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# Far-infrared and submillimeter-wave conductivity in electron-doped cuprate La2-xCexCuO4

## I Introduction

The interest in the physical properties of electron-doped superconductors tokura  has revived recently concerning the symmetry of the superconducting order parameter. Earlier results in these compounds on penetration depth wu , Raman stadlober  and tunneling spectroscopies alff  were explained in terms of conventional (s-wave) symmetry of the superconducting order parameter. However, later experiments, including half-flux effect tsuei , penetration-depth measurements prozorov , and photoemission sato  provided strong evidences for d-wave type symmetry. This contradiction can possibly be resolved on the basis of recent microwave experiments lemberger  and point-contact spectroscopy biswas , which suggest changes of the gap symmetry as a function of doping.

Electron doping of the high-$`T_\mathrm{c}`$ cuprates can be achieved by substituting Ce4+ into Ln2CuO4 with Ln = Pr, Nd, Sm, and Eu tokura ; naito . Among these family Nd2-xCexCuO4 is the earliest known and best studied compound fournier . The highest transition temperatures for electron-doped cuprates ($`T{}_{\mathrm{c}}{}^{}=30`$K) can be achieved in La2-xCexCuO4 (LCCO) naito . The temperature of the superconducting transition in LCCO is close to $`T_\mathrm{c}=39`$K in a recently-discovered superconductor MgB2 nagamatsu , which is believed to be of BCS-type dahm ; advances . In order to obtain valuable information about the gap symmetry in LCCO, a direct comparison of the physical properties of these compounds can be carried out. Such analysis is provided by the low-frequency electrodynamics which directly visualizes many important features of superconductors as energy gap nb ; mgb2ir  or quasiparticle scattering rate ybco .

In this paper we present the far-infrared and submillimeter-wave conductivity of underdoped ($`x=0.081`$, $`T{}_{\mathrm{c}}{}^{}=25`$K) LCCO thin film. In order to obtain the complex conductivity above and below the superconducting gap energy, two different experimental methods have been applied using the same sample. For frequencies below 40 cm-1 the complex conductivity has been obtained by the submillimeter transmission spectroscopy. At higher frequencies the reflectance was measured using standard far-infrared techniques and the conductivity has been obtained via a Kramers-Kronig analysis of the spectra.

## II Experimental details

High quality La2-xCexCuO4 film with $`x=0.081\pm 0.01`$ (underdoped regime), were deposited by molecular-beam epitaxy naito  on transparent (001) SrLaAlO4 substrates $`10\times 10\times 0.5`$ mm3 in size. The thickness of the present film was 140 nm and the film revealed a sharp transition into the superconducting state ($`\mathrm{\Delta }T_c<1`$ K) at $`T_\mathrm{c}=25`$K. Lower transition temperature compared to the optimal doping ($`x0.11`$, $`T_\mathrm{c}=30`$K naito ) confirms the underdoped character of the sample.

The transmission experiments for frequencies $`5`$ cm$`{}_{}{}^{1}<\nu <40`$ cm-1 were carried out in a Mach-Zehnder interferometer arrangement volkov  which allows both, the measurements of the transmittance and the phase shift of a film on a substrate. The properties of the blank substrate were determined in a separate experiment. Utilizing the Fresnel optical formulas for the complex transmission coefficient of the substrate-film system, the absolute values of the complex conductivity $`\sigma ^{}=\sigma _1+i\sigma _2`$ were determined directly from the measured spectra. In the frequency range $`40<\nu <4000`$ cm-1 reflectance measurements were performed using a Bruker IFS-113v Fourier-transform spectrometer. In addition, the reflectance for frequencies $`5<\nu <40`$ cm-1 was calculated from the complex conductivity data of the same samples, which was obtained by the submillimeter transmission. This substantially improves the quality of the subsequent Kramers-Kronig analysis of the reflectance and therefore the reliability of the data especially at low frequencies. A similar technique has been applied recently to the films of newly discovered MgB2 mgb2ir ; mgb2 , leading to the observation of a superconducting absorption edge. Reference mgb2ir  gives further details of the experimental set-up.

The reflectance of a thin metallic film on a dielectric substrate can be obtained from the Maxwell equations heavens :

$$r=\frac{r_{0f}+r_{fs}\mathrm{exp}(4\pi in_fd/\lambda )}{1+r_{0f}r_{fs}\mathrm{exp}(4\pi in_fd/\lambda )},$$
(1)
with $`r_{0f}=(1n_f)/(1+n_f)`$ and $`r_{fs}=(n_fn_s)/(n_f+n_s)`$ being the Fresnel reflection coefficients at the air-film $`(r_{0f})`$ and film-substrate $`(r_{fs})`$ interface. Here $`n_f=(i\sigma ^{}/\epsilon _0\omega ^{})^{1/2}`$ and $`n_s`$ are the complex refractive indices of the film and substrate, respectively, $`\lambda `$ is the radiation wavelength, $`d`$ is the film thickness, $`\omega =2\pi \nu `$ is the angular frequency, $`\sigma ^{}=\sigma _1+i\sigma _2`$ is the complex conductivity of the film, and $`\epsilon _0`$ is the permittivity of free space. Eq. (1) is written neglecting the multiple reflections from the opposite sides of the substrate.

If the film thickness is smaller than the penetration depth ($`\left|n_f\right|d\lambda `$) and if $`\left|n_f\right|\left|n_s\right|`$, Eq. (1) can be simplified to :

$$r\frac{1\sigma ^{}dZ_0n_s}{1+\sigma ^{}dZ_0+n_s},$$
(2)
where $`Z_0=\sqrt{\mu _0/\epsilon _0}377\mathrm{\Omega }`$ is the impedance of free space. Eq. (2) provides a good approximation of the reflectance at submillimeter frequencies. For higher frequencies Eq. (1) has to be used.

## III Results and Discussion

The middle panel of Fig. 1 shows the far-infrared reflectance of the underdoped LCCO film at different temperatures. A common feature of all spectra is a sharp structure above 200 cm-1 which is due to the phonons of the substrate (upper panel). The influence of the substrate is reduced substantially by calculating the complex conductivity via Eq. (1) but cannot be fully removed. At low frequencies and in the normally-conducting state the reflectance is approximately frequency independent. This is in agreement with Eq. (2) for a metal at low frequencies with $`\sigma ^{}\sigma _1`$. In the superconducting state, the low-frequency reflectance of the LCCO film becomes frequency dependent and follows approximately $`1|r|^2\nu ^2`$. This behavior follows directly from Eq. (2): in the superconducting state the complex conductivity can be approximated by $`\sigma ^{}i\sigma _2i/\nu `$, which leads to $`1|r|^2\nu ^2`$. Comparing the reflectance of LCCO in the superconducting state (Fig. 1) with the spectra of a s-wave superconductor with comparable transition temperature, e.g. with the reflectance spectra of MgB2 (lower panel) mgb2ir ; advances , significant differences can be observed. In the spectra of MgB2 the s-wave symmetry of the superconducting order parameter leads to a sharp ”knee” in the reflectance around $`h\nu 2\mathrm{\Delta }_0`$, which is in contrast to the spectra of LCCO where only a gradual decrease is observed. Thus, already the analysis of the reflectance spectra reveals a first indication of an unconventional gap-symmetry in LCCO.

Figure 2 shows the far-infrared conductivity of the underdoped LCCO film in the normally-conducting state. The results above 40 cm-1 were obtained applying the Kramers-Kronig analysis to the reflectance data and solving Eq. (1). Below 40 cm-1 the complex conductivity was calculated directly from the transmittance and phase shift. We recall that the resonance-like structures between 200 and 700 cm-1 are due to the residual influence of the substrate. In this frequency range only the overall frequency dependence of the conductivity is significant. The far-infrared conductivity in the normally-conducting state can well be described by the Drude model with a frequency-independent scattering rate $`1/\tau `$. At low frequencies, $`\sigma _1`$ is frequency-independent and $`\sigma _2`$ increases approximately linearly with frequency. For frequencies close to the value of the scattering rate, $`\sigma _1`$ starts to decrease and $`\sigma _2`$ shows a maximum, $`\nu _{max}1/2\pi \tau `$. The gray solid line in Fig. 2 provides a good description of the conductivity at $`T=50`$K and demonstrates the validity of the Drude model for LCCO. Substantial deviations between the data and the model can be observed above 200 cm-1. These deviations can be described assuming a frequency dependence of the quasiparticle scattering, which agrees well with the infrared experiments in (NdCe)2CuO4 by Homes et al. homes  and Singley et al. singley .

The infrared spectra of high-$`T_\mathrm{c}`$ cuprates and of highly anisotropic materials often show a finite-frequency peak in $`\sigma _1(\omega )`$. In addition to well-known mechanisms to explain the origin of this peak, like localization of the charge carriers timusk , a new possibility has been proposed recently tilt . The conductivity peak at finite frequencies results from a small ($`1^{}`$) tilt of the sample surface from the ideal c-axis orientation. In present experiment care has been taken to avoid such tilt effects, resulting in a peak-free real part of the infrared conductivity in the normal state.

