble. This effective mass dependence of $`m_\chi `$ upon $`\kappa `$ gives rise to the entrapment of $`\chi `$ bosons inside the bubble.

## III Gauged Dimension Bubble

Consider the case where a domain bubble forms, entrapping a conserved number $`Q`$ of $`\chi `$ bosons. (For definiteness, we take the electromagnetic charge $`Qe`$ to be positive and the potential $`V`$ is taken to be given by $`V=\mu _0^2\chi ^{}\chi `$.) The simplified situation is assumed to exist for which the bosons are nearly massless inside the bubble, so that a gas of ultra-relativistic particles exists inside, and the bosons are massive outside, with the boson mass being $`m`$. We assume that the bubble takes a spherical shape at equilibrium. The inner surface of the bubble wall lies at a radius $`R_{}`$ and the outer surface is located at $`R_+`$. We will use a thin wall approximation, in which case $`R_{}R_+R`$.

The mass $`M`$ of the bubble gets contributions from the kinetic energy $`_\chi `$ of the $`\chi `$ bosons, the energy of the domain wall forming the bubble surface, $`_W=4\pi R^2\sigma `$, and the electromagnetic (EM) energy due to the entrapped $`\chi `$ bosons, $`_{em}`$. In addition, there is a contribution from the $`\phi `$ \- dependent potential $`U(\phi )`$ in the interior of the bubble. This arises from the fact that we are considering the case where $`U(\phi )0`$ in the 4d vacuum region and $`U(\phi )>0`$ in the 5d vacuum region of the bubble’s interior, where $`\phi `$ assumes a large, but finite, value. Denoting the value of $`U(\phi )`$ in the bubble’s interior by $`\lambda `$, a constant in our approximation, we have the corresponding volume term $`_V=\frac{4}{3}\pi \lambda R^3`$ contributing to the mass $`M`$ of the bubble. The bubble mass can therefore be written as

$$M=_\chi +_{em}+_W+_V$$
(22)
The first term $`_\chi `$ in this expression for the mass can be estimated easily. For the ground state kinetic energy of an ultra-relativistic $`\chi `$ boson trapped inside a bubble of radius $`R`$, we take the boson wavelength to be roughly equal to the bubble diameter, $`\lambda _\chi 2R`$. Then the kinetic energy is $`_{\text{kin}}2\pi /\lambda _\chi \pi /R`$. The kinetic energy of $`Q`$ bosons in the ground state is then approximately $`_\chi =Q\pi /R`$. For the EM energy we need to integrate the electromagnetic energy density $`u=\frac{1}{2}\stackrel{}{D}\stackrel{}{E}=\frac{1}{2}\kappa E^2`$ over all space,

$$_{em}=u𝑑V=2\pi _0^{\mathrm{}}\kappa E^2r^2𝑑r$$
(23)
### A Electric and Displacement Fields

The EM field satisfies the field equation $`_\mu (\kappa F^{\mu \nu })=j^\nu =eJ^\nu `$, where $`J^\mu `$ is the current per unit charge that generates the $`\chi `$ boson number density, so that $`Q=J^0𝑑V`$. As a simplifying approximation we assume that $`B`$ and $`\kappa =B/B_4`$ take on constant values inside and outside the bubble:

$$B=\left\{\begin{array}{cc}B_5,\hfill & \text{inside, }(r<R)\hfill \\ B_4,\hfill & \text{outside, }(r>R)\hfill \end{array}\right\},\kappa =\left\{\begin{array}{cc}\kappa _5=\frac{B_5}{B_4},\hfill & \text{inside, }(r<R)\hfill \\ 1,\hfill & \text{outside, }(r>R)\hfill \end{array}\right\}$$
(24)
We therefore have $`\stackrel{}{D}=j^0=\rho `$, where $`\stackrel{}{D}=\kappa \stackrel{}{E}`$, and by Gauss’ Law the radial displacement field is $`(4\pi r^2)D=q_{en}=_V\rho 𝑑V`$, and $`q_{en}=Q_{en}e`$, where $`Q_{en}`$ is the number of bosons enclosed within the volume $`V`$. The radial component of the displacement field is therefore

$$D=\kappa E(r)=\frac{q_{en}(r)}{4\pi r^2}=\frac{Q_{en}(r)e}{4\pi r^2}$$
(25)
Inside the bubble we approximate the charge density as a constant so that $`\rho =Qe/(\frac{4}{3}\pi R^3)`$, and

$$q_{en}(r)=\left\{\begin{array}{cc}\frac{Qer^3}{R^3},& (rR)\\ Qe,& (rR)\end{array}\right\}$$
(26)
We therefore obtain the displacement field

$$D=\left\{\begin{array}{cc}\kappa _5E_5=\frac{Qer}{4\pi R^3},\hfill & (r<R)\hfill \\ E_4=\frac{Qe}{4\pi r^2},\hfill & (r>R)\hfill \end{array}\right\}$$
(27)
where $`E_5`$ ($`E_4`$) denotes the electric field inside (outside) the bubble. The displacement $`\stackrel{}{D}`$ is continuous at the bubble wall, but with our thin wall approximation with an infinitely thin domain wall, the value of the electric field jumps up by a factor of $`\kappa _5`$ on the outer surface of the bubble. The interior of the bubble appears as a dielectric with an enormous dielectric constant $`\kappa _51`$.

### B Electromagnetic Energy $`_{em}`$

We calculate the EM energy associated with the configuration by integrating the EM energy density $`u=\frac{1}{2}\stackrel{}{D}\stackrel{}{E}`$ over all space. From (27)

$$u=\left\{\begin{array}{cc}\left(\frac{Q^2\alpha }{8\pi }\right)\frac{r^2}{\kappa _5R^6},& (r<R)\\ \left(\frac{Q^2\alpha }{8\pi }\right)\frac{1}{r^4},& (r>R)\end{array}\right\}$$
(28)
where $`\alpha =e^2/4\pi `$. The EM configuration energy

$$_{em}=_0^{\mathrm{}}u\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}4}\pi r^2𝑑r=2\pi _0^R\kappa _5E_5^2r^2𝑑r+2\pi _R^{\mathrm{}}E_4^2r^2𝑑r$$
(29)
is then given by

$$_{em}=\frac{Q^2\alpha }{2R}\left(1+\frac{1}{5\kappa _5}\right)=\frac{Q^2\alpha }{2R}\left(1+\frac{1}{5}\frac{B_4}{B_5}\right)$$
(30)
For $`\kappa _51`$, the contribution to $`_{em}`$ from the interior region is negligible in comparison to the contribution from the exterior region. If the dielectric constant inside the bubble were unity, the EM energy would be $`\frac{3}{5}\frac{Q^2\alpha }{R}`$, so that the effect of a macroscopic extra dimension is a reduction of the EM energy of the bubble.

### C Bubble Mass and Radius

Eq. (22) for the bubble mass gives, approximately,

$$M=_\chi +_{em}+_W+_V=\frac{Q\pi }{R}\left(1+\frac{Q\alpha c}{2\pi }\right)+4\pi \sigma R^2+\frac{4}{3}\pi \lambda R^3$$
(31)
where

$$c=\left(1+\frac{1}{5\kappa _5}\right)=\left(1+\frac{1}{5}\frac{B_4}{B_5}\right)$$
(32)
The equilibrium radius is obtained by minimizing the expression for $`M`$ with respect to $`R`$, holding the charge $`Q`$ fixed. The equilibrium mass of a bubble at its equilibrium radius can then be obtained. We consider two limiting cases allowing us to obtain analytical expressions for the bubble’s equilibrium mass and radius: (i) the surface term $`_W`$ is negligible and (ii) the volume term $`_V`$ is negligible.

(i) Negligible Surface Term $`_W`$: For the first case we assume that $`_W_\chi +_{em}`$ and $`_W_V`$, which can be rewritten as the conditions

$$\frac{4\sigma R^3}{Q\left(1+\frac{Q\alpha c}{2\pi }\right)}1,\frac{3\sigma }{\lambda R}1$$
(33)
In this case the bubble mass is approximately $`M=_\chi +_{em}+_V`$. We get for the equilibrium radius $`R`$ and equilibrium mass $`M`$, respectively,

$$R=\left[\frac{Q\left(1+\frac{Q\alpha c}{2\pi }\right)}{4\lambda }\right]^{1/4}$$
(34)
and

$$M=\pi (4\lambda )^{1/4}\left[Q\left(1+\frac{Q\alpha c}{2\pi }\right)\right]^{3/4}=\frac{\pi Q}{R}\left(1+\frac{Q\alpha c}{2\pi }\right)$$
(35)
Using (34) we find that the conditions of (33) are approximately satisfied for

$$\sigma \left[\lambda ^3Q\left(1+\frac{Q\alpha c}{2\pi }\right)\right]^{1/4}$$
(36)
(ii) Negligible Volume Term $`_V`$: For the second case we assume that $`_V_\chi +_{em}`$ and $`_V_W`$, which can be rewritten as the conditions

$$\lambda \frac{3\sigma }{R},\lambda \frac{3Q}{4R^4}\left(1+\frac{Q\alpha c}{2\pi }\right)$$
(37)
The bubble mass in this case is approximately $`M=_\chi +_{em}+_V`$, and we get for the equilibrium radius $`R`$ and equilibrium mass $`M`$, respectively,

$$R=\frac{1}{2}\left[\frac{Q}{\sigma }\left(1+\frac{Q\alpha c}{2\pi }\right)\right]^{1/3}$$
(38)
and

$$M=3\pi \sigma ^{1/3}\left[Q\left(1+\frac{Q\alpha c}{2\pi }\right)\right]^{2/3}=\frac{3\pi Q}{2R}\left(1+\frac{Q\alpha c}{2\pi }\right)$$
(39)
Using (38) we find that the conditions of (37) are approximately satisfied for

$$\lambda \sigma ^{3/4}\left[Q\left(1+\frac{Q\alpha c}{2\pi }\right)\right]^{1/3}$$
(40)
We can notice that the ratio

$$\frac{_{em}}{_\chi }=\frac{Q\alpha c}{2\pi }=\frac{Q\alpha }{2\pi }\left(1+\frac{1}{5\kappa _5}\right)$$
(41)
indicates that $`_\chi `$ dominates $`_{em}`$ for $`Q2\pi /\alpha `$ and vice versa for $`Q2\pi /\alpha `$.

