format: text

text:
# Localized tachyon condensation and G-parity conservation

## 1 Introduction

After discovering interesting phenomena on the tachyon condensation in open string theory , it has been tantalizing question to ask the same in closed string cases. The simplest closed string tachyon is the case where the closed string tachyon is localized at the singular point of the background geometry. In this direction, Adams, Polchinski and Silverstein  considered localized tachyon for non-compact orbifold $`^r/_n`$ and argued that starting from a non-supersymmetric orbifolds, there will be a cascade of tachyon condensation until space-time SUSY is restored. In a subsequent paper, Vafa  reformulated the problem using the mirror picture of gauged linear sigma model, which turns out to be an orbifolded Landau-Ginzburg theory, and confirmed the result of APS.

Since the tachyon condensation process can be considered as a renormalization goup (RG) flow, it would be interesting to ask whether there is a quantity like a c-function. In non-compact orbifolds, the c-theorem does not work. Therefore the authors of  tried to establish a closed string analogue of the g-theorem of boundary conformal field theory. It turns out that, if valid, it would give an explicit counter-example to the result of APS. On the other hand, in a related paper , Dabholkar and Vafa suggested that the minimal R-charge in the Ramond sector is the height of tachyon potential at the unstable critical point.

In , it is argued that the $`g_{cl}`$ of  does not respect the stability of supersymmetric theory and suggested a modified quantity to replace it. In a subsequent paper , one of the present authors suggested that the minimal tachyon mass squared should increase under the localized tachyon condensation. It turns out that this quantity is nothing but the GSO projected version of (negative of) minimal R-charge of Dabholkar-Vafa mentioned above. Later, the statement has been studied in a series of the papers, and it is proved that the R-charge decreases at the level of conformal field theories before GSO projection. For type II theory, the proof was incomplete mainly due to the incomplete understanding of behavior of G-parity of GSO projection under the tachyon condensation. In related papers  the picture of Vafa was extended by working out the generators of daughter theories (the result of decay of the mother theory). The chiral rings and GSO-projection of orbifold theory was examined in more detail in .

The goal of this paper is to complete the proof of statement with full consideration of GSO projection, namely to prove the following statement for type II theory of $`^2/_n`$ orbifold:

* Let $`m:=\mathrm{max}\left|\alpha ^{}M^2\right|.`$ Then, $`m(UV)m(IR)`$, under condensation of localized tachyon.

Notice that $`M_{min}^2`$ is negative and increases under the tachyon condensation while $`m`$ is positive and decreases as stated above. Figure 1 is the schematic diagram to clarify the content of this statement. We call this as a m-theorem to prevent possible confusion with c-theorem or g-theorem.

The rest of the paper goes as follows. In section 2, we consider the consistency of various GSO-projections introduced by arbitrarily different authors using different logics. In section 3, we show that, $`n(k_1,k_2)`$, the $`_n`$ orbifold with generator $`(k_1,k_2)`$ equivalent to $`n(1,k)`$ for some $`k`$ which we will fix in detail. We call the latter as ”canonical representation”. In section 4, we prove that the $`G`$ parity is conserved under the condensation of the localized tachyon given by the chiral primaries. This is the most important step in proving the m-theorem. In section 5, we finish the proof of the m-theorem. In section 6, we give a discussion on the implication of the theorem and conclude.

## 2 Equivalence of various GSO-projections

In this section we first want to understand whether orbifold GSO chiral projections recently introduced in  are mutually consistent. Let $`k_1,k_2`$ be the generator of the orbifold action of $`_n`$, that is,

$$x^{(1)}(z)e^{2\pi ik_1/n}x^{(1)},x^{(2)}(z)e^{2\pi ik_2/n}x^{(2)},$$
(1)
where $`x^{(1)},x^{(2)}`$ are complex co-ordinate of $`^2`$. We represent $`^2/_n`$ with generator $`(k_1,k_2)`$ by $`n(k_1,k_2)`$. In HKMM , $`k_1=1`$ cases were discussed. Here we discuss their result in the extended form, that is, with general $`(k_1,k_2)`$. The chiral primary operators were constructed from bosonized world sheet fermions $`\psi _i=e^{iH_i}`$ as

$$X_j=X_{n\{\frac{jk_1}{n}\}}^{(1)}X_{n\{\frac{jk_2}{n}\}}^{(2)},$$
(2)
where

$$X_j=\sigma _{\frac{j}{n}}e^{i\frac{j}{n}(H\overline{H})},$$
(3)
with $`\sigma _{\frac{j}{n}}`$ being a twist operator. The $`Z_2`$ action defining the GSO projection is given by

$$H_1H_1+k_2\pi ,H_2H_2k_1\pi .$$
(4)
In untwisted sector it acts as $`(1)^{F_L}`$ and restricts both $`k_1`$ and $`k_2`$ to be an odd. In twisted sector $`X_j`$ has phase

$$X_je^{i\pi (k_2\{\frac{jk_1}{n}\}k_1\{jk_2/n\})}X_j:=(1)^sX_j,$$
(5)
where $`\{x\}=x[x]`$ with $`[x]`$ being the greatest integer that does not exceed $`x`$. Note that $`s`$ is an integer in general and especially when $`k_1=1`$ and $`k_2=k`$

$$s=\left[\frac{jk}{n}\right].$$
(6)
In , Vafa reformulated the orbifold problem as Landau-Ginzburg theory by imbedding the orbifold geometry in the gauged linear sigma model and subsequently taking the mirror dual. The superpotential coming from the vortex contribution can be written as

$$W=u_1^n+u_2^n+e^{t/n}u_1^{p_1}u_2^{p_2}$$
(7)
$`(1)^{F_L}`$ should be defined by requiring $`WW`$. This can be achieved by defining the $`Z_n`$ action on $`u_i`$ by 111We have to make modifications of discussion of  on GSO projection.

$$u_1e^{i\pi k_2/n}u_1,u_2e^{i\pi k_1/n}u_2.$$
(8)
As a result,

$$u_1^{p_1}u_2^{p_2}(1)^{p_1k_2/np_2k_1/n}u_1^{p_1}u_2^{p_2}:=(1)^s^{}u_1^{p_1}u_2^{p_2}.$$
(9)
So by identifying $`p_i=n\{jk_i/n\},i=1,2,`$ we get

$$s=p\times k/n=s^{},$$
(10)
and consequently, two GSO actions are completely consistent. Notice that $`s`$ is always an integer. We also see that $`u_1^{p_1}u_2^{p_2}`$ in the mirror LG theory corresponds to $`X_j`$ of the operator construction.

We now want to see whether the GSO projection coming from the partition function  is also consistent with above two. The result of ref.  shows that $`u_1^{p_1}u_2^{p_2}`$ is projected out if

$$G=[jk_1/n]+[jk_2/n]$$
(11)
is even (odd) for $`cc`$ ring ($`ac`$ ring). For our purpose, it is enough to show that

$$Gs\mathrm{mod}\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}2}.$$
(12)
We first notice that for special case $`k_1=1,k_2=k`$,

$$s=[jk/n]=G.$$
(13)
In the next section we will prove that all $`n(k_1,k_2)`$ have equivalent representation $`n(1,k)`$ for some $`k`$. So the above result is enough if we consider only a given theory. However, we will need to consider the case where $`k_11`$ when we consider the ‘decay’ of $`n(1,k)`$ by explicitly specifying the daughter theories. So let’s consider the general cases. For type II, we need to have $`k_1+k_2=even`$ . If both $`k_1,k_2`$ are odd integers, the equivalence can be readily seen by considering $`s+G`$ with the help of the following identity.

$$s=k_2\{jk_1/n\}k_1\{jk_1/n\}=k_2[jk_1/n]+k_1[jk_2/n],$$
(14)
so that $`s+G`$ is even, which is enough for our goal. If both $`k_1,k_2`$ are even, then $`s`$ is even and $`G`$ is not necessarily equivalent to $`s`$. In table 1, we give an explicit example for this case. However, if we further restrict ourselves to the case where $`n,k_1,k_2`$ are mutually co-prime, we can restrict ourselves to the case where $`k_1,k_2`$ are odd. Later in section 4, we will only need to consider the case where $`k_1=1`$ or both $`k_1,k_2`$ are odd.

## 3 Equivalence of $`n(k_1,k_2)`$ and $`n(1,k)`$

Now, we want to show that $`n(k_1,k_2)`$ is equivalent with $`n(1,k)`$ for some $`k`$. We can choose a convention where $`k_1>0`$, since $`n(k_1,k_2)=n(k_1,k_2)`$ even after GSO projection. 222One can see this from $`[jk_i/n]=[jk_i]1`$ regardless of the sign of $`k_i`$. First, notice that $`(k_1,k_2)`$ and $`(1,k)`$ should generate the same spectra if $`k_2/k_1=k`$ and $`n,k_1`$ and $`n,k_2`$ are relatively co-prime, since the spectrum is nothing but the modulo-$`n`$-rearrangement of $`j(k_1,k_2)`$ for $`j=1,\mathrm{},n1`$. In fact, any of the element of the spectrum, that is, any of $`j(k_1,k_2)`$ modulo $`n`$ can be the generator of the same spectrum set. Therefore, without GSO projection, the equivalence of the two is quite obvious. For type 0 case, the GSO projection does not eliminate any variety of chiral primaries in the following sense: if an operator with a certain charge is projected out in $`cc`$ ring, there is a surviving operator in $`aa`$ ring with the same charge. This can be seen from the fact that $`j`$-th element of $`cc`$-ring and $`(nj)`$-th element of $`aa`$ ring have the same charge but different G-parity if $`k_1+k_2=odd`$ :

$$n(1\{(nj)k_i/n\})=n\{jk_i/n\},G(nj)G(j)+k_1+k_2\mathrm{mod}\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}2}.$$
(15)
Similar relations hold between $`ca`$ and $`ac`$ rings. Therefore if two type 0 theories have the same spectrum before GSO projection, so do they after GSO.