The infrared conductivity changes dramatically upon entering the superconducting state. These data are represented in Fig. 3. The real part of the conductivity is strongly suppressed below 100 cm-1 (upper panel). Contrary to the conductivity of s-wave superconductors mgb2ir ; palmer , no clear onset of $`\sigma _1(\nu )`$ can be seen in the far-infrared range, which again indicates an unconventional character of the energy gap. Instead, $`\sigma _1(\nu )`$ clearly reveals two contributions, a Drude-like quasiparticle peak at zero frequency and a finite-frequency peak close to 100 cm-1. A similar maximum at correspondingly higher frequencies has been observed in infrared experiments on hole-doped cuprates basov . Assuming a spin-fluctuation scenario of superconductivity, the frequency of the conductivity peak can be ascribed to the quadrupled frequency of the superconducting gap $`4\mathrm{\Delta }_0`$ quinlan . Compared to an s-wave superconductor with the conductivity onset at $`2\mathrm{\Delta }_0`$, an additional shift by $`2\mathrm{\Delta }_0`$ arises due to a four-particle final state. The d-wave pairing in connection with a spin-fluctuation mechanism may lead to another characteristic energy scale of the optical conductivity abanov . In that case the residual attraction in a d-wave superconductor binds a particle and hole in a spin exciton at an energy $`\mathrm{\Delta }_{spin}`$. As a result the characteristic feature in the conductivity is shifted to $`2\mathrm{\Delta }_0+\mathrm{\Delta }_{spin}`$ abanov . These mechanisms possibly explain the origin of the conductivity peak shown in Fig. 3. Although the optical spectroscopy is not sensitive to a sign change of the superconducting order parameter, the conductivity data in Fig. 3 provide strong experimental evidence for a highly anisotropic (and, possibly, d-wave) energy gap in underdoped LCCO: according to d-wave model calculations including spin-fluctuation scattering, a gap with nodes gives rise to a residual Drude-like peak hirschfeld , and a peak at finite frequencies resulting from inelastic scattering processes quinlan ; abanov .

Due to the suppression of the conductivity at far-infrared frequencies, substantial spectral weight is removed from this frequency range and is transferred to the delta-function at zero frequency (superconducting condensate). This transfer leads to the dramatic increase of $`\sigma _2(\nu )`$ at low frequencies, $`\sigma _2(\nu )=A/\omega `$. The spectral weight of the superconducting condensate can easily be obtained as the pre-factor of this proportionality $`A=n_se^2/m=1.710^6\mathrm{\Omega }^1cm^2`$. The missing spectral weight (partial sum rule ir ) can be calculated by direct integration

$$\mathrm{\Delta }N(\omega )=\frac{2}{\pi }\underset{0}{\overset{\omega }{}}[\sigma _{1,n}\sigma _{1,s}](\omega )𝑑\omega .$$
(3)
The result is shown in the inset of Fig. 3. $`A=\mathrm{\Delta }N`$ indicates the conservation of the spectral weight. The change of spectral weight, $`\mathrm{\Delta }N`$, saturates only around $`\nu 400`$cm-1, i.e. for frequencies well above the characteristic gap frequency. In LCCO the far-infrared saturation gives $`\mathrm{\Delta }N=1.910^6\mathrm{\Omega }^1cm^2`$ and is $`20\%`$ higher than the measured weight of the condensate. This difference probably indicates that some amount of the spectral weight remains in the superconducting state at frequencies below the range of the present experiment.

At frequencies below 10 cm-1 and in the superconducting state, $`\sigma _1`$ shows a wing of the low-frequency excitations (upper panel of Fig. 3) which probably corresponds to a Drude-like quasiparticle peak quinlan ; hirschfeld . The rate of the quasiparticle scattering is strongly suppressed compared to the normal-state ($`1/2\pi \tau 100`$cm-1 at $`T=50`$K) and attains values around 10 cm-1.

Fig. 4 shows the temperature dependence of the quasiparticle scattering of LCCO. The effective scattering rate has been obtained solely from the submillimeter-wave conductivity using a two-fluid analysis ybco

$$\sigma ^{}(\omega )=\frac{\epsilon _0\omega _p^2\tau }{1i\omega \tau }+A[\frac{\pi }{2}\delta (0)+\frac{i}{\omega }].$$
(4)
Here $`\omega _p^2`$, $`\tau `$, and $`A`$ represent the plasma frequency, the scattering rate of quasiparticles, and the spectral weight of the superconducting condensate. In this equation the delta function $`\delta (0)`$ obviously does not influence the calculations at finite frequencies and the parameter $`A`$ is obtained as low-frequency limit of $`\sigma _2\omega `$.

The most prominent feature of Fig. 4 is the suppression of the effective scattering rate directly at $`T_\mathrm{c}`$. This is similar to the temperature dependence of the scattering rate in optimally-doped YBa2Cu3O7-δ, where a drop in $`1/\tau `$ has been observed, e.g. using microwave resonator technique bonn  or submillimeter transmission spectroscopy ybco . However, in case of YBa2Cu3O7-δ the scattering rate revealed a linear temperature dependence above $`T_\mathrm{c}`$, in contrast to LCCO where the scattering rate levels off for temperatures below $`100`$K.

## IV Conclusions

In conclusion, combining two experimental techniques we obtained the far-infrared conductivity of underdoped La2-xCexCuO4 in the frequency range above and below the gap frequency. No characteristic onset of absorption is observed in the superconducting state, which is inconsistent with the conventional BCS scenario. At low temperatures a maximum of infrared conductivity is observed at frequencies close to 100 cm-1 which is qualitatively similar to the properties of the hole-doped cuprates. The quasiparticle scattering rate is suppressed upon entering the superconducting state. These results provide experimental evidence for a d-wave or highly anisotropic s-wave gap in underdoped LCCO.

## V Acknowledgements

The stimulating discussion with P. J. Hirschfeld is gratefully acknowledged. This work was supported by BMBF (13N6917/0 - EKM).


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# On the asymptotic linearity of Castelnuovo-Mumford regularity

## Introduction

Let $`A`$ be a commutative Noetherian ring with unity. Let $`R`$ be a standard graded algebra over $`A`$, where “standard” means $`R_0=A`$ and $`R`$ is generated by elements of $`R_1`$. Let $`R_+`$ be the ideal generated by the elements of positive degree. For any finitely generated graded $`R`$-module $`M`$ and $`i0`$ we denote by $`H_{R_+}^i(M)`$ the $`i`$th local cohomology module of $`M`$ with respect to $`R_+`$. The Castelnuovo-Mumford regularity of $`M`$ is the invariant

$$\mathrm{reg}(M):=\mathrm{max}\{a(H_{R_+}^i(M))+i|i0\},$$

where $`a(H)`$ denotes the maximal non-vanishing degree of a graded $`R`$-module $`H`$ with the convention $`a(H)=\mathrm{}`$ if $`H=0`$. It is a natural extension of the usual definition of the Castelnuovo-Mumford regularity in the case $`R`$ is a graded algebra over a field. If $`R`$ is a polynomial ring over a field $`k`$, then $`M`$ has a finite graded minimal free resolution: $`0F_r\mathrm{}F_1F_0M`$ and $`\mathrm{reg}(M)=\mathrm{max}\{b_i(M)i|i0\}`$, where $`b_i(M)`$ denotes the maximal degree of the generators of $`F_i`$. Hence one may view $`\mathrm{reg}(M)`$ as a measure for the complexity of the structure of $`M`$ (see e.g. \[BaM93\] and \[EG84\]).

There have been a surge of interest on the behavior of the function $`\mathrm{reg}(I^n)`$ where $`I`$ is a homogeneous ideal in a polynomial ring over a field. It was first discovered by Bertram, Ein, and Lazarsfeld \[BEL91\] that if $`I`$ is the defining ideal of a smooth complex variety, $`\mathrm{reg}(I^n)`$ is bounded by a linear function. Later, Swanson \[Swa97\] proved this for all homogeneous ideals. Recently, Cutkosky et al \[CuHT99\] and Kodiyalam \[Kod00\] found out that $`\mathrm{reg}(I^n)`$ is asymptotically a linear function. See also \[Cha97\], \[Cut00\], \[CuEL\], \[GGP95\] for related results.

The aim of this paper is to prove the above phenomenon for the general case, namely, when $`I`$ is a graded ideal of a standard graded algebra $`R`$ over an arbitrary ring $`A`$. That is not a simple task because the proof in the case $`R`$ is a polynomial ring over a field is based strongly on the fact that finitely generated modules over $`R`$ have finite minimal free resolutions, whereas that fact does not hold in general. Moreover, as far as we can see, the general case can not be reduced to this case. Our approach uses the characterization of the Castelnuovo-Mumford regularity by means of filter-regular sequences combined with some results originally due to \[CuHT99\] and \[Kod00\]. Even these results need to be proved differently since the original proofs are based on techniques which are not available in general such as Gröbner basis and Nakayama’s lemma. More general, we will study the asymptotic regularity of the $`I`$-adic filtration of an arbitrary finitely generated graded $`R`$-module $`M`$. This generalization allows us to prove that $`\mathrm{reg}(\overline{I^n})`$, where $`\overline{I^n}`$ denotes the integral closure of $`I^n`$, is asymptotically a linear function with the same slope as $`\mathrm{reg}(I^n)`$ if $`R`$ is a domain over an affine ring. The latter fact was not known when $`R`$ is a polynomial ring over a field.

