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# Desy-01-038, DSF-11-2001, quant-ph/0103144 When does a detector click?

## I Introduction

Time measurements play an important role in experiments, but in quantum theory the corresponding observables are not easy to find. The difficulties are connected with the fact that the dual observable, the energy, has a nontrivial spectrum, on which shifts are in general not well defined.

It is well known and easy to see that no selfadjoint operator exists which decribes the measurement of time . Therefore one has to rely on a more general concept of observables, and a natural option is the concept of positive operator valued measures . This concept has meanwhile often been applied to the problem of time measurements (see e.g. ). What is missing, however, so far we know, is a discussion of the effect whose occurence time is described. A description of the latter is the main contribution of this letter.

## II The Construction of a Time Operator

Let $`A>0`$ be a bounded operator on a Hilbert space $``$ which measures the occurence of an effect at time $`t=0`$. In Quantum Mechanics one might think of the projection operator $`P(xM)`$ for the position being in the region $`M`$, see e.g. , in Quantum Field Theory a choice would be an Araki-Haag counter , i.e. an almost local operator with vanishing vacuum expectation value, an (unbounded) example, in free massive field theory, being the partial number operator $`a(f)^{}a(f)`$ where $`a(f)`$ denotes the annihilation operator for a particle with a smooth momentum space wave function $`f`$.

Given a state $`\omega `$ and a time evolution $`\alpha _t`$, one may consider the expectation values $`\omega (\alpha _t(A))`$ as a nonnegative function of $`t`$ (assumed to be continuous). At times $`t`$ when this function is big the occurence of the effect will be more probable than at times $`t`$ when it is small, and one may ask whether one can derive from this a probability distribution. It may happen that $`\omega (\alpha _t(A))𝑑t=\mathrm{}`$, so the time spent in the detector is infinitely long, and a probability distribution cannot be defined (in this case an arrival time might possibly be introduced (see e.g. )). It may also happen that $`\omega (\alpha _t(A))=0`$ for all $`t`$, which means that the effect never takes place; also then it does not make sense to discuss a probability distribution. But in the intermediate case when the integral is finite a probability distribution can be found.

The question arises whether such a probability distribution can be written as the expectation value of a positive operator valued measure. This means essentially that the normalization should be done on the level of operators, not on the level of expectation values.

We start from the integrals

$$B(I)=_I\alpha _t(A)𝑑t,$$

where $`I`$ is some bounded interval of the real line $`𝐑`$. Hence $`B(I)`$ is a positive bounded operator, and $`B(J)B(I)`$ if $`JI`$. We want to construct the operator

$$B=_𝐑\alpha _t(A)𝑑t.$$

Up to the normalization of $`A`$, $`B`$ may be interpreted as the total time duration of the effect.

For this purpose we consider the operators $`(B(I)+1)^1`$. They form a decreasing net of positive bounded operators with greatest lower bound $`C1`$. Let $`_{\mathrm{}}`$ be the kernel of $`C`$ and $`_0`$ the joint kernel of $`\alpha _t(A)`$. In the corresponding states the time of occurence of the effect is infinite, resp. $`0`$. Let $`_{\text{finite}}`$ be the orthogonal complement of $`_{\mathrm{}}+_0`$ in $``$. On $`_{\text{finite}}`$ we define $`B`$ as the operator

$$B=C^11.$$

$`B`$ is a positive selfadjoint, in general unbounded operator, which dominates all operators $`B(I)`$ (restricted to operators in $`_{\text{finite}}`$). We set

$$P(I)=B^{\frac{1}{2}}B(I)B^{\frac{1}{2}},$$

and get positive operators bounded by 1 with

$$P(IJ)=P(I)+P(J),$$

for disjoint intervals $`I`$ and $`J`$ and with

$$P(𝐑)=1.$$

One may readily check that the countable additivity property of $`P`$ is also fulfilled. So we obtained a positive operator valued measure which transforms in the right way under time translations,

$$\alpha _t(P(I))=P(I+t).$$

To compare our concept with other definitions of time measurements we consider the first moment of the measure (the time operator associated to $`A`$),

$$T_A=tP(dt).$$

We assume that the time translations are implemented by unitaries $`e^{itH}`$ with a selfadjoint Hamiltonian $`H`$ with absolutely continuous spectrum and that the Hilbert space of our model can be represented as the space of sections of a (trivial) bundle of finite dimensional Hilbert spaces over the spectrum of $`H`$.

Let $`A`$ be a positive operator with a smooth integral kernel $`a(E,E^{})`$ with $`a(E,E)>0,E`$. Then the integral kernel of $`B`$ is

$`b(E,E^{})`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle e^{it(EE^{})}a(E,E^{})𝑑t}`$
$`=`$ $`2\pi \delta (EE^{})a(E,E^{}).`$
For $`P(I)`$ we find the integral kernel

$$\frac{1}{2\pi }c(E,E^{})_Ie^{it(EE^{})}𝑑t,$$

with

$$c(E,E^{})=a(E,E)^{\frac{1}{2}}a(E,E^{})a(E^{},E^{})^{\frac{1}{2}}.$$

For the first moment (the time operator) we obtain on smooth sections $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ with compact support which vanish at the boundaries of the spectrum of $`H`$

$$T_A\mathrm{\Phi }(E)=(i_E+d_A(E))\mathrm{\Phi }(E),$$

with

$$d_A(E)=i_E^{}c(E,E^{})|_{E^{}=E}.$$

Note that $`d_A`$ is hermitian because of the positivity of $`c`$.

