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# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

The production of net baryon asymmetry requires baryon number violating interactions, C and CP violation and a departure from thermal equilibrium. In the original and simplest model of baryogenesis a GUT gauge or Higgs boson decays out of equilibrium producing a net baryon asymmetry. Another mechanism of generating the cosmological baryon asymmetry in supersymmetric theories is proposed by Affleck and Dine who utilized the decay of scalar condensate along the flat direction. This mechanism is a natural product of supersymmetry, which contains many flat directions that break $`U(1)_B`$. The scalar potential along this direction vanishes identically when supersymmetry breaking is not induced. Supersymmetry breaking lifts this degeneracy,

$$Vm_{soft}^2|\varphi |^2$$
(1.1)
where $`m_{soft}^2`$ is the supersymmetry-breaking scale and $`\varphi `$ is the direction in the field space corresponding to the flat direction. For large initial values of $`\varphi `$, a large baryon number asymmetry may be generated if the condensate of the field breaks $`U(1)_B`$. The mechanism also requires the presence of baryon number violating operators that may appear through higher dimensional A-terms. The decay of these condensates through such an operator can lead to a net baryon asymmetry. In the most naive consideration the baryon asymmetry is computed by tracking the evolution of the sfermion condensate. Considering a toy model with the potential

$$V(\varphi ,\varphi ^{})=m_{soft}^2|\varphi |^2+\frac{1}{4}[\lambda \varphi ^4+h.c.],$$
(1.2)
the equation of motion becomes

$$\ddot{\varphi }+3H\dot{\varphi }=m_{soft}^2\varphi +\lambda (\varphi ^{})^3.$$
(1.3)
The baryon (or lepton) number density is given by:

$$n_B=q_B\left(\dot{\varphi }^{}\varphi \varphi ^{}\dot{\varphi }\right),$$
(1.4)
where $`q_B`$ is the baryon (or lepton) charge carried by the field. Now one can write down the equation for the baryon number density

$$\dot{n_B}+3Hn_B=2q_BIm\left[\lambda (\varphi ^{})^4\right].$$
(1.5)
Integrating this equation, one can obtain the baryon (or lepton) number produced by the Affleck-Dine oscillation. For large initial amplitude, the produced baryon number is estimated as $`n_B\frac{4q_B|\lambda |}{9H}|\varphi _{ini}|^4\delta _{eff}`$, where $`\delta _{eff}`$ is the effective CP violation phase of the initial condensate. This crude estimation suggests that by generating some angular motion one can generate a net baryon density.

In conventional mechanism of Affleck-Dine baryogenesis, one should assume large $`H>m_{3/2}`$ before the time of Affleck-Dine baryogenesis to destabilize the flat directions and obtain the large initial amplitude of baryon-charged directions.

Although it seems plausible that Affleck-Dine baryogenesis generates baryon asymmetry of the Universe, there are some difficulties in the naive scenario. The formation of Q-ball is perhaps the most serious obstacles that puts a serious constraint on the baryon number density at the time of Q-ball formation. Q-balls are formed due to the spatial instability of the Affleck-Dine field, and have been shown by numerical calculations that they absorb almost all the baryonic charges in the Universe when they form. This means that the baryon asymmetry of the Universe in the later period must be provided by decaying Q-balls. In general, the stability of Q-ball is determined by their charge, which is inevitably fixed by Affleck-Dine mechanism itself. The reason is that the formation of Q-ball occurs almost immediately, which makes it hard to expect any additional diluting mechanism before Q-ball formation. The point is that in general Affleck-Dine baryogenesis the initial baryon number density becomes so huge that the produced Q-balls are stable. The stable Q-balls that produce the present baryon asymmetry of the Universe by their decay are dangerous, because such Q-balls can also produce dangerous relics at the same time when they decay to produce the baryons. The decay temperature of the associated Q-balls becomes in general much lower than the freeze-out temperature of the dangerous lightest supersymmetric particle, which causes serious constraint.

Another obstacle is the problem of early oscillation caused by the thermalization. When the fields that couple to the Affleck-Dine field is thermalized, they induce the thermal mass to the Affleck-Dine field. The early oscillation starts when the thermal mass term exceeds the destabilizing mass. The serious constraint appears because the destabilizing mass, which is about the same order of the Hubble parameter, is in general much smaller than the temperature of the plasma.

Now let us explain what we have in mind. In general Affleck-Dine baryogenesis the following conditions are required to produce net baryon asymmetry.

* There exists the field condensate $`\varphi _{AD}0`$ charged with the baryon number. The condensate must decay during or after the baryon number production.
* The A-term that determines the initial phase of the condensate must be different from the one in the true vacuum. There must be the phase transition of the A-term that rotates the phase of the condensate. The rotation produces net baryon number.

In conventional models of Affleck-Dine baryogenesis it is assumed that the phase transition of the collapsing condensate and the phase transition of the A-term take place almost simultaneously during the inflaton-dominated era of the Universe. Both of them were supposed to be induced by the supersymmetry breaking of the decreasing Hubble parameter. In the scenario of the conventional Affleck-Dine baryogenesis, the A-term induced by non-zero $`H`$ displaces the CP-violating phase. As $`H`$ becomes smaller, other sources for the A-term dominate and the shift of the phase turns into the driving force in the angular direction, which produces net baryon number.

However, in some cases, these phase transitions do not start simultaneously. The most serious example is the early oscillation induced by the thermal mass of the flat direction, which starts before the phase transition of the A-term. In such cases, the required baryon number is not produced. On the other hand, one can remedy this situation if the phase transition of the A-term starts earlier than the collapse of the condensate.

Here we try to construct models where the required phase transitions are completely separated from the inflation. When one discusses the cosmological domain wall, one must take into account the large (but local) domains of the quasi-degenerated vacua. In generic situations the radius of the domain immediately becomes as large as the Hubble radius. If the required condensate exists in one of these domains, the first requirement $`\varphi _{AD}0`$ is satisfied locally in the domain. Then our task is to construct a model where the A-term changes its phase before the collapse of the quasi-degenerated domain of the condensate.222The criteria for the cosmological domain wall is discussed in ref.. If they ever existed, they must have disappeared at $`t<t_c(G\sigma )^1`$.

The most significant difference from the conventional Affleck-Dine baryogenesis is that the production of the baryon number starts at much later period of the evolution of the Universe.

In this paper we construct a concrete model in which the required condensate is realized in the domain of the quasi-degenerated vacua. Our model starts with the situation where the Universe is occupied by the domains of the false and the true vacua.333 Of course one may consider the case where the destabilization of the field (1.6) appears inside cosmological defects such as walls and strings. Then there will be the volume factor suppression. The volume suppression is $`ϵ_{vol}\mathrm{\Delta }_{AD}/H^1`$ for domain walls and $`ϵ_{vol}(\mathrm{\Delta }_{AD}/H^1)^2`$ for strings, if one assumes only one configuration per unit horizon. For fat walls and strings, a viable baryon number production is expected in the allowed parameter regions. We also construct models in which the phase transition of the A-term is realized at low energy scale.

Let us consider a toy model with a potential in the domain of the false vacuum,

$$V(\varphi ,\varphi ^{})=m^{}_{}{}^{}2|\varphi _{AD}|^2+[\frac{a_o}{4M_p}\varphi _{AD}^4+h.c.]$$
(1.6)
where the vacuum expectation value of the Affleck-Dine field $`\varphi _{AD}`$ is non-zero. $`a_o`$ represents the A-term in the true vacuum.444 Eq.(1.6) represents the potential in the false vacuum domain of the condensate after the A-term phase transition. Please note that we are considering two types of false vacuum configurations that appear independently.  We must also include the temporal A-term,

$`V_A(\varphi ,\varphi ^{})=[{\displaystyle \frac{a^{}}{4M_p}}\varphi ^4+h.c.]`$ (1.7)
which disappears after $`t>t_A`$. Here $`t_A`$ denotes the time when the phase transition of the A-term takes place, and $`a^{}`$ is induced by the false vacuum configuration during $`t<t_A`$. $`a^{}`$ is required to be larger than $`a_o`$. Integrating the equation555 See eq.(1.5) in the review part., one can find the produced baryon number density in the domain of the false vacuum,

$$n_B\frac{4q_B}{9H}\left|\frac{a_0}{M_p}(\varphi _{AD}^{ini})^4\right|\delta _{eff}.$$
(1.8)
Unlike the conventional Affleck-Dine baryogenesis, here the Hubble parameter $`H`$ is the parameter that should be determined by the time of the A-term phase transition at $`t=t_A`$.

In Section 2 we show example in which the condensate is realized inside the domain of the quasi-degenerated vacua.

In section 3 we consider examples in which the misalignment of the A-term appears at the phase transition of the A-term.

## 2 Condensate in the false vacuum domain

In general models of Affleck-Dine baryogenesis, the destabilization of the flat direction is expected to be induced by the Hubble parameter, which is expected to be larger than $`m_{3/2}`$ at an earlier stage of the Universe.

In this section we consider examples in which the Affleck-Dine condensate is realized inside the domain of the false vacuum. The most significant difference from the conventional scenario is that the condensate is realized in the local domain and it can remain at much lower temperature after reheating.

We consider an additional sector that is described by the superpotential

$$W_M=\frac{1}{3}\lambda S^3\kappa _sS\mathrm{\Lambda }^2+\kappa _QS\overline{Q}^iQ^i.$$
(2.1)
The quark-like superfield $`Q^i`$ is not a conventional ingredient of the standard model, but charged with the standard model gauge group and $`U(1)_B`$. $`Q^i`$ can be replaced by the lepton-like superfield $`L^i`$ if one considers Affleck-Dine leptogenesis. The minima of this potential are at

$`<S>`$ $`=`$ $`\pm \sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{\kappa _s}{\lambda }}}\mathrm{\Lambda }`$
$`<\overline{Q}^iQ^i>`$ $`=`$ $`0`$ (2.2)
and

$`<S>`$ $`=`$ $`0`$
$`<\overline{Q}^iQ^i>`$ $``$ $`\mathrm{\Lambda }^2.`$ (2.3)
We set the scale $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ at the intermediate scale $`M_{EW}\mathrm{\Lambda }M_p`$, and assume that $`\kappa _s`$, $`\kappa _Q`$ and $`\lambda `$ are constants of O(1).

In this case, the Affleck-Dine field is not intended to be the flat direction of the model. The Affleck-Dine field is the baryonic direction that develops non-zero vacuum expectation value in the false vacuum (2). Here $`N_fN_c`$ heavy quarks are required in our messenger sector, which decouple in the true vacuum while they condensate in the false vacuum. We can define baryonic combinations $`B^{i_1\mathrm{}i_{N_c}}=Q^{i_1}\mathrm{}Q^{i_{N_c}}`$ as in the usual models of supersymmetric QCD, which is schematically denoted by $`\varphi _{AD}`$. Obviously, this direction is not the flat direction of the model. One can also add heavy leptonic fields $`L^i`$ in this sector.

Here we make a brief comment on the stability of the false vacuum and related domain walls. First, the degeneracy between (2) and (2) is obviously broken by the soft mass terms. In the presence of the soft mass terms, the difference between these vacua becomes $`ϵm_{soft}^2\mathrm{\Lambda }^2`$ if there is no miraculous cancellation, which is enough to explain the safe decay. We should also consider the degeneracy between $`S=\pm \sqrt{\frac{\kappa _s}{\lambda }}\mathrm{\Lambda }`$. In this case, one may gauge the relevant discrete symmetry, or expect destabilization by the effective terms induced by the gravitational interactions.