Hence from now on, we concentrate on the type II case, where $`k_1+k_2=even`$. We first have to specify $`k`$ more precisely. Let $`k_1^1`$ be the multiplicative inverse of $`k_1`$ in $`_n`$ so that there is a unique integer $`a`$ depending on $`k_1`$ such that

$$k_1^1k_1=na+1,\text{for any given }k_1.$$
(16)
Then, $`k`$ is equal to $`k_1^1k_2`$ modulo $`n`$. So there exists an integer $`l`$ such that

$$k=k_1^1k_2+ln,\mathrm{and}n<k<n.$$
(17)
In fact, there are two such $`l`$’s, since the length of range is $`2n`$. They are consecutive. In order for $`n(1,k)`$ to be a type II string theory, we require that

$$k=k_1^1k_2+ln=odd.$$
(18)
For odd $`n`$, this fixes $`l`$ uniquely, since $`kk\pm n`$ mod 2. However, for even $`n`$, the ambiguity will be removed only after we take account the G-parity of $`k^1`$ and $`l`$ more carefully. Before we proceed, we give some examples to give some feeling on how things work.

* $`8(3,5)`$: It is the same with $`8(1,1)`$ before GSO projection, since $`53^11`$ in $`_8`$. However, these are NOT equivalent after GSO as one can see from the table 2. Then, it may look like a counter example. However, for even $`n`$, both $`n(k_1,k_2)`$ and $`n(k_1,k_2\pm n)`$ represent the same type of theory regarding to whether they are type 0 or type II . Here $`\pm `$ is chosen such that $`n<k_2\pm n<n`$ is satisfied. Therefore we should also consider $`8(1,7)`$ instead of $`8(1,1)`$. Remarkably, $`8(3,5)`$ and $`8(1,7)`$ have the same GSO projected spectrum as one can see from table 2.
* $`7(3,5)`$: It is equivalent to $`7(1,3)`$ and also to $`7(1,4)`$ before GSO projection. But $`7(3,5)`$ and $`7(1,3)`$ is a type II while $`7(1,4)`$ is type 0. Therefore in this case there is a unique representation in the same type. One can explicitly check that $`7(3,5)`$ has identical spectrum with $`7(1,3)`$ after GSO from table 3.

Now let us come back to the general argument. Consider $`G`$-parity for $`n(k_1,k_2)`$ and $`n(1,k)`$ with $`k`$ given in eq.(17). We call them as $`A`$ and $`B`$ orbifold theory respectively. The $`G`$-parity for $`j`$-th element of $`A`$ is $`G_A(j)=[jk_1/n]+[jk_2/n]`$ and the $`G`$-parity for $`j`$-th one of $`B`$ is $`G_B(j)=[jk/n]`$. We remind that the $`cc`$\- and $`ca`$-rings of $`A`$ and $`B`$ are the same (as sets) before GSO projection. Let the $`j`$-th element of A theory appears as the $`j^{}`$-th element for B so that

$$j^{}=n\{jk_1/n\}.$$
(19)
For our purpose, it is enough to show that

$$G_A(j)G_B(j^{})\mathrm{mod}\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}2}.$$
(20)
Since $`k`$ is an odd integer,

$$G_B=[(jk_1/n[jk_1/n])k][jk_1/n]+jk_1(k_1^1k_2+ln)/n\mathrm{mod}\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}2}.$$
(21)
Using eq.(16), one can easily show that

$$G_BG_A+jk_1l+jk_2a\mathrm{mod}\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}2}.$$
(22)
If both $`k_1,k_2`$ are even and $`n`$ is odd, then our job is done. If both are odd, then $`G_BG_A+j(l+a)`$ modulo 2. For even $`n`$, one of the consecutive $`l`$’s (see below eq.(17)) can be chosen such that $`l+a`$ is even and this condition removes the ambiguity in the choice of $`l`$ (hence in $`k`$) as mentioned before.

For odd $`n`$, $`l`$ is fixed as follows: If $`k_1^1k_2`$ is already odd, then $`l`$ should be even not to change the type 0/type II. If the former is even, then $`l`$ should be odd. For $`k_1^1k_2`$ odd case, using eq. (16),

$$(na+1)k_2=k_1oddk_1\mathrm{mod}\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}2}.$$
(23)
If $`k_1,k_2`$ are both odd, $`na+1`$ should be odd. Since $`n`$ is odd, $`a`$ must be even. Therefore if $`k_1^1k_2`$ is odd and $`k_1,k_2`$ have the same number of factor 2, $`l+a`$ is even as desired. Similarly, for $`k_1^1k_2`$ even case,

$$(na+1)k_2=k_1evenk_1\mathrm{mod}\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}2}.$$
(24)
If $`k_1,k_2`$ are both odd, then $`na+1`$ must be even, hence $`a`$ must be even. Therefore in this case also $`l+a`$ is even as desired. Hence we proved the following

* Lemma: For any orbifold $`n(k_1,k_2)`$, we can represent it by $`n(1,k)`$ with GSO projection properly considered.

## 4 Conservation of $`G`$-parity under LTC

The final most important step in proving the m-theorem is to show that $`G`$ parity is conserved under the localized tachyon condensation. Namely, if a particular charge is projected out in the mother theory, its daughter image under $`T_p`$ is also projected out in a daughter theory.

In the previous work , we showed that the decay of $`n(k_1,k_2)`$ under the condensation of localized tachyon with weight $`p=(p_1,p_2)`$ is

$$n(k_1,k_2)p_1(k_1,s)p_2(s,k_2)$$
(25)
where $`p_1=\{jk_1/n\}`$, $`p_2=\{jk_2/n\}`$ and $`s=p\times k/n=k_2\{jk_1/n\}k_1\{jk_2/n\}`$. Its $`G`$-parity is given by

$$G_p=[\frac{jk_1}{n}]+[\frac{jk_2}{n}]\mathrm{mod}\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}2}$$
(26)
Here $`[x]`$ means the integer part of $`x`$ while $`\{x\}`$ means the fractional part of $`x`$. In order for $`(p_1,p_2)`$ to survive, $`G_p`$ should be an odd integer. On the other hand, by the result of last section, we only need to consider the decay of a canonical representation:

$$n(1,k)p_1(1,s_p)p_2(s_p,k),$$
(27)
with $`p_i=n\{jk_i/n\},s_p=p\times k/n=(p_2kp_1)/n`$. In order to fix the ambiguity in the daughter-theory-generators, we use the fact that for type II theory, the bulk tachyon is projected out and it can not and should not be regenerated by the localized tachyon condensation process. That is, type II can decay only to type II. Then $`s`$ and $`k`$ should be both odd. This conditions are already satisfied: the orginal theory is type II hence $`k`$ is odd and $`p`$ as a surviving element of $`cc`$-ring must have odd $`G_p(=s_p)`$. If any of $`p_1`$, $`p_2`$ is odd, that can not be added or subtracted to the generator, since it convert the type II to type 0. If any of them are even, it can be added to the generator and we have ambiguity in the determination of the daughter theory. However, as we will see shortly, this can not be so and we will see that the eq. (27) describe the tachyon condensation properly even after the GSO projection. For a moment, we assume that eq. (27) is true.

We need the map which gives the G-parity value $`[lk/n]`$ when the data $`(q_1,q_2)=(l,n\{lk/n\})`$ of a charge are given. This is given by the observation:

$$G_q=[lk/n]=(kq_1q_2)/n=q\times k/n.$$
(28)
Under the condensation of $`(p_1,p_2)`$, $`q`$ is mapped to $`q^{}`$ by the tachyon map $`T_p`$ . If $`q^{}`$ belongs to up-theory of daughter theory,

$$q^{}=T_p^+q=\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& 0\\ p_2/n& p_1/n\end{array}\right)\left(\begin{array}{c}q_1\\ q_2\end{array}\right)=\left(\begin{array}{c}q_1\\ p\times q/n\end{array}\right)=\left(\begin{array}{c}q_1^{}\\ q_2^{}\end{array}\right).$$
(29)
Then,

$$G_q^{}=\frac{q_2^{}q_1^{}s_p}{p_1}=\frac{1}{np_1}(p\times qq_1(p\times k))=\frac{1}{n}(q\times k)=G_q,$$
(30)
which proves the conservation of G-parity for the up-theory spectrum. Similarly we can prove the same statement for the down-theory using the equivalence of G-parity with $`s`$ proved before. Notice that both $`s`$ and $`k`$ are odd, so that the result applies here. Since

$$q^{\prime \prime }=T_p^{}q=(p\times q/n,q_2):=(q_1^{\prime \prime },q_2^{\prime \prime }),$$
(31)
we have

$$G_{q^{\prime \prime }}=\frac{q_2^{\prime \prime }s+q_1^{\prime \prime }k}{p_2}=\frac{1}{np_2}((p\times q)k+q_2(p\times k))=\frac{1}{n}(q\times k)=G_q,$$
(32)
finishing the proof of G-parity conservation. 333We can also use the inverse representation $`n(k^{},1)p_1(k^{},s_p^{})p_2(s_p^{},1),`$ to prove the G-parity conservation for the down theory spectrum. Here $`k^{}:=k^1`$ in the finite field $`_n`$, and $`s_p^{}=p\times k^{}/n=(p_1k^{}p_2)/n`$. Using $`G=[lk^{}/n]=(q_2k^{}q_1)/n`$, we have $`G_q^{}=\frac{q_2^{}(s_p^{})q_1}{p_2}=\frac{1}{np_2}(q_2(p\times k^{})+p\times q)=\frac{1}{n}(q_2k^{}q_1)=G_q.`$

An important remark is in order. The decay rule eq. (25) or eq.(27) is given at the conformal field theory level. After GSO, since $`n(k_1,k_2)`$ and $`n(k_1,k_2\pm n)`$ are different theories, it seems that the decay rule has the same ambiguity: that of adding $`\pm p_1`$, $`\pm p_2`$ to $`s`$ and $`k_2`$ respectively in the right hand side of eq. (25): why the following process is not allowed?

$$n(k_1,k_2)p_1(k_1,s\pm p_1)p_2(s,k_2\pm p_2).$$
(33)
If $`p_1(k_1,s_p)`$ is replaced by $`p_1(k_1,s_p\pm p_1)`$, then a computation shows that

$$G_q^{}=G_qq_1.$$
(34)
This means that an operator that is projected out in the mother theory can be resurrected in daughter theory under the localized tachyon condensation(LTC). This is not physical, because what changes under the LTC is not the operator $`u_1^{q_1}u_2^{q_2}`$ but the Lagrangian:

$$W=u_1^n+u_2^n+e^{t/n}u_1^{p_1}u_2^{p_2}.$$
(35)
Namely, each operator remains the same and only the coefficient $`e^{t/n}`$ of condensing tachyon operator changes so that the measuring method of the weight of operators $`u_1^{q_1}u_2^{q_2}`$ changes. Once an operator is projected out at the moment of $`t\mathrm{}`$, it is not possible to resurrect it by a smooth deformation of taking $`t\mathrm{}`$. The same argument holds for the $`p_2(s_p,k\pm p_2)`$. Therefore the original rule eq.(25) or eq.(27) remains its form and the modified rule eq.(33) is not allowed.

