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# Electromagnetic radiation from superconducting string cusps

## I Introduction

Cosmic strings are one dimensional topological defects which may have been left behind by phase transitions in the early universe. In the zero width approximation we can describe the dynamics of the strings by the Nambu-Goto (NG) action , namely

$$S=\mu d^2\zeta \sqrt{\gamma }$$
(1)
where $`\mu `$ is the energy per unit length of the string and $`\gamma `$ the determinant of the worldsheet metric parameterized by the coordinates $`\zeta ^0`$ and $`\zeta ^1`$. Due to the reparameterization invariance of the Nambu-Goto action, we have the freedom to impose several conditions on the functions that denote the string position, in other words to fix the gauge. The most convenient gauge for ordinary strings in flat spacetime is the conformal gauge, in which we impose

$`|𝐱^{}(\sigma ,\tau )|^2+|\dot{𝐱}(\sigma ,\tau )|^2`$ $`=`$ $`1`$ (3)
$`𝐱^{}(\sigma ,\tau )\dot{𝐱}(\sigma ,\tau )`$ $`=`$ $`0`$ (4)
where we have fixed $`\zeta ^0=\tau =x^0`$ and $`\zeta ^1=\sigma `$, and primes and dots denote differentiation with respect to $`\sigma `$ and $`\tau `$ respectively. . With these conditions the equations of motion become

$$𝐱^{\prime \prime }(\sigma ,\tau )=\ddot{𝐱}(\sigma ,\tau ).$$
(5)
The general solution is

$$𝐱(\sigma ,\tau )=\frac{1}{2}(𝐚(\sigma \tau )+𝐛(\sigma +\tau ))$$
(6)
where $`𝐚`$ and $`𝐛`$ are arbitrary functions constrained by the gauge conditions to satisfy $`|𝐚^{}|=|𝐛^{}|=1`$. From Eq. (6) we see that

$$𝐱^{}=\frac{1}{2}[𝐚^{}(\sigma \tau )+𝐛^{}(\sigma +\tau )]$$
(7)
and

$$\dot{𝐱}=\frac{1}{2}[𝐚^{}(\sigma \tau )+𝐛^{}(\sigma +\tau )].$$
(8)
If there is a point along the string at which $`𝐚^{}=𝐛^{}`$, then $`𝐱^{}=0`$ and even more importantly $`|\dot{𝐱}|=1`$. This means that there are points on the string that move at the speed of light and where the string doubles back on itself. (See Fig. 1.) These events are called cusps.

It is clear that this kind of dynamics falls outside of the domain of validity of the assumptions involved to obtain the Nambu-Goto action. Nevertheless it has been shown by field theory simulations that the motion of the string is quite accurately described by the NG solution up to the point of interaction between the two branches of the string.

The violent motion of the string at the cusps suggests the possibility of a range of effects which could have prospects of detection .

In 1985 Witten showed that certain particle physics models could lead to the formation of strings with superconducting behavior. It was soon realized that these models could in principle have a much richer phenomenology due to the inertia of the charge carriers and their coupling to the long-range electromagnetic field.

In particular we can think that if the current on the string is not very large, then the string motion would not be affected, and calculate the electromagnetic radiation from a Nambu-Goto prescribed motion for the string. However, the power emitted by radiation near the cusp in this approximation is divergent due to the infinite Lorentz factor of the NG cusp. This infinite result suggests that electromagnetic back-reaction is crucial in order to understand the superconducting string cusp.

The short-range effects of the electromagnetic field can be taken into account by renormalization of the charge carrier inertia and charge. The charge carrier inertia term prevents the appearance of an infinite Lorentz factor, and thus the calculation yields a finite result. In principle, this result could be further modified by back-reaction due to long-range fields (i.e. radiation), but for generic values of the parameters we expect this correction to be small . Further approximating that the current is chiral, at least in the vicinity of the cusp, we are able to do a proper calculation of the total power radiated.

## II Superconducting strings

The equations of motion for a superconducting string can be written

$`_a\left(\sqrt{\gamma }\left(\mu \gamma ^{ab}+\theta ^{ab}\right)x_{,b}^\nu \right)`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{\gamma }F_\sigma ^\nu x_{,a}^\sigma J^a`$ (10)
$`_a\left(\sqrt{\gamma }\gamma ^{ab}\varphi _{,b}\right)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}qϵ^{ab}F_{\mu \nu }x_{,a}^\mu x_{,b}^\nu `$ (11)
$`_\nu F^{\mu \nu }`$ $`=`$ $`4\pi j^\mu `$ (12)
where $`\mu `$ is the energy per unit length of the string, $`q`$ the electromagnetic coupling of the fields on the string, $`\theta ^{ab}`$ the energy-momentum tensor of the charge carriers,

$$\theta ^{ab}=\gamma ^{ac}\gamma ^{bd}\varphi _{,c}\varphi _{,d}\frac{1}{2}\gamma ^{ab}\gamma ^{cd}\varphi _{,c}\varphi _{,d},$$
(13)
$`\varphi `$ the auxiliary scalar field in terms of which we can express the conserved worldsheet current

$$J^a=q\frac{1}{\sqrt{\gamma }}ϵ^{ab}\varphi _{,b},$$
(14)
and $`j^\mu `$ the 4-dimensional current,

$$j^\mu (x)=d^2\zeta \sqrt{\gamma }J^ax_{,a}^\mu \delta ^{(4)}(xx(\zeta )).$$
(15)
These equations of motion are obtained from a two-dimensional effective action for the superconducting string and they are valid as long the current, measured in an invariant way, is not too large,

$$J_aJ^a|J_{\mathrm{crit}}|^2,$$
(16)
where $`J_{\mathrm{crit}}`$ is the limiting current at which charge carriers can be ejected.

The leading effect of electromagnetic self-interaction of the current-carrying string can be taken into account by a redefinition of the auxiliary field $`\varphi `$ and its charge. This enables us to include the near-field effect on the left-hand side of the equations of motion. If we take this as our only back-reaction effect, then we can rewrite the equations above in a much simpler way by taking $`q`$ and $`\varphi `$ to be the renormalized quantities, to get

$`_a\left(\sqrt{\gamma }\left(\mu \gamma ^{ab}+\theta ^{ab}\right)x_{,b}^\nu \right)`$ $`=`$ $`0`$ (18)
$`_a\left(\sqrt{\gamma }\gamma ^{ab}\varphi _{,b}\right)`$ $`=`$ $`0`$ (19)
$`_\nu F^{\mu \nu }`$ $`=`$ $`4\pi j^\mu `$ (20)
This procedure decouples the first two equations from the third one, and they now give the motion of a ‘neutral’ superconducting string. In the last equation, $`F^{\mu \nu }`$ is the external field emitted by the current moving according to the first two equations.

Numerical simulations have suggested that as a superconducting cosmic string loop contracts under its own tension, it would approach the ‘chiral’ limit, in which the current on the string is null, in other words, $`J_aJ^a=0`$. This, in turn, means that the auxiliary scalar field fulfills the condition,

$$\gamma ^{ab}\varphi _{,b}\varphi _{,a}=0.$$
(21)
Furthermore, it can be shown that if the current is not chiral it would become supercritical around the cusp and charge carriers would be ejected. We therefore expect that this process would drive this region of string around the cusp to the chiral limit. These arguments suggest that most of the electromagnetic radiation would come from chiral current carrying string cusps.

If the current is chiral, the set of equations describing the string and the ‘neutral’ current can be solved completely. In this case, the general solution for the scalar field is

$$\varphi (\sigma ,\tau )=F(\sigma +\tau ),$$
(22)
where $`F`$ is an arbitrary function, and the string position is given by

$`x^0`$ $`=`$ $`\tau `$ (24)
$`𝐱`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}[𝐚(\sigma \tau )+𝐛(\sigma +\tau )],`$ (25)
with constraints for the otherwise arbitrary functions $`𝐚^{}`$ and $`𝐛^{}`$,

$`|𝐚^{}|^2`$ $`=`$ $`1`$ (27)
$`|𝐛^{}|^2`$ $`=`$ $`1{\displaystyle \frac{4F^2}{\mu }}.`$ (28)
This description of the chiral strings makes evident that they behave very similarly to the Nambu-Goto case. As before, the functions $`𝐚^{}`$ and $`𝐛^{}`$ live on the surface of spheres (if the current is constant), but now their radii are different for the two cases. This change, however, brings important consequences for the string motion. As the magnitude of the current increases, the average velocity of the loop decreases, arriving at the limiting stationary case when $`4F_{}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}/\mu =1`$, the chiral vorton.

This also means that the string can only reach a finite Lorentz factor at the cusp-like regions, in contrast with the Nambu-Goto case. This effect can be easily understood in terms of the resistance of the charge carriers to being accelerated by the string tension. Equations (II) also imply that $`|𝐱^{}|>0`$ at the cusp so the actual shape of the string around the cusp is rounded off by the effect of the charge carriers, as shown in Fig. 1. (Another way for the string to be rounded off, producing a self intersection, is discussed in .)

## III Electromagnetic Radiation from the cusp

Using the solution for the string motion from the previous section, which as discussed is free from divergences in its Lorentz factor, we can now compute, using Eq. (20), the electromagnetic radiation from the cusp-like region. Throughout this section we follow closely the calculation of the radiation by Spergel et al., and introduce the necessary modifications for the chiral string motion.

Since the radiation is mainly produced by the region with a large Lorentz factor, we can estimate the energy output from the position of the string expanded in a Taylor series around the cusp, which we take as $`\sigma =0`$ and $`\tau =0`$. We also assume throughout the calculation that $`2|F^{}|/\sqrt{\mu }1`$, since otherwise the string would not reach high Lorentz factors at all.

Using the light-like variables $`\sigma _+=\sigma +\tau `$ and $`\sigma _{}=\sigma \tau `$, we can expand the functions $`𝐚`$ and $`𝐛`$ near $`\sigma _\pm =0`$ as

$`𝐚(\sigma _{})`$ $`=`$ $`𝐚_0^{}\sigma _{}+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}𝐚_0^{\prime \prime }\sigma _{}^2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{6}}𝐚_0^{\prime \prime \prime }\sigma _{}^3+\mathrm{}`$ (30)
$`𝐛(\sigma _+)`$ $`=`$ $`𝐛_0^{}\sigma _++{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}𝐛_0^{\prime \prime }\sigma _+^2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{6}}𝐛_0^{\prime \prime \prime }\sigma _+^3+\mathrm{},`$ (31)
where we center our coordinate system at the position of the cusp, so that $`𝐱_0=0`$. In analogy with the Nambu-Goto case, we consider the cusp to be the place at which $`𝐚^{}`$ and $`𝐛^{}`$ are anti-parallel,

$$\frac{𝐚_0^{}}{|𝐚_0^{}|}=\frac{𝐛_0^{}}{|𝐛_0^{}|}$$
(32)
which corresponds to the point of maximum concentration of energy and the minimum value of $`|𝐱^{}|`$. Assuming that the current remains constant over the region of interest, we can see that the constraint equations (II) impose a constant magnitude for the vectors $`𝐚^{}`$ and $`𝐛^{}`$. We can choose for simplicity

$`𝐚_0^{}`$ $`=`$ $`\widehat{𝐱}`$ (34)
$`𝐛_0^{}`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{𝐱}`$ (35)
where $`\mathrm{\Delta }=1ϵ`$, with $`ϵ1`$ and constant. Due to the fact that $`|𝐚^{}|`$ and $`|𝐛^{}|`$ are constants we have the following relations,

$`𝐚_0^{}𝐚_0^{\prime \prime }`$ $`=`$ $`𝐛_0^{}𝐛_0^{\prime \prime }=0`$ (37)
$`𝐚_0^{}𝐚_0^{\prime \prime \prime }`$ $`=`$ $`|𝐚_0^{\prime \prime }|^2`$ (38)
$`𝐛_0^{}𝐛_0^{\prime \prime \prime }`$ $`=`$ $`|𝐛_0^{\prime \prime }|^2`$ (39)
Using Eqs. (32, III) we can express the most general expansion of the string position near the cusp up to third order in $`\sigma _\pm `$ in the form

$`𝐚(\sigma _{})`$ $`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{6}}\alpha ^2\sigma _{}^3\sigma _{}\right)\widehat{𝐱}+\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\alpha \sigma _{}^2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{6}}\varrho \sigma _{}^3\right)\widehat{𝐲}+\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{6}}\delta \sigma _{}^3\right)\widehat{𝐳}`$ (41)
$`𝐛(\sigma _+)`$ $`=`$ $`\left(\mathrm{\Delta }\sigma _+{\displaystyle \frac{(\beta ^2+\gamma ^2)}{6\mathrm{\Delta }}}\sigma _+^3\right)\widehat{𝐱}+\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\beta \sigma _+^2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{6}}\varpi \sigma _+^3\right)\widehat{𝐲}+\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\gamma \sigma _+^2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{6}}\eta \sigma _+^3\right)\widehat{𝐳}.`$ (42)
The parameters $`\alpha ,\beta ,\gamma `$ are of order $`L^1`$, with $`L`$ denoting the typical length scale of the loop, and $`\delta ,\varpi ,\varrho ,\eta `$ are of order $`L^2`$.

