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# Blocking of lattice monopoles from the continuum in hot lattice gluodynamics

## 1 Introduction

One of the most popular approaches to the problem of confinement of quarks in QCD is the so-called dual superconductor mechanism . The key role in this approach is played by abelian monopoles which are identified with the help of the abelian projection method . The basic idea behind the abelian projections is to fix partially the non-abelian gauge symmetry up to an abelian subgroup. For $`SU(N)`$ gauge theories the residual abelian symmetry group is compact since the original non-abelian group is compact as well. The abelian monopoles arise naturally due to the compactness of the residual gauge subgroup.

In the dual superconductor mechanism the abelian monopoles are considered as effective degrees of freedom which are responsible for confinement of quarks. According to the numerical results  the monopoles are condensed in the low temperature (confinement) phase. The condensation of the monopoles leads to formation of the chromoelectric string due to the dual Meissner effect. As a result the fundamental sources of chromoelectric field, quarks, are confined by the string. The importance of the abelian monopoles is also stressed by the existence  of the abelian dominance phenomena which was first observed in the lattice $`SU(2)`$ gluodynamics: the monopoles in the so-called Maximal abelian projection  make a dominant contribution to the zero temperature string tension (for a review, see ref. ).

In the deconfinement phase (high temperatures) the monopoles are not condensed and the quarks are liberated. This does not mean, however, that monopoles do not play a role in non-perturbative physics. It is known that in the deconfinement phase the vacuum is dominated by static monopoles (which run along the “temperature” direction in the euclidean theory) while monopoles running in spatial directions are suppressed. The static monopoles should contribute to the “spatial string tension” — a coefficient in front of the area term of large spatial Wilson loops. And, according to numerical simulations in the deconfinement phase , the monopoles make a dominant contribution to the spatial string tension.111Note that in another approach to the “spatial confinement” problem, the area law for the spatial Wilson loops is suggested to be caused by magnetic thermal quasi-particles discussed in ref. . It seems plausible that the continuum abelian monopoles may be correlated with these magnetic excitations.

In this paper we investigate the physics of the lattice monopole currents in the $`SU(2)`$ gauge theory at high temperatures. The properties of the monopoles are effectively three dimensional due to static nature of the currents. However, the problem which is discussed in this article is quite general and it can not be ascribed only to the three dimensional case which is considered here as a useful and physically relevant example.

The lattice monopoles in Monte Carlo simulations are detected by the standard DeGrand-Toussaint construction  which identifies the magnetic monopoles by measuring the magnetic flux coming out of lattice $`3D`$ cells (cubes). The properties of thus-measured lattice monopoles should obviously depend on the physical size, $`b`$, of the lattice cell (below we call these lattice objects as “lattice monopoles of the size $`b`$”). To get the continuum properties of the monopoles one should send the size of the lattice cells to zero, $`b0`$, what is usually a difficult numerical problem. Here we propose a method — which can be called as “blocking of monopoles from continuum to the lattice” — to identify the couplings of a continuum model for monopoles using the numerical results obtained on the lattice with a finite spacing.

Each lattice $`3D`$ cell can be considered as a “detector” which measures the magnetic charges of the continuum monopoles travelling through the lattice: if the continuum monopole is located inside a lattice $`3D`$ cell then the DeGrand-Toussaint method detects a *lattice* monopole. From this point of view the limit $`b0`$ is needed to detect accurately the position of the continuum monopole with the help of the lattice detector. If the size of the lattice cell is finite then two or more continuum monopoles may be placed inside the cell. The fluctuations of the monopole charges of the lattice cells should be described by a continuum model. As a result, the lattice observables — such as the vacuum expectation value of the lattice monopole density — should carry information about dynamics of the continuum monopoles. The observables should depend not only on the size of the lattice cell, $`b`$, but also on features of the continuum model which describes the monopole dynamics. We take the high temperature gluodynamics as a simple example and show that the density and action of the static lattice monopoles of various sizes $`b`$ can self-consistently be described by a continuum Coulomb gas model.

Our approach resembles the idea of the blocking of the continuum *fields* to the lattice . This method allows to construct perfect actions and operators in various field theories. In our paper we are blocking continuum monopoles what is ideologically similar to the blocking of a topological charge  and a fermionic current  to the lattice. The blocking of the fields, however, leads to a *non-integer* lattice magnetic current contrary to the quantized lattice definition of the monopole charge . Thus the blocking of topological defects seems to be more suitable for investigation of the lattice monopole charges. There is also a similarity of our approach with the blocking of the lattice monopole degrees of freedom from fine to coarser lattices . This method allows to define a perfect monopole action independent on the spacing of the fine lattice.

To avoid misunderstanding we would like to stress from the very beginning the difference between various lattice monopole sizes $`b`$. As we mentioned above, we call the size of the lattice $`3D`$ cell — used for detection of the monopoles — as “the size of the lattice monopole”. This should be distinguished from the *physical* radius, $`r_0`$, of the monopole core  which is obviously independent on the size of the lattice “detector”. In this paper we disregard the existence of the monopole core and consider the continuum monopoles as point-like objects. Thus, we get the finite-sized lattice monopoles by blocking the point-like monopoles from continuum to the lattice.

There is another motivation for our study. Various properties of the lattice monopoles such as the action and density of the monopole currents, depend on the *physical* size of the lattice monopole . This effect is observed both at zero  and finite  temperatures. Usually the monopole density is calculated numerically for so called elementary monopoles the size of which coincide with the lattice spacing $`a`$. Then the monopole quantities in continuum limit ($`e.g.`$, continuum monopole density) are usually associated with the limit $`a0`$. However, since the monopole in the gluodynamics has a core of the finite size  the continuum monopole may simply “drop” through the lattice cells if $`ar_0`$. Moreover, the scale of the ultraviolet lattice artifacts coincides with the lattice UV cut-off $`a`$, which, in turn, equal to the size of the elementary monopoles. Therefore the lattice elementary may be affected by the lattice UV artifacts. Both these reasons imply that (at least, naively) there is a possibility that the continuum monopole density may not correctly be calculated as the *elementary* lattice monopole density in the limit $`a0`$. One of advantages of our approach is that it allows to relate the *lattice* monopole quantities to the corresponding *physical* quantities in continuum limit at the *finite* lattice spacing making irrelevant the problems noticed above.

The structure of the paper is as follows. In section 2 we derive the lattice monopole action and the density of squared magnetic charges. The basic assumption behind the derivation is that the dynamics of the continuum monopoles — which are blocked to the lattice — is described by the Coulomb gas model. In section 3 we present the numerical results both for the monopole action and for the density of squared magnetic charges. We show that these quantities are in a good agreement with the predictions of section 2. The comparison of the analytical and numerical results allows us to calculate the product of the abelian magnetic screening mass and the monopole density in the continuum model. At the end of section 3 we check the self-consistency of our results as well as validity of the Coulomb gas description for the static monopole currents. Our conclusion is presented in the last section 4.

## 2 Lattice monopoles from continuum monopoles

In this section we consider the blocking of the continuum monopoles to the lattice in three space-time dimensions. Let us consider a lattice with a finite lattice spacing $`b`$ which is embedded in the continuum space-time. The cells of the lattice are defined as follows:

$$C_s=\{b(s_i\frac{1}{2})x_ib(s_i+\frac{1}{2}),i=1,2,3\},$$
(1)
where $`s_i`$ is the lattice dimensionless coordinate and $`x_i`$ corresponds to the continuum coordinate.

Each lattice cell, $`C_s`$, detects the total magnetic charge, $`k_s`$, of “continuum” monopoles inside it:

$$k_s=\underset{C_s}{}\text{d}^3x\rho (x),\rho (x)=\underset{a}{}q_a\delta ^{(a)}(xx^{(a)}),$$
(2)
where $`\rho (x)`$ is the density of the continuum monopoles, $`x_a`$ and $`q_a`$ is the position and the charge (in units of a fundamental magnetic charge, $`g_M`$) of $`a^{\mathrm{th}}`$ continuum monopole. In three dimensions the monopoles are instanton-like objects and the monopole trajectories have zero dimensionality (points). It is worth stressing the difference between continuum and lattice monopoles: the continuum monopoles are fundamental point-like objects in this approach while the lattice monopoles correspond to the lattice cells with non-zero total magnetic charges of continuum monopoles located inside appropriate cells.

According to definitions (2), the lattice monopole charge shares similar properties to the continuum monopole charge. The lattice monopole charge $`k_s`$ is quantized, $`k_s`$, and conserved in the three-dimensional sense:

$$\underset{s\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}k_s\underset{V}{}\text{d}^3x\rho (x)=0,$$
(3)
if the continuum charge is conserved. Here $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ and $`V`$ denote the lattice and continuum volume occupied by the lattice, respectively. In other words, the total magnetic charge of the lattice monopole configuration is zero on a finite lattice with periodic boundary which is considered in this paper.

Suppose that the dynamics of the continuum monopoles is governed by the $`3D`$ Coulomb gas model:

$$𝒵=\underset{N=0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\frac{\zeta ^N}{N!}\left[\underset{a=1}{\overset{N}{}}\text{d}^3x^{(a)}\underset{q_a=\pm 1}{}\right]\mathrm{exp}\left\{\frac{g_M^2}{2}\underset{\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{a,b=1}{ab}}{\overset{N}{}}q_aq_bD\left(x^{(a)}x^{(b)}\right)\right\}.$$
(4)
The Coulomb interaction in eq. (4) is represented by the inverse laplacian $`D`$: $`_i^2D(x)=\delta ^{(3)}(x)`$. The density of the continuum monopole is assumed to be low. The continuum monopole charges therefore are restricted by the condition $`|q_a|1`$ which means that these monopoles do not overlap. The average continuum monopole density $`\rho `$ is controlled by the fugacity parameter $`\zeta `$.

Note that the model (4) does not exist without properly defined ultraviolet cut-off. Indeed, the self-energy of the point-like monopoles is a linearly divergent function due to the infinite nature of the Coulomb interaction. This divergence — which is not explicitly present in eq. (4) — should appear manifestly in a field representation of the Coulomb gas model which we need below (see, for example, the sin-Gordon representation for the lattice monopole action, eq. (2.1)). The renormalized fugacity is, $`\zeta _{\mathrm{ren}}=\zeta \mathrm{exp}\{g_m^2/(8\pi r_0)\}`$, where the $`r_0`$ is the ultraviolet cut-off. In our case this cut-off is given by the size of the monopole core which is of the order of 0.05 fm at zero temperature . For simplicity we omit the subscript “ren” in the renormalized fugacity below.

The magnetic charges in the Coulomb gas (4) are screened: at large distances the two-point charge correlation function is exponentially suppressed, $`\rho (x)\rho (y)\mathrm{exp}\{|xy|/\lambda _D\}`$. Here $`\lambda _D`$ is the Debye screening length ,

$$\lambda _D=\frac{1}{g_M\sqrt{\rho }}.$$
(5)
Note that the three dimensional Debye screening length corresponds to a *magnetic* screening in four dimensions. The density of the continuum monopoles in the leading order is related to fugacity as  $`\rho =2\zeta `$. Below we choose the vacuum expectation value of the continuum monopole density, $`\rho `$, and the Debye screening length, $`\lambda _D`$, as suitable parameters of the continuum model (instead of $`g_M`$ and $`\zeta `$).

We are interested in two basic quantities characterizing the lattice monopoles: the lattice monopole action $`S_{mon}(k)`$ and the *v.e.v.* of the squared magnetic charge, $`k_s^2`$. We study the quantity $`k_s^2`$ instead of the density, $`|k_s|`$, since the analytical treatment of the density is difficult while both these quantities are equivalent philosophically.