## 5 Proof of m-theorem

According to the result of , the spectrum of daughter theories can be regarded as images of certain linear mapping $`T`$ for $`cc`$ ring and $`F`$ for $`ca`$ or $`ac`$ rings given by

$`T_p^+(q)=(q_1,p\times q/n),`$ $`T_p^{}(q)=(p\times q/n,q_2),`$
$`F_p^+(\overline{q})=(q_1,p_1p\times q/n),`$ $`F_p^{}(\stackrel{~}{q})=(p_2+p\times q/n,q_2).`$ (36)
Here, superscript $`+`$ is for up-theory, $``$ is for down-theory and $`\overline{q}=(q_1,nq_2)ca`$ ring, $`\stackrel{~}{q}=(nq_1,q_2)ca`$ and $`p^{}=(p_1,p_2)`$. $`T`$ is a mapping for tachyon condensation which exists due to the worldsheet $`𝒩=2`$ SUSY, while $`F`$ is not a mapping describing tachyon condensation and its existence is due to the conformal symmetry of the final theory. For more detail, see . The most important property of $`T`$ and $`F`$ is their monotonicity, which enables the proof of m-theorem possible.

The conservation of $`G`$ parity means that the same logic can be applied to the spectrum of type II even after GSO projection. The worst thing that can happen is the case where the operator with minimum R-charge of the Mother theory is deleted in the mother theory but resurrected in the daughter theory. The G-parity conservation guarantees that such phenomena can never happen. See figure 2.

For completeness, we describe some of the detail here. Let $`p`$ be the condensing tachyon and $`q_{min}^{}`$ be the element with minimal R-charge of the daughter theory, i.e. the smallest one among all charges in up and down theories. If $`q_{min}^{}`$ belongs to $`cc`$ ring of up-theory, then it is an image of an element $`q`$ in the mother theory under $`T_p^+`$. $`q`$ must belong to the $`cc`$-ring of the mother theory due to the G-parity conservation. If $`q_{min}`$ is the minimal element of the mother theory, $`R[q_{min}]`$, the R-charge of $`q_{min}`$, is smaller than $`R[q]`$ by definition. Then our desired statement,

$$R[q_{min}]R[q_{min}^{}]$$
(37)
comes from the monotonicity of $`T^+`$, namely,

$$R[q]R[T_p^+(q)]=R[q_{min}^{}].$$
(38)
If $`q_{min}^{}`$ belongs to $`cc`$ ring of down-theory, then $`T_p^{}`$ replaces $`T_p^+`$ for above argument. If $`q_{min}^{}ca`$-ring of daughter theories, then the entire arguments can be repeated by replacing the map $`T^\pm `$ by $`F^\pm `$ to finish the proof.

## 6 Discussion

Our proof was actually motivated from the numerical work we performed, which showed that the theorem holds for all $`n(k_1,k_2)`$ with $`n100`$ and $`n<k_1<k_2<n`$, which provided significant evidence to believe that the m-theorem is true.

The m-theorem we just proved implies that the one loop cosmological constant of the non-supersymmetric orbifold is a monotonically decreasing quantity under the localized tachyon condensation. This is because, the former is defined as the integral of one loop partition function over the fundamental domain with some cutoff to control the divergence. The main divergence comes from the low temperature limit of the partition function which is dominated by the contribution of the lowest tachyon mass. Therefore the present work proves the statement of the original conjecture of  in its full strength. The cosmological constant vanishes when the theory reaches a supersymmetric point by the tachyon condensation.

We describe some future work. Our work is still comparing two end points of RG where conformal invariance makes the explicit computations available. Therefore it is still needed to extend our work to the string off-shell level, which would require much more non-trivial efforts. Some preliminary work in this direction for the simplest case is discussed in Dabholkar and Vafa . Extension in this direction is in progress .

###### Acknowledgments.

This work is supported by KOSEF Grant 1999-2-112-003-5.


text:
# The Parton Structure of the Nucleon and Precision Determination of the Weinberg Angle in Neutrino Scattering

## Introduction:

An important open question in particle physics in recent years has been the significance of the “NuTeV anomaly”—a $`3\sigma `$ deviation of the measurement of $`\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _\mathrm{W}`$ ($`0.2277\pm 0.0013\pm 0.0009`$) reported in Ref. nuanom , from the world average of other measurements lepew  ($`0.2227\pm 0.0004`$). Possible sources of the NuTeV anomaly, both within and beyond the standard model, have been examined in forte . No consistent picture has yet emerged in spite of extensive literature barzo ; gambino ; moch ; isospin ; kulagin  on this subject. The measurement in Ref. nuanom  was based on a correlated fit to the ratios of charged and neutral current (CC & NC) interactions in sign-selected neutrino and anti-neutrino scattering events on a (primarily) iron target at Fermilab. This procedure is closely related to measuring the Paschos-Wolfenstein ratio pw , which provides the theoretical underpinning of the analysis. Specifically, the Paschos-Wolfenstein ratio $`R^{}`$ is related to the Weinberg angle $`\theta _W`$ by

$`R^{}`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\sigma _{\mathrm{NC}}^\nu \sigma _{\mathrm{NC}}^{\overline{\nu }}}{\sigma _{\mathrm{CC}}^\nu \sigma _{\mathrm{CC}}^{\overline{\nu }}}}`$
$``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _\mathrm{W}+\delta R_A^{}+\delta R_{QCD}^{}+\delta R_{EW}^{}`$
where the three correction terms are due to the non-isoscalarity of the target ($`\delta R_A^{}`$), next-to-leading-order (NLO) and nonperturbative QCD effects ($`\delta R_{QCD}^{}`$), and higher-order electroweak effects ($`\delta R_{EW}^{}`$). Since $`R^{}`$ is a ratio of differences of cross sections, the correction terms are expected to be rather small. But at the accuracy required to test the consistency of the Standard Model, all the corrections need to be quantified as precisely as possible—similar to some previous combined perturbative/nonperturbative re-analyses hetjets ; cano  of challenges in QCD.

In this paper, we focus on QCD corrections, which are generally recognized barzo ; gambino ; moch ; isospin ; kulagin  to be the least well known. Let us write

$$\delta R_{QCD}^{}=\delta R_s^{}+\delta R_I^{}+\delta R_{NLO}^{}$$
(2)
where the three terms on the right-hand side are due to possible strangeness asymmetry ($`s^{}=s\overline{s}0`$) and isospin violation ($`u_{p,n}d_{n,p}`$) effects in the parton structure of the nucleon, and NLO ($`O(\alpha _s)`$) corrections, respectively111Strictly speaking, there are also heavy-quark asymmetry terms such as $`\delta R_c^{}c\overline{c}`$ from intrinsic charm states. These must be numerically negligible, and are certainly experimentally unknown.. The original NuTeV analysis was carried out at LO in QCD and assumed $`\delta R_s^{}=0=\delta R_I^{}`$. Our analysis is based the recent NLO calculation of kr03 , together with new parton analyses that explicitly allow strangeness asymmetry ($`\delta R_s^{}0`$) DimuonFitting  and isospin violation ($`\delta R_I^{}0`$) mrst . The actual calculation is carried out at the cross section level, i.e., using the first line of Eq. (Introduction:) rather than using the schematic linearized form given in the second line of Eq. (Introduction:) and Eq. (2). Our results provide more realistic estimates of the sizes and uncertainties of the QCD corrections, and a new look at the significance of the “anomaly.” (Cf. also a recent re-evaluation of the electroweak correction to the calculation of $`R^{}`$ Hollik .)

## NLO Calculation:

At sufficiently high neutrino energy, the total neutrino cross section

$$\sigma ^\nu \sigma ^{\nu NlX}=d^3p_l\frac{d^3\sigma ^{\nu NlX}}{d^3p_l}$$
(3)
can be calculated in QCD perturbation theory—in contrast to charged lepton scattering, where the massless photon propagator leads to dominance of nonperturbative photoproduction events over deep inelastic scattering. The differential cross section in Eq. (3) factorizes into a sum of convolutions of parton distribution functions and partonic cross sections

$$d^3\sigma ^{\nu NlX}=\underset{f=q,g}{}fd^3\sigma ^{\nu flX}.$$
(4)
This calculation has been performed at NLO accuracy in Ref. kr03 . The analysis included target and charm mass effects. These corrections are needed to obtain reliable results because there are non-negligible contributions from low $`Q`$ values to the integral in Eq. (3)—e.g., about 5% from $`Q^2<1\mathrm{GeV}^2`$ for $`\sigma _{\mathrm{CC}}^{\overline{\nu }}`$ and from $`Q^2<2\mathrm{GeV}^2`$ for $`\sigma _{\mathrm{CC}}^\nu `$. (For NC neutrino events, it is not possible to exclude the low-$`Q`$ region by experimental kinematic cuts.) Other corrections included are the non-isoscalarity of the target material (iron), i.e., $`\delta R_A^{}`$ in (Introduction:); energy averaging over the neutrino and anti-neutrino flux spectra; and cuts in hadronic energy ($`20\mathrm{GeV}<yE_\nu <180\mathrm{GeV}`$ for lepton inelasticity $`y`$) as used in the experimental analysis nuanom .

Ref. kr03  used previously available parton distributions ctq6 ; grv98 , all of which assume isospin symmetry and $`s=\overline{s}`$ symmetry within the nucleon. The study confirmed the smallness222Note, however that NLO effects may be more important for the analysis nuanom  that does not measure $`R^{}`$ directly.  of the higher order corrections to $`R^{}`$ in general. (The same conclusion is reached by the NLO and NNLO moment analyses of forte ; moch ; dobel .) It was also shown that the non-monochromatic neutrino and anti-neutrino beams, with different profiles, and typical cuts in the hadronic event energy do not alter $`\delta R_{NLO}^{}`$ substantially. In the next two sections, we will examine shifts of the NLO calculation due to recent advances in global QCD analysis of parton distributions that allow strangeness asymmetry and isospin violation.