## 3 A-term phase transition

In this section we construct several examples of the A-term phase transition that induces the driving force in the angular direction of $`\varphi _{AD}`$.

### 3.1 Thermal phase transition

We shall first consider an example where the thermal effect triggers the phase transition at the critical temperature $`T_c`$.

The phase transition can be realized by imposing extra gauge symmetries such as $`U(1)_{BL}`$ or other string-motivated $`U(1)`$ symmetries.666 Affleck-Dine baryogenesis with gauged $`U(1)_{BL}`$ is discussed in ref. from a different point of view. These extended gauge symmetries are sometimes utilized to certificate the proton decay in many kinds of grand unification models. We can consider the case where the higher dimensional terms that break baryon (or lepton) number are suppressed by enhanced gauge symmetries, which is sometimes discussed in the light of string-derived GUT models. These symmetries are used to suppress naturally the unsafe $`d=4`$ as well as the color-triplet mediated or gravity induced $`d=5`$ proton-decay operators, which generically arise in unification models of supersymmetry. For example, in the models that contain $`BL`$ as a symmetry, the dangerous $`d=4`$ operators permitted by the standard model gauge symmetry are forbidden. However, such operators can in general appear through non-renormalizable operators if there exists a spontaneous breaking of the symmetry in the presence of non-zero vacuum expectation values of the fields that carry $`BL`$. To eliminate the dangerous $`d=5`$ operators, one may add other additional gauge symmetries or adjust the charge assignment of the $`BL`$ breaking field. Of course one may use discrete gauge symmetries alternatively.

Here we consider an additional superfield $`Z`$ charged with $`U(1)_{BL}`$. We assume that $`Z`$ is a standard model singlet with the flat potential destabilized by the soft mass. We consider a nonrenormalizable operator that contains $`Z`$,

$$W_A\frac{1}{M_p^{n3}}\left(\frac{Z}{M_p}\right)\varphi _{AD}^n$$
(3.1)
where $`\varphi _{AD}`$ denotes the AD direction that carries non-zero $`U(1)_{BL}`$ charge. We have set that the cut-off scale is simply given by the Planck scale. The relevant A-term takes the following form

$$V_Aam_{3/2}\frac{1}{M_p^{n3}}\left(\frac{Z}{M_p}\right)\varphi _{AD}^n+h.c.$$
(3.2)
where $`a`$ is the constant of $`O(1)`$.

$`Z`$ can be thermalized to obtain the thermal mass $`T^2`$, which stabilizes the potential. Let us assume that the above superpotential dominates the A-term in the true vacuum. On the other hand, in the false vacuum where $`Z`$ vanishes, other terms can naturally contribute to determine the phase of the condensate so that the expected value of the phase becomes different from the one in the true vacuum.777 Without loss of generality, we can assume that there are other sources of A-term that determine the phase of the condensate when $`Z`$ vanishes. For example, there is the A-term of the form $`V_A\frac{F_Z}{M_p^{n2}}\varphi _{AD}^n+h.c.`$ where $`F_Z\rho _I^{1/2}`$ during thermal inflation.  In this respect, the gap of the phase appears between the above two vacua. When the false vacuum of the A-term eventually collapses, the misalignment of the phase of $`\varphi _{AD}`$ produces net baryon number in the local domain of the condensate $`\varphi _{AD}0`$. In this model, the phase transition from $`<Z>=0`$ to $`<Z>\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ takes place at the temperature about $`T_cm_{3/2}`$ since the direction is expected to be flat around the origin.888 The nearly flat direction of this form may induce thermal inflation. The evolution of the domain wall during thermal inflation is already discussed in ref.. In this case, there should be a short period of thermal inflation, and the baryon number production occurs after thermal inflation. We can estimate the baryon to entropy ratio,

$$\frac{n_B}{s}\frac{T_{R_Z}}{H_o}\frac{|am_{3/2}Z\varphi _{AD}^n|}{M_p^{n2}\rho _I}$$
(3.3)
where $`\frac{n_b}{n_{\varphi _{AD}}}`$ is the ratio of the baryon to Affleck-Dine field number densities, which can be assumed to be $`O(1)`$. $`H_o`$ denotes the Hubble parameter at the time when the oscillation of the AD field starts, and $`T_{R_Z}`$ is the reheating temperature after thermal inflation. Assuming that the energy density during thermal inflation $`\rho _I`$ is $`\rho _I(m_{3/2}Z)^2`$, we can obtain the crude estimation for $`n=4`$,

$$\frac{n_B}{s}10^{10}\left(\frac{T_{R_Z}}{1GeV}\right)\left(\frac{10^2GeV}{m_{3/2}}\right)^2\left(\frac{10^{12}GeV}{<Z>}\right)^2\left(\frac{\varphi _{AD}}{10^9GeV}\right)^4,$$
(3.4)
where $`<Z>`$ is the vacuum expectation value of $`Z`$ in the true vacuum. Although in general $`H_o`$ is expected to be less than $`H_I=\rho _Z^{1/2}/M_p`$, here we have assumed $`H_oH_I`$ which corresponds to the case where the AD oscillation starts immediately after thermal inflation.

In this case, the baryon number is actually generated.

Let us discuss the string-derived symmetries for an another example. Without any additional symmetry other than the standard model gauge symmetry, a supersymmetric theory in general permits dimension 4 and dimension 5 operators that violate the baryon and lepton numbers. The operators in problem are written by using standard notations,

$`W`$ $`=`$ $`[\eta _1\overline{U}\overline{D}\overline{D}+\eta _2QL\overline{D}+\eta _3LL\overline{E}]`$ (3.5)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{M}}[\lambda _1QQQL+\lambda _2\overline{U}\overline{U}\overline{D}\overline{E}+\lambda _3LLH_2H_2].`$
Experimental limits on proton lifetime impose the constraint on the couplings as: $`\eta _1\eta _210^{24}`$ and $`\lambda _{1,2}/M10^{25}(GeV)^1`$. One may also impose the requirements that the symmetry naturally ensures the proton stability and simultaneously permits the light neutrino masses. The solution given in ref. utilizes the gauged $`BL`$ and other string-motivated symmetries, such as

$$\lambda _1\left(\frac{\stackrel{~}{\overline{N}_R}}{M}\right)\left(\frac{T_i\overline{T_j}}{M^2}\right)^210^{2.5}\left(\frac{\mathrm{\Lambda }_c}{M}\right)^4$$
(3.6)
where $`T_i\overline{T_j}`$ is the condensate in the hidden sector and their magnitude is denoted by $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_c^2`$.999 See ref. for notations. The experimental bound on $`\eta _{1,2}`$ implies $`(\mathrm{\Lambda }_c/M)^410^{9.5}`$. On the other hand, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_c`$ cannot be less than $`TeV`$, since then the heavy particles of the relevant gauge symmetry would be accessible to the experiments.

Here we consider another operator

$$W_A=\lambda _A\frac{T_i\overline{T}_j}{M_p^2}\frac{\varphi _{AD}^4}{M_p}.$$
(3.7)
In this model, naive thermal phase transition in the hidden sector ($`T_i\overline{T_j}=0`$ to $`T_i\overline{T_j}=\mathrm{\Lambda }_c^2`$) is expected to induce the misalignment of the phase. In this case, the temperature of the baryon number production is determined by the scale of the condensate of the hidden sector matter field $`T_i`$. The resultant baryon number is101010 See eq.(1.8) in the introduction.

$$n_B\frac{1}{H}\left[m_{3/2}\frac{|T_i\overline{T}_j\lambda _A\varphi _{AD}^4|}{M_p^3}\right]$$
(3.8)
where we have omitted numerical factors and parameters of $`O(1)`$. We estimate the baryon to entropy ratio at the critical temperature $`T_c\mathrm{\Lambda }_c`$,

$$\frac{n_B}{s}10^{10}\left(\frac{\varphi _{AD}}{10^{10}GeV}\right)^4\left(\frac{10^6GeV}{\mathrm{\Lambda }_c}\right)^3\left(\frac{m_{3/2}}{10^2GeV}\right).$$
(3.9)
### 3.2 Less trivial example

Here we consider different types of phase transitions. In both cases, misalignment of the phase is induced by the changes in the effective A-term. The difference is that in the above examples the changes are induced by thermal phase transition while in the following examples they are consequences of the decay of the false vacuum domains of the A-term. In general, there are two types of such phase transitions. In one case, an alternative A-term becomes larger than the ordinary one, while in the other case the misalignment appears because the phase of the conventional A-term takes different values in the quasi-degenerated domains.

Larger A-term appears in the false vacuum

The authors of ref. argued that additional A-terms possibly appear by thermal effect and it will be proportional to the temperature $`T`$. In ref., however, it is discussed that the A-term will not appear in generic situation.

Here we consider an alternative of A-term generation in ref.. We consider the case where the condensate of the trigger field is not due to the thermal effect, but is realized by the false vacuum field configuration. We consider terms in the potential of the form:

$$W=\lambda \frac{\varphi _{AD}^4}{M}+h\varphi _{AD}\xi \xi ,$$
(3.10)
where the field $`\xi `$ represents extra matter field that couples to the Affleck-Dine field with a Yukawa coupling. Higher dimensional couplings may be included in the coupling constant $`\lambda `$ and $`h`$. Then the potential includes terms such as:

$$V_A=h\lambda \frac{\varphi _{AD}^3}{M}\xi ^{}\xi ^{}.$$
(3.11)
If large vacuum expectation value of $`<\xi ^{}\xi ^{}>`$ is formed in the false vacuum, quite large A-term will effectively appear. As we have discussed in the previous section, it is possible to construct such configurations in which the scalar component of the field $`\xi `$ develops large expectation value in the false vacuum. When the false vacuum bubble shrinks or collapses due to the energy difference, misalignment will appear.111111 Here the false vacuum of the A-term does not cover the whole Universe, but it appears as a false vacuum domain of the $`H^1`$ size. Baryogenesis is expected to take place in the regions where both the field condensate and the additional A-term exist.  We can estimate the produced baryon number,

$$n_B\frac{1}{H}\left[\lambda \frac{m_{3/2}}{M_p}\varphi _{AD}^4\right]$$
(3.12)
where numerical factors and parameters of $`O(1)`$ are ignored. The resultant baryon to entropy ratio is

$$\frac{n_B}{s}10^{10}\left(\frac{\lambda }{10^{11}}\right)\left(\frac{m_{3/2}}{10^2GeV}\right)\left(\frac{\varphi _{AD}}{10^6GeV}\right)^4\left(\frac{10^5GeV}{T_A}\right)^5$$
(3.13)
where $`T_A`$ denotes the temperature when the condensate of $`\xi `$ decays.

For an alternative example, here we consider a model with the superpotential

$$W=S(\overline{X}X\mathrm{\Lambda }_X^2)+S^3.$$
(3.14)
Here we assume that $`S`$ is charged with the discrete gauged R-symmetry. The two degenerated minima of this potential are

$`<S>`$ $``$ $`\pm \mathrm{\Lambda }_X`$
$`<\overline{X}X>`$ $`=`$ $`0`$ (3.15)
and

$`<S>`$ $`=`$ $`0`$
$`<\overline{X}X>`$ $``$ $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_X^2.`$ (3.16)
The nonrenormalizable operators in the superpotential can be written as

$$W_A\frac{1}{M_p^{n3}}\left(\frac{S}{M_p}\right)\varphi _{AD}^n$$
(3.17)
where $`\varphi _{AD}`$ denotes the AD direction. We have set that the cut-off scale is simply given by the Planck scale.

