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# High order correlations of generic pure states of finite-dimensional quantum systems are determined by lower order correlations

## Abstract

We show that almost every pure state of multi-party quantum systems (each of whose local Hilbert space has the same dimension) is completely determined by the state’s reduced density matrices of a fraction of the parties; this fraction is less than about two-thirds of the parties for states of large numbers of parties. In other words once the reduced states of this fraction of the parties have been specified, there is no further freedom in the state.

It is natural to think that a pure quantum state of $`n`$ parties, chosen at random, would have some multi-party entanglement of all possible types including what one might call irreducible $`n`$-party entanglement. Giving concrete, and quantifiable, meaning to this idea is a major goal in the foundations of quantum mechanics and quantum information theory which has yet to be achieved.

Nonetheless, it has been shown that not all entanglement of $`n`$-parties can be reversibly transformed into two-party entanglement , and indeed  that for any $`n`$ there are states which cannot be transformed reversibly into states of fewer than $`n`$ parties. One might deduce from this that there is a notion of irreducible $`n`$-party entanglement, even though it has so far eluded us as to how to measure the amount of it that is contained in any given $`n`$-party state. We note that the general situation is different from the case of two parties where the entropy of entanglement is essentially the unique measure of the bipartite entanglement of two-party pure states .

In this letter we give results which throw a surprising light on these issues. We consider the case of pure states of any number $`n`$ of parties each of which has a $`d`$-dimensional Hilbert space. We show that for almost all such states (i.e. for generic states of this type), the reduced states of a fraction of the parties (at most about two-thirds for large $`n`$) uniquely specify the full quantum state of the $`n`$ parties; there are no other states, pure or mixed consistent with the given reduced states. In the language of , we may say that all the information in a generic $`n`$-party state is contained in the reduced states of a fraction of the parties. Expressed differently, the low order correlations uniquely determine the high order correlations.

An earlier paper  considered this question for pure states of three qubits. It was shown that in this case the three two-party reduced states uniquely determine the full three-party state for generic pure states of three parties. It might have been imagined that this was an anomalous case arising from the low dimensionality of the system. We show here that, on the contrary, this general picture, namely that the high order correlations are determined by lower order ones, is the rule for generic pure quantum states in finite dimensions.

It may be worth remarking how different this situation is from the case of classical probability distributions. For generic distributions of $`n`$ random variables each taking $`d`$ values—such distributions arise, for example, from making local von Neumann measurements on the quantum systems we are considering—it is not difficult to show that even the set of all the marginal distributions for $`n1`$ of the variables does not uniquely specify the full probability distribution.

In a different context—the many-electron systems of molecular physics—much progress has been made on the related problem of reconstructing $`n`$-electron density matrices (especially where $`n=3`$ or 4) from the 2-particle reduced state . Although our problem is similar in spirit, in molecular physics it is fundamental that the particles are indistinguishable (fermions) and so the fact that full quantum state is totally antisymmetric plays a key role. In this letter, we deal with the usual context of quantum information theory: the particles are distinguishable and the full quantum state need have no particular symmetry under interchange of the particles.

The plan of this letter is first to show there is a fraction $`\alpha _U`$ of the parties such that, given the reduced states of this fraction of the parties, the only state (pure or mixed) consistent with these reduced states is the original state (the subscript $`U`$ is to denote the fact that this is an upper bound). These reduced states uniquely specify the state and all the information in the full state is already contained in the reduced states. This result, however, leaves open the possibility that perhaps the true proportion of parties whose reduced states uniquely specify the full state is much smaller; indeed it might grow like $`\mathrm{log}n`$ for example. The second part of the letter shows that, in fact, the number of parties must grow linearly with $`n`$. We give a lower bound $`\alpha _L`$ for this proportion; it is about $`18.9\%`$ for systems of $`n`$ qubits and grows to 50% for systems of $`n`$ $`d`$-level systems.

We will first show that there is an upper bound $`\alpha _U`$ on the fraction of parties whose reduced states are sufficient to uniquely specify the full state of $`n`$ parties. To this end we first consider three parties $`A,B,C`$ with Hilbert spaces whose dimensions are $`M,N,P`$ respectively. We will take $`MN+P1`$ for reasons which will become clear.

Consider then, an arbitrary pure state $`|\xi `$ of three parties $`A`$, $`B`$ and $`C`$. We can write $`|\xi `$ as

$$|\xi =\underset{i=1}{\overset{M}{}}\underset{j=1}{\overset{N}{}}\underset{k=1}{\overset{P}{}}a_{ijk}|ijk;$$
(1)
the labels in the ket refer to systems $`A`$, $`B`$ and $`C`$ in that order. We wish first to answer the following question: Under what conditions is $`|\xi `$ uniquely determined by its two-particle reduced states?

A state that agrees with $`|\xi `$ in its reduced states but is not equal to $`|\xi `$ is most likely going to be a mixed state. In order to allow for this possibility, it is helpful to imagine an environment $`E`$ with which the system might be entangled, such that the whole system, system plus environment, is in a pure state $`|\psi `$. Let us first ask what form $`|\psi `$ must take in order to be consistent with the (generally mixed) state of the pair $`AB`$ derived from $`|\xi `$.

The density matrix of this two-particle state is at most of rank $`P`$, being confined to the space spanned by the vectors $`|v_1=_{ij}a_{ij1}|ij1,|v_2=_{ij}a_{ij2}|ij2,\mathrm{},|v_P=_{ij}a_{ijP}|ijP`$. The state $`|\psi `$ must thus be a superposition of the form

$$|\psi =|v_1|E_1+|v_2|E_2\mathrm{}+|v_P|E_P,$$
(2)
$`|E_1,\mathrm{},|E_P`$ being states of the joint system $`CE`$. Moreover, if the states $`|v_1,\mathrm{},|v_P`$ are linearly independent—this will be the case for almost all states $`|\xi `$—then in order to get the correct density matrix when one traces over $`C`$ and $`E`$, the $`P`$ states $`|E_1,\mathrm{},|E_P`$ must be orthonormal. Expanding $`|E_1,\mathrm{},|E_P`$ in the standard basis $`\{|1,\mathrm{},|P\}`$ of particle $`C`$, we obtain the following form for $`|\psi `$:

$$|\psi =\underset{i=1}{\overset{M}{}}\underset{j=1}{\overset{N}{}}\underset{k,l=1}{\overset{P}{}}a_{ijl}|ijk|e_{lk}.$$
(3)
The states $`|e_{lk}`$ are states of $`E`$ alone. The orthonormality conditions on $`|E_1,\mathrm{},|E_P`$ become

$$\underset{k}{}e_{lk}|e_{l^{}k}=\delta _{ll^{}}.$$
(4)
Thus, in order to match the reduced state on $`AB`$, $`|\psi `$ must be of the form given in Eq. (3), and for a generic $`|\xi `$, the $`|e_{lk}`$ in this equation must satisfy Eq. (4).

Similarly, in order to match the reduced state on $`AC`$, we must have

$$|\psi =\underset{i=1}{\overset{M}{}}\underset{j,l=1}{\overset{N}{}}\underset{k=1}{\overset{P}{}}a_{ilk}|ijk|f_{lj},$$
(5)
where the states $`|f_{lj}`$ are states of $`E`$ satisfying (for generic $`|\xi `$)

$$\underset{j}{}f_{lj}|f_{l^{}j}=\delta _{ll^{}}.$$
(6)
And to match the reduced state on $`BC`$, we must have

$$|\psi =\underset{i,l=1}{\overset{M}{}}\underset{j=1}{\overset{N}{}}\underset{k=1}{\overset{P}{}}a_{ljk}|ijk|g_{li},$$
(7)
with (again for generic $`|\xi `$)

$$\underset{i}{}g_{li}|g_{l^{}i}=\delta _{ll^{}}.$$
(8)
We will proceed by deriving consequences of the two equations (3) and (5)—both of these expressions must describe the same state $`|\psi `$. Thus

$`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{M}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{j=1}{\overset{N}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{k,l=1}{\overset{P}{}}}a_{ijl}|ijk|e_{lk}`$ (9)
$`={\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{M}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{j,r=1}{\overset{N}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{k=1}{\overset{P}{}}}a_{irk}|ijk|f_{rj}.`$ (10)
We now consider specific terms in this equation. For example consider the terms with $`|i11_S`$ in them with $`i`$ fixed. They lead to $`M`$ equations (one for each choice of $`i`$)

$$\underset{l=1}{\overset{P}{}}a_{i1l}|e_{l1}=\underset{r=1}{\overset{N}{}}a_{ir1}|f_{r1}.$$
(11)
It is helpful to rearrange these equations as $`M`$ homogeneous equations in the $`N+P1`$ variables

$$(|e_{11}|f_{11}),|e_{21},\mathrm{}|e_{P1},|f_{21},\mathrm{}|f_{N1}.$$
(12)
Let us take the case that $`MN+P1`$. In this case, for generic values of the $`a_{ijk}`$, the only solutions are

$$|e_{11}=|f_{11};|e_{l1}=0\mathrm{for}l1;|f_{r1}=0\mathrm{for}r1.$$
(13)
Note that the $`M`$ equations do not involve all the $`a_{ijk}`$, and there is no reason for the associated determinant to be zero in general.