Using standard results in electromagnetic theory, we can calculate the energy radiated per unit frequency and per solid angle for a source given by Eq. (15) using the expression,

$$\frac{d^2E_{rad}}{d\omega d\mathrm{\Omega }}=\frac{\omega ^2}{4\pi ^2}\left|𝑑\sigma 𝑑\tau (𝐧\times 𝐜)\mathrm{exp}[i\omega (n^\mu x_\mu )]\right|^2$$
(43)
where $`n^\mu `$ is the unit null vector from the source point to the observation point,

$$n^\mu =(1,\mathrm{cos}\theta ,\mathrm{sin}\theta \mathrm{cos}\phi ,\mathrm{sin}\theta \mathrm{sin}\phi )(1,1\frac{\theta ^2}{2},\theta \mathrm{cos}\phi ,\theta \mathrm{sin}\phi ).$$
(44)
This last approximation is justified since the radiation is highly beamed in the direction of movement of the cusp, in this case, $`\widehat{𝐱}`$. The four-vector $`c^\mu `$ is the source current, which in our case takes the form

$$c^\mu =qϵ^{ab}_a\varphi _bx^\mu $$
(45)
where $`a,b=1,2`$ stand for $`\sigma `$ and $`\tau `$. In the chiral case, the four-vector current becomes

$$c^\mu =q\frac{d\varphi }{d\sigma }\left(\frac{x^\mu }{\sigma }\frac{x^\mu }{\tau }\right)=2qF^{}\frac{x^\mu }{\sigma _{}}.$$
(46)
Keeping only the lowest terms in the angle $`\theta `$, we get

$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2E_{rad}}{d\omega d\mathrm{\Omega }}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\omega ^2}{16\pi ^2}}\left|{\displaystyle 𝑑\sigma _{}𝒞(\sigma _{},\theta ,\phi ,F^{})\mathrm{exp}[i\omega (J\sigma _{}+K\sigma _{}^2+L\sigma _{}^3)]}\right|^2`$ (48)
$`\times \left|{\displaystyle 𝑑\sigma _+\mathrm{exp}[i\omega (S\sigma _++T\sigma _+^2+U\sigma _+^3)]}\right|^2`$
with

$$𝒞(\sigma _{},\theta ,\phi ,F^{})=qF^{}(\alpha \theta \mathrm{sin}\phi \sigma _{},\theta \mathrm{sin}\phi ,\alpha \sigma _{}+\theta \mathrm{cos}\phi )$$
(49)
and

$`J`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\theta ^2}{4}}`$ (51)
$`K`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\theta }{4}}\alpha \mathrm{cos}\phi `$ (52)
$`L`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha ^2}{12}}`$ (53)
and

$`S`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\left(1\mathrm{\Delta }(1{\displaystyle \frac{\theta ^2}{2}})\right)`$ (55)
$`T`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\theta }{4}}\left(\beta \mathrm{cos}\phi +\gamma \mathrm{sin}\phi \right)`$ (56)
$`U`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{12\mathrm{\Delta }}}\left(\beta ^2+\gamma ^2\right).`$ (57)
The two integrals in Eq. (48) can be evaluated, first changing variables to get rid of the term quadratic in $`\sigma _\pm `$ in the exponent, and then using the following forms of the Airy integrals:

$$_0^{\mathrm{}}𝑑x\mathrm{cos}\left[\frac{3}{2}\xi \left(x+\frac{1}{3}x^3\right)\right]=\frac{1}{\sqrt{3}}K_{\frac{1}{3}}(\xi )$$
(58)
and

$$_0^{\mathrm{}}𝑑xx\mathrm{sin}\left[\frac{3}{2}\xi \left(x+\frac{1}{3}x^3\right)\right]=\frac{1}{\sqrt{3}}K_{\frac{2}{3}}(\xi )$$
(59)
where $`K_\nu `$ are the modified Bessel functions of order $`\nu `$. With a little bit of algebra we get to the result,

$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2E_{rad}}{d\omega d\mathrm{\Omega }}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\omega ^2}{16\pi ^2}}\left(qF^{}\right)^2\left({\displaystyle \frac{2}{3}}K_{\frac{1}{3}}(\xi _+)\chi _+\right)^2`$ (61)
$`\times \left[\theta ^2\mathrm{sin}^2\phi \left({\displaystyle \frac{2}{3}}K_{\frac{1}{3}}(\xi _{})\chi _{}\right)^2+\alpha ^2\left({\displaystyle \frac{2}{3\sqrt{3}}}K_{\frac{2}{3}}(\xi _{})\chi _{}^2\right)^2\right]`$
where

$`\chi _+(ϵ)`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{3SUT^2}{3U^2}}}=\left({\displaystyle \frac{3[2ϵ+\theta ^2Y]}{\beta ^2+\gamma ^2}}\right)^{1/2}`$ (63)
$`\xi _+(ϵ)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2}{3\sqrt{3}}}\omega \left(S{\displaystyle \frac{T^2}{3U}}\right)\chi _+={\displaystyle \frac{1}{6}}\omega \left({\displaystyle \frac{\left[2ϵ+\theta ^2Y\right]^3}{\beta ^2+\gamma ^2}}\right)^{1/2}`$ (64)
and where we have defined the dimensionless quantity,

$$Y=\frac{\left(\beta \mathrm{sin}\phi \gamma \mathrm{cos}\phi \right)^2}{\beta ^2+\gamma ^2}=\mathrm{sin}^2(\phi \phi _0),$$
(65)
where $`\phi _0`$ is the angle between $`𝐚_0^{\prime \prime }`$ and $`𝐛_0^{\prime \prime }`$, so that $`\mathrm{tan}\phi _0=\gamma /\beta `$. On the other hand the expression for the same type of parameters for the integral in $`\sigma _{}`$ are much simpler,

$`\chi _{}`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{3JLK^2}{3L^2}}}=\sqrt{3}\theta \left|{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{sin}\phi }{\alpha }}\right|`$ (67)
$`\xi _{}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2}{3\sqrt{3}}}\omega \left(J{\displaystyle \frac{K^2}{3L}}\right)\chi _{}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{6}}\omega \theta ^3\left|{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{sin}^3\phi }{\alpha }}\right|.`$ (68)
It is important to note that the different behavior of the superconducting chiral string cusp is encoded in the presence of the parameter $`ϵ`$. If we take the limit $`ϵ=0`$, we would recover the pure Nambu-Goto cusp.

Using the above definitions, we can simplify Eq. (61) to

$$\frac{d^2E_{rad}}{d\omega d\mathrm{\Omega }}=\left(\frac{qF^{}\mathrm{sin}^2\phi }{3\pi \alpha }\right)^2\left(\omega \theta ^2\right)^2\left(\frac{2ϵ+\theta ^2Y}{\beta ^2+\gamma ^2}\right)\left[K_{\frac{1}{3}}(\xi _+(ϵ))\right]^2\left(\left[K_{\frac{1}{3}}(\xi _{})\right]^2+\left[K_{\frac{2}{3}}(\xi _{})\right]^2\right)$$
(69)
We can now integrate over frequencies with the change of variables $`z=\xi _{}`$ to get,

$$\frac{dE_{rad}}{d\mathrm{\Omega }}=24\left(\frac{qF^{}}{\pi }\right)^2\theta ^3|\mathrm{sin}^3\phi |\frac{|\alpha |^{1/3}}{\left(\beta ^2+\gamma ^2\right)^{2/3}}(\xi _+/\xi _{})$$
(70)
where we have defined the function $``$ as

$$(a)=_0^{\mathrm{}}𝑑za^{2/3}z^2\left[\left[K_{\frac{1}{3}}(az)K_{\frac{1}{3}}(z)\right]^2+\left[K_{\frac{1}{3}}(az)K_{\frac{2}{3}}(z)\right]^2\right].$$
(71)
The integral can be done exactly in hypergeometric functions. The function $``$ has asymptotic behavior

$$(a)\{\begin{array}{cc}\mathrm{const}\hfill & a0\hfill \\ \mathrm{const}/a\hfill & a\mathrm{}\hfill \end{array}$$
(72)
(with different constants).

In order to integrate Eq. (70) with respect to the angle $`\theta `$, we first note that we can extend the range of integration to infinity since only the region around the direction of the cusp contributes. In order to extract the dependence on the parameter $`ϵ`$, we perform another change of variables to $`\theta ^{}=\theta /\sqrt{ϵ}`$, so the final expression for the energy emitted at the cusp becomes

$$E_{rad}=𝒜(\alpha ,\beta ,\gamma )(qF^{})^2ϵ^{1/2},$$
(73)
where $`𝒜(\alpha ,\beta ,\gamma )`$ is a constant which can be written in terms of the magnitudes of $`𝐚_0^{\prime \prime }`$ and $`𝐛_0^{\prime \prime }`$ and the angle between them, $`\phi _0`$, as

$$𝒜=\frac{24}{\pi ^2}\frac{|𝐚_0^{\prime \prime }|^{1/3}}{|𝐛_0^{\prime \prime }|^{4/3}}_0^{2\pi }𝑑\phi _0^{\mathrm{}}𝑑\theta ^{}\theta ^2|\mathrm{sin}^3\phi |\left[\frac{|𝐚_0^{\prime \prime }|}{|𝐛_0^{\prime \prime }|}\left(\frac{2+\theta ^2\mathrm{sin}^2(\phi \phi _0)}{\theta ^2\mathrm{sin}^2\phi }\right)^{3/2}\right]O(L).$$
(74)
Figure 2 plots the value of $`𝒜/L`$ versus $`\phi _0`$ for an $`m=1`$, $`n=2`$ Burden loop, which has $`|𝐚_0^{\prime \prime }|=2\pi /L`$ and $`|𝐛_0^{\prime \prime }|=4\pi /L`$ at the cusp.

We can understand the form of $`𝒜`$ as follows. When $`\theta ^{}1`$ (i.e., $`\theta \sqrt{ϵ}`$), the argument to $``$ goes as $`\theta ^3\mathrm{sin}^3\phi 1`$, and the integrand becomes proportional to $`\theta ^{}`$, which is just the geometrical factor from the integration. Thus the radiated power per solid angle is uniform for small angles. Now we consider the case with $`\theta ^{}`$ large. When $`\mathrm{sin}(\phi \phi _0)`$ is far from zero, then $`\theta ^{}1`$ makes the argument of $``$ constant. In such directions, the radiated power is suppressed by $`\theta ^2`$, so their contribution is small. If $`\mathrm{sin}(\phi \phi _0)`$ is small, then the argument of $``$ goes to zero, and thus the value to a constant, unless $`\mathrm{sin}\phi `$ is also small. Thus, as long as $`\phi _0`$ is far from $`0`$ and $`\pi `$, the radiation is confined to a beam with radius $`\theta \sqrt{ϵ}`$.