When the false vacuum of $`S=0`$ eventually collapses, the misalignment of the AD phase appears producing net baryon number in the local domain of the AD condensate. In general the temperature of the baryogenesis is determined by the scale of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_X`$, from the requirement that the cosmological domain walls must decay before they dominate the Universe.121212 The constraint is discussed in appendix A. For $`n=6`$, the produced baryon number is

$$n_B\frac{1}{H}\left[\frac{m_{3/2}}{M_p^3}\frac{\mathrm{\Lambda }_X}{M_p}\varphi _{AD}^6\right]$$
(3.18)
where numerical factors and parameters of $`O(1)`$ are ignored. The resultant baryon to entropy ratio is

$$\frac{n_B}{s}10^{10}\left(\frac{\mathrm{\Lambda }_X}{10^9GeV}\right)\left(\frac{m_{3/2}}{10^2GeV}\right)\left(\frac{\varphi _{AD}}{10^9GeV}\right)^6\left(\frac{10^4GeV}{T_A}\right)^5$$
(3.19)
where $`T_A`$ denotes the temperature when the false vacuum domain of the A-term collapses.

Misalignment of the A-term

We can also consider another example in which the domain wall appears simply as the consequence of the spontaneously broken $`Z_N`$ symmetry of the coefficient in the A-term, which may appear when the A-term is determined by the field with the effective $`Z_N`$ symmetry. Then the misalignment of the A-term appears as the consequence of the discrete phases of a field, for example $`<X>\mathrm{\Lambda }_Xe^{\frac{2\pi ik}{N}}`$. The appearance of such misalignment is very natural since each field appearing in the A-term may have their effective discrete symmetries that is spontaneously broken by their vacuum expectation values.

In this case, there is a naive concern that the produced baryon in each $`k`$-domain may cancel when the contributions are summed over the whole Universe. To see what happens in our model, let us consider the relevant part of the potential of the form

$$V_A\frac{\lambda a_k}{M_p^{n3}}\varphi _{AD}^n+h.c.$$
(3.20)
where $`a_k`$ is assumed to be determined by the vacuum expectation value of the field. Here we consider the case where the misalignment occurs because the discrete domains of $`a_k=\mathrm{\Lambda }_ae^{\frac{2\pi i}{N}k}`$ are formed before baryon number production. In addition to the domains of $`k`$-vacuum of the A-term, there are discrete $`n`$ vacua that appear because of the effective $`Z_n`$ symmetry of the AD field. As the result, the initial phase in each domain takes the form

$$\theta _{\varphi _{AD}}^{ini}\frac{1}{n}\left[arg(\lambda )arg(a_k)+2\pi j\right],$$
(3.21)
where $`j=1,2,\mathrm{},n`$ and $`k=1,2,\mathrm{},N`$. In the conventional Affleck-Dine baryogenesis, one of the $`(j,k)`$ vacuum dominates the whole Universe because of the inflationary period, which determines the initial condition of Affleck-Dine baryogenesis. On the other hand, in our case, the resultant baryon number may contain the following summation factor. Let us denote the A-term in the final state by $`a_{k_0}`$. If there is no biasing, it is given by

$`ϵ_{sum}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{AllDomain}{}}\mathrm{sin}\left(arg(\lambda )+arg(a_{k_0})+narg(\varphi _{AD})\right)`$ (3.22)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{k=1}{\overset{N}{}}}\mathrm{sin}\left(arg(\lambda )+arg(a_{k_0})+\left[arg(\lambda )arg(a_k)+2\pi j\right]\right)`$
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{k=1}{\overset{N}{}}}\mathrm{sin}\left(arg(a_{k_0})arg(a_k)\right)`$
$`=`$ $`0`$
In the above example, cancellation occurs if there is no biasing at the domain formation.131313The mechanism for biasing the domain formation is discussed by many authors. See ref. for example. Estimation of the biasing factor requires computational simulations, which is not suitable for our motivation for this paper. In models for baryogenesis, the biasing factor is sometimes related to the CP violating phase of O(0.01). On the other hand, however, complete cancellation is rather miraculous because the biasing is expected in more realistic situations. We expect the biasing factor of $`ϵ_{sum}0.10.01`$ because the vacua as well as the potential is not strictly symmetric in our model.

Note that the cancellation cannot occur when the initial AD phase is determined by other A-terms.

## 4 Conclusions and Discussions

In this paper we have tried to separate the mechanism of Affleck-Dine baryogenesis from the inflation in order to avoid several obstacles in the original model. We have shown several examples for realizing Affleck-Dine baryogenesis in the alternative way. Our mechanism is quite efficient in producing baryons and we believe that application of our mechanism may solve the problems of the conventional models of baryogenesis. The idea of Affleck-Dine baryogenesis proceeding with different efficiency in local domains was suggested in ref. from different context.

## 5 Acknowledgment

We wish to thank K.Shima for encouragement, and our colleagues in Tokyo University for their kind hospitality.

## Appendix A Constraint on the cosmological domain walls

It is well known that whenever the Universe undergoes a phase transition associated with the spontaneous symmetry breaking, domain walls will inevitably form. In most cases, the domain walls are dangerous for the standard evolution of the universe. However, if some criteria are satisfied, unstable domain walls that disappear at $`t<t_c(G\sigma )^1`$ can exist. First, we review how to estimate the constraint to safely remove the cosmological domain walls. When the discrete symmetry is broken by gravitational interactions, the symmetry is an approximate discrete symmetry. The degeneracy is broken and the energy difference $`ϵ0`$ appears. Regions of the higher density vacuum tend to collapse, the corresponding force per unit area of the wall is $`ϵ`$. The energy difference $`ϵ`$ becomes dynamically important when this force becomes comparable to the force of the tension $`f\sigma /R_w`$, where $`\sigma `$ is the surface energy density of the wall and $`R_w`$ denotes the typical scale for the wall distance. For walls to disappear, this has to happen before they become harmful. On the other hand, the domain wall network is not a static system. In general, the initial shape of the walls right after the phase transition is determined by the random variation of the scalar VEV. One expects the walls to be very irregular, random surfaces with a typical curvature radius, which is determined by the correlation length of the scalar field. To characterize the system of domain walls, one can use a simulation. The system will be dominated by one large (infinite size) wall network and some finite closed walls (cells) when they form. The isolated closed walls smaller than the horizon will shrink and disappear soon after the phase transition. Since the walls smaller than the horizon size will efficiently disappear so that only walls at the horizon size will remain, their typical curvature scale will be the horizon size, $`RtM_p/g_{}^{\frac{1}{2}}T^2`$. Since the energy density of the wall $`\rho _w`$ is about

$$\rho _w\frac{\sigma }{R},$$
(A.1)
and the radiation energy density $`\rho _r`$ is

$$\rho _rg_{}T^4,$$
(A.2)
one sees that the wall dominates the evolution below a temperature $`T_w`$

$$T_w\left(\frac{\sigma }{g_{}^{1/2}M_p}\right)^{\frac{1}{2}}.$$
(A.3)
To prevent the wall domination, one requires the pressure to have become dominant before this epoch,

$$ϵ>\frac{\sigma }{R_{wd}}\frac{\sigma ^2}{M_p^2},$$
(A.4)
which is consistent with the criterion in ref.. Here $`R_{wd}`$ denotes the horizon size at the wall domination. A pressure of this magnitude would be produced by higher dimensional operators, which explicitly break the effective discrete symmetry.

The criterion (A.4) seems appropriate, if the scale of the wall is higher than $`(10^5GeV)^3`$. For the walls below this scale ($`\sigma (10^5GeV)^3`$), there should be further constraints coming from primordial nucleosynthesis. Since the time associated with the collapsing temperature $`T_w`$ is $`t_wM_p^2/g_{}^{\frac{1}{2}}\sigma 10^8\left(\frac{(10^2GeV)^3}{\sigma }\right)`$sec, the walls $`\sigma (10^5GeV)^3`$ will decay after nucleosynthesis. In this case, one must consider stronger constraint. If the walls are not hidden and are supposed to decay into standard model particles, the entropy produced when walls collapse will violate the phenomenological bounds for nucleosynthesis. On the other hand, this simple bound from the nucleosynthesis is not effective for the walls that cannot decay into standard model particles. The walls such as soft domain walls, the succeeding story should strongly depend on the details of the hidden components and their interactions. These walls can decay late to contribute to the large scale structure formation.

Of course, the condition for the cosmological domain wall not to dominate the Universe (A.4) should also be changed if the wall velocity is lower than the speed of the light and then the Universe contains walls more than one. This implies that the condition to evade the wall domination becomes $`ϵ>(\sigma ^2/M_p^2)\times x`$, where the constant $`x`$ is determined by $`R_w`$ as $`xM_p/(R_wT^2)`$. For the walls with lower velocity, the bound for $`ϵ`$ is inevitably raised since such walls will dominate earlier.

## Appendix B Comment on the early oscillation

In conventional scenarios of Affleck-Dine baryogenesis, the oscillation of condensates along flat directions that carry non-zero baryonic charge and attained large vacuum expectation values at the end of the inflationary epoch is important. Although these directions are flat, they may couple to other fields that acquire masses induced by the vacuum expectation values of the flat directions. If the masses of other fields are sufficiently small, the plasma of inflaton and their decay products can act on the flat directions, which may induce thermal masses. In such cases, the flat directions acquire large masses and start their oscillations earlier than usually estimated. There will be other way terminating the oscillations due to evaporation of the condensate. These thermal effects should alter the estimates of the conventional Affleck-Dine baryogenesis as is discussed in ref..

In our paper we have discussed the phase transition of the A-term at low energy scales. However, the scales of the phase transitions can be raised to much higher energy scales. If the typical scales of such A-term phase transitions are raised so that they can take place before the early oscillation, they can produce baryon number before the problematic early oscillation avoiding the problem of the original Affleck-Dine baryogenesis.


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# Magnetic order in the Shastry-Sutherland model

## I Introduction

The Shastry-Sutherland model defined by the two-dimensional spin 1/2 Hamiltonian

$`H`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{𝐱,𝐲}{}}𝐒(𝐱)𝐒(𝐲)+\alpha {\displaystyle \underset{𝐱,𝐲}{}}𝐒(𝐱)𝐒(𝐲)`$ (1)
with nearest neighbor couplings and frustrating next-nearest neighbor couplings on the diagonals shown in Fig. 1 has attracted a lot of interest for theoretical and experimental reasons:

(1) The product wave function

$`\mathrm{\Psi }`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{𝐱,𝐲}{}}[𝐱,𝐲]`$ (2)
built up from singlet states

$`[𝐱,𝐲]`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}}\left(\chi _+(𝐱)\chi _{}(𝐲)\chi _{}(𝐱)\chi _+(𝐲)\right)`$ (3)
is known to be an eigenstate of the Hamiltonian (1), which turns out to be the ground state, if the coupling $`\alpha `$ exceeds a critical value $`\alpha _c`$ ($`\alpha _c1.4`$).  The phase diagram has been studied recently by Weihong, Oitmaa and Hamer  by means of series expansions.

(2) The Hamiltonian (1) is suggested to be an appropriate model for the compound $`SrCu_2(BO_3)_2`$ the magnetic properties of which have been investigated in recent high magnetic field experiments. Plateaus have been found in the magnetization curve $`M=M(B)`$ at rational values of the magnetization $`M/M_S=1/3,\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1}/4,\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1}/8`$, where $`M_S=1/2`$ is the saturating magnetization.