In principle, the parton distribution functions in Eq. (4) should be those of nuclear targets. Our calculation is done as an incoherent sum of contributions from parton densities of unbound nucleons. This approximation is reasonable in that we only calculate relative shifts between $`[S^{}]=0`$ and $`[S^{}]0`$ PDFs (where $`[S^{}]`$ is defined in Eq. (7); similarly for isospin. In fact, experimental information on nuclear PDFs is relatively scarce, and nuclear PDFs only account for leading twist 2 ($`\tau =2`$) effects. Higher twists, whether they relate to nuclear modifications or not, are generally difficult to handle consistently. By limiting ourselves to $`\tau =2`$, our error estimates may be underestimates.

## Strangeness Asymmetry:

Because the strange quark mass $`m_s`$ is comparable to $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mathrm{QCD}}`$, the strange quark PDF is a nonperturbative component of the nucleon bound state. Except for the strangeness number sum rule,

$$\left[s(x)\overline{s}(x)\right]𝑑x=0,$$
(5)
there is no fundamental or approximate symmetry that relates the strange quark PDF $`s(x)`$ to the antiquark PDF $`\overline{s}(x)`$. Limits on $`s^{}s(x)\overline{s}(x)`$ can, therefore, only be derived from data (or perhaps eventually from a lattice QCD calculation). Until recently, $`s^{}`$ has been largely unknown and usually assumed to vanish. However, the recently published CCFR-NuTeV data on dimuon cross sections in $`\nu N`$ and $`\overline{\nu }N`$ scattering yield a direct handle on $`s(x)`$ and $`\overline{s}(x)`$, and hence on $`s^{}`$ DimuonFitting , because the dimuon data reflect semileptonic decays of the charm quark in $`W^+sc`$ and $`W^{}\overline{s}\overline{c}`$ events.

An asymmetric strange sea in the nucleon ($`s^{}0`$) contributes to a correction term to $`R^{}`$ at LO forte . If the scale dependence of the parton distributions is neglected, i.e. $`f(x,Q)f(x)`$, and in the approximation of overlooking experimental cuts, the total cross section in Eq. (3) is sensitive to the second Mellin moment integrals $`𝑑xxf(x)`$ of the PDFs forte ; moch . Making the further approximation of an isoscalar target, and in the limit of a negligible charm quark mass, a strange sea asymmetry contributes at LO as

$$\delta R_s^{}\left(\frac{1}{2}\frac{7}{6}\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _\mathrm{W}\right)\frac{[S^{}]}{[Q^{}]},$$
(6)
where the strangeness asymmetry is quantified by

$$\left[S^{}\right]x\left[s(x)\overline{s}(x)\right]𝑑x;$$
(7)
and $`[Q^{}]=x[q(x)\overline{q}(x)]𝑑x`$ with $`q(x)=(u(x)+d(x))/2`$ represents the isoscalar up and down quark combination.

By including the dimuon data, and by exploring the full allowed parameter space in a global QCD analysis, Ref. DimuonFitting  presents a general picture of the strangeness sector of nucleon structure. The strong interplay between the existing experimental constraints and the global theoretical constraints, especially the sum rule (5), places useful limits on acceptable values of the strangeness asymmetry momentum integral $`[S^{}]`$. The limit quoted in DimuonFitting  is $`0.001<\left[S^{}\right]<+0.004`$. A large negative $`[S^{}]`$ is strongly disfavored by both dimuon and other inclusive data. The strict sum rule (5) implies that a non-zero $`s^{}(x)`$ function must change sign at least once. Studies in DimuonFitting  demonstrate that the exact value of $`[S^{}]`$ is a volatile quantity. The best fit “B” is a solution where negative $`s^{}(x)`$ at low $`x`$ is compensated by positive $`s^{}(x)`$ at large $`x`$; this leads to positivity of the second moment integral in Eq. (7). The same trend had previously been observed in a fit to inclusive neutrino scattering barzo . Also, this behavior was anticipated by a dynamical model broma  based on baryon-meson fluctuations of the nucleon light-cone wave function.333For some more recent model discussions, cf. e.g. mcm .

We quantify the impact of the PDFs of Ref. DimuonFitting  on the Paschos-Wolfenstein relation in Eq. (Introduction:) by employing the NLO neutrino cross section calculations of Ref. kr03 . The PDF sets A,B,C of Ref. DimuonFitting  represent good fits within the allowed parton parameter space. They all have $`s(x)\overline{s}(x)`$, and $`[S^{}]>0`$. In our calculations, we employ these PDFs consistently; i.e., we use the full set of PDFs, not just their strange quark distributions.

The shift in $`R^{}`$ due to strangeness asymmetry, $`\delta R_s^{}`$, is obtained as the difference:

$$\delta R_s^{}R_{\{\mathrm{A},\mathrm{B},\mathrm{C},\mathrm{B}^+,\mathrm{B}^{}\}}^{}R_{\mathrm{CTEQ6}}^{}.$$
(8)
These are given in the last column of Table 1, along with a summary of the underlying PDFs. We show not only the preferred fit values for the sets A, B, C but also results for fits $`\mathrm{B}^\pm `$ that were obtained by using the Lagrange multiplier method to push the limits of the allowed $`[S^{}]`$ value in both directions somewhat beyond the preferred range as described in DimuonFitting . The quality of the fits is indicated by the relative $`\chi ^2`$ values, which are normalized to the reference solution “B”. Thus, the values in row B are 1.0 (italized) by definition. The three preferred sets A, B, C are comparable in quality; the extreme sets B+ and B- are clearly disfavored.

For a given value of “measured” $`R^{}`$, a shift of the theoretical prediction, such as $`\delta R_s^{}`$, leads to a shift in the extracted $`\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _\mathrm{W}`$ value according to (cf. Eq.(Introduction:)):

$$\delta (\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _W)=\delta R_s^{}.$$
(9)
The results of our calculation (Table 1), along with the range $`0.001<[S^{}]<0.004`$ of Ref. DimuonFitting , which is based on more extensive studies than just the fits shown in Table 1, lead us to estimate the range of $`\delta R_s^{}`$, hence $`\delta (\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _W)`$, to be $`0.005<\delta (\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _W)<+0.001`$.

We find that the shift in $`R^{}`$, calculated as an average over $`\nu `$ and $`\overline{\nu }`$ energies according to their flux spectra, is relatively insensitive to the incident neutrino energy. The values of $`\delta R_s^{}`$ in Table 1 are also approximately unchanged when the cut on $`yE_\nu `$ is eliminated. These findings suggest that the incorporation of other detector effects recipe ; moch , which make the analysis in Ref. nuanom  somewhat more involved than a direct measurement of $`R^{}`$, will not significantly impact the importance of the $`[S^{}]`$ contribution to $`\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _\mathrm{W}`$444To estimate the size of detector-dependent effects, we have calculated $`\delta \mathrm{sin}^2\theta _\mathrm{W}`$ using the prescription of recipe , summarized in the functional $`F[\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _\mathrm{W},s\overline{s};x]𝑑x`$. The shifts are within 30% of those presented above..

The shift in $`\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _W`$ corresponding to the central fit B bridges a substantial part of the original $`3\sigma `$ discrepancy between the NuTeV result and the world average of other measurements of $`\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _\mathrm{W}`$. For PDF sets with a shift toward the negative end, such as $`0.004`$, the discrepancy is reduced to less than $`1\sigma `$. On the other hand, for PDF sets with a shift toward the positive end, such as $`+0.001`$, the discrepancy remains.

More input on $`s^{}(x)=s(x)\overline{s}(x)`$ would, of course, be helpful in pinning down the contribution of strangeness asymmetry to $`\delta R^{}`$. Measurements of associated production of charmed jets and $`W^\pm `$ bosons at the Tevatron, at RHIC, or at the future LHC, would increase our knowledge of $`s(x)`$ and $`\overline{s}(x)`$ (cf. wplusc ). It will help that the “valence” density $`s^{}(x)`$ is more easily accessible than the predominantly singlet $`s(x)+\overline{s}(x)`$, which is concentrated at small $`x`$; however, the low expected statistics will make this measurement extremely challenging. In principle it seems also feasible to study $`s(x)\overline{s}(x)`$ on the lattice lattice . Unfortunately, the most relevant moment $`[S^{}]`$ does not correspond to a local operator and cannot be calculated on the lattice.

## Possible Isospin Violation:

Isospin symmetry holds to a good approximation in low energy hadron spectroscopy and scattering, but it is not an exact symmetry. The level of accuracy of the usual assumption of isospin symmetry at the parton level, e.g. $`u_p=d_n`$ and $`d_p=u_n`$, is largely unknown. Isospin symmetry violation effects at the parton level contribute a shift of the P-W ratio $`R^{}`$ by

$$\delta R_I^{}\left(\frac{1}{2}\frac{7}{6}\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _\mathrm{W}\right)\frac{[D_N^{}U_N^{}]}{[Q^{}]}$$
(10)
where $`N=(p+n)/2`$ and, as before, $`[]`$ denotes the second Mellin moment.

There have been model studies isospin  that indicate $`\delta R_I^{}`$ could be large enough to have an effect on the interpretation of the NuTeV anomaly. However, it is preferable to quantify the allowed range of uncertainty of this effect directly and by model-independent global analysis of the differences. Unfortunately, there are few experimental constraints on these small differences.

Nonetheless, the MRST collaboration mrst  have recently made a first attempt to separate proton and neutron PDFs where isospin for the valence quarks is broken by a function with a single parameter $`\kappa `$. Within physically reasonable limits, they find the overall $`\chi ^2`$ of the global fit to be rather insensitive to $`\kappa `$. By Eq. (10), the determination of $`\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _W`$ via the measurement of $`R^{}`$ is thus subject to a non-negligible uncertainty due to isospin violation.

To make this point more concrete, we have applied the candidate PDFs from mrst  to our NLO calculation, in the same spirit as the study of strangeness asymmetry discussed above. We find that the range of allowed $`\kappa `$ parameter given in mrst , $`0.7<\kappa <0.7`$, implies

$$0.007\delta R_I^{}0.007,$$
(11)
and the best fit value of $`\kappa =0.2`$ corresponds to a shift of $`\delta R_I^{}=0.0022`$. A one-parameter functional form may not be general enough to pin down the true isospin violations of the parton structure. Nevertheless, the large range of $`\delta R_I^{}`$ in Eq. (11) indicates that a reasonable theoretical uncertainty due to isospin violation needs to be assigned to the determination of $`\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _\mathrm{W}`$.

