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# Conductance of a quantum point contact in the presence of spin-orbit interaction

## I Introduction

The interaction between the electron spin and its orbital motion, commonly refered to as the spin-orbit (SO) interaction or SO coupling, has been known for a long time. Recently the effect of SO-interaction on mesoscopic transport phenomena and the quantum Hall effect has attracted growing interest.  Although the interaction magnitude is small compared to the Fermi energy, it may have significant impact on electronic transport, particularly in mesoscopic systems where quantum interference is extremely important. Using the transfer matrix method, Meir et al.  showed that the SO-interaction in one-dimensional (1D) non-interacting disordered rings induces an effective spin-dependent magnetic flux, and then any spin-dependent transport quantity can be expressed in terms of the same quantity in the absence of the SO scattering but with an effective magnetic flux. The adiabatic Berry phase induced by the SO-interaction and its effect on the electronic transport were studied extensively by Loss et al. Aronov and Lyanda-Geller.  Persistent currents in mesoscopic rings induced by the SO-interaction was addressed in Ref.4. Promisingly, as observed by Morpurgo et al.,  the geometric phase induced by the SO-interaction  could induce the splitting of the main peak in the ensemble average Fourier spectrum. Also interestingly, lifting of the spin degeneracy by the Rashba SO-interaction was reported experimentally in two-dimensional (2D) electron systems for different semiconductor structures.  Lommer et al. pointed out that the Rashba mechanism becomes dominant in a narrow gap semiconductor system.  The spin splitting energy at the Fermi energy in the absence of magnetic field is $`\mathrm{\Delta }=2\alpha k_F`$ (with $`\alpha `$ as a SO coupling constant and $`k_F`$ as the Fermi wave vector), which is about $`1.05.0meV`$ in typical semiconductor materials.

On the other hand, the observation of the universal  and the nonuniversal  quantizations of the conductance in a quasi-1D constrication is also remarkable. In a clean quasi-1D constrication, if the mean free path is much longer than the effective channel length, the conductance is quantized in unit of $`2G_0`$ with $`G_0=e^2/h`$ at zero magnetic field, referred to as the universal quantization, where the factor of $`2`$ aries from the electron spin degeneracy.  Recently, Thomas and co-workers found that, in addition to the above quantized conductance plateau, there is also a structure at $`0.7(2G_0)`$. This so-called $`0.7`$ structure (nonuniversal or fractional conductance quantization) appears to be related to spontaneous lifting of spin degeneracy in the 1D constrication, but the origin of it remains as an open question.  Since the $`0.7`$ structure may be understood as a zero-field spin splitting with an estimated energy of $`\mathrm{\Delta }1meV`$ which is the same order as the spin splitting energy induced by the SO-interaction, it is nature to ask an important question: Is the spin polarization induced by the SO coupling responsible for the $`0.7`$ structure? To answer this question, we study the effect of SO-interaction on the electronic transport through quantum point contacts (QPC) in this paper. We find that the $`0.7`$ structure is unlikely to stem from the SO-interaction. However, some interesting oscillations in the ‘quantized’ conductance may be induced by the SO-interaction, and may be experimentally observable. Moreover, the spin-dependent transport properties are of current interest in both fundamental physics and applied spin electronics. It is quit intriguing to develop a method to calculate the spin-dependent transport in mesoscopic systems. Also in this paper, generalizing a method established for spin-independent cases  we have done such a job. It is worth pointing out that another theoretical approach may be generalized to calculate the spin-dependent conductance.

The paper is organized as follows. In Sec.II A, we derive the 2D tight-binding Hamiltonian with the Rashba SO coupling. In Sec.II B, the recursive Green’s function technique is presented to calculate the spin-dependent transmission coefficient. In Sec.III the conductance is calculated numerically in a model QPC in the presence of SO coupling and/or magnetic field. The finite temperature effect is also studied. This paper ends with a brief summary.

## II Model and calculation method

### A 2D tight-binding Hamiltonian with the Rashba SO coupling

In a magnetic field, the 2D Hamiltonian for electrons (of effective mass $`m^{}`$ and charge $`e`$) with the Rashba SO-interaction reads

$$H=\frac{𝚷_x^2+𝚷_y^2}{2m^{}}+\frac{\alpha }{\mathrm{}}(\widehat{\sigma }_x𝚷_y\widehat{\sigma }_y𝚷_x)+U(x,y)\frac{g\mu _B}{2}\hat{\sigma }𝐁,$$
(1)
where $`𝚷=𝐩\frac{e}{c}𝐀`$ is the canonical momentum, $`U(x,y)`$ represents the spin-independent potential, $`𝐀`$ is the electromagnetic gauge potential with $`𝐁=\times 𝐀`$ relating it to the magnetic fields, and $`g`$, $`\mu _B`$,$`\hat{\sigma }`$ are the $`g`$ factor, Bohr magneton, Pauli matrices respectively. $`\alpha `$ is the Rashba SO-interaction constant which is determined from an effective electric field along $`z`$ direction given by the form of the confining potential in the absence of an inversion center. Now we choose a discrete square lattice, on which points are located at $`x=na`$ and $`y=ma`$, with $`n,m`$ as integers and $`a`$ as the lattice constant. In terms of the quaternion, the one-electron tight-binding Hamiltonian with the Rashba SO coupling can now be parameterized as

$`H`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{nm}{}}\epsilon _{nm}|nmnm|{\displaystyle \underset{nm}{}}(V_{nm,n1m}|nmn1m|`$ (2)
$`+`$ $`V_{nm,nm1}|nmnm1|+H.C.),`$ (3)
where $`|nm`$ is a two-component orthonormal set in the lattice sites $`(n,m)`$; $`\epsilon _{nm}=(U_{nm}+4t)\tau _0i\gamma \tau _3`$ with $`U_{nm}=U(x=na,y=ma)`$, $`t=\mathrm{}^2/2m^{}a^2`$, $`\gamma =g\mu _BB_z/2`$; $`V_{nm,n1m}=V_xexp(ieA_xa/\mathrm{})`$ and $`V_{nm,nm1}=V_yexp(ieA_ya/\mathrm{})`$ with $`V_x=t\tau _0\alpha ^{}\tau _2`$, $`V_y=t\tau _0+\alpha ^{}\tau _1`$ and $`\alpha ^{}=\alpha /2a`$. The quaternion basis $`\{\tau _i\}`$ is defined by the $`2\times 2`$ unit matrix $`\tau _0`$ and $`\tau _l=i\widehat{\sigma }_l(l=1,2,3)`$ with $`\widehat{\sigma }_l`$ as the Pauli matrices. $`A_x`$ or $`A_y`$ is evaluated at the middle point between sites $`(n,m)`$ and $`(n+1,m)`$ or $`(n,m+1)`$.

### B Model and the recursive Green’s function technique

To describe spin-dependent transport properties through a specific mesoscopic structure, we consider a 2D structure composed of three different regions ( Fig.1). The shadowed central zone is a mesoscopic structure where the SO coupling and/or a homogeneous perpendicular magnetic field are present. To simplify scattering boundary conditions, we assume that the structure is connected to both sides with semi-infinite ideal leads without SO-interaction and magnetic field. In our lattice model atoms are at the sites of a square lattice $`(na,ma)`$ ( with $`a`$ to be set equal to unit, $`m=1,2,\mathrm{},M`$.) in the shadowed zone and two ideal leads. As a result the system is described by a one-electron tight-binding Hamiltonian similar to Eq.(3). For a homogeneous magnetic field $`𝐁=(0,0,B)`$ perpendicular to the 2D-plane ($`𝐀=(yB,0,0)`$ in the Landau gauge), we can write the Hamiltonian for the shadowed central zone as

$$H_c=\underset{n=1}{\overset{N}{}}|n)H_n(n|+\underset{n=1}{\overset{N1}{}}[|n)H_{n,n+1}(n+1|+H.C.],$$
(4)
where $`|n)`$ is the set of $`2M`$ ket vectors belonging to the $`n`$th cell, and

$$H_nH_{n,n}=\left(\begin{array}{ccccc}\epsilon _{n1}\hfill & V_y^+\hfill & 0\hfill & \mathrm{}\hfill & 0\hfill \\ V_y\hfill & \epsilon _{n2}\hfill & V_y^+\hfill & \mathrm{}\hfill & 0\hfill \\ 0\hfill & V_y\hfill & \epsilon _{n3}\hfill & \mathrm{}\hfill & 0\hfill \\ \mathrm{}\hfill & \mathrm{}\hfill & \mathrm{}\hfill & \mathrm{}\hfill & \mathrm{}\hfill \\ 0\hfill & 0\hfill & 0\hfill & \mathrm{}\hfill & \epsilon _{nM}\hfill \end{array}\right),$$
(5)
$$(H_{n,n+1})_{pp^{}}=V_x^+e^{i2\pi \beta (p\frac{M+1}{2})}\delta _{pp^{}}(p,p^{}=1,\mathrm{},M).$$
(6)
Here $`\beta =Ba^2/\varphi _0`$ with $`\varphi _0=hc/e`$ as the magnetic flux quantum. The forms of Hamiltonian for the two ideal leads are the same as Eq.(4), but with different summing regions ($`\mathrm{}<n<1`$ at the left lead and $`N<n<\mathrm{}`$ at the right lead) and different values of the parameters: $`V_x=V_y=t\tau _0,\epsilon _{nm}=4t\tau _0,B=0`$. Moreover, it seems acceptable to assume that the coupling between the ideal leads and the mesoscopic structure takes simply the form $`H_{0,1}=H_{N,N+1}=t\delta _{pp^{}}`$

Following the recursive Green’s function technique developed for some spin-independent systems,  we may generalize the method to the nontrivial spin-dependent cases. The spin-dependent transmission $`t_{lj}^{\sigma \sigma ^{}}`$ for the incident channel $`(l,\sigma )`$ and out-going channel $`(j,\sigma ^{})`$ can be found readily (see the appendix A) . At a finite temperature $`T`$, the conductance through a 2D mesoscopic structure is given by the Landauer-Büttiker formula

$$G=G_0\underset{lj,\sigma \sigma ^{}}{}_0^{\mathrm{}}T_{lj}^{\sigma \sigma ^{}}\frac{f(E,T)}{E}𝑑E,$$
(7)
where $`T_{lj}^{\sigma \sigma ^{}}=|t_{lj}^{\sigma \sigma ^{}}|^2`$ is determined from Eq.(A3), and $`f(E,T)=[1+exp(EE_f)/k_BT]^1`$ is the Fermi-Dirac distribution function with $`k_B`$ as the Boltzmann constant. Obviously, Eq (7) reduces to $`G=G_0_{\{lj,\sigma \sigma ^{}\}}T_{lj}^{\sigma \sigma ^{}}`$ at zero temperature.

In the following, we focus on a QPC structure with the Büttiker saddle-point potential

$`U_{nm}=V_0`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}m^{}\omega _x^2a^2[n(N+1)/2]^2`$ (8)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}m^{}\omega _y^2a^2[m(M+1)/2]^2,`$ (9)
which is a practical candidate to describe a real QPC.  $`\omega _{x,y}`$ indicate the strength of the lateral confinement. Note that the well-pronounced quantized plateaus occur if $`\omega _y\omega _x`$.

Before the end of this section, it is worth pointing out that the recursive Green’s function method described in this section can be straightforwardly generalized to 3D mesoscopic structures, and thus is quite useful in studying the spin-dependent transport of many different mesoscopic structures which are of current interest, such as the devices with quantum Hall effect, giant magnetoresistance, tunnel magnetoresistence.

## III Numerical results

We now calculate numerically the conductance of the QPC in the presence of SO-interaction and/or a magnetic field. We here present the results for the system of $`M=7`$, $`N=15`$  and $`t=1`$.