From the theoretical point of view the appearance of magnetization plateaus is well understood in quasi one-dimensional systems, e.g. with ladder geometry.  Here, a quantization rule has been formulated by Oshikawa, Yamanaka and Affleck,  which originates from the prediction of soft modes  based on the Lieb-Schultz-Mattis (LSM) theorem.  Only the position of the possible plateaus – i.e. the quantized value of the magnetization – are predicted by this rule. The upper and lower critical fields which define the width of the plateau, however, depend on the magnitude of transition matrix elements with a momentum transfer corresponding to the relevant soft mode. These matrix elements contribute to the dynamical and static structure factors and a strong peak in these quantities at the soft mode momenta is needed for a pronounced plateau in the magnetization curve.

The extension of the Lieb Schultz Mattis construction to higher dimensions ($`D>1`$) meets difficulties. As was pointed out by Oshikawa  magnetization plateaus are possible in higher dimensions as well, provided that the “commensurability condition” is satisfied. Based on a topological argument he shows, that this condition is a robust non-perturbative constraint.

The emergence of magnetization plateaus in a modified Shastry-Sutherland model has been discussed in Ref. \[\]. Recently, Misguich, Jolicœr, and Girvin studied the emergence of magnetization plateaus in the framework of a Chern-Simons theory.

In Ref. \[\] Kageyama et al. proposed that product wave functions of the type (2) with certain distributions of $`N_S`$ singlets (3) and $`N_T`$ triplets

$`\{𝐱,𝐲\}`$ $`=`$ $`\chi _+(𝐱)\chi _+(𝐲)`$ (4)
might yield an appropriate ansatz for the ground state in the sector with total spin

$`S_T`$ $`=`$ $`N_T/4`$ (5)
where $`N_T`$ and $`N_S`$ are constrained by the total number of sites

$`N_S+N_T`$ $`=`$ $`N/2.`$ (6)
Typical examples of these states are shown in Figs. 2(b), 3(b), 4(c) and 4(d). An effective Hamiltonian, describing the interaction between singlets and triplets, has been developed and evaluated in Refs. \[\].

In this paper, we investigate a wider class of product wave functions \- which we call monomer-dimer configurations  \- and which are aimed to describe the magnetic order at those magnetizations ($`M=1/4,1/6,1/8,1/16`$), where plateaus are expected. Indeed we find a change in the magnetic order if the frustration parameter exceeds a critical value $`\alpha _c(M)`$, which depends on the magnetization $`M`$. For $`\alpha >\alpha _c(M)`$ we recover the singlet-triplet configurations proposed in Ref.\[\]. For $`\alpha <\alpha _c(M)`$, however, we find new configurations with lower energy.

The outline of the paper is as follows: In Sec. II we define the monomer-dimer configurations. In Sec. III we minimize the expectation value of the Hamiltonian (1) between monomer-dimer configurations. This procedure singles out specific configurations, which visualize the magnetic order at fixed magnetization $`M`$. In Sec. IV we introduce the “frozen monomer approximation”, which allows to lower the energy expectation values between monomer-dimer configurations without changing the magnetic order, i.e. the distribution of “frozen” monomers.

The quality of the frozen monomer approximation is studied for $`M=1/8,1/6,1/4`$ in Sec. V by a comparison with the ground state energies obtained from exact diagonalizations on finite clusters.

We also look for the formation of magnetization plateaus. Possible interpretations of the observed plateaus in $`SrCu_2(BO_3)_2`$ are discussed in Sec. VI.

## II Monomer-Dimer configurations

The Shastry-Sutherland Hamiltonian (1) conserves the total spin

$`𝐒`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{𝐱}{}}𝐒(𝐱)`$ (7)
and we therefore start from eigenstates of

$`𝐒^2`$ $`=`$ $`S(S+1)\text{and}S_3=S,\mathrm{},S.`$ (8)
Following Hulth en , these states $`|K,\nu =2S`$ can be constructed in the sector with total spin $`S`$ -i.e. magnetization $`M=S/N`$\- as product states of

* unpaired spin-up states at sites $`𝐱_1,\mathrm{},𝐱_\nu `$, $`\nu =2S`$:

$`|𝐱+`$ $`=`$ $`\chi _+(𝐱)`$ (9)
which we call “monomers”
* singlets of paired spins $`[𝐱,𝐲]`$ (3) at sites $`𝐱`$, $`𝐲`$ (“dimers”):

$`|K,\nu `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{j=1}{\overset{\nu =2S}{}}}|𝐱_j+{\displaystyle \underset{𝐱,𝐲}{}}[𝐱,𝐲]`$ (10)

Note, that in the monomer-dimer configuration $`K`$ each site $`𝐱`$ is occupied exactly once: either by a monomer or a dimer. Moreover, monomer-dimer configurations $`|K,\nu `$ yield an overcomplete non-orthogonal set of eigenstates with total spin $`S`$.

The expectation value of the Hamiltonian (1) between monomer-dimer configurations can be easily calculated with the following rules:

$`1+,2+|𝐒(1)𝐒(2)|1+,2+`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}`$ (11)
$`[1,2]|𝐒(1)𝐒(2)|[1,2]`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{3}{4}}`$ (12)
$`[1,3]2+|𝐒(1)𝐒(2)|[1,3]2+`$ $`=`$ $`0`$ (13)
$`[1,3][2,4]|𝐒(1)𝐒(2)|[1,3][2,4]`$ $`=`$ $`0.`$ (14)
If we count on each configuration the numbers

* $`N_1^{(0)}(K)`$ of nearest neighbor dimers
* $`N_2^{(0)}(K)`$ of next-nearest neighbor dimers (corresponding to Fig. 1)
* $`N_1^{(1)}(K)`$ of nearest neighbor monomer pairs
* $`N_2^{(1)}(K)`$ of next-nearest neighbor monomer pairs (corresponding to Fig. 1)

we can immediately compute the expectation value:

$`K,\nu |H|K,\nu `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{3}{4}}N_1^{(0)}{\displaystyle \frac{3}{4}}\alpha N_2^{(0)}`$ (16)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}N_1^{(1)}+{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha }{4}}N_2^{(1)}.`$
In order to minimize this expectation value we have to look for configurations with

* a maximum number of nearest neighbor dimers $`N_1^{(0)}`$ if $`\alpha <1`$
* a maximum number of next-nearest neighbor dimers $`N_2^{(0)}`$ if $`\alpha >1`$
* a minimum number of monomer pairs $`N_1^{(1)}`$, $`N_2^{(1)}`$ on nearest and next-nearest neighbor sites.

## III Magnetic ordering at fixed magnetizations

### A $`M=1/4`$, $`\nu =N/2`$

Let us start with $`M=1/4`$. In this situation we have to distribute $`\nu =N/2`$ monomers and $`N/4`$ dimers on the square lattice. We cannot avoid the appearance of monomer pairs on nearest and next-nearest neighbor sites, but we can minimize their numbers $`N_1^{(1)}`$ and $`N_2^{(1)}`$ if we cover the lattice in the way shown in Fig.2(a). The bold lines symbolize the nearest-neighbor singlets, the thin lines the monomer pairs on nearest and next-nearest neighbor sites. Dimer pairs can interact via the next-nearest neighbor couplings in the Hamiltonian; they are represented by dotted lines. According to (16), the expectation value of the Hamiltonian is found to be:

$`E(K_1,1/4)`$ $`=`$ $`K_1,N/2|H|K_1,N/2`$ (17)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{N}{8}}(1+\alpha /4).`$ (18)
A second configuration, shown in Fig. 2(b) has been proposed in Ref.\[\] as a possible ground state configuration for $`M=1/4`$. In this case, the expectation value of $`H`$ turns out to be:

$`E(K_2,1/4)`$ $`=`$ $`K_2,N/2|H|K_2,N/2`$ (19)
$`=`$ $`\alpha {\displaystyle \frac{N}{8}}.`$ (20)
The difference of (17) and (19)

$`E(K_1,1/4)E(K_2,1/4)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{N}{8}}(1+{\displaystyle \frac{5}{4}}\alpha )`$ (21)
changes its sign for $`\alpha =4/5`$, which means there is a change in the magnetic order from configuration $`K_1`$ to $`K_2`$ if the frustration parameter exceeds the value $`\alpha _c(M=1/4)=4/5`$.

### B $`M=1/6`$, $`\nu =N/3`$

Next, we turn to the case $`M=1/6`$, where we have to distribute $`\nu =N/3`$ monomers and $`N/3`$ dimers on the lattice. The configuration $`K_1`$ \[Fig. 3(a)\] minimizes the number $`N_2^{(1)}`$ of monomer pairs on next-nearest neighbor sites, whereas in the configuration $`K_2`$ \[Fig. 3(b)\] the next-nearest neighbor sites of Fig. 1 are occupied with singlets and triplets in the spirit of Ref.\[\]. The difference of the expectation values of $`H`$

$`E(K_1,1/6)`$ $`=`$ $`K_1,N/3|H|K_1,N/3`$ (23)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{N}{4}}(1{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha }{12}})`$ (24)
$`E(K_2,1/6)`$ $`=`$ $`K_2,N/3|H|K_2,N/3`$ (25)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{N}{4}}{\displaystyle \frac{5\alpha }{6}}`$ (26)
$`E(K_1,1/6)E(K_2,1/6)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{N}{4}}(1{\displaystyle \frac{11}{12}}\alpha )`$ (27)
changes sign for $`\alpha _c(M=1/6)=12/11`$. Again we observe a change in the magnetic order from $`K_1`$ to $`K_2`$ if $`\alpha `$ passes this value.

It is remarkable to note, that in both cases $`\alpha <\alpha _c(M=1/6)`$ and $`\alpha >\alpha _c(M=1/6)`$ a stripe order of the monomers is predicted.

### C $`M=1/8`$, $`\nu =N/4`$

In the case of $`M=1/8`$ we have to distribute $`\nu =N/4`$ monomers and $`3N/8`$ dimers on the square lattice. We can avoid now completely the appearance of monomer pairs on nearest and next-nearest neighbor sites as is demonstrated by the configuration $`K_1`$ shown in Fig. 4(a). Owing to the stripe structure, we can also construct a second configuration \[Fig. 4(b)\] with $`N_1^{(0)}=N/8`$ dimers on nearest neighbor sites and $`N_2^{(0)}=N/4`$ dimers on next-nearest neighbor sites. Two further configurations $`K_3`$ and $`K_4`$ have been proposed in Refs. \[\], which only contain $`N_1^{(0)}=3N/8`$ dimers and $`N_1^{(1)}=N/8`$ monomer pairs on next-nearest neighbor sites.

The corresponding energy expectation values are

$`E(K_1,1/8)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{9}{32}}N`$ (29)
$`E(K_2,1/8)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{3}{32}}N(1+2\alpha )`$ (30)
$`E(K_3,1/8)`$ $`=`$ $`E(K_4,1/8)={\displaystyle \frac{N}{4}}\alpha .`$ (31)
Comparing the expectation values (29)-(31) we expect a change in the magnetic order with $`\alpha `$:

$`\alpha <1:`$ $`E(K_1)<E(K_2)<E(K_3)=E(K_4)`$ (32)
$`1<\alpha <{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}:`$ $`E(K_2)<E(K_1)<E(K_3)=E(K_4)`$ (33)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}<\alpha :`$ $`E(K_3)=E(K_4)<E(K_2)<E(K_1).`$ (34)
## IV The frozen monomer approximation (FMA)

The monomer-dimer configurations which we developed in the last section to describe the magnetic order in the Shastry-Sutherland model are not eigenstates of the Hamiltonian (1). Application of (1) onto these states will generate new states. In this section we study the impact of those couplings in the Hamiltonian, which generate interactions only between dimer pairs, i.e. we consider an approximation where the $`\nu `$ monomers are frozen at sites $`𝐱_1\mathrm{}𝐱_\nu `$ in the configuration $`|K,\nu `$. For each of these configurations, we define a decomposition of the Hamiltonian in three parts:

$`H`$ $`=`$ $`H_\nu +H(K)+{\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}H(𝐱_i,K)`$ (35)
where

* $`H_\nu `$ contains all the nearest and next-nearest neighbor couplings between the sites $`𝐱_1\mathrm{}𝐱_\nu `$, where the monomers are located. All other sites are occupied with dimers. They form an antiferromagnetic cluster $`K`$, which are represented by the dimers and the dotted connections between dimers in Figs. 2(a)-4(d).
* The cluster Hamiltonians $`H(K)`$ is defined by the nearest and next-nearest neighbor couplings on the dimer cluster $`K`$.
* The nearest and next-nearest neighbor couplings in $`H(𝐱_i,K)`$ take into account the remaining interactions between the monomer at site $`𝐱_i`$ and the dimers in the cluster $`K`$.

