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# A Study of 𝜋 Aquarii During a Quasi-normal Star Phase: Refined Fundamental Parameters and Evidence for Binarity

## 1 Introduction

$`\pi `$ Aquarii (HR 8539, HD 212571) is a bright rapidly rotating ($`v\mathrm{sin}i300\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$) Be star whose variable characteristics have been noted since the beginning of the $`20^{\mathrm{th}}`$ century. However, its behavior until the 1960’s is only well-documented spectroscopically. McLaughlin (1962) reported variations of the Balmer line profiles (H$`\beta `$ and H$`\gamma `$), which appeared double-peaked most of the time, between 1911 and 1961. He reported strong $`V/R`$ changes ranging from 0.5 to 4.0, and several periods with an absence of bright emission lines (1936–1937, 1944–1945, 1950). This study showed that the star was active, but it did not determine the physical characteristics of the star and its envelope.

Since the late 1950’s the star has been frequently observed with various techniques (multicolor photometry, high-resolution spectroscopy, polarimetry) that allow a quantitative study. Several attempts have been made to determine the fundamental parameters of the star. These have resulted, however, in different values being derived, mainly due to the influence of the circumstellar envelope. The following ranges of the parameters were reported in the literature: Teff=22500–30000 K, $`\mathrm{log}g`$= 3.3–4.0, M$`{}_{V}{}^{}=`$3.00 – $`3.83`$ mag., and AV=0.25–0.69 mag. (Nordh and Olofsson, 1974; Underhill et al., 1979; Snow, 1981; Goraya, 1985; Theodossiou, 1985; Kaiser, 1989; Fabregat and Reglero, 1990; Zorec and Briot, 1991).

Some of the envelope’s parameters are noted in the literature. A wind terminal velocity of 1450 km s-1 and a mass loss rate of $`2.61\times 10^9M_{}\mathrm{yr}^1`$, which is one of the largest among the Be stars, were estimated from UV resonance line profiles (Snow, 1981). An envelope temperature of $`T_\mathrm{e}15,000`$ K was derived from optical spectrophotometric and IR photometric observations (Nordh and Olofsson, 1974; Gehrz, Hackwell, and Jones, 1974). Profiles of the He i lines at 4026 and 4471Å and the Mg ii line at 4481Å were used to estimate the inclination angle of the rotation axis to the line of sight ($`i=25`$$`30\mathrm{°}`$) and the ratio of the angular velocity to the critical value $`\omega /\omega _{\mathrm{crit}}=0.75`$ (Gao and Cao, 1986; Ruusalepp, 1989). However, Ruusalepp (1989) pointed out that such high values of $`v\mathrm{sin}i`$ and $`\omega /\omega _{\mathrm{crit}}`$ would imply $`i50\mathrm{°}`$.

Hanuschik et al. (1996) noted that $`\pi `$ Aqr might be an interacting binary because of its broad and complex H$`\alpha `$ line profile, observed in 1980’s. A hypothesis of a binary origin for Be stars was introduced by Křiž and Harmanec (1975). So far $``$ 40 Be stars have been found to be binaries (e.g., Pavlovski et al., 1997; Okazaki, 1997) using mainly spectroscopic and speckle interferometric techniques. Only a few eclipsing Be binaries, which allow photometric detection, are known. Most known Be binaries have orbital periods between a few days and a few hundred days. Since distances toward Be stars usually exceed 100 pc, the angular separation between the binary companions is relatively small ($``$ 10 mas). Therefore, speckle interferometry, with its contemporary threshold of $``$50 mas, is able to detect only long-period systems (e.g., Mason et al., 1997). Thus spectroscopy, with its capability of measuring radial velocity (RV) variations of a few km s-1, remains the best tool for searching for Be binaries; however, this requires long-term monitoring. The results of our spectroscopic observations provide a good example of such a program.

Around 1985 the star’s brightness, polarization, and emission-line strengths began to decrease. They reached a minimum in 1996 and have stabilized since then. However, line profile variations are still detectable. Only a few Be stars that show strong brightness and emission-line variations have been observed in detail, and these resulted in different interpretations of the phenomenon (Dachs, 1982; Hummel, 1998). The recent transition of $`\pi `$ Aqr from a Be star to a quasi-normal star phase, in connection with our continuous long-term monitoring of the star, gave us a unique opportunity to refine our knowledge of this remarkable object and of the physics of the Be phenomenon.

We collected published information concerning the behavior of $`\pi `$ Aqr since the beginning of the last active emission phase, summarized our own data obtained during the decline and minimum phases, and analyzed the complete data set. This allowed us to arrive at important conclusions about the properties of the $`\pi `$ Aqr system. In this paper we present our general view of the active emission phase development, report the evidence for binarity of $`\pi `$ Aqr, and refine the fundamental parameters of the system’s primary. Other results concerning the polarimetric behavior of the system and its disk modeling will be reported elsewhere.

Below we describe our observations (§ 2), discuss the behavior of $`\pi `$ Aqr during the last four decades (§ 3 and § 3.2) and the H$`\alpha `$ line profile variations (§ 3.3), and suggest an interpretation of the observed phenomena (§ 4).

## 2 Observations

Our monitoring of $`\pi `$ Aqr includes the following observations: 1) $`UBV`$ photometry (shown in Fig. 1) at a robotic 25 cm reflecting telescope (1987–1999) operated by the Automatic Photoelectric Telescope Service in Arizona (Boyd, Genet, and Hall, 1986); 2) Spectroscopy with a resolution $`R26,000`$ in the range 5280–6600Å with an échelle spectrograph at the 1 m telescope of the Ritter Observatory of the University of Toledo (1996–2000); and 3) $`UBVRIJHK`$ photometry with a two-channel photometer-polarimeter (Bergner et al., 1988) at a 1 m telescope of the Tien-Shan Observatory in Kazakhstan (August–December 1998). Spectropolarimetric monitoring (1989–2001, Bjorkman, 2000) and broadband $`UBVRI`$ polarimetry (1985–1998, McDavid, 1999) were also carried out. The photometric and polarimetric data will be presented and discussed in detail elsewhere. In this paper we use our spectroscopic data and the brightness level in the minimum state of the object to refine its fundamental parameters.

The Ritter data were reduced with IRAF111IRAF is distributed by the National Optical Astronomy Observatories, which are operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., under contract with the National Science Foundation.. Eighty-three spectra with signal-to-noise ratios of 50 and higher were obtained between August 1996 and September 2001. The dates of the observations at Ritter, along with information about the emission component of the H$`\alpha `$ line, are presented in Table 1.

Several observations of the H$`\alpha `$ line were obtained in 1990–1991 at Kitt Peak National Observatory (G. Peters, private communication) and at the University of Colorado’s Sommers-Bausch Observatory (M. Allen, private communication) in support of the Astro-1 mission, when the star was also observed spectropolarimetrically in the UV region (Bjorkman et al., 1991). These data are included in Fig. 1 and 3. Our study also made use of the IUE spectra of $`\pi `$ Aqr obtained between 1985 and 1995, which were retrieved from the IUE final archive (Rodríguez-Pascual et al., 1999).

## 3 Observed Behavior

### 3.1 The Last Active Be-Phase

The last active Be-phase of $`\pi `$ Aqr, during which line emission was clearly noticeable, probably began in the early 1950’s. Weak double-peaked emission in H$`\alpha `$ and no emission in H$`\beta `$ were detected by Burbidge and Burbidge (1950) in mid-1949, while McLaughlin (1962) reported the absence of bright emission in 1950. The early broadband polarimetric data (Coyne and Kruczewski, 1969; Serkowski, 1970) show that the star already had a large polarization (nearly 1%) by the end of the 1950’s, which gradually increased until approximately 1985 (McDavid, 1986).

During the period covered by photoelectric photometry data (1957–present), $`\pi `$ Aqr displayed mostly smooth and slow changes of its brightness, reaching a maximum brightness phase between the mid-1970’s and mid-1980’s (see Fig. 1). However, the lack of available data in 1975–1985 makes the detailed shape of the optical brightness maximum uncertain. The near-IR brightness was reported to be roughly constant from 1970 to 1985. Nevertheless, a detailed look at the $`K`$-band light curve (Fig. 1b) shows its similarity to the $`V`$-band curve. From all the data displayed in Fig. 1, we estimate that $`\pi `$ Aqr reached the peak of its active Be star phase in approximately 1980–1985, at which time it had reached a maximum in optical and IR brightness, optical polarization, and emission strength of the H$`\alpha `$ line.

The IR excess at this maximum phase was strong and similar to that of other Be stars, i.e., due to free-free and free-bound radiation from the circumstellar gas. Surprisingly, the star was not reported among the Be stars detected by the $`IRAS`$ satellite (e.g., Waters, Coté, and Lamers, 1987). Since its galactic latitude is rather high ($`b=45\mathrm{°}`$), we suspected it might have been recorded in the $`IRAS`$ Faint Source Catalog. Indeed, we found an IR source, F22227$`+`$0107, whose position coincided with the optical position of $`\pi `$ Aqr. We used the data obtained in the late 1970’s to early 1980’s to construct the active Be-phase spectral energy distribution (SED) in the range 0.2–60 $`\mathrm{\mu m}`$, using the averaged data from $`IUE`$ (1978–1985), optical and IR photometry, and the $`IRAS`$ fluxes (see Fig. 2b). The $`IRAS`$ fluxes obtained in 1983 are in excellent agreement with the IR photometry by Gehrz, Hackwell, and Jones (1974) obtained in 1973.

The spectrum of $`\pi `$ Aqr was not extensively monitored from 1960 to 1995. Published results showed that the H$`\alpha `$ line displayed significant intensity variations on a time scale of months (Gray and Marlborough, 1974). The profile shape was single-peaked from 1973–1989 (e.g., Slettebak and Reynolds, 1978; Andrillat and Fehrenbach, 1982). However, in 1989 it changed to a double-peaked profile, and only this shape was detected until 1995 (Hanuschik et al., 1996; Viotti, Rossi, and Muratorio, 1998). Characteristic H$`\alpha `$ line profiles obtained by different studies during the active Be star phase are displayed in Fig. 3. The H$`\beta `$ and H$`\gamma `$ line profiles were seen only as double-peaked during the entire Be star phase (Slettebak, Collins, and Truax, 1992; Hanuschik, Kozok, and Kaiser, 1988). According to McLaughlin (1962), the He i 5876Å line varied similarly to the Balmer lines. Since 1996, when our spectroscopic monitoring observations began, only weak signs of emission have been seen in H$`\alpha `$, while the He i line has always appeared in absorption (see Fig. 45). Both the polarization and IR brightness dropped significantly since 1985 (Bjorkman, 1994a; McDavid, 1999). While the polarization data shown here still contain an interstellar polarization component, analysis of that interstellar component (Bjorkman and Wisniewski, 2002) shows that the intrinsic polarization itself is declining throughout this later period. Our data indicate that the star’s optical brightness stopped fading in 1995, the line emission reached a minimum in 1996, and the optical polarization stabilized in 1995 (McDavid, 1999; Bjorkman, 2000). Considering all this information, we conclude that the most recent active Be-phase of $`\pi `$ Aqr ended in 1995/6 after lasting for nearly 40 years.

### 3.2 The Current Quasi-Normal Star Phase

How should we refer to the new phase of $`\pi `$ Aqr’s behavior since 1995/6? Our simultaneous optical and near-IR photometry, obtained in August 1998, resulted in the detection of the lowest brightness level ever reported in all filters. As seen in Fig. 2a, the SED does not show any notable excess flux with respect to normal stars. The current polarization wavelength dependence is essentially that of a solely interstellar contribution (McDavid, 1999; Bjorkman and Wisniewski, 2002). However, weak emission is still seen in the H$`\alpha `$ line. Thus, we refer to the current phase as the “quasi-normal star” phase.

Only a few spectral lines that are potential indicators of circumstellar envelope activity fall into the wavelength ranges covered by the 9 non-overlapping orders of our échelle spectra. They are Fe ii 5317Å, He i 5876Å, Na i D1,2, Si ii 6347 & 6371Å, Fe ii 6383Å, and H$`\alpha `$. There are no signs of the presence of the Fe ii and Si ii lines within 2% of the underlying continuum. The Na i lines have a full-width at zero intensity (FWZI) of about 110 km s-1 and an equivalent width (EW) ratio of 1.3, which is consistent with an interstellar origin. The two remaining lines, He i 5876Å and H$`\alpha `$, display detectable profile variations. These variations are better seen in H$`\alpha `$, since the He i line is weaker (see Fig. 4d).

As we mentioned in § 1, the fundamental parameters of the underlying star as determined by different authors scatter significantly. One of the main reasons for the scatter is that all the studies used data obtained during the active Be phase of the star. The added effect of the circumstellar envelope distorts both the continuum SED and the spectral line profiles, making determination of the star’s characteristics uncertain and model dependent. Thus, it is appropriate to make use of the data obtained during the quasi-normal star phase for re-estimation of the main parameters of the star.

