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# Testing the self-duality of topological lumps in SU(3) lattice gauge theory

## Abstract

We discuss a simple formula which connects the field-strength tensor to a spectral sum over certain quadratic forms of the eigenvectors of the lattice Dirac operator. We analyze these terms for the near zero-modes and find that they give rise to contributions which are essentially either self-dual or anti self-dual. Modes with larger eigenvalues in the bulk of the spectrum are more dominated by quantum fluctuations and are less (anti) self-dual. In the high temperature phase of QCD we find considerably reduced (anti) self-duality for the modes near the edge of the spectral gap.

Chiral symmetry breaking is one of the central pillars in our understanding of QCD. For the underlying mechanism an interesting picture based on instantons has been developed during the last 20 years . The relevant excitations in the QCD vacuum are believed to consist of a weakly interacting fluid of instantons and anti-instantons. For a single instanton or anti-instanton the Dirac operator has an exact zero-mode. For the weakly interacting instantons and anti-instantons instead of many zero modes one expects the build-up of a non-vanishing density of small but non-zero eigenvalues corresponding to so-called near zero-modes. This spectral density near the origin is related to a non-vanishing chiral condensate through the Banks-Casher formula .

During the last year we have seen several papers - which test the scenario of chiral symmetry breaking through instantons with ab-initio calculations on the lattice, some supporting the instanton picture, some challenging it. The common basic idea is to study the properties of the near zero-modes of the lattice Dirac operator and to analyze whether one can identify localized structures which resemble instantons. The underlying assumption is that the near zero-modes are only slight deformations of zero-modes which in turn are known to be localized at the same position as the instanton.

In this letter we derive a simple formula which relates the field strength tensor $`F_{\mu \nu }`$ to a spectral sum over certain quadratic forms of the eigenvectors of the lattice Dirac operator. The terms in this spectral representation of the field strength, i.e. the quadratic forms of the eigenvectors, have a clear interpretation. One can analyze the contributions of the near zero-modes and test the scenario of chiral symmetry breaking through instantons.

In particular we will focus on analyzing the duality properties of the field strength. The possibility that the localized lumps in the field strength are not (anti) self-dual, i.e. do not have a fundamental property of (anti) instantons, has been brought up in Ref. , a paper which challenges the local quantization of topological charge in integer units. However, this possibility is ruled out by our current results: We find that the contributions to $`F_{\mu \nu }`$ which come from the near zero-modes do indeed show a high degree of (anti) self-duality. For contributions from eigenmodes with larger eigenvalues we find a decrease of (anti) self-duality as they are more dominated by quantum fluctuations.

When the temperature is increased beyond its critical value, QCD undergoes a phase transition where chiral symmetry is restored. In the instanton picture this transition is believed to be related to the formation of tightly bound instanton anti-instanton molecules. The spectrum develops a gap and due to the Banks-Casher formula the chiral condensate vanishes. When analyzing the modes with eigenvalues close to the edge of the spectral gap, we do indeed find a considerably reduced amount of (anti) self-duality as is expected for the tightly bound molecules.

We will denote the Dirac operator by $`D=\gamma _\mu D_\mu `$ with $`D_\mu =_\mu +A_\mu `$. The gauge potential $`A_\mu `$ is anti-hermitian and in components is given by $`A_\mu =iA_\mu ^aT_a`$ where $`T_a,a=\mathrm{1..8}`$ are the generators of su(3). In this notation the field strength tensor is given by $`F_{\mu \nu }=[D_\mu ,D_\nu ]`$, and in components reads $`F_{\mu \nu }=iF_{\mu \nu }^aT_a`$. When evaluating the square of the Dirac operator one finds

$$D^2(x)=\underset{\mu }{}D_\mu ^2(x)+\underset{\mu <\nu }{}\gamma _\mu \gamma _\nu F_{\mu \nu }(x).$$
(1)
The field strength $`F_{\mu \nu }`$ can be projected out by multiplying $`D^2`$ with $`\gamma _\mu \gamma _\nu `$ and taking the trace over the Dirac indices. This results in the formula ($`\mu \nu `$)

$$\frac{1}{4}\text{Tr}_D\left[\gamma _\mu \gamma _\nu D^2(x)\right]=F_{\mu \nu }(x),$$
(2)
for the field strength $`F_{\mu \nu }`$. For a lattice Dirac operator the situation is slightly more involved. On the lattice the Dirac operator is a difference operator and has two space-time indices $`x,y`$. When repeating the above calculation for e.g. Wilson’s lattice Dirac operator $`D_W`$, one finds (the indices $`\mu ,\nu `$ on the right hand side are not summed)

$``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\text{Tr}_D\left[\gamma _\mu \gamma _\nu D_W^2(x,y)\right]=F_{\mu \nu }(x){\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}[\delta _{x+\mu +\nu ,y}`$ (3)
$`+`$ $`\delta _{x+\mu \nu ,y}+\delta _{x\mu +\nu ,y}+\delta _{x\mu \nu ,y}]+𝒪(a^2).`$ (4)
Thus one finds that the field strength is slightly smeared out among several lattice points. We remark that an equivalent formula holds for staggered fermions where $`\gamma _\mu \gamma _\nu `$ is replaced by a staggered factor depending on $`\mu ,\nu `$. For a general Dirac operator, such as the overlap operator , the fixed point operator  or the chirally improved operator  (which we use here) one finds (from now on we drop “$`𝒪(a^2)`$”)

$$F_{\mu \nu }(x)=\frac{1}{4}\underset{y}{}t_y(x)_{\mu \nu }\text{Tr}_D\left[\gamma _\mu \gamma _\nu D^2(x,y)\right],$$
(5)
with some function $`t_y(x)_{\mu \nu }`$ which describes the smearing out of the field strength around the central point $`x`$. For the overlap operator this function is fast decaying in $`|xy|`$ but has infinite support while for a finite approximation of the fixed point operator or the chirally improved operator $`t_y(x)_{\mu \nu }`$ will vanish for a sufficiently large separation of $`x`$ and $`y`$. One can show that a substantial contribution comes from $`x=y`$ and below we will concentrate on this particular case.

We now use the spectral representation of the Dirac operator to express the right hand side of Eq. (5) in terms of the eigenvectors $`D(x,y)=_j\lambda _j|j_x_yj|`$. In this formula we denote the eigenvectors by $`|j_x`$ and write explicitly only the space-time index $`x`$, while the color and Dirac indices are denoted with the bra-ket notation. The corresponding eigenvalues are denoted by $`\lambda _j`$. We remark that for non-normal operators, the bra’s $`{}_{y}{}^{}j|`$ have to be replaced by left eigenvectors and only the $`|j_x`$ are the conventional right eigenvectors .

After inserting the spectral decomposition of $`D`$ into our formula (5) we find:

$`F_{\mu \nu }^a(x)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{y}{}}t_y(x)_{\mu \nu }{\displaystyle \underset{j}{}}\lambda _j^2f_{\mu \nu }^a(x)_{y,j},`$ (6)
$`f_{\mu \nu }^a(x)_{y,j}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{i}{2}}{}_{y}{}^{}j|\gamma _\mu \gamma _\nu T_a|j_{x}^{}.`$ (7)
In order to project onto the $`a`$-th component of the field strength tensor we have used $`F_{\mu \nu }^a=i2`$ Tr$`{}_{c}{}^{}[F_{\mu \nu }T_a]`$.

Equations (6) and (7) provide the announced spectral decomposition of the field strength tensor. One can now study the individual contributions $`f_{\mu \nu }^a(x)_{y,j}`$ in order to analyze properties of the field strength tensor. It is interesting to note that the exact zero modes do not contribute to the spectral decomposition (6),(7). Our formula has been tested on lattice discretizations of continuum instantons

Let us briefly comment on the setting of our numerical calculation. We study QCD in the quenched approximation using the Lüscher-Weisz action  with coefficients from tadpole improved perturbation theory. We work on lattices of size $`16^4`$ for the zero temperature ensembles and on $`6\times 20^3`$ lattices for the ensembles in the high temperature chirally symmetric phase. The leading coupling $`\beta _1`$ of the Lüscher-Weisz action is $`\beta _1=8.45`$ which corresponds to a lattice spacing of $`a=0.095`$ fm . This value gives a temperature of 346 MeV for the high temperature ensemble. We use the chirally improved operator which is a systematic expansion of a solution of the Ginsparg-Wilson equation . The computation of the eigenvalues and eigenvectors of the Dirac operator was done with the implicitly restarted Arnoldi method .

Let us begin our analysis of the terms in the spectral representation (6),(7) by displaying a single contribution $`f_{\mu \nu }^a(x)_{y,j}`$ and compare it to its dual $`\stackrel{~}{f_{\mu \nu }^a}(x)_{y,j}=1/2\epsilon _{\mu \nu \rho \sigma }f_{\rho \sigma }^a(x)_{y,j}`$. In particular in Fig. 1 we show a slice through the $`16^4`$ lattice and display the $`f_{12}^5`$ component in the top plot and the $`f_{34}^5`$ component in the bottom plot. We have set $`x=y`$, i.e. we show the center of the smeared-out field strength, and we evaluate the contribution for the first near zero-mode, i.e. the eigenvector with the smallest non-vanishing eigenvalue.

Both plots show a large peak accompanied by smaller wiggles. The peak changes sign but otherwise essentially keeps its size and shape when going from the $`f_{12}^5`$ to the $`f_{34}^5`$ component. Thus the peak is anti self-dual. For the smaller wiggles it is not straightforward to identify such a simple duality behavior - they are mainly quantum fluctuations. When inspecting many of these plots we find that the typical pattern consists of small quantum fluctuations and pronounced peaks which are either self-dual or anti self-dual. For contributions of eigenvectors with larger eigenvalues, so called bulk-modes, one finds that the abundance of isolated peaks decreases and the contributions become more dominated by quantum fluctuations.