Now consider the equations with with $`|i12`$ in them with $`i`$ fixed. These are $`M`$ equations

$$\underset{l=1}{\overset{P}{}}a_{i1l}|e_{l2}=\underset{r=1}{\overset{N}{}}a_{ir2}|f_{r1}.$$
(14)
Using the fact that the only non-zero $`|f_{r1}`$ is $`|f_{11}`$, we can rearrange (14) into $`M`$ equations in the $`P`$ variables

$$(|e_{22}|f_{11}),|e_{12},|e_{32},\mathrm{}|e_{P2}.$$
(15)
These equations will have solutions

$$|e_{22}=|f_{11};|e_{l2}=0\mathrm{for}l2,$$
(16)
since again the determinant will not be zero, in the generic case.

Proceeding in this way to use the equations in $`|i1k_S`$, $`k=1\mathrm{}P`$, we find eventually that

$$|e_{lk}=\delta _{lk}|e_{11}.$$
(17)
Thus

$$|\psi =\underset{ijkl}{}a_{ijl}|ijk|e_{lk}=\underset{ijk}{}a_{ijk}|ijk|e_{11}.$$
(18)
In other words, the fact that $`|\psi `$ must be consistent with the reduced states of $`AB`$ and $`AC`$ forces it to be the original pure state tensor product with a state of the environment. We note that, in getting to this result, we have not needed to make use of the requirement that the full state be consistent with the reduced state for $`BC`$.

We may now use this three-party result to learn about $`n`$-party systems. For let $`N=P=d^m`$, $`M=d^{(m+1)}`$, i.e., a total of $`(3m+1)`$ $`d`$-level systems (clearly $`M>N+P1`$). The reduced states of $`(2m+1)`$ parties, determine the full state. In other words, for large numbers of parties, the knowledge of the reduce states of roughly $`\alpha _U=2/3`$ of the parties is sufficient to uniquely specify the full pure state.

We notice that we have made no use of the orthogonality conditions for the environment states. Indeed in the case of three qubits, we were able to use this orthogonality to show that the three two-party reduced states uniquely specific the full state of three parties for generic pure 3-qubit states. We thus expect that the orthogonality conditions will allow us to reduce the fraction $`\alpha _U`$ of parties whose reduced states are required to specify the full state.

It will also have been noticed that we have derived the above bound for $`n`$-party systems by requiring that the full state be consistent with only two of the very many reduced states of full system. One may well imagine, that requiring consistency with the all the reduced states reduces this fraction. Perhaps the number of parties needed might be much less than two-thirds of the total. Indeed perhaps it might grow sub-linearly with $`n`$. We now show that in fact the true number of parties cannot be much less than our upper bound $`n\alpha _U`$: the number must grow linearly with $`n`$ and indeed for $`n`$ qubits it must be more than about 0.189$`n`$ for large $`n`$. We do this by finding a lower bound $`\alpha _L`$; one must know the reduced states of at least this fraction of the parties.

Let us first consider the case of qubits. We consider a fraction $`\alpha `$ of the total number of qubits $`n`$. We have in mind that all the reduced states of this fraction of qubits are known. The total number of parameters in this set of reduced states must certainly be as large at the number $`2^{n+1}2`$ of parameters in the pure states we could hope to reconstruct.

We now estimate how many independent parameters there are in the reduced states of $`n\alpha `$ of the particles. We use the Bloch parametrization which is valid for any state, pure as well as mixed, e.g. for 3 parties any density matrix may be written as

$`\rho _{ABC}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{8}}(111+\alpha _i\sigma _i11+\beta _i1\sigma _i1`$ (19)
$`+\gamma _i11\sigma _i+R_{ij}\sigma _i\sigma _j1+S_{ij}\sigma _i1\sigma _j`$ (20)
$`+T_{ij}1\sigma _i\sigma _j+Q_{ijk}\sigma _i\sigma _j\sigma _k),`$ (21)
since the set of matrices $`(1,\sigma _x,\sigma _y,\sigma _z)`$ is a basis for the operators on $`^2`$ (the parameters $`\alpha _i,\beta _i`$ etc. are real).

Thus for $`n`$ parties the total number of parameters in the reduced states of up to $`n\alpha `$ parties is

$$\underset{r=1}{\overset{n\alpha }{}}\left(\begin{array}{c}n\\ r\end{array}\right)3^r.$$
(22)
Now

$`{\displaystyle \frac{\left(\begin{array}{c}n\\ r1\end{array}\right)3^{r1}}{\left(\begin{array}{c}n\\ r\end{array}\right)3^r}}`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{r}{3(nr+1)}}`$ (28)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha }{3(1\alpha )}},`$
for $`rn\alpha `$.

Thus

$`{\displaystyle \underset{r=1}{\overset{n\alpha }{}}}\left(\begin{array}{c}n\\ r\end{array}\right)3^r\left(\begin{array}{c}n\\ n\alpha \end{array}\right)3^{n\alpha }\left({\displaystyle \frac{33\alpha }{34\alpha }}\right),`$ (33)
summing the geometric progression to infinity (we need $`\alpha <3/4`$, but it will be, see below).

Now we find a value of $`\alpha `$ for which this total number of terms in the reduced states is less than $`2^{n+1}2`$. We want

$$\left(\begin{array}{c}n\\ n\alpha \end{array}\right)3^{n\alpha }\left(\frac{33\alpha }{34\alpha }\right)2^{n+1}2.$$
(34)
Thus at leading order in $`n`$, we need

$$e^{nH(\alpha )+n\alpha \mathrm{ln}3}e^{n\mathrm{ln}2},$$
(35)
where $`H(x)=x\mathrm{ln}x(1x)\mathrm{ln}(1x)`$.

Numerically we find the solution to

$$H(\alpha )+\alpha \mathrm{ln}3\mathrm{ln}2=0$$
(36)
to be $`\alpha 0.189`$. Thus for $`\alpha `$ less than this there are not enough parameters in the reduced states to account for the different pure states.

Thus taking the upper and lower bounds together we conclude that for generic pure states of $`n`$ qubits, the reduced states of somewhere between $`0.189n`$ and $`2n/3`$ of the qubits uniquely specify the full quantum state; differently put the correlations amongst between $`0.189`$ and $`2/3`$ of the qubits specify uniquely the high order correlations (i.e. the correlations amongst more of the qubits). Using the analogue of the parametrization in (21) for an $`n`$-party state, we see that the higher order tensors in the expression for the pure state are determined by the lower order ones; these higher order tensors may not be freely varied once the lower order tensors are specified.

For systems of $`n`$ parties, each of which lives in a $`d`$-dimensional Hilbert space, the argument for the lower bound is the same as that which we used for qubits. Rather than the 3 Pauli matrices we use $`d^21`$ matrices to span the space of traceless Hermitian operators. Thus the condition (36) becomes

$$H(\alpha )+\alpha \mathrm{ln}(d^21)\mathrm{ln}d=0.$$
(37)
One finds that the lower bound for the fraction increases with increasing $`d`$; from 18.9% for qubits to $`1/2`$ for large $`d`$.

We believe that it will be valuable to find the exact fraction of parties whose reduced states determine the full state for general values of $`n`$ and $`d`$. The states which are not generic are also interesting. In the case of three qubits , the (non-trivial) non-generic states are those which are locally equivalent to

$$a|111+b|222.$$
(38)
There are many states consistent with the two-party reduced states for these pure states. We conjecture that non-generic states for general $`n`$ and $`d`$ will have special properties as far as their multi-particle entanglement is concerned.

