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# Untitled Document

TIFR/TH/01-07

SINP/TNP/01-07

Reviving the energy independent suppression of the solar neutrino flux

Sandhya Choubeya, Srubabati Goswamia, Nayantara Guptab, D.P. Royc

a Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics,

1/AF, Bidhannagar, Calcutta 700 064, INDIA

b Indian Association for the Cultivation of Sciences

Calcutta 700 032, INDIA

c Tata Institute of Fundamental Research

Homi Bhabha Road, Mumbai 400 005, INDIA

Abstract

We explore the possibility of an energy independent suppression of the solar neutrino flux in the context of the recent SuperKamiokande data. From a global analysis of the rate and spectrum data, this scenario is allowed at only 14% probability with the observed Cl rate. If we allow for a 20% upward renormalisation of the Cl rate along with a downward renormalisation of the $`B`$ neutrino flux then the fit improves considerably to a probability of $`50\%`$. We compare the quality of these fits with those of the MSW solutions. These renormalisations are also found to improve the quality of the fits with MSW solutions and enlarge the allowed region of their validity in the parameter space substantially. Over much of this enlarged region the matter effects on the suppression of the solar neutrino flux are found to be very weak, so that the solutions become practically energy independent.

The results from the SuperKamiokande (SK) continue to confirm the suppression of the solar neutrino flux as compared to the standard solar model prediction . The result from the GNO experiment  is consistent with the earlier Ga experiment results from Gallex and SAGE . The most popular explanation to this suppression is neutrino oscillation either in vacuum or in matter. Table 1 shows the suppression rate or survival probability of the solar neutrino $`(P_{\nu _e\nu _e})`$ from the combined Ga , Cl  and SK experiments along with their energy thresholds. The corresponding compositions of the solar neutrino flux are also indicated. The SK suppression rate shown in brackets is appropriate for the oscillation of $`\nu _e`$ into another active neutrino $`(\nu _{\mu ,\tau })`$. It is obtained by subtracting the neutral current contribution of $`\nu _{\mu ,\tau }`$ from the SK rate.

| Experiment | Gallium | Clorine | SuperKamiokanda |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Suppr. Rate | 0.576 $`\pm `$ 0.04 | 0.327 $`\pm `$ 0.029 | 0.465 $`\pm `$ 0.015 |
|  |  |  | (0.36 $`\pm `$ .015) |
| $`\mathrm{E}_{\mathrm{th}}`$ (MeV) | 0.2 | 0.8 | 6.5 |
| Composition | $`pp`$ (55%), $`Be`$ (25%), $`B`$ (10%) | $`B`$ (75%), $`Be`$ (15%) | $`B`$ (100%) |

Table 1. The suppression rates of solar neutrino $`P_{\nu _e\nu _e}`$ shown for Ga, Cl and SK experiments \[1-6\] along with their threshold energies and compositions. The effective suppression rate of the SK experiment, appropriate for $`\nu _e\nu _{\mu ,\tau }`$ oscillation, is shown in bracket. All the suppression rates are shown relative to the standard solar model prediction of BP00 .

The observed energy dependence in the suppression rates in Ga, Cl and SK experiments can be explained by the vacuum oscillation (VO), small and large mixing angle MSW (SMA and LMA) as well as the LOW solutions . The apparent energy dependence comes from assuming the sun-earth distance to coincide with the oscillation node of a MeV range neutrino in the VO solution, while it comes from matter effects in the sun for the MSW solutions and in the earth for the LOW solution. The VO and SMA solutions show strong and nonmonotonic energy dependence. But the LMA and LOW solutions show monotonic decrease from Ga to SK energies in contrast to the apparent rise between the Cl and SK rates.

The recent SK data on the energy spectra at day and night show no evidence of any energy dependence nor any day-night asymmetry in the suppression rate . This rules out a large part of the parameter space. In particular it practically rules out the VO solution and disfavours the SMA along with a part of the LMA solution . The remaining part of the LMA solution and the low solution show relatively weak energy dependence and cover two small patches in the parameter space. Thus it is possible to explain the above mentioned rates and the energy spectra only for very limited ranges of neutrino mass $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^2`$ and mixing angle $`\theta `$.

We present here fits to the above data, first with an energy independent solution and then with two-flavour oscillation including matter effects. We shall see that with reasonable allowance for the renormalisations of the Cl rate and the $`B`$ neutrino flux the data are described well by the energy independent solution. These renormalisations shall also be seen to improve the quality of fits with the oscillation solutions and enlarge the region of their validity in the parameter space substantially. Moreover we shall see that most of this enlarged region of parameter space shows weak matter effect on $`P_{\nu _e\nu _e}`$, implying practically energy independent suppression of the solar neutrino flux. Thus the energy independent solution can be looked upon as an effective parameterisation of the oscillation solutions over this region.

The definition of $`\chi ^2`$ used in our fits is,

$$\chi ^2=\underset{i,j}{}\left(F_i^{th}F_i^{exp}\right)(\sigma _{ij}^2)\left(F_j^{th}F_j^{exp}\right)$$
(1)
Where i,j runs over the number of experimental data points. Here $`F_i^\alpha =T_i^\alpha /T_i^{BP00}`$ where $`\alpha `$ is the theoretical prediction or the experimental value of the event rate, normalised by the standard solar model prediction of BP00 . $`F_i^{exp}`$ is taken from Table 1 for total rates and from  for day/night spectrum. The error matrix $`\sigma _{ij}`$ contains the experimental errors, the theoretical errors and their correlations. For evaluating the error matrix we use the procedure described in . The details of the solar neutrino code used is described in . As in  we vary the normalisation of the spectrum as a free parameter which avoids the overcounting of the rates and spectrum data for SK. Hence for the day/night spectrum analysis we have (36 - 1) degrees of freedom (d.o.f) while for the total rates we have 3, which makes a total of 38 d.o.f for the rates+spectrum analysis. In addition to the best-fit parameter values and $`\chi _{min}^2`$ we shall present the goodness of fit (g.o.f.) of a solution where by g.o.f. we mean the probability that the $`\chi ^2`$ will exceed the $`\chi _{min}^2`$ for a correct model. Finally for the general oscillation solution with matter effects, we shall also delineate the 90%, 95% and 99% allowed regions in the two parameter $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^2\mathrm{tan}^2\theta `$ plane. These regions are defined as $`\chi ^2\chi _{min}^2+\mathrm{\Delta }\chi ^2`$ where $`\mathrm{\Delta }\chi ^2`$ is 4.61,5.99,9.21 respectively for two parameters and the $`\chi _{min}^2`$ corresponds to the global $`\chi ^2`$ minimum .

Energy Independent Solution:

We shall explore first the possibility of explaining these data in terms of a simple energy independent solution by assuming modest changes in the Cl rate and the $`B`$ neutrino flux. Energy independent solutions to the solar neutrino anomaly have been considered by several authors in the past . Traditionally it is associated with the vacuum oscillation solution at a distance much larger than the oscillation wave-length, so that the average survival probability

$$P_{\nu _e\nu _e}=1\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{sin}^22\theta .$$
(2)
We shall see below however that this survival probability remains approximately valid over a wide range of parameters even after including the matter effects in the sun and the earth, since the matter effects over this range are too small to be measurable at the present level of experimental accuracy. In particular the so called bimaximal mixing solution, corresponding to nearly maximal mixing of solar neutrino $`(\nu _e)`$, implies such an energy independent solution over a very wide range of $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^2`$ . Moreover an energy independent solution to the solar neutrino anomaly seems to offer the possibility of explaining the atmospheric and the LSND neutrino anomalies as well without assuming any sterile neutrino .

We present the results of our fit to the combined data on rates and the SK day/night spectrum with the energy independent solution (2) in Table 2 for both $`\nu _e`$ oscillations into active and sterile neutrinos. In order to reconcile the energy independence of the spectrum with the apparent energy dependence in the rates of Table 1, we have cosidered the following changes in the Cl rate and $`B`$ neutrino flux.

1. Clorine Rate: Since the Cl experiment  has not been calibrated, there are several fits in the literature disregarding this rate . In any case the apparent rise between the Cl and SK rates is in direct conflict with the predicted fall for the LMA and LOW solutions, which are favoured by the spectrum data. Therefore we have considered an upward renormalisation of the Cl data by 20%, which is a $`2\sigma `$ effect.
2. Boron Neutrino Flux: The $`B`$ neutrino flux is very sensitive to the solar core temperature and hence to the underlying solar model. Even within the standard solar model estimate of BP00 it has a large error bar, i.e.

$$f_B=5.15\times 10^6/\mathrm{cm}^2/\mathrm{sec}\left(1.0\begin{array}{c}+.20\\ .16\end{array}\right).$$
(3)
Therefore we have considered a variation of this flux within a corridor of about $`\pm 2\sigma `$ of the above central value.