### 2.1 Lattice monopole action

To derive the lattice monopole action we substitute the unity,

$$1=\underset{k(\mathrm{\Lambda })}{}\underset{s\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}\delta _\mathrm{\Lambda }\left(k_s\underset{C_s}{}\text{d}^3x\rho (x)\right),$$
(6)
into eq. (4). Here $`_{k(\mathrm{\Lambda })}_{s\mathrm{\Lambda }}_{k_s}`$ and $`\delta _\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ stands here for the Kronecker symbol ($`i.e.`$, lattice $`\delta `$-function). We get

$`𝒵`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{k(\mathrm{\Lambda })}{}}{\displaystyle \underset{N=0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{\zeta ^N}{N!}}\left[{\displaystyle \underset{a=1}{\overset{N}{}}}{\displaystyle }\text{d}^3x^{(a)}{\displaystyle \underset{q_a=\pm 1}{}}\right]{\displaystyle \underset{\pi }{\overset{\pi }{}}}𝒟_\mathrm{\Lambda }h{\displaystyle }𝒟\chi \times `$ (7)
$`\times \mathrm{exp}\left\{{\displaystyle \text{d}^3x\left[\frac{1}{2g_M^2}\left(_i\chi (x)\right)^2+i\rho (x)\left(\chi (x)\underset{s\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}\theta _s(x)h_s\right)+i\underset{s\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}k_sh_s\right]}\right\},`$
where we have introduced two additional integrations over the continuum field $`\chi `$ and the compact lattice field $`h`$ to represent the inverse laplacian in eq. (4) and the Kronecker symbol in eq. (6), respectively. The subscript $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ in $`𝒟_\mathrm{\Lambda }h`$ indicates that the integration is going over the lattice fields $`h`$. The representative function of the $`s^{\mathrm{th}}`$ lattice cell is denoted as $`\theta _s`$:

$$\theta _s(x)=\{\begin{array}{cc}1,\hfill & xC_s,\hfill \\ 0,\hfill & \text{otherwise}.\hfill \end{array}$$
(8)
Summing over the continuum monopole positions according to ref. , we get

$$Z=\underset{k(\mathrm{\Lambda })}{}e^{S_{mon}(k)},$$
(9)
where the lattice monopole action, $`S_{\mathrm{mon}}`$, is defined as follows:

$`e^{S_{\mathrm{mon}}(k)}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle }𝒟\chi {\displaystyle \underset{\pi }{\overset{\pi }{}}}𝒟_\mathrm{\Lambda }h\mathrm{exp}\{{\displaystyle }\text{d}^3x[{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2g_M^2}}\left(_i\chi (x)\right)^2`$
$`2\zeta \mathrm{cos}(\chi (x){\displaystyle \underset{s\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}}\theta _s(x)h_s)+i{\displaystyle \underset{s\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}}k_sh_s]\}.`$
The functional integral over the field $`\chi `$ in the l.h.s. of this equation resembles the sin-Gordon model coupled to an external source.

Note that the left hand side of eq. (2.1) is invariant both under the global continuum transformations of the field $`\chi `$, and under the lattice local transformations of the field $`h`$,

$`\begin{array}{cccc}\chi (x)\hfill & \hfill & \chi (x)+2\pi n,\hfill & n\hfill \\ h_s\hfill & \hfill & h_s+2\pi m_s,\hfill & m_s,\hfill \end{array}`$ (13)
respectively. Due to the last invariance we extend below the integration over the lattice field $`h`$ to infinite limits (this leads to appearance of an inessential factor in front of the partition function).

Let us consider the lattice monopole action in the tree (or, gaussian) approximation. The validity of this approximation is discussed in section 2.2. We expand the cosine function over the small fluctuations in $`\chi `$ and $`h`$ and we get in a leading order:

$`e^{S_{\mathrm{mon}}^{\mathrm{tree}}(k)}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle }𝒟\chi {\displaystyle \underset{\pi }{\overset{\pi }{}}}𝒟_\mathrm{\Lambda }h\mathrm{exp}\{{\displaystyle }\text{d}^3x[{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2g_M^2}}\left(_i\chi (x)\right)^2+`$
$`+\zeta (\chi (x){\displaystyle \underset{s\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}}\theta _s(x)h_s)^2+i{\displaystyle \underset{s\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}}k_sh_s]\}.`$
The integration over field $`\chi `$ leads to the following expression:

$$e^{S_{\mathrm{mon}}^{\mathrm{tree}}(k)}=\underset{\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}𝒟_\mathrm{\Lambda }h\mathrm{exp}\left\{\zeta b^3\underset{s,s^{}}{}h_s_{s,s^{}}^1h_s^{}+i\underset{s\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}k_sh_s\right\},$$
(15)
where

$`_{s,s^{}}^1`$ $`=`$ $`\delta _{s,s^{}}m_D^2b^2𝒢_{s,s^{}},`$ (16)
$`𝒢_{s,s^{}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{b^5}}{\displaystyle \text{d}^3x\text{d}^3y\theta _s(x)D_{m_D}(xy)\theta _s^{}(y)},`$ (17)
where $`D_{m_D}`$ is the scalar propagator for a massive particle, $`(_i^2+m^2)D_m(x)=\delta ^{(3)}(x)`$, with the Debye mass $`m=m_D\lambda _D^1`$. Note that the lattice operators $``$ and $`𝒢`$ are dimensionless quantities.

In eq. (15) the integration over the lattice field $`h`$ can be performed straightforwardly giving us the action for the lattice monopoles:

$$S_{\mathrm{mon}}^{\mathrm{tree}}(k)=\frac{1}{4\zeta b^3}\underset{s,s^{}}{}k_s_{s,s^{}}k_s^{}.$$
(18)
Let us calculate the operator $``$ on the infinite lattice. We represent the propagator $`D_{m_D}`$ as an integral over continuum momentum and integrating over $`x`$ and $`y`$ coordinates in eq. (17):

$$𝒢_{s,s^{}}=\frac{1}{b^5}\frac{\text{d}^3p}{(2\pi )^3}\frac{1}{p^2+m_D^2}\left[\underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}\left(\frac{2\mathrm{sin}(bp_i/2)}{p_i}\right)\right]e^{i(ss^{},p)b},$$
(19)
where $`(a,b)`$ denotes the scalar product of the vector quantities. Changing in eq. (19) the integration variable, $`p=q/b`$, and introducing the dimensionless mass,

$$\mu =b/\lambda _D,$$
(20)
we get

$$𝒢_{s,s^{}}=\frac{\text{d}^3q}{(2\pi )^3}H(q,\mu )e^{i(ss^{},q)},H(q,\mu )=\frac{1}{q^2+\mu ^2}\underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}\left[\frac{\mathrm{sin}(q_i/2)}{q_i/2}\right]^2.$$
(21)
Now we have to find the operator $``$ which is inverse to eq. (16). We represent $``$ as follows:

$$_{s,s^{}}=_\pi ^\pi \text{d}^3u(u)e^{i(ss^{},u)},$$
(22)
Substituting this equation and eq. (16) in the relation,

$$\underset{s^{\prime \prime }\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}_{s,s^{\prime \prime }}^1_{s^{\prime \prime },s^{}}=\delta _{s,s^{}},$$

we get the equation,

$$_\pi ^\pi \text{d}^3u\left\{(u)\left[1\mu ^2\underset{r\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}H(u+2\pi r,\mu )\right]\frac{1}{(2\pi )^3}\right\}e^{i(ss^{},u)}=0,$$
(23)
where we have used the Poisson summation formula,

$$\underset{s^{\prime \prime }\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}e^{i(s^{\prime \prime },uq)}=(2\pi )^3\underset{r\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}\delta ^{(3)}(qu2\pi r),$$
(24)
and then integrated over the momentum $`q`$.

The solution to eq. (23) is

$$(u)=\frac{1}{(2\pi )^3}\frac{1}{1\mu ^2_{r\mathrm{\Lambda }}H(u+2\pi r,\mu )}.$$
(25)
Substituting eq. (25) in eq. (22) and using definition (21), we finally get

$$_{s,s^{}}=\underset{\pi }{\overset{\pi }{}}\frac{\text{d}^3u}{(2\pi )^3}\left[\underset{r(\mathrm{\Lambda })}{}\underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}\frac{4\mathrm{sin}^2(u_i/2)}{(\stackrel{}{u}+2\pi \stackrel{}{r})^2+\mu ^2}\underset{\stackrel{j=1}{ji}}{\overset{3}{}}\left(\frac{2\mathrm{sin}(u_j/2)}{u_j+2\pi r_j}\right)^2\right]^1e^{i(ss^{},u)},$$
(26)
where we have used the relation

$$\underset{r_i}{}\frac{1}{(u_i+2\pi r_i)^2}=\frac{1}{[4\mathrm{sin}^2(u_i/2)]}.$$
(27)
The operator $`_{s,s^{}}`$ coincides with a three-dimensional perfect propagator for a free scalar field space-time discussed in details in ref. .

The summation in eq. (26) over one of the integers $`r_i`$ can explicitly be done with the help of the relation,

$$\underset{r_i}{}\frac{1}{(\stackrel{}{u}+2\pi \stackrel{}{r})^2+\mu ^2}=\frac{1}{2\lambda _i(\stackrel{}{u}+2\pi \stackrel{}{r},\mu )}\frac{\mathrm{sinh}\lambda _i(\stackrel{}{u}+2\pi \stackrel{}{r},\mu )}{\mathrm{cosh}\lambda _i(\stackrel{}{u}+2\pi \stackrel{}{r},\mu )\mathrm{cos}u_i},$$
(28)
where

$$\lambda _i(\stackrel{}{q},\mu )=\left[\underset{\stackrel{j=1}{ji}}{\overset{3}{}}q_j^2+\mu ^2\right]^{1/2}.$$
(29)
Substituting eq. (28) into eq. (26) we get the final expression for operator $``$:

$`_{s,s^{}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{\pi }{\overset{\pi }{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{\text{d}^3u}{(2\pi )^3}}e^{i(ss^{},u)}\times `$
$`\times \left[{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{r_j}{ji}}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{2\mathrm{sin}^2(u_i/2)}{\lambda _i(\stackrel{}{u}+2\pi \stackrel{}{r},\mu )}}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{sinh}\lambda _i(\stackrel{}{u}+2\pi \stackrel{}{r},\mu )}{\mathrm{cosh}\lambda _i(\stackrel{}{u}+2\pi \stackrel{}{r},\mu )\mathrm{cos}u_i}}{\displaystyle \underset{\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{k=1}{ki}}{\overset{3}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{4\mathrm{sin}^2(u_k/2)}{(u_k+2\pi r_k)^2}}\right]^1.`$
The leading term in the lattice monopole action is defined by eqs.(18), (2.1).

The finite-volume expression for the lattice monopole action can be obtained from eq. (2.1) by the standard substitution:

$$u_i\frac{2\pi k_i}{L_i},k=0,1,\mathrm{}L_i1,\underset{\pi }{\overset{\pi }{}}\frac{\text{d}u_i}{2\pi }\frac{1}{L_i}\underset{k_i=0}{\overset{L_i1}{}},$$
(31)
where $`L_i`$ is the lattice size in $`i^{\mathrm{th}}`$ direction.

In the infinite-volume case the lattice operator $`_{s,s^{}}`$ depends only on the dimensionless quantity $`\mu `$, eq. (20), which is the ratio of the lattice monopole size $`b`$ and the Debye screening length, eq. (5). As we will see below the form of the operator $``$ is qualitatively different in the limits of small and large $`\mu `$. Thus the Debye length $`\lambda _D`$ sets a scale for the lattice monopole size (or, better to say, for the size of the lattice cell) which characterizes different forms of the lattice monopole action.

#### 2.1.1 Action for large lattice monopoles

Let us consider the case of the large lattice monopoles, $`b\lambda _D`$, or, equivalently, $`\mu 1`$. In this case eq. (2.1) can be simplified since functions $`\lambda _i`$ (eq. (29)) are large and $`\mathrm{sinh}\lambda _i\mathrm{cosh}\lambda _ie^{\lambda _i}/2`$. Up to $`O(e^\mu )`$ corrections the operator $`_{s,s^{}}`$ is given by

$$_{s,s^{}}(\mu 1)=\underset{\pi }{\overset{\pi }{}}\frac{\text{d}^3u}{(2\pi )^3}\left[\underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}\underset{\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{r_j}{ji}}{}\frac{2\mathrm{sin}^2(u_i/2)}{\lambda _i(u,\mu )}\underset{\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{k=1}{ki}}{\overset{3}{}}\frac{4\mathrm{sin}^2(u_k/2)}{(u_k+2\pi r_k)^2}\right]^1e^{i(ss^{},u)}.$$
(32)
In the case of large $`\mu `$, the function $`\lambda _i`$ in eq. (29) is close to $`\mu `$ for all $`r_i\mu /(2\pi )`$. The deviation of $`\lambda `$ from $`\mu `$ becomes substantial only for terms with large summation variable $`r_i`$, $`r_i\mu /(2\pi )`$. However such large $`r_i`$’s are in any case suppressed as $`_{ji}(2\pi r_j)^2`$ according to eq. (32). Therefore the approximation $`\lambda _i=\mu `$ would lead only to $`O(\mu ^2)`$ corrections in eq. (32). Up to these corrections eq. (32) reads as follows:

$$_{s,s^{}}(\mu 1)=\frac{\mu }{2}\underset{\pi }{\overset{\pi }{}}\frac{\text{d}^3u}{(2\pi )^3}\left[\underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}\mathrm{sin}^2\left(\frac{u_i}{2}\right)\underset{\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{j=1}{ji}}{\overset{3}{}}\underset{r_j}{}\frac{4\mathrm{sin}^2(u_j/2)}{(u_j+2\pi r_j)^2}\right]^1e^{i(ss^{},u)}.$$
(33)
In turn, eq. (33) can be simplified with the help of the relation (27), giving:

$$_{s,s^{}}(\mu 1)=2\mu D_{s,s^{}},$$
(34)
where $`D_{s,s^{}}`$ is the lattice laplacian:

$$D_{s,s^{}}=\underset{\pi }{\overset{\pi }{}}\frac{\text{d}^3u}{(2\pi )^3}\left[4\underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}\mathrm{sin}^2\left(\frac{u_i}{2}\right)\right]^1e^{i(ss^{},u)}.$$
(35)
Thus for large sizes of the lattice cells, $`b\lambda _D`$, the lattice monopole action (18) is of the Coulomb-type:

$$S_{\mathrm{mon}}^{\mathrm{tree}}(k)=C(b)\underset{s,s^{}}{}k_sD_{s,s^{}}k_s^{}+O\left(\left(\frac{\lambda _D}{b}\right)^4\right),b\lambda _D.$$
(36)
The pre-Coulomb term $`C`$ can be expressed through the continuum density of the monopoles, $`\rho `$, the Debye screening length $`\lambda _D`$ and the lattice spacing $`b`$ as

$$C(b)=\frac{1}{\lambda _D\rho }\frac{1}{b^2}.$$
(37)
Here we used eq. (20).