## IV Photon Opacity and Photon Stabilized Bubbles

### A Bubble Wall Opacity

An interesting effect associated with the difference in space dimensionalities inside and outside of a dimension bubble is the opacity of the bubble wall to electromagnetic radiation. From the Lagrangian for the EM field $`F_{\mu \nu }`$, given by (17), we have the field equations $`_\mu (\kappa F^{\mu \nu })=j^\nu `$, which represents Maxwell’s equations in terms of the displacement field $`\stackrel{}{D}=ϵ\stackrel{}{E}=\kappa \stackrel{}{E}`$ and the magnetic field $`\stackrel{}{H}=\stackrel{}{B}/\mu =\kappa \stackrel{}{B}`$. We then identify the permittivity $`ϵ`$, permeability $`\mu `$, index of refraction $`n=\sqrt{ϵ\mu }`$, and “impedance” $`Z=\sqrt{\mu /ϵ}`$ of a region of space as

$$\begin{array}{ccc}ϵ=\frac{1}{\mu }=\kappa ,& n=\sqrt{ϵ\mu }=1,& Z=\sqrt{\mu /ϵ}=\frac{1}{\kappa }\end{array}$$
(42)
The reflectivity and transmissivity of light at an interface between two dielectrics with indices $`ϵ_I`$, $`\mu _I`$ and $`ϵ_T`$, $`\mu _T`$, where $`I,T`$ represent the incident and transmitting media, respectively, can be obtained from classical electrodynamics. For example, light impinging upon an interface between two media with impedances $`Z_I`$ and $`Z_T`$ has an associated reflection ratio given<sup>*</sup><sup>*</sup>*This result for the reflection ratio $``$ is true for all angles of incidence. This follows from Snell’s law and the fact that the index of refraction is unity everywhere. by

$$=\frac{E_R}{E_I}=\frac{1(Z_T/Z_I)}{1+(Z_T/Z_I)}$$
(43)
For light impinging upon the bubble wall from either the inside or the outside, we have $`||1O(\kappa _5^1)1`$, where $`\kappa _5^1=B_4/B_51`$. Therefore the bubble wall is almost totally opaque to EM radiation, and photons inside the bubble remain effectively trapped inside the bubble. Photon radiation pressure therefore serves as yet another means of stabilizing a dimension bubble against collapse.

### B Photon Stabilized Bubble

A dimension bubble may contain a bath of photon radiation in addition to the charged bosons in its interior. Let us focus on a limiting case in which essentially all the energy density of the bubble’s contents is due to photons. The photon energy densityIn keeping with our Kaluza-Klein zero mode ansatz, we assume that there are essentially no nonzero momentum states in the direction of the extra dimension. is $`\rho _\gamma =(\pi ^2/15)T^4=aT^4`$, so that the energy of the bubble is

$$M=_\gamma +_W=\frac{4}{3}\pi \rho _\gamma R^3+4\pi \sigma R^2=\frac{4\pi ^3}{45}T^4R^3+4\pi \sigma R^2$$
(44)
The bubble, after it forms, will adjust its radius to reach an equilibrium with an adiabatic (isentropic) expansion or contraction. The photon entropy density is $`s_\gamma T^3`$, and if we assume that the bubble adjusts its radius to reach equilibrium on a very small time scale so that essentially no energy is lost from the bubble during equilibration, we have that

$$RT=const$$
(45)
Using these expressions, a minimization of the mass function gives an equilibrium radius $`R`$ and an equilibrium mass $`M`$ of

$$R=\frac{90}{\pi ^2}\frac{\sigma }{T^4},M=12\pi \sigma R^2$$
(46)
(One could also obtain these results by balancing the photon pressure with the pressure associated with the tension in the domain wall.)

To estimate the lifetime of such a bubble, we use the fact that photons slowly leak out through the bubble wall at a rate that depends upon the transmission coefficient $`𝒯O(\kappa _5^1)`$. Using Poynting’s theorem relating the Poynting flux through the bubble wall to the rate of energy decrease inside the bubble, we estimate that the bubble loses energy at a rate

$$\frac{dM}{dt}S_T(4\pi R^2)$$
(47)
where $`S_T=𝒯S_{inc}=𝒯\rho _\gamma `$ is the Poynting flux transmitted through the bubble wall, $`𝒯`$ is the transmission coefficient, $`S_{inc}`$ is the Poynting flux incident upon the wall, and $`\rho _\gamma =aT^4=(\pi ^2/15)T^4`$ is the photon energy density. We then have, from (46) and (47),

$$\frac{dM}{dt}\left(𝒯aT^4\right)(4\pi R^2)24\pi \sigma R\frac{dR}{dt}$$
(48)
which gives

$$\frac{dR}{dt}𝒯O(\kappa _5^1)$$
(49)
At time $`t`$ a bubble has a radius $`RR_0𝒯t`$, and the lifetime of the bubble is

$$\tau \frac{R_0}{𝒯}O(\kappa _5)R_0$$
(50)
A remark is in order for the case of a dimension bubble with a 5d interior, whose domain wall arises, in part, from the low temperature Rubin-Roth potential contribution to the effective potential $`U(\phi )`$. In this case the local minimum of $`U(\phi )`$ disappears at high temperatures, so that the domain wall itself disappears, or “bursts”, at some temperature $`T_c`$. Therefore the photon temperature of the bubble’s (5d) interior must be restricted to values $`TT_c`$. At a temperature $`TT_c`$ the bubble would burst, releasing all of its radiation. From (46) we see that as the bubble shrinks, the photon temperature increases. When the temperature reaches $`TT_c`$, the bubble explodes, so that the bubble lifetime is actually $`\tau O(\kappa _5)R_0`$.

## V Summary

The dimension bubble scenario has been extended to include Maxwell fields and sources. Beginning with a 5d Maxwell theory with sources, the reduction to four dimensions leads to an effective 4d dilaton-Maxwell system that, in the dielectric approach, leads to an interpretation of the extra dimensional scale factor $`B(x)`$ as a dielectric function $`\kappa (x)=B(x)/B_4`$ that takes drastically different values $`\kappa _51`$ in the interior of a bubble and $`\kappa =1`$ in the exterior. One result of this is that the electromagnetic energy associated with charged scalar bosons confined to the bubble’s interior is reduced from what would be the case for a 4d interior. This is due to the fact that the electromagnetic energy density $`u=\frac{1}{2}\kappa E^2=D^2/2\kappa `$ is greatly suppressed in a 5d interior with dielectric constant $`\kappa _5`$.

Another, somewhat striking, result is that the bubble wall possesses a near total reflectivity for $`\kappa _51`$, making it opaque to photons incident upon it from either side. Photons that are trapped within the bubble at its time of formation cannot easily escape, so that a dimension bubble can be held in a metastable state, supported by entrapped photons alone. The photon temperature, however, must remain below the critical temperature $`T_c`$ above which the domain wall disappears and an existing bubble would burst. A bubble filled with photons slowly decreases in size, with a resulting lifetime $`\tau O(\kappa _5)R_0`$. As the bubble shrinks, the temperature $`T`$ inside increases until it reaches a critical temperature $`T_c`$, at which time the bubble explodes, releasing its radiation contents.


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# 1. Introduction

## 1. Introduction

Over decades since the works of Kaluza and Klein the idea of extra dimensions enjoys constantly growing interest of the physical community. Designed originally to serve the unification of the General Relativity and Maxwell electrodynamics it is now more fashionable to invoke the extra dimensions for solving the problems of hierarchy and vacuum energy. A recent review on old and new paths to the extra dimensions is . It is customary nowadays to consider the Kaluza-Klein idea in the context of the brane paradigm. According to this picture, the non-gravitational physics, conveniently described by the Standard Model, is confined to a $`(3+1)`$-dimensional subspace called brane of the $`(4+n)`$-dimensional space-time with $`n`$ compactified extra dimensions. Only gravitational field is allowed to propagate through the whole spacetime and probe the extra dimensions. If $`L`$ is a typical size of the extra dimensions the gravitational physics on the brane is expected to be $`(4+n)`$-dimensional on the scales of order $`L`$ and smaller while the familiar 4-dimensional gravitational interaction is supposed to emerge on the much larger than $`L`$ scales. A standard way to study this is to look at the static Newton potential along the brane. At large distances $`rL`$ it takes the 4-dimensional form $`G_4/4\pi r`$, with $`G_4`$ being the induced 4-dimensional Newton constant, while the higher dimensional physics manifests in exponentially small corrections, $`e^{r/L}`$.

In this paper we give up staticity and look at propagation of waves. The higher-dimensional corrections to the purely 4-dimensional law of propagation then are no more exponentially small but have a power law. This makes the waves a more convenient tool for probing the extra dimensions. Some puzzling surprises are however awaiting for us on this venue. Most surprising is the fact that the causal propagation of wave signals from a source is radically different for odd and even dimensions. This differenceThe mathematical theory of the propagation of waves in various dimensions is known for quite long time, see for example . is most transparent in the retarded potentials. In even dimensions, $`(3+1)`$-dimensional space-time being a particular example, the retarded potential is proportional to the delta-function of $`(tr)`$ and thus is concentrated on the future light-cone and vanishing everywhere else. In contrast, the retarded potential in odd spacetime dimensions has support everywhere inside the light-cone! Additionally, there appear non-integrable divergences on the forefront of the propagating wave. The above properties make the wave propagation in 5-dimensional space-time very much different from the propagation in the 4-dimensional case. In particular, the night sky would look quite differently if we lived in 5-dimensional Universe. Even already dead stars would still produce flashing spots on the sky so that night would not be as dark as in our home Universe. A natural question arises§§§ This question should have been asked years ago. However, with few exemptions , ,  this property of wave propagation remains unknown in the current literature on extra dimensions.: how after all these differences the large scale propagation on the brane still manages to be 4-dimensional even though it is built out of the 5-dimensionally propagating waves. In this paper we address this question and moreover study the manifestations of the 5-dimensional character of the wave propagation in the form of corrections to the purely 4-dimensional law.

We find a few interesting effects. First, we consider propagation of a signal of finite duration $`T`$ emitted by a source on the brane. In purely 4-dimensional picture an observer at some large distance from the source would see a pulse of same finite duration $`T`$. In the 5-dimensional picture with compact extra dimension the signal detected by an observer is a superposition of signals coming from large number of images additionally to the original source. In fact, the purely 4-dimensional picture arises as a result of this superposition. The corrections are however important. Most significantly, when the entire signal has passed through the point of observation there still remain signals coming from the images which are inside the past light-cone of the point of observation. These signals keep arriving and result in a tail, a power-like decaying with time signal. The whole effects thus is due to the combination of the 5-dimensional feature of the propagation inside the light-cone which we mentioned above and the compactness of the fifth dimension manifested in presence of large number of images. On the other hand, the shape of the forefront of the signal is modified by what we call screening effect: corrections appear with negative sign and smooth out the otherwise a step-like forefront profile. Another effect appears for the periodic signal. We find that the amplitude of the signal at the point of observation is amplified with a frequency-dependent amplification factor. Both effects are proportional to $`L`$ in some power and are clear indications of the presence of the extra dimension. This makes it interesting to reconcile these effects with modern observational possibilities available at LIGO or LISA.