Table 2 shows that taking the experimental rates at their face value results in a poor fit to the energy independent solution, corresponding to a probability of 14.39 (3.75)% for the active (sterile) case. But assuming a 20% renormalisation of the Cl rate and floating the normalisation of $`B`$ flux improves the probability to 46.6 (26.4)%. Let us comment on two related features of this fit, which may appear counter intuitive. The theoretical survival rate from (2) is $`0.5`$ while the experimental rates from Cl and SK with the BP00 $`B`$ neutrino flux are significantly lower than 0.5 (Table 1). Thus one would naively expect the fit with the BP00 neutrino flux, denoted by $`X_B=1`$, to result in $`\mathrm{sin}^22\theta =1`$ and a much larger $`\chi _{min}^2`$ than the free $`X_B`$ fit. We have checked these to be true if we drop the theoretical error in (1), reducing it to the standard expression for $`\chi ^2`$. However including the large uncertainty in the $`B`$ neutrino flux of (3) via the theoretical error matrix implies that the best fit with the BP00 flux ($`X_B=1`$ solution) corresponds actually to an $`X_B`$ significantly lower than 1. Hence the corresponding $`\chi _{min}^2`$ and $`\mathrm{sin}^22\theta `$ values are close to those of the free $`X_B`$ fit. The $`\chi _{min}^2`$ is found to be quite flat in $`\mathrm{sin}^22\theta `$ (and even more so in $`\mathrm{tan}^2\theta `$) in the region around the best-fit values. It may be noted here that using 1$`\sigma `$ lower limits of the appropriate nuclear reaction rates Brun, Truck-Chieze and Morel  have obtained a relatively low value of $`B`$ neutrino flux,

$$f_B=3.21\times 10^6/\mathrm{cm}^2/\mathrm{sec},$$
(4)
and found it to give better agreement to the helioseismic data than (3). This corresponds to a low value of $`X_B0.63`$, which is about $`2\sigma `$ below the central value of (3). More recently a $`X_B0.75`$ has been obtained from the helioseismic model using standard values of the nuclear reaction rates .

Oscillation Solution with Matter Effects:

We shall first analyse the two-flavour oscillation solution, including the matter effects in the sun and the earth, to determine the region of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^2\mathrm{tan}^2\theta `$ plane in which it effectively reduces to the energy independent solution (2). Since the normalisation uncertainty of Ga and Cl experiments are $`>10\%`$ each, one cannot experimentally distinguish the solutions showing energy dependence of $`<10\%`$ over the energy range of Ga to SK experimeriments from the energy independent solution (2). We have therefore assumed that a matter effect of $`<10\%`$ on $`P_{\nu _e\nu _e}`$ over the range of Ga to SK neutrino energies is a good working definition for an effectively energy independent solution (2). Fig. 1 shows the region in the $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^2\mathrm{tan}^2\theta `$ plane, where the oscillation solution including matter effects effectively reduces to the energy independent solution (2). We have restricted the plot to $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^2<10^3\mathrm{eV}^2`$ in view of the severe constraint from the CHOOZ experiment above this range . One sees from Fig. 1 two distinct regions of validity of the energy independent solution (2). Firstly the solar matter effect is negligible in the shaded region above the MSW range

$$10^{15}\mathrm{eV}\stackrel{<}{}\mathrm{\Delta }m^2/4E\stackrel{<}{}\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}10}^{11}\mathrm{eV},$$
(5)
with $`4E150`$ MeV, along with the triangular region below. Moreover a narrow strip around $`\mathrm{tan}^2\theta =1`$ represents the region of near maximal-mixing, where the MSW solution for $`P_{\nu _e\nu _e}`$ reduces to the vacuum solution (2). However the regeneration effect in earth makes a significant contribution to the maximal-mixing region over $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^210^510^7\mathrm{eV}^2`$, which accounts for the gap in this strip. It is this near maximal-mixing strip that is relevant for the energy independent solution of Table 2 and the oscillation solutions presented below.

We shall now present the fits of the oscillation solutions including matter effects to the combined data on rates and the SK day/night spectrum. As in the previous case we have done these fits with the rates shown in Table 1 as well as those with renormalised Cl rate and $`B`$ neutrino flux.

|  | Type of | Nature of | $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^2`$ | $`tan^2\theta `$ | $`\chi _{min}^2`$ | g.o.f |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|  | Neutrino | Solution | in eV2 |  |  |  |
|  |  | SMA | $`5.48\times 10^6`$ | $`5.79\times 10^4`$ | 43.22 | 19.01% |
|  | Active | LMA | $`4.18\times 10^5`$ | 0.36 | 37.33 | 40.78% |
| Cl |  | LOW | $`1.51\times 10^7`$ | 0.64 | 39.54 | 31.48% |
| Obsvd. |  | SMA | $`3.74\times 10^6`$ | $`5.2\times 10^4`$ | 44.85 | 14.79% |
|  | Sterile | LMA | $`1.03\times 10^4`$ | 0.58 | 52.18 | 3.96% |
|  |  | LOW | $`3.47\times 10^8`$ | 0.82 | 50.57 | 5.43% |
|  |  | SMA | $`4.97\times 10^6`$ | $`3.15\times 10^4`$ | 42.43 | 21.37% |
| Cl | Active | LMA | $`6.68\times 10^5`$ | 0.39 | 30.32 | 73.53% |
| Renorm. |  | LOW | $`1.63\times 10^7`$ | 0.76 | 32.43 | 63.9% |
|  |  | SMA | $`3.44\times 10^6`$ | $`3.59\times 10^4`$ | 41.98 | 22.76% |
|  | Sterile | LMA | $`1.04\times 10^4`$ | 0.53 | 37.9 | 38.27% |
|  |  | LOW | $`4.08\times 10^8`$ | 0.84 | 36.8 | 42.98% |

Table 3: The best-fit values of the parameters, the $`\chi _{\mathrm{min}}^2`$ and the g.o.f from a combined analysis of rate and spectrum in terms of $`\nu _e`$ oscillation into an active/sterile neutrino, including the matter effects.

Table 3 summarises the results of fitting the oscillation solutions to the combined data with the observed and renormalised Cl rates assuming the $`B`$ neutrino flux of BP00 $`(X_B=1)`$. We see from the upper part of this table that one can get acceptable fits to the data taken at its face value in terms of $`\nu _e`$ oscillation into active flavour in the LMA and LOW regions, while the SMA region gives a marginal fit at 19% probability. The corresponding oscillation solutions into sterile neutrino give poor fits. Renormalising the Cl rate upwards by 20% improves the quality of oscillation solutions into active flavour remarkably in the LMA and LOW regions but not in the SMA region. The quality of the sterile solutions also improves to acceptable levels of probability; but they remain inferior to the oscillation solutions into active neutrino.

A clear pedagogical discussion of the LMA and LOW solutions can be found in . We shall only point out here some essential features, focussing on the oscillation into active neutrino. The $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^2`$ of the LMA solutions of Table 3 lie at the upper edge (adiabatic edge) of the MSW range (5). They lie outside this range for Ga energy, so that the corresponding survival rate is approximated by (2), or equivalently

$$P_{\nu _e\nu _e}\frac{1}{2}(1+ϵ^2),$$
(6)
$$ϵ=\mathrm{cos}2\theta =\frac{1\mathrm{tan}^2\theta }{1+\mathrm{tan}^2\theta }.$$
(7)
On the other hand they lie inside the MSW range at SK energy. Here the solar $`\nu _e`$ gets adiabatically converted into the heavier one of the two neutrino mass states,

$$\nu _2=\mathrm{sin}\theta \nu _e+\mathrm{cos}\theta \nu _{\mu ,\tau }.$$
(8)
The resulting survival probability on earth is

$$P_{\nu _e\nu _e}\mathrm{sin}^2\theta =\frac{1}{2}(1ϵ).$$
(9)
With the LMA mixing angles of Table 3, corresponding to $`ϵ0.4`$, eqs. (6) and (9) can be seen to roughly reproduce the Ga and SK rates of Table 1. In the LOW solutions the energy dependence arises from the $`\nu _e`$ regeneration in earth during the night. This is known to be small for the SK energy from the absence of day/night asymmetry, so that the corresponding rate (9) is valid for the LOW solution as well. However the regeneration contribution can be significant for the LOW solution at Ga energy, which has moved into the MSW range (5). The corresponding rate after averaging over day and night is

$$\overline{P}_{\nu _e\nu _e}=\frac{1}{2}(1ϵ+f_{reg}).$$
(10)
For a constant density earth

$$f_{reg}=\frac{\eta _E(1ϵ^2)}{2(12ϵ\eta _E+\eta _E^2)}.$$
(11)
Thus the earth regeneration contribution is always positive and can be significant for $`\eta _E1`$, where

$$\eta _E=0.66\left(\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }m^2/E}{10^{13}\mathrm{eV}}\right)\left(\frac{g/\mathrm{cm}^3}{\rho Y_e}\right).$$
(12)
Here $`\rho `$ is the matter density in earth and $`Y_e`$ the average number of electrons per nucleon. The maximal contribution comes from $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^23E\times 10^{13}\mathrm{eV}10^7\mathrm{eV}^2`$ for Ga energy. The mixing angle of the LOW solutions, $`ϵ0.2`$, corresponds to a maximal $`f_{reg}0.3`$, which can account for the Ga rate of Table 1. While this description of the matter effects in the sun and the earth is admittedly simplistic we have treated them rigorously in our calculation at all energies.

Fig. 2 shows the 90%, 95% and 99% C.L. allowed regions in the $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^2\mathrm{tan}^2\theta `$ plane for the oscillation solutions into active neutrino. We find that SMA solution is disallowed at 95% (99%) C.L. with the observed (renormalised) Cl rate. The allowed regions of the LMA and LOW solutions increase mildly with the upward renormalisation of the Cl rate. Comparison of Figs. 1 and 2 shows that modest parts of the allowed regions for both the LMA and LOW solutions correspond to the effectively energy independent solution (2).

