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# (Conformal) Killing Vectors and their Associated Bivectors

## I INTRODUCTION

In a number of papers Brian Edgar and the present author investigated spacetimes with (conformal) Killing vectors ((C)KVs), i.e. with Killing vectors (KVs), a homothetic vector (HV), and/or proper conformal Killing vectors (CKVs). One of the key ingredients was the notion of a preferred tetrad relative to a (C)KV. Working, at first, in the Geroch-Held-Penrose (GHP) formalism the notion of preferred null directions relative to a vector, in particular, relative to a (C)KV, was defined. This was done in such a way that when a suitably defined GHP generalization of the ordinary Lie derivative is applied to such a preferred GHP tetrad the result takes its simplest possible form. Proceeding to the Newman-Penrose formalism it was then necessary to define the notion of a preferred gauge as well (thus defining what is meant by a preferred tetrad). Although this was done by requiring that the the GHP Lie operator and the ordinary Lie derivative have the same effect on arbitrary scalar quantities, the upshot of it was that when the (ordinary) Lie derivative is applied to a preferred tetrad it yields the simplest possible result. In particular, relative to a KV, the Lie derivative annihilates the tetrad if and only if the latter is preferred.

In a recent article, Fayos and Sopuerta (FS) set up a formalism to facilitate the study of vacuum spacetimes with an isometry. (Steele has meanwhile extended their method to include homotheties.) This formalism centred around the bivector associated with a Killing vector. The aim of the present paper is three-fold. Firstly, we show that their formalism can be obtained quite simply by re-writing the Killing equations and their integrability conditions as obtained in Ref.\[\] (KL), in terms of the associated bivector. Secondly, since the latter equations were obtained for an arbitrary spacetime, vacuum or not, and for homothetic and proper conformal Killing vectors as well, the extension of the FS equations to this most general case is straightforward. Thirdly, we show how the generalized FS equations or, equivalently, the KL equations, can be used most efficiently to find all (C)KVs for a given spacetime if they are combined with the notion of a preferred tetrad.

Normally, to find all possible (C)KVs of a given spacetime one solves the (conformal) Killing equations. Inevitably, this has to be done with the aid of the integrability conditions of these equations. Both sets of equations were worked out in all generality in KL in the GHP formalism. They are readily converted into the NP formalism. Generally speaking, these equations are still quite difficult to tackle unless one chooses the tetrad appropriately. Insisting that the tetrad be preferred relative to a (C)KV yet to be found, furnishes tremendous simplification. In the FS approach the tetrad direction(s) are chosen to be principal null direction(s) of the bivector associated with the KV. In the case of an HV or a KV, such null directions are then preferred and lead to suitable simplifications. (The issue of alignment of the bivector with the Weyl tensor is not addressed here. It applies only to some specialized cases, albeit perhaps interesting ones. Here we concentrate on the more general case where such an alignment may or may not exist.) However, it is usually better to adapt the null directions to the Weyl tensor or some other aspect of the (conformal) geometry since they will then be preferred with respect to *all* (C)KVs. Except when there is alignment, such null directions are then not principal null directions of the bivector(s) associated with the (C)KVs. Further, when dealing with a proper CKV, the principal null directions of the associated bivector are not preferred and the equations will not simplify. Therefore, although the FS formalism (and, by implication, the present extension) appears to be useful in deriving general properties for spacetimes with (C)KVs it does not seem to be a good tool for actually determining such (C)KVs unless combined with the notion of a preferred tetrad. Although we maintain that the best tool is the commutator approach$`^\text{-}`$ (which also employs preferred tetrads), in this paper we shall work with the KL equations or, equivalently, the (generalized) FS equations.

The notation used here for the tetrad components of the (C)KV and of other quantities agrees with that of Refs.\[\] and is different in some respects from that used by FS. However, the correspondence is readily made.

In section 2 we review the notion of preferred null directions relative to a (C)KV and rewrite the conformal Killing equations and their integrabilty conditions in terms of the bivector associated with a (C)KV. In the following section we make the connection to the FS formalism and discuss a few general results that may readily be obtained from this formalism. In section 4, after reviewing the notion of a preferred gauge, we convert these equations from the GHP formalism to the NP formalism. Finally, in section 5, we illustrate on a concrete example (the non-vacuum metric of Kimura) how these equations, when used in conjunction with a preferred tetrad, can be solved to yield all (C)KVs of the given metric.

## II THE GHP CONFORMAL KILLING EQUATIONS AND THEIR INTEGRABILITY CONDITIONS

The most useful generalization of the Lie derivative $`\mathrm{\pounds }__\xi `$ to the GHP formalism is the ”GHP Lie derivative Ł$`__\xi `$” defined as

$$\text{Ł}__\xi =L__\xi \frac{p}{4}\left(𝒫𝒫^{}+𝒫^{}𝒫^{}\right)\frac{q}{4}\left(𝒫𝒫^{}+𝒫^{}𝒫^{}\right)$$
(1)
where $`p,q`$ are the GHP weights of the quantity operated upon,

$$𝒫=n__\mu L__\xi l^^\mu $$
(2)
(with similar definitions for the companions $`𝒫^{},𝒫^{},𝒫^{}`$), and

$$L__\xi =\mathrm{\pounds }__\xi \xi ^^\mu \left(p\zeta __\mu +q\overline{\zeta }__\mu \right),$$
(3)
where, using the usual NP notation,

$$\zeta __\mu =\gamma l__\mu +\epsilon n__\mu \alpha m__\mu \beta \overline{m}__\mu .$$
(4)
As a result, Ł$`{}_{_\xi }{}^{}l_{}^{\mu }`$ has the form

$$\text{Ł}__\xi l^^\mu =\frac{1}{2}\left(𝒫+𝒫^{}\right)l^^\mu +n^^\mu 𝒬m^^\mu \overline{𝒬}\overline{m}^^\mu $$
(5)
and similarly for its companions under the prime, star and star-prime operations. When $`\xi `$ is a (C)KV, i.e. when it satisfies

$$\mathrm{\pounds }__\xi g_{\mu \nu }=\phi g_{\mu \nu },$$
(6)
the conformal Killing equations may be written

$`𝒫^{}`$ $`=𝒫\phi \text{}𝒫^{}=𝒫^{}\phi `$
$`𝒬`$ $`=𝒬^{}\text{}𝒬^{}=𝒬^{}`$
$``$ $`=^{}=^{}=^{}=0.`$ (7)
Since $`\overline{𝒫^{}}=𝒫^{}`$ it follows from the second of Eqs.(7) that $`\overline{𝒫^{}}+𝒫^{}=\phi `$. Hence, for a (C)KV, we can write

$$𝒫^{}=\frac{\phi }{2}i𝒮$$
(8)
where $`S`$ is real. It follows that for a (C)KV,

$$\text{Ł}__\xi =L__\xi \frac{p}{2}\left(𝒫i𝒮+\frac{\phi }{2}\right)\frac{q}{2}\left(𝒫+i𝒮+\frac{\phi }{2}\right).$$
(9)
When the null directions $`l`$ and $`n`$ are chosen such that $`𝒬=𝒬^{}=0`$, which is always possible, they are called *preferred*. In this case we have (for a (C)KV $`\xi `$)

$$\text{Ł}__\xi l^^\mu =\frac{1}{2}\phi l^^\mu ,$$
(10)
and similarly for its companions.

The bivector $`F_{\mu \nu }`$ associated with a (C)KV is, as in Eq.(KL24) of Ref.\[\], defined by

$$F_{\mu \nu }=\xi _{\mu ;\nu }\frac{1}{2}\phi g_{\mu \nu }$$
(11)
and its tetrad components, as in Eqs.(KL26-KL28), are given by

$`\varphi __0`$ $`=F_{\mu \nu }l^^\mu m^^\nu =\overline{𝒬}\kappa a\tau b+\sigma c+\rho \overline{c}`$ (12)
$`\varphi __2`$ $`=F_{\mu \nu }\overline{m}^^\mu n^^\nu =\overline{𝒬}^{}\pi a\nu b+\mu c+\lambda \overline{c}`$ (12)
$`\varphi __1`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}F_{\mu \nu }\left(l^^\mu n^^\nu +\overline{m}^^\mu m^^\nu \right)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\left(𝒫i𝒮+{\displaystyle \frac{\phi }{2}}\right),`$ (13)
where $`a`$, $`b`$, $`c`$, $`d`$ are the tetrad components of the (C)KV $`\xi `$:

$$\xi =al^^\mu +bn^^\mu cm^^\mu \overline{c}\overline{m}^^\mu .$$
(14)
Note that by the last of Eqs.(12), Eq.(9) may now be written as

$$\text{Ł}__\xi =L__\xi \frac{p}{2}\varphi __1\frac{q}{2}\overline{\varphi __1}.$$
(15)
It is also worthwhile noting that the weights of $`\varphi __0`$, $`\varphi __1`$, $`\varphi __2`$ are, respectively, (2,0), (0,0), and (-2,0) and that under the prime and star operations these quantities transform according to

$`\varphi __0^{}`$ $`=\varphi __2,\varphi __1^{}=\varphi __1^{}`$
$`\varphi __i^{}`$ $`=\varphi __i\left(i=0,1,2\right).`$ (16)
The weights and transformation properties of other GHP quantities of interest are found in the Appendices of Ref.\[\].

In terms of these quantities $`\varphi _i`$ the Killing equations as given by Eqs.(KL21-KL23) become

$`\text{þ}b`$ $`=\kappa c\overline{\kappa }\overline{c}`$ (17)
$`\text{þ}^{}a`$ $`=\overline{\nu }c+\nu \overline{c}`$ (17)
$`\text{ð}\overline{c}`$ $`=\sigma a+\overline{\lambda }b`$ (17\*)
$`\text{þ}a`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{\phi }{2}}\varphi __1\overline{\varphi __1}+\overline{\pi }c+\pi \overline{c}`$ (18)
$`\text{þ}^{}b`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{\phi }{2}}+\varphi __1+\overline{\varphi __1}\tau c\overline{\tau }\overline{c}`$ (18)
$`\text{ð}c`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{\phi }{2}}+\varphi __1\overline{\varphi __1}\overline{\rho }a+\mu b`$ (18\*)
$`\text{þ}c`$ $`=\overline{\varphi __0}\overline{\kappa }a+\pi b`$ (19)
$`\text{þ}^{}\overline{c}`$ $`=\overline{\varphi __2}\tau a+\overline{\nu }b`$ (19)
$`\text{ð}a`$ $`=\overline{\varphi __2}+\overline{\lambda }c+\mu \overline{c}`$ (19\*)
$`\overline{\text{ð}}b`$ $`=\overline{\varphi __0}\rho c\overline{\sigma }\overline{c}`$ (19\*)
Their first integrability conditions, given in Eqs.(KL34-KL36) are also easily re-written in terms of the $`\varphi _i`$ and become

$`\text{þ}\varphi __1`$ $`=\pi \varphi __0\kappa \varphi __2{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\text{þ}\phi +b\left(\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{11}}\mathrm{\Psi }__2\right)+c\mathrm{\Psi }__1+\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{10}}`$ (20)
$`\text{þ}^{}\varphi __1`$ $`=\nu \varphi __0\tau \varphi __2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\text{þ}^{}\phi a\left(\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{11}}\mathrm{\Psi }__2\right)c\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{12}}\overline{c}\mathrm{\Psi }__3`$ (20)
$`\text{ð}\varphi __1`$ $`=\mu \varphi __0\sigma \varphi __2{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\text{ð}\phi +a\mathrm{\Psi }__1b\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{12}}+\overline{c}\left(\mathrm{\Lambda }+\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{11}}\mathrm{\Psi }__2\right)`$ (20\*)
$`\overline{\text{ð}}\varphi __1`$ $`=\lambda \varphi __0\rho \varphi __2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\overline{\text{ð}}\phi +a\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{10}}b\mathrm{\Psi }__3c\left(\mathrm{\Lambda }+\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{11}}\mathrm{\Psi }__2\right)`$ (20\*)
$`\text{þ}\varphi __2`$ $`=2\pi \varphi __1{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\overline{\text{ð}}\phi b\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__3+\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}\right)+c\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__2+2\mathrm{\Lambda }\right)+\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{20}}`$ (21)
$`\text{þ}^{}\varphi __0`$ $`=2\tau \varphi __1+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\text{ð}\phi +a\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__1+\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}\right)c\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{02}}\overline{c}\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__2+2\mathrm{\Lambda }\right)`$ (21)
$`\text{ð}\varphi __2`$ $`=2\mu \varphi __1{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\text{þ}^{}\phi +a\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__2+2\mathrm{\Lambda }\right)b\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{22}}+\overline{c}\left(\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}\mathrm{\Psi }__3\right)`$ (21\*)
$`\overline{\text{ð}}\varphi __0`$ $`=2\rho \varphi __1+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\text{þ}\phi +a\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{00}}b\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__2+2\mathrm{\Lambda }\right)+c\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__1\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}\right)`$ (21\*)
$`\text{þ}\varphi __0`$ $`=2\kappa \varphi __1b\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__1+\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}\right)+c\mathrm{\Psi }__0+\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{00}}`$ (22)
$`\text{þ}^{}\varphi __2`$ $`=2\nu \varphi __1+a\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__3+\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}\right)c\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{22}}\overline{c}\mathrm{\Psi }__4`$ (22)
$`\text{ð}\varphi __0`$ $`=2\sigma \varphi __1+a\mathrm{\Psi }__0b\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{02}}\overline{c}\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__1\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}\right)`$ (22\*)
$`\overline{\text{ð}}\varphi __2`$ $`=2\lambda \varphi _1+a\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{20}}b\mathrm{\Psi }__4+c\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__3\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}\right)`$ (22\*)
The Maxwell equations (with source) are implicit in these equations. They are obtained by subtracting Eq.(21<sup>′∗</sup>) from Eq.(20) and doing the same with their respective companions. Thus,

$`\text{þ}\varphi __1\overline{\text{ð}}\varphi __0`$ $`=\pi \varphi __0+2\rho \varphi __1\kappa \varphi __2{\displaystyle \frac{3}{4}}\text{þ}\phi a\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{00}}+b\left(3\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{11}}\right)+c\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}+\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{10}}`$ (23)
$`\text{þ}^{}\varphi __1\text{ð}\varphi __2`$ $`=\nu \varphi __02\mu \varphi __1\tau \varphi __2+{\displaystyle \frac{3}{4}}\text{þ}^{}\phi a\left(3\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{11}}\right)+b\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{22}}c\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{12}}\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}`$ (23)
$`\text{ð}\varphi __1\text{þ}^{}\varphi __0`$ $`=\mu \varphi __0+2\tau \varphi __1\sigma \varphi __2{\displaystyle \frac{3}{4}}\text{ð}\phi a\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}b\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{12}}+c\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{02}}+\overline{c}\left(3\mathrm{\Lambda }+\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{11}}\right)`$ (23\*)
$`\overline{\text{ð}}\varphi __1\text{þ}\varphi __2`$ $`=\lambda \varphi __02\pi \varphi __1\rho \varphi __2+{\displaystyle \frac{3}{4}}\overline{\text{ð}}\phi +a\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{10}}+b\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{20}}c\left(3\mathrm{\Lambda }+\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{11}}\right)`$ (23\*)
When specialized to vacuum and to a proper Killing vector, Eqs.(20) - (22) readily yield the formalism of FS, as we shall see in the next section.