The color-index variations of $`\pi `$ Aqr between the Be and quasi-normal star phases are typical for the positive correlation between brightness and emission-line strength noted in many Be stars (e.g., Dachs, 1982). At maximum brightness $`UB`$ was bluer, while $`BV`$ was redder than at minimum (Fig. 1). This effect is due to the circumstellar contribution to the overall brightness of the system (see Harmanec, 2000a, for a discussion). The values at minimum brightness ($`V`$=4.85 mag., $`UB=0.90`$ mag., $`BV=`$0.20 mag., $`K`$=5.45 mag.), the presence of an interstellar polarization component, and the sharp Na i D1,2 lines in the star’s spectrum indicate that the interstellar extinction toward $`\pi `$ Aqr is not zero. The averaged color indices in 1998–1999 give $`E(BV)=0.05\pm 0.01`$ mag, implying a spectral type of B1 v if we assume a mean interstellar extinction law (Savage and Mathis, 1979). The near-IR color indices obtained in August 1998 ($`JH=`$0.07 mag., $`HK=`$0.03 mag.) give essentially the same result. The 1998 brightness in the near IR suggests the absence of additional circumstellar emission in this spectral region. Analysis of the recently released results from the $`MSX`$ mission (Egan et al., 1999) shows that $`\pi `$ Aqr was detected (source $`MSX5C\mathrm{\_}`$G066.0066$``$44.7392) in only one ($`A`$ band, centered at 8.28 $`\mathrm{\mu m}`$) of the 6 photometric bands (total range from 4 to 21 $`\mathrm{\mu m}`$), with a flux of 0.385 Jy. This is nearly 10 times lower than the average IR flux (interpolated to the $`MSX`$ $`A`$-band wavelength) during the active Be phase. From this information we can derive the star’s fundamental parameters by fitting a theoretical SED to the observed one.

To do this, we used the following: our photometric data in the region 0.36–2.2 $`\mathrm{\mu m}`$ obtained in August 1998; the $`IUE`$ fluxes in a number of intervals free of spectral lines from 0.12 to 0.31 $`\mathrm{\mu m}`$ obtained on 1995 May 25 (high-resolution spectra LWP 30769 and SWP 54752); and the $`MSX`$ 8.28 $`\mathrm{\mu m}`$ flux. These data provided a determination of the star’s effective temperature ($`T_{\mathrm{eff}}`$) and interstellar reddening ($`A_V`$). The H$`\alpha `$ and He i 5876Å line profiles obtained in 1996–2000 (see Figs. 45) suggest that the circumstellar contribution to the flux in the continuum was extremely small. The SED constructed from our data (Fig. 2a) was fitted to Kurucz (1994) model atmospheres with $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}`$ and $`A_V`$ as free parameters (note that this procedure is not sensitive to the stellar gravity). The best fit values are $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=24000\pm 1000`$ K and $`A_V=0.15\pm `$0.03 mag. Adopting a distance of $`340_{70}^{+105}`$ pc, obtained by HIPPARCOS (ESA, 1997), we derive the following fundamental parameters of the star: $`\mathrm{log}(L_{\mathrm{bol}}/L_{\mathrm{}})=4.1\pm 0.3`$ and $`R_{}=6.1\pm 2.5R_{\mathrm{}}`$.

The $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}`$ is unlikely to be less than 23,000 K, because otherwise the corresponding interstellar reddening would be too small for the observed strength of the Na i lines and current polarization level ($`P_V0.45\%`$). It is seen in Fig. 2c that the $`IUE`$ data, obtained in 1995 when $`\pi `$ Aqr already had very weak emission lines, lie just below the Kurucz model for $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=24,000`$ K. During the active Be phase, the UV flux level was lower than in 1995 because of the metallic line blanketing effect and a lesser additional circumstellar emission than that in the optical and near-IR range. A noticeable dip due to absorption by Fe ii lines in the circumstellar disk is seen in Fig. 2d. Thus even if some amount of line blanketing was still present in the 1995 $`IUE`$ spectrum, it is unlikely that the level of the stellar flux in this region is larger than the theoretical one for $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=25,000`$ K.

Comparison with theoretical evolutionary tracks (Shaerer et al., 1993) provides an estimate of the star’s mass, $`M_{}=11\pm 1.5M_{}`$ (Fig. 6), and hence the critical rotational velocity, $`v_{\mathrm{crit}}=585_{95}^{+185}\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$, and $`\mathrm{log}g=3.9\pm 0.1`$. Comparison of the observed SED with that of the Collins and Sonneborn (1977) model for a B1-type star ($`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=25,000`$ K) rotating at half the critical rotation speed (which corresponds to $`v260\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ for the parameters adopted by Collins and Sonneborn (1977) and is close to the $`v\mathrm{sin}i`$ of $`\pi `$ Aqr) shows excellent agreement at all considered wavelengths.

An independent way to estimate the stellar parameters is to fit the observed line profiles to theoretical ones. For this purpose we can use the averaged He i 5876Å line profile and the H$`\alpha `$ line wings, which are unaffected by the traveling emission component which is discussed below. The detected regular variations of the H$`\alpha `$ absorption component were taken into account. Note that the H$`\alpha `$ in our case is mainly indicative of the star’s rotational velocity. We calculated a grid of theoretical spectra containing these lines using the radiation transfer code SYNSPEC (Hubeny, Lanz, and Jeffery, 1995) for $`\mathrm{log}g=4.0`$ and $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}`$ from 20,000 to 30,000 K, and broadened them by rotation. The best fits for the H$`\alpha `$ line were achieved for $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=25,000\pm 2,000`$ K and $`v\mathrm{sin}i=250\pm 10\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$. The observed He i line profile turned out to be too deep even for $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=20,000`$ K and $`v\mathrm{sin}i=300\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ (Fig. 4d). Such a discrepancy between the theoretical and observed profiles of some He i lines, including the one at 5876Å, has previously been noted by Smith, Hubeny, and Lanz (1994). This might also imply that the line, which is formed very close to the stellar surface where the circumstellar envelope is most dense, is still affected by the circumstellar contribution. Also, the average observed profile is rather noisy because of its weakness and both regular and possible irregular variations.

As mentioned in § 1, the inclination of $`\pi `$ Aqr’s rotation axis once was estimated to be 25–30° based on an analysis of several He and Mg absorption lines. Ruusalepp (1989) noted that the $`v\mathrm{sin}i`$ of the star and this purported inclination angle were not consistent with each other. The large variations of the H$`\alpha `$ line profile, the double-peaked shape of the H$`\beta `$ and H$`\gamma `$ lines, and a high polarization during the brightness maximum all suggest a configuration much closer to edge-on. Hanuschik et al. (1996) detected a double-peaked emission profile of the Fe ii 5317Å line, which suggests an intermediate inclination angle. Furthermore, the central depressions in the Balmer line profiles observed in 1989–1995 (see Fig. 3) are not very strong, indicating that the disk is not seen exactly edge-on. Calculations by Stee and Araujo (1994), performed with stellar and envelope parameters close to those we find for $`\pi `$ Aqr, suggest that the H$`\alpha `$ profiles which were observed in 1989–1995 can be reproduced with inclination angles of about 50–60°. Calculations by Hummel (2000) show that the central depression drops below the continuum in H$`\alpha `$ profiles for $`i80\mathrm{°}`$. Based on this information, we suggest that $`50\mathrm{°}i75\mathrm{°}`$ for $`\pi `$ Aqr.

### 3.3 H$`\alpha `$ Variations During the Quasi-Normal Star Phase

During the quasi-normal star phase, the H$`\alpha `$ line is seen in absorption most of the time. The photospheric profile is altered by variable emission, in which we can identify three distinct components. Two of them are very weak most of the time ($`0.02I_{\mathrm{cont}}`$ above the theoretical photospheric profile) and are located at about $`\pm 350\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ (see Fig. 4c). On only three occasions, 1996 August 30 and 1998 September 9 and 29, these components were observed to be significantly stronger (see Fig. 4a). The former two profiles are almost identical, while the third one has weaker emission peaks. Another feature of these profiles is that they show stronger emission at almost all velocities than is seen in the other spectra. These two emission components are reminiscent of the double-peaked profile that the star displayed during the decline phase in 1989–1995. However, the peak separation in 1996–2000 is noticeably larger than it was previously.

The rest of the H$`\alpha `$ profiles obtained show an additional emission component of almost the same width ($`200\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$) traveling inside the photospheric absorption within $`\pm 101\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ (see Table 1). To locate this component, we normalized each spectrum to the underlying continuum, removed the profile regions contaminated with telluric water vapor lines, and subtracted a theoretical photospheric profile calculated for the star’s fundamental parameters as derived above. The residual profiles obtained in September–November 1999 are shown in Fig. 5. The average parameters of the traveling emission component are as follows: $`v_{\mathrm{FWZI}}400\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$, $`v_{\mathrm{FWHM}}200\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$, $`I0.08I_{\mathrm{cont}}`$. It is difficult to constrain the shape of the component’s line wings because of blending with the double-peaked structure; however, the core is rather symmetric.

In addition to the RV variations of the traveling emission component, the entire H$`\alpha `$ absorption profile changes its RV. Since the former occupies an insignificant portion of the latter, we were able to measure their RVs independently. A technique of matching symmetric parts of the original and mirrored profiles was used for both components. When measuring RVs of the absorption wings, the region of the traveling emission component was excluded. Similarly, the photospheric profile was subtracted to measure RVs of the traveling emission component. As a result, we found that both variations are periodic, have the same period (within the uncertainties listed in Table 2), and are anti-phased. The measured RVs of the emission and absorption component are plotted against each other in Fig. 7b. The relationship between them is well determined (a correlation coefficient of 0.9), despite some scatter due to the measurement errors ($``$2–3 km s-1 for most of the datapoints, up to $``$5 km s-1 for those with the lowest signal-to-noise ratios).

The periodic RV variations of the traveling emission component have been observed during more than 20 cycles. This indicates that the source of the H$`\alpha `$ emission rotates around the star in a stable orbit. The radius of this orbit can be calculated using the derived period and the semi-amplitude of the RV curve: $`r_{\mathrm{orb}}=169\mathrm{R}_{\mathrm{}}\mathrm{sin}^1i`$, where $`i`$ is the inclination angle of the orbit. Alternatively, if we assume that the H$`\alpha `$ emission source rotates in the star’s disk, we can derive its orbital radius using Kepler’s law, v(R)=vcrit$`(\mathrm{r}/R_{})^{0.5}`$. The result, 133 R sin$`{}_{}{}^{2}i`$, is not consistent with the above rorb at any inclination angle. This indicates that the source is located outside $`\pi `$ Aqr’s disk. It seems unlikely that the H$`\alpha `$ emission source is just a cloud of gas orbiting about the star. A more plausible explanation of this phenomenon is that there is a secondary companion, surrounded by a gaseous envelope, in a stable orbit about the primary. Moreover, the RV amplitude of the absorption component, which we suppose to be mostly photospheric, is much smaller than that of the emission component. Such behavior is expected for spectroscopic binaries, a number of which are Be stars (e.g., Pavlovski et al., 1997).

If we assume this is evidence that $`\pi `$ Aqr is a spectroscopic binary, we can derive appropriate binary parameters for the system. First we checked for eccentricity effects by fitting the RV curves to the general equation of orbital motion. The RV curves for both the absorption and emission components were found to be virtually symmetric within the measurement errors, which indicates that the orbital eccentricity is very small or absent. Thus, the orbit is approximately circular.

The best fit parameter values are shown in Table 2. The RV phase curves for both components are presented in Fig. 7a. These results strongly argue in favor of a binary origin of the system, in which the absorption-line spectrum is associated with a more massive B-type primary, while the traveling emission component in the H$`\alpha `$ line originates in a region around a less massive secondary. The differences between the parameters derived from the RVs of the H$`\alpha `$ emission and absorption components are most likely due to individual measurement errors, quoted above. We should also note that the RVs of the emission component depend on the adopted theoretical photospheric profile. The latter affects the resulting RV, especially at the extremal positions of the emission component, because of the photospheric profile curvature. However, this effect only results in an uncertainty of $``$ 0.05 days in the orbital period and of $``$5 km s-1 in the RV semi-amplitude. The emission phenomenon, which gave rise to the three double-peaked profiles mentioned above, does not have any effect on the periodicity. It does not even hide the traveling emission component. The only profile in which the traveling component was not seen is that of 1998 September 29. The component’s RV at that time should have been about zero, and we were unable to measure it because of the contamination with additional emission.

Using these orbital parameters, we can estimate the orbiting masses using corresponding equations for Keplerian motion with zero eccentricity. Applying the data from Table 2, one can calculate the mass function $`f(M)=0.041M_{}`$ and, using the RV semi-amplitudes, $`M_1sin^3i=12.4M_{}`$, $`M_2sin^3i=2.0M_{}`$, and $`M_2/M_1=0.16`$.

The equivalent width of the traveling emission component listed in Table 2 also shows variations with the 84 day period. Additionally, the component strength seems to decrease with time. The phase curve corrected for the temporal trend shows that the emission becomes weaker at phases 0.6–0.7 (Fig. 7c). This phase interval is centered at the moment when the RV=0, and the secondary should be in front of the primary. This phenomenon might be caused by a non-spherical distribution of circumstellar gas around the secondary, so that the star occults more matter at the mentioned phases. In other words, there is additional circumstellar matter between the stars. At the same time, the absence of such an effect around phase 0.25 suggests that there is no obscuration of the emitting material by the visible star and its disk remnant.

Thus, our spectra obtained during the current quasi-normal star phase of $`\pi `$ Aqr have revealed a cyclic emission activity in the H$`\alpha `$ line. Other indicators of the circumstellar envelope, except for the very weak double-peaked emission in the H$`\alpha `$ line, have vanished. RV variations of the photospheric H$`\alpha `$ profile, indicating an orbital motion of the primary component, have also been detected. Similar variations are seen in the He i 5876Å line. However, it is more difficult to measure them since the line is shallower than H$`\alpha `$.

## 4 Discussion

The RV variations of the H$`\alpha `$ profile components gave another estimate of the visible star mass ($`M_1\mathrm{sin}^3i=12.4M_{}`$). This estimate is probably only accurate to within 20% because of the measurement errors and uncertainties mentioned above. If we assume that the orbital inclination angle is the same as the disk inclination angle ($`70\mathrm{°}`$, see § 3.2), then $`M_115\pm 3M_{}`$. This is somewhat higher than our evolutionary track estimate, but still within the calculation uncertainties. A more accurate spectroscopic estimate might be derived given more observations at a higher signal-to-noise ratio and from a drier site, if the system remains in the quasi-normal star phase.

