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# A Localization Argument for Characters of Reductive Lie Groups: An Introduction and Examples

## 1 Introduction

For motivation, let us start with the case of a compact group. Thus we consider a connected compact group $`K`$ and a maximal torus $`TK`$. Let $`𝔨_{}`$ and $`𝔱_{}`$ denote the Lie algebras of $`K`$ and $`T`$ respectively, and $`𝔨`$, $`𝔱`$ be their complexified Lie algebras. Let $`\pi `$ be a finite-dimensional representation of $`K`$, that is $`\pi `$ is a group homomorphism $`KAut(V)`$. One of the most important invariants associated to a representation is its character. It is a function on $`K`$ defined by $`\mathrm{\Theta }_\pi (x)=_{\text{def}}\mathrm{tr}(\pi (x))`$, $`xK`$. Any finite-dimensional representation is completely determined (up to isomorphism) by its character. Recall the exponential map $`\mathrm{exp}:𝔨_{}K`$. If $`K`$ is a matrix subgroup of some $`GL(n)`$, then $`\mathrm{exp}(A)=e^A`$. We use this exponential map to define the character on the Lie algebra of the representation $`(\pi ,V)`$:

$$\theta _\pi =(det\mathrm{exp}_{})^{1/2}\mathrm{exp}^{}\mathrm{\Theta }_\pi .$$

It is a smooth bounded function on $`𝔨_{}`$. Because $`K`$ is connected and compact, the exponential map is surjective and generically non-singular. Thus $`\theta _\pi `$ still determines the representation.

Now let us assume that the representation $`\pi `$ is irreducible, that is there are no proper $`K`$-invariant subspaces of $`V`$. One reason for introducing this factor $`(det\mathrm{exp}_{})^{1/2}`$ in the definition of $`\theta _\pi `$ is that for irreducible representations $`\pi `$ the character $`\theta _\pi `$ becomes an eigenfunction of the algebra of conjugation-invariant constant coefficient differential operators on the Lie algebra $`𝔨_{}`$.

There are two entirely different character formulas for $`\theta _\pi `$ – the Weyl character formula and Kirillov’s character formula. Recall that the irreducible representations of $`K`$ can be enumerated by their highest weights which are elements of the weight lattice $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ in $`i𝔱_{}^{}`$ intersected with a chosen Weyl chamber. Let $`\lambda =\lambda (\pi )i𝔱_{}^{}`$ denote the highest weight corresponding to $`\pi `$. The group $`K`$ acts on its own Lie algebra $`𝔨_{}`$ by adjoint representation $`Ad`$. Let $`W=N_K(𝔱_{})/T`$, where $`N_K(𝔱_{})`$ is the normalizer of $`𝔱_{}`$ in $`K`$. The set $`W`$ is a finite group called the Weyl group; it acts on $`𝔱_{}`$ and hence on $`i𝔱_{}^{}`$. We can choose a positive definite inner product $`,`$ on $`i𝔱_{}^{}`$ invariant under $`W`$. Then the Weyl character formula can be stated as follows:

$$\theta _\pi |_𝔱_{}(t)=\underset{wW}{}\frac{e^{w(\lambda +\rho )(t)}}{_{\alpha \mathrm{\Phi },w(\lambda +\rho ),\alpha >0}\alpha (t)},$$

where $`\mathrm{\Phi }i𝔱_{}^{}`$ is the root system of $`𝔨_{}`$ and $`\rho i𝔱_{}^{}`$ is a certain small vector independent of $`\pi `$. Because $`\theta _\pi `$ is $`Ad(K)`$-invariant and every $`Ad(K)`$-orbit in $`𝔨_{}`$ meets $`𝔱_{}`$, this formula completely determines $`\theta _\pi `$.

Kirillov’s character formula provides a totally different expression for the irreducible characters on $`𝔨_{}`$. The splitting $`𝔨_{}=𝔱_{}[𝔱_{},𝔨_{}]`$ (Cartan algebra $``$ root spaces) induces a dual splitting of the vector space $`i𝔨_{}^{}`$, which allows us to think of $`\lambda `$ and $`\rho `$ as lying in $`i𝔨_{}^{}`$. The adjoint action of $`K`$ on $`𝔨_{}`$ has a dual action on $`i𝔨_{}^{}`$ called coadjoint representation. We define

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_{\lambda +\rho }=\text{ }K\text{-orbit of }\lambda +\rho \text{ in }i𝔨_{}^{}.$$

It will be convenient to define the Fourier transform $`\widehat{\phi }`$ of a test function $`\phi 𝒞_c^{\mathrm{}}(𝔨_{})`$ without the customary factor of $`i=\sqrt{1}`$ in the exponent, as a function on $`i𝔨_{}^{}`$:

$$\widehat{\phi }(\zeta )=_𝔨_{}\phi (x)e^{\zeta ,x}𝑑x.$$

Then Kirillov’s character formula describes $`\theta _\pi `$ as a distribution on $`𝔨_{}`$:

$$_𝔨_{}\theta _\pi \phi 𝑑x=_{\mathrm{\Omega }_{\lambda +\rho }}\widehat{\phi }𝑑\beta ,$$

where $`d\beta `$ is the measure induced by the canonical symplectic structure of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{\lambda +\rho }`$. In other words,

$$\widehat{\theta }_\pi =\text{ integration over }\mathrm{\Omega }_{\lambda +\rho }.$$

Kirillov calls this the “universal formula” for irreducible characters.

The geometric relationship between these two formulas is even more striking. As a homogeneous space, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{\lambda +\rho }`$ is isomorphic to the flag variety $`X`$, i.e the variety of Borel subalgebras $`𝔟𝔨=𝔨_{}_{}`$. The space $`X`$ is a smooth complex projective variety which is also isomorphic to $`K/T`$ as a homogeneous space. The Borel-Weil-Bott theorem can be regarded as an explicit construction of a holomorphic $`K`$-equivariant line bundle $`_\lambda X`$ such that the resulting representation of $`K`$ in the cohomology groups is:

$`H^p(X,𝒪(_\lambda ))=0\text{ if }p0,`$
$`H^0(X,𝒪(_\lambda ))\pi .`$
Then the Weyl character formula is a consequence of the Atiyah-Bott fixed point formula or the Lefschetz fixed point formula. On the other hand, N. Berline, E. Getzler and M. Vergne proved in \[BGV\] Kirillov’s character formula using the integral localization formula for $`K`$-equivariant forms. They showed that the right hand side of Kirillov’s character formula equals the right hand side of the Weyl character formula.

Equivariant forms were introduced in 1950 by Henri Cartan. There are many good texts on this subject including \[BGV\] and \[GS\].

Let $`K`$ act on a smooth manifold $`M`$, and let $`\mathrm{\Omega }^{}(M)`$ denote the algebra of smooth differential forms on $`M`$. A $`K`$\- equivariant form is a smooth map

$$\omega :𝔨_{}\mathrm{\Omega }^{}(M)$$

whose image need not lie entirely in any single degree component of $`\mathrm{\Omega }^{}(M)`$ and which is $`K`$-invariant, i.e. for all elements $`k𝔨_{}`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{k}K`$ we have

$$\omega (k)=(\stackrel{~}{k})^1\omega \left(Ad(\stackrel{~}{k})k\right).$$

We say that an equivariant form $`\omega `$ is equivariantly closed if $`d_{equiv}(\omega )=0`$, where

$$\left(d_{equiv}(\omega )\right)(k)=d(\omega (k))+\iota (k)\omega (k).$$

Here, the first term is the ordinary deRham differential of $`\omega (k)`$ and the last term denotes the contraction of the differential form $`\omega (k)`$ by the vector field on $`M`$ generated by the infinitesimal action of $`k`$.

If $`NM`$ is a submanifold, then

$$_N\omega =_{\text{def}}_N\text{component of }\omega \text{ of degree }dimN;$$

it is a function on $`𝔨_{}`$. Then the localization formula reduces integration of an equivariantly closed form to summation over the zeroes of the vector field in $`M`$ generated by $`k𝔨_{}`$. In other words, it expresses a global object such as integral of a differential form in terms of quantities which can be calculated locally at the zeroes of the vector field. It is crucial for the localization formula to hold that the group $`K`$ is compact.

Now let $`G_{}`$ be a connected, linear, reductive Lie group. We let $`𝔤_{}`$ denote its Lie algebra. Then most representations of interest have infinite dimension. We always consider representations on complete, locally convex Hausdorff topological vector spaces and require that the action of $`G_{}`$ is continuous. Let $`K`$ be a maximal compact subgroup of $`G_{}`$. A reasonable category of representations consists of admissible representations of finite length. (A representation $`\pi `$ has finite length if every increasing chain of closed, invariant subspaces breaks off after finitely many steps; $`\pi `$ is admissible if its restriction to $`K`$ contains any irreducible representation of $`K`$ at most finitely often.) Admissibility is automatic for irreducible unitary representations. Although trace of a linear operator in an infinite-dimensional space cannot be defined in general, it is still possible to define a character $`\theta _\pi `$ as an $`Ad(G_{})`$-invariant distribution on $`𝔤_{}`$.

M. Kashiwara and W. Schmid in their paper \[KSch\] generalize the Borel-Weil-Bott construction. (Recall that $`X`$ denotes the flag variety of Borel subalgebras of the complexified Lie algebra $`𝔤=𝔤_{}_{}`$.) Instead of line bundles on $`X`$ they consider $`G_{}`$-equivariant sheaves $``$ and, for each integer $`p`$, they define representations of $`G_{}`$ in $`\mathrm{Ext}^p(,𝒪)`$. Such representations turn out to be admissible of finite length. Then W. Schmid and K. Vilonen prove in \[SchV2\] two character formulas for these representations – the fixed point character formula and the integral character formula. In the case when $`G_{}`$ is compact, the former reduces to the Weyl character formula and the latter – to Kirillov’s character formula. The fixed point formula was conjectured by M. Kashiwara in \[K\], and its proof uses a generalization of the Lefschetz fixed point formula to sheaf cohomology due to M. Goresky and R. MacPherson in \[GM\]. On the other hand, W. Rossmann in \[R\] established existence of an integral character formula over an unspecified Borel-Moore cycle. W. Schmid and K. Vilonen prove the integral character formula where integration takes place over the characteristic cycle of $``$, $`Ch()`$, and their proof depends totally on representation theory.

$`Ch()`$ is a conic Lagrangian cycle in the cotangent space $`T^{}X`$ associated to the sheaf $``$. Characteristic cycles were introduced by M. Kashiwara and their definition can be found in \[KaScha\]. On the other hand, W. Schmid and K. Vilonen give a geometric way to understand characteristic cycles in \[SchV1\].

In this article we only deal with characteristic cycles when considering the important cases in the situation of $`SL(2,)`$. Each time a characteristic cycle appears here it is described explicitly and, therefore, the reader is not expected to be familiar with this notion.