We call a graded ideal $`JI`$ an $`M`$-reduction of $`I`$ if $`I^{n+1}M=JI^nM`$ for some $`n0`$. Define

$$\rho _M(I):=\mathrm{min}\{d(J)|J\text{ is an }M\text{-reduction of }I\},$$

where for a graded module $`N`$, $`d(N)`$ denotes the minimum number $`d`$ such that there is a homogeneous generating set for $`N`$ with elements of degree $`d`$. Moreover, let $`\epsilon (M)`$ denote the smallest degree of the homogeneous elements of $`M`$. Then our main result can be formulated as follows.

Theorem 3.2. Let $`R`$ be a standard graded ring over a commutative Noetherian ring with unity and $`I`$ a graded ideal of $`R`$. Let $`M`$ be a finitely generated graded $`R`$-module. Then there exists an integer $`e\epsilon (M)`$ such that for all large $`n`$,

$$\mathrm{reg}(I^nM)=\rho _M(I)n+e.$$

## 1. Filter-regular sequence and regularity

Let $`A`$ be an arbitrary commutative Noetherian ring with unity. Let $`R`$ be a standard graded algebra over $`A`$ and $`M`$ a finitely generated graded $`R`$-module.

Let $`z_1,\mathrm{},z_s`$ be linear forms in $`R`$. We call $`z_1,\mathrm{},z_s`$ an $`M`$-filter-regular sequence if $`z_iP`$ for any associated prime $`PR_+`$ of $`(z_1,\mathrm{},z_{i1})M`$ for $`i=1,\mathrm{},s`$. Filter-regular elements have their origin in the theory of Buchsbaum rings \[STC78\].

The Castelnuovo-Mumford regularity can be characterized by means of filter-regular sequences. The following characterization was proved implicitly in the proof of \[Tru98, Theorem 2.4\] for the case $`M=R`$. But that proof also holds for any $`M`$.

###### Proposition 1.1.

Let $`z_1,\mathrm{},z_s`$ be an $`M`$-filter-regular sequence of linear forms which generate an $`M`$-reduction of $`R_+`$. Then

$$\mathrm{reg}(M)=\mathrm{max}\{a((z_1,\mathrm{},z_i)M:R_+/(z_1,\mathrm{},z_i)M)|i=0,\mathrm{},s\}.$$

Note that a homogeneous ideal $`QR_+`$ is an $`M`$-reduction of $`R_+`$ if and only if $`(M/QM)_n=0`$ for all large $`n`$.

We shall see that any $`M`$-reduction of $`R_+`$ can be generated by an $`M`$-filter-regular sequence in a flat extension of $`A`$.

###### Lemma 1.2.

Let $`Q`$ be an $`M`$-reduction generated by the linear forms $`x_1,\mathrm{},x_s`$. For $`i=1,\mathrm{},s`$ put $`z_i=_{j=1}^su_{ij}x_j`$, where $`U=\{u_{ij}|i,j=1,\mathrm{},s\}`$ is a matrix of indeterminates. Put

$$A^{}=A[U,\mathrm{det}(U)^1],R^{}=R_AA^{},M^{}=M_AA^{}.$$

If we view $`R^{}`$ as a standard graded algebra over $`A^{}`$ and $`M^{}`$ as a graded $`R^{}`$-module, then $`z_1,\mathrm{},z_s`$ is an $`M^{}`$-filter-regular sequence.

###### Proof.

Since the elements $`z_i`$ are defined by independent sets of indeterminates, it suffices to show that $`z_1P`$ for any associated prime $`PR_+^{}`$ of $`M^{}`$. By the definition of $`R^{}`$, such a prime $`P`$ must have the form $`𝔭R^{}`$ for some associated prime $`𝔭R_+`$ of $`M`$. If $`Q𝔭`$, then $`(M/𝔭M)_n=0`$ for all large $`n`$ since $`M/𝔭M`$ is a quotient module of $`M/QM`$. From this it follows that there is a number $`t`$ such that $`R_+^tM𝔭M`$. Since $`\mathrm{ann}(M)𝔭`$, this implies $`R_+𝔭`$, a contradiction. So we get $`Q𝔭`$. Since $`Q=(x_1,\mathrm{},x_s)`$, this implies $`z_1=u_{11}x_1+\mathrm{}+u_{1s}x_s𝔭R^{}=P`$. ∎

Lemma 1.2 allows us to use Proposition 1.1 for the computation of $`\mathrm{reg}(M)`$. Indeed, since $`A^{}=`$ is a flat extension of $`A`$, we have $`H_{R_+^{}}^i(M^{})_nH_{R_+}^i(M)_n_AA^{}`$ for all $`n`$ and $`i0`$, whence

$$\mathrm{reg}(M)=\mathrm{reg}(M^{}).$$

From the characterization of the regularity by means of filter-regular sequences we can deduce the following relationship between $`d(M)`$ and $`\mathrm{reg}(M)`$. This was done in \[Tru87, Proposition 4.1\] for the case $`R`$ is a polynomial ring over a local ring and $`M`$ is a graded ideal of $`R`$. But the proof there also holds for the general case.

###### Proposition 1.3.

$`d(M)\mathrm{reg}(M)`$.

## 2. Bigraded module and regularity

Let $`S=A[X_1,\mathrm{},X_s,Y_1,\mathrm{},Y_v]`$ be a polynomial ring over a commutative Noetherian ring $`A`$ with unity. Given a sequence of non-negative integers $`d_1,\mathrm{},d_v`$, we can view $`S`$ as a bigraded ring with $`\mathrm{deg}X_i=(1,0)`$, $`i=1,\mathrm{},s`$, and $`\mathrm{deg}Y_j=(d_j,1)`$, $`j=1,\mathrm{},v`$. For convenience we will assume that $`d_v=\mathrm{max}\{d_i|i=1,\mathrm{},v\}.`$

Let $``$ be a finitely generated bigraded module over $`A[X_1,\mathrm{},X_s,Y_1,\mathrm{},Y_v]`$. For a fixed number $`n`$ put

$$_n:=_{a0}_{(a,n)}.$$

Then $`_n`$ is a finitely generated graded module over the naturally graded polynomial ring $`A[X_1,\mathrm{},X_s]`$. We will show that $`\mathrm{reg}(_n)`$ is asymptotically a linear function.

If $`s=0`$, then $`\mathrm{reg}(_n)`$ is the invariant

$$a(_n)=\mathrm{max}\{a|_{(a,n)}0\}.$$

This case is settled by the following result which was already known in the case $`A`$ is a field \[CuHT99, Theorem 3.3\]. However, the proof there used Gröbner basis (and integer programming) which is not available in the general case.

###### Proposition 2.1.

Let $``$ be a finitely generated bigraded module over the bigraded polynomial ring $`A[Y_1,\mathrm{},Y_v]`$. Then $`a(_n)`$ is asymptotically a linear function with slope $`d_v`$.

###### Proof.

The case $`v=0`$ is trivial. Assume that $`v1`$. Consider the exact sequence of bigraded $`A[Y_1,\mathrm{},Y_v]`$-modules:

$$0[0_{}:Y_v]_{(a,n)}_{(a,n)}\stackrel{Y_v}{}_{(a+d_v,n+1)}[/Y_v]_{(a+d_v,n+1)}0.$$

Since $`0_{}:Y_v`$ and $`/Y_v`$ can be viewed as bigraded modules over $`A[Y_1,\mathrm{},Y_{v1}]`$, using induction we may assume that $`a([0_{}:Y_v]_n)`$ and $`a([/Y_v]_n)`$ are asymptotically linear functions with slopes $`d_v`$. As a consequence,

$`a([0_{}:Y_v]_n)+d_v`$ $`a([0_{}:Y_v]_{n+1})`$
$`a(/Y_v)_n)+d_v`$ $`a([/Y_v]_{n+1})`$
for all large $`n`$. Further, we are done if $`a(_n)=a([0_{}:Y_v]_n)`$ for all large $`n`$.

Since $`a(_n)a([0_{}:Y_v]_n)`$ for all $`n`$, it remains to consider the case that there exists an infinite sequence of integers $`m`$ for which $`a(_m)>a([0_{}:Y_v]_m)`$. Putting this condition into the above exact sequence we get

$$a(_{m+1})=\mathrm{max}\{a(_m)+d_v,a([/Y_v]_{m+1})\}.$$

On the other hand, we have

$$a(_m)+d_va(/Y_v)_m+d_va([/Y_v]_{m+1})$$

for $`m`$ large enough. So we can find infinitely many integers $`m`$ such that

$$a(_{m+1})=a(_m)+d_v>a([0_{}:Y_v]_m)+d_va([0_{}:Y_v]_{m+1}).$$

Fix such an integer $`m`$. Similarly, we can prove that for all $`nm`$, $`a(_n)>a([0_{}:Y_v]_n)`$ and therefore $`a(_{n+1})=a(_n)+d_v`$. So $`a(_n)`$ is asymptotically a linear function with slope $`d_v`$ in this case. ∎

Now we are going to consider the general case.