### A The effects of SO interaction

It is well known that the conductance through QPC is quantized with the unit of $`2G_0`$ as a function of the saddle energy $`V_0`$. The conductance quantization is well explained by Landauer-Büttiker formula of quantum ballistic transport: for a nonmagnetic QPC, the spin-up and spin-down electrons make the same contribution and then the unit of the conductance quantization is $`2G_0`$. However, if the Rashba SO-interaction is present in the QPC, the spin degeneracy of conductance electrons would be broken. Whether the quantization of the conductance is affected by the SO-interaction in a meaningful sense?

Figure 2 shows the conductance $`G`$ as a function of $`V_0`$ for the SO parameters $`\alpha ^{}=0,`$ $`0.005`$, $`0.01`$, and $`0.015`$. Other parameters are $`E_f=1.21`$, $`\omega _y=3\omega _x`$. Two effects of the SO-interaction on the conductance are seen. (i) The SO-interaction induces some oscillations on the plateaus, and the stronger the SO-interaction is the larger the oscillation amplitude is. Remarkably, some sharp dips exist on the oscillation for the strong SO coupling, for example, the height of dip is almost $`2G_0`$ for $`\alpha ^{}0.015`$. (ii) A tiny plateau exists near $`0.7(2G_0)`$ for a weak SO interaction $`\alpha 0.005`$ ( We will address the temperature effect on this tine plateau later). But it becomes a sharp dip for the strong SO-interaction (see the inset of Fig.2). The conductance oscillations as well as the sharp dips in the plateaus may be observable in future mesoscopic experiments.

We now attempt to understand the above numerical results heuristically. The conductance oscillations appear to stem from the multiple reflections with the SO coupling. By taking into account the multiple reflections, the conductance of the QPC may be rewritten as

$$G=G_0\underset{j\sigma }{}\frac{(1R_{j\sigma })^2}{12R_{j\sigma }cos(2k_{j\sigma }L_x)+R_{j\sigma }^2},$$
(10)
where the reflection probability $`R_{j\sigma }`$ for channel $`(j,\sigma )`$ is given by

$$R_{j\sigma }=\left(\frac{v_j^Lv_{j\sigma }^c}{v_j^L+v_{j\sigma }^c}\right)^2,$$
(11)
with $`v_j^L`$ ( $`v_{j\sigma }^c`$) as the value of velocity in the leads ( scattering zone). $`v_{j\sigma }^c=E_{j\sigma }^c/\mathrm{}k`$ is determined by the dispersion relation for the electron states in the QPC, which is approximately written as

$$E_j^c\mathrm{}^2k_j^2/2m^{}+(j1/2)\mathrm{}\omega _y+V_0$$
(12)
(independent on $`\sigma `$) in the absence of the SO coupling, but as

$$E_{j\sigma }^c\mathrm{}^2k_{j\sigma }^2/2m^{}+\sigma \alpha |k_{j\sigma }|+(j1/2)\mathrm{}\omega _y+V_0$$
(13)
in the presence of SO coupling. Here we only consider the energy spectrum at $`x=0`$ since the transport properties for the Büttiker saddle-point potential depend mainly on the narrowest part. Note that the quantized plateaus are well-pronounced in the absence of the SO coupling (as shown in Fig.2) since $`v_j^c=\mathrm{}^2k_j/m^{}v_j^L`$ and thus $`R_j`$ for a propagating model in the Büttiker saddle-point potential is negligible. However, the additional $`R_{j\sigma }`$ may be induced from the SO coupling because as seen from Eq.(13) $`v_{j\sigma }^c`$ in the presence of SO coupling is different from that in the absence of SO coupling. Therefore, the oscillations may stem from the SO coupling since Eq (10) predicts the transmission oscillations, provided that $`R_{j\sigma }`$ induced by the SO coupling are not too small.  Moreover, we can understand from Eqs. (10) and (11) that a dip in the conductance may appear for a relatively larger $`R_{j\sigma }`$ when an electron in the channel $`(j,\sigma )`$ is in a propagating state ($`k_{j\sigma }>0`$) with $`v_{j\sigma }^c0`$. It is interesting to note from Eq.(13) that $`v_j^c=0`$ for $`\stackrel{~}{k}_j=m^{}\alpha /\mathrm{}^2`$, which corresponds the minimum of $`E_{j\sigma }^c`$ as a function of momentum. When $`V_0`$ varies in the scale of magnitude $`\alpha \stackrel{~}{k}_j`$, $`v_j^c0`$ for the same $`v_j^L`$-channel as in the absence of SO coupling. This clearly shows that a larger $`R_{j\sigma }`$ may appear in a narrow region in the presence of the SO coupling, leading to a dip. Our numerical results in Fig.2 agree qualitatively with the above arguments.

We now look into whether the interesting behaviors seen in Fig.2 are sensitive to the set of parameters. Firstly, we plot Fig.3(a) and (b) for two other different $`\omega _y/\omega _x`$ ( the other parameters are the same as those in Fig.2). The plateaus are not well pronounced for $`\omega _y=1.5\omega _x`$ even if $`\alpha ^{}=0`$(Fig.3(a)). In this case, the SO-induced oscillations are not so distinctive with the conductance curve for $`\alpha ^{}=0`$, but the sharp dips still appear in the conductance. For $`\omega _y=6\omega _x`$ ( Fig.3(b)), the width of the plateaus is widened. Comparing the results in Fig.2, Fig.3(a), and (b), we found that the well-pronounced plateaus occur for larger ratio $`\omega _y/\omega _x`$, which is due to the Büttiker saddle-point potential. We also noticed that the effects induced by the SO coupling are similar to those in Fig.2. Secondly, we plot Fig.3(c) and (d) for two other different Fermi energies (the other parameters are the same as those in Fig.2). It is seen that the main effects induced by the SO coupling are still similar to those in Fig.2. Therefore, we may conclude that the essential feature induced by the SO coupling in Fig.2 is not quite sensitive to the Fermi energy and the ratio of $`\omega _y/\omega _x`$, but is indeed sensitive to the SO coupling parameter $`\alpha ^{}`$.

The temperature dependence of the conductance as a function of $`V_0`$ can be seen from Figs.4(a) and (b). Firstly, in certain temperature regions, the oscillation induced by the SO-interaction disappears when the temperature increases, meanwhile the quality of the quantized plateaus is improved. However the quantized plateaus are destroyed when temperature increases further. The mechanism for the destruction of the quantized plateaus by the finite temperature is energy averaging. Secondly, the tine plateau and the dip near $`0.7(2G_0)`$ are destroyed by energy averaging before the integer plateaus disappear. However the $`0.7`$ structure observed by Thomas et al. is still observable even at a temperature when all the integer quantized plateaus disappear. This obvious different temperature effect on the quantization conductance suggests that the $`0.7`$ structure should not stem from the SO-interaction. Finally, the quantized plateaus disappear at $`k_BT0.1`$ for $`\alpha ^{}=0.005`$, while the plateaus is still obvious at this temperature for $`\alpha ^{}=0.01`$ (the plateau disappears at a higher temperature $`k_BT0.12`$).

### B The effects of magnetic fields

We now discuss the effect of a perpendicular magnetic field on the conductance quantization: the Zeeman effect and the Peierls phase factor. In many theoretical calculations, the Zeeman effect is usually ignored for simplicity. Here we consider both the Peierls phase and the Zeeman effect. Figures.5(a) and (b) show the field-dependent conductance as a function of $`V_0`$ for $`\alpha ^{}=0,0.01`$, respectively. From Fig.5, one of the characteristic features of QPC’s in a magnetic field is that conductance steps begin to appear at odd integer multiples of $`G_0`$ at $`\beta 0.09`$, due to the lifting of the spin degeneracy by the Zeeman effect. Another feature is that the width of the plateaus is widened when compared to the $`\beta =0`$ case. On the other hand, the number of effective subbands is decreased when the magnetic field is applied, and actually it is proportional to $`1/\beta `$. Moreover, figure 5(b) shows that the oscillation as well as the sharp dips are destroyed at high fields. Thus the quality of the quantization is improved when the magnetic field is applied. Certainly, the effect of the SO-interaction is suppressed by a high magnetic field.

## IV Conclusions and discussions

The SO-interaction is equivalent to a momentum-dependent effective magnetic field. However, comparing with a genuine magnetic field, there exist some essential differences in the energy spectra of electrons induced by an effective field or a genuine field,  which induce several significant different effects on the conductance. Firstly, spin split energy $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ induced by the SO-interaction at $`|k_i=0|`$ is zero, while the spectrum induced by a genuine field is determined by the nonzero Zeeman energy $`g\mu B_z`$. This is the reason why the conductance steps do not appear at odd integer multiples of $`G_0`$ in the presence of SO-interaction but zero magnetic field, noting the appearance of this kind of quantized plateaus is the essential feature induced by a genuine field. Secondly, in the presence of SO coupling, there exist bumps ( a nonmonotonic portion) in the spectrum as a function of transverse momentum, while the spectrum is a monotonous function of the momentum in the presence of a genuine magnetic field. Therefore, the reflections at the scattering region in the presence of SO coupling may induce by the negative velocity for $`k>0`$. It provides us another understanding of the transmission oscillations. Finally, the SO-interaction can remove the spin degeneracy in the band structure but could not lead to an overall spin polarization. Consequently, the $`0.7`$ structure is unlikely induced by the SO-interaction. On the other hand, the results addressed in the presence of magnetic field may be restricted within weak field since the non-interacting electron model used in the recursive Green’s function is invalid in a very strong magnetic field.

We are now concerned with the possible experimental test of the above SO-induced properties. In unit of $`t`$, $`\alpha ^{}=m^{}\alpha a/\mathrm{}^2`$, which is estimated to be $`(0.545.4)\times 10^3`$ for some typical semiconductors \[ here we choose the parameters of InAs, where $`a0.608nm`$, $`\alpha (1.010.0)\times 10^{10}evcm`$, and $`m^{}0.067m_e`$ with $`m_e`$ as the mass of a free electron. \]. Thus the oscillations induced by SO coupling may be experimentally observable, depending crucially on the value of $`\alpha ^{}`$.

Finally, we wish to make a few remarks on why the SO-induced effects on the quantized conductance have not been observed in experiments so far. Firstly, the experimental observation on the SO-induced phenomenon would crucially depend on the value of $`\alpha ^{}`$, but $`\alpha ^{}`$ in some typical semiconductor systems may be relatively small based on the above estimation. Thus it is helpful to increase the coupling coefficient in experiments. As indicated by Heida et al. two methods may be used to increase the coefficient $`\alpha `$ in mesoscopic experiments: one is to increase the electron density $`n_s`$ in QPC since $`\alpha `$ is proportional to $`n_s`$; and the other is to vary the gate bias which controls the magnitude of the SO-interaction. On the other hand, a larger effective mass of charge carriers would also be helpful for observing the SO-induced oscillations in experiments. Secondly, the SO coupling in the leads has been neglected in the present study. This approximation may enhance the oscillations observed above although the Rashba SO coupling in QPC is larger than that in the leads. It is extremely difficult to include the SO coupling in the leads using the present method because the analytical wave function in the leads should be given; while it appears to be unsolvable in the leads with the SO coupling . Nevertheless, with the advancement of nanotechnology, it is possible to fabricate a mesoscopic structure where the SO coupling is important only in the QPC (i.e., negligible in the two leads). In such systems, it could be easier to observe the SO-induced effects predicted here.

In conclusion, we have generalized a recursive Green’s function approach to calculate numerically the spin-dependent conductance in mesoscopic structures in the presence of SO-interaction and magnetic field. The effect of SO-interaction on the conductance of a QPC is studied in detail. Some interesting oscillations in conductance induced by the SO-interaction have been observed numerically, which may be tested by future mesoscopic experiments.

###### Acknowledgements.

We thank Prof. W. Y. Zhang for his helpful discussions. This work was supported by a RGC grant of Hong Kong under grant number HKU7118/00P.