## Conclusion:

The uncertainties in the parton structure of the nucleon that relate to $`R^{}`$ will not decrease substantially any time soon. The uncertainties in the theory that relates $`R^{}`$ to $`\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _\mathrm{W}`$ are substantial on the scale of precision of the high statistics NuTeV data nuanom . Within their bounds, the results of this study suggest that the new dimuon data, the Weinberg angle measurement, and other global data sets used in QCD parton structure analysis can all be consistent within the standard model of particle physics.

## Acknowledgments:

We thank members of NuTeV collaboration, particularly K. McFarland, for interesting discussions; P. Gambino for discussions and useful comments; and R. Thorne for discussions and for providing grids of the PDFs in mrst . This research was supported by the National Science Foundation (grant No. 0100677), the U.S. Department of Energy (Contracts No. DE-FG03-95ER40908 and No. FG02-91ER40664), and by the Lightner-Sams Foundation. S. K. is grateful to RIKEN, Brookhaven National Laboratory and the U.S. Department of Energy (contract No. DE-AC02-98CH10886) for providing the facilities essential for the completion of this work.


text:
# The Cellular Burning Regime in Type Ia Supernova Explosions

## 1 Introduction

In the canonical astrophysical model Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia in the following) are associated with thermonuclear explosions of white dwarf (WD) stars (Hoyle & Fowler, 1960). These WDs are composed of carbon and oxygen. Due to the high temperature sensitivity of the activation energy of carbon and oxygen burning, the reaction is confined to a very narrow region and propagates as a combustion wave. This defines a *thermonuclear flame*. The theoretical understanding of flame propagation in WDs provides the key to SN Ia explosion models with the effective flame velocity being the most important parameter. What are the phenomena that mediate the combustion wave? The answer to that question is given by the hydrodynamics of combustion. Conservation laws across the flame admit two fundamental modes of flame propagation: the *detonation*, in which the flame propagates due to shock waves, and the *deflagration*, which is based on microphysical transport phenomena such as heat conduction and species diffusion.

Flame propagation in the detonation mode is certainly easiest to model. Here the flame propagation velocity with respect to the unburnt material is larger than the corresponding sound speed. Therefore the WD star has no time to expand prior to the incineration in this *detonation model* of SN Ia explosions and all the material is consumed at high densities resulting in ashes consisting solely of iron-peak elements (Arnett, 1969). However, this is in conflict with observational spectra, which show strong indication of intermediate mass elements.

Consequently, the star has to expand considerably before it is processed by the thermonuclear flame. This is possible if flame propagation starts out in the deflagration mode, since here the microphysical transport processes lead to a subsonic flame velocity. In the present study, we refer to that *deflagration model* of SNe Ia. Moreover, underlying to our model is the so-called single-degenerate scenario, where the progenitor is a binary system with the WD accreting matter from the non-degenerate companion until it reaches the Chandrasekhar mass. At this point, thermonuclear reaction ignites near the center of the WD and propagates outward as a deflagration flame. For a review of SN Ia explosion models we refer to Hillebrandt & Niemeyer (2000).

In the framework of the deflagration model, recent large-scale SN Ia explosion models have been quite successful (Reinecke et al., 2002; Gamezo et al., 2003). Nevertheless, the determination of the flame propagation speed is much harder in this case. A planar deflagration flame would be far too slow to cause powerful SN Ia explosions, but these models predict an acceleration of the deflagration flame due to interaction with turbulence. The resulting energy release is sufficient to unbind the WD star. Following the reasoning by Niemeyer & Woosley (1997), the turbulent motions are evoked by large-scale instabilities—such as the Rayleigh-Taylor (buoyancy) instability and the Kelvin-Helmholtz (shear) instability—and decay to smaller scales forming a turbulent eddy cascade (Richardson, 1922). Eddies of that cascade wrinkle the flame and increase its surface. This corresponds to an acceleration of the effective flame propagation speed. However, the vast range of spatial scales relevant to the problem of SN Ia explosions (from the radius of the star down to the width of a typical flame it covers about 11 orders of magnitude) restricts these models to the simulation of effects on the largest scales only. This makes it impossible to directly determine the turbulent flame propagation velocity in the simulations and therefore assumptions on the physics on unresolved small scales must be made. The fundamental idea here is that flame propagation is dominated by the turbulent cascade that is driven solely from large-scale instabilities and that no other effects contribute to the generation of turbulence.

However, due to the scaling law of the turbulent cascade, which predicts the turbulent velocity fluctuations to monotonically decrease with smaller scale, there exists a certain length scale below which the flame burns faster through the corresponding eddies than these can deform it. For chemical flames, this scale is identified with the Gibson scale (Peters, 1986) and we will use this term in the context of thermonuclear combustion, too. Below the Gibson scale the flame propagates in a “frozen turbulence field” and is no longer affected by the eddy cascade. Large scale models assume stable flame propagation here. Although some theoretical concepts support this idea, no hydrodynamical simulations provided convincing proofs yet.

In order to fill that gap in SN Ia models we performed numerical studies of flame propagation around the Gibson scale. The basic physical effects that determine flame propagation here are the hydrodynamical *Landau-Darrieus instability* (Darrieus, 1938; Landau, 1944) and the counteracting nonlinear stabilization of the flame (Zel’dovich, 1966). The balance of the two effects gives rise to a stable cellular flame structure characterizing the *cellular burning regime*. The goals of our investigations were to determine whether or not the cellular burning regime exists for thermonuclear flames in WD matter and to test how robust the anticipated cellular stabilization is under varying conditions. On the one hand, these studies examine a fundamental assumption of present SN Ia explosion models and on the other hand they are intended to explore the possibility of new physical effects that may have to be included into these. In particular, the question of the robustness of the cellular stabilization of the flame is closely connected to the so-called *delayed detonation models* of SN Ia explosions. In these models, the flame starts out as a deflagration wave, but later turns into a supersonic detonation. Empirical one-dimensional SN Ia models support this idea, since those lead to quite realistic spectra if a *deflagration-to-detonation transition* (DDT) is imposed artificially at low fuel densities (Höflich & Khokhlov, 1996; Iwamoto et al., 1999). Although DDTs are frequently observed in terrestrial combustion, a mechanism that could account for such a transition under conditions of SN Ia explosions could not be identified so far (Niemeyer, 1999). However, one possibility is a breakdown of the flame stabilization and a subsequent generation of turbulence on small scales by the flame itself, that would result in an additional acceleration of the flame. This *active turbulent combustion* (ATC) mechanism has been proposed by Niemeyer & Woosley (1997) on the basis of a work by Kerstein (1996). Niemeyer & Woosley (1997) suggest that the cellular flame stabilization could break down at the Gibson scale leading to ATC. One motivation for our study is to examine this idea.

The present paper is the third in a series of publications on the investigation of the cellular burning regime in Type Ia supernova explosions. After the introduction of the numerical methods to study this regime together with providing some examples of application (Röpke et al., 2003b), the implementation was used to study flame propagation into quiescent fuel (Röpke et al., 2003a). The results obtained there (to be summarized in the next section) raised the question of the interaction of a cellular flame with turbulent flows. This topic is also motivated from the supernova model. Around the Gibson scale one can still expect turbulent velocity fluctuations of the order of the laminar burning speed of the flame originating from the turbulent cascade. Additionally, pre-ignition convection in the WD may result in relic turbulent motions of considerable strength. Höflich & Stein (2002) claim surprisingly high values of convective velocities.

A brief description of the physical effects underlying the cellular burning regime and of the numerical methods applied to model it will be provided in the next section. In Sect. 3 the results of our numerical simulations will be presented and discussed. Finally, we will draw conclusions emphasizing the implications of our results for SN Ia models.

## 2 The cellular burning regime and its numerical simulation

Since our study aims at the flame evolution around the Gibson scale, which is expected to be well-separated from the scale of the flame width for fuel densities above $`10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$, we will treat the flame in the *discontinuity approximation* in the following. That is, we describe the flame as a simple discontinuity between fuel and ashes and ignore its internal structure. Note that this picture does not account for the microphysical transport phenomena and therefore the laminar burning speed of the flame (i.e. the velocity of a planar deflagration flame) is not intrinsically given in this model.

The Gibson scale is determined by this laminar burning speed $`s_l`$, by the velocity fluctuations at the integral scale of turbulence, and by the scaling law of the eddy cascade. Timmes & Woosley (1992) determined the laminar burning velocity by means of one-dimensional simulations fully resolving the internal structure of the flame, and we apply the fitting formula given there to obtain the value for a particular composition and density of the fuel. As has been mentioned by Röpke et al. (2003a), this formula is afflicted with some uncertainties, which introduce a considerable ambiguity to the exact value of the Gibson scale. Following the approach of Röpke et al. (2003a), we will arrange our simulations at length scales around $`10^4\mathrm{cm}`$ as a crude estimate of the Gibson length, since our goal is to qualitatively explore the possible effects here rather than to perform highly precise measurements.

Below the Gibson scale, flame propagation is determined by the competition between the Landau-Darrieus (LD) instability and its nonlinear stabilization. The LD instability is of pure hydrodynamical origin and results from the density contrast across the flame front in combination with mass flux conservation. This leads to a refraction of the stream lines at the flame causing a flow field that enhances initial perturbations of the planar flame shape. The fact that the LD instability acts on thermonuclear flames under conditions of SN Ia explosions has been proven by means of a full hydrodynamical simulation by Niemeyer & Hillebrandt (1995). The refined numerical model that was described by Röpke et al. (2003b) allowed us to investigate this instability in detail. We simulated the propagation of a sinusoidally perturbed flame front into quiescent fuel. The initial linear regime of flame evolution was shown to be indeed determined by the LD instability. The flow field accounting for this effect was apparent in our simulations (Röpke et al., 2003a). Moreover, the growth rate of the amplitude of the perturbation was found to be consistent with the dispersion relation that Landau (1944) derived by means of a linear stability analysis.

The nonlinear stabilization of the flame is a geometrical effect. Zel’dovich (1966) explained the mechanism by following the propagation of a perturbed flame by means of Huygens’ principle of geometrical optics (see also Fig. 1 in Röpke et al. 2003b). Once the perturbation has grown to a critical size, former recesses of the flame front develop into cusps between bulges of the front. It can easily be shown that the propagation velocity $`v_{\mathrm{cusp}}`$ of such a cusp exceeds the laminar burning velocity $`s_l`$ of the other parts of the flame by

$$v_{\mathrm{cusp}}=\frac{s_l}{\mathrm{cos}\theta },$$
(1)
where $`\theta `$ denotes the inclination angle of the bulges adjacent to the cusp. This effect balances further growth of the perturbation due to the LD instability and causes a cellular shape of the flame front. Therefore the regime of flame propagation at scales where it is dominated by the interplay between the LD instability and its nonlinear stabilization will be termed *cellular burning regime* in the following.