###### Theorem 2.2.

Let $``$ be a finitely generated bigraded module over the above bigraded polynomial ring $`A[X_1,\mathrm{},X_s,Y_1,\mathrm{},Y_v]`$. Then $`\mathrm{reg}(_n)`$ is asymptotically a linear function with slope $`d_v`$.

###### Proof.

By Proposition 2.1 we may assume that $`s1`$. For $`i=1,\mathrm{},s`$ put $`z_i=_{j=1}^su_{ij}X_j`$, where $`U=\{u_{ij}|i,j=1,\mathrm{},s\}`$ is a matrix of indeterminates. Put $`A^{}=A[U,\mathrm{det}(U)^1]`$ and $`^{}=_AA^{}.`$ Then $`^{}`$ is a finitely generated bigraded module over $`A^{}[X_1,\mathrm{},X_s,Y_1,\mathrm{},Y_v]`$. Since $`_n^{}=_n_AA^{}`$, we have

$$\mathrm{reg}(_n)=\mathrm{reg}(_n^{})$$

for all $`n0`$. By Lemma 1.2, $`z_1,\mathrm{},z_s`$ is an $`_n^{}`$-filter-regular sequence. Put $`R=A^{}[X_1,\mathrm{},X_s]`$. Since $`(z_1,\mathrm{},z_s)=(X_1,\mathrm{},X_s)=R_+`$, applying Proposition 1.1 we get

$$\mathrm{reg}(_n^{})=\mathrm{max}\{a((z_1,\mathrm{},z_i)_n^{}:R_+/(z_1,\mathrm{},z_i)_n^{})|i=0,\mathrm{},s\}.$$

It is easy to check that

$$(z_1,\mathrm{},z_i)_n^{}:R_+/(z_1,\mathrm{},z_i)_n^{}=[(z_1,\mathrm{},z_i)^{}:R_+/(z_1,\mathrm{},z_i)^{}]_n.$$

Moreover, we may consider $`(z_1,\mathrm{},z_i)^{}:R_+/(z_1,\mathrm{},z_i)^{}`$ as a graded module over the bigraded polynomial ring $`A^{}[Y_1,\mathrm{},Y_v]`$. By Proposition 2.1, the invariant $`a\left([(z_1,\mathrm{},z_i)^{}:R_+/(z_1,\mathrm{},z_i)^{}]_n\right)`$ is asymptotically a linear function with slope $`d_v`$ for $`i=0,\mathrm{},s`$. Therefore, we can conclude that $`\mathrm{reg}(_n)`$ is asymptotically a linear function with slope $`d_v`$. ∎

## 3. Regularity of adic filtrations

Let $`A`$ be a commutative Noetherian ring with unity. Let $`R`$ be a standard graded algebra over $`A`$ and $`I`$ a graded ideal of $`R`$. We will apply the results of the preceding sections to study the function $`\mathrm{reg}(I^nM)`$ for any finitely generated graded $`R`$-module $`M`$.

First we will establish a relationship between $`d(I^nM)`$ and the invariants $`\rho _M(I)`$, $`\epsilon (M)`$ introduced in the introduction. This relationship was already known for the case $`M=R`$ and $`R`$ is a polynomial ring over a field \[Kod00, Proposition 4\]. However the original proof does not hold in the general case since it uses Nakayama’s lemma.

###### Lemma 3.1.

$`d(I^nM)\rho _M(I)n+\epsilon (M)`$ for all $`n0`$.

###### Proof.

We may write $`I=J+K`$, where $`J`$ and $`K`$ denote the ideals generated by the homogeneous elements of $`I`$ of degree $`<\rho _M(I)`$ and $`\rho _M(I)`$, respectively. Then

$$I^nM=JI^{n1}M+K^nM.$$

Note that $`K^nM`$ is generated by homogeneous elements of degree $`\rho _M(I)n+\epsilon (M)`$. If $`d(I^nM)<\rho _M(I)n+\epsilon (M)`$, then $`I^nM=JI^{n1}M`$. Hence $`J`$ is an $`M`$-reduction of $`I`$. Since by definition of $`J`$, $`d(J)<\rho _M(I)`$, this gives a contradiction to the definition of $`\rho _M(I)`$. ∎

Now we are going to prove the main result of this paper.

###### Theorem 3.2.

Let $`R`$ be a standard graded ring over a commutative Noetherian ring with unity and $`I`$ a graded ideal of $`R`$. Let $`M`$ be a finitely generated graded $`R`$-module. Then there exists an integer $`e\epsilon (M)`$ such that for all large $`n`$,

$$\mathrm{reg}(I^nM)=\rho _M(I)n+e.$$

###### Proof.

Let $`J`$ be an $`M`$-reduction of $`I`$ with $`d(J)=\rho _M(I)`$. Let $`R[Jt]=_{n0}J^nt^n`$ be the Rees algebra of $`R`$ with respect to $`J`$ and $`=_{n0}I^nM`$. Since $`I^{n+1}M=JI^nM`$ for all large $`n`$, we may consider $``$ as a finitely generated graded module over $`R[Jt]`$. Assume that $`R_1`$ is generated by the linear forms $`x_1,\mathrm{},x_s`$ and $`J`$ is generated by the forms $`y_1,\mathrm{},y_v`$ with $`\mathrm{deg}y_j=d_j`$, $`j=1,\mathrm{},v`$. Represent $`R[Jt]`$ as a quotient ring of the bigraded polynomial ring $`A[X_1,\mathrm{},X_s,Y_1,\mathrm{},Y_v]`$ with $`\mathrm{deg}X_i=(1,0)`$, $`i=1,\mathrm{},s`$, and $`\mathrm{deg}Y_j=(d_j,1)`$, $`j=1,\mathrm{},v`$. Then $``$ is a finitely generated bigraded module over $`A[X,Y]`$ with $`_n=I^nM`$. By Theorem 2.2, $`\mathrm{reg}(I^nM)`$ is asymptotically a linear function with slope $`\mathrm{max}\{d_1,\mathrm{},d_v\}=d(J)`$. Let $`dn+e`$ be this linear function. By Proposition 1.3 and Lemma 3.1 we have

$$\mathrm{reg}(I^nM)d(I^nM)\rho _M(I)n+\epsilon (M)$$

for all $`n`$. Therefore, $`d\rho _M(I)`$. Since $`dd(J)=\rho _M(I)`$, we can conclude that $`d=\rho _M(I)`$ and $`e\epsilon (M)`$. ∎

Setting $`M=R`$ we immediately obtain the following consequence (see \[CuHT99, Theorem 3.1\] and \[Kod00, Theorem 5\] for the case when $`R`$ is a polynomial ring over a field).

###### Corollary 3.3.

Let $`R`$ be a standard graded ring over a commutative Noetherian ring with unity and $`I`$ a graded ideal of $`R`$. Then there exists an integer $`e0`$ such that for all large $`n`$,

$$\mathrm{reg}(I^n)=\rho _R(I)n+e.$$

In particular, we may apply Theorem 3.2 to study the asymptotic regularity of the integral closures $`\overline{I^n}`$ of $`I^n`$ (see \[CuHT99, Corollary 3.5\] for the case $`R`$ is a polynomial ring over a field where the slope could not be determined).

###### Corollary 3.4.

Let $`R`$ be a standard graded domain over over a commutative Noetherian ring with unity and $`I`$ a graded ideal of $`R`$ such that $`\overline{I^{n+1}}=I\overline{I^n}`$ for $`n`$ sufficiently large. Then $`\mathrm{reg}(\overline{I^n})`$ is asymptotically a linear function with slope $`\rho _R(I).`$

###### Proof.

By assumption, there exists an integer $`n_0`$ such that $`\overline{I^{n+1}}=I\overline{I^n}`$ for all $`nn_0`$. Put $`M=\overline{I^{n_0}}`$. Then $`I^nM=\overline{I^{n+n_0}}`$ for all $`n0`$. As a consequence, a graded ideal $`JI`$ is an $`M`$-reduction if and only if $`\overline{J}=\overline{I}`$ or, equivalently, $`J`$ is an $`R`$-reduction of $`I`$. Therefore, $`\rho _M(I)=\rho _R(I)`$. Hence the conclusion follows from Theorem 3.2. ∎

It is well-known that the assumption of Corollary 3.4 is satisfied for any ideal $`I`$ if $`R`$ is an affine domain.


text:
# The Kinematic State of the Local Volume

## 1 Mass and Motion Models

Under the physically well-motivated assumption that the only important force on the largest astronomical scales and for most of the history of the universe is gravity, there should be an intimate relationship between the cosmic velocity field and the cosmic density field. Predicting, calculating and observing the details of this relationship have been the major occupations of cosmology for most of the past century.

The first-order description of the kinematics of the universe takes the form of a homogeneous, isotropic expansion. To investigate this it is best to examine the largest spatial scales, where the density field is closest to the homogeneous ideal. In that case the observational goal is to determine the Hubble constant ($`H_0`$) and the major problem is the determination of reliable distances. A subsidary problem appears in practice, seen for example in de Vaucouleurs & Bollinger (1979), in the fact that the distribution of galaxies with the most reliable distances (the closer ones) is not homogeneous and their motions are subsequently not uniform.

