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# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

One of the most important physical outcomes of the Seiberg-Witten theory  is the demonstration of confinement of electric charges via monopole condensation. Although the idea of confinement as a dual Meissner effect was suggested many years ago by Mandelstam and ’t Hooft  only relatively recent progress in the understanding of the electomagnetic duality in $`𝒩=2`$supersymmetry allowed Seiberg and Witten to present the quantitative description of this phenomenon  .

Let us recall the basic idea of Mandelstam and ’t Hooft . Once monopoles (charges) condense the electric (magnetic) flux is confined in the Abrikosov-Nielsen-Olesen (ANO) flux tube  connecting heavy trial electric (magnetic) charge and anti-charge. The energy of the ANO string increases with its length. This ensures increasing confinement potential between heavy electric (magnetic) charge and anti-charge.

In the Seiberg-Witten theory this confinement scenario is realized in two possible ways. First, in the pure gauge theory near the monopole (dyon) singularity upon breaking $`𝒩=2`$supersymmetry by the small mass term of the adjoint matter . In this case monopoles condense and electric charges are confined by electric flux tubes.

Second, in the unbroken $`𝒩=2`$theory with $`N_f`$ flavors of the fundamental matter with degenerative masses on Higgs branches . In this case, say at large masses of the fundamental matter electric charges condense on the Higgs branch while magnetically charged dyons confined by magnetic flux tubes .

Given this progress it is still unclear if the confinement in the Seiberg-Witten theory can be taken as a model (at least qualitatively) for the confinement in QCD. The point is that the confinement in the Seiberg-Witten theory has several unwanted properties we do not expect to have in QCD (see  for a recent review).

In particular, one group of such properties of confinement in Seiberg-Witten theory is related to the large value of the ANO string tension $`T`$. In terms of the photon mass $`m_\gamma `$ of the effective low energy $`𝒩=2`$QED it is given by

$$T\frac{m_\gamma ^2}{g^2}.$$
(1.1)
At small values of QED coupling $`g^2`$ it is much larger then $`m_\gamma `$. As a consequence the low energy hadron spectrum, say near the monopole point consists of relatively light photon and monopoles (which we would like to interpret as glueballs) of mass $`m_\gamma `$ and heavy hadrons built of quarks connected by ANO strings with mass of order of $`\sqrt{T}`$ 111This is true if we take the bare mass of quarks to be small, the possibility discussed in detail below.. In contrast, in QCD we have light $`\overline{q}q`$ states while the candidates for glueballs are relatively heavier.

Another problem related to the large value of ANO string tension (1.1) is the non-linear behavior of Regge trajectories. The transverse size of a string is of order of $`1/m_\gamma `$. This is much larger then its length which is of order of $`1/\sqrt{T}`$ for small hadron spins $`j`$. Therefore, the string is not developed (grows thick and short) and the $`\overline{q}q`$ state looks more like spherically symmetric soliton rather than a string. This is the reason for the non-linear behavior of Regge trajectories in wide region of spins $`j\begin{array}{c}<\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}1/g^2`$ .

The purpose of this paper is to overcome the above mentioned problems related to the large value of the string tension (1.1). We suggest a regime in the Seiberg-Witten theory in which ANO strings becomes light (almost tensionless).

To be more specific, we consider the second of the above mentioned scenarios of confinement which arises on the Higgs branch. Namely, we consider $`𝒩=2`$gauge theory with $`SU(2)`$ gauge group and two hypermultiplets of the fundamental matter (we call them quarks). If the masses of quarks are equal the Higgs branch is developed. It touches the Coulomb branch at the singular point where some quarks become massless  (we give a brief review of Higgs branches in the next section). The effective low energy description of the theory near the root of Higgs branch is given by $`𝒩=2`$QED. When scalar quarks develop vev’s on the Higgs branch the effective QED is in the Higgs phase. The formation of ANO flux tubes in this vacuum leads to confinement of monopoles (any dyons with non-zero magnetic charge)  222Strictly speaking this terminology refers to large values of bare quark masses. For small quark masses (below Argyres-Douglas point) quantum numbers of particles are changed because of monodromies  and now monopoles are condensed at the Higgs branch while electric charges are confined . To avoid confusion in this paper we use the terminology which refers to large quark masses.

At large values of bare quark mass $`m`$ monopoles are heavy and can be viewed as heavy trial particles to probe confinement. It is a challenging problem to see what happens to confinement if we reduce the monopole mass and make monopoles dynamical. If ANO flux tubes still exist in this regime and have finite transverse size we would still expect confinement of monopoles to occur, although the Wilson loop does not show the area law any longer (flux tubes can be broken by light monopole-anti-monopole pairs). In this setup the problem of confinement becomes similar to that in QCD.

In this paper we study what happen to ANO flux tubes on the Higgs branch of the Seiberg-Witten theory once we reduce $`m`$ and eventually come close to the Argyres-Douglas (AD) point. These points were originally introduced in the moduli/parameter space of $`𝒩=2`$theories as points where two singularities with mutually non-local light states on the Coulomb branch coalesce . It is believed that the theory in the AD point flows in the infrared to a nontrivial superconformal theory (let us call it $`CFT_{AD}`$). We consider the theory on the Higgs branch where massless scalar quarks develop vev $`v`$. AD point corresponds to the value of the bare quark mass $`m`$ equal to some critical value $`m_{AD}`$ at which monopoles also become massless.

When we come close to the AD point our effective QED description is no longer valid because QED enters a strong coupling regime. Our main proposal in this paper is that the ANO string tension $`T`$ becomes small, $`Tv^2`$. We give arguments based on what we know about the effective sigma model on the Higgs branch in favor of this conjecture. As we explained above the small value of string tension eliminates certain important “disadvantages” of confinement in the Seiberg-Witten theory making it similar to the one we expect in QCD.

Once $`\sqrt{T}`$ is much smaller then the inverse transverse size of the flux tube the correct low energy description of the theory is in terms of long and thin strings. We apply methods of non-critical string theory developed mostly by Polyakov  to our ANO flux tube. We consider this as another example of duality between field theory (QED, in the case at hand) at strong coupling and string theory at weak coupling.

The non-critical string theory contains curved fifth (Liouville) coordinate $`u`$  which is associated with RG scale in field theory . We suggest a low energy version of AdS/CFT correspondence  in which the AdS metric at large $`u`$ on the 5d “gravity” side corresponds to $`CFT_{AD}`$ on the field theory side in the UV limit. Note, that we use the word gravity in quotation marks here because it has nothing to do with the real gravity at the Planck scale. In this paper we discuss “gravity inside hadrons”  which appears at the hadron scale $`\sqrt{T}`$.

Then we consider breaking of the conformal invariance induced by small monopole mass near the AD point (it is determined by $`mm_{AD}`$). On the “gravity” side we associate this perturbation with a scalar field in 5d “gravity”. We study 5d “gravity” equations of motion with this scalar included and find the scale $`u_{CB}`$ at which the kink separating the UV and IR behavior destroys the AdS metric. Using $`u_{CB}`$ we estimate the renormalized ANO string tension. It turns out to be small, proportional to the monopole mass. This result shows selfconsistency of our initial conjecture. In particular, $`T`$ goes to zero at the AD point.

Then we verify that the radius of AdS space is large in string units justifying the “gravity” approximation .333Note, we do not use the logic of large $`N`$  in this paper. We also make two estimates of the string coupling constant $`g_s`$, one from the “gravity” side and another one from the field theory side. Although our accuracy is not enough to show quantitative agreement both calculations shows that $`g_s`$ is small, $`g_s1`$.

The paper is organized as follows. In sect. 2 we review quasiclassical results on ANO flux tubes on Higgs branches of Seiberg-Witten theory. In sect. 3 we discuss field/string theory duality near the AD point and introduce 5d “gravity” description. In sect. 4 we consider perturbation of $`AdS_5`$ metric and estimate the renormalized string tension. Sect. 5 contains our conclusions and discussion.

## 2 ANO strings on Higgs branch in the quasiclassical regime

In this section we review quasiclassical results obtained for ANO flux tubes on Higgs branch of $`𝒩=2`$QCD with gauge group $`SU(2)`$ and $`N_f=2`$ flavors of fundamental matter (quarks) with common bare mass parameter $`m`$ . First, we briefly review the effective theory on the Higgs branch .

### 2.1 Higgs branch

The $`𝒩=2`$vector multiplet of the theory at hand on the component level consists of the gauge field $`A_\mu ^a`$, two Weyl fermions $`\lambda _1^{\alpha a}`$ and $`\lambda _2^{\alpha a}`$ $`(\alpha =1,2)`$ and the complex scalar $`\phi ^a`$, where $`a=1,2,3`$ is the color index. Fermions form a doublet $`\lambda _f^{\alpha a}`$ with respect to global $`SU(2)_R`$ group, $`f=1,2`$.

The scalar potential of this theory has a flat direction. The adjoint scalar field develop an arbitrary vev along this direction breaking $`SU(2)`$ gauge group down to $`U(1)`$. We choose $`\phi ^a=\delta ^{a3}a`$. The complex parameter $`a`$ parameterize the Coulomb branch. The low energy effective theory generically contains only the photon $`A_\mu =A_\mu ^3`$ and its superpartners: two Weyl fermions $`\lambda _f^{3\alpha }`$ and the complex scalar $`a`$. This is massless short vector $`𝒩=2`$multiplet. It contains 4 boson + 4 fermion states. W-boson and its superparthners are massive with masses of order of $`a`$.

Quark hypermultiplets has the following structure. They consist of complex scalars $`q^{kfA}`$ and fermions $`\psi ^{k\alpha A}`$, $`\stackrel{~}{\psi }_{Ak}^{\dot{\alpha }}`$, where $`k=1,2`$ is the color index and $`A=1,\mathrm{},N_F`$ is the flavor one. Scalars form a doublet with respect to $`SU(2)_R`$ group. All these states are in the BPS short representations of $`𝒩=2`$algebra on the Coulomb branch with $`4\times N_c\times N_f=16`$ real boson states (+ 16 fermion states).

Coulomb branch has three singular points where monopoles , dyons or charges become massless. Two of them correspond to monopole and dyon singularities of the pure gauge theory. Their positions on the Coulomb branch are given by

$$u_{m,d}=\pm 2m\mathrm{\Lambda }_2\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{\Lambda }_2^2,$$
(2.1)
where $`u=\frac{1}{2}\phi ^{a^2}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_2`$ is the scale of the theory with $`N_f=2`$. In the large $`m`$ limit $`u_{m,d}`$ are approximately given by their values in the pure gauge theory $`u_{m,d}\pm 2m\mathrm{\Lambda }_2=\pm 2\mathrm{\Lambda }^2`$, where $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is the scale of $`N_f=0`$ theory.

The charge singularity corresponds to the point where half of quark states becomes massless. We denote them $`q^{fA}`$ and $`\psi ^{\alpha A}`$, $`\stackrel{~}{\psi }_A^{\dot{\alpha }}`$ dropping the color index. They form $`N_f=2`$ short hypermultiplets with $`4\times N_f=8`$ real boson states. The rest of quark states acquire large mass $`2m`$ and we ignore them in the low energy description. The charge singularity appears at the point

$$a=\sqrt{2}m$$
(2.2)
on the Coulomb branch. In terms of variable $`u`$ (2.2) reads

$$u_c=m^2+\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{\Lambda }_2^2.$$
(2.3)
Strictly speaking, we have $`2+N_f=4`$ singularities on the Coulomb branch. However, two of them coincides for the case of two flavors of matter with the same mass.