Quantities of more physical interest are the action density Tr $`F_{\mu \nu }F_{\mu \nu }`$ and the topological charge density Tr $`F_{\mu \nu }\stackrel{~}{F_{\mu \nu }}`$. In particular a direct comparison of the two quantities shows if the field is (anti) self-dual in all components. Again it is most interesting to analyze the contributions of the near zero-modes and see whether they are dominated by (anti) self-dual lumps as expected from the instanton picture. To this purpose we truncate the sum over the eigenvalues $`\lambda _i`$ in Eq. (6) and take into account only the first $`N`$ eigenvalues. In Fig. 2 we show

$$\text{Tr}F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}=\underset{i,j=1}{\overset{N}{}}\frac{\lambda _i^2\lambda _j^2}{2}f_{\mu \nu }^a(x)_{x,i}f_{\mu \nu }^a(x)_{x,j},$$
(8)
in the top plot. The color indices $`a=\mathrm{1..8}`$ on the right hand side of (8) are summed to produce the color trace on the left hand side. The corresponding contribution to Tr $`F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}\stackrel{~}{F_{\mu \nu }}(x)^{}`$ is constructed in the same way and is displayed in the bottom plot of Fig. 2. For the figure we set $`N=6`$, i.e. we take into account only the contributions from the lowest 6 near zero-modes.

Both plots in Fig. 2 show two pronounced peaks with one of them changing sign when going from Tr $`F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}`$ to Tr $`F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}\stackrel{~}{F_{\mu \nu }}(x)^{}`$. We remark that Figs. 1 and 2 were made from the same gauge configuration and the anti self-dual sign-changing peak of Fig. 2 is the same peak which we already saw in the contribution to the 5-component displayed in Fig. 1. The other smaller peak in Fig. 2 is a self-dual fluctuation in a different color component. Since the composed quantities Tr $`F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}`$ and Tr $`F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}\stackrel{~}{F_{\mu \nu }}(x)^{}`$ are built from products of the single components $`f_{\mu \nu }^a`$ the relative size of the quantum fluctuations is suppressed considerably compared to the larger, (anti) self-dual structures. We find that the contributions of the near zero-modes to Tr $`F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}`$ and Tr $`F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}\stackrel{~}{F_{\mu \nu }}(x)^{}`$ are entirely dominated by lumps which are either self-dual or anti self-dual.

In order to go beyond an illustration of the duality properties by a few examples we now discuss an observable which allows to test (anti) self-duality systematically. Its construction is similar to the chirality observable proposed in . We define the ratio

$$r(x)=\frac{\text{Tr}F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}\text{Tr}F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}\stackrel{~}{F_{\mu \nu }}(x)^{}}{\text{Tr}F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}+\text{Tr}F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}\stackrel{~}{F_{\mu \nu }}(x)^{}}.$$
(9)
For a space-time point $`x`$ where the gauge field is self-dual the numerator will vanish while the denominator is finite and $`r(x)`$ equals to 0. Conversely for an $`x`$ where the gauge field is anti self-dual the role of numerator and denominator are exchanged and $`r(x)=\mathrm{}`$. For space-time points without definite duality properties $`r(x)`$ assumes some finite value between 0 and $`\mathrm{}`$. The transformation $`R(x)=4/\pi \mathrm{arctan}r(x)1`$ maps the interval $`[0,\mathrm{})`$ into the interval $`[1,1]`$. For configurations which are dominated by (anti) self-dual lumps one expects values near $`\pm 1`$. As for the local chirality variable of  it is interesting to study different selections for the lattice points $`x`$ in $`R(x)`$. In Fig. 3 we use all lattice points (top curve), the subset of 50% of the lattice points supporting the highest peaks of $`|`$Tr $`F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}\stackrel{~}{F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}}|`$ (middle curve) and also a cut of 10% (bottom curve). Again we use the 6 lowest modes in the series for $`F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}`$. The histograms were computed by averaging over 50 configurations.

Fig. 3 shows that the contributions of the near zero-modes to the spectral representation of the field strength are highly (anti) self-dual. Even when including all lattice points (100%, top curve) one finds a pronounced double peak. When throwing away 50% of the lattice points with small $`|`$Tr$`F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}\stackrel{~}{F_{\mu \nu }}(x)^{}|`$ this cuts mainly into the center of the histogram, showing that the most (anti) self-dual excitations are indeed the large peaks sticking out of the quantum fluctuations. This trend continues when focusing on only the highest 10% of the peaks. Since our analysis is based on the exact spectral decomposition of the field strength it truly reflects self-duality of the topological lumps in the gauge field.

It is interesting to perform the same analysis also in the chirally symmetric phase of QCD. As discussed, the instanton picture describes this phase by tightly bound molecules of instantons and anti-instantons . In Fig. 4 we show our results for the histograms of the duality observable $`R`$ for our ensembles in the high temperature phase. Again we average over 50 configurations. $`F_{\mu \nu }(x)^{}`$ is now computed from the 6 modes with eigenvalues closest to the edge of the spectral gap. Obviously the amount of (anti) self-duality has decreased considerably which is exactly what is expected to happen when instantons and anti-instantons condense to tightly bound molecules and lose their identity as isolated (anti) self-dual objects.

Let us briefly summarize the obtained results. We derive a representation of the field strength in terms of a spectral sum of quadratic forms of the eigenvectors of the lattice Dirac operator. The contributions of individual eigenvectors to the field strength can be analyzed. We find that the near zero-modes are dominated by (anti) self-dual lumps, while modes with larger eigenvalues further in the bulk of the spectrum become dominated by quantum fluctuations. Our spectral representation thus decomposes the field strength tensor into contributions (the near zero-modes) sensitive to the large scale fluctuations and contributions (the bulk modes) dominated by quantum fluctuations. In the high temperature phase we find a reduced amount of (anti) self-duality for the modes with eigenvalues near the edge of the spectral gap. Our results support the picture of chiral symmetry breaking by instantons and its restoration through the formation of instanton anti-instanton molecules. Acknowldegements: I would like to thank Pierre van Baal, Tom DeGrand, Meinulf Göckeler, Ivan Hip, Christian Lang, Paul Rakow, Stefan Schaefer and Andreas Schäfer for discussions and the Austrian Academy of Science for support (APART 654). The calculations were done on the Hitachi SR8000 at the Leibniz Rechenzentrum in Munich and I thank the LRZ staff for training and support.


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# Phase Diagram of the Superfluid Phases of 3He in 98% Aerogel

## I Introduction

Quenched disorder in condensed matter systems is manifest in a wide variety of materials from glassy solids and liquid crystals to the mixed state of superconductors. It arises in diverse phenomena ranging from cosmological models for the evolution of the universe to vortex tangles in superfluid 4He. Disorder in superfluid 3He is of special interest since the order parameter structure of this superfluid is non-trivial, although well known, and its various phases exhibit a number of spontaneously broken symmetries. Quenched disorder in a superfluid can be generated extrinsically by a random impurity field with inhomogeneity on a length scale short compared to the coherence length. In the present case this is achieved by imbibing 3He into silica aerogel, a highly-porous material made of randomly inter-connected strands of SiO2.

Aerogels have been used to study liquid crystals, superfluid 4He, 3He-4He mixtures  and superfluid 3He. Glassy effects have been observed in the liquid crystal-aerogel systems. In 3He-4He mixtures a profound influence of aerogel on the phase diagram was reported. Superfluid 3He in aerogel was found to have a suppressed, but relatively sharp, transition temperature and the order parameter appears to be reduced. However, the nature of the phase diagram, and identification of the thermodynamically stable phases, have not yet been clearly established. Here we report the use of high resolution transverse acoustic impedance to map out this phase diagram.

The 3He-A and -B superfluid phases were discovered in 1972 by Osheroff, Richardson and Lee. The order parameter is now established to be a p-wave spin-triplet which has two thermodynamically stable superfluid phases in zero field. The A-phase is the axial state which separately breaks spin and orbit rotational symmetries. The B-phase is the isotropic state which breaks relative spin-orbit symmetry. The stability of the A-phase over the B-phase at elevated pressure, above the polycritical pressure of 21 bars in zero field, is a consequence of strong coupling in the quasiparticle interactions. After 30 years of extensive experimental and theoretical investigation 3He is the best understood of all unconventional superfluids or superconductors. Motivation to investigate disorder in this superfluid derives in part from our need to understand impurity effects in this, and in similar, unconventionally paired systems. New families of superconducting materials such as Sr2RuO4, URhGe, and organic conductors  may be unconventional superconductors, and in some cases, a p-wave structure has been suggested.

At millikelvin temperatures 3He is the purest material in nature. Its properties have been investigated extensively as a system entirely free of impurity scattering other than at surfaces. The influence of aerogel on 3He is to suppress the transition retaining a narrow width and to alter the behavior of the superfluid phases. In contrast, for surface scattering, the orientation and the amplitude of the order parameter are both constrained and the superfluid becomes spatially inhomogeneous. The use of highly-porous aerogels to introduce impurity scattering in 3He has provided a significant opportunity to learn about unconventional pairing states. The first observations of superfluidity were torsional oscillator experiments to measure the superfluid density performed at Cornell  and Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) at Northwestern . These results were found to be consistent with theoretical models for impurity scattering . In its simplest form, the Homogeneous Scattering Model (HSM), the suppression of the superfluid transition is given by the well-known Abrikosov-Gorkov formula

$$ln(\frac{T_{c0}}{T_{ca}})=\mathrm{\Psi }(\frac{1}{2}+\frac{1}{2}\frac{\xi _0}{l_{tr}}\frac{T_{c0}}{T_{ca}})\mathrm{\Psi }(\frac{1}{2})$$
(1)
where $`T_{ca}`$($`T_{c0}`$) is the superfluid transition temperature of the aerogel (bulk) system, $`\xi _0\mathrm{}v_f/2\pi k_BT_{c0}`$ is the bulk coherence length, and $`l_{tr}`$ is the transport mean free path. These earlier results triggered numerous experimental investigations and theoretical work aimed at characterizing and understanding the properties of the ‘dirty’ superfluid formed inside the aerogel matrix. However, the identification of the superfluid state in the 3He-aerogel system has been controversial, and only recently has there been agreement as to which are the superfluid phases observed.

The first NMR measurement in pure 3He and 1.2 kG suggested a superfluid in an equal-spin pairing (ESP) state similar to the bulk A-phase. With 4He additions a non-ESP state was found like the bulk B-phase. NMR measurements at lower fields ($``$50 G) without 4He found evidence for a B-phase superfluid in aerogel  and Barker et al. found a transition between a ESP and a non-ESP state at 284 G with 4He coverage. This transition was found to supercool quite readily and was identified to take place between A and B superfluids, but it should be kept in mind that the orbital symmetry of the order parameter in aerogel has not yet been determined. The aerogel AB-transition was also observed recently by a vibrating viscometer at low pressures , and was studied near the bulk polycritical pressure (PCP) using high-frequency sound. The reason for covering the strands with some 4He (2 or more atomic layers) is to replace magnetic solid 3He that contributes to measurement of the 3He magnetization and may also affect the nature of the scattering and possibly properties of the dirty superfluid. In the present work, we present a comprehensive acoustics study of the phase diagram of the A and B-superfluid phases of 3He in a 98% aerogel without 4He and from 0 to 3 kG.