The ground state energy $`E(K)`$ of the antiferromagnetic cluster Hamiltonian $`H(K)`$

$`H(K)\mathrm{\Psi }(K)`$ $`=`$ $`E(K)\mathrm{\Psi }(K).`$ (36)
is obviously lower than the expectation value of $`H(K)`$ between the dimer product wave function on the cluster $`K`$.

The product ansatz

$`|𝐱_1\mathrm{}𝐱_\nu ,K`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{\nu =2S}{}}}|𝐱_i+{\displaystyle \underset{j}{}}\mathrm{\Psi }(K)`$ (37)
yields an eigenfunction of $`H_\nu +H(K)`$ with energy

$`E(K,\nu )`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}N_1^{(1)}(K)+{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha }{4}}N_2^{(1)}(K)+E(K)`$ (38)
which again represents an upper bound for the exact ground state energy $`E_0(M=\nu /2N)`$ of (35) in the sector with magnetization $`M=S/N`$:

$`E_0(M=\nu /2N)`$ $``$ $`E(K,\nu ).`$ (39)
In the derivation of (39) one has to use the fact, that the expectation value of the interaction term $`H(\nu ,K)`$ between the product state (37) vanishes, since

$`\mathrm{\Psi }(K)|S_l(y)|\mathrm{\Psi }(K)`$ $`=`$ $`0yK,l=1,2,3.`$ (40)
## V Numerical results

In order to check the quality of the frozen monomer approximation (FMA), we have computed the energies (38) and compared with exact diagonalizations of the Shastry-Sutherland Hamiltonian at fixed magnetization $`M=\nu /2N`$ on lattices with $`N=4\times 4=16`$ and $`N=4\times 6=24`$.

The strongest effects due to the frozen monomer approximation occur at small magnetizations. We therefore start with $`M=1/8`$.

### A $`M=1/8`$

From Fig. 4(a)-4(c) we see that the interactions between the dimers generate a two-dimensional cluster which contains all dimers in the configuration. In contrast, the dimers in Fig. 4(d) form quasi-one-dimensional “stripe” clusters.

In Fig. 5 the expectation values $`E(K_j,M=1/8,\alpha )`$, $`j=1,2,3,4`$ in the frozen monomer approximation – corresponding to the configurations Fig. 4(a)-4(d) – are represented by dotted lines.

The following points should be noted:

* The transition in the magnetic order from configuration $`K_2`$ \[Fig. 4(b)\] to configuration $`K_3`$ \[Fig. 4(c)\] occurs here at a larger value of the frustration parameter

$`\alpha _c(M=1/8)`$ $``$ $`2.3.`$ (41)
At this value the difference in the expectation values $`E(K_1,M=1/8,\alpha )E(K_3,M=1/8,\alpha )`$ changes sign. For smaller values of $`\alpha `$ the distribution of monomers according to Fig. 4(a),(b) is favored in comparison with the distribution of triplets in Fig. 4(c),(d).
* For $`\alpha >1.3`$ the expectation values

$`E(K_3,M)`$ $`=`$ $`E(K_4,M)`$ (42)
corresponding to configurations $`K_3`$ and $`K_4`$ \[Fig. 4(c) and Fig. 4(d)\] coincide in the frozen monomer approximation. Indeed, here, the dimer product ansatz (10) is an eigenstate of the antiferromagnetic cluster Hamiltonian (36). In other words: The interactions between the dimers \[dotted lines in Fig. 4(c),(d)\] do not lower the ground state expectation value.
* The expectation values $`E(K_j,M=1/8)`$ deviate significantly for $`\alpha 1.3`$ from the exact results given by the solid curves. Therefore, other distributions of monomers should play an important role in the exact ground state.
* For small $`\alpha `$, the eact results show a linear behavior which is well reproduced in a perturbative expansion in $`\alpha `$:

$`N^1E_0(M,\alpha )`$ $`=`$ $`ϵ_1(M)+{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha }{4}}ϵ_2(M)`$ (43)
where

$`ϵ_j(M)`$ $`=`$ $`0|𝐒(𝐱)𝐒(𝐲)|0j=1,2`$ (44)
$`ϵ_1(1/8)`$ $``$ $`0.59`$ (45)
$`ϵ_2(1/8)`$ $``$ $`+0.43`$ (46)
are the ground state expectation values of the nearest neighbor ($`j=1`$, $`𝐱,𝐲`$) and next-nearest neighbor ($`j=2`$, $`𝐱,𝐲`$) spin-spin correlators of the unfrustrated Hamiltonian $`H(\alpha =0)=H_1(1,1)`$.
* Finite-size effects are small, as can be seen from a comparison of the exact results for the two systems $`N=16`$ and $`N=24`$.

### B $`M=1/6`$

In this case the interactions between the dimers form quasi-one-dimensional clusters with stripe geometry as can be seen from Fig. 3(a),(b). The expectation values $`E(K_j,M=1/6,\alpha )`$ $`j=1,2`$ in the frozen monomer approximation are shown in Fig. 6. The transition point in the magnetic order is found her at

$`\alpha _c(M=1/6)`$ $`=`$ $`1.2.`$ (47)
At this point the exact result of the $`N=4\times 6=24`$ system (solid line) has its maximum. The expectation values $`E(K_j,M=1/6)`$ deviate significantly for $`\alpha <1.2`$ from the exact results given by the solid curve.

### C $`M=1/4`$

The configuration $`K_1`$ in Fig. 2(a) is built up from 4-point singlet clusters. In the frozen monomer approximation we lower the energy if we substitute each dimer pair

$`[1,2][3,4]`$ $``$ $`\mathrm{\Psi }(1,2,3,4)`$ (48)
by the ground state of the 4-point cluster computed from the 4-point Hamiltonian

$`H(1,2,3,4)`$ $`=`$ $`𝐒(1)𝐒(2)+𝐒(3)𝐒(4)+\alpha 𝐒(2)𝐒(3).`$ (49)
The corresponding ground state energy

$`E(1,2,3,4)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2+\alpha }{4}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\left(42\alpha +\alpha ^2\right)^{1/2}<{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}`$ (50)
is lower than the energy of the dimer pair. Taking into account this effect in the expectation value (17) we find

$`E(K_1,M=1/4)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{N}{16}}\left(42\alpha +\alpha ^2\right)^{1/2}.`$ (51)
Note that there are no interactions between the dimers in the configuration $`K_2`$ \[Fig. 2(b)\]. Therefore the ground state energy (19) cannot be lowered through the frozen monomer approximation. The energy differences of (51) and (19) changes its sign at

$`\alpha _c(M=1/4)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}}(1+\sqrt{3})0.869.`$ (52)
Below this value the expectation value $`E(K_1,M=1/4)`$ is a very poor approximation for the exact ground state energy, indicating that the true ground state is not reproduced adequately by the frozen monomer approximation.

In Fig. 8 we compare the energy expectation values $`E(K_1,M=1/4,\alpha )`$ (51) and, $`E(K_2,M=1/4,\alpha )`$ (19) with the exact diagonalization on finite systems with $`N=4\times 4=16`$ and $`N=4\times 6=24`$ sites. The maximum of the exact ground state energy $`E_0(M=1/4,\alpha )`$ is found at $`\alpha 1.5`$ far beyond the transition point (52) from configuration $`K_1`$ to $`K_2`$.

We have also studied the formation of plateaus in the magnetization curve at $`M=1/8,1/6,1/4`$ by exact diagonalizations on the finite clusters with $`N=4\times 4=16`$ and $`N=4\times 6=24`$ sites. The lower and upper critical fields

$`B_L(M,\alpha )`$ $`=`$ $`E_0(M,\alpha )E_0(M2/N,\alpha )`$ (53)
$`B_U(M,\alpha )`$ $`=`$ $`E_0(M+2/N,\alpha )E_0(M,\alpha )`$ (54)
were computed from ground state energies $`E_0(M2/N,\alpha )`$, $`E_0(M,\alpha )`$, $`E_0(M+2/N,\alpha )`$ with neighboring total spins $`S1,S,S+1`$, $`S=MN`$. The results are shown in Fig. 9 (a) for $`M=1/8`$ (b) for $`M=1/6`$ (c) for $`M=1/4`$.

For $`\alpha <1.2`$ all critical fields are rather $`\alpha `$-independent. The finite-size effects indicate that the plateau width

$`\mathrm{\Delta }(M,\alpha )`$ $`=`$ $`B_U(M,\alpha )B_L(M,\alpha )\text{for }\alpha <1.2`$ (55)
will vanish in the thermodynamic limit $`N\mathrm{}`$ as it is known for the unfrustrated model ($`\alpha =0`$).

For $`\alpha =1.5`$ the lower critical fields $`B_L(M=1/8,\alpha )`$ and $`B_L(M=1/6,\alpha )`$ have a pronounced minimum; beyond this value ($`\alpha >1.5`$) all lower and upper critical fields for $`M=1/8,1/6`$ increase with $`\alpha `$.

For $`M=1/8`$ \[Fig. 9(a)\] and $`\alpha >1.5`$, finite-size effects appear to be small for $`B_L(M=1/8,\alpha )`$ but large for $`B_U(M=1/8,\alpha )`$. We suggest that the rectangular geometry of the $`4\times 6`$ system might be responsible for this failure. It breaks the rotational invariance and therefore does not allow for the rotated patterns in Fig. 4.

For $`M=1/4`$ \[Fig. 9(c)\] and $`\alpha >1.5`$ we observe a rather clean signal for the opening of a magnetization plateau.

## VI Discussion and perspectives

In this paper, we have investigated the magnetic order of the Shastry-Sutherland model at fixed magnetizations $`M=1/8,1/6,1/4`$. For large enough values of the frustration parameter

$`\alpha >\alpha _c(M=1/8)=2.3,`$ $`\alpha >\alpha _c(M=1/6)=1.2,`$ (56)
$`\alpha >\alpha _c(M=1/4)=0.89`$ (57)
configurations built up from singlets and triplets on the Shastry-Sutherland lattice \[cf. Figs. 2(b), 3(b), 4(c),(d)\] – as they were proposed in \[\] – yield the lowest energy expectation values. Here, a strong coupling approach ($`\alpha ^10`$) to take into account singlet-triplet interactions is applicable. With this method Momoi and Totsuka  found evidence for plateaus in the magnetization curve at $`M=1/4`$ and $`M=1/6`$. However, they did not find plateaus at smaller magnetizations ($`M=1/8`$ and $`M=1/16`$), “since the mechanism to stabilize these plateaus is not yet clear” – as they say.