However, if $`\phi _0`$ is near $`0`$ (or, equivalently, near $`\pi `$), then it is possible to have $`\mathrm{sin}(\phi \phi _0)`$ and $`\mathrm{sin}\phi `$ small simultaneously. In that case, there is a range of $`\theta ^{}`$ up to about $`\phi _0^1`$, in which large contributions to the integral are still possible. This is the cause of the divergence seen in Fig. 2: $`𝒜`$ is proportional to $`\phi _0^1`$ for $`\phi _01`$. In this case, the beam can be greatly elongated in the plane of the cusp. In the limiting case, $`\varphi =0`$ or $`\varphi =\pi `$, the Burden loop has a cusp at all times, which rotates around the string. In cases close to this, we see that the cusp is longer lived than usual and thus has the opportunity to beam radiation through a wider angle.

In this regime, Eq. (73) is not correct, because we cannot extend the $`\theta `$ integration to infinity. Instead, we should have a cutoff at $`\theta ^{}ϵ^{1/2}`$. If we include this effect, then the growth of $`𝒜`$ with $`\phi _0^1`$ is cut off at $`\phi _0\sqrt{ϵ}`$.

Now suppose that we have a set of loops with $`\phi _0`$ distributed evenly between $`0`$ and $`\pi `$. To find the contribution due to the loops with $`\phi _0`$ near 0, we can integrate

$$_0𝑑\phi _0E(\phi _0)_{ϵ^{1/2}}𝑑\varphi _0\varphi _0^1\mathrm{ln}ϵ.$$
(75)
Thus if $`ϵ`$ is small, loops with $`𝐚_0^{\prime \prime }`$ and $`𝐛_0^{\prime \prime }`$ nearly parallel or antiparallel dominate the total electromagnetic radiation, but the effect is only logarithmic.

Returning to the generic case, let’s now remember that we have defined $`ϵ`$ to be the deviation of the magnitude $`𝐛^{}`$ from unity,

$$|𝐛^{}|=\mathrm{\Delta }=1ϵ$$
(76)
so in the chiral string model, for a current much smaller than the energy per unit length of the string,

$$|𝐛^{}|=\sqrt{1\frac{4|F^{}|^2}{\mu }}1\frac{4|F^{}|^2}{2\mu }$$
(77)
so

$$ϵ\frac{4|F^{}|^2}{2\mu }$$
(78)
It can be shown that the parameter $`ϵ`$ determines the maximum Lorentz factor reached near the cusp, namely,

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_{max}=(2ϵ)^{1/2}$$
(79)
so we can rewrite Eq (73) as

$$E_{rad}q^2\sqrt{\mu }|F^{}|LL(qF^{})^2\mathrm{\Gamma }_{max}$$
(80)
in agreement with earlier estimates. We can also write the total energy output in terms of the physical current as

$$E_{rad}qj\sqrt{\mu }L.$$
(81)
Equations (80,81) are valid when $`\varphi _0`$ is far from $`0`$ and $`\pi `$.

## IV Discussion

Electromagnetic radiation from superconducting cosmic strings cusps has traditionally been considered a distinctive signature of superconducting string models. Recently this interest has been revived by as possible connection with gamma ray bursts and ultra-high energy cosmic rays. The total energy output from a pure Nambu-Goto string cusp (i.e. no back-reaction included) yields an infinite result due to the infinite Lorentz factor of the tip of the string, where the charge carriers get concentrated. It is therefore necessary to impose some sort of cutoff for this process. Early calculations assumed the cutoff to be where the energy in the charge carriers was comparable with the energy of the string. This procedure gives a linear dependence of the total energy with the maximum Lorentz factor. We redo this calculation in the context of a chiral current on the string. This is the most interesting case since loops are driven to chirality by charge carrier ejection, especially near the cusps.

The full system of equations for a superconducting string is very complicated. Nevertheless in the case of a chiral current they are much simpler and can be solved exactly. This allows us to compute the electromagnetic radiation from a chiral-current string trajectory taking into account in an exact way the back-reaction of the charge carriers on the string motion. In order to do this we closely follow the procedure described in Spergel et al. and we extract the dependence of the total energy on the maximum Lorentz factor that the string has in the pseudo-cusp region. We found the same linear dependence in the maximum Lorentz factor as earlier estimates. This suggests that the intuitive picture of thinking about the back-reaction of the charge carriers as a process that only becomes important when their energy density is comparable to the energy of the string is correct, making it possible to extend this result to all types of currents.

In the case of cusps where the parameters $`𝐚_0^{\prime \prime }`$ and $`𝐛_0^{\prime \prime }`$ are nearly parallel or antiparallel, the radiation can be much larger than in the generic case. For small currents, the radiation from such cusps dominates in the total flux, but only by a logarithmic factor.

## V Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Alex Vilenkin and Xavier Siemens for helpful conversations. This work was supported in part by funding provided by the National Science Foundation.


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# Measurement of persistence in 1-D diffusion

## Abstract

Using a novel NMR scheme we observed persistence in 1-D gas diffusion. Analytical approximations and numerical simulations have indicated that for an initially random array of spins undergoing diffusion, the probability $`p(t)`$ that the average spin magnetization in a given region has not changed sign (i.e., “persists”) up to time $`t`$ follows a power law $`t^\theta `$, where $`\theta `$ depends on the dimensionality of the system. Using laser-polarized 129Xe gas, we prepared an initial “quasirandom” 1D array of spin magnetization and then monitored the ensemble’s evolution due to diffusion using real-time NMR imaging. Our measurements are consistent with analytical and numerical predictions of $`\theta `$ $``$ 0.12.

The dynamics of non-equilibrium systems is a field of great current interest, including such topics as phase ordering in binary alloys, uniaxial ferromagnets, and nematic liquid crystals, as well as coarsening of soap froth and diffusion of inhomogeneous fluids (*e.g.* ). The evolving spatio-temporal structures in these non-equilibrium systems depend crucially on the history of the system’s evolution and are not completely characterized by simple measures such as two-time correlation functions. Therefore, an important problem in the study of non-equilibrium dynamics is the development of simple and easily measurable quantities that give nontrivial information about the history of the system’s evolution. The recently identified phenomenon of “persistence” may be such a quantity: it characterizes the statistics of first passage events in spatially extended non-equilibrium systems . Persistence is being actively studied in statistical physics; e.g., in the search for universal behavior in non-equilibrium critical dynamics . Practically, persistence may be important in determining what fraction of a system has reached a threshold condition as a function of time; e.g., in certain chemical reactions or disinfectant procedures.

Consider a non-equilibrium scalar field $`\varphi (𝐱,t)`$ fluctuating in space and time according to some dynamics (e.g., a random array of interdiffusing spins). Persistence is the probability $`p(t)`$ that at a fixed point in space the quantity $`[\varphi (𝐱,t)\varphi (𝐱,t)]`$ has not changed sign up to time $`t`$. It has been found that this probability decays as a power law $`p(t)t^\theta `$, where the persistence exponent $`\theta `$ is generally nontrivial and has been suggested as a new universal dynamic critical exponent . This exponent depends both on the system dimensionality and the prevalent dynamics , and is difficult to determine analytically due to the non-Markovian nature of the phenomena. Although $`\theta `$ has been calculated – largely using numerical techniques – for such systems as simple diffusion , the Ising model , and the more generalized $`q`$-state Potts model , few measurements of persistence have been performed (see Table I). In particular, “breath figures” , 2-D soap froth , and twisted nematic liquid crystals  are the only systems for which experimental results have been reported. Further experimental investigation is needed to probe the utility of persistence in studies of fundamental and applied non-equilibrium dynamics.

In this paper we present the first measurement of persistence in a system undergoing diffusion (i.e., dynamics governed by Fick’s Law $`\dot{\varphi }=D\varphi ^{\prime \prime }`$). Our experiment is also the first to observe persistence in one dimension (1-D). We employed a novel NMR technique to create an initial “quasi-random” spatial variation in the nuclear spin magnetization of a sample of laser-polarized 129Xe gas. Subsequent 1-D NMR imaging allowed us to monitor the temporal evolution of the ensemble. We observed persistence by noting mean magnetization sign changes at fixed locations of constant size (i.e., imaging pixels) as a function of time. Using a simple theory (the “independent interval approximation”) and numerical simulations, both Derrida *et al.*  and Majumdar *et al.*  independently found that $`\theta `$ $`0.121`$ for 1-D diffusion. Newman and Toroczkai  found $`\theta `$ 0.125 in 1-D using an analytic expression for the diffusion persistence exponent. Our measurements are consistent with these calculations.

Recently, laser-polarized noble gas NMR has found wide application in both the physical and biomedical sciences. Examples include fundamental symmetry tests , probing the structure of porous media , and imaging of the lung gas space . These varied investigations, as well as the experiment reported here, exploit special features of laser-polarized noble gas: the large nuclear spin polarization ($``$ 10%) that can be achieved with optical pumping techniques; the long-lived nuclear spin polarization of the spin-1/2 noble gases 129Xe and 3He; and rapid gas-phase diffusion.

We performed laser-polarization of xenon gas using spin-exchange optical pumping . We filled a coated cylindrical glass cell  ($``$ 9 cm long, 2 cm I.D.) with approximately 3 bar of xenon gas isotopically enriched to 90% 129Xe, 0.5 bar of N2 gas, and a small amount of Rb metal. We heated the sealed cell to $`100^{}`$C to create a significant Rb vapor. Optical pumping on the Rb D1 line was achieved with 15 W of circularly-polarized 795 nm light (FWHM $``$ 3 nm) from a fiber-coupled laser diode array. After 20 minutes the 129Xe gas was routinely nuclear spin-polarized to 1% by spin-exchange collisions with the Rb vapor. We next cooled the cell to room temperature in a water bath and placed the cell inside a homemade RF solenoid coil (2.5 cm diameter, 15 cm long, $`Q`$ 900) centered in a 4.7 T horizontal bore magnet (GE Omega/CSI spectrometer/imager) with 129Xe Larmor frequency = 55.345 MHz. To allow the gas temperature to reach equilibrium, we left the cell in place for 20 minutes before starting the persistence measurements. At equilibrium under these conditions, the 129Xe polarization decay time constant ($`T_1`$) was in excess of 3 hours, with a 129Xe diffusion coefficient of 0.0198 cm2/s . (Note that changes in the sample gas pressure, and hence the diffusion coefficient, simply cause a rescaling of the time variable and do not affect the persistence power law $`p(t)t^\theta `$ .)

The NMR pulse sequence we used to observe persistence in laser-polarized 129Xe gas diffusion is shown schematically in Fig. 1. The first portion of the pulse sequence encodes a 1-D “quasi-random” pattern on the transverse magnetization of the laser-polarized 129Xe gas sample by using $`m`$ pairs of variable-strength RF and magnetic-field-gradient pulses, repeated in rapid succession (see Fig. 1). Each pair of RF and gradient pulses adds different spatial Fourier components to the 1-D transverse magnetization pattern, with wavenumbers given by the gradient pulse area and Fourier component amplitudes set by the RF pulse area. Next, a $`\pi /2`$ RF pulse “stores” this quasi-random 1-D magnetization distribution along the longitudinal ($`z`$) direction while a subsequent strong (crusher) gradient pulse dephases any remaining transverse magnetization. The quasi-random longitudinal magnetization distribution then evolves with time due to diffusion and is monitored by a series of 1-D FLASH (Fast Low Angle SHot) NMR images  (see Fig. 1).