## II Experimental

High-frequency sound ($``$MHz) has proven to be a powerful tool to study the properties of pure 3He in the normal Fermi liquid and in the superfluid state. For example, Landau’s seminal prediction of collisionless sound, called zero-sound, in a Fermi liquid was experimentally verified with high-frequency sound attenuation measurements. High-frequency sound also couples strongly to the order parameter collective modes (OPCM) of the superfluid and numerous OPCM have been observed in both the A and B-phases of pure 3He (see  for a review). Transverse sound was predicted to exist in normal 3He by Landau, and was shown to propagate in 3He-B from the observation of an acoustic Faraday effect. In what follows, we describe a technique used to probe the phase diagram of 3He in aerogel using both transverse and longitudinal high-frequency sound waves.

The acoustic technique is similar to that reported previously and a schematic of our acoustic cavity is depicted in Fig.1. The cavity was formed with two quartz transducers separated by two parallel stainless steel wires of diameter $`d=270`$ $`\mu m`$. One transducer was AC-cut for transverse sound, and the other X-cut for longitudinal sound, with a diameter of 9.5 mm. Their fundamental frequencies were 4.8 MHz and 2.9 MHz, respectively. This arrangement allowed us to perform experiments with either transverse or longitudinal sound. The aerogel was grown in situ, in the volume between the transducers. Each transducer has two active sides; one probes the aerogel-filled cavity, and the other the bulk liquid outside the cavity. All experiments were performed with pure 3He which was verified to contain less than 250 ppm of 4He, much less than the amount required to cover the aerogel strands with one atomic layer of 4He.

The electrical impedance of the transducers was measured using a continuous wave spectrometer. The measurements were performed at a fixed frequency corresponding to odd harmonics of the fundamental resonance, with a frequency modulation of 400 Hz and modulation amplitude of 3 kHz. In the case of longitudinal sound, the medium inside the cavity is of sufficiently low attenuation that a standing wave pattern is established throughout the cavity. Small changes in the attenuation and velocity, induced by changes in temperature or pressure, produced changes in the electrical impedance of the transducers that can be detected by the spectrometer . For transverse sound, the highly attenuating medium prohibits the existence of well-defined standing waves and the measurement is similar to that of an acoustic impedance measurement. It is not possible with this technique to separate individual contributions from attenuation, sound velocity, or coupling to collectives modes in the transverse acoustic impedance. However, we have found that, at low frequencies ($``$ 10 MHz), the transverse sound impedance changes abruptly at all of the known phase transitions in each of the bulk and aerogel superfluids, Fig.2.

The transverse acoustic response at 8.691 MHz and a pressure of 25 bars is shown in the left panels of Fig.2 on cooling (upper trace) and warming (lower trace) and at zero (upper panel) and 2.57 kG applied magnetic field (lower panel). The phase transitions in the bulk liquid and the aerogel are denoted by arrows. On cooling, and in zero applied field, we successively observed the bulk superfluid ($`T_{c0}`$), bulk AB ($`T_{AB0}`$), aerogel superfluid ($`T_{ca}`$) and aerogel AB ($`T_{ABa}`$) transitions. The thermometry scales for cooling and warming are different. The scale shown in the figure is for slow warming such that equilibrium is assured between the LCMN thermometer used in low field, the melting curve thermometer, and the aerogel sample. For the results in Fig.2 and Fig.4, we corrected the thermometry for the more rapid cooling experiments using the temperature dependence of the acoustic impedance established in equilibrium during warming. This provides a convenient and intrinsic secondary thermometer, but for clarity the cooling traces are offset. When a magnetic field is applied, we also observed the bulk A$`{}_{1}{}^{}A_2`$ splitting as a ‘knee’ in the acoustic response, as shown in the inset of the lower left panel. The bulk $`A_1`$ and $`A_2`$-transitions are completely resolved in the acoustic trace at a field of $``$ 5 kG and above.

In the right panels of Fig.2 we show a direct comparison of the signatures from transverse and longitudinal sound for the aerogel AB-transition observed on warming at 25 bars and 2.57 kG. A small jump in the acoustic trace of longitudinal sound, coincident in temperature with that of transverse sound, was observed when the AB-transition occured at temperatures sufficiently well below $`T_{ca}`$. The condition for observing the signature in longitudinal sound was that the transition be either supercooled or that it appear on warming in a field $`B`$ 2 kG. However, we cannot determine whether this jump in the longitudinal sound trace arises from a change in attenuation due to collective modes, or from quasiparticle excitations. The observation of the aerogel AB-transition in longitudinal sound ensures that the transition observed with transverse sound is not a local effect occurring near the surface of the transducer. We have shown previously that a well-defined longitudinal sound mode can be established in our acoustic cavity, and therefore the AB-transition observed with this mode reflects the behavior of the superfluid over the entire aerogel sample. We have also verified that the change of slope in the transverse acoustic trace labeled $`T_{ca}`$ corresponds to the temperature at which the attenuation of longitudinal sound decreases at the onset of the superfluid transition. However, the wider range of observability of the aerogel AB-transition by transverse sound, as compared with longitudinal sound, and its higher precision make it a better tool to map out the phase diagram of 3He in 98% aerogel. The frequency dependence of the bulk superfluid transition $`T_{c0}`$, as observed with transverse sound, was also systematically studied at a pressure of 17 bars and for frequencies ranging from 3 MHz to 55 MHz. We found that the transverse acoustic signature signaling $`T_{c0}`$ is weakly frequency dependent but that it recovers the transition temperature $`T_{c0}`$ in the low-frequency limit, $``$10 MHz. The transition temperatures observed in our sample are in excellent agreement with those reported elsewhere  for the same density of aerogel. In what follows, the (P,T,B) phase diagram of 3He in aerogel was determined using transverse sound at a frequency of 8.691 MHz.

## III Results and discussion

### A P-T-B dependence of the AB-transition in aerogel

One of the key issues in the study of superfluid 3He in aerogel is to determine in what way the superfluid phase diagram is modified by impurity scattering. Unlike s-wave superconductors for which only magnetic impurity scattering is pair breaking, p-wave Cooper pairs are sensitive to all forms of scattering. For superfluid 3He in aerogel, there is now general agreement that impurity scattering suppresses the superfluid transition temperature and the amplitude of the order parameter, and that a non-ESP phase similar to the bulk B-phase is favored near zero field. However, most experiments have been performed in different regions of P, T, and B and also under different experimental conditions, e.g. with or without 4He preplating on the aerogel strands and with different aerogel densities. In particular, the phase diagram of the pure superfluid phases of pure 3He in 98% aerogel has not been established; the zero-field phase diagram is largely unknown. We emphasize that only the spin structure of the pairing state of 3He in aerogel has been identified through NMR measurement of the magnetization or the stability of the transition in a magnetic field . In the latter case, assuming triplet pairing, we can infer the spin component of the order parameter (ESP or non-ESP) from the field dependence of the phase boundaries. The orbital symmetry is more elusive. For example, it would be helpful to investigate the OPCM which couple to orbital degrees of freedom of the order parameter, but they have not yet been observed . Nonetheless, we use the earlier notation ‘A’ and ‘B’ for the aerogel superfluid phases corresponding to ESP and non-ESP states, by analogy with the bulk, and we discuss later implications from our measurements for the orbital symmetry of the aerogel superfluid.

The phase diagrams of the aerogel AB-transition as a function of $`B^2`$ and for various pressures are shown in Fig.3. The triangles denote the superfluid transitions, $`T_{ca}`$, as determined by the change of slope in the transverse acoustic trace, the filled circles are the equilibrium AB-transitions taken on slow warming, and the empty circles are the supercooled AB-transitions. The long-dashed lines show the average values of $`T_{ca}`$ and the dotted lines are extrapolations to zero field. With our technique, we were unable to observe directly the aerogel AB-transitions on warming at fields below 1.4 kG, i.e. for $`T_{ABa}/T_{ca}0.9`$. An independent check on the validity of our extrapolation to zero field will be discussed below.

The magnetic field independent transition from normal to superfluid state, and field-dependent transitions from A to B-superfluids strongly suggest that these are transition between normal fluid to ESP superfluid states, and between ESP and non-ESP states, as in the bulk. The strong supercooling of the AB-transition, even in zero applied field, shows that the transition is first-order. However, there are key differences in the aerogel phase diagram as compared to the bulk. In particular, the zero-field equilibrium region of aerogel A-phase is extremely narrow,$``$ 20 $`\mu `$K at 33.4 bars, if it exists at all.

In order to locate the AB-phase boundary at 33.4 bars in zero applied field, we have performed a series of temperature sweeps in which the temperature was slowly raised from low-temperature ($``$ 0.6 mK) to a temperature in the vicinity, but slightly less than, $`T_{ca}`$, and then rapidly cooled. If the AB-phase boundary were reached on warming, the supercooled AB-transition would be observed on cooling, whereas in the opposite case the aerogel superfluid would remain in the B-phase with no evidence for an AB-transition. This procedure depends on the absence of what is called a memory effect for secondary nucleation which we verified indpendently in modest magnetic fields.

Fig.4 shows these various traces upon warming to a temperature in the vicinity of $`T_{ca}`$ (lower panel and traces labeled 1 to 4, vertically offset for clarity), and then rapidly cooled. The thermal disequilibrium during sudden cooling is sufficient to make the cooling traces appear to move up in this figure. The lowest trace shows the complete acoustic record with $`T_{ca}`$ indicated by a change of slope and marked by a solid vertical line.