Table 4 summarises the effects of changing the $`B`$ neutrino flux $`(X_B)`$ on the oscillations solutions into active neutrino. It lists the best solutions for $`X_B=0.75`$, favoured by helioseismic model , as well as for free $`X_B`$. In each case the solutions are shown for both observed and renormalized Cl rates. It may be noted that the $`X_B=0.75`$ lies within $`1.5\sigma `$ of the BP00 flux (3). In combination with the 20% renormalisation of the Cl rate it would imply that all the suppression rates of Table 1 agree with one another within $`1.5\sigma `$. Therefore this combination is expected to favour an effectively energy independent solution.

|  |  | Nature of | $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^2`$ | $`tan^2\theta `$ | $`\chi _{min}^2`$ | g.o.f |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|  |  | Solution | in eV2 |  |  |  |
|  |  | SMA | $`5.43\times 10^6`$ | $`5.09\times 10^4`$ | 39.50 | 31.64% |
|  | $`X_B=0.75`$ | LMA | $`4.39\times 10^5`$ | 0.54 | 43.18 | 19.13% |
| Cl |  | LOW | $`1.41\times 10^7`$ | 0.69 | 41.88 | 23.08% |
| Obsvd. | 0.57 | SMA | $`5.35\times 10^6`$ | $`4.35\times 10^4`$ | 37.98 | 37.92% |
|  | $`X_B1.34`$ | LMA | $`4.21\times 10^5`$ | 0.25 | 34.22 | 55.34% |
|  | 0.93 | LOW | $`1.51\times 10^7`$ | 0.63 | 39.59 | 31.28% |
|  |  | SMA | $`4.95\times 10^6`$ | $`3.11\times 10^4`$ | 38.15 | 37.19% |
| Cl | $`X_B=0.75`$ | LMA | $`6.92\times 10^5`$ | 0.57 | 34.06 | 56.11% |
| Renorm. |  | LOW | $`1.59\times 10^7`$ | 0.82 | 32.76 | 62.35% |
|  | 0.53 | SMA | $`4.90\times 10^6`$ | $`2.92\times 10^4`$ | 35.57 | 48.89% |
|  | $`X_B1.14`$ | LMA | $`6.57\times 10^5`$ | 0.35 | 29.94 | 75.14% |
|  | 0.88 | LOW | $`1.64\times 10^7`$ | 0.76 | 31.95 | 66.17% |

Table 4: Best fits to the combined rates and spectrum data in terms of $`\nu _e`$ oscillation into active neutrino with $`X_B=0.75`$ and free $`X_B`$.

As we see from the top part of Table 4, with observed Cl rate and $`X_B=0.75`$ the SMA gives a better fit than the LMA and LOW solutions. This is because reducing $`X_B`$ to 0.75 accentuates the rise between the Cl and the SK rates of Table 1 as it enhances the latter by a larger amount. Hence it favours the nonmonotonic energy dependence of SMA over the monotonically decreasing energy dependence of LMA and LOW solutions. However this anomaly disappears with the upward renormalisation of the Cl rate, so that the LMA and LOW solutions become much better than the SMA. Note also that reducing $`X_B`$ to 0.75 results in reducing the energy dependence between the Ga and SK rates, resulting in larger mixing angle for the LMA solutions than in Table 3.

The free $`X_B`$ fits yield $`X_B=0.50.6`$ for the SMA and $`X_B>1`$ for the LMA solutions. This is because $`X_B=0.50.6`$ enhances the SK rate more than Cl as favoured by SMA, while $`X_B>1`$ suppresses the SK rate more than Cl as favoured by the LMA solutions. Note however that $`X_B>1`$ magnifies the decrease between the Ga and SK rates, resulting in a smaller mixing angle for the LMA solutions than in Table 3. But the shift is small for the renormalised Cl rate. The LOW solution gives the worst fit for the observed Cl rate, since its weak energy dependene favours $`X_B<1`$ which accentuates the rise between the Cl and SK rates. But with renormalised Cl the LMA and LOW solutions become much better than the SMA.

Fig. 3 shows the 90%, 95% and 99% C.L. allowed regions in the $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^2\mathrm{tan}^2\theta `$ plane for the free $`X_B`$ fits. With the observed Cl rate the LMA region covers relatively small mixing angles while the LOW region is marginal. Consequently there is little overlap with the energy independent region of Fig. 1. However for the renormalised Cl rate the LMA region expands to larger mixing angles and masses. The LOW region also covers a large range of mass. Consequently there is a significant overlap with the energy independent region of Fig. 1.

Finally Fig. 4 shows the corresponding allowed regions for $`X_B=0.75`$ fits with observed and renormalised Cl rates. In the former case there is a large allowed region at 90% C.L. for the SMA solution. However in the latter case the 90% C.L. region disappears from the SMA solution, while covering a very large range of masses and mixing angles for the LMA and LOW solutions. Comparing this contour with Fig. 1 shows that the bulk of the expanded 90% C.L. region in this case corresponds effectively to the energy independent suppresion rate (2), as anticipated earlier. Note in particular the expansion of the 90% CL allowed region of the LMA solution well into the so called dark region, corresponding to $`\mathrm{tan}^2\theta >1`$ $`(ϵ<0)`$. In this region the MSW prediction of energy dependence via eqs. (6,9) changes its direction, which goes against the direction of the data. Nonetheless the energy dependence becomes so mild with $`X_B=0.75`$ that the 90% CL region extends upto $`\mathrm{tan}^2\theta >2`$, which is beyond the range shown in Fig. 1. In other words the region of effectively energy independent solution shown in Fig. 1 is a conservative one. The expansion of the 90% CL region of the LOW solution also shows remarkable overlap with the lower energy independent strip of Fig. 1. It may be added here that both these strips go down to $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^210^9\mathrm{eV}^2`$, below which one gets significant energy dependence from vacuum oscillation.

Let us conclude by briefly discussing whether some of the forthcoming neutrino experiments will be able to discreminate between the energy independent and the MSW solutions. In particular the SNO experiment is expected to provide both the charged current and neutral current scattering rates over roughly the same energy range as SK. Thus the B neutrino flux can be factored out from their ratio, CC/NC. For oscillation into active neutrino corresponding double ratio $`R_{cc}/R_{nc}`$ is predicted to be larger than 0.5 for the energy independent solution (eq.2) and smaller than 0.5 for the LMA and LOW solutions (eq.9). We have calculated the best fit values of this ratio for the energy independent solution of Table 2 and the LMA and LOW solutions of Table 3 with renormalised Cl rate. The predicted ratios are shown in Table 5.With a sample of 5000 CC and 2000 NC events the total $`1\sigma `$ error for this ratio at SNO is expected to be about 4%. This will be able to distinguish the energy idependent solution clearly from the LMA and to a lesser extent from the LOW solution. On the other hand the LOW solution predicts a large Day-Night asymmetry of $`>`$ 10% for the Be neutrino at the Borexino and the KamLAND experiments. This will be able to distingusish the LOW from the LMA and the energy independent solutions. Lastly it should be noted that the reactor neutrino data at KamLAND is expected to show oscillatory behavior for the LMA solution, which will help to distinguish it from the LOW or a generic energy independent solution.

| Nature of Solution | $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^2`$ | $`tan^2\theta `$ | $`R_{cc}/R_{nc}`$ |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| LMA | $`6.68\times 10^5`$ | 0.39 | 0.32 |
| LOW | $`1.63\times 10^7`$ | 0.76 | 0.45 |
| energy independent | - | 0.52 | 0.55 |

Table 5. The $`R_{cc}/R_{nc}`$ at SNO at the best-fit values for the LMA, LOW and energy independent solution for the renormalised Chlorine and $`X_B`$ fixed cases of Table 2 and Table 3.

Summary:

In summary the recent SK data on day/night spectrum is in potential conflict with the apparent energy dependence in the suppression rates observed in Ga, Cl and SK experiments. Including matter effects one can get acceptable oscillation solutions to both rates and spectrum data only over limited regions of mass and mixing parameters. However an upward renormalisation of the Cl rate by 20% $`(2\sigma )`$ results in substantial improvement of the quality of fit. Moreover a downward renormalisation of the $`B`$ neutrino flux by 25% $`(1.5\sigma )`$ as suggested by the helioseismic model enlarges the allowed region of the parameter space substantially. Over most of this enlarged region the energy dependence resulting from the matter effects is too weak to be discernible at the present level of experimental accuracy. Hence with these renormalisations of the Cl rate and the $`B`$ neutrino flux the data can be described very well by an energy independent solution. Note added: After this work was completed the 1258 days SK data has appeared on the net. We have checked that the results of our analysis do not show any significant changes with the new data.

We thank Profs. H.M. Antia, G. Bhattacharya, S.M. Chitre, K. Kar and A. Raychaudhuri for discussions.

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22. A.B. McDonald for the SNO collaboration, Nucl.Phys. Proc. Suppl. 91, 21, 2000:
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26. S. Fukuda et al., hep-ex/0103033.

Fig 1 The quasi energy independent allowed region in $`\mathrm{\Delta }m^2\mathrm{tan}^2\theta `$ parameter space where the solar neutrino survival probability agrees with eq. (2) to within 10% over the Ga and SK energies.

Fig. 2: The 90, 95 and 99% C.L. allowed area from the global analysis of the total rates from Cl (observed and 20% renormalised), Ga and SK detectors and the 1117 days SK recoil electron spectrum at day and night, assuming MSW conversions to active neutrinos.

Fig. 3: The 90, 95 and 99% C.L. allowed area from the global analysis of the total rates from Cl (observed and 20% renormalised), Ga and SK detectors and the 1117 days SK recoil electron spectrum at day and night, assuming MSW conversions to active neutrinos. The B normalisation is floated as a free parameter.