We think that this failure has a simple explanation: The singlet-triplet configurations on the Shastry-Sutherland lattice (cf. e.g. Fig. 4(c),(d) for $`M=1/8`$) are unfavorable, since the formation of triplets on next-nearest neighbor sites costs energy \[cf. e.g. (16)\]. Configurations – like $`K_2`$ in Fig. 4(b) for $`M=1/8`$ – with well separated monomers (unpaired spin-up states) yield a lower energy as long as $`\alpha `$ is not too large ($`\alpha <\alpha _c(M=1/8)=2.3`$).

If the coupling $`\alpha `$ – realized in the compound $`SrCu_2(BO_3)_2`$ – is indeed below this value, the experimentally observed plateaus at $`M=1/8`$ and $`M=1/16`$ cannot be associated with singlet-triplet configurations on the Shastry-Sutherland lattice.

In order to find the correct magnetic order at low magnetizations $`M<\nu /2N`$ and $`\alpha <2.3`$ a more general ansatz for the ground state configurations is needed. This can be constructed in terms of monomers at fixed sites $`𝐱_1\mathrm{}𝐱_\nu `$. The spins on the remaining sites form an antiferromagnetic cluster, the ground state energy of which depends on the fixed positions of the $`\nu `$ monomers. Therefore, a specific distribution of monomers characterizing the magnetic order is given by a minimum of the ground state energy of the corresponding antiferromagnetic cluster (cf. e.g. Fig. 4(a),(b) for $`M=1/8`$). We expect that for small values of $`M`$ – in particular in the sectors with a finite number $`\nu `$ of monomers, i.e. $`M=\nu /2N0`$ for $`N\mathrm{}`$ – the singlet-triplet configurations on the Shastry-Sutherland lattice are dominant again (for $`\alpha \alpha _c(M=0)=1.4`$). Each of the $`(N\nu )/2`$ singlets lowers the energy by $`3\alpha /4`$ whereas each of the few ($`\nu /2`$) triplets costs energy $`\alpha /4`$.

It should also be noted that the frozen monomer approximation becomes better and better for $`M0`$, since the antiferromagnetic clusters cover more and more of the whole lattice.

Finally, we have also studied the formation of plateaus in the magnetization curve of the Shastry-Sutherland model.

We looked for the $`\alpha `$-dependence of the lower and upper critical fields as they follow from exact diagonalizations on finite clusters with $`N=4\times 4=16`$ and $`N=4\times 6=24`$ sites. All the critical fields are almost $`\alpha `$-independent for $`\alpha <1.2`$, but change rapidly above this value. Indications for the opening of a plateau are visible for $`M=1/4,1/6`$ supporting previous results with other methods.

The situation for $`M=1/8`$ appears to be more subtle. The lower critical field has a pronounced minimum at $`\alpha =1.5`$. Here, the finite-size effects are rather small. In contrast the upper critical field reveals a strong finite-size dependence. Computations on larger systems are needed for a reliable estimate of the thermodynamic limit.

###### Acknowledgements.

We are indebted to M. Karbach for a critical reading of the manuscript.


text:
# Semistable reduction for overconvergent 𝐹-isocrystals on a curve

## 1 Introduction

The purpose of this paper is to prove the following semistable reduction theorem for overconvergent $`F`$-isocrystals on a curve, answering a conjecture of de Jong \[dJ, Section 5\], a reformulation of a conjecture of Crew (of which more about below).

###### Theorem 1.1 (Semistable reduction).

Let $`X`$ be a smooth, geometrically connected curve over a field $`k`$ of characteristic $`p>0`$, let $`K`$ be a finite, totally ramified extension of $`\mathrm{Frac}(W(k))`$ admitting a lift of the $`p`$-power Frobenius on $`k`$, and let $``$ be an overconvergent $`F^a`$-isocrystal on $`X`$ with respect to $`K`$ for some $`a`$. Then after replacing $`k`$ by a suitable finite purely inseparable extension (depending on $``$), there exist a finite generically étale morphism $`f:X_1X`$, a smooth compactification $`j:X_1\overline{X_1}`$ of $`X_1`$, and a log-$`F^a`$-isocrystal $``$ on $`(\overline{X_1},\overline{X_1}X_1)/K`$ such that $`j^{}f^{}`$.

Our basic approach is to use the quasi-unipotence theorem ($`p`$-adic local monodromy theorem) for $`F^a`$-isocrystals, plus a matrix factorization argument from \[Ke1\], to “fill in” $``$ at each of the points of $`\overline{X_1}X_1`$. The quasi-unipotence theorem, conjectured by Crew \[Cr, Section 10\], follows from the work of any of André \[A\], Mebkhout \[M\], or the author \[Ke2\]; see Proposition 3.1 for the formulation we need here.

Theorem 1.1 “almost” yields a more precise statement proposed by Crew \[Cr\], by implying that there exists a finite morphism $`f:X_1X`$ such that $`f^{}`$ is unipotent at each point of $`\overline{X_1}X_1`$. (In fact, we will prove Theorem 1.1 by proving this first.) The caveat is that Crew actually wanted $`f`$ to be étale. We have only been able to achieve this in the unit-root case, and do not know whether it should be possible in general; it definitely fails if we allow $``$ to be a log-$`F^a`$-isocrystal to start with. We discuss these matters in Section 6.

We hope to extend Theorem 1.1 to higher dimensional varieties in subsequent work. In this case, we must allow the morphism $`f:X_1X`$ to be generically étale, but not necessarily finite, because the normalization of $`X`$ in a finite extension of its function field need not be smooth. For this and other reasons, the argument in higher dimensions will be technically more involved.

The precise higher-dimensional analogue of Theorem 1.1 has been formulated conjecturally by Shiho \[S, Conjecture 3.1.8\]; by Shiho’s work, proving this statement would provide good comparison results between rigid and crystalline cohomology. For example, it would yield an alternate proof of finite dimensionality of rigid cohomology of a curve with coefficients in an overconvergent $`F`$-isocrystal, via comparison with crystalline cohomology; Theorem 1.1 does this for curves. (Crew’s proof in \[Cr\] uses $`p`$-adic functional analytic techniques; the general finiteness proof in \[Ke3\] uses a devissage to the curve case.)

### Acknowledgments

Thanks to Pierre Berthelot, Johan de Jong and Fabien Trihan for helpful discussions. The author was partially supported by a National Science Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship.

## 2 Definitions and notations

We set up notation following \[Ke3\]; this makes it a bit more convenient to work with global objects than does the notation of \[Ke2\]. We retain the convention of \[Ke2\] that all matrices are $`n\times n`$ matrices and $`I`$ denotes the identity matrix.

Let $`k`$ be a field of characteristic $`p>0`$, and let $`C(k)`$ be a Cohen ring for $`k`$, that is, a complete discrete valuation ring with residue field $`k`$ and maximal ideal generated by $`p`$. (See \[Bo\] for proof of existence and basic properties of Cohen rings.) Let $`K`$ be a finite totally ramified extension of $`\mathrm{Frac}C(k)`$, let $`𝒪`$ be the integral closure of $`C(k)`$ in $`K`$, and let $`v_p`$ denote the $`p`$-adic valuation on $`K`$. Assume that there exists a ring endomorphism $`\sigma _0`$ on $`𝒪`$ lifting the $`p`$-power Frobenius on $`k`$. Let $`q=p^a`$ be a power of $`p`$, and put $`\sigma =\sigma _0^a`$.

The ring $`_r`$ consists of bidirectional power series $`_ic_iu^i`$, with $`c_iK`$, such that

$$\underset{i\pm \mathrm{}}{lim}sv_p(c_i)+i=\mathrm{}(0<sr);$$

for each $`s`$, the function $`w_s(_ic_iu^i)=\mathrm{min}_i\{sv_p(c_i)+i\}`$ is a nonarchimedean valuation on $`_r`$. The ring $``$ (the “Robba ring”) is the union of the $`_r`$ over all $`r>0`$. Its subring $`^{\mathrm{int}}`$ consists of those series with $`c_i𝒪`$ for all $`i`$; this subring is a (noncomplete) discrete valuation ring, unramified over $`𝒪`$, with residue field the field $`k((t))`$ of formal Laurent series in $`k`$. (In \[Ke2\], the rings $``$ and $`^{\mathrm{int}}`$ are called $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\mathrm{an},\mathrm{con}}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\mathrm{con}}`$, respectively.) By adding the superscript $`+`$ or $``$ to $``$ or $`^{\mathrm{int}}`$, we will mean the subring with only nonnegative or nonpositive powers of $`u`$, respectively.

For $`L/k((t))`$ finite separable, there is a natural discrete valuation ring $`_L^{\mathrm{int}}`$, integral and unramified over $`^{\mathrm{int}}`$, with residue field $`L`$. Namely, take any monic polynomial $`P(x)`$ over $`^{\mathrm{int}}`$ whose reduction $`\overline{P}`$ satisfies $`Kk((t))[x]/(\overline{P}(x))`$, and put $`_L^{\mathrm{int}}^{\mathrm{int}}[x]/(P(x))`$.

The Monsky-Washnitzer algebra of rank $`n`$ is defined as

$$W_n=\{\underset{I}{}c_Ix^I:c_I𝒪,\underset{I}{lim\; inf}\frac{v_p(c_I)}{I}>0\},$$

where $`I=(i_1,\mathrm{},i_n)`$ represents an $`n`$-tuple of nonnegative integers, $`x^I=x_1^{i_1}\mathrm{}x_n^{i_n}`$ and $`I=i_1+\mathrm{}+i_n`$. An *integral dagger algebra* is any quotient $`A^{\mathrm{int}}`$ of a Monsky-Washnitzer algebra which is flat over $`𝒪`$ and for which $`\mathrm{Spec}(A^{\mathrm{int}}_𝒪k)`$ is smooth over $`\mathrm{Spec}(k)`$. (Given $`A^{\mathrm{int}}_𝒪k`$, one can always find a corresponding $`A^{\mathrm{int}}`$; see \[vdP\].) A *dagger algebra* $`A`$ is an algebra of the form $`A^{\mathrm{int}}_𝒪K`$ for some integral dagger algebra $`A^{\mathrm{int}}`$ (uniquely determined by $`A`$ and the $`p`$-adic valuation on $`A`$).

Given a dagger algebra $`A`$ with $`A^{\mathrm{int}}W_n/𝔞`$ and $`fA`$ not a zero divisor, the *localization* $`A^{}`$ of $`A`$ at $`f`$ is the dagger algebra with

$$(A^{})^{\mathrm{int}}W_{n+1}/(W_{n+1}𝔞+(fx_{n+1}1)W_{n+1});$$

this is a dagger algebra in which $`f`$ is invertible.

Given a dagger algebra $`A`$ with $`A^{\mathrm{int}}W_n/𝔞`$ for some ideal $`𝔞`$ of $`W_n`$, we define $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{A/K}^1`$ as the free $`A`$-module generated by symbols $`dx_1,\mathrm{},dx_n`$, modulo relations of the form $`da=0`$ for $`a𝔞_𝒪K`$. By construction, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{A/K}^1`$ is equipped with a $`K`$-linear derivation $`d:A\mathrm{\Omega }_{A/K}^1`$.