In the upper panel, we show the same acoustic traces for rapid cooling (1 to 4) as a function of time while the trace labeled 5 is for a cooling experiment originating from the normal state. We do not observe the aerogel AB-transition upon cooling in the trace 1 and 2 (and also for any partial warmup to temperatures below those shown here), while in the traces 3 and 4 the aerogel AB-transition is observed on cooling. This shows that the equilibrium aerogel AB-transition lies at a temperature somewhere between the traces 2 and 3, which is indicated in the lower panel of Fig.4 by a dotted line. This is close to $`T_{ca}`$ ($``$20 $`\mu `$K) and is approximately the width of $`T_{ca}`$ itself ($``$30 $`\mu `$K), sufficiently close that we cannot say that the normal state of the 3He fluid in aerogel had not been reached somewhere in the sample. Consequently, we have inferred that the region of A-phase in aerogel in zero applied field is extremely narrow, $``$20 $`\mu `$K at a pressure of 33.4 bars. We have also verified at a pressure of 20 bars that the AB-phase boundary in zero applied field is indistinguishable from $`T_{ca}`$ using the same slow warming and quench-cooling method.

From the data of Fig.3 we construct a three-dimensional phase diagram for pressure, temperature and magnetic field for the superfluid phases of pure 3He in 98% aerogel, Fig.5. The relative stability of the superfluid phases of the pure and dirty superfluids can be directly visualized and compared. The data of the equilibrium AB-transition from Fig.3 are shown as empty circles, and the thick solid lines are a smoothed fit of $`T_{ABa}`$ and $`T_{ca}`$. Below 10 bars, the data from Matsumoto et al.  were used to describe $`T_{ca}`$. They found a critical pressure of $``$ 6 bars in the zero-temperature limit. The thick solid curve at a pressure of 4.8 bars was taken from the field dependence of the aerogel AB-transition measured by the Lancaster group with a vibrating viscometer, but with its superfluid transition adjusted to match that of Matsumoto et al.. Above 10 bars our data for $`T_{ca}`$ in zero field are similar from that of Matsumoto et al. and the data points are not shown for reasons of clarity. The aerogel phases are denoted by ‘A’ and ‘B’ while the pure phases are denoted by A and B. The shaded volume emphasizes the aerogel A-phase opening up with applied magnetic field, and the dotted lines are the pure phase diagram shown here for comparison. The field dependence of the aerogel superfluid transitions $`T_{ca}`$ plotted as a solid line at 33.4 bars will be discussed later.

The three-dimensional plot of the (P,T,B) phase diagram of 3He in 98% aerogel shows the effects of impurity scattering on the equilibrium A-phase. The equilibrium region of A-phase is destabilized by impurity scattering in zero field; however, we believe that there is a very thin sliver of equilibrium A-phase that gives rise to supercooling of the A-phase observed in zero applied field at pressures above 15 bars. Barker et al. observed a metastable aerogel AB-transition on cooling using an NMR technique at 284 G and with 4He preplating. At 32 bars, an equilibrium region of A-phase of 70 $`\mu `$K was inferred from the data. This is somewhat larger than our results at the same field. The magnetization discontinuity at the AB-transition known to occur in the bulk system was not observed in aerogel, making it difficult to locate the equilibrium AB-transition. Furthermore, given the scatter of the data and the thermometry resolution $`20`$ $`\mu K`$, it seems plausible that the A-phase region might have been smaller than 70 $`\mu `$K and consistent with our findings here.

### B Magnetic suppression of the AB-transition and the Homogeneous Scattering Model

The Ginzburg-Landau (GL) theory for superfluid 3He describes the free energy near the transition temperature expanded in powers of the order parameter. With this approach the relative stability of various possible p-wave states can be explored in terms of the expansion coefficients of the theory. An extension to the dirty superfluid has been developed using a model that describes elastic quasiparticle scattering. There are five possible fourth order combinations of the order parameter that are invariant under all the symmetries of the p-wave superfluid. These fourth-order terms are characterized by the coefficients, $`(\beta _1,\beta _2,\beta _3,\beta _4,\beta _5)`$, which in the GL-theory are determined by thermodynamic quantities such as heat capacity, the magnetization, the phase diagram and the NMR frequency shift. In principle one could uniquely determine the $`\beta _i`$’s (thus the free energy functional) if five independent thermodynamic measurements were performed; the fact that in bulk superfluid 3He there are only four such measurements is unfortunate. Nonetheless, combinations of the $`\beta _i`$’s can be extracted from experiment and are very helpful in the understanding the magnetic suppression of the B-phase of 3He in aerogel.

In the pure superfluid the GL-theory can be used to describe the suppression of the AB-transition by magnetic field only for pressures less than 21 bars, the pressure of the polycritical point. For superfluid 3He in aerogel, the data from Fig.3 suggest that this theory can be applied at all pressures with

$$1\frac{T_{ABa}}{T_{ca}}=g_a(\beta )(\frac{B}{B_0})^2+𝒪(\frac{B}{B_0})^4,$$
(2)
where $`g_a(\beta )`$ is a strong-coupling parameter defined in a manner similar to that of the pure superfluid and $`B_0`$ is defined as,

$$B_0=\sqrt{\frac{8\pi ^2}{7\zeta (3)}}\frac{k_BT_{ca}}{\gamma \mathrm{}}(1+F_0^a),$$
(3)
with $`\gamma `$ the gyromagnetic ratio of 3He and $`F_0^a`$ is a Fermi liquid parameter. In the Homogeneous Scattering Model (HSM) which we describe below, $`B_0`$ is modified by impurity scattering according to

$$B_0^{HSM}/B_0=\sqrt{\frac{7\zeta (3)[1x_{n=1}^{\mathrm{}}(n1/2+x)^2]}{_{n=1}^{\mathrm{}}(n1/2+x)^3}}$$
(4)
where $`x\mathrm{}v_f/4\pi k_BT_{ca}l_{tr}`$ and $`l_{tr}`$ is the transport mean free path. This correction is about 2.5% at 25 bars with a 200 nm mean free path. We use the weak coupling approximation in Eq.3 which has been shown to be appropriate for bulk 3He . Assuming that the aerogel AB-transition occurs between the axial and the isotropic states, as in the pure superfluid, the coefficient $`g_a(\beta )`$ is written as,

$`g_a(\beta )={\displaystyle \frac{\beta _{245}}{2(3\beta _{13}+2\beta _{345})}}\times `$ (5)
$`\left(1+\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{(3\beta _{12}+\beta _{345})(2\beta _{13}\beta _{345})}{\beta _{245}\beta _{345}}}}\right)`$ (6)
where we have used the Mermin-Stare convention, $`\beta _{ijk}\beta _i+\beta _j+\beta _k`$. In the weak-coupling limit, $`\beta _5^{wc}=\beta _4^{wc}=\beta _3^{wc}=\beta _2^{wc}=2\beta _1^{wc}=2\beta _0^{wc}`$ with $`\beta _0^{wc}=7\zeta (3)N(0)/240(\pi k_BT_{c0})^2`$ and N(0) the density of states. In the weak-coupling limit, $`g_a(\beta ^{wc})=1`$.

The coefficient $`g_a(\beta )`$ can be taken directly from the low-field slope, $`m`$, of the data in Fig.3, $`m=g_a(\beta )T_{ca}/B_0^2`$. In Fig.3, the dotted lines show the quadratic suppression of $`T_{ABa}`$ for the smallest field at which the transition was observed, and the extrapolation to zero field was verified using the quench-cooling method we have described above, see Fig.4. The pressure dependence of $`g_a(\beta )`$ obtained from the data between 15 and 33.4 bars is shown in Fig.6 (filled circles), together with the measured values from the bulk, $`g_0(\beta )`$, taken from Hahn et al.. (open circles). For the aerogel data, $`B_0`$ was defined as in the pure case; using $`B_0^{HSM}`$ increases $`g_a(\beta )`$ slightly, however, its effect for a mean free path of $``$200 nm remains within the experimental error bar. For this reason and for clarity, we have used $`B_0`$ which does not depend on the transport mean free path. We have also deduced the value of $`g_a(\beta )`$ at 4.8 bars from the magnetic suppression of the aerogel AB-transition measured by the Lancaster group , denoted in Fig.6 with a star. The solid line is a guide-to-the-eye and the dotted, dashed, and dot-dashed lines are calculations using the homogeneous scattering model (HSM) which we discuss below. The pressure dependence of $`g_a(\beta )`$ is markedly different from the pure superfluid, $`g_0(\beta )`$, which diverges at the PCP near 21 bars. The almost linear dependence on pressure observed in the aerogel superfluid, even at high pressure, is a substantial modification of the phase diagram induced by impurity scattering.

The simplest model of impurity scattering is the Homogeneous Scattering Model (HSM). In this model, the scattering probability is independent of position and the medium is completely isotropic. This model has the advantage that the Ginzburg-Landau theory is only slightly modified from that of pure 3He. The superfluid transition in aerogel, $`T_{ca}`$, is given by solving Eq.1 in the form,

$$ln(T_{ca}/T_{c0})+\underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\left(\frac{1}{n\frac{1}{2}}\frac{1}{n\frac{1}{2}+x}\right)=0$$
(7)
where $`x\mathrm{}v_f/4\pi k_BT_{ca}l_{tr}`$ and $`l_{tr}`$ is the transport mean free path. The $`\beta _i`$’s have been calculated for the HSM and are given by,

$$\left(\begin{array}{c}\beta _1\\ \beta _2\\ \beta _3\\ \beta _4\\ \beta _5\end{array}\right)=a_1\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ 2\\ 2\\ 2\\ 2\end{array}\right)+a_2\left(\begin{array}{c}0\\ 1\\ 0\\ 1\\ 1\end{array}\right)+\left(\begin{array}{c}\delta \beta _1^{sc}\\ \delta \beta _2^{sc}\\ \delta \beta _3^{sc}\\ \delta \beta _4^{sc}\\ \delta \beta _5^{sc}\end{array}\right)$$
(8)
where the coefficients $`a_1`$ and $`a_2`$ are given by,

$`a_1\beta _a^{wc}={\displaystyle \frac{N(0)_{n=1}^{\mathrm{}}(n\frac{1}{2}+x)^3}{240(\pi k_BT_{ca})^2}},`$ (9)
$`a_2={\displaystyle \frac{N(0)\mathrm{}v_f}{288(\pi k_BT_{ca})^3l_{tr}}}(sin^2\delta _0{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}){\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}(n{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}+x)^4`$ (10)
and the $`\delta \beta _i^{sc}`$’s are the strong-coupling corrections to the free energies. Note that in the bulk limit ($`l_{tr}\mathrm{}`$), $`a_1\beta _0^{wc}`$ and $`a_20`$. We choose a random scattering phase shift $`\delta _0`$ such that $`sin^2\delta _0=1/2`$ and $`a_2=0`$. Calculations performed with a scattering phase shift in the unitary limit ($`sin^2\delta _0=1`$) or Born limit ($`sin^2\delta _0=0`$) have only a small effect on the magnitude of $`g_a(\beta )`$ and do not alter our conclusions. The strong-coupling corrections relative to the weak-coupling value $`\delta \beta _i^{sc}/\beta _0^{wc}`$, essential to calculate accurately $`g_a(\beta )`$, are taken from pure 3He; namely, $`\beta _{345}`$ is derived from measurements of the B-phase NMR g-shifts and longitudinal resonance frequency, $`\beta _{12}`$ from the normal to B-phase heat capacity jump , and $`\beta _{245}`$ and $`\beta _5`$ are from measurements of the $`A_1A_2`$ splitting  and magnetic suppression of the bulk AB-transition, $`g_0(\beta )`$ . The only unknown parameter in the HSM is the transport mean path, $`l_{tr}`$, for which high-frequency acoustic measurements on our sample were found to be consistent with a mean free path of $``$200-300 nm . In all of the calculations, $`T_{ca}`$ was solved using Eq. 7 and was used consistently throughout our calculations of the $`\beta _i`$’s.