## III GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS

Before revisiting the FS equations, albeit in their most general from which includes non-vacuum metrics and HV and proper CKV, let us derive some general results of interest.

Multiplying Eqs.(22), (21$`{}_{}{}^{})`$, (22\*), and (21\*) by $`a,b,c,\overline{c}`$, respectively, and adding the results we first calculate $`\left(a\text{þ}+b\text{þ}^{}c\text{ð}\overline{c}\overline{\text{ð}}\right)\varphi __0`$, i.e. $`L__\xi \varphi __0`$, and then, from Eq.(15), Ł$`{}_{_\xi }{}^{}\varphi _{_0}^{}`$. Doing similar calculations for $`\varphi __1`$ and $`\varphi __2`$ we find that

$`\text{Ł}__\xi \varphi __0`$ $`=2\overline{𝒬}\varphi __1+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}b\text{ð}\phi {\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\overline{c}\text{þ}\phi `$ (24)
$`\text{Ł}__\xi \varphi __2`$ $`=2\overline{𝒬}^{}\varphi __1{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}a\overline{\text{ð}}\phi +{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}c\text{þ}^{}\phi `$ (24)
$`\text{Ł}__\xi \varphi __1`$ $`=\overline{𝒬}^{}\varphi __0\overline{𝒬}\varphi __2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\left(a\text{þ}\phi +b\text{þ}^{}\phi +c\text{ð}\phi \overline{c}\overline{\text{ð}}\phi \right).`$ (25)
Restricting ourselves to HV and KVs and assuming that the bivector $`F_{\mu \nu }`$ does not vanish identically, we see immediately from Eqs.(24, 24, 25) that if the null directions are preferred then the $`\varphi __i`$ are annihilated by the GHP operator Ł$`__\xi `$, as perhaps expected. Conversely, if we choose the $`l`$ \- direction to be a principal null direction of the bivector, so that $`\varphi __0`$vanishes, we find immediately from Eqs.(24) and (25) that $`𝒬=0`$, i.e. that this direction is preferred. From the first of Eqs.(12) we now deduce that

$$\kappa a+\tau b\sigma c\rho \overline{c}=0$$
(26)
i.e. that the vector $`X__1=\tau l\kappa n+\rho m+\sigma \overline{m}`$ is orthogonal to the KV/HV $`\xi `$. If the bivector is non-null we can choose the second null direction to coincide with the bivector’s second principal null direction and we get the prime of the above result, $`𝒬^{}=0`$, i.e.

$$\pi ab\nu +\mu c+\lambda \overline{c}=0$$
(27)
i.e. that the vector $`X__3=\nu l+\pi n\lambda m\mu \overline{m}`$ is also orthogonal to the KV/HV $`\xi `$. As FS have shown, and as we shall see below, there may, under certain circumstances (such as in vacuum), be yet another vector $`X__2`$ orthogonal to $`\xi `$.

Still restricting ourselves to an HV or a KV, if we add Eqs.(21\*) and (21\*), convert to the NP formalism where we take a gauge such that $`\rho =\mu `$ (which is possible provided $`\rho \mu 0`$) we obtain after a lengthy calculation that $`\rho ,__\mu \xi ^_\mu =\frac{\phi }{2}\rho `$. Clearly now, if $`\rho `$ is a constant in this gauge, $`\phi `$ has to vanish; there cannot be an HV. This is the case for the Kimura metric considered in Section 5. It should be noted that this conclusion is arrived at much faster using the KL formalism. In fact, Eqs.(21\*) and (21\*) are simply Eqs.(KL35\*) and (KL35\*) which, for preferred null directions reduce to the complex conjugates of Ł$`{}_{_\xi }{}^{}\rho =\frac{\phi }{2}\rho `$ and Ł$`{}_{_\xi }{}^{}\mu =\frac{\phi }{2}\mu `$, respectively. Since the gauge $`\rho =\mu `$ has a preferred boost part and since both $`\rho `$ and $`\mu `$ have weights of the form ($`p,p`$), it follows from the discussion in the next section that $`\mathrm{\pounds }__\xi \rho =\frac{\phi }{2}\rho `$ and $`\mathrm{\pounds }__\xi \mu =\frac{\phi }{2}\mu `$. Hence, when $`\rho =\mu =`$ constant we necessarily have $`\phi =0`$.

Let us now return to the general case that includes proper CKVs. Eqs.(21)-(22), including their companions, can be solved pairwise for $`N\mathrm{\Psi }__i`$ $`(i=0,\mathrm{}4))`$, where $`N=\xi ^^\mu \xi __\mu `$. We find that

$`N\mathrm{\Psi }__3`$ $`=c\left(\text{ð}\varphi __22\mu \varphi __1+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\text{þ}^{}\phi +b\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{22}}\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}\right)`$
$`a\left(\text{þ}\varphi __22\pi \varphi __1+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\overline{\text{ð}}\phi +b\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{20}}\right)`$ (28)
$`N\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__2+2\mathrm{\Lambda }\right)`$ $`=b\left(\text{ð}\varphi __22\mu \varphi __1+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\text{þ}^{}\phi +b\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{22}}\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}\right)`$
$`\overline{c}\left(\text{þ}\varphi __22\pi \varphi __1+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\overline{\text{ð}}\phi +b\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{20}}\right)`$ (29)
$`N\mathrm{\Psi }__1`$ $`=b\left(\text{þ}^{}\varphi __0+2\tau \varphi __1{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\text{ð}\phi a\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}+c\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{02}}\right)`$
$`\overline{c}\left(\overline{\text{ð}}\varphi __0+2\rho \varphi __1{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\text{þ}\phi a\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{00}}+c\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}\right)`$ (28)
$`N\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__2+2\mathrm{\Lambda }\right)`$ $`=c\left(\text{þ}^{}\varphi __0+2\tau \varphi __1{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\text{ð}\phi a\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}+c\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{02}}\right)`$
$`a\left(\overline{\text{ð}}\varphi __0+2\rho \varphi __1{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\text{þ}\phi a\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{00}}+c\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}\right)`$ (29)
$`N\mathrm{\Psi }__0`$ $`=b\left(\text{ð}\varphi __0+2\sigma \varphi __1+b\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{02}}\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}\right)\overline{c}\left(\text{þ}\varphi __0+2\kappa \varphi __1+b\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{00}}\right)`$ (30)
$`N\mathrm{\Psi }__1`$ $`=a\left(\text{þ}\varphi __0+2\kappa \varphi __1+b\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{00}}\right)+c\left(\text{ð}\varphi __0+2\sigma \varphi __1+b\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{02}}\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}\right)`$ (31)
$`N\mathrm{\Psi }__4`$ $`=c\left(\text{þ}^{}\varphi __22\nu \varphi __1a\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}+c\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{22}}\right)a\left(\overline{\text{ð}}\varphi __22\lambda \varphi __1a\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{20}}+c\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}\right)`$ (30)
$`N\mathrm{\Psi }__3`$ $`=b\left(\text{þ}^{}\varphi __22\nu \varphi __1a\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}+c\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{22}}\right)\overline{c}\left(\overline{\text{ð}}\varphi __22\lambda \varphi __1a\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{20}}+c\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}\right)`$ (31)
Note that these equations hold even when $`N=0`$. Together with the Maxwell equations (23) they are equivalent to the first integrability conditions we started with. For vacuum and when $`\xi `$ is a Killing vector, they reduce to those of the FS formalism, provided we assume either that the bivector is nonnull and $`\varphi __0=\varphi __2=0`$, $`\varphi __10`$ or that the bivector is null and $`\varphi __0=\varphi __1=0`$, $`\varphi __20`$. The latter formalism is indeed a very special case of the present one.

Let us assume that $`\xi `$ is a KV with a nonsingular bivector and that we have taken a canonical basis for which $`\varphi __0=0=\varphi __2.`$ Adding Eqs.(29) and (29) then yields

$$2\varphi __1\xi X_2b^2\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{22}}+2b\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}c\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{20}}2ac\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}+c^2\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{02}}+a^2\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{00}}=0$$
(32)
where

$$X_2=\mu l\rho n\pi m+\tau \overline{m}.$$
(33)
In vacuum this gives the third vector orthogonal to $`\xi `$, as also derived by FS. But we see clearly from Eq.(32) that only under special conditions as the ones described do we get such a third orthogonal vector.

## IV THE NP CONFORMAL KILLING EQUATIONS AND THEIR INTEGRABILITY CONDITIONS

From Eqs.(1)-(4) we see that

$$\text{Ł}__\xi =\mathrm{\pounds }__\xi p𝔊q\overline{𝔊}$$
(34)
where

$$𝔊=\frac{1}{4}(𝒫𝒫^{}+𝒫^{}𝒫^{}+4\xi ^^\mu \zeta __\mu .)$$
(35)
Because of the conformal Killing equations (7), for a (C)KV $`\xi `$ this reduces to

$$𝔊=\frac{1}{2}(𝒫i𝒮+\frac{\phi }{2}+2\xi ^^\mu \zeta __\mu .)$$
(36)
In terms of the component $`\varphi __1`$ of the associated bivector this becomes

$$𝔊=\varphi __1+\xi ^^\mu \zeta __\mu ,$$
(37)
i.e.

$$𝔊=\varphi __1+ϵa+\gamma b\beta c\alpha \overline{c}.$$
(38)
To fix the gauge requires the specification of two real parameters corresponding to boost and phase. It is therefore possible to have a preferred boost or a preferred phase (or both). The necessary and sufficient condition for the boost-part of the gauge to be preferred is that Ł$`{}_{_\xi }{}^{}\eta =`$ $`\mathrm{\pounds }__\xi \eta `$ for any scalar quantity $`\eta `$ of weight ($`p,p`$). Therefore, for a preferred boost we must have

$$𝔊+\overline{𝔊}=0.$$
(39)
Similarly, the necessary and sufficient condition for the phase-part of the gauge to be preferred is that Ł$`{}_{_\xi }{}^{}\eta =`$ $`\mathrm{\pounds }__\xi \eta `$ for any scalar quantity $`\eta `$ of weight ($`p,p`$), i.e. that

$$𝔊\overline{𝔊}=0.$$
(40)
The necessary and sufficient condition for the full gauge to be preferred is that $`𝔊`$ vanish, i.e. that

$$\varphi __1=ϵa\gamma b+\beta c+\alpha \overline{c}.$$
(41)
Recalling that

$$\text{þ}=Dpϵq\overline{ϵ},$$
(42)
and similarly for its companions, it is straightforward to write Eqs.(17)-(22) in NP notation. They become

$`Db\left(ϵ+\overline{ϵ}\right)b`$ $`=\kappa c\overline{\kappa }\overline{c}`$ (43)
$`Da+\left(ϵ+\overline{ϵ}\right)a`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{\phi }{2}}\varphi __1\overline{\varphi __1}+\overline{\pi }c+\pi \overline{c}`$ (44)
$`Dc+\left(ϵ\overline{ϵ}\right)c`$ $`=\overline{\varphi __0}\overline{\kappa }a+\pi b`$ (45)
$`D\varphi __1`$ $`=\pi \varphi __0\kappa \varphi __2{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}D\phi +b\left(\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{11}}\mathrm{\Psi }__2\right)+c\mathrm{\Psi }__1+\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{10}}`$ (46)
$`D\varphi __2+2ϵ\varphi __2`$ $`=2\pi \varphi __1{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\overline{\delta }\phi b\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__3+\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{21}}\right)+c\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__2+2\mathrm{\Lambda }\right)+\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{20}}`$ (47)
$`D\varphi __02ϵ\varphi __0`$ $`=2\kappa \varphi __1b\left(\mathrm{\Psi }__1+\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{01}}\right)+c\mathrm{\Psi }__0+\overline{c}\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{00}}`$ (48)
together with their companions.

## V AN ILLUSTRATIVE EXAMPLE

Although the commutator approach (Ref. ) seems preferable to a direct solving of the Killing equations and their first integrability conditions we illustrate in this section how the latter approach is facilitated by using preferred tetrads relative to the (C)KVs. To this end we once again find all (C)KVs for the Kimura metric.