We see that the time operator $`T_A`$ has the expected form as a covariant derivative in our bundle. Different effects give rise to different connections $`d_A`$.

From this result we can immediately obtain the observable which measures the time in between two effects. If $`d_1`$ and $`d_2`$ are the corresponding connections (we may assume that they are bounded, so the domain of the time operators in question coincide), the transition time between both effects is

$$d_1d_2.$$

The transition time is therefore (under the above conditions) a selfadjoint bounded operator showing none of the problems associated with the time operator. (This is in conflict with the statement in  that also transition times have an intrinsic uncertainty. The reason for this discrepancy, as far we can see, is that in  the transition time is analyzed only in eigenstates of the momentum whereas the eigenstates of the transition time as defined above are superpositions of different momentum eigenstates with the same energy.)

## III Application to Scattering Theory

A famous example for an analysis of times in quantum theory is the time delay in scattering theory (see, e.g., ). Here a general formula can be derived which is valid for all interactions. In the literature  it is done using the so-called sojourn time. The sojourn time is defined as the expectation value of the operator $`B`$ introduced above where the effect $`A`$ is the projection operator characterizing the probability that the particle is in a certain region of space which eventually tends to the whole space. One then compares the sojourn times of the interacting case with the noninteracting case. This analysis requires delicate arguments of convergence. We want to show that our concept leads to a much more direct and elementary derivation.

Let us consider a typical situation of scattering in quantum mechanics: The initial state $`\varphi _{\text{in}}`$ evolves according to the interacting Hamiltonian and asymptotically tends to $`\varphi _{\text{out}}=S\varphi _{\text{in}}`$ where $`S`$ is the scattering matrix (assumed to be unitary). The time delay of the event measured by the positive operator $`A`$ is given by the formula

$$\varphi _{\text{out}},T_A\varphi _{\text{out}}\varphi _{\text{in}},T_A\varphi _{\text{in}}$$

(provided the domain of $`T_A`$ is invariant under $`S`$). Hence,

$`t_{\text{delay}}`$ $`=`$ $`\varphi _{\text{in}},(S^1T_AST_A)\varphi _{\text{in}}`$
$`=`$ $`\varphi _{\text{in}},S^1[T_A,S]\varphi _{\text{in}}.`$
According to what has been exposed in the previous section we obtain

$`t_{\text{delay}}(E)`$ $`=`$ $`S(E)^1(i_E)S(E)`$
$`+`$ $`S(E)^1[d_A(E),S(E)],`$
so the time delay is just the change of the connection under the action of the on-shell scattering matrix (considered as a gauge transformation). If $`d_A`$ commutes with $`S`$ (this is always the case when the energy spectrum is nondegenerate) one obtains the well known formula of Eisenbud and Wigner (see , but especially  and ).

As a simple explicit example let us analyze the case of a central repulsive and short range potential.

The radial wave function of a scattering state of the particle with sharp angular momentum has the form

$$\psi (t,r)=e^{itE}u_k(r)\phi (k)𝑑k,E=\frac{k^2}{2m},$$

where the functions $`u_k`$ are solutions of the radial Schrödinger equation with the asymptotic behavior for $`r\mathrm{}`$

$$u_k(r)e^{ikr}+e^{ikr+i\delta (k)},$$

with a real function $`\delta `$ (the phase shift).

We first have to find an observable which indicates the passage of the particle through a spherical shell, of thickness $`\rho `$ (which eventually will tend to zero) with a sufficiently large radius $`R`$, in outward direction. Such an observable is

$$A=Q^{}PQ,$$

where $`P`$ is the projection onto states with positions inside the shell and where $`Q`$ simulates the (nonexistent) projection on states with positive radial momentum. We may choose

$$Q=i_r(2mH)^{\frac{1}{2}}1,$$

where $`_r`$ is the derivative operator with boundary condition $`\psi (r=0)=0`$ (then $`i_r`$ is maximally symmetric but not selfadjoint). Note that $`Q`$ is bounded and that it selects for large $`r`$ the outgoing component of $`u_k`$.

We now insert $`A`$ into the formulas derived before and get

$$a(E,E^{})=\frac{m}{\sqrt{kk^{}}}Qu_k,PQu_k^{},$$

$`c(E,E^{})`$ $`=`$
$`Qu_k,PQu_k^{\frac{1}{2}}Qu_k,PQu_k^{}Qu_k^{},PQu_k^{}^{\frac{1}{2}},`$
$`d(E)`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{im}{2k}}Qu_k,PQu_k^1`$ $`(Q_ku_k,PQu_k`$
$`Qu_k,PQ_ku_k).`$
Provided $`r`$ is sufficiently large, we can replace $`u_k`$ by its asymptotic form and find

$$c(E,E^{})=\frac{\mathrm{sin}\rho (kk^{})/2}{\rho (kk^{})/2}e^{iR(kk^{})}e^{i(\delta (k)\delta (k^{}))}.$$

We see that we can safely take the limit $`\rho 0`$.