Thus in the limit of large lattice monopole sizes, $`b`$, the lattice monopole action is of the Coulomb form. The long-range nature of the Coulomb interaction in the effective lattice action and the screening effect in the underlying high temperature theory do not contradict each other as one may think. The analog of this situation in continuum can be represented by a similar Coulomb gas model (4) which contain the long-range interaction part in the lagrangian. However, the interactions between monopoles lead to the screening effect in various correlators in this model. Obviously, the lattice Coulomb gas model (36) must also possess the screening effect despite the long range nature of the Coulomb term in the action.

The coefficient in front of the Coulomb term, $`C(b)`$, scales as $`C(b)b^2`$. Note that this form of scaling is a non-perturbative effect. Indeed, naively one could expect that this coefficient has to be proportional to the (squared) renormalized magnetic charge in three dimensions, $`C(b)g_M^2`$. The magnetic charge is inversely proportional to the $`3D`$ electric charge, $`g_Mg_{E,3D}^1`$. In the leading (tree) order of dimensional reduction formalism the electric charge is given by $`g_{E,3D}=g_{4D}(\mathrm{\Lambda },T)\sqrt{T}`$, where $`T`$ is the temperature, $`g_{4D}`$ is the running $`4D`$ charge of the $`SU(2)`$ gluodynamics and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is the renormalization scale. As a result, $`C(b)[g_{4D}^2(\mathrm{\Lambda },T)T]^1`$. The size of the lattice monopole, $`b`$, may enter the above expression only in the form of the renormalization scale, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }1/b`$. However, this would lead only to logarithmic $`b`$-dependence of the coefficient $`C(b)`$. Thus the $`b^2`$ dependence of the pre-Coulomb coefficient is clearly of a non-perturbative nature.

#### 2.1.2 Action for small lattice monopoles

In the case of small lattice monopoles the leading term of the operator $``$ for $`b\lambda _D`$ follows immediately from eq. (16): $`F_{s,s^{}}=\delta _{s,s^{}}`$. Thus the monopole action (18) becomes:

$$S_{\mathrm{mon}}^{\mathrm{tree}}(k)=M(b)\underset{s}{}k_s^2+O\left(\left(\frac{b}{\lambda _D}\right)^2\right),b\lambda _D,$$
(38)
where the coefficient

$$M(b)=\frac{1}{4\rho }\frac{1}{b^3},$$
(39)
plays a role of the lattice monopole mass. Indeed, the leading term in the action for $`N`$ small lattice monopoles with the charges $`q=\pm 1`$ is $`S=M(b)N`$.

In summary, we have established that the monopole action depends on the ratio of the lattice cell and the continuum Debye screening mass, $`b/\lambda _D`$:

$`S_{\mathrm{mon}}(k)=\{\begin{array}{ccc}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\rho }}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{b^3}}{\displaystyle \underset{s}{}}k_s^2+\mathrm{},\hfill & b\lambda _D;\hfill & \\ {\displaystyle \frac{1}{\rho \lambda _D}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{b^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{s,s^{}}{}}k_sD_{s,s^{}}k_s^{}+\mathrm{},\hfill & b\lambda _D,\hfill & \end{array}`$ (42)
where $`D_{s,s^{}}`$ is the inverse laplacian on the lattice. Thus the leading contribution to the lattice monopole action is given by the mass (Coulomb) terms for small (large) lattice monopoles.

### 2.2 Validity of the gaussian approximation

As we will see below, from the point of view of numerical computations the most interesting and reliable case corresponds to the large-$`b`$ monopoles. Here we briefly discuss the validity of the gaussian approximation in this limit. The detailed derivation will be given elsewhere .

We have truncated the cosine function in eq. (2.1) and performed the gaussian integration over the continuum field $`\chi `$ in eq. (2.1) to get the effective action in the leading order for the lattice field $`h_s`$. This action appears under the exponential function in eq. (15). The integration over the lattice fields $`h`$ led us to the Coulomb action (36) for the lattice monopoles in the large-$`b`$ limit. Let estimate the Coulomb action (36) coming from the next order of the truncation of the cosine function in eq. (2.1).

Expanding the cosine function in eq. (2.1) up to the fourth order and treating the correction as a perturbation we arrive to the following correction to the monopole action,

$$\delta S_{\mathrm{mon}}^{(4)}(k)=\frac{\zeta }{12}\text{d}^3x\left(\chi (x)\underset{s\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}\theta _s(x)h_s\right)^4,$$
(43)
where we used the superscript “$`(4)`$” because, as we show below, this action contains, $`O(k^4)`$ monopole-monopole interactions. The quantum average (43) is taken in the partition function (2.1) containing the monopole current $`k`$ as a source.

Integrating the fields $`\chi `$ and $`h`$, and neglecting independent of $`k`$ terms we arrive to the following $`k^4`$-correction to the monopole action:

$`\delta S_{\mathrm{mon}}^{(4)}(k)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{192\zeta ^3b^9}}{\displaystyle \underset{s_1,\mathrm{},s_4}{}}k_{s_1}\mathrm{}k_{s_4}D_{s_1,\mathrm{},s_4},`$
$`D_{s_1,\mathrm{},s_4}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{s_1^{},\mathrm{},s_4^{}}{}}_{s_1,s_1^{}}\mathrm{}_{s_4,s_4^{}}Y_{s_1^{},\mathrm{},s_4^{}},`$ (44)
where

$`Y_{s_1^{},\mathrm{},s_4^{}}`$ $`=`$ $`\left[{\displaystyle \underset{a=1}{\overset{4}{}}}{\displaystyle }{\displaystyle \frac{\text{d}^3q^{(a)}}{(2\pi )^3}}{\displaystyle \frac{q^{(a),2}}{q^{(a),2}+\mu ^2}}\right](2\pi )^3\delta ^{(3)}(q^{(1)}+\mathrm{}+q^{(4)})\times `$ (45)
$`\times \left[{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{sin}(q_i^{(a)}/2)}{q_i^{(a)}/2}}\right]\mathrm{exp}\left\{i{\displaystyle \underset{b=1}{\overset{4}{}}}q^{(b)}s_b\right\}.`$
The operator $`Y`$ is a converging function both in the limits of large and small $`q`$.

According to eq. (34) the operator $``$ is proportional to the first power of $`b`$ in the limit $`\mu m_Db1`$. The estimation of the operator $`Y`$, eq. (45), is difficult even in the limit of large $`b`$. However, one can notice that $`Y`$ contains the dependence on $`b`$ in the denominators under the integrals over $`q`$, and, similarly to the operator $`^1`$, the operator $`Y`$ should not be a rising function of the scale $`b`$. Estimating $`Y`$ as being of the order of unity, we get: $`|S_{\mathrm{mon}}^{(4)}(k)|g_M^4/(48\zeta b^5)O(k^4)`$. Thus, in the limit $`b\mathrm{}`$ the action $`S_{\mathrm{mon}}^{(4)}`$ provides a small correction to the Coulomb action (36), which is proportional to $`b^2`$. These results are confirmed by the fact that in the limit of large monopoles $`k^4`$ correction to the monopole action is small compared to the quadratic terms, ref. . Moreover, as we will see below, our numerical calculations shows that the quadratic part of the monopole action can be described by the Coulomb interactions with a high accuracy.

### 2.3 Lattice monopole density

In this section we discuss the dependence of the density of the extended lattice monopoles on the monopole size $`b`$. The simplest quantity characterizing the monopoles is the monopole density $`\rho _{latt}(b)`$ measured in the *lattice* units:

$$\rho _{\mathrm{latt}}(b)=\frac{1}{L^3}\underset{s\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}|k_s|,$$
(46)
where $`L`$ is the lattice size in units of $`b`$. However, the treatment of eq. (46) from the analytical point of view is more difficult than that of the squared density of the squared lattice monopole charges:

$$k^2(b)=\frac{1}{L^3}\underset{s\mathrm{\Lambda }}{}k^2(s).$$
(47)
Below we discuss the quantity (47) which has a similar physical meaning to the lattice monopole density (46).

Both in eq. (46) and eq. (47) the value of $`k_s`$ is equal to the total magnetic charge of the continuum monopoles which are placed inside the corresponding cube of the volume $`b^3`$. Obviously the lattice density (46) does not give the correct density of the continuum monopoles in general since if the lattice monopole size is large enough then the oppositely charged continuum monopoles cancel fields of each other inside the cell $`C_s`$. Moreover, the dependence of the densities (46) and (47) on the lattice monopole size $`b`$ must reflect the dynamics of the continuum monopoles. Indeed, one can expect that the functions $`\rho _{\mathrm{latt}}(b)`$ for the Coulomb monopole gas and for the random monopole ensembles should differ from each other since the inter-monopole correlations are absent in the latter case contrary to the former one. As we will see below the situation is similar to the lattice monopole action discussed in the previous section.

Using eq. (2) the lattice density (47) can be written in the continuum theory as follows:

$$k^2=_{C_s}\text{d}^3x_{C_s}\text{d}^3y\rho (x)\rho (y),$$
(48)
where the lattice site $`s`$ is fixed and the average is taken in the Coulomb gas of the magnetic monopoles described by the partition function (4). We assume the validity of the dilute gas approximation for the continuum monopoles.

The correlator of the continuum monopole densities, $`\rho (x)\rho (y)`$, is well known from ref. . Introducing the source for the magnetic monopole density, $`J`$, eq. (48) can be rewritten as follows:

$$k^2=_{C_s}\text{d}^3x_{C_s}\text{d}^3y\frac{\delta ^2}{\delta J(x)\delta J(y)}\mathrm{exp}\{i\text{d}^3z\rho (z)J(z)\}|_{J=0}.$$
(49)
Then we repeat the transformations in the previous section which led us to eq. (2.1). Integrating over quadratic fluctuations of the field $`\chi `$ we get in the leading order

$$\rho (x)\rho (y)=\rho \left[\delta ^{(3)}(xy)m_D^2D_{m_D}(xy)\right].$$
(50)
Substituting eq. (50) in eq. (48) and taking the integrals over the cell $`C_s`$ we get

$$k^2=\rho b^3P(\mu ),$$
(51)
where $`\mu `$ is the dimensionless Debye mass, eq. (20) and in the thermodynamical limit the function $`P`$ is

$$P(\mu )(^1)_{0,0}(\mu )=1\mu ^2\frac{\text{d}^3q}{(2\pi )^3}H(q,\mu ).$$
(52)
Here the inverse matrix $`_{s,s^{}}`$ is given by eq. (16) and the function $`H`$ is defined in eq. (21). The finite-volume analog of eq. (52) can be easily written using the substitution (31). *Note that eq. (51), (52) establish a direct relation between the density of the squared lattice monopole charges and the lattice monopole action, eq. (18).*

It is interesting to study the scaling laws of the lattice monopole densities for large and small monopoles. In the limiting cases the behaviour of the function $`P`$ is as follows:

$`P(\mu )=\{\begin{array}{cc}C_1\mu ^1+O(\mu ^3),\hfill & \mu \mathrm{},\hfill \\ 1C_2\mu ^2+O(\mu ^4),\hfill & \mu 0,\hfill \end{array}`$ (55)
where the constants $`C_{1,2}`$ are

$$C_12.94,C_2=\frac{\text{d}^3q}{(2\pi )^3}H(q,0)0.148.$$
(56)
Substituting the asymptotic functions (55) in eq. (51) we get the scaling laws (in physical units) for the density of the squared lattice monopole charge:

$`k^2=\{\begin{array}{cc}C_1\rho \lambda _Db^2\left[1+O\left(\left(\lambda _D/b\right)^2\right)\right],\hfill & b\lambda _D,\hfill \\ \rho b^3\left[1+C_2\rho (b/\lambda _D)^2+O\left(\left(b/\lambda _D\right)^4\right)\right],\hfill & b\lambda _D.\hfill \end{array}`$ (59)
One can note some interesting properties of the density of the squared magnetic charge, eq. (59).