This paper is organized as follows. In section 2 we formulate the set-up and find various representations for the Green’s function describing propagation of the 5-dimensional signal along the lower-dimensional subspace (brane). We focus on the retarded potentials in section 3 and derive the 5-dimensional potential consistent with the boundary conditions we impose along the fifth dimension. The propagation of the finite pulse is considered in section 4 and the periodic signal in section 5. In section 6 we estimate the predicted effects and compare them with the available sensitivity of the gravitational detectors.

## 2. Many faces of the Green’s function

### 2.1. The set-up

We consider flat 5-dimensional space-time covered by coordinates $`X^A=(x^\mu ,y)`$ where $`y`$ is the coordinate along the fifth dimension and $`x^\mu ,\mu =0,1,2,3`$ are the four-dimensional coordinates. We restrict the coordinate $`y`$ to lie within the interval between $`y=0`$ and $`y=L`$ and we impose the Neumann boundary conditions on the perturbations of the five-dimensional gravitational field at the ends of this interval. $`L`$ is thus a size of the extra dimension. Our four-dimensional world with experimental devices, standard model particles and human beings resign on the four-dimensional subspace at $`y=0`$ so that only gravitational field may propagate into the fifth dimension. The subspace $`y=0`$ (as well as the one at $`y=L`$) can be also thought of as a zero-tension brane. We sometimes will use this terminology. A generalization to branes with non-vanishing tension (the Neumann boundary condition then has to be replaced by a condition of the Robin type) is possible although technically more involved. Another possible setting is to impose the periodic boundary conditions $`\varphi (x,y=0)=\varphi (x,y=L)`$, where $`\varphi (x,y)`$ stands for the relevant five-dimensional perturbation. In this case we have a standard Kaluza-Klein configuration. Although all our results are naturally extended to the case with periodic boundary conditions, we will stick to the scenario with the Neumann boundary conditions.

### 2.2. Kaluza-Klein representation

It should be noted that in what follows we systematically ignore the tensor structure of the gravitational perturbations assuming that the field equation of interest takes the form of the scalar type field equation

$`\left(_0^2+_y^2+_𝐱^2\right)\varphi (y,x^0,𝐱)=0`$ (2.1)
subject to the boundary conditions

$`_y\varphi (y,x^0,𝐱)|_{y=0}=_y\varphi (y,x^0,𝐱)|_{y=L}=0.`$ (2.2)
The normalized modes forming the basis of functions in the $`y`$-direction are

$`\phi _n(y)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{L}}},n=0`$ (2.3)
$`\phi _n(y)=\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{2}{L}}}\mathrm{cos}(m_ny),m_n={\displaystyle \frac{n\pi }{L}},n>0`$ (2.4)
while in the $`x`$-direction the modes are the usual plane waves $`e^{ipx}`$ appropriately normalized on the delta-function. In terms of these modes the 5-dimensional propagator (or the Green’s function) defined as a solution to the field equation with delta-like source

$`_5^2D_5(X,X^{})=\delta (X,X^{})`$ (2.5)
takes the following five-dimensional momentum space representation

$`D_5(X,X^{})={\displaystyle \frac{1}{(2\pi )^4}}{\displaystyle d^4p\underset{n=0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}e^{ip(xx^{})}\frac{\phi _n(y)\phi _n(y^{})}{p^2+m_n^2}},`$ (2.6)
where $`p^2=p_0^2+𝐩^2`$. In Lorentzian signature there are various types of propagator depending on the contour chosen when the integration over momenta is taken. The particular choices of the integration will be discussed in the next section. Here for simplicity of the presentation we switch to the Euclidean signature by means of the analytic continuation $`p_0=ip_4`$ so that $`p^2`$ becomes a positive quantity and the problem of the integration contour does not arise.

We see that $`m_n`$ introduced in (2.4) have the meaning of the Kaluza-Klein masses. Note that in case of periodic boundary conditions we would get a similar form for the propagator with different set of Kaluza-Klein masses $`m_n=2\pi n/L`$.

The main object of interest in the present paper is the reduction of the propagator (2.6) to the subspace $`y=0`$. In other words, we are interested in the situation when the gravitational 5-dimensional signal propagates between two points on the subspace where we happen to live. This propagation is described by the quantity

$`D(x,x^{})D_5(X,X^{})|_{y=y^{}=0}.`$ (2.7)
It is clear from equation (2.6) that $`D(x,x^{})`$ reduces to the series of 4-dimensional massive Green’s functions of the Kaluza-Klein tower

$`D(x,x^{})={\displaystyle \frac{1}{(2\pi )^4L}}{\displaystyle d^4p\underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\frac{e^{ip(xx^{})}}{p^2+m_n^2}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{L}}{\displaystyle \underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}D(m_n^2|xx^{}),`$ (2.8)
where

$`D(m^2|xx^{})={\displaystyle \frac{m}{4\pi ^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{K_1(m|xx^{}|)}{|xx^{}|}},|xx^{}|=\sqrt{(xx^{})^2}`$ (2.9)
is the 4-dimensional propagator of massive field given in Euclidean space by the MacDonald function of the first order. Equation (2.8) gives us the first, very natural from the Kaluza-Klein perspective, representation for the brane-to-brane propagator as mediated by the set of massive Kaluza-Klein fields.

### 2.3. Momentum space representation

Another way to look at the expression (2.8) is to consider it as a momentum space representation for the entirely four-dimensional propagator

$`D(x,x^{})={\displaystyle \frac{1}{(2\pi )^4L}}{\displaystyle d^4pD(p)e^{ip(xx^{})}}`$ (2.10)
with the non-trivial propagator $`D(p)`$ as a function of the 4-dimensional momentum $`p`$. $`D(p)`$ is expressed in terms of the infinite sum over Kaluza-Klein masses as in (2.8). For the tower of these masses given by (2.4) (tracing back to the boundary conditions (2.2)) the sum over $`n`$ can be calculated explicitly and the answer is

$`D(p){\displaystyle \underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{p^2+m_n^2}}={\displaystyle \frac{L}{p}}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cosh}(Lp)}{\mathrm{sinh}(Lp)}},p=\sqrt{p^2}.`$ (2.11)
Notice that (2.11) is valid for the Euclidean signature. Switching to the Lorentzian signature is provided by the analytic continuation $`pip`$ so that the Lorentzian form of the propagator $`D(p)`$ at timelike momenta is the following

$`D_M(p)={\displaystyle \frac{L}{p}}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cos}(Lp)}{\mathrm{sin}(Lp)}},p=\sqrt{p^2}.`$ (2.12)
Notice that it has poles at real values of $`p`$, $`Lp=\pi n`$, which correspond to the Kaluza-Klein modes. Additionally $`D_M(p)`$ has zeros at $`Lp=\frac{\pi }{2}(2n+1)`$, $`n`$ is integer. The physical interpretation of the zeros of the propagator is less clearThese zeros guarantee the positivity of residues of the propagator at its poles or the normal non-ghost nature of the corresponding Kaluza-Klein modes and also follow from the duality of the Dirichlet and Neumann boundary value problems in braneworld physics .. At large values of momentum (or, respectively for very short space-time intervals) the propagator (2.11) behaves as $`D(p)\frac{1}{p}`$, the typical behavior of truly 5-dimensional propagation as it is seen from a lower-dimensional subspace. On the other hand, at small values of momentum (i.e. at large intervals on the brane) the four-dimensional behavior $`D(p)\frac{1}{p^2}`$ is recovered. This guarantees us that the four-dimensional physics is reproduced at large scales even though the underlying physics is 5-dimensionalFor a curved de Sitter brane embedded in various 5-dimensional backgrounds this transition was analyzed in detail in . The cross-over between two regimes happens at the space-time intervals $`s^2(x,x^{})`$ of order $`L^2`$. Provided we were not aware that our four-dimensional world is embedded into a higher-dimensional space-time we would have to deal with the propagator (2.12) as a non-trivial function of the 4-momentum $`p`$ not being aware about its Kaluza-Klein origin.

### 2.4. Sum over images representation

The integration over momentum in (2.10) includes the integration over angles and the integration over absolute value $`p`$ of the 4-momentum. Inserting the exact expression (2.11) into (2.10) the integration over angles can be performed explicitly and gives

$`D(x)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\pi ^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{|x|}}{\displaystyle \underset{0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}𝑑pp{\displaystyle \frac{1}{L}}D(p)J_1(p|x|),`$ (2.13)
where the table integral

$`{\displaystyle \underset{0}{\overset{\pi }{}}}𝑑\theta \mathrm{sin}^2\theta e^{iy\mathrm{cos}\theta }={\displaystyle \frac{\pi }{y}}J_1(y)`$ (2.14)
has been used. Taking into account that on the real axis the following relation holds between the Bessel and Hankel functions

$`J_1(z)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\left(H_1^{(1)}(z)+H_1^{(2)}(z)\right)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\left(H_1^{(1)}(z)+H_1^{(1)}(z)\right)`$ (2.15)
one can transform the integral to the integration over the whole real axis of $`p`$ with the principal value prescription at $`p=0`$

$`{\displaystyle \underset{0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}𝑑pp{\displaystyle \frac{1}{L}}D(p)J_1(p|x|)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\mathrm{P}{\displaystyle \underset{\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}𝑑pp{\displaystyle \frac{1}{L}}D(p)H_1^{(1)}(p|x|).`$ (2.16)
By closing the contour of integration in the upper-half plane of the complex variable $`p`$ one finds that the result reduces to the contribution of poles on the imaginary semiaxis, $`p_n=im_n`$, $`n0`$ (the pole at $`n=0`$ contributing only one half of the residue in view of the principal value integration above)

$`{\displaystyle \underset{0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}𝑑pp{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cosh}(Lp)}{\mathrm{sinh}(Lp)}}J_1(p|x|)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{L|x|}}+{\displaystyle \frac{2\pi }{L^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}nK_1(m_n|x|),`$ (2.17)
where $`K_1(z)=\pi H_1^{(1)}(iz)`$ is the modified Bessel (MacDonald) function. In view of the relation $`K_1(z)=_zK_0(z)`$ between the MacDonald functions of the zeroth and first order, one has

$`{\displaystyle \underset{0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}𝑑pp{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cosh}(Lp)}{\mathrm{sinh}(Lp)}}J_1(p|x|)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{L|x|}}{\displaystyle \frac{2\pi }{L^2}}_z{\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}K_0(nz)|_{z=\pi |x|/L},`$ (2.18)
where the series of McDonald functions can be calculated with the aid of the formula

$`{\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}K_0(nz)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\left(𝐂+\mathrm{ln}{\displaystyle \frac{z}{2\pi }}\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{\pi }{2z}}+\pi {\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{z^2+4\pi ^2n^2}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2\pi n}}\right).`$ (2.19)
Putting things together this gives us yet another, coordinate space, representation for the propagator

$`D(x,x^{})={\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\pi ^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{((xx^{})^2+4n^2L^2)^{3/2}}}.`$ (2.20)
This result obviously reproduces the recovery of the Green’s function along the brane by another method – method of images. Indeed, it can be obtained by summing the contributions of images of the original source, located at the infinite sequence of points $`X_n`$

$`D(x)=2{\displaystyle \underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}D_5(XX_n)|_{X=(x,0)},`$ (2.21)
$`X_n=(0,\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}nL),(XX_n)^2=x^2+4n^2L^2,`$ (2.22)
mediated by the five-dimensional Green’s function\**\**\**The coefficient of two here arises from the fact that the magnitude of the source effectively doubles when the source approaches the brane and merges with one of its primary images – this happens with all pairs of higher-order images merging at $`X_n=(0,2Ln)`$, $`n0`$.