As a test we evaluate our positive operator valued measure in a state

$$\psi (r)=\phi (k)u_k(r)𝑑k,$$

where $`\phi `$ has support in a small neighbourhood. The probability density of passage times is given by the integral

$$p(t)=\overline{\phi (k)}\phi (k^{})e^{i((kk^{})R+\delta (k)\delta (k^{})+t(EE^{}))}𝑑k𝑑k^{}.$$

Since the support of $`\phi `$ is small, we may linearize $`\delta `$ as a function of $`E`$ and find that $`p(t+_E\delta )`$ is independent of the interaction. Hence (in this approximation) the distribution of the times when the particle passes through the shell in outward direction is delayed and we get the well known time delay

$$t_{\text{delay}}=_E\delta .$$

The same conclusion can also be obtained from the general definition of the time delay with the time operator $`T_A`$ as derived previously. A straightforward computation gives

$$d_A(E)=\frac{mR}{k}_E\delta ,$$

which yields again the logarithmic derivative of the on-shell scattering matrix. Note, however, that the first moment of a positive operator valued measure does in general not contain all informations on the measure (in contrast to projection valued measures).

As a byproduct we see that the connection $`d_A`$, in the case of the free time evolution, is a function of the energy (independent of the angular momentum). Therefore it commutes with the scattering matrix also for noncentral potentials, and we obtain the Eisenbud and Wigner formula in the general case.

## IV Conclusions and outlook

We presented a general construction of a time operator measuring the occurence time of an effect and used it for a new derivation of the well known formula for time delay in scattering theory. Our approach may be generalized in several directions. The first is the study of coincidence arrangements of detectors, either in quantum mechanics or in quantum field theory, leading to a distribution of multiple times resembling the general framework of the consistent histories approach. Another generalization is an analysis of times in a periodic or quasiperiodic situation related to bound states of the Hamiltonian. There the positive operator valued measure is concentrated on a compact space on which time translations act, quite similar to Bellissard’s action of translations on homogenous disordered systems . One may also use a similar construction to characterize the localization of an event in spacetime. This may be compared with the somewhat different ansatz in . We hope to report soon elsewhere on these interesting topics.

###### Acknowledgements.

The authors acknowledge the support of the EU, INFN-sez. Napoli, DFG and MURST, whose grants allowed the collaboration during the last years.


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# On faint companions in the close environment of star–forming dwarf galaxies

## 1 Introduction

Dwarf galaxies are considered important contributors to the baryonic mass of the Universe and to the star formation rate (SFR) density at higher redshifts (see. e.g. Guzmán et al. guzman98 (1998)). Some of them may even be similar to low–mass building blocks of normal galaxies in a bottom–up cosmological model. A better understanding of the processes that drive their evolution is therefore central to cosmological studies, and to the understanding of galaxy formation and evolution.

Starbursts, i.e. brief episodes of strongly enhanced star formation (SF) activity, are thought to occur frequently during the lifetime of a gas–rich dwarf galaxy. A number of internal processes has been put forward to explain their origin and transient nature, such as Stochastic Self–Propagating Star Formation (Gerola, Seiden & Schulmann gerola80 (1980), see Thuan thuan91 (1991)) or a cyclic process of gas infall onto and expulsion from an older stellar host (e.g. Davies & Phillips davies88 (1988), Papaderos et al. papaderos96 (1996)).

Alternatively, environmental influences have been suggested to induce starburst activity in star–forming dwarf galaxies (SFDGs; see Section 2). Based on the hypothesis that dwarf galaxies are affected in a similar way to luminous disk galaxies (e.g. Kennicutt et al. kennicutt87 (1987)), mainly tidal interactions with stellar or gaseous companions have been treated by former studies.

Information on the presence and frequency of such external perturbors has been assembled from environmental studies of emission line galaxies (ELGs), performed mainly in the context of large scale structure formation and biased formation and evolution of galaxies in different environments. ELGs were found to smoothly follow the structures delineated by luminous galaxies, although they are more fuzzily distributed (Rosenberg et al. rosenberg94 (1994)), generally populating lower-density environments (Salzer salzer89 (1989), Telles & Terlevich 1995, hereafter TT (95)), and are less strongly clustered than less active luminous galaxies (Loveday et al. loveday99 (1999), Telles & Maddox telles99 (1999), Lee et al. lee00 (2000)). As for SFDGs, they were found to be concentrated towards void boundaries (Lindner et al. 1996, hereafter L (96)), with a fraction ($``$ 20% ) of them inside voids (Pustilnik et al. pustilnik95 (1995)), arranged in loose groups which do not contain any bright galaxies (L (96)). Interactions with luminous companions were therefore considered too rare to be the generic triggering agent of starbursts in SFDGs, given that luminous galaxies are rare in the close neighbourhood of SFDGs.

Whether interactions with companion galaxies can significantly influence SF activity and evolution of SFDGs has been investigated in earlier work (Campos–Aguilar et al. campos91 (1991), campos93 (1993); TT (95)). The spectrophotometric properties of the studied objects showed no significant dependence on the presence or absence of a companion galaxy, and both SF activity and metallicity seemed unrelated to distance or absolute magnitude of putative companions. Campos–Aguilar et al. chose their samples from the spectrophotometric catalogue of H ii galaxies (SCHG, Terlevich et al. terlevich91 (1991)), which mostly covers redshifts $`cz`$ 2000 kms-1. Taking into account the magnitude cutoff of the CfA catalogue used for the companion search (13.5 mag), these studies were practically restricted to luminous companions (M$``$ –18 mag), typically not particularly close to SFDGs. TT (95), on their part, explicitly focus on the possible influence of luminous companions (M$`<`$ –19 mag). Also, the opposite conclusion by Grogin & Geller (grogin00 (2000)), that ELGs in low–density environments show enhanced SF activity in the presence of a companion, is mostly drawn from studies of luminous ELGs and companions.