In Fig.6, the dotted line shows the calculations of $`g_a(\beta )`$ which assumes that the strong-coupling corrections are the same as in the pure superfluid and with a transport mean free path of 200 nm. The effect of scattering is to increase the polycritical pressure, where $`g_a(\beta )`$ diverges, thus increasing the stability of the dirty B-phase. This model does not describe our experimental data for any reasonable value of the transport mean free path. However, we expect that the strong-coupling corrections should scale to first-order as $`\delta \beta _i^{sc}(T_c/T_F)\beta _0^{wc}`$, hence being reduced (relative to the weak-coupling value) in the dirty system accordingly to $`(\delta \beta _i^{sc})_a/\beta _a^{wc}(\delta \beta _i^{sc})_0/\beta _0^{wc}\times \frac{T_{ca}}{T_{c0}}`$ where $`(\delta \beta _i^{sc})_a`$ and $`(\delta \beta _i^{sc})_0`$ are the strong-coupling corrections in the dirty and the pure superfluids. In Fig.6 the calculations of $`g_a(\beta )`$ were also performed with the HSM using the rescaled strong-coupling coefficients. They are shown with two choices of transport mean free path of 200 nm (dashed line) and 150 nm (dot-dashed line). Considering the limitations of the HSM, the agreement between the data and calculated $`g_a(\beta )`$ is reasonably good. However, the better agreemnt with the smaller mean free path of 150 nm indicates that smaller values of $`T_{ca}`$ than the epexerimental ones are needed to correctly decsribe the strong-coupling corrections in aerogel. But more importantly, the HSM calculations shows unambiguously that the strong-coupling corrections (relative to weak-coupling) are reduced by impurity scattering and that the PCP is increased in a 98% porous aerogel above the melting pressure, beyond experimental reach. At the PCP, the heat capacity jump in the A-phase equals that of the B-phase, equivalent to the condition, $`3\beta _{13}=2\beta _{345}`$ in Eq. 6. The HSM with rescaled strong-coupling corrections predicts a PCP of $``$ 34 bars for a mean free path of 200 nm and a PCP of $``$ 40 bars for a mean free path of 150 nm. The almost linear dependence on pressure of $`g_a(\beta )`$ that we observe suggests that the true PCP may even be higher than estimated from the HSM. Experiments with higher porosity aerogels, having a correspondingly larger mean free path, may be able to clarify this situation. It might also be necessary to take into account modification of the strong-coupling corrections beyond a simple rescaling as we have done, e.g. the effect of impurities on spin-fluctuation feedback.

The qualitative agreement of our data with the HSM calculations using a rescaling of the strong coupling corrections to the $`\beta _i`$’s provides qualitative evidence that the orbital symmetry of the order parameter in the aerogel system is similar to that of the pure superfluid. The expression, Eq. 4, for suppression of the AB-transition is specific to the transition between axial and isotropic states and so the agreement between the model and our measurements of the transition is consistent with, but not a proof of, their identification with A and B phases in the dirty superfluid.

Finally, it is worth noting that in the pure superfluid $`g_0(\beta )`$ does not recover its weak-coupling value (1) at zero pressure, but rather takes the value 1.61 . This rather large deviation from weak-coupling theory at zero pressure, $`40\%`$, is unexpected since all other thermodynamic measurements indicate much smaller deviations from weak coupling at low pressure. At zero pressure, the B-phase heat capacity jump and $`A_1A_2`$ linear field splitting  are within 3% of their weak-coupling values. This finite contribution to $`g_0(\beta )`$ at zero pressure has been interpreted as evidence that 3He is not a weak-coupling superfluid at zero pressure. As we have shown above, the strong-coupling corrections are reduced by scattering (scaling with $`T_{ca}`$) and should therefore be dramatically reduced at low pressure where $`T_{ca}`$ is most strongly suppressed. We therefore expect $`g_a(\beta )`$ to recover its weak-coupling limit in aerogel at low pressure, if indeed the deviation of $`g_0(\beta )`$ from weak coupling in pure 3He at low pressure is due to strong-coupling corrections. Our data in aerogel do not allow us to extrapolate to zero pressure and so an accurate measurement of $`g_a(\beta )`$ at low pressures would be desirable since it might shed light on this problem.

### C Field dependence of $`T_{ca}`$

The field dependence of $`T_{ca}`$ at 33.4 bars is shown in Fig.7 for fields ranging from 0 to 5 kG. The transition is clearly field independent and from this we can infer that the superfluid transition is from a normal fluid to an ESP superfluid. These data contradict earlier NMR work where a $`B^2`$ field dependence was reported for the superfluid transition in aerogel. Upon reanalysis of these same earlier results including some additional experiments, by Haard, it was found that the NMR data are consistent with the acoustic experiments presented here to within experimental error.

In pure superfluid 3He, owing to particle-hole asymmetry, a magnetic field produces a linear splitting of the normal to A-phase transition . The field dependence of the splitting between the $`A_1`$ and $`A_2`$ phase lines is 6 $`\mu `$K/kG near melting pressure and is shown in Fig.7 as dotted lines shifted to the average value of $`T_{ca}`$.

In contrast, for the aerogel superfluid we do not observe any deviation of $`T_{ca}`$ from its zero-field value, nor do we observe significant broadening of the transition region in the acoustic trace even at our highest field of 8 kG (not shown in Fig.7. This splitting may be hard to resolve owing to the rather broad superfluid transition in aerogel, $`30\mu K`$. The expected linear $`A_1A_2`$ splitting in the dirty superfluid can be estimated from calculations based on Ginzburg-Landau theory and the HSM (see above). The bulk $`A_1A_2`$ splitting can be expressed by the quantity $`U_0`$ defined as,

$$U_0\frac{(dT/dB)_{A1}}{(dT/dB)_{A2}}=\frac{\beta _5}{\beta _{245}}.$$
(11)
which ranges for pure 3He from 0.97 at zero pressure to 1.81 at melting pressure. In the HSM, the $`U`$ parameter can be calculated from $`\beta _5`$ and $`\beta _{245}`$ and in aerogel takes the value at melting pressure of $`U_a0.85U_0`$ with a mean free path of 200 nm. For this estimate, we have used the rescaled bulk strong-coupling corrections as discussed above. Measurements of $`T_{ca}`$ in high fields sufficient to resolve this splitting are desirable in order to establish a better understanding of the thermodynamics of the dirty superfluid.

### D Supercooling of the aerogel AB-transition in zero applied field

We have shown that the polycritical point vanishes for superfluid 3He in 98% aerogel. Consequently, in zero field we expect that superfluidity occurs by a second order transition from the normal state directly to the B-phase without supercooling. Our observation of supercooling giving a large region of metastable A-phase with no applied field is quite unexpected. Supercooling was first noted by Barker et al. for the aerogel AB-transition at 284 G with 4He preplating. This was also found for zero applied field and was studied as a function of magnetic field by Gervais et al.. Our smallest field in this case was estimated to be less than 10 G. There are a number of possible intrepretations and so a review of the expected behavior in the limit of low magnetic field is appropriate.

Taking pure superfluid 3He as a guide, the first transition encountered on cooling in a small but non-zero magnetic field is from the normal state to the $`A_1`$-phase and then, in the absence of supercooling, to the B-phase. If there were to be supercooling it is likely that the $`A_2`$ transition would be encountered before reaching the B-phase. This follows since the $`A_1`$ transition increases linearly with field whereas the B-phase is suppressed quadratically. Consequently, the supercooling of the aerogel AB-transition at 284 G observed by Barker et al.  can be explained in a trivial way: a small region of $`A_1`$-phase in equilibrium, $``$ 1$`\mu `$K, is first encountered on cooling, leading to a metastable A-phase that supercools until the B-phase nucleates. However, the mechanism for producing relative stability of one phase over another, or the nucleation of the most stable phase, has not been explored in such a small interval of temperature near $`T_c`$.

Can the same argument for supercooling in 284 G hold at very low field as well? If the total field for the case of zero applied field were less than 10 G then the window of stability of the $`A_1`$-phase would be only $``$ 0.03 $`\mu `$K. We find supercooling under these circumstance to be even more remarkable since there is no evidence of similar supercooling for the pure superfluid at pressures below the polycritical point. If the phenomenon of supercooling in low field were to be unique to the dirty superfluid then it would require a correspondingly unique nucleation scenario specific to the aerogel AB-transition, which, in addition, must also account for our observation that the extent of supercooling is field independent. Furthermore, it seems not to make sense to rely on details for phase stability in such a narrow window of temperature when the superfluid transition $`T_{ca}`$ is inhomogeneously broadened over an interval three orders of magnitude larger. A second possibility, and one that we believe to be more likely, is that there must be a thin, but unobserved, sliver of A-phase near $`T_{ca}`$ which gives rise to the metastability that is observed. This sliver is at most $``$20 $`\mu `$K wide, but might be stabilized by inhomogeneity in the aerogel structure in a manner that is not yet understood. In Fig.8, the metastable phase diagram from Gervais et al. is shown with no applied magnetic field ranging in pressure from 15 to 33.4 bars. The region of metastability is strikingly similar to that observed by Barker et al. in a field of 284 G, with 4He preplating, and for a much larger aerogel sample. The critical radius $`R_c`$ for B-phase nucleation may play an important role, since a large critical radius in the aerogel might give rise to the observed metastability. An estimate near melting pressures from the susceptibility difference and field dependence of $`T_{ABa}`$ shows that it is slightly larger in aerogel, $`R_c^{aero}5R_c^{bulk}`$, at the same value of $`T/T_{AB}`$. In pure 3He the critical radius has not been measured below melting pressure. Future work in a magnetically shielded environment and with different aerogel densities, together with characterization of $`R_c`$ as a function of pressure, could bring some understanding to this puzzle.