With improving observational and calculational techniques this subsidary problem has been turned into an area of research in its own right. Courteau, Strauss, & Willick (2000) provide an overview; specific techniques and results are found in, for instance, Branchini et al. (1999) and Dekel et al. (1999). One of the objects of this work is the estimations of the biasing parameter, which measures the relationship between actual density fluctuations and observed galaxies. To do this convincingly, however, requires a volume large enough that density contrasts remain in or near the linear region, hence this is the study of large-scale structure. Unfortunately, distance indicators for galaxies so far away are not very accurate and are subject to various systematic biases; one must take large samples and be careful about manipulating statistics.

The situation reverses itself in the Local Volume, the region within about 10 megaparsecs (Mpc). Here we are several rungs down on the cosmic distance ladder and distance indicators are based on resolved stars, allowing accuracies better than 7% under good conditions. With redshifts good to a few km s-1 from HI observations, the data are (potentially) excellent. Balancing this are the complications of nonlinear dynamics (sufficiently nonlinear that pertubative techniques, such as the Zeldovich approximation and expansion to a few orders, cannot be used) and the fact that peculiar velocities are comparable to the Hubble flow.

Dynamically, this is almost unknown territory. It lies between the well-studied galaxy and galaxy group scales on one hand, and that of large-scale structure on the other. Neither are there any galaxy clusters in the Local Volume, Virgo being just outside. The potential scientific returns of examining this unexplored region, especially when excellent data are available, are great. For instance, dark matter on galaxy scales seems to be concentric with luminous matter, but far more extended; on the linear-structure scale, both seem to be distributed the same way. The biasing parameter $`b`$, which measures the concentration of luminous matter relative to dark matter, is found to be in the range 0.5-1.0 on large scales (Dekel et al. (1999); Branchini et al. (1999)); within a spiral galaxy it must range from zero beyond the visible disk to some number possibly greater than unity at the center. In between these two scales, what happens?

Without a dynamical model of obvious applicability to the Local Volume, we must begin by studying the kinematics. The procedure in what follows is to calculate overall average motions, and then examine deviations from them for systematic effects. In effect, we are looking for some kind of non-randomness among peculiar (radial) velocities.

Two models will be used for the “overall average motions.” Both include the average velocity of all galaxies in a sample, showing up as the solar reflex velocity; the first model then adds a uniform expansion (the local reflection of the universal Hubble flow). The second is suggested by the general distribution of galaxies within the Volume. The Supergalactic Plane is well-defined in this region, clear in Tully & Fisher (1987) as well as with updated data in Karachentsev & Makarov (1996) and Lahav et al. (2000). There should be therefore an anisotropy in the overall flow, expansion normal to the Supergalactic Plane being slower than in the Plane. In fact de Vaucouleurs & Bollinger (1979) found something of the sort, as have Karachentsev & Makarov (2001) and Karachentsev & Makarov (1996). In addition, the tidal effect of the Virgo Cluster should be visible as an elongation (high eigenvalue) in the direction of the Cluster and a contraction (low eigenvalues) normal to it. Since Virgo is almost in the Plane, at roughly Supergalactic Longitude $`100\mathrm{°}`$, we expect the highest eigenvalue in that direction, the lowest at the Supergalactic poles, and an intermediate eigenvalue in the Plane at longitude about $`10\mathrm{°}`$. This relationship between the distribution of galaxies in the Supergalactic Plane and velocities can be seen either as dynamic (the concentration of mass causing anisotropic motions) or as kinematic (the concentration of galaxies having been produced by anisotropic motions), or more accurately both.

## 2 The Overall Hubble Flow

### 2.1 Calculations

The mathematical tools used here are similar to some of those developed in Lynden-Bell et al. (1988), though details and the use to which they are put differ.

Suppose that the velocity field in the Local Volume is smooth, continuous and differentiable. Under these conditions we may expand this field in terms of the vector distance from us, $`𝐫`$, as a Taylor series:

$$𝐯=𝐯_0+𝐫\frac{𝐯}{𝐫}+\frac{1}{2}𝐫\frac{^2𝐯}{𝐫^2}𝐫+\mathrm{}$$
(1)
If we truncate this series at the term linear in distance and recognize that only the radial velocities are observable, we find that

$$v_{\mathrm{obs}}=𝐯\widehat{𝐫}=𝐯_0\widehat{𝐫}+𝐫𝐇\widehat{𝐫}$$
(2)
where $`𝐇`$ is the symbol for the first-order partial-derivative tensor and $`\widehat{𝐫}`$ is the unit vector in the $`𝐫`$ direction. If the tensor is isotropic, $`𝐇`$ reduces to a scalar; if the region over which it is determined is representative of the universe as a whole, it is the Hubble constant. It is therefore convenient to call $`𝐇`$ the Hubble tensor111However, it is worth emphasizing that the determination of the Hubble tensor over the Local Volume has no necessary cosmic implication, since this region is too small to be a fair sample of the universe.. The Hubble tensor, quantifying anisotropic motion, is the next more complicated description of cosmic motion after a simple uniform expansion.

To determine the components of the Hubble tensor from a set of data, a least-squares method is the most straightforward. We take as a measure of goodness of fit the average square of the difference between the predicted radial velocity and the observed radial velocity222 Compare Karachentsev & Makarov (2001), in which a slightly different measure is used.,

$$\sigma ^2=\frac{1}{N}\underset{i}{}\sigma _i^2=\frac{1}{N}\underset{i}{}\left(v_{\mathrm{obs}}\left(𝐯_0\widehat{𝐫}+\widehat{𝐫}𝐇𝐫\right)\right)^2$$
(3)
Taking the derivatives of this with respect to the three components of $`𝐯_0`$ and the six independent components of $`𝐇`$ and setting them equal to zero gives nine linear equations to be solved for the nine unknowns, a straightforward if tedious calculation333In practice, this was done by the Mathematica program.. An isotropic solution is determined similarly, using four equations in four unknowns.

### 2.2 Data

Distance and radial velocity data for galaxies within 10 Mpc were gathered from the literature and are summarized in Table 1. In gathering the data much use has been made of the NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database (NED)444 NED is operated by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.. The column headings are: (1) Designation; for those galaxies which have been catalogued several times, only one was chosen, to maintain readability of the table555Unfortunately, most galaxies in this sample have at least three popular designations, and a given author will mention one while another will only use a different one. The designation used here is generally that found in the distance reference; others may conveniently be found by referring to NED.; (2) Apparent $`B`$ magnitude, from NED; (3) Morphological type, from NED; (4) Supergalactic longitude, in degrees; (5) Supergalactic latitude, in degrees; (6) Radial velocity, in km s-1; (7) the source for the radial velocity; (8) Distance, in Mpc; (9) the source for the distance; (10) the method used to derive the distance. The references corresponding to the source codes are listed at the end of the table. An asterisk denotes data which are not known.

Galaxies known to be part of the Local Group are not included, to avoid a possible dynamical bias at the small end of the distance scale. Of course, distances derived from a velocity model were of no use for this purpose. Those available were based on Cepheids (“ceph” in the table), brightness of the tip of the Red Giant Branch (TRGB; in one case, the tip of the Asymptotic Giant Branch, TAGB), surface brightness fluctuations (SBF), a geometric method involving water masers (geo), or the brightness of the brightest stars (stars). The former methods have quoted accuracies of $`\pm `$ 0.2 magnitudes or less in distance modulus. The last method was found by Karachentsev & Tikhonov (1994) to have an accuracy of 0.3 to 0.45 magnitudes, depending on exactly how it was applied. However, in several cases (see, for example, Crone et al. (2000), and compare Karachentsev & Makarov (1996) with Aparicio & Tikhonov (2000) for the case of DDO 109 = UGC 9240) it has been found to be in error by a factor of two or more. In what follows calculations will be performed separately on both on the full data set of 98 galaxies (so as to take advantage of the larger number of objects) and on the set of 35 galaxies with more reliable distances.

Although the data come from many sources and some difficulties could be anticipated from that fact, in practice there were no problems along those lines. Each of the TRGB distances used the same calibration (Lee, Freedman & Madore, 1993), as did the Cepheid distances within the stated errors; and all used as a zero-point the Large Magellanic Cloud at a distance modulus of 18.50. The SBF method itself was calibrated using TRGB and Cepheid data, most of which found its way into this data set. The internal consistency of the better-quality distances is therefore reliable666This agreeable state of affairs probably won’t last long, as someone is sure to come up with a “better” calibration of some distance method soon..

As noted, the brightest-star distances are treated with less confidence here, and the better-quality data will be examined separately when possible. In the case of NGC 4258 the Cepheid and geometric distances do not agree within their stated errors (7.98 and 7.2 Mpc, respectively). The distance shown is the average.

It is worth pointing out that the data amount to a minority of the galaxies estimated to lie in this volume. Including the brightest-star galaxies possibly as much as a quarter of the population is represented; restricting ourselves to the better data, less than a tenth777So even if one were to ignore nonlinear effects, a POTENT-like treatment (Dekel et al., 1999) of the Local Volume is impossible: the locations of most of the luminous masses are just not known.. In addition, these are not all the largest or brightest, nor uniformly distributed. It is worthwhile, then, to look into possible effects of this uneven sampling.