The Kimura metric considered by Koutras and Skea is given by

$$ds^2=\frac{r^2}{b__0}dt^2\frac{1}{r^2b__0^2}dr^2r^2d\theta ^2r^2\mathrm{sin}^2\theta d\varphi ^2,$$
(49)
where $`b__0`$ is a constant. It is of Petrov type D with a non-zero energy momentum tensor. We can readily construct a tetrad such that follows that

$$\begin{array}{cccc}Dt=\frac{\sqrt{b___0}}{r\sqrt{2}},\hfill & Dr=\frac{rb__0}{\sqrt{2}},\hfill & D\theta =0,\hfill & D\varphi =0\hfill \\ \mathrm{}t=\frac{\sqrt{b___0}}{r\sqrt{2}},\hfill & \mathrm{}r=\frac{rb__0}{\sqrt{2}},\hfill & \mathrm{}\theta =0,\hfill & \mathrm{}\varphi =0\hfill \\ \delta t=0,\hfill & \delta r=0,\hfill & \delta \theta =\frac{1}{r\sqrt{2}},\hfill & \delta \varphi =\frac{i}{r\sqrt{2}\mathrm{sin}\theta }.\hfill \end{array}$$
(50)
The NP spin coefficients are then given by

$`\kappa `$ $`=\sigma =\lambda =\nu =\tau =\pi =0`$
$`\gamma `$ $`=\epsilon ={\displaystyle \frac{b___0}{2\sqrt{2}}},\rho =\mu ={\displaystyle \frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}},\beta =\overline{\alpha }={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cot}\theta }{2\sqrt{2}r}},`$ (51)
and

$$\mathrm{\Psi }__2=\frac{1}{6r^2},\mathrm{\Phi }_{_{11}}=\frac{1}{4r^2},\mathrm{\Lambda }=\frac{b__0^2}{2}+\frac{1}{12r^2}$$
(52)
are the only nonzero components of the Riemann tensor.

In view of Eqs.(51) and (52), the conformal Killing equations and their first integrability conditions, Eqs. (43) -(48) and their companions, become

$`Da`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{\phi }{2}}\left(𝔊+\overline{𝔊}\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}}b,\mathrm{\Delta }a={\displaystyle \frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}}a,\delta a=\overline{\delta }a=0`$
$`Db`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}}b,\mathrm{\Delta }b={\displaystyle \frac{\phi }{2}}+𝔊+\overline{𝔊}{\displaystyle \frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}}a,\delta b=\overline{\delta }b=0`$
$`Dc`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}}c,\mathrm{\Delta }c={\displaystyle \frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}}c,`$
$`\delta c`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{\phi }{2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}}\left(ab\right)+𝔊\overline{𝔊}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cot}\theta }{\sqrt{2}r}}\overline{c},\overline{\delta }c={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cot}\theta }{\sqrt{2}r}}c`$ (53)
$`D\varphi __0`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}}\varphi __0,\mathrm{\Delta }\varphi __0{\displaystyle \frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}}\varphi __0={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\delta \phi +\overline{c}b__0^2`$
$`\delta \varphi __0`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cot}\theta }{\sqrt{2}r}}\varphi __0,\overline{\delta }\varphi __0+{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cot}\theta }{\sqrt{2}r}}\varphi __0=\sqrt{2}b___0+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}D\phi +bb__0^2`$ (54)
$`D\varphi __1`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}D\phi {\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}bb__0^2,\mathrm{\Delta }\varphi _1={\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\mathrm{\Delta }\phi +{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}ab__0^2`$
$`\delta \varphi __1`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}}\varphi __0{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\delta \phi +\overline{c}\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{2r^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{b__0^2}{2}}\right),\overline{\delta }\varphi __1={\displaystyle \frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}}\varphi __2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\overline{\delta }\phi c\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{2r^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{b__0^2}{2}}\right)`$ (55)
$`D\varphi __2+{\displaystyle \frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}}\varphi __2`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\overline{\delta }\phi cb__0^2,\mathrm{\Delta }\varphi __2={\displaystyle \frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}}\varphi __2`$
$`\delta \varphi __2+{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cot}\theta }{\sqrt{2}r}}\varphi __2`$ $`=\sqrt{2}b___0\varphi __1{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\mathrm{\Delta }\phi ab__0^2,\overline{\delta }\varphi __2={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cot}\theta }{\sqrt{2}r}}\varphi __2.`$ (56)
Clearly, the null directions are the principal null directions of the Weyl tensor. These directions are preferred relative to all possible (C)KVs and hence $`𝒬=`$ $`0`$ $`=𝒬^{}`$. In view of Eqs.(51), we see immediately from Eqs.(12) that

$$\varphi __0=\frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}\overline{c},\varphi __2=\frac{b___0}{\sqrt{2}}c.$$
(57)
The gauge is not in any obvious way preferred for all (C)KVs; in fact, in hindsight it will be seen that neither the boost-part nor the gauge part can be chosen in a way that is preferred relative to all six (C)KVs that this metric turns out to possess. Although we could solve the basic equations involved for $`\varphi __1`$, it is easier to work in terms of $`𝔊`$, the quantity that is a measure of by how much the given gauge differs from a preferred one for each (C)KV. Alternatively, we could put an arbitrary gauge factor into our spin coefficients, but that too turns out to make the problem more difficult. From Eqs.(38) and (51) we obtain

$$\varphi __1=𝔊\frac{b__0}{2\sqrt{2}}\left(a+b\right)+\frac{\mathrm{cot}\theta }{2\sqrt{2}r}\left(c\overline{c}\right).$$
(58)
Substituting from Eqs.(57) and (58) into Eqs. (54) and (56) yields only that

$$D\phi =\sqrt{2}b___0\left(\frac{\phi }{2}𝔊\overline{𝔊}\right),\mathrm{\Delta }\phi =\sqrt{2}b___0\left(\frac{\phi }{2}+𝔊+\overline{𝔊}\right),\delta \phi =0.$$
(59)
Subtracting these two equations we get $`D\phi \mathrm{\Delta }\phi =\sqrt{2}b___0\phi `$. From this we see immediately that the metric cannot have a proper HV.

Substituting Eqs.(57) and (58) into Eqs.(55) and using the Killing equations (53) yields

$`D𝔊`$ $`=\mathrm{\Delta }𝔊=0`$
$`\delta 𝔊`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cot}\theta }{2\sqrt{2}r}}\left(𝔊\overline{𝔊}{\displaystyle \frac{\phi }{2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{b___0\left(ab\right)}{\sqrt{2}}}\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{c+\overline{c}}{4r^2\mathrm{sin}^2\theta }}`$
$`\overline{\delta }𝔊`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cot}\theta }{2\sqrt{2}r}}\left(𝔊\overline{𝔊}+{\displaystyle \frac{\phi }{2}}{\displaystyle \frac{b___0\left(ab\right)}{\sqrt{2}}}\right){\displaystyle \frac{c+\overline{c}}{4r^2\mathrm{sin}^2\theta }}`$ (60)
Eqs.(53), (59) and (60) can now be solved for the unknowns $`a,b,c,\phi ,𝔊.`$ We find that

$`a`$ $`=r\left({\displaystyle \frac{h__0}{\sqrt{2b__0}}}+{\displaystyle \frac{l__1}{2\sqrt{2}b__0}}+{\displaystyle \frac{l__0t}{\sqrt{2}}}\right){\displaystyle \frac{l__0}{\sqrt{2b__0}}}`$
$`b`$ $`=r\left({\displaystyle \frac{h__0}{\sqrt{2b__0}}}{\displaystyle \frac{l__1}{2\sqrt{2}b__0}}{\displaystyle \frac{l__0t}{\sqrt{2}}}\right){\displaystyle \frac{l__0}{\sqrt{2b__0}}}`$
$`c`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{r}{\sqrt{2}}}\left(a__0\mathrm{cos}\varphi +b__0\mathrm{sin}\varphi \right)+{\displaystyle \frac{ir}{\sqrt{2}}}\left[c__0\mathrm{sin}\theta \mathrm{cos}\theta \left(a__0\mathrm{sin}\varphi b__0\mathrm{cos}\varphi \right)\right]`$
$`\phi `$ $`=r\left(l__1+2l__0b__0t\right)`$
$`𝔊`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{l__0\sqrt{b__0}}{2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{i}{2\mathrm{sin}\theta }}\left(a__0\mathrm{sin}\varphi b__0\mathrm{cos}\varphi \right)`$ (61)
where $`l__0,l__1,h__0,c__0,a__0,b__0`$ are integration constants. Putting all but one of these equal to zero in turn and using Eq.(14) we find, in coordinates ($`t,r,\theta ,\varphi `$), the two proper CKVs

$`l__0`$ $`=1:\xi _{_{\left(1\right)}}^\mu =({\displaystyle \frac{1}{r}},r^2b__0t,0,0)`$
$`l__1`$ $`=1:\xi _{_{\left(2\right)}}^\mu =(0,{\displaystyle \frac{r^2}{2}},0,0)`$ (62)
with respective conformal factors $`\phi =2rb__0t`$ and $`\phi =r`$, as well as the four Killing vectors

$`h__0`$ $`=1:\xi _{_{\left(3\right)}}^\mu =(1,0,0,0)`$
$`c__0`$ $`=1:\xi _{_{\left(4\right)}}^\mu =(0,0,0,1)`$
$`a__0`$ $`=1:\xi _{_{\left(5\right)}}^\mu =(0,0,\mathrm{cos}\varphi ,\mathrm{cot}\theta \mathrm{sin}\varphi )`$
$`b__0`$ $`=1:\xi _{_{\left(6\right)}}^\mu =(0,0,\mathrm{sin}\varphi ,\mathrm{cot}\theta \mathrm{cos}\varphi ).`$ (63)
Noting from the last of Eqs.(61) that $`𝔊+\overline{𝔊}`$ $`=l__0\sqrt{b__0}`$ and $`𝔊\overline{𝔊}=\frac{i}{\mathrm{sin}\theta }\left(a__0\mathrm{sin}\varphi b__0\mathrm{cos}\varphi \right)`$ we see from Eqs.(62) and (63) that $`𝔊+\overline{𝔊}`$ vanishes for all but $`\xi _{_{\left(1\right)}}.`$ Therefore, the four KVs and the proper CKV $`\xi _{_{\left(2\right)}}`$ have the boost-part of the given gauge preferred. Similarly, the two proper CKVs and the KVs $`\xi _{_{\left(3\right)}}`$ and $`\xi _{_{\left(4\right)}}`$ have the phase part of the given gauge preferred.

## VI ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The author would like to thank Brian Edgar for drawing his attention to the problem, for many useful discussions, and for a critical reading of the manuscript. He is also grateful to the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada for its ongoing financial support.


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# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

Recently noncommutative geometry has appeared in the context of M(atrix)-theory compactifications  and the $`D`$-branes in a constant NS $`B`$-field . In particular, the $`D`$-branes in a constant NS $`B`$-field have attracted much interest in the understanding of non-perturbative aspects of string theory. The noncommutative Yang-Mills theory which appears as an effective world-volume field theory on the $`D`$-branes with a $`B`$-field has an interesting feature that the singularity of the instanton moduli space is naturally resolved .

Four dimensional $`U(N)`$ $`k`$-instanton is realized as $`k`$ $`D0`$-branes within $`N`$ $`D4`$-branes in type IIA string theory. When we turn on an anti-self-dual constant $`B`$-field, for preserving 1/4 of supercharges, the instanton moduli space is resolved, and $`D0`$-branes cannot escape from $`D4`$-branes. From the viewpoint of $`D0`$-brane theory, the moduli space of vacua of the Higgs branch coincides with the moduli space of instantons and the anti-self-dual $`B`$-field corresponds to the Fayet-Iliopoulos (FI) parameters. If the FI parameters are non-zero, the $`D0`$-$`D4`$ system can not enter the Coulomb branch through the small instanton singularity.

On the other hand, it is also of interest to generalize the above case to higher dimensional systems in the context of both brane dynamics and the brane world-volume theories. These systems with a constant $`B`$-field are considered from various points of view in , and are shown equivalent by T-duality to the systems that are rotated branes at angles by several authors . In particular they showed that there are three cases preserving respectively 1/16, 1/8 and 3/16 of supercharges in the $`D0`$-$`D8`$ systems with a $`B`$-field that must satisfy certain relations in each case. Concretely in the $`D0`$-$`D8`$ system, the constant $`B`$-field satisfies the extended “self-dual” conditions given in  which associate with the subgroup $`Spin(7),SU(4)`$ and $`Sp(2)`$ of the eight dimensional rotational group $`SO(8)`$. These $`B`$-fields preserve 1/16, 1/8 and 3/16 of supercharges respectively.

The ADHM construction is a powerful tool to construct self-dual Yang-Mills instantons . Especially in four dimensions we know that the instanton moduli space and the ADHM moduli space completely coincide. In eight dimensions, the ADHM construction  of “self-dual” instantons associated with the group $`Sp(2)`$ is known, but we does not know whether this ADHM construction gives all solutions of “self-dual” equations associated with the group $`Sp(2)`$ . However, some simple solutions of eight dimensional ADHM equations are already known in . Eight dimensional noncommutative ADHM equations were proposed in , but these equations are difficult to solve even in the simple case. Some properties of moduli space of these equations were also discussed in .

This paper is organized as follows. In section 2, we describe eight dimensional noncommutative Yang-Mills instantons associated with the group $`Sp(2)`$ as $`D0`$-$`D8`$ bound states in a $`B`$-field using the noncommutative eight dimensional ADHM construction. In this case, the $`B`$-field is also necessary to satisfy the extended “(anti-)self-dual” relations. We can construct some new classes of non-trivial solutions extending the eight dimensional ADHM constructions of  and the solutions found by Papadopoulos and Teschendorff  in the commutative case, and interpret them as $`D0`$-$`D8`$ bound states. The final section is devoted to discussions.