For all experiments to date it has been unavoidable that pure and dirty superfluids be juxtaposed. In future work it may be possible to explore the connection between these two unconventional superfluids and such experiments can benefit from detailed knowledge of the phase diagram. In this spirit we have recently investigated the nucleation of the AB-transition showing that proximity coupling between the pure and dirty superfluids is too weak to act as a source of nucleation.

## IV Conclusion

We have described the phase diagram of superfluid 3He in 98% aerogel. In this phase diagram we find two equilibrium states which we call A and B, by analogy with pure 3He. The B-phase is favored in zero field and is destablized by a magnetic field yielding the A-phase. The superfluid transition from the normal state, i.e. normal to A-phase transition, is insensitive to magnetic field. On this basis alone we can be confident of the nature of the spin part of the order parameter associated with each of these phases: the A-phase is an equal spin pairing state and the B-phase is a non-equal spin pairing state. The field dependence of the AB-transition can be understood from calculations using the HSM model combined with a simple rescaling of strong-coupling corrections to the quasiparticle interactions, assuming that the A and B dirty phases are in fact the axial and isotropic p-wave states. The theory and experiment both concur that sufficient impurity scattering, as is the case for 98% aerogel, causes the polycritical point to vanish. It is intriguing that no hint of the expected but small $`A_1A_2`$ splitting was observed even at fields of $``$8 kG; however, higher field experiments will be better able to address this question.

The extensive supercooling of the AB-transition, especially with no applied field, remains a puzzle. It cannot be simply explained in terms of the phase diagram that we present, nor in terms of current nucleation scenarios. This raises further questions concerning the nature of the superfluid state in aerogel and whether it might be inherently inhomogeneous.

In summary, the measurements of the equilibrium phase diagram of 3He with impurity scattering improves our understanding of pure and dirty superfluids and sets the stage for a better understanding of its non-equilibrium behavior, metastability and nucleation.

###### Acknowledgements.

We acknowledge helpful discussions with J.A. Sauls, E.V. Thuneberg and G. Kharadze. Work supported by the NSF under grant no. DMR-0072350. One of the author (G.G) acknowledges receipt of support from FCAR (Québec).


text:
# Lorentz Integral Transform for Inclusive and Exclusive Cross Sections with the Lanczos Method

## I Introduction

The study of reaction cross sections is an important tool to reveal the dynamics of particle systems. For systems with a small number of particles one aims at microscopic calculations trying to take into account all relevant degrees of freedom of the considered process. However, calculations via the classical approach, where one employs initial and continuum state wave functions, are very difficult to perform for reactions at energies beyond a possible three-body breakup threshold. On the other hand the calculation can be carried out in an alternative way, namely via the Lorentz Integral Transform (LIT) method . This method allows ab initio calculations which take into account final state interactions correctly, without explicit knowledge of the complicated continuum wave functions. Various applications of this method for reactions of nuclei up to four nucleons can be found in the literature (see e.g. ).

The LIT is expressed in terms of Lorentz states $`\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Psi }}`$, which have bound state like asymptotic boundary conditions that are much simpler to treat than the boundary conditions for a continuum state and thus $`\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{\Psi }}`$ can be calculated with similar methods as a bound state wave function. Common to many bound state methods is an expansion of the wave function on some basis set. In fact in the above mentioned LIT calculations an expansion on the hyperspherical harmonics basis has been employed for the reactions of nuclei with $`A3`$ (with the exception of Ref. ). As the Hilbert space increases with the number of particles the calculations face larger and larger hamiltonian matrices, which have to be inverted in order to solve the equations associated with the LIT method. Such an inversion is time consuming and limits the number of possible basis states used in the calculation. The aim of the present paper is to point out that the inversion can be avoided. Inspired by recent condensed matter calculations  we have adapted the Lanczos method for the calculation of the LIT. In this way we open the possibility to extend the LIT method to problems, where a rather large number of basis functions is needed, e.g., calculations of reactions of the $`\alpha `$ particle with realistic interactions or calculations of reactions of systems with more than four particles.

The outline of the paper is as follows. In Sections II/III we review the LIT method for inclusive/exclusive reactions briefly and discuss the corresponding implementation of the Lanczos technique. Various checks of the calculation are discussed in Section IV, which also contains a short summary at the end.

## II Inclusive Processes

As pointed out for the case of the Stieltjes transform  the integral transform method can be used for the calculation of a variety of reaction cross sections. In this and in the following section we restrict the discussion to inclusive and exclusive cross sections due to an external probe, though the approach can also be applied to other reaction cross sections, e.g., to the elastic scattering of particle systems.

In order to determine inclusive cross sections due to external probes one has to calculate various dynamical functions

$$F_{kk^{}}(\omega ,q)=𝑑\psi _f\psi _0|\widehat{O}_k^{}(q)|\psi _f\psi _f|\widehat{O}_k^{}(q)|\psi _0\delta (E_fE_0\omega ),$$
(1)
where $`\omega `$ and $`q`$ are energy and momentum transfer; $`\psi _0`$ and $`\psi _f`$ denote ground and final state wave functions of the considered system with energies $`E_0`$ and $`E_f`$, respectively, while the various $`\widehat{O}_k`$ are excitation operators inducing different types of transitions.

For few-body reactions with $`A>2`$ one faces very often the problem that $`F_{kk^{}}(\omega ,q)`$ cannot be calculated exactly, since the microscopic calculation of $`\psi _f`$ is too complicated. However, via the LIT approach the problem can be reformulated in such a way that the knowledge of $`\psi _f`$ is not necessary . To this end the LIT of the response function is introduced

$$L_{kk^{}}(\sigma )=𝑑\omega \frac{F_{kk^{}}(\omega )}{(\omega \sigma _R)^2+\sigma _I^2},$$
(2)
where

$$\sigma =\sigma _R+i\sigma _I\sigma _R,\sigma _I>0\text{.}$$
(3)
In (2), as well as in the following equations, we suppress the dependence on $`q`$ of $`L_{kk^{}}(\sigma ,q)`$ and $`F_{kk^{}}(\omega ,q)`$.

The LIT method proceeds in two steps. First $`L_{kk^{}}(\sigma )`$ is evaluated in a direct way, which does not require the knowledge of $`F_{kk^{}}`$, and then in a second step the dynamical function is obtained from an inversion of the LIT. The direct calculation of $`L_{kk^{}}(\sigma )`$ is outlined in the following. Starting from the definition of the LIT in (2), substituting for $`F_{kk^{}}(\omega )`$ the expression in (1) and using the completeness relation of the Hamiltonian eigenstates,

$$𝑑f|\psi _f\psi _f|=1\text{,}$$
(4)
one finds

$$L_{kk^{}}(\sigma )=\psi _0|\widehat{O}_k^{}\frac{1}{\widehat{H}E_0\sigma _Ri\sigma _I}\frac{1}{\widehat{H}E_0\sigma _R+i\sigma _I}\widehat{O}_k^{}|\psi _0\text{.}$$
(5)
It is evident that the solutions of the equations

$$(\widehat{H}E_0\sigma _R+i\sigma _I)|\stackrel{~}{\psi }_l=\widehat{O}_l|\psi _0;l=k,k^{}$$
(6)
lead directly to the searched transform:

$$L_{kk^{}}(\sigma )=\stackrel{~}{\psi }_k|\stackrel{~}{\psi }_k^{}\text{.}$$
(7)
Physical solutions for the Lorentz states $`|\stackrel{~}{\psi }_l`$ of (6) have asymptotic boundary conditions like a bound state. Moreover the solutions are unique, since due to the hermiticity of $`\widehat{H}`$ the homogeneous equation

$$(\widehat{H}E_0\sigma _R+i\sigma _I)|\stackrel{~}{\psi }_l=0$$
(8)
has only the trivial solution $`|\stackrel{~}{\psi }_l=0`$.

The inversion of the calculated $`L_{kk^{}}(\sigma )`$ leads to the dynamical functions $`F_{kk^{}}(\omega )`$. For details on the inversion procedure see, e.g., Ref. . The LIT method leads to reliable results as shown in test calculations for two- and three-body systems .

If one solves (6) expanding $`|\stackrel{~}{\psi }_l`$ on a set of basis functions $`|\mu `$ one has to invert the corresponding hamiltonian matrix $`H_{\mu \mu ^{}}`$. For a large number of basis functions this is a time consuming calculation, moreover, for dense matrices this task rapidly becomes prohibitive. As we will show, the Lanczos method can help to overcome this problem.

Basically the Lanczos method  is used to tridiagonalize matrices. If one is interested in calculating the ground state energy of an hamiltonian matrix $`H_{\mu \mu ^{}}`$ one has first to choose a starter, a vector $`|\varphi _0`$, which must have a non-zero overlap with the ground state $`|\psi _0`$. One can then build the Lanczos orthonormal basis $`\{|\varphi _i\text{,}i=0,\mathrm{}\text{,}n\}`$ by applying the Lanczos algorithm recursively

$$b_{i+1}|\varphi _{i+1}=\widehat{H}|\varphi _ia_i|\varphi _ib_i|\varphi _{i1},$$
(9)
where

$$|\varphi _1=0\text{,}\varphi _i|\varphi _j=\delta _{ij}\text{.}$$
(10)
The Lanczos coefficients $`a_i`$ and $`b_i`$ are defined as

$$a_i=\varphi _i|\widehat{H}|\varphi _i\text{,}b_i=b_i|\varphi _i\text{,}b_0=0\text{.}$$
(11)
If one applies $`M`$ Lanczos steps to an $`M\times M`$ matrix, then the original matrix is reduced into a tridiagonal form. However, the power of the Lanczos algorithm lays in the fact that even after $`m<<M`$ steps the eigenvalues of the $`m\times m`$ tridiagonal Lanczos matrix are good approximations of the extreme eigenvalues of $`H`$. These eigenvalues converge rapidly with increasing number of Lanczos steps. Working with finite precision, it is necessary to recall that at each step there are round-off errors so that after a certain number of steps the Lanczos vectors loose their orthogonality. In order to obtain accurate results this loss has to remain small, otherwise one has to apply an additional reorthogonalization procedure.