The derived $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}`$ is in good agreement with the spectral type (B1) assigned to the star in earlier studies (e.g., Guetter, 1968). We found that $`\pi `$ Aqr is basically less luminous than previously thought, since the star was usually estimated to be brighter because of the effect of the circumstellar envelope. This effect also caused overestimation of the interstellar reddening in most previous papers (see § 1).

The measured semi-amplitude ratio of the absorption and emission component RVs during the quasi-normal star phase suggests that the stellar companion, if placed at the center of the H$`\alpha `$ emission source, should be $``$6 times less massive than the visible star. According to the derived RV curve parameters and the estimated orbital inclination angle, the mass associated with the emission component is between 2 and 3 $`M_{}`$. Thus, it is most likely a star surrounded by a gaseous envelope. Evolutionary arguments would suggest that this secondary component should be a main-sequence star. The evolutionary tracks (Shaerer et al., 1993) for such a star indicate that it would be an A-type (or even F-type) star with a luminosity more than 2 orders of magnitude smaller than that of the primary. This would imply a visual magnitude difference of at least 4 magnitudes. Therefore, the contribution from such a secondary to the continuum radiation of the system is negligible, and it is not surprising that no signs of it have been detected.

From the estimated brightness ratio of the companions, one can model the H$`\alpha `$ profiles observed during the quasi-normal star phase in order to estimate an average density of the circumstellar gas around the secondary. For this purpose, we assume that the emission line due to this gas is described by a Gaussian profile, and that the secondary’s photospheric H$`\alpha `$ profile is described by a Kurucz (1994) model atmosphere with $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=9,000`$ K and $`\mathrm{log}g=4.0`$. The secondary’s rotation rate and fundamental parameters are not crucial because of the large brightness ratio. The results for one observed spectrum are shown in Fig. 8. The H$`\alpha `$ emission in the secondary spectrum should be rather strong (equivalent width of about 20 Å), which would require a mean number density on the order of 1011 cm-3, assuming a spherical density distribution. Such an emission line strength and envelope density is similar to that of Herbig Ae/Be stars, which have mass loss rates of about 10$`{}_{}{}^{8}M_{}^{}`$ yr-1 (Böhm and Catala, 1995). However, this does not mean that the secondary is at the pre-main-sequence evolutionary stage. Its envelope is most likely formed due to mass exchange in the system.

The semi-major axis of the binary orbit can be derived from the data of Table 2, which gives $`a=0.96\mathrm{sin}^1i`$ A.U. This value corresponds to an angular separation of $``$3 mas at the HIPPARCOS distance of $`\pi `$ Aqr. This is far below the Rayleigh limit of 55 mas reported for the star by Mason et al. (1997), who searched for binary components around Be stars using speckle interferometry.

The observational data for $`\pi `$ Aqr, collected and summarized in Fig. 1, show that variations of its brightness, color-indices, emission-line strength, and polarization correlate with each other. Three major distinct phases can be recognized in the stellar behavior during the last four decades: 1) the active Be star phase, showing an increase of brightness, emission-line strength, and polarization (early 1950’s through $``$1985); 2) the transition phase, with a rapid decrease of these same characteristics ($``$1985 through 1995); and 3) the quasi-normal star phase, with only very weak signs of circumstellar activity (since 1996).

The temporal correlation indicates that all the detected variations can be explained by the same mechanism. This mechanism is most likely the added flux due to a circumstellar gaseous envelope with a variable density, as previously suggested for $`\pi `$ Aqr by Nordh and Olofsson (1977). Gradual strengthening of the circumstellar emission until the mid-1980’s suggests that the amount of matter in the disk was increasing during this time. Therefore, an SED constructed from data obtained at a particular time during this phase reflects only the amount of matter accumulated in the disk up to that time. An SED constructed from only observations at an earlier or later time would lead to a different mass estimate for the disk.

The Stokes $`QU`$ parameters measured at different times are distributed along a well-established line (see Bjorkman, 2000), implying that the intrinsic polarization position angle (PA) was nearly constant. According to current models (e.g., Wood, Bjorkman, and Bjorkman, 1997), the intrinsic polarization of Be stars originates in the circumstellar disk, and the resulting PA is perpendicular to the disk equatorial plane. This has been verified observationally by Quirrenbach et al. (1997). Thus, the observed intrinsic PA constancy leads to the conclusion that the orientation of the disk around $`\pi `$ Aqr with respect to the line of sight did not change during the period considered here.

The unusual H$`\alpha `$ line profile shape observed in 1973–1989 (see Fig. 3) might imply that mass transfer from the primary’s disk into the secondary’s Roche lobe through the inner Lagrangian point $`L_1`$ occurred during a part of the active Be phase (see Fig. 6 from Harmanec, 1985). This suggestion can be supported by the following arguments:

1) The RVs of the H$`\alpha `$ profile dominating peak were confined within $`\pm 100\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$ (see Fig. 3), which is well inside the peak separation of the double-peaked structure observed in 1989–1995. This suggests that the dominating peak was formed in a low-velocity region of the disk. If Be star disks are Keplerian (see Hummel and Hanuschik, 1997), this region should be close to the disk’s outer parts.

2) The size of the primary’s Roche lobe, $`0.6a`$ for the derived components’ mass ratio (Pringle and Wade, 1985), is $`25R_1`$. This value is similar to the disk size of $`\gamma `$ Cas derived from interferometry (Berio et al., 1999). Since the emission-line spectrum of $`\pi `$ Aqr during the active Be phase was even stronger than that of $`\gamma `$ Cas, the primary’s disk in the $`\pi `$ Aqr system might fill the primary’s Roche lobe.

3) The absence of mass transfer out of the disk would result in a very different picture of the object’s variability since 1989. In this case, in order to get rid of the bulk of the disk matter, one needs to accrete it onto the primary. In the beginning, this process would re-shape the line profiles, making them double-peaked with a larger intensity, as the amount of matter in the disk is still constant. However, we observed a decrease of emission peak intensity only a few months after the H$`\alpha `$ profile re-shaping occurred.

We should note here that reasons for the mass loss variations from the primary star are not known. Concerning the disk dissipation process, if we assume a constant velocity of 1 km s-1, a particle would cross the $`\pi `$ Aqr disk in 2 years. This is consistent with the observed timescale of the disk dissipation ($``$5 yr).

A detection of $`\pi `$ Aqr by the $`ROSAT`$ survey in 1990 (during the early decline phase) with $`\mathrm{log}(L_\mathrm{x}/L_{\mathrm{bol}})6.6`$ (corrected using our new value of $`L_{\mathrm{bol}}`$) shows that its x-ray luminosity is only marginally higher than the average value for stars hotter than B1-type (Berghöffer, Schmitt, and Cassinelli, 1996). However, the detected x-ray luminosity is only 0.3 dex smaller than that of $`\gamma `$ Cas, which has been suspected of having a compact companion (Mason, White, and Sanford, 1976), and it may also be variable. $`\pi `$ Aqr was one of only a few Be stars detected by EUVE (Christian et al., 1999), which might imply the presence of flux in excess of the photospheric contribution in this wavelength region. Such an excess might be attributed to chromospheric activity of the secondary.

A number of other bright Be stars show variations of the H$`\alpha `$ line profile, similar to those of $`\pi `$ Aqr, during their active Be phase (e.g. $`\gamma `$ Cas, 59 Cyg, $`\zeta `$ Tau). The binary hypothesis may well be applied to these objects. $`\zeta `$ Tau is already known as a spectroscopic binary with a period of 132.91 days (e.g., Underhill, 1952), close to the period we found for $`\pi `$ Aqr. Recently Harmanec et al. (2000b) found a period of 203.59 days in the emission line variations of $`\gamma `$ Cas and attributed them to binary orbital motion.

Now we can make some suggestions in response to the questions raised by McDavid (1999) about the physical reasons for the polarization decline in $`\pi `$ Aqr. The multiwavelength behavior of $`\pi `$ Aqr during the quasi-normal star phase indicates that the primary’s disk indeed lost its replenishment source. The temporal variations of the system indicate that the disk is not a static structure, but rather has a variable mass and density distribution. The underlying star does not seem to change its fundamental characteristics. However, a triggering mechanism which could turn off the mass loss is not clear yet. At present we have no information which would allow us to discuss this subject in any detail.

## 5 CONCLUSIONS

We have presented and analyzed photometric, polarimetric, and spectroscopic data for the bright Be star $`\pi `$ Aqr obtained during the last four decades. The star showed a brightening between the late 1950’s and early 1970’s, a maximum phase through 1985, a decline between 1985 and 1995, and a low-brightness phase by the present time. This large data set allowed us to derive new, more reliable physical parameters of the star. We also have identified $`\pi `$ Aqr with IR sources in the $`IRAS`$ Faint Source Catalog and in the $`MSX`$ satellite point source catalog.

Regular RV variations of a traveling emission component within the H$`\alpha `$ line profile and of the underlying photospheric absorption profile with a period of 84.1 days have been detected during the quasi-normal star phase of $`\pi `$ Aqr in 1996–2000. The combined picture of the profile structure and variations suggests that $`\pi `$ Aqr may be a close binary system with variable mass exchange.

The following estimates of the fundamental parameters of the system’s visual component and the interstellar reddening were made: $`M_1=11\pm 1.5M_{\mathrm{}},R_1=6.1\pm 2.5R_{\mathrm{}},T_{\mathrm{eff}}=25,000\pm 2,000K,\mathrm{log}(L_{\mathrm{bol}}/L_{\mathrm{}})=4.1\pm 0.3,A_V=0.15`$ mag. Also, some constraints were placed on the system inclination angle, binary mass ratio and separation: $`50\mathrm{°}i75\mathrm{°},M_2/M_1=0.16,a=0.96\mathrm{sin}^1i`$ A.U. The secondary is most likely an A–F main-sequence star.

There are some major consequences of our interpretation of the active Be phase. First, the mass loss rate cannot be determined accurately from the SED (IR excess) obtained at a particular time, because the star’s gradual brightening indicates a disk mass growth with time. Second, variations of the H$`\alpha `$ line profiles of other Be stars, which show a structure similar to that of $`\pi `$ Aqr during its active Be phase, should be searched for periodicities. We would like to emphasize here that we do not claim that this mechanism is operating for all Be stars; however, a certain fraction of them may well be explained by a similar hypothesis.

Further observations of $`\pi `$ Aqr are of interest in order to follow the quasi-normal star phase and detect any new possible brightening. They would help to reconstruct the the disk replenishment process and improve the parameters of the $`\pi `$ Aqr binary system, which was first suspected by Hanuschik et al. (1996) but not detected with speckle interferometry (Mason et al., 1997).

We thank an anonymous referee for comments which helped improve the manuscript. We are grateful to R. W. Hanuschik for providing us with his H$`\alpha `$ line profiles of $`\pi `$ Aqr obtained in 1982–1995, to A. V. Mironov for sending us unpublished photometric $`WBVR`$ data obtained in 1986, and to G. Peters and M. Allen for providing the KPNO and SBO H$`\alpha `$ spectroscopic observations. We thank the present and past members of the Ritter observing team, especially N. Morrison, C. Mulliss, K. Gordon, D. Knauth, and W. Fischer, for assistance in the data acquisition. We thank J. Bjorkman for useful conversations about these results. AM and KSB acknowledge support from NASA grant NAG5-8054. Karen Bjorkman is a Cottrell Scholar of the Research Corporation, and gratefully acknowledges their support. Support for observational research at Ritter Observatory has been provided by The University of Toledo, by NSF grant AST-9024802 to B. W. Bopp, and by a grant from the Fund for Astrophysical Research. Technical support at Ritter is provided by R. J. Burmeister. This research has made use of NASA’s Astrophysics Data System and of the SIMBAD database, operated at CDS, Strasbourg, France.


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# Almost Conservation Laws and Global Rough Solutions to a Nonlinear Schrödinger Equation

## 1. Introduction and Statement of Results

We study the following initial value problem for a defocussing nonlinear Schrödinger equation,

(1.1) $`i_t\varphi (x,t)+\mathrm{\Delta }\varphi (x,t)`$ $`=|\varphi (x,t)|^2\varphi (x,t)x𝐑^n,t0`$
(1.2) $`\varphi (x,0)`$ $`=\varphi _0(x)H^s(𝐑^n)`$
when $`n=2,3`$. Here $`H^s(𝐑^n)`$ denotes the usual inhomogeneous Sobolev space. Our goal is to loosen the regularity requirements on the initial data which ensure global-in-time solutions. In particular, we aim to extend the global theory to certain infinite energy initial data.

It is known  that (1.1)-(1.2) is well-posed locally in time when $`n=2,3`$ and $`s>0,\frac{1}{2}`$ respectively111In addition, there are local in time solutions from $`L^2,H^{\frac{1}{2}}`$ data when $`n=2,3`$, respectively. However, it is not yet known whether the time interval of existence for such solutions depends only on the data’s Sobolev norm. For example, the $`L^2`$ conservation law (1.3) does not yield the widely conjectured result of global in time solutions on $`𝐑^{2+1}`$ from $`L^2`$ initial data.. In addition, these local solutions enjoy $`L^2`$ conservation;

(1.3) $`\varphi (,t)_{L^2(^n)}`$ $`=\varphi _0()_{L^2(^n)}`$
and the $`H^1(𝐑^n)`$ solutions have the following conserved energy,

(1.4) $`E(\varphi )(t)`$ $`{\displaystyle _^n}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}|_x\varphi (x,t)|^2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}|\varphi (x,t)|^4dx=E(\varphi )(0).`$
Together, energy conservation and the local-in-time theory immediately yield global-in-time well-posedness of (1.1)-(1.2) from data in $`H^s(^n)`$ when $`s1`$, and $`n=2,3`$. It is conjectured that (1.1)-(1.2) is in fact globally well-posed in time from all data included in the local theory. The obvious impediment to claiming global-in-time solutions in $`H^s`$, with $`0<s<1`$, is the lack of any applicable conservation law.