Fig. 4: The 90, 95 and 99% C.L. allowed area from the global analysis of the total rates from Cl (observed and 20% renormalised), Ga and SK detectors and the 1117 days SK recoil electron spectrum at day and night, assuming MSW conversions to active neutrinos. The B normalisation is held fixed at 0.75 of SSM value.


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# Topological Quantization and Degeneracy in Josephson-Junction Arrays

## Abstract

We consider the conductivity quantization in two-dimensional arrays of mesoscopic Josephson junctions, and examine the associated degeneracy in various regimes of the system. The filling factor of the system may be controlled by the gate voltage as well as the magnetic field, and its appropriate values for quantization is obtained by employing the Jain hierarchy scheme both in the charge description and in the vortex description. The duality between the two descriptions then suggests the possibility that the system undergoes a change in degeneracy while the quantized conductivity remains fixed.

During past decades two-dimensional arrays of superconducting grains, weakly coupled by Josephson junctions, have been studied extensively. In particular recent advances in fabrication techniques make it possible to control the physical parameters of the arrays, providing a convenient model system for the study of charge and vortex configuration and dynamics. When the dimensions of the superconducting grains and the capacitances involved are small, the associated charging energy is non-negligible and quantum dynamics comes into play at the macroscopic level. In such an array of ultra-small junctions, frustration can be introduced not only by applying magnetic fields but also by inducing external charges; these control the numbers of vortices and charges (Cooper pairs), leading to interesting dynamic responses. In appropriate regimes the Hall conductivity as well as the dc component of the voltage or of the current may be quantized, and the possibility of the corresponding quantum Hall effect  as well as the giant Shapiro steps and giant inverse Shapiro steps  has been pointed out.

This work examines such conductivity quantization in various regimes of the system, with regard to the associated degeneracy. We thus consider a Josephson-junction array with the junction capacitance between nearest-neighboring grains dominant over the self-capacitance of each grain; the system is characterized by the charge-vortex duality, which is manifested by transforming charge variables into vortex variables. Here in the presence of both the charging energy and the Josephson coupling energy, charges or vortices may form incompressible quantum liquids and display quantization of the Hall conductivity at appropriate values of the filling factor, which may be controlled by the gate voltage as well as the magnetic field. We employ the Jain hierarchy scheme to obtain the quantization values of the filling factor both in the charge description and in the vortex description. The duality between the two descriptions then suggests that the system may undergo a change in degeneracy while the quantized conductivity remains fixed.

We begin with an $`L\times L`$ square array ($`L^2N`$) with the Josephson coupling $`E_J`$ and the charging energy $`E_Ce^2/2C`$, in the limit that the self-capacitance $`C_0`$ is negligibly small compared with the junction capacitance $`C`$. The system in the uniform transverse magnetic field $`𝐁\times 𝐀`$ is described by the Hamiltonian

$`H=`$ $`4E_C{\displaystyle \underset{𝐫,𝐫^{}}{}}(n_𝐫f_c)G_{𝐫,𝐫^{}}(n_𝐫^{}f_c)`$ (2)
$`E_J{\displaystyle \underset{𝐫,𝐫^{}}{}}\mathrm{cos}(\varphi _𝐫\varphi _𝐫^{}A_{𝐫,𝐫^{}}),`$
where the (excess) Cooper pair number $`n_𝐫`$ at site $`𝐫`$ is conjugate to the phase $`\varphi _𝐫`$ and $`G_{𝐫,𝐫^{}}`$ is the lattice Green’s function. The (uniform) charge frustration $`f_c`$ is related to the externally induced charge $`Q`$ on each grain via $`f_cQ/2e`$, whereas the plaquette sum of the bond angle $`A_{𝐫,𝐫^{}}(2\pi /\mathrm{\Phi }_0)_𝐫^𝐫^{}𝐀𝑑𝐥`$ gives the the number of the flux quantum $`\mathrm{\Phi }_02\pi \mathrm{}c/2e`$ or the (uniform) magnetic frustration $`f_v`$ according to $`_pA_{𝐫,𝐫^{}}=2\pi f_v`$. Here the system is described in terms of charge variables; in this description the charges (Cooper pairs) interact via the 2D Coulomb potential of strength $`E_C`$ while the Josephson coupling $`E_J`$ provides the kinetic energy for them.

When the charging energy is smaller than the Josephson coupling energy, it is convenient to use the dual description by means of the vortex Hamiltonian

$`H=`$ $`2\pi E_J{\displaystyle \underset{𝐑,𝐑^{}}{}}(n_𝐑^vf_v)G_{𝐑,𝐑^{}}(n_𝐑^{}^vf_v)`$ (4)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\pi ^2}}E_C{\displaystyle \underset{𝐑,𝐑^{}}{}}\mathrm{cos}(\varphi _𝐑^v\varphi _𝐑^{}^vA_{𝐑,𝐑^{}}^v),`$
where the vortices, defined on dual lattice sites $`𝐑`$, are taken for quantum mechanical particles. Namely, the vortex charge $`n_𝐑^v`$ and the vortex phase $`\varphi _𝐑^v`$ are conjugate to each other. The vortex bond angle $`A_{𝐑,𝐑^{}}^v`$ has been defined in such a way that its plaquette sum (on the dual lattice) gives the induced charge on the enclosed grain or charge frustration, $`_pA_{𝐑,𝐑^{}}^v=2\pi f_c`$. The vortex bond angle may also be expressed as the line integral of the vortex vector potential $`𝐀_v`$: $`A_{𝐑,𝐑^{}}^v=(2\pi /2e)_𝐑^𝐑^{}𝐀_v𝑑𝐥`$, where the corresponding vortex magnetic field $`𝐁_v\times 𝐀_v`$ is simply the induced surface charge density $`\rho `$, so that the flux through a grain is simply the total induced charge on that grain, $`𝐁_v𝑑𝐚=Q`$. In this vortex Hamiltonian, the roles of the charging energy and the Josephson energy are reversed: The latter describes interactions between vortices whereas the former provides kinetic energy. The resulting charge-vortex duality between Eqs. (2) and (4) has been shown to give interesting consequences such as universal conductivity,  persistent current and voltage,  and giant Shapiro steps and inverse steps in response to applied ac currents.

In the absence of the Josephson coupling ($`E_J=0`$), the ground state of the system, determined by the first term of the Hamiltonian in Eq. (2), forms an insulating charge lattice. When $`f_c=p/q`$ with $`p`$ and $`q`$ relatively prime, the charge lattice has the $`q\times q`$ structure, in general with $`q`$-fold degeneracy. On the other hand, in the opposite case that the charging energy is absent ($`E_C=0`$), the ground state is determined by the second term of Hamiltonian (4), forming an $`s\times s`$ vortex lattice for $`f_v=r/s`$ (again with relatively prime $`r`$ and $`s`$). Thus obtained is a superconducting state with $`s`$-fold degeneracy. Obviously, these degeneracy factors may also be obtained from the dual descriptions. For example, in the latter case of $`E_C=0`$, Eq. (2) reduces to the Hamiltonian for a (tight-binding) charged particle in a magnetic field, which is well known to display $`s`$-fold degenerate energy spectra.

In the presence of both charging energy and Josephson energy, the latter provides kinetic energy of charges or the former provides that of vortices, which tends to destroy the charge or vortex lattice structure. Unlike in a continuum system,  vortices in the array system considered here are generally accepted as rather well-defined point-like objects with finite effective mass. In particular, vortices as well as charges have been argued to be bosons, possessing hard cores in the appropriate regimes.  Accordingly, when the two energies are comparable to each other, we have strongly interacting particles (charges or vortices), which have been suggested to form a quantum liquid in the ground state. In this case it is convenient to write the Hamiltonain (2) or (4) in the second quantized representation:

$$H=t\underset{i,j}{}e^{iA_{ij}}b_i^{}b_j+u\underset{i,j}{}(n_if)G_{ij}(n_jf),$$
(5)
where $`b_i^{}`$ and $`b_i`$ are the boson (charge or vortex) creation and annihilation operators at (original or dual) lattice site $`i`$, respectively, $`n_ib_i^{}b_i`$ is the number operator, $`A_{ij}`$ is the charge or vortex bond angle, and $`f`$ describes charge or magnetic frustration. We here consider the case of large $`u`$ such that bosons are well defined with small fluctuations, possessing hard cores ($`n_i=0,1`$). This corresponds to the regime of large $`E_C`$ in the charge description, where $`t`$ and $`u`$ are proportional to $`E_J`$ and $`E_C`$, respectively; these roles of $`E_C`$ and $`E_J`$ are reversed in the vortex description.

Equation (5) describes a two-dimensional system of $`fN`$ bosons, i.e., $`N_c=f_cN`$ Cooper pairs or $`N_v=f_vN`$ vortices, each of charge $`2e`$ or $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0`$, in a uniform magnetic field $`𝐁`$ or $`𝐁_v`$. Here each vortex carries one magnetic flux quantum $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0`$ or each charge one vortex magnetic flux quantum $`2e`$. Thus we have $`N_c`$ particles together with $`N_v`$ flux quanta or vice versa, leading to the charge or vortex filling factor $`\nu _cN_c/N_v=f_c/f_v`$ and $`\nu _vN_v/N_c=\nu _c^1`$ The usual (charge) Hall conductivity thus reads

$$\sigma _H=\nu _c\frac{(2e)^2}{h},$$
(6)
whereas the vortex Hall conductivity, given by the inverse

$$\sigma _H^v=\nu _v\frac{\mathrm{\Phi }_0^2}{h}=\frac{c^2}{\sigma _H},$$
(7)
simply corresponds to the Hall resistivity.