The effective theory on the Coulomb branch near the charge singularity (2.2) is given by $`𝒩=2`$ QED with light matter fields $`q^{fA}`$, and their superparthners as well as the photon multiplet.

The charge singularity (2.2) is the root of the Higgs branch . To find it we impose $`D`$-term and $`F`$-term conditions which look like

$$\overline{q}_{Ap}(\tau ^m)_f^pq^{fA}=0,m=1,2,3.$$
(2.4)
(Here $`m`$ is an adjoint $`SU(2)_R`$ index, not to be confused with color indices.) This equation determines the Higgs branch (manifold with $`q0`$) which touches the Coulomb branch at the point (2.2). It has non-trivial solutions for $`N_f2`$ . This is the reason why we choose $`N_f=2`$ for our discussion.

The low energy theory for boson fields near the root of the Higgs branch is given by

$$S_{\mathrm{boson}}^{\mathrm{root}}=d^4x\left\{\frac{1}{4g^2}F_{\mu \nu }^2+\overline{}_\mu \overline{q}_{Af}_\mu q^{fA}+\frac{g^2}{8}[\text{ Tr }(\overline{q}\tau ^mq)]^2\right\},$$
(2.5)
where trace is calculated over flavor and $`SU(2)_R`$ indices. Here $`_\mu =_\mu in_eA_\mu `$, $`\overline{}_\mu =_\mu +in_eA_\mu `$, the electric charge $`n_e=1/2`$ for fundamental matter fields.

This is an Abelian Higgs model with last interaction term coming from the elimination of $`D`$ and $`F`$ terms. The QED coupling constant $`g^2`$ is small near the root of the Higgs branch if $`m`$ is not close to its AD value $`m_{AD}`$. The effective theory (2.5) is correct on the Coulomb branch near the root of the Higgs branch (2.2) or on the Higgs branch not far away from the origin at $`q=0`$.

Once $`|q|^2=v^20`$ on the Higgs branch the $`U(1)`$ gauge group in (2.5) is broken and the photon acquires the mass

$$m_\gamma ^2=\frac{1}{2}g^2v^2$$
(2.6)
It is clear that the last term in (2.5) is zero on fields $`q`$ which satisfy constraint (2.4). This means that moduli fields which develop vev’s on the Higgs branch are massless, as expected. It turns out that there are four real moduli fields $`q`$ (out of 8) which satisfy the constraint (2.4) . They correspond to the lowest components of one short hypermultiplet.

The other quark fields (4 real boson states + fermions) acquire the mass of the photon (2.6). Together with states from the photon multiplet they form one long (non-BPS) $`𝒩=2`$multiplet (cf. ). It has 8 boson \+ 8 fermion states. The reason why the long multiplet appears is easy to understand. Electric charge is screened by the quark condensation on the Higgs branch. Therefore, the central charges of $`𝒩=2`$algebra are zero now. That means that there is no BPS particles any longer. Note, that the multiplet of moduli fields is short (4 boson + 4 fermion states) because it is massless.

We can parameterize massless moduli fields as

$$q^{f\dot{A}}(x)=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}\sigma _\alpha ^{f\dot{A}}\varphi _\alpha (x)e^{i\alpha (x)}.$$
(2.7)
Here $`\varphi _\alpha (x),\alpha =1\mathrm{}4`$ are four real moduli fields. It is clear that fields (2.7) solve (2.4). The common phase $`\alpha (x)`$ in (2.7) is the U(1) gauge phase. Once $`\varphi _\alpha =v_\alpha 0`$ on the Higgs branch the U(1) group is broken and $`\alpha (x)`$ is eaten by the Higgs mechanism. Say, in the unitary gauge $`\alpha (x)=0`$. In the next subsection we consider vortex solution for the model (2.5). Then $`\alpha (x)`$ is determined by the behavior of the gauge field at the infinity.

Once $`v_\alpha 0`$ we expect monopoles (they are heavy at $`m\mathrm{\Lambda }_2`$) to confine via formation of vortices which carry the magnetic flux. The peculiar feature of the theory (2.5) is the absence of the Higgs potential for the moduli fields $`\varphi _\alpha `$. Therefore, the Higgs phase of of the theory in (2.5) is the limiting case of type I superconductor with the vanishing Higgs mass. In the next subsection we will review the peculiar features of ANO vortices in this model.

If we consider the low energy limit of the theory at energies much less then the photon mass (2.6) we can integrate out massive fields. Then the effective theory is a $`\sigma `$-model for massless fields $`\varphi _\alpha `$ which belong to 4-dimensional hyper–Kahler manifold $`R^4/Z_2`$. The metric of this $`\sigma `$-model is flat , there are, however, higher derivative corrections induced by instantons .

### 2.2 ANO string

Now let us review classical solution for ANO vortices in the model (2.5) . Without loss of generality we take vev’s of $`\varphi _\alpha `$ $`v_\alpha =(v,0,0,0)`$. Moreover, we drop fields $`\varphi _2,\varphi _3`$ and $`\varphi _4`$ together with massive scalars from (2.5) because they are irrelevant for the purpose of finding classical vortex solutions. Thus, we arrive at the standard Abelian Higgs model

$$S_{AH}=d^4x\left\{\frac{1}{4g^2}F_{\mu \nu }^2+|_\mu q|^2+\lambda (|q|^2v^2)^2\right\},$$
(2.8)
for the single complex field $`q`$ with quartic coupling $`\lambda =0`$. Here

$$q(x)=\varphi _1(x)e^{i\alpha (x)}.$$
(2.9)
Following  consider first the model (2.8) with small $`\lambda `$, so that the Higgs mass $`m_Hm_\gamma `$ ($`m_H^2=4\lambda v^2`$). Then we take the limit $`m_H0`$.

To the leading order in $`\mathrm{log}m_\gamma /m_H`$ the vortex solution has the following structure in the plane orthogonal to the string axis . The electromagnetic field is confined in a core with the radius

$$R_g^2\frac{1}{m_\gamma ^2}\mathrm{ln}^2\frac{m_\gamma }{m_H}.$$
(2.10)
The scalar field is close to zero inside the core. Instead, outside the core, the electromagnetic field is vanishingly small while the scalar field slowly (logarithmically) approaches its boundary value $`v`$. The result for the string tension is

$$T_\lambda =\frac{2\pi v^2}{\mathrm{ln}m_\gamma /m_H}.$$
(2.11)
The main contribution to the tension in (2.11) comes from the logarithmic “tail” of the scalar field.

The results in (2.10), (2.11) mean that if we naively take the limit $`m_H0`$ the string becomes infinitely thick and its tension goes to zero . This means that there are no strings in the limit $`m_H=0`$. The absence of ANO strings in theories with flat Higgs potential was first noticed in .

One might think that the absence of ANO strings means that there is no confinement on Higgs branches. As we will see now this is not the case . So far we have considered infinitely long ANO strings. However the setup for the confinement problem is slightly different . We have to consider monopole–anti-monopole pair at large but finite separation $`L`$. Our aim is to take the limit $`m_H0`$. To do so let us consider ANO string of the finite length $`L`$ within the region

$$\frac{1}{m_\gamma }L\frac{1}{m_H}.$$
(2.12)
Then it turns out that $`1/L`$ plays the role of the $`IR`$-cutoff in Eqs. (2.10) and (2.11) instead of $`m_H`$ . Now we can safely put $`m_H=0`$.

The result for the electromagnetic core of the vortex becomes

$$R_g^2\frac{1}{m_\gamma ^2}\mathrm{ln}^2m_\gamma L,$$
(2.13)
while its string tension is given by

$$T_0=\frac{2\pi v^2}{\mathrm{ln}m_\gamma L}.$$
(2.14)
We see that the ANO string becomes ”thick” but still its transverse size $`R_g`$ is much less than its length $`L`$, $`R_gL`$. As a result the potential between heavy well separated monopole and anti-monopole is still confining but is no longer linear in $`L`$. It behaves as

$$V(L)=2\pi v^2\frac{L}{\mathrm{ln}m_\gamma L}.$$
(2.15)
As soon as the potential $`V(L)`$ is an order parameter which distinguishes different phases of a theory (see, for example, review ) we conclude that we have a new confining phase on the Higgs branch of the Seiberg–Witten theory. It is clear that this phase can arise only in supersymmetric theories because we do not have Higgs branches without supersymmetry.

These quasiclassical results are valid if the effective QED coupling is small, $`g^21`$. It is small if two conditions are satisfied. First, $`v\mathrm{\Lambda }_2`$ ensures that W-bosons are massive and we can ignore them and use the effective QED description. Second, is that $`m`$ is not close to $`m_{AD}`$ , which ensures that monopoles/dyons are massive. In the next section we relax the second condition and study what happen to ANO strings if we go close to AD point.

Now let us comment on why we choose this relatively complicated type of ANO string for our study of what happens to confinement near AD point. The reason is that $`𝒩=2`$supersymmetry is unbroken on the Higgs branch. We will use this heavily in the next section. Alternatively, one could consider the confinement scenario near the monopole point which arises upon breaking $`𝒩=2`$supersymmetry down to $`𝒩=1`$by the mass term of the adjoint matter. In this case ANO strings appear to be “almost” BPS saturated once the breaking is small . However, if we reduce quark mass going to AD point the monopole condensate vanishes showing deconfinement . We can try to find a regime in which monopole condensate is fixed while quark mass goes to zero. However, it is easy to show that in this regime $`𝒩=2`$breaking becomes strong .

## 3 ANO string at the AD point

In this section we discuss what happen to ANO strings if we go close to AD point. On the Coulomb branch the mass of the monopole is given by the BPS formula  $`m_m=\sqrt{2}|a_D|`$, where $`a_D`$ is the dual variable to $`a`$. Now let us take $`m`$ close to $`m_{AD}`$ so the monopole singularity collides with the root of the Higgs branch (charge singularity). From (2.1) and (2.3) we learn that

$$m_{AD}=\mathrm{\Lambda }_2.$$
(3.1)
Since $`a_D=0`$ in the monopole point, while charges are massless in the charge singularity we have simultaneously both charges and monopoles becoming massless at $`m=\mathrm{\Lambda }_2`$. The theory at AD point on the Coulomb branch flows in the IR to a non-trivial interacting fixed point  which we call $`CFT_{AD}^C`$. The superscript $`C`$ indicates here that we are talking about the CFT on the Coulomb branch. The conformal dimension of $`a_D`$ equals to 1 near AD point, while the conformal dimension of $`(m\mathrm{\Lambda }_2)`$ is 2/3 . Thus, we conclude that the monopole mass behaves as

$$m_m\frac{(m\mathrm{\Lambda }_2)^{3/2}}{\mathrm{\Lambda }_2^{1/2}}$$
(3.2)
when $`m\mathrm{\Lambda }_2`$.