The average motion of all the galaxies in each sample will show up in the solar reflex velocity. Subsidiary “bulk flows,” motions of one part of the Volume with respect to the whole, will appear as peculiar velocities systematically different in that part—but only if there are galaxies there to show it. Similarly, flows on a smaller scale (or a larger) than is sampled will go unnoticed.

More subtle would be effects on overall parameters due to badly-distributed data. To examine those, suppose that we are attempting to fit a model of anisotropic flow (as above) to an actual flow. The “real” flow is described by a flow with noise, in part due to distance errors (which obey a distribution function $`\delta r`$) and in part due to real peculiar velocities (which obey a vector distribution function $`𝐞`$). The quantity we attempt to minimize during least-squares fitting is then

$`\sigma ^2`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N}}{\displaystyle \left(v_{obs}v_{model}\right)^2}`$
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N}}{\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}\left(𝐯_{0a}\widehat{𝐫}_i+\widehat{𝐫}_i𝐇_a\widehat{𝐫}_i\left(r_i+\delta r_i\right)+𝐞_i\widehat{𝐫}_i𝐯_{0m}\widehat{𝐫}_i\widehat{𝐫}_i𝐇_m\widehat{𝐫}_ir_i\right)^2`$
where the subscript $`a`$ stands for “actual” and $`m`$ for “model,” and the vector $`𝐫`$ is written as a product of magnitude and direction, $`r\widehat{𝐫}`$. The various terms may be regrouped as follows:

$`\sigma ^2`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N}}{\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}[((𝐯_{0a}𝐯_{0m})\widehat{𝐫}_i+\widehat{𝐫}_i(𝐇_a𝐇_m)\widehat{𝐫}_ir_i)^2`$
$`+2\left(𝐯_{0a}𝐯_{0m}\right)\widehat{𝐫}_i\widehat{𝐫}_i𝐇_a\widehat{𝐫}_i\delta r_i`$
$`+2\widehat{𝐫}_i\left(𝐇_a𝐇_m\right)\widehat{𝐫}_ir_i\widehat{𝐫}_i𝐇_a\widehat{𝐫}_i\delta r_i`$
$`+2\widehat{𝐫}_i\left(𝐇_a𝐇_m\right)\widehat{𝐫}_ir_i𝐞_i\widehat{𝐫}_i`$
$`+2\left(𝐯_{0a}𝐯_{0m}\right)\widehat{𝐫}_i𝐞_i\widehat{𝐫}_i`$
$`+(\widehat{𝐫}_i𝐇_a\widehat{𝐫}_i\delta r_i+𝐞_i\widehat{𝐫}_i)^2]`$
The first line, the squared term, is the difference between the model and the actual situation in the absence of errors or noise; its minimum is zero, when the actual and model parameters are identical. The last line is the collected “noise” and does not contain the model parameters at all; its only effect on the process is to set a positive minimum to the quantity $`\sigma ^2`$. The cross terms require some attention.

If we assume that the real peculiar velocity distribution $`𝐞`$ does not depend on direction or distance, the two cross terms containing it will average to zero. Also, if the distance errors $`\delta r_i`$ do not depend on direction (that is, our measures are no more uncertain in one part of the sky than another), the first cross term vanishes also. The second cross term is harder to deal with, since in general we do expect a correlation between the distance $`r_i`$ and the distance error $`\delta r_i`$: the distance error should be larger as the distance itself increases, so that galaxies farther away will contribute terms of larger magnitude to this sum. However, as long as the error distribution function itself averages to zero, this cross term also vanishes.

So if peculiar velocities and distance errors have no systematic correlation with direction then the actual distribution of galaxies (the particular $`𝐫_i`$ from which kinematic model parameters are derived) is irrelevant. The lack of galaxies at high Supergalactic latitudes, for instance, and in some directions in the Supergalactic Plane should not bias the values for the solar reflex velocity and Hubble tensor. Put another way, if all the galaxies in the sample take part in the same motion with random deviations, the motion can be reconstructed from any part of it (though with varying amounts of uncertainty).

A peculiar velocity distribution which does show some systematic variation with position, of course, will change the derived overall parameters. In the simplest case it would be a sort of “bulk flow” on a smaller scale than the total sample, and should be visible in plots of peculiar velocity against position (which will be shown below). In the case of a mass concentration like a cluster, a locally increased velocity dispersion should be visible on the same plots. Of course, in volumes containing few or no sample galaxies such flows or mass concentrations will not be visible.

There remains the possibility of inducing biases by the choice of the galaxy sample. This is potentially serious, since the available data were gathered from many different sources who had obtained them for many different reasons, and there is no guarantee of even coverage in any parameter. An example of subtle biases of this sort is found in Rubin, Ford & Rubin (1973). There, a study of galaxies in a narrow magnitude range showed a significant velocity anisotropy, most evident in two concentrations at 4950 km s-1 and 6400 km s-1. Further analysis (Fall & Jones, 1976) showed that the narrow magnitude range actually isolated different parts of the galaxy luminosity function in each case, so in fact different kinds of galaxy were being compared; a further attempt to limit the sample by redshift only exacerbated the problem (James, Joseph & Collins, 1991).

The present study is not subject to quite the same kind of bias. The distances used here are not dependent on a certain selection technique for the galaxies, and especially for the higher-accuracy sample are quite good. The range in absolute magnitude is very wide and there is no great concentration in any luminosity interval (to anticipate, see Figures 16 and 17); neither is there a concentration at any particular distance within the 10 Mpc limit (Figure 18). It appears that the hetrogeneous nature of the sample has acted as a sort of random selection, at least in those variables.

There still remains the possibility of a slightly different bias, perhaps stemming from uneven spatial coverage or some effect which causes kinematically important galaxies to be underrepresented in published data. Especially given the fact that a minority of galaxies known to be within this chosen region is represented, it is well to keep this in mind. Unfortunately, it is impossible to correct for a bias whose form (and even existence) is unknown.

### 2.3 Results

The various results of the Hubble-tensor calculation are shown in several following tables. Calculations were done for four cases: anisotropic expansion using the whole 98-galaxy sample, anisotropic using the 35 galaxies with more accurate distances, and isotropic using each sample. For reference, some parallel results from the literature are included.

Considering the reflex solar velocity ($`𝐯_0`$, shown in Table 2) first, taking different samples and treating them different ways leads to a speed varying over a range of 60 km $`\mathrm{s}^1`$ and a direction changing over a dozen degrees. Comparing these results with other determinations we find a similar variation. That of Karachentsev & Makarov (2001) uses a somewhat larger but overlapping sample of galaxies going out to a similar distance. Yahil, Tammann & Sandage (1977) only used Local Group galaxies, so their result is not necessarily comparable (though it has been used to correct the radial velocities of more distant galaxies by, for example, Schmidt & Boller (1992)). The expected amount of variation, given the data, will be treated quantitatively below.

The results for the Hubble tensor (as well as the isotropic solutions) are displayed in Table 3. The directions U, V and W are those of the eigenvectors, in no specific order (that is, U is not necessarily the closest eigenvector to X, and U in one solution is not necessarily the closest eigenvector to the U in the other).

Given the amount of attention which is to be paid to the deviations from the models, it is important to try to separate the effects of observational errors from real velocities. For the linear relation between distance and radial velocity, deviations from the models are related by

$$\delta v=H\delta r$$
(4)
so the variances are

$$\frac{1}{N}\underset{i}{}\delta v_i^2=H^2\frac{1}{N}\underset{i}{}\delta r_i^2$$
(5)
If we assume that the distance errors are proportional to distance888Strictly speaking, distance errors derived from stellar photometry depend in a rather complicated way on the flux from the target stars and standards and thus on the telescopes and exposure times used. In practice, observations are planned and conducted to a given signal-to-noise ratio and yield errors as an almost constant fraction of distance., and that their distribution once the distance is factored out is independent of them,

$`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N}}{\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}\delta v_i^2`$ $`=`$ $`H^2{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N}}{\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}r_i^2\delta x_i^2`$
$`=`$ $`H^2{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N}}{\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}r_i^2{\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}\delta x^2`$
For the galaxies with higher-quality distances, the quoted errors range from 0.1 to 0.2 magnitudes with an average of slightly under 0.15, giving a distance error of 7.2%. As noted above, the brightest-star errors are not as well known; but taking 0.4 magnitudes as an estimate yields an average distance error of 20%. Putting these into the above formula gives contributions of 67 and 21 km s-1 of distance errors to the total rms velocity dispersion for the brightest-star and better distances, respectively; which leaves 97 km s-1 of real motion in the 98-galaxy isotropic solution, 78 km s-1 in the 98-galaxy anisotropic solution, and 86 and 74 km s-1 for the respective 35-galaxy solutions999Radio HI radial-velocity measurements themselves have quoted accuracies of one to a few km s-1, negligible for purposes of these calculations. There are a handful of galaxies with much more inaccurate optical radial velocities, but they have no significant effect on this study.
One might try to set up a sort of inverse method to find the various contributions to the overall velocity dispersion. If one assumes that the deviations from the models are made up of an intrinsic part, say $`\sigma _a`$ for the anisotropic model and $`\sigma _i`$ for the isotropic model, and the part due to distance errors, $`\sigma _{35}`$ and $`\sigma _{98}`$, added in quadrature, we can set up four equations in four unknowns to find the true values of each. Unfortunately, the “intrinsic” velocity dispersions are dispersions around different models; different enough that the four equations are inconsistent with each other and have no common solution..