Via the Jordan-Wigner transformation, the boson system described by the Hamiltonian (5) can be mapped into a fermion system with an additional gauge field, which is possible owing to the hard-core condition.  Namely, we attach $`\alpha `$ flux quanta to each boson, where $`\alpha `$ is an odd integer, and transform the boson into a fermion. This results in $`N_c`$ fermions (charges) with the effective number of flux quanta given by $`N_{\varphi ,eff}^c=|N_v\alpha N_c|`$ or $`N_v`$ fermions (vortices) with $`N_{\varphi ,eff}^v=|N_c\alpha N_v|`$ flux quanta, and such a system of interacting fermions in a magnetic field is expected to form an incompressible quantum fluid for an appropriate filling factor. In the simple case the ground state is described by the Laughlin wave function

$$\mathrm{\Psi }=\underset{i<j}{\overset{fN}{}}|z_iz_j|^\alpha (z_iz_j)^m\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{1}{4\mathrm{}^2}\underset{i}{\overset{fN}{}}|z_i|^2\right]$$
(8)
where $`z_i`$ represents the complex coordinate of the $`i`$th particle (Cooper pair or vortex) and $`\mathrm{}\sqrt{\mathrm{}c/2eB}`$ or $`\sqrt{\mathrm{}c/\mathrm{\Phi }_0B_v}`$ is the magnetic length. Here the odd integer $`m`$ is related to the filling factor via $`\nu =(m+\alpha )^1`$, giving the fractional quantization of the Hall conductivity at even-denominator filling factors.

According to the topological argument, fractional quantization associated with the filling factor $`1/2k`$ requires that the ground-state wave function should be multi-valued on a torus, possessing $`2k`$ components. Here it is of interest to note that such fractional quantization of the vortex Hall conductivity corresponds to the integer quantization of the charge Hall conductivity. In particular the relation between the two filling factors, $`\nu _c=\nu _v^1`$, suggests the possibility of different topological degeneracy depending on the description, in terms of either charges or vortices. To examine such possibility, we adopt the Jain hierarchy  to obtain appropriate filling factors for quantization. With $`m1`$ flux quanta attached to each fermion, the remaining flux quanta gives the net number $`N_{\varphi ,net}^{c,v}=N_{\varphi ,eff}^{c,v}(m1)N_{c,v}`$. Note that attaching $`m1`$ flux quanta to a fermion corresponds to attaching $`\alpha +m1(2k1)`$ flux quanta to the boson (original charge or vortex), thus transforming it into a fermion. For charges, this leads to $`N_{\varphi ,net}^c/N=f_v(\alpha +m1)f_c`$ for $`\alpha f_c<f_v`$ and $`N_{\varphi ,net}^c/N=(\alpha m+1)f_cf_v`$ for $`\alpha f_c>f_v`$; for vortices, the roles of $`f_c`$ and $`f_v`$ are reversed. The net filling factor is then given by

$$\nu _{c,v}^{(net)}\frac{N_{c,v}}{N_{\varphi ,net}^{c,v}}=\{\begin{array}{cc}\frac{\nu _{c,v}}{1\left(\alpha +m1\right)\nu _{c,v}},\hfill & \alpha f_{c,v}<f_{v,c}\hfill \\ & \\ \frac{\nu _{c,v}}{\left(\alpha m+1\right)\nu _{c,v}1},\hfill & \alpha f_{c,v}>f_{v,c},\hfill \end{array}$$
(9)
where $`\nu _{c,v}f_{c,v}/f_{v,c}`$ is the bare filling factor for charges or vortices. To obtain quantization, we should have an integer number of filled Landau levels, i.e., $`\nu ^{(net)}=n`$. With this condition, Eq. (9) yields the values of the filling factors appropriate for quantization, which, for both charges and vortices, obtain the form

$$\nu =\frac{1}{(2k1)\pm \frac{1}{n}}$$
(10)
with $`k=1,2,3,\mathrm{}`$. When only the lowest Landau level is filled ($`n=1`$), the above result reduces to $`\nu =1/2k`$, reproducing the values of the Laughlin state, as expected. On the other hand, in case that all the flux quanta are attached ($`n\mathrm{}`$), we have $`\nu =1/(2k1)`$, implying that odd-denominator values are also possible.

In the charge description, relevant for the case of sufficiently large $`E_C`$, we have fractional quantization of the Hall conductivity at $`\nu _c=(2k1\pm 1/n)^1`$. In the opposite case that $`E_J`$ is sufficiently larger than $`E_C`$, the vortex description is applicable, yielding quantization (of the charge Hall conductivity) at $`\nu _c=(2k1\pm 1/n)`$. In this regime, however, the topological character is determined by the vortex configuration, and may not be the same as that appearing by the charge configuration. As an example, we consider the case $`f_c=1/2`$ and $`f_v=1/3`$, leading to the filling factors $`\nu _c=3/2`$ and $`\nu _v=2/3`$. In the charge description, Eq. (10) with $`k=1`$ and $`n=3`$ gives $`\nu _c=3/2`$, implying (charge) Hall conductivity quantization at this value, with two-fold topological degeneracy. Similarly, the value $`\nu _v=2/3`$ can be obtained from Eq. (10) with $`k=1`$ and $`n=2`$, thus suggesting quantization of the vortex Hall conductivity at $`\nu _v=2/3`$, with three-fold degeneracy. Via Eq. (7), this corresponds to quantization of the charge Hall conductivity at $`\nu _c=3/2`$. Accordingly, the quantization (of the charge Hall conductivity) remains the same in the two regimes, but the topological degeneracy is apparently different.

Generalizing the above, we consider a system with given values of $`f_c`$ and $`f_v`$, such that the quantized filling factors are given by $`\nu _c=f_c/f_v=p/q`$ and $`\nu _v=\nu _c^1=q/p`$ with $`p`$ and $`q`$ relatively prime. When $`E_J/E_C`$ is sufficiently small, the charge description is appropriate and gives $`q`$-fold degeneracy. For sufficiently large $`E_J/E_C`$, on the other hand, we have $`p`$-fold degeneracy from the vortex description. This is reminiscent of the problem of a charged particle in a periodic (lattice) potential under a magnetic field:  In the tight-binding limit, where the potential is sufficiently strong compared with the kinetic energy, the system is described by Harper’s equation with the frustration parameter $`f`$, displaying $`s`$-fold degeneracy. (Here $`f=r/s`$ is again the flux per plaquette in units of the flux quantum.) In the opposite limit of weak potential, the system is still described by Harper’s equation, manifesting duality, but $`f`$ is replaced by $`f^1`$, leading to $`r`$-fold degeneracy. Since the Josephson coupling corresponds to the kinetic energy of charges, the duality between the two regimes in the array is indeed analogous to that in Harper’s equation. In the regime $`E_J/E_C1`$, the ground state of the system should be an insulator; for $`E_J/E_C1`$ it should be a superconductor. The system is thus expected to undergo a phase transition between the insulating state and the superconducting one as $`E_J/E_C`$ is varied, suggesting the duality present between the two states. Assuming a single transition, we expect the system to be self-dual at the critical value $`(E_J/E_C)_c`$, which depends upon the frustration parameters $`f_c`$ and $`f_v`$. It then follows that the system with quantization at $`\nu _c=p/q`$ possesses $`q`$-fold degeneracy for $`E_J/E_C<(E_J/E_C)_c`$ and $`p`$-fold one for $`E_J/E_C>(E_J/E_C)_c`$.

In summary, we have considered the possibility of conductivity quantization in a two-dimensional array of Josephson junctions, and examined the associated degeneracy in various regimes of the system. In the presence of both the charging energy and the Josephson coupling energy, charges or vortices may form incompressible quantum liquids and display quantization of the Hall conductivity at appropriate values of the filling factor, which may be controlled by the gate voltage as well as the magnetic field. Adopting the Jain hierarchy scheme, we have obtained the quantization values of the filling factor both in the charge description and in the vortex description. The duality between the two descriptions has then been shown to suggest the interesting possibility that the degeneracy of the system can change while the quantized conductivity remains fixed.

MYC thanks D.J. Thouless for the hospitality during his stay at University of Washington, where this work was performed. JC thanks D. Belitz for the hospitality during his stay at University of Oregon. This work was supported in part by the Ministry of Education through the BK21 Program and by the National Science Foundation Grant DMR-9815932.


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# Photovoltage Effects in Photoemission from Thin GaAs Layers

## I Introduction.

The negative electron affinity (NEA) state of activated (100) GaAs has been widely studied and used for a variety of applications. While the qualitative features of the electron photoemission are known, a full quantitative understanding is lacking . The co-adsorption of Cs and O (or F) on an atomically clean surface of $`p`$-type GaAs is known to result in a significant lowering of the GaAs electron affinity as well as a shift of the surface Fermi level deep into the band gap with a formation of the band bending region (BBR) near the surface. The band-bending is an important contribution to the lowering of the electron affinity. The emitted electron energy distribution depends on the density of states, the doping level and the electron kinetics in the BBR, leading to differing interpretations of the electron energy distribution (EDC) curves . While the activated surface develops a surface barrier for the electrons, the structure and transparency of the barrier is not well understood.