The equivalence of these two formulas can be stated in terms of the sheaves $``$ alone, without any reference to their representation-theoretic significance. In the announcement \[Sch\] W. Schmid posed a question: “Can this equivalence be seen directly without a detour to representation theory, just as in the compact case.”

In this article I provide such a geometric link. I introduce a localization technique which allows to localize integrals to the zeroes of vector fields on $`X`$ generated by the infinitesimal action of $`𝔤_{}`$. Thus, in addition to a representation-theoretical result, we obtain a whole family of examples where it is possible to localize integrals to fixed points with respect to an action of a noncompact group. As far as I am aware, this localization argument is the first successful attempt in the direction of building an integral localization theory for noncompact groups.

The following convention will be in force throughout these notes: whenever $`A`$ is a subset of $`B`$, we will denote the inclusion map $`AB`$ by $`j_{AB}`$.

## 2 Two Character Formulas

In these notes we try to keep the same notations as W. Schmid and K. Vilonen use in \[SchV2\] as much as possible. That is they fix a connected, complex algebraic, reductive group $`G`$ which is defined over $``$. The representations they consider are representations of a real form $`G_{}`$ of $`G`$ – in other words, $`G_{}`$ is a subgroup of $`G`$ lying between the group of real points $`G()`$ and the identity component $`G()^0`$. They regard $`G_{}`$ as a reductive Lie group and denote by $`𝔤`$ and $`𝔤_{}`$ the Lie algebras of $`G`$ and $`G_{}`$ respectively, they also denote by $`X`$ the flag variety of $`G`$.

If $`g𝔤`$ is an element of the Lie algebra, we denote by $`\mathrm{VF}_g`$ the vector field on $`X`$ generated by $`g`$: if $`xX`$ and $`f𝒞^{\mathrm{}}(X)`$, then

$$\mathrm{VF}_g(x)f=\frac{d}{d\epsilon }f(\mathrm{exp}(\epsilon g)x)|_{\epsilon =0}.$$

We call a point $`xX`$ a fixed point of $`g`$ if the vector field $`\mathrm{VF}_g`$ on $`X`$ vanishes at $`x`$, i.e. $`\mathrm{VF}_g(x)=0`$.

In this paragraph we explain the general picture, but since objects mentioned here will not play any role in what follows they will not be defined, rather the reader is referred to \[SchV2\]. W. Schmid and K. Vilonen denote by $`𝔥`$ the universal Cartan algebra. They pick an element $`\lambda 𝔥^{}`$ and introduce the “$`G_{}`$-equivariant derived category on $`X`$ with twist $`(\lambda \rho )`$” denoted by $`\mathrm{D}_G_{}(X)_\lambda `$. They also introduce $`𝒪_X(\lambda )`$, the twisted sheaf of holomorphic functions on $`X`$, with twist $`(\lambda \rho )`$. Then, for $`\mathrm{D}_G_{}(X)_\lambda `$, they define a virtual representation of $`G_{}`$

$$\underset{p}{}(1)^p\mathrm{Ext}^p(𝔻,𝒪_X(\lambda )),$$

where $`𝔻\mathrm{D}_G_{}(X)_\lambda `$ denotes the Verdier dual of $``$. It was shown in \[KSch\] that each $`\mathrm{Ext}^p(𝔻,𝒪_X(\lambda ))`$ is admissible of finite length. There are two formulas expressing the character $`\theta `$ of this virtual representation as a distribution on $`𝔤_{}`$. We think of a character as a linear functional defined on the space of smooth compactly supported differential forms $`\phi `$ on $`𝔤_{}`$ of top degree, and write $`_𝔤_{}\theta \phi `$ for the value of $`\theta `$ at $`\phi `$. In my article \[L\] I start with the right hand side of the integral character formula

$$_𝔤_{}\theta \phi =\frac{1}{(2\pi i)^nn!}_{Ch()}\mu _\lambda ^{}\widehat{\phi }(\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )^n$$
(1)
and show that it is equivalent to the right hand side of the fixed point character formula

$$_𝔤_{}\theta \phi =_𝔤_{}F_\theta \phi ,F_\theta (g)=\underset{k=1}{\overset{|W|}{}}\frac{m_{x_k(g)}e^{g,\lambda _{x_k(g)}}}{\alpha _{x_k(g),1}(g)\mathrm{}\alpha _{x_k(g),n}(g)},$$
(2)
where $`F_\theta `$ is a function in $`L_{loc}^1(𝔤_{})`$, $`x_1,\mathrm{},x_n`$ are the fixed points of $`g`$ and integers $`m_{x_k(g)}`$’s are the local invariants of $``$.

Because both character formulas depend on $`\mathrm{D}_G_{}(X)_\lambda `$ only through its characteristic cycle $`Ch()`$, as far as characteristic cycles concern, we can simply replace $``$ with a $`G_{}`$-equivariant sheaf on the flag variety $`X`$ with the same characteristic cycle. We will use the same notation $``$ to denote this $`G_{}`$-equivariant sheaf on $`X`$. Let $`n=dim_{}X`$, let $`\pi :T^{}XX`$ be the projection map, and equip $`𝔤_{}`$ with some orientation. Then $`Ch()`$ is a $`2n`$-cycle in $`T^{}X`$ which has real dimension $`4n`$.

We will make an elementary calculation of the integral

$$\frac{1}{(2\pi i)^nn!}_{Ch()}\mu _\lambda ^{}\widehat{\phi }(\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )^n$$

where $`\phi `$ is a smooth compactly supported differential form on $`𝔤_{}`$ of top degree,

$$\widehat{\phi }(\zeta )=_𝔤_{}e^{g,\zeta }\phi (g𝔤_{},\zeta 𝔤^{})$$

is its Fourier transform (without the customary factor of $`i=\sqrt{1}`$ in the exponent), $`\mu _\lambda :T^{}X𝔤^{}`$ is the twisted moment map defined in \[SchV1\] and $`\tau _\lambda `$, $`\sigma `$ are 2-forms on $`X`$ and $`T^{}X`$ respectively defined in \[SchV2\]. $`\sigma `$ is the complex algebraic symplectic form on $`T^{}X`$. On the other hand, the precise definition of the form $`\tau _\lambda `$ will not be important. What will be important, however, is that, for each $`g𝔤`$, the $`2n`$-form on $`T^{}X`$

$$e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}(\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )^n$$
(3)
is closed.

If $`\lambda =0`$, the twisted moment map $`\mu _\lambda `$ reduces to the ordinary moment map $`\mu _0=\mu `$ defined by

$$\mu (\zeta ):g\zeta ,\mathrm{VF}_g,\zeta T^{}X.$$

The moment map $`\mu `$ takes values in the nilpotent cone $`𝒩^{}𝔤^{}`$. In general, $`\mu _\lambda =\mu +\lambda _x`$, where $`\lambda _x`$ is a function on $`X`$ mapping $`xX`$ into $`\lambda _x𝔤^{}`$.

Suppose that $`\lambda 𝔥^{}`$ is regular. For $`𝔤=𝔰𝔩(2,)`$ this simply means $`\lambda 0`$. Then $`\mu _\lambda `$ is a real analytic diffeomorphism of $`T^{}X`$ onto $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\lambda 𝔤^{}`$ – the orbit of $`\lambda `$ under the coadjoint action of $`G`$ on $`𝔤^{}`$. Let $`\sigma _\lambda `$ denote the canonical $`G`$-invariant complex algebraic symplectic form on $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\lambda `$. Then $`e^{g,\zeta }(\sigma _\lambda )^n`$ is a holomorphic $`2n`$-form of maximal possible degree, hence closed. It turns out that $`\mu _\lambda ^{}(\sigma _\lambda )=\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda `$. This shows that, for $`\lambda `$ regular, $`g𝔤`$,

$$e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}(\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )^n=\mu _\lambda ^{}\left(e^{g,\zeta }(\sigma _\lambda )^n\right)$$

is a closed $`2n`$-form on $`T^{}X`$. Note that neither map $`\mu _\lambda `$ nor the form (3) is holomorphic. Because the form $`e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}(\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )^n`$ depends on $`\lambda `$ real analytically and the set of regular elements is dense in $`𝔥^{}`$, we conclude that the form in the equation (3) is closed.

## 3 Localization Argument for $`SL(2,)`$

In this section we will deal with characteristic cycles of sheaves. I remind it once again that all characteristic cycles which appear here will be described explicitly and the reader is not expected to be familiar with this notion.

There are three major obstacles to any geometric proof of the equivalence of formulas (1) and (2): first of all, the characteristic cycle $`Ch()`$ need not be smooth, in fact, it may be extremely singular; secondly, the integrand in (1) is an equivariant form with respect to some compact real form $`U_{}G`$, but $`U_{}`$ does not preserve $`Ch()`$ (unless $`Ch()`$ is a multiple of the zero section of $`T^{}X`$ equipped with some orientation); and, lastly, $`Ch()`$ is not compactly supported.

In this section we will consider two different examples when $`G_{}=SL(2,)`$.

Recall that when $`G_{}=SL(2,)`$, the flag variety $`X`$ is just a 2-sphere $`P^1`$ on which $`SL(2,)`$ acts by projective transformations. There are exactly three $`SL(2,)`$-orbits: two open hemispheres and one circle which is their common boundary. Also, $`n=dim_{}X=1`$.

To deal with the problem of noncompactness of $`Ch()`$ we fix a norm $`.`$ on the space of linear functionals on $`𝔰𝔩(2,)`$, $`𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}`$. Then the moment map $`\mu `$ induces a vector bundle norm on $`T^{}X`$: for $`\zeta T^{}X`$ its norm will be $`\mu (\zeta )`$. We will use the same notation $`.`$ for this norm too.

Let $`𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}`$ denote the set of regular semisimple elements in $`𝔰𝔩(2,)`$: $`𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}`$ consists of those elements in $`𝔰𝔩(2,)`$ which are diagonalizable over $``$, with distinct eigenvalues.

Since the complement of $`𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}`$ in $`𝔰𝔩(2,)`$ has measure zero, we can replace integration over $`𝔰𝔩(2,)`$ by integration over $`𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}`$. Then

$$\begin{array}{c}\frac{1}{2\pi i}_{Ch()}\mu _\lambda ^{}\widehat{\phi }(\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )\hfill \\ \hfill =\underset{R\mathrm{}}{lim}\frac{1}{2\pi i}_{𝔰𝔩(2,)\times (Ch()\{\zeta R\})}e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )\\ \hfill =\underset{R\mathrm{}}{lim}\frac{1}{2\pi i}_{𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times (Ch()\{\zeta R\})}e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda ).\end{array}$$
(4)
(Of course, the orientation on $`𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times (Ch()\{\zeta R\})`$ is induced by the product orientation on $`𝔰𝔩(2,)\times Ch()`$.)