## A

In the appendix we present the recursive Green’s function approach to calculate the spin-dependent transmission $`t_{lj}^{\sigma \sigma ^{}}`$. The electron wave functions in the strip $`n`$ of the leads can be expressed as a linear combination of eigenfunctions of a straight infinite lead at a given energy $`E`$. If the incident electron from the left lead is in the $`(l,\sigma )`$ channel with $`l`$ and $`\sigma `$ as the subband and spin indices, the scattering states are represented as

$`|`$ $`n)_{left}=e^{ik_ln}\varphi _{k_l\sigma }+{\displaystyle }_{j\sigma ^{}}r_{lj}^{\sigma \sigma ^{}}e^{ik_jn}\varphi _{k_j\sigma ^{}},`$ (A1)
$`|`$ $`n)_{right}={\displaystyle }_{j\sigma ^{}}t_{lj}^{\sigma \sigma ^{}}e^{ik_jn}\varphi _{k_j\sigma ^{}},`$ (A2)
where $`t_{lj}^{\sigma ,\sigma ^{}}`$ ($`r_{lj}^{\sigma ,\sigma ^{}}`$) is the transmission (reflection) amplitudes for the incident channel $`(l,\sigma )`$ and out-going channel $`(j,\sigma ^{})`$, and the wave functions $`\varphi _{k_j\sigma }`$ are given by $`\varphi _{k_j\sigma }=\varphi _{k_j}\chi (\sigma _z)`$ with

$$\varphi _{k_j}=\sqrt{\frac{2}{M+1}}(sin\frac{\pi j}{M+1},\mathrm{},sin\frac{\pi jm}{M+1},\mathrm{},sin\frac{\pi jM}{M+1})^{T_r},$$

and

$$\chi (+)=\left(\begin{array}{c}1\hfill \\ 0\hfill \end{array}\right),\chi ()=\left(\begin{array}{c}0\hfill \\ 1\hfill \end{array}\right).$$

Here the sign $`T_r`$ denotes the transposition of matrix. The number of open channels and the value of $`k_j`$ are determined by the Fermi energy from the energy dispersion in ideal leads

$$E=4t2t(cosk_j+cos\frac{\pi j}{M+1}).$$

Only if $`k_j`$ is real do we have a propagating state; we have an evanescent state when $`k_j`$ is imaginary. All real $`k_j`$’s are positive, because we have already considered separately the states propagating to the right (incident and transmitted wave) or to the left (reflected wave). Following the recursive Green’s function technique, we find

$$t_{lj}^{\sigma \sigma ^{}}=\sqrt{v_j/v_l}\varphi _{k_j\sigma ^{}}^+G_{N+1,0}\mathrm{\Theta }(\sigma )\varphi _{k_l\sigma }e^{ik_jL_x},$$
(A3)
where

$$v_j=\frac{1}{\mathrm{}}\frac{E}{k_j},$$

$$\mathrm{\Theta }(\sigma )=2it\underset{l=1}{\overset{M}{}}sink_l[Q_l\zeta (\sigma _z)],$$

with

$$(Q_l)_{pp^{}}=\frac{2}{M+1}sin\frac{l\pi p}{M+1}sin\frac{l\pi p^{}}{M+1},(p,p^{}=1,\mathrm{},M),$$

$$\zeta (+)=\left(\begin{array}{cc}1\hfill & 0\\ 0\hfill & 0\end{array}\right),\zeta ()=\left(\begin{array}{cc}0\hfill & 0\\ 0\hfill & 1\end{array}\right).$$

The set of vectors $`\varphi _{k_j\sigma ^{}}^+`$ are the duals of the set $`\varphi _{k_l\sigma }`$, defined by $`\varphi _{k_j\sigma ^{}}^+\varphi _{k_l\sigma }=\delta _{jl}\delta _{\sigma ^{}\sigma }`$. $`G_{N+1,0}`$ is the retarded Green’s function for the scattering region between two ideal leads, which can be obtained by a set of recursion formulas in a matrix form,

$`G_{n^{}+1,0}`$ $`=`$ $`g^{n^{}+1}H_{n^{}+1,n^{}}G_{n^{},0},(0n^{}N)`$ (A4)
$`g^{n^{}+1}`$ $`=`$ $`[E\stackrel{~}{H}_{n^{}+1}\mathrm{\Lambda }^n^{}]^1,`$ (A5)
$`(\mathrm{\Lambda }^n^{})_{pp^{}}`$ $`=`$ $`e^{i2\pi (pp^{})\beta }V_x^+(g^n^{})_{pp^{}}V_x,(p,p^{}=1,\mathrm{},M)`$ (A6)
by iteration starting form $`g^0=G_{0,0}=(E\stackrel{~}{H}_0)^1`$, where $`\stackrel{~}{H}_0=H_0tF(\sigma _{in})`$, $`\stackrel{~}{H}_l=H_l(1lN)`$, $`\stackrel{~}{H}_{N+1}=H_{N+1}tF(\sigma _{out})`$ with $`\sigma _{in}`$ $`(\sigma _{out})`$ as the spin state of the incident (outgoing) electrons, and

$$F(\sigma )=\underset{j=1}{\overset{M}{}}e^{ik_j}[Q_j\zeta (\sigma _z)],$$
(A7)
It is worth pointing out that each element of Green’s function in the above recursion formula is given by a quaternion number in the presence of the SO-interaction or the Zeeman effect. In the numerical calculations of $`G_{N+1,0}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Theta }(\sigma )`$ in Eq.(A3), we have used explicitly the multiplication table for quaternion number.


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# Radio-Infrared Supernebulae in II Zw 40

## 1 Introduction: Infrared and Radio Supernebulae in Starbursts

Starburst galaxies are distinguished by the concentration, and not simply the quantity, of star formation. Optical and UV studies with the resolution of the HST have found star formation regions to contain super-star clusters (SSCs), as populous and as dense as globular clusters but with ages of only a few million years. Observations in the radio and infrared are finding the even younger and obscured counterparts of these star clusters. Traced by optically thick free-free emission at centimeter wavelengths, radio/infrared “supernebulae” (Turner, Ho, & Beck, 1998; Turner, Beck, & Ho, 2000; Gorjian, Turner, & Beck, 2001) or “ultra-dense HII regions” (Kobulnicky & Johnson, 1999) have been discovered in nearby starburst galaxies. The discovery of these regions has been due to the development of subarcsecond imaging in the infrared and radio. These HII regions are bright and compact, excited by immense clusters of hot young stars, or “starforming clumps” (Beck, Turner, & Gorjian, 2001). The sources have in common all of the signs of young star formation: high gas density (often $`>10^4\mathrm{cm}^3:`$ Turner, Ho, & Beck, 1998; Kobulnicky & Johnson, 1999; Tarchi et al., 2000; Meier, Turner, & Beck, 2002), a cm-wave continuum with spectral index from -0.1 to +1.5, substantial extinctions (Av $`>10`$ mag: Kawara, Nishida, & Phillips, 1989; Ho, Beck, & Turner, 1990), and very strong mid-infrared emission (Gorjian, Turner, & Beck, 2001; Beck, Turner, & Gorjian, 2001; Dale et al., 2001; Vacca, Johnson, & Conti, 2002). It is not just that these supernebulae are very luminous in the infrared, they may actually dominate the infrared emission of the entire galaxy. In the nearby dwarf galaxy NGC 5253, for example, at least 75% of the mid-infrared emission seen by IRAS and 25% of the total bolometric luminosity appear to come from one obscured star cluster less than 2 pc in diameter (Gorjian, Turner, & Beck, 2001). In another starbursting dwarf, He 2-10, essentially all the mid-infrared emission is from star-forming clumps in a 200 pc by 50 pc disk (Beck, Turner, & Gorjian, 2001; Vacca, Johnson, & Conti, 2002). If infrared emission traces and quantifies star formation, as has been thought since IRAS, then since these clusters or supernebula are the sources of infrared, they are also the starburst.

II Zw 40 is a starburst dwarf galaxy 10.5 ($`\mathrm{H}_\mathrm{o}`$/75) Mpc away. It appears to be the result of a collision of two smaller galaxies (Baldwin, Spinrad, & Terlevich, 1982; Brinks & Klein, 1988; van Zee, Skillman, & Salzer, 1998). At optical wavelengths it is dominated by one bright star cluster (Sargent, 1970), which is also a strong source of $`H\alpha `$ (Sargent & Searle, 1970) and associated nebular lines (Walsh & Roy, 1993), has the Wolf-Rayet feature (Vacca & Conti, 1992), and in general has all the signs of a young star formation region. The infrared spectrum is dominated by high-excitation lines such as \[NeIII\] and \[SIV\] (Roche et al., 1991; Thornley et al., 2000; Beck et al., 2002). The radio continuum emission is nearly all thermal emission (Klein, Weiland, & Brinks, 1991; Klein, Wielebinski, & Thuan, 1984; Jaffe, Perola, & Tarenghi, 1978; Deeg et al., 1993), and the emission is relatively compact (Wynn-Williams & Becklin, 1986; Sramek & Weedman, 1986; Klein, Weiland, & Brinks, 1991). Like the radio continuum, the H$`\alpha `$ (Sargent & Searle, 1970) and Brackett $`\gamma `$ lines (Wynn-Williams & Becklin, 1986; Moorwood & Oliva, 1988; Joy & Lester, 1988; Vanzi et al., 1996; Davies, Sugai, & Ward, 1998) are bright in this galaxy . Molecular gas is conspicious by its absence; Sage et al. (1992) remark on its unusually high star formation efficiency. In these respects, II Zw 40 resembles NGC 5253 (Crowther et al., 1999; Turner, Ho, & Beck, 1998; Turner, Beck, & Ho, 2000), probably the youngest, most massive, and most extreme example of an obscured young super star cluster or supernebula in the local universe.

Motivated by the galaxy’s similarity to NGC 5253, we imaged II Zw 40 at 6, 3.6 and 2 cm using the Very Large Array111The National Radio Astronomy Observatory is a facility of the National Science Foundation operated under cooperative agreement by Associated Universities, Inc. in its A configuration for the maximum angular resolution, and at $`11.7\mu `$m with the Long Wavelength Spectrometer (LWS) at the W. M. Keck Observatory.222The W. M. Keck Observatory is operated as a scientific partnership among the California Institute of Technology, the University of California, and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The Observatory was made possible by the generous financial support of the W. M. Keck Foundation. The observations and results are described in the next section and the nature of the source in $`\mathrm{\S }3`$, in which we also compare the supernebula in II Zw 40 to other dwarf starbursts and discuss the significance of the structure seen in the radio maps.

## 2 Observations and Results

### 2.1 Radio Images

II Zw 40 was observed at 6, 3.6 and 2 cm on 23 August 1999, using the VLA in the A configuration. The observations began in late morning with reasonable summer weather. During the run the 12 GHz site monitor rms phase rose from 12 to 20. Absolute fluxes were calibrated using 3C286, with fluxes of 3.45 Jy, 5.18 Jy, and 7.49 Jy at 2, 3.6, and 6 cm, respectively. We estimate absolute flux (scaling) uncertainties of $``$ 5% at 6 and 3.6 cm, and $``$7% at 2 cm due to source structure and variability in 3C286. Missing antennas in the inner array contributed to these uncertainties. For the 2 cm data, we used fast-switching with a 50s-calibrator/100s-source cycle time. We spent 6 minutes, realtime, on source at 6 cm and 3.6 cm, and 79 minutes, realtime, on source at 2 cm. However, given the fast-switching duty-cycle, the actual on-source time at 2 cm was about 44 minutes. The nearby calibrator 0552+032 was used for the fast-switching cycle; we measure a flux of 0.53 Jy for this source. The fast-switching cycles were bracketed with standard calibration scans on the stronger calibrator 0532+075, for which we measure a flux of 1.65 Jy. We applied referenced pointing during the run, with pointing scans taken at 3.6 cm every hour on 0532+075. In this way we were able to obtain reasonable images with the A configuration at 2 cm in daytime summer observing. We estimate, from our mapping of the calibrators, that the “seeing” at 2 cm with our fast-switching cycle is less than $`<`$0.01″, which is the upper limit we fit to the deconvolved sizes of both calibrators. This is less than a tenth of a beam. Due to the lack of short spacings, the images are insensitive to structures that are more extended than $``$ 30 times the beam. This approximate limit, $`\theta _{max}`$, is listed for each wavelength in Table 1, along with beamsizes and rms noise levels.