1. The dependence of the lattice monopole charge squared on the monopole size $`b`$ is always polynomial, $`b^n`$. In particular, this property is remarkable in the large-$`b`$ region: one may expect that the screening of the monopole charges in the magnetic monopole plasma would lead to an exponential behaviour, $`e^{\text{const.}m_Db}`$, which is not the case.
2. As in the case of the lattice monopole action, the power $`n`$ of the leading scaling law depends crucially on the value of the ratio of the lattice monopole size and the Debye screening length.
3. The proportionality of the density $`k^2`$ to $`b^2`$ in large-$`b`$ region has a simple explanation. In a random gas of continuum monopoles we would get $`k^2\rho b^3`$ since the monopoles are not correlated with each other. In the Coulomb gas the monopoles are correlated and moreover, screened. Therefore the monopoles separated from the boundary of the cell by the distance larger than $`\lambda _D`$, do not contribute to $`k^2`$. Consequently, the $`b^3`$ proportionality for the random gas turns into $`\lambda _Db^2`$ in the Coulomb gas and we get $`k^2\rho \lambda _Db^2`$. The coefficient of proportionality is of a geometrical origin.
4. In the small $`b`$ region the density of the squared lattice monopole charges is equal to the density of the continuum monopoles times the volume of the cell. This is natural, since the smaller volume of the lattice cell, $`b^3`$, the smaller chance for two continuum monopoles to be located at the same cell. Therefore each cell predominantly contains not more that one continuum monopole, which leads to the relation $`k_s^2=|k_s|=0,1`$. As a result we get $`k^2\rho _{\mathrm{latt}}(b)\rho b^3`$ in the limit $`b0`$.

Closing this section we mention interesting relations between the density of the small- and large- sized lattice monopoles and the coefficients in front of, respectively, the mass and the Coulomb terms of the monopole action, eqs.(42), (59):

$$C(b)=\frac{C_1}{k^2(b)},b\lambda _D,\text{and}M(b)=\frac{1}{4k^2(b)},b\lambda _D.$$
(60)
All these results are obtained in the gaussian approximation. The results on next to the leading order correction to the action and the monopole density will be published elsewhere .

## 3 Numerical results

### 3.1 Details of simulations

In order to get perfect lattice monopole action and density we perform numerically blockspin transformations for the lattice monopole currents. The original model is define on the fine lattice with the lattice spacing $`a`$ and after the blockspin transformation, the renormalized lattice spacing becomes $`b=na`$, where $`n`$ is the number of steps of blockspin transformations. The continuum limit is taken as the limit $`a0`$ and $`n\mathrm{}`$ for a fixed physical scale $`b`$.

Finite temperature system possesses a periodic boundary condition for time direction and the physical length in the time direction is limited to less than $`1/T`$. In this case it is useful to introduce anisotropic lattices. In the space direction, we perform the blockspin transformation and the continuum limit is taken as $`a_s0`$ and $`n_s\mathrm{}`$ for a fixed physical scale $`b=n_sa_s`$. Here $`a_s`$ is the lattice spacing in the space directions and $`n_s`$ is the blockspin factor. In the time direction, the continuum limit is taken as $`a_t0`$ and $`N_t\mathrm{}`$ for a fixed temperature $`T=1/(N_ta_t)`$. Here $`a_t`$ is the lattice spacing in the time direction and $`N_t`$ is the number of lattice sites for the time direction. After taking the continuum limit, we finally get the effective lattice monopole action which depends on the physical scale $`b`$ and the temperature $`T`$.

In this paper the numerical procedure to generate the field configurations is identical to the one used ref. . While referring an interested reader to the above paper, here we mention for completeness briefly the basic points of our numerical procedure. The anisotropic Wilson action for pure four-dimensional $`SU(2)`$ QCD is written as

$`S`$ $`=`$ $`\beta \left\{{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\gamma }}{\displaystyle \underset{s,i>j4}{}}P_{ij}(s)+\gamma {\displaystyle \underset{s,i4}{}}P_{i4}(s)\right\},`$
$`P_{\mu \nu }(s)`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}Tr\left[\mathrm{𝟙}U_\mu (s)U_\nu (s+\widehat{\mu })U_\mu ^{}(s+\widehat{\nu })U_\nu ^{}(s)\right]+\text{h.c.}`$ (61)
If $`\gamma =1`$, the lattice is isotropic $`(a_s=a_t)`$. We can consider various lattice spacings $`a_s`$ and $`a_t`$ by varying the parameters $`\beta `$ and $`\gamma `$ in the action. The procedure to determine the relation between the lattice spacings $`a_s`$, $`a_t`$ and the parameters $`\beta `$, $`\gamma `$ is described in details in ref. . Using the parameters which are determined in ref. , we simulate the pure four-dimensional $`SU(2)`$ QCD on the lattice $`48^3\times L_t`$ with $`L_t=12,10,8,6,4`$ corresponding to temperature $`T/T_c=1.6,1.92,2.4,3.2,4.8`$. The parameters used here are summarized in Table 1. The scaling behaviors for time-like lattice monopole action at above mentioned lattices show in large $`b`$ region .

To study the abelian monopole dynamics we generate the thermalized non-abelian link fields $`\{U_\mu (s)\}`$ and we perform abelian projection in the Maximally abelian (MA) gauge  for each $`SU(2)`$ configuration. The MA gauge fixing condition is the maximization of the quantity $`R`$,

$$\underset{\mathrm{\Omega }}{\mathrm{max}}R[U^{(\mathrm{\Omega })}],R[U]=Tr\underset{s,\mu }{}\left[U_\mu (s)\sigma _3U_\mu ^{}(s+\widehat{\mu })\sigma _3\right].$$
(62)
under the $`SU(2)`$ gauge transformations, $`UU^{(\mathrm{\Omega })}=\mathrm{\Omega }^{}U\mathrm{\Omega }`$. The gauge fixing condition (62) is invariant under an abelian subgroup of the group of the $`SU(2)`$ gauge transformations. Thus the condition (62) corresponds to the partial gauge fixing, $`SU(2)U(1)`$.

After the MA gauge fixing, the abelian, $`\{u_\mu (s)\}`$, and non-abelian $`\{\stackrel{~}{U}_\mu (s)\}`$ link fields are separated, $`\stackrel{~}{U}_\mu (s)=C_\mu (s)u_\mu (s)`$ , where

$$C_\mu (s)=\left(\begin{array}{cc}\sqrt{1|c_\mu (s)|^2}& c_\mu ^{}(s)\\ c_\mu (s)& \sqrt{1|c_\mu (s)|^2}\end{array}\right),u_\mu (s)=\left(\begin{array}{cc}e^{i\theta _\mu (s)}& 0\\ 0& e^{i\theta _\mu (s)}\end{array}\right).$$
(63)
The vector fields $`C_\mu (s)`$ and $`u_\mu (s)`$ transform like a charged matter and, respectively, a gauge field under the residual $`U(1)`$ symmetry. Next we define a lattice monopole current (DeGrand-Toussaint monopole) . Abelian plaquette variables $`\theta _{\mu \nu }(s)`$ are written as

$$\theta _{\mu \nu }(s)=\theta _\mu (s)+\theta _\nu (s+\widehat{\mu })\theta _\mu (s+\widehat{\nu })\theta _\nu (s),(4\pi <\theta _{\mu \nu }(s)4\pi ).$$
(64)
It is decomposed into two terms using integer variables $`n_{\mu \nu }(s)`$:

$$\theta _{\mu \nu }(s)\overline{\theta }_{\mu \nu }(s)+2\pi n_{\mu \nu }(s),(\pi <\overline{\theta }_{\mu \nu }(s)\pi ).$$
(65)
Here $`\overline{\theta }_{\mu \nu }(s)`$ is interpreted as an electromagnetic flux through the plaquette and $`n_{\mu \nu }(s)`$ corresponds to the number of Dirac string piercing the plaquette. The lattice monopole current is defined as

$$k_\mu (s)=\frac{1}{2}ϵ_{\mu \nu \rho \sigma }_\nu n_{\rho \sigma }(s+\widehat{\mu }).$$
(66)
It satisfies the conservation law $`_\mu ^{}k_\mu (s)=0`$.

To study numerically the lattice monopoles of various lattice sizes we use the so-called extended monopole construction . At zero temperature the extended monopoles can be defined in the symmetric way. They have the physical size $`b^3`$ where $`b=na`$. The charge of the $`n`$-blocked monopole is equal to the sum of the charges of the elementary lattice monopoles inside the $`n^3`$ lattice cell. At finite temperature the blocking of spatial and temporal currents should be done separately :

$`K_{\mu 4}(s_s,s_4)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{i,j=0}{\overset{n_s1}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{l=0}{\overset{n_t1}{}}}k_{\mu 4}(n_ss_s+(n_s1)\widehat{\mu }+i\widehat{\nu }+j\widehat{\rho },n_ts_4+l),`$
$`K_4(s_s,s_4)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{i,j,l=0}{\overset{n_s1}{}}}k_4(n_ss_s+i\widehat{\mu }+j\widehat{\nu }+l\widehat{\rho },n_ts_4+(n_t1)),`$ (67)
where $`n_s`$ ($`n_t`$) is the number of blocking steps in space (time) direction.

We consider only the $`n_t=1`$ case since we are interested in high temperatures for which the monopoles are almost static. The lattice blocking is performed only in spatial directions, $`n_s=1\mathrm{}8`$, and we study only the static components $`K_4`$ among the $`4D`$ monopole currents $`K_\mu `$ (below we denote $`K_4`$ as $`k`$.). At high temperature we disregard the spatial currents $`K_i`$ since they are not interesting from the point of view of the long-range non-perturbative spatial physics. The size of the lattice monopoles is measured (unless otherwise specified) in terms of the zero temperature string tension, $`\sigma _{T=0}`$.

In order to figure out whether the continuum monopole currents can be described by the Coulomb gas model we should compare Monte Carlo results with the appropriate analytical predictions derived in the previous section. In principle this should allow us to obtain all independent parameters of the Coulomb gas (the continuum monopole density and the Debye screening length). However, the lattice monopoles of small sizes are largely affected by the lattice artifacts since in this case the number of blocking steps is small and possible magnetic charges of such monopoles are restricted due to peculiarities of the DeGrand-Toussaint definition . Moreover, the short-range interaction between the continuum monopoles should deviate from the simple Coulomb law due to a non-zero finite radius of the abelian monopole . Thus in order to get reliable results we perform the comparison of the numerical data with analytical predictions for sufficiently large blocking steps only. The restriction to large-$`b`$ region allows us to calculate the product of the continuum monopole density and the Debye screening length,

$$R(T)=\lambda _D(T)\rho (T),$$
(68)
while a separate calculation of these quantities is not possible. Nevertheless the knowledge of quantity is enough to make a conclusion about realization of the Coulomb gas picture for static continuum monopole lines. In subsections 3.2 and 3.3 we get the quantity $`R`$ from the lattice monopole action and density, respectively. To avoid confusion we denote $`R`$ in these cases as $`R_{act}`$ and $`R_\rho `$, correspondingly. In subsection 3.4 we check the consistency of the obtained values of $`R_{act}`$ and $`R_\rho `$ with each other and with the Coulomb gas picture.

### 3.2 Lattice monopole action

The lattice monopole action for the static monopole currents, $`k_s`$, at high temperatures was found numerically in ref.  using an inverse Monte-Carlo procedure. It turns out that the self-interaction of the temporal lattice currents can be successfully described by the quadratic monopole action:

$$S_{\mathrm{mon}}(k)=\underset{i}{}f_iS_i(k),$$
(69)
where $`S_i`$ are two-point operators of the lattice monopole charges corresponding to different separations between the charges. The term $`S_1`$ corresponds to the zero distance between the lattice monopoles, $`S_2`$ corresponds to the unit distance and so on (see ref.  for further details).

The two-point coupling constants, $`f_i`$, of the lattice monopole action are shown in figures 1 and 2 as a function the distance between the lattice points. The numerical data corresponds to lowest, $`T=1.6T_c`$, and highest, $`T=4.8T_c`$, available temperatures. The number of blocking steps is fixed to $`n_s=6`$ while the spatial spacings of the fine lattice, $`a_s`$, are available for a set of values ranging from $`a_s=.16\sigma ^{1/2}`$ till $`a_s=.25\sigma ^{1/2}`$.