We will interchange the order of integration: integrate over the characteristic cycle first and only then perform integration over $`𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}`$. As we already mentioned, the integrand is an equivariant form with respect to some compact real form $`U_{}G=SL(2,)`$. But $`U_{}`$ does not preserve $`Ch()`$ (unless $`Ch()`$ is a multiple of the zero section of $`T^{}P^1`$ equipped with some orientation). We regard the integral as an integral of a closed differential form $`e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )`$ over a chain in $`𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times (T^{}P^1\{\zeta R\})`$.

Each regular semisimple element $`g𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}`$ has exactly two fixed points on $`X=P^1`$. We will use the open embedding theorem of W. Schmid and K. Vilonen (\[SchV1\]) to construct a deformation of $`Ch()`$ into a simple cycle of the following kind:

$$m_1T_{x_1}^{}X+m_2T_{x_2}^{}X,$$

where $`m_1,m_2`$ are some integers, $`x_1,x_2`$ are the points in $`P^1`$ fixed by $`g`$, and each cotangent space $`T_{x_k}^{}X`$ is given some orientation. To ensure that the integral behaves well, we will stay during the process of deformation inside the set

$$\{(g,\zeta )𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times T^{}P^1;Re(g,\mu (\zeta ))0\}.$$

The most important case is the split Cartan case, i.e. the case when the eigenvalues of $`g`$ are real and the unique Cartan algebra containing $`g`$ is split. The compact Cartan case also needs to be considered, but because it can be treated using the classical theory of equivariant forms it is not so interesting.

In the split Cartan case one fixed point in $`P^1`$ is stable (the vector field $`\mathrm{VF}_g`$ on $`P^1`$ points towards it) and the other fixed point in $`P^1`$ is unstable (the vector field $`\mathrm{VF}_g`$ points away from it). We can position $`X=P^1`$ in space so that the unstable fixed point is the north pole $`N`$ and the stable fixed point is the south pole $`S`$. Furthermore, we can position it so that the eastern and western hemispheres are stable under the $`SL(2,)`$-action. So, let $`H`$ denote one of these two open hemispheres, say, the western one; and let $`S^1P^1`$ denote the circle containing the Greenwich meridian; $`S^1=H`$.

There are only two essential choices for the $`SL(2,)`$-equivariant sheaf $``$: $`_{\text{principal}}`$ – the sheaf which is “zero outside of $`S^1`$ and the constant sheaf along $`S^1`$” – defined by

$$_{\text{principal}}=(j_{S^1P^1})_{}_{S^1},$$

where $`_{S^1}`$ denotes the constant sheaf on $`S^1`$; and $`_{\text{discrete}}`$ – the sheaf which is “zero outside of $`H`$ and the constant sheaf along $`H`$” – defined by

$$_{\text{discrete}}=(j_{HP^1})_!_H,$$

where $`_H`$ denotes the constant sheaf on $`H`$. If we take any other $`SL(2,)`$-equivariant sheaf $``$, its characteristic cycle $`Ch()`$ will be an integral linear combination of $`Ch(_{\text{principal}})`$, $`Ch(_{\text{discrete}})`$ and $`Ch(_{\text{discrete’}})`$, where

$$_{\text{discrete’}}=(j_{H^{}P^1})_!_H^{}$$

and $`H^{}`$ denotes the open hemisphere opposite to $`H`$ (the eastern hemisphere).

In the case of $`_{\text{principal}}`$, the integral character formula (1) calculates the character of the principal series representation. On the other hand, in the case of $`_{\text{discrete}}`$, for certain values of $`\lambda `$, the integral character formula (1) calculates the character of the discrete series representation.

If $`M`$ is a submanifold of $`X`$, we will denote by $`T_M^{}X`$ the conormal vector bundle to $`M`$ in $`T^{}X`$. That is $`T_M^{}X`$ is a subbundle of $`T^{}X`$ restricted to $`M`$ consisting of those covectors in $`T_m^{}X`$ which annihilate $`T_mMT_mX`$, $`mM`$.

As promised, we give an explicit description of the characteristic cycles:

$$Ch(_{\text{principal}})=T_{S^1}^{}P^1,$$

the conormal bundle to $`S^1`$; and the open embedding theorem of W. Schmid and K. Vilonen (\[SchV1\]) tells us that

$$\begin{array}{c}Ch(_{\text{discrete}})=T_H^{}P^1\{\zeta T_{S^1}^{}P^1;\zeta ,v0\hfill \\ \hfill \text{ for all tangent vectors }v\text{ pointing outside of }H\}.\end{array}$$

Of course, their orientations must be specified too, but they are not important at this level of details.

For $`t(90^{},90^{}]`$ we will denote by $`U_t`$ the open set consisting of all points on the sphere $`P^1`$ whose latitude is strictly less than $`t`$.

Now we will describe the deformations of $`Ch(_{\text{discrete}})`$ first and then of $`Ch(_{\text{principal}})`$. For $`t(90^{},90^{}]`$ we can consider the sheaf $`_{\text{discrete},t}`$ which is “zero outside of $`HU_t`$ and the constant sheaf along $`HU_t`$” defined by

$$_{\text{discrete},t}=(j_{U_tP^1})_!(_{\text{discrete}}|_{U_t})=(j_{HU_tP^1})_!_{HU_t}.$$

Observe that

$$_{\text{discrete},90^{}}=_{\text{discrete}}.$$

Heuristically, if one “deforms a sheaf slightly” (whatever that means) one could expect its characteristic cycle make only slight changes too.

Then we can consider the characteristic cycle of $`_{\text{discrete},t}`$, $`Ch(_{\text{discrete},t})`$. If $`t=90^{}`$, $`Ch(_{\text{discrete},t})=Ch(_{\text{discrete}})`$. When $`t(90^{},90^{})`$, we use the open embedding theorem of W. Schmid and K. Vilonen (\[SchV1\]) once again to see that

$$\begin{array}{c}Ch(_{\text{discrete},t})=Ch\left((j_{HU_tP^1})_!_{HU_t}\right)\hfill \\ \hfill =T_{HU_t}^{}P^1\{\zeta T_x^{}P^1;x(HU_t),\zeta ,v0\\ \hfill \text{ for all tangent vectors }v\text{ pointing outside of }HU_t\}.\end{array}$$

We see that, as we decrease $`t`$ from $`90^{}`$ to $`0^{}`$, we continuously deform the cycle $`Ch(_{\text{discrete}})`$. The end result of this deformation is the cotangent space at the south pole $`S`$, $`T_S^{}P^1`$. Moreover, because the vector field $`\mathrm{VF}_g`$ never points outside of $`HU_t`$, it is true that during the process of deformation we always stayed inside the set

$$\{\zeta T^{}P^1;Re(g,\mu (\zeta ))=\mathrm{VF}_g,\zeta 0\}.$$

In other words, $`Ch(_{\text{discrete}})T_S^{}P^1`$ is the boundary of a chain which lies entirely inside

$$\{\zeta T^{}P^1;Re(g,\mu (\zeta ))0\}.$$
(5)
Notice also that although the north pole $`N`$ and the south pole $`S`$ apriori seem to be entirely symmetric with respect to $``$, it is only the south pole $`S`$ that counts because the condition (5) must be satisfied during a deformation. And there is no way to deform $`Ch(_{\text{discrete}})`$ into $`T_N^{}P^1`$ without breaking the condition (5).

Next we show how to deform $`Ch(_{\text{principal}})`$. First of all, we observe that the flag variety

$$X=P^1=U_{90^{}}\{N\}.$$

(For general real reductive Lie groups $`G_{}`$ we use the Bruhat cell decomposition.) Hence we get a distinguished triangle:

$$(j_{U_{90^{}}P^1})_!(_{\text{principal}}|_{U_{90^{}}})_{\text{principal}}(j_{\{N\}P^1})_!(_{\text{principal}}|_{\{N\}}),$$

which is equivalent to

$$(j_{S^1U_{90^{}}P^1})_!_{U_{S^1U_{90^{}}}}_{\text{principal}}(j_{\{N\}P^1})_!_N.$$

The first term is the sheaf which is “zero outside $`S^1U_{90^{}}=S^1\{N\}`$ and the constant sheaf along $`S^1U_{90^{}}`$”; the last term is the sheaf which is “zero outside $`\{N\}`$ and the constant sheaf on $`\{N\}`$”.

It is a basic property of characteristic cycles that the characteristic cycle of the middle sheaf in a distinguished triangle equals the sum of the characteristic cycles of the other two sheaves:

$$Ch(_{\text{principal}})=Ch\left((j_{S^1U_{90^{}}P^1})_!_{S^1U_{90^{}}}\right)+Ch\left((j_{\{N\}P^1})_!_N\right).$$

The term

$$Ch\left((j_{\{N\}P^1})_!_N\right)=T_N^{}P^1.$$

already has the desired form. We deform the other term

$$Ch\left((j_{S^1U_{90^{}}P^1})_!_{S^1U_{90^{}}}\right)=T_{S^1}^{}P^1T_N^{}P^1$$

only, and we do it very similarly to the case of $`Ch(_{\text{discrete}})`$.

Thus, for $`t(90^{},90^{}]`$, we consider the sheaf $`_{\text{principal},t}`$ which is “zero outside $`S^1U_t=S^1\{N\}`$ and the constant sheaf along $`S^1U_t`$” defined by

$$_{\text{principal},t}=(j_{U_tP^1})_!(_{\text{principal}}|_{U_t})=(j_{S^1U_tP^1})_!_{S^1U_t}.$$

Then we consider its characteristic cycle $`Ch(_{\text{principal},t})`$. When $`t=90^{}`$, $`Ch(_{\text{principal},t})=T_{S^1}^{}P^1T_N^{}P^1`$. When $`t(90^{},90^{})`$, we use the open embedding theorem of W. Schmid and K. Vilonen (\[SchV1\]) once again to see that

$$\begin{array}{c}Ch(_{\text{principal},t})=Ch((j_{S^1U_tP^1})_!_{S^1U_t})\hfill \\ \hfill =T_{S^1U_t}^{}P^1\{\zeta T_x^{}P^1;x(S^1U_t),\zeta ,v0\\ \hfill \text{ for all tangent vectors }vT_xS^1\text{ pointing outside of }U_t\}.\end{array}$$

We see that, as we decrease $`t`$ from $`90^{}`$ to $`0^{}`$, we continuously deform the cycle

$$Ch\left((j_{S^1U_{90^{}}P^1})_!_{S^1U_{90^{}}}\right).$$

The end result of this deformation is the cotangent space at the south pole $`S`$, $`T_S^{}P^1`$. Moreover, as before, it is true that during the process of deformation we always stayed inside the set

$$\{\zeta T^{}P^1;Re(g,\mu (\zeta ))=\mathrm{VF}_g,\zeta 0\}.$$

In other words, $`Ch(_{\text{principal}})(T_N^{}P^1+T_S^{}P^1)`$ is the boundary of a chain which lies entirely inside

$$\{\zeta T^{}P^1;Re(g,\mu (\zeta ))0\}.$$

Let me remind once again what we have achieved so far. We started with a cycle $`𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times Ch()`$ inside $`𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times T^{}P^1`$ and deformed it into a new cycle. Let us call it $`C_{}`$. The new cycle $`C_{}`$ is characterized by the following two properties: First of all, for each regular semisimple $`g𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}`$, $`C_{}`$ intersects $`\{g\}\times T^{}P^1`$ transversally and

$$C_{}(\{g\}\times T^{}P^1)=m_1T_{x_1}^{}P^1+m_2T_{x_2}^{}P^1,$$

where $`m_1,m_2`$ are some integers, $`x_1,x_2`$ are the points in $`P^1`$ fixed by $`g`$, and each cotangent space $`T_{x_k}^{}P^1`$ is given some orientation. Secondly, the deformation of the cycle $`𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times Ch()`$ into $`C_{}`$ takes place inside the set

$$\{(g,\zeta )𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times T^{}P^1;Re(g,\mu (\zeta ))0\}.$$

These two properties determine the cycle $`C_{}`$ uniquely.