$`D_5(X,X^{})={\displaystyle \frac{1}{8\pi ^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{((XX^{})^2)^{3/2}}}.`$ (2.23)
The representation (2.20) of the propagator expresses the obvious fact that there many ways to propagate signal between two space-time points on the brane: it may propagate entirely along the brane (the $`n=0`$ term in the sum (2.20)) or through the fifth dimension reflecting off the second brane at $`y=0`$ and coming back to our brane. Each such propagation contributes to the sum in (2.20). Since the number of reflections can be arbitrary high the sum has infinite number of terms.

When $`(xx^{})^2`$ is much larger than $`L^2`$ the sum in (2.22) can be approximated by the integral, $`_n=\frac{1}{2L}𝑑y`$ where $`y=2Ln`$. Evaluating the integral we find

$`D(x,x^{}){\displaystyle \frac{1}{8\pi ^2L}}{\displaystyle _{\mathrm{}}^+\mathrm{}}𝑑y{\displaystyle \frac{1}{((xx^{})^2+y^2)^{3/2}}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\pi ^2L}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(xx^{})^2}},`$ (2.24)
so that 4-dimensional Green’s function is recovered in this limit. It is actually a realization of the well-known in mathematics method called descent method to obtain Green’s function from a Green’s function one dimension higher. Thus, the 4-dimensional propagator is recovered for large (compared to $`L`$) intervals on the brane as a result of superposition of contributions from infinite number of images.

### 2.5. Newton potential

We finish this section with a brief illustration of how the Newton potential emerges from our analysis. Indeed, the Newtonian potential on the brane can be easily recovered from (2.20) by integrating over time (it is again a realization of the descent method discussed in the previous subsection)

$`V(r)={\displaystyle \underset{\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}𝑑x^4D(𝐱,x^4)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2\pi ^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{r^2+4n^2L^2}},r^2=𝐱^2.`$ (2.25)
In view of the summation formula (2.11) it equals

$`V(r)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\pi r}}\left(1+{\displaystyle \frac{2}{e^{\pi r/L}1}}\right)`$ (2.26)
and, thus, reproduces at large distances $`rL`$ the usual four-dimensional Newtonian potential with Yukawa-type corrections in the four-dimensional world. For small distances $`rL`$ it obviously features the five-dimensional behavior $`1/r^2`$.

## 3. Retarded potentials

The retarded Green’s function which is an object of our prime interest here can be obtained from the Euclidean Green’s functions of the previous section by the analytic continuation. This can be done directly in the final result (2.20) in the coordinate representation, or separately for massive Green’s functions of the Kaluza-Klein tower in (2.8). Here we choose the first method, and its equivalence to the second one is shown in the Appendix A.

To distinguish the coordinates of the Lorentzian spacetime $`x=(x^0,𝐱)`$ from those of the Euclidean space we supply the latter by the subscript $`E`$, $`x_E=(x^4,𝐱)`$. They are related by the Wick rotation

$`x_E(x^4,𝐱)=(ix^0,𝐱),`$ (3.1)
$`x_E^2(x^4)^2+𝐱^2=(x^0)^2+𝐱^2+i\epsilon =x^2+i\epsilon ,`$ (3.2)
which in particular determines the analytic continuation from the (massive) Euclidean Green’s function

$`(m^2_E^2)D_E(x_E)=\delta (x_E)`$ (3.3)
to the Feynman propagator in Lorentzian spacetime – the boundary value on the real axis of the Lorentzian spacetime interval $`x^2`$ when approaching from the upper half complex plane of $`x^2`$ according to (3.2), $`\epsilon 0`$,

$`(m^2i\epsilon ^2)D_F(x)=\delta (x),D_F(x)=iD_E(x_E)|_{x_E=(ix^0,𝐱)}`$ (3.4)
(the factor $`i`$ here follows from the formal identification $`\delta (x)=i\delta (x_E)`$ matching with (3.1)).

As is well known , other Green’s functions in flat spacetime can be obtained from the Feynman propagator by taking its real and imaginary parts and multiplying it with distributions reflecting the needed causality properties. In particular, the retarded propagator reads

$`D_R(x)=2\theta (x^0)\mathrm{Re}D_F(x).`$ (3.5)
We illustrate this prescription for massless field propagator. Starting with the massless Euclidean Green’s function in four-dimensions

$`D_E(x_E)|_{m^2=0}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\pi ^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{x_E^2}}`$ (3.6)
one finds in view of (3.3) and (3.5) the well-known retarded Green’s function of a massless field

$`D_R(x)|_{m^2=0}={\displaystyle \frac{\theta (x^0)}{2\pi ^2}}\mathrm{Re}{\displaystyle \frac{i}{x^2+i\epsilon }}={\displaystyle \frac{\theta (t)}{4\pi }}{\displaystyle \frac{\delta (rt)}{r}},r=|𝐱|,t=x^0,`$ (3.7)
where in the last line the well-known formula

$$\frac{1}{x^2+i\epsilon }\frac{1}{x^2i\epsilon }=2\pi i\delta (x^2)$$

has been used. Important feature of this propagator in four dimensions is that it has a support on the past light cone of the observation point. As we shall see in a moment the behavior of the retarded potential in five dimensions is rather different.

Application of this rule to 5-dimensional Green’s function (2.23) or (2.20) is trickier because of the branching points in this expression. Wick rotation for the Euclidean Green’s function (2.20) is based on the relation

$`(x^2\pm i\epsilon )^\lambda =|x^2|^\lambda e^{\pm i\pi \lambda \theta (x^2)},|\lambda |<1.`$ (3.8)
Because of the restriction on $`\lambda `$ we cannot apply the above formula immediately to (2.23) in which $`\lambda =3/2`$. Therefore, we first effectively lower the degree of the singularity by noting that

$`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(x^2+i\epsilon )^{3/2}}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{r}}{\displaystyle \frac{}{r}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(r^2t^2+i\epsilon )^{1/2}}}`$ (3.9)
and then apply (3.8) to get

$`D_R^{(5)}(r,t)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\pi ^2}}\mathrm{Re}{\displaystyle \frac{i}{(r^2t^2+i\epsilon )^{3/2}}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\pi ^2r}}{\displaystyle \frac{}{r}}{\displaystyle \frac{\theta (tr)}{(t^2r^2)^{1/2}}}.`$ (3.10)
We should apply now this formula to each term in (2.20) so that finally the kernel of the retarded Green’s function takes the form

$`D_R(t,𝐱)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2\pi ^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{r}}{\displaystyle \frac{}{r}}{\displaystyle \frac{\theta (t\sqrt{r^2+4n^2L^2})}{\sqrt{t^2r^24n^2L^2}}}.`$ (3.11)
An alternative derivation of this result, starting directly with retarded propagators for massive Kaluza-Klein modes in (2.8), is given in the Appendix A. Two drastic differences from the 4-dimensional case (3.7) should be mentioned. First, the retarded Green’s function (3.10), (3.11) has support on entire region inside the future light-cone (in 4-dimensional case the support was just on the surface of the light-cone) of the delta-like source at $`r=0,t=0`$. Second, the presence of non-integrable singularity on the light-cone in (3.10) should be noted. Additionally, all images of the original source, belonging to the interior of the past light cone of the observation point, contribute to the Green’s function (3.11).

## 4. Finite pulse

The brane-to–brane Green’s function (3.11) gives on the brane $`y=0`$ the solution of the equation

$`_5^2\mathrm{\Phi }(X)=G_5J(X)`$ (4.1)
with zero initial conditions in the past and with the source $`J(X)`$ located on the same brane

$`J(x,y)=f(t)\delta ^{(3)}(𝐱)\delta (y).`$ (4.2)
Here $`G_5`$ denotes the five-dimensional gravitational coupling constant. This solution reads

$`\mathrm{\Phi }(t,𝐱)=G_5{\displaystyle \underset{\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}𝑑t^{}D_R(tt^{},𝐱)f(t^{}).`$ (4.3)
Substituting (3.11) we have

$`\mathrm{\Phi }(t,𝐱)={\displaystyle \frac{G_5}{2\pi ^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{r_n}}{\displaystyle \frac{}{r_n}}{\displaystyle \underset{\mathrm{}}{\overset{tr_n}{}}}𝑑t^{}{\displaystyle \frac{f(t^{})}{\sqrt{(tt^{})^2r_n^2}}}|_{r_n=(r^2+4n^2L^2)^{1/2}}.`$ (4.4)
When the source $`f(t)`$ in (4.2) has the form of a constant pulse of a finite duration $`T`$,

$`f(t)=\theta (t)\theta (tT),`$ (4.5)
the expression (4.4) (after the integration over $`t^{}`$ has been performed) takes the form

$`\mathrm{\Phi }(t,𝐱)={\displaystyle \frac{G_5}{16\pi ^2L^3}}t\theta (tr)I(\alpha ,\beta |[\alpha ])(ttT),`$ (4.6)
in terms of the function $`I(\alpha ,\beta |[\alpha ])`$ of the two parameters

$`\alpha ={\displaystyle \frac{\sqrt{t^2r^2}}{2L}},`$ (4.7)
$`\beta ={\displaystyle \frac{r}{2L}}.`$ (4.8)
Here the square brackets in the notation $`[\alpha ]`$ denote the integer part of $`\alpha >0`$ and the function of three arguments $`I(\alpha ,\beta |m)`$ is given by the following finite sum

$`I(\alpha ,\beta |m)={\displaystyle \underset{n=m}{\overset{m}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(\beta ^2+n^2)\sqrt{\alpha ^2n^2}}},m<\alpha .`$ (4.9)
Let us first discuss the contribution of the forefront of the pulse – the first term of (4.5). With $`t`$ reaching the value of the radial coordinate $`r`$ at which the observer is located, the observer starts getting the signal encoded in the first term of (4.6). As long as this term depends on the integer part of the parameter $`\alpha `$, $`m=[\alpha ]`$, this signal is not continuous in time. For any value of time when $`\alpha `$ becomes integer, a new pair of terms at $`n=\pm [\alpha ]`$ appear in the sum (4.9) and the value of the sum changes discontinuously. This corresponds to the fact that the signals from the two new images located at $`y=\pm 2[\alpha ]L`$ reach the observer. Moreover, immediately at $`\alpha =[\alpha ]`$ these signals are singular, because they are proportional to $`1/\sqrt{\alpha [\alpha ]}`$. This is a direct consequence of the structure of singularity of the retarded Green’s function in five dimensions. In contrast to four dimensions its support is not restricted to the past light cone, rather it is given by the entire interior of the latter (see Eq.(3.10)), and the Green’s function kernel in (3.10) has a singularity $`1/(t^2r^2)^{3/2}`$ at $`tr+0`$. Because of the square root the corresponding singularity in the $`m=\pm [\alpha ]`$ terms of (4.9) is not strong, and when averaged over the time lapse between two consequitive singularities gives, as we show below, a finite contribution.