The initial pattern of longitudinal 129Xe magnetization is quasi-random in that there must be a minimum length scale to the induced variations in the 129Xe magnetization, i.e., a maximum wavenumber in the pattern, for there to be sufficient NMR signal for useful imaging. (This minimum length scale was $`0.6`$ mm in our experiment.) Nevertheless, at longer length scales the induced pattern must be random enough that persistence behavior can be expected. Ideally, $`\varphi (x,0)\varphi (x^{},0)=\delta (xx^{})`$; however, calculations indicate that it is sufficient for the initial condition correlator to decrease faster than $`|xx^{}|^1`$ for 1-D persistence . We found that six to eight RF/gradient pulse pairs ($`m=`$ 6–8) were optimal for the desired quasi-random 1-D patterning of the 129Xe magnetization. $`m<6`$ resulted in a pattern that was not sufficiently random, while $`m>8`$ significantly reduced the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of the NMR images. The requirement of $`m6`$ is supported by numerical calculations in which we modeled the NMR encoding sequence and simulated the subsequent gas diffusion using a finite difference first-order forward Euler scheme : we found persistence behavior (i.e., $`p(t)t^\theta `$) only when $`m6`$. The requirement of $`m8`$ was set by the available NMR signal (i.e., the finite 129Xe magnetization), the necessity of rapid data acquisition to avoid excessive diffusion during the imaging sequence itself, the limitation of approximately 2$`\pi \times `$(0.6 mm)-1 for the maximum wavenumber, and the maximum imaging gradient strength available.

For NMR imaging, we used a field of view (FOV) of 31.5 cm with 0.6 mm resolution, which thus divided the 9 cm cell into about 150 imaging pixels, each corresponding to a discernible spatial region of fixed size and location. We typically employed 8 excitation RF pulse angles and acquired 32 1-D images spaced logarithmically in time from $``$ 3 ms to 5 s for a single experimental run. Longitudinal magnetization depletion due to imaging was highly uniform across the sample and did not affect the persistence measurement, since the relative magnetization amplitudes in neighboring imaging pixels was unchanged. An example of the images acquired in a typical run are shown in Fig. 2. For each pixel, we derived average magnetizations (aligned or anti-aligned to the main magnetic field) from the phase information contained in the time-domain NMR image data, and spatial positions from the frequency information . An experimental run thus provided a record of the 129Xe gas magnetization in each pixel as a function of time proceeding from the initial quasi-random pattern to the equilibrium condition of homogeneous (near-zero) polarization.

To measure persistence, we noted the sign of the 129Xe magnetization in each fixed spatial region (i.e., in each 1-D image pixel) and counted how many remained unchanged as a function of time. We equated the probability $`p(t)`$ with the fraction of pixels that had not changed sign up to time $`t`$. We chose $`t=0`$ to coincide with the first image and assigned the time index for each image to be the start time of the imaging RF pulse. Images with SNR $`<40`$ were excluded from the data to minimize uncertainty in pixel sign changes. We conducted about 30 experiments with image SNR $`>40`$, each with a unique set of randomly chosen encoding magnetic field gradients {$`g_i`$}. We observed that pixel sign changes occurred smoothly, so it was unlikely we missed sign changes with an error of more than one step in the imaging sequence. We employed two averaging schemes to combine the results from different experimental runs. In the first method, we used a linear least-squares fit of $`\mathrm{log}[p(t)]`$ vs. $`\mathrm{log}[t]`$ for each run, resulting in a distribution of power law exponents with a weighted mean $`\theta `$ $`=0.119\pm 0.048`$. With our numerical simulations of quasi-random initial conditions, we found that this averaging scheme results in a gaussian distribution of exponents with a mean value $`\theta `$ 0.12 in agreement with previous calculations for 1-D diffusion  and our experimental results. In the second averaging scheme, we combined the data from all experimental runs; hence $`p(t)`$ represented the fraction of total pixels from all experiments that had not changed sign up to time $`t`$. We found $`p(t)t^\theta `$ with $`\theta `$ $`=0.118\pm 0.008`$ for 0.1 s $`t`$ 1 s. Figure 3 shows a log-log plot of $`p(t)`$ vs. $`t`$ when the data is averaged using this method.

The observed deviations from power law behavior for $`t0.1`$ s and $`t1`$ s are explained by image resolution and finite size effects, respectively. At short times persistence is not observed because 129Xe atoms have not yet diffused on average across a single 1-D image pixel ($`0.6`$ mm). The relevant diffusion time is $`(0.6`$ mm$`)^2/(2D_{Xe})0.1`$ s for our typical experimental conditions. At long times, the coarsening of the 129Xe magnetization pattern by diffusion results in large “domains” of adjacent pixels with the same sign of the magnetization. Our simulations indicate that persistence is not observed when there are few domains in the finite size sample because the number of magnetization boundaries is greatly reduced; hence the rate of pixel sign-changing (i.e., the growth of the gray area in Fig. 2) is curtailed. Both the short and long-time deviations are seen in Fig. 4, where the average length $`L`$ of like-signed magnetization domains from all experimental runs is plotted against time. For $`0.1`$ s $`t1`$ s, our data are in reasonable agreement with the expected power law $`Lt^{1/2}`$ for diffusion . For $`t1`$ s, we find $`L1`$ cm, implying there are typically less than 10 magnetization boundaries in the 9 cm long sample cell.

In conclusion, we experimentally measured a persistence exponent $`\theta `$ $``$ 0.12 for 1-D diffusion, consistent with analytical and numerical studies. We performed the measurement using a novel NMR scheme with laser-polarized 129Xe gas which allowed us to both encode a spatially “quasi-random” magnetization pattern and monitor its evolution over several seconds. We also observed the effect of finite sample size for long-time diffusion. In future work the experimental technique employed in this study may allow measurements of persistence in 2 and 3-D diffusion, in heterogeneous systems (e.g., porous media) infused with noble gas, and in ‘patterns’ .

The authors thank Satya Majumdar, Michael Crescimanno, and Lukasz Zielinski for useful discussions. This work was supported by NSF Grant No. CTS-9980194, NASA Grant No. NAG9-1166, and the Smithsonian Institution Scholarly Studies Program.


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# Scattering of energetic particles by anisotropic magnetohydrodynamic turbulence with a Goldreich-Sridhar power spectrum

## Abstract

Scattering rates for a Goldreich-Sridhar (GS) spectrum of anisotropic, incompressible, magnetohydrodynamic turbulence are calculated in the quasilinear approximation. Because the small-scale fluctuations are constrained to have wave vectors nearly perpendicular to the background magnetic field, scattering is too weak to provide either the mean free paths commonly used in Galactic cosmic-ray propagation models or the mean free paths required for acceleration of cosmic rays at quasi-parallel shocks. Where strong pitch-angle scattering occurs, it is due to fluctuations not described by the GS spectrum, such as fluctuations generated by streaming cosmic rays.

— accepted for publication in Physical Review Letters —

The scattering of energetic particles by turbulent magnetic and electric fields plays an important role in the acceleration and propagation of cosmic rays . The turbulent fields responsible for cosmic-ray scattering can be excited by the cosmic rays themselves or by some mechanism that is independent of the cosmic rays. This paper focuses upon the latter case. In previous treatments of scattering, different turbulence models have been used, including fluctuations with wave vectors $`𝐤`$ parallel to the ambient large-scale magnetic field $`𝐁_0`$ (slab symmetry) or perpendicular to $`𝐁_0`$ (2D), or power spectra that are isotropic in $`k`$-space . On the other hand, a number of studies suggest that in magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) turbulence excited by large-scale stirring, small-scale fluctuations have non-zero values of $`k_{}`$ that are $`k_{}`$, where $`k_{}`$ and $`k_{}`$ are the components of $`𝐤`$ $``$ and $``$ to $`𝐁_0`$ . In this paper, the quasilinear approximation  is used to calculate general scattering rates for incompressible MHD turbulence and also shear-Alfvénic turbulence on the non-MHD scales shorter than the collisional mean free path of thermal particles . These rates are then evaluated for the Goldreich-Sridhar power spectrum , which has significant power at small scales only for $`k_{}k_{}`$. The condition $`k_{}k_{}`$ is found to significantly decrease the efficiency of pitch-angle scattering relative to the slab-symmetric and isotropic cases. Astrophysical applications and limitations of quasilinear theory (QLT) are discussed.

It is assumed that there is an inertial-range spectrum of fluctuations extending from some large scale $`l`$ to a much smaller scale $`d`$, with the fluctuations at scales $`l`$ dominating the total magnetic energy. Only cosmic rays with gyroradii $`\rho l`$ are considered. A scale $`l^{}`$ is introduced, with $`\rho l^{}l`$. The energetically dominant fluctuations on scales $`>l^{}`$ are treated as a uniform field $`𝐁_0`$. The magnetic fluctuations on scales $`<l^{}`$, denoted $`𝐁_1`$, are small compared to $`𝐁_0`$ and are treated using QLT. It can be verified a posteriori that the QLT scattering rates are independent of $`l^{}`$ to lowest order in $`\rho /l`$. In contrast to most previous treatments, the turbulence is treated as strong, in the sense that fluctuations decorrelate in one linear wave period.

In QLT, the turbulence causes the cosmic rays to diffuse in momentum space, with the diffusion coefficients determined by the statistical properties of the turbulence ,

$$\frac{f}{t}=\frac{}{\xi }\left(D_{\xi \xi }\frac{f}{\xi }\right)+\frac{}{\xi }\left(D_{\xi p}\frac{f}{p}\right)+\frac{1}{p^2}\frac{}{p}\left[p^2\left(D_{p\xi }\frac{f}{\xi }+D_{pp}\frac{f}{p}\right)\right],$$
(1)
where $`f`$ is the cosmic-ray distribution function averaged over the small scales of the fluctuating fields, $`𝐩`$ is momentum, $`\theta `$ (the pitch angle) is the angle between $`𝐩`$ and $`𝐁_0`$, and $`\xi =\mathrm{cos}\theta `$. In equation (1) it has been assumed that the length scale characterizing variations in $`f`$ is large compared to $`\rho `$, so that $`f`$ can be taken to be independent of gyrophase. At each $`𝐤`$, $`𝐁_1`$ and the incompressible turbulent velocity $`𝐔_1`$ are decomposed into shear-Alfvén and pseudo-Alfvén components by projecting along the appropriate polarization vectors . These components are denoted respectively by the superscripts s and p, so that

$$𝐁_1(𝐤,t)=𝐁_1^\mathrm{s}(𝐤,t)+𝐁_1^\mathrm{p}(𝐤,t),$$
(2)
with an analogous equation for $`𝐔_1(𝐤,t)`$. The electric field is given by Ohm’s Law, $`𝐄_1=(1/c)𝐔_1\times 𝐁_0`$. The normalized power spectra of the shear-Alfvén modes are given by

$`M^\mathrm{s}(k_{},k_{},\tau )`$ $`=`$ $`𝐁_1^\mathrm{s}(𝐤,t)𝐁_1^\mathrm{s}(𝐤,t+\tau )/B_0^2,`$ (3)
$`C^\mathrm{s}(k_{},k_{},\tau )`$ $`=`$ $`𝐔_1^\mathrm{s}(𝐤,t)𝐁_1^\mathrm{s}(𝐤,t+\tau )/v_AB_0,\text{ and}`$ (4)
$`K^\mathrm{s}(k_{},k_{},\tau )`$ $`=`$ $`𝐔_1^\mathrm{s}(𝐤,t)𝐔_1^\mathrm{s}(𝐤,t+\tau )/v_A^2,`$ (5)
with analogous equations for the pseudo-Alfvén modes, where $`v_A`$ is the Alfvén speed associated with $`𝐁_0`$, and $`\mathrm{}`$ denotes an ensemble average. It is assumed that the turbulence is homogeneous and stationary, that $`𝐁_1(𝐱,t)𝐁_1(𝐱+𝐫,t+\tau )=𝐁_1(𝐱,t)𝐁_1(𝐱𝐫,t+\tau )`$ with analogous equations for $`𝐔_1𝐔_1`$ and $`𝐔_1𝐁_1`$ (no magnetic or kinetic helicity), that $`𝐔_1(𝐱,t)𝐁_1(𝐱+𝐫,t+\tau )=𝐔_1(𝐱,t)𝐁_1(𝐱+𝐫,t\tau )`$ (which gives $`D_{\xi p}=D_{p\xi }`$), and that the shear-Alfvén and pseudo-Alfvén modes are statistically independent.