According to eq. (42) the leading term in the lattice monopole action for large lattice monopoles ($`b\lambda _D`$) must be proportional to the Coulomb interaction,

$$S_{\mathrm{mon}}(k)=C_C\underset{s,s^{}}{}k_sD_{s,s^{}}k_s^{}.$$
(70)
To check this prediction we fit the coupling constants $`f_i`$ by the Coulomb interaction (70) treating $`C_C`$ is the fitting parameter. The fits are visualized by the dashed lines in figures 1 and 2.

As one can see from the figures, this *one-parametric* fit works very good. The $`\chi ^2/d.o.f.`$ parameter is of the order of unity for most fits while it is of order of 2 for the smallest lattice spacing, $`a\sqrt{\sigma }=0.16`$. Note that the dependence of the lattice Coulomb interaction on the distance between the interaction points is not a monotonic function, as one can see from the fitting curves. Similar non-monotonic behaviour is also observed in the numerical data.

Using the fitting of the action we obtain the values of $`C_C`$ for various sizes of the lattice monopole, $`b\sqrt{\sigma }=.96\mathrm{}1.5`$ at different temperatures, $`T=(1.6\mathrm{}4.8)T_c`$. According to eq. (42) the pre-Coulomb coefficient $`C_C(b,T)`$ at sufficiently large lattice monopole sizes, $`b`$ ($`b\lambda _D`$) should be as follows:

$$C_C(b,T)=\frac{1}{R(T)b^2},$$
(71)
where $`R`$ is the product of the screening length and the continuum monopole density, eq. (68).

We present the data for the pre-Coulomb coefficient, $`C_C(b,T)`$ and the corresponding *one-parameter* fits (71) in figure 4. The fit is one-parametric with $`R`$ being the fitting parameter. Again we observe that the agreement between the data for $`C_C`$ and the fits is very good. We show the quantity $`R`$ $`vs.`$ temperature in figure 4.

The lattice Coulomb form of the action and proportionality of the pre-Coulomb term to $`b^2`$ at large values of $`b`$ was established  also in the three-dimensional Georgi-Glashow model for the ’t Hooft-Polyakov monopoles. These facts does not come unexpected from the point of view of the discussion above.

### 3.3 Lattice monopole density

As we have seen from previous section the density of squared lattice monopole charge should also contain the information about the parameters of the Coulomb gas model. According to eq. (59) the large-$`b`$ asymptotics of the quantity $`k^2(b)/b^2`$ can be used to extract the product of the screening length and the continuum monopole density $`R`$, eq. (68). We have measured the density of squared lattice monopole charge for all available temperatures and lattice monopole sizes. As an example we plot in figures 6 and 6 the quantity $`k^2(b)/b^2`$ $`vs.`$ the lattice monopole size, $`b`$, for lowest and highest available temperatures, respectively.

Our theoretical expectations (59) indicate that the function $`k^2(b)/b^2`$ must vanish at small monopole sizes and tend to constant at large $`b`$. This behaviour can be observed in our numerical data, figure 6, up to some jumps for densities with different $`n_s`$. We ascribe these jumps to the lattice artifacts emerged due to finiteness of the fine lattice spacing, $`a`$, and finite volume effects.

According to eq. (59) we should know the large-$`b`$ asymptotics of $`k^2(b)/b^2`$ to get the quantity $`R`$, eq. (68). These asymptotics are approximated by averaging of the appropriate $`n_s=8`$ data for which the behaviour of the function in question is almost flat. Then we get the product of the screening length and the continuum monopole density, $`R`$, depicted in figure 7.

The result is very similar to the one obtained from the behavior of the lattice monopole action. However, the quantity $`R`$ obtained from the lattice monopole density is a bit larger than the same quantity calculated from the lattice monopole action. This fact can be expected since we have approximated the asymptotics of $`k^2(b)/b^2`$ by the average of the $`n_s=8`$ data which may slightly differ from a correct asymptotics.

### 3.4 Check of the Coulomb gas picture for continuum monopoles

Although both quantities $`R_\rho `$ and $`R_{act}`$ correspond to the product of the screening length and the continuum monopole density, from a numerical point of view both $`R`$’s are independent. To check the self-consistency of our approach we plot the ratio of these quantities in figure 9. It is clearly seen that the ratio is independent of the temperature and very close to unity, as expected. The 10%–15% deviation of this quantity from unity may be explained by reasons mentioned in the end of the previous subsection.

A check of the validity of the Coulomb gas picture can be obtained with the help of the quantity

$$C_{sp}(T)=\frac{\sigma _{sp}(T)}{\lambda _D(T)\rho (T)}\frac{\sigma _{sp}(T)}{R(T)},$$
(72)
where $`\sigma _{sp}`$ is the spatial string tension. In the abelian projection approach the spatial string tension should be saturated by the contributions from the static continuum monopoles. In the dilute Coulomb gas of monopoles the string tension is : $`\sigma =8\sqrt{\rho }/g_M`$ while the screening length is given by (5). These relations imply that in the dilute Coulomb gas of continuum monopoles we should get $`C_{sp}=8`$.

We use the results for the spatial string tension of ref.  in the high temperature $`SU(2)`$ gluodynamics. It was found that for the temperatures higher than $`T2T_c`$ the spatial string tension can be well described by the formula: $`\sigma _{sp}(T)=0.136(11)g_{4D}^4(T)T^2`$, where $`g_{4D}(T)`$ is the four-dimensional $`SU(2)`$ 2-loop running coupling constant,

$$g_{4D}^2(T)=\frac{11}{12\pi ^2}\mathrm{log}\left(\frac{T}{\mathrm{\Lambda }_T}\right)+\frac{17}{44\pi ^2}\mathrm{log}\left[2\mathrm{log}\left(\frac{T}{\mathrm{\Lambda }_T}\right)\right],$$

with the scale parameter $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_T=0.076(13)T_c`$. Taking also into account the relation between the critical temperature and the zero-temperature string tension , $`T_c=0.69(2)\sqrt{\sigma }`$ we calculate the quantity $`C_{sp}`$ and plot it in figure 9 as a function of the temperature, $`T`$. If the Coulomb picture works then $`C_{sp}`$ should be close to $`8`$. From figure 9 we conclude that this is indeed the case at sufficiently high temperatures, $`T/T_c2.5`$.

## 4 Conclusions

In order to describe the lattice monopole dynamics we have proposed to consider the lattice monopoles as the defects which are blocked from continuum. In other words the lattice was suggested to be a measuring device for the continuum monopoles. As a result we are able to draw the following conclusions:

* Using the Monte Carlo results for the density of the squared monopole charges and the monopole action we are able to calculate the product of the abelian magnetic screening length and the monopole density corresponding to the continuum Coulomb gas model. The values of this parameter obtained from density and action measurements are consistent with each other and — at sufficiently high temperatures — are consistent with known results for the spatial string tension. At temperatures $`T/T_c2.5`$ the spatial string tension is dominated by contributions from the continuum static monopoles.
* The *continuum* Coulomb gas model can describe the results of the Monte Carlo simulations for the action and density of the *lattice* monopoles. The dependence of these quantities on the physical sizes of the lattice monopoles (the size of the cell which is used for the monopole detection) is in a good agreement with the analytical predictions.
* The lattice monopole action is dominated by the mass and the Coulomb terms for, respectively, small and large sizes of the lattice monopoles. A relation between the density of the squared magnetic charges and the monopole action is established (eqs. (18), (51), (52) and/or eqs. (36), (38), (60)). Our analytical derivation was done in a gaussian approximation. We have shown that the corrections to the leading terms of the action are small in the large-$`b`$ limit. A detailed analysis of the corrections will be discussed elsewhere .

We believe that this method can also be applied to the four dimensional non-abelian gauge theory. We think that this would allow to get (at least, a part of) parameters of the dual superconductor model.

###### Acknowledgments.

We thank E.M. Ilgenfritz, M.I. Polikarpov, H. Reinhardt and V.I. Zakharov for interesting discussions. We also grateful to W. Bietenholz for bringing to our attention refs. . M.N.Ch. is supported by the JSPS Fellowship P01023.


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# x Reparameterization Invariance for Collinear Operators

## Abstract

We discuss restrictions on operators in the soft-collinear effective theory (SCET) which follow from the ambiguity in the decomposition of collinear momenta and the freedom in the choice of light-like basis vectors $`n`$ and $`\overline{n}`$. Invariance of SCET under small changes in $`n`$ and/or $`\overline{n}`$ implies a symmetry of the effective theory that constrains the form of allowed operators with collinear fields. The restrictions occur at a given order in the power counting as well as between different orders. As an example, we present the complete set of higher order operators that are related to the collinear quark kinetic term.

preprint:   UCSD/PTH 02-07 INT-PUB-02-36 DUKE-TH-02-220

Strong interaction processes involving highly energetic particles can be described within an effective field theory framework known as the Soft-Collinear Effective Theory (SCET) bfl ; bfps ; cbis ; bpssoft . SCET has been used to simplify proofs of classical factorization theorems bfprs , provide the first all-orders proof of factorization in $`\overline{B}D\pi `$ decays bps , and facilitate the resummation of Sudakov logarithms in $`B`$ and $`\mathrm{{\rm Y}}`$ decays bfl ; bfps ; xian .

Suppose a set of light hadrons are created in a hard-scattering process. The hadrons are assumed to have a large energy $`Q\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mathrm{QCD}}`$, and invariant mass $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mathrm{QCD}}`$. To a good approximation each light hadron is composed of constituents nearly collinear to a light-like vector $`n`$. To decompose collinear momenta it is necessary to define an auxiliary light-like vector for an orthogonal direction, $`\overline{n}`$, such that $`n\overline{n}=2`$. If for example, $`n`$ is along the positive $`z`$-axis, $`n^\mu =(1,0,0,1)`$, then one could choose $`\overline{n}^\mu =(1,0,0,1)`$ or equally well $`\overline{n}^\mu =(3,2,2,1)`$. Since the perpendicular size of the hadron is $`1/\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mathrm{QCD}}`$ the momentum $`P^\mu `$ of a collinear constituent is $`(nP,\overline{n}P,P_{})Q(\lambda ^2,1,\lambda )`$, where $`\lambda \mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mathrm{QCD}}/Q`$. This scaling holds for either choice of $`\overline{n}`$ above. The SCET provides a systematic way of dealing with the disparate scales $`Q\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mathrm{QCD}}(\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mathrm{QCD}})^2/Q`$. The momentum $`P^\mu `$ of a fast particle is decomposed as the sum of a large momentum $`p^\mu `$ with $`\overline{n}p\lambda ^0`$, $`p_{}^\mu \lambda `$, and $`np=0`$ and a smaller momentum $`k^\mu \lambda ^2`$:

$`P^\mu =p^\mu +k^\mu ={\displaystyle \frac{n^\mu }{2}}\overline{n}(p+k)+{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}^\mu }{2}}nk+(p_{}^\mu +k_{}^\mu ).`$ (1)
The large momentum $`p`$ is treated as a label on collinear fields, and the small residual momentum $`k`$ is associated with the spatial variation of the fields. In this paper we show that requiring invariance under the ambiguity in the decomposition in Eq. (1) has important consequences for collinear operators in SCET. As examples, we show that this reparameterization invariance places important restrictions on the form of the leading order collinear quark action, and fixes the anomalous dimensions of an infinite class of subleading terms.

The decomposition in Eq. (1) is similar to the one in heavy quark effective theory (HQET). In HQET $`P^\mu =mv^\mu +k^\mu `$, where $`m`$ is the heavy quark mass, the velocity $`v^\mu `$ labels HQET fields $`h_v(x)`$, and $`k^\mu `$ is a residual momentum picked out by derivatives on $`h_v`$. The ambiguity in the decomposition of $`P^\mu `$ leads to a reparameterization invariance LM . This symmetry is the remnant of invariance under the Lorentz generators $`v_\mu M^{\mu \nu }`$ which were broken by the introduction of the vector $`v_\mu `$ (for the rest frame these generators are the boosts $`M^{0i}=K^i`$). Requiring that physics is invariant under the simultaneous change

$`v_\mu v_\mu +{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }_\mu }{m}},k_\mu k_\mu \mathrm{\Delta }_\mu (v\mathrm{\Delta }=0)`$ (2)
gives useful constraints on the form of the HQET Lagrangian and currents LM ; Chen ; FGM ; Manohar ; Sundrum ; Neubert ; Campanario:2002fy .

In SCET reparameterization invariance is more involved, because the collinear momentum decomposition in Eq. (1) has a more complicated structure. In particular, HQET reparameterization invariance only connects operators appearing at different orders in the $`1/m`$ expansion, while we will see that the counterpart in SCET also constrains the form of operators appearing at any given order. From Eq. (1) two types of ambiguity are:

* The component decompositions, $`\overline{n}(p+k)`$ and $`(p_{}^\mu +k_{}^\mu )`$, are arbitrary by an order $`Q\lambda ^2`$ amount, and any decomposition should yield an equivalent description.
* Any choice of the reference light-cone vectors $`n`$ and $`\overline{n}`$ satisfying

$`n^2=0,\overline{n}^2=0,n\overline{n}=2,`$ (3)
are equally good, and can not change physical predictions.