Let us go to the Higgs branch taking $`v0`$. Now we have two scales in the problem $`v`$ and $`m_m`$ determined by $`m\mathrm{\Lambda }_2`$ via (3.2). If $`m_mv`$ then monopoles are heavy. The monopole multiplet contains 4 boson +4 fermion states. Still monopoles cannot be BPS saturated on the Higgs branch because central charges of $`𝒩=2`$algebra are zero. They are confined by ANO flux tubes and instead of monopoles we see hadrons built of open ANO string states with monopoles and anti-monopoles attached to string ends. These are, of course, non-BPS states. Note, that as we discussed in the Introduction, in fact, strings are not developed in this regime. They grow short and thick provided the effective QED coupling is small, see (2.13), (2.14).

More specifically, if $`m_mv`$ the effective coupling is of order of

$$g^2\frac{1}{\mathrm{log}(m_\gamma /\mathrm{\Lambda }_2)},$$
(3.3)
frozen at the photon mass scale. Thus, $`g^21`$ at $`v\mathrm{\Lambda }_2`$. Instead, near the monopole point on the Coulomb branch the dual coupling constant is small, thus $`g^2`$ is large

$$g^2\mathrm{log}(m_m/\mathrm{\Lambda }_2).$$
(3.4)
It is clear from last two equations that the QED coupling constant on the Higgs branch increases as we reduce $`m\mathrm{\Lambda }_2`$ and eventually we enter the strong coupling regime, $`g^21`$ at $`m_mv`$.

### 3.1 Tensionless strings and QED/string theory duality

Now let us discuss what happens if we reduce $`m_m`$ well below $`v`$ making monopole much lighter then photon. At first glance, the natural guess is that ANO string tension stays large,

$$T\frac{v^2}{\mathrm{log}vL}$$
(3.5)
as it is suggested by the quasiclassical result (2.14). This seems natural because the string is “built” of quarks and electromagnetic field and seems to have nothing to do with monopoles. However, as we will now show the guess in (3.5) is not correct.

Suppose we keep $`m_mv`$ but do not go directly to AD point and integrate out hadrons built of monopoles together with photon multiplet. Then we are left with a sigma model for massless quark moduli. As soon as the Higgs branch is a hyper-Kahler manifold its metric is determined uniquely and cannot receive corrections. In fact, it is known to be flat . However, there are higher derivative corrections. It is clear that higher derivative corrections encode all the information about massive states we have integrated out.

On dimensional grounds higher derivative corrections can go in powers of

$$\frac{^2}{v^2}$$
(3.6)
or in powers of

$$\frac{^2}{(m\mathrm{\Lambda }_2)^2}.$$
(3.7)
The difference $`(m\mathrm{\Lambda }_2)`$ appears here because it is clear that the theory can have singularities only at the AD value of $`m`$, $`m=\mathrm{\Lambda }_2`$. At any other values of $`m`$ the theory is smooth.

Higher derivative corrections of type (3.6) become singular at $`v=0`$ (on the Coulomb branch) showing that certain states become massless in this limit. Photon multiplet is an example of such a state. Higher derivative corrections of type (3.7), if present, would signal that some states become massless at AD point on the Higgs branch at non-zero $`v`$. If (3.5) were correct there would be no such corrections because all hadrons built of monopoles are heavy with masses of order of $`\sqrt{T}v`$ and cannot produce singularities of type (3.7).

Now the question is whether there are higher derivative corrections of type (3.7). This problem was studied in . In particular, in  higher derivative corrections on the Higgs branch induced by one instanton were calculated. Consider large $`m`$, $`m\mathrm{\Lambda }_2`$ far away from the AD point. Then the Higgs branch is in the weak coupling and quasi-classical methods can be applied. The holomorphic one instanton induced corrections appear to be non-zero and proportional to powers of $`/m`$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_2/m`$. Note, that $`v`$ is considered large in , $`vm`$. Thus, these instanton corrections are really of type (3.7) rather then of type (3.6). Now if we reduce $`m`$ going to AD point these corrections blow up showing a singularity at $`m=\mathrm{\Lambda }_2`$. This singularity should correspond to some extra states (besides quark moduli) becoming massless. These extra states cannot be just monopoles because monopoles are in the confinement phase. They are bound into hadrons by ANO strings.

The plausible suggestion is that some hadrons built of monopoles (ANO string states) become massless. This could happen only if the ANO string becomes tensionless at the AD point. Thus, we conclude that (3.5) is not correct and suggest instead that

$$Tv^2$$
(3.8)
at $`m_mv`$. In particularly, we need

$$T(m_m0)0.$$
(3.9)
Note, that alternatively, we could suggest that the string tension stays large but some of string states become massless. Definitely this would be the case for a critical string. However, for a non-critical string (moreover, for a string without world sheet conformal invariance) this hardly can happen.

In particularly, (3.9) means that strictly at the AD point the theory flows in the IR to a non-trivial conformal field theory of interacting massless quark moduli with massless string states. We call this theory $`CFT_{AD}^H`$ where $`H`$ stands for the Higgs branch. This is a descendant of $`CFT_{AD}^C`$ which is a CFT at the AD point on the Coulomb branch.

The conclusion in eqs. (3.8), (3.9) is quite a dramatic one. It means that we loose confinement as we reduce mass of confining matter. In particular, (3.9) means that size of hadrons built of monopoles becomes infinite as we approach AD point. This is in a contradiction with the standard point of view that, say, confinement in QCD is insensitive to the quark mass. We assume the proposal (3.8), (3.9) below in this paper and check its selfconsistency.

The proposed behavior although surprising is quite similar to what happens to monopoles in the Seiberg-Witten theory. At certain point on the Coulomb branch the monopole becomes massless. Its size stays small, of order of the inverse W-boson mass so we can consider monopole as a point-like particle to be included in the effective low energy theory. Similar to that, in the case at hand, at certain point of the parameter space ($`m=\mathrm{\Lambda }_2`$) the ANO string becomes tensionless, while its transverse size $`R_g`$ remains small, determined by the mass of the photon ($`v^1`$).

This means that ANO strings are now long and thin (with typical length $`L1/\sqrt{T}`$). This is exactly what is assumed for a string in the string theory. Thus, we expect that appropriate description of our theory is in terms of non-critical theory of ANO strings. We interpret this as a duality between field theory ( $`𝒩=2`$QED) at strong coupling and the string theory at weak coupling 444We confirm in the next section that the string coupling $`g_s`$ appears to be small..

In the conclusion of this subsection let us compare the physics on the Higgs branch at the AD point with the one we have at the AD point of $`N_f=1`$ theory with $`𝒩=2`$supersymmetry broken down to $`𝒩=1`$by the mass term of the adjoint matter . Suppose we are at the monopole vacuum turning the quark mass parameter in a way to ensure the collision of the monopole vacuum with the charge one. Then the monopole condensate goes to zero in the AD point . The monopole condensate sets the mass scale of all light states in the theory, thus, all of them become massless (including photon). In particular, the ANO string becomes tensionless, however its transverse size (given by the inverse photon mass) goes to infinity. Therefore, it cannot be considered as a stringy object, in fact, it disappears .

On the Higgs branch in the theory at hand the physics is quite different. At the AD point ANO strings becomes tensionless too, but their transverse size remains small, of order of $`v^1`$. The string remains a localized object in transverse directions. In fact, the mass of the photon ($`v`$) plays now the role of the UV cutoff for our low energy effective string theory. Below we describe this string theory and use it to calculate the string tension $`T`$.

### 3.2 5d string theory and AdS metric

One can develop a string theory representation for the ANO string in the quasiclassical regime $`g^21`$. This is done in  and  for cases of strings in the type II superconductor, BPS-strings and strings in the type I superconductor respectively. The common feature of these representations is that the leading term of the world sheet action is the Nambu–Goto term

$$S_{\mathrm{str}}=Td^2\sigma \left\{\sqrt{g^{ind}}+\text{ higher derivatives }\right\},$$
(3.10)
where $`g_{ij}^{ind}=_ix_\mu _jx_\mu `$ is the induced metric $`(i,j=1,2)`$. Higher derivative corrections in (3.10) include the Jacobian term , rigidity term  etc. These terms contain powers of $`/m_\gamma `$. For thin strings $`m_\gamma `$ is large and these corrections can be neglected in the action (3.10). However, as we explained in the Introduction for the ANO vortex in the semiclassical regime $`^2/m_\gamma ^2T/m_\gamma ^21/g^21`$ (see (1.1)). Hence, higher derivative corrections blow up in (3.10) and the string approximation is not acceptable. In particularly, there is no world sheet conformal invariance.

The QED coupling is large at the AD point so there is no hope to to use quasiclassical analysis to derive the sting theory for ANO flux tubes from QED. Therefore, we take another route. We have to construct this string theory imposing the world sheet conformal invariance. The latter requirement follows from (3.8). To see this note, that if there were no world sheet conformal invariance, the string tension would get renormalized  and become of order of the string theory UV cutoff, which is $`v^2`$. This is in a contradiction with (3.8).

To maintain the world sheet conformal invariance is quite a problem for the string moving in the space with a non-critical dimensionality. The Liouville coordinate does not decouple and a string should be considered as moving in the 5 dimensional space . Even this “high price” appeared to be not enough. For $`d1`$ the string turns out to be unstable.

The way out was found by Polyakov who conjectured that the fifth coordinate should be curved . The bosonic part of the string action looks like

$$S_{\mathrm{str}}=T_0d^2\sigma \left[a(y)(_ix^\mu )^2+(_iy)^2+\mathrm{\Phi }(y)R_2+\mathrm{}\right].$$
(3.11)
Here $`y`$ is the Liouville coordinate, $`R_2`$ is the world sheet curvature and $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ is the dilaton depending on the fifth coordinate only. Dots stands for other possible background fields. Of course, the metric in the 4-dimensional slice of this space should be flat.

The function $`a(y)`$ gives the running string tension

$$T=T_0a(y),$$
(3.12)
where $`T_0`$ is the classical string tension (2.14) which we consider as UV data at the UV scale $`v`$. It is subject to a renormalization (3.12) within the string theory (3.11).

The condition of the world sheet conformal invariance means the vanishing of $`\beta `$-functions for the 2d theory (3.11). The latter conditions coincide with equations of motion for the 5d effective “gravity”

$$S_{gr}=\frac{1}{2\kappa }d^5x\sqrt{g}\mathrm{exp}(2\mathrm{\Phi })\left[R+2(D_M\mathrm{\Phi })^2+4V(0)+\mathrm{}\right].$$
(3.13)
Here $`M=1,\mathrm{}5`$, $`R`$ is 5d curvature, $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ is the dilaton and $`V(0)`$ sands for the “cosmological constant” which is the value of the scalar potential at zero. Dots in (3.13) represents other background fields of the string theory (3.11) to be included in (3.13).

Generically (3.13) is relatively useless because we don’t know terms associated with these additional background fields. However, we can look at it as at an effective low energy theory at scales below the string scale $`\sqrt{T}`$. Then all string states can be integrated out and we are left with an effective theory of “gravity” for a few light fields. In this setup string is considered as moving in a slow varying classical gravitational background. After finding a solution of gravitational equations of motion we have to check that the curvature of the 5d space is much smaller than the string scale $`T`$.