Images at each wavelength are in Figure 1. These maps were made with natural weighting. The emission is clearly resolved, especially in the highest resolution 2 cm map. The position (J2000) of the 2 cm peak of 0.64 mJy/beam is $`\alpha =05^h55^m42`$$`\stackrel{\mathrm{s}}{\mathrm{.}}`$614 $`\pm `$0$`\stackrel{\mathrm{s}}{\mathrm{.}}`$001, $`\delta =03^{}23^{}32`$$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$03 $`\pm `$0$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$01. The main source is kidney-shaped, hinting that there is further unresolved substructure on sizescales less than 0$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$4 (20 pc). There is a secondary 2 cm peak, with a flux of 0.54 mJy/beam, located 0.23″ (11 pc) to the east of the main source, at $`\alpha =05^h55^m42`$$`\stackrel{\mathrm{s}}{\mathrm{.}}`$629 $`\pm `$0$`\stackrel{\mathrm{s}}{\mathrm{.}}`$001, $`\delta =03^{}23^{}32`$$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$04 $`\pm `$0$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$01. The 6 cm and 3.6 cm sources are consistent with the structure seen at 2 cm.

Peak fluxes and other information for naturally-weighted maps are presented in Table 1. Total mapped fluxes were obtained by integrating the flux radially outward from the peak until it reached a maximum using AIPS task IRING. These mapped fluxes are presented in Figure 2 with the single dish fluxes and other interferometric fluxes from the literature. Most of the 6 cm and 3.6 cm flux is contained within a radius of 5-6″. The 2 cm flux is confined to the inner 1$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$5 (75 pc) radius region. These sizescales are similar to $`\theta _{max}`$, the angular size at which undersampling effects set in. Sixty to eighty percent of the single dish emission is concentrated within this central few arcsecond portion of II Zw 40.

The spectral index of radio continuum emission, which is defined as $`\alpha `$ in $`S_\nu \nu ^\alpha `$, is -0.1 for pure thermal emission, some larger negative value, typically -0.6 to -1.2 for non-thermal emission from supernovae events and remnants, and takes on positive values when the radio emission is optically thick. We cannot formally derive the spectral index because the naturally-weighted beams at different wavelengths are not matched: the maps at the shorter wavelengths will lose relatively more flux due to undersampling. The spectral index of the overall radio emission in II Zw 40 has been discussed at length in Wynn-Williams & Becklin (1986); Klein, Weiland, & Brinks (1991); Deeg et al. (1993). These studies indicate that the cm-wave emission of II Zw 40, even at 20 cm, is mostly thermal, and that thermal emission is overwhelmingly dominant at wavelengths less than 6 cm.

### 2.2 12$`\mu `$m Image

II Zw 40 was observed on the night of 17 February 2000 using the LWS (Jones & Puetter, 1993) on the Keck 1 telescope in imaging mode. The resulting image is shown in Figure 1d (greyscale) and in Figure 3. The exposure was 486 seconds through a $`1\mu `$m wide filter centered at $`11.7\mu `$m. $`\beta `$ Gemini and $`\alpha `$ Bootes were used for calibration. The night was humid and non-photometric; scatter in the standards was 7% in an hour but as high as 18% over the night, so we conservatively assign 15% uncertainty to the infrared flux. The pixel size is $`0.08\mathrm{}`$ and the chip $`128\times 128`$; the actual resolution, based on the standard star images, is $`0.3\mathrm{}`$ to $`0.5\mathrm{}`$. The infrared source observed is either not or only slightly resolved; the FWHM is $`0.5\mathrm{}`$. At this resolution the source cannot be distinguished from circularly symmetric.

The total flux at $`11.7\mu `$m is 0.24 Jy. This agrees with the 0.22 Jy (Rieke & Low, 1972) observed with a $`6\mathrm{}`$ aperture and is more than half of the 0.46 Jy seen by IRAS with a beam that took in the entire galaxy. The bright mid-infrared emission indicates that the compact radio source is not a supernova remnant. The II Zw 40 source has all the radio and infrared behavior of an HII region ionized by young OB stars. The ratio of mid-infrared to thermal 2 cm radio emission is $`20`$ for this compact radio/IR source, on the low side of the range expected for an HII region (Ho, Beck, & Turner, 1990) but quite out of the range of supernovae. The value of 12$`\mu `$m/6 cm is only a factor of two greater than the value expected on the basis of Ly$`\alpha `$ heating alone (Genzel et al., 1982), and it is nearly an order of magnitude smaller than it is in the otherwise very similar supernebula in NGC 5253 (Gorjian, Turner, & Beck, 2001). The presence of an infrared excess (IRE) over the value expected from Ly$`\alpha `$ heating is generally attributed to factors such as the competition of dust and gas for UV photons and the absorption of longer wavelength light by dust. The conditions in II Zw 40—low metallicity and a dominant OB population—may not be conducive to the “normal” IRE.

We list measured IR fluxes from the literature for II Zw 40 in Table 2, including large-aperture IRAS fluxes, and we plot the IR SED in Figure 2. We fit the SED of II Zw 40 with three dust components, adopting dust emissivities proportional to $`\nu ^\beta `$, where $`\beta =1.5`$. The fits are also illustrated in Figure 2.

Our 11.7$`\mu `$m flux of 0.24 Jy agrees well with the fluxes measured by other groups (Rieke & Low, 1972; Wynn-Williams & Becklin, 1986) in few-arcsecond apertures, and suggests that the mid-IR flux of the central starburst region is confined to the 0.5″ (25 pc) source in our image. The spectrum of this source is rather flat in the mid-IR. It therefore requires fairly warm emission; we can fit it with a dust component of temperature T$`200`$K, giving a luminosity of $`\mathrm{L}2.4\times 10^8\mathrm{L}_{}`$ for this component (see Figure 2). Dust emission from the supernebula in NGC 5253 and from the dwarf galaxy SBS 0335-052 also indicate hot (200K) dust, based on high resolution imaging at 11.7$`\mu `$m and 18.7$`\mu `$m (Gorjian, Turner, & Beck, 2001; Dale et al., 2001).

We can estimate a total $`\mathrm{L}_{\mathrm{IR}}`$ for II Zw 40 by including IRAS fluxes. The $`25\mu `$m IRAS flux of II Zw 40 is due to hot dust with a temperature of $``$100K, we estimate, to explain both the $`25\mu `$m and $`60\mu `$m components–again, like NGC 5253. This component (Figure 2) contributes about $`7.2\times 10^8\mathrm{L}_{}`$, about three times what the 200K dust contributes. The dust emission is unusually warm in this galaxy (Vader et al., 1993), although the cool (42K) dust does contribute about half ($`9.4\times 10^8\mathrm{L}_{}`$) of the total IR luminosity. The $`100\mu `$m is also complicated by the presence of Galactic cirrus. From the dust emission out to a wavelength of $`100\mu `$m we obtain a total infrared luminosity of $`\mathrm{L}1.9\times 10^9\mathrm{L}_{}`$.

### 2.3 Radio Analysis of the Source: Thermal and Nonthermal Emission and Sizescales

There is a wealth of radio continuum observations of II Zw 40, both single dish and interferometric, and thus much information on the distribution of thermal and nonthermal emission in the source (Jaffe, Perola, & Tarenghi, 1978; Klein, Wielebinski, & Thuan, 1984; Sramek & Weedman, 1986; Klein, Weiland, & Brinks, 1991; Deeg et al., 1993).Vanzi et al. (1996) and Joy & Lester (1988) also discuss the radio structure and the thermal/nonthermal flux ratio. Since our A array images do not detect large spatial structures, it is useful to compare them to lower resolution maps and single dish fluxes which are sensitive to extended emission.

At 6 cm, the lower resolution VLA images of Wynn-Williams & Becklin (1986) and Sramek & Weedman (1986) revealed 16 mJy of flux within a 20″ region (corresponding to their undersampling radius). The total 6 cm single dish flux is about 21-22 mJy (Jaffe, Perola, & Tarenghi, 1978; Klein, Weiland, & Brinks, 1991). We detect 15$`\pm `$1 mJy at 6 cm, 68% of the total single dish flux. Vanzi et al. (1996) predict, based on their extinction-corrected H$`\alpha `$ flux, a 6 cm flux of 15.7 mJy for a 15″ aperture. Joy & Lester (1988) also conclude that their near-IR and Br$`\gamma `$ fluxes are in excellent agreement with the VLA fluxes. From this we conclude that at least 70% of the single-dish 6 cm emission is thermal, and confined to a region of less than 6″ (300 pc) in extent. The remaining 30% of the single dish 6 cm emission forms a diffuse extended ($`>`$15″, or 750 pc, based on the lower resolution VLA maps of Wynn-Williams & Becklin, 1986) halo of thermal emission about this central, bright source.

We detect a similar percentage of the total single dish emission at 2 cm. Our flux of 14 mJy is $``$75% of the estimated single dish emission of 18-19 mJy at 15 GHz (extrapolated from the 10.55, 10.7, and 24.5 GHz measurements of Jaffe, Perola, & Tarenghi, 1978; Klein, Weiland, & Brinks, 1991; Klein, Wielebinski, & Thuan, 1984). Our 2 cm flux is consistent with the VLA fluxes of Wynn-Williams & Becklin (1986) and Sramek & Weedman (1986) of 12 mJy from lower resolution observations. The 14 mJy of 2 cm flux is confined to within a 3″ diameter region; of this, 10 mJy is found in the inner, 1.5″ diameter, bright “core” region visible in the contour plot of Figure 1. The remaining 4-5 mJy of single dish flux that is not detected in any of the VLA maps must either be very diffuse, extended over sizescales $`>`$20″ (1 kpc), or consist of a spatially extended collection of low flux sources.

The total 2 cm flux is much greater than the sum of the two peaks seen in the naturally-weighted maps. For our flux of 10 mJy for the inner 1.5″ (75 pc) core region, the required Lyman continuum fluxes are at least $`\mathrm{N}_{\mathrm{Lyc}}=1.0\times 10^{53}\mathrm{s}^1`$, and higher if the emission has significant optical depth that it is partly thick at 2 cm. The total mapped 2 cm flux of 14 mJy, which is contained within the inner 3″, requires $`\mathrm{N}_{\mathrm{Lyc}}=1.4\times 10^{53}\mathrm{s}^1.`$

### 2.4 “Matched-Beam” Radio Images

We cannot directly compare fluxes at different wavelengths for the naturally-weighted maps of the previous section. This is because the missing short baselines scale to different angular resolutions at the different wavelengths: the spatial scale at which emission is resolved out in the 2 cm maps ($`\theta _{\mathrm{max}}34`$″) is three times smaller than for the 6 cm map ($`\theta _{\mathrm{max}}10`$″). So the maps at each wavelength are missing a different fraction of the true total flux.

It is possible, however, to make maps at different wavelengths for which fluxes can be directly compared. For this we must restrict the baselines in the inner (u,v) plane in the 6 cm and 3.6 cm maps to match the 2 cm (u,v) restriction. With the current data set, we eliminated all baselines for which B/$`\lambda <20,000`$. The resulting 6 cm and 3.6 cm images are noiser than before, but their sensitivity to extended structure is close to that of the 2 cm image. We then convolved these “nearly identical” beams to the Gaussian beamsize of the 6 cm map, 0$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$88 $`\times `$ 0$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$43, p.a. 52, and compared them.

Total mapped fluxes for these (u,v)-restricted maps, which resemble the naturally-weighted 6 cm map in appearance, are presented in the last column of Table 1. At 6 and 3.6 cm the “matched beam” images contain less flux than do the naturally -weighted images: as the undersampling sizescale, $`\theta _{max}`$, decreases, more of the flux is resolved out. Of the 15 mJy of flux in the naturally-weighted 6 cm map ($`\theta _{max}10`$″), only 9 $`\pm `$1.5 mJy remains in the “matched beam” image; of the 12 mJy of flux in the naturally-weighted 3.6 cm image, only 10$`\pm `$1.5 mJy is left in the “matched beam” map. But since the U band map is already restricted with respect to short spacings, the “matched beam” flux is the same as for the naturally-weighted map; the 2 cm flux is 14 mJy.