The first argument extending the lifespan of rough solutions to (1.1)-(1.2) in a range $`s_0<s<1`$ was given in  (see also ). In what might be called a “Fourier truncation” approach, Bourgain observed that from the point of view of regularity, the high frequency component of the solution $`\varphi `$ is well-approximated by the corresponding linear evolution of the data’s high frequency component. More specifically: one makes a first approximation to the solution for a small time step by evolving the high modes linearly, and the low modes according to the nonlinear flow for which one has energy conservation. The correction term one must add to match this approximation with the actual solution is shown to have finite energy. This correction is added to the low modes as data for the nonlinear evolution during the next time step, where the high modes are again evolved linearly. For $`s>\frac{3}{5}`$, one can repeat this procedure to an arbitrarily large time provided the distinction between “high” and “low” frequencies is made at sufficiently large frequencies.

The argument in  has been applied to other subcritical initial value problems with sufficient smoothing in their principal parts. (See , , , , , and ). It is important to note that the Fourier truncation method demonstrates more than just rough data global existence. Indeed, write $`S_t^{NL}`$ for the nonlinear flow222That is, $`S_t^{NL}(\varphi _0)(x)=\varphi (x,t)`$, where $`\varphi ,\varphi _0`$ as in (1.1)-(1.2). of (1.1)-(1.2), and let $`S_t^L`$ denote the corresponding linear flow. The Fourier truncation method shows then that for $`s>\frac{3}{5}`$ and for all $`t[0,\mathrm{})`$,

(1.5) $`S_t^{NL}\varphi _0S_t^L\varphi _0`$ $`H^1(𝐑^2).`$
Besides being part of the conclusion, the smoothing property (1.5) seems to be a crucial constituent of the Fourier truncation argument itself.

In this paper we will use a modification of the above arguments, originally put forward to analyze equations where the smoothing property (1.5) is not available because it is either false (e.g. Wave maps 333See the appendix of  for the failure of (1.5) for Wave Maps.) or simply not known (e.g. Maxwell-Klein-Gordon equations , for which we suspect (1.5) is false). In this “almost conservation law” approach, one controls the growth in time of a rough solution by monitoring the energy of a certain smoothed out version of the solution. It can be shown that the energy of the smoothed solution is “almost conserved” as time passes, and controls the solution’s sub-energy Sobolev norm. In proving the almost conservation law for the i.v.p. (1.1)-(1.2), we shall use only the linear estimates presented in , . Implicitly, we also use the view of  that the energy at high frequencies does not move rapidly to low frequencies.

The almost conservation approach to global rough solutions has proven to be quite robust , , , , and has been improved significantly by adding additional “correction” terms to the original almost conserved energy functional. As a result, one obtains even stronger bounds on the growth of the solution’s rough norm, and at least in some cases sharp global well-posedness results , , .

The aims of this paper are three-fold: first and most obviously, an improved understanding of the evolution properties of rough solutions of (1.1)-(1.2); second, the almost conservation law approach is presented in a relatively straightforward setting; and third, we can directly compare this almost conservation law approach to the Fourier cut-off technique, since both approaches apply to the semilinear Schrödinger initial value problem. Our main result is the following:

###### Theorem 1.1.

The initial value problem (1.1)-(1.2) is globally-well-posed from data $`\varphi _0H^s(𝐑^n),n=2,3`$ when $`s>\frac{4}{7},\frac{5}{6}`$ respectively.

By “globally-well-posed”, we mean that given data $`\varphi _0H^s(𝐑^n)`$ as above, and any time $`T>0`$, there is a unique solution to (1.1)-(1.2)

(1.6) $`\varphi (x,t)C([0,T];H^s(𝐑^n))`$
which depends continuously in (1.6) upon $`\varphi _0H^s(𝐑^n)`$. The polynomial bounds we obtain for the growth of $`\varphi _{H^s(𝐑^n)}(t)`$ are contained in (3.4), (3.14), and (4.6) below.

Theorem 1.1 extends to some extent the work in  where global well-posedness was shown when $`s>\frac{3}{5},\frac{11}{13}`$ and $`n=2,3`$ respectively. In a different sense, the result here is weaker than the results of  as we obtain no information whatsoever along the lines of (1.5).

In a later paper, we hope to extend Theorem 1.1 to still rougher data, using the additional cancellation terms mentioned above, and the multilinear estimates contained in .

In Section 2 below we present some notation and linear estimates that are used in our proofs. Sections 3, 4 present the almost conservation laws and proofs of Theorem 1.1 in space dimensions two and three, respectively.

## 2. Estimates, Norms, and Notation

Given $`A,B0`$, we write $`AB`$ to mean that for some universal constant $`K>2`$, $`AKB`$. We write $`AB`$ when both $`AB`$ and $`BA`$. The notation $`AB`$ denotes $`B>KA`$.

We write $`A(1+A^2)^{\frac{1}{2}}`$, and $``$ for the operator with Fourier multiplier $`(1+|\xi |^2)^{\frac{1}{2}}`$. The symbol $``$ will denote the spatial gradient.

We will use the weighted Sobolev norms, (see ),

(2.1) $`\psi _{X_{s,b}}`$ $`\xi ^s\tau |\xi |^2^b\stackrel{~}{\psi }(\xi ,\tau )_{L^2(𝐑^n\times 𝐑)}.`$
Here $`\stackrel{~}{\psi }`$ is the space-time Fourier transform of $`\psi `$. We will need local-in-time estimates in terms of truncated versions of the norms (2.1),

(2.2) $`f_{X_{s,b}^\delta }`$ $`\underset{\psi =f\text{on}[0,\delta ]}{inf}\psi _{X_{s,b}^\delta }.`$
We will often use the notation $`\frac{1}{2}+\frac{1}{2}+ϵ`$ for some universal $`0<ϵ1`$. Similarly, we shall write $`\frac{1}{2}\frac{1}{2}ϵ`$, and $`\frac{1}{2}\frac{1}{2}2ϵ`$.

Given Lebesgue space exponents $`q,r`$ and a function $`F(x,t)`$ on $`𝐑^{n+1}`$, we write

(2.3) $`F_{L_t^qL_x^r(𝐑^{n+1})}`$ $`\left({\displaystyle _𝐑}\left({\displaystyle _{𝐑^n}}|F(x,t)|^r𝑑x\right)^{\frac{q}{r}}𝑑t\right)^{\frac{1}{q}}.`$
This norm will be shortened to $`L_t^qL_x^r`$ for readability, or to $`L_{x,t}^r`$ when $`q=r`$.

We will need Strichartz-type estimates  involving the spaces (2.3), (2.1). We will call a pair of exponents $`(q,r)`$  Schrödinger admissible for $`𝐑^{n+1}`$ when $`q,r2`$, $`(n,q)(2,2)`$, and

(2.4) $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{q}}+{\displaystyle \frac{n}{2r}}`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{n}{4}}.`$
For a Schrödinger admissible pair $`(q,r)`$ we have what we will call the $`L_t^qL_x^r`$ Strichartz estimate,

(2.5) $`\varphi _{L_t^qL_x^r(𝐑^{n+1})}`$ $`\varphi _{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
Finally, we will need a refined version of these estimates due to Bourgain .

###### Lemma 2.1.

Let $`\psi _1,\psi _2X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta `$ be supported on spatial frequencies $`|\xi |N_1,N_2`$, respectively. Then for $`N_1N_2`$, one has

(2.6) $`\psi _1\psi _2_{L^2([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^2)}`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{N_1}{N_2}}\right)^{\frac{1}{2}}\psi _1_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }\psi _2_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }.`$
In addition, (2.6) holds (with the same proof) if we replace the product $`\psi _1\psi _2`$ on the left with either $`\overline{\psi }_1\psi _2`$ or $`\psi _1\overline{\psi }_2`$.

## 3. Almost conservation and Proof of Theorem 1.1 in $`𝐑^2`$

For rough initial data, (1.2) with $`s<1`$, the energy is infinite, and so the conservation law (1.4) is meaningless. Instead, Theorem 1.1 rests on the fact that a smoothed version of the solution (1.1)-(1.2) has a finite energy which is almost conserved in time. We express this ‘smoothed version’ as follows.

Given $`s<1`$ and a parameter $`N1`$, define the multiplier operator

(3.1) $`\widehat{I_Nf}(\xi )`$ $`m_N(\xi )\widehat{f}(\xi ),`$
where the multiplier $`m_N(\xi )`$ is smooth, radially symmetric, nonincreasing in $`|\xi |`$ and

(3.2) $`m_N(\xi )`$ $`=\{\begin{array}{cc}1\hfill & |\xi |N\hfill \\ \left(\frac{N}{|\xi |}\right)^{1s}\hfill & |\xi |2N.\hfill \end{array}`$
For simplicity, we will eventually drop the $`N`$ from the notation, writing $`I`$ and $`m`$ for (3.1) and (3.2). Note that for solution and initial data $`\varphi ,\varphi _0`$ of (1.1), (1.2), the quantities $`\varphi _{H^s(^n)}(t)`$ and $`E(I_N\varphi )(t)`$ (see (1.4)) can be compared,

(3.3) $`E(I_N\varphi )(t)`$ $`\left(N^{1s}\varphi (,t)_{\dot{H}^s(^n)}\right)^2+\varphi (t,)_{L^4(^n)}^4,`$
(3.4) $`\varphi (,t)_{H^s(^n)}^2`$ $`E(I_N\varphi )(t)+\varphi _0_{L^2(^n)}^2.`$
Indeed, the $`\dot{H}^1(^n)`$ component of the left hand side of (3.3) is bounded by the right side by using the definition of $`I_N`$ and by considering separately those frequencies $`|\xi |N`$ and $`|\xi |N`$. The $`L^4`$ component of the energy in (3.3) is bounded by the right hand side of (3.3) by using (for example) the Hörmander-Mikhlin multiplier theorem. The bound (3.4) follows quickly from (3.2) and $`L^2`$ conservation (1.3) by considering separately the $`\dot{H}^s(𝐑^n)`$ and $`L^2(𝐑^n)`$ components of the left hand side of (3.4).

To prove Theorem 1.1, we may assume that $`\varphi _0C_0^{\mathrm{}}(𝐑^n)`$, and show that the resulting global-in-time solution grows at most polynomially in the $`H^s`$ norm,

(3.5) $`\varphi (,t)_{H^s(^n)}`$ $`C_1t^M+C_2,`$
where the constants $`C_1,C_2,M`$ depend only on $`\varphi _0_{H^s(𝐑^n)}`$ and not on higher regularity norms of the smooth data. Theorem 1.1 follows immediately from (3.5), the local-in-time theory , and a standard density argument.

By (3.4), it suffices to show

(3.6) $`E(I_N\varphi )(t)`$ $`(1+t)^M.`$
for some $`N=N(t)`$. (See (3.13), (3.14) below for the definition of $`N`$ and the growth rate $`M`$ we eventually establish.) The following proposition, which is one of the two main estimates of this paper (see also Proposition 4.1), represents an “almost conservation law” of the title and will yield (3.6) in space dimension $`n=2`$.

###### Proposition 3.1.

Given $`s>\frac{4}{7},N1,`$ and initial data $`\varphi _0C_0^{\mathrm{}}(𝐑^2)`$ (see preceeding remark) with $`E(I_N\varphi _0)1`$, then there exists a $`\delta =\delta (\varphi _0_{L^2(𝐑^2)})>0`$ so that the solution

$`\varphi (x,t)`$ $`C([0,\delta ],H^s(𝐑^2))`$
of (1.1)-(1.2) satisfies

(3.7) $`E(I_N\varphi )(t)`$ $`=E(I_N\varphi )(0)+O(N^{\frac{3}{2}+}),`$
for all $`t[0,\delta ]`$.

Remark: Equation (3.7) asserts that $`I_N\varphi `$, though not a solution of the nonlinear problem (1.1), enjoys something akin to energy conservation. If one could replace the increment $`N^{\frac{3}{2}+}`$ in $`E(I_N\varphi )`$ on the right side of (3.7) with $`N^\alpha `$ for some $`\alpha >0`$, one could repeat the argument we give below to prove global well posedness of (1.1)-(1.2) for all $`s>\frac{2}{2+\alpha }`$. In particular, if $`E(I_N\varphi )(t)`$ is conserved (i.e. $`\alpha =\mathrm{}`$), one could show that (1.1)-(1.2) is globally well-posed when $`s>0`$.