Immediately after $`t`$ reaches the value of $`r`$ only the zeroth term of the sum (4.9), $`1/\alpha \beta ^2=8L^3/r^2\sqrt{t^2r^2}`$ contributes to the signal (4.6). This corresponds to the contribution of only the source located at $`y=0`$ (and its image merging with the source and, thus, doubling its value – see discussion in Sect.2). Therefore this contribution is essentially 5-dimensional by its nature and reflects the fact that the retarded potential (3.10) in five dimensions has non-integrable singularity on the lightcone. As time goes on more signals from images start to arrive so that at sufficiently large time the signal detected on the brane has the shape of a sequence of singular spikes. Obviously, an observer on the brane with devices at hand is not capable to resolve the spikes so that the time averaging which we employ below in the paper becomes a meaningful procedure.

The recovery of the 4-dimensional nature of the signal for a given $`r`$ takes place after some time when the signals from many images reach the observer and form the cumulative effect of many terms in the sum (4.9). This situation corresponds to the limit of $`\alpha 1`$. The calculation of the sum (4.9) in this limit is presented in the Appendix B and gives the following result in the first two orders of the asymptotic $`1/\alpha `$-expansion

$`I(\alpha ,\beta |[\alpha ])={\displaystyle \frac{\pi }{\beta }}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{coth}\pi \beta }{\sqrt{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}}{\displaystyle \frac{2^{3/2}}{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{\delta }{\alpha }}}\left[\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}}I(\delta )\right]_{\delta =\alpha [\alpha ]+1}`$
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{2^{1/2}}{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{\alpha (\alpha [\alpha ])}}}+\mathrm{O}\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{\alpha ^{7/2}}}\right).`$ (4.10)
Here $`I(\delta )`$ is the following integral of the parameter $`\delta =\alpha [\alpha ]+1`$ belonging the finite range $`1\delta <2`$

$`I(\delta )={\displaystyle \underset{0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{dy}{e^{2\pi y\delta }1}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{(1+y^2)^{1/2}1}{1+y^2}}\right)^{1/2}.`$ (4.11)
This integral is a decreasing function bounded in this range by its very small value at $`\delta =1`$, $`I(1)0.03`$ and in what follows gives a negligible contribution.

Similarly to the situation with small $`\alpha `$, the last term of (4.10) becomes singular also at large integer values of $`\alpha `$, which corresponds to the arrival of the signal from the new distant pair of images located at $`|y|=2[\alpha ]LtL`$. Interestingly, though, that the singular spikes occurring for late times with the period $`\mathrm{\Delta }t4(\alpha L^2/t)\mathrm{\Delta }\alpha =2L\sqrt{1r^2/t^2}2L`$ have now integrable singularities, so that the averaging over time of this spiky signal gives a finite average value. This averaging obviously implies that the temporal resolution threshold of the observing device is much bigger than the period $`2L`$ of spikes for hypothetic values of $`L`$ belonging to a millimetre range.

Thus, the temporal averaging of the spike singularity in (4.10) is finite and equals

$`<\left(\alpha [\alpha ]\right)^{1/2}>{\displaystyle \underset{[\alpha ]}{\overset{[\alpha ]+1}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{d\alpha }{\sqrt{\alpha [\alpha ]}}}=2`$ (4.12)
(we are averaging here only the most rapidly varying singular factor while the other factors for $`\alpha 1`$ can be regarded nearly constant). Similarly in the second term of (4.10) the averaging gives

$`<\sqrt{\alpha [\alpha ]+1}>{\displaystyle \underset{[\alpha ]}{\overset{[\alpha ]+1}{}}}𝑑\alpha \sqrt{\alpha [\alpha ]+1}={\displaystyle \frac{2}{3}}\left(2^{3/2}1\right).`$ (4.13)
Assembling these results together and taking into account the smallness of $`I(\delta )<0.03`$ in (4.10), one has the dominant contribution to the temporal average of $`I(\alpha ,\beta |[\alpha ])`$

$`={\displaystyle \frac{\pi }{\beta }}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{coth}\pi \beta }{\sqrt{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}}+{\displaystyle \frac{2^{3/2}}{\sqrt{\alpha }(\alpha ^2+\beta ^2)}}{\displaystyle \frac{52^{5/2}}{3}},\alpha 1`$ (4.14)
Substituting this expression to (4.6) and taking into account the values of parameters (4.7)-(4.8) we finally have the retarded potential averaged over the time lapse between singular spikes

$`<\mathrm{\Phi }(t,𝐱)>={\displaystyle \frac{G_4}{4\pi r}}\left(1+{\displaystyle \frac{2}{e^{\pi r/L}1}}\right)\theta (tr)`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{G_4}{3\pi ^2t}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{L^2}{t^2r^2}}\right)^{1/4}(2^{5/2}5)\theta (tr)`$
$`(ttT),t^2r^2L^2.`$ (4.15)
Here $`G_4`$ is an effective 4-dimensional gravitational constant

$`G_4={\displaystyle \frac{G_5}{L}}`$ (4.16)
and the subtracted term at $`tT`$ gives the contribution of the back front of the pulse (4.5) of finite duration $`T`$. It should be noted that the first term in (4.15) is exactly the signal expected in 4-dimensions. Remarkably, the radial function there is exactly the Newton potential which we calculated in section 2. The second term in (4.15) is a correction which originated entirely due to the contribution of signals arriving at a given point from large number of images.

When $`t>T+r`$ both signals from the forefront and the backfront (as well as from their images) of the pulse start to arrive. As a result, the first “static”, i.e. dependent only on the radial coordinate $`r`$ from the source, term cancels out. If we were in 4-dimensions this would be the only possible signal at $`t>T+r`$: after the entire pulse has passed through our point our devices detect no signal at all. In five dimensions the life is more interesting: the whole region inside the lightcone contributes to the signal detected at a given point. So that even after the shining candle dies off one can still see its glimmering light. In the present case an observer on the brane will detect a signal coming not only from the source but also from a large number of its images. As a result, we observe an interesting phenomenon: even when the pulse has passed through the point of observation our devices still detect some signal. This “tail” signal originates from the second term in (4.15) and takes the form

$`<\mathrm{\Phi }(t,𝐱)>_{\mathrm{tail}}=(2^{5/2}5){\displaystyle \frac{G_4}{3\pi ^2}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{L^{1/2}}{(tT)((tT)^2r^2)^{1/4}}}{\displaystyle \frac{L^{1/2}}{t(t^2r^2)^{1/4}}}\right).`$ (4.17)
For later time when $`tr`$ and $`tT`$ we have a simple expression for the tail

$`<\mathrm{\Phi }(t,𝐱)>_{\mathrm{tail}}`$ $`=`$ $`(2^{5/2}5){\displaystyle \frac{G_4}{2\pi ^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{L^{1/2}T}{t^{5/2}}}.`$ (4.18)
It is proportional to the square root of the size of extra dimension so that it is a rather small quantity. It is also a power-like decaying function of time and for late times, satisfying the relation $`tr`$, is distance-independent.

Finally, there is one more interesting effect: deformation of the forefront of the signal. It is due to the second term in equation (4.15). Noting the negative sign of this term it effectively leads to a relative screening of the purely 4-dimensional part of the signal. The typical shape of the resultant signal is shown in Fig.1. In order to analyse this effect it is useful to rewrite eq.(4.15) once again

$`<\mathrm{\Phi }(t,𝐱)>\mathrm{\Phi }_0(t,𝐱)+\mathrm{\Phi }_1(t,𝐱),`$ (4.19)
$`\mathrm{\Phi }_0(t,𝐱)={\displaystyle \frac{G_4}{4\pi r}},`$ (4.20)
$`\mathrm{\Phi }_1(t,𝐱)={\displaystyle \frac{G_4}{6\pi ^2r}}{\displaystyle \frac{2^{5/2}5}{\alpha (t)^{1/2}}}={\displaystyle \frac{2}{3\pi }}{\displaystyle \frac{2^{5/2}5}{\alpha (t)^{1/2}}}\mathrm{\Phi }_0(t,𝐱),`$ (4.21)
where we assumed that $`r<t<r+T`$ so that no contribution of the backfront is yet present, in terms of parameter††††††We neglect the difference between $`\alpha `$ and $`[\alpha ]`$ for large $`\alpha `$. $`\alpha (t)=(t^2r^2)^{1/2}/2L`$ having the meaning of number of spikes that have already passed through the observer by the time of observation. This number is supposed to be sufficiently large to guarantee the formation of the four-dimensional signal (the first term in eq.(4.15)). It also should be relatively small for the relation $`tr`$ to hold. Eventually, the minimal value of $`\alpha (t)`$ is related to the time resolution of the measuring devise: it may not resolve a single spike, but should resolve the lapse between the arrival of the forefront and the observation moment $`t`$. Similar regime exists at the backfront tail: for $`t`$ close to $`r+T`$ the tail signal (4.17) is dominated by the number of spikes arriving right after the original signal ends. Later in the paper we will discuss possible observational implications in the gravitational astronomy of the tail effect (4.18) and, especially, the correction effect (4.21).