The contributions to the momentum diffusion coefficients from the shear-Alfvén modes and pseudo-Alfvén modes are, respectively,

$$\left(\begin{array}{c}D_{\xi \xi }^\mathrm{s}\\ D_{\xi p}^\mathrm{s}\\ D_{pp}^\mathrm{s}\end{array}\right)=\underset{L\mathrm{}}{lim}\mathrm{\Omega }^2(1\xi ^2)\frac{d^3k}{L^3}_0^{\mathrm{}}𝑑\tau \underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}e^{i(k_{}v_{}+n\mathrm{\Omega })\tau }\frac{n^2J_n^2(z)}{z^2}\left(\begin{array}{c}\delta ^2\xi ^2K^\mathrm{s}+2\delta \xi C^\mathrm{s}+M^\mathrm{s}\\ (\delta ^2\xi K^\mathrm{s}+\delta C^\mathrm{s})(p)\\ p^2\delta ^2K^\mathrm{s}\end{array}\right),\text{ and}$$
(6)
$$\left(\begin{array}{c}D_{\xi \xi }^\mathrm{p}\\ D_{\xi p}^\mathrm{p}\\ D_{pp}^\mathrm{p}\end{array}\right)=\underset{L\mathrm{}}{lim}\mathrm{\Omega }^2(1\xi ^2)\frac{d^3k}{L^3}_0^{\mathrm{}}𝑑\tau \underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}e^{i(k_{}v_{}+n\mathrm{\Omega })\tau }\frac{k_{}^2J_n^{\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}}(z)}{k^2}\left(\begin{array}{c}\delta ^2\xi ^2K^\mathrm{p}+2\delta \xi C^\mathrm{p}+M^\mathrm{p}\\ (\delta ^2\xi K^\mathrm{p}+\delta C^\mathrm{p})(p)\\ p^2\delta ^2K^\mathrm{p}\end{array}\right),$$
(7)
where $`\delta =v_A/v`$, $`z=k_{}\rho `$, $`\rho =v_{}/\mathrm{\Omega }`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ is the cosmic-ray gyrofrequency, $`v_{}`$ and $`v_{}`$ are the cosmic-ray velocity components $``$ and $``$ to $`𝐁_0`$, $`L`$ is the dimension of a window function that multiplies the variables before a Fourier transform is taken, and the arguments of $`K`$, $`C`$, and $`M`$ are $`(𝐤,\tau )`$. Since the shear-Alfvén and pseudo-Alfvén modes are statistically independent, $`D_{\xi \xi }=D_{\xi \xi }^\mathrm{s}+D_{\xi \xi }^\mathrm{p}`$, etc. Equations (6) and (7) are derived using a standard method based on the linearized Vlasov equation , modified to treat strongly turbulent fluctuations instead of waves satisfying linear dispersion relations. Alternatively, they can be derived from equations (7a), (7b), and (7c) of , if one notes the typographical error on the eighth line of equation (7a), namely, that $`Q_R`$ should instead be $`Q_R`$.

A Goldreich-Sridhar spectrum of strong, anisotropic MHD turbulence  is now assumed, with

$$M^\mathrm{s}(k_{},k_{},\tau )=\frac{L^3}{6\pi }k_{}^{10/3}l^{1/3}g\left(\frac{k_{}}{k_{}^{2/3}l^{1/3}}\right)e^{|\tau |/\tau _𝐤}$$
(8)
for $`(l^{})^1<k_{}<d^1`$ with $`d0`$, where $`\tau _𝐤=(l/v_A)(k_{}l)^{2/3}`$ is the Lagrangian correlation time appropriate for strong anisotropic incompressible MHD turbulence, and

$$g(x)=\{\begin{array}{cc}1\hfill & \text{ if }|x|<1\hfill \\ 0\hfill & \text{ if }|x|1\hfill \end{array}.$$
(9)
The spectrum of equation (8) is also taken to describe the fluctuations on scales between $`l^{}`$ and $`l`$, and the normalization has been chosen so that the total magnetic energy $`_{l^1}^{\mathrm{}}k_{}𝑑k_{}_{\mathrm{}}^{\mathrm{}}𝑑k_{}M^\mathrm{s}(k_{},k_{},0)B_0^2/4=L^3B_0^2/8\pi `$. At small scales in MHD turbulence, there is equipartition between magnetic and kinetic energies, so that $`K^\mathrm{p}=M^\mathrm{p}`$ and $`K^\mathrm{s}=M^\mathrm{s}`$. It is assumed that $`M^\mathrm{p}=M^\mathrm{s}`$ and $`C^\mathrm{p}=C^\mathrm{s}=\sigma M^\mathrm{s}`$, where the arguments of each of these spectra are $`(k_{},k_{},\tau )`$, and where the fractional cross helicity $`\sigma (1,1)`$ is independent of $`𝐤`$.

In many applications, there are two small parameters,

$$ϵ=\frac{v}{l\mathrm{\Omega }},\text{ and }\delta =\frac{v_A}{v}.$$
(10)
For $`\mathrm{sin}\theta ϵ^{1/2}`$, one finds from equations (6) and (7) and the assumed forms of the power spectra that to lowest order in $`ϵ`$ and $`\delta `$,

$$\left(\begin{array}{c}D_{\xi \xi }^\mathrm{s}\\ D_{\xi p}^\mathrm{s}\\ D_{pp}^\mathrm{s}\end{array}\right)=\frac{v}{l}\left[\frac{2ϵ^{3/2}|\mathrm{cos}\theta |^{11/2}}{13\mathrm{sin}\theta }\underset{n=1}{\overset{n=\mathrm{}}{}}n^{9/2}\frac{\delta \mathrm{ln}ϵ}{3}\mathrm{sin}^2\theta \right]\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ \sigma p\delta \\ p^2\delta ^2\end{array}\right),\text{ and}$$
(11)
$$\left(\begin{array}{c}D_{\xi \xi }^\mathrm{p}\\ D_{\xi p}^\mathrm{p}\\ D_{pp}^\mathrm{p}\end{array}\right)=\frac{v}{l}\left\{\frac{2ϵ^{3/2}|\mathrm{cos}\theta |^{7/2}\mathrm{sin}\theta }{13}\underset{n=1}{\overset{n=\mathrm{}}{}}n^{9/2}\frac{\delta \mathrm{ln}ϵ}{6}\frac{\mathrm{sin}^4\theta }{\mathrm{cos}^2\theta }\left[1\frac{v_A}{v_{}}\mathrm{arctan}\left(\frac{v_{}}{v_A}\right)\right]\right\}\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ \sigma p\delta \\ p^2\delta ^2\end{array}\right).$$
(12)
The terms on the right-hand sides of equations (11) and (12) proportional to $`ϵ^{3/2}`$ correspond to fluctuations satisfying the magnetostatic gyroresonance condition $`k_{}v_{}=n\mathrm{\Omega }`$, which states that the Doppler-shifted frequency of a static magnetic fluctuation in the reference frame of an energetic particle’s motion along $`𝐁_0`$ is an integral multiple of the particle’s gyrofrequency. A fluctuation is seen as static when a cosmic ray passes through one wavelength of the fluctuation in a time $`(k_{}v_{})^1\tau _𝐤`$. The gyroresonant terms in equations (11) and (12) are much smaller than in the case of slab-symmetric or isotropic turbulence for $`\mathrm{sin}\theta ϵ^{1/2}`$ because equations (8) and (9) imply that $`k_{}>k_{}^{3/2}l^{1/2}`$, so that fluctuations satisfying $`k_{}v_{}=n\mathrm{\Omega }`$ also satisfy $`k_{}\rho >n^{3/2}ϵ^{1/2}\mathrm{sin}\theta \mathrm{cos}^{3/2}\theta 1`$. The condition $`k_{}\rho 1`$ implies that a cosmic ray traverses many uncorrelated fluctuations of the required $`k_{}`$ during a single gyro orbit. The effects of these uncorrelated fluctuations tend to cancel. The weakening of gyroresonant scattering due to this gyro-orbit averaging would occur for any power spectrum in which all fluctuations on scales $`l`$ satisfy $`k_{}k_{}`$. The terms on the right-hand sides of equations (11) and (12) proportional to $`(\mathrm{ln}ϵ)\delta `$ correspond to non-resonant interactions. In equation (12) the non-resonant term arises from the $`n=0`$ term in equation (7), which represents the effects of the magnetic-mirror force of the pseudo-Alfvén modes (transit-time damping). This term becomes large as $`\theta \pi /2`$, since as $`v_{}v_A`$ particles can “surf” magnetic mirrors moving at speeds $`v_A`$ more effectively.

For $`\mathrm{sin}\theta ϵ^{1/2}`$, scattering is dominated by magnetostatic gyroresonant interactions with shear-Alfvén modes, and to lowest order in $`ϵ`$ and $`\delta `$

$$\left(\begin{array}{c}D_{\xi \xi }^\mathrm{s}\\ D_{\xi p}^\mathrm{s}\\ D_{pp}^\mathrm{s}\end{array}\right)=\left(\frac{v}{l}\right)\frac{\pi \theta ^2}{8}\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ \sigma p\delta \\ p^2\delta ^2\end{array}\right).$$
(13)
Although $`D_{\xi \xi }`$ vanishes as $`\theta 0`$, the pitch-angle scattering frequency $`\nu =2D_{\xi \xi }/(1\xi ^2)`$ (which unlike $`D_{\xi \xi }`$ is independent of $`\theta `$ for isotropic scattering) approaches $`(\pi /4)(v/l)`$ as $`\theta 0`$. Gyroresonant interactions are stronger for $`\theta ϵ^{1/2}`$ than for $`\theta ϵ^{1/2}`$, because when $`\theta ϵ^{1/2}`$ modes satisfying $`k_{}v_{}=n\mathrm{\Omega }`$ also satisfy $`k_{}\rho 1`$, so that a cosmic ray doesn’t traverse many uncorrelated resonant modes during a single gyro orbit.

In figure 1, the pitch-angle scattering frequency $`\nu `$ from equations (11) and (12) is plotted with the solid line, and the limiting value of $`\nu `$ as $`\mathrm{sin}\theta 0`$ from equation (13) is given by the dashed line. The $`\times `$s indicate numerical evaluations of $`\nu `$ from equations (6) and (7) for the assumed spectra in which only those terms in the infinite sum with $`|n|10`$ are kept and in which $`l^{}=0.1l`$ (see introduction). The values $`ϵ=10^3`$ and $`\delta =10^3`$ have been used. ($`\sigma `$, which only weakly affects $`\nu `$, has been set to 0.) The characteristic values $`\nu v/l`$ for $`\mathrm{sin}\theta <ϵ^{1/2}`$, $`\nu \delta ^1v/l`$ for $`|\pi \theta |<\delta `$, and $`\nu [(\mathrm{ln}ϵ)\delta +ϵ^{3/2}]v/l`$ for moderate pitch angles can be extrapolated to all values of $`ϵ`$ and $`\delta `$ much less than 1 in the quasilinear approximation.