We thank Sandu Popescu for illuminating conversations. We gratefully acknowledge funding from the European Union under the project EQUIP (contract IST-1999-11063).


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# Exploring Halo Substructure with Giant Stars III: First Results from the Grid Giant Star Survey and Discovery of a Possible Nearby Sagittarius Tidal Structure in Virgo

## 1 Introduction

There has been a long and somewhat checkered history of observations attempting to isolate substructure in the Galactic halo (e.g., E79; Sommer-Larsen & Christensen, 1987; Croswell et al., 1991; Côté et al., 1993; Majewski et al., 1996). While observations in the last decade have confirmed the existence of a few coherent groups of halo stars (Côté et al., 1993; Majewski et al., 1996; Helmi et al., 1999), more recent large-area CCD surveys are beginning to reveal the ubiquity of these structures (Vivas, 2001; Dohm-Palmer et al., 2001; Newberg et al., 2002). Given the central importance of these probable relics of satellite accretion to the Searle & Zinn (1978) model of the formation of the Galactic stellar halo, their implications for the formations of massive halos via the Cold Dark Matter hypothesis (Navarro et al., 1997), and their usefulness for measuring the Galactic potential (Johnston et al., 1999), there is motivation to identify and catalogue Galactic halo streams and moving groups. We present in this paper first results from the Grid Giant Star Survey (GGSS), in which we identify a new, coherent moving group of Galactic halo stars.

The GGSS probes 1302 evenly spaced, $`0.40.6`$ deg2 areas of the sky to (a) supply several thousand bright ($`V12.5`$), sub-solar metallicity K giants for the Astrometric Grid of the Space Interferometry Mission (see Patterson et al., 2002), and (b) explore problems related to the structure and kinematics of the Milky Way. The photometric technique for discriminating late type giants from dwarf stars, which uses the Washington $`M,T_2`$ and $`DDO51`$ filters, is described by Majewski et al. (2000a), and is being used by several groups (Morrison et al., 2000; Geisler et al., 2002; Majewski et al., 2000b) to explore Galactic structure problems. Further discussion of the reliability of the photometric selection of giant stars is given in Palma et al. (2002). It bears reiteration here that follow up high resolution spectroscopy -R=50,000; 5000-5900A coverage; S/N$``$25 observations undertaken to monitor the spectroscopic stability of GGSS candidates and search for possible companions- of stars selected by the GGSS as metal-poor giants in a similar magnitude range as the stars discussed here has revealed 100% of candidates observed so far to be, in fact, metal-poor giants (Verne Smith, private communication). While preliminary inspection of $``$300 candidates suggests that they are all giants, detailed cross correlation studies with model spectra of a randomly selected sub-sample of 38 stars confirms that they are indeed so with $`1.0Log(g)3.1`$ and $`T_{eff}5500K`$ for every candidate.

GGSS photometry for $`\delta <+20^{}`$ fields was obtained on the Swope 1-m telescope at Las Campanas Observatory, and spans $`9V17`$. Pipeline reductions convert the three-filter data to photometric abundances and parallaxes for likely giants according to the prescription in Majewski et al. (2000a). A more detailed discussion will be given elsewhere.

We describe here first results from a spectroscopic probe of the GGSS giant star sample from among the earliest fields processed through the photometric pipeline. Samples of candidate giant stars in 11 fields along $`\delta 17^{}`$ (J2000) and $`12^h<\alpha <17^h`$ were observed with the Blanco 4-m telescope + Hydra multifiber system on UT 28-30 Mar 2000. We limited ourselves to $`M<15`$ giants for this initial probe of GGSS fields because of limited available observing time, obtained as brief ($`<1`$ hour) hour angle “fillers” for other projects. The data were obtained using the Schmidt camera and 2$`\times `$4k SITe CCD in conjunction with the KPGLD grating. When centered on the infrared calcium triplet region, this setup delivers radial velocity precision of $`5`$ km s-1 (verified by repeat observations of test stars).

## 2 A Coherent Feature in Phase Space

Fig. 1 shows the distribution of heliocentric radial velocities, $`v_{helio}`$ for all photometrically classified giant (top) and dwarf (bottom) stars having Hydra spectroscopy, as a function of Galactic longitude. For comparison the dotted curve marks the minimum (maximum) $`v_{helio}`$ for $`270^{}<l<360^{}`$ ($`0^{}<l<90^{}`$) expected for stars within 20 kpc - the distance limit of our observations - if they follow a constant circular rotation curve with $`v_{rot}=`$200 km s-1 \[we adopt a solar motion of $`(u,v,w)=(9,11,6)`$ km s-1 about a local standard of rest with $`v_{rot}=`$220 km s-1\]. The solid line plots the 0 km s-1 “rotation” curve, i.e. the reflex of solar motion. These illustrative curves do not include the effects of velocity dispersion about the adopted $`v_{rot}`$; nevertheless, while the zero velocity dispersion and constant \[$`v_{rot}(R_{GC})`$\] simplifications increasingly break down toward $`l=0^{}`$ (where the bulge contributes), the curves, which should nominally bound the expected $`v_{helio}`$ range for the Milky Way’s flattened, disk-like components, do make apparent several aspects of our sample.

For example, as expected, the velocity distribution of the dwarfs is more consistent with a colder disk population than is that for giant stars, which tend to have a larger fraction of members outside the curves. Among these outliers we identify a conspicuous group of eight stars, marked with solid circles in Fig. 1, that trace a sequence of $`v_{helio}`$ (and $`R_{GC}`$, see below) with position in the sky, with a smoothness that suggests that they are members of a population having a tight velocity coherence (the progressive variation reflecting primarily changes in line-of-sight perspective). Table 1 lists observed and derived properties of these stars. If a disk population, these stars can only be matched by circular rotation curves with $`v_{rot}`$ in the range $`250400`$ km s-1 at the distances reported in Table 1. This far exceeds the $`v_{rot}`$ of the Galaxy at the $`R_{GC}`$’s of this group (2-8 kpc). The combination of kinematical coldness and rotational velocities exceeding $`v_{circ}`$, which is generally only attained near the perigalacticon of a highly elliptical orbit for halo objects, supports the notion that these stars are part of a coherent debris stream from a Galactic satellite.

Fig. 2 shows the $`(MT_2,MDDO51)`$ distribution of the giant candidates in Table 1 along with iso-metallicity loci of giant stars \[see Majewski et al. (2000a) for details\]. Within the photometric uncertainties, it can be seen that the stars in our proposed stream also appear to have similar metal abundances of roughly \[Fe/H\] $`=1.0`$.

Fig. 3 shows the location of the stream stars in the sky; note that the positional coherence here is because of our study of fields along constant declination. However, when the photometric parallaxes, $`r`$, and ($`l,b`$) positions of candidate stream stars are converted to Cartesian Galactic coordinates, the stars follow a linear or arcing sequence, where each star is roughly equidistant from the Galactic center (Fig. 4). By accounting for other dimensions of phase space, we have managed to “follow” this well-ordered sequence of stars into the velocity range occupied by more typical field stars for $`l<305^{}`$; it is to the very existence of such a group of stars with a smooth progression in various dimensions of parameter space that we wish to draw attention, as it would be unusual to find at random a group of stars that are velocity outliers, have similar $`R_{GC}`$, and show a coherent sequence of velocities in independently measured multifiber survey fields.