Observational evidence of a different kind points towards a correspondence between the membership of a SFDG in a given environment and its spectrophotometric properties. A comparative study of SF activity in SFDGs populating different environments by Vílchez (vilchez95 (1995), vilchez97 (1997)) suggests that objects in low density environments have higher SF activity than those located in high density regions. The results of Hashimoto et al. (hashimoto98 (1998)) point in the same direction. Popescu, Hopp and Rosa (popescu99 (1999)) reported no conspicuous difference in present and past SF activity for ELGs in field and void environments. On the other hand, Vennik, Hopp and Popescu (vennik00 (2000)) found that the low surface brightness hosts of non–isolated ELGs tend to be more compact than those of isolated ones.

The mixed evidence for an influence of the environment on the SF activity of a SFDG calls for further studies, extending previous ones to larger samples and fainter magnitudes. This seems particularly important in view of the conjecture by L (96), who attributed the apparent isolation of a fraction of BCDs to an observational bias against their low–luminosity companions.

Assuming that companions are capable of inducing SF activity in SFDGs, the mechanism and the prime parameters controlling this process remain unclear. Tidal forces are, however, considered to be of major importance. If $`D_c`$ and $`M_c`$ denote respectively the distance and mass of a companion, the tidal forces acting on a SFDG scale as

$$F_{tid}M_c\times D_c^3,$$
(1)
so that a nearby low–mass, i.e. faint, perturbor can affect a SFDG to the degree a more distant giant galaxy does (cf. Campos–Aguilar et al. campos91 (1991)). Observational data (Wilcots et al. wilcots96 (1996)) and numerical models (Hensler et al. hensler99 (1999), Pilyugin pilyugin00 (2000)) further suggest that, in addition to tidal interactions, low-mass stellar or gaseous companions may trigger and fuel starbursts by infalling onto a SFDG.

Although Telles & Maddox (telles99 (1999)), from an analysis of APM catalogues, found no excess of dwarf companions for H ii galaxies down to $``$ –14.5 B mag and $``$ 108 M, numerous results point to the presence of objects of even lower masses and luminosities. Non–catalogued objects of low optical luminosities and surface brightnesses were found for most one–armed magellanic irregulars (Odewahn odewahn94 (1994)), and around many BCDs (Pustilnik et al. pustilnik97 (1997), Walter et al. walter97 (1997), Doublier et al. doublier99 (1999), Méndez & Esteban 1999).

Likewise, H i observations of the environment of magellanic irregulars (Wilcots et al. wilcots96 (1996)) and H ii galaxies (Taylor et al. taylor94 (1994), taylor95 (1995), taylor96 (1996)) revealed H i companions for the majority of them, down to intergalactic H i clouds with masses of $``$ 107 M for some of which no optical counterpart was found.

The presence of still undetected objects of low optical and H i luminosity appears also likely, keeping in mind that the LF steepens towards the low–luminosity end for SFDGs (Loveday et al. loveday99 (1999)), and in view of e.g. the high space density and the masses of local Ly$`\alpha `$ absorbers (Shull et al. shull96 (1996)). Grogin & Geller (grogin00 (2000)) found for luminous ELGs that the frequency of companions at low redshift differences is widely independent of the local galaxy density. Therefore, faint companions may not be rare even in regions of low density of luminous galaxies.

The aim of this study is to investigate the incidence of close optical companions of SFDGs and whether such close companions strongly affect a SFDG’s SF activity. Particular attention is attached to faint close companions, the presence and influence of which was generally not assessed in previous work. In order to address the problem of observational bias against low–luminosity sources, we investigate separately a subset of nearby SFDGs with recession velocities $`<`$ 2000 kms-1. For a sample of SFDGs, we compiled photometric and spectroscopic properties at different wavelengths and corrected distance dependent observables for the Virgocentric infall.

The paper is organized as follows: In Section 2 we describe our galaxy sample and the data processing. In Section 3, we analyse our data sets by applying different statistical methods and list the results, which are further discussed in Section 4. In Section 5, we summarize our work and conclusions. We assume $`H_0=`$75 km s-1 Mpc-1 throughout.

## 2 The Data

### 2.1 Sample selection

Various criteria were applied to select samples of dwarf galaxies with current or recent strong SF, which resulted in catalogues of Blue Compact Dwarf Galaxies (BCDs, e.g. Thuan & Martin thuan81 (1981)) and H ii galaxies (e.g. SCHG, Terlevich et al. terlevich91 (1991)). Despite the different classification schemes, it has been subsequently shown that the underlying stellar hosts of starbursting dwarf galaxies have generally a compact structure (Papaderos et al. papaderos96 (1996), Marlowe et al. 1997, Salzer & Norton salzer98 (1998)). Also comparative studies of dwarf H ii galaxies, BCDs and dwarf amorphous galaxies with ongoing SF showed them to widely share the colours and structural properties of their host galaxies, relative starburst luminosities and $`EW`$(H$`\alpha `$), suggesting that they basically form one and the same class of extragalactic objects (Papaderos et al. papaderos96 (1996), Telles et al. 1997, Marlowe et al. marlowe99 (1999)). We will therefore unify both BCDs and H ii galaxies using the term “star–forming dwarf galaxies” (SFDGs), following Vílchez (vilchez95 (1995), vilchez97 (1997)).