## 2 Noncommutative instantons on $`𝐑^8`$ as $`D0`$-$`D8`$ bound states with a $`B`$-field

In this section, we construct noncommutative instantons on $`𝐑^8`$ and interpret them as supersymmetric $`D0`$-$`D8`$ bound states with a certain $`B`$-field. This noncommutativity is induced by a constant NS $`B`$-field on the $`D8`$-brane. In the following, we consider the case of the gauge group $`U(N)`$ with the instanton number $`k`$ since these states correspond to the bound states of $`k`$ $`D0`$-branes and $`N`$ $`D8`$-branes.

We also construct some solutions of the eight dimensional noncommutative ADHM equations. Eight dimensional noncommutative ADHM equations were proposed in , but it is difficult to solve those equations even in the $`U(2)`$ case. So we try to solve the equations by generalizing the solutions found by Papadopoulos and Teschendorff  in the commutative case.

### 2.1 Eight dimensional ADHM construction

In this subsection, we consider the extended ADHM construction of the eight dimensional “self-dual” instantons associated with the $`Sp(2)`$ group given in . This construction of instantons is the slight extension of the four dimensional ADHM construction. When we take $`𝐁=0,`$ or $`𝐁^{}=0`$ which are defined in the following, we will reproduce the four dimensional ADHM equations. Some simple solutions to these equations were constructed in  and others.

In order to treat the eight dimensional space, it is useful to regard eight coordinates of $`𝐑^8`$ as two quaternionic coordinates

$$𝐱=\underset{\mu =1}{\overset{8}{}}\stackrel{~}{\sigma }_\mu x^\mu =\left(\begin{array}{cc}z_2& z_1\\ \overline{z}_1& \overline{z}_2\end{array}\right),𝐱^{}=\underset{\mu =1}{\overset{8}{}}\stackrel{~}{\sigma }_\mu ^{}x^\mu =\left(\begin{array}{cc}z_4& z_3\\ \overline{z}_3& \overline{z}_4\end{array}\right),$$
(2.1)
where we defined the eight vector matrices

$`\stackrel{~}{\sigma }_\mu `$ $`=`$ $`(i\tau _1,\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0},i\tau _2,\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0},i\tau _3,\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0},\text{1}_2,\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0}),`$ (2.2)
$`\stackrel{~}{\sigma }_\mu ^{}`$ $`=`$ $`(\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0},i\tau _1,\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0},i\tau _2,\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0},i\tau _3,\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0},\text{1}_2),`$ (2.3)
and the four complex coordinates

$$z_1=x^3+ix^1,z_2=x^7+ix^5,z_3=x^4+ix^2,z_4=x^8+ix^6.$$
(2.4)
Using the $`(N+2k)\times 2k`$ matrices $`𝐀,𝐁`$ and $`𝐁^{}`$, we next define the Dirac-like operator

$$D_z=\text{A}+\stackrel{}{𝐁}\stackrel{}{𝐗}$$
(2.5)
where $`\stackrel{}{𝐁}=(𝐁,𝐁^{})`$ and $`\stackrel{}{𝐗}=(𝐱,𝐱^{})`$ .

If we solve the following Dirac-like equations

$$D_z^{}\psi =0,$$
(2.6)
for the $`(N+2k)\times N`$ matrix $`\psi `$ which is normalized as $`\psi ^{}\psi =\mathrm{𝟏}_{N\times N}`$, we can construct the $`U(N)`$ gauge field as

$$A_\mu =\psi ^{}_\mu \psi .$$
(2.7)
Then using the relations

$$\mathrm{\Sigma }_\mu _\mu \stackrel{}{𝐗}=\left(\begin{array}{c}\stackrel{~}{\sigma }_\mu \\ \stackrel{~}{\sigma }_\mu ^{}\end{array}\right),$$
(2.8)
and the completeness equation

$$\text{1}_{N+2k}=\psi \psi ^{}+D_z\frac{1}{D_z^{}D_z}D_z^{},$$
(2.9)
we can obtain the “self-dual” gauge field strength as

$`F_{\mu \nu }`$ $`=`$ $`2\psi ^{}\left(_{[\mu }D_z{\displaystyle \frac{1}{D_z^{}D_z}}_{\nu ]}D_z^{}\right)\psi `$ (2.10)
$`=`$ $`2\psi ^{}\stackrel{}{𝐁}\overline{N}_{\mu \nu }{\displaystyle \frac{1}{D_z^{}D_z}}\stackrel{}{𝐁}^{}\psi ,`$
where $`\overline{N}_{\mu \nu }=\frac{1}{2}(\mathrm{\Sigma }_\mu \mathrm{\Sigma }_\nu ^{}\mathrm{\Sigma }_\nu \mathrm{\Sigma }_\mu ^{})`$ is a “self-dual” tensor satisfying

$$\frac{1}{2}T_{\mu \nu \rho \sigma }\overline{N}_{\rho \sigma }=\overline{N}_{\mu \nu }.$$
(2.11)
Here we must require that $`D_z^{}D_z`$ commutes with $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_\mu `$. This is a necessary condition to obtain the “self-dual” gauge field strength on the $`𝐑^8`$. This condition corresponds to the eight dimensional ADHM equations both for commutative and noncommutative case.

### 2.2 Eight dimensional noncommutative ADHM construction

We can obtain supersymmetric $`D0`$-$`D8`$ bound states with a $`B`$-field by T-duality from intersecting $`D4`$-branes at four angles. Supersymmetry condition reduces to three cases preserving 1/16, 1/8 and 3/16 of supercharges respectively. In the following, we concentrate on the 3/16 BPS states. In this case, the $`B`$-field is necessary to satisfy the generalized “(anti-)self-dual” equations  which are written by using the $`Sp(2)SO(8)`$ invariant tensor $`T_{\mu \nu \rho \sigma }`$ as

$$\frac{1}{2}T_{\mu \nu \rho \sigma }B^{\rho \sigma }=\lambda B_{\mu \nu }.$$
(2.12)
As in the four dimensional case, it is also easy to extend the eight dimensional ADHM construction to noncommutative space because of its algebraic nature. Since we define instantons as “self-dual” configurations, the “anti-self-dual” $`B`$-field is of interest from the viewpoint of the instanton moduli space resolution. In this case the coordinates of $`𝐑^8`$ become noncommutative as

$$[z_1,\overline{z}_1]=[z_2,\overline{z}_2]=[z_3,\overline{z}_3]=[z_4,\overline{z}_4]=\frac{\zeta }{2},$$
(2.13)
for a positive constant parameter $`\zeta `$. These commutation relations can be represented using creation and annihilation operators ;

$`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\zeta }}}z_1|n_1:n_2:n_3:n_4=\sqrt{n_1+1}|n_1+1:n_2:n_3:n_4,`$
$`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\zeta }}}\overline{z}_1|n_1:n_2:n_3:n_4=\sqrt{n_1}|n_11:n_2:n_3:n_4,`$
$`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\zeta }}}\overline{z}_2|n_1:n_2:n_3:n_4=\sqrt{n_2+1}|n_1:n_2+1:n_3:n_4,`$
$`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\zeta }}}z_2|n_1:n_2:n_3:n_4=\sqrt{n_2}|n_1:n_21:n_3:n_4,`$ (2.14)
$`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\zeta }}}z_3|n_1:n_2:n_3:n_4=\sqrt{n_3+1}|n_1:n_2:n_3+1:n_4,`$
$`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\zeta }}}\overline{z}_3|n_1:n_2:n_3:n_4=\sqrt{n_3}|n_1:n_2:n_31:n_4,`$
$`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\zeta }}}\overline{z}_4|n_1:n_2:n_3:n_4=\sqrt{n_4+1}|n_1:n_2:n_3:n_4+1,`$
$`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\zeta }}}z_4|n_1:n_2:n_3:n_4=\sqrt{n_4}|n_1:n_2:n_3:n_41.`$
If we also require that $`D_z^{}D_z`$ commutes with $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_\mu `$ as in the commutative case, we can obtain the “self-dual” gauge field strength on the noncommutative $`𝐑^8`$. As in the four dimensional case, there are also equivalence relations between different sets of matrices $`𝐀,𝐁`$ and $`𝐁^{}`$ . Using these relations, the eight dimensional noncommutative ADHM equations were proposed in . However it is even difficult to find simple explicit solutions of those equations. Then instead of solving them, we solve the conditions for “self-duality” as , and give some simple solutions below.

$`U(1)`$ one-instanton solutions

In the noncommutative case, $`U(1)`$ instanton is already non-trivial. In this case, $`D_z`$ becomes a $`3\times 2`$ matrix. If we consider the following ansatz ;

$$D_z=\left(\begin{array}{cc}z_2+z_4& z_1+z_3\\ \overline{z}_1\overline{z}_3& \overline{z}_2+\overline{z}_4\\ A_1& A_2\end{array}\right),$$
(2.15)
the commuting condition of $`D_z^{}D_z`$ becomes

$$[z_1,\overline{z}_1][z_2,\overline{z}_2]+[z_3,\overline{z}_3][z_4,\overline{z}_4]+A_1^{}A_1A_2^{}A_2=0,A_1^{}A_2=0.$$
(2.16)
When $`\zeta >0`$, these equations have a non-trivial solution as

$$A_1=\sqrt{2\zeta },A_2=0.$$
(2.17)
Then $`D_z`$ becomes

$$D_z=\left(\begin{array}{cc}z_2+z_4& z_1+z_3\\ \overline{z}_1\overline{z}_3& \overline{z}_2+\overline{z}_4\\ \sqrt{2\zeta }& 0\end{array}\right).$$
(2.18)
This is the simplest extension of the four dimensional $`U(1)`$ one-instanton solution found by . Zero mode $`\psi `$ of the $`D_z^{}`$ is given by

$$\psi =\left(\begin{array}{c}\sqrt{2\zeta }(z_2+z_4)\\ \sqrt{2\zeta }(\overline{z}_1+\overline{z}_3)\\ (z_1+z_3)(\overline{z}_1+\overline{z}_3)+(\overline{z}_2+\overline{z}_4)(z_2+z_4)\end{array}\right).$$
(2.19)
As in the four dimensional case, $`\psi ^{}\psi `$ annihilates $`|0:0:0:00:0:0:0|`$ so that we must normalize the zero mode in the subspace of the Fock space where $`|0:0:0:0`$ is projected out .

We can generalize the above solution assuming the ansatz such as  ;

$$D_z=\left(\begin{array}{c}(𝐩)^{}𝐱+(𝐩^{})^{}𝐱^{}𝐚\\ A\end{array}\right).$$
(2.20)
Here $`𝐩`$, $`𝐩^{}`$ and $`𝐚`$ are assumed to be arbitrary quaternions, and $`A`$ is a $`1\times 2`$ matrix. Then the commuting condition of $`D_z^{}D_z`$ can be solved when $`\zeta >0`$ as

$$A=\left(\begin{array}{cc}\sqrt{\zeta \left((𝐩)^{}𝐩+(𝐩^{})^{}𝐩^{}\right)}& 0\end{array}\right).$$
(2.21)
When $`𝐩=𝐩^{}=\mathrm{𝟏}_2`$ and $`𝐚=\mathrm{𝟎}_2`$ the above solution reduces to (2.18), and when $`𝐩^{}=𝐚=\mathrm{𝟎}`$ and $`𝐩=\mathrm{𝟏}_2`$ to the four dimensional noncommutative $`U(1)`$ one-instanton solution found by  corresponding to $`D4`$-$`D8`$ bound states in this case. If instead $`𝐩=𝐚=\mathrm{𝟎}`$ and $`𝐩^{}=\mathrm{𝟏}_2`$, the solution reduces to the other four dimensional noncommutative $`U(1)`$ one-instanton solution. Therefore our solutions are natural to extend the four dimensional solutions.

$`U(1)`$ two-instanton solutions

In this case $`D_z`$ becomes a $`5\times 4`$ matrix. We assume the ansatz such as  ;

$$D_z=\left(\begin{array}{cc}(𝐩_1)^{}𝐱^1+(𝐩_1^{})^{}𝐱^2𝐚_1& 0\\ 0& (𝐩_2)^{}𝐱^1+(𝐩_2^{})^{}𝐱^2𝐚_2\\ \lambda _1A_1& \lambda _2A_2\end{array}\right),$$
(2.22)
where $`𝐩_{1,2}`$, $`𝐩_{1,2}^{}`$ and $`𝐚_{1,2}`$ are assumed to be arbitrary quaternions, $`A_{1,\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}}`$ are $`1\times 2`$ matrices, and $`\lambda _{1,2}`$ are constants. Then if we take $`\lambda _{1,2}`$ as

$$\lambda _1=\sqrt{\zeta \left((𝐩_1)^{}𝐩_1+(𝐩_1^{})^{}𝐩_1^{}\right)},\lambda _2=\sqrt{\zeta \left((𝐩_2)^{}𝐩_2+(𝐩_2^{})^{}𝐩_2^{}\right)},$$
(2.23)
the commuting condition of $`D_z^{}D_z`$ becomes the following equations ;

$`(A_1^{}A_1)_{11}(A_1^{}A_1)_{22}=1,(A_2^{}A_2)_{11}(A_2^{}A_2)_{22}=1,`$ (2.24)
$`A_1^{}A_21_{2\times 2},A_2^{}A_11_{2\times 2},(A_1^{}A_1)_{12}=(A_2^{}A_2)_{12}=0.`$ (2.25)
Now $`A_1`$ and $`A_2`$ are $`1\times 2`$ matrices, these equations seem to have no non-trivial solutions. However if we set $`𝐩_1,𝐩_2`$ or $`𝐩_1^{},𝐩_2^{}`$ to zero, these equations reduce to the four dimensional $`U(1)`$ two-instanton ADHM equations, then can have non-trivial solutions. As we will see below, in the $`U(2)`$ case we can construct non-trivial eight dimensional two-instanton solutions using the above ansatz.