In the following we show how the Lanczos algorithm can be applied to the LIT method for inclusive processes. To this end we rewrite the LIT in the following form

$$\frac{\sigma _I}{\pi }L_{kk^{}}(\sigma )=\frac{1}{\pi }\text{Im}\left\{\psi _0|\widehat{O}_k^{}\frac{1}{\sigma _R+i\sigma _I+E_0\widehat{H}}\widehat{O}_k^{}|\psi _0\right\}\text{.}$$
(12)
A similar relation connects the dynamical functions $`F_{kk^{}}`$ to the Green’s function

$$F_{kk^{}}(\omega )=\frac{1}{\pi }\text{Im}\left\{\underset{\eta 0}{lim}G(\omega +i\eta +E_0)\right\};G(z)=\psi _0|\widehat{O}_k^{}\frac{1}{z\widehat{H}}\widehat{O}_k^{}|\psi _0,$$
(13)
provided that $`z=\omega +i\eta `$ is replaced by $`\sigma _R+i\sigma _I`$. This is not surprising since for $`\sigma _I0`$ the properly normalized Lorentzian kernel tends to $`\delta (\omega \sigma _R)`$ and thus $`L_{kk^{}}(\sigma _R)\sigma _I/\pi F_{kk^{}}(\sigma _R)`$. In condensed matter calculations  the Lanczos algorithm has been applied to the calculation of the Green function with a small value of $`\eta `$, and its imaginary part has been interpreted as $`F_{kk^{}}(\omega )`$ directly. This can be done if the spectrum is discrete (or discretized) and $`\eta `$ is sufficiently small. In our case we have a genuine continuum problem and we want to avoid any discretization, therefore we calculate $`L_{kk^{}}(\sigma _R)`$ in the same way i.e. with finite $`\sigma _I`$ using the Lanczos algorithm, but then we antitransform $`L_{kk^{}}(\sigma _R)`$ in order to obtain $`F_{kk^{}}(\omega )`$.

Choosing

$$|\varphi _0=\frac{\widehat{O}|\psi _0}{\sqrt{\psi _0|\widehat{O}^{}\widehat{O}|\psi _0}}$$
(14)
as starting vector for the Lanczos basis and setting $`z=E_0+\sigma _R+i\sigma _I`$ one finds

$$L(\sigma )=\frac{1}{\sigma _I}\psi _0|\widehat{O}^{}\widehat{O}|\psi _0\text{Im}\{\varphi _0|\frac{1}{z\widehat{H}}|\varphi _0\}$$
(15)
showing that the LIT depends on the matrix element

$$x_{00}=\varphi _0|\frac{1}{z\widehat{H}}|\varphi _0.$$
(16)
One can calculate $`x_{00}`$ applying Cramer’s rule to the solution of the linear system

$$\underset{n}{}(z\widehat{H})_{mn}x_{n0}=\delta _{m0}$$
(17)
that arises from the expansion of the identity

$$(z\widehat{H})(z\widehat{H})^1=I$$
(18)
over the Lanczos basis {$`|\varphi _i\text{,}i=0\text{,}\mathrm{}\text{,}n\}`$ . In this way one is able to write $`x_{00}`$ as a continued fraction containing the Lanczos coefficients $`a_i`$ and $`b_i`$,

$$x_{00}=\frac{1}{(za_0)\frac{b_1^2}{(za_1)\frac{b_2^2}{(za_2)b_3^2\mathrm{}.}}},$$
(19)
and thus also the LIT becomes a function of the Lanczos coefficients

$$L(\sigma )=\frac{1}{\sigma _I}\text{Im}\left\{\frac{\psi _0|\widehat{O}^{}\widehat{O}|\psi _0}{(za_0)\frac{b_1^2}{(za_1)\frac{b_2^2}{(za_2)b_3^2\mathrm{}.}}}\right\}.$$
(20)
This illustrates that the Lanczos method allows to determine $`L(\sigma )`$ without solving the differential equation (6), i.e. without inverting the hamiltonian matrix.

## III Exclusive Processes

Different from an inclusive reaction where the final state of the studied particle system is unobserved, for an exclusive process one has to determine the cross section of a specific breakup channel for specific angles of the outgoing fragments. For instance, the unpolarized cross section for a two-body breakup induced by an external probe is given by

$$\frac{d\sigma }{d\mathrm{\Omega }_f}=\underset{kk^{}}{}c_{kk^{}}(\omega ,q,\varphi _f)f_{kk^{}}(\omega ,q,\theta _f),$$
(21)
where $`\mathrm{\Omega }_f=(\theta _f,\varphi _f)`$ is the spherical angle of one of the outgoing fragments. In (21) the $`c_{kk^{}}`$ are known kinematical functions, while the dynamics of the particle system is contained in the structure functions

$$f_{kk^{}}(\omega ,q,\theta _f)=\underset{\alpha m}{}T_{\alpha km}^{}(E_f)T_{\alpha k^{}m}(E_f).$$
(22)
The above transition matrix elements are defined as follows

$$T_{\alpha km}(E_f)=\psi _{f,\alpha }|\widehat{O}_k(q)|\psi _{0,m},$$
(23)
where $`\alpha `$ stands for a set of quantum numbers of the final state function $`\psi _f`$ with energy $`E_f`$ in the specific breakup channel and $`m`$ is the projection of the total angular momentum of the initial state wave function $`\psi _0`$.

Different from the inclusive cross section, where an integral method leads to the direct determination of the dynamical function $`F_{kk^{}}`$, one has to determine any single transition matrix element $`T_{\alpha km}(E_f)`$ in order to calculate the exclusive cross section .

We illustrate the derivation of the integral transform method for the exclusive case restricting ourselves to a breakup of the A-body system in two fragments. In this case the final state of the system can be written using the Lippmann-Schwinger equation

$$\psi _{f,\alpha }|=\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}|+\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}|\widehat{V}_{12}\frac{1}{E_f+iϵ\widehat{H}},$$
(24)
where $`|\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}`$ describes the plane wave relative motion of the two fragments with the same set of quantum numbers $`\alpha `$ as $`\psi _{f,\alpha }`$, while $`\widehat{V}_{12}`$ denotes the interaction of the constituents of one fragment with the constituents of the other fragment. In coordinate space the plane wave has the following form

$$\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}(\stackrel{}{r})=𝒜\psi _1\psi _2\frac{e^{i\stackrel{}{p}\stackrel{}{r}}}{(2\pi )^{3/2}},$$
(25)
where $`𝒜`$ is an antisymmetrization operator acting on the constituents of both fragments, $`\psi _1`$ and $`\psi _2`$ are the internal wave functions of the two fragments, while $`\stackrel{}{p}`$ is the relative momentum and $`\stackrel{}{r}`$ the relative coordinate of the two fragments. Note that internal coordinates and quantum numbers of $`\psi _1`$ and $`\psi _2`$ are suppressed in (25).

Substituting (24) into (23) one finds that the transition matrix element is described by the sum of two pieces, a Born term

$$T_{\alpha km}^{Born}(E_f)=\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}|\widehat{O}_k|\psi _{0,m}$$
(26)
and a final state interaction (FSI) term

$$T_{\alpha km}^{FSI}(E_f)=\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}|\widehat{V}_{12}\frac{1}{E_f+iϵ\widehat{H}}\widehat{O}_k|\psi _{0,m}\text{.}$$
(27)
While the Born term can be calculated without major problems the FSI term is more difficult. Using the completeness of the eigenstates $`|\psi _p(E_p)`$ of $`\widehat{H}`$ one gets for the FSI term

$`T_{\alpha km}^{FSI}(E_f)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle 𝑑f^{}\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}|\widehat{V}_{12}|\psi _f^{}(E_f^{})\psi _f^{}(E_f^{})|\frac{1}{E_f+iϵ\widehat{H}}\widehat{O}_k|\psi _{0,m}}`$ (28)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle }df^{}\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}|\widehat{V}_{12}|\psi _f^{}(E_f^{})\psi _f^{}(E_f^{})|\widehat{O}{}_{k}{}^{}|\psi _{0,m}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{E_f+iϵE_f^{}}}`$ (29)
$`=`$ $`i\pi F_{\alpha km}(E_f)+𝒫{\displaystyle _{E_0\delta }^{\mathrm{}}}𝑑E_f^{}{\displaystyle \frac{F_{\alpha km}(E_f^{})}{E_fE_f^{}}}`$ (30)
with

$$F_{\alpha km}(E_f^{})=\underset{f^{}}{}\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}|\widehat{V}_{12}|\psi _f^{}(E_f^{})\psi _f^{}(E_f^{})|\widehat{O}_k|\psi _{0,m}\text{,}$$
(31)
where the sum over $`f^{}`$ stands for a possible degeneracy of the states $`|\psi _f^{}`$ with energy $`E_f^{}`$.