For type (b) the most general infinitesimal change in $`n`$ and $`\overline{n}`$ which preserves Eq. (3) is a linear combination of

$`\text{(I)}\{\begin{array}{c}n_\mu n_\mu +\mathrm{\Delta }_\mu ^{}\hfill \\ \overline{n}_\mu \overline{n}_\mu \hfill \end{array}\text{(II)}\{\begin{array}{c}n_\mu n_\mu \hfill \\ \overline{n}_\mu \overline{n}_\mu +\epsilon _\mu ^{}\hfill \end{array}\text{(III)}\{\begin{array}{c}n_\mu (1+\alpha )n_\mu \hfill \\ \overline{n}_\mu (1\alpha )\overline{n}_\mu \hfill \end{array},`$ (10)
where $`\{\mathrm{\Delta }_\mu ^{},ϵ_\mu ^{},\alpha \}`$ are five infinitesimal parameters, and $`\overline{n}\epsilon ^{}=n\epsilon ^{}=\overline{n}\mathrm{\Delta }^{}=n\mathrm{\Delta }^{}=0`$. Invariance under subset (I) of these transformations has already been explored in Ref. chay , and used to derive important constraints on the next-to-leading order collinear Lagrangian and heavy-to-light currents. Here we explore the consequences of invariance under the full set of reparameterization transformations and extend the analysis of class (I) transformations to higher orders in $`\lambda `$. In particular we show that the transformations in classes (II) and (III) are necessary to rule out the possibility of additional operators in the lowest order collinear Lagrangian that are allowed by power counting and gauge invariance.

As might be expected the collinear reparameterization invariance is a manifestation of the Lorentz symmetry that was broken by introducing the vectors $`n`$ and $`\overline{n}`$. Essentially reparameterization invariance restores Lorentz invariance to SCET order by order in $`\lambda `$. The five parameters in Eq. (10) correspond to the five generators of the Lorentz group which are “broken” by introducing the vectors $`n`$ and $`\overline{n}`$, namely {$`n_\mu M^{\mu \nu }`$, $`\overline{n}_\mu M^{\mu \nu }`$}. If the perpendicular directions are $`1,2`$ then the five broken generators are $`Q_1^\pm =J_1\pm K_2`$, $`Q_2^\pm =J_2\pm K_1`$, and $`K_3`$. The type (I) transformations are equivalent to the combined actions of an infinitesimal boost in the $`x`$ ($`y`$) direction and a rotation around the $`y`$ ($`x`$) axis, such that $`\overline{n}_\mu `$ is left invariant with generators ($`Q_1^{}`$, $`Q_2^+`$). Type (II) transformations are similar but ($`Q_1^+`$, $`Q_2^{}`$) leave $`n_\mu `$ invariant, while transformation (III) is a boost along the $`3`$ direction ($`K_3`$).

In SCET one introduces three classes of fields: collinear, soft and ultrasoft (usoft), with momentum scaling as $`Q(\lambda ^2,1,\lambda )`$, $`Q(\lambda ,\lambda ,\lambda )`$ and $`Q(\lambda ^2,\lambda ^2,\lambda ^2)`$, respectively. For our purposes the interesting fields are those for collinear quarks ($`\xi _{n,p}`$), collinear gluons ($`A_{n,q}`$), and usoft gluons ($`A_u`$). At tree level the transition from QCD to collinear quark fields can be achieved by a field redefinition bfps

$`\psi (x)={\displaystyle \underset{p}{}}e^{ipx}\left[1+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}𝒟}}𝒟/^{}{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\right]\xi _{n,p},`$ (11)
where the two-component collinear quark field $`\xi _n`$ satisfies bfl

$`{\displaystyle \frac{n/\overline{n}/}{4}}\xi _n=\xi _n,n/\xi _n=0.`$ (12)
The covariant derivatives are further decomposed into two parts, $`𝒟^\mu =D_c^\mu +D_u^\mu `$, where $`D_c^\mu `$ and $`D_u^\mu `$ involve collinear and usoft momenta and gauge fields respectively. To distinguish the size of derivatives it is convenient to introduce label operators, $`\overline{𝒫}`$ and $`𝒫_{}`$, which pick out the labels of collinear fields cbis . For instance, $`\overline{𝒫}\xi _{n,p}=\overline{n}p\xi _{n,p}`$. The label operators allow sums and phases involving label momenta to be suppressed. Under gauge transformations the usoft gluons act like a background field and collinear gauge invariance ensures that only the linear combinations bpssoft

$`i\overline{n}D_c=\overline{𝒫}+g\overline{n}A_{n,q},iD_c^{}=𝒫^{}+gA_{n,q}^{},in𝒟=inD_u+gnA_{n,q}`$ (13)
appear. Each term in Eq. (13) is the same order in $`\lambda `$. It is often convenient to swap the order $`\lambda ^0`$ field $`\overline{n}A_{n,q}(x)`$ for the Wilson line

$`W=\left[{\displaystyle \underset{\mathrm{perms}}{}}\mathrm{exp}\left({\displaystyle \frac{g}{\overline{𝒫}}}\overline{n}A_{n,q}(x)\right)\right]=\left[{\displaystyle \frac{1}{i\overline{n}D_c}}\overline{𝒫}\right],`$ (14)
where the differential operators do not act outside the square brackets, and $`[i\overline{n}D_cW]=0`$.

Now consider the constraints imposed by reparameterization transformations of type (a) in Eq. (1). These act only on the components of label momenta, so

$`\xi _{n,p}(x)e^{i\beta x}\xi _{n,p+\beta }(x),A_{n,q}(x)e^{i\beta x}A_{n,q+\beta }(x),`$ (15)
where the label and phase changes compensate each other. Expressed in terms of $`𝒫^\mu =\frac{1}{2}n^\mu \overline{𝒫}+𝒫_{}^\mu `$, and $`i_\mu `$ the transformation in Eq. (15) essentially causes

$`𝒫_\mu 𝒫_\mu +\beta _\mu ,i_\mu i_\mu \beta _\mu ,`$ (16)
with $`\beta _\mu =\overline{n}\beta n_\mu /2+\beta _\mu ^{}`$. This implies that reparameterization invariant operators must be built out of the linear combination $`𝒫_\mu +i_\mu `$. Usoft gauge invariance forces $`i_\mu `$ to appear along with an usoft gauge field in the combination $`i^\mu +gA_u^\mu `$. Furthermore, from Eq. (13) collinear gauge invariance forces collinear fields to appear along with $`𝒫_\mu `$ and $`n`$. Thus, reparameterization invariant operators should be built out of

$`𝒟^\mu D_c^\mu +D_u^\mu .`$ (17)
Since the components of $`D_c`$ and $`D_u`$ scale in different ways we see that Eq. (17) connects operators at different orders in $`\lambda `$. It is important to note, however, that factors of $`D_u^\mu `$ can also appear by themselves (when the $`_\mu `$ acts on non-collinear fields). An example is the $`D/_u`$ in the usoft quark Lagrangian. Eq. (17) is analogous to the fact that reparameterization invariance in HQET forces $`v^\mu +iD^\mu /m`$ to appear together LM .

The ambiguities of type (b) give more interesting constraints on operators. The transformations (I,II,III) change the decomposition of any vector or tensor along the light-like directions. For example, for a vector

$`V^\mu ={\displaystyle \frac{n^\mu }{2}}\overline{n}V+{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}^\mu }{2}}nV+V_{}^\mu ,`$ (18)
the components transform as

$`(nV,\overline{n}V,V_{}^\mu )`$ $`\stackrel{\mathrm{I}}{}`$ $`(nV+\mathrm{\Delta }^{}V^{},\overline{n}V,V_{}^\mu {\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }_{}^\mu }{2}}\overline{n}V{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}^\mu }{2}}\mathrm{\Delta }^{}V^{}),`$
$`(nV,\overline{n}V,V_{}^\mu )`$ $`\stackrel{\mathrm{II}}{}`$ $`(nV,\overline{n}V+\epsilon _{}V_{},V_{}^\mu {\displaystyle \frac{\epsilon _{}^\mu }{2}}nV{\displaystyle \frac{n^\mu }{2}}\epsilon _{}V_{}),`$
$`(nV,\overline{n}V,V_{}^\mu )`$ $`\stackrel{\mathrm{III}}{}`$ $`(nV+\alpha nV,\overline{n}V\alpha \overline{n}V,V_{}^\mu ).`$ (19)
These results are easily derived by demanding that the vector itself remains invariant, $`V^\mu V^\mu `$. These transformations apply to all vector components including those of the covariant derivative $`𝒟^\mu `$. Due to the projection operators in Eq. (12) the transformations also effect collinear spinors. To derive the spinor transformations we first equate the decomposition in Eq. (11) before and after the reparameterization transformation,

$`{\displaystyle \underset{p}{}}e^{ipx}\left[1+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}𝒟}}𝒟/^{}{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\right]\xi _{n,p}={\displaystyle \underset{p^{}}{}}e^{ip^{}x}\left[1+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}𝒟^{}}}𝒟/_{}^{}{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/^{}}{2}}\right]\xi _{n,p}^{},`$ (20)
where the primes denote quantities transformed under (I), (II), or (III). In each case multiplying both sides by the transformed $`n/\overline{n}//4`$ projection operator then gives an expression for $`\xi _{n,p}^{}`$ in terms of $`\xi _{n,p}`$. We find

$`\xi _n`$ $`\stackrel{\mathrm{I}}{}`$ $`(1+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\mathrm{\Delta }/^{}\overline{n}/)\xi _n,`$ (21)
$`\xi _n`$ $`\stackrel{\mathrm{II}}{}`$ $`(1+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\epsilon /^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}𝒟}}𝒟/_{})\xi _n,`$ (22)
$`\xi _n`$ $`\stackrel{\mathrm{III}}{}`$ $`\xi _n.`$ (23)
Finally, we consider the transformation of the Wilson line in Eq. (14). From this definition we see that $`W`$ is invariant under type (I) and (III) transformations. The transformation of $`W`$ under (II) can be derived by noting that $`[\overline{n}D_cW]=0`$ implies $`0=\delta [\overline{n}D_cW]=[\delta (\overline{n}D_c)W]+[\overline{n}D_c\delta W]`$ which we can solve for $`\delta W`$ to find

$`W`$ $`\stackrel{\mathrm{II}}{}`$ $`\left[\left(1{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}𝒟}}ϵ_{}𝒟_{}\right)W\right].`$ (24)
For easy reference a summary of the most commonly used transformations is given

in Table 1.

Requiring invariance under the transformations in Table 1 places important constraints on collinear operators. In particular some classes of operators are ruled out, while others have coefficients whose matching and anomalous dimensions are related to all orders in perturbation theory.

For the purpose of power counting we take

$`\mathrm{\Delta }_{}\lambda ,ϵ_{}\lambda ^0,\alpha \lambda ^0,`$ (25)
and then demand reparameterization invariance order by order in $`\lambda `$. The scaling for the infinitesimal parameters is assigned to be the maximum power that leaves the power counting of the collinear momentum components intact. This means that only transformations that leave collinear fields collinear are considered. For example we do not consider large longitudinal boosts $`1/\lambda `$ that could turn a collinear momentum into a soft momentum. For $`\mathrm{\Delta }_{}`$ we see from Table 1 that the $`n`$ and $`\xi _n`$ transformations are suppressed by $`\lambda `$, while the transformation of $`n𝒟`$ and $`𝒟^{}`$ include homogeneous terms. By homogeneous we mean the same order in $`\lambda `$ as the untransformed operator. For $`𝒟_\mu ^{}`$ the term $`\frac{1}{2}\overline{n}^\mu \mathrm{\Delta }_{}𝒟^{}\lambda ^2`$ is smaller than $`𝒟_\mu ^{}\lambda `$. For $`\epsilon _{}`$ the transformations of $`\xi _n`$, $`W`$, and $`\overline{n}𝒟`$ are suppressed by $`\lambda `$. The $`𝒟^{}`$ transformation involves a homogeneous term, as well as a term suppressed by a single $`\lambda `$. Finally, the type (III) transformations are completely homogeneous. Note that the homogeneous terms can induce constraints without mixing orders in the power counting. This occurs for all type (III) cases as well as for any leading order operator involving a quantity with a homogeneous term in its type (I) or (II) transformation.