In order to study a sufficiently large SFDG sample for which comparable observational data are available, we decided to use lists IV and V of the sample of ELGs from the University of Michigan (UM) Survey (McAlpine et al. 1977a , 1977b , 1977c ; McAlpine & Lewis mcalpine78 (1978); McAlpine & Williams mcalpine81 (1981)), systematically investigated in Salzer et al. (1989a , 1989b ) by means of spectroscopy and CCD imaging in $`B`$ and $`V`$. Among the different types of ELGs, all objects classified as H ii galaxies were selected; the magnitude limit of M$`{}_{B}{}^{}>`$ –18 mag, commonly adopted to select dwarf galaxies, was applied after the distance correction (Section 2.3) had been performed. More than 80% of these UM galaxies are located at redshifts $`cz>`$ 2000 km s-1.

Our sample further includes SFDGs studied by Cairós and Noeske (cf. Cairós & Vílchez cairos98 (1998), Cairós et al. cairos00 (2000), Noeske et al. 1998a , 1998b , Noeske noeske99 (1999)). These are, for the most part, nearby objects ($`cz<`$ 2000 km s-1) which allow an environmental search that is less biased against faint objects than the quite distant UM sample. None of our sample galaxies are members of galaxy clusters. Those which are known or likely members of groups (cf. NED and Garcia garcia93 (1993)) were rejected (Mkn 35, Mkn 71 and Mkn 527). Only 3 galaxies, UM 454, UM 455 and UM 513, have been reported to lie inside voids (Salzer salzer89 (1989)). The resulting sample consists of 98 dwarf galaxies in typical field– and low density environments and is listed in Table 3.

### 2.2 Search for companion objects

Our companion search catalogue was the NASA Extragalactic Database 111The NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database (NED) is operated by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. (NED).

Most of our objects have declinations $`\delta >`$ –3$`\mathrm{°}`$30$`\mathrm{}`$, i.e. lie within the sky region covered by the CGCG (Zwicky zwicky61 (1961)), which is included into the NED (cf. TT (95)). We can therefore attribute the completeness limit of the CGCG, m$`{}_{B}{}^{lim}`$ m$`{}_{phot}{}^{lim}`$ 15.5 mag, to our companion search. As the NED includes numerous other literature sources, considerably fainter objects should partly be detectable, which makes NED a suitable catalogue to find as many known faint sources as possible. The non–uniform completeness of this database does, on the other hand, not constitute a drawback since a meaningful extrapolation beyond even a well–defined completeness limit is at present not possible (see Section 4.1).

In an initial selection procedure, we considered any type of extragalactic source a possible companion. Statistical analyses of spatial companion frequencies from excess source densities around SFDGs have been previously done (Telles & Maddox telles99 (1999)). We hence restricted ourselves to sources for which redshift data was available. Thereby some companions are missed, but information on individual companions’ properties such as luminosity etc. can be analyzed.

Any object within a projected separation $`s_p0.1`$ Mpc from our sample galaxies was included into a tentative list of companions. The corresponding angular search radius was calculated from the redshift $`cz`$ given in the NED, assuming a pure Hubble flow. We allowed, in the first place, a maximum separation in velocity space of $`\mathrm{\Delta }cz2000`$ km s-1 between sample object and companion. The final selection criterion below which we finally considered an object a companion was, however, $`\mathrm{\Delta }cz500`$ km s-1 (cf. Section 3.1.1).

### 2.3 Distances and correction for Virgo Cluster infall

The choice of a less distant subsample of SFDGs with $`cz<`$ 2000 km s-1 does not justify the assumption of a pure Hubble flow throughout to determine galaxy distances, but requires a correction for the peculiar velocity field in the environment of the Virgo Cluster (VC). For this purpose, we adopted the distances listed in the Nearby Galaxies Catalog (Tully 1988, hereafter T (88)). These are based on a Virgocentric infall model, which uses redshift – independent distance determinations, morphology and neighbourhood considerations to treat those galaxies affected by the triple value problem (see Tully & Shaya tully84 (1984)).

For all objects not listed in T (88), the distance was directly calculated from their redshift given in the NED. Galaxies within the redshift range covered by T (88), $`cz<`$ 3000 km s-1, which are not listed in the catalogue, were found to be at least 1.5 mag fainter than the dwarf – non dwarf separation limit of M$`{}_{B}{}^{}>`$ –18 mag, i.e. can be considered dwarfs despite their possibly larger distance insecurities. For galaxies outside the redshift range of T (88), the deviation of the true distance from the one obtained assuming a pure Hubble Flow can be estimated from Kraan–Korteweg (kraan86 (1986), cf. their Fig. 3b) to $``$ 30% due to VC infall effects. A comparable deviation was obtained by Marinoni et al. (marinoni98 (1998), cf. their Fig. 14) who have adopted in their study a multiattractor model. The above mentioned dispersion translates in the worst case into an uncertainty of $``$ 0.6 mag in the distance modulus which may then slightly affect the luminosity–based distinction between dwarf and luminous galaxies. This does not affect the distance-independent quantities $`BV`$ and $`EW(`$H$`\beta )`$ involved in our study.