## 5. Periodic signal

In this section we consider the situation when the source on the brane radiates a periodic in time signal. So that we have

$$f(t)=e^{i\omega t},$$
(5.1)
where $`\omega `$ is the frequency of the signal, to be substituted in (4.4). The $`t`$-integral then is taken explicitly to produce

$`{\displaystyle _{\mathrm{}}^{tr}}{\displaystyle \frac{dt^{}e^{i\omega t^{}}}{\sqrt{(tt^{})^2r^2}}}={\displaystyle \frac{(\pi i)}{2}}e^{i\omega t}H_0^{(2)}(\omega r),`$ (5.2)
so that the gravitational field takes the form

$`\mathrm{\Phi }(r,t)={\displaystyle \frac{G_5}{8\pi i}}e^{i\omega t}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{r}}_r{\displaystyle \underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{+\mathrm{}}{}}}H_0^{(2)}(\omega \sqrt{r^2+4n^2L^2}).`$ (5.3)
A possible way to estimate the infinite sum is to replace it by integral. This approximation is valid when $`\omega L<<1`$. Then we have that

$`{\displaystyle \underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{+\mathrm{}}{}}}H_0^{(2)}(\omega \sqrt{r^2+4n^2L^2})2{\displaystyle _0^{\mathrm{}}}𝑑xH_0^{(2)}(\omega \sqrt{r^2+4L^2x^2})={\displaystyle \frac{1}{L\omega }}e^{i\omega r},`$ (5.4)
where in the passing to the last expression a table integral available in  has been used. Thus, to the leading order the gravitational signal is

$`\mathrm{\Phi }(r,t)\mathrm{\Phi }_0(r,t)={\displaystyle \frac{G_4}{8\pi r}}e^{i\omega (tr)}.`$ (5.5)
It is exactly the shape of the purely 4-dimensional signal arising from a periodic source. Thus, by replacing the sum over images in (5.3) with the integral we have explicitly demonstrated our earlier statement that the 4-dimensional physics is recovered from 5-dimensional as a superposition of signals from infinite number of images. In order to get a correction to the four-dimensional result (5.5) we have to estimate a deviation of the integral in (5.4) from the sum. First, we estimate this deviation for a single term in the sum (by expanding the integrand to first term of its Taylor series),

$`H_0^{(2)}(\omega \sqrt{r^2+4n^2L^2}){\displaystyle _n^{n+1}}𝑑xH_0^{(2)}(\omega \sqrt{r^2+4n^2x^2})`$
$`={\displaystyle _n^{n+1}}𝑑x(H_0^{(2)}(\omega \sqrt{r^2+4n^2L^2})H_0^{(2)}(\omega \sqrt{r^2+4L^2x^2}))`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{2nL^2\omega }{\sqrt{r^2+4L^2n^2}}}H_1^{(2)}(\omega \sqrt{r^2+4L^2n^2}).`$ (5.6)
Summing now this deviation for all $`n`$ and again replacing the sum by the integral (which turns out to be exactly integrable in view of the relation $`H_1^{(2)}(z)=(d/dz)H_0^{(2)}(z)`$) we find

$`{\displaystyle _0^{\mathrm{}}}𝑑x{\displaystyle \frac{2xL^2\omega }{\sqrt{r^2+4L^2x^2}}}H_1^{(2)}(\omega \sqrt{r^2+4L^2x^2})={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}H_0^{(2)}(\omega r).`$ (5.7)
Thus we find that the correction $`\mathrm{\Phi }_1(r,t)`$ to the purely 4-dimensional result (5.4) is

$`\mathrm{\Phi }_1(r,t)={\displaystyle \frac{G_4}{8\pi i}}{\displaystyle \frac{L\omega }{r}}e^{i\omega t}H_1^{(2)}(\omega r),`$ (5.8)
We are interested in a limit when the value of $`\omega r`$ is large. Then we can use the asymptotic formula for the Hankel function and get

$`\mathrm{\Phi }_1(r,t){\displaystyle \frac{G_4}{8\pi }}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\pi }}}{\displaystyle \frac{L\sqrt{\omega }}{r^{3/2}}}e^{i\omega (tr)+i\frac{\pi }{4}}=\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{2L^2\omega }{\pi r}}}e^{i\pi /4}\mathrm{\Phi }_0(r,t).`$ (5.9)
This part of the signal is entirely due to the extra dimension. Notice the phase shift with respect to the 4-dimensional signal (5.5). Also, the amplitude of (5.9) now depends on the frequency of the signal. These two circumstances help to distinguish the purely 4-dimensional part of the signal from that of due to presence of the extra dimension. We see that one of the manifestations of the fifth dimension is some frequency-dependent amplification of the amplitude $`|\mathrm{\Phi }_0(r,t)+\mathrm{\Phi }_1(r,t)|`$ of the signal from a periodic source.

## 6. Can gravitational antenna detect the extra
dimension?

Our analysis shows that there are two, at least in principle observable, effects of the compact fifth dimension on the propagation of the gravitational signal. First, it is the tail effect discussed in section 4: after a signal of finite duration $`T`$ has passed through the observer there still remains a tail signal (4.18) entirely due to the presence of extra dimension. The late-time tail signal is a power decaying function of time, $`t^{5/2}`$. In the four-dimensional physics the tail does not appear at all. Therefore, its observation would be a clear evidence for the fifth dimension. The amplitude of the purely four-dimensional signal at distance $`r`$ from the source is the usual Newton potential (4.20), $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0(t,r)=G_4/4\pi r`$. Measuring the amplitude of the tail (4.18) with respect to $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0`$ we find that the upper bound on this ratio is given by the quantity

$`\chi {\displaystyle \frac{L^{1/2}T}{r^{3/2}}},`$ (6.1)
where we took the observation moment $`tr`$.

Another effect comes for a periodic signal of frequency $`\omega `$ from a source placed at distance $`r`$ from the point of observation. The signal is amplified due to multiple winding around the compact extra dimension, moreover the correction component (5.9) has a phase shift useful for observational purposes. The amplification factor is $`1+\eta `$ where $`\eta `$ according to (5.9) behaves as

$`\eta {\displaystyle \frac{L}{\sqrt{\lambda r}}},`$ (6.2)
in terms of the wavelength $`\lambda =2\pi /\omega `$ of the signal (in our units the speed of light $`c=1`$).

The two effects suggest that the extra dimension in principle could be observed in gravitational wave experiments and thus may have some consequences for the gravitational astronomy. The effects governed by parameters $`\chi `$ or $`\eta `$ are however expected to be extremely small. Here we give some estimates adjusted for the parameters (see for example  and ) of the LIGO and LISA detectors. The sensitivity of the LISA detector covers a low frequency range $`10^41`$ Hz. For a source placed at distance of 10 Mpc from the Earth and producing a signal of finite duration $`T10^4`$ s (associated with the inverse of the lower bound of this frequency band) we have, assuming that the size of the extra dimension $`L10^1`$ cm, that $`\chi 10^{25}`$. The LIGO detector is sensitive for a higher frequency, $`110^4`$ Hz, and is more appropriate for the observation of the amplification effect for a periodic signal. For the frequency $`\omega 100`$ Hz and the distance of 10 Mpc we find that $`\eta 10^{18}`$. The observation of the amplification effects thus requires less amplitude sensitivity of the gravitational antenna. We should not forget, however, that $`\eta `$ (or $`\chi `$) should be further multiplied by the amplitude of the purely four-dimensional signal to give the value for the amplitude of the interesting part of the signal. The resultant effect then is too small to be experimentally observable now or in coming future. It is nevertheless worth noting that the late time tail (4.18) does not depend on the distance from the source. Therefore, there might be a cumulative effect of superposition of the tails from large number of various sources. The resultant signal is proportional to the number of sources (both recent and in very distant past) in our part of the Universe and thus may have a much larger amplitude and can be singled out by the characteristic $`t^{5/2}`$ behavior.

There is yet another range of observation intervals which gives more hope for experimental detection. This range corresponds to (4.19)-(4.21) – the transition regime from the moment of the arriving forefront of the signal at $`t=r`$ to late times $`t>r`$. In this regime the time is sufficiently larger than $`r`$ to generate a large number $`\alpha (t)`$ of signal spikes – signals from images that already reached the observer – but not big enough to relax to negligible small tail rapidly decaying with time. This number $`\alpha (t)`$ should be high enough to guarantee the formation of the four-dimensional signal (4.19) (remember that it gets completely recovered at infinite $`t`$ as a cumulative effect of an infinite number of images), but it should not be too big so that antenna would be able to resolve the lapse after arriving the forefront and the observation time. The correction to the 4-dimensional signal is given by the product $`\alpha (t)^{1/2}\mathrm{\Phi }_0(t,𝐱)`$. The lower bound on $`\alpha `$ is related to the time resolution $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ of the antenna as $`[\mathrm{min}\alpha ](\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }t}{L})^{1/2}(\frac{r}{L})^{1/2}`$. This gives an estimate $`\alpha ^{1/2}10^8`$ (adjusted to the frequency $`10^4`$ Hz available at LIGO) and it makes certainly a much stronger effect than the ones that have been just discussed.

Thus, the idea of echoing extra dimension(s) by the gravitational-wave astronomy looks feasible, and we are planning to return to this issue in subsequent publications.

## Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful to Slava Mukhanov for his stimulating criticism. S.S. would also like to acknowledge a lively discussion with Dejan Stojkovic and Andrei and Valeri Frolov. A.O.B. is grateful for hospitality of the Physics Department of LMU, Munich, where a major part of this work has been done under the support of the grant SFB375. The work of A.O.B. was also supported by the Russian Foundation for Basic Research under the grant No 02-02-17054 and the grant LSS-1578.2003.2. Research of S.S. is supported by the grant DFG-SPP 1096.

## Appendix A. Alternative derivation of the retarded Green’s function

The retarded Green’s function of the massive Klein-Gordon operator in four dimensions has a representation in terms of the Bessel function of zeroth order

$`G_R(m^2|t,𝐱)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\pi r}}{\displaystyle \frac{}{r}}\left[J_0(m\sqrt{t^2r^2})\theta (tr)\right].`$ (A.1)
Therefore, the retarded version of the equation 2.8 involves summation over the tower of Kaluza-Klein masses $`m_n=n\pi /L`$. This summation can be done with the aid of the Eq.(8.522) of

$`{\displaystyle \underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}J_0(n\pi s/L)={\displaystyle \frac{2L}{\pi }}{\displaystyle \underset{n=m}{\overset{m}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{s^24n^2L^2}}},`$ (A.2)
where $`m`$ is the integer satisfying the inequalities

$`2m<s/L<2(m+1).`$ (A.3)
This can be rewritten for $`s=\sqrt{t^2r^2}`$ as

$`{\displaystyle \underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}J_0(n\pi \sqrt{t^2r^2}/L)={\displaystyle \frac{2L}{\pi }}{\displaystyle \underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{\theta (t\sqrt{r^2+4n^2L^2})}{\sqrt{t^2r^24n^2L^2}}},`$ (A.4)
so that the resultant expression for the retarded Green’s function is given by equation (3.11) in the main text.