The way this deformation procedure is done in general, it becomes very similar to the classical Morse’s lemma which says that if we have a smooth real valued function $`f`$ on a manifold $`M`$, then the sublevel sets $`\{mM;f(m)<a\}`$ and $`\{mM;f(m)<b\}`$ can be deformed one into the other as long as there are no critical values of $`f`$ in an open interval containing $`a`$ and $`b`$.

After deforming the cycle $`𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times Ch()`$ into $`C_{}`$ we encounter the following obstacle: The integrand $`e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )`$ when restricted to $`C_{}`$ becomes zero! There is no contradiction to Stokes’ theorem because the cycles in question are not compact. In this situation we are simply not allowed to interchange pointwise limits and integration. See Remark 3.

In order to deal with this problem, for each regular semisimple $`g𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}`$, we define another deformation $`\mathrm{\Theta }_t(g):T^{}XT^{}X`$, $`t[0,1]`$. Its description will be given right after the equation (6). These $`\mathrm{\Theta }_t(g)`$’s combine into a deformation

$$\mathrm{\Theta }_t:𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times T^{}X𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times T^{}X,t[0,1].$$

The idea of this deformation was inspired by the classical proof of the Fourier inversion formula

$$\phi (g)=\frac{1}{(2\pi i)^{dim_{}𝔤}}_{\zeta i𝔤_{}^{}}\widehat{\phi }(\zeta )e^{g,\zeta }$$

where we multiply the integrand by a term like $`e^{t\zeta ^2}`$ to make it integrable over $`𝔤_{}\times i𝔤_{}^{}`$, and then let $`t0^+`$. The deformation $`\mathrm{\Theta }_t`$ has a very similar effect – it makes our integrand an $`L^1`$-object. The following result is Lemma 17 in \[L\]:

###### Lemma 1

For any $`t[0,1]`$, we have:

$$\begin{array}{c}\underset{R\mathrm{}}{lim}_{𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times (Ch()\{\zeta R\})}(e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )\hfill \\ \hfill \mathrm{\Theta }_t^{}(e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )))=0.\end{array}$$

It essentially says that it is permissible to substitute

$$\mathrm{\Theta }_t^{}(e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda ))$$

in place of the original integrand $`e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )`$.

Proof of Lemma 1 is very technical, but the idea is quite simple. The difference between the original integral and the deformed one is expressed by an integral of $`e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )`$ over a certain cycle $`\stackrel{~}{C}(R)`$ supported in $`𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times (T^{}P^1\{\zeta =R\})`$ which depends on $`R`$ by scaling along the fiber. Recall that the Fourier transform $`\widehat{\phi }`$ decays rapidly in the imaginary directions which is shown by an integration by parts. We modify this integration by parts argument to prove a similar statement about behavior of the integrand on the support of $`\stackrel{~}{C}(R)`$ as $`R\mathrm{}`$. Hence the difference of integrals in question tends to zero.

Let $`C`$ be the Borel-Moore chain in $`𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times T^{}P^1`$ of dimension 6 which lies inside the set

$$\{(g,\zeta )𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times T^{}P^1;Re(g,\mu (\zeta ))0\}$$

and such that

$$C=𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times Ch()C_{}.$$

Take an $`R1`$ and restrict all cycles to the set

$$\{(g,\zeta )𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times T^{}P^1;\zeta R\}.$$

Then the restricted chain $`C`$ has boundary

$$\begin{array}{c}(C\{\zeta R\})=𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times (Ch()\{\zeta R\})\hfill \\ \hfill (C_{}\{\zeta R\})C^{}(R),\end{array}$$

where $`C^{}(R)`$ is a 5-chain supported in the set

$$\{(g,\zeta )𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times T^{}X;\zeta =R,Re(g,\mu (\zeta ))0\}.$$

Because our chain $`C`$ is conic, the piece of boundary $`C^{}(R)`$ depends on $`R`$ by appropriate scaling of $`C^{}(1)`$ in the fiber direction.

The following result is Lemma 18 in \[L\]:

###### Lemma 2

For a fixed $`t(0,1]`$,

$$\underset{R\mathrm{}}{lim}_{C^{}(R)}\mathrm{\Theta }_t^{}\left(e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )^n\right)=0.$$

We start with the right hand side of the integral character formula (1) and continuing calculations (4) using Lemmas 1 and 2 we obtain:

$$\begin{array}{c}\frac{1}{2\pi i}_{Ch()}\mu _\lambda ^{}\widehat{\phi }(\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )\hfill \\ \hfill =\underset{R\mathrm{}}{lim}\frac{1}{2\pi i}_{𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times (Ch()\{\zeta R\})}e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )\\ \hfill =\underset{R\mathrm{}}{lim}\frac{1}{2\pi i}_{𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}\times (Ch()\{\zeta R\})}\mathrm{\Theta }_t^{}(e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda ))\\ \hfill =\underset{R\mathrm{}}{lim}\frac{1}{2\pi i}_{(C_{}\{\zeta R\})+C^{}(R)}\mathrm{\Theta }_t^{}(e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda ))\\ \hfill =\underset{R\mathrm{}}{lim}\frac{1}{2\pi i}_{C_{}\{\zeta R\}}\mathrm{\Theta }_t^{}(e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda ))\\ \hfill =\frac{1}{2\pi i}_C_{}\mathrm{\Theta }_t^{}\left(e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )\right).\end{array}$$
(6)
It turns out that the last integral is pretty easy to calculate.

As before, $`g𝔰𝔩(2,)^{}`$ is a regular semisimple element, and $`x_1,x_2P^1`$ are the zeroes of the vector field $`\mathrm{VF}_g`$ on $`P^1`$. For $`k=1,2`$, we let $`𝔟_k𝔤`$ be the Borel subalgebra of $`𝔤`$ consisting of all elements in $`𝔤`$ fixing $`x_k`$. Let $`𝔫_k𝔤`$ be the root spaces with respect to the unique Cartan algebra $`𝔱𝔤`$ containing $`g`$ such that $`𝔤=𝔟_k𝔫_k`$ as linear spaces. Define maps $`\psi _k:𝔫_kP^1`$, $`n\mathrm{exp}(n)x_k`$. Each $`\psi _k`$ is a diffeomorphism onto its image and their images cover all of $`P^1`$, i.e. $`\{\psi _1,\psi _2\}`$ is an atlas of $`P^1`$. Let $`z_k:𝔫_k\stackrel{~}{}`$ be a linear coordinate on $`𝔫_k`$. Then it is not hard to show that the vector field $`\mathrm{VF}_g`$ can be expressed in these coordinates by

$$\alpha _{x_k}(g)z_k\frac{}{z_k},$$

where $`\alpha _k𝔱^{}`$ denotes the root of $`𝔰𝔩(2,)`$ corresponding to the root space $`𝔫_k`$.

We expand $`z_k`$ to a standard coordinate system $`z_k,\xi _k`$ on $`T^{}𝔫_k`$ so that every element of $`T^{}𝔫_k𝔫_k\times 𝔫_k^{}`$ is expressed in these coordinates as $`(z_k,\xi _kdz_k)`$. This gives us two charts $`\stackrel{~}{\psi }_k:(z_k,\xi _k)T^{}P^1`$ and an atlas $`\{\stackrel{~}{\psi }_1,\stackrel{~}{\psi }_2\}`$ of $`T^{}P^1`$.

The diffeomorphism $`\mathrm{\Theta }_t(g):T^{}P^1T^{}P^1`$ is defined using the atlas $`\{\stackrel{~}{\psi }_1,\stackrel{~}{\psi }_2\}`$ and smooth cutoff functions. It is designed so that it approximates the maps

$$(z_k,\xi _k)(z_kt\frac{\overline{\alpha }_k(g)}{|\alpha _k(g)|}\overline{\xi }_k,\xi _k).$$
(7)
Of course, these maps cannot be defined globally on $`T^{}P^1`$, but for the purposes of calculating the integral (6) we are allowed to pretend that, in each chart $`\stackrel{~}{\psi }_k`$, $`\mathrm{\Theta }_t(g)`$ is given by the equation (7).

Next we calculate the restriction of the integrand of (6)

$$\mathrm{\Theta }_t(g)^{}\left(e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )\right)$$

to $`T_{x_k}^{}P^1`$:

$$\mathrm{\Theta }_t(g)^{}\left(g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )\right)|_{T_{x_k}^{}P^1}=t|\alpha _k(g)||\xi _k|^2+\mathrm{\Theta }_t(g)^{}g,\lambda _x,$$

$$\mathrm{\Theta }_t(g)^{}\sigma |_{T_{x_k}^{}P^1}=t\frac{\overline{\alpha }_k(g)}{|\alpha _k(g)|}d\overline{\xi }_kd\xi _k,$$

and $`\mathrm{\Theta }_t(g)^{}(\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )`$ on $`T_{x_k}^{}P^1`$ can be expressed as $`t^2`$ times a bounded $`2`$-form. Putting it all together, we obtain

$$\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{\Theta }_t(g)^{}\left(e^{g,\mu _\lambda (\zeta )}\phi (\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )\right)|_{T_{x_k}^{}P^1}\hfill \\ \hfill =e^{t|\alpha _k(g)||\xi _k|^2+\mathrm{\Theta }_t(g)^{}g,\lambda _x}\phi (g)\left(t\frac{\overline{\alpha }_k(g)}{|\alpha _k(g)|}d\xi _kd\overline{\xi }_k+t^2(\text{bounded term})\right).\end{array}$$

One can argue using a coordinate change and the Lebesgue dominated convergence theorem that, as $`t0^+`$, we can replace the integrand with

$$t\frac{\overline{\alpha }_k(g)}{|\alpha _k(g)|}e^{g,\lambda _{x_k}}e^{t|\alpha _k(g)||\xi _k|^2}\phi (g)d\xi _kd\overline{\xi }_k,$$
(8)
which integrates over $`T_{x_k}^{}P^1`$ to

$$(2\pi i)\frac{e^{g,\lambda _{x_k}}}{\alpha _k(g)}\phi (g).$$

The last expression may appear to be missing a negative sign, but it is correct because we are using the convention (11.1.2) in \[KaScha\] to identify the real cotangent bundle $`T^{}(X^{})`$ with the holomorphic cotangent bundle $`T^{}X`$ of the complex manifold $`X`$. Under this identification, the standard symplectic structure on $`T^{}(X^{})`$ equals $`2Re(\sigma )`$.