## 3 Log-$`F`$-isocrystals and log-$`(\sigma ,)`$-modules

Let $`A`$ be a dagger algebra and $`\sigma _0:A^{\mathrm{int}}A^{\mathrm{int}}`$ a lift of the $`p`$-power Frobenius map extending the given $`\sigma _0`$ on $`𝒪`$; again, set $`\sigma =\sigma _0^a`$. (Such a lift always exists: again, see \[vdP\].) Given $`uA`$ such that $`u^\sigma /u^q`$ is invertible in $`A`$, we define the logarithmic module of differentials $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{A/K}^1[d\mathrm{log}u]`$ by adding to $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{A/K}^1`$ a symbol $`d\mathrm{log}u`$ such that $`u(d\mathrm{log}u)=du`$; then $`d\sigma `$ extends to $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{A/K}^1[d\mathrm{log}u]`$ sending $`du/u`$ to $`qdu/u+d(u^\sigma /u^q)/(u^\sigma /u^q)`$. We define a *log-$`(\sigma ,)`$-module* over $`A`$ (with respect to $`u`$) as a finite locally free $`A`$-module $`M`$ equipped with a $`\sigma `$-linear map $`F`$ that induces an isomorphism $`F:M_{A,\sigma }AM`$, and with an $`A`$-linear connection $`:MM_A\mathrm{\Omega }_{A/K}^1[d\mathrm{log}u]`$ which is integrable (i.e., which satisfies $`_1=0`$ for $`_1:M\mathrm{\Omega }_{A/K}^1[d\mathrm{log}u]M_A^2\mathrm{\Omega }_{A/K}^1[d\mathrm{log}u]`$ induced by $``$) and which makes the following diagram commute:

If $`u=1`$, we drop the “log” and simply refer to $`M`$ as a $`(\sigma ,)`$-module. We analogously define $`(\sigma ,)`$-modules over $``$ for $`\sigma :`$ induced by the $`a`$-th composition power of a map $`\sigma _0:^{\mathrm{int}}^{\mathrm{int}}`$ of the form

$$\underset{i}{}c_iu^i\underset{i}{}c_i^{\sigma _0}(u^{\sigma _0})^i$$

lifting the $`p`$-th power map. In this case, we take $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{/K}^1`$ to be the free $``$-module generated by $`du`$. (Note: since we are only considering curves, the integrability condition will be superfluous in our situations, as $`^2\mathrm{\Omega }^1`$ will vanish.)

Log-$`(\sigma ,)`$-modules are Zariski-local avatars of more global objects, namely overconvergent log-$`F^a`$-isocrystals. Rather than take space for a full-blown definition of log-$`F^a`$-isocrystals here, we summarize the key features of the definition below.

* If $`X`$ is smooth over $`k`$ and equipped with the fine log structure associated to some strict normal crossings divisor $`Z`$, there is a category of overconvergent log-$`F^a`$-isocrystals on the pair $`(X,Z)`$. (We drop the “log” if $`Z`$ is empty.)
* An oveconvergent log-$`F^a`$-isocrystal on $`(X,Z)`$ can be specified by giving overconvergent log-$`F^a`$-isocrystals on an affine cover of $`X`$ plus isomorphisms on the pairwise intersections satisfying the cocycle condition. (Loosely put, the category is a Zariski sheaf.)
* Given a dagger algebra $`A`$, a Frobenius lift $`\sigma `$, and an element $`uA^{\mathrm{int}}`$ such that $`u^\sigma /u^q`$ is invertible in $`A`$, the category of log-$`(\sigma ,)`$-modules with respect to $`u`$ is canonically equivalent to the category of overconvergent log-$`F^a`$-isocrystals on $`(X,Z)`$, where $`X=\mathrm{Spec}(A^{\mathrm{int}}_𝒪k)`$ and $`ZX`$ is the zero locus of $`u`$. In particular, the former does not depend on $`\sigma `$; in fact, there is an explicit formula for transforming a Frobenius structure with respect to a given $`\sigma `$ into a Frobenius structure with respect to another (with respect to the same $``$).

See \[CI, Section 6\] for an informal overview of log-$`F^a`$-isocrystals; for a much more detailed study, see \[S, Chapter 2\]. (It might help to consider the situation without logarithmic structures first; see \[Be\] for an introduction there.)

The main input into this paper is the $`p`$-adic local monodromy theorem (“Crew’s conjecture”), established separately by André \[A\], Mebkhout \[M\], and the author \[Ke2\]. We say an extension of $`k((t))`$ is *nearly finite separable* if it is finite separable over $`k^{1/p^n}((t))`$ for some nonnegative integer $`n`$. With that definition, the local monodromy theorem (e.g., in the form of \[Ke2, Theorem 6.12\]) implies the following.

###### Proposition 3.1.

Let $`M`$ be a $`(\sigma ,)`$-module over $``$. Then there exists a nearly finite separable extension $`L/k((t))`$ so that $`M_{^{\mathrm{int}}}_L^{\mathrm{int}}`$ admits a basis $`𝐯_1,\mathrm{},𝐯_n`$ such that $`𝐯_i\mathrm{SatSpan}(𝐯_1,\mathrm{},𝐯_{i1})\mathrm{\Omega }^1`$ for $`i=1,\mathrm{},n`$.

In fact, if $`u_L^{\mathrm{int}}`$ lifts a uniformizer of $`L`$ and $`K^{}`$ is the integral closure of $`K`$ in $`_L^{\mathrm{int}}`$ (so that $`_L^{\mathrm{int}}`$ is isomorphic to the integral Robba ring with coefficient field $`K^{}`$), then one can ensure that in fact $`𝐯_i(K^{}𝐯_1+\mathrm{}+K^{}𝐯_{i1})\frac{du}{u}`$; this implies that $`F𝐯_iK^{}𝐯_1+\mathrm{}+K^{}𝐯_n`$ for all $`i`$. If such a basis already exists over $``$, we say $`M`$ is *unipotent* over $``$.

## 4 Matrix factorizations

In this section, let $`A`$ be a dagger algebra such that $`\mathrm{Spec}(A_𝒪k)`$ is a smooth affine geometrically connected curve over $`\mathrm{Spec}(k)`$; in particular, $`A`$ is an integral domain. Suppose $`tA_𝒪k`$ generates a prime ideal with residue field $`k`$; choose a lift $`uA^{\mathrm{int}}`$ of $`t`$. Then there is a natural embedding $`\rho _u:A^{\mathrm{int}}^{+,\mathrm{int}}`$ sending $`u`$ to the series parameter; this extends to an embedding of any localization of $`A`$ into $``$. We identify each localization of $`A`$ with its image under $`\rho _u`$.

###### Lemma 4.1.

For $`r>0`$, let $`U`$ be an invertible matrix over $`_r`$. Then there exists an invertible matrix $`V`$ over some localization $`A^{}`$ of $`A`$ such that $`w_r(VUI)>0`$.

###### Proof.

Let $`A_1`$ be the localization of $`A`$ at $`u`$; then $`A_1`$ is dense in $`_r`$ under $`w_r`$. Thus we can choose a matrix $`V`$ over $`A_1`$ such that $`w_r(VU^1)>w_r(U)`$; then

$$w_r(VUI)=w_r((VU^1)U)w_r(VU^1)+w_r(U)>0.$$

Since $`w_r(VUI)>0`$, we have $`w_r(det(VU)1)>0`$, so in particular $`det(VU)0`$. Hence $`det(V)0`$, so we can form the localization $`A^{}`$ of $`A_1`$ at $`det(V)`$. Over $`A^{}`$, $`V`$ becomes an invertible matrix, as desired. ∎

###### Proposition 4.2.

Let $`U`$ be an invertible matrix over $``$. Then there exist invertible matrices $`V`$ over some localization $`A^{}`$ of $`A`$ and $`W`$ over $`^+`$ such that $`U=VW`$.

###### Proof.

Choose $`r>0`$ so that $`U`$ is invertible over $`_r`$. By Lemma 4.1, we can find an invertible matrix $`X`$ over some localization $`A_1`$ of $`A`$ such that $`w_r(XUI)>0`$. By \[Ke2, Proposition 6.5\], we can write $`XU`$ as a product $`YZ`$ with $`Y`$ invertible over $`^{}`$ and $`Z`$ invertible over $`^+`$. Let $`A^{}`$ be the localization of $`A_1`$ at $`u`$; then $`^{}A^{}`$, so $`X^1Y`$ is invertible over $`A^{}`$. Thus we may take $`V=X^1Y`$ and $`W=Z`$. ∎

## 5 Semistable reduction

In this section, we prove that an overconvergent $`F^a`$-isocrystal $``$ on $`X`$ which is unipotent at each point of $`\overline{X}X`$, for $`\overline{X}`$ a smooth compactification of $`X`$, has “semistable reduction”. This will yield our proof of Theorem 1.1.

We begin with a result that translates unipotence of a $`(\sigma ,)`$-module into semistable reduction. The argument is based on the proof of \[Ke1, Theorem 5.0.1\].

###### Theorem 5.1.

Let $`A`$ be a dagger algebra equipped with a Frobenius lift $`\sigma `$. Suppose the image of $`uA^{\mathrm{int}}`$ in $`A^{\mathrm{int}}_𝒪k`$ generates a prime ideal and $`u^\sigma /u^q`$ is a unit in $`A`$. Let $`A^{}`$ be the localization of $`A`$ at $`u`$, and let $`M`$ be a free $`(\sigma ,)`$-module over $`A^{}`$ which becomes unipotent over $``$ (where $`A^{}`$ is identified with a subring of $``$ via $`\rho _u`$). Then $`M`$ is isomorphic to a log-$`(\sigma ,)`$-module, with respect to $`u`$, over some localization $`A^{\prime \prime }`$ of $`A`$ in which $`u`$ is not invertible.

###### Proof.

Let $`𝐞_1,\mathrm{},𝐞_n`$ be a basis of $`M`$, so that $`F𝐞_j=_i\mathrm{\Phi }_{ij}𝐞_i`$ and $`𝐞_j=_iN_{ij}𝐞_i\frac{du}{u}`$. Define the differential operator $`\theta (f)=u\frac{df}{du}`$. By hypothesis, there exists a matrix $`U`$ over $``$ such that $`U^1\mathrm{\Phi }U^\sigma `$ and $`U^1NU+U^1\theta (U)`$ have entries in $`𝒪`$. By Proposition 4.2, we can factor $`U`$ as $`VW`$, where $`V`$ is invertible over some localization $`A_1`$ of $`A^{}`$ and $`W`$ is invertible over $`^+`$. Now put $`𝐯_j=_jV_{ij}𝐞_i`$; then $`F𝐯_j=_i\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Phi }}_{ij}𝐯_i`$ and $`𝐯_j=_i\stackrel{~}{N}_{ij}𝐯_i\frac{du}{u}`$, where

$`\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Phi }}`$ $`=V^1\mathrm{\Phi }V^\sigma =W(U^1\mathrm{\Phi }U^\sigma )W^\sigma `$
$`\stackrel{~}{N}`$ $`=V^1NV+V^1\theta (V)=W(U^1NU+U^1\theta (U))W^1\theta (W)W^1`$
have entries in $`A^{\prime \prime }=A_1^+`$, which is a localization of $`A`$ (because it contains $`A`$ and is contained in the localization $`A_1`$) in which $`u`$ is not invertible (because $`u`$ is not invertible in $`^+`$). ∎

We now proceed to the proof of our main theorem.