## Appendix B. Calculation of $`I(\alpha ,\beta |m)`$

The calculation of the finite sum (4.9) is based on the following representation of this sum in terms of the contour integral in the complex plane of the summation parameter $`z`$

$`I(\alpha ,\beta |m)={\displaystyle \frac{\pi }{\beta }}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{coth}\pi \beta }{\sqrt{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}}+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2i}}{\displaystyle \underset{𝐂_m}{}}𝑑z{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cot}\pi z}{(\beta ^2+z^2)\sqrt{\alpha ^2z^2}}}.`$ (B.1)
The closed contour of integration $`𝐂_m`$ here consists of the four lines,

$`𝐂_m=𝐂_m^+𝐂_m^{}𝐂^+\mathrm{}𝐂^{\mathrm{}},`$
$`𝐂_m^\pm :z=\pm m+iy,\mathrm{}<y<\mathrm{},`$
$`𝐂^\pm \mathrm{}:z=x\pm i\mathrm{},m<x<m,`$ (B.2)
forming a rectangle gone around in anti-clockwise way. The contour integral in (B.1) gives the sum of contributions of residues at the poles of $`\mathrm{cot}\pi z`$ which reproduce the needed finite sum (4.9) and the sum of two residues of the integrand at $`z=\pm i\beta `$ compensated by the first term on the right hand side of (B.1).

The integrals over $`𝐂^\pm \mathrm{}`$ obviously give zero contribution, while the integrals over $`𝐂_m^+𝐂_m^{}`$ in view of the relation

$`\mathrm{cot}\pi (\pm m+iy)=i\mathrm{coth}\pi y=i\left(1+{\displaystyle \frac{2}{e^{2\pi y}1}}\right)`$ (B.3)
can be reduced to the sum of the following contributions of the integral over the segment of the real axis, $`mzm`$, the residue of the integrand at $`z=+i\beta `$ and the thermal-type integral

$`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2i}}{\displaystyle \underset{𝐂_m}{}}𝑑z{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cot}\pi z}{(\beta ^2+z^2)\sqrt{\alpha ^2z^2}}}={\displaystyle \frac{\pi }{\beta \sqrt{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}}+{\displaystyle _m^m}{\displaystyle \frac{dx}{(\beta ^2+x^2)\sqrt{\alpha ^2x^2}}}`$
$`2i{\displaystyle \underset{0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}𝑑y{\displaystyle \frac{1}{e^{2\pi y}1}}\left(f(y)f(y)\right),`$ (B.4)
where the function $`f(y)`$ equals

$`f(y)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{(\beta ^2+z^2)\sqrt{\alpha ^2z^2}}}|_{z=m+iy}.`$ (B.5)
Since

$`{\displaystyle _m^m}{\displaystyle \frac{dx}{(\beta ^2+x^2)\sqrt{\alpha ^2x^2}}}={\displaystyle \frac{2}{\beta \sqrt{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}}\mathrm{arctan}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\sqrt{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}{\beta }}{\displaystyle \frac{m}{\sqrt{\alpha ^2m^2}}}\right)`$ (B.6)
we finally have

$`I(\alpha ,\beta |m)={\displaystyle \frac{\pi }{\beta }}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{coth}\pi \beta 1}{\sqrt{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}}+{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\beta \sqrt{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}}\mathrm{arctan}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\sqrt{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}{\beta }}{\displaystyle \frac{m}{\sqrt{\alpha ^2m^2}}}\right)`$
$`2i{\displaystyle \underset{0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}𝑑y{\displaystyle \frac{1}{e^{2\pi y}1}}\left(f(y)f(y)\right).`$ (B.7)
So far it was exact calculation without any approximation made. We are now interested in the limit of large $`\alpha `$. The calculation of the last integral in (B.7) for $`\alpha 1`$ follows from the asymptotic expression for the combination of functions $`f(\pm y)`$ in (B.7)

$`f(y)f(y)={\displaystyle \frac{i}{\sqrt{\alpha \delta }}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{(1+y^2/\delta ^2)^{1/2}1}{1+y^2/\delta ^2}}}\left(\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1}+\mathrm{O}\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{\alpha ^{1/2}}}\right)\right),`$ (B.8)
where the parameter $`\delta =\alpha m`$ is of order unity (bearing in mind that $`m`$ will be identified with $`[\alpha ]`$). Thus the integral in (B.7) after rescaling the integration variable $`yy\delta `$ becomes

$`2i{\displaystyle \underset{0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}𝑑y{\displaystyle \frac{1}{e^{2\pi y}1}}\left(f(y)f(y)\right)={\displaystyle \frac{2}{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{\delta }{\alpha }}}I(\delta )\left(\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1}+\mathrm{O}\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{\alpha ^{1/2}}}\right)\right),`$ (B.9)
where $`I(\delta )`$ is defined by Eq.(4.11).

In the expression for the retarded potential (4.6) the parameter $`m`$ should be taken coinciding with $`[\alpha ]`$. Then for integer values of $`\alpha `$ the parameter $`\delta `$ will be vanishing and $`I(\delta )`$ will be divergent. To isolate these divergences we disentangle from the sum (4.9), $`I(\alpha ,\beta |[\alpha ])`$, the potentially divergent terms at $`n=\pm [\alpha ]`$,

$`I(\alpha ,\beta |[\alpha ])=I(\alpha ,\beta |[\alpha ]1)+{\displaystyle \frac{2}{(\beta ^2+[\alpha ]^2)\sqrt{\alpha ^2[\alpha ]^2}}}.`$ (B.10)
The last term here becomes singular at integer values of $`\alpha `$, but the first term is absolutely finite, because its corresponding value of $`\delta =\alpha [\alpha ]+1`$ belongs to the range $`1\delta <2`$. Therefore, using in (B.10) the equation (B.7) with $`m=[\alpha ]1`$ and expanding the arctangent

$`{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\beta \sqrt{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}}\mathrm{arctan}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\sqrt{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}{\beta }}{\displaystyle \frac{[\alpha ]1}{\sqrt{\alpha ^2([\alpha ]1)^2}}}\right)`$
$`={\displaystyle \frac{\pi }{\beta \sqrt{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}}{\displaystyle \frac{2^{3/2}}{\alpha ^2+\beta ^2}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha [\alpha ]+1}{\alpha }}}+\mathrm{O}\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{\alpha ^{7/2}}}\right)`$ (B.11)
one finally obtains the expression (4.10) used in Sect.4.


text:
# K+- and K--production in heavy-ion collisions at SIS-energies

## 1 Introduction

Heavy-ion collisions provide the unique possibility to study baryonic matter well above saturation density. The conditions inside the dense reaction zone and the in-medium properties of hadrons can be explored by measuring the particles created in such collisions . In particular, the production of strange mesons at beam energies below or close to their respective threshold in binary nucleon-nucleon collisions ($`\mathrm{NN}\mathrm{K}^+\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{N}`$ at $`E_{beam}=1.6`$ GeV, $`\mathrm{NN}\mathrm{K}^+\mathrm{K}^{}\mathrm{NN}`$ at $`E_{beam}=2.5`$ GeV) is well suited for these studies. The production at these energies requires multiple nucleon-nucleon collisions or secondary collisions like $`\pi \mathrm{N}\mathrm{K}^+\mathrm{Y}`$ ($`\mathrm{Y}=\mathrm{\Lambda },\mathrm{\Sigma }`$) for the K+ or the strangeness exchange reaction $`\pi \mathrm{Y}\mathrm{K}^{}\mathrm{N}`$ for the K-. The propagation of K+-mesons in nuclear matter is characterized by the absence of absorption (they contain an $`\overline{\mathrm{s}}`$-quark and hence cannot be absorbed in hadronic matter consisting almost entirely of u- and d-quarks). In combination with the sensitivity to multi-step processes, which are more likely to occur at high particle densities, this absence of absorption makes them nearly undisturbed messengers carrying information on the hot and dense phase of the reaction. This allows to extract information on the nuclear equation-of-state . The K- on the other hand can be reabsorbed via the inverse direction of the strangeness exchange reaction mentioned above. By analyzing observables sensitive to the reaction dynamics like energy distributions and angular distributions, both as a function of the size of the reaction system and of the collision centrality, the time dependence of the K+\- and of the K--emission can be investigated.

The experiments were performed with the Kaon Spectrometer (KaoS) at the heavy-ion synchrotron (SIS) at the GSI in Darmstadt . The magnetic spectrometer has a large acceptance in solid angle and in momentum ($`\mathrm{\Omega }30`$ msr, $`p_{max}/p_{min}2`$). The particle identification and the trigger are based on separate measurements of the momentum and of the time-of-flight. The trigger suppresses pions and protons by factors of 102 and of 103, respectively. The background due to spurious tracks and pile-up is removed by a trajectory reconstruction based on three large-area multi-wire proportional counters. The short distance of 5 - $`6.5`$ m from the target to the focal plane minimizes the number of kaon-decays in flight. The loss of kaons by decay is accounted for by Monte Carlo simulations using the GEANT code. Three different collision systems have been investigated (Au+Au, Ni+Ni, and C+C) at incident beam energies ranging from $`0.6`$ AGeV to $`2.0`$ AGeV. Results have been published in  and will in part be presented in this contribution.

Section 2 briefly summarizes the results on the excitation function of the K+-production and the conclusions that can be drawn on the nuclear equation-of-state. In section 3 a detailed analysis of dynamical observables for the reaction systems Au+Au and Ni+Ni at an incident beam energy of $`1.5`$ AGeV is presented, followed by conclusions on the time dependence of the emission of K+\- and of K--mesons in section 4.

## 2 K+-production as a probe for the nuclear equation-of-state

Early transport calculations predicted that the K+-yield in Au+Au collisions at beam energies below the production threshold in nucleon-nucleon collisions would be enhanced by a factor of about 2 if a soft rather than a hard equation-of-state is assumed . Recent calculations take into account modifications of the kaon properties within the dense nuclear medium. The assumed repulsive K+N-potential depends nearly (or less than) linearly on the baryonic density  and thus reduces the K+-yield accordingly. On the other hand, at subthreshold beam energies the K+-mesons are created in secondary collisions involving two or more particles and hence their production depends at least quadratically on the density. To disentangle these two competing effects we have studied the K+-production in a light (C+C) and in a heavy collision system (Au+Au) at different beam energies near threshold. The maximum baryonic density reached in Au+Au reactions is significantly higher than in C+C reactions. Moreover, the maximum baryonic density reached in Au+Au reactions depends strongly on the compression modulus of nuclear matter $`\kappa `$  whereas in C+C collisions this dependence is rather weak . Hence, the ratio of the K+-multiplicity per nucleon $`M/A`$ in Au+Au to the one in C+C is expected to be sensitive to the compression modulus $`\kappa `$ while providing the advantage that uncertainties within the experimental data (beam normalization etc.) and within the transport model calculations (elementary cross sections etc.) are partly cancelled.