Comparison of the “matched beam” fluxes indicates that the spectral index of the compact ($`\theta <4`$″) emission in II Zw 40 is rising from 6 cm to 2 cm, with a value between +0.4 and +2. This strongly suggests that a significant fraction of the 2 cm free-free emission is not only compact, but optically thick.

### 2.5 Highest Resolution Image: The Compactest Structure

To further investigate the compact structure we have mapped the 2 cm emission with the highest possible resolution, and the result is presented in Figure 4. This map was made with uniform weighting, which places greater weight on the longer baselines. For standard VLA configurations, this sharpens the beam by roughly 50%. The noise in this image, 0.17 mJy $`\mathrm{beam}^1`$, is a factor of two higher than in the naturally-weighted map, which is why less emission is seen. The uniform beam is 0.14″$`\times `$ 0.12″, p.a. 44.

The uniform image reveals 3-4 peaks within the central emission region, all of which are 0.59-0.60 mJy/beam, 3.5$`\sigma `$. The three strongest peaks are separated by 0$`\stackrel{\mathrm{s}}{\mathrm{.}}`$015, or 11 pc. They are at (J2000) $`\alpha =5^h55^m`$ 42$`\stackrel{\mathrm{s}}{\mathrm{.}}`$630, 42$`\stackrel{\mathrm{s}}{\mathrm{.}}`$615, 42$`\stackrel{\mathrm{s}}{\mathrm{.}}`$601 $`\pm `$ 0$`\stackrel{\mathrm{s}}{\mathrm{.}}`$001, $`\delta `$=03 23′ 32$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$01, 32$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$02, 32$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$02 $`\pm `$ 0$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$01, from east to west, respectively. The first two sources listed also appear as the secondary and main peak in the lower-resolution 2 cm image of Figure 1. The fourth source is 6 pc to the north of the westernmost source of the triplet, also 6 mJy/bm, at $`\alpha `$=5h 55m 42$`\stackrel{\mathrm{s}}{\mathrm{.}}`$601 $`\pm `$ 0$`\stackrel{\mathrm{s}}{\mathrm{.}}`$001, $`\delta `$=03 23′ 32$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$13 $`\pm `$ 0$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$01.

These sources may simply be the peaks of the more extended distribution, although there is an increase in brightness temperature with decreasing beam. The 2 cm naturally-weighted map has $`\mathrm{T}_\mathrm{b}120`$K, while the uniform map, with a beam a factor of 1.7 smaller in area, has $`\mathrm{T}_\mathrm{b}200`$K. This suggests that there is indeed some unresolved structure. The brightest peak in the uniform map, at $`\alpha =5^h55^m`$ 42$`\stackrel{\mathrm{s}}{\mathrm{.}}`$525, $`\delta `$= 03 23′ 32$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$88 has a peak flux of 0.76 mJy/beam, $`5\sigma `$. This peak is located about 1.5″ to the northwest of the center of the triplet. There is little extended emission associated with this source, as it is not strong in the lower resolution images.

We can estimate the source sizes using the spectrum and the intensities observed here. Peak flux densities of $``$ 0.6 mJy/beam for the quadruplet correspond to brightness temperatures of $``$200 K for the 0$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$14 by 0$`\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}`$12 beam. In order for this brightness to be consistent with the rising spectrum, and optically thick emission, the source must be confined to a region smaller than the beamsize. For an electron temperature of 13000K, as determined from optical lines by Walsh & Roy (1993), and for $`\tau 1`$, we estimate that a source diameter of d$`1`$ pc would produce the observed brightness. The emission measure implied by a turnover frequency of 15 GHz is about $`10^9\mathrm{cm}^6\mathrm{pc}`$, and the corresponding nebular density would then be $`34\times 10^4\mathrm{cm}^3`$. Emission measures and densities of these magnitude are seen only in the youngest HII regions in the Galaxy. This suggests that these nebulae are very young. The dynamical time for the expansion of an HII region to this size at a sound speed of 10 km/s is $`10^5`$ yrs; its size is another suggestion of its likely youth.

For each source within the quadruplet, we find a lower limit to the Lyman continuum of $`\mathrm{N}_{\mathrm{Lyc}}6\times 10^{51}\mathrm{s}^1`$ for $`\tau =0`$ (optically thin), $`\mathrm{N}_{\mathrm{Lyc}}=0.81\times 10^{52}\mathrm{s}^1`$ for $`\tau =1`$, and higher if $`\tau >1`$.

### 2.6 Comparison with Brackett $`\gamma `$; Extinction in the Nebula

Brackett $`\gamma `$ fluxes have been obtained and analyzed by several groups, including Wynn-Williams & Becklin (1986) and Joy & Lester (1988). Vanzi et al. (1996) and Davies, Sugai, & Ward (1998) have actually imaged Brackett $`\gamma `$. We can compare our high resolution free-free fluxes with their results to estimate extinctions.

We measure 14 mJy of free-free emission at 2 cm in II Zw 40, from a region $``$3″ in diameter. Using the recombination emissivities of (Hummer & Storey, 1987) for 12500K, we would predict on the basis of the 2 cm free-free flux a Br $`\gamma `$ flux of $`\mathrm{S}_{\mathrm{Br}\gamma }^{\mathrm{pred}}=1.2\times 10^{13}\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{cm}^2`$. This can be compared to the $`\mathrm{S}_{\mathrm{Br}\gamma }^{\mathrm{obs}}=0.30.4\times 10^{13}\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{cm}^2`$ measured by Vanzi et al. (1996) in an aperture of 3-4″, and $`\mathrm{S}_{\mathrm{Br}\gamma }^{\mathrm{obs}}=0.4\times 10^{13}\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{cm}^2`$ measured by Davies, Sugai, & Ward (1998). The extinction at 2.2 $`\mu `$m implied by the difference is $`\mathrm{A}_\mathrm{K}11.2`$, for a visual extinction of $`\mathrm{A}_\mathrm{V}810`$ mag (adopting the extinction curve of Rieke & Lebofsky, 1985). Based on comparisons of H$`\alpha `$ and Br$`\gamma `$ fluxes, Joy & Lester (1988), Vanzi et al. (1996), and Davies, Sugai, & Ward (1998) estimate $`\mathrm{A}_\mathrm{K}0.320.36`$, a factor of 3 lower than we find. It is likely that the apparent contradiction is caused by the fact that much of the extinction is high and internal to the nebula. Infrared line ratios frequently give higher extinctions than do visible line ratios (Beck et al., 1986). $`\mathrm{A}_\mathrm{K}`$ 1 mag is seen in many starbursts of this luminosity (Ho, Beck, & Turner, 1990; Kawara, Nishida, & Phillips, 1989).

We interpolate a single dish flux of 18.5 mJy at 2 cm from the 2.88 cm and 1.18 cm measurements of Klein, Weiland, & Brinks (1991) and Klein, Wielebinski, & Thuan (1984). For apertures larger than $``$4″ we would predict a Br$`\gamma `$ flux of $`\mathrm{S}_{\mathrm{Br}\gamma }^{\mathrm{pred}}=1.6\times 10^{13}\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{cm}^2`$, which can be compared with the observed flux of $`\mathrm{S}_{\mathrm{Br}\gamma }^{\mathrm{obs}}=7\times 10^{14}\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{cm}^2`$ measured by Vanzi et al. (1996) for a 15″ aperture and Moorwood & Oliva (1988) in a 6″ x 6″ aperture. From these fluxes we estimate $`\mathrm{A}_\mathrm{K}0.96`$, or $`\mathrm{A}_\mathrm{V}8`$ for emission on larger ($`\mathrm{r}>200\mathrm{pc}`$) sizescales.

## 3 The Nature and Stellar Population of the Source

The infrared and radio emission from II Zw 40 has the form of a concentrated 1.5″ (75 pc) diameter core containing at least half (10 mJy) of the large aperture flux, within a slightly larger (3″, 150 pc diameter, 14 mJy) region of lower-level (2-2.5$`\sigma `$) extended emission, and diffuse thermal emission extended on larger scales which cannot be detected in these images. Our further discussion will concentrate on the compact thermal sources detected in these maps.

The number of stars needed to ionize the radio source can be estimated from the total ionization of $`1.4\times 10^{53}\mathrm{sec}^1`$. This requires $`1.4\times 10^4`$ typical O7 stars over the central 3″ (150 pc) region, of which $`10^4`$ are confined to the inner 75 pc core. If the stars follow the nebular emission—as seems to be the case in NGC 5253—then from its appearance in the highest resolution map II Zw 40 is currently forming at least four pc-sized clusters with $``$ 600 O stars each. For a Salpeter ZAMS IMF down to $`1\mathrm{M}_{}`$, these four clusters would have masses of $`10^5M_{}`$, and higher if the IMF extends to below $`1\mathrm{M}_{}`$. The estimated mass for the entire 150 pc region would be at least $`2\times 10^6M_{}`$ (O3 to G).

The luminosity of this large population of young stars is consistent with the IR spectrum, in which the mid-infrared contribution is substantial. The total observed IR luminosity out to 100$`\mu `$m is $`\mathrm{L}_{\mathrm{IR}}1.9\times 10^9\mathrm{L}_{}`$. We estimate, using a ZAMS Salpeter IMF with upper mass cutoff of O3 (following Turner, Ho, & Beck, 1998) that the ratio of ZAMS luminosity/Lyman continuum photons is $`\mathrm{N}_{\mathrm{Lyc}}2\times 10^{44}\mathrm{s}^1`$. Then our Lyman continuum rate of $`1.4\times 10^{53}s^1`$ implies an OB luminosity of $`\mathrm{L}_{\mathrm{OB}}3\times 10^9\mathrm{L}_{}`$. This OB luminosity is very similar to $`\mathrm{L}_{\mathrm{OB}}`$ obtained by Vanzi et al. (1996) on the basis of emission line excitation. $`\mathrm{L}_{\mathrm{OB}}`$ may exceed $`\mathrm{L}_{\mathrm{IR}}`$, although there are uncertainties in the SED and in the fit, and in $`\mathrm{L}_{\mathrm{OB}}`$. What is clear, however, is that the current starburst is responsible for the infrared luminosity; even a ZAMS OB luminosity appears to overpredict $`\mathrm{L}_{\mathrm{IR}}`$. This suggests that the starburst is exceedingly young, or that there are unusually massive stars, O2 or above, as might be suggested by comparison with the smaller and less extreme cluster R136 (Massey & Hunter, 1998). The thermal radio and infrared source, which we call the supernebula because of its similarity in all but size to a normal HII region, provides all of the infrared luminosity in II Zw 40. In fact, in this galaxy, the infrared luminosity may fall short of measuring the true star formation rate.

We would like to emphasize a point made by Vanzi et al. (1996): the radio to IR correlation seen in many galaxies does not hold in II Zw 40, since the cm-wave fluxes fall short of the value predicted by the radio/IR correlation by factors of 6-10. Given that the IR excess in this galaxy appears to be low, based on the thermal radio fluxes, this discrepancy is even more notable. There is just not much nonthermal synchrotron emission in this BCD for the magnitude of its star formation. This is consistent with the starburst being extremely young. However, the very similar starburst in NGC 5253 shows a similar lack of nonthermal emission even though it has clusters estimated to range from 2.5-50 Myr (Calzetti et al., 1997; Tremonti et al., 2001). It is unclear if the lack of nonthermal synchrotron emission from these starbursting dwarfs is due to the youth of the starburst or to some other cause, such as the lack of a global magnetic field (Turner, Ho, & Beck, 1998).