When $`\nu `$ is sufficiently large, $`f_0`$ becomes nearly isotropic, and the pitch-angle-averaged distribution $`\overline{f}`$ can be treated in the diffusion approximation ,

$$\frac{\overline{f}}{t}=\frac{}{l}\left(\kappa _{}\frac{\overline{f}}{l}\right)+\frac{1}{p^2}\frac{}{p}\left(p^2\overline{D}_p\frac{\overline{f}}{p}\right)+\mathrm{},$$
(14)
where $`l`$ is distance along a field line, and the ellipsis indicates the omission of the advection and adiabatic-acceleration terms. The coefficient of spatial diffusion along $`𝐁_0`$ is given by

$$\kappa _{}=\frac{v^2}{8}_1^1𝑑\xi \frac{(1\xi ^2)^2}{D_{\xi \xi }}.$$
(15)
To lowest order in $`ϵ`$ and $`\delta `$ when $`ϵ^{3/2}(\mathrm{ln}ϵ)\delta `$, QLT gives

$$\kappa _{}^{\mathrm{QLT}}=vl(\delta \mathrm{ln}ϵ)^1\left(\frac{5}{2}\frac{3\pi }{4}\right).$$
(16)
\[In this paper, from equation (11) on, $`M^\mathrm{p}=M^\mathrm{s}`$; however, if either $`M^\mathrm{p}`$ or $`M^\mathrm{s}`$ is set to zero, equation (16) becomes $`\kappa _{}^{\mathrm{QLT}}=vl(2\delta \mathrm{ln}ϵ)^1`$.\] To lowest order in $`ϵ`$ and $`\delta `$ when $`(\mathrm{ln}ϵ)\delta ϵ^{3/2}`$ QLT gives

$$\kappa _{}^{\mathrm{QLT}}=vlc_1(\delta \mathrm{ln}ϵ)^{5/11}ϵ^{9/11},\text{ where}$$
(17)
$`c_1=(\pi /22)\mathrm{csc}(5\pi /11)6^{5/11}[(2/13)_{n=1}^{\mathrm{}}n^{9/2}]^{6/11}0.88`$. The pitch-angle-averaged momentum diffusion coefficient in equation (14) is given by

$$\overline{D}_p=\frac{1}{2}_1^1𝑑\xi \left[D_{pp}\frac{D_{\xi p}^2}{D_{\xi \xi }}\right].$$
(18)
To lowest order in $`ϵ`$ and $`\delta `$, QLT gives

$$\overline{D}_p^{\mathrm{QLT}}=(\pi /24)(1\sigma ^2)(\mathrm{ln}ϵ)p^2v_A^2/(vl).$$
(19)
When $`\sigma ^2=1`$, $`\overline{D}_p`$ vanishes since the small-scale fluctuations all travel in a single direction along $`𝐁_0`$ at the speed $`v_A`$, and, in the reference frame that follows their motion, particle energies are conserved.

Although QLT is a useful and standard tool, it suffers from important inaccuracies. QLT assumes that during the time a particle is correlated with a turbulent fluctuation, the orbit of that particle is the same as in a uniform magnetic field. However, field-strength fluctuations $`\mathrm{}|B|`$ with $`\mathrm{}|B|/|B|\alpha 1`$ magnetically trap cosmic rays with $`|\xi |\alpha ^{1/2}`$. (For incompressible turbulent fluctuations, which have phase velocities $`v_A`$ along the magnetic field, and for cosmic rays with $`vv_A`$, the trapping condition is essentially the same as if the fluctuations were stationary.) The trajectories of such trapped particles differ greatly from the trajectories of particles in a uniform field, violating the QLT assumptions. Because the integral in equation (18) is dominated by values of $`|\xi |\delta 1`$ for which trapping is important, the value of $`\overline{D}_p`$ in equation (19) is unreliable. Similarly, when $`(\mathrm{ln}ϵ)\delta ϵ^{3/2}`$, the integral in equation (15) is dominated by small $`|\xi |`$, and thus the value of $`\kappa _{}`$ in equation (17) is unreliable. In addition, assuming an unperturbed particle orbit in the presence of a slowly and non-periodically varying $`𝐄_1`$ or $`𝐁_1`$ leads to spurious changes in a particle’s magnetic moment $`\mu =mv_{}^2/2B_0`$, which, as an adiabatic invariant, should be virtually conserved when $`𝐄_1`$ and $`𝐁_1`$ vary on a time scale $`\mathrm{\Omega }^1`$. The non-resonant terms in equations (11) and (12) arise from slowly varying modes and imply such spurious changes in $`\mu `$, thereby significantly overestimating non-resonant pitch-angle scattering. Since $`\kappa _{}`$ in equation (16) is determined by this non-resonant pitch-angle scattering, equation (16) underestimates $`\kappa _{}`$.

Although the QLT results for the key particle-transport coefficients are inaccurate, QLT does show that resonant scattering by MHD turbulence with $`k_{}k_{}`$ is much weaker than resonant scattering by slab-symmetric or isotropic fluctuations. Moreover, equation (16) as a lower bound on $`\kappa _{}`$ has important implications. If $`B_0=5\mu `$G, $`l=100`$ pc, and $`v_A=10^6`$ cm/s \[parameters characteristic of the interstellar medium (ISM)\], then $`ϵ=2.2\times 10^9E_{\mathrm{GeV}}`$ for a relativistic proton, where $`E_{\mathrm{GeV}}`$ is the proton’s energy in GeV, and $`\delta =3.3\times 10^5`$. If $`E_{\mathrm{GeV}}10^6`$, then $`ϵ^{3/2}(\mathrm{ln}ϵ)\delta `$, and equation (16) gives a lower limit to the scattering mean free path $`\kappa _{}/v`$ of $`430\text{ kpc}\times (20\mathrm{ln}E_{\mathrm{GeV}})^1`$. This value is so large that if the power-law spectrum of interstellar turbulence inferred from observations  is described by equation (8), then some mechanism besides such turbulence must be invoked to explain the confinement of cosmic rays to the Galaxy . At energies $`10^210^3`$ GeV, such a mechanism is provided by resonant MHD waves that cosmic rays themselves excite, but at higher energies it is believed that self-confinement does not work . For $`E_{\mathrm{GeV}}>10^210^3`$, cosmic-ray confinement and isotropization can be explained even if turbulent scattering is weak if one takes into account molecular-cloud magnetic mirrors . If the interstellar turbulence generated by supernovae and stellar winds is described by equation (8), the inefficient scattering associated with such turbulence may indicate that quasi-parallel shocks are unable to accelerate cosmic rays up to the $`10^6`$ GeV energies at the “knee” of the galactic cosmic-ray energy spectrum , although this suggestion is controversial . Quasi-perpendicular shocks, however, may be able to accelerate cosmic rays to the knee and beyond .

I thank Steve Spangler, Eliot Quataert, Torsten Ensslin, Randy Jokipii, Steve Cowley, Jon Arons, Peter Goldreich, and Russell Kulsrud for valuable discussions.


text:
# 1 Introduction and motivations

## 1 Introduction and motivations

Stochastic GW backgrounds  constitute a promising source for wideband interferometers whose operating window can be approximately located between few Hz and 10 kHz. There are no compelling theoretical reasons why in such a frequency interval we should expect a negligible energy density stored in a stochastic background of primordial origin. Listening to phenomenology, we know that, unless $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{GW}}`$ (the logarithmic energy spectrum of relic gravitons) is either flat or decreasing (as predicted, for instance, by some classes of inflationary models), the present constraints on stochastic gravitational waves backgrounds are quite mild. Listening to the theory we know that if $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{GW}}`$ increases for frequencies larger than few mHz , then it is indeed possible to achieve a large signal in the operating window of interferometric detectors without conflicting neither with the fractional timing error of the millisecond pulsar’s pulses  nor with the requirement that the total energy density of relic GW should be smaller than the total amount of relativistic matter at nucleosynthesis . These qualitative features can easily emerge in different models based on diverse physical frameworks including quintessential inflationary models , dimensional decoupling , early violations of the dominant energy conditions  and superstring theories .

Recently the proposal of building in Europe an advanced interferometer of dimensions comparable with VIRGO  has been carefully scrutinized . In view of this idea we would like to determine what would be the sensitivity of the correlation between two VIRGO-like detectors to a generic stochastic GW background. The answer to this question depends upon two experimental informations (i.e. the specific form of the noise power spectra and the relative location and orientation of the two detectors) and upon the theoretical form of the logarithmic energy spectrum. Concerning the last point, the specific frequency dependence of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{GW}}(f)`$ is extremely relevant. In fact $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{GW}}(f)`$ directly enters in the expression of the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR)  and, therefore, logarithmic energy spectra with a different frequency dependence will lead, necessarily, to different SNR .

Given a theoretical model, in order to compute reliably the sensitivity we have to specify the location of the two VIRGO detectors and the form of the noise power spectra. It is important to analyze how the relative distance between the two detectors of the pair can affect the sensitivity to the specific logarithmic energy spectrum of relic GW we ought to detect. In this respect, scale-invariant and non-scale-invariant logarithmic energy spectra lead to different sensitivity levels for the VIRGO pair already under the assumption that no improvement in the reduction of the thermal noises will take place prior to the construction of the second VIRGO detector. If a reduction in the contribution of the pendulum and pendulum’s internal modes to the noise power spectra is achieved the improvements in the sensitivity will be even sharper .

Before starting our analysis we want to comment about the terminology. In our paper we will refer to GW. However, one should recall that we could also talk about relic graviton backgrounds. In fact the gravitational waves of cosmological origin are nothing but squeezed states of many gravitons produced from the vacuum fluctuations of the metric. In our investigations the quantum mechanical properties (i.e. correlations) of these states will not be essential but they can be, in principle, discussed along the lines of .

## 2 Maximal and minimal overlap

In the hypothesis that the GW background is isotropic and unpolarized the reduction of the sensitivity due to the relative distance and orientation of the two detectors depends upon the frequency $`f`$ and it is usually parameterized in terms of the (dimensionless) overlap reduction function .

By denoting (in spherical coordinates) with $`\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }}=(\mathrm{cos}\varphi \mathrm{sin}\theta ,\mathrm{sin}\varphi \mathrm{sin}\theta ,\mathrm{cos}\theta )`$ a generic direction along which the given gravitational wave (GW) propagates, the overlap reduction function $`\gamma (f)`$ can be expressed, in terms of the pattern functions $`F_i^A`$ determining the response of the $`i`$-th detector ($`i=1,2`$) to the $`A=+,\times `$ polarizations111We introduced the notation
$$\mathrm{}_{\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }},\psi }=_{S^2}\frac{\mathrm{d}\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }}}{4\pi }_0^{2\pi }\frac{\mathrm{d}\psi }{2\pi }(\mathrm{})$$
to denote the average over the propagation direction $`(\theta ,\varphi )`$ and the polarization angle $`\psi `$ of the GW.:

$`F^A(\widehat{r},\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }},\psi )`$ $`=`$ $`\text{Tr}\{D(\widehat{r})\epsilon ^A(\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }},\psi )\}`$ (1)
$`\gamma (f)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{F}}{\displaystyle \underset{A}{}}e^{i2\pi fd\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }}\widehat{s}}F_1^A(\widehat{r}_1,\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }},\psi )F_2^A(\widehat{r}_2,\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }},\psi )_{\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }},\psi }={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Gamma }(f)}{F}}.`$ (2)
Notice that $`\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{}{r}=\stackrel{}{r}_1\stackrel{}{r}_2=d\widehat{s}`$ is the separation vector between the two detector sites and the summation over the index $`A`$ has to be taken over the physical polarizations (characterized by the polarization angle $`\psi `$)

$`\epsilon ^+(\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }},\psi )`$ $`=`$ $`e^+(\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }})\mathrm{cos}2\psi e^\times (\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }})\mathrm{sin}2\psi ,`$
$`\epsilon ^\times (\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }},\psi )`$ $`=`$ $`e^+(\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }})\mathrm{sin}2\psi +e^\times (\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }})\mathrm{cos}2\psi ,`$ (3)
of the incoming wave. The symmetric, trace-less tensor $`D(\widehat{r})`$ appearing in Eq. (1) depends on the geometry of the detector located in $`\stackrel{}{r}`$. A general analytical expression for the function $`\gamma (f)`$ can be written as

$$\gamma (f)=\rho _0(\delta )D_1^{ij}D_{2ij}+\rho _1(\delta )D_1^{ij}D_{2i}^ks_js_k+\rho _2(\delta )D_1^{ij}D_2^{kl}s_is_js_ks_l$$
(4)
where

$$\left[\begin{array}{c}\rho _0(\delta )\\ \rho _1(\delta )\\ \rho _2(\delta )\end{array}\right]=\frac{1}{F\delta ^2}\left[\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill 2\delta ^2& \hfill 4\delta & \hfill 2\\ \hfill 4\delta ^2& \hfill 16\delta & \hfill 20\\ \hfill \delta ^2& \hfill 10\delta & \hfill 35\end{array}\right]\left[\begin{array}{c}j_0(\delta )\\ j_1(\delta )\\ j_2(\delta )\end{array}\right],$$
(5)
Notice that $`j_k(\delta )`$ are the standard spherical Bessel functions:

$$j_0(\delta )=\frac{\mathrm{sin}\delta }{\delta },j_1(\delta )=\frac{j_0(\delta )\mathrm{cos}\delta }{\delta },j_2(\delta )=3\frac{j_1(\delta )}{\delta }j_0(\delta ),$$

expressed as function of the dimensionless argument $`\delta =2\pi fd`$.