We first show that Proposition 3.1 implies (3.6). Note that the initial value problem here has a scaling symmetry, and is $`H^s`$-subcritical when $`1>s>0,\frac{1}{2}`$ and $`n=2,3`$, respectively. That is, if $`\varphi `$ is a solution to (1.1), so too

(3.8) $`\varphi ^{(\lambda )}(x,t)`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\lambda }}\varphi ({\displaystyle \frac{x}{\lambda }},{\displaystyle \frac{t}{\lambda ^2}}).`$
Using (3.3), the following energy can be made arbitrarily small by taking $`\lambda `$ large,

(3.9) $`E(I_N\varphi _0^{(\lambda )})`$ $`\left((N^{22s})\lambda ^{2s}+\lambda ^2\right)(1+\varphi _0_{H^s(𝐑^2)})^4`$
(3.10) $`C_0(N^{22s}\lambda ^{2s})(1+\varphi _0_{H^s(𝐑^2)})^4.`$
Assuming $`N1`$ is given444The parameter $`N`$ will be chosen shortly., we choose our scaling parameter $`\lambda =\lambda (N,\varphi _{H^s(𝐑^2)})`$

(3.11) $`\lambda `$ $`=N^{\frac{1s}{s}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{2C_0}}\right)^{\frac{1}{2s}}\left(1+\varphi _0_{H^s(𝐑^2)}\right)^{\frac{2}{s}}`$
so that $`E(I_N\varphi _0^{(\lambda )})\frac{1}{2}`$. We may now apply Proposition 3.1 to the scaled initial data $`\varphi _0^{(\lambda )}`$, and in fact may reapply this Proposition until the size of $`E(I_N\varphi ^{(\lambda )})(t)`$ reaches $`1`$, that is at least $`C_1N^{\frac{3}{2}}`$ times. Hence

(3.12) $`E(I_N\varphi ^{(\lambda )})(C_1N^{\frac{3}{2}}\delta )`$ $`1.`$
Given any $`T_01`$, we establish the polynomial growth (3.6) from (3.12) by first choosing our parameter $`N1`$ so that

(3.13)
$$T_0\frac{N^{\frac{3}{2}}}{\lambda ^2}C_1\delta N^{\frac{7s4}{2s}},$$

where we’ve kept in mind (3.11). Note the exponent of $`N`$ on the right of (3.13) is positive provided $`s>\frac{4}{7}`$, hence the definition of $`N`$ makes sense for arbitrary $`T_0`$. In two space dimensions,

$`E(I_N\varphi )(t)`$ $`=\lambda ^2E(I_N\varphi ^{(\lambda )})(\lambda ^2t).`$
We use (3.11), (3.12), and (3.13) to conclude that for $`T_01`$,

(3.14) $`E(I_N\varphi )(T_0)`$ $`C_2T_0^{\frac{1s}{\frac{7}{4}s1}+},`$
where $`N`$ is chosen as in (3.13) and $`C_2=C_2(\varphi _0_{H^s(𝐑^2)},\delta )`$. Together with (3.4), the bound (3.14) establishes the desired polynomial bound (3.5).

It remains then to prove Proposition 3.1. We will need the following modified version of the usual local existence theorem, wherein we control for small times the smoothed solution in the $`X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta `$ norm.

###### Proposition 3.2.

Assume $`\frac{4}{7}<s<1`$ and we are given data for the problem (1.1)-(1.2) with $`E(I\varphi _0)\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}1}`$. Then there is a constant $`\delta =\delta (\varphi _0_{L^2(𝐑^2)})`$ so that the solution $`\varphi `$ obeys the following bound on the time interval $`[0,\delta ]`$,

(3.15) $`I\varphi _{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }`$ $`1.`$
###### Proof.

We mimic the typical iteration argument showing local existence. We will need the following three estimates involving the $`X_{s,\delta }`$ spaces (2.1) and functions $`F(x,t),f(x)`$. (Throughout this section, the implicit constants in the notation $``$ are independent of $`\delta `$.)

(3.16) $`S(t)f_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }`$ $`f_{H^1(𝐑^2)},`$
(3.17) $`{\displaystyle _0^t}S(t\tau )F(x,\tau )𝑑\tau _{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}}`$ $`F_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta },`$
(3.18) $`F_{X_{1,b}^\delta }`$ $`\delta ^PF_{X_{1,\beta }^\delta },`$
where in (3.18) we have $`0<\beta <b<\frac{1}{2}`$, and $`P=\frac{1}{2}(1\frac{\beta }{b})>0.`$ The bounds (3.16), (3.17) are analogous to estimates (3.13), (3.15) in . As for (3.18), by duality it suffices to show

$`F_{X_{1,\beta }^\delta }`$ $`\delta ^PF_{X_{1,b}^\delta }.`$
Interpolation555The argument here actually involves Lemma 3.2 of . We thank S. Selberg for pointing this out to us. gives

$`F_{X_{1,\beta }^\delta }`$ $`F_{X_{1,0}^\delta }^{(1\frac{\beta }{b})}F_{X_{1,b}^\delta }^{\frac{\beta }{b}}.`$
As $`b(0,\frac{1}{2})`$, arguing exactly as on page 771 of ,

$`F_{X_{1,0}^\delta }`$ $`\delta ^{\frac{1}{2}}F_{X_{1,b}^\delta },`$
and (3.18) follows.

Duhamel’s principle and (3.16)- (3.18) give us

$`I\varphi _{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }`$ $`=S(t)(I\varphi _0)+{\displaystyle _0^t}S(t\tau )I(\varphi \overline{\varphi }\varphi )(\tau )𝑑\tau _{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }`$
$`I\varphi _0_{H^1(𝐑^2)}+I(\varphi \overline{\varphi }\varphi )_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }`$
(3.19) $`I\varphi _0_{H^1(𝐑^2)}+\delta ^ϵI(\varphi \overline{\varphi }\varphi )_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}++}^\delta },`$
where $`\frac{1}{2}++`$ is a real number slightly larger than $`\frac{1}{2}+`$ and $`ϵ>0`$. By the definition of the restricted norm (2.2),

(3.20) $`I\varphi _{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }`$ $`I\varphi _0_{H^1(𝐑^2)}+\delta ^ϵI(\psi \overline{\psi }\psi )_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}++}},`$
where the function $`\psi `$ agrees with $`\varphi `$ for $`t[0,\delta ]`$, and

(3.21) $`I\varphi _{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }`$ $`I\psi _{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
We will show shortly that

(3.22) $`I(\psi \overline{\psi }\psi )_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}++}}`$ $`I\psi _{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}}^3.`$
Setting then $`Q(\delta )I\varphi (t)_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }`$, the bounds (3.19), (3.21) and (3.22) yield

(3.23) $`Q(\delta )`$ $`I\varphi _0_{H^1(𝐑^2)}+\delta ^ϵ(Q(\delta ))^3.`$
Note

(3.24) $`I\varphi _0_{H^1(𝐑^2)}`$ $`(E(I\varphi _0))^{\frac{1}{2}}+\varphi _0_{L^2(𝐑^2)}1+\varphi _0_{L^2(𝐑^2)}.`$
As $`Q`$ is continuous in the variable $`\delta `$, a bootstrap argument yields (3.15) from (3.23), (3.24).

It remains to show (3.22). Using the interpolation lemma of , it suffices to show

(3.25) $`\psi \overline{\psi }\psi _{X_{s,\frac{1}{2}++}}`$ $`\psi _{X_{s,\frac{1}{2}+}}^3,`$
for all $`\frac{4}{7}<s<1`$. By duality and a “Leibniz” rule666By this, we mean the operator $`D^s`$ can be distributed over the product by taking Fourier transform and using $`\xi _1+\mathrm{}\xi _4^s\xi _1^s+\mathrm{}\xi _4^s`$., (3.25) follows from

(3.26) $`\left|{\displaystyle _𝐑}{\displaystyle _{𝐑^2}}(^s\varphi _1)\overline{\varphi _2}\varphi _3\varphi _4𝑑x𝑑t\right|`$ $`\varphi _1_{X_{s,\frac{1}{2}+}}\varphi _2_{X_{s,\frac{1}{2}+}}\varphi _3_{X_{s,\frac{1}{2}+}}\varphi _4_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}}}.`$
Note that since the factors in the integrand on the left here will be taken in absolute value, the relative placement of complex conjugates is irrelevant. Use Hölder’s inequality on the left side of (3.26), taking the factors in, respectively, $`L_{x,t}^4,L_{x,t}^4,L_{x,t}^6`$ and $`L_{x,t}^3`$. Using a Strichartz inequality,

$`^s\varphi _1_{L_{x,t}^4(𝐑^{2+1})}`$ $`^s\varphi _1_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}`$
$`=\varphi _1_{X_{s,\frac{1}{2}+}},`$
and

$`\varphi _2_{L_{x,t}^4(𝐑^{2+1})}`$ $`\varphi _2_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}`$
$`\varphi _2_{X_{s,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
The bound for the third factor uses Sobolev embedding and the $`L_t^6L_x^3`$ Strichartz estimate,

$`\varphi _3_{L_t^6L_x^6(𝐑^{2+1})}`$ $`^{\frac{1}{3}}\varphi _3_{L_t^6L_x^3(𝐑^{2+1})}`$
$`^{\frac{1}{3}}\varphi _3_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}`$
$`\varphi _3_{X_{s,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
It remains to bound $`\varphi _4_{L^3(𝐑^{2+1})}`$. Interpolating between $`\varphi _4_{L_t^2L_x^2}\varphi _4_{X_{0,0}}`$ and the Strichartz estimate $`\varphi _4_{L_t^4L_x^4}\varphi _4_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}`$ yields

$`\varphi _4_{L_t^3L_x^3}`$ $`\varphi _4_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}}}.`$
This completes the proof of (3.26), and hence Proposition 3.2. ∎

###### Proof of Proposition 3.1.

The usual energy (1.4) is shown to be conserved by differentiating in time, integrating by parts, and using the equation (1.1),

$`_tE(\varphi )`$ $`=\text{Re}{\displaystyle _{𝐑^2}}\overline{\varphi _t}(|\varphi |^2\varphi \mathrm{\Delta }\varphi )𝑑x`$
$`=\text{Re}{\displaystyle _{𝐑^2}}\overline{\varphi _t}(|\varphi |^2\varphi \mathrm{\Delta }\varphi i\varphi _t)𝑑x`$
$`=0.`$
We follow the same strategy to estimate the growth of $`E(I\varphi )(t)`$,

$`_tE(I\varphi )(t)`$ $`=\text{Re}{\displaystyle _{𝐑^2}}\overline{I(\varphi )_t}(|I\varphi |^2I\varphi \mathrm{\Delta }I\varphi iI\varphi _t)𝑑x`$
$`=\text{Re}{\displaystyle _{𝐑^2}}\overline{I(\varphi )_t}(|I\varphi |^2I\varphi I(|\varphi |^2\varphi ))𝑑x,`$
where in the last step we’ve applied $`I`$ to (1.1). When we integrate in time and apply the Parseval formula777That is, $`_{𝐑^n}f_1(x)f_2(x)f_3(x)f_4(x)𝑑x=_{\xi _1+\xi _2+\xi _3+\xi _4=0}\widehat{f}_1(\xi _1)\widehat{f}_2(\xi _2)\widehat{f}_3(\xi _3)\widehat{f}_4(\xi _4)`$ where $`_{_i\xi _i=0}`$ here denotes integration with respect to the hyperplane’s measure
$`\delta _0(\xi _1+\xi _2+\xi _3+\xi _4)d\xi _1d\xi _2d\xi _3d\xi _4`$, with $`\delta _0`$ the one dimensional Dirac mass. it remains for us to bound

(3.27)
$$\begin{array}{c}E(I\varphi (\delta ))E(I\varphi (0))=\hfill \\ \hfill _0^\delta _{_{j=1}^4\xi _j=0}\left(1\frac{m(\xi _2+\xi _3+\xi _4)}{m(\xi _2)m(\xi _3)m(\xi _4)}\right)\widehat{\overline{I_t\varphi }}(\xi _1)\widehat{I\varphi }(\xi _2)\widehat{\overline{I\varphi }}(\xi _3)\widehat{I\varphi }(\xi _4).\end{array}$$

The reader may ignore the appearance of complex conjugates here and in the sequel, as they have no impact on the availability of estimates. (See e.g. Lemma 2.1 above.) We include the complex conjugates for completeness.

We use the equation (1.1) to substitute for $`_tI(\varphi )`$ in (3.27). Our aim is to show that

(3.28) $`\text{Term}_1+\text{Term}_2`$ $`N^{\frac{3}{2}+},`$
where the two terms on the left are

(3.29) $`\text{Term}_1`$ $`\left|{\displaystyle _0^\delta }{\displaystyle _{_{i=1}^4\xi _i=0}}\left(1{\displaystyle \frac{m(\xi _2+\xi _3+\xi _4)}{m(\xi _2)m(\xi _3)m(\xi _4)}}\right)\widehat{(\mathrm{\Delta }\overline{I\varphi })}(\xi _1)\widehat{I\varphi }(\xi _2)\widehat{\overline{I\varphi }}(\xi _3)\widehat{I\varphi }(\xi _4)\right|`$
(3.30) $`\text{Term}_2`$ $`\left|{\displaystyle _0^\delta }{\displaystyle _{_{i=1}^4\xi _i=0}}\left(1{\displaystyle \frac{m(\xi _2+\xi _3+\xi _4)}{m(\xi _2)m(\xi _3)m(\xi _4)}}\right)\widehat{(\overline{I(|\varphi |^2\varphi ))}}(\xi _1)\widehat{I\varphi }(\xi _2)\widehat{\overline{I\varphi }}(\xi _3)\widehat{I\varphi }(\xi _4)\right|.`$
In both cases we break $`\varphi `$ into a sum of dyadic constituents $`\psi _j`$, each with frequency support $`\xi 2^j`$, $`j=0,\mathrm{}`$..

For both $`\text{Term}_1`$ and $`\text{Term}_2`$ we’ll pull the symbol

(3.31)
$$1\frac{m(\xi _2+\xi _3+\xi _4)}{m(\xi _2)m(\xi _3)m(\xi _4)}$$

out of the integral, estimating it pointwise in absolute value, using two different strategies depending on the relative sizes of the frequencies involved. After so bounding the factor (3.31), the remaining integrals in (3.29), (3.30), involving the pieces $`\psi _i`$ of $`\varphi `$, are estimated by reversing the Plancherel formula888 Assuming, as we may, that the spatial Fourier transform of $`\varphi `$ is always positive. and using duality, Hölder’s inequality, and Strichartz estimates. We can sum over the all frequency pieces $`\psi _i`$ since our bounds decay geometrically in these frequencies. We suggest that the reader at first ignore this summation issue, and so ignore on first reading the appearance below of all factors such as $`N_i^0`$ which we include only to show explicitly why our frequency interaction estimates sum. The main goal of the analysis is to establish the decay of $`N^{\frac{3}{2}+}`$ in each class of frequency interactions below.