For the companion candidates, we assumed the same distances as for the sample galaxies around which they were found. Given that the peculiar velocity field in the VC vicinity is not expected to change dramatically on scales of few tens of kpc, and that the companions show signs of physical association with the sample galaxies (cf. Section 3.1.1), the above assumption appears justified. For these distances, projected separations $`s_p`$ between sample objects and candidate companions were calculated from their angular separation.

### 2.4 Photometric and spectroscopic data

Aperture photometry in optical broadbands was taken from the NED i.e. listing mostly RC3 data, from Salzer (1989a , 1989b ), Cairós et al. (cairos00 (2000)), Noeske (1999), and Noeske et al. (1998a , 1998b ). H$`\beta `$ equivalent widths were compiled from French (french80 (1980)), Thuan & Martin (thuan81 (1981)), the SCHG (Terlevich et al. terlevich91 (1991)) and Salzer (1989a , 1989b ).

Adopting the distances obtained as described in Section 2.3, apparent magnitudes were transformed to absolute values. A correction for galactic foreground dust extinction was applied to all photometric data using the $`B`$ band extinction given in the NED for each galaxy, and applying the standard reddening curve by Savage & Mathis (savage79 (1979)).

## 3 Results

### 3.1 The close environment

#### 3.1.1 Distribution of the companions and companion selection criteria

It is conceivable that the recession velocity difference, $`\mathrm{\Delta }cz`$, and the projected separation, $`s_p`$, strongly influence the dynamical response and spectrophotometric evolution of dwarf galaxies in the presence of a companion.

We assumed tidal forces to have significant dynamical influence within the range $`\mathrm{\Delta }cz<`$ 500 km s-1 and $`s_p<`$ 0.1 Mpc. These criteria follow the estimates by Campos–Aguilar et al. (campos93 (1993)), and are comparable to those by Pustilnik et al. (pustilnik00 (2001)). They are further compatible with observed values of $`s_p`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }cz`$ for e.g. the BCD II Zw 33 and its companion II Zw 33 B, which are probably bound (Walter et al. walter97 (1997)) and likely to be influenced by interaction (Méndez et al. mendez99 (1999)). For M51–like close pairs of galaxies, which show signs of perturbation due to interaction, similar values for $`\mathrm{\Delta }cz`$ are observed (Laurikainen et al. laurikainen98 (1998)).

The distribution of our SFDG companion candidates on the $`\mathrm{\Delta }cz`$ vs. $`s_p`$ plane (Figure 1, filled circles) peaks towards small redshift differences. This is also illustrated in Figure 2, which shows the frequency of the companions to be rising towards smaller $`\mathrm{\Delta }cz`$. If this trend reflects a physical association between sample SFDG and companion (see Section 4), then our cutoff, $`\mathrm{\Delta }cz<`$ 500 km s-1, should mainly select true companions, i.e. objects likely to act as perturbers repeatedly or on longer timescales, rather than randomly passing interlopers.

Table 1 (first row) shows the companion statistics obtained by the latter search criteria.

We will in the following refer to the galaxies with at least one possible companion within the limits stated above as to the non–isolated sample and to those for which no companion candidates were found as to the isolated galaxies. This is for the sake of simplicity; one has to keep in mind that the isolation criteria described above are empirical, being based on assumptions and observational clues.

#### 3.1.2 Companion properties; bias against faint companions

The first row of Table 1 shows that the majority ($``$ 80 %) of the possible close companions are dwarf galaxies (M$`{}_{B}{}^{}>`$ –18 mag); this is also illustrated in Figure 3. Their mean $`BV`$ colour (0.44$`\pm `$0.11 mag) is nearly equal to the average value for the sample galaxies (cf. Table 2), pointing to recent or ongoing SF activity. The differences between the B luminosities of each sample galaxy and its companions are shown in Figure 4. This distribution shows a large scatter around a median of 0.72 mag, which suggests that we tend to find primarily the brightest companion galaxies (cf. Section 4).

The observational bias against low–luminosity companions, i.e. against the majority of close companions of SFDGs, is also evident from Table 1. The rough completeness limit of the NED of $``$15.5 B mag (cf. Section 2), translates, by the $`H_0`$ adopted herein (Section 1) and assuming a pure Hubble flow, to a maximum distance of 50 Mpc ($`cz`$ 3760 km s-1) for a dwarf companion (M$`{}_{B}{}^{}>`$ –18 mag) to be listed in the NED. Indeed, for $`cz`$ 4000 km s-1, no dwarf companions were found. In the determination of the fraction of SFDGs which have a possible dwarf companion, one is therefore forced to stick to small redshifts. This is further demonstrated by the fact that for the subsample at $`cz`$ 2000 km s-1, the fraction of non–isolated galaxies is considerably higher (31 %) than for the total sample (16 %). We will further comment on this point in Section 4.

### 3.2 Star Formation and Environment

To assess whether the SF activity of a SFDG can be influenced by its close environment, we chose those commonly used indicators which were available for most of our sample galaxies and trace the relative strength of the SF activity on different timescales (see e.g. Schaerer schaerer99 (1999) for a review):
(i) The $`H\beta `$ equivalent width $`EW(`$H$`\beta )`$, approximately relating the flux of Lyman continuum photons, i.e. the actual or very recent ($`\tau _{\mathrm{burst}}`$ 10 Myr) SFR, to the continuum flux in the B band, which is usually dominated by stellar emission.
(ii) The integral $`BV`$ colour of the galaxies which is an indicator of the past SF activity on timescales of $``$ 108 yr (see e.g. the models by Krüger krueger92 (1992) for different burst parameters). We refrain from a discussion of IRAS fluxes, originally collected and analyzed for the sample as well, as they are available for few SFDGs only, and possibly biased towards metal–rich dwarfs (see Dultzin–Hacyan et al. dultzin90 (1990)).