### 3.1 The Structure of the Starburst in II Zw 40: Multiple Star Clusters?

The starburst in II Zw 40 clearly has a complex radio structure, best seen in our 2 cm map (Fig. 1a and Fig. 3). In the highest resolution uniform maps there are at least four sources visible, within a region of emission that extends to a diameter of 150 pc. Under the very rough assumptions of the earlier sections we estimate that the starburst contains 14,000 O7 star equivalents. The starburst appears to be made up of four compact, 1-pc diameter nebulae excited by clusters each containing $``$600 O stars and $`10^5\mathrm{M}_{}`$. The individual nebulae/clusters are separated by 10-12 pc. These characteristics are similar to the supernebulae in NGC 5253, He 2-10, and NGC 2146 (Beck et al., 1996; Turner, Ho, & Beck, 1998; Kobulnicky & Johnson, 1999; Turner, Beck, & Ho, 2000; Tarchi et al., 2000; Beck, Turner, & Gorjian, 2001). But it should be noted that what we refer to as “clusters” and “sources” are not isolated and well-defined emission regions, like globular clusters in our Galaxy. Rather, these are emission peaks within an extended region of emission. In this sense the nebulae resemble large Galactic HII region complexes such as W49 and W51. It would be very worthwhile to re-observe this galaxy with the highest possible resolution and better S/N.

If the O stars deduced from the radio flux formed alongside the usual number of smaller stars, there will be a total mass of $`2\times 10^6M_{}`$ in young stars within the 150 pc volume of the starburst, and an estimated $`10^610^7`$ young stars. This stellar density is high but not extraordinary; NGC 5253 for example has an estimated 1 million stars within a region 1 by 2 pc (Turner, Beck, & Ho, 2000). However II Zw 40 is a tiny galaxy. Sargent & Searle (1970), Joy & Lester (1988) and Vanzi et al. (1996) all point out that the OB mass of II Zw 40 is a remarkably high (10%) fraction of its total stellar mass, which Vanzi et al. (1996) estimate at $`\mathrm{M}2\times 10^7\mathrm{M}_{}`$.

The 75 pc extent of the starburst core places constraints on the trigger for the starburst. The crossing time for a disturbance moving at the sound speed in $`10^4`$ K gas is roughly 5-10 Myr. While it is difficult to place ages on these nebulae, comparison with Galactic HII regions of similar properties would give the nebulae ages of $`<1`$ Myr (Gorjian, Turner, & Beck, 2001). The ages of these sources are almost certainly a small fraction of the crossing time of the region, suggesting that the star formation was triggered nearly simultaneously. It seems unlikely, therefore, that “sequential super star cluster formation” is operating in II Zw 40.

How does the structure seen in II Zw 40 compare to that in other supernebula-dominated systems? II Zw 40 is like NGC 5253 and He 2-10 in that the infrared and radio fluxes come from obscured super star clusters. The II Zw 40 source is more luminous than the NGC 5253 supernebula in the radio and infrared and contains at least twice the number of O stars, but they are distributed in multiple sources over a much larger volume. The total stellar content of the II Zw 40 source is close to that of the main source A in the dwarf galaxy He 2-10 (Kobulnicky & Johnson, 1999; Beck, Turner, & Gorjian, 2001; Vacca, Johnson, & Conti, 2002), which it also resembles in size and radio and infrared flux. He 2-10 has not been observed with high resolution so the possibility of discrete sub-clusters within the main sources is open. Why is the starburst in II Zw 40 concentrated within 75 pc, that in He 2-10 200 pc, that in SBS 0335-052 1000 pc (Dale et al., 2001; Izotov et al., 1997), and in NGC 5253 only 2 pc? That must depend on the interactions that triggered the formation of the massive star clusters in the first place and their subsequent evolution.

## 4 Conclusions

Our high-resolution radio and infrared observations of the starburst dwarf galaxy II Zw 40 have found that the radio emission at 6, 3.6, and 2 cm is thermal free-free emission with $``$70-75%, of the cm-wave emission confined to a region less than 3″ in diameter. Within this region, there is a bright core of diameter $`1.5`$″ (75 pc) containing at least four sub-sources. The spectrum of the compact emission appears to be rising between 3.6 cm and 2 cm, suggesting that the free-free emission is optically thick at 2 cm, with implied emission measure of $`\mathrm{EM}10^9\mathrm{cm}^6\mathrm{pc}`$ and electron density $`\mathrm{n}_\mathrm{e}34\times 10^4\mathrm{cm}^3`$. For optically thick emission, the observed brightnesses require that the emitting sources are $``$1 pc diameter HII regions, with $`\mathrm{N}_{\mathrm{Lyc}}6\times 10^{51}\mathrm{s}^1`$. The 75 pc “core” starburst region is a complex of four compact “supernebulae”, each powered by $``$600 O stars, with an estimated $`10^5\mathrm{M}_{}`$ in young stars in each cluster. The supernebulae/clusters are separated by $``$12 pc. The total ionization of II Zw 40 is at least $`\mathrm{N}_{\mathrm{Lyc}}=1.4\times 10^{53}\mathrm{s}^1`$, or 14,000 O7 star equivalents. For a Salpeter ZAMS IMF, we estimate that roughly 1-10 million young stars and a young stellar mass of $`2\times 10^6\mathrm{M}_{}`$ are present within II Zw 40. The total young stellar luminosity is $`\mathrm{L}_{\mathrm{OB}}3\times 10^9\mathrm{L}_{}`$. The OB luminosity is in good agreement with or perhaps even higher than the observed infrared luminosity of $`\mathrm{L}_{\mathrm{IR}}1.9\times 10^9\mathrm{L}_{}`$. The radio-infrared ratios in this galaxy differ from the usual starburst values; we attribute this to the extreme youth of the star formation activity, the low metal content of the gas, and a very weak cool dust component.

We are grateful to S. Van Dyk for assistance with the 6 cm data and to an anonymous reviewer for helpful comments. This work was supported in part by NSF grant AST-0071276 to J.L.T. and by the Israel Academy Center for Multi-Wavelength Astronomy grant to S.C.B. This research has made use of the NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database (NED) which is operated by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The authors wish to recognize the significant cultural role that the summit of Mauna Kea has had within the indigenous Hawaiian community and are grateful for the opportunity to conduct observations from this mountain.


text:
# How much state assignments can differ

## 1 Observers with differing information

Suppose there is a physical system $`𝒮`$ with an associated Hilbert space $`_S`$ of (finite) dimension $`D`$, and two observers Alice and Bob each acquire information about $`𝒮`$ by some means. Based on this information, they describe $`𝒮`$ by two states: $`\rho _A`$ and $`\rho _B`$, respectively. If the information that Alice and Bob acquire is not the same, then in general $`\rho _A\rho _B`$.

The question we address in this paper is this: is there any restriction on the possible assignments $`\rho _A`$ and $`\rho _B`$ that can be made? We argue that there is; and we term two states $`\rho _A`$ and $`\rho _B`$ which could represent two descriptions of the same physical system compatible.

For the purposes of this paper, we assume that all of the information acquired by Alice and Bob is both accurate and reliable. By accurate we mean the usual: that any measurements were performed and recorded correctly, and that no one deliberately lied to either of them. By reliable we mean something rather more subtle: that the information acquired by Alice and Bob has not been rendered incorrect by disturbances to $`𝒮`$ unknown to them.

Classically this is a rather straightforward assumption, but quantum mechanically it is not, largely due to the disturbing effects of measurement. If Bob, for instance, were to measure $`𝒮`$, that measurement would disturb the system, potentially introducing errors into Alice’s state assignment. By assuming that the information of both observers is reliable, we are explicitly ruling out such disturbances. What this means technically will become clear below.

## 2 Compatibility

Intuitively, what should we expect from a criterion for compatibility? First, if $`\rho _A`$ and $`\rho _B`$ are both pure states, then they should only be compatible if they are identical:

$$\rho _A=\rho _B=|\psi \psi |$$
(1)
for some $`|\psi `$. This seems natural, because pure states represent states of maximal knowledge (or minimal ignorance).

Rudolph Peierls suggested two criteria for compatibility in the general case:

$`\mathrm{PI}:`$ $`[\rho _A,\rho _B]=0,`$
$`\mathrm{PII}:`$ $`\rho _A\rho _B0.`$
These criteria together rule out differing pure state assignments. Criterion PII seems very natural: it is just the statement that $`\rho _A`$ and $`\rho _B`$ are not orthogonal, and hence not contradictory. PI is somewhat less obvious. It seems to be reasoned by analogy with compatible observables, in which $`[\widehat{A},\widehat{B}]=0`$ implies that the observables A and B can be measured simultaneously.

Unfortunately, in the current case it is much too restrictive. Consider the following example:

$`\rho _A`$ $`=`$ $`|\psi \psi |`$
$`\rho _B`$ $`=`$ $`p|\psi \psi |+(1p)|\varphi \varphi |,`$ (2)
where $`\psi |\varphi 0`$. This pair of assignments fails to satisfy PI; but it could easily arise from two observers with different information. For instance, Bob may believe that $`𝒮`$ could have been prepared in either state $`|\psi `$ or $`|\varphi `$, while Alice has additional information which rules out the latter.

Let’s consider instead one of the following two (equivalent) criteria: $`\rho _A`$ and $`\rho _B`$ are compatible if and only if there exist decompositions of $`\rho _A`$ and $`\rho _B`$

$`\rho _A`$ $`=`$ $`p_0|\chi \chi |+{\displaystyle \underset{i>0}{}}p_i|\psi _i\psi _i|,`$
$`\rho _B`$ $`=`$ $`q_0|\chi \chi |+{\displaystyle \underset{j>0}{}}q_j|\varphi _j\varphi _j|,`$ (3)
which share a state $`|\chi `$ in common, such that $`p_0,q_0>0`$; or equivalently, if and only if the intersection of their supports is nontrivial,

$$S[\rho _A]S[\rho _B]0,$$
(4)
where $`S[\rho ]`$ is the space spanned by the eigenvectors of $`\rho `$ with nonzero eigenvalues. Note that this definition of compatibility extends straightforwardly to any number of observers, Alice, Bob, Cara, etc. This criterion implies PII, and also implies that pure state assignments must be identical. We show below that this criterion is both necessary and sufficient.

## 3 Necessity

Assuming Alice and Bob are rational, if they pool their information they should agree on a joint state description $`\rho _J`$. Furthermore, since it was assumed that their information was reliable, any measurement outcome to which either of them initially assigned zero probability must still have zero probability in the new state $`\rho _J`$.

This means that the null space of the new state $`N[\rho _J]`$ must include the null spaces of the two states $`\rho _A`$ and $`\rho _B`$:

$`N[\rho _A]`$ $``$ $`N[\rho _J],`$
$`N[\rho _B]`$ $``$ $`N[\rho _J],`$ (5)
(where $`N[\rho ]`$ is the space spanned by the eigenvectors of $`\rho `$ with vanishing eigenvalues). This implies that $`N[\rho _J]`$ contains the span of $`N[\rho _A]`$ and $`N[\rho _B]`$, which implies in turn that

$$S[\rho _J]S[\rho _A]S[\rho _B].$$
(6)
In order for such a joint state assignment to exist, therefore, the intersection of the supports of $`\rho _A`$ and $`\rho _B`$ must be nontrivial.

## 4 Sufficiency

Obviously, if one is just given two state assignments $`\rho _{A,B}`$ it is impossible to know if they are intended to apply to the same system or not. So by sufficiency what we mean is that if the assignments satisfy the compatibility criterion, then they could be different descriptions of the same system based on different information.