In the remainder of this Letter we present the implications of the symmetry transformations (I)-(III) for the operators in the collinear quark Lagrangian. The leading order Lagrange density in the collinear quark sector can be obtained by tree level matching and is given by bfps ; cbis

$`_0=\overline{\xi }_n\{niD_u+gnA_n+(𝒫/_{}+gA/_n^{}){\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{𝒫}+g\overline{n}A_n}}(𝒫/_{}+gA/_n^{})\}{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n,`$ (26)
where $`_0\lambda ^4`$. As discussed above, invariance under collinear label reparameterization forces the collinear derivatives in SCET to appear with the ultrasoft derivatives. Therefore the Lagrangian (26) is just the first term in the expansion of the manifestly reparameterization invariant Lagrangian obtained by replacing the collinear derivatives with $`i𝒟`$

$``$ $`=`$ $`\overline{\xi }_n\{ni𝒟+i𝒟/^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}i𝒟}}i𝒟/^{}\}{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n.`$ (27)
Expanding the derivatives $`i𝒟`$ in powers of $`\lambda `$, one finds that $`=_0+_1+_2+\mathrm{}`$, where the terms $`_i`$ scale like $`\lambda ^{4+i}`$. In particular, the next two subleading terms in the Lagrange density are

$`_1`$ $`=`$ $`\overline{\xi }_n\{iD/_u^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}iD_c}}iD/_c^{}+iD/_c^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}iD_c}}iD/_u^{}\}{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n`$ (28)
$`_2`$ $`=`$ $`\overline{\xi }_n\{iD/_u^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}iD_c}}iD/_u^{}iD/_c^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}iD_c}}\overline{n}iD_u{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}iD_c}}iD/_c^{}\}{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n.`$
The expressions in Eq. (28) agree with the tree level matching result. The reparameterization argument shows that these terms are connected to the leading order Lagrangian. Thus, their structure is determined by $`_0`$ to all orders in perturbation theory and they have no non-trivial Wilson coefficients.666In principle the above results do not rule out the possibility of additional terms in the power suppressed collinear Lagrangians which are reparameterization invariant all by themselves. This result for $`_1`$ agrees with Ref. chay , while the structure of $`_2`$ (and all higher terms in the expansion of Eq. (27)) are new.

The observant reader will have noticed that the reasoning in Eqs. (26) through (28) relies on the fact that Eq. (26) is the unique lowest order Lagrangian. In fact using only collinear gauge invariance the operator appearing in Eq. (26) is not the most general allowed operator. For instance both

$`𝒪_1`$ $`=`$ $`\overline{\xi }_niD/_c^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}iD_c}}iD/_c^{}{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n,𝒪_2=\overline{\xi }_niD_{c\mu }^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}iD_c}}iD_c^\mu {\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n,`$ (29)
are collinear gauge invariant, but only $`𝒪_1`$ was included in Eq. (26). Even if only $`𝒪_1`$ is present at tree level, the other operator could in principle be induced through radiative corrections. The presence of $`𝒪_2`$ at leading order in $`\lambda `$ would be a concern, since it would imply that the collinear quark kinetic Lagrangian can only be defined order by order in perturbation theory. However, it is easy to show that $`𝒪_2`$ is ruled out by invariance under type (II) reparameterization transformations in SCET. We will present this in some detail before extending the basis in Eq. (29) to the most general set of gauge invariant operators.

To see that class (I) is not sufficient to rule out $`𝒪_2`$ note that since $`\delta _{(\mathrm{I})}[\overline{n}/\xi _n]=0`$ we have

$`\delta _{(\mathrm{I})}𝒪_2`$ $`=`$ $`\overline{\xi }_ni\mathrm{\Delta }^{}D_c{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n=\delta _{(\mathrm{I})}𝒪_1.`$ (30)
Here $`\delta _{(\mathrm{I})}𝒪_{1,2}`$ and $`𝒪_{1,2}`$ are the same order in $`\lambda `$. Now at this order we also have

$`\delta _{(\mathrm{I})}\left(\overline{\xi }_nni𝒟{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n\right)=\overline{\xi }_ni\mathrm{\Delta }^{}D_c{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n.`$ (31)
This shows that reparameterization invariance of type (I) ties the first two terms in Eq. (26) with the third one. However, as far as transformations of type (I) are concerned we could replace $`𝒪_1`$ in Eq. (26) by $`𝒪_2`$ and still leave $`_0`$ invariant.

For a type (II) transformation we begin by noting that for any scalar operator in the single collinear quark sector the terms homogeneous in $`\lambda `$ vanish identically. This follows from the fact that the index on $`D_{}^\mu `$ is contracted into another perpendicular vector, and that the transformation for $`\overline{n}^\mu `$ is subleading except for when it is contracted with $`\gamma _\mu `$. As discussed in Ref. bfprs  a complete Dirac basis for these bilinears is $`\overline{n}/`$, $`\overline{n}/\gamma _5`$, and $`\overline{n}/\gamma _{}^\mu `$. However, if $`\overline{n}/`$ in any of these Dirac structures is transformed the resulting structure vanishes between $`\xi _n`$ fields. This implies that as far as the collinear Lagrangian is concerned we can impose invariance under the remaining type (II) transformations order by order in $`\lambda `$ without worrying about connecting terms of different orders. In general this need not be true for currents.

Making a type (II) transformation one finds that the change in the first term of the effective Lagrangian in Eq. (26) is

$`\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}\overline{\xi }_nni𝒟{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n=\overline{\xi }_n(iD/_c^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}iD_c}}{\displaystyle \frac{\epsilon /^{}}{2}}ni𝒟+ni𝒟{\displaystyle \frac{\epsilon /^{}}{2}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}iD_c}}iD/_c^{}){\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n.`$ (32)
This variation is exactly canceled by the change in $`𝒪_1`$ coming from the $`iD/_c^{}`$ factors. The remaining variation in $`𝒪_1`$ is from the change in the $`\xi _n`$ fields and in the $`1/\overline{n}iD_c`$ factor, thus

$`\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}𝒪_1`$ $`=`$ $`\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}\overline{\xi }_nni𝒟{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n+\overline{\xi }_n\{iD/_c^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}iD_c}}{\displaystyle \frac{\epsilon /^{}}{2}}iD/_c^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}iD_c}}iD/_c^{}`$
$`iD/_c^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}iD_c}}\epsilon _{}iD_c^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}iD_c}}iD/_c^{}+iD/_c^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}iD_c}}iD/_c^{}{\displaystyle \frac{\epsilon /^{}}{2}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{n}iD_c}}iD/_c^{}\}{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n`$
$`=`$ $`\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}\overline{\xi }_nni𝒟{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n.`$
On the other hand, the variation of the $`D_{}`$’s in $`𝒪_2`$ gives terms with $`ϵ^{}D_c^{}`$ which can not cancel the variation of the $`in𝒟`$ term. Furthermore, for $`𝒪_2`$ the terms analogous to the ones in curly brackets in Eq. (x Reparameterization Invariance for Collinear Operators) do not vanish because the first and third terms from the variation of $`\xi `$ do not cancel against the term from the $`i\overline{n}D`$ variation. Thus, $`𝒪_2`$ is not allowed in the leading order effective Lagrangian by reparameterization invariance of type (II).

We now proceed to a more general analysis of the complete set of gauge invariant operators in the collinear Lagrangian up to $`\lambda ^4`$. A special feature of SCET is the presence of the dimensionful collinear covariant derivative $`\overline{n}iD_c=\overline{𝒫}+g\overline{n}A_n`$ which scales like $`\lambda ^0`$. Because of this operator, dimensional analysis and gauge invariance are not sufficient to completely constrain the operators that appear at a given order in $`\lambda `$. Since we require two $`\xi _n`$ fields the operators in the Lagrange density start at order $`\lambda ^2`$. At this order gauge invariance allows

$`_2`$ $`=`$ $`\overline{\xi }_n\overline{n}i𝒟{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n.`$ (34)
However, invariance under transformation (III) requires that each time $`\overline{n}`$ appears in the numerator it is accompanied by either an $`n`$ in the numerator or a factor of $`\overline{n}`$ in the denominator. Thus, the Lagrangian in Eq. (34) is not allowed by type (III) reparameterization invariance. At order $`\lambda ^3`$ the only way to construct an operator is with one factor of $`D_{}^\mu `$. Since the Lagrangian is a scalar this index must be contracted with an object that will not increase the power of $`\lambda `$, which leaves $`\overline{\xi }_n\overline{n}/𝒟/_{}\xi _n`$. However, this operator is also ruled out by type III reparameterization invariance.

At order $`\lambda ^4`$ there are infinitely many operators allowed by gauge invariance and invariance under (III):

$`_0^{}`$ $`=`$ $`\overline{\xi }_n𝒪{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n,`$ (35)
where

$`𝒪`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{a}{}}c_a𝒪^a+{\displaystyle \underset{a,b}{}}(s_{ab}𝒮^{ab}+t_{ab}𝒯^{ab}),`$ (36)
and the operators $`𝒪^a,𝒮^{ab}`$ and $`𝒯^{ab}`$ are

$`𝒪^a`$ $`=`$ $`N^a(ni𝒟){\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^a}}+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^a}}(ni𝒟)N^a,`$ (37)
$`𝒮^{ab}`$ $`=`$ $`N^ai𝒟/_{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^{a+b+1}}}i𝒟/_{}N^b+N^bi𝒟/_{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^{a+b+1}}}i𝒟/_{}N^a,`$
$`𝒯^{ab}`$ $`=`$ $`N^ai𝒟_{}^\mu {\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^{a+b+1}}}i𝒟_\mu ^{}N^b+N^bi𝒟_{}^\mu {\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^{a+b+1}}}i𝒟_\mu ^{}N^a.`$
To simplify the formulae we have defined $`N\overline{n}i𝒟`$. The operators $`𝒪^a,𝒮^{ab}`$ and $`𝒯^{ab}`$ are Hermitian so the coefficients $`c_a,s_{ab}`$ and $`t_{ab}`$ are real numbers. Since $`[iD_{}^i,iD_{}^j]=igG_{}^{ij}`$ and $`[N,iD_{}^i]=ig\overline{n}_\mu G^{\mu i}`$, any operator that is order $`\lambda ^4`$ and contains a collinear gluon field strength can be reduced to a linear combination of those in Eq. (37).

The variation of Eq. (35) under the transformation (II) is given by

$`\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}_0^{}=\overline{\xi }_n[\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}𝒪+i𝒟/_{}\epsilon /^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2N}}𝒪+𝒪{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2N}}\epsilon /^{}i𝒟/_{}]{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n.`$ (38)
Most terms appearing in Eq. (35) will not be invariant unless the operator coefficient is set to zero. First consider the variation of $`𝒮^{ab}`$:

$`\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}𝒮^{ab}`$ $`=`$ $`[\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}N^a]i𝒟/_{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^{a+b+1}}}i𝒟/_{}N^b+N^ai𝒟/_{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^{a+b+1}}}i𝒟/_{}[\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}N^b]`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}N^a\epsilon /_{}ni𝒟{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^{a+b+1}}}i𝒟/_{}N^b{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}N^a𝒟/_{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^{a+b+1}}}i\epsilon /^{}ni𝒟N^b`$
$`+N^ai𝒟/_{}\left[\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^{a+b+1}}}\right]i𝒟/_{}N^b+(ab),`$
where for positive $`a`$

$`\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}N^a`$ $`=`$ $`ϵ^{}i𝒟^{}N^{a1}+Nϵ^{}i𝒟^{}N^{a2}+\mathrm{}+N^{a1}ϵ^{}i𝒟^{},`$ (40)
$`\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^a}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N}}ϵ^{}iD^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^a}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^2}}ϵ^{}i𝒟^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^{a1}}}\mathrm{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N^a}}ϵ^{}i𝒟^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N}}.`$
The vanishing of Eq. (38) requires $`\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}𝒪`$ to consist of operators in which $`𝒟/^{}`$ appears all the way to the left or all the way to the right. Except for the case $`a=b=0`$, the operators appearing in $`\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}𝒮^{ab}`$ are not of this form. These operators cannot be canceled by variations of $`𝒪^a`$ or $`𝒯^{ab}`$ since the latter have a trivial Dirac structure, while the operators in $`\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}𝒮^{ab}`$ do not. Thus invariance under (II) requires $`s_{ab}=0`$ except for $`s_{00}`$, which will be set to $`1/2`$ once the normalization of the free quark kinetic term is fixed.