In view of the bias against faint companions (Section 3.1.2) we stick here to the SFDGs with redshifts $`cz<`$ 2000 km s-1. The above mentioned SF indicators for the isolated and non–isolated samples are compared in Figure 5. The corresponding statistics are listed in Table 2. Column (4) lists a comparison of the sample distributions by means of Kolmogorov–Smirnov tests. Both the $`EW(`$H$`\beta )`$ and $`BV`$ colours of the isolated and non–isolated subsamples are compatible with the hypothesis that they are drawn from equal parent distributions. Similarly, the sample means of $`EW(`$H$`\beta )`$ and $`BV`$ are compatible for the isolated and non–isolated subsamples within their respective sample standard deviations. Hence, from the available data, we do not confirm the higher mean $`EW(`$H$`\beta )`$ of the ’non–isolated’ sample.

## 4 Discussion

### 4.1 Frequency, distribution and properties of the companion candidates

The present investigation reveals that a significant fraction of SFDGs possesses possible close companions which are in almost all cases dwarf galaxies. However, the selection of the nearby SFDG subsample at $`cz<`$2000 km s-1 does not eliminate, but merely moderates, the degree of incompleteness, which is illustrated by the distribution of the B magnitudes of the companion candidates (Figure 3): unlike that expected for a complete sample, it shows no increase towards fainter luminosities. In this respect, the median of the magnitude differences between a sample galaxy and its found companion candidate(s) ($``$ 0.7 B mag, Figure 4) should be interpreted as due to selection effects: the companions of SFDGs are not necessarily brighter than the SFDGs themselves, but only the brightest among the companions are listed in NED. Nevertheless, even these brightest companions qualify as dwarfs. The integrated colours of these companions are similar to those of the sample SFDGs (cf. Section 3.1.2), being consistent with a similar recent SF history in both sample SFDG and found companions. While this could be interpreted as a result of mutual interaction, it might again reflect the abovementioned selection effect: faint companions are most likely to be detected in emission line surveys (cf. Salzer et al. 1989b ), which, of course, list preferably actively star–forming galaxies.

The quantification of the true frequency of dwarf companions suffers from the principal drawback that both the low–luminosity end of the galaxy LF and the frequency of H i companions without any optical counterpart (Taylor et al. taylor94 (1994), taylor95 (1995), taylor96 (1996)) are not yet well–constrained. Therefore, even a uniform and well–defined homogeneous completeness limit for the NED would to date not allow any meaningful extrapolation. Instead, we emphasize that the value of $``$ 30 % inferred in Section 3.1.2 must be considered a lower limit to the true fraction of SFDGs with close optical or purely gaseous (dwarf) companions within $`\mathrm{\Delta }cz<`$ 500 km s-1 and $`s_p<`$ 0.1 Mpc. It must be noted that this work and the one by Pustilnik et al. (pustilnik00 (2001)), performed independently and using different approaches and data, find almost equal frequencies of low–luminosity companions of SFDGs/BCDs. Furthermore, Pustilnik et al. (pustilnik00 (2001)) also report evidence for a considerable number of even fainter, but yet uncatalogued companions. Altogether, this lends further support to the results by L (96), who attributed the apparent extreme isolation of some BCDs to an observational bias against distant, intrinsically faint companions.

The small redshift differences between SFDGs and companions, the distribution of which rises towards smaller values, are comparable to what is found for binary galaxies (Schneider & Salpeter schneider92 (1992)). In particular, a similar behaviour is reported for dwarf satellites of field spirals (Zaritsky et al. zaritsky97 (1997)). This is illustrated in Figures 1 and 2, where we plot our results of a near–object search (not restricted to dwarf galaxies) in the NED around field spirals from Kennicutt & Kent (kennicutt83 (1983)). Analogous to spiral companions, there is no evident correlation between $`\mathrm{\Delta }cz`$ and $`s_p`$ for the SFDG companions. A plausible explanation of this issue was offered in the framework of a CDM scenario, taking into account a number of further dynamical arguments, by Zaritsky et al. (zaritsky97 (1997)). They consider the spiral satellites to be associated with an extended massive DM halo of the mother galaxy, which strongly influences the system’s dynamics, so that $`\mathrm{\Delta }cz`$ is widely independent of $`s_p`$. Figure 1 suggests that $`\mathrm{\Delta }cz`$ and $`s_p`$ are also uncorrelated for the SFDG–companion systems. If this can be corroborated by a larger dataset, then a hypothesis worth investigating for compatibility with CMD models is that SFDGs and their companions share common DM haloes of similar mass and structure.

At least, the data strongly suggest some physical association between SFDGs and their companions. In combination with our considerations on the frequency of dwarf companions, this leads to the assumption that SFDGs are frequently associated with systems of two or more dwarf galaxies. This is reminiscent of the dwarf galaxy groups L (96) found in voids, and may offer important clues to dwarf galaxy formation.