We prove this by construction. Suppose $`\rho _A`$ and $`\rho _B`$ have decompositions (3). These state assignments could have arisen in the following way. Suppose that there are two ancillary systems $`𝒜`$ and $``$ in addition to $`𝒮`$, and that both Alice and Bob know that the initial state was

$`|\mathrm{\Psi }`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N}}(|0_𝒜|0_{}|\chi _𝒮+{\displaystyle \underset{i>0}{}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{p_i}{p_0}}}|0_𝒜|i_{}|\psi _i_𝒮`$ (7)
$`+{\displaystyle \underset{j>0}{}}\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{q_j}{q_0}}}|j_𝒜|0_{}|\varphi _j_𝒮),`$
where $`N`$ is a normalization factor, $`|0_𝒜`$ and $`|j_𝒜`$ are all mutually orthogonal, and similarly for $`|0_{}`$ and $`|i_{}`$. Alice then measures subsystem $`𝒜`$ and Bob measures $``$, both getting result 0, but they do not share their results. It is clear that in this case Alice and Bob will make the state assignments $`\rho _A`$ and $`\rho _B`$ given in (3). If they were to pool their information, they would both arrive at the joint state assignment $`|\chi `$. So any state assignments which satisfy the compatibility criterion could arise from observers with different information about the same physical system $`𝒮`$.

## 5 Further questions

Both the problem and the solution are easy to state, but lead one into subtle and interesting questions about how state assignments are made. For example:

1. What restrictions are there on how Alice and Bob acquire their information, if we want it to be accurate and reliable? How does the case where they perform measurements differ from the case where they get information from a knowledgeable third party?

2. If Alice and Bob pool their information, how do they form a joint state assignment? Rather than giving an all or nothing criterion, is it possible to quantify a degree of compatibility between two state assignments?

3. Are there other reasonable notions of compatibility? And if so, do they lead to well-defined compatibility criteria?

All of these questions have been examined to some extent, but much remains open. This just shows how far there is to go in completely understanding state assignment in quantum mechanics.

## Acknowledgments

First and foremost, I would like to acknowledge my collaborators Jerry Finkelstein and David Mermin; all technical results of this paper were developed jointly with them. I thank Robin Blume-Kohout, Carl Caves, Jennifer Dodd, Chris Fuchs, David Poulin and Rüdiger Schack for stimulating conversations and feedback, and the organizers of QCMC 2002. This research was supported in part by the Martin A. and Helen Chooljian Membership in Natural Sciences, and by DOE Grant No. DE-FG02-90ER40542.


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# A convolution integral representation of the thermal Sunyaev-Zel’dovich effect

## 1 Introduction

Distortions to the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMBR) spectrum arise from the interaction between the radiation photons and electrons present in large structures such as the hot intracluster gas now known to exist in the universe. Such distortions are only a very small effect changing the brightness of the spectrum by a figure of the order of 0.1 percent. This effect, excluding the proper motion of the cluster, is now called the thermal Sunyaev-Zel’dovich effect   and its detection is at present a relatively feasible task due to the modern observational techniques available. Its main interest lies on the fact that it provides information to determine important cosmological parameters such as Hubble’s constant and the baryonic density -.

The kinetic equation first used to describe the SZE was one derived by Kompaneets back in 1956  -. This approach implies a photon diffusion description of the effect that works basically when the electrons present in the hot intracluster gas are non-relativistic. Many authors, including Sunyaev and Zel’dovich themselves, were very reluctant in accepting a diffusive mechanism as the underlying phenomena responsible for the spectrum distortion. Later on, Rephaeli and others  computed the distorted spectrum by considering Compton scattering off relativistic electrons. Those works show that, at high electron temperatures, the distortion curves are significantly modified. Useful analytic expressions that describe the relativistic SZE can be easily found in the literature .

One possible physical picture of the effect is that of an absortion-emission process in which a few photons happen to be captured by electrons in the optically thin gas. An electron moving with a given thermal velocity emits (scatters) a photon with a certain incoming frequency $`\nu _o`$ and outgoing frequency $`\nu `$. The line breath of this process is readily calculated from kinetic theory taking into account that the media in which the process takes place has a small optical depth directly related to the Compton parameter $`y`$. When the resulting expression, which will be called *structure factor*, is convoluted with the incoming flux of photons obtained from Planck’s distribution, one easily obtains the disturbed spectra. For the non-relativistic SZE, a Gaussian structure factor has been successfully established , but the obtention of a simple analytic relativistic structure factor is a more complicated task . Nevertheless, this work shows that a relativistic structure factor can be obtained with the help of the expressions derived in Refs.  and by the use of simple mathematical properties of the convolution integrals that describe the physical processes mentioned above. In both cases, extensive use has been made of the intracluster gas.

To present these ideas we have divided the paper as follows. In section II, for reasons of clarity we summarize the ideas leading to the SZ spectrum for a non-relativistic electron gas emphasizing the concept of structure factor. In section III we discuss the relativistic case using an appropriate equation for the structure factor whose full derivation is still pending but leads to results obtained by other authors using much more complicated methods. Section IV is left for concluding remarks.

## 2 General Background

As it was clearly emphasized by the authors of this discovery in their early publications   as well as by other authors, the distortion in the CMBR spectrum by the interaction of the photons with the electrons in the hot plasma filling the intergalactic space is due to the diffusion of the photons in the plasma which, when colliding with the isotropic distribution of a non-relativistic electron gas, generates a random walk. The kinetic equation used to describe this process was one first derived by Kompaneets back in 1956 -. For the particular case of interest here, when the electron temperature $`Te10^8K`$ is much larger than that of the radiation, $`TT_{Rad}(2.726K)`$, the kinetic equation reads

$$\frac{dN}{dy}=\nu ^2\frac{d^2N}{d\nu ^2}+4\nu \frac{dN}{d\nu }$$
(1)
Here $`N`$ is the Bose factor, $`N=(e^x1)^1`$ , $`x=\frac{h\nu }{kT}`$, $`\nu `$ is the frequency, $`h`$ is Planck’s constant, $`k`$ Boltzmann’s constant and $`y`$ the “Compton parameter” given by,

$$y=\frac{kTe}{m_ec^2}\sigma _Tn_ec𝑑t=\frac{kTe}{m_ec^2}\tau $$
(2)
$`m_e`$ being the electron mass, $`c`$ the velocity of light, $`\sigma _T`$ the Thomson’s scattering cross section and $`n_e`$ the electron number density. The integral in Eq. (2) is usually referred to as the “optical depth, $`\tau `$”, measuring essentially how far in the plasma can a photon travel before being captured (scattered) by an electron. Without stressing the important consequences of Eq. (1) readily available in many books and articles -, we only want to state here, for the sake of future comparison, that since the observed value of $`N_o(\nu )`$ is almost the same as its equilibrium value $`N_{eq}(\nu )`$, to a first approximation one can easily show that

$$\frac{\delta N}{N}\frac{N(\nu )N_{eq}(\nu )}{N_{eq}(\nu )}=y\left[\frac{x^2e^x(e^x+1)}{(e^x1)^2}\frac{4xe^x}{e^x1}\right]$$
(3)
implying that, in the Rayleigh-Jeans region $`\left(x<<1\right)`$,

$$\frac{\delta N}{N}2y$$
(4)
and in the Wien limit $`\left(x>>1\right)`$ :

$$\frac{\delta N}{N}x^2y$$
(5)
If we now call $`I_o(\nu )`$ the corresponding radiation flux for frequency $`\nu `$, defined as

$$I_o(\nu )=\frac{c}{4\pi }U_v(T)$$
(6)
where $`U_v(T)=\frac{8\pi h\nu ^3}{c^3}N_{eq}(\nu )`$ is the energy density for frequency $`\nu `$ and temperature $`T`$ , and noticing that

$$\frac{\delta T}{T}=\left(\frac{(\mathrm{ln}I(\nu ))}{(\mathrm{ln}T)}\right)\left(\frac{\delta I}{I}\right)$$
(7)
we have that the change in the background brightness temperature is given, in the two limits, by

$$\frac{\delta T}{T}2y,x<<1$$
(8)
and

$$\frac{\delta T}{T}xy,x>>1$$
(9)
showing a decrease in the low frequency limit and an increase in the high frequency one. Finally, we remind the reader that the curves extracted from Eq. (3) for reasonable values of the parameter $`\mathrm{`}\mathrm{`}y\mathrm{"}`$ show a very good agreement with the observational data.

As mentioned before, many authors, including Sunyaev and Zel’dovich themselves, were very reluctant in accepting a diffusive mechanism as the underlying phenomena responsible for the spectrum distortion. The difficulties of using diffusion mechanisms to study the migration of photons in turbid media, specially thin media, have been thoroughly underlined in the literature -. Several alternatives were discussed in a review article in 1980  and a model was set forth by Sunyaev in the same year  based on the idea that Compton scattering between photons and electrons induce a change in their frequency through the Doppler effect. Why this line of thought has not been pursued, or at least, not widely recognized, is hard to understand. Two years ago, one of us (ASV)  reconsidered the single scattering approach to study the SZ effect. The central idea in that paper is that in a dilute gas, the scattering law is given by what in statistical physics is known as the  *dynamic structure factor*, denoted by $`G(k,\nu )`$ where $`k=\frac{2\pi }{\lambda }`$, and $`\lambda `$ is the wavelength. In such a system, this turns out to be proportional to $`\mathrm{exp}(\frac{(\nu \overline{\nu })^2}{W^2})`$ where $`W`$ is the broadening of the spectral line centered at frequency $`\nu `$ given by

$$W=\frac{2}{c}(\frac{2kTe}{m})^{1/2}\nu $$
(10)
If one computes the distorted spectrum through the convolution integral

$$I\left(\nu \right)=_0^{\mathrm{}}I_o\left(\overline{\nu }\right)G(k,\overline{\nu }(1ay)\nu )𝑑\overline{\nu }$$
(11)
where the corresponding frequency shift $`\frac{\delta \nu }{\nu }`$ has been introduced through Eqs. (8-9) $`(a=2+x)`$, one gets a good agreement with the observational data. This result is interesting from, at least, two facts. One, that such a simple procedure is in agreement with the diffusive picture. This poses interesting mathematical questions which will be analyzed elsewhere, specially since the exact solution to Eq. (1) is known (see Eq. (A-8) ref. ). The other one arises from the fact that this is what triggered the idea of reanalyzing the SZ effect using elementary arguments of statistical mechanics and constitutes the core of this paper.

Indeed, we remind the reader that if an atom in an ideal gas moving say with speed $`u_x`$ in the $`x`$ direction emits light of frequency $`\nu _o`$ at some initial speed $`u_x(0)`$, the intensity of the spectral line $`I\left(\nu \right)`$ is given by

$$\frac{I\left(\nu \right)}{I_o\left(\nu \right)}=\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{mc^2}{2kT}\left(\frac{\nu _o\nu }{\nu }\right)^2\right]$$
(12)
Eq. (12) follows directly from the fact the velocity distribution function in an ideal gas is Maxwellian and that $`u_x`$, $`u_x(0)`$ and $`\nu `$ are related through the Doppler effect. For the case of a beam of photons of intensity $`I_o\left(\nu \right)`$ incident on a hot electron gas regarded as an ideal gas in equilibrium at a temperature $`T_e`$ the full distorted spectrum may be computed from the convolution integral given by

$$I\left(\nu \right)=\frac{1}{\sqrt{\pi }W\left(\nu \right)}_0^{\mathrm{}}I_o\left(\overline{\nu }\right)\mathrm{exp}\left[\left(\frac{\overline{\nu }f(y)\nu }{W\left(\nu \right)}\right)^2\right]𝑑\overline{\nu }$$
(13)
which defines the joint probability of finding an electron scattering a photon with incoming frequency $`\overline{\nu }`$ and outgoing frequency $`\nu `$ multiplied by the total number of incoming photons with frequency $`\overline{\nu }`$. $`\frac{1}{\sqrt{\pi }}W\left(\nu \right)`$ is the normalizing factor of the Gaussian function for $`f(y)=1`$, $`W\left(\nu \right)`$ is the width of the spectral line at frequency $`\nu `$ and its squared value follows from Eq.(10)