Consider first $`\text{Term}_1`$. By Proposition 3.2,

$`\mathrm{\Delta }(I\varphi )_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }`$ $`I\varphi _{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }`$
$`1.`$
Hence we conclude $`\text{Term}_1N^{\frac{3}{2}+}`$ once we show

(3.32)
$$\begin{array}{c}\left|_0^\delta _{_{i=1}^4\xi _i=0}\left(1\frac{m(\xi _2+\xi _3+\xi _4)}{m(\xi _2)m(\xi _3)m(\xi _4)}\right)\widehat{\overline{\varphi _1}}(\xi _1)\widehat{\varphi _2}(\xi _2)\widehat{\overline{\varphi _3}}(\xi _3)\widehat{\varphi _4}(\xi _4)\right|\hfill \\ \hfill N^{\frac{3}{2}+}(N_1N_2N_3N_4)^0\varphi _1_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}}\varphi _2_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}}\varphi _3_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}}\varphi _4_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}},\end{array}$$

for any functions $`\varphi _i,i=1,\mathrm{},4`$ with positive spatial Fourier transforms supported on

(3.33) $`\xi `$ $`2^{k_i}N_i,`$
for some $`k_i\{0,1,\mathrm{}\}`$. (Note that we are not decomposing the frequencies $`|\xi |1`$ here. In the three dimensional argument we’ll need to do this.) The inequality (3.32) implies our desired bound (3.28) for $`\text{Term}_1`$ once we sum over all dyadic pieces $`\psi _j`$.

By the symmetry of the multiplier (3.31) in $`\xi _2,\xi _3,\xi _4`$, and the fact that the refined Strichartz estimate (2.6) allows complex conjugates on either factor, we may assume for the remainder of this proof that

(3.34)
$$N_2N_3N_4.$$

Note too that $`_{i=1}^4\xi _i=0`$ in the integration of (3.32) so that $`N_1N_2`$. Hence it is sufficient to obtain a decay factor of $`N^{\frac{3}{2}+}N_2^0`$ on the right hand side of (3.32). We now split the different frequency interactions into three cases, according to the size of the parameter $`N`$ in comparison to the $`N_i`$.

$`\text{Term}_1`$, Case 1: $`NN_2`$. According to (3.2), the symbol (3.31) is in this case identically zero and the bound (3.32) holds trivially.

$`\text{Term}_1`$, Case 2: $`N_2NN_3N_4`$. Since $`_i\xi _i=0`$, we have here also $`N_1N_2`$. By the mean value theorem,

(3.35) $`\left|{\displaystyle \frac{m(\xi _2)m(\xi _2+\xi _3+\xi _4)}{m(\xi _2)}}\right|`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{|m(\xi _2)(\xi _3+\xi _4)|}{m(\xi _2)}}{\displaystyle \frac{N_3}{N_2}}.`$
This pointwise bound together with Plancherel’s theorem and (2.6) yield

(3.36) Left Side of (3.32) $`{\displaystyle \frac{N_3}{N_2}}\varphi _1\varphi _3_{L^2([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^2])}\varphi _2\varphi _4_{L^2([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^2)}`$
(3.37) $`{\displaystyle \frac{N_3N_3^{\frac{1}{2}}N_4^{\frac{1}{2}}}{N_2N_1^{\frac{1}{2}}N_2^{\frac{1}{2}}}}{\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}\varphi _i_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }.`$
Comparing (3.32) with (3.37) it remains only to show that

$`{\displaystyle \frac{N_3N_3^{\frac{1}{2}}N_4^{\frac{1}{2}}N_1}{N_2N_1^{\frac{1}{2}}N_2^{\frac{1}{2}}N_2N_3N_4}}`$ $`N^{\frac{3}{2}+}N_2^0,`$
which follows immediately from our assumptions $`N_1N_2NN_3N_4`$.

$`\text{Term}_1`$, Case 3: $`N_2N_3N`$. We use in this instance a trivial pointwise bound on the symbol,

(3.38) $`\left|1{\displaystyle \frac{m(\xi _2+\xi _3+\xi _4)}{m(\xi _2)m(\xi _3)m(\xi _4)}}\right|`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{m(\xi _1)}{m(\xi _2)m(\xi _3)m(\xi _4)}}.`$
When estimating the remainder of the integrand on the left of (3.32), break the interactions into two subcases, depending on which frequency is comparable to $`N_2`$.

Case 3(a): $`N_1N_2N_3N`$. We aim for

$`{\displaystyle \frac{m(N_1)}{m(N_2)m(N_3)m(N_4)}}\left|{\displaystyle _0^\delta }{\displaystyle _{_{i=1}^4\xi _i=0}}\widehat{\overline{\varphi _1}}\widehat{\varphi _2}\widehat{\overline{\varphi _3}}\widehat{\varphi _4}\right|`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{N^{\frac{3}{2}+}N_2^0N_2N_3N_4}{N_1}}{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{4}{}}}\varphi _i_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }.`$
Pairing $`\overline{\varphi _1}\varphi _4`$ and $`\varphi _2\overline{\varphi _3}`$ in $`L^2`$ and applying (2.6), it remains to show

$`{\displaystyle \frac{m(N_1)N_4^{\frac{1}{2}}N_3^{\frac{1}{2}}}{m(N_2)m(N_3)m(N_4)N_1^{\frac{1}{2}}N_2^{\frac{1}{2}}}}`$ $`N^{\frac{3}{2}+}{\displaystyle \frac{N_2^1N_3N_4}{N_1}},`$
or

(3.39) $`{\displaystyle \frac{N^{\frac{3}{2}+}N_2^0}{m(N_3)m(N_4)N_2N_3^{\frac{1}{2}}N_4^{\frac{1}{2}}}}`$ $`1.`$
When estimating such fractions here and in the sequel, we frequently use two trivial observations999Alternatively, use (3.2) to write out the value of $`m`$ explicitly.: for any $`p>\frac{3}{7}`$, the function $`m(x)x^p`$ is increasing; and $`m(x)x^p`$ is bounded below. For example, in the denominator of (3.39), $`m(N_4)N_4^{\frac{1}{2}}1`$ and $`m(N_3)N_3^{\frac{1}{2}}m(N)N^{\frac{1}{2}}=N^{\frac{1}{2}}`$. After these observations one quickly concludes that (3.39) holds.

Case 3(b): $`N_2N_3N`$. In this case we also know $`N_1N_2`$, since the frequencies $`\xi _i`$ must sum to zero. Argue as above, now pairing $`\varphi _1\varphi _2`$ and $`\varphi _3\varphi _4`$ in $`L^2`$. The desired bound (3.32) will follow from

$`{\displaystyle \frac{m(N_1)N_1^{\frac{1}{2}}N_4^{\frac{1}{2}}}{m(N_2)m(N_3)m(N_4)N_2^{\frac{1}{2}}N_3^{\frac{1}{2}}}}`$ $`N^{\frac{3}{2}+}{\displaystyle \frac{N_2^1N_3N_4}{N_1}},`$
or, after cancelling powers of $`N_1`$ in the numerator with powers of $`N_2`$ in the denominator,

(3.40) $`{\displaystyle \frac{m(N_1)N^{\frac{3}{2}}N_2^{0+}}{m(N_2)m(N_3)m(N_4)N_3^{\frac{1}{2}}N_2N_4^{\frac{1}{2}}}}`$ $`1.`$
Using $`m(N_4)N_4^{\frac{1}{2}}1`$ and that both $`m(N_2)N_2^{\frac{1}{2}},m(N_3)N_3^{\frac{1}{2}}m(N)N^{\frac{1}{2}}=N^{\frac{1}{2}}`$, we get (3.40). This completes the proof of (3.32), and the bound for the contribution of $`\text{Term}_1`$ in (3.28).

We turn to the bound (3.28) for $`\text{Term}_2`$ (3.30). As in our previous discussion of $`\text{Term}_1`$, it suffices to show

(3.41)
$$\begin{array}{c}\left|_0^\delta _{_{i=1}^6\xi _i=0}\left(1\frac{m(\xi _4+\xi _5+\xi _6)}{m(\xi _4)m(\xi _5)m(\xi _6)}\right)P_{N_{123}}\widehat{\overline{I(\varphi _1\varphi _2\varphi _3)}}(\xi _1+\xi _2+\xi _3)\widehat{I\varphi _4}(\xi _4)\widehat{\overline{I\varphi _5}}(\xi _5)\widehat{I\varphi _6}(\xi _6)\right|\hfill \\ \hfill N^{\frac{3}{2}+}N_4^0\underset{i=1}{\overset{6}{}}I\varphi _i_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}},\end{array}$$

where as above, $`0\widehat{\varphi _i}(\xi _i)`$ is supported for $`|\xi _i|N_i=2^{k_i}`$, and without loss of generality,

(3.42) $`N_4N_5N_6,`$ $`\text{and}N_4N,`$
the latter assumption since otherwise the symbol on the left of (3.41) vanishes. In (3.41) we have written $`P_{N_{123}}`$ for the projection onto functions supported in the $`N_{123}`$ dyadic spatial frequency shell. The decay factor on the right of (3.41) allows us to sum in $`N_4,N_5,N_6,`$ and $`N_{123}`$, which suffices as we do not dyadically decompose that part of $`\text{Term}_2`$ represented here by $`\varphi _i,i=1,2,3.`$ We pointwise bound the symbol on the left of (3.41) in the obvious way

$`\left|1{\displaystyle \frac{m(\xi _4+\xi _5+\xi _6)}{m(\xi _4)m(\xi _5)m(\xi _6)}}\right|`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{m(N_{123})}{m(N_4)m(N_5)m(N_6)}}`$
and as before, we undo the Plancherel formula. After applying Hölder’s inequality, it suffices to show

(3.43)
$$\begin{array}{c}\frac{m(N_{123})}{m(N_4)m(N_5)m(N_6)}P_{N_{123}}I(\varphi _1\varphi _2\varphi _3)_{L_t^2L_x^2}I\varphi _4_{L_t^4L_x^4}I\varphi _5_{L_t^4L_x^4}I\varphi _6_{L_t^{\mathrm{}}L_x^{\mathrm{}}}\hfill \\ \hfill N^{\frac{3}{2}+}N_4^0\underset{i=1}{\overset{6}{}}I\varphi _i_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}}.\end{array}$$

To this end we’ll use

###### Lemma 3.3.

Suppose the functions $`\varphi _i,i=1,\mathrm{}6`$ as above. Then,

(3.44) $`P_{N_{123}}I(\varphi _1\varphi _2\varphi _3)_{L_t^2L_x^2}`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N_{123}}}{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}}I\varphi _i_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}},`$
(3.45) $`I\varphi _j_{L_t^4L_x^4}`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N_j}}I\varphi _j_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}}j=4,5,`$
(3.46) $`I\varphi _6_{L_t^{\mathrm{}}L_x^{\mathrm{}}}`$ $`I\varphi _6_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
###### Proof.

For (3.44), it suffices to prove

(3.47) $`P_{N_{123}}I(\varphi _1\varphi _2\varphi _3)_{L_t^2L_x^2}`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}}I\varphi _i_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
(See Section 2 above for notation). The operator $`I`$ obeys a Leibniz rule. Using Hölder’s inequality on a typical resulting term,

(3.48) $`P_{N_{123}}\left((I(\varphi _1))\varphi _2\varphi _3\right)_{L_t^2L_x^2}`$ $`I(\varphi _1)_{L_{x,t}^4}\varphi _2_{L_{x,t}^8}\varphi _3_{L_{x,t}^8}.`$
By Sobolev’s inequality and a $`L_t^8L_x^{\frac{8}{3}}`$ Strichartz estimate (2.5),

$`\varphi _2_{L_{t,x}^8}`$ $`^{\frac{1}{2}}\varphi _2_{L_t^8L_x^{\frac{8}{3}}}`$
$`^{\frac{1}{2}}\varphi _2_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}`$
(3.49) $`\varphi _2_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}}`$
and similarly for the $`\varphi _3`$ factor on the right of (3.48). Applying the $`L_{x,t}^4`$ Strichartz estimate,

(3.50) $`I\varphi _1_{L_{x,t}^4}`$ $`I\varphi _1_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
Together, (3.48) - (3.50) yield (3.44).

The bounds (3.45) follow immediately from the $`L_{t,x}^4`$ Strichartz estimate as in (3.50). The estimate (3.46) is seen using Sobolev embedding, the fact that $`\varphi _6`$ is frequency localized, and the $`L_t^{\mathrm{}}L_x^2`$ Strichartz bound,

$`I\varphi _6_{L_{x,t}^{\mathrm{}}}`$ $`I\varphi _6_{L_t^{\mathrm{}}L_x^2}`$
$`I\varphi _6_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
Together, (3.43) and Lemma 3.3 leave us to show

(3.51) $`{\displaystyle \frac{m(N_{123})N^{\frac{3}{2}}N_4^{0+}}{m(N_4)m(N_5)m(N_6)N_{123}N_4N_5}}`$ $`1`$
under the assumption (3.42). We can break the frequency interactions into two cases: $`N_4N_5`$ and $`N_4N_{123}`$, since we have $`_{i=1}^6\xi _i=0`$ in (3.41).