### 4.2 Close dwarf companions as starburst triggers?

The similarity of the SF tracers for the isolated and non–isolated subsamples may suggest that the observed starburst activity is regulated by solely internal processes. This hypothesis can, on the other hand, not be proven, and neither can an influence of the presence or absence of companions be disproven. Indeed, this latter hypothesis may receive some support from the marginal trend in $`EW`$(H$`\beta `$) that the data shows. The large scatter of the analyzed SF diagnostics is not surprising, for a number of reasons:

(i) The severe incompleteness of the available data aggravates the separation of galaxies with and without close companions.

(ii) Balmer emission lines, i.e. Lyman continuum tracers, correspond to short–term variations in the SFR. The latter are particularly strong in SFDGs, where SF generally occurs in short bursts of $``$ 107 yr (Elmegreen et al. elmegreen96 (1996)). Considerable variations with time also occur for the $`BV`$ colours after the onset of a starburst (see e.g. Krüger krueger92 (1992)). Whatever triggers a starburst, the time window during which strongly enhanced SF indicators are observable is narrow. In addition, such SFR tracers also depend on evolutionary parameters – metallicity, age and stellar continuum contribution – of the SFDG itself.

The hypothesis of interaction–induced starburst activity in SFDGs might be more reliably assessed when a large sample of SFDGs with sufficiently deeply observed environments is available. However, the abovementioned intrinsic sources of scatter certainly limit the usefulness of a comparison that is restricted to integral SFR tracers.

This research emphasizes the need for a systematic effort on the part of theory to advance the understanding of conditions required for inducing and sustaining starburst activity in dwarf galaxies, with particular emphasis on dwarf galaxy interactions.

## 5 Summary and Conclusions

We have searched the close environment of a sample of 98 star–forming dwarf galaxies (SFDGs) in field and low–density environments, taken from different catalogues, for possible companion galaxies. To supplement previous work, which had mostly dealt with luminous companions, a subsample of nearby SFDGs was chosen to moderate the effect of observational bias against low luminosity companions. Distances were obtained from the recession velocity of the sample galaxies assuming a pure Hubble flow and have been corrected for Virgocentric infall. Using the Nasa Extragalactic Database (NED) as a search catalogue, objects with a projected linear separation of $`<`$100 kpc and a recession velocity difference $`<`$2000 km s-1 were catalogued as possible companions of a SFDG. Most of them differ in their recession velocity by $`<`$500 km s-1 from the sample SFDGs, which, along with a number of other considerations, led us to adopt this value as a limit to identify possible companions. For both SFDGs and companion candidates, spectrophotometric data were compiled from the NED and a number of literature sources.

We studied the frequency, redshift difference distribution, and photometric properties of companion candidates, as well as their possible influence on the star formation (SF) activity of the sample SFDGs. Our results can be summarized as follows:

(i) A substantial fraction of SFDGs possess companion galaxies within its close environment. The overwhelming majority of these companions are dwarfs (M$`{}_{\mathrm{B}}{}^{}>`$ –18), which renders their detection at large distances difficult. The fraction of SFDGs for which we detect dwarf companion candidates, $``$ 30 %, must be considered a lower limit to the true value, given the increasing incompleteness of the available data set for systems fainter than $`m_B`$ 15.5 mag. A meaningful extrapolation to fainter magnitudes is precluded by the poorly constrained frequency of H i companions with no optical counterpart, and by the uncertain faint end of the galaxy luminosity function.

(ii) The recession velocity differences between SFDGs and identified companions amount typically to $``$250 km s-1. Their frequency rises towards lower differences. This is similarly reported for dwarf companions of spirals, and suggests that the SFDG companions are physically associated with the sample galaxies.

(iii) Both the $`BV`$ colours and the H$`\beta `$ equivalent widths appear compatible for objects with and without a possible perturber. The significance level of the data is too low to prove the hypothesis of a solely internal regulation of the SF activity, whereas external influence cannot be disproven either. The considerable intrinsic scatter inherent to statistical studies based on the abovementioned SF diagnostics, together with the insufficiently complete companion search databases, blurs the picture.

The identification of companions in the close environment of SFDGs readdresses the question of whether gravitational interactions are partly responsible for the onset of SF activity in gas-rich dwarfs. Whereas interaction–induced SF activity was dismissed for most SFDGs due to the absence of luminous companions, the presence of faint dwarfs in the close vicinity of SFDGs provides again support to this hypothesis. While deep radio and spectrophotometric surveys may yield more conclusive answers, it will equally be important to theoretically model the effects of interactions on dwarf galaxies.

###### Acknowledgements.

KGN gratefully acknowledges financial support from the German Research Foundation (DFG) grant FR325/50-1, and from the IAC Summer Research Programme 1998. This study was partly financed by the Spanish DGES (Dirección General de Enseñanza Superior) (grant PB97-0158). PP received support from Deutsche Agentur für Raumfahrtangelegenheiten (DARA) GmbH grant 50 OR 9907 7. This Research has made use of the NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database (NED) which is operated by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, CALTECH, under contract with the National Aeronautic and Space Administration. We have made use of the Lyon-Meudon Extragalactic Database (LEDA) supplied by the LEDA team at the CRAL-Observatoire de Lyon (France). We thank S.A. Pustilnik and A. Kniazev for fruitful discussions and helpful comments on this paper. KGN wishes to thank L.M. Cairós, J. Iglesias, J. Vílchez and the IAC staff for their hospitality. We thank the referee, Dr. Metcalfe, for his helpful comments.