Compared to the differences in solar reflex velocity among the various calculations it is perhaps reassuring to find among the tensor model results a stable, high value of 82-84 km $`\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{Mpc}^1`$ close to the supergalactic plane and not far from the direction of Virgo. However, there appears to be no agreement in direction among the other eigenvectors and very wide variation in eigenvalues; indeed, in the solution with the most reliable data the Virgo-pointing eigenvector does not correspond to the largest eigenvalue. Clearly, the reliablility of these results must be investigated.

An appropriate way to compare solutions as a whole is the F-ratio test101010See, for example, Hoel (1971), p. 269. Bronshtein & Semendyayev (1998), p. 629 (section 5.2.3.4) also has a useful discussion. In practice calculations were performed using the program Mathematica.. One finds their respective variances (average square of the deviation from the model; here, the square of the velocity dispersions) and the number of degrees of freedom in each, and then calculates the probability that the larger variance could be produced by the model which better fits the data. Essentially, while a model with more parameters will always give a smaller dispersion, one demands that it give a significantly smaller dispersion.

For the 98-galaxy sample, the difference is quite significant: the anisotropic solution is a better fit at the 90% level. For the 35-galaxy sample the probability is lower, 77%, but we may still say that anisotropy is a better fit to the data. (The fact that the more reliable data produce the less certain result, though, is troubling, and will be explored below.)

Clearly some parts of the solutions are better known than others. In an attempt to separate the uncertainties of the various parameters we expand the dispersion as a Taylor series about the solution:

$$\sigma ^2=\sigma _0^2+\frac{d\sigma ^2}{d𝐇}\delta 𝐇+\frac{1}{2}\delta 𝐇\frac{d^2\sigma ^2}{d𝐇^2}\delta 𝐇$$
(6)
At the solution the linear term vanishes, and since the variance itself is quadratic in H all higher derivatives are identically zero (see equation 3). Restricting ourselves to the quadratic term and shifting to summation by repeated indices,

$$\mathrm{\Delta }\sigma ^2=\frac{1}{2}\frac{^2\sigma ^2}{H_{ij}H_{kl}}\mathrm{\Delta }H_{ij}\mathrm{\Delta }H_{kl}$$
(7)
We seek a parameter which is dimensionless and thus more easily compared between different situations. The most obvious is the fractional change in dispersion divided by the fractional change in Hubble tensor, giving a fourth-order tensor:

$`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{ijkl}`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\sigma ^2/\sigma ^2}{\mathrm{\Delta }H_{ij}\mathrm{\Delta }H_{kl}/H_{ij}H_{kl}}}`$ (8)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }H_{ij}\mathrm{\Delta }H_{kl}}{\sigma ^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{^2\sigma ^2}{H_{ij}H_{kl}}}`$
The components of this tensor are conveniently computed from the data:

$$\mathrm{\Lambda }_{ijkl}=\frac{H_{ij}H_{kl}}{N\sigma ^2}\underset{n}{}\frac{x_ix_jx_kx_l}{r^2}$$
(9)
where $`x_i`$ is the coordinate of a galaxy in the $`i`$ direction and $`r`$ its (total) distance. The first fraction shows that a component of this error-tensor is larger as the ratio of eigenvalues to dispersion is larger, and the sum shows the leverage of more distant data points in the particular spatial directions. That is, an eigenvalue of the error-tensor will be larger and the corresponding eigenvalue of the Hubble tensor will be more certain as the Hubble component is larger compared with the variance, and as the data in the direction of the Hubble component are more distant.

As Lynden-Bell et al. (1988) note with their similar construction, a tensor of this sort is difficult to display or interpret in its entirety. However, we only need the values corresponding to specific eigenvalues of specific solutions. The $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{uuuu}`$, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{vvvv}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{wwww}`$ components, corresponding to the second-order change in the variance for each of the eigenvalues of the two anisotropic solutions, are given in Table 3.

We continue with the F-ratio test as a way of interpreting these components. Recall that a change in the ratio of variance by a certain amount corresponds to a certain probability that one solution is significantly different from another. For the number of degrees of freedom in the 35-galaxy sample, for instance, a ratio of 1.8 means a 95% probability that the smaller variance corresponds to the better solution. The allowable change in the eigenvalue to remain within this 95% window is thus

$$\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }H_{ii}}{H_{ii}}=\sqrt{\frac{1.81}{\mathrm{\Lambda }_{iiii}}}$$
(10)
The results of this kind of calculation are shown in Table 4.

From the table, the uncertainty in the out-of-plane tensor components is rather large. If 70% confidence is required, for instance, the $`H_{ww}`$ eigenvalues in each solution are still only known with a 50% error. The effect of these uncertainties on the whole solution may be illustrated by the 35-galaxy $`H_{uu}`$ eigenvalue. At 70% confidence it may vary by a fraction of 0.44, which means it could have a value of 61 km s-1 Mpc-1, smaller indeed than the middle eigenvalue. In that case its direction ceases to be an eigenvector. As suggested by the great differences in direction and magnitude among the models, the details of anisotropic flow are quite uncertain.

An exactly similar derivation gives the error tensor corresponding to solar reflex motion:

$`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{ij}`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\sigma ^2/\sigma ^2}{\mathrm{\Delta }V_i\mathrm{\Delta }V_j/V_iV_j}}`$
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{V_iV_j}{N\sigma ^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{n}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{x_ix_j}{r^2}}`$
and in the same way (using the F-ratio test) it can be turned into uncertainties of components of the reflex motion vector. To allow comparison with the entries in Table 2, the 70%-confidence limits of each component (corresponding to about one-sigma error bars) were combined into limits on the magnitude and direction and listed in Table 5. Some of the uncertainty comes from distance errors, which translate into correlated errors in the components; most is uncorrelated. Figures are given for both extremes, with the actual situation being closer to the uncorrelated ideal. For large values of angle uncertainties (about $`15\mathrm{°}`$ or over) the limits become strongly asymetrical; the figures listed are averages.

For comparison, Karachentsev & Makarov (2001) give their uncertainties (standard errors) as $`\pm `$ 11 km s-1 in reflex velocity magnitude and one or two degrees in direction; and 3-5 km s-1 Mpc-1 in Hubble tensor components.

### 2.4 Uncertainty of the Uncertainties

We have at hand three different ways of estimating the uncertainty in our numbers: the variation in parameters between calculations; the formal standard error; and the error tensor. Unfortunately, they do not agree.

Considering the solar reflex velocity (magnitude and direction) and out-of-plane Hubble tensor eigenvectors and eigenvalues, variations between the calculations are much larger than the standard error allows. They are, however, consistent with estimates based on the error tensor. The standard error assumes a rather strict Gaussian distribution of deviations from the model, and that the sample at hand is an unbiased description of it. The error tensor also assumes a Gaussian distribution, but is less strict, in that it takes into account just how the variance changes with this particular data set when changing a parameter. We must conclude, then, that the data at hand do not satisfy the necessary conditions for the standard error: an unbiased sample of an underlying model, with a strictly Gaussian distribution of errors around it. Exactly how the samples fail is not clear from calculations to this point, but two general areas are identifiable.

First, the samples could be chosen with some bias which prevents a good representation of the kinematics of the Local Volume. A good fit to the data may then translate to a poor fit to the real kinematics. This is indicated by the fact that some parameters show a very strong dependence on the particular data set used, and that in places where the data sets overlap (such as in the direction of the 82-84 km s-1 Mpc-1 Hubble tensor component) the results are more similar than the error tensor indicates they should be.

Second, the assumed kinematic models could be inappropriate, in that there are systematic motions not considered. This would make the peculiar velocity distribution about the models non-Gaussian. Deviations which are systematic in space will be investigated in the next section, followed by other possibilities.

## 3 Spatial Deviations from the Hubble Models

In Figures 1 through 12 are plotted the deviations of each galaxy from the various solutions (that is, how much its radial velocity differs from what the model would predict) against the various spatial coordinates. The first figures use Supergalactic X, Y and Z; the second half use U, V and W, constructed along the eigenvectors of the tensor solutions (note that the directions of each U, V and W axis are different in the 98-galaxy and 35-galaxy solutions).

The most important point about these plots is the lack of any pattern. The deviation of any particular galaxy from a model appears to be quite random in space (with exceptions to be pointed out).

Consider in detail, for example, the Supergalactic X plots. There is clearly a lack of galaxies at negative X values, reflecting the uneven distribution of data. There is no clear trend of error with postion, though the total width of the error is reduced somewhat in the anisotropic solution. The isolated point with a -400 to -500 km/$`\mathrm{sec}^1`$ error is UGC 7857, a dwarf galaxy with only a brightest-star distance, in the general direction of the Virgo cluster. The distance may be in error, or the redshift could be affected by a superimposed star (a problem noted several times in Whiting, Hau & Irwin (2002)); or, just possibly, it could represent a very high-velocity tail of the peculiar velocity distribution (a matter discussed below). Note also that, in areas with points, the density is approximately constant. That is, there is no apparent concentration around any given value. This important observation will be expanded below.