Substituting into (6) we obtain

$$\frac{1}{2\pi i}_{Ch()}\mu _\lambda ^{}\widehat{\phi }(\sigma +\pi ^{}\tau _\lambda )=_𝔤_{}\underset{k=1}{\overset{2}{}}m_k(g)\frac{e^{g,\lambda _{x_k(g)}}}{\alpha _{k(g)}(g)}\phi (g)=_𝔤_{}F_\theta \phi ,$$

which says that the right hand side of the integral character formula (1) is equal to the right hand side of the fixed point character formula (2).

###### Remark 3

Notice that, as $`t0^+`$, the integrand (8) tends to zero pointwise, but its integral does not. We had to introduce the deformation $`\mathrm{\Theta }_t(g):T^{}XT^{}X`$ so that we could interchange pointwise limits and integrals and resolve the situation when integrand (3) restricted to the cycle $`C_{}`$ is zero, but the integral does not tend to zero.

The key ideas are the deformation of $`Ch()`$, the definition of $`\mathrm{\Theta }_t(g):T^{}XT^{}X`$ and Lemma 1. Because of the right definition of $`\mathrm{\Theta }_t(g)`$, Lemma 1 holds and our calculation of the integral becomes very simple. We see that, as $`R\mathrm{}`$, the integral concentrates more and more inside $`T^{}U`$, where $`U`$ is a neighborhood of the set of fixed points of $`g`$ in $`X`$. In the limit, we obtain the right hand side of the fixed point character formula. This means that the integral is localized at the fixed points of $`g`$.

As was stated before, complete proofs with all technical details are available in \[L\].

matvei@math.umass.edu

Department of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Massachusetts, Lederle Graduate Research Tower, 710 North Pleasant Street, Amherst, MA 01003


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# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

Although nowadays, there are many powerful general-purpose symbolic algebra packages available, the most well-known ones probably being Mathematica, Maple, MuPAD, MACSYMA, and Reduce, there still are many open problems which require (sometimes highly specialized) computer algebra that has become feasible on modern machines, but is beyond the scope and limitations of these systems. Hence, in some areas of research, there is notable demand for tailored symbolic algebra.

In this work, a package for group-theoretic calculations is presented which originally was created for the computation of explicit expressions for the potentials of gauged maximal supergravity theories on Euler-angle-like parametrized submanifolds of the manifolds of supergravity scalars. Currently, this seems to be the most effective tool for the determination of these potentials and hence possible vacua of these supergravity theories, but it may be applicable to a wider class of more general group-theoretic problems. Nevertheless, the structure of mentioned supergravity potentials turned out to be so rich that they have not been mined completely up to date, which by itself is a strong incentive to make this package publicly available.

There are two complementary ways how such a package could be implemented: either as a library manipulating tensor expressions on the symbolic level, like MathTensor, or as a library operating on explicit tensor coordinates (which nevertheless may well be symbolic themselves). Here, the latter approach was chosen for two reasons: first, the possibility to always go down to plain numbers on the fly leads to better testability and broader applicability in the field of numerical calculations, and second, since one typical application is to break the exceptional group $`E_{8(+8)}`$ to subgroups as small as possible, the number of terms generated on the purely symbolic level would explode, nullifying the conceptual advantages of the former approach.

Some of the outstanding features of the symbolic algebra framework presented here are:

* It is Free Software, available under the GNU Lesser General Public License, Version 2.1. (Nevertheless, users are urged to read the accompanying copyright information to see how it is applied in this particular case.)
* It is complementary to the LiE package in that sense that LiE can not perform calculations that deal with explicit Lie algebra or Lie group elements, while such functionality lies at the heart of LambdaTensor1.0.
* It is reasonably efficient, since it employs and is designed for an optimizing machine code compiler.
* It is extensible at the level of the implementation itself, not, like most other symbolic algebra packages, only at the level of a built-in application language. In particular, it does not restrict the user of this package to a simple stripped-down C-like-in-spirit application language. Instead, the user has full access to the feature-rich, extensible, compiler system on which this package was built, CMU Common LISP.

It is perhaps noteworthy that utilizing a functional subsystem (in this case, Common LISP) not only obsoletes the need for the implementation of yet another application-centric programming language, which hardly could and should compete with a system backed by its own user community and team of developers, but also readily makes available a variety of other useful existing libraries and tools written for this system. The rationale behind the design decision to use Common LISP, and in particular to build on the CMU CL implementation, instead of using one of the other viable alternatives suggesting themselves here, namely Haskell (in particular, GHC), Objective Caml, or Scheme (in particular, Gambit), which is of course mainly a question of personal preferences of the author, comes in part from the experienced inflexibility of systems based on typed $`\lambda `$-calculus (ML and Haskell – although the power of Haskell’s typeclass system has to be acknowledged), partly due to general typability problems, partly since these systems do not provide means to modify the very language itself which would be comparable to the macro facilities of LISP (although this is much less a problem in a lazy functional language like Haskell), and in part from the baroque richness in features of the Common LISP standard (especially when compared to Scheme). The main drawback of this decision is that the most advanced freely available Common LISP compiler system, CMU CL, is only well supported for x86-based platforms, and due to technical reasons, comes with a limitation on the size of the data being processed in memory of 800 MB111Experienced Unix users can raise this to about 1.6 GB, but in many cases this requires in particular manual modification of the kernel source..

The central idea behind this package is to utilize the observation that tensors showing up in group theory calculations frequently are very sparsely occupied – for example, using the conventions of , structure constants of the largest (248-dimensional) exceptional Lie group $`E_8`$ $`f_𝒜^𝒞`$ contain only $`\mathrm{49\hspace{0.17em}440}`$ out of $`248^3=\mathrm{15\hspace{0.17em}252\hspace{0.17em}992}`$ nonzero entries – and hence, we can make good use of efficient implementations of abstract algorithms that can handle sparsely occupied higher-rank tensors. Efficient code working on sparse matrices is widely used and readily available; the appropriate algorithms for handling higher-rank tensors are also quite well-known, albeit in a very different context: relational databases.

In particular, at the level of explicit tensor entries, forming a quantity like

$$M_{abc}=N_{gha}P^{gh}_{bc}$$
(1.1)
translates as follows into the language of relational databases (SQL syntax used here):

```
SELECT t1.index3 as index1,
       t2.index3 as index2,
       t2.index4 as index3,
       SUM(t1.val*t2.val)
   FROM tensor1 t1, tensor2 t2
   WHERE t1.index1=t2.index1 AND t1.index2=t2.index2
   GROUP BY t1.index3, t2.index3, t2.index4;

```

Unfortunately, it is not feasible to just connect to an existing SQL database system (like PostgreSQL), create relations for tensors, and use existing implementations of these algorithms by doing all the calculations in the database, for various reasons. Besides considerations concerning the efficiency of communication, and considerable additional computational overhead due to databases having different aims, one major problem is that extending the database system to abstract from the implementation of sum and product here, as is necessary as soon as we want to work with data types not natively supported by the database (which are frequently limited to integers and floatingpoint numbers) would bring along too many technical problems. Hence, what is required is a re-implementation of the underlying database algorithms with numerical and symbolic tensor computations as applications in mind. Furthermore, this implementation has to be abstract enough to allow all relevant arithmetic operations to be provided as parameters, so that one may switch between approximate numerics, exact (i.e. rational number) numerics, and symbolic calculations. (The ability to implement and use arbitrary arithmetics on tensor entries has proven to be of great value during the debugging phase of the symbolic algebras provided within this package. For example, it is easy to lift an existing implementation of arithmetic operations on symbolic terms to an implementation working on pairs of terms and numerical values of these terms for a given occupation of variables that signals an error whenever a discrepancy between these values shows up.)

The LambdaTensor1.0 package consists of the following parts:

1. Various general-purpose functions providing important infrastructure. (containing e.g. simple combinatorial functions, basic linear algebra, balanced binary trees, simple optimization functions, priority queues, and a serializer.) For the Debian GNU/Linux system, this part is available as a separate package.
2. Support for sparse higher-rank arrays and tensor operations on them, where implementations of arithmetic operations on tensor entries may be given as parameters.
3. Different implementations of symbolic algebra. (One which is similar in spirit and intention, though not in scope, to conventional general-purpose symbolic algebra packages, one which is aggressively optimized (and hence far from being general-purpose) for calculations involving products of trigonometric functions of the particular form showing up in supergravity calculations as in , and a third one utilizing the CMUCL port of the MAXIMA symbolic algebra package.)
4. Applications. In particular, definitions relevant for the exceptional groups $`E_{7(+7)}`$ and $`E_{8(+8)}`$ and the potentials of maximal gauged extended supergravity theories in three and four dimensions.
5. Worked out, documented examples that demonstrate how to use the package.

Since this package was created as a byproduct of work targeted at the determination of the extremal structure of supergravity potentials, these tools are in some aspects just as good as they had to be for this task, with lots of opportunities for optimization and improvement still remaining. In a different vein, since those particular calculations are quite demanding, these tools are quite optimized in the most central aspects. Nevertheless, large parts of this codebase are constantly exchanged, improved, re-written, and hence, major changes should be expected between version 1.0 and subsequent versions.

## 2 An overview over LambdaTensor1.0

Since detailed technical documentation can be found in the LambdaTensor1.0 manual, we only want to give a brief overview over concepts and algorithms underlying the different pieces of this package.

### 2.1 General purpose functions

This is a collection of various functions and macros ranging from simple more convenient redefinitions of features already available in COMMON LISP to implementations of ubiquitous algorithms to complex facilities providing vital infrastructure for the other parts of LambdaTensor1.0. Since parts of this highly inhomogeneous conglomerate of functions and definitions are not essential for LambdaTensor1.0, but perhaps useful in a much broader context, the decision was made to split this off into a separate package for the the Debian distribution of LambdaTensor1.0. Current functionality provided here encompasses, but is not limited to, macros providing machine-code optimization information to the compiler, various abbreviations and definitions that were inspired by the Perl language, elementary combinatorial functions, basic polynome factorization, linear algebra, and optimization support, as well as efficient implementations of balanced binary trees and priority queues.