Equation (31) is only a formal solution for $`F_{\alpha km}(E)`$, since one should know all the eigenstates of $`\widehat{H}`$. A direct calculation of $`F_{\alpha km}(E)`$ is even more difficult than the original problem of Eq. (23), where one needs to know just the eigenstate of energy $`E_f`$. However, one obtains $`F_{\alpha km}`$ indirectly applying the LIT approach:

$`L_{\alpha km}(\sigma )`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle _{E_0\delta }^{\mathrm{}}}𝑑E{\displaystyle \frac{F_{\alpha km}(E)}{(E\sigma )(E\sigma ^{})}}`$ (32)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle _{E_0\delta }^{\mathrm{}}}𝑑f^{}\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}|\widehat{V}_{12}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\widehat{H}\sigma }}|\psi _f^{}\psi _f^{}|{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\widehat{H}\sigma ^{}}}\widehat{O}_k|\psi _{0,m}`$ (33)
$`=`$ $`\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}|\widehat{V}_{12}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\widehat{H}\sigma }}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\widehat{H}\sigma ^{}}}\widehat{O}_k|\psi _{0,m}`$ (34)
$`=`$ $`\stackrel{~}{\psi }_\alpha (\sigma )|\stackrel{~}{\psi }_{km}(\sigma ).`$ (35)
The Lorentz state $`\stackrel{~}{\psi }_{km}(\sigma )`$ is obtained solving essentially the same differential equation as for the inclusive case discussed in the previous chapter:

$$(\widehat{H}\sigma _R+i\sigma _I)|\stackrel{~}{\psi }_{km}=\widehat{O}_k|\psi _{0,m}\text{,}$$
(36)
whereas $`\stackrel{~}{\psi }_\alpha (\sigma )`$ is the solution of new differential equation

$$(\widehat{H}\sigma _R+i\sigma _I)|\stackrel{~}{\psi }_\alpha =\widehat{V}_{12}|\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}\text{.}$$
(37)
If $`\widehat{V}_{12}`$ represents a finite range potential, the term on the right hand side of (37) vanishes for large distances, and one has also for $`\stackrel{~}{\psi }_\alpha `$ an asymptotic bound state boundary condition similar to a bound state. If $`\widehat{V}_{12}`$ is not of finite range one can reformulate the LIT method accordingly .

Inverting the various $`L_{\alpha km}`$ one gets the functions $`F_{\alpha km}`$ and thus the transition matrix elements $`T_{\alpha km}^{FSI}`$. An additional calculation of the Born terms $`T_{\alpha km}^{Born}`$ leads to the searched structure functions. Also for exclusive cross sections one obtains reliable results with the LIT method as shown in a test calculation for the $`d(e,e^{}N)`$ reaction .

Now we turn to the application of the Lanczos method to the LIT of the exclusive reaction. To this end we first rewrite the LIT in the following form

$$L_{\alpha km}(\sigma )=\frac{1}{2i\sigma _I}\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}|\widehat{V}_{12}(\frac{1}{\widehat{H}\sigma _Ri\sigma _I}\frac{1}{\widehat{H}\sigma _R+i\sigma _I})\widehat{O}_k|\psi _{0,m}\text{.}$$
(38)
Using the completeness relation over the Lanczos vectors $`\{|\varphi _i\text{,}i=0,\mathrm{},n\}`$, where the starting vector $`|\varphi _0`$ is the same as in (14), and setting $`z=\sigma _R+i\sigma _I`$ one finds

$`L_{\alpha km}(\sigma )`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{i}{2\sigma _I}}\{{\displaystyle \underset{i=0}{\overset{n}{}}}\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}|\widehat{V}_{12}|\varphi _i[\varphi _i|{\displaystyle \frac{1}{z\widehat{H}}}\widehat{O}_k|\psi _{0,m}\varphi _i|{\displaystyle \frac{1}{z^{}\widehat{H}}}\widehat{O}_k|\psi _{0,m}]\}`$ (39)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{i\sqrt{\psi _{0,m}|\widehat{O}_k^{}\widehat{O}_k|\psi _{0,m}}}{2\sigma _I}}\{{\displaystyle \underset{i=0}{\overset{n}{}}}\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}|\widehat{V}_{12}|\varphi _i[\varphi _i|{\displaystyle \frac{1}{z\widehat{H}}}|\varphi _0\varphi _i|{\displaystyle \frac{1}{z^{}\widehat{H}}}|\varphi _0]\}`$ (40)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{i\sqrt{\psi _{0,m}|\widehat{O}_k^{}\widehat{O}_k|\psi _{0,m}}}{2\sigma _I}}\{{\displaystyle \underset{i=0}{\overset{n}{}}}\varphi _\alpha ^{PW}|\widehat{V}_{12}|\varphi _i[x_{i0}\stackrel{~}{x}_{i0}]\},`$ (41)
with the matrix elements

$`x_{0i}`$ $`=`$ $`\varphi _0|{\displaystyle \frac{1}{z\widehat{H}}}|\varphi _i\text{,}`$ (42)
$`\stackrel{~}{x}_{0i}`$ $`=`$ $`\varphi _0|{\displaystyle \frac{1}{z^{}\widehat{H}}}|\varphi _i,`$ (43)
which can be written as continued fractions of the Lanczos coefficients, like in (19).

In the following we describe a simple algorithm for a recursive calculation of all the $`x_{0i}`$ starting from $`x_{00}`$. Defining

$$g(\nu )=\frac{b_\nu ^2}{za_\nu \frac{b_{\nu +1}^2}{za_{\nu +1}\frac{b_{\nu +2}^2}{\mathrm{}}}}$$
(44)
one has

$$x_{00}=\frac{1}{za_0+g(1)}.$$
(45)
The next matrix element $`x_{01}`$ can be written as

$$x_{01}=\frac{1}{(za_1)\lambda _0b_1+\lambda _0g(2)},$$
(46)
where

$$\lambda _0=\frac{za_0}{b_1}$$
(47)
is obtained from $`x_{00}`$. Now a new parameter

$$\lambda _1=\frac{(za_1)\lambda _0b_1}{b_2}$$
(48)
can be obtained from $`x_{01}`$ leading to the evaluation of

$$x_{02}=\frac{1}{(za_2)\lambda _1b_2\lambda _0+\lambda _1g(3)}.$$
(49)
Proceeding in this way it is easy to show that the $`n`$-th matrix element $`x_{0n}`$ can be written as

$$x_{0n}=\frac{1}{(za_n)\lambda _{n1}b_n\lambda _{n2}+\lambda _{n1}g(n+1)}$$
(50)
with

$$\lambda _n=\frac{(za_n)\lambda _{n1}b_n\lambda _{n2}}{b_{n+1}}.$$
(51)
## IV Results

In order to check the accuracy and to quantify the advantages of the Lanczos method for the LIT approach we apply it to the calculation of total photoabsorption cross sections of <sup>3</sup>H and <sup>4</sup>He and compare to results which we obtain solving Eq. (6) via an inversion of the hamiltonian matrix.

For the total photoabsorption cross section we use the dipole approximation, where one has a single transition operator, namely

$$\widehat{O}_k=\widehat{O}_k^{}=\underset{i}{\overset{A}{}}z_i\frac{1+\tau _z(i)}{2};$$
(52)
here $`z_i`$ and $`\tau _z(i)`$ are the third components of the spatial coordinate and of the isospin of particle $`i`$, respectively. We expand ground and Lorentz states on the hyperspherical harmonics basis making use of the recently developed EIHH approach . As NN interaction model we employ the semirealistic MTI-III potential . We note in passing that calculations of the total photoabsorption cross section of <sup>3</sup>H and <sup>4</sup>He via the LIT already exist .

In Fig. 1 we show the LIT for the triton photodisintegration choosing the isospin channel $`T=1/2`$ of the disintegrated three-body system. One sees that there is an excellent agreement between both calculations. The relative difference of both results is far below 0.1 $`\%`$. For the second isospin channel ($`T=3/2`$), not shown here, the comparison is of the same excellent quality. In Fig. 2 we show the LIT for the case of the <sup>4</sup>He photodisintegration, where one has only a single isospin channel of the disintegrated four-body system ($`T=1`$) for the considered dipole transition. Again one sees a very good agreement comparing the results with and without application of the Lanczos method. One finds only tiny differences between both results. It is evident from Figs. 1 and 2 that the Lanczos method leads to highly reliable results.

The main advantage of the Lanczos technique lies in the enormous reduction of the cpu time. In particular one should note that it is not necessary to perform all the Lanczos steps. In fact, checking the convergence of $`L(\sigma )`$ with respect to the number of Lanczos coefficients used in the continued fraction one finds the following: for $`\sigma _R\mathrm{}`$ only the first Lanczos step is necessary, because the entire continued fraction is dominated just by $`\sigma _R`$. Also in the low $`\sigma _R`$ region one can expect that the continued fraction converges rapidly, since for $`\sigma _R0`$ the dominating contribution to the term $`1/(z\widehat{H})`$ is given by the lowest eigenvalue of $`\widehat{H}`$, which is well approximated using only the first few Lanczos coefficients. Thus one may hope that in the intermediate $`\sigma _R`$ region a rather small number of Lanczos coefficients will be sufficient. In Fig. 3 we illustrate the convergence behaviour with respect to the number of Lanczos steps for the LIT of the <sup>4</sup>He photodisintegration for a test case with 1372 basis states. As one can see the transforms are somewhat different from the converged one only if one takes less than $`100`$ Lanczos coefficients. The relative error is already smaller than $`0.5\%`$ for 150 coefficients and becomes rapidly smaller with a further increasing number of Lanczos steps. One can conclude that $`200÷300`$ steps are completely sufficient in the studied case. Also due to the rapid convergence we obtain a reduction in cpu time of two orders of magnitude comparing with the conventional LIT calculation.

Applying the Lanczos method one has to pay attention to the loss of orthogonality of the Lanczos vectors with an increasing number of steps, since it could reduce the precision of the Lanczos coefficients. We check the orthogonality calculating the scalar products of the $`0`$-th and the $`i`$-th Lanczos vectors. The results for the LIT case, illustrated in Fig. 3, are shown in Table I. It is evident that after 300 Lanczos steps, where one has a sufficiently converged LIT, one has still a rather good orthogonality. In fact the overlap between the 0-th and the 300-th Lanczos vector is quite small (about $`10^4`$). However, in other cases one could encounter problems with the orthogonality and thus one would need to reorthogonalize the Lanczos vectors.

In the following we summarize our results briefly. The LIT approach for the calculation of both inclusive and exclusive cross sections including complete final state interactions is reformulated in order to use the Lanczos algorithm. The Lanczos method allows one to calculate the LIT without complete inversion of the hamiltonian matrix. It leads to a huge simplification of the calculation reducing the needed cpu time enormously (about two orders of magnitude) and, even more important, paving the way for calculations with large number of basis functions. We have tested the reliability of the method with great success for the LIT of the total photoabsorption cross sections of <sup>3</sup>H and <sup>4</sup>He. The high precision of the method together with the strong reduction of the cpu time opens the way to precise microscopic calculations of reaction cross sections also for more complex few-body systems. Indeed, very recently the new method has been applied to the first microscopic calculation of the total photoabsorption cross section of the A=6 nuclei with complete final state interactions of the six-nucleon system .