$`U(2)`$ one-instanton solutions

In this case, $`D_z`$ becomes a $`4\times 4`$ matrix. Here also we assume the ansatz such as

$$D_z=\left(\begin{array}{c}(𝐩)^{}𝐱^1+(𝐩^{})^{}𝐱^2𝐚\\ \lambda A\end{array}\right),$$
(2.26)
where $`𝐩`$, $`𝐩^{}`$ and $`𝐚`$ are assumed to be arbitrary quaternions, $`A`$ is a $`2\times 2`$ matrix which is not necessary to be quaternion, and $`\lambda `$ is a constant. Then the commuting condition of $`D_z^{}D_z`$ becomes the following equations ;

$$\lambda ^2\left((A^{}A)_{11}(A^{}A)_{22}\right)=\zeta \left((𝐩)^{}𝐩+(𝐩^{})^{}𝐩^{}\right),(A^{}A)_{12}=0.$$
(2.27)
If we take $`\lambda `$ as

$$\lambda =\sqrt{\zeta \left((𝐩)^{}𝐩+(𝐩^{})^{}𝐩^{}\right)},$$
(2.28)
then a matrix $`A`$ is for example given by

$$A=\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 0\\ 1& 0\end{array}\right).$$
(2.29)
This gives an eight dimensional noncommutative $`U(2)`$ one-instanton solution.

$`U(2)`$ two-instanton solutions

In this case, $`D_z`$ is a $`6\times 4`$ matrix. Here also we assume the ansatz such as

$$D_z=\left(\begin{array}{cc}(𝐩_1)^{}𝐱^1+(𝐩_1^{})^{}𝐱^2(𝐚_1)& 0\\ 0& (𝐩_2)^{}𝐱^1+(𝐩_2^{})^{}𝐱^2(𝐚_2)\\ \lambda _1A_1& \lambda _2A_2\end{array}\right),$$
(2.30)
where $`𝐩_{1,2}`$, $`𝐩_{1,2}^{}`$ and $`𝐚_{1,2}`$ are assumed to be arbitrary quaternions, $`A_{1,\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}}`$ are $`2\times 2`$ matrices which are not necessary to be quaternions, and $`\lambda _{1,2}`$ are constants. Then if we take $`\lambda _{1,2}`$ as

$`\lambda _1`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{\zeta \left((𝐩_1)^{}𝐩_1+(𝐩_1^{})^{}𝐩_1^{}\right)},`$ (2.31)
$`\lambda _2`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{\zeta \left((𝐩_2)^{}𝐩_2+(𝐩_2^{})^{}𝐩_2^{}\right)},`$ (2.32)
the commuting condition of $`D_z^{}D_z`$ becomes the following equations ;

$`(A_1^{}A_1)_{11}(A_1^{}A_1)_{22}=1,(A_2^{}A_2)_{11}(A_2^{}A_2)_{22}=1,`$ (2.33)
$`A_1^{}A_21_{2\times 2},A_2^{}A_11_{2\times 2},(A_1^{}A_1)_{12}=(A_2^{}A_2)_{12}=0.`$ (2.34)
In contrast with the $`U(1)`$ two-instanton case, these equations have for example a non-trivial solution ;

$$A_1=\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 0\\ 1& 0\end{array}\right),A_2=\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& 0\\ 0& 0\end{array}\right).$$
(2.35)
This gives an eight dimensional noncommutative $`U(2)`$ two-instanton solution.

$`U(2)`$ $`k`$-instanton solutions

The above case can be easily generalized to multi-instanton solution. In this case, $`D_z`$ becomes a $`(2+2k)\times (2k)`$ matrix. We consider the following ansatz ;

$$D_z=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}(𝐩_1)^{}𝐱^1+(𝐩_1^{})^{}𝐱^2(𝐚_1)& \mathrm{}& 0\\ \mathrm{}& \mathrm{}& \mathrm{}\\ 0& \mathrm{}& (𝐩_k)^{}𝐱^1+(𝐩_k^{})^{}𝐱^2(𝐚_k)\\ \lambda _1A_1& \mathrm{}& \lambda _kA_k\end{array}\right),$$
(2.36)
where $`𝐩_{1,\mathrm{},k}`$, $`𝐩_{1,\mathrm{},k}^{}`$ and $`𝐚_{1,\mathrm{},k}`$ are assumed to be arbitrary quaternions, $`A_{1,\mathrm{},k}`$ are $`2\times 2`$ matrices which are not necessary to be quaternions, and $`\lambda _{1,\mathrm{},k}`$ are constants. Then if we take $`\lambda _{1,\mathrm{},k}`$ as

$`\lambda _1`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{\zeta \left((𝐩_1)^{}𝐩_1+(𝐩_1^{})^{}𝐩_1^{}\right)},`$
$`\mathrm{}`$
$`\lambda _k`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{\zeta \left((𝐩_k)^{}𝐩_k+(𝐩_k^{})^{}𝐩_k^{}\right)},`$ (2.38)
the commuting condition of $`D_z^{}D_z`$ becomes the following equations ;

$`(A_1^{}A_1)_{11}(A_1^{}A_1)_{22}=1,\mathrm{},(A_k^{}A_k)_{11}(A_k^{}A_k)_{22}=1,`$ (2.39)
$`A_1^{}A_k1_{2\times 2},A_2^{}A_k1_{2\times 2},\mathrm{},A_{k1}^{}A_k1_{2\times 2},`$ (2.40)
$`(A_1^{}A_1)_{12}=\mathrm{}=(A_k^{}A_k)_{12}=0.`$ (2.41)
These equations have for example a non-trivial solution ;

$$A_1=A_2=\mathrm{}=A_{k1}=\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 0\\ 1& 0\end{array}\right),A_k=\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& 0\\ 0& 0\end{array}\right).$$
(2.42)
This gives an eight dimensional noncommutative $`U(2)`$ $`k`$-instanton solution.

## 3 Discussions

In this paper, we described eight dimensional noncommutative Yang-Mills instantons associated with the group $`Sp(2)`$ as $`D0`$-$`D8`$ bound states in a $`B`$-field using the noncommutative eight dimensional ADHM construction. In this case, the $`B`$-field was necessary to satisfy the extended “(anti-)self-dual” relations for preserving some proportions of supercharges. We constructed some new classes of non-trivial solutions of the eight dimensional noncommutative ADHM equations generalizing the solutions found by Papadopoulos and Teschendorff  in the commutative case, and interpreted them as $`D0`$-$`D8`$ bound states.

However in the noncommutative case it is non-trivial whether the instanton number is actually the expected one, therefore it would be interesting to calculate explicitly the instanton numbers.

In the commutative case, (2.30) is a solution of eight dimensional ADHM equations when $`A_1(=A_2)`$ is arbitrary quaternion and $`\lambda _{1,\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}}`$ are arbitrary constants. Then there exists following equivalence relations ;

$$\{𝐩_1,𝐩_1^{},𝐩_2,𝐩_2^{},𝐚_1^{},𝐚_2^{},A_1^{}\}\{𝐩_1𝐬,𝐩_1^{}𝐬,𝐩_2𝐬,𝐩_2^{}𝐬,𝐚_1^{}𝐬,𝐚_2^{}𝐬,A_1^{}𝐬\},$$

where $`𝐬𝐇`$. Therefore the moduli space structure of the above solution may be related with the Grassmannian ;

$$\frac{Sp(2)}{Sp(1)\times Sp(1)},$$

and this may suggest that the moduli space of the eight dimensional instanton will have an $`Sp(2)`$ holonomy . It is not yet made clear how the noncommutativity deforms the moduli space structure of the eight dimensional instantons, but we expect that our solutions will shed light on this problem.

It is also of interest to search for the ADHM constructions associated with the group $`Spin(7)`$ and $`SU(4)`$. In the $`Spin(7)`$ case, some solutions are known as octonionic Yang-Mills instantons in  which are constructed on the $`Spin(7)`$ holonomy manifold (gravitational instanton) by the standard embedding of the spin connection into the Yang-Mills connection. In four dimensional case, the ADHM constructions of instantons on an ALE space (gravitational instanton) are well-known . Eight dimensional ALE spaces are considered in . Therefore we expect that similar constructions are possible in the eight-dimensional case, and our solutions give some insight into the moduli space structures of eight dimensional instantons.

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank K.Ohta for useful comments and H.Ishikawa for useful discussions and encouragements.


text:
# 1E 1207.4–5209: The puzzling pulsar at the center of the PKS 1209–51/52 supernova remnant

## 1. Introduction

Radio-quiet compact central objects of supernova remnants (SNRs) have emerged recently as a separate class of X-ray sources (see, e.g., Pavlov et al. 2002, for a review). The nature of at least some of these sources, presumably neutron stars (NSs), remains enigmatic. They are characterized by soft, apparently thermal, X-ray spectra and a lack of observed pulsar activity and optical counterparts. One of the most important properties, which potentially allows one to elucidate the nature of these sources, is the periodicity of their radiation. Our previous observation of 1E 1207.4–5209, the central object of PKS 1209–51/52 (=G296.5+10.0), with the Advanced CCD Imaging Spectrometer (ACIS) on board of the Chandra X-ray observatory allowed us to detect a period $`P=0.424129`$ s (Zavlin et al. 2000; Paper I hereafter), which proved that the source is indeed a neutron star. This source was discovered with the Einstein observatory (Helfand & Becker 1984), $`6^{}`$ off the center of the $`81^{}`$ diameter SNR. From the analysis of radio and optical observations of this SNR, Roger et al. (1988) estimated the SNR age to be 7 kyr, with an uncertainty of a factor of 3. The distance to the SNR is $`d=2.1_{0.8}^{+1.8}`$ kpc (Giacani et al. 2000). The X-ray spectrum of the central source can be described by a thermal model, with a blackbody temperature of 3–4 MK and a radius of 1–2 km, at $`d=2`$ kpc (Mereghetti, Bignami, & Caraveo 1996; Vasisht et al. 1997; Zavlin, Pavlov, & Trümper 1998). Fitting the spectrum with a hydrogen atmosphere model, Zavlin et al. (1998) obtained an effective temperature of 1.4–1.9 MK and a radius of about 10–12 km. Mereghetti et al. (1996) reported upper limits on the source flux in radio ($`<0.1`$ mJy at 4.8 GHz), optical ($`V>23.5`$), and $`\gamma `$-rays ($`<1\times 10^7`$ photons cm-2 s-1 for $`E>100`$ MeV).

In this Letter we present the results of second Chandra ACIS observation, which allowed us to estimate the period derivative and other parameters of the pulsar.

## 2. Observation and data reduction

1E 1207.4–5209 was observed with Chandra on 2002 January 5–6 with the spectroscopic array ACIS-S in the Continuous Clocking (CC) mode. This mode provides the highest time resolution of 2.85 ms available with ACIS at the expense of one dimension of image. The source was imaged on the back-illuminated chip S3, at a focal plane temperature of –120 C. The total duration of the observation was 31.6 ks. Time history of detected events does not reveal substantial background flares, so we do not exclude any time intervals from the analysis.

The 1D image of 1E 1207.4–5209 in “sky pixels” is consistent with the ACIS Point Spread Function, and it is similar to the image obtained in the previous observation, taken at almost the same roll angle of $`65.2^{}`$ (vs. $`65.3^{}`$ in the second observation). To obtain the source count rate, we extracted 20,282 source-plus-background counts from a 1D segment of 8 pixel length centered at the source position (10 pixels contain 20,588 counts). The background was taken from similar segments adjacent to the 1D source aperture. Subtracting the background, we find a source countrate of $`0.64\pm 0.01`$ s-1, versus $`0.76\pm 0.01`$ s-1 in the previous ACIS observation. The reduction of the count rate can be attributed to a reduction of ACIS sensitivity at low energies.

## 3. Timing analysis

The event times in the event file of a CC observation are the times when the event is read out at the chip node. To restore the actual event arrival times, we subtracted the times of charge transfer between the detection point and the readout node from the readout times and corrected the times for the satellite wobbling (dither) and the Science Instrument Module motion using the approach described in Paper I. The corrected times were transformed to the solar system barycenter using the axBary tool of the CIAO package (v. 2.2).

From a 3-pixel segment centered at the source position, we extracted 18,237 counts in the 0.3–4.0 keV energy range, where the background contribution is negligible (about $`0.7\%`$). We ran the $`Z_m^2`$ test ($`m`$ is the number of harmonics included — see Buccheri et al. 1983) in the vicinity of the pulsation frequency determined in our previous observation. For $`m=1`$, 2, 3, 4, and 5, we found the $`Z_m^2`$ peak values of 62.2, 63.9, 73.0, 77.6, and 79.3 at frequencies lower than a reference frequency 2.35777 Hz by 5.2, 4.9, 2.4, 2.8, and 3.3 $`\mu `$Hz, respectively. The probability to find such high peaks in a noise spectrum is extremely low, $`10^{14}`$ in a frequency range $`10`$ $`\mu `$Hz, which confirms our previous period detection. For a uniform comparison of the peak frequencies in first and second observations, we recalculated the $`Z_m^2`$ peaks for the first observation using exactly the same extraction segments, energy range, and time corrections as in the second one and obtained $`Z_m^2=61.6`$, 61.8, 62.3, 62.7, and 65.6 (notice the smaller contributions from higher harmonics in first observation compared to second one, in which third and fourth harmonics are quite significant). The peak frequencies in the second observation are lower than in the first one: $`f_1f_2=4.2`$, 2.9, 1.1, 1.9, and 2.2 $`\mu `$Hz, for $`m=1`$, 2, 3, 4, and 5, respectively. This result shows that the pulsar has slowed down in two years, although the scatter of the frequency shift is rather high.