Following  we include in (3.13) the $`U(1)`$ R-R 5-form $`F`$ besides the 5d metric $`g_{MN}`$ and the dilaton $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$. With these fields taken into account Einstein equations of motion take the form

$$R_{MN}+2D_MD_N\mathrm{\Phi }+T\mathrm{exp}(2\mathrm{\Phi })[F_{MKLPQ}F_N^{KLPQ}$$

$$\frac{1}{10}g_{MN}F_{SKLPQ}F^{SKLPQ}]=0,$$
(3.14)
while the equation balancing the central charge is

$$R4(D_M\mathrm{\Phi })^2+4D_MD^M\mathrm{\Phi }+4V(0)+\pi T(10d)=0,$$
(3.15)
where $`D_M`$ is the covariant derivative. The last term in (3.15) comes from the anomaly . It is nonzero for the non-critical dimension $`d=5`$. Since we started from $`𝒩=2`$QED we assume a target space supersymmetry for the string theory (3.11), thus the critical dimension would correspond to $`d=10`$.. The equation for the $`U(1)`$ 5-form reads

$$D^MF_{MKLPQ}=0$$
(3.16)
The metric in our 5d “gravity” has a special form determined by the single function $`a(y)`$ (see (3.11))

$$ds^2=a(y)(dx_\mu )^2+(dy)^2.$$
(3.17)
With this ansatz for the metric eqs. (3.14)-(3.16) were studied in . The solution for (3.16) corresponds to a constant 5-form field strength

$$F_{MKLPQ}=\frac{f}{\sqrt{g}}ϵ_{MKLPQ}=\frac{f}{a^2}ϵ_{MKLPQ},$$
(3.18)
where $`f`$ is a dimensionless constant. Within the large $`N`$ approach of  $`fN`$, so it is natural to assume that $`f1`$ in the case at hand. Substituting this result back into eqs. (3.14), (3.15) we get

$$\frac{1}{2}\frac{a^{\prime \prime }}{a}\frac{1}{2}\frac{a^2}{a^2}+\frac{a^{}}{a}\mathrm{\Phi }^{}=Tf^2\mathrm{exp}(2\mathrm{\Phi })$$
(3.19)
for $`\mu \nu `$ components of (3.14) and

$$2\frac{a^{\prime \prime }}{a}+\frac{a^2}{a^2}+2\mathrm{\Phi }^{\prime \prime }=Tf^2\mathrm{exp}(2\mathrm{\Phi })$$
(3.20)
for the $`55`$ component. The equation for zero central charge becomes 555In fact, it is a certain linear combination of the equation (3.15) and eqs. (3.19), (3.20).

$$\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{\Phi }^{\prime \prime }+\mathrm{\Phi }^2\frac{a^{}}{a}\mathrm{\Phi }^{}\frac{5}{4}Tf^2\mathrm{exp}(2\mathrm{\Phi })=V(0)+\frac{5\pi }{4}T$$
(3.21)
Here prime stands for the derivative with respect to $`y`$.

These equations admit  the solution with AdS metric

$$a(y)=\mathrm{exp}(2\frac{y}{r_0})$$
(3.22)
and constant dilaton

$$\mathrm{\Phi }=\mathrm{\Phi }_0.$$
(3.23)
Here $`r_0`$ is the radius of the AdS space. We can trust our “gravity” solution if this radius is large enough in string units ,

$$r_01/\sqrt{T}.$$
(3.24)
Substituting (3.22) into eqs. (3.19)-(3.21) we find

$$f^2\mathrm{exp}(2\mathrm{\Phi }_0)=\frac{4}{Tr_0^2}$$
(3.25)
and

$$r_0^2=\frac{20}{4V(0)+5\pi T}.$$
(3.26)
From (3.26) we see that in order to fulfill the condition (3.24) we need some cancelation between the “cosmological constant” term $`V(0)`$ and the contribution due to the anomaly in (3.26). Unfortunately, we don’t know the scalar potential for our 5d “gravity” and cannot check (3.24) on the gravity side. 666In principle, certain information about scalar potential can be extracted by the dimensional reduction from 10d supergravity . We do not follow this approach in this paper because our 5d “gravity” is an effective low energy theory which has nothing to do with real 10d gravity. We will come back to this issue below and use information on the field theory side to show that (3.24) is fulfilled.

Now let us discuss the meaning of the Liouville coordinate $`y`$ in the 4d field theory. It was suspected for a long time that this coordinate has a meaning of RG scale from the point of view of 4d field theory. In  this interpretation was formulated explicitly. To be more specific, it is convenient to introduce a new coordinate $`r`$ instead of $`y`$ as

$$r=r_0\mathrm{exp}\frac{y}{r_0}.$$
(3.27)
In terms of this coordinate the AdS metric looks like

$$ds^2=\frac{r^2}{r_0^2}(dx^\mu )^2+r_0^2\frac{(dr)^2}{r^2}.$$
(3.28)
Now following  we introduce the coordinate

$$u=Tr$$
(3.29)
which has dimension of energy and identify it with the energy scale of the RG flow, $`u=\mu `$ (see  for the discussion of the normalization in this identification).

In particularly, large $`u`$, $`u\begin{array}{c}>\hfill \\ \hfill \end{array}u_0`$ (here $`u_0=Tr_0`$) corresponds to UV region in the field theory, while moving to small $`u`$ towards the throat of the AdS space is associated with the RG flow to the IR. As the mass of the photon ($`v`$) serves as a UV cutoff for our effective string theory of ANO string, it is natural to identify

$$u_0=v.$$
(3.30)
This identification shows immediately that the AdS radius is large in string units,

$$r_0=\frac{u_0}{T}=\frac{v}{T}\frac{1}{\sqrt{T}},$$
(3.31)
where we use the condition of smallness of the string tension (3.8). This result shows that we can trust the “gravity” solution.

It was shown in  that AdS metric in the 5d gravity corresponds to a conformal invariant field theory in 4d. To understand this note, that the solution (3.22), (3.23) has constant dilaton and zero values of other fields which we do not include in the effective 5d “gravity”(3.13). These fields play the role of “coupling constants” in the 4d field theory . As soon as coupling constants do not run with the RG energy scale $`u`$ we are dealing with CFT. We obtained our string theory under condition (3.8) as an effective theory at the AD point on the Higgs branch. Therefore the conformal theory in question is the $`CFT_{AD}^H`$ which we discussed in the previous subsection.

Now let us see what does the “gravity” solution with AdS metric (3.28) gives for the renormalized string tension (3.12). Clearly, 4d conformal invariance means that $`T=0`$. This was explicitly shown in  by the calculation of the Wilson loop in the $`AdS_5`$ background. This result is qualitatively clear from eq. (3.12) with function $`a(y)`$ given by (3.22). The string goes all the way down to the throat of the AdS space at $`u=0`$ ($`y=\mathrm{}`$) producing the zero result for the tension.

To get a non-zero string tension we have to prevent the string from penetrating into the throat. This can be done by the conformal symmetry breaking at some scale $`u_{CB}`$ associated with the kink (domain wall) solution of 5d “gravity” separating AdS region at large $`u`$ from a different AdS regime in the IR at small $`u`$ (cf. ). We consider this breaking in the next section.

Note, in conclusion of this section that the result $`T=0`$ which follows from the AdS solution of the 5d “gravity” coincides with our field theory expectations (3.9) showing selfconsistency of our approach.

## 4 Deformation of the AdS metric

In general, the 4d CFT can be driven away from criticality by a relevant scalar operator $`O`$ with conformal dimension $`\mathrm{\Delta }4`$ by adding the term

$$d^4x\sigma _0O(x)$$
(4.1)
to the action. Here $`\sigma _0`$ is a “coupling constant”. From the 5d “gravity” point of view this constant becomes a scalar field $`\sigma (r)`$ with the boundary value $`\sigma =\sigma _0`$ at the UV boundary $`r=r_0`$ . Near the boundary at large $`r`$ it behaves as

$$\sigma =\sigma _0\left(\frac{r_0}{r}\right)^{4\mathrm{\Delta }}.$$
(4.2)
In the theory at hand we associate the breaking of the conformal invariance with moving slightly away from AD point. Then the monopole mass becomes non-zero, see (3.2). Thus, the relevant deformation in question is the monopole mass term with the conformal dimension $`\mathrm{\Delta }=2`$. On the “gravity” side we have to include the scalar field $`\sigma `$ in our 5d “gravity” (3.13) with the boundary condition

$$\sigma _0=\frac{m_m^2}{u_0^2},$$
(4.3)
which is determined by the small monopole mass $`m_m`$ at the scale $`u=u_0`$.

Einstein equations of motion modify as

$$\frac{1}{2}\frac{a^{\prime \prime }}{a}\frac{1}{2}\frac{a^2}{a^2}+\frac{a^{}}{a}\mathrm{\Phi }^{}=Tf^2\mathrm{exp}(2\mathrm{\Phi }),$$

$$2\frac{a^{\prime \prime }}{a}+\frac{a^2}{a^2}+2\mathrm{\Phi }^{\prime \prime }+2\sigma ^2=Tf^2\mathrm{exp}(2\mathrm{\Phi }),$$

$$\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{\Phi }^{\prime \prime }+\mathrm{\Phi }^2\frac{a^{}}{a}\mathrm{\Phi }^{}\frac{5}{4}Tf^2\mathrm{exp}(2\mathrm{\Phi })=V(\sigma )+\frac{5\pi }{4}T.$$
(4.4)
Also we have additional equation for $`\sigma `$

$$\sigma ^{\prime \prime }+2\mathrm{\Phi }^{}\sigma ^{}2\frac{a^{}}{a}\sigma ^{}+\frac{V(\sigma )}{\sigma }=0.$$
(4.5)
Here $`V(\sigma )`$ is the potential for the scalar $`\sigma `$ which we unfortunately don’t know.

Below we develop a perturbation theory near the AdS metric at large $`r`$ to make an estimate of the scale $`u_{CB}`$ at which the kink solution takes over and destroys the AdS metric. We assume that the scalar potential has the following expansion

$$V(\sigma )=V(0)+\frac{1}{2}m_\sigma ^2\sigma ^2+\frac{\lambda }{r_0^2}\sigma ^4+\mathrm{},$$
(4.6)
where $`\lambda `$ is dimensionless constant and $`m_\sigma `$ is the mass of the scalar $`\sigma `$. Eq. (4.5) gives for this mass

$$m_\sigma ^2=\frac{4}{r_0^2}$$
(4.7)
in accordance with the general result

$$\mathrm{\Delta }=2+\sqrt{4+m_\sigma ^2r_0^2}$$
(4.8)
relating the conformal dimension of operator $`O`$ in 4d field theory and the mass of the corresponding scalar field in 5d gravity 777 Note that the value of mass in (4.7) is at the border of stability, see ..