### 2.2 Sparse array functions

This is the heart of LambdaTensor1.0, implementing sparse arbitrary-rank arrays using database algorithms. In particular, a sparse array is represented internally as a multidimensional hash of its nonzero components. Sparse arrays are transparently re-hashed if their occupation density grows, up to a certain percentage, where the implementation internally switches to storing tensor entries in a nonsparse array. Currently, removing entries from a sparse-array does not induce the underlying hash to shrink once occupation density falls below a certain level.

The most important sparse array function provided is SP-X which implements efficient tensor multiplication, contraction, and index reordering of an arbitrary number of tensors (limited by resources) where multiplications and contractions are heuristically sequenced in such a way to minimize the total number of operations. To give an example of what SP-X can do and how it is used, let’s assume that the variable F-abc contains the structure constants $`f_{ab}^c`$ of a Lie algebra. Then, the Cartan-Killing metric $`g_{ab}=f_{ap}{}_{}{}^{q}f_{bq}^{}^p`$ can be computed as follows:

```
(defvar metric (sp-x ‘(a b) ‘(,F-abc a p q) ‘(,F-abc b q p)))

```

A second example: assuming so8-sigma is the rank-3 tensor of $`SO(8)`$ $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$-matrices with index order $`(i,\alpha ,\dot{\beta })`$, the following piece of code checks the Clifford algebra properties under contraction of the cospinor indices:

```
(sp-multiple-p
 (sp+ (sp-x ‘(i j a b) ‘(,so8-sigma i a a*) ‘(,so8-sigma j b a*))
      (sp-x ‘(i j a b) ‘(,so8-sigma j a a*) ‘(,so8-sigma i b a*)))
 (sp-x ‘(i j a b) ‘(,(sp-id 8) i j) ‘(,(sp-id 8) a b)))

```

Besides tensor arithmetics (parametrized by the underlying implementation of arithmetics on tensor entries)222for some kinds of tensor entries, in particular complex double-precision floatingpoint numbers, the implementation uses specially optimized versions of internal functions. and functions computing embedding tensors for index split operations, this piece of code also provides linear algebra functions on sparse tensors (like SP-INVERT and SP-MATRIX-EIGENVALUES for quadratic rank-2 tensors over numbers (not yet symbolic expressions)), conversion functions mapping sparse arrays to and from nonsparse vectors, as well as group theory related functions like SP-LIN-INDEP-COMMUTATORS, giving a linearly independent basis for all the commutators of two sets of quadratic sparse rank-2 tensors, or SP-FIND-ROOT-OPERATOR which, given structure constants, a Cartan subalgebra, and a root vector, determines the adjoint-representation coefficients of the corresponding ladder operator.

### 2.3 Symbolic Algebra

There are different implementations of symbolic algebra available within this package, each of them having its own raison d’être. The most effective since most highly optimized towards the problem for the original task of computation of supergravity potentials is the packof-exp, or, in brief, poexp algebra. When looking at a typical supergravity potential restricted to a gauge subgroup singlet manifold, like the following one from  of $`N=16,D=3`$ supergravity with gauge group $`SO(8)\times SO(8)`$ on the conveniently parametrized four-dimensional $`\left(SL(2)/U(1)\right)^2`$ manifold of $`G_{2,\mathrm{diag}}`$ singlets,

$$\begin{array}{ccc}8g^2V\hfill & =& \frac{243}{8}+\frac{7}{2}\mathrm{cosh}\left(2s\right)+\frac{49}{8}\mathrm{cosh}\left(4s\right)+\frac{1141}{64}\mathrm{cosh}\left(s\right)\mathrm{cosh}\left(z\right)\hfill \\ & & +\frac{427}{64}\mathrm{cosh}\left(3s\right)\mathrm{cosh}\left(z\right)\frac{7}{64}\mathrm{cosh}\left(5s\right)\mathrm{cosh}\left(z\right)\hfill \\ & & \frac{25}{64}\mathrm{cosh}\left(7s\right)\mathrm{cosh}\left(z\right)+\frac{21}{8}\mathrm{cos}\left(4v\right)\hfill \\ & & \frac{7}{2}\mathrm{cos}\left(4v\right)\mathrm{cosh}\left(2s\right)+\frac{7}{8}\mathrm{cos}\left(4v\right)\mathrm{cosh}\left(4s\right)\hfill \\ & & \frac{21}{64}\mathrm{cos}\left(4v\right)\mathrm{cosh}\left(s\right)\mathrm{cosh}\left(z\right)\hfill \\ & & +\frac{21}{64}\mathrm{cos}\left(4v\right)\mathrm{cosh}\left(3s\right)\mathrm{cosh}\left(z\right)\hfill \\ & & +\frac{7}{64}\mathrm{cos}\left(4v\right)\mathrm{cosh}\left(5s\right)\mathrm{cosh}\left(z\right)\hfill \\ & & \frac{7}{64}\mathrm{cos}\left(4v\right)\mathrm{cosh}\left(7s\right)\mathrm{cosh}\left(z\right)\hfill \\ & & \frac{1645}{128}\mathrm{cos}\left(vw\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(z\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(s\right)\hfill \\ & & +\frac{651}{128}\mathrm{cos}\left(vw\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(z\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(3s\right)\hfill \\ & & +\frac{7}{128}\mathrm{cos}\left(vw\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(z\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(5s\right)\hfill \\ & & \frac{49}{128}\mathrm{cos}\left(vw\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(z\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(7s\right)\hfill \\ & & \frac{315}{64}\mathrm{cos}\left(3v+w\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(z\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(s\right)\hfill \\ & & +\frac{133}{64}\mathrm{cos}\left(3v+w\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(z\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(3s\right)\hfill \\ & & \frac{7}{64}\mathrm{cos}\left(3v+w\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(z\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(5s\right)\hfill \\ & & \frac{7}{64}\mathrm{cos}\left(3v+w\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(z\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(7s\right)\hfill \\ & & +\frac{35}{128}\mathrm{cos}\left(7v+w\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(z\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(s\right)\hfill \\ & & \frac{21}{128}\mathrm{cos}\left(7v+w\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(z\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(3s\right)\hfill \\ & & +\frac{7}{128}\mathrm{cos}\left(7v+w\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(z\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(5s\right)\hfill \\ & & \frac{1}{128}\mathrm{cos}\left(7v+w\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(z\right)\mathrm{sinh}\left(7s\right),\hfill \end{array}$$
(2.1)
one notices that the typical summand in such a term (as well as in all intermediate quantities) is of the form $`k\mathrm{exp}\left(_jc_jv_j\right)`$, where $`v_j`$ are variable names, and $`c_j`$ as well as $`k`$ all are either real or imaginary rational numbers. Furthermore, these terms ‘come in packs’ and can be grouped together to form summands like $`\frac{7}{128}\mathrm{cos}(7v+w)\mathrm{sinh}(z)\mathrm{sinh}(5s)`$. Hence, we can forge an internal representation of such terms which is orders of magnitude more efficient both in terms of memory consumption and possible reductions than the conventional one of a generic term (as used by other computer algebra systems) by using this additional structure. (Details are given in the manual.)

It is the combination of this problem-specific implementation of a symbolic algebra with efficient sparse array database algorithms that made it possible to transcend all previous limitations in complexity in .

As is perhaps imaginable, this aggressively optimized symbolic algebra was not the first one to be employed in conjunction with sparse tensor algorithms. The former one, which is available as the function-polynome (funpoly, or often briefly fp) algebra, is much closer in design to conventional symbolic algebra, hence also more flexible and still shows up in some places within LambdaTensor1.0. (Note that the poexp algebra is so specialized that it can not handle anything else but terms of the structure described above. In particular, it can not represent quasipolynomials, hence one easily runs into trouble when nilpotence enters the stage.) The funpoly symbolic algebra also implements some peculiarities going beyond what one may expect from conventional symbolic algebra packages, in particular some non-local reductions of precisely that kind which FORM avoids by construction in order to be able to efficiently handle formulae much bigger than available memory. Since this piece of code did not undergo as many evolutionary cycles of being re-written as some of the rest of this package, its design still shows some flaws and weaknesses333in particular, handling of fractional powers of rational numbers is quite clumsy, and so it is scheduled for replacement in later versions.

Since it may nevertheless be important to also have a flexible, general, tested, and powerful implementation of some symbolic algebra available that can be used in conjunction with this package, even if one should not try to use that particular one for the calculation of supergravity potentials, LambdaTensor1.0 also comes with a simple interface to the free MACSYMA-replacement MAXIMA, which was originally implemented on top of GCL, but then also ported to other LISPs, including CMU CL.

### 2.4 Applications and examples

LambdaTensor1.0 comes with optional additional definitions related to the groups $`E_{8(8)}`$, $`E_{7(7)}`$ as well as important subgroups thereof and further functions relevant for the computation and investigation of the structure of the scalar potentials of three- and four-dimensional maximal gauged supergravity theories. Finally, detailed worked-out examples are provided within the package which explain how to apply it to supergravity calculations.

## 3 Availability and concluding remarks

The most recent version of LambdaTensor is available from the webpage http://www.cip.physik.uni-muenchen.de/~tf/lambdatensor/

To the author’s best knowledge, the library presented here is the first abstract implementation of efficient fundamental sparse higher-rank tensor multilinear algebra, thus possibly closing an important gap. Therefore, the present author considers a release under a free software license, in particular, the GNU LGPL 2.1, as adequate. As stated in detail in the accompanying copyright information, users of this library are asked to quote the present article, since it is customary to use citations as a rough measure for scientific relevance, so that further development of this work can be kept up to the needs of its users.