The normalization $`F`$ is given by

$$F=\underset{A}{}F_1^A(\widehat{r}_1,\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }},\psi )F_2^A(\widehat{r}_2,\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }},\psi )_{\widehat{\mathrm{\Omega }},\psi }_{12},$$
(6)
where the notation $`12`$ is a compact way to indicate that the detectors are coincident, coaligned and, if at least one of the two is an interferometer, the angle between its arms is equal to $`\pi `$/2 (L-shaped geometry). In this situation, by definition, $`\gamma (f)=1`$. When the detectors are shifted apart (so there is a phase shift between the signals in the two detectors), or rotated out of coalignment (so the detectors have different sensitivity to the same polarization) we will have that $`|\gamma (f)|<1`$. The normalization factor $`F`$ is $`2/5`$ in the case of the VIRGO pair and in the case of any pair of wide band interferometers.

By varying the frequency $`f`$ the overlap reduction function is of order one until it reaches its first zero and, then, it starts oscillating around zero. The position of this first zero is roughly proportional to the inverse of the distance $`d`$ between the two detectors. The location of the corner station of the first interferometer will be assumed in Cascina (43.6 N , 10.5 E) where the VIRGO interferometer is presently under construction. The position of the second corner station is, at present, still under study. In our investigation we will suppose that the second corner station in different european sites.

On a purely theoretical ground one ought to have a situation where the overlap reduction function is as close as possible to one for most of the frequencies in the operating window of the VIRGO pair. In other words we would like to push the first zero in the at higher frequencies because this would imply that the region of maximal overlap (i.e. $`\gamma (f)1`$ ) gets larger. Since an increase in the region of maximal overlap produces a decrease in the relative distance of the two interferometers it will not be possible to decrease the distance ad libitum. In fact, when we decrease the distance between the detectors, we might introduce correlations between the local seismic and electromagnetic noises. We will assume that a distance of approximately $`50`$ km is sufficient to decorrelate these noises. At the moment we do not have indications against such an assumption.

The maximization of the overlap constitutes an important component as we can argue from the full expression of the signal-to-noise ratio. For the correlation of two interferometers, under the assumptions that the detector noises are Gaussian, much larger in amplitude than the gravitational strain and statistically independent on the strain itself, it can be shown  that the signal-to-noise ratio in a frequency range $`(f_\mathrm{m},f_\mathrm{M})`$ is given, for an observation time $`T`$, by 222 We follow the notations of Refs.

$$\mathrm{SNR}^2=\frac{3H_0^2}{5\sqrt{2}\pi ^2}\sqrt{T}\left\{_{f_\mathrm{m}}^{f_\mathrm{M}}df\frac{\gamma ^2(f)\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{GW}}^2(f)}{f^6S_n^{(1)}(f)S_n^{(2)}(f)}\right\}^{1/2},$$
(7)
where $`H_0`$ is the present value of the Hubble parameter. In Eq. (7), the performances achievable by the pair of detectors is controlled by the noise power spectra (NPS) $`S_n^{(1,2)}`$, whereas $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{GW}}(f)`$ is the theoretical background signal defined through the logarithmic energy spectrum, normalized to the critical density $`\rho _c`$, and expressed at the present (conformal) time333In most of our equations we drop the dependence of spectral quantities upon the present time since all the quantities introduced in this paper are evaluated today. $`\eta _0`$

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{GW}}(f,\eta _0)=\frac{1}{\rho _c}\frac{\mathrm{d}\rho _{\mathrm{GW}}}{\mathrm{d}\mathrm{ln}f}=\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}(\eta _0)\omega (f,\eta _0).$$
(8)
It is intuitively clear, from the combined analysis of the two previous expressions, that if $`\gamma (f)`$ reaches its first zero a low frequencies, the value of the integral will be smaller than in the case where $`\gamma (f)`$ reaches its first zero at larger frequencies.

## 3 Overlap versus noise power spectra

Given a specific logarithmic energy spectrum of primordial GW the signal-to-noise ratio is determined by the interplay between the overlap reduction function and the noise power spectra of the detectors. The noise power spectrum of the VIRGO detector can be approximated by an analytical fit , namely

$$\mathrm{\Sigma }_n(f)=\frac{S_n(f)}{S_0}=\{\begin{array}{cc}\mathrm{}\hfill & f<f_b\\ \mathrm{\Sigma }_1\left(\frac{f_\mathrm{a}}{f}\right)^5+\mathrm{\Sigma }_2\left(\frac{f_\mathrm{a}}{f}\right)+\mathrm{\Sigma }_3\left[1+\left(\frac{f}{f_\mathrm{a}}\right)^2\right],\hfill & ff_b\end{array}$$
(9)
where

$$S_0=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}10}^{44}\mathrm{s},f_a=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}500}\mathrm{Hz},f_b=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}\mathrm{Hz},\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{\Sigma }_1=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}3.46}\times \mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}10}^6\hfill \\ \mathrm{\Sigma }_2=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}6.60}\times \mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}10}^2\hfill \\ \mathrm{\Sigma }_3=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}3.24}\times \mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}10}^2.\hfill \end{array}$$

The noise power spectrum of the VIRGO detectors is reported in Fig. 1.

In our parametrization, $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_1`$ and $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_2`$ control the contribution of the pendulum and pendulum’s internal modes  to the thermal noise. $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_3`$ controls instead the shot noise. For frequencies smaller than $`f_b`$ the noise power spectrum goes to infinity. The different values of $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_{1,2,3}`$ together with $`f_a`$ and $`f_b`$ define a specific noise configuration of the detectors. If, in the future, one of the contributions to the noises will be reduced, the noise power spectra will change accordingly and the noise configuration might be different. Without entering into the details of the actual experimental method which could allow such a reduction we can parametrize possible changes in the noise power spectra through a noise “reduction vector”

$$\stackrel{}{\rho }=(\rho _1,\rho _2,\rho _3)$$
(10)
where $`\rho _i<1`$ defines the reduction in the corresponding coefficient $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_i`$ entering Eq. (9). Within the present noise configuration $`\stackrel{}{\rho }=(1,1,1)`$.

By using into Eq. (7) the expression of the theoretical spectrum given in Eq. (8) we have that the minimum normalization $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ of a spectrum with functional variation $`\omega (f)`$, detectable by the VIRGO pair in an observation time $`T`$ with a given SNR is determined by

$$h_0^2\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}\frac{4.0\times \mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}10}^7}{J}\left(\frac{1\mathrm{yr}}{T}\right)^{1/2}\mathrm{SNR}^2.$$
(11)
In this equation the information of the specific $`\omega (f)`$ is encoded in the quantity $`J`$:

$$J=\left\{_{\nu _\mathrm{m}}^{\nu _\mathrm{M}}d\nu \frac{\gamma ^2(f_0\nu )\omega ^2(f_0\nu )}{\nu ^6\mathrm{\Sigma }_n^{(1)}(f_0\nu )\mathrm{\Sigma }_n^{(2)}(f_0\nu )}\right\}^{\frac{1}{2}}$$
(12)
where the integration variable is $`\nu =f/f_0`$ ($`f_0`$ is a generic frequency scale within the region $`f_\mathrm{m}ff_\mathrm{M}`$ ). We can assume $`f_\mathrm{M}=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}10}`$ kHz, whereas the lower extreme $`f_\mathrm{m}`$ is put equal to the frequency $`f_b`$ entering Eq. (9). The choice of $`f_0`$ is purely conventional and in view of our discussion we took $`f_0=100`$ Hz.

Following the terminology of Sec. II the curve denoted by A in Fig. 2 corresponds to the maximal overlap. The minimal overlap is represented by the curve C where the location of the second VIRGO detector coincides with the present location of the GEO  detector. For completeness we also illustrate a possible intermediate overlap (profile B) corresponding the situation where the two detectors are roughly $`500`$ km far apart. In principle, the effect of a maximization (or reduction) of the overlap between the two detectors of the VIRGO pair is not independent on the analytical form of the logarithmic energy spectrum $`\omega (f)`$. Indeed, as we will show in the following Sections a reduction in the overlap has a mild effect if the logarithmic energy spectrum is scale-invariant. However, if the logarithmic energy spectrum is non-scale-invariant (and it increases with frequency) then the effect can be sizable.

## 4 Scale-Invariant Energy Spectra

Suppose, as a warm-up, that $`\omega (f)=1`$ so that the logarithmic energy spectrum is strictly scale-invariant. Then according to Eq. (11) the sensitivity of the VIRGO pair can be computed.

Let us firstly assume that the two detectors have minimal overlap (i.e curve C in Fig. 2) and let us suppose that the VIRGO detectors will have the NPS given specifically by Eq. (9). In other words the reduction vector will have its present value $`\stackrel{}{\rho }=(1,1,1)`$. In this case, from Eq. (12) we can determine the sensitivity of the VIRGO pair. By using now into Eq. (11) the expression of the theoretical spectrum given in Eq. (8) we can determine the sensitivity of the VIRGO pair after one year of observation (i.e. $`T=\pi \times 10^7`$ s) and with SNR = 1 :

$$h_0^2\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}8.5\times 10^8.$$
(13)
Suppose now to repeat the same estimate by assuming the maximal overlap. We want also to assume that the pendulum and pendulum’s internal modes are suppressed by a factor of a hundred corresponding to a noise reduction vector $`\stackrel{}{\rho }=(0.01,0.01,1)`$. Under this second set of assumptions we have that for $`T=1`$ yr and SNR = 1 the sensitivity of the VIRGO pair becomes

$$h_0^2\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}1.9\times 10^9.$$
(14)
The two previous examples are quite extreme but a more complete analysis of the interplay between maximization of the overlap and noise reduction is illustrated in Tab. 1.

In the first column of Tab. 1 we report the different values taken by the reduction vector $`\stackrel{}{\rho }`$ whereas in the second, third and fourth columns (from the left) we indicate the sensitivities achieved by a VIRGO pair under the assumption that the second (coaligned) VIRGO interferometer is located, respectively, in the three positions specified by the three profiles A, B and C of Fig. 2. The first corner station is always assumed, in our estimates, to be in Cascina.

In spite of the fact that the example of an exactly flat spectrum is academic and oversimplified 444Needless to say that the analysis of the Sachs-Wolfe contribution to the detected amount of anisotropy implies, on a theoretical ground that, for $`f_\mathrm{m}<f<f_\mathrm{M}`$, $`h_0^2\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{GW}}10^{15}`$ if a scale-invariant spectrum was originated during inflation. we can draw, from our exercise, few interesting hints. We can see that if no noise reduction and minimal overlap are simultaneously assumed the sensitivity is, comparatively, smaller than in the case where a selective reduction of the thermal noises and maximal overlap are postulated. If the reduction does not occur in the thermal components of the noise the improvement in the sensitivity is negligible, but still present.

Our considerations were deduced only assuming a reduction in the thermal components of the noise. In principle, we should also consider the possible effect of a reduction in the shot noise. If the reduction is selectively applied to the shot noise, the improvement in the sensitivity is negligible . This can be easily understood from the analysis of Fig. 1: the shot noise starts being the dominant contribution to the NPS for $`f1`$ kHz, i.e. in a frequency region where the overlap begins to deteriorate (see Fig. 2). As far as the achievable sensitivity levels are concerned, we can notice that the three location are practically indistinguishable. This statement is even more accurate if the reduction in the thermal noise components gets larger.

For sake of completeness in Tab. 2 we report the minimum detectable $`h_0^2\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ ($`T`$ = 1 yr and SNR = 1) for the correlation of VIRGO with the major interferometers presently under construction (LIGO, GEO, TAMA) . We also report the same quantity for the correlation of VIRGO with the existing resonant bars which are located close to the VIRGO site (AURIGA and NAUTILUS ). These sensitivities are deduced from the calculation of ref.  in the case of interferometers, while are directly taken from ref.  for the resonant bars.