The solution of equations of motion (4.4) to the second order in the perturbation around the AdS metric looks like

$$a(y)=e^{2\frac{y}{r_0}}\left[\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}1}+(\frac{\lambda }{8}\frac{1}{25})\sigma _0^4e^{8\frac{y}{r_0}}+\mathrm{}\right],$$

$$\mathrm{\Phi }=\mathrm{\Phi }_0\frac{\sigma _0^2}{5}e^{4\frac{y}{r_0}}+\frac{\sigma _0^4}{25}e^{8\frac{y}{r_0}}+\mathrm{},$$

$$\sigma =\sigma _0e^{2\frac{y}{r_0}}+(\frac{\lambda }{4}\frac{1}{5})\sigma _0^3e^{6\frac{y}{r_0}}+\mathrm{}.$$
(4.9)
Here the metric , the dilaton and the scalar $`\sigma `$ expressed in terms of the boundary value $`\sigma _0`$ which is determined by the small monopole mass via the boundary condition (4.3). The dilaton expectation value $`\mathrm{\Phi }_0`$ is constrained by eq. (3.25). To find higher terms in this expansion (or exact solution for the kink) we need to know the form of the potential (4.6).

Note, that generally speaking the equation (4.5) admits two solutions with behavior $`r_0^2/r^2`$ and $`log(r_0^2/r^2)r_0^2/r^2`$ at large $`r`$. One can show, however, that the second solution does not lead to a consistent solution of other equations of motion in (4.4).

For generic couplings $`\lambda `$( $`\lambda 1`$) corrections in (4.9) becomes of order of one and destroy the AdS metric at $`y_{CB}`$ determined by

$$\mathrm{exp}(2\frac{y_{CB}}{r_0})\sigma _0.$$
(4.10)
In terms of the RG scale variable $`u`$ the above equation reads

$$\frac{u_{CB}^2}{u_0^2}\sigma _0.$$
(4.11)
Substituting here the boundary value of $`\sigma _0`$ (4.3) we get the scale of the conformal symmetry breaking

$$\frac{u_{CB}^2}{u_0^2}\frac{m_m^2}{v^2}.$$
(4.12)
Now let us make an estimate of the value of the renormalized string tension at the scale $`u_{CB}`$. Eq. (3.12) gives

$$T=T_0\frac{u^2}{u_0^2},$$
(4.13)
where we use $`a(u)=u^2/u_0^2`$ for the AdS metric. Assuming that the kink stops the string from penetrating into the throat of the AdS space and determines the scale $`u_{CB}`$ to be substituted into eq. (4.13) we get

$$T\frac{m_m^2}{\mathrm{log}vL},$$
(4.14)
where we use (4.12) and the expression (2.14) for the bare string tension at the UV scale $`v`$. Recall that the length of the string $`L`$ appears here because we do not have infinitely long flux tubes on the Higgs branch where quarks are strictly massless, see subsection 2.2.

The estimate (4.14) is our final result for the string tension near the AD point. To prove it rigorously (and to work out the coefficient in (4.14)) one has to find the exact solution for the kink and to calculate the Wilson loop in the kink background (cf. ). This is left for a future work.

Note, that the result (4.14) satisfy conditions (3.8) and (3.9) showing the consistency of the 5d “gravity” description with field theory expectations. In particular, (4.14) gives zero tension at the AD point. As we already explained, the string becomes tensionless, however still remains to be a stringy object because its transverse size $`v^1`$ is finite. This is an interesting example of the non-trivial conformal theory $`CFT_{AD}^H`$ containing massless quarks and tensionless ANO strings with massless monopoles attached to ends of these strings.

Now let us estimate the value of the string coupling constant and show that it is small, $`g_s1`$. First note, that as we already mentioned in section 3 the radius of the AdS space is large in string units. Substituting (4.14) into (3.31) we get

$$r_0\frac{v}{m_m^2}.$$
(4.15)
where we drop the logarithm factor. Now eq. (3.25) gives for the closed string coupling constant ($`g_s^2=\mathrm{exp}2\mathrm{\Phi }_0`$)

$$g_s^2f^2\frac{m_m^2}{v^2}1.$$
(4.16)
As we already mention we assume that the field strength of the RR 5-form is of order one, $`f1`$. Then (4.16) gives $`g_s1`$.

We can also estimate the string coupling from the field theory side. The open string coupling constant measures the probability that the string is broken by the monopole-anti-monopole pair production. This probability is of order of

$$g_s\mathrm{exp}(c\frac{m_m^2}{T}),$$
(4.17)
where the positive constant $`c`$ can be, in principle calculated. Taking into account the logarithm factor in (4.14) we get

$$g_s\left(\frac{m_m}{v}\right)^\gamma 1,$$
(4.18)
where $`\gamma >0`$. Here we use that the typical length of the string is of order of $`L1/\sqrt{T}`$ for small hadron spins. The reason why the string coupling constant turns out to be small is that monopoles, although light with respect to photon, appear to be heavy with respect to the string scale $`\sqrt{T}`$ because of the logarithm factor in (4.14). Therefore, the monopole-anti-monopole production is suppressed.

Although we don’t know $`\gamma `$ in the field theory expression (4.18) as well as we don’t know $`f^2`$ on the “gravity” side, the two estimates (4.18) and (4.16) are consistent with each other and show that our string theory is in the weak coupling.

## 5 Discussion

In this paper we considered ANO flux tubes on the Higgs branch near the AD point in $`𝒩=2`$QCD. The effective low energy QED describing the theory near the root of the Higgs branch becomes strongly coupled when we approach the AD point. Thus, the semi-classical analysis is no longer valid. We present arguments based on the consideration of instanton induced higher derivative corrections on the Higgs branch that the ANO string tension is small, much smaller than the scale determined by the quark condensate, see (3.8), (3.9). This condition ensures that the ANO flux tube is long and thin and can be described by the non-critical string theory with the world sheet conformal invariance. This leads us to the string moving in 5d space with curved fifth (Liouville) coordinate . At the AD point the 4d conformal invariance on the field theory side corresponds to AdS background metric of the 5d space. We also considered the breaking of the conformal invariance by moving slightly away from the AD point. From 5d “gravity” equations of motion we found that the renormalized ANO string tension is determined by the small mass of monopoles, see (4.14).

The main lesson to learn is that once we make the confining matter light the ANO string becomes light too and does not “want” to live in four dimensions. It goes into a five dimensional space. This happens already at the hadron scale.

Note, that we do not use the logic of large $`N`$ in this paper . The radius of the AdS space remains unfixed within the 5d “gravity” approach, see (3.26). Instead, we use the field theory arguments to show that it is large in string units, see (4.15). Thus the “gravity” solution can be trusted.

At first sight it seems surprising that 5d “gravity” gives reasonable results. It seems to “know” almost nothing about the field theory at the AD point under consideration. Still the results we obtained from 5d “gravity” are consistent with the field theory expectations. This means that the 5d “gravity” description is quite universal. The only information from the field theory side that we use formulating the string theory (3.11) and its effective 5d “gravity” description is the existence of two scales $`v`$ and $`m_m`$, subject to the condition $`m_mv`$ as well as relations (3.8), (3.9) for the string tension. On the 5d “gravity” side we identified the UV scale $`v`$ with the radius of the AdS space $`u_0`$ ( see (3.30)) and the small monopole mass $`m_m`$ with the boundary value of the 5d scalar $`\sigma `$, see (4.3). Then Einstein equations give the estimate (4.12) which tells us that the scale of the conformal symmetry breaking is given by $`m_m`$, which is quite obvious conclusion from the field theory point of view. Then the result (4.14) comes from the expression for the running string tension (4.13) in the AdS background .

Of course, to find the exact solution for the kink (domain wall) we need to use much more information about our field theory near AD point. First, we have to impose $`𝒩=2`$supersymmetry. On the 5d “gravity” side this means imposing $`𝒩=4`$ supersymmetry for the AdS background which corresponds to $`CFT_{AD}^H`$ at large $`u`$ (cf. ). The kink should be 1/2-BPS solution preserving the $`𝒩=2`$supersymmetry. It should satisfy first order differential equations. This kink separates the UV AdS region associated with $`CFT_{AD}^H`$ from the different AdS regime in the IR. The latter should correspond to the free theory of massless quark moduli on the Higgs branch which emerges at scales well below the string scale $`\sqrt{T}`$. We also have to impose global $`SU(2)_R`$ symmetry which becomes a gauge symmetry in 5d “gravity”. Hopefully this information would be enough to fix the scalar potential in 5d “supergravity” and find the kink solution.

Another important open problem is related to the presence of massless quarks on the Higgs branch. The number of massless quark moduli specify precisely the $`CFT_{AD}^H`$ we are dealing with. In particular, it determines fractional conformal dimensions of various operators. The presence of massless quark moduli should be taken into account in the 5d “gravity” description. In ref.  fractional dimensions were related to the spectrum of Laplacian operator in the geometry determined by 3-branes moving near 7-branes singularities. It would be interesting to find a 5d analog of this description.

### Acknowledgments

The author is grateful to Alexandr Gorsky, Gennady Danilov, Andrei Marshakov, Erich Poppitz, Mikhail Shifman, Arkady Vainshtein and, in particular, to Alexei Morozov for helpful discussions. The author also would like to thank the Theoretical Physics Institute at the University of Minnesota for hospitality and support. This work is also supported by Russian Foundation for Basic Research under grant No. 99-02-16576 and by the US Civilian Research and Development Foundation under grant No. RP1-2108.


text:
# Fluorescence from few electronsPublished in Physical Review B, 62 (2000) 13482–13489

## I Introduction

A number of remarkable experiments involving few electrons in semiconductors and free-space, metal particles, and spin-1/2 atoms at low temperatures, have been recently reported , . Only electrons are considered below. These collections of electrons may be isolated or in thermal contact with the environment, but, in any event, the number of particles is constant. The Fermi-Dirac (FD) distribution holds when electrons may be freely exchanged with a large reservoir (grand-canonical ensemble), but is inaccurate for the systems considered. The present paper provides simple and accurate formulas for electron occupancy and fluorescence for evenly-spaced single-electron energy levels. Spontaneous emission is supposed to be weak enough not to perturb importantly the system state of equilibrium . Only vanishingly small Coulomb interaction between electrons  is considered. The time required for the system to reach equilibrium is not needed because averagings are performed over unlimited time scales. Quantum Optics effects, such as resonance fluorescence or super-radiance, will not be considered.

The assumption of evenly-spaced single-electron energy levels is not as restrictive as one may think at first. Consider indeed one-dimensional devices such as the quantum wires employed in modern laser diodes . If the wire is uniform over its length and the valence and conduction bands are parabolic in the energy-momentum space, the energy spacing, $`ϵ`$, between adjacent levels is not a constant. However, the variations of $`ϵ`$ may be neglected near the Fermi level as long as the temperature is not too high. For zero-band-gap semiconductors such as Pb0.84Sn0.16Te, the energy-momentum relationship is linear rather than parabolic, and $`ϵ`$ is exactly a constant. Level spacings in small irregular metal particles (with a size on the order of $`10`$nm) are nearly uniform as a consequence of the mechanism of level “repulsion”. The probability that adjacent levels be separated by $`ϵ`$ is, for the appropriate ensemble, of the form: $`ϵ^4\mathrm{exp}(ϵ^2)`$, a sharply peaked function of $`ϵ`$ . As is well-known, the Landau levels that describe electron motion in uniform magnetic fields  are evenly spaced. These levels are highly degenerate, but the coupling between degenerate states (expressing the drift of electrons through the magnetic field lines) may be neglected over some period of time. Likewise, two or three-dimensional harmonic oscillators, modeling for example the confinement of electrons in traps, exhibit degenerate evenly-spaced levels. Our approach may be generalized to degenerate levels. It is appropriate to mention also that the density of states of (two-dimensional) quantum wells with parabolic bands is a constant within a sub-band. This implies that the energy-level spacing is constant on the average, though not exactly.