$`\text{Term}_2`$, Case 1; $`N_4N_5;N_4N_5N_6;N_4N`$: We aim here for

$`{\displaystyle \frac{m(N_{123})N^{\frac{3}{2}}N_4^{0+}}{(m(N_4))^2N_4^2m(N_6)N_{123}}}`$ $`1.`$
Since $`m(N_4)N_4^{\frac{1}{2}}m(N)N^{\frac{1}{2}}=N^{\frac{1}{2}}`$ it suffices to show

(3.52) $`{\displaystyle \frac{m(N_{123})N^{\frac{1}{2}}N_4^{0+}}{N_4m(N_6)N_{123}}}`$ $`1,`$
which is clear since $`N_{123}m(N_{123})`$, and

(3.53) $`m(y)x^{\frac{1}{2}}`$ $`1\text{for all}0yx.`$
$`\text{Term}_2`$, Case 2; $`N_4N_{123};N_4N_5N_6;N_4N`$: Here we argue that

$`{\displaystyle \frac{m(N_4)N^{\frac{3}{2}}N_4^{0+}}{m(N_4)N_4^2m(N_5)m(N_6)N_5}}`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{N^{\frac{3}{2}}N_4^{0+}}{m(N_5)N_5^{\frac{1}{2}}m(N_6)N_4^2N_5^{\frac{1}{2}}}}1,`$
using (3.53) and our assumptions on the $`N_i`$. This completes the proof of (3.28) and hence the proof of Proposition 3.1. ∎

## 4.  Proof of Theorem 1.1 in $`𝐑^3`$

In three space dimensions our almost conservation law takes the following form,

###### Proposition 4.1.

Given $`s>\frac{5}{6},N1,`$ and initial data $`\varphi _0C_0^{\mathrm{}}(𝐑^3)`$ with $`E(I_N\varphi _0)1`$, then there exists a universal constant $`\delta `$ so that the solution

$`\varphi (x,t)`$ $`C([0,\delta ],H^s(𝐑^3))`$
of (1.1)-(1.2) satisfies

(4.1) $`E(I_N\varphi )(t)`$ $`=E(I_N\varphi )(0)+O(N^{1+}),`$
for all $`t[0,\delta ]`$.

The norm $`\varphi (t,)_{L^2(𝐑^3)}`$ is supercritical with respect to the scaling (3.8). Hence, aside from the $`L^2`$ conservation (1.3) we will avoid using this quantity in the proof of the three dimensional result. Beside the technical issues introduced by scaling the $`L^2`$ norm, our proof of Theorem 1.1 for $`n=3`$ follows very closely the $`n=2`$ arguments of Section 3.

We begin with the fact that Proposition 4.1 implies Theorem 1.1 with $`n=3`$. Recall that it suffices to show the $`H^s(𝐑^3)`$ norm of the solution to (1.1)- (1.2) grows polynomially in time. Recall too $`\varphi ^{(\lambda )}`$ as the scaled solution defined in (3.8). When $`n=3`$, the definition of the energy (1.4) and Sobolev embedding imply

(4.2)
$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill E(I_N\varphi _0^{(\lambda )})& =\frac{1}{2}I_N\varphi _0^{(\lambda )}_{L^2(𝐑^3)}^2+\frac{1}{4}I_N\varphi _0^{(\lambda )}_{L^4(𝐑^3)}^4\hfill \\ & C_0N^{22s}\lambda ^{12s}(1+\varphi _0_{H^s(𝐑^3)})^4.\hfill \end{array}$$

Once the parameter $`N`$ is chosen, we will choose $`\lambda `$ according to

(4.3) $`\lambda `$ $`=\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{2C_0}}\right)^{\frac{1}{12s}}N^{\frac{2s2}{12s}}(1+\varphi _0_{H^s(𝐑^3)})^{\frac{4}{12s}}.`$
Together, (4.3) and (4.2) give $`E(I_N\varphi _0^{(\lambda )})\frac{1}{2}`$. We can therefore apply Proposition 4.1 at least $`C_1N^1`$ times to give

(4.4) $`E(I_N\varphi ^{(\lambda )})(C_1N^1\delta )`$ $`1.`$
The estimate (4.4) implies $`\varphi (t,)_{H^s(𝐑^3)}`$ grows at most polynomially when $`\frac{5}{6}<s<1`$. This can be seen exactly as in the two dimensional case. We include the argument here for completeness.

Given any $`T_01`$, first choose $`N1`$ so that

(4.5)
$$T_0=\frac{C_1N^1\delta }{\lambda ^2}N^{\left(\frac{\frac{5}{2}3s}{\frac{1}{2}s}\right)}.$$

Note that the exponent of $`N`$ on the right of (4.5) is positive (and hence this definition of $`N`$ makes sense) precisely when $`s>\frac{5}{6}`$. In three space dimensions we have

$`E(I_N\varphi ^{(\lambda )})(\lambda ^2t)`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{1}{\lambda }}E(I_N\varphi )(t).`$
According to (4.3), (4.4), (4.5), we therefore get

$`E(I_N\varphi )(T_0)`$ $`\lambda E(I_N\varphi ^{(\lambda )})(\lambda ^2T_0)`$
$`\lambda `$
$`N^{\frac{2s2}{12s}}`$
$`T_0^{\frac{1s+}{3(s\frac{5}{6})}}.`$
According to (3.4) and (1.3), the $`H^s(𝐑^3)`$ norm grows with at most half this rate when $`\frac{5}{6}<s<1`$,

(4.6) $`\varphi _{H^s(𝐑^3)}(T)`$ $`(1+T)^{\frac{1s+}{6(s\frac{5}{6})}}.`$
As in the two dimensional argument, the proof of Proposition 4.1 relies on bounds for the local-in-time $`H^s`$ solution. The following analogue of Proposition 3.2 avoids the use of the norm $`\varphi (,t)_{L^2(𝐑^3)}`$, which, as mentioned above, is supercritical with respect to scaling.

###### Proposition 4.2.

Assume $`\frac{5}{6}<s<1`$ and we are given data for (1.1)-(1.2) with $`E(I\varphi _0)\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}1}`$. Then there is a universal constant $`\delta >0`$ so that the solution $`\varphi `$ obeys the following bound on the time interval $`[0,\delta ]`$,

(4.7) $`I\varphi _{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }`$ $`1.`$
###### Proof.

Arguing as in the proof of Proposition 3.2, it suffices to prove

$`I(\varphi \overline{\varphi }\varphi )_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}++}^\delta }`$ $`I\varphi _{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}^3,`$
Again, the interpolation lemma in  allows us to assume $`N=1`$ in the definition (3.1) of the operator $`I`$. After applying a Leibniz rule for the operator $`I`$ and duality, we aim to show

(4.8) $`(I)(\varphi _1)\overline{\varphi _2}\varphi _3\psi _{L^1(𝐑^{3+1})}`$ $`\psi _{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}}}{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}}I\varphi _i_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
Again, the complex conjugate will have no bearing on our bounds. We split the functions $`\varphi _j,j=2,3`$ into high and low frequency components,

(4.9) $`\varphi _j`$ $`=\varphi _j^{\text{high}}+\varphi _j^{\text{low}},`$
where

$`\text{supp}\widehat{\varphi _j^{\text{high}}}(\xi ,t)`$ $`\{|\xi |{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\}`$
$`\text{supp}\widehat{\varphi _j^{\text{low}}}(\xi ,t)`$ $`\{|\xi |1\}.`$
Note that when $`n=3`$, homogeneous Sobolev embedding and the $`L_t^{10}L_x^{\frac{30}{13}}`$ Strichartz estimate give

(4.10)
$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill \varphi _{L_t^{10}L_x^{10}(𝐑^{3+1})}& \varphi _{L_t^{10}L_x^{\frac{30}{13}}(𝐑^{3+1})}\hfill \\ & \varphi _{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}.\hfill \end{array}$$

Consider first the low frequency components on the left of (4.8). Apply Holder’s inequality with the factors in $`L_{x,t}^{\frac{10}{3}},L_{x,t}^{10},L_{x,t}^{10},`$ and $`L_{x,t}^2`$ respectively. The $`L_{x,t}^{\frac{10}{3}}`$ Strichartz estimate along with (4.10) give,

$`(I)(\varphi _1)\overline{\varphi _2^{\text{low}}}\varphi _3^{\text{low}}\psi _{L^1(𝐑^{3+1})}`$ $`\psi _{X_{0,0}}I\varphi _1_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}{\displaystyle \underset{i=2}{\overset{3}{}}}\varphi _j^{\text{low}}_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
Together with the fact that $`\varphi _j^{\text{low}}=I\varphi _j^{\text{low}}`$, this bound accounts for part of the low frequency contributions of $`\varphi _2,\varphi _3`$ in (4.8). A typical contribution which remains to be bounded is

$$(I\varphi _1)\overline{\varphi _2^{\text{high}}}\varphi _3^{\text{high}}\psi _{L_{x,t}^1(𝐑^{3+1})}.$$

Recall the Strichartz estimate,

(4.11) $`\psi _{L_{x,t}^{\frac{10}{3}}(𝐑^{3+1})}`$ $`\psi _{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
Interpolating between (4.11) and the trivial bound $`\psi _{L_{x,t}^2(𝐑^{3+1})}\psi _{X_{0,0}}`$ gives

(4.12) $`\psi _{L_{x,t}^3(𝐑^{3+1})}`$ $`\psi _{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}}}.`$
Using (4.12) and Holder’s inequality on the left of (4.8), we aim to show

(4.13) $`(I\varphi _1)\varphi _2^{\text{high}}\varphi _3^{\text{high}}_{L_{x,t}^{\frac{3}{2}}(𝐑^{3+1})}`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}}I\varphi _i_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
Since we’ve reduced to the case $`N=1`$, we note $`I^1=^g`$, where

(4.14) $`g`$ $`1s(0,{\displaystyle \frac{1}{6}})`$
is the gap between $`s`$ and $`1`$. We may therefore rewrite our desired estimate as

(4.15) $`(I\varphi _1)(^gI\overline{\varphi _2^{\text{high}}})(^gI\varphi _3^{\text{high}})_{L_{x,t}^{\frac{3}{2}}(𝐑^{3+1})}`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}}I\varphi _i_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
But this estimate follows after taking the factors on the left in $`L_{x,t}^{\frac{10}{3}},L_{x,t}^{\frac{60}{11}},L_{x,t}^{\frac{60}{11}}`$, respectively and using Hölders inequality. The first resulting factor is bounded using the $`L_{x,t}^{\frac{10}{3}}`$ Strichartz estimate. As for the second two factors, Sobolev embedding, the bounds (4.14) on $`g`$, and the $`L_{t,x}^{\frac{60}{11}\frac{45}{17}}`$ Strichartz estimate yield for $`j=2,3`$,

$`^gI\varphi _j^{\text{high}}_{L_{x,t}^{\frac{60}{11}}(𝐑^{3+1})}`$ $`^{1g}^gI\varphi _j^{\text{high}}_{L_{t,x}^{\frac{60}{11}\frac{45}{17}}}`$
$`I\varphi _j^{\text{high}}_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
The case where $`\varphi _2^{\text{low}}\varphi _3^{\text{high}}`$ appears on the left of (4.8) is handled similarly, using a homogeneous Sobolev embedding to bound the $`\varphi _2^{\text{low}}`$ term. ∎

###### Proof of Proposition 4.1.

Arguing as in the two dimensional result leaves us to show

(4.16) $`\text{Term}_1+\text{Term}_2`$ $`N^{1++},`$
where the two terms on the left are as before, (3.29), (3.30). We will have to pay closer attention here than in $`𝐑^2`$ when we sum the various dyadic components of this estimate. The fact that we only control inhomogeneous norms (4.7) forces us to decompose the frequencies $`|\xi |1`$ as well.

Considering first $`\text{Term}_1`$, it follows from the definition of the $`X_{s,b}`$ norms (2.1) that

(4.17) $`\mathrm{\Delta }I\varphi _{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }`$ $`I\varphi _{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }.`$
We conclude $`\text{Term}_1N^{1++}`$ once we prove

(4.18)
$$\begin{array}{c}\left|_0^\delta _{_{i=1}^4\xi _i=0}\left(1\frac{m(\xi _2+\xi _3+\xi _4)}{m(\xi _2)m(\xi _3)m(\xi _4)}\right)\widehat{\varphi _1}(\xi _1)\widehat{\varphi _2}(\xi _2)\widehat{\varphi _3}(\xi _3)\widehat{\varphi _4}(\xi _4)\right|\hfill \\ \hfill N^{1++}C(N_1,N_2,N_3,N_4)\varphi _1_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}}\underset{j=2}{\overset{4}{}}\varphi _j_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}},\end{array}$$

for sufficiently small $`C(N_1,N_2,N_3,N_4)`$ and for any smooth functions $`\varphi _i,i=1,\mathrm{}4`$ with $`0\widehat{\varphi _i}(\xi _i)`$ supported for $`|\xi _i|N_i2^{k_i},k_i=0,\pm 1,\pm 2,\mathrm{}`$. As before, we may assume $`N_2N_3N_4`$. The precise extent to which $`C(N_1,N_2,N_3,N_4)`$ decays in its arguments, and the fact that this decay allows us to sum over all dyadic shells, will be described below on a case-by-case basis.

In addition to the estimates (4.10), (4.11), our analysis here uses the following related bounds, all of which are quick consequences of homogeneous Sobolev embedding, Hölder’s inequality in the time variable, and/or Strichartz estimates. These estimates will allow for bounds decaying in the frequencies. For a function $`\varphi `$ with frequency support in the $`D`$’th dyadic shell,

(4.19) $`\varphi _{L_t^{10}L_x^{10\pm }([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^3)}`$ $`D^{0\pm }\varphi _{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}`$
(4.20) $`\varphi _{L_t^{\frac{10}{3}}L_x^{\frac{10}{3}}([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^3)}`$ $`\delta ^{0+}\varphi _{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}`$
(4.21) $`\varphi _{L_t^{\frac{10}{3}}L_x^{\frac{10}{3}+}([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^3)}`$ $`D^{0+}\varphi _{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
$`\text{Term}_1`$, Case 1: $`NN_2`$. Again, the symbol (3.31) is in this case identically zero and the bound (4.18) holds trivially, with $`C0`$.
$`\text{Term}_1`$, Case 2: $`N_2NN_3N_4`$. We have $`N_2N_1`$ here as well. We will show

(4.22) $`C(N_1,N_2,N_3,N_4)`$ $`=N_2^0N_4^{0+}.`$
With this decay factor, and the fact that we are considering here terms where $`N_1N_2`$, we may immediately sum over the $`N_1,N_2`$ indices. Similarly, the factor $`N_4^{0+}`$ in (4.22) allows us to sum over all terms here with $`N_3,N_41`$. It remains to sum the terms where $`1N_4N_3N`$, but these introduce at worst a divergence $`N^{0+}\mathrm{log}(N)`$, which is absorbed by the decay factor $`N^{1++}`$ on the right side of (4.18).