Information on the properties of the NEA surface is obtained with photoemission studies at high power excitation . When the photocathode is excited with high densities of light near the band gap, the total photoemitted charge is not proportional to the light intensity. This phenomenon was first observed using bulk GaAs , and can be described as a surface charge limit (SCL). Several experimental studies have been made on strained GaAs, superlattice structures , and thin unstrained GaAs . In  the SCL was attributed to the photovoltage building up in the band bending region. The photoelectrons captured in the BBR produce an opposing field that flattens the bands and reduces NEA, which can be described as the effect of the surface photovoltage (SPV). It was determined that SPV formation and its relaxation is mainly controlled by the restoring current of the holes  and is very sensitive to the transparency of the barrier for the holes formed by the BBR . The value of the surface photovoltage at several temperatures for a (100) GaAs surface has been measured in studies of core-level photoemission spectra under synchrotron radiation excitation  and in studies of the EDC at high excitation levels .

The problem of the SCL is important for operation of polarized electron photocathodes at the Stanford Linear Collider (SLC) and even more so for the next generation linear colliders such as the Next Linear Collider (NLC). The present NLC design requires a train of 95 microbunches spaced 2.8 ns apart. Each microbunch is required to have $`2.8\times 10^{10}`$ electrons with a peak current of 4.5 A, totaling $`2.7\times 10^{12}`$ electrons in a 266 ns train. The required total charge is two orders of magnitude higher than the SLC case.

In the present paper, we report on the first detailed experimental studies and theoretical analysis for a set of 100 nm-thick GaAs samples with various levels of uniform doping. For thin-layer cathodes the time of electron extraction from the active layer to the BBR is much smaller than the bulk lifetime and the diffusion time, eliminating the influence of the recombination effects in the layer. The optical properties of unstrained GaAs are fairly well known, allowing reliable estimation of the surface escape probability from the experimental data. Using long-pulse excitation and pump-probe measurements, the kinetics of photovoltage buildup and electron emission are investigated.

## II The Charge Limit Model

### A Surface Escape Probability

Fig. 1 shows schematically the GaAs band structure near the surface activated by Cs(O/F) deposition and the electron potential near the surface. When the cathode is illuminated with a pulsed laser with photon energy slightly above the band gap energy, the photoexcited electrons in the conduction band are rapidly thermalized and captured in the BBR potential well from which they tunnel into vacuum through the surface barrier. For a thin unstrained GaAs layer ($`\alpha d1`$$`\alpha L1`$, where $`\alpha `$ is the optical absorption coefficient, $`d`$ is the active layer thickness, $`L`$ is the diffusion length) all the electrons optically excited in the GaAs layer near the absorption edge are captured in the BBR region forming the flow of the electrons to the surface, $`j_{\mathrm{el}}=q\alpha d(1R)J`$, where $`J`$ is the light excitation intensity and $`R`$ is the surface optical reflection coefficient. A part of this flow is emitted into vacuum, while the rest contributes to the surface recombination current, so that the quantum yield Y is:

$$Y=\alpha d(1R)B_N.$$
(1)
Here $`B_N`$ is the surface escape probability. The value of $`B_N`$ depends on the details of the competition between electron recombination in the BBR and emission into vacuum through the surface barrier.

To estimate local values of $`B_N`$ on the activated surface we use the results of near band gap low-intensity measurements of the quantum yield for a small excitation spot. Taking $`d=10^5`$ cm, $`(1R)`$=0.68 and $`\alpha =5\times 10^3`$ cm-1 , we obtain $`B_N0.15`$ for a typical quantum yield of a thin GaAs layer of $`Y`$ = 0.5%. Thus, even at the low-intensity excitation only $`1/7`$th of the electron flow to the surface is photoemitted into vacuum, and the majority recombines in the band bending region.

The quantum yield from NEA surfaces increases with bias field at the GaAs surface . This effect is attributed traditionally to the image-force lowering of the surface barrier by the applied field (see Fig. 1a). This barrier lowering, $`\delta U`$, can be evaluated from a simple electrostatic consideration:

$$\delta U(F)=q\sqrt{\frac{qF(ϵ_s1)}{4\pi ϵ_0(ϵ_s+1)}},$$
(2)
where $`q`$ is the free electron charge, $`F`$ is the external electric field, and $`ϵ_s`$ is the relative permittivity of the semiconductor. The quantity $`\delta U(F)`$ is seen to be proportional to the square root of the bias field. More commonly, this effect is studied for surfaces having positive electron affinity or Schottky barriers, where the image force modifies the thermionic emission current. The emission current is then an exponential function of the barrier height, so that $`\mathrm{log}(Y)`$ grows linearly with the square root of applied bias field. For NEA photocathodes, both linear and logarithmic dependences of $`Y`$ on the square root of the bias field have been observed. In Appendix A an expression for the surface escape probability $`B_N`$ is derived. For the conditions of this experiment the dependence of $`B_N`$ on the NEA value $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ is shown to be linear. From these considerations it follows that the relative variation of the yield with the bias field F is given by:

$$\frac{Y(F)}{Y(0)}=1+\frac{\delta U(F)}{\mathrm{\Delta }}.$$
(3)
### B The Photovoltage

Under intense optical excitation the electron flow to the surface starts to compensate the positive charge of the donor-like states that provide band bending at the surface. This results in a flattening of the energy bands and a lifting of the bottom of the conduction band at the surface (see the dashed curve in Fig. 1b). One can assume that the properties of the resulting effective surface barrier in the several monolayer-thick activation layer are not influenced by this relatively small shift. One can further assume that the electron diffusion to the band bending region does not change since it remains faster than the surface processes. The change in quantum yield can then be evaluated if one replaces the NEA value $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ by $`\mathrm{\Delta }U(J)`$, where $`U(J)`$ is the up-shifting of the conduction band due to the photovoltage. Taking into account the bias field effect, we obtain

$$\frac{Y(J)}{Y_0}=1\frac{U(J)}{\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Delta }}},$$
(4)
where $`\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Delta }}=\mathrm{\Delta }+\delta U`$ is the NEA value recalculated for a given bias field, $`\delta U`$ is the potential barrier lowering resulting from an external bias field, and $`Y_0`$ is the quantum yield for non charge-limited photoemission.

### C The Restoring Currents

When the excited electrons are captured in the BBR, the majority of electrons recombine at the surface with the holes coming from the valence band. There are several mechanisms for electron recombination (starting from the recombination in the band bending region itself). However, for activated GaAs surfaces the electron capture by surface localized states appears to be the fastest process since the electrons drift in the strong electric field to these capture centers, which have an attractive Coulomb potential. Therefore the recombination rate of these electrons is limited by the excess hole current to the surface, $`j_p`$. In the stationary state where the excitation time is much longer than the surface process time, the SPV value can be evaluated from the balance of the surface current densities, $`j_{el}=j_p`$.

There are two major mechanisms providing the recombination hole current to the surface through the band bending region: thermionic emission and tunneling through the barrier. The photovoltage dependence of the hole current at low temperatures tracks with the tunneling contribution, while at higher temperatures the hole current increases due to the thermal shift of the hole energy distribution, which assists hole tunneling through the barrier. In the equilibrium state with no illumination, the excess hole current equals zero at the equilibrium band bending. Therefore, the resulting excess current $`j_p(U)`$ can be expressed as:

$$j_p(U)=j_{p,0}[\mathrm{exp}(U/E_0)1],$$
(5)
where the energy $`E_0`$ for the band bending region is given by:

$$E_0=E_{00}\mathrm{coth}(\frac{E_{00}}{kT}),E_{00}=\frac{\mathrm{}}{2}\left[\frac{q^2N_a}{m_hϵ_0ϵ_s}\right]^{1/2}=18.57\times \left[\frac{N_a}{m_hϵ_s}\right]^{1/2}\mathrm{meV},$$
(6)
where $`m_h`$ is the hole mass, and $`N_a`$ is the acceptor concentration in the unit of 1018 cm-3. For the case of thermally assisted tunneling in metal-semiconductor junctions, $`j_{p,0}`$ can be expressed as:

$$j_{p,0}=A^{}\frac{T(E_{00}V)^{1/2}}{k\mathrm{cosh}(E_{00}/kT)}\mathrm{exp}(\frac{V}{E_0}),$$
(7)
where $`k`$ is the Boltzmann constant and $`A^{}`$ is the effective Richardson constant, $`A^{}`$ =9.6 A K-2 cm-2, for tunneling by light holes. It follows from Eq. (6) that for GaAs and a typical doping level of 5$`\times `$ 1018 cm-3, the value of $`E_{00}`$ can vary from 17 meV to 40 meV depending on the relative contribution of the light and heavy holes into the hole current. However, the light hole contribution to $`j_p(U)`$ is dominant due to the mass dependence of the $`j_{p,0}`$ factor. The above expression for $`j_{p,0}`$ is in the context of a Schottky barrier model with a metallic layer and thus may be different for cesiated NEA GaAs surfaces.

## III Experiment

The samples for the present experiment were grown by the Quantum Epitaxial Devices Corporation  using molecular-beam-epitaxy (MBE). The substrate material was (100) n-type (Si doped to 1$`\times `$1018cm-3) GaAs. Since heavy p-type doping is necessary to achieve a NEA surface, a 0.1-$`\mu `$m-thick p-type GaAs (Be doped to 5$`\times `$1018cm-3) layer was first grown on the substrate, followed by a 1-$`\mu `$m-thick p-type (Be doped to 5$`\times `$1018cm-3) Al0.3Ga0.7As buffer layer. The 0.1-$`\mu `$m-thick p-type GaAs active layer was then grown on this buffer. Four samples were grown with uniform doping concentrations of 5$`\times `$1018cm-3, 1$`\times `$1019cm-3, 2$`\times `$1019cm-3, and 5$`\times `$1019cm-3 in the active layer respectively. The Al0.3Ga0.7As intermediate layer serves as a potential barrier to isolate the active GaAs layer from the substrate GaAs. In order to preserve an atomically clean surface the samples were anodized to form an oxide layer of about 50 Å on the GaAs surface. The oxide layer was later removed as described below. The relevant sample parameters are tabulated in Table I.