To test whether this group of velocity outliers could be halo or thick disk stars aligned by chance, we performed a series of Monte Carlo simulations. For each GGSS field with a stream candidate (Table 1) we simulated 50,000 stars by assigning a random velocity defined by the halo velocity ellipsoid of Chiba & Beers (2000), and distance based on our distribution of photometric parallaxes. The probability of finding a halo outlier with radial velocity less than the velocity of a particular stream star (plus 5 km s-1 to further account for velocity uncertainties) varies from 0.27 to 0.37 for each GGSS field. The probability of finding eight outliers in the specific fields listed in Table 1 is $``$0.0001. If we assume a probability of finding similar outliers in the three other Table 1 fields is also $``$0.3, then the probability of finding a set of outliers in eight consecutive fields is 0.0006. Similar simulations using the thick disk velocity ellipsoid from Chiba & Beers (2000) in conjunction with a constant circular velocity of 200 km s-1 yield probabilities of finding a random outlier from $`<`$0.001 to 0.35 in each of our fields, with a formal probability of a pure disk population indistinguishable from 0. Choosing the larger of the halo or thick disk outlier probability in each field yields a probability of at most 0.001 for finding outliers in eight consecutive fields. We have an additional constraint in that the distance and velocity of our outliers are correlated (Table 1), with a correlation coefficient of 0.84. Assuming each of the eight stream fields has a star with the velocity listed in Table 1, we randomly assigned each star a distance from the ensemble of measured distances in each field. One hundred thousand simulations revealed only 2% with an absolute value of the correlation coefficient greater than 0.84. Thus, we conclude that the probability of randomly finding a correlated stream of outliers, such as detected here, is negligibly small (probability of 0.001$`\times `$0.02). Thus the combined evidence of a smooth, cold progression in the various projections of phase space ($`lv_{helio}`$, $`lb`$, $`XZ`$, $`br`$, $`rv_{GSR}`$ – see Figs. 1, 3 and 4) strongly suggests that these stars are parts of a loop of tidal debris arcing around the Galactic Center.

We looked for other such “sequences” in the data but found nothing else as striking. There are other velocity outliers in Fig. 1, as would be expected from our estimate of a $``$30% chance to find a velocity outlier in any particular field; but, for example, the four positive velocity outliers in Fig. 1 show no obvious correlation with distance, and yield a metallicity dispersion twice that of our proposed stream.

Our observations suggest the Table 1 stream to be extremely diffuse. Each GGSS pointing used for this set of observations covers an area of 0.4 deg2 separated by $`5.6^{}`$ from its neighbor. The absolute magnitudes of both our stream and non-stream giants span the entire range covered by the “red giant branch bump” and “normalization region” stars reported by Bono et al. (2001, “B01” hereafter) in their HST based starcount studies of Galactic globular clusters. By comparing the stellar density of our stream stars with the total density of “red giant branch bump” and “normalization region” stars in the B01 globular clusters we estimate the difference/offset in surface brightness densities. The globular cluster NGC 6362 has an average metallicity in the range of our proposed stream stars, and is a diffuse, nearby object (Harris, 1996) – so that the average density/surface brightness within the HST-WFPC2 field of view of the B01 observations is roughly constant, and approximately equal to the central value. By adding the difference in surface brightness density of the stream with respect to NGC 6362, calculated above, to the central surface brightness of this globular cluster (Harris, 1996) we estimate the surface brightness of the stream to be fainter than $`29`$ mags arcsec-2 in the $`V`$ band. While this estimate is admittedly crude, it is likely that our stream is among the most diffuse known coherent substructures in the Galactic halo, and this find highlights the capability of the GGSS to discern such a gossamer thread among the clutter of Galactic stars. We note that our “tidal feature” does not seem to correspond well with any of the features in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) data of Newberg et al. (2002), even though their observational plane is only 17 different from ours. This may be attributable both to the low surface brightness of the feature, as well as the fact that the main sequence turn-off counterparts of the stars we see here are at the bright magnitude limit of the SDSS.

The extent of the proposed debris stream is presently not well defined, but we are undertaking follow-up photometry and spectroscopy to bracket the limits better. Note that we lose track of the sequence past $`l=345^{}`$ possibly due to magnitude limitation – the $`l=350^{}`$ field would have the next farthest star from us, but this is close to the magnitude limit of the present spectroscopic sample. At the other end of the sequence, any progression of the sequence of stars is lost among disk stars having similar velocities. It is interesting that if our sequence is indeed tidal debris, then extrapolation brings it through the solar neighborhood.

## 3 Possible Association with Sagittarius

The positions of our selected stars in Fig. 3 and the top left panel of Fig. 4 are very suggestive of tidal debris from a satellite orbiting the Galaxy on a nearly polar orbit. Of the galaxies known to be satellites of the Milky Way today, the Sagittarius dwarf (discovered by Ibata et al., 1994) is the one most likely to be the parent of this debris since it is the closest of all the satellites to the Galactic center (currently at 16 kpc) and is also on a nearly polar orbit passing through the region where our fields are located. Not only is the highly distorted shape of the main body of this galaxy suggestive of tidal disruption (Ibata et al., 1997), but there is already substantial evidence for significant debris associated with this galaxy at many tens of degrees from its main body (Mateo et al., 1998; Majewski et al., 1999; Ibata et al., 2001; Ivezić et al., 2000; Dinescu et al., 2000; Yanny et al., 2000; Martínez-Delgado et al., 2001; Vivas, 2001; Dohm-Palmer et al., 2001; Newberg et al., 2002). We note that the Table 1 stars have photometric \[Fe/H\] that approximate the -1.3 and -0.7 dex values of the 11 and 5 Gyr aged populations seen in Sgr (Layden & Sarajedini, 2000).

Figs. 3 and 4 compare our data with semi-analytic predictions for the position and velocity of debris lost from Sgr during the last 1.5 Gyrs (see Johnston, 1998, for a description of the model). In this particular model Sgr had an initial mass of 2.1$`\times `$109 $`M_{}`$, the Milky Way’s circular velocity was fixed at 200 km s-1, and Sgr’s tangential velocity was allowed to vary within the proper motion error bars of present day observations to find the best fit, $`u=200`$, $`v=20`$ and $`w=175`$ km s-1. The portion of the streamer that is the closest match to the data comes from debris lost $``$1 Gyr ago, two pericentric passages previous to the most recent encounter i.e. we adopt perigalacticon passage n=0 for the most recent encounter while the passage of interest in n=-2. The debris from this encounter has wrapped entirely around the Milky Way.

Figs. 3 and 4 suggest that it is plausible that the feature we have found is indeed associated with Sagittarius. However, we note that this feature alone cannot strongly constrain the details of Sgr’s orbit, mass, mass loss history or Milky Way potential. The profusion of streams plotted in our figures is some indication of the degeneracy of the problem. Rather, our discovery is interesting in that it is the first case reported of debris that could be from Sagittarius within the Sun’s orbit and, if the association is correct, suggests that there should be many more Sgr streams wrapped around the Galaxy within a few kiloparsecs of the Solar Neighborhood. Previous studies (Totten & Irwin, 1998; Dinescu et al., 2000; Johnston et al., 1999) have suggested evidence of multiply wrapped tails; the GGSS can provide a direct means of identifying and studying such features in the inner halo. Considering that our first detailed look at a portion of the GGSS data revealed evidence of such a diffuse stream we are hopeful that future studies with the GGSS data set will yield more such features, as part of our goal to understand the formation and mass distribution of the Galactic halo.

Note added in proof: A preliminary reduction of new follow up spectroscopic observations (of a mix of stars previously observed, and fainter giant candidates that we hadn’t observed spectroscopically earlier) obtained since the paper was submitted shows more outliers consistent with the stream. They even extend the stream out to the fields G1532-16 and G1556-16 and have stream members with even more extreme outlying velocities.

Our work on the Grid Giant Stars Survey has been supported by NASA/JPL by the following SIM Preparatory Science Grants: Grant #AST-1201670 (SRM as PI), Grant #AST-1222563 (SRM as PI), and Grant #NRA-99-04-OSS-058 (DG as PI). SRM also acknowledges support from NSF Career Award AST 97-02521, a Cottrell Scholar Award from The Research Corporation, and a David and Lucile Packard Foundation Fellowship.


text:
# The Structure Function Working Group SummaryPresented at DIS2002, Cracow, 30 April - 4 May 2002

## 1 Introduction

In this report we summarize new results on lepton-nucleon deep inelastic scattering (DIS) from the fixed target experiments NuTeV and Hermes, and from the $`ep`$ collider HERA in the range of four-momentum transfer squared, $`Q^2`$, between 0.35 and 30000 GeV2. Recent next-to-leading-order (NLO) QCD fits and uncertainties of the parton distribution functions (PDFs) are discussed. In the theory part of this summary, developments in lattice QCD, saturation type effects and colour glass condensates, $`k_T`$-factorization, and collinear factorization are surveyed.