The amount of light spontaneously emitted by electronic systems depends on the optical-mode density of state, which is different for free-space, low-dimensional structures, or photonic band gap materials. It is not the purpose of the present paper to discuss such problems. Because all comparisons are made at the same optical wavelength, terms depending on wavelength only (essentially the optical-mode density of state) may be dropped. The quantity that we calculate is the probability that the system exhibits an electron at level $`k`$ and a hole (no electron) at level $`k^{}`$, with $`kk^{}=\mathrm{}\omega /ϵd`$, where $`\mathrm{}`$ denotes the Planck constant divided by $`2\pi `$ and $`\omega `$ the angular optical frequency of observation. In pure semiconductors, electron-momentum conservation entails that transitions may occur only symmetrically with respect to the Fermi level, implying that $`k=(1+d)/2`$, $`k^{}=(1d)/2`$, with odd $`d`$, if $`k=0`$ labels the zero-temperature top electron. We will particularly consider the case where this condition holds.

Let us recall that, in Statistical Mechanics, isolated systems are described by microcanonical ensembles, systems that may exchange energy but not particles with a reservoir are described by canonical ensembles, and systems that may exchange both energy and particles with a reservoir are described by grand-canonical ensembles. The Fermi-Dirac (FD) distribution  is applicable to finite systems only in the latter case. That is, the FD distribution is invalid for isolated systems and for systems that are in contact with an electrical insulator such as diamond. In the present context, “finite” (or “small”, or “mesoscopic”) means that $`k_BT`$, where $`T`$ denotes the absolute electron gas temperature, is not necessarily large compared with the adjacent-level energy spacings $`ϵ`$. In grand canonical ensembles, the fluorescence is proportional to the *product* of the probabilities that the upper level be occupied and that the lower level be empty. In canonical ensembles, it turns out that fluorescence is proportional to the *difference* between lower and upper levels occupancies. This is apparently a new result.

Exact formulas for level occupancy in finite single-spin systems with evenly-spaced levels in contact with a heat bath have been reported before , , , , . Our method  consists of first enumerating the microstates of isolated systems. Subsequent averaging provides expressions for the canonical occupancies. This method is considerably simpler than the second-quantization methods and integral-transformation formulas employed in , . The present paper generalizes the results reported in  to account for the fact that some electrons may change spin in the course of time. Simple, exact formulas for fluorescence are obtained for isolated systems and canonical ensembles. For arbitrary level energies and the canonical ensemble, known recurrence formulas  are satisfied by our more special, but explicit, forms.

The FD distribution is derived in Section 2 to set up the notation and to recall why, in grand-canonical ensembles, spin is properly accounted for by a two-fold degeneracy. This method of accounting for the electron spin, however, is invalid in microcanonical or canonical ensembles because unpaired electrons may be in either one of two distinguishable states. Finite systems that exchange energy but not particles with a reservoir are considered in Section 3 and 4. In Section 3, the electron spin is supposed to be strictly preserved and, for simplicity, it is supposed that there are as many electrons with spin up and with spin down. Formulas valid for single-spin electrons need only be multiplied by factors of 2 in that situation. In Section 4, electrons are allowed to change spin in the course of time (but not during a spontaneous emission event). For the sake of clarity, only essential formulas relating to canonical ensembles are given in the main text, detailed derivations and intermediate results being relegated to Appendices A and B.

The purpose of Appendix A is to explain why the total number $`W`$ of microstates of isolated systems is related to the partitions of integers, for single-spin-state electrons. It is shown that the number $`m(k)`$ of microstates whose level $`k`$ is occupied is simply related to $`W`$. The number $`m(k;k^{})`$ of microstates whose level $`k`$ is occupied and level $`k^{}`$ is empty is shown to be simply related to $`m(k)`$, and thus to $`W`$. Averaging, with the Boltzmann factor as a weight, provides the corresponding formulas in the canonical ensemble. Appendix B explains how the possibility that electrons may change spin in the course of time is accounted for.

## II The Fermi-Dirac Distribution

The probability $`p`$ that a system in thermal *and* electrical contact with a large medium contains $`N^+`$ electrons with spin up, $`N^{}`$ electrons with spin down, and energy $`U`$, is proportional to the corresponding number of medium states (subscripts $`m`$) conveniently written as $`\mathrm{exp}\left(S_m(N_m^+,N_m^{},U_m)\right)`$ with $`S_m`$ the system entropy. If the system-medium contact is very weak, energies as well as particle numbers add up. A first-order expansion of $`S_m`$ with respect to its arguments then gives

$$p(N^+,N^{},U)=C\mathrm{exp}(\alpha N^+\alpha N^{}\beta U)$$
(1)
where $`C`$ denotes a constant and

$`\beta `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{S_m}{U_m}}`$ (2)
$`\alpha `$ $``$ $`\beta \mu ={\displaystyle \frac{S_m}{N_m^+}}={\displaystyle \frac{S_m}{N_m^{}}}`$ (3)
Here, $`\beta 1/k_BT`$, where $`T`$ denotes the temperature, and $`\mu `$ the Fermi level. A single $`\mu `$ value occurs because the medium behavior is the same for electrons of opposite spins.

It follows from Eq. (1) that the probabilities $`p^{(0)}`$ that a nondegenerate state of energy $`ϵ_k`$ is unoccupied, $`p^{(1)}`$ that it is occupied by an electron of either spin, and $`p^{(2)}`$ that it is occupied by two electrons, are respectively

$`p^{(0)}`$ $`=`$ $`C`$ (4)
$`p^{(1)}`$ $`=`$ $`Cz`$ (5)
$`p^{(2)}`$ $`=`$ $`Cz^2`$ (6)
with $`z\mathrm{exp}(\alpha \beta ϵ_k)`$. Normalization ($`p^{(0)}+2p^{(1)}+p^{(2)}=1`$) gives $`C=1/(1+z)^2`$. The occupancy (average number of electrons) $`n_{FD}=2p^{(1)}+2p^{(2)}`$ of level $`k`$ is therefore

$`n_{FD}(q;k)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2}{z^1+1}}`$ (7)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\mathrm{exp}(\beta (ϵ_k\mu ))+1}}`$ (8)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2}{q^{\frac{1}{2}k}+1}}`$ (9)
where $`q\mathrm{exp}(\beta )`$ denotes the Boltzmann factor. In the last expression it is assumed that $`ϵ_k=k`$, where $`k`$ denotes any relative integer. The separation $`ϵ`$ between adjacent-level energies is taken as the energy unit, with a typical value for $`1\mu `$m–long quantum wires $`ϵ=1`$meV. In the last expression in Eq. (9), $`k=1`$ labels the level just above the top electron at $`T=0`$K, and we have set $`\mu =\frac{1}{2}`$. Note that for large $`k`$–values, $`n_{FD}(q;k)2q^{k1/2}`$.

The average system energy added on top of the $`T=0`$K energy is obtained by summing up the occupancy over all levels, and subtracting a similar sum for the $`T=0`$K distribution. The result is

$$r_{FD}(q)=\underset{j=1,3\mathrm{}}{}\frac{j}{q^{j/2}+1}$$
(10)
In grand canonical ensembles, occupancies at different levels are independent. For a single spin state, this means that the probability that level $`k`$ is occupied and level $`k^{}`$ is empty is the product of level $`k`$ occupancy and \[$`1`$level $`k^{}`$ occupancy\]. When the two spin-states are considered, we obtain

$$L_{FD}(q;k,k^{})=2\frac{n_{FD}(q,k)}{2}\left(1\frac{n_{FD}(q,k^{})}{2}\right)$$
(11)
Fluorescence may indeed occur for 8 out of the 16 possibilities of occupancy of levels $`k`$ and $`k^{}`$ (no electron, spin-up electron, spin-down electron, or two electrons for each of the two levels). Because occupancies are independent, the sum of the probabilities that fluorescence events occur is indeed found to be given by Eq. (11).

If the electron-momentum conservation law is enforced, we have $`k=(1+d)/2`$, $`k^{}=(1d)/2`$, and the FD fluorescence in Eq. (11) reads after rearranging

$$L_{FD}(q;d)=\frac{2}{\left(q^{d/2}+1\right)^2}$$
(12)
Thus, the fluorescence in the grand-canonical ensemble is given by a simple function of temperature $`T`$ and angular optical frequency of observation $`\omega `$. We will see that the canonical ensemble fluorescence is given by a simple series.

## III Fluorescence without spin flip

For single-spin electrons, the occupancy in isolated systems is given by a simple formula reported in . The proof, omitted in , is given in Appendix A of the present paper (see Eq. (A18)). If the energy added to the system is denoted by $`r`$, the number $`W(r)`$ of configurations of the system is equal here to the number $`p(r)`$ of *partitions* of $`r`$. Indeed, microstates may be obtained by shifting electrons upward from their $`T=0`$K locations by non-increasing steps that sum up to $`r`$. Let us recall that a partition of $`r`$ is a set of positive integers summing up to $`r`$. For example $`(2,1,1)`$ is a partition of $`4`$. The number $`p(4)`$ of partitions of $`4`$ equals $`5`$. By convention, $`p(0)=1`$ and $`p(r)=0`$ if $`r<0`$.

To illustrate the difference existing between the exact result and the Fermi-Dirac distribution, let us note that, for any microstate, the energy separation between the top electron and the lowest hole cannot exceed $`rϵ`$, where $`ϵ`$ denotes as before the adjacent-level energy spacing. Accordingly, the fluorescence drops abruptly at an angular optical frequency $`\omega =rϵ/\mathrm{}`$. When $`r1`$, a system temperature $`T`$ may be defined : $`k_BTϵ\sqrt{6r}/\pi `$. As an example, room-temperature isolated systems with $`ϵ=1`$ meV should not emit visible light according to the exact formula, while some faint light is expected according to the FD distribution.

In the present section, it is supposed that the electron spins are preserved in the course of time, and that there are as many electrons with spin up and spin down, for simplicity. It then suffices to multiply the expressions for single-spin electron occupancy, average energy, and fluorescence, given in Appendix A, by factors of 2.

The occupancy reads, according to Eq. (A19)

$$n_u(q;k)=2\underset{j=1,2\mathrm{}}{}(1)^jq^{jk+j(j1)/2}$$
(13)
Note that, for large $`k`$–values, $`n_u(q;k)2q^k`$ so that $`n_u(q;k)/n_{FD}(q;k)=\sqrt{q}`$, if the expression for $`n_{FD}(q;k)`$ in Eq. (9) is used.

The average added energy reads

$$r_u(q)=2\underset{j=1,2\mathrm{}}{}\frac{j}{q^j1}$$
(14)
We first compare in Fig. 1a the occupancy in isolated systems with the FD occupancy. The former is obtained by multiplying $`n_i(r;k)`$ given in Eq. (A18) by a factor of 2 to account for the two spin states. The FD occupancy is given in Eq. (9), with $`q`$ expressed in terms of the average energy $`r`$ with the help of Eq. (10). Note that, below 0.1, isolated-system occupancies are *smaller* than FD occupancies.