## 4 Addendum: New features in version 1.1

Since an update of this software package hardly justifies a new paper, a brief overview over new functionality introduced in version 1.1, released on 25.03.2003, is given in this addendum. First and perhaps most important, the installation process has been considerably simplified, now providing packages for all major Linux distributions. Besides some minor bugfixes to code and documentation, a considerable amount of new functionality has been implemented to extend the group-theoretic capabilities of this library into the direction of the LiE program. Among the major new algorithm implementations are a version of the Fast Freudenthal algorithm to calculate weight multiplicities of representations of simple groups, the Peterson recursion formula to determine root multiplicities of Kac-Moody algebras (this was used in  to calculate level decompositions of the infinite-dimensional algebras $`E_{10}`$ and $`E_{11}`$), as well as LISP-oriented versions of the Todd-Coxeter coset enumeration algorithm and the Schreier-Sims algorithm for permutation groups.


text:
# Resonance shift effects in apertureless scanning near-field optical microscopy

## I Introduction

Scanning near-field optical microscopy (SNOM) pohl84 ; lewis84 ; paesler  is a technique that allows to obtain optical images of objects with subwavelength resolution. In the pioneering experiments, pohl84 ; lewis84  subwavelength optical apertures where used to illuminate the sample and obtain subwavelength images. Nevertheless, it is also possible to perform near-field optical imaging without aperture probes. This is the case of apertureless SNOM, fischer ; specht ; zenhausern ; inouye ; gleyzes  which has attracted considerable attention in recent years, allowing interesting experiments such as near-field fluorescence imaging sanchez  and near-field vibrational absorption detection. knoll  In apertureless SNOM, light is focused at the tip of a scanning probe microscope (SPM) and the field enhancement near the tip is used to obtain the subwavelength imaging. Apertureless SNOM allows to perform simultaneously near-field optical imaging and other types of local probe microscopies, such as atomic force microscopy (AFM) or scanning tunneling microscopy (STM). In addition, it has provided higher resolution than other SNOM techniques. A key issue in the apertureless SNOM technique is the tip-sample coupling, and how the electromagnetic resonances at the cavity formed by the tip and the surface may affect the corresponding scattered field.

There has been an extensive theoretical research about SNOM, girard96 ; greffet  mostly related to imaging with aperture probes. With regard to apertureless SNOM, it has been studied theoretically considering different models and approximations such as electric dipole for the tip, vigoureux ; girard92  the electrostatic approximation, denk  or the passive probe approximation. vanlabeke  It has also been studied in two dimensions. madrazo  There have been detailed numerical calculations of the near field associated with apertureless probes, martin ; novotny97 ; furukawa  and the field enhancement has been discussed in the context of apertureless SNOM. zayats  In addition, the role of tip geometry,aigouy ; aizpurua ; porto00  the influence of tip modulation, walford01  and the implications for magneto-optical near-field imaging johansson01 ; walford02  have been studied. Nevertheless, there is a need for clarification of how the tip-sample coupling affects the signal detected and the local-field enhancement. In particular, the question concerning the link between electromagnetic resonances at the cavity formed by the tip and the surface and the corresponding scattered field needs to be addressed. These resonances concern free electron metals for which surface plasmons may exist. In the simple case of an isolated particle it is well known that the scattering and extinction cross sections have resonance maxima at about the same photon energy. This is obvious from the fact that large charges at the surface give rise to large dipoles and consequently large radiation. If we instead consider two interacting particles the situation is not so simple. In this case there is not a direct correlation between near-field and far-field resonances.aravind ; metiu

This problem is of the highest relevance concerning the emerging field of optical spectroscopy with an apertureless SNOM, which comprises areas such as near-field Raman scattering and luminescence. The small number of molecules between the tip and the surface leads to extremely small signals that are very difficult to measure. One possible way to overcome this problem is to take advantage of the resonance that may exist at the cavity between the tip and the surface and the extremely high fields associated. rendell  In this context, a key question is what is the signature of this type of resonances on the far field and on the optical images.

In this article we develop a theory which allows to perform a detailed study of the tip-sample interaction in apertureless SNOM. We model the tip by a sphere of finite size, whose radius may correspond roughly to the radius of curvature of the real tip. The main features of the theory are: (i) retardation, (ii) higher multipoles of the sphere, and (iii) the multiple scattering between the sphere and the surface are taken into account. johansson01  We use this theory to analyze the effects associated with the shift in energy of the surface-plasmon resonances of the tip-sample system as the tip approaches the surface. Those resonances produce an enhancement in the near field and in the far field as well, although there is not always an exact correspondence between the two enhancements. We will also discuss the convergence of the results with the number of multipoles taken into account in the calculation. As a general result, a high number of multipoles should be retained to arrive at convergence.

The paper is organized as follows. In Sec. II we highlight the main points of the theoretical framework used for the calculations. In Sec. III we discuss the numerical results obtained for the near-field enhancement and scattering cross sections as a function of different parameters of the system. In Sec. IV, we present the concluding remarks.

## II Method

In this section we present the main features of the theoretical formalism employed. johansson01  Figure 1(a) shows the system under study. A flat metallic sample, filling the half-space $`z<z_0=(R+d)`$, is probed by a metallic tip, modeled by a sphere with radius $`R`$. The distance between the sphere and the surface is $`d`$, as shown in Fig. 1(a).

We are interested in studying how this system scatters the incident light and which local electromagnetic fields are built up in the process. For that purpose, we consider a plane wave incident on this system with wave vector $`𝐪`$, which can be written as (an $`e^{i\omega t}`$ factor is omitted in fields and other quantities in what follows)

$$𝐄_{in}(𝐫)=\left\{E^{(s)}\widehat{𝐬}+E^{(p)}\widehat{𝐩}\right\}e^{i𝐪𝐫}.$$
(1)
For a wave vector $`𝐪`$, the polarization vectors for s and p polarization are, respectively, $`\widehat{𝐬}=\widehat{𝐳}\times \widehat{𝐪}_{}`$, and $`\widehat{𝐩}=\widehat{𝐪}\times (\widehat{𝐳}\times \widehat{𝐪}_{}),`$ where $`𝐪_{}`$ is the projection of $`𝐪`$ in the surface plane. In the present work we will mainly focus on the p-polarization.

In order to tackle the scattering off the sphere-surface system, the electromagnetic field inside and just outside the sphere is expanded in terms of the electric (E) and magnetic (M) multipoles. jackson  The electric field inside the sphere can be expressed as

$$𝐄=\underset{lm}{}kc_{lm}^{(M)}j_l(k_Tr)𝐗_{lm}+\frac{i}{ϵ_T}\times \left[c_{lm}^{(E)}j_l(k_Tr)𝐗_{lm}\right].$$
(2)
The electric field just outside the sphere can be written as the linear combination of incident and outgoing waves from the sphere

$`𝐄=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{lm}{}}k[a_{lm}^{(M)}j_l(kr)+b_{lm}^{(M)}h_l(kr)]𝐗_{lm}+`$ (3)
$`+i\times \left\{[a_{lm}^{(E)}j_l(kr)+b_{lm}^{(E)}h_l(kr)]𝐗_{lm}\right\},`$
where $`𝐗_{lm}`$ is the vector spherical harmonics, $`j_l`$ denotes the spherical Bessel functions related to incoming waves, and $`h_l`$ are the spherical Hankel functions related to outgoing waves. Equivalent expressions can be written for the magnetic field.

By imposing the continuity of the tangential components of E and H and the normal components of B and D at the sphere surface, it is possible to relate the coefficient of the outgoing wave to the incoming wave for each electric and magnetic multiple:

$$s_l^{(E)}=\frac{b_{lm}^{(E)}}{a_{lm}^{(E)}},\mathrm{and}s_l^{(M)}=\frac{b_{lm}^{(M)}}{a_{lm}^{(M)}},$$

where $`s_l^{(E)}`$ and $`s_l^{(M)}`$ are sphere response functions. Due to the symmetry of the sphere, the “quantum” number $`l`$ is conserved in a scattering event and the response functions are independent of $`m`$. These expressions can be rewritten in a matrix form

$$\stackrel{}{b}=\stackrel{}{s}\stackrel{}{a},$$
(4)
where $`\stackrel{}{s}`$ is a diagonal tensor that relates the incoming wave coefficients, $`\stackrel{}{a}`$, to the outgoing waves, $`\stackrel{}{b}`$.

In the situation under study, the field impinging on the sphere consists of three contributions \[see Fig. 1(b)\],

$$\stackrel{}{a}=\stackrel{}{a}^{\mathrm{dir}}+\stackrel{}{a}^{\mathrm{ref}}+\stackrel{}{N}\stackrel{}{a}.$$
(5)
$`\stackrel{}{a}^{\mathrm{dir}}`$ corresponds to the amplitude of the field from the original incident wave, its value can be obtained by expanding the incident plane wave in the multipoles of the sphere, while $`\stackrel{}{a}^{\mathrm{ref}}`$ represents the amplitude of the incident wave reflected once from the sample surface. Its value is obtained by expanding the reflected plane wave from the surface in the multipoles of the sphere. Finally, $`\stackrel{}{N}\stackrel{}{a}`$ represents waves scattered from the sphere that return to it after reflection from the sample. This term contains the exact field described by $`\stackrel{}{a}`$, therefore it accounts for all multiple scattering events in which waves are scattered between the sphere and the sample an arbitrary number of times. $`\stackrel{}{N}`$ is a tensor in multipole space. It indicates how a spherical wave with a given angular momenta l and m is reflected from the surface and returns to the sphere. In this reflection process the quantum number $`l`$ is not necessarily conserved but, thanks to the cylindrical symmetry, $`m`$ is. In the coupling between the sphere and the sample, both propagating and evanescent waves are taken into account.

Retaining a finite number of multipoles, Eq. (5) can be solved by a matrix inversion

$$\stackrel{}{a}=\left[\stackrel{}{1}\stackrel{}{N}\right]^1\left(\stackrel{}{a}^{\mathrm{dir}}+\stackrel{}{a}^{\mathrm{ref}}\right).$$
(6)
Now, from Eq. (4) we can obtain the coefficients for the outgoing waves from the sphere. From those coefficients it is possible to calculate the radiated field from the sphere-surface system in a particular direction given by the wave vector $`𝐪^{}`$,

$$𝐄_{\mathrm{rad}}=\left\{E_{\mathrm{rad}}^{(s)}\widehat{𝐬}^{}+E_{\mathrm{rad}}^{(p)}\widehat{𝐩}^{}\right\}e^{i𝐪^{}𝐫}.$$
(7)
If we consider a direction other than the specular direction, the radiated field comprises two contributions:

$$𝐄_{\mathrm{rad}}=𝐄_{\mathrm{rad},\mathrm{sphere}}+𝐄_{\mathrm{rad},\mathrm{surface}},$$
(8)
where $`𝐄_{\mathrm{rad},\mathrm{sphere}}`$ represents the field radiated directly by the sphere, and $`𝐄_{\mathrm{rad},\mathrm{surface}}`$ corresponds to waves having a final scattering event from the surface.

## III Results and discussion

In this section, we study the system formed by a gold sphere and a gold surface by means of the theoretical method described above. The dielectric function of gold is described using the tables reported in Ref. palik, . We will consider an incident p-polarized wave with angle of incidence $`\theta _{in}=57^o`$. We will mainly concentrate on the effects associated with the formation of resonances of the tip-surface coupled system. In what follows, we will mainly focus on the analysis of the local field enhancement and the scattering cross section for scattered p-polarized light. Results will be shown for the observation angles $`\theta _{\mathrm{out}}=57^\mathrm{o}`$ and $`\varphi _{\mathrm{out}}=90^\mathrm{o}`$. It should be noticed that similar effects than the ones discussed in the present work can be seen for other angles of observation and incidence.