## 2 DIS results on the proton structure functions

### 2.1 The first NuTeV results on $`F_2`$

The $`\nu (\overline{\nu })`$-nucleon cross sections from the NuTeV neutrino experiment were presented by R. Bernstein . In Fig.1 (left) the results are compared with the former CCFR data  as function of the inelasticity $`y`$. The measurements are in a good agreement apart from $`x=0.45`$ where the $`\overline{\nu }`$ results of CCFR are systematically lower. In contrast to CCFR the NuTeV experiment uses very clean $`\nu `$ and $`\overline{\nu }`$ beams provided by a Sign Selected Quadrupole Train where the charge of the parent $`\pi ,K`$ of the neutrinos can be selected. The admixtures of the wrong neutrino type is $`310^4`$ for $`\nu `$ and $`410^3`$ for $`\overline{\nu }`$ beams. The energy scale uncertainties for muons and hadrons are also improved compared to CCFR with 0.8$`\%`$ for muon (goal 0.3$`\%`$) and 0.4$`\%`$ for hadrons. For CCFR both uncertainties were 1$`\%`$.

The sum of $`\nu `$ and $`\overline{\nu }`$ cross sections depends on $`F_2`$, $`R`$, the ratio $`\sigma _L/\sigma _T`$ of longitudinal to transverse cross sections, and $`\mathrm{\Delta }xF_3=xF_3^\nu xF_3^{\overline{\nu }}=4x(sc)`$ which is sensitive to heavy quark densities. All three functions cannot be derived from the data simultaneously because of strong correlations among corresponding parameters. The first NuTeV results on $`F_2(x,Q^2)`$, shown in Fig.1 (right), were obtained using the world knowledge on $`R`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }xF_3`$ deduced from the $`y`$ dependence of the cross sections.

### 2.2 New HERMES results on nuclear effects in DIS

DIS cross section ratios for positrons of 27.5 GeV on helium-3, nitrogen and krypton with respect to deuterium were measured by the HERMES collaboration (presented by A. Bruell ). The helium-3 and nitrogen data were already published . Recently, those data were found to suffer from an A-dependent tracking efficiency of the HERMES spectrometer, which was not recognised in the previous analysis. The resulting correction of the cross section ratios is significant at low values of $`x`$ and $`Q^2`$ and substantially changes the interpretation of those data. The data corrected for this effect are shown in Fig.2. They are in agreement with previous measurements of NMC and SLAC. Values for the ratio $`R_A/R_D`$ have been derived from the the $`y`$ dependence of the data and are found to be consistent with unity.

### 2.3 HERA results at low and medium $`Q^2`$

T. Lastovicka  presented new H1 data on $`F_2(x,Q^2)`$ at very low $`x`$ and $`0.35<Q^2<3.5`$ GeV2 in the transition region from the non-perturbative QCD to the DIS domain, see Fig.3. The data were taken in 2000 in a special run with the interaction vertex shifted by 70 cm in the proton beam direction, thereby accessing lower $`Q^2`$ than at the nominal vertex position. The luminosity was increased by about a factor of four as compared to the initial shifted vertex run in 1995 which lead to the first H1  and ZEUS  data on the proton structure function in the low $`Q^2`$ domain.

The steep rise of the proton structure function $`F_2`$ towards small $`x`$ was first observed in 1993 in the HERA data . In perturbative QCD this rise corresponds to an increase of the gluon density and is expected to slow down at highest energies (small $`x`$) due to gluon-gluon interactions. Meanwhile the precision of the $`F_2`$ data is much improved and the rise is studied in great detail. J. Gayler  presented the local derivative $`\lambda =(`$ ln $`F_2/`$ ln $`x)_{Q^2}`$ based on the new H1 $`F_2`$ data  and published precision H1 data . The $`x`$ and $`Q^2`$ dependence of $`\lambda `$ is shown in Fig. 4 (left). The derivative is constant for fixed $`Q^2`$ in the range $`x<0.01`$ consistent with the QCD fit. Therefore the data were fitted assuming the power behaviour $`F_2=c(Q^2)x^{\lambda (Q^2)}`$. The results for the $`\lambda `$ and $`c`$ values are presented in Fig. 4 (right). At $`Q^2<2`$ GeV2 the H1 data were combined with data of NMC  and ZEUS . We can state that no damping effects of the rise of $`F_2`$ are visible yet at present energies for $`Q^2>0.85`$ GeV2. For $`Q^23.5`$ GeV2 and $`x<0.01`$, $`F_2`$ can be well described by the very simple parameterisation $`F_2=cx^{\lambda (Q^2)}`$ with $`c0.18`$ and $`\lambda (Q^2)=a`$ln($`Q^2/\mathrm{\Lambda }^2`$). At very low $`Q^2`$ $`\lambda `$ is approaching 0.08 which corresponds to the energy dependence of soft hadronic interactions $`\sigma _{tot}s^{\alpha _P(0)1}s^{0.08}`$ .

### 2.4 High $`Q^2`$ HERA data

New high $`Q^2`$ HERA data were presented by M. Ellerbrock , M. Moritz  and S. Grijpink . Both ZEUS and H1 have results from $`16pb^1`$ of $`e^{}p`$ data taken in the years 1998-1999 and $`60pb^1`$ of $`e^+p`$ data taken in the years 1999-2000, both at $`\sqrt{s}=318\mathrm{G}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}`$. These $`e^+p`$ data can be combined with the previously published data at $`\sqrt{s}=300\mathrm{G}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}`$ to give a total sample of $`90pb^1`$.

The ZEUS and H1 data for neutral (NC) and charged current (CC) $`e^\pm p`$ scattering are compared in Fig. 5. There is excellent agreement between the experiments and with the Standard Model predictions for electroweak unification at high $`Q^2`$.

Neglecting the small contribution of $`F_L`$, the differential cross-section for NC $`e^\pm p`$ scattering is given by

$$\frac{d^2\sigma \left(e^\pm p\right)}{dxdQ^2}=\frac{2\pi \alpha ^2}{Q^4x}\left[Y_+F_2(x,Q^2)Y_{}xF_3(x,Q^2)\right],$$
(1)
where $`F_2,xF_3`$ are expressed in terms of parton distribution functions (PDFs) as

$$F_2(x,Q^2)=\mathrm{\Sigma }_iA_i(Q^2)(xq_i(x,Q^2)+x\overline{q}_i(x,Q^2))$$
(2)
and

$$xF_3(x,Q^2)=\mathrm{\Sigma }_iB_i(Q^2)(xq_i(x,Q^2)x\overline{q}_i(x,Q^2))$$
(3)
in leading order perturbative QCD. For unpolarised lepton beams the coefficients $`A,B`$ are given in terms of electroweak couplings . The parity violating structure function $`xF_3`$ is only significant at high $`Q^2`$. Fig 5 also shows the difference in the $`e^+`$ and $`e^{}`$ NC cross-sections due to this $`xF_3`$ term as a function of $`Q^2`$. This has been used to extract $`xF_3`$ and a new measurement from ZEUS is shown in Fig 6. With the greater luminosity of HERA-II a precison measurement of this valence structure function will be possible across all $`x`$. Currently the only such precision measurement is the $`xF_3`$ measurement from CCFR $`\nu ,\overline{\nu }`$ scattering on an Fe target.

High $`Q^2`$ CC data can be used to gain information on the high $`x`$ valence PDFs, with flavour separation between $`u_v`$ and $`d_v`$. CC scattering involves only the quark flavours which are appropriate to the charge of the current, so that the differential cross-section for CC $`e^\pm p`$ scattering with unpolarized beams is given by

$$\frac{d^2\sigma (e^{}p)}{dxdQ^2}=\frac{G_F^2}{2\pi x}\frac{M_W^4}{(Q^2+M_W^2)^2}\left[xU(x,Q^2)+(1y)^2x\overline{D}(x,Q^2)\right]$$
(4)
and

$$\frac{d^2\sigma (e^+p)}{dxdQ^2}=\frac{G_F^2}{2\pi x}\frac{M_W^4}{(Q^2+M_W^2)^2}\left[x\overline{U}(x,Q^2)+(1y)^2xD(x,Q^2)\right]$$
(5)
where $`U`$ stands for $`U`$-type quarks with charge $`+2/3`$ and $`D`$ for $`D`$-type quarks with charge $`1/3`$. Clearly at high $`x`$ the $`e^{}p`$ cross-section is dominated by the $`u_v`$ PDF and the $`e^+p`$ cros–section by the $`d_v`$ PDF. The new high $`Q^2`$ CC data are shown in Fig 7. Their contribution to the precision extraction of PDFs will be discussed in Sec. 3.2.