$$W^2\left(\nu \right)=\frac{4kT_e}{m_ec^2}\tau \nu ^2=4yv^2$$
(14)
where $`\tau `$ is the optical depth whose presence in Eq. (14) will be discussed later. The function $`f(y)`$ multiplying $`\nu `$ in Eq. (13) is given by $`f(y)=1+ay`$ where $`a=2`$ in the Rayleigh-Jeans limit and $`a=xy`$ in the Wien’s limit, according to Eqs. (8-9) and the fact that $`\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\nu }{\nu }=\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }T}{T}`$ for photons. Eq.(13) is the central object of this paper so it deserves a rather detailed examination. In the first place it is worth noticing that $`I_o(\nu )`$, the incoming flux, is defined in Eq. (6). Secondly, it is important to examine the behavior of the full distorted spectrum in both the short and high frequency limits. In the low frequency limit, the Rayleigh-Jeans limit $`I_o(\nu )`$ $`=\frac{2kT\nu ^2}{c^2}`$, so that performing the integration with $`a=2`$ and noticing that $`y`$ is a very small number, one arrives at the result

$$\frac{\delta I}{I}\frac{I(\nu )I_o(\nu )}{I_o(\nu )}=2y,x<<1$$
(15)
(15) is in complete agreement with the value obtained using Eq.( 3), the photon diffusion equation. In the high frequency limit where $`a=xy`$ and $`I_o(\nu )`$ $`=\frac{2h\nu ^3}{c^2}e^x`$, a slightly more tedious sequence of integrations leads also to a result at grips with the diffusion equation, namely

$$\frac{\delta I}{I}=x^2y,x>>1$$
(16)
Why both asymptotic results, the ones obtained with the diffusion equation and those obtained from Eq. (13) agree so well, still puzzles us. At this moment we will simply think of them as a mathematical coincidence. Nevertheless, it should be stressed that in his 1980 paper, Sunyaev  reached rather similar conclusions although with a much more sophisticated method, and less numerical accuracy for the full distortion curves. The distorted spectrum for the CMBR radiation may be easily obtained by numerical integration of Eq. (13) once the optical depth is fixed, $`y`$ is determined through Eq.(2) and $`a=2+x`$. The intergalactic gas cloud in clusters of galaxies has an optical depth $`\tau 10^2`$ .

From the results thus obtained in the non-relativistic case, one appreciates the rather encouraging agreement between the observational data and the theoretical results obtained with the three methods, the diffusion equation, the structure factor or scattering law approach, and the Doppler effect. This, in our opinion is rather rewarding and some efforts are in progress to prove the mathematical equivalence of the three approaches. From the physical point of view, and for reasons already given by many authors, we believe that the scattering Doppler effect picture does correspond more with reality, specially for reasons that will become clear in the last section.

## 3 The relativistic case

Following the discussion of the previous section, Eq.(13) may be written as:

$$I\left(\nu \right)=_0^{\mathrm{}}I_o\left(\overline{\nu }\right)G(\overline{\nu },\nu )𝑑\overline{\nu }$$
(17)
where the function $`G(\overline{\nu },\nu )=\frac{1}{\sqrt{\pi }W\left(\nu \right)}\mathrm{exp}\left[\left(\frac{\overline{\nu }f(y)\nu }{W\left(\nu \right)}\right)^2\right]`$ and $`I_o\left(\overline{\nu }\right)`$ is defined in Eq.( 6). It is now clear that in Wien’s limit, when $`\frac{h\nu }{kT}>>1`$ , Eq. (17) becomes the Laplace transform of $`I_o\left(\overline{\nu }\right)`$ with a parameter $`s=\frac{h}{kT}`$ so that calling $`I_{pW}`$ the distorted spectrum in that limit, one gets that:

$$I_{pW}(\nu )=\frac{2h}{c^2}_0^{\mathrm{}}\overline{\nu }^3G(\overline{\nu },\nu )e^{s\overline{\nu }}𝑑\overline{\nu }$$
(18)
Comparing Eq. (18) with the result obtained by integrating the Kompaneets equation for the change of intensity in Wien’s limit, namely -

$$\mathrm{\Delta }I=y\frac{2k^3T_o^3}{h^2c^2}x^4\frac{e^x}{\left(e^x1\right)^2}\left[4+F\left(x\right)\right]$$
(19)
where $`F(x)=x\mathrm{coth}(\frac{x}{2})`$, a straight forward inversion of the Laplace transform yields that

$$G(\overline{\nu },\nu )=\delta (\overline{\nu }\nu )4y\frac{\nu ^4}{\overline{\nu }^3}\delta ^{}(\overline{\nu }\nu )+y\frac{\nu ^5}{\overline{\nu }^3}\delta ^{^{\prime \prime }}(\overline{\nu }\nu )$$
(20)
In this equation, the primes denote derivatives with respect to $`\nu `$ . It may be thus regarded as a representation of $`G(\overline{\nu },\nu )`$ in terms of the Delta function an its derivatives. To illustrate this point we can show that the RJ and Wien’s limits of integral (11) arise by substituting $`G(\overline{\nu },\nu )`$ by a shifted delta function (see appendix).

In the relativistic case, the form for $`G(\overline{\nu },\nu )`$ may also be written down taking the relativistic form for the particle’s energy $`E=\frac{m_oc^2}{\sqrt{1\frac{u^2}{c^2}}}`$ and performing a power series expansion in powers of $`\frac{u^2}{c^2}`$. Defining $`z=\frac{kT_e}{m_ec^2}`$, this leads to an integral for $`I(\nu )`$ which reads as follows:

$$I(\nu )=\frac{1}{\sqrt{\pi }W\left(\nu \right)}_0^{\mathrm{}}I_o\left(\overline{\nu }\right)\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{\sqrt{1\frac{\left[\overline{\nu }f(y)\nu \right]^2}{2\tau y}}1}{z}\right]𝑑\overline{\nu }$$
(21)
Nevertheless, its integration even in the two limits Wien’s and Rayleigh-Jeans has been unsuccesful. However, by direct numerical integration one obtains curves that agree qualitatively well with those obtained by other methods. Thus, in order to verify the generosity of the delta function representation we proceeded in an indirect way. It has been shown in the literature that a good representation of the relativistic SZE up to second order in $`y`$ reads as :

$$\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{\Delta }I=y\frac{2k^3T_o^3}{h^2c^2}x^4\frac{e^x}{\left(e^x1\right)^2}[4+F\left(x\right)+\frac{y^2}{\tau }(10+\frac{47}{2}F(x)\hfill \\ \frac{47}{5}F^2(x)+\frac{7}{10}F^3(x)\frac{21}{5}H^2(x)+\frac{7}{5}F(x)H^2(x))]\hfill \end{array}$$
(22)
Here, $`H(x)=x\left[\mathrm{sinh}(x/2)\right]^1`$. Taking the inverse Laplace transform in Wien’s limit of Eq. (22) one obtains that

$$\begin{array}{c}G_R(\overline{\nu },\nu )=\delta (\overline{\nu }\nu )\left(4y+\frac{10y^2}{\tau }\right)\frac{\nu ^4}{\overline{\nu }^3}\delta ^{}(\overline{\nu }\nu )+\hfill \\ \left(y+\frac{47y^2}{2\tau }\right)\frac{\nu ^5}{\overline{\nu }^3}\delta ^{^{\prime \prime }}(\overline{\nu }\nu )\frac{42y^2}{5\tau }\frac{\nu ^6}{\overline{\nu }^3}\delta ^{^{\prime \prime \prime }}(\overline{\nu }\nu )+\frac{7y^2}{10\tau }\frac{\nu ^7}{\overline{\nu }^3}\delta ^{^{(IV)}}(\overline{\nu }\nu )\hfill \end{array}$$
(23)
There is of course the remaining problem, namely to obtain Eq. (22) from the convolution integral (21). This has so far defied our skills, but is purely a mathematical problem. The main point we want to underline here is the possibility of using expressions such as Eqs. ( 20) and (23), in principle obtainable from convolution integrals with structure factors which provide a useful analytical tool that avoids resorting too complicated and laborious methods. In fact, Fig. 1 shows CMBR distortion comparison curves obtained using Eqs. ( 19) and (17) with (20), for several non-relativistic clusters. Fig. 2 shows the corresponding comparison relativistic curves at higher, realistic, electron temperatures using Eqs. ( 22) and (17) with (23). It is clear that, for any practical purpose, the curves are identical. Indeed, one is not able to identify two different plots in each figure.

## 4 Discussion of the results

It is known that, for the case of a beam of photons of intensity $`I_o\left(\nu \right)`$ incident on a hot electron gas regarded as an ideal gas in equilibrium at a temperature $`T_e`$, the full non-relativistic SZE distorted spectrum may be computed from the convolution integral given in Eq. (13), which defines the joint probability of finding an electron scattering a photon with incoming frequency $`\overline{\nu }`$ and outgoing frequency $`\nu `$ multiplied by the total number of incoming photons with frequency $`\overline{\nu }`$. $`12y`$ is a function that corrects the outgoing photon frequency due to the thermal effect . $`\frac{1}{\sqrt{\pi }}W\left(\nu \right)`$ is the normalizing factor of the Gaussian, $`W\left(\nu \right)`$ is the width of the spectral line at frequency $`\nu `$ and its squared value is defined in Eq. (14).

Thus, it is clear that an accurate convolution integral between the undistorted Planckian and a *regular function* exists and can be obtained from strictly physical arguments in the non-relativistic SZE. It is interesting, however, that the corresponding relativistic expression does not seem to be a simple physical generalization of Eq. (13). Yet, Eqs. (17,23) give the correct mathematical description of the relativistic distortion by means of Dirac delta functions and its derivatives. Two questions can now be posed. One, of a rather mathematical fashion, states under what conditions a structure factor such as that appearing in Eq. (17) can be written in a representation involving Dirac’s delta functions and its derivatives. This subject seems to be related to the mathematical theory of distributions. The second one, of more physical type, concerns with the possible description of the thermal SZE as a light scattering problem in which CMBR photons interact with an electron gas in a thermodynamical limit that allows simple expressions for the structure factors. If this were the case, the thermal relativistic SZE physics would not need of Montecarlo simulations or semi-analytic methods in its convolution integral description.

Emphasis should be made on the fact that the main objective pursued in this work is to enhance the physical aspects of the SZE by avoiding complicated numerical techniques in many cases. This is achieved, as shown, by resorting the concept of structure factors, or scattering laws, widely used in statistical physics.

APPENDIX

The starting point here is Eq.(17). In the RJ limit, $`I_{oRJ}\left(\overline{\nu }\right)=\frac{2kT}{c^2}\overline{\nu }^2`$. Introducing $`G(\overline{\nu },\nu )=\delta (\overline{\nu }\nu (1ay))`$ one obtains

$$I_{RJ}(\nu )=\frac{2kT}{c^2}_0^{\mathrm{}}\overline{\nu }^2\delta (\overline{\nu }\nu (1ay))𝑑\overline{\nu }=\frac{2kT}{c^2}\nu ^2(1ay)^2$$

keeping terms linear in $`y`$ we find that

$$\frac{I_{RJ}(\nu )I_{oRJ}\left(\nu \right)}{I_{oRJ}\left(\nu \right)}=2ay$$

This result is consistent with Eq. (8) setting $`a=1`$.

Now, in the Wien limit, $`I_{oW}\left(\overline{\nu }\right)=\frac{2h}{c^2}\overline{\nu }^3e^{\frac{h\overline{\nu }}{kT}}`$, in this case the introduction of $`\delta (\overline{\nu }\nu (1ay))`$ leads to

$$I_W(\nu )=\frac{2h}{c^2}_0^{\mathrm{}}\overline{\nu }^3e^{\frac{h\overline{\nu }}{kT}}\delta (\overline{\nu }\nu (1ay))𝑑\overline{\nu }=\frac{2h}{c^2}\nu ^3(1ay)^3e^{\frac{h\nu }{kT}}e^{\frac{h\nu }{kT}ay}$$

Expanding $`e^{\frac{h}{kT}ay}`$ and keeping terms up to first order in $`y`$ we obtain that

$$\frac{I_W(\nu )I_{oW}\left(\nu \right)}{I_{oW}\left(\nu \right)}=6ay+axy$$

Finally, setting $`a=1`$ and considering $`x>>6`$ in the Wien limit, we obtain the desired result, Eq. (9).

This work has been supported by CONACyT (Mexico), project 41081-F.