To evaluate the most plausible frequencies and the frequency shift, we employed the method of Gregory & Loredo (1996), based on the Bayesian formalism. This method uses the phase-averaged epoch-folding algorithm to calculate the frequency-dependent odds ratio $`O(f)`$. This ratio specifies how the data favor a periodic model of a given frequency $`f`$ over the unpulsed model, and it allows one to find the corresponding probability distribution $`p(f)O(f)f^1`$ (see Gregory & Loredo 1996, Paper I, for details). The profile $`O(f)`$ calculated for the second observation appears to be much broader than for the first one (FWHM$`10`$ $`\mu `$Hz vs. $`3`$ $`\mu `$Hz), with several narrow peaks of comparable heights (see Fig. 1). Exploring the $`O(f)`$ dependence in various energy ranges, which show different relative contributions of the harmonics of the pulsation frequency, we found that the separate peaks are associated with different harmonics (e.g., the highest peak in the lower panel of Fig. 1 is associated with $`m=1`$), in agreement with the different $`Z_m^2`$ peak frequencies mentioned above. The median frequency of the probability distribution in second observation, for the 0.3–4.0 keV band, is $`f_2^\mathrm{o}=2.3577625`$ Hz; it differs from the mean frequency by $`0.1`$ $`\mu `$Hz. The uncertainties of the frequency are $`(3.2,+4.5)`$, $`(4.2,+8.0)`$, and $`(4.5,+10.1)`$ $`\mu `$Hz at 68%, 90%, and 95% confidence level, respectively; the standard deviation is $`\sigma _{f2}=3.7`$ $`\mu `$Hz. We repeated a similar calculation for the data from the first observation (using the same extraction segment and energy range as for the second one) and obtained $`f_1^\mathrm{o}=2.3577699`$ Hz, with uncertainties of $`(1.4,+1.2)`$, $`(2.5,+1.8)`$, and $`(2.9,+2.1)`$ at 68%, 90%, and 95% confidence level, respectively; $`\sigma _{f1}=1.3`$ $`\mu `$Hz.

We calculated the probability density distribution for the frequency difference, $`\mathrm{\Delta }=f_2f_1`$, as $`p(\mathrm{\Delta })=p_2(f)p_1(f\mathrm{\Delta })df`$ (see Fig. 2), where $`p_1(f_1)`$ and $`p_2(f_2)`$ are the probability densities obtained for the two observations. The median of this distribution, $`\mathrm{\Delta }^\mathrm{o}=7.0`$ $`\mu `$Hz, gives a shift somewhat smaller than the mean shift, $`\mathrm{\Delta }p(\mathrm{\Delta })d\mathrm{\Delta }f_2^\mathrm{o}f_1^\mathrm{o}=7.4`$ $`\mu `$Hz, but the difference is well within the uncertainties of $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$: (–3.8,+4.5), (–5.4,+7.1), and (–5.9,+8.3) $`\mu `$Hz at 68%, 90%, and 95% confidence level, respectively; $`\sigma _\mathrm{\Delta }=3.9`$ $`\mu `$Hz. Because of the large widths of the $`p_2(f_2)`$ and, consequently, $`p(\mathrm{\Delta })`$ distributions, there is a non-negligible (albeit small) 5.6% probability that $`f_2>f_1`$.

Adopting $`\mathrm{\Delta }^\mathrm{o}=7.0_{3.8}^{+4.5}`$ $`\mu `$Hz for the frequency shift and assuming a steady slowdown (lack of strong timing noise, glitches, etc) during two years between the observations, we obtain the following estimates for the time derivatives

$$\dot{f}=1.1_{0.6}^{+0.7}\times 10^{13}\mathrm{Hz}\mathrm{s}^1,\dot{P}=2.0_{1.3}^{+1.1}\times 10^{14}\mathrm{s}\mathrm{s}^1.$$
(1)
The light curve extracted at $`f=f_2^\mathrm{o}`$ in the energy range 0.3–4.0 keV (Fig. 3, right panel) reveals one broad pulse per period with a source pulsed fraction of $`f_\mathrm{p}=8\pm 2\%`$, similar to that obtained in first observation. Figure 3 indicates that in both observations there is a considerable shift of the pulse phase, up to 0.4–0.6, between the energy bands 0.3–1.0 and 1.0–1.7 keV, perhaps accompanied by a change of the pulse shape. (Similar behavior has been observed in a number of middle-aged pulsars — e.g., Ögelman 1995.) There is also some evidence that the pulse shapes are different in the two observations — e.g., in the 0.3–4.0 keV band the pulse is closer to a sinusoid in first observation while its shape becomes more “triangular” in second observation.

## 4. Discussion

The detection of approximately the same period in the second observation confirms our previous detection and proves unambiguously that 1E 1207.4–5209 is a neutron star. However, the time derivative of the period appears to be surprisingly small — the corresponding characteristic age of the pulsar, $`\tau _c=P/(2\dot{P})=340_{120}^{+600}`$ kyr, exceeds the estimated SNR age, 3–20 kyr, by a large factor, and even the most conservative upper limit, $`\dot{P}<5\times 10^{14}`$ s s-1, yields an incredibly old age, $`\tau _c>130`$ kyr. Such values of $`P`$ and $`\dot{P}`$, as well as the corresponding values of rotation energy loss rate, $`\dot{E}=4\pi ^2I\dot{P}P^3=1.0_{0.7}^{+0.6}\times 10^{34}I_{45}`$ erg s-1, and conventional “magnetic field”, $`B=(3Ic^3P\dot{P}/8\pi ^2R^6)^{1/2}=2.9_{1.1}^{+0.8}\times 10^{12}I_{45}^{1/2}R_6^3`$ G, are typical for radio pulsars.

This result could be easily explained if one assumes that 1E 1207.4–5209 is merely a middle-aged field pulsar, unrelated to the SNR. If this pulsar were a background object at a distance well beyond the SNR, it would be difficult to explain the very high (thermal) X-ray luminosity — e.g., $`L_\mathrm{x}3\times 10^{34}`$ erg s-1 at $`d=10`$ kpc cannot be emitted from radio pulsar polar caps because it exceeds $`\dot{E}`$, and it cannot be emitted from the surface of a cooling NS because the observed temperature is too high for such an age. One, however, might assume that the pulsar is a foreground object, at a distance of several hundred parsecs, perhaps similar to the radio-quiet Geminga ($`\tau _c300`$ kyr, $`d0.2`$ kpc) or (radio-bright) PSR B1055–52 ($`\tau _c500`$ kyr, $`d1`$ kpc). In this case, the observed thermal-like pulsed X-ray radiation could be interpreted as emitted from hot polar caps with a size of a few hundred meters. The lack of detected radio and $`\gamma `$-ray radiation might be due to unfavorable orientation of pulsar beams (albeit $`\gamma `$-ray beams are expected to be rather broad). To explain the lack of softer thermal radiation from the entire cooling NS surface (like that observed from Geminga and PSR B1055–52), one could speculate that 1E 1207.4–5209 is older than the above-mentioned pulsars (e.g., $`\tau _c1`$ Myr cannot be ruled out), so that its surface temperature is lower, and its thermal radiation is too soft to be observable in X-rays. However, although the observed properties of 1E 1207.4–5209 cannot exclude the hypothesis that it is a foreground pulsar, the probability to find a middle-aged pulsar so close to the line of sight towards the SNR center is very low. Therefore, we consider this interpretation unlikely.

If 1E 1207.4–5209 is indeed associated with the SNR, we can reconcile the pulsar’s age with that of the SNR, assuming that the braking index $`n`$ of the pulsar is large and/or its initial period $`P_0`$ was close to its current value. If the pulsar slowdown is described by the equation $`\dot{f}=Kf^n`$, then its age, for a constant $`K`$, is

$$\tau =\frac{P}{(n1)\dot{P}}\left[1\left(\frac{P_0}{P}\right)^{n1}\right].$$
(2)
To obtain $`\tau 20`$ kyr (an upper limit on the age of PKS 1209–51/52), one can assume, for instance, $`n20`$–90 at $`P_0P`$, or $`P_0395`$–417 ms for $`n=2.5`$. We are not aware of physical models of pulsar deceleration which would give so large braking indices, although Johnston & Galloway (1999) argue that empirical braking indices of relatively old pulsars can be as large as 20–50. On the other hand, there is no physical limitations on the initial period — it can be very close to its current value if the constant $`K`$ in the slowdown equation is small.

It should be noted that 1E 1207.4–5209 is not the only pulsar that shows a characteristic age much older than the age of the SNR with which it is apparently associated. A similar example is the 7-s Anomalous X-ray Pulsar (AXP) 1E 2259+586 associated with the SNR CTB 109 — the SNR age, $`3`$–21 kyr (Rho & Petre 1997; Parmar et al. 1998), is much younger than $`\tau _c226`$ kyr (Kaspi, Chakrabarty, & Steinberger 1999). Another example is the 65 ms rotation-powered X-ray pulsar AX J1811.5–1926, whose period and period derivative were measured with ASCA (Torii et al. 1997, 1999), and association with the remnant G11.2–0.3 of the historic supernova A.D. 386 was strongly supported by Chandra observations (Kaspi et al. 2001a). The characteristic age of AX J1811.5–1926, about 24 kyr, is 15 times the true age.

If the pulsar was born in the supernova explosion that created PKS 1209–51/52, its X-ray luminosity, $`L_\mathrm{x}1\times 10^{33}`$ erg s-1 in the 0.5–6.0 keV band (at $`d=2`$ kpc), is 0.06–0.3 of the spin-down luminosity $`\dot{E}`$. This means that 1E 1207.4–5209 is different from AXPs, which show $`L_\mathrm{x}>\dot{E}`$. On the other hand, the fraction of the spin-down luminosity detected in X-rays is too large to interpret the X-ray radiation as a nonthermal radiation or thermal polar-cap radiation emitted from a rotation-powered pulsar (in fact, the X-ray spectrum of 1E 1207.4–5209 is inconsistent with a nonthermal, power-law model — see Zavlin et al. 1998). Therefore, the original interpretation of the spectrum as emitted from the surface of a cooling NS (Matsui, Long, & Tuohy 1988) remains most plausible, and the size of the emitting region and the effective temperature can be reconciled with those expected for a 10-kyr NS assuming that the NS is covered with a hydrogen or helium atmosphere (Zavlin et al. 1998). The magnetic field $`3\times 10^{12}`$ G, inferred from the estimated $`\dot{P}`$ assuming a centered magnetic dipole and $`R_{\mathrm{NS}}=10`$ km, may look too low to cause the temperature non-uniformity (Shibanov & Yakovlev 1996) required to explain pulsations detected from 1E 1207.4–5209. However, we can speculate that the magnetic dipole is off-centered, which can give a much stronger local magnetic field at the same value of the magnetic moment.

While estimating the period derivative from just two observations, one should not forget that such an estimate implies a lack of glitches or other timing irregularities. Young and middle-aged radio pulsars show glitches with $`\delta f`$ up to $`5\times 10^6f`$ (Lyne & Graham-Smith 1998). Even higher timing irregularities have been observed from some AXPs (e.g., $`\delta f10^4f`$ in 1E 1048.1–5937 — Kaspi et al. 2001b). If, for instance, our pulsar had a glitch $`\delta f10^5f`$ just before the second observation, the pre-glitch frequency would be lower than the measured one by $`20`$ $`\mu `$Hz, which would increase the frequency shift and lowered the NS age by a factor of 3. Finally, we cannot rule out that 1E 1207.4–5209 is in a binary system with a long orbital period — our X-ray observations, each spanning about 8 hours, suggest that the period should be $`P_{\mathrm{orb}}40`$ hours, as no effect of the binary orbit is clearly observed in the data, and the optical observations were not deep enough to exclude the presence of a faint secondary companion. In this case, the X-ray observations give Doppler-shifted periods — e.g., a radial velocity of 10 km s-1 corresponds to a shift of 79 $`\mu `$Hz, much larger than the observed one. Therefore, the above estimates of pulsar parameters should be taken with caution until more timing observations of the pulsar are carried out.

To conclude, we measured the shift of the pulsar period between two Chandra observations. The period and its apparent derivative do not contradict to the hypothesis that it is a young pulsar physically associated with the SNR PKS 1209–51/52. From the data available, we cannot completely rule out that that this is a foreground middle-aged pulsar, but this alternative interpretation looks less plausible. The inferred properties of the pulsar warrant deep radio, optical, and $`\gamma `$-ray observations of this object. To understand the nature of the pulsar, its timing behavior should be monitored in X-rays, which would allow one to find out whether it shows strong timing irregularities or it is in a binary system. Another clue to the nature of 1E 1207.4–5209 would be provided by deep, high-resolution spectral observations of this object in X-rays, which could detect and identify spectral lines and evaluate the surface magnetic field of the neutron star.