The above analysis implies that

$`𝒪=i𝒟/^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N}}i𝒟/^{}+𝒪^{},`$ (41)
where $`𝒪^{}`$ contains contributions to $`𝒪`$ from the operators $`𝒪^a`$ and $`𝒯^{ab}`$. Inserting this into Eq. (38), one finds after some algebra:

$`\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}_0^{}=\overline{\xi }_n[\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}𝒪^{}+i𝒟/^{}\epsilon /^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2N}}(𝒪^{}ni𝒟)+(𝒪^{}ni𝒟){\displaystyle \frac{1}{2N}}\epsilon /^{}i𝒟/^{}]{\displaystyle \frac{\overline{n}/}{2}}\xi _n.`$ (42)
The terms involving $`\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}𝒪^{}`$ and $`\epsilon /^{}`$ must vanish independently since they have different Dirac structures. Thus, $`𝒪^{}=niD`$ and $`\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}𝒪^{}=0`$ which together imply $`\delta _{(\mathrm{II})}_0^{}=0`$. Thus, reparameterization invariance of type (II) and (III) require the Lagrangian to be $`_0`$ to all orders in perturbation theory. Since the free quark kinetic terms come from $`_0`$ the normalization of these terms is entirely fixed and they cannot acquire an anomalous dimension. This completes the proof that the result in Eq. (27) is the most general reparameterization invariant collinear quark Lagrangian whose expansion starts out at order $`\lambda ^4`$.

In this paper we have used reparametrization invariance to constrain the form of the collinear SCET Lagrangian. An important result of this paper is that the form of the leading Lagrangian is uniquely determined by gauge invariance, reparameterization invariance, and tree level matching. Reparametrization invariance was also used to identify the complete set of subleading operators containing usoft gluon fields which are related to the leading order Lagrangian, and therefore are not renormalized to all orders in perturbation theory. We have not been able to construct subleading corrections to the two quark sector of the collinear Lagrangian which are by themselves reparameterization invariant. An important open question is whether such operators exist. If not, then reparameterization invariance would uniquely determine the SCET Lagrangian in the two collinear quark sector. It is of course possible to write down operators coupling to external currents which involve one or more collinear quark fields and receive nontrivial renormalization. Examples include the heavy to light currents bfl ; bfps ; chay  and deep inelastic scattering bfprs . The anomalous dimensions of these operators can be used to sum logarithms involving ratios of the hard and infrared scales.

An application of reparameterization invariance which we have not considered in this paper is matching and anomalous dimension calculations for operators. For processes with energetic hadrons a local QCD current matches onto an infinite series of operators in SCET. Reparameterization invariance can be used to derive relations between Wilson coefficients of different operators in this expansion that are valid to all orders in perturbation theory much like the relations for heavy-to-heavy currents in HQET Neubert . In SCET relations have been derived for heavy-to-light currents in Ref. chay  using the type (I) transformations. It would also be interesting to extend these calculations to include type (II) transformations as well as currents composed entirely of collinear fields. The latter should have applications for the calculation of power suppressed cross sections in high energy processes.

###### Acknowledgements.

This work was supported in part by the Department of Energy under the grants DOE-FG03-97ER40546 and DE-FG03-00-ER-41132. T.M. is supported by DOE grant DE-FG02-96ER40945 and by the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility, which is operated by the Southeastern Universities Research Association (SURA) under DOE contract DE-AC05-84ER40150. T.M. also thanks the UCSD theory group for their hospitality.


text:
# A Very Large Glitch in PSR J1806-2125

## 1 INTRODUCTION

The spin-down of pulsars is usually remarkably steady and predictable. However, timing observations of young pulsars have revealed rotational irregularities such as timing noise, a noise-like fluctuation in rotation rate, and glitches which manifest themselves in a sudden spin-up of the pulsars (e.g. Lyne, Shemar & Graham-Smith 2000). Typical increases in rotational frequency during a glitch are of the order of $`\mathrm{\Delta }\nu /\nu =10^8`$ to $`10^6`$ which is followed by a relaxation process during which the pulsar usually returns to its pre-glitch spin-down rate. The time scales for relaxation vary from hours to years, depending on pulsar and glitch event.

Observing glitches and their relaxation processes provides a unique method for studying the interior of neutron stars: glitches are thought to be caused by a sudden transfer of angular momentum from a faster-rotating component of the superfluid interior to the solid crust of the pulsar. Hence, monitoring pulsars to detect glitches and to measure their subsequent relaxation provides a kind of rotational seismology to probe neutron star interiors (e.g. Pines 1991; Lyne 1992).

In this Letter we present the largest glitch event ever observed, with a fractional frequency increase almost 2.5 times larger than the previously known largest glitch \[Wang et al. 2000\] and 16 times greater than the mean glitch size. This glitch was observed in PSR J1806$``$2125, a pulsar which was discovered in the Parkes multibeam survey \[Manchester et al. 2001\]. This survey has discovered numerous young pulsars, which are subsequently monitored using the Parkes 64-m or the Jodrell Bank 76-m radio telescopes. The discovery of PSR J1806$``$2125 is reported in Morris et al. (2002). The pulsar has a rotational period of $`P=0.4`$ s and a characteristic age of 65 kyr.

## 2 Observations

Following its discovery, PSR J1806$``$2125 was observed 37 times using the 76-m Lovell radio telescope at Jodrell Bank Observatory between January 1998 and October 1999 (MJDs 50820 and 51462), and again from January 2002 (MJD 52298). The observing system is described in Morris et al. (2002). In brief, the two hands of circular polarisation at a frequency near 1400 MHz are fed through a multichannel filterbank and digitised. The data are dedispersed and folded on-line according to the pulsar’s dispersion measure and topocentric period. The folded pulse profiles for each polarisation are subsequently combined to produce the total intensity. Pulse times-of-arrival (TOAs) are determined by cross-correlating the profile with a template of high signal-to-noise ratio. During the upgrade period of the Lovell telescope, timing observations are continuing using the central beam of the 13-beam system installed on the 64-m Parkes radio telescope \[Manchester et al. 2001\]. Between December 2000 and January 2002 (MJDs 51894 and 52257), the pulsar was observed 14 times with a typical integration time of 240 s.

## 3 Results

The rotational, positional and derived parameters for PSR J1806$``$2125 are given in Table 1. These parameters are obtained by model-fitting the Jodrell Bank pulse TOAs using tempo111See http://pulsar.princeton.edu/tempo.. All uncertainties are twice the standard tempo values. The rotational frequency of the pulsar increased between October 1999 and December 2000, indicating that a glitch had occurred. The nature of the event is summarised in Figure 1. The rotational frequencies versus time are plotted in Figure 1a. It is clear that sometime during the 430 day gap between observations, approximately 700 days of normal spin-down were reversed. Assuming, as argued later, that this occurred in a single event, the step change in rotation rate was $`\mathrm{\Delta }\nu /\nu 16\times 10^6`$. The frequencies for the final two pre-glitch Jodrell Bank observations were obtained by determining the shift in the pulse profile across the integration time of $``$20 minutes. All other frequencies were obtained from a least-squares fit of a timing model to 4–8 adjacent TOAs, keeping positional parameters and the frequency derivative fixed with the epoch set to the mid-point of the TOAs. The effect of subtracting the pre-glitch rotational frequency and frequency derivative, determined from the Jodrell Bank data, is shown in Figure 1b. To view structure in the post-glitch residuals, an offset is subtracted from the post-fit data and the scale expanded by a factor of 100 (Figure 1c). The post-glitch rotational frequency decays with time over a few hundred days. The changing frequency derivative is shown in Figure 1d. The last observation prior to the glitch was obtained at Jodrell Bank on MJD 51462 and the first observation after the glitch was obtained at Parkes on MJD 51894 (indicated by dotted lines in Figure 1). Unfortunately, the large interval between the Jodrell Bank and Parkes observations prevents extrapolation of the pre- and post- glitch pulse ephemerides without pulse period ambiguities. We can therefore only deduce that the glitch occurred sometime between the two dates.

Table 2 gives the pre-glitch value of the frequency, $`\nu `$, and its first and second derivatives extrapolated to the epoch of the first observation after the glitch (MJD 51894). This table also contains the analogous post-glitch parameters given for the same epoch and the instantaneous changes at the glitch. For the pre-glitch data, $`\ddot{\nu }`$ reflects timing noise, however in the post-glitch data, $`\ddot{\nu }`$ describes both the timing noise and the recovery from the glitch. No other glitch events are visible in the data limiting the magnitudes of any glitches to less than $`\mathrm{\Delta }\nu /\nu 10^9`$. In some cases, glitches may be confused with timing noise particularly when there are large gaps between observations. The timing residuals of PSR J1806$``$2125 show small amounts of timing noise; the pre- and post-glitch residuals (Table 2) have root-mean-square values of 3.4 and 8.2 ms respectively. As the pre- and post-glitch data sets are only $``$1 year in length, these fits may under-estimate the amount of timing noise which may have been absorbed in the rotational parameters or position. In particular, the position given in Table 1 may be in error by more than the quoted formal uncertainty. Even if PSR J1806$``$2125 had similar timing noise properties to PSR B1951$`+`$32, which is known to exhibit extreme amounts of timing noise \[Foster et al. 1994\], its apparent fractional frequency change through the data would still be less than $`10^8`$. This would not affect the main parameters of the glitch given in Table 2.

## 4 Discussion

Pulsar glitches seem to be divided into two sizes: most are large with fractional frequency increases of $``$10-6 while the smaller events are in the range $`10^7`$ to $`10^9`$. The event described in this letter is large — the fractional frequency increase is more than twice that of the largest previously known glitch (Figure 2). It is not possible to rule out the possibility that multiple glitches occurred during the gap of observations between MJDs 51462 and 51894. This large gap, due to an administration error, is an unfortunate feature of our data and highlights the importance of making regular timing observations of young pulsars. However, pulsars with large glitches tend to show larger intervals between glitches (Lyne et al. 2000) and no glitch occurred during the 600 days of well sampled observations at Jodrell Bank. Assuming that the integrated effect of the glitches is to reverse 1.7 per cent of the star’s slow-down (Lyne et al. 2000) then such giant-sized glitches can only occur every $``$120 years.

The mean size of pulsar glitches on a plot of the magnitude of frequency derivative versus rotational frequency is shown on Figure 3. Clearly, glitches occur predominantly in young pulsars located in the top right of the diagram. However, further trends are more difficult to identify. Region A on this diagram contains nine glitching pulsars with similar characteristic ages of $``$10 kyr and five pulsars with no history of glitching. The surface magnetic field strengths for the pulsars in this region range from $`10^{12}`$ to $`10^{13}`$ Gauss. Amongst 34 pulsars in an equivalent region centred on PSR J1806$``$2125 (region B on Figure 3), only four have been observed to glitch. PSR B2334$`+`$61, a pulsar which lies just above PSR J1806$``$2125 in this region, has been observed at Jodrell Bank for 15 years. Although the timing residuals for this pulsar show large amounts of timing noise, no glitch has been observed; any large glitch would easily be observable. This pulsar could therefore glitch on a possibly similar 100 year timescale. However, PSR B1737$``$30 is also in this region and glitches regularly — nine small glitches over 8.5 years with a mean fractional frequency increase of 221$`\times `$10-9 have been reported in Lyne et al. (2000) and Krawczyk et al. (2002). This suggests that the size of and time between glitches depends upon more than the pulsar’s position in the frequency–frequency derivative diagram.

Large glitch events are clearly very rare and will only be detected in pulsars which have been observed for many years. This suggests that many pulsars which have not been observed to glitch may do so on longer timescales. The existence of such large glitches offers new hope for attempts to observe thermal X-ray emission from the internal heat released following a glitch. Such a large event in a nearby pulsar would provide an opportunity for detecting such thermal emission and hence constrain the neutron star structure \[Tang & Cheng 2001\].

The amplitude of the transient seen in Figure 1c is less than 1 per cent of the step change in frequency and is consistent with results presented in Lyne et al. (2000). The amplitude could, of course, be much larger if the glitch occurred near the beginning of the gap of observations. The moderately large fractional change in frequency derivative ($`\mathrm{\Delta }\dot{\nu }=17\times 10^{15}`$ s-2 or $`\mathrm{\Delta }\dot{\nu }/\dot{\nu }=34\times 10^3`$) suggests that the pulsar’s effective moment of inertia was reduced during the glitch by 3 per cent. This reduction is transitory; after $``$300 days, $`\dot{\nu }`$ approximates its pre-glitch value.

This is the first observation of such an extreme glitch event. Although such large events must be rare, the great number of pulsars now known due to the highly successful Parkes multibeam survey increases the chance of studying such events in detail. Information obtained in these studies will provide unique constraints on theories of the internal structure of neutron stars and the mechanism which reduces a surprisingly large fraction of the effective moment of inertia of these massive cosmic fly-wheels.

## Acknowledgments

GH acknowledges the receipt of post-graduate studentships from the UK Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council. IHS received support from the Jansky postdoctoral fellowship. FC is supported by NASA grant NAG 5-9095. VMK is an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow and was supported in part by a US National Science Foundation (NSF) Career Award (AST-9875897) and by a Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada grant (RGPIN 228738-00). The Parkes radio telescope is part of the Australia Telescope which is funded by the Commonwealth of Australia for operation as a National Facility managed by CSIRO.