###### Proof of Theorem 1.1.

Let $`K(X)`$ be the function field of $`X`$, and let $`\overline{X}`$ be a smooth compactification of $`X`$. Without loss of generality, enlarge $`k`$ so that the geometric points of $`Z=\overline{X}X`$ are $`k`$-rational. (Given the desired result over a finite extension of $`k`$, we deduce the result over $`k`$ by restriction of scalars.) For each geometric point $`x`$ of $`Z`$, choose a function $`t_xK(X)`$ with a simple zero at $`x`$, and choose an open affine neighborhood $`U_x`$ of $`x`$ in $`\overline{X}`$ such that $`U_xZ=\{x\}`$ and $`\mathrm{div}(t_x)U_x=\{x\}`$. Let $`A_x`$ be a dagger algebra with $`U\mathrm{Spec}(A_x^{\mathrm{int}}_𝒪k)`$, choose a Frobenius lift $`\sigma `$ on $`A_x`$ and choose a lift $`u_x`$ of $`t_x`$ in $`A_x^{\mathrm{int}}`$. Let $`A_x^{}`$ be the localization of $`A_x`$ at $`u_x`$; then the restriction of $``$ to $`U\{x\}`$ corresponds to a $`(\sigma ,)`$-module $`M_x`$ over $`A_x^{}`$. After shrinking $`U_x`$ if needed, we may assume that $`M_x`$ is free over $`A_x^{}`$.

Let $`\rho _x`$ be the embedding of $`A_x`$ into $`^{+,\mathrm{int}}`$ sending $`u_x`$ to the series parameter. By Proposition 3.1, there exists a nearly finite separable extension $`L_x`$ of the $`t_x`$-adic completion of $`K(X)`$ such that $`M_x_{A_x^{}}_{L_x}^{\mathrm{int}}`$ is unipotent. By Krasner’s lemma, after replacing $`k`$ with $`k^{1/p^n}`$ for some nonnegative integer $`n`$, we can choose a finite separable extension $`L`$ of $`K(X)`$ whose completion at any point above $`x`$ contains $`L_x`$ for each $`xZ`$. After enlarging $`k`$ again, we may assume that the places of $`L`$ above $`x`$ are all $`k`$-rational. Let $`f:\overline{X_1}\overline{X}`$ be the cover corresponding to the extension $`L/K(X)`$, and put $`X_1=f^1(X)`$.

For each geometric point $`y`$ of $`Z_1=\overline{X_1}X_1`$, choose a function $`t_yK(X_1)`$ with a simple zero at $`y`$ and no multiple zeroes; then $`t_y`$ gives rise to a map $`g_y:\overline{X_1}^1`$. (If $`k`$ is finite, it may be necessary to enlarge it again to find such $`t_y`$.) Put $`x=f(y)`$, and choose an open affine neighborhood $`V_y`$ of $`y`$ in $`\overline{X_1}`$ such that $`V_yZ_1=\{y\}`$, $`\mathrm{div}(t_y)V_y=\{y\}`$, $`f(V_y)U_x`$, and $`V_y`$ does not meet the branch locus of $`g_y`$. Then there is a dagger algebra $`B_y`$ with $`V_y\mathrm{Spec}(B_y^{\mathrm{int}}_𝒪k)`$ which is a localization of a finite extension of $`A_x`$.

Choose a lift $`u_y`$ of $`t_y`$ in $`B_y^{\mathrm{int}}`$. Since $`V_y`$ is unramified over its image under $`g_y`$, $`B_y`$ is finite and unramified over some localization $`C_y`$ of its subring $`Ku_y^{}`$ (the $`p`$-adic closure of $`K[u_y]`$ within $`B_y`$). Now $`Ku_y^{}`$ admits a $`p`$-power Frobenius lift $`\sigma _0^{}`$ sending $`u_y`$ to $`u_y^\sigma `$; this lift extends to the localization $`C_y`$, then to the unramified extension $`B_y`$. Put $`\sigma ^{}=(\sigma _0^{})^a`$.

Let $`B_y^{}`$ be the localization of $`B_y`$ at $`u_xA_xB_y`$, which is the same as the localization at $`u_y`$ because $`\mathrm{div}(t_x)V_y=\mathrm{div}(t_y)V_y=\{y\}`$, and put $`V_y^{}=\mathrm{Spec}((B_y^{})^{\mathrm{int}}_𝒪k)=V_y\{y\}`$; then the restriction of $`f^{}`$ to $`V_y^{}`$ corresponds to the $`(\sigma ^{},)`$-module $`M_x_{A_x^{}}B_y^{}`$. (That is, its connection is the one induced from $`M_x`$, but its Frobenius structure is defined with respect to $`\sigma ^{}`$ instead of $`\sigma `$.) By construction, this $`(\sigma ^{},)`$-module is unipotent. Moreover, $`u_y^\sigma ^{}/u_y^q=1`$, so Theorem 5.1 implies that $`M_x_{A_x^{}}B_y^{}`$ is isomorphic to a log-$`(\sigma ,)`$-module over some localization $`B_y^{\prime \prime }`$ of $`B_y`$ in which $`u_y`$ is not invertible. If $`V_y^{\prime \prime }=\mathrm{Spec}((B_y^{\prime \prime })^{\mathrm{int}}_𝒪k)`$, then $`V_y^{\prime \prime }`$ is an open affine neighborhood of $`y`$ in $`\overline{X_1}`$ on which $`f^{}`$ extends to a log-$`F`$-isocrystal.

In short, we have an open affine neighborhood of each $`yZ_1`$ in $`\overline{X_1}`$, on which $`f^{}`$ extends to a log-$`F`$-isocrystal relative to $`\{y\}`$. Each neighborhood contains no other points of $`y`$, so the pairwise intersections all lie in $`X_1`$. Thus we automatically have glueing isomorphisms on the log-$`F`$-isocrystals satisfying the cocycle conditions (since $`f^{}`$ is defined on $`X_1`$), yielding a log-$`F`$-isocrystal on $`(\overline{X_1},Z_1)`$, as desired. ∎

## 6 Finite versus étale

As noted earlier, Crew \[Cr, Section 10\] conjectured that an overconvergent $`F`$-isocrystal on a curve should extend to a log-$`F`$-isocrystal after a base extension which is not just finite and generically étale, but actually étale. It is unclear whether this should hold in general; the best we can do at the moment is prove it in the unit-root case, as done below. Note that this proof does not use the full strength of the quasi-unipotence theorem, but only the unit-root case; this case is due to Tsuzuki \[T1\]. Also note that a unit-root log-$`F`$-isocrystal is automatically an $`F`$-isocrystal, so there is no “log” in the statement of the theorem.

The proof of the following lemma is straightforward.

###### Lemma 6.1.

Let $`B`$ be a matrix over $`k[[t]]`$, for $`k`$ a perfect field of characteristic $`p>0`$, and let $`\tau `$ denote the $`q`$-th power map. Then any solution $`D`$ of either of the matrix equations

$$D^1BD^\tau =I\text{or}D^\tau D=B$$

over the integral closure of $`k[[t]]`$ in $`k((t))^{\mathrm{alg}}`$ is defined over an unramified extension of $`k[[t]]`$.

###### Theorem 6.2.

Let $`X`$ be a smooth, geometrically connected curve over a perfect field $`k`$ of characteristic $`p>0`$, and let $``$ be an overconvergent unit-root $`F^a`$-isocrystal on $`X/K`$. Then there exists a finite étale morphism $`f:X_1X`$, a smooth compactification $`j:X_1\overline{X_1}`$ of $`X_1`$, and a unit-root $`F^a`$-isocrystal $``$ on $`\overline{X_1}`$ such that $`j^{}f^{}`$.

###### Proof.

If $`X`$ is projective, there is nothing to prove, so we assume $`X`$ is affine. Let $`A`$ be a dagger algebra with $`X\mathrm{Spec}(A^{\mathrm{int}}_𝒪k)`$, and choose a Frobenius lift $`\sigma `$ on $`A`$. Then $``$ corresponds to a $`(\sigma ,)`$-module $`M`$ over $`A`$. Choose (not necessarily free) generators $`𝐯_1,\mathrm{},𝐯_m`$ of $`M`$, and let $`NM`$ be the $`A^{\mathrm{int}}`$-span of $`F^i𝐯_j`$ over $`i=0,1,\mathrm{}`$ and $`j=1,\mathrm{},m`$. Then $`N`$ is locally free over $`A^{\mathrm{int}}`$.

Let $`L`$ be the $`p`$-adic completion of the valuation subring of $`\mathrm{Frac}A`$; note that $`N`$ is free over $`L`$ and $`F`$ acts on any basis of $`N`$ over $`L`$ via an invertible matrix. Let $`\pi `$ be a uniformizer of $`𝒪`$, and pick an integer $`d`$ such that $`v_p(\pi ^d)>1/(p1)`$.

Given any basis $`𝐞_1,\mathrm{},𝐞_n`$ of $`N`$ to start with, define the matrix $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ by $`F𝐞_j=_{ij}\mathrm{\Phi }_{ij}𝐞_i`$. We then solve the matrix equation $`C_i^1\mathrm{\Phi }C_i^\sigma I(mod\pi ^i)`$ for $`i=1,\mathrm{},d`$ to obtain a matrix $`C_d`$ over some finite unramified extension $`L^{}`$ of $`L`$. Then $`N_{A^{\mathrm{int}}}L^{}`$ admits a basis $`𝐰_1,\mathrm{},𝐰_n`$ for which $`F𝐰_i𝐰_i(mod\pi ^d)`$.

If we insist that $`L^{}`$ be minimal for the existence of the basis of the desired form, then it is unique; in particular, it does not depend on the choice of the starting basis. Let $`X_1`$ be a curve for which $`K(X_1)L^{}/\pi L^{}`$ and let $`f:X_1X`$ be the induced map. If we choose the initial basis $`𝐞_1,\mathrm{},𝐞_n`$ over a localization $`A_1^{\mathrm{int}}`$ of $`A^{\mathrm{int}}`$ over which $`N`$ becomes free, we discover that $`f`$ is étale over any point in $`\mathrm{Spec}(A_1^{\mathrm{int}}_𝒪k)`$ by Lemma 6.1. (Namely, $`C_0`$ satisfies an equation modulo $`\pi `$ of the first type in the lemma, while $`C_{i1}^1C_i=I+\pi ^{i1}D`$ for some matrix $`D`$ satisfying an equation modulo $`\pi `$ of the second type.) Since $`N`$ is locally free over $`A^{\mathrm{int}}`$, we can arrange for $`\mathrm{Spec}(A_1^{\mathrm{int}}_𝒪k)`$ to contain any closed point of $`X`$. Thus $`f`$ is finite étale. Since $`v_p(\pi ^d)>1/(p1)`$, we may apply \[T1, Theorem 5.1.1\] (at least for $`a=1`$; see \[Ke2, Proposition 6.11\] for a reduction to this case) to see that $`f^{}`$ admits a basis of elements in the kernel of $``$, on which $`F`$ acts by a matrix over $`𝒪`$. This allows us to extend $`f^{}`$ to a compactification $`\overline{X_1}`$ of $`X_1`$, as desired. ∎

The general case is complicated by the fact that there is no obvious global criterion for when a non-unit-root overconvergent $`F`$-isocrystal becomes unipotent. Moreover, a slightly stronger statement turns out to be false: it is not always possible to pull back a log-$`F`$-isocrystal by an étale map to obtain a log-$`F`$-isocrystal that extends over a smooth compactification. This is demonstrated by an example of Tsuzuki \[T2, Section 6\]. In this example (the “Bessel isocrystal”), an overconvergent $`F`$-isocrystal over $`^1\{0,\mathrm{}\}`$ is unipotent over $`0`$ and becomes unipotent over $`\mathrm{}`$ after making a tamely ramified quadratic extension. Thus the $`F`$-isocrystal already extends to a log-$`F`$-isocrystal over $`^1\{\mathrm{}\}`$ with respect to the divisor $`(0)`$, but no étale cover of $`^1\{\mathrm{}\}`$ can induce anything but a totally wildly ramified extension of the local ring at $`\mathrm{}`$.