The nonlinear stage of flame evolution could not be reached by early attempts of hydrodynamical simulations of flame propagation (Niemeyer & Hillebrandt, 1995). However, applying a semi-analytical description of flame evolution, Blinnikov & Sasorov (1996) explored effects of the cellular burning regime in the context of SN Ia explosions and also Bychkov & Liberman (1995) discussed the cellular flame stabilization. With help of the numerical implementation that was described by Röpke et al. (2003b) on the basis of the work by Reinecke et al. (1999), it was possible to prove by means of a hydrodynamical simulation, that cellular stabilization holds for thermonuclear flames in SN Ia explosions (Röpke et al., 2003b, a). In connection with flame interaction with vortical flows, which will be studied in the following, the most important results of the investigation of the cellular stabilization of the flame propagating into *quiescent* fuel were the following:

* The flame stabilizes in a cellular shape for fuel densities down to $`10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$. However, at the lowest fuel densities, the stabilization can only be revealed with high numerical resolution. This may be interpreted as a hint to increased sensitivity of the cellular flame stabilization to (numerical) noise at low fuel densities.
* The evolution of the flame shape tends to a steady state consisting of only one cell filling the entire computational domain. This is consistent with results from semi-analytical and analytical studies based on the Sivashinsky-equation (Gutman & Sivashinsky, 1990; Thual et al., 1985). The single-cell solution establishes independently of the wavelength of the initial flame perturbation via merging of small cells.
* Applying a simulation setup of an on average planar flame configuration in a finite computational domain leads to a dependence of the alignment of the finally emerging domain-filling single-cell structure on the boundary conditions imposed transverse to the direction of flame propagation. In contrast to periodic boundaries, the crest will align in the center for reflecting boundary conditions. This is consistent with semi-analytical results (Gutman & Sivashinsky, 1990).
* The emerging cellular shape of the flame leads to an increased flame surface and equivalently an increased effective flame propagation speed as compared to a planar flame front.
* Depending on the width of the computational domain, the fundamental single-cell structure may be superimposed by a short-wavelength cellular pattern. However, these small cells are advected towards the cusp where they disappear. This mechanism is consistent with theoretical predictions by Zel’dovich et al. (1980).

These results will be helpful in the interpretation of the simulations of flame propagation in *vortical* flows. The possibility of a weaker cellular stabilization at low fuel densities is a further motivation to test the interaction of the flame with physical noise, represented by a vortical flow field.

We will only briefly outline the numerical implementation here and refer to Röpke et al. (2003b) and Reinecke et al. (1999) for detailed discussions. The description of the flame in the discontinuity approximation allows us to separate the flame propagation from the hydrodynamics in a first step. The hydrodynamics part of the numerical implementation thus reduces to the solution of the reactive Euler equations, which is performed applying a finite-volume approach. In particular we employ the piecewise parabolic method (PPM) suggested by Colella & Woodward (1984) in the Prometheus implementation by Fryxell et al. (1989). Flame propagation is modeled using the level-set method (e.g. Osher & Sethian 1988; Sussman et al. 1994; Smiljanovski et al. 1997; Reinecke et al. 1999). For the correct reproduction of hydrodynamical effects, such as the LD instability, a precise coupling between flame and flow turned out to be essential (Röpke et al., 2003b). This is provided by applying the in-cell reconstruction/flux-splitting technique introduced by Smiljanovski et al. (1997).

## 3 Flame interaction with a vortical flow

In the following we will present the results from simulations of the interaction of cellular flames with vortical flows. After discussing the simulation setup we will make some general remarks on what can be expected in the simulations. This will be followed by a survey of flame evolution depending on the strength of the vortices for an exemplary case at a fixed fuel density. Finally, we will capture the simulation results for various fuel densities in a quantitative way.

### 3.1 Simulation setup

The basic setup of our simulations was similar to that used to describe flame propagation into quiescent fuel (Röpke et al., 2003b, a). The flame was initialized in a computational domain with periodic boundary conditions transverse to the direction of flame propagation. In order to capture the full flame front in cases of strong deformation, we changed from a quadratic domain to a rectangle of $`300\times 200`$ computational cells. The cell width was set to $`\mathrm{\Delta }x=\mathrm{\Delta }y=50\mathrm{cm}`$. Several experiments with initially planar flames yielded drastic responses of the flame shape when the vortices encountered it. This can be attributed to the high sensitivity of planar flames to perturbations. Consequently, in order to make the results of different simulations comparable and to enable a quantification of the flame evolution, the flame was perturbed initially in a sinusoidal way with eight periods fitting into the domain. This initial perturbation grows due to the LD instability and stabilizes in a cellular pattern, before the injected vortices reach the flame front. In this way it was possible to study the interaction of a stabilized flame with a vortical flow field preventing the incoming flow from unpredictably deforming the flame shape at the first encounter.

The numerical investigation of flame interaction with turbulence is generally an intricate issue. In principle, the straight forward way to go would be to produce an isotropic turbulence field by external forcing and to set up a flame in this field. This approach is, however, too expensive for the purpose of the parameter study we are aiming at. For this reason we simply modified the inflow boundary condition in order to inject a vortical flow field instead of quiescent fuel. The flow field is not stirred and turbulence is not actively produced inside the computational domain by external forcing. As a consequence turbulence injected here partly decays before reaching the flame front—an effect which we have to take into account in the measurement of characteristic quantities.

As suggested by Helenbrook & Law (1999), we applied an *oscillating inflow boundary condition* on the right hand side of the computational domain, which generates a vortical velocity field approaching the flame. The velocity at the boundary now reads:

$`v_x`$ $`=`$ $`s_l\left\{1+v^{}\mathrm{sin}2k\pi y\mathrm{cos}2k\pi (xts_l)\right\}`$ (2)
$`v_y`$ $`=`$ $`s_lv^{}\mathrm{cos}2k\pi y\mathrm{sin}2k\pi (xts_l).`$ (3)
The parameter $`v^{}`$ characterizes the strength of the imprinted velocity fluctuations and $`k`$ denotes the wavenumber of the oscillation. This produces what is termed “square vortices” by Helenbrook & Law (1999). A similar flow field is applied by Vladimirova et al. (2003) who name it “cellular flow” and also Zhu & Ronney (1994) use a flow with cellular vortices to study flame propagation in it. The particular flow has the advantage of being very simple—ideally containing only one Fourier mode. This helps to make the effects visible more clearly and simplifies the interpretation. Figure 1 illustrates the vortical flow applied in our simulations. It shows an example at a density of $`\rho =5\times 10^8\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$. In Fig. 2a the $`y`$-component of the velocity is plotted against the $`x`$-coordinate for the same simulation. Obviously, the velocity fluctuation is damped while propagating from the inflow boundary into the computational domain. The damping is even stronger for lower densities. Figure 2b shows a plot for $`\rho =1\times 10^8\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$.

In order to be able to follow the long-term flame evolution, the simulations are carried out in a frame of reference comoving with the flame. For a planar flame this could be achieved by applying an inflow condition on the right hand side of the domain, where fuel enters at the laminar burning velocity, and an outflow condition on the opposite side of the domain. Since flame wrinkling and subsequent surface enhancement due to the LD instability and interaction with turbulent eddies will accelerate the flame, additional measures have to be taken in order to keep the flame centered in the domain. In the simulations presented by Röpke et al. (2003b, a) the grid was simply shifted according to the flame motion relative to $`s_l`$. However, this approach is not consistent with the oscillating boundary condition. Therefore we modified eq. (2) to

$$v_x=s_l\left\{\frac{A}{A_{\mathrm{planar}}}+v^{}\mathrm{sin}2k\pi y\mathrm{cos}2k\pi (xts_l)\right\},$$
(4)
where $`A`$ denotes the actual flame surface (measured in each time step) and $`A_{\mathrm{planar}}`$ stands for the surface of the corresponding planar flame, which is equivalent to the width of the domain in our case. This ensures that the velocity with which the fuel enters the domain adapts to the current effective flame propagation speed (cf. eq. (6) in Sect. 3.4) and the position of the flame relative to the grid is kept approximately fixed.

We performed a number of simulations with different fuel densities. For convenience of the reader, a compilation of the setup values is given in Table 1.

### 3.2 What can be expected?

Before we present the results of our numerical study we discuss what we actually are looking for in the simulations. That is, we somehow have to define how to discriminate between stable flame propagation and a breakdown of the stabilization. Why is this a question of definition? From the conjecture of *active turbulent combustion* it may appear that a breakdown of the stabilization must be obvious from a rapid and unlimited growth of the flame propagation velocity. However, this cannot be expected to occur in a numerical simulation where the growth of the flame surface due to ATC would be limited by discretization and resolution. Hence, the maximum effect that can be anticipated is a rapid increase in flame surface and burning velocity and a saturation at some higher value. A second possibility is that with increasing strength the vortical flow starts to dominate the flame evolution.

On the other hand, how can we guarantee flame stabilization? Owing to the high computational costs it will not be possible to follow the flame propagation for an arbitrarily long time. However, in case of stabilization we can actually make use of the knowledge of the flame pattern that is to be expected in case of stability in our specific simulation setup. From the preceding studies of flame propagation into quiescent fuel (Röpke et al., 2003b, a) it is known that the flame finally stabilizes in a single domain-filling cusp-like structure for our setup. This structure may be superimposed by a smaller-scale cellular pattern in sufficiently resolved simulations. A similar result can be anticipated for interaction with weak imprinted vortices.

Thus we may expect two extremal behaviors of the flame. In one case the flame stabilizes and the incoming perturbation fails to break up the cellular pattern. The cells of the stabilized small wavelength pattern caused by the initial perturbation of the flame front will then merge forming the single domain-filling cusp which then propagates stably. Alternatively, if the intensity of the incoming vortices is high enough to destroy the stabilization, no single domain-filling cusp will finally emerge. In this second case the flame should rather show a transient pattern.