We thank Glenn Allen and Allyn Tennant for the helpful advice on the ACIS timing issues. We are grateful to Marcus Teter and Fernando Camilo for useful discussions. This work was partly supported by SAO grant GO2-3088X and NASA grant NAG5-10865.


text:
# Combined effect of Zeeman splitting and spin-orbit interaction on the Josephson current in a S-2DEG-S structure

## Abstract

We analyze new spin effects in current-carrying state of superconductor-2D electron gas-superconductor (S-2DEG-S) device with spin-polarized nuclei in 2DEG region. The hyperfine interaction of 2D electrons with nuclear spins, described by the effective magnetic field $`𝑩`$, produces Zeeman splitting of Andreev levels without orbital effects, that leads to the interference pattern of supercurrent oscillations over $`B`$. The spin-orbit effects in 2DEG cause strongly anisotropic dependence of the Josephson current on the direction of $`𝑩`$, which may be used as a probe for the spin-orbit interaction intensity. Under certain conditions, the system reveals the properties of $`\pi `$-junction.

The spin-orbit (SO) and hyperfine (HF) interactions in GaAs heterojunctions and similar 2D quantum Hall systems attract permanent theoretical and experimental attention. The hyperfine field of the nuclear spin subsystem acting upon the spins of charge carriers may reach $`10^4`$ G. At low temperatures, the nuclear spin relaxation time can be macroscopically long, so the nonequilibrium spin population in heterojunctions, once created, is conserved during hundreds of seconds. The Zeeman splitting combined with a strong spin-orbit coupling in GaAs/AlGaAs 2DEG gives rise to a novel class of coherent phenomena, e.g., the spontaneous Aharonov-Bohm effect.

In this paper we discuss mesoscopic spin-orbit effects in Josephson current flowing across the S-2DEG-S structure (Fig. 1) with polarized nuclei in 2DEG region. The transfer of the Josephson current through the normal conducting layer is provided by the Andreev reflection of electrons and holes at the NS-interfaces, which convert normal electron excitations into Cooper pairs in the superconducting banks. In a pure system with length $`d`$ smaller than the electron scattering length, the interference between coherent electron states and retro-reflected hole states produces the set of spin-degenerate Andreev energy levels $`E_\lambda (\mathrm{\Phi })`$, which depend on the quantum numbers $`\lambda `$ and on the difference $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ of the order parameter phases in superconducting electrodes. In short structures, $`d\xi _0`$ ($`\xi _0`$ is the coherence length in the superconductor), the Josephson current can be presented as the sum of currents transferred by individual Andreev bound states (see, e.g., Ref.  and references therein),

$$I(\mathrm{\Phi })=\frac{2e}{\mathrm{}}_\lambda \frac{E_\lambda (\mathrm{\Phi })}{\mathrm{\Phi }}\mathrm{tanh}\frac{E_\lambda (\mathrm{\Phi })}{2T},$$
(1)
and must be sensitive to the HF and SO interaction which eliminate spin degeneracy of the Andreev levels.

The contact HF interaction in a semiconductor is described by the Hamiltonian

$$\widehat{H}_{hf}=(8\pi /3)\mu _B\gamma _h_i𝑰_i𝝈\delta (𝒓𝑹_i).$$
(2)
Here $`\mu _B`$ is the Bohr magneton, $`\gamma _h`$ is the nuclear magneton, and $`𝑰_i`$, $`𝝈`$, $`𝑹_i`$, $`𝒓`$ are nuclear and charge carrier spins and positions, respectively. It follows from Eq. (2) that if the nuclear spins are polarized, $`_i𝑰_i0`$, the charge carrier spins feel the effective HF field $`𝑩`$ which may cause spin splitting in 2DEG of the order of one tenth of the Fermi energy $`E_F`$. The influence of the Zeeman splitting solely on a supercurrent was studied first in Ref.  for the SFS junction (F denotes ferromagnetic metal). It was shown that the spin splitting suppresses the critical current and produces its oscillations over the intrinsic magnetic field localized within the F-layer.

The SO interaction of a charge carrier with the interface potential in GaAs/AlGaAs heterojunctions is modelled by the Bychkov-Rashba term,

$$\widehat{H}_{\text{so}}=(\alpha /\mathrm{})\left[𝝈𝒑\right]𝒏,$$
(3)
where $`\alpha =0.6\times 10^9`$ eV cm for holes, and $`\alpha =0.25\times 10^9`$ eV cm for electrons, $`𝝈_i`$, $`𝒑_i`$ are the charge carrier spin and momentum, $`𝒏`$ is the normal to the interface directed towards the Al-doped layer.

The configuration proposed in Fig. 1 has the following characteristic features:

i) the nuclear field $`𝑩`$ is localized outside the superconductors and does not influence the pairing mechanism;

ii) it affects only the electron spins and does not modify the space motion of charge carriers, whereas usual magnetic field causes strong orbital effects and transforms Andreev levels into Landau bands;

iii) since the SO interaction in Eq. (3) is spatially uniform along the 2DEG plane, it does not suppress the supercurrent, in contrast to the SO scattering at nonmagnetic impurities which acts as a depairing factor. The situation changes in presence of the nuclear field.

To calculate the Josephson current in Eq. (1), it is enough to find discrete eigenvalues of the BCS Hamiltonian supplied by the HF and SO interaction terms,

$$=dV[\psi ^+(E(\widehat{𝒑})+𝝈\widehat{𝚲}(𝒓))\psi +\mathrm{\Delta }(𝒓)\psi _{}^+\psi _{}^++h.c.]$$
(4)
where $`𝝈`$ is the vector of Pauli matrices, the spinor $`\psi `$ is composed from the annihilation operators $`\psi _{}`$, $`\psi _{}`$ of the electron with a given spin, and $`E(𝒑)=𝒑^2/2mE_F`$ is the energy of a normal electron excitation. For simplicity, we accept a step-wise model for the order parameter $`\mathrm{\Delta }(𝒓)`$,

$$\mathrm{\Delta }(x)=\{\begin{array}{ccc}\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{exp}\left(i\mathrm{\Phi }\text{sign}x/2\right),& |x|>d/2,& \\ 0,& |x|<d/2.& \end{array}$$
(5)
The vector $`\widehat{𝚲}(𝒓)`$ in Eq. (4) describes the HF and SO interactions in accordance with Eqs. (2) and (3),

$$\widehat{𝚲}(x)=\{\begin{array}{ccc}0,& |x|>d/2,& \\ 𝒉+\widehat{𝒘},& |x|<d/2,& \end{array}𝒉=\mu _B𝑩,\widehat{𝒘}=\frac{\alpha }{\mathrm{}}[\widehat{𝒑}𝒏].$$
(6)
In order to consider uniformly the spin and electron-hole states of quasiparticles, it is convenient to express the Hamiltonian in Eq. (4) in terms of the 4-spinor field,

$$\phi =\left(\begin{array}{ccc}\psi _{}& & \\ \psi _{}& & \\ \psi _{}^+& & \\ \psi _{}^+& & \end{array}\right),\phi ^+=(\psi _{}^+,\psi _{}^+,\psi _{},\psi _{}),$$
(7)
$$=\frac{1}{2}𝑑V\phi ^+(𝒓)\widehat{H}\phi (𝒓),$$
(8)
$$\widehat{H}=\tau _zE(\widehat{𝒑})+\{\begin{array}{ccc}\sigma _z[\mathrm{\Delta }(x)\tau _++\mathrm{\Delta }^{}(x)\tau _{}],\hfill & |x|>d/2,\hfill & \\ \widehat{𝒘}𝝈+h_z\sigma _z+\tau _z𝒉_{}𝝈,\hfill & |x|<d/2.\hfill & \end{array}$$
(9)
Here $`𝒉_{}`$ is the component of Zeeman field in 2DEG plane; the Pauli matrices $`\sigma `$ act upon the spin states, while $`\tau `$-matrices operate in electron-hole space, e.g.,

$$\sigma _z\tau _z=\left(\begin{array}{ccc}\sigma _z& 0& \\ 0& \sigma _z& \end{array}\right).$$
(10)
The problem of single-particle spectrum of the Hamiltonian $``$ in Eq. (8) is equivalent to the solution of the Bogolyubov-de Gennes (BdG) equation for the 4-component wave function $`\mathrm{\Psi }_\lambda (𝒓)`$

$$\widehat{H}\mathrm{\Psi }_\lambda (𝒓)=E_\lambda \mathrm{\Psi }_\lambda (𝒓).$$
(11)
Assuming all characteristic energies $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$, $`h`$, $`w`$ to be much smaller than $`E_F`$, we use the quasiclassical representation of $`\mathrm{\Psi }_\lambda (𝒓)`$ as the product of rapidly oscillating exponent over the slowly varying envelope $`u(x)`$:

$$\mathrm{\Psi }_\lambda (𝒓)=\mathrm{exp}(ispx+ip_yy)u_s(x),p=\sqrt{p_F^2p_y^2}$$
(12)
where $`s=\pm 1`$ indicates two signs of $`x`$-component of the electron momentum. The spinor function $`u(x)`$ obeys Eq. (11) with a reduced Hamiltonian, in which the quasiclassical approximation for the kinetic energy and SO operators is used,

$$E(\widehat{𝒑})sv\widehat{p}_x,\widehat{𝒘}\frac{\alpha }{\mathrm{}}[𝒑𝒏],𝒑=(sp,p_y,0),v=\frac{p}{m}.$$
(13)
The matching of the solutions of Eq. (11) at the NS interfaces, which are assumed to be completely transparent, yields a dispersion relation,

$$\frac{Ed}{\mathrm{}v}=\pi n+\mathrm{arccos}\frac{E}{\mathrm{\Delta }}+s\frac{\mathrm{\Phi }}{2}+\sigma \gamma ,n=0,\pm 1,\pm 2\mathrm{},$$
(14)
$$\gamma (𝒉,𝒘)=\mathrm{arcsin}[\underset{k=\pm 1}{}\frac{1+k𝒏_+𝒏_{}}{2}\mathrm{sin}^2\frac{A_++kA_{}}{2}]^{1/2}$$
(15)
$$A_\pm =(d/\mathrm{}v)|𝒉\pm 𝒘|,𝒏_\pm =(𝒉\pm 𝒘)/|𝒉\pm 𝒘|$$
(16)
which has the standard structure of the equation for Andreev levels in current-carrying SNS junction. An additional term $`\sigma \gamma `$, where $`\sigma =\pm 1`$ indicates the spin direction, describes Zeeman splitting of the Andreev levels renormalized by the SO interaction. In terms of the BdG wave mechanics, the spin effects change phase relations between the wave functions of the incident and retro-reflected quasiparticles. This produces oscillations of the Andreev levels with the change of the interaction parameters $`h`$, $`w`$ which enter the oscillating phase shift $`\sigma \gamma `$ in Eq. (14). As a result, the Josephson current in Eq. (1) also reveals oscillations with $`h`$, $`w`$ as the manifestation of complicated interference between partial supercurrents carried by individual Andreev bands. In this sense, the effect represents a spin-induced analogue of the Fraunhofer pattern in a planar Josephson junction in external magnetic field. Note that in the absence of Zeeman field ($`h=0`$), all spin effects disappear: $`\gamma (0,𝒘)=0`$.

The most striking manifestation of the SO interaction itself is the anisotropy of Andreev levels with respect to the direction of the Zeeman field $`𝒉`$; in the absence of the SO interaction ($`𝒘=0`$), $`E_n(\mathrm{\Phi })`$ depends only on the modulus of $`𝒉`$:

$$\gamma (𝒉,0)=\mathrm{arcsin}\left[\mathrm{sin}\left(hd/\mathrm{}v\right)\right].$$
(17)
It is helpful to consider this anisotropy for a single electron state with fixed direction of the SO vector $`𝒘`$. As follows from Eqs. (14)-(16), the energy of Andreev level depends only on the angle between $`𝒉`$ and $`𝒘`$ and their moduli, being insensitive to the rotation of $`𝒉`$ around $`𝒘`$. At $`𝒉𝒘`$, the effects of SO interaction vanish, as in Eq. (17). These conclusions can be extended to the angle dependence of the Josephson current in Eq. (1) in a narrow 2DEG channel which holds a single electron mode ($`p=p_F`$, $`p_y=0`$). In this extreme case, the vectors $`𝒘`$ of all electrons are directed along the $`y`$-axis and create a fixed reference frame for the Zeeman vector $`𝒉`$.

At arbitrary length of the 2DEG region, Eq. (14) can be solved only numerically. Below we consider an analytically solvable case of 2DEG channel much shorter than the coherence length $`\xi _0`$, when the left-hand side of Eq. (14) is negligibly small,

$$E_\lambda (\mathrm{\Phi })=s\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{cos}(\mathrm{\Phi }/2+\sigma \gamma ),(s,\sigma )=\pm 1.$$
(18)
At $`\gamma =0`$, Eq. (18) describes two spin-degenerated Andreev levels in a superconducting constriction which traverse across the whole energy gap with the change of $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ and intersect each other at $`\mathrm{\Phi }=\pi `$. The spin effects split each level into two spin-dependent terms and, in addition, expand them into four energy bands which transfer the Josephson current

$`I(\mathrm{\Phi })={\displaystyle \frac{e\mathrm{\Delta }}{\mathrm{}}}{\displaystyle _{p_F}^{p_F}}{\displaystyle \frac{dp_y}{2\pi \mathrm{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{\sigma =\pm 1}{}}\mathrm{tanh}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }}{2T}}\mathrm{cos}({\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Phi }}{2}}+\sigma \gamma )\right]`$ (19)
$`\times \mathrm{sin}\left(\mathrm{\Phi }/2+\sigma \gamma \right).`$ (20)
At $`h=0`$, Eq. (19) is reduced to a 2D analogue of the current-phase relationship for pure constriction.