In ref.  is also considered the possibility to correlate VIRGO with a (hyphotetical) spherical detector with a 3 m diameter made of Al 5056 ($`M`$ = 38 ton). The sensitivity turns out to be $`h_0^2\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}2\times \mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}10}^5`$ if the sphere is located in the AURIGA site, and it gets worse ( by a factor 2) if the sphere is moved to the NAUTILUS location. All these values have to be compared with the sensitivities reported in the first row of Tab. 1. Even in the less favorable case (correlation C of Tab. I) the sensitivity is greater (by one order of magnitude) than the best achievable sensitivities reported in Tab 2.

## 5 Non-scale-invariant spectra

It is interesting to repeat a similar analysis in the case where $`\omega (f)`$, instead of being scale-invariant, increases with $`f`$. In principle we would expect that in the latter case the impact of the maximization of the overlap will be more pronounced. The reason is that the contribution of $`\omega (f)`$ to the integrand of Eq. (7) (or of Eq. (12)) increases at high frequencies if $`\omega (f)`$ increases. Therefore, if the first zero of $`\gamma (f)`$ falls just after 100 Hz (or possibly even before) the contribution of $`\omega (f)`$ will be erased more efficiently.

In order to show this behaviour let us analyze some specific examples among the ones mentioned in the introduction. For instance, in string cosmological models, the minimal pre-big-bang spectra have a two-branch form which can be expressed as

$$\omega (f)=\{\begin{array}{cc}z_s^{2\beta }\left(\frac{f}{f_s}\right)^3\left[\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1}+z_s^{2\beta 3}\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{ln}\frac{f}{f_s}\right]^2\hfill & ff_s=\frac{f_1}{z_s}\\ \left[\left(\frac{f}{f_1}\right)^{3\beta }+\left(\frac{f}{f_1}\right)^\beta \right]^2\hfill & f_s<ff_1\end{array}$$
(15)
where

$$\beta =\frac{\mathrm{ln}(g_1/g_s)}{\mathrm{ln}z_s},$$
(16)
In this formula $`z_s=f_1/f_s`$ and $`g_s`$ are, respectively, the red-shift during, and the value of the coupling constant at the beginning of, the string phase . The maximal amplified frequency $`f_1`$ of the GW spectrum is

$$f_1(\eta _0)\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}64.8}\sqrt{g_1}\left(\frac{10^3}{n_r}\right)^{1/12}\mathrm{GHz},$$
(17)
where $`n_r`$ is the effective number of spin degrees of freedom in thermal equilibrium at the end of the stringy phase (of the order of 102 $`÷`$ 103, depending upon the specific string model), and $`g_1=M_s/M_{\mathrm{Pl}}`$ is the mismatch between the string ($`M_s`$) and Planck ($`M_{\mathrm{Pl}}`$) masses. The value of $`g_1`$ corresponds to the dilaton coupling at the beginning of the radiation dominated epoch and it can be estimated to lie between $`0.3`$ and $`0.03`$ .

In the case of increasing logarithmic energy spectra the evaluation of the sensitivity is a bit different from the case of purely flat spectra. If $`\omega (f)`$ grows in frequency the integrated spectrum can become, in principle large. We know, however, that the total amount of GW present at big-bang nucleosynthesis (BBN) cannot exceed the total amount of relativistic matter . Otherwise the expansion rate of the Universe would increase too much and the observed light elements abundances could not be correctly reproduced. This implies that

$$h_0^2_{f_{\mathrm{ns}}}^{f_{\mathrm{max}}}\mathrm{\Omega }_{\mathrm{GW}}(f,\eta _0)\mathrm{d}\mathrm{ln}f<\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0.2}h_0^2\mathrm{\Omega }_\gamma (\eta _0)\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}5}\times \mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}10}^6,$$
(18)
where $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\gamma (\eta _0)=\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2.6}\times \mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}10}^5h_0^2`$ is the fraction of critical energy density stored in radiation at the present observation time $`\eta _0`$; $`f_{\mathrm{ns}}10^{10}`$ Hz and $`f_{\mathrm{max}}`$ are, respectively, the nucleosynthesis frequency and the maximal frequency of the GW spectrum (for our present example $`f_{\mathrm{max}}=f_1`$). It is intuitively clear that if the spectrum is flat the BBN bound will be easily satisfied provided the theoretical amplitude of the spectrum, $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{th}}`$ is roughly less than $`10^6`$. In the case of growing spectra the situation is more tricky. Let us denote with

$$h_0^2\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{max}}\frac{5\times \mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}10}^6}{},=_{f_{\mathrm{ns}}}^{f_{\mathrm{max}}}\omega (f)\mathrm{d}\mathrm{ln}f,$$
(19)
the maximal normalization of the spectrum compatible with the BBN bound. The sensitivity to a given $`\omega (f)`$ (which now increases with $`f`$) will be always given by Eq. (11). We should however exclude from the parameter space of our theoretical model those regions where $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}>\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{max}}`$. Thus, the regions of the parameter space of a given model for which $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{max}}>\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ are, simultaneously, visible by the VIRGO pair and compatible with the BBN. In the absence of a specific theoretical normalization this would be the end of the story. However, in some models one can also estimate (with a given accuracy) the theoretical normalization of the spectrum. For instance, in the case of string cosmological models, the theoretical normalization of the spectrum can be expressed as

$$\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{th}}2.6g_1^2\left(\frac{10^3}{n_r}\right)^{1/3}\mathrm{\Omega }_\gamma (\eta _0).$$
(20)
The accuracy of this determination coincides with the accuracy in the determination of $`g_1`$ (the dilaton coupling at the beginning of the string phase) and of $`n_r`$ as defined in Eq. (17).

If we want to compare the achievable sensitivity not only with the BBN bound but also with the theoretical normalization we will have to require that $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{max}}>\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ and $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{th}}>\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ are simultaneously satisfied. With these necessary specifications let us now analyze the impact of the maximization of the overlap in the case of non-scale-invariant spectra of string cosmological type. Our results for the ratios $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{max}}/\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ and $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{th}}/\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ are reported in Figs. 3, 4, and 5. In Fig. 3 we illustrate the sensitivity to string cosmological spectra under the assumption of maximal overlap (profile A of Fig. 2). The region in the left plot of Fig. 3 traces the area of the parameter space where $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{max}}>\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$, whereas the right plot corresponds to the region of the parameter space for which $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{th}}>\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$.

The plots of Fig. 3 can be compared with the case where the overlap is not maximal. This is done in Figs. 4 and 5.

In Fig. 4 the meaning of the shaded regions is exactly the same as in Fig. 3 but with the assumption of minimal overlap. In fact, the relevant profile of $`\gamma (f)`$ is the one labeled with C in Fig. 2. By comparing Fig. 3 with Fig. 4 we can notice that the effects of the maximization of the overlap is to increase the visibility region both in terms of $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{max}}/\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ and in terms of $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{th}}/\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$. For sake of completeness we also report in Fig. 5 the patterns of the visibility region for non-scale-invariant spectra in the case of intermediate overlap. In this case the two VIRGO detectors are assumed to be roughly 500 km apart and this corresponds to the profile B of Fig. 2. As we can see from Fig. 5 the area of the visibility region is, approximately, in between the ones obtained in the case of Figs. 3 and 4.

In order to complete our analysis we would like to discuss the simultaneous effect of overlap maximization and noise reduction since this is one of the open possibilities of the upgraded VIRGO program. Suppose, for instance, that the noise configuration of the upgraded VIRGO would correspond to a reduction vector $`\stackrel{}{\rho }=(0.1,0.01,1)`$. If the overlap is either maximal or minimal the visibility region are the ones reported in Fig. 6. In particular, in Fig. 6 we report the regions for which $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{th}}>\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ (needless to say that we report only those regions of parameter space for which the BBN bound is satisfied, i.e. $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{th}}<\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{max}}`$). In the left plot of Fig. 6 we assumed maximal overlap (profile A of Fig. 2) whereas in the right plot we assumed minimal overlap (profile C of Fig. 2). As we can see, a joined reduction of thermal noises overwhelms almost completely the effect of the maximization of the overlap in the sense that, if the thermal noises are consistently reduced, the visibility region seems to be rather insensitive to the relative location of the two detectors. Similar conclusions (and similar plots) are obtained in the case of different reduction vectors affecting the thermal noises. Finally, if the shot noise contribution is reduced the sensitivity is only mildly affected . The reason for this statement stems from the fact that the shot noise reduction starts being important for frequencies larger than the kHz (see Fig. 1) . But for $`f>1`$ kHz the overlap reduction is very efficient in spite of the location of the two detectors as it can be argued from Fig. 2.

We close this section with some considerations about the magnitude of the ratios $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{max}}/\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ and $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{th}}/\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$. Let us start from the case without noise reduction ($`\stackrel{}{\rho }=(1,1,1)`$). In the case of correlation A, the ratios $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{max}}/\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ and $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{th}}/\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ get their maximal values, of the order of 3 and 2, respectively, in the region $`g_1/g_s\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1}`$ and $`\mathrm{log}z_s\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}9}`$. By inserting the fiducial values $`g_1=1/20`$ and $`n_r=10^3`$ in Eq. (20) one obtains $`h_0^2\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{th}}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1.7}\times \mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}10}^7`$ and, thus, the minimum detectable $`h_0^2\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ turns out of the order of $`8.5\times \mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}10}^8`$. This sensitivity gets worse if we move the second detector from A to C. The loss in sensitivity is roughly of the same order as in the case of the flat spectrum (see Tab. 1).

The reduction of noise does not affect the region of the ($`g_1/g_s,\mathrm{log}z_s`$)-plane where the ratios $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{max}}/\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ and $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{th}}/\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ are maximal. On the contrary, the magnitude of these ratios is affected: for the correlation A and in the case $`\stackrel{}{\rho }=(0.1,0.01,1)`$, $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{max}}/\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ and $`\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}^{\mathrm{th}}/\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ can be, respectively, as large as 40 or 30. This implies that the minimum detectable $`h_0^2\overline{\mathrm{\Omega }}`$ is of the order of $`3.4\times \mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}10}^9`$, roughly 25 times less than the corresponding value without noise reduction. This improvement in sensitivity is about twice the one achieved in the same comparison but for the case of flat spectrun (see Tab. 1). The same considerations hold if we repeat this analysis to the case of the correlation C.

## 6 Conclusion

The effect of maximization (or reduction) of the overlap of two coaligned VIRGO detectors depends upon the specific form of the logarithmic energy spectrum of relic GW backgrounds. If the spectra are purely scale-invariant the effect of minimization of the overlap are negligible. If the spectra are non-scale-invariant the maximization of the overlap has a sizable impact on the sensitivity.

If we simultaneously maximize the overlap and reduce (selectively) the contributions of the pendulum and pendulum’s internal modes to the noise power spectra, the sensitivity of the VIRGO pair to a scale-invariant spectrum can be as low as $`10^9`$ after one year of observations and with SNR = 1.

In the assumption that no noise reduction will take place in the context of the upgraded VIRGO program, the maximization of the overlap alone enlarges sizably the visibility window (always for $`T=1`$ yr and SNR = 1) for the case of non-scale-invariant (and growing with frequency) logarithmic energy spectra. In the assumption of a consistent reduction of the thermal noises the sensitivity to growing logarithmic energy spectra increase significantly in spite of the location of the second VIRGO interferometer since, in the latter case, the good effect of the overlap maximization is overcome by the thermal noise reduction.

From a theoretical perspective, our results support the conclusion that the maximization of the overlap has a different impact depending upon the analytical form of the logarithmic energy spectrum, urging, in particular dedicated studies of the forthcoming data for the specific case of growing logarithmic energy spectra. From a purely experimental perspective our findings suggest that a simultaneous maximization of the overlap and a noise reduction in the pendulum and pendulum’s internal modes is desirable and extremely useful for a decisive improvement in the sensitivity of the VIRGO pair.

## Acknowledgments

We want to thank A. Giazotto for very interesting remarks and conversations.