### 3.3 General features

As an example, we consider the case of a fuel density amounting to $`5\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$ (cf. Table 1). Figure 3 gives an overview over the flame evolution in interaction with vortical fuel flows of different strengths. The values $`v^{}/s_l=0.7`$, $`v^{}/s_l=2.0`$, and $`v^{}/s_l=2.5`$ indicate the amplitudes of velocity fluctuations imposed at the right boundary of the domain. Note, however, that they do not necessarily represent the values experienced by the flame front for reasons given in section 3.1.

Figure 3a provides the comparison with flame propagation into quiescent fuel for the chosen setup. In this simulation $`v^{}`$ was set to zero. It resembles the features of the simulations presented by Röpke et al. (2003b, a). Due to the LD instability, the initial perturbation grows and the flame shape evolves into a cellular pattern in the nonlinear regime. The subsequent contours show the “merging” of the short-wavelength cells imprinted by the initial condition resulting in the formation of larger cells. This behavior was observed in a simulation of the long-term flame evolution in quiescent fuel (Röpke et al., 2003a). There a cusp-like structure that was centered in the domain finally emerged as the steady state structure. The tendency to form a domain-filling cell is also apparent in Fig. 3a. However, following the evolution until the steady-state is reached is very expensive and shall not be tried here. This is certainly a drawback in the current study, but it was chosen as a compromise in order to be able to explore a larger parameter space with given computational resources.

Contrary to the flame evolution in Fig. 3a, the case of $`v^{}/s_l=2.5`$ (Fig. 3d) clearly shows the disruption of the initial cellular pattern by interaction of the flame with vortices. Also, the formation of a single domain-filling cell is suppressed by the interaction. The overall flame shape evolution in this case can be interpreted as an adaptation to the imprinted vortical flow structure. This is emphasized by Fig 4. It provides a more detailed visualization of the interaction between the flame shape and the vortical flow, which is characterized by the color-coded logarithm of the absolute value of the vorticity $`\zeta `$ of the flow field,

$$\zeta =\frac{v_y}{x}\frac{v_x}{y},$$
(5)
pointing out the vortices imprinted on the fuel flow.

The transition in the flame evolution between the extreme cases depicted in Figs. 3a and 3d does, however, not proceed abruptly, but rather in a smooth transition. Figures 3b,c present two examples of intermediate behaviors at $`v^{}/s_l=0.7`$ and $`v^{}/s_l=2.0`$, the first of which is again illustrated by snapshots in Fig. 5. In this case, still a tendency to form a long-wavelength cellular structure is visible. Here the mechanism of the advection of small perturbations toward the cusp (Zel’dovich et al., 1980; Röpke et al., 2003b, a) dominates over the effects of the vortical flow on the flame shape.

Simulations similar to the aforementioned were also performed in some cases with higher resolution of the numerical grid in order to test whether or not insufficient resolution prevents small scale flame structures from developing. However, no significant difference to the flame evolution depicted in Fig. 3a–d could be noticed. This agrees with Helenbrook & Law (1999), who found in their simulations of chemical flames that the wavelength of perturbations that develop in the interaction with a vortical flow is determined by the scale of the vortices and not by a critical wavelength (introduced by a curvature-dependent burning speed of the flame front according to Markstein 1951).

### 3.4 A Parameter study

In order to quantify the flame evolution as qualitatively described in the preceding section, we conducted a parameter study. It aimed at the determination of flame behavior as a function of the strength of the vortices in the incoming flow and in dependence on the fuel density.

As discussed by Röpke et al. (2003a), the simulation of flame stabilization at around $`1.0\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$ requires unaffordable high numerical resolutions and furthermore our thin flame approximation is certainly not a realistic description of thermonuclear burning in SNe Ia at these low densities. On the other hand, it can be observed, that at higher fuel densities (around $`10^8\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$) the sensitivity of the initial flame to small-wavelength perturbations increases. This causes difficulties in producing a stable flame configuration prior to the incoming vortices encountering the flame front. However, in connection with a possible DDT we are mainly interested in the late stages of the SN Ia explosions (see Sect. 1). Therefore we restricted the study to four fuel densities: $`\rho _u=1.25\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$, $`\rho _u=2.5\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$, $`\rho _u=5\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$, and $`\rho _u=7.5\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$ (cf. Table 1).

Plots similar to Fig. 3 corresponding to simulations with different fuel densities are given by Röpke (2003). The flame evolution in these simulations can be summarized as follows: At lower fuel densities the effect of the incoming vortices on the flame structure is generally more drastic. For $`\rho _u=2.5\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$ the tendency of the formation of the domain-filling structure is still visible in the case of propagation into quiescent fuel. This is not the case for $`\rho _u=1.25\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$ for reasons discussed by Röpke et al. (2003a). However, with increasing strengths of the imprinted velocity fluctuations, the flame still gradually adapts to the flow for both fuel densities. At $`\rho _u=7.5\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$ the flame evolution is similar to that at $`\rho _u=5\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$. Only in case of propagation into quiescent fuel an initial destabilization with respect to small wavelength perturbations (cf. Röpke et al. 2003a) alters the evolution for a transition period, before the flame finally stabilizes in a domain-filling single-cell structure.

In a quantitative evaluation of our parameter study regarding the flame evolution for different fuel densities we will now address (i) the dependency of the effective flame propagation velocity on the strength of the imprinted velocity fluctuations and (ii) the amplification of the velocity fluctuation by the flame front.

For the exemplary case of $`\rho _u=5\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$ we discuss the measurement of the necessary quantities in our simulations.

The effective propagation velocity $`v_{\mathrm{eff}}`$ of the flame is determined via the flame surface:

$$\frac{v_{\mathrm{eff}}}{s_l}=\frac{A_{\mathrm{surf}}}{A_{\mathrm{planar}}}.$$
(6)
Underlying to that relation is the assumption of a constant, geometry independent burning velocity $`s_l`$ of the flame. This assumption has been discussed in the context of the present flame model by Röpke et al. (2003b). The measured flame surface area as a function of time is plotted in Figs. 6a and 6b for the simulations with $`v^{}/s_l=0.7`$ and $`v^{}/s_l=2.5`$, respectively. Here adaptation of the flame structure to the strong vortical fuel flow is obvious. After the imprinted velocity fluctuations reach the flame at $`t150\tau _{\mathrm{\Delta }x}`$, its surface becomes dominated by the vortices and changes with the frequency of these. This is reflected by the high-frequency fluctuations of $`A`$ in Fig. 6b. In addition to fluctuations on a small time scale, the interaction with the vortical flow field introduces considerable long term fluctuations. These are, of course, expected in the initial phase when the flame begins to react to the incoming vortices. But even at much later times the flame surface area does not reach a steady state.

The standard deviation of the velocity field is obtained separately in the fuel upstream of the front and in the ashes downstream of it in order to determine the amplification of the velocity fluctuations across the flame front. In Fig. 7 the quantities are plotted against time for our exemplary case. As mentioned above, the strength of the vortices produced at the inflow boundary is not a reliable measure of what the flame actually experiences, since the velocity fluctuations get damped quickly when propagating toward the flame and bending of the flame front may lead to different velocity fluctuations at different locations on the flame. Moreover, the dependence of the damping on the fuel density hampers the comparability of simulations with this parameter varying. Therefore we determine the standard deviations of the velocity fields, $`\sigma (v_u)`$ and $`\sigma (v_b)`$, within a certain belt around the flame front. This belt was scaled in a way that the time for flame crossing over its width remained the same for all fuel densities.

All quantities measured in our simulations fluctuate considerably with time. Hence we averaged them over a time ranging from 480 $`\tau _{\mathrm{\Delta }x}`$ to 720 $`\tau _{\mathrm{\Delta }x}`$ ($`\tau _{\mathrm{\Delta }x}`$ denotes the crossing time of the corresponding laminar flame over one grid cell).

In Fig. 8 the temporal mean value of flame surface area $`A_{\mathrm{surf}}`$ (normalized to the surface area of the corresponding planar flame front $`A_{\mathrm{planar}}`$) is plotted against the temporal mean of standard deviation of the velocity in the fuel region (normalized to the laminar burning velocity of the flame). The increase of the flame speed with stronger incoming velocity fluctuations is evident here. However, there is quite a large scatter in the data. This has two reasons. First, we certainly did not follow the flame evolution long enough to undoubtly reach the steady state of the flame shape—which should ideally be the clearly distinct single domain-filling cusp-like structure in case of weak incoming vortices. To follow the flame propagation up to this stage would, however, be much too expensive for a parameter study. Second, some peculiar features of the flame shape may develop as a result of small perturbations (e.g. due to numerical noise). In particular, this may cause substantial deviations if it affects the long-wavelength structure of the flame and is primarily responsible for the scatter of the results in case of strong incoming velocity fluctuations. This scatter could very likely be cured by taking the mean over longer time intervals.

Damköhler (1940) proposed a linear dependence of the effective flame propagation velocity on the turbulence intensity for turbulent combustion in what is today called the flamelet regime (Peters, 1986). Our results are consistent with a linear growth law. Corresponding fits to the data are included in Fig. 8 and values for the parameter $`a`$ according to the fitting formula

$$\frac{A_{\mathrm{surf}}}{A_{\mathrm{planar}}}=1.0+a\frac{\sigma (v_u)}{s_l}$$
(7)
are given in Table 2. It is evident from Fig. 8 that interaction of the flame in the cellular regime with turbulent velocity fluctuation can lead to a substantial acceleration of the flame propagation velocity.

Unfortunately, it is not possible to infer a clear trend of the slope depending on the fuel density from this parameter study.

In order to estimate the amplification of the velocity fluctuations across the flame for different densities, we compared the strength of velocity fluctuations downstream of the flame with the strength of the imprinted vortices in the fuel. As already shown for the case of flame propagation into quiescent fuel (Röpke et al., 2003a), the flame produces vorticity in the ashes. Here, the question is addressed whether vorticity present in the fuel will be amplified in the flame.

The result of the study for a variety of fuel densities is plotted in Figure 9. In this plot, trends show up much more clearly than in Fig. 8. However, some scatter is still present in the data. As can be seen from snapshots of the evolution of the flame front (an example is the bottom left snapshot in Fig. 4), the merging of cusps can eventually produce transient “bursts” in the vorticity downstream of the flame. This is particularly prominent in case of changes in the long-wavelength flame structure, but not necessarily connected to it. From Fig. 7d, where this “burst” in velocity fluctuation appears as a spike in the profile, it can be concluded that the duration of those events is very short. Hence their contribution to the temporal mean is small (whereas the long-wavelength flame structure and thus the flame surface changes slowly). Consequently, the scatter in plot 9 is much smaller than in plot 8.