Figure 2(a) shows the local-field enhancement below the sphere as a function of energy for different values of the tip-sample distance and a sphere radius of 40 nm. The peak that is built up as the sphere approaches the surface is due to a surface plasmon of the coupled system formed by the sphere and the surface. rendell  This maximum experiences a redshift as the tip approaches the surface. The scattered light from the system shows a similar peak, as illustrated by Fig. 2(b).

Figure 3(a) shows the local-field enhancement when a larger sphere (radius of 80 nm) is considered. The first peak has moved to lower energy (compared to the previous case with smaller radius) and a new peak appears at higher energy, but the field enhancement does not vary substantially over a wide range of energies. The scattering cross section has a qualitatively different behavior \[see Fig. 3(b)\]. The first peak appears also in the scattering cross section. By contrast, for higher energies, there is no significant correspondence between the scattering cross section and the local field enhancement.

In order to analyze the different features in Figs. 2 and 3, we study the distribution of the electric field near the sphere. Figure 4 represents the electric field around the 80 nm-radius sphere for the first field enhancement maximum in Fig. 3(a). This figure, as well as other vector plots shown below, displays the electric field just outside the sphere in a vertical plane that also contains the incident wave vector $`𝐪`$. The fields shown in Fig. 4 corresponds to the fundamental resonant surface-plasmon mode of the tip-surface system. This fundamental mode is also responsible for the peak in Fig. 2(a), where a smaller radius is considered. The local field in that case shows a very similar pattern. However, for the second peak in Fig 3(a), the field pattern is significantly different, as can be seen in Fig. 5. The local field shows extra features that correspond to a higher mode of the tip-surface system. The dipolar character of the fundamental mode makes it fairly efficient in emitting light, as shown by the large scattering cross section associated with it (see Fig. 3(b)). On the contrary, the higher mode has a small scattering cross section associated, which can be explained by the more complex distribution of the local field for this mode.

The formation of such resonances and their energy shifts have significant consequences on the “approach curves”, i.e. when varying the tip-surface distance for fixed values of the photon energy. Figure 6 shows the local-field enhancement and the scattering cross section for a photon energy of 1.9 eV and different values of the radius of the sphere. The local-field enhancement increases when the tip approaches the surface for the range of tip-sample distance studied and for all the sphere radii under study \[Fig. 6(c)\]. (We only show results for tip-surface distances larger than 0.3 nm, since for very short distances the description of the system with a macroscopic dielectric function is no longer justified. johansson98 )

Figure 6(a) illustrates the behavior of the differential scattering cross section as a function of tip-surface distance. It presents a maximum. It is worth noticing that this maximum does not imply a maximum of the local field enhancement, which keeps increasing when the sphere approaches the surface. The corresponding feature in the local field enhancement is a shoulder, rather than a maximum, as can be seen in Fig 6(c) for sphere radius R=40 nm. The tip-surface distance at which the maximum of the scattered field appears increases with the radius of the sphere and the peak becomes wider. In addition, some extra structure appears at very short distances \[see fig. 6(b)\], especially for the larger radii. We will analyze the physical origin of the different features by looking in detail at the local field distribution.

Figure 7 displays the local field around the sphere for the maximum of the scattering cross section for a sphere with radius 40 nm. This figure shows that the peak corresponds to the fundamental surface plasmon mode of the tip-surface system. The approach curves for small spheres were previously calculated by Girard,girard92  who modeled the sphere by an electric dipole and obtained peaks that can be related to the fundamental surface plasmon mode. For the larger radii under study, the fundamental mode resonance is already shifted to energies lower than 1.9 eV, the photon energy considered in Fig. 6. The behavior of the scattering cross section as a function of tip-surface distance is in this case controlled by the tail of the resonance peaks shown in Fig. 3. This explains why the peaks in the scattering cross section as a function of tip-sample distance displayed in Fig. 6(a) and calculated for larger sphere radii (60 nm and 80 nm) are much wider than the one calculated for the 40-nm sphere. At a much smaller tip-surface distance, i.e. about 0.5 nm, a narrow peak is present for the $`R`$=80 nm sphere \[Fig. 6(b)\]. The local field distribution displayed in Fig. 8, with its characteristic node, shows that this peak is associated with the higher mode resonance of the tip-surface system. The tip-sample distance at which this higher-mode resonance appears increases with increasing sphere radius and photon energy.

When studying the light scattered by an isolated sphere one finds that for the larger sphere ($`R`$=80 nm) there is a Mie resonance at energies near 1.9 eV. When considering the sphere-surface system, the Mie resonance of the isolated sphere implies that, for the 80 nm-radius sphere, the amount of s-polarized scattered light becomes larger than the p-polarized light. Nevertheless, the amount of s-polarized scattered light is almost independent of the tip-sample distance, except for distances shorter than 1 nm, where some features appear that could be related to the formation of the higher resonant mode discussed above.

It is also interesting to analyze the approach curve for photon energies with no significant resonance effects. Figure 9(a) shows the local-field enhancement for a photon energy of 2.4 eV. In this “off-resonance” situation, the local-field enhancement presents a maximum as a function of the tip-sample distance. This maximum appears between d=1 nm and d=3 nm for the sphere radii studied. The maximum of the local field enhancement manifests itself also in the scattering cross section through a very small peak at similar tip-surface distance \[see Fig. 9(b)\]. However, the scattering cross-section maximum appears at much larger tip-surface distances, between d=10 nm and d=20 nm.

In order to gain physical insight about the origin of the different maxima in the off-resonance situation ($`E`$=2.4 eV), we study the convergence with the number of multipoles taken into account in the calculation. We analyze the case of a sphere radius of 40 nm, for which the maxima of enhancement and scattered amplitude appear at well separated values of tip-surface distance. The local-field enhancement requires a high number of multipoles to converge, in this particular case it was necessary to consider multipoles of order $`l=20`$ to arrive at a satisfactory convergence. Differently, convergence for the scattering cross section is achieved with a low number of multipoles. Retaining multipoles up to $`l=2`$, i.e. dipole and quadrupole modes of the sphere, we obtain most of the features of the scattering cross section, in particular, its main maximum. This fast convergence implies that a simple model for the sphere-surface system can be adequate for the estimation of the scattering off the system when no resonant behavior is involved. In particular, the often used model consisting of a dipole representing the sphere and its image dipole that together have a quadrupole character might be suitable in this situation. If we are interested in the local-field enhancement, even in this off resonance situation, we need to consider a more sophisticated model including higher multipoles of the sphere.

On the other hand, for a photon energy of 1.9 eV (the “on-resonance” situation for which cavity modes can be built up), it was necessary to take into account a high number of multipoles in order to converge both the scattering cross section and the local field enhancement. For example, for a sphere radius of 60 nm, for reproducing the main wide peak of the scattering cross section it was enough to retain multipoles up to around $`l=10`$. However, we needed to take into account multipoles up to the order of $`l=70`$ to arrive at convergence for the local field enhancement and to reproduce the peak of the scattering cross section at short sphere-surface distance associated with a higher resonant mode. For the range of energies where tip-surface plasmon modes can be built up, a simple model is inadequate to describe the system.

Cavity or gap modes have been reported in the context of light emission in STM berndt ; nilius  and in samples consisting of metallic nanoparticles placed very close to a metallic surface. kume  In both cases, the distance between the metallic tip or nanoparticle and the metallic surface can be shorter than 1 nanometer. For SNOM, little has been done in connection with gap modes. In the context of apertureless SNOM, the approach curves have been experimentally studied in detail by several groups. fischer ; specht ; kim ; koglin ; ferber ; hillenbrand ; andre  A usual effect is the appearance of a peak or maximum of the signal when tip approaches the sample, especially when both the tip and the sample are made of the same metal. ferber  This peak, which is sensitive to the polarization and the dielectric functions of the tip and the sample, can be interpreted as a manifestation of the fundamental cavity mode discussed in this article. In a recent article, andre  André et al. have reported experimental results on apertureless SNOM with a STM that might be related to the formation of cavity modes between the tip and the surface. Particularly, different behaviors of the signal as a function of the tip-substrate distance have been measured, with the appearance of minima and maxima as the tip is removed from the substrate. There are some qualitative similarities with the results shown in Fig. 6, supporting the claim that the effects observed in Ref. andre,  are associated with cavity modes. Nevertheless, the experimental setup in Ref. andre,  is different than the one considered in the present work, therefore the comparison should be established with caution.

So far, we have considered sphere-surface distances much shorter than the wavelength. For sphere-surface separations on the order or larger than the wavelength of the incident wave, both the scattering cross-section and the near-field enhancement oscillate as a function of the tip-surface distance. These undulations are due to the interference of the incident wave and the wave reflected by the surface. At this range of sphere-surface distance, there is no significant coupling between the sphere and the sample.

## IV Conclusions

By means of a detailed theoretical framework, which includes retardation, higher multipoles of the tip, and multiple scattering between the tip and the sample, we have studied the effects associated with the tip-sample coupling in apertureless SNOM. In particular, we have analyzed the implications of energy shifts of the tip-induced surface plasmons or cavity modes as the tip approaches the surface. There is no exact correspondence between the local field enhancement and the scattering cross section. As a function of the tip-surface distance, the scattering cross section present maxima related to the cavity modes, while the local field enhancement keeps increasing as the tip approaches the surface. For a photon energy for which resonant effects are negligible, both the local field enhancement and the scattering cross section present maxima but at well separated values of the tip-surface distance, in contrast to what is sometimes assumed. In some cases, the maximum of the scattering cross section appears at tip-surface distances of 15 nm while the maximum local-field enhancement is at a tip-surface distance of approximately 2 nm.

We have also studied the convergence of the results in terms of the number of multipoles included in the calculation. In general, one must retain a high number of multipoles in order to arrive at convergence. Only for energies for which no cavity modes are built up, a simple model (retaining dipole and quadrupole modes of the sphere) for the sphere-surface system can be appropriate for estimating the light scattered off the system, but insufficient for the local field enhancement. When tip-surface plasmon modes are present, the simple model is inadequate and a high number of multipoles should be taken into account.

Finally, we would like to stress that the present results are also significant for surface-enhanced Raman scattering nie  and the emerging area of tip-enhanced Raman spectroscopy. stockle ; anderson ; hayazawa  The formation of cavity modes between the tip and the sample and the associated field enhancement can play a significant role. mills

## Acknowledgments

JAP gratefully acknowledges financial support from the European Union through TMR network Electromagnetic Interactions in Tunneling (Contract No. ERB-FMRX-CT98-0198). The research of PJ and SPA is further supported by the Swedish Natural Science Research Council. The work of PJ is also supported by the SSF through the Nanometer Consortium at Lund University.