The experiments were performed at the Gun Test Laboratory at SLAC . The apparatus, which is a replica of the first few meters of the SLAC injector beamline, consists of a 22.5 mm diameter photocathode diode gun with a load-lock system for cathode loading/removal, and an electron beamline terminating into a Faraday cup. Prior to installation in the system, the sample was degreased in a boiling solution of trichloroethane. After the protective oxide layer was removed in ammonium hydroxide, the sample was rinsed in distilled water and methanol. The load-lock system was essential for loading the samples into and removing them from the gun under vacuum. This system avoided the cathode contamination that normally accompanies the bake of the gun system, resulting in reproducible cathode activations and high quantum yield. The cathode activation to obtain an NEA surface consisted of heat cleaning to 600 C for 1 hour, followed by application of cesium until the photoyield peaked, and then cesium and nitrogen-trifluoride codeposition until the photoyield was again maximized.

Two different excitation sources were used for the two types of measurements. The first type of measurement used a flash-lamp pumped Ti:sapphire laser (Flash-Ti) producing a long laser pulse adjustable from 150-350 ns at 120 Hz with energy up to 130 $`\mu `$J. This excitation mode was used to directly study the time evolution of the photovoltage and the dependence of the photovoltage on the laser intensity. The second type of measurement used two pulsed Ti:sapphire lasers pumped by a single frequency-doubled Nd:YAG laser (YAG-Ti) in a pump-pulse/probe-pulse combination. In this excitation mode the pump-pulse was an intense short pulse inducing a photovoltage in the photocathode followed by a short high intensity probe-pulse, but not in the intensity regime to produce a photovoltage effect. The two YAG-Ti lasers each produced a 2 ns pulse at 60 Hz with a pump laser energy of up to 100 $`\mu `$J. In these measurements, the time separation between the pump and probe laser pulses was varied. This technique allowed an independent measurement of the photovoltage parameters. All laser wavelengths were 850 nm, and the spot size was set to about 20 mm so as to fill the exposed area of the cathode.

An optically isolated nanoammeter, a beam position monitor (BPM), a ceramic gap monitor, and a fast Faraday cup were used for beam intensity measurements. The cathode was biased at $`120`$ kV and maintained at a temperature of 0 $`\pm `$ 2 C. The vacuum in the gun was maintained at about 1x10-11 Torr by means of ion and nonevaporative getter pumping.

Two low-power CW diode lasers of 833 nm and 850 nm were used for the low power quantum yield measurements. For an individual sample, the quantum yield typically varied by a factor of two over the surface, but in some cases as high as a factor five. These variations were presumably caused by the inhomogeneous distribution of cesium on the surface. Similar variations were reported in Ref. . The quantum yield values averaged over the surface for the individual samples are shown in Table 1.

## IV Results

The bias field dependence of the quantum yield was measured using the low power 833 nm diode laser. Fig. 2 shows the experimentally observed variation of the quantum yield with the bias field for sample 1a, sample 3, and two other photocathodes not used for the present experiment. These two additional samples were zinc-doped strained GaAs and carbon-doped 1 $`\mu `$m thick GaAs. The observed dependence clearly favors a linear rather than a logarithmic dependence of $`Y`$ on $`\sqrt{F}`$. Following Eq. (3), the zero-field NEA value $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ can be determined from the slope of the fitted curves, shown as a solid line in Fig. 2, giving values of $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ in the range $`\mathrm{\Delta }=`$ 122 – 138 meV. These NEA values are, to a good approximation, the same for all well activated samples. As a comparison, the values extracted from the data of Ref.  for different points on the surface of a thick GaAs cathode are in the range of 100 – 160 meV. Therefore the quality of the activation in both cases is found to be similar.

The surface charge limit effect can be explored if the cathode is excited with a high peak power laser using a pulse length much longer than the characteristic time scale of the surface photovoltage effect. This is the technique using the long-pulse Flash-Ti laser described earlier. Figs. 3a, 3b, and 3c show representative temporal profiles of the emission current pulses measured using varying light pulse energies for (a) sample 1b, (b) sample 2a, and (c) sample 3, respectively. The observed photovoltage effect has several features. As seen in Fig. 3a, the electron emission current rises to a peak at the start of the laser pulse and then decreases as the photovoltage builds up. With time the electron emission current reaches a steady state value as the photovoltage saturates. With increasing laser energy, the photovoltage builds up more quickly and the suppression of the emission current due to the photovoltage is more pronounced. Fig. 3b and Fig. 3c show that the photovoltage effect decreases as the doping level increases.

To understand the temporal profile of the emission current, the charge limit model described in Section II is used. The time variation of the excess electronic charge $`Q`$ at the surface can be written in terms of the capacitance per unit surface area and the restoring hole current as:

$$C\frac{dU}{qdt}=j_{el}j_p(U)=q\alpha d(1R)Jj_p(U).$$
(8)
Within the depletion region approximation  for the BBR region with width $`w`$, the capacitance is given by:

$$C=ϵ_0ϵ_s/w=\sqrt{\frac{q^2ϵ_sϵ_0N_a}{2(VU)}},$$
(9)
where $`V`$ is the initial band bending energy (see Fig. 1). Here we assume that the emission current is much smaller than the recombination current since the surface escape probability $`B_N`$ 0.15. Integration of Eq. (8) using Eq. (5) gives for the normalized yield:

$$\frac{Y(J)}{Y_0}=1+\frac{E_0}{\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Delta }}}\times \mathrm{ln}\left[\frac{1+qJ/\stackrel{~}{j}_{p,0}\mathrm{exp}[(1+qJ/\stackrel{~}{j}_{p,0})t/\tau ]}{(1+qJ/\stackrel{~}{j}_{p,0})}\right],$$
(10)
where $`\stackrel{~}{j}_{p,0}`$ = $`j_{p,0}/\alpha d(1R)`$ and $`\tau =E_0C/qj_{p,0}`$. The quantum yield decreases with a characteristic saturation time constant $`\tau ^{}`$, where

$$\tau ^{}=\frac{\tau }{(1+qJ/\stackrel{~}{j}_{p,0})},$$
(11)
and reaches the steady state value:

$$Y(J)/Y_0=1\frac{E_0}{\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Delta }}}\mathrm{ln}(1+\frac{qJ}{\stackrel{~}{j}_{p,0}}).$$
(12)
Figs. 4a, 4b, and 4c show the measured dependencies of the steady state emission current on the light excitation intensity for samples 1a and 1b (Fig. 4a), samples 2a and 2b (Fig. 4b), and sample 3 (Fig. 4c) respectively, measured for a broad range of excitation intensities. The solid lines in Fig. 4 are fits for $`JY(J)`$ using Eq. (12). The SCL effect appears as the deviation of the emission current from a linear dependence on the excitation light intensity and is more pronounced in the lower doped samples (samples 1a and 1b). The SCL effects are not observed in the samples with p = 2$`\times `$1019cm-3 (sample 3), and 5$`\times `$1019cm-3 (sample 4, not shown in Fig. 4).

Figs. 5a and 5b show the experimentally observed variation of the saturation time $`\tau ^{}`$ as a function of the excitation intensity for (a) samples 1a, 1b, and (b) samples 2a, 2b. The saturation time shortens as the excitation intensity is increased, consistent with Eq. (11). The solid lines in Fig. 5 represent the results of a fit to Eq. (11).

The decay of the surface photovoltage can also be explored using the pump-probe technique described earlier. The short intense pump laser pulse induces a photovoltage which subsequently decays in time according to:

$$C\frac{dU}{qdt}=j_p(U).$$
(13)
The solution of Eq. (13) (neglecting the weak variation of the BBR capacitance with illumination) gives:

$$U(t)=E_0\times \mathrm{ln}\left[1\left(1\mathrm{exp}(\frac{U(0)}{E_0})\right)\mathrm{exp}(\frac{t}{\tau })\right].$$
(14)
Here it is seen that $`\tau `$, from Eq. (10), is the characteristic relaxation time of the photovoltage. The photocathode is then illuminated by the second short laser pulse at time $`t`$ at which time the photovoltage is $`U(t)`$. Using Eq. (4), the expression for the quantum yield $`Y(t)`$ of the probe pulse relative to the yield with no photovoltage effect is then given by:

$$\frac{Y(t)}{Y_0}=1+\frac{E_0}{\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Delta }}}\times \mathrm{ln}\left[1\left(1\mathrm{exp}(\frac{U(0)}{E_0})\right)\mathrm{exp}(\frac{t}{\tau })\right].$$
(15)
Fig. 6 shows the time variation of this ratio for samples 1b, 2a, 2b, and 3. At large times $`t`$ it is seen that the photovoltage has decayed and the yield ratio asymptotically approaches one. The solid lines in Fig. 6 are the results of a fit to Eq. (15).