The strong dependence of the CC cross-sections on the $`W`$ propagator can be used to make an extraction of $`M_W`$ in a space-like process. The results from ZEUS and H1 for $`e^{}`$ and $`e^+`$ data are given in Table 1. The $`e^{}`$ data give the better determinations, both because of the larger cross-section and because of the reduced uncertainty from the PDFs when the better known $`u`$ quark distribution is dominant.

At HERA-II our ability to measure electroweak parameters will be greatly improved both due to increased statistics and due to the polarization of the beams, as detailed in the contribution of F. Metlica . For example, with $`1fb^1`$ and $`P(e^{})=0.7`$, the error achievable will be $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_W0.055\mathrm{GeV}`$, c.f. the PDG value $`\mathrm{\Delta }M_W0.049\mathrm{GeV}`$ from time-like processes.

## 3 Recent NLO QCD fits

A large amount of new data has become available during the past couple of years, in particular the recent measurements of inclusive DIS cross sections in $`ep`$ interactions by H1 and ZEUS and the inclusive high-$`E_T`$ jet data by D0 and CDF. The improved precision of the data led to a new generation of global NLO DGLAP QCD analyses, such as MRST01  and CTEQ6  presented at the workshop by R. Thorne  and W.K. Tung . B. Reisert  and E. Tassi  presented QCD fits performed by H1  and ZEUS using their respective data supplemented by the data from fixed target experiments. Improved quality of the fits is achieved due to more precise data as well as due to a new level of sophistication in the fitting technique including a full treatment of available experimental correlated systematic uncertainties.

The MRST01, CTEQ6 and ZEUS PDFs are compared in Fig. 8, where the error band illustrated is that from the ZEUS standard (ZEUS-S) analysis. There is good agreement of all these PDFs within experimental uncertainties.

### 3.1 Uncertainty of parton distributions from QCD fits

A new feature of the recent QCD analyses is a systematic and pragmatic treatment of the uncertainties of the parton distribution functions and their physical predictions. One of the problems of the uncertainty estimation for fits with many data sets is related to a certain degree of inconsistency of the latter. Usually the one sigma error of a parameter in a fit is determined by variation of $`\chi ^2`$ by one unit from the minimum. Very often, however, this rule becomes unrealistic. This is demonstrated in Fig. 9, where the distances from $`\chi ^2`$-minima of individual data sets to the global minimum by far exceeds the range allowed by the $`\mathrm{\Delta }\chi ^2=1`$ criterion. It is not possible to simply drop “inconsistent” data sets, as then the partons in some regions would lose important constraints. On the other hand the level of “inconsistency” should be reflected in the uncertainties of the PDFs. This can by achieved by modification of the $`\chi ^2`$ tolerance criterion to $`\mathrm{\Delta }\chi ^2=T^2`$  where $`T`$ stands for a tolerance which should be estimated from the level of (in)consistency of the data sets used in each particular QCD fit. In the CTEQ6 fit the tolerance was taken to be 10 ($`\mathrm{\Delta }\chi ^2=100`$), as shown by the horizontal lines in Fig. 9 (right). The choices for $`T^2`$ in the QCD fits are listed in Table 2 and range from 1 to 100.

The values of the strong coupling constant $`\alpha _s(M_Z^2)`$ obtained in the fits are also given in Table 2. They are remarkably consistent. However, the estimates of the experimental uncertainties on $`\alpha _s(M_Z^2)`$ are different due to different judgements on the $`\mathrm{\Delta }\chi ^2`$ criterion. This is not a contradiction, all choices are legitimate and reflect different emphases in the fits. For example, H1  uses the canonical $`\mathrm{\Delta }\chi ^2=1`$ after careful consistency checks of the two data sets (H1 and BCDMS $`\mu p`$) used in the fit. The relative uncertainty bands for the gluon distribution obtained in the CTEQ6 and ZEUS-S fits are shown in Fig. 10. They illustrate a reasonable consistency of judgement on the experimental errors of the gluon PDF.

Thus, there are reasonable approaches to how to treat experimental statistical and systematical errors, how to take into account model uncertainties such as charm or bottom masses, and how to account for incompatibilities of data sets. It is not so easy to estimate theoretical uncertainties, this is explored further in  and in Sec. 5.4. The model uncertainty which comes from the choice of parametric forms for the PDFs at the input scale also merits further investigation. The latter issue was studied by CTEQ  and H1. B. Reisert  presented an investigation of the parameter space using general forms of MRST type parameterisations $`xPDF=ax^b(1x)^c(1+d\sqrt{x}+ex)`$ for the PDFs of the gluon, quarks and anti-quarks at the input scale. Starting with the parameters $`a,b,c`$ for each PDF, an additional parameter was considered only when its introduction improved $`\chi ^2`$ by more than one unit. The uncertainty envelope in this study was defined as an overlap of the experimental and model error bands of fits with $`\chi ^2<\chi _{best}^2+\sqrt{2N_{dof}}`$. Here $`\chi _{best}^2`$ corresponds to the fit with the best $`\chi ^2`$. This criterion is constructed by analogy with the statistical error of $`\chi ^2`$. It is somewhat arbitrary and used here only provisionally. The uncertainty bands in Fig. 11 show that an assumption on the parametric form for the PDFs at an input scale of $`Q_0^2=4`$ GeV2 influences the predictions of the QCD fit even at moderate $`Q^2`$ in the case of highly integrated observables like $`d\sigma /dQ^2`$.

### 3.2 Results from QCD fits

The HERA data are crucial for determining the low $`x`$ sea and gluon shapes. The ZEUS-S sea and gluon distributions are compared in Fig 12 . The gluon density is much larger than the sea density for $`Q^2>5`$ GeV2, but for lower $`Q^2`$ the sea density continues to rise at low $`x`$ (consistent with the rise in $`F_2`$ down to low $`Q^2`$ mentioned in Sec 2.3), whereas the gluon density is suppressed. This could be a signal that the conventional DGLAP formulation of NLO-QCD is inadequate in this region. Fig. 12 also shows data at very low $`Q^2`$ compared to the ZEUS-S fit. Such a fit clearly fails for $`Q^20.65`$ GeV2, even when the conservative error bands on the fit are considered.

For this generation of PDFs the data which most strongly determine the valence distributions are the fixed target data. However new high $`Q^2`$ HERA data can put some constraint on the valence distributions and this is important because these data do not suffer from the uncertainties associated with nuclear target corrections.

Both the NC and CC high-$`Q^2`$ data are very well described by the global PDF fits. ZEUS has also made a special fit to ZEUS data alone (ZEUS-O) including the new $`e^{}p`$ 98/99 and the preliminary $`e^+p`$ 99/00 high $`Q^2`$ data . In this fit these additional data sets were used instead of the fixed-target data to constrain the valence distributions. Fig. 13 compares the valence distributions from the ZEUS-S global fit to those for the ZEUS-O fit. The level of precision of the ZEUS-O fit is approaching that of the global fit and its precision is statistics limited rather than systematics limited, so that improvement can be expected with higher luminosity HERA-II data. The systematic precision of high-$`x`$ ($`x>0.7`$) measurements at HERA-II can also be improved further as explored in the contribution of M. Helbich .

There are further advantages to using HERA data alone. In the ZEUS-O fit, the high-$`x`$ $`d`$-valence distribution is determined by the high-$`Q^2`$ $`e^+p`$ CC data. In contrast in the global fits it is strongly determined by the NMC $`F_2^D/F_2^p`$ data. It has been suggested that such measurements are subject to significant uncertainty from deuteron binding corrections . The ZEUS-O extraction does not suffer this uncertainty.

The ZEUS-O fit was made using the same form of parton parametrization as the ZEUS-S global fit. For the global fits, parametrization dependence is not severe since, for example, the valence shapes are strongly constrained across all $`x`$ by the CCFR $`xF_3`$ data, and the $`\overline{d}\overline{u}`$ distribution is constrained by $`D,p`$ target data. However, if HERA data alone are used, then these constraints are lost and parametrization dependence can be significant, as discussed in Sec 3.1 . At HERA-II the precision measurement of $`xF_3`$ across all $`x`$ should considerably reduce this uncertainty, and eliminate the uncertainty from heavy target corrections which is unavoidable in the CCFR $`xF_3`$ measurement.