The data plotted in Fig. 9 can be fit rather well by a linear relation between the ratio $`\sigma (v_b)/\sigma (v_u)`$ and the incoming turbulence intensity, i.e.

$$\sigma (v_b)=b+c\sigma (v_u).$$
(8)
Table 2 provides the fit parameters. In contrast to Figure 8, the plot in Figure 9 reveals a clear trend for the fuel density. The slope $`c`$ increases with lower $`\rho _u`$. This is what would be expected taking into account the increased production of specific volume across the flame with lower $`\rho _u`$. In Fig. 10 the factor $`c`$ is plotted against the corresponding density ratio $`\mu `$, accentuating the trend. Of course, a functional dependence cannot be inferred from this small sample of data. It is interesting to note that for $`\rho _u2.5\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$ the slope $`c`$ becomes greater than unity, indicating a slight amplification of velocity fluctuation in this case.

The above interpretation of this result requires some caution, since the cellular stabilization of the flame has been shown to be weaker with lower fuel density. However, this seems to be a numerical rather than a physical effect, since the cusps become more stable with higher resolution. Thus, at the given resolution of our parameter study, the flame evolution shows peculiar behavior below a fuel density of $`1.25\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$. Here, cusps may loose stability distorting the flame shape, which then responds with accelerated propagation of the perturbed part for a short period, after that the flame stabilizes again. However, we do not observe such a flame evolution at higher fuel densities included in this parameter study. Thus, the dependency on the fuel density is likely to be (at least partially) of physical origin.

## 4 Conclusions

In the presented simulations we performed the first attempt to investigate the interaction of cellular flames with turbulent velocity fluctuations in the context of SN Ia explosions. The results can be summarized as follows:

1. In case of the interaction of the flame with weak vortices in the fuel flow, the flame exhibits an evolution similar to that observed in case of flame propagation into quiescent fuel. In the setup chosen for our simulations the flame front showed a tendency to align in a single domain-filling cellular structure. Interaction with the incoming vortices leads to a superposition of this fundamental structure with a cellular pattern of shorter wavelength. Similar to the simulations presented by Röpke et al. (2003b), where a cellular superposition of the basic flame structure was observed in case of wide computational domains, this does not lead to a destabilization of the domain-filling cell. In accord with theoretical predictions (Zel’dovich et al., 1980) the small superimposed perturbations are advected toward the cusp where they disappear. The flow field accounting for this effect was studied by Röpke et al. (2003a).
2. If the cellularly stabilized flame interacts with vortices of sufficient strength, then the initial cellular pattern will break up in the sense that the initial shape is lost and the flame adapts to the incoming vortical flow. The tendency of the flame to form a single-cell structure is suppressed by this effect. However, we do not observe a sharp transition but rather a gradual change in the flame behavior.
3. Our numerical simulations suggest that the flame smoothly adapts to the incoming vortical flow with increasing turbulence intensity. No drastic effects were observed. Although we measured an amplification of the strength of the velocity fluctuation across the flame for $`\rho _u=2.5\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$, we could not observe a deviation from a linear scaling between the flame surface area (and thus the effective flame propagation speed) and the strength of the imprinted velocity fluctuations.

We draw the conclusion that the results of our study are consistent with flame propagation in the flamelet regime of turbulent combustion, at least at fuel densities above $`\rho _u2.5\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$. Thus, our study corroborates the assumption of flame stability at unresolved scales in large-scale SN Ia explosion models. This is an important contribution that our small-scale model makes to the credibility of those simulations. The slight amplification of the turbulent velocity fluctuations across the flame at $`\rho _u=2.5\times 10^7\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^3`$ (and possibly even more pronounced below that value) may have no significant impact on the current SN Ia models, since the flame width at those densities will become non-negligible (cf. the data given by Timmes & Woosley 1992). Then the burning is expected to enter the distributed regime of turbulent combustion, whose simulation requires completely different numerical methods. In the context of SN Ia explosions, an approach to study this regime was discussed by Lisewski et al. (2000).

Although the increase in effective flame propagation resulting from the cellular regime is negligible compared to the increase in flame speed at larger scales where the flame is affected by the turbulent cascade, it may be significant in the early stages of the explosion. In the current large-scale models (e.g. Reinecke et al. 2002), the flame is assumed to propagate with its laminar flame velocity before the rising Rayleigh-Taylor bubbles establish the turbulent cascade. This may cause a problem with the nucleosynthetic yields from the SN Ia explosion (Reinecke, 2001). Since the laminar flame speed is very low, the WD expands slowly in the beginning of the explosion and thus the combustion products remain at rather high densities for a considerable time. This effect causes a neutronization of the material by electron capture and an overproduction of neutron-rich heavy nuclei (Nomoto & Kondo, 1991; Brachwitz et al., 2000), eventually even leading to a collapse of the star. Taking into account the velocity increase resulting from the cellular regime, this problem could be extenuated. As has been shown in this study, this may be in particular the case if strong velocity fluctuations left over from the pre-ignition convection interact with the flame. However, the strength of turbulence resulting from pre-ignition effects is not well-determined yet. Höflich & Stein (2002) claim values as high as $``$$`10^7\mathrm{cm}\mathrm{s}^1`$. The impact of the cellular burning regime on the nucleosynthesis yields of the SN Ia explosion models will be investigated in a forthcoming study.

Even though we can probably not completely rule out the possibility of active turbulent combustion, we found no convincing hint for such an effect in our numerical investigations. Our simulations indicate that effects resulting from the cellular regime of flame propagation are unlikely to trigger a presumed deflagration-to-detonation transition. Hence, the search for active turbulent combustion and deflagration-to-detonation transition should focus on the distributed burning regime.

###### Acknowledgements.

This work was supported in part by the European Research Training Network “The Physics of Type Ia Supernova Explosions” under contract HPRN-CT-2002-00303 and by the DFG Priority Research Program “Analysis and Numerics for Conservation Laws” under contract HI 534/3. A pleasant atmosphere to prepare this publication was provided at the workshop “Thermonuclear Supernovae and Cosmology” at the ECT\*, Trento, Italy. We would like to thank M. Reinecke, S. Blinnikov, and W. Schmidt for stimulating discussions. The numerical simulations were performed on an IBM Regatta system at the computer center of the Max Planck Society in Garching.


text:
# Detailed Lattice-QCD Study for the Three-Quark Potential and Y-type Flux-Tube Formation

## 1 The Static Three-Quark Potential and the Y-type Flux-Tube Formation

The three-quark (3Q) potential is one of the most important fundamental quantities in the hadron physics, because it is directly responsible to the baryon properties and is the key quantity to clarify the quark confinement in baryons.

We perform the first systematic study of the ground-state 3Q potential $`V_{3\mathrm{Q}}^{\mathrm{g}.\mathrm{s}.}`$ and the excited-state 3Q potential $`V_{3\mathrm{Q}}^{\mathrm{e}.\mathrm{s}.}`$ using SU(3) lattice QCD . For more than 300 different patterns of the spatially-fixed 3Q systems, we perform the thorough calculation for the ground-state potential $`V_{3\mathrm{Q}}^{\mathrm{g}.\mathrm{s}.}`$ in lattice QCD with $`12^3\times 24`$ at $`\beta =5.7`$ and with $`16^3\times 32`$ at $`\beta =5.8,6.0`$ at the quenched level. For the accurate calculation, we construct the quasi-ground-state of the 3Q system using the smearing method .

As an important conclusion, the static ground-state 3Q potential $`V_{3\mathrm{Q}}^{\mathrm{g}.\mathrm{s}.}`$ is found to be well described by the “Coulomb plus Y-type linear potential”, i.e., Y-ansatz,

$$V_{3\mathrm{Q}}^{\mathrm{g}.\mathrm{s}}=A_{3\mathrm{Q}}\underset{i<j}{}\frac{1}{|𝐫_i𝐫_j|}+\sigma _{3\mathrm{Q}}L_{\mathrm{min}}+C_{3\mathrm{Q}},$$
(1)
within the 1%-level deviation . Here, $`L_{\mathrm{min}}`$ denotes the minimal value of total flux-tube length, as shown in Fig.1. Such a Y-type flux-tube profile is actually observed in recent lattice QCD , as shown in Fig.2. From the comparison with the Q-$`\overline{\mathrm{Q}}`$ potential, $`V_{\mathrm{Q}\overline{\mathrm{Q}}}(r)=A_{\mathrm{Q}\overline{\mathrm{Q}}}\frac{1}{r}+\sigma _{\mathrm{Q}\overline{\mathrm{Q}}}r+C_{\mathrm{Q}\overline{\mathrm{Q}}}`$, we find the universality of the string tension as $`\sigma _{3\mathrm{Q}}\sigma _{\mathrm{Q}\overline{\mathrm{Q}}}`$ and the one-gluon-exchange result as $`A_{3\mathrm{Q}}\frac{1}{2}A_{\mathrm{Q}\overline{\mathrm{Q}}}`$ .

## 2 The Gluonic Excitation Energy and the Success of the Quark Model

We study also the excited-state potential $`V_{3\mathrm{Q}}^{\mathrm{e}.\mathrm{s}.}`$ in the spatially-fixed 3Q systems in lattice QCD with $`16^3\times 32`$ at $`\beta =5.8`$ . The energy gap between $`V_{3\mathrm{Q}}^{\mathrm{g}.\mathrm{s}.}`$ and $`V_{3\mathrm{Q}}^{\mathrm{e}.\mathrm{s}.}`$ physically means the excitation energy of the gluon field in the presence of the spatially-fixed three quarks, and the gluonic excitation energy, $`V_{3\mathrm{Q}}^{\mathrm{e}.\mathrm{s}.}V_{3\mathrm{Q}}^{\mathrm{g}.\mathrm{s}.}`$, is found to be about 1GeV, as shown in Fig.3. Note that the gluonic excitation energy is rather large compared with the excitation energy of quark origin, and the present result predicts that the hybrid baryon expressed as $`qqqG`$ should be heavier than 2GeV.

We show in Fig.4 a possible scenario from QCD to the massive quark model. In terms of the flux-tube picture, the large gluonic-excitation energy is conjectured to originate from the large string tension as a result of strong color confinement. The large gluonic-excitation energy would be responsible to the absence of the gluonic mode and the success of the quark model for low-lying hadrons.