We now show (4.18), (4.22). As before, (3.35), we bound the symbol in this case by $`\frac{N_3}{N_2}`$. We apply Hölder’s inequality to the left side of (4.18), bounding $`\varphi _1,\varphi _3`$ in $`L_{x,t}^{\frac{10}{3}}`$ as in (4.11); $`\varphi _2`$ in $`L_t^{\frac{10}{3}}L_x^{\frac{10}{3}}`$ as in (4.20); and $`\varphi _4`$ in $`L_t^{10}L_x^{10+}`$ as in (4.19) to get,

Left Side of (4.18) $`N_4^{0+}{\displaystyle \frac{N_3}{N_2}}\varphi _1_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}\varphi _2_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}\varphi _3_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}\varphi _4_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{N_4^{0+}N_3N_1}{N_2N_2N_3}}\varphi _1_{X_{1,\frac{1}{2}+}}{\displaystyle \underset{j=2}{\overset{4}{}}}\varphi _j_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
We conclude the bound (4.18), (4.22) for this case once we note

$`{\displaystyle \frac{N_3N_1N^1N_2^{0+}}{N_2N_2N_3}}`$ $`1,`$
which is immediate from our assumptions on the $`N_i`$.
$`\text{Term}_1`$, Case 3, $`N_2N_3N`$: As in the two dimensional argument, we use here the straightforward bound (3.38) for the symbol. The estimate of the remainder of the integrand will break up into six different subcases, depending on which $`N_i`$ is comparable to $`N_2`$, and whether or not $`N_1,N_41`$.
Case 3(a), $`N_1N_2N_3N;N_41`$: We will show here

(4.23) $`C(N_1,N_2,N_3,N_4)`$ $`=N_4^{0+}N_3^0,`$
which suffices since one may use (4.23) to sum directly in $`N_3,N_4`$, and use Cauchy-Schwarz to sum in $`N_1,N_2`$.

To establish (4.18), (4.23), estimate the $`\varphi _4`$ factor in $`L_t^{10}L_x^{10+}`$ using (4.19); $`\varphi _3`$ in $`L_t^{\frac{10}{3}}L_x^{\frac{10}{3}}`$ as in (4.20); and $`\varphi _1,\varphi _2`$ in $`L_{x,t}^{\frac{10}{3}}`$ as in (4.11). It remains then to show

(4.24) $`{\displaystyle \frac{m(N_1)N_1N^1N_3^{0+}}{m(N_2)m(N_3)N_2N_3}}`$ $`1.`$
Note that since $`s(\frac{5}{6},1)`$, we can use the following fact while working in three space dimensions,

(4.25)
$$(m(x))^{p_1}x^{p_2}\text{is nondecreasing in }x\text{ when}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0}<p_1\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}6}p_2.$$

We check (4.24) by first cancelling factors involving $`N_1`$ and $`N_2`$ from numerator and denominator,and then using (4.25),

$`{\displaystyle \frac{m(N_1)N_1N^1N_3^{0+}}{m(N_2)m(N_3)N_2N_3}}`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{N^1N_3^{0+}}{m(N_3)N_3}}`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{N^1N_3^{0+}}{(m(N))N^1N_3^{0+}}}1.`$
Case 3(b), $`N_2N_3N,N_11,N_41`$: Exactly as above, one shows (4.18), (4.23) holds. With this, one may sum directly in $`N_4`$, and also in $`N_1,N_2,N_3`$ using the $`N_3`$ decay in (4.23).
Case 3(c), $`N_2N_3N,N_11,N_41`$: Here we have

(4.26) $`C(N_1,N_2,N_3,N_4)`$ $`=N_3^0N_4^{0+}N_1^{0+}.`$
Allowing us to sum directly in all $`N_i`$. One shows (4.26) by modifying the argument in 3(a), taking $`\varphi _1,\varphi _2`$ in $`L_t^{\frac{10}{3}}L_x^{\frac{10}{3}+},L_t^{\frac{10}{3}}L_x^{\frac{10}{3}+}`$, respectively.
Case 3(d), $`N_1N_2N_3N;N_41`$: We will show here

(4.27) $`C(N_1,N_2,N_3,N_4)`$ $`=N_3^0N_4^0,`$
allowing us to sum immediately in $`N_3`$ and $`N_4`$; summing in $`N_1,N_2`$ using Cauchy-Schwarz.

After taking the symbol out of the left side of (4.18) using (3.38), we apply Hölder’s inequality as follows: estimate the $`\varphi _4`$ factor in $`L_t^{10}L_x^{10}`$ using (4.19); $`\varphi _3`$ in $`L_t^{\frac{10}{3}}L_x^{\frac{10}{3}+}`$ as in (4.21); and $`\varphi _1,\varphi _2`$ in $`L_{x,t}^{\frac{10}{3}}`$ as in (4.11). We will establish (4.18), (4.27) once we show

(4.28) $`{\displaystyle \frac{m(N_1)N_1N^1N_3^{0+}N_3^{0+}}{m(N_2)m(N_3)m(N_4)N_2N_3}}`$ $`1.`$
This is done as in the argument of Case 3(a).
Case 3(e), $`N_2N_3N`$; $`N_41`$;$`N_11`$: We will show here

(4.29) $`C(N_1,N_2,N_3,N_4)`$ $`=N_2^0N_1^0,`$
allowing us to sum directly in all the $`N_i`$. The Hölder’s inequality argument here takes the $`\varphi _1`$ factor in $`L_t^{10}L_x^{10}`$ using (4.19); $`\varphi _2`$ in $`L_t^{\frac{10}{3}}L_x^{\frac{10}{3}+}`$ as in (4.21); and $`\varphi _3,\varphi _4`$ in $`L_{x,t}^{\frac{10}{3}}`$ as in (4.11). We will have shown (4.18), (4.29) once we show,

(4.30) $`{\displaystyle \frac{m(N_1)N_1N^1N_2^{0+}N_2^{0+}}{m(N_2)m(N_3)m(N_4)N_2N_3}}`$ $`1.`$
This argument is by now straightforward,

$`{\displaystyle \frac{m(N_1)N_1N^1N_2^{0+}N_2^{0+}}{m(N_2)m(N_3)m(N_4)N_2N_3}}`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{N^1N_2^{0+}N_2^{0+}}{m(N_2)^2N_2}}`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{N^1N_2^{0+}N_2^{0+}}{N^1N_2^{0+}N_2^{0+}}}1.`$
Case 3(f), $`N_2N_3N`$; $`N_41`$;$`N_11`$: We will show here

(4.31) $`C(N_1,N_2,N_3,N_4)`$ $`=N_2^0N_1^{0+},`$
allowing us to sum directly in all the $`N_i`$.

The proof of (4.18), (4.31) is similar to Case (3e), now taking $`\varphi _1`$ in $`L_t^{10}L_x^{10+}`$ using (4.19); $`\varphi _2`$ in $`L_t^{\frac{10}{3}}L_x^{\frac{10}{3}+}`$ as in (4.21); and $`\varphi _3,\varphi _4`$ in $`L_t^{\frac{10}{3}}L_x^{\frac{10}{3}}`$ as in (4.20).

This completes the 3-dimensional analysis of $`\text{Term}_1`$ in (4.16).

We will show $`\text{Term}_2N^{1+}`$ using the straightforward bound (3.38) on the symbol in the case $`N_2N`$, and the following,

###### Lemma 4.3.

(4.32) $`I(\varphi _1\varphi _2\varphi _3)_{L_t^2L_x^2([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^3)}`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}}I\varphi _i_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
We postpone the proof of Lemma 4.3. As in the work for $`\text{Term}_1`$ above, the argument bounding $`\text{Term}_2`$ is complicated only by the presence of low frequencies. Our aim is to show

(4.33) Left Side of (3.41) $`C(N_{123},N_4,N_5,N_6){\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{6}{}}}I\varphi _i_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
where $`N_4N_5N_6`$ and $`N_4N`$, and as in the $`\text{Term}_1`$ work above, $`C(N_{123},N_4,N_5,N_6)`$ decays sufficiently fast to allow us to add up the individual frequency interaction estimates to get (4.16).

We sum first the interactions involving $`N_i1`$ for all frequencies in (4.33). In this case we’ll show a decay factor of $`C=N^{1+}(N_{123}N_4N_5N_6)^0`$, allowing us to sum in each index $`N_i`$ directly. Apply Hölder’s inequality to the integrand on the left of (3.41), taking the factors in $`L_{x,t}^2;L_{x,t}^{\frac{10}{3}};L_{x,t}^{10}`$; and $`L_{x,t}^{10}`$; respectively. Using (3.38), (4.32), the Strichartz estimates and (4.10) as in the $`\text{Term}_1`$ argument, it suffices to show

(4.34) $`{\displaystyle \frac{N^1N_4^{0+}m(N_{123})}{N_4m(N_4)m(N_5)m(N_6)}}`$ $`1.`$
The fact that $`m(x)`$ is nonincreasing in $`x`$ and (4.25) give us

$`{\displaystyle \frac{N^1N_4^{0+}m(N_{123})}{N_4m(N_4)m(N_5)m(N_6)}}`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{N^1N_4^{0+}m(N_{123})}{N_4(m(N_4))^3}}`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{N^1N_4^{0+}m(N_{123})}{N_4^{0+}N^1(m(N))^3}}1.`$
The above argument is easily modified in the presence of small frequencies. We sketch these modifications here. In case $`N_{123}N_4`$, with $`N_61`$ and possibly also $`N_51`$, we need to get factors of $`N_6^{0+}`$ and possibly also $`N_5^{0+}`$ on the right hand side of (4.33). We accomplish this by taking the factor $`I\varphi _6`$ and possibly also $`I\varphi _5`$ in $`L_t^{10}L_x^{10+}`$,and take the factor $`I\varphi _4`$ in $`L_t^{\frac{10}{3}}L_x^{\frac{10}{3}}`$, or possibly $`L_t^{\frac{10}{3}}L_x^{\frac{10}{3}}`$.

In case $`N_4N_5`$, with $`N_{123}`$ and/or $`N_6`$ small, a similar argument gets the necessary decay: we can take $`P_{N_{123}}I(\varphi _1\varphi _2\varphi _3)`$ in $`L_t^2L_x^{2+}`$, and/or $`I\varphi _6`$ in $`L_t^{10}L_x^{10+}`$, and take $`I\varphi _4`$ in $`L_t^{10/3}L_x^{\frac{10}{3}}`$ or $`L_t^{10/3}L_x^{\frac{10}{3}}`$. ∎

###### Proof of Lemma 4.3.

By the interpolation lemma in , we may assume $`N=1`$. By Plancherel’s theorem, it suffices to prove

(4.35) $`\varphi _1\varphi _2\varphi _3_{L_{x,t}^2([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^3)}`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}}\varphi _i_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
Decomposing $`\varphi _i=\varphi _i^{\text{low}}+\varphi _i^{\text{high}}`$ as in (4.9), we consider first the contribution when only the low frequencies interact with one another. Hölder’s inequality in space-time, homogeneous Sobolev embedding, Hölder’s inequality in time, and the energy estimate yield,

$`\varphi _1^{\text{low}}\varphi _2^{\text{low}}\varphi _3^{\text{low}}_{L_{x,t}^2([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^3)}`$ $`=I\varphi _1^{\text{low}}I\varphi _2^{\text{low}}I\varphi _3^{\text{low}}_{L_{x,t}^2([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^3)}`$
$`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}}I\varphi _i^{\text{low}}_{L_{x,t}^6([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^3)}`$
$`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}}I\varphi _i^{\text{low}}_{L_t^6L_x^2([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^3)}`$
$`\delta ^{\frac{1}{2}}{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}}I\varphi _i^{\text{low}}_{L_t^{\mathrm{}}L_x^2([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^3)}`$
$`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}}I\varphi _i^{\text{low}}_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}}.`$
A typical term whose contribution to (4.35) remains to be controlled is

(4.36)
$$I\varphi _1^{\text{low}}^gI\varphi _2^{\text{high}}^gI\varphi _3^{\text{high}}_{L_{x,t}^2([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^3)},$$

where $`g`$ is as in (4.14). Take the first factor here in $`L_t^6L_x^{18}`$ and each of the second two in $`L_t^6L_x^{\frac{9}{2}}`$ via Hölder’s inequality. Note then that Sobolev embedding and the $`L_t^6L_x^{\frac{18}{7}}`$ Strichartz inequality give us

$`I\varphi _1^{\text{low}}_{L_t^6L_x^{18}(𝐑^{3+1})}`$ $`I\varphi _1^{\text{low}}_{L_t^6L_x^{\frac{18}{7}}(𝐑^{3+1})}`$
$`I\varphi _1^{\text{low}}_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }.`$
Similarly, the fact that $`g(0,\frac{1}{6})`$, Sobolev embedding, Hölder’s inequality in time, and the energy estimate give us for $`j=2,3`$,

$`^gI\varphi _j^{\text{high}}_{L_t^6L_x^{\frac{9}{2}}([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^3)}`$ $`I\varphi _j^{\text{high}}_{L_t^6L_x^2([0,\delta ]\times 𝐑^3)}`$
$`\delta ^{\frac{1}{6}}I\varphi _j^{\text{high}}_{L_t^{\mathrm{}}L_x^2(𝐑^{3+1})}`$
$`I\varphi _j_{X_{0,\frac{1}{2}+}^\delta }.`$
This completes the proof of Lemma 4.3. ∎