## 4 $`F_2^{c\overline{c}}`$, $`F_2^\gamma `$

Results relevant to the charm structure function and the photon structure function were extensively covered in the Hadron Final States Working Group and will not be discussed again in detail here. Results from HERA on the charmed structure function were reviewed for the Structure Function Working Group by O. Behnke . M. Prybycien  reviewed the status of photon structure function measurements at LEP.A. De Roeck  presented new OPAL data from two-photon processes and S. Maxfield  reviewed measurements of real and virtual photon structure. There was also some progress in developing new PDF sets for the photon, accounting for modern data and correct heavy quark treatment, as presented by S. Albino  and P. Jankowski .

## 5 Theory

At this workshop the main emphasis of the theoretical contributions was the different ways in which one can calculate structure functions and the regions of applicability of these different approaches. Essentially there were four alternative methods which were outlined, all of which have seen significant progress, or at least new results. These are:

1. Lattice QCD.

2. Saturation type effects/colour glass condensates.

3. $`k_T`$-factorization.

4. Collinear Factorization.

There were also some other talks which do not fall into these general categories. D. Haidt presented a consistency check for DGLAP evolution , examining the partons extracted from the measured values of $`F_2`$ and $`dF_2/d\mathrm{ln}Q^2`$ and checking that these are consistent with the evolution equations. A discrepancy is found at low $`x`$ and $`Q^2`$. T. Lastovicka demonstrated that a good fit to structure functions may be obtained using a parameterization determined by assuming a self similar structure, i.e. using the fractal dimensions for the structure functions . A. Kotikov presented a fit to high $`x`$ data using cuts determined by the region of large systematic errors extracting, for example, $`\alpha _S(M_Z^2)=0.1174\pm 0.0007(\mathrm{stat})\pm 0.0019(\mathrm{sys})\pm 0.0010(\mathrm{norm})`$ from a nonsinglet fit . D. Timashkov also presented an analytic formula for structure functions for all $`x`$ and $`Q^2`$ based on expressions in the limiting cases $`Q^20`$, $`x1`$ and $`x0`$ . However, the summary is based on the above four alternative procedures.

### 5.1 Lattice QCD

There has been significant progress in this area, and we were given a summary by S. Capitani . It is not possible to compute structure functions directly on the lattice because the parton distributions are defined on the light cone, while lattice simulations are done in Euclidean space. However, one can use the Operator Product Expansion and calculate moments. The main effort has been in the calculation of 1st, 2nd and 3rd moments of nonsinglet distributions, both for unpolarized and polarized structure functions. A reason for only calculating nonsinglet quantities is due to the difficulty in computing disconnected diagrams (i.e., connected only by gluon lines) due to the expense in computer time. Nonsinglet quantities are insensitive to such diagrams.

One of the main improvements has been the first calculations without using the quenching approximation. This has shown that, for nonsinglet quantities at least, the quenched approximation is indeed very good. There have also been improvements in the perturbative renormalization factors required to translate the results on the lattice to a particular continuum renormalization scheme (e.g $`\overline{\mathrm{MS}}`$). In order to obtain the final results on the lattice it is ultimately necessary to perform chiral and continuum extrapolations, using a fit formula $`A+Bm_\pi ^2+ca^2`$, due to the finite lattice spacing $`a`$ and to the fact that one currently has a pion with mass $`m_\pi 500\mathrm{M}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}`$. This appears to be well under control, but the results are disappointing – for the first moment of the $`ud`$ distribution they find $`0.30\pm 0.03`$ where the standard distributions give $`0.23\pm 0.02`$. The results for polarized distributions are more in agreement with experiment.

It is thought that this discrepancy is due to the finite size of the lattice missing the effects of the pion cloud. From chiral perturbation theory one obtain terms $`m_\pi ^2\mathrm{ln}m_\pi ^2`$. Introducing an additional term in the extrapolation formula of the form $`m_\pi ^2\mathrm{ln}(m_\pi ^2/\mathrm{\Lambda }^2)`$ can solve this problem, but only for $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ a free parameter $`300700\mathrm{M}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}`$ for various processes, destroying any predictive power. One needs lattices such that $`m_\pi <250\mathrm{M}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}`$, which may be possible with computers within a couple of years. It would also be desirable to investigate the pion cloud effects by doing simulations with larger physical volumes. Finally, preliminary investigates of higher twist moments have been performed, giving results which are surprisingly small.

### 5.2 Saturation type effects/colour glass condensates

There was a lot of emphasis on the region of small $`x`$ and low $`Q^2`$ where the gluon density is expected to saturate. Recently a great deal of interest has focused on the GBW saturation model . In this one factorizes deep inelastic scattering into the fluctuation of the virtual photon into a dipole pair and the dipole-proton cross-section. The former is calculable at LO and the latter is modelled in the form

$$\widehat{\sigma }(x,r)=\sigma _0[1\mathrm{exp}(r^2/4R_0^2(x))]$$

where $`r`$ is the dipole size and $`R_0^2(x)=(x/x_0)^\lambda \mathrm{GeV}^2`$. This then saturates at large $`r`$ and low $`x`$ and predicts geometric scaling, i.e that the structure functions are functions of $`Q^2R_0^2(x)`$ alone. For $`\lambda 0.28`$ this model could be made to fit data well, and the procedure could then predict the total diffractive cross-section. We had a presentation from N. Timneanu on an extension of this type of approach to two photon physics . Using a number of sensible extensions of the dipole-proton cross-section to model the dipole-dipole cross-section he demonstrated that a good fit to existing data on photon-photon cross-sections is obtained for both real and virtual photons. However, this data is not very precise, and in particular, can not distinguish between the different extensions.

However, the new more accurate HERA data on proton structure functions presented at this workshop is very precise and forces the simple saturation model to be modified, e.g., the effective power $`\lambda `$ in $`F_2(x,Q^2)x^\lambda `$ is accurately measured to run with $`Q^2`$ (see Sec. 2.3 and Fig. 4) whereas it saturates at moderate $`Q^2`$ in the simplistic saturation model. In order to rectify this it is necessary to include DGLAP evolution in the model , replacing the above $`\widehat{\sigma }(x,r)`$ by

$$\widehat{\sigma }(x,r)=\sigma _0\left[1\mathrm{exp}\left(\frac{\pi ^2r^2\alpha _s(\mu ^2)xg(x,\mu ^2)}{3\sigma _0}\right)\right],$$

where $`\mu ^2`$ is parameterized in terms of $`r^2`$. This can improve the fit considerably, as shown in Fig. 14. However, it moves one away from the original principles somewhat, and geometric scaling is violated. There are two alternative formulations in  (somewhere between the two is likely to be most realistic), both moving the saturation scale to lower $`x`$ and $`Q^2`$. Including charm quarks rather than only 3 light flavours in the original model (hardly optional since charm contributes over $`30\%`$ of the structure function in some regions) also moved the saturation scale down an order of magnitude in $`x`$. If this is also true for the modified model it implies that for $`Q^2=1\mathrm{G}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}^2`$ saturation sets in only for $`x<0.00001`$ in structure functions.

We also had some other talks on saturation in QCD, discussing the solutions to the nonlinear equations describing QCD at high parton density and adding support to the type of models considered above. We had a review of this subject by L. McLerran  (which will be discussed in the summary of the diffractive session). We also had a presentation by A. Freund which outlined some specific points . He told us that “Colour Glass Condensate” simply means that in QCD (colour) at high energies, fields slowly evolve relative to natural scales (glass) and the phase-space density saturates (condensate). Hence, at high energies, but at scales high enough that perturbative QCD applies, one can write a renormalization group equation in $`x`$ in terms of suitable variables . This results in a Fokker-Plank equation which is nonlinear, but which one can use known techniques to solve. Implementing a single input condition one obtains a solution (for fixed $`\alpha _S`$) of the general form $`F_2(x,Q^2)=(x/x_0)^{2\lambda }f(x_0,\left(\left(\frac{x}{x_0}\right)^\lambda \frac{Q}{Q_0}\right)^2)`$ where $`\lambda =0.18`$, which fits the data well and is similar to geometric scaling. This has also been applied to nuclear structure functions with successful results, and where it is found that the scaling variable is $`Q^2(x/x_0)^{2\lambda }A^\delta `$, where $`\delta =0.1`$ rather than the naively expected $`1/3`$. Hence, the first principle solutions in the colour-glass-condensate approach support the saturation models, implying a similar type of scaling. Corrections to this scaling have been estimated. However, there are further improvements to be made, e.g. a full treatment of running coupling, and it is intriguing that geometric scaling should work so well when the charm quark contribution is ignored, despite the fact that it contributes a great deal to the structure function, and should lead to violation of any geometric type scaling.