The set of curves $`I(\mathrm{\Phi })`$ calculated numerically at $`T=0`$ for various directions and magnitudes of Zeeman field combined with SO interaction is presented in Fig. 2b-d in dimensionless variables

$$𝑯=(\mathrm{}v_F/d)𝒉,𝑾=(\mathrm{}v_F/d)𝒘,$$
(21)
in comparison with those plotted for $`W=0`$ in Fig. 2a. The common features of these dependencies are drastic variations of the shape of $`I(\mathrm{\Phi })`$ at $`H1`$, and the rapid change of sign of the derivative $`dI/d\mathrm{\Phi }`$ at $`\mathrm{\Phi }=\pi `$ in small field $`H`$. It is interesting that the curves at $`W=0`$ and at $`W=1`$, $`𝑯𝒚`$ (Fig. 2a,b) are similar each to other, as well as the curves for $`W=1`$, $`𝑯𝒙`$ and $`W=1`$, $`𝑯𝒛`$ (Fig. 2c,d). This reflects the results of our analysis of the anisotropy of Andreev levels in 1D case which appears to be qualitatively applicable for 2D system: the SO effects are relatively small at $`𝑯𝒚`$ and approximately isotropic under rotation of Zeeman field around the $`y`$-axis.

In Fig. 3 we present oscillations of the critical current $`I_c(H)`$ depending on the HF field direction and SO interaction intensity, for two values of temperature. At the vicinity of $`T_c`$, where $`I(\mathrm{\Phi })`$ has a single harmonic,

$$I(\mathrm{\Phi })I_m\mathrm{sin}\mathrm{\Phi },I_m=\frac{\pi e\mathrm{\Delta }^2}{(2\pi \mathrm{})^2T_c}_{p_F}^{p_F}𝑑p_y\mathrm{cos}2\gamma ,$$
(22)
the critical current $`I_c(W,H)=|I_m|`$ turns to zero periodically with $`H`$ like in SFS system.

The positive sign of $`dI/d\mathrm{\Phi }`$ at $`\mathrm{\Phi }=\pi `$, which occurs at $`H0`$ (Fig. 2), means that this state can be stable and may produce persistent current in the ground state of a superconducting loop with high enough inductance ($`\pi `$-junction). On the other hand, the negative sign of $`dI/d\mathrm{\Phi }`$ at $`\mathrm{\Phi }=0`$, which occurs within the certain field range at $`W=0`$ or at $`W0`$, $`𝑯𝒚`$, signifies instability of usual ground state with $`\mathrm{\Phi }=0`$ (note that the SO interaction stabilizes this state at $`𝑯𝒚`$, at least at $`T=0`$). The results of a numerical analysis of stability of states $`\mathrm{\Phi }=0`$, $`\pi `$ within the whole temperature range are shown in Fig. 4.

In summary, we have shown that the Josephson current in a mesoscopic S-2DEG-S structure is highly sensitive to the combined action of the Zeeman field and spin-orbit interactions. In particular, the critical current reveals oscillations and anisotropy with respect to the Zeeman field $`𝑩`$, and the regions of stability at $`\mathrm{\Phi }=\pi `$ (like in $`\pi `$-junctions) emerge. We assumed hyperfine interaction of electrons with polarized nuclei as the source of electron spin polarization, though similar effects should be observed in external magnetic field lying in the 2DEG-plane (to avoid orbital effects). In order to access the regime of strong interaction ($`H1`$, $`W1`$) in short 2DEG bridge ($`d<\xi _0`$) considered here, the interaction energies $`h`$, $`w`$ of 2DEG should exceed $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$. Since the HF and SO interaction magnitudes in GaAs/AlGaAs heterojunctions reach at most 1K in temperature scale, the banks of short S-2DEG-S structure should be preferably fabricated from a superconductor with low $`T_c1`$K. This restriction can be significantly softened in long ($`d\xi _0`$) S-2DEG-S junctions where the interaction energies should be comparable with the small distance between Andreev levels: $`h,w\mathrm{}v_F/d\mathrm{\Delta }`$.


text:
# Adaptive Optics imaging of Quasar HostsBased on data obtained at the Canada-France-Hawaii telescope which is operated by CNRS of France, NRC of Canada and the University of Hawaii.

## 0.1 Introduction

Evidence that nearby bright galaxies contain massive dark objects in their center has become increasingly compelling over the last few years and early suggestions that a tight correlation exists between the mass of the dark object and the mass of the bulge (?) have been convincingly corroborated (??). It is thus possible that AGN activity is a usual episode of the history of most, if not all, present-day bright galaxies. One way to investigate this is to determine the luminosity and morphology of galaxies hosting quasars. In addition, this gives clues on the range of conditions needed for strong nuclear activity to occur.

Several studies of quasar host-galaxies have been performed with the main aim of distinguishing between radio-loud and radio-quiet quasars, either from IR ground-based observations (???) or by using HST imaging (????). The detection and analysis of host-galaxies is difficult even from space (????). Indeed, the determination of the PSF and the subtraction of the point source image are crucial in this work. Differenciation between the two classical profiles, either an exponential disk or a de Vaucouleur power-law, is effective only in the regions close to the center, or in the far-wings of the PSF (see Fig. 1 of ?). Because of seeing limitation, PSF subtraction is the main limitation in determining host-galaxy morphologies from the ground. With the advent of adaptive optics however, it is possible to alleviate this limitation (????). In addition, observing in the infrared minimizes the difference in luminosity between the host and nucleus again improving our ability to determine the host morphology. PSF determination is still a major problem but the difficulties are balanced by the prospect of using 10 m class telescopes which will provide higher sensitivity and better spatial resolution.

In this contribution we present the summary of the results of a pilot programme aiming at testing the capabilities of adaptive optics in this field. The details can be found in ?.

## 0.2 Sample selection and data

In order to use adaptive optics correction quasars were selected such that the nuclei is bright enough to be used as the wavefront reference point source. The sample of radio-quiet quasars were all PG quasars with mb $`<`$ 16.5 and with redshift less than 0.6. The radio-loud objects were selected from 3C, 4C, B2 and PKS catalogues with the same magnitude and $`z`$ criteria. The final objects observed (see Table 1 in ?) were selected based upon the suitability for the observing conditions on the observing runs.

We used the CFHT adaptive optics bonnette (PUEO) and the IR camera KIR on May 1998 and May 1999. The weather conditions were poor during both runs and the FWHM of the seeing PSF was never better than 0.8 arcsec. The adaptative-optics correction was performed on the QSOs themselves. The final images after the usual process of NIR-imagin reduction, have a typical resolution of $`FWHM`$ $``$ 0.3 arcsec. After each science observation an image of a star with similar magnitude as the QSO was taken in order to determine the PSF and use it to deconvolve the images. Due to rapid variations in the wheather conditions however, it was not always possible to follow this predefined procedure.

A synthetic PSF function, derived from the stellar images was used to deconvolve each of the images. As it was not always possible to apply a standard procedure due to fluctuating seeing conditions, a careful although, somewhat arbitrary choice of the PSF had to be done. In ? we have shown that the best PSF to be used for deconvolution is that obtained using the star with the FWHM closest to that of the science exposure. In general, this illustrates the crucial role played by a careful PSF determination in AO observations.

## 0.3 Analysis

In each of the images, we first masked out the companion objects and the ghosts due to the telescope. We then obtained the surface brightness profiles of the galaxies using the IRAF111IRAF is the Image Analysis and Reduction Facility made available to the astronomical community by the National Optical Astronomy Observatories, which are operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA), Inc., under contract with the U.S. National Science Foundation. task ellipse. The resulting profiles were fitted over the radius range from 3 times the FWHM of the PSF up to the point where the galaxy surface brightness level falls below 2 $`\times \sigma `$ of the background level. We have systematically fitted an exponential disk and a de Vaucouleurs r1/4 law. Out of the 10 objects for which we can extract some morphological information, two of the host-galaxies are most probably barred spirals, the rest being ellipticals or very early type spirals. We note that in general the number of points we can use to fit either profile is not large enough to unambiguously distinguish between the two fitted profiles. At small radii, the excess of light between the observed profile and the model disk can be due to the presence of a bulge. The morphology is determined considering both the 2D luminosity spatial distribution and the 1D profile. It is apparent that to discriminate between both morphologies, the S/N ratio must be high at large radii.

The magnitudes of the hosts have been derived by integrating the $`r^{1/4}`$ profiles for all the objects. Indeed, it can be seen that there is an excess of light at small radius compared to the disk profile for all objects. This suggests that in our sample, the disk galaxies have also a strong bulge and/or a strong bar. This is confirmed by the 2D luminosity distribution. We have also subtracted a scaled version of the most suitable PSF for each nucleus imposing a non-negative profile in the center (see ?). The resulting host magnitudes, computed by integrating the PSF-subtracted images, are in good agreement with those obtained from the profile fitting.

The results of the analysis are given in Table 2 in ?. We also give the number of objects (probably companions) found within 5 and 10 arcsec from the quasar down to $`m_\mathrm{H}`$ = 20.5 and the maximum radial distance (in arcsec and kilo-parsec) to which the host is detected at a significance level of 3$`\sigma `$ above the background.

We concentrate in the results on PG 1700+514. The description of the remaining objects can be found in ?.

## 0.4 PG1700+514

PG 1700+514 is one of the most infrared-luminous, radio-quiet BAL quasar (??). Ground-based imaging revealed an extension about 2 arcsec north-east of the quasar (?) which was shown by adaptive-optics imaging and follow-up spectroscopy to be a companion with a redshift 140 km s-1 blueward of the quasar (?). NICMOS observations lead Hines et al. (1999) to argue that the companion is a collisionally induced ring galaxy. The fit to the SED and the Keck spectrum of the companion imply that the light is emitted by an old population of stars plus a 85 Myr old star-burst (?). Note however that the H-band flux ($`m_\mathrm{H}`$ $``$ 16.6) deduced from HST imaging is much larger than that predicted by the model. ? showed that the inclusion of embedded dust can produce a spectral-energy distribution that is consistent with both the optical spectrophotometry and the IR photometry.

The image obtained at CFHT is shown in Fig. 1. We confirm the findings by ? that the companion has the appearance of an arc with several condensations. We used different PSF to deconvolve the image. The best deconvolution is obtained using the star with the FWHM closest to that of the AGN (0.30 arcsec). The image has a final resolution of 0.16 arcsec and is probably the best image obtained yet on this object. The companion is seen as a highly disturbed system with a bright nucleus and a ring-like structure; the nucleus beeing decentered with respect to the ring. The host-galaxy is clearly seen around the quasar with a bright extension to the south-west, first noted by ? and clearly visible in the optical images by ?. In addition, we detect a bright knot to the south-east which is not seen in the NICMOS data probably because of the presence of residuals in the PSF subtraction. The comparison between the HST and CFHT images of PG 1700+514 shows how powerful AO can be, and bodes well for the use of the technique on 10 m-class telescopes. No obvious relation is found between the near-IR image and the radio map (?).

## 0.5 Mock data

We have fitted the 1-D profiles of the host-galaxies with either exponential or de Vaucouleurs laws. In order to test our fitting procedure, we have generated images of model elliptical and disk galaxies with scale-lengths and effective surface brightness within the range derived from the data. The same orientation and axis ratio is given to all of them. A point source is added in the center of the galaxy to mimic the quasar. An appropriate amount of noise is added, and then the images are convolved with a typical observed PSF. The mocked images are analyzed in the same way as real data.

We first note that an elliptical galaxy is always recognized as such by the fitting procedure, whereas a disk-galaxy is better fitted by a $`r^{1/4}`$ law when the unresolved point-source contributes more than half the total light. This means that, at least with data of similar quality to those presented here, the fraction of elliptical galaxies in the sample may be overpredicted. Going deeper, at least 0.5 to 1 magnitude, should help solve this problem as it is apparent that the distinction between spiral and elliptical profiles is easier when the galaxy is detected at larger distances from the central point-source.

It is interesting to note that the output magnitudes are brighter than the input in both cases, elliptical or disk galaxies. The reason for this is probably the difficulty in determining the extension of the PSF wings which, if not subtracted properly, will artificially increase the flux of the host-galaxy. In the case of spirals, the difference is as large as 0.6 magnitudes when the contribution of the point-source is the same as the contribution of the host-galaxy. For the ellipticals, the difference is less but still important when the QSO dominates the total flux.

Note that the ratio between the QSO and the host-galaxy luminosities is expected to increase with redshift. The above bias tends to imply that host-galaxy luminosities could be overestimated.

## 0.6 Conclusions

AO imaging in the H and K bands has been used to study the morphology of QSO host-galaxies at low and intermediate redshifts ($`z`$ $`<`$ 0.6). We detect the host-galaxies in 11 out of 12 quasars (5 radio-quiet and 7 radio-loud). The images, obtained under poor seeing conditions, and with the QSOs themselves as reference for the correction, have typical spatial resolution of $`FWHM`$ $``$ 0.3 arcsec before deconvolution. Close companions and obvious signs of interactions are found in 4 objects. The 2D images of 3 of the host-galaxies unambiguously reveal bars and spiral arms. For the other objects, it is difficult to determine the host-galaxy morphology on the basis of one dimensional surface brightness fits alone. In the best case, the deconvolved H-band image of PG 1700$`+`$514 (with a spatial resolution of 0.16 arcsec) reveals a wealth of detail on the companion and the host-galaxy, and is probably the best-quality image of this object thus far.

We have simulated mocked images of host-galaxies, both spirals and ellipticals, and applied the same analysis as to the data. Disk hosts can be missed for small disk scalelengths and large QSO contributions. In this case, the host-galaxy can be misidentified as an elliptical galaxy. Elliptical galaxies are always recognized as such, but with a luminosity which can be overestimated by up to 0.5 magnitudes. The reason for this is that the method used here tends to attribute some of the QSO light to the host. This is also the case for disk galaxies with a strong contribution of the unresolved component.

###### Acknowledgements.

This work is financed by DGICyT grants PB96-0921, PB98-0521 and AYA2001-2089. Financial support to develop the present investigation has been obtained through the Junta de Andalucía TIC-114.