Consider next the case where the system is in contact with a heat bath. The ratio of the exact occupancy in Eq. (13) (where $`q`$ is expressed in terms of the average energy $`r`$ with the help of Eq. (14)) and the FD occupancy (Eqs. (9), (10)), is represented in Fig. 1b as a function of the FD occupancy for various values of the average energy $`r`$ (namely, $`r=6`$, 60, and 600). Below 0.1, the exact occupancy *exceeds* the FD occupancy. Figure 2a shows that, when the comparison is made at equal temperatures $`T`$ (instead of equal average energies), the opposite occurs. In Fig. 2, we have chosen to represent the occupancy ratios as functions of the level number $`k`$ (referred to the Fermi level) instead of the FD occupancy.

To evaluate fluorescence, we need to know the number $`m(r;k;k^{})`$ of microstates of added energy $`r`$ having an electron at level $`k`$ and none at level $`k^{}=kd`$, where $`d\mathrm{}\omega /ϵ`$. Appendix A shows that this quantity is easily expressible in terms of the numbers $`m(r;k)`$ of microstates having an electron at level $`k`$ (irrespectively of other state occupancies). Averaging the result over $`r`$ with $`q^r`$ as a weight to account for energy fluctuations in the presence of a heat bath, the fluorescence is found to be (see Eq. (A14))

$$L_u(q;k,k^{})=\frac{n_u(q;k^{})n_u(q;k)}{q^d1}$$
(15)
where $`n_u(q;k)`$ is given in Eq. (13).

If the law of electron-momentum conservation is enforced, the fluorescence reads

$$L_u(q;d)=L_u(q;\frac{1+d}{2},\frac{1d}{2})$$
(16)
Recall that $`q\mathrm{exp}(ϵ/k_BT)`$ (where $`ϵ`$ is typically $`1`$meV and room temperature corresponds to $`k_BT=26`$meV), and $`d\mathrm{}\omega /ϵ`$. The fluorescence ratio: $`L_u(q;d)/L_{FD}(q;d)`$ according to Eq. (12) and Eq. (16), is represented in Fig. 3a as a function of $`d`$ for different temperatures. It is interesting that canonical and grand-canonical fluorescences almost coincide at small wavelengths even though the occupancies are quite different in that limit.

## IV Fluorescence with spin flip

Electron spins are now allowed to vary in the course of time (but not during a fluorescence event). The numbers $`N^+`$ and $`N^{}`$ of electrons with spin up and spin down, respectively, may fluctuate, but their sum $`N^++N^{}N`$ remains constant if the system is isolated or in contact with an electrically-insulating heat sink such as diamond. The occupancy and fluorescence for coupled-spin electrons is derived from previous expressions through a succession of partitionings and averagings. Because the details are lengthy, they are relegated to Appendix B. Remarkably, many summations can be performed in closed form so that the final result is simple.

The occupancy reads

$$n_c(q;k)=\frac{_{j=\mathrm{}}^+\mathrm{}q^{j^2}n_u(q;k+j)}{_{j=\mathrm{}}^+\mathrm{}q^{j^2}}$$
(17)
where $`n_u(q;k)`$ is given in Eq. (13). Comparisons with the FD distributions are exemplified in Figs. 1d and 2b. With the help of theta functions  the average added energy may be written as a simple sum (see Eq. (B12))

$$r_c(q)=2\underset{j=1,2\mathrm{}}{}\left(\frac{j}{q^j1}+\frac{(1)^jj}{q^jq^j}\right)$$
(18)
The fluorescence reads (see Eqs. (A20) and (B13))

$$L_c(q;d)=\frac{_{j=\mathrm{}}^+\mathrm{}q^{j^2}L_u(q;j+\frac{1+d}{2},j+\frac{1d}{2})}{_{j=\mathrm{}}^+\mathrm{}q^{j^2}}$$
(19)
where $`L_u(q;k,k^{})`$ is given in Eq. (15). Fluorescence is illustrated in Fig. 3b. Note that the exact result is closer to the FD result when electrons are allowed to change spin in the course of time.

## V Conclusion

When a (possibly small) system is in thermal and electrical contact with a large medium such as a piece of copper, the average number of electrons occupying some energy level (occupancy) is twice the value given by Fermi-Dirac (FD) formula. The fluorescence (light spontaneously emitted without electron-spin flip), defined in terms of the probability that an electron at level $`k`$ may drop to level $`k\mathrm{}\omega /ϵ`$ ($`\omega `$ denotes the angular optical frequency of observation), is also easily obtained. But when the system is isolated, or in thermal contact with an electrical insulator, electron occupancies are given by different expressions. Because modern electronics often employ short quantum wires supported by diamond heat sinks, it is important to have at our disposal precise expressions for occupancy and fluorescence in such situations. The expressions obtained in this paper were illustrated by comparison with the FD results. We considered the case where the electron spins are strictly maintained in the course of time (Section 3), and the case where spin-flip is allowed (Section 4). We found, for example, that small FD occupancies should be multiplied by approximately $`\mathrm{exp}(ϵ/2k_BT)0.22`$ if $`ϵ=1`$meV and $`T=4`$K, a factor that differs significantly from unity. But, unexpectedly, the fluorescence turns out to be given rather accurately by the FD distribution.

Our mathematical approach is based on a direct enumeration of the microstates, and the results are expressed in terms of the number of partitions of integers. This method is considerably simpler than those previously reported for similar models, both conceptually and algebraically. A computer simulation has given results that are in very good agreement with the analytical formulas reported in this paper.

It is our intention to report in the future analytical and numerical results relating to mesoscopic laser-diode light fluctuations. A preliminary step consists of considering single-mode cavities incorporating the electron gas at thermal equilibrium, with one or two bands of states (for a single band, see Appendix A of the present paper). The intraband Auger effect and the stimulated transitions may be introduced at that stage. Next, the probability that low-lying electrons be promoted to high-lying levels by the action of a (quiet or fluctuating) pump, and the probability that light quanta be absorbed, are introduced. At low power, our simulation gives output light fluctuations that agree very well with elementary laser-noise theory predictions . At high power, new effects (temperature fluctuations, spectral-hole burning, statistical fluctuations of the optical gain $`\mathrm{}`$) occur that are difficult to handle analytically . The analytical formulas reported in this paper are helpfull to assess the accuracy of the simulation in special situations.

## A Occupancy and fluorescence for single-spin-state electrons. Arbitrary energy levels

We are only concerned in the main text with one-electron energy levels $`\{ϵ_k\}=`$. Rigorous occupancy formulas are obtained in the present Appendix by considering first arbitrary $`\{ϵ_k\}`$. Eventually the number of levels is allowed to go to infinity.

Consider an isolated system whose nondegenerate one-electron level energies are, in increasing order, $`ϵ_1`$, $`ϵ_2`$, …$`ϵ_k`$, …$`ϵ_B`$, with $`NB`$ single-spin electrons. According to the Pauli principle each level may be occupied by only $`0`$ or $`1`$ electron. The system energy $`U`$ is therefore the sum of $`N`$ of the $`ϵ_k`$. The purpose of this Appendix is to evaluate:

1. The number $`W(N,U)`$ of possible ways of obtaining some given $`U`$ (number of microstates, or “statistical weight”).
2. The number $`m(N,U;k)`$ of microstates whose level $`k`$ is occupied. The occupancy $`n(N,U;k)`$ of level $`k`$ is defined as $`m(N,U;k)/W(N,U)`$.
3. The number $`m(N,U;k;k^{})`$ of microstates whose level $`k`$ is occupied and level $`k^{}`$ is empty. The fluorescence $`L(N,U;k;k^{})`$ emitted by electrons dropping from level $`k`$ to level $`k^{}`$ is defined as $`m(N,U;k;k^{})/W(N,U)`$.

These evaluations will be presented in reversed order. Let us first relate the number $`m(N,U;k;k^{})`$ of microstates whose level $`k`$ is occupied and level $`k^{}`$ is empty, to the numbers $`m(N,U;k)`$ defined above. For each microstate, let the electron at level $`k`$ be transferred to the lower empty level $`k^{}`$. The number $`N`$ of electrons is unaffected but the total energy gets reduced from $`U`$ to $`Ud`$ where $`d=ϵ_kϵ_k^{}>0`$, and the roles of $`k`$ and $`k^{}`$ are reversed. The following equality

$$m(N,U;k;k^{})=m(N,Ud;k^{};k)$$
(A1)
therefore holds. Now notice that,

$`m(N,U;k)m(N,U;k;k^{})=`$ (A3)
$`m(N,U;k^{})m(N,U;k^{};k)`$
because the two sides of the above equation count microstates whose levels $`k`$ and $`k^{}`$ are *both* occupied. When the expression in Eq. (A3) is introduced in Eq. (A1) iteration gives a recurrence relation for $`m(N,U;k;k^{})`$ that reads

$`m(N,U;k;k^{})=`$ (A5)
$`{\displaystyle \underset{j=1,2\mathrm{}}{}}\left(m(N,Ujd;k^{})m(N,Ujd;k)\right)`$
The above series terminates when the total energy vanishes, i.e., when $`jd`$ exceeds $`U`$.

Consider next the $`m(N,U;k)`$ microstates whose levels $`k`$ are occupied, and remove these electrons. The same number of microstates is obtained, with $`N1`$ electrons, total energy $`Uϵ_k`$, and no electron at level $`k`$. The number of these new microstates may be written as the difference between the *total* number of microstates and the number of microstates whose level $`k`$ is *occupied*. We have therefore the identity

$$m(N,U;k)=W(N1,Uϵ_k)m(N1,Uϵ_k;k)$$
(A6)
After a sufficient number of iterations, either the energy or the number of electrons becomes negative and the last term vanishes. The quantity $`m(N,U;k)`$ may therefore be written as a finite sum

$$m(N,U;k)=\underset{j=1,2\mathrm{}}{}(1)^jW(Nj,Ujϵ_k)$$
(A7)
The series terminates when $`j`$ exceeds either $`N`$ or $`U/ϵ_k`$.

We have the obvious identity (the number of occupied states for the whole set of microstates being written in two different manners)

$$NW(N,U)=\underset{k1}{}m(N,U;k)$$
(A8)
A system in contact with a heat bath at temperature $`T`$ is described by the canonical ensemble. Let us define as in the main text $`q\mathrm{exp}(\beta )`$, where $`\beta 1/k_BT`$. The so-called partition function $`Z(N,q)`$ is the sum over $`U`$ of $`q^UW(N,U)`$, and the average energy is $`(q/Z)Z(N,q)/q`$. When both sides of Eq. (A8) are multiplied by $`q^U`$ and summed over $`U`$ we obtain, using Eq. (A7)

$`Z(N,q)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N}}{\displaystyle \underset{k=1,2\mathrm{}}{}}{\displaystyle \underset{U}{}}q^Um(N,U;k)`$ (A9)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N}}{\displaystyle \underset{j=1,2\mathrm{}}{}}(1)^j{\displaystyle \underset{k=1,2\mathrm{}}{}}q^{jϵ_k}`$ (A11)
$`\times {\displaystyle \underset{U}{}}q^{Ujϵ_k}W(Nj,Ujϵ_k)`$
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N}}{\displaystyle \underset{j=1,2\mathrm{}N}{}}(1)^jZ(1,q^j)Z(Nj,q)`$ (A12)
Indeed, for a single electron ($`N=1`$), $`U`$ may only take one of the $`ϵ_k`$ values and the statistical weight $`W`$ is unity. It follows that $`Z(1,q)`$ is the sum over $`k`$ from 1 to $`B`$ of $`q^{ϵ_k}`$. Note that $`Z(0,q)=1`$. Equation (A12) was obtained earlier  from a less direct proof.