### 5.3 $`k_T`$ factorization

This should be applicable at high energies at scales where perturbation theory holds but high density effects are minimal. There have been a number of improvements in this field. One of these is in the Monte Carlos based on $`k_T`$-factorization. H. Jung showed that there has been significant progress in correcting previous shortcomings in the CASCADE Monte Carlo , both in the treatment of the scale in the running of the coupling and in the inclusion of the non-singular terms in the $`𝒪(\alpha _S)`$ gluon-gluon splitting function . Explicitly, in the original version the splitting function had the form $`P=\frac{\overline{\alpha }_S}{1z}+\frac{\overline{\alpha }_S}{z}\mathrm{\Delta }_{ns}`$ where $`\mathrm{\Delta }_{ns}`$ is the non-Sudakov form factor. This misses the non-singular terms $`\overline{\alpha }_S(2+z(1z))`$ in the LO splitting function. Since this is a negative contribution its omission leads to a bigger gluon at high and moderate $`x`$. This has lead to the modification

$$P=\overline{\alpha }_S\left(\frac{z}{1z}+Bz(1z)\right)+\overline{\alpha }_S\left(\frac{1z}{z}+(1B)z(1z)\right)\mathrm{\Delta }_{ns}$$

where $`B0.5`$, as well as changes to the form factors. Unfortunately, although these modifications, or something similar, are necessary, the decreased positive contribution to the evolution at moderate $`x`$ actually leads to worse agreement with data for forward jets, and Tevatron $`b`$ production, with the data showing an excess in both cases. There was also an alternative approach to $`k_T`$-factorization based Monte Carlos presented by G. Miu . This is based on the Linked-Dipole-Chain model, and differs mainly in the manner in which partons are separated into initial and final state emissions. The resulting integrated gluon distribution obtained from fits to $`F_2`$ agree well with standard distributions. While this need not be the case at small $`x`$, where $`k_T`$-factorization and collinear factorization may well differ, it must be the case at higher $`x`$, where a correctly modified Monte Carlo should not significantly alter the conventional results.

A. Stasto talked on solutions to the LO BFKL equation with running coupling . She argued that if one calculates the purely perturbative contribution to the high-energy gluon Green’s function one obtains an expansion in $`\beta _0\overline{\alpha }_S^2Y`$ which is reasonably well-behaved as long as $`\beta _0\overline{\alpha }_S^2Y0.1`$ (beyond this the series diverges), and explicit results are known for this series . It was also demonstrated that the transition to the nonperturbative region is a sudden tunneling-like effect, rather than due to diffusion as is generally assumed . The regime where the alternative methods of breakdown occur was compared and found to be similar for $`\overline{\alpha }_S0.1`$ but the perturbative expansion having a larger range of applicability for lower $`\overline{\alpha }_S`$ (or in the formal limit of small $`\beta _0`$). However, $`\beta _0\overline{\alpha }_S^2Y0.1`$ is not in practice a very wide range, and it is unclear if purely perturbative calculations of high-energy scattering are really possible in a quantitative sense, though higher order corrections may help matters.

S. Gieseke presented an update of the present status of the calculation of NLO impact factors in the BFKL framework . This consists of two different contributions - the one-loop virtual corrections to the quark box diagrams and the contributions with an additional gluon in the intermediate state, as illustrated in Fig. 15. The calculation of the vertex diagrams in each of these two cases is now complete, and moreover, it has been proven that the infrared divergences due to the two separate contributions cancel each other in the appropriate manner. However, it still remains to perform the integrals over phase space to obtain the final result. Once this is done we will finally be in a position where NLO calculations of physical processes can be made with the $`k_T`$-factorization framework for the first time.

### 5.4 Collinear factorization

This is what we normally think of as standard perturbative QCD, which we use assuming high accuracy at large scales and uncertain $`x`$, usually at NLO. Within the framework of NLO QCD, S. Kretzer gave a presentation of various issues in heavy-flavour production : a prescription for fully differential charm production at NLO for charm production in DIS , which will be important in determining the strange quark distribution with more accuracy at NuTeV; the NLO and mass corrections to the DIS contribution to $`\nu _\tau N\tau X`$; and a modification of the ACOT prescription for inclusive charm production in DIS to include the appropriate threshold behaviour in coefficient functions at each order . J. Bartels also gave a summary of the contribution of higher twist operators at small $`x`$ . Within the context of the double-leading-log approximation, and having to model the inputs, the contributions of the four sources due to gluon operators show a potentially large cancellation in $`F_2`$, but imply a large negative twist four correction to $`F_L`$.

S. Moch gave a summary of NNLO calculations of splitting functions and coefficient functions . These rely on calculating the Mellin moments of the structure functions, which results in simplification since internal propagators in diagrams which depend on the parton momentum $`p`$ can be expanded in powers of $`(pq/q^2)^N`$ where $`N`$ indeed corresponds to the Mellin moment variable. For the diagrams with only one internal line dependent on $`p`$, known as basic building blocks, this reduces 4-point diagrams to 2-point diagrams and the calculation is greatly simplified. Various techniques then also have to be used to relate more complicated diagrams to these building blocks . A number of fixed moments of 3-loop splitting functions and coefficient functions have already been calculated . The complete calculation of non-singlet quantities is nearly finished. The much more complicated singlet quantities will be a little longer.

Finally, we had an update on both the MRST and CTEQ parton distributions . W.K.Tung  concentrated on the treatment of uncertainties due to experimental errors (discussed in Sec. 3.1). R. Thorne  instead emphasized the need to understand theory errors for partons as well as the development of experimental errors. For example, MRST have used the approximate NNLO splitting functions in  to perform global fits and make predictions at NNLO . This suggests that NNLO leads to a bigger correction even to the W cross-section at Tevatron than the experimental error within NLO. The theory errors associated with higher orders are probably much bigger for gluon dominated quantities. Additionally, detailed investigation of cuts on data  suggest that the fits improve if the lowest $`Q^2`$ and particularly lowest $`x`$ data are cut out, and the predictions for cross-sections with the new partons change. This suggests potentially large corrections to NLO DGLAP at low $`Q^2`$ and low $`x`$.

### 5.5 Theoretical Conclusions

As outlined, there are various different approaches to calculating structure functions, and there has been real progress in some of these calculations, e.g. NNLO in the usual expansion in $`\alpha _S`$, in the colour glass model and in NLO corrections to BFKL impact factors. All the approaches are probably applicable in their own regime, and in some cases can be extrapolated with considerable success for surprising distances. However, this success may sometimes lead to unwarranted claims that one approach is actually particularly appropriate. There needs to be more real understanding of precisely where the regimes are and how they can be combined in order to produce the best overall theory with the maximum predictive power. In our opinion the best theory, particularly when one considers the predictive power for a wide range of processes over a range of different experiments (HERA, Tevatron, NuTev, LEP, LHC) is probably the collinear factorization theorem, but improved as much as possible by, for example, resummations at small and large $`x`$, higher twist corrections, etc. Clearly this will then require modification in the nonperturbative regime. This construction of the best complete, universally applicable theory is a difficult task, and help will be needed from even more precise and wide-ranging data.

## 6 Conclusions

New precise results on structure functions across a wide range of $`Q^2`$, from $`0.35`$ to $`30000\mathrm{G}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}^2`$, have been presented this year. The data are now systematics rather than statistics limited such that QCD fits to extract parton distributions and $`\alpha _s`$ have to consider correlated systematic errors. The precision of the data requires extension of the conventional formalism of NLO QCD, as embodied in the DGLAP formalism, and this challenge is being met as this formalism extended in various directions: to NNLO, to small $`x`$, to high density and to the non-perturbative regime.