Figure 1 shows a comparison of the ratio $`(M/A)_{\mathrm{Au}+\mathrm{Au}}/(M/A)_{\mathrm{C}+\mathrm{C}}`$ for K+ with the predictions of RQMD transport model calculations . The calculations were performed with two values for the compression modulus: $`\kappa =200`$ MeV (solid line) and $`\kappa =380`$ MeV (dashed line) corresponding to a “soft” or “hard” nuclear equation-of-state, respectively. The RQMD transport model takes into account a repulsive K+N-potential and uses momentum-dependent Skyrme forces to determine the compressional energy per nucleon (i.e. the energy stored in the compression) as a function of the baryon density. The comparison demonstrates clearly that only the calculation based on a soft nuclear equation-of-state reproduces the trend of the experimental data. A similar result is obtained using the transport code IQMD .

## 3 K+\- and K--production at 1.5 AGeV

In this section detailed results of experiments on the production and on the propagation of K+\- and of K--mesons in Ni+Ni and in Au+Au collisions at a beam energy of $`1.5`$ AGeV are presented. This is the lowest beam energy where K- have been observed so far in collisions between heavy nuclei. The spectral and the angular distributions of strange mesons as a function of the collision centrality have been measured and significant differences between K+ and K- have been found .

Due to the energy loss in the Au-target (thickness 0.5 mm) the average energy of the Au-beam is $`1.48`$ AGeV. The energy loss of the Ni-ions in the Ni-target is negligible. A high-statistics sample of K-mesons was recorded at a polar angle of $`\theta _{lab}`$ = 40. Data from Au+Au collisions were also taken at $`\theta _{lab}`$ = 32, 48, 60, and 72 with lower statistics. The laboratory momenta of the K-mesons range from 260 to 1100 MeV. Figure 2 shows the acceptance covered by these measurements as a function of the rapidity normalized to beam rapidity $`y/y_{beam}`$ and of the transverse momentum $`p_{}`$.

The centrality of the collision was derived from the multiplicity of charged particles measured in the interval $`12^{}<\theta _{lab}<48^{}`$ by a hodoscope consisting of 84 plastic-scintillator modules. In order to study the centrality dependence the data measured close to midrapidity ($`\theta _{lab}=40^{}`$) were grouped into five centrality bins both for Ni+Ni and for Au+Au collisions. The most central collisions correspond to 5% of the total reaction cross-section $`\sigma _R`$, the subsequent centrality bins correspond to 15%, 15% and 25% of $`\sigma _R`$. The most peripheral collisions correspond to 40% of $`\sigma _R`$. The total reaction cross-section was derived from a measurement with a minimum bias trigger and was found to be $`\sigma _R`$ = 6.0$`\pm `$0.5 barn for Au+Au and $`\sigma _R`$ = 2.9$`\pm `$0.3 barn for Ni+Ni collisions. The corresponding mean number of participating nucleons for each centrality bin $`A_{part}`$ was calculated from the measured reaction cross-section fraction for this bin using a geometrical model assuming spherical nuclei.

Figure 3 shows the production cross sections for K+\- and for K--mesons measured close to midrapidity as a function of the kinetic energy in the center-of-momentum system for the five centrality bins in Au+Au collisions. The uppermost spectra correspond to the most central reactions, the subsequent bins are shown from the top to the bottom of the figure with decreasing centrality. The error bars represent the statistical uncertainties of the kaon and the background events. An overall systematic error of 10% due to efficiency corrections and beam normalization has to be added. The solid lines represent the Boltzmann function $`d^3\sigma /dp^3=CE\mathrm{exp}(E/T)`$ fitted to the data. $`C`$ is a normalization constant and the exponential function describes the energy distribution with $`T`$ being the inverse slope parameter.

The spectra presented in figure 3 exhibit a distinct difference between K- and K+: The slopes of the K--spectra are steeper than those of the K+-spectra. The inverse slope parameters $`T`$ as a function of the mean number of participating nucleons $`A_{part}`$ for each centrality bin are displayed in figure 4. $`T`$ increases with increasing centrality and is found to be significantly lower for K- than for K+, even for the most central collisions.

The multiplicities of K+\- and of K--mesons in Ni+Ni as well as in Au+Au collisions at $`1.5`$ AGeV differ by about a factor of 50. The inclusive kaon multiplicity is defined for each centrality bin as $`M=\sigma _\mathrm{K}/(f\sigma _R)`$ with $`\sigma _\mathrm{K}`$ being the kaon production cross section and $`(f\sigma _r)`$ being the fraction of the reaction cross-section for the particular event class. Figure 5 presents the multiplicity per number of participating nucleons $`M/A_{part}`$ as a function of $`A_{part}`$ for K+ (upper panel) and for K- (middle panel). Both, for K+\- and for K--mesons the multiplicities exhibit a similar rise with $`A_{part}`$. Moreover, $`M/A_{part}`$ is found to be almost identical in Ni+Ni and in Au+Au collisions. The resulting K-/K+ ratio is about 0.02 below $`A_{part}=100`$ and decreases slightly to about 0.015 for the most central collisions (lower panel).

Another observable sensitive to the production mechanism is the polar angle emission pattern. The deviation from isotropy of the K+\- and of the K--emission can be studied using the ratio $`\sigma _{inv}(E_{cm},\theta _{cm})`$/$`\sigma _{inv}(E_{cm},90^{})`$ as a function of $`\mathrm{cos}(\theta _{cm})`$. Here, $`\sigma _{inv}(E_{cm},\theta _{cm})`$ is the invariant kaon production cross-section measured at the polar angle $`\theta _{cm}`$ in the center-of-momentum frame and $`\sigma _{inv}(E_{cm},90^{})`$ is the one measured at $`\theta _{cm}=90^{}`$. Due to limited statistics we considered only Au+Au collisions grouped into two centrality bins: near-central (impact parameter $`b<`$6 fm) and non-central collisions ($`b>`$6 fm). Figure 6 displays the anisotropy ratio for K+ (upper panels) and for K- (lower panels), both for near-central (right) and for non-central collisions (left). For an isotropic distribution this ratio would be constant and identical to 1.

The solid lines in figure 6 represent the function $`1+a_2\mathrm{cos}^2(\theta _{cm})`$ which is fitted to the experimental distributions with the values of $`a_2`$ given in the figure. In near-central collisions the K--mesons exhibit an isotropic emission pattern whereas the emission of K+-mesons is forward-backward peaked. The angular distributions observed for K+ and for K- in Ni+Ni collisions at $`1.93`$ AGeV are similar to the ones presented in figure 6 . The measured emission patterns indicate that the K- \- in contrast to the K+ \- have lost the memory of the beam direction for central heavy-ion collisions.

## 4 The time dependence of the K+\- and of the K--emission

When summarizing the experimental results on the production and on the propagation of $`K`$-mesons at $`1.5`$ AGeV remarkable similarities and differences between K+ and K- are found. The yields of the K+\- and of the K--mesons are related to each other (as indicated by the almost constant K-/K+ ratio as a function of $`A_{part}`$). On the other hand, the phase-space distributions (polar angles and spectral slopes) of the K+\- and of the K--mesons differ significantly. These observations can be explained by the following scenario. In the early phase of the collision the K+-mesons and the hyperons are produced via processes like $`\mathrm{NN}\mathrm{K}^+\mathrm{YN}`$ or $`\pi \mathrm{N}\mathrm{K}^+\mathrm{Y}`$ with $`\mathrm{Y}=\mathrm{\Lambda },\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ . The K+-mesons leave the reaction volume with little rescattering because of their long mean free path. Therefore, they probe the early, dense and hot phase of the collision and have been used to obtain information on the nuclear equation-of-state as discussed in section 2. The K--mesons, however, can hardly be produced in direct NN collisions at a beam energy of $`1.5`$ AGeV, even when taking into account Fermi motion. Indeed, transport model calculations predict that in heavy-ion collisions at SIS energies the production and absorption of K- predominantly proceeds via strangeness-exchange reactions $`\pi \mathrm{Y}\mathrm{K}^{}\mathrm{N}`$ . As the K+ are produced associated with the hyperons the yields of K+ and K- are correlated. Indeed, the measured K-/K+ ratio only slightly decreases with increasing centrality, i.e. with the system size.

The mean free path of the K--mesons is about $`0.8`$ fm in nuclear matter due to strangeness-exchange reactions like $`\mathrm{K}^{}\mathrm{N}\mathrm{Y}\pi `$. However, via the inverse reaction ($`\pi \mathrm{Y}\mathrm{K}^{}\mathrm{N}`$) the K- may reappear again thus propagating to the surface of the reaction volume. Those of the K--mesons which reach the detector are emitted in a late stage of the collision when the reaction volume is expanding and cooling down. Consequently, the spectral slope of the K- is steeper than the one of the K+. Furthermore, the emission pattern of the K--mesons is nearly isotropic due to multiple collisions. Both features are observed in the experiment.

The assumption of different emission times for K+\- and for K--mesons is supported by a transport model calculation using the IQMD code. Figure 7 shows the results of a simulation of central Au+Au collsions ($`b=0`$ fm) at $`1.5`$ AGeV . In the upper panel the time dependence of the density in the reaction zone is given. The lower panel shows the rate $`dN/dt`$ of emitted K+ (solid line) and of emitted K- (dashed line) as a function of their production time $`t`$. Within this calculation the K- are emitted at a later stage of the reaction during the expansion of the reaction volume while the K+ are emitted during the high-density phase of the collision.

In summary, we have presented differential cross sections and phase-space distributions of K+\- and of K--mesons produced in heavy-ion collisions at $`1.5`$ AGeV. We observed the following features: (i) The K-/K+ ratio is quite independent of $`A_{part}`$ both for Ni+Ni and for Au+Au collisions, (ii) in near-central collisions K--mesons are emitted almost isotropically whereas K+-mesons exhibit a forward-backward enhanced emission pattern, and (iii) the inverse slope parameters are significantly smaller for K-\- than for K+-mesons even for the most central Au+Au collisions. These findings indicate that (i) the production mechanisms of K+\- and of K--mesons are correlated by strangeness-exchange reactions, (ii) K--mesons undergo many collisions before leaving the reaction volume and, as a consequence, (iii) K--mesons freeze out later than K+-mesons.

## References