The data of Fig. 2 for $`Y(F)`$ vs $`\sqrt{F}`$ are used to determine the quantity $`\delta U(F)/\mathrm{\Delta }`$ using Eqs. (2) and (3). With $`\delta U=47`$ meV for a bias voltage of $`120`$ kV, the average zero-field NEA value is determined to be $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ = 133 meV ($`\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Delta }}=\mathrm{\Delta }+\delta U`$ = 180 meV). The data of Fig. 4 for $`JY(J)`$ vs. $`J`$ are used to determine the quantities $`E_0/\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Delta }}`$ and $`j_{p,0}`$ using Eq. (12) from which the parameter $`E_0`$ is calculated. The data of Fig. 5 for $`\tau ^{}`$ vs. $`J`$ are used to determine the quantity $`\tau `$ and independently determine $`j_{p,0}`$ using Eq. (11). Finally, the pump-probe data of Fig. 6 are used as an independent method to determine the relaxation time $`\tau `$ using Eq. (15). The average values of these parameters resulting from the fits are tabulated in Table I.

## V Discussion

The most important and theoretically predictable parameter is $`E_0`$. The fit procedure yields $`E_0=45`$ meV for the average of samples 1a and 1b, and 62 meV for the average of samples 2a and 2b. These values are consistent with the values expected from the light hole contribution to the restoring current given by Eq. (6): $`E_0=43`$ meV for sample 1, and $`E_0=61`$ meV for sample 2.

The experimental results for the quantity $`j_{p,0}`$ are tabulated in Table 1. These values are about 100 times smaller than predicted by Eq. (7), which suggests that the hole capture cross section of the surface Cs states is much smaller than the value expected from the Schottky barrier model with a metallic Cs layer. Also, the parameter $`j_{p,0}`$ is exponentially dependent on the initial surface band bending $`V`$, which varies in the range 0.3-0.5 eV depending on the activation details, adding to the uncertainty.

The observation of the linear dependence of $`B_N`$ on the NEA value $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ predicted by Eq. (22) is strongly supported by the data on the variation of $`Y`$ with the bias field. Numerical values for $`B_N`$ were calculated from the sample yield measurements using Eq. (1) and were found to be in the range $`0.09B_N0.26`$. These values, together with Eq. (22) and the value for the optical phonon energy $`\mathrm{}\omega _0`$ = 36 meV for GaAs, are used to evaluate the electron emission rate $`\nu _{\mathrm{emi}}`$ in vacuum. The value of $`\tau _0`$ in Eq. (21) was estimated for GaAs from quantum well magneto-luminescence experiments to be 0.05 ps, which gives $`\nu _{\mathrm{emi}}0.7\mathrm{ps}^1`$. This value is close to the values found experimentally in the time-resolved electron emission measurements from thin GaAs layers .

## VI Conclusions

The present experimental results show that the surface escape probability from NEA GaAs surfaces is in the range of $`B_N0.26`$ and is a linear function of the NEA energy including photovoltage and bias voltage effects. For well activated photocathodes, the quantum yield is observed to increase linearly with the square-root of the bias field. The NEA value $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ is determined from the slope of this dependence giving values of $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ which are similar for all well activated samples.

The time evolution of the photovoltage and the photovoltage dependence on excitation laser intensity have been studied for thin GaAs samples with varying doping concentrations using a long laser pulse technique and a second technique using short pulse lasers in a pump-probe configuration. The results of these measurements show that the photovoltage effect has a strong doping concentration dependence decreasing with increased doping, and diminishing to zero at a doping level of 5$`\times `$1019cm-3. The experimental determinations of the parameter $`j_{p,0}`$ are about 1% of the values expected from a Schottky barrier model, indicating that the surface Cs layer has a non-metallic nature.

The overall experimental results are consistent with a model based on electron energy relaxation by multiple phonon emission in the band bending region and tunneling through the surface barrier to vacuum.

### Acknowledgments

A.V.S. thankfully acknowledges the hospitality of SLAC during his stay in USA. We thank R. Alley and T. Galetto for technical assistance. This work was supported by Department of Energy contract DE–AC03–76SF00515(SLAC) and DE-FG02-95ER40896(Wisconsin).

APPENDIX Electron Kinetics in the BBR: Surface Escape Probability

In this appendix an expression for the surface escape probability $`B_N`$ is derived. For unstrained GaAs photocathodes the EDC curves are spread over a broad energy band with a width close to the NEA value $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$, implying a long electron stay in the BBR accompanied by energy relaxation. In both bulk and quantum well GaAs structures the most effective mechanism for energy loss is optical phonon emission. One can assume that this mechanism also dominates in the BBR.

In this case the fraction of energy lost in one scattering event is much smaller than $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$. It is then possible to describe the energy relaxation and emission into vacuum by a Fockker-Planck  type equation for the electron density $`n(ϵ)`$ in the BBR at a given energy $`ϵ`$:

$$\frac{n(ϵ)}{t}=\frac{}{ϵ}\left[\frac{ϵ}{\tau _ϵ}n(ϵ)D(ϵ)\frac{n(ϵ)}{ϵ}\right]\nu _{emi}(ϵ)n(ϵ)=0,$$
(16)
where $`ϵ`$ is the electron energy measured downward from the conduction band edge. The first term in square brackets describes the flow of electrons through the states with energy $`ϵ`$ due to phonon emission and the second term corresponds to diffusion in energy space. In this equation $`\tau _ϵ`$ is the energy relaxation time, $`\nu _{emi}(ϵ)`$ is the rate of electron emission into vacuum, and $`D(ϵ)`$ is the diffusion coefficient. The emission current density through the energy band $`0ϵ\mathrm{\Delta }`$ can be calculated as:

$$j_{emi}=q_0^\mathrm{\Delta }\nu _{emi}(ϵ)n(ϵ)𝑑ϵ.$$
(17)
To solve Eq. (16) we note that the diffusion term, for a broad energy distribution $`\mathrm{\Delta }kT`$ in the electron flow, is of order $`kT/\mathrm{\Delta }1`$ and can be neglected. Then Eq. (16) reduces to:

$$\frac{}{ϵ}\left[\frac{ϵ}{\tau _ϵ}n(ϵ)\right]=\nu _{emi}(ϵ)n(ϵ).$$
(18)
The calculation of the ratio of the emission current through the energy band $`0ϵ\mathrm{\Delta }`$ to the electron flow at $`ϵ=0`$ using Eq. (17) and (18) results in:

$$B_N=1\mathrm{exp}\left[_0^\mathrm{\Delta }\frac{\nu _{\mathrm{emi}}(ϵ)\tau _ϵ(ϵ)}{ϵ}𝑑ϵ\right].$$
(19)
The rate of electron emission in vacuum is controlled by the transparency of the thin atomic-width barrier at the surface. The transparency is presumably a slowly decreasing function of the electron energy $`ϵ`$, and therefore can be replaced in Eq. (19) by its average value $`\nu _{\mathrm{emi}}`$. The surface escape probability for the case $`B_N1`$ can then be written as:

$$B_N=\nu _{\mathrm{emi}}\tau _d,\tau _d=_0^\mathrm{\Delta }\tau _ϵ\frac{dϵ}{ϵ}.$$
(20)
For the case where the dominant energy relaxation mechanism is optical phonon emission, the following relation is a valid approximation: ***$`\tau _0`$ is assumed to be independent of $`ϵ`$, a good approximation for the conditions of this experiment.

$$\frac{\tau _ϵ(ϵ)}{ϵ}=\frac{\tau _0}{\mathrm{}\omega _0},$$
(21)
where $`\mathrm{}\omega _0`$ is the optical phonon energy and $`\tau _0`$ is the characteristic time for phonon emission. With these assumptions, $`\tau _d`$ and $`B_N`$ are linear functions of the NEA value $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$, giving:

$$B_N=\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }}{E_B},E_B=\frac{\mathrm{}\omega _0}{\nu _{\mathrm{emi}}\tau _0}.$$
(22)
The linear dependence of the surface escape probability on $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ can be obtained from a more general analysis of electron energy diffusion in the band bending region and does not depend on a surface density of states. This result, the linear dependence of $`B_N`$ on $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$, is therefore not altered by band bending variations resulting from optical pumping.

LIST OF FIGURES

1. Energy band diagram of a GaAs active layer showing the negative electron affinity vacuum level for various conditions. (a) The NEA variation with the bias field $`\delta U(F)`$ and (b) the photovoltage $`U(J)`$ with the arrows indicating the direction of the movement of the NEA level. The photoemission and hole recombination processes are shown schematically in Fig. 1b.
2. The bias field dependence of the quantum yield for various photocathodes. Solid circles: sample 1a; Open circles: sample 3; Solid squares: zinc-doped strained GaAs; Open squares: carbon-doped 1$`\mu `$m-thick GaAs. The quantum yields have been rescaled as indicated in the figure.
3. The temporal profiles of the electron emission current using a long laser excitation pulse for (a) sample 1b, (b) sample 2a, and (c) sample 3. The laser intensity is varied from 1 W/cm2 to 150 W/cm2.
4. The steady state emission current as a function of the light excitation intensity for (a) sample 1a and 1b, (b) sample 2a and 2b, and (c) sample 3. The solid lines are fitted results to Eq. (12).
5. The saturation time constant $`\tau ^{}`$ of the photovoltage as a function of excitation light intensity for (a) sample 1a and 1b, and (b) sample 2a and 2b. The solid lines are fitted results to Eq. (11).
6. The quantum yield as a function of delay time between the pump and probe pulses from pump-probe measurements for samples 1b, 2a, 2b, and 3. The solid lines are fitted results to Eq. (15).