The occupancy (average number of electrons) $`n(q;k)`$ of level $`k`$, is equal to the sum over $`U`$ of $`q^Um(N,U;k)`$, divided by $`Z(N,q)`$, where $`m(N,U;k)`$ is given in Eq. (A7) and $`Z(N,q)`$ is defined in Eq. (A12) from a recurrence relation. Thus

$$n(q;k)=\frac{_{j=1,2\mathrm{}}(1)^jq^{jϵ_k}Z(Nj,q)}{Z(N,q)}$$
(A13)
Expression (A13) was reported before .

The probability that level $`k`$ be occupied and that level $`k^{}`$ be empty at temperature $`T`$ is similarly obtained by summing $`q^Um(N,U;k;k^{})`$ over $`U`$, and dividing the result by $`Z(N,q)`$, where $`m(N,U;k;k^{})`$ is given in Eq. (A5). The result of the summation may be expressed as the *difference* of the lower and upper occupancies, according to

$$L(q;k,k^{})=\frac{n(q;k^{})n(q;k)}{q^{ϵ_k^{}ϵ_k}1}$$
(A14)
where the occupancy $`n(q;k)`$ is given in Eq. (A13). Thus the fluorescence is equal to the difference between the occupancies at $`k^{}`$ and $`k`$ multiplied by the Bose function.

Let us now specialize the above formulas for the case where $`ϵ_k=k`$, $`k=1\mathrm{}B`$. Considering the displacement of the $`N`$ electrons from their least-energy locations ($`k=1`$ to $`N`$) beginning to the one on top, we observe that $`W(N,U)`$ is the number $`p(P;N,r)`$ of partitions of the *added energy* $`rUN(N+1)/2`$ into at most $`N`$ parts, none of them exceeding $`PBN`$. Note that the numbers $`p(P;N,r)`$ may be obtained from a recurrence relation , $`p(P;N,r)p(P;N1,r)=p(P1;N,rN)`$. Let us now change slightly our notation, letting $`k=0`$ denote the top electron in the least energy configuration, and let us employ the added energy $`r`$ instead of the total energy $`U`$ as an argument. Equation (A7) reads

$`m(N,r;k)={\displaystyle \underset{j=1,2\mathrm{}}{}}(1)^j`$ (A16)
$`\times p(P+j;Nj,rjkj(j1)/2)`$
If $`r`$ does not exceed $`N`$ and $`P`$, it is intuitive that $`p(P;N,r)=p(r)`$, where $`p(r)`$ denotes the number of unrestricted partitions of $`r`$. Equation (A16) then simplifies to

$$m(r;k)=\underset{j=1,2\mathrm{}}{}(1)^jp(rjkj(j1)/2)$$
(A17)
This expression was reported (for the first time to our knowledge), in . If $`N`$ and $`P`$ are infinite ($`\{ϵ_k\}=`$), Eq. (A17) holds for any finite value of $`r`$ and the corresponding single-spin-state occupancy of an isolated system is

$$n_i(r;k)=m(r;k)/p(r)$$
(A18)
Averaging the numerator and denominator of above expression with $`q^r`$ as a weight with $`r`$ from 0 to $`\mathrm{}`$, gives the canonical occupancy

$$n(q;k)=\underset{j=1,2\mathrm{}}{}(1)^jq^{jk+j(j1)/2}$$
(A19)
Finally the expression in Eq. (A14) simplifies in the present situation to

$$L(q;k,k^{})=\frac{n(q;k^{})n(q;k)}{q^{k^{}k}1}$$
(A20)
We have set up a Monte Carlo simulation program that enables us to recover previous analytical expressions. For the case of isolated systems, a constant probability per unit time is ascribed to level-changing events that preserve energy. The system eventually reaches a state of equilibrium with an electron distribution very close to the one derived from previous recurrence formulas. The Fermi-Dirac distribution is obtained in the limit of large $`B`$-values, with temperatures and Fermi levels that depend on the energy given initially to the system. Our computer program may handle single-electron level distributions that could be difficult to analyze theoretically (for example, two bands of states).

When the system is in thermal contact with a heat bath, electrons at level $`k`$ are ascribed a probability per unit time, $`p`$, of being promoted to level $`k+1`$ and a probability, $`qp`$, of being demoted to level $`k1`$, provided these levels are empty. Strictly speaking, these prescriptions rest on an Einstein-type model of solids that supposes that the atoms are vibrating at frequency $`\omega _{phonon}=ϵ/\mathrm{}`$, where $`ϵ`$ denotes as before the electronic level spacing. But the details of the thermalization model turn out to be rather unimportant. The computer program enabled us to reproduce the theoretical results with great accuracy. For example, when $`B=100`$, $`ϵ=1`$meV, and $`T=`$100K, the numerical distribution fits the Fermi-Dirac distribution with a discrepancy not exceeding 0.2%.

When the electron gas is enclosed in a single-mode cavity, the probability that the cavity contains $`m`$ light quanta is proportional to $`W(rmd)`$, where $`W(r)`$ denotes the statistical weight of the electron gas for an added energy $`r`$, see Appendix B of . If, initially, only the highest levels are occupied, we obtain exactly, from the recurrence relation satisfied by $`p(P;N,r)`$, $`\mathrm{variance}(m)/\mathrm{average}(m)=(B+1)/6`$.

## B Occupancy and fluorescence for two-spin-states electrons

In the present Appendix we restrict ourselves to energy levels $`ϵ_k=k`$, with $`k=1,2\mathrm{}`$, the origin of the energy being set at $`k=0`$. Electrons are allowed to change spin in the course of time. We first consider an isolated system with constant numbers of spin-up and spin-down electrons ($`N^+`$ and $`N^{}`$, respectively), electrons of different spins being allowed to exchange energy. Next, spin-flip is allowed. Averaging, with the Boltzmann factor as a weight, provides occupancies for the case where the systems are in contact with a heat bath. Occupancies in these various situations are illustrated in Fig. 1, again by comparison with the FD distribution.

Consider first an isolated system with $`N^+`$ spin-up electrons and $`N^{}`$ spin-down electrons, and suppose that the two sub-systems may exchange energy but that spin flip is not allowed. Setting $`N^++N^{}2N`$ and $`N^+N^{}2n`$, the system least energy is

$`U_0`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{N^+(N^++1)}{2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{N^{}(N^{}+1)}{2}}`$ (B1)
$`=`$ $`N(N+1)+n^2`$ (B2)
If $`rn^2`$ denotes the energy added to the system on top of $`N(N+1)`$, the remaining energy $`s=rn^2`$ splits into $`r_1`$ in sub-system 1 and $`r_2=sr_1`$ in sub-system 2.

We have shown in Appendix A that, for the case presently considered and in the limit $`N\mathrm{}`$, the number of microstates for single-spin electrons is the number of partitions $`p(r)`$ of the excess energy $`r`$. The number of microstates relating to one particular splitting of $`s`$ is therefore $`p(r_1)p(r_2)`$. Accordingly, occupancies are obtained by averaging single-spin state occupancies shifted by $`\pm n`$, with a probability law proportional to $`p(r_1)p(sr_1)`$ with $`r_1`$ running from 0 to $`s`$.

$`n_e(r;k)=`$ (B4)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{_{r_1}\left(m(r_1;kn)p(sr_1)+m(sr_1;k+n)p(r_1)\right)}{_{r_1}p(sr_1)p(r_1)}}`$
where $`m(r;k)`$ is given by Eq. (A17). Figure 1c compares $`n_e(r;k)`$ in Eq. (LABEL:eq:B2) to $`n_{FD}`$ in Eqs. (9), (10) for the case where $`n=0`$ ($`N^+=N^{}`$ or $`r=s`$) and various values of the added energy.

When spin flip is allowed, $`N^++N^{}=2N`$ remains fixed, but $`n(N^+N^{})/2`$ may take any value that does not exceed $`\sqrt{r}`$, where $`r`$ denotes as before the energy added on top of $`N(N+1)`$. If $`r=6`$ for example, five values of $`n`$ are permitted, namely $`n=0`$, $`n=\pm 1`$ and $`n=\pm 2`$. It thus suffices to sum the numerator and denominator of Eq. (LABEL:eq:B2) over permissible values of $`n`$. The occupancy reads

$`n_s(r;k)=`$ (B7)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{_n_{r_1}\left(m(r_1;kn)p(sr_1)+m(sr_1;k+n)p(r_1)\right)}{_n_{r_1}p(sr_1)p(r_1)}}`$
where the sum over $`r_1`$ is from 0 to $`s=rn^2`$, and $`m(r;k)`$ is given Eq. (A17). The two terms in the numerator give equal contributions. Figure 1e compares $`n_s(r;k)`$ as given in Eq. (LABEL:eq:B3) with the FD distribution for various values of the added energy.

When the system is in contact with a heat bath at temperature reciprocal $`\beta `$, $`r`$ fluctuates with a probability law $`q^r`$ where, as before, $`q\mathrm{exp}(\beta )`$. Accordingly, occupancies are obtained by multiplying the numerator and denominator of the previous expression in Eq. (LABEL:eq:B3) by $`q^r`$ and summing over $`r`$ from 0 to $`\mathrm{}`$. The denominator gives the sum over states

$`Z^{}(q)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{r}{}}q^r{\displaystyle \underset{n}{}}{\displaystyle \underset{r_1}{}}p(r_1)p(rn^2r_1)`$ (B9)
$`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \underset{r}{}}q^rp(r)\right)^2{\displaystyle \underset{n}{}}q^{n^2}`$ (B10)
which may be written as an infinite product . The average added energy reads

$`r_c(q)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{q}{Z^{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{d}Z^{}}{\mathrm{d}q}}`$ (B11)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{j=1,2\mathrm{}}{}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{2j}{q^j1}}+{\displaystyle \frac{(1)^j2j}{q^jq^j}}\right)`$ (B12)
The expression for the occupancy may be reduced to a double sum, which coincides with the one given in Eq. (13), shifted by $`\pm n`$ and weighted by $`q^{n^2}`$. This final result is intuitive since unbalancing between $`N^+`$ and $`N^{}`$ increments the energy by $`n^2`$. We have

$$n_c(q;k)=\frac{_n\left(n(q;kn)+n(q;k+n)\right)q^{n^2}}{_nq^{n^2}}$$
(B13)
where the sums over $`n`$ run from $`\mathrm{}`$ to $`+\mathrm{}`$, and $`n(q;k)`$ is given in Eq. (A19). The two terms in the numerator give the same contributions. The occupancy $`n_c(q;k)`$ may be expressed as a function of the average energy and $`k`$ with the help of Eq. (B12). Comparison with the FD distribution is in Fig. 1e.

Similarly the fluorescence is obtained by shifting $`k`$ by $`n`$ with a weight factor $`q^{n^2}`$.