The 98-galaxy Supergalactic Z, isotropic plot does show interesting systematic behavior. Recall that these are the residual radial velocities after the average expansion of the cloud of galaxies has been subtracted. There appears to be a trend for galaxies with $`\mathrm{Z}<2`$ to line up from lower left to upper right, which would indicate a lower effective Hubble constant normal to the Supergalactic Plane. This was noted by Karachentsev & Makarov (1996) in their similar plot. This flow is easily interpreted as the expected lower effective Hubble constant normal to the Plane.

However, it disappears in the plot of higher-quality data (in part, it must be noted, because the high-quality coverage of high-latitude galaxies is poor). More important, it does not show up in the Hubble tensor calculation in the form of a low eigenvalue in the direction of the Supergalactic Pole, the nearest eigenvector being $`45\mathrm{°}`$ away. It is not, then, a sign of any average slower Hubble flow out of the Plane.

Going to the coordinate system defined by the eigenvectors of the calculated tensors, first we note that the 98-galaxy U plots look much like the Supergalactic Y plots. This is no surprise, since the respective axes are only a few degrees apart. There is no clear trend in the other plots. In particular, the dynamical behavior discerned above in the 98-galaxy, Supergalactic Z plot (Figure 3) has faded or disappeared. The fact that the calculated eigenvectors might actually conceal information on the kinematics of the system is an indication that they are not useful in its description. This reinforces the conclusion of the previous section: the anisotropic flow models tell more about a given data set than about the underlying galaxy motions.

The overall lack of any systematic behavior in the spatial plots is very significant. It means that, at least as far as these data can show, there are no signficant “bulk flows” within the 10 Mpc volume. Also, any nonlinear effects, such as a second-order tidal effect from the Virgo cluster, would show as a curve in at least some of the plots; none are there. In addition, significant mass concentrations should result in a localized increase in the peculiar velocity width; nothing of this kind is seen, although the data are too sparse to rule it out entirely.

## 4 The Peculiar Velocity Distribution

### 4.1 The Shape of the Velocity Distribution

It has been noted that there was no obvious concentration of deviations from each model near zero; that is, it was roughly as likely to find galaxies far from the model as close to it. This is made more quantitative by Figures 13 and 14, which show histograms of the number of galaxies against the deviation from model flows111111Only the 98-galaxy solutions are shown, since 35 galaxies do not provide enough information to produce a useful histogram. The choice of bin sizes is a compromise between having enough galaxies in each bin to be significant, and having enough bins to show a shape. The 20 km s-1 bins are clearly rather noisy, so 40 km s-1 bins are shown for comparison. Between them, any spurious signals due to unfortunate binning should be eliminated.. In each case a Gaussian distribution with the same average and standard deviation has been superimposed.

Each histogram is markedly asymmetric, showing a clear slope upward toward positive errors and a rather abrupt cutoff. (Quantitatively, a $`\chi `$-squared test comparing the four histograms to Gaussian distributions enables us to rule them out with 98% to over 99% confidence.) This is almost certainly a selection effect. When making up a list of galaxies out to a certain distance, those with high radial velocities are generally excluded, the assumption being that most of that velocity is due to Hubble flow (for instance, Schmidt & Boller (1992)). Those with a peculiar velocity slightly larger than 200 km $`\mathrm{sec}^1`$ in addition to a Hubble flow of 300 km $`\mathrm{sec}^1`$ (appropriate to 5 Mpc at the average local Hubble value from the calculations here) simply will not be included in a sample limited to 500 km $`\mathrm{sec}^1`$. While the galaxies in the present data samples are known from information other than radial velocities to be close by, one may expect most of them (at least) to have been chosen for study initially based on radial velocity.

The lack of high radial velocity galaxies in the sample means that the Hubble constant and Hubble tensor eigenvalues calculated above are biased low. The velocity dispersion given in Table 3 for each solution is also significantly underestimated, and there must be many known galaxies not now considered members of the Local Volume which in fact reside there. (This statement probably does not apply to the brightest and most important galaxies in the sky, which have been well-studied and which have other sorts of distance estimates. But there should be many of middling brightness and importance which are much closer than has been assumed, and certainly many dwarfs.) In addition, statistical estimators based on Gaussian statistics can no longer be trusted; this reinforces the results in section 2.4.

Unfortunately, the actual values cannot be estimated from the data without a good idea of the quantitative form of the selection effect, and the quality and quantity of information at hand simply do not allow us to derive it. Formally, one might have an almost unlimited peculiar velocity distribution, as long as it is balanced by a high Hubble constant to avoid a large population of galaxies with negative radial velocities (which would certainly have been noticed, but haven’t been observed).

One might try to fit the observed shape of a histogram to an assumed form of the peculiar velocity distribution, either Gaussian (which assumes a dynamically young system), Maxwellian (which assumes a dynamically old system) or the more sophisticated function derived by Saslaw et al. (1990), assuming that the low-radial velocity end of the distribution is accurate. However, note that if error bars of $`\sqrt{n}`$ are added to each bin in Figure 14 (isotropic model), that is if Poisson statistics are assumed, the shape is consistent with a flat distribution from -150 to +200 km s-1; a monotonic linear increase from -250 to +200 km s-1, abruptly cut off at the upper limit; a Gaussian with a center about +50 km s-1 and its high-velocity end truncated; or a Maxwellian similarly biased and truncated. The data at hand simply do not allow accurate curve fitting121212 A $`\chi `$-squared fit on a flat distribution shows it to be overall a worse fit than the superimposed Gaussians. However, the linear “sawtooth” mentioned above is much better, being rejected at only the 82% level. It is not offered seriously as a model, but shows how asymmetric the distribution really is..

If we guess that the distributions shown actually contain most of the peculiar velocity dispersion (alternatively, that the Hubble constant is not biased very much), then 200 km s-1 forms a rough limit to the observed dispersion and the rms value is something over half that131313These figures include, of course, a dispersion from observational errors in distances.. A substantially unbiased sample must then include radial velocities out to about 700 km $`\mathrm{sec}^1`$ for 5 Mpc and 1000 km $`\mathrm{sec}^1`$ for 10 Mpc.

### 4.2 Mass, Light and the Coldness of the Local Flow

Using a sample of nine galaxies extending to about 8 Mpc, Sandage (1986) concluded that the velocity field in the Local Volume was extremely quiet, the velocity dispersion being about equal to the observational errors in distance, near 60 km $`\mathrm{sec}^1`$. Ekholm et al. (2001) repeated the calculation with 14 galaxies having Cepheid distances, obtaining a similar dispersion of 40-60 km $`\mathrm{sec}^1`$. A flow this cold is difficult to explain theoretically, recent attempts including those of Baryshev, Chernin, & Teerikorpi (2001) and Axenides & Perivolaropoulos (2002). However, the fact of a cold flow has been disputed, by de Vaucouleurs & Bollinger (1979) for instance, and the present study indicates a dispersion twice that of Ekholm et al. (2001) even ignoring the sample incompleteness at high radial velocity. In any investigation of kinematics in the Local Volume this disagreement requires some explanation.

The non-Local Group galaxies used by Ekholm et al. (2001) in their study are shown in Figure 15, as they fall in the 35-galaxy anisotropic solution. They clearly do not explore the full width of the velocity dispersion. This is easily explained if the Cepheid galaxies are more massive than the average, and thus harder to disturb by gravitational interaction (and a priori plausible, given that Cepheids are easier to find in massive spirals). However, in the right hand side of the same figure several galaxies are singled out which are about as massive as the Cepheid set, perhaps more so, and show a much greater dispersion. It appears that the various cold-flow groups have been misled by small number statistics141414However, on much larger scales, where motions of the order of 600 km $`\mathrm{sec}^1`$ are found, a dispersion of 100-200 km $`\mathrm{sec}^1`$ is still cold. In this context the cold-flow problem remains, though it changes character and may not be as intractable theoretically (see, for instance, van de Weygaert & Hoffman (2000))..

But this raises a very important point. We still expect that, if peculiar velocities are generated by (two- or few-body) gravitational interaction among galaxies, more massive galaxies should have smaller peculiar velocities. Figure 15 suggests it might not be true; in addition, Karachentsev & Makarov (2001) reported no difference in dispersion between group and field galaxies, and between giant and dwarf galaxies. It is a matter worth investigating in some detail.

Reliable, or even consistent, dynamical estimates of galaxy masses are even harder to perform (and thus rarer) than distance measurements. As a surrogate we will use total brightness, assuming some sort of relation between mass and light to be made more specific later. Apparent $`B`$ magnitudes and extinction estimates from NED (the Schlegel, Finkbeiner & Davis (1998) extinction figures) were combined with distances to produce corrected absolute magnitudes for 97 of the 98 galaxies in the sample151515UGC 6451 had no listed photometry.. Morphological types were also extracted from NED. Finally, each galaxy was assigned to a group or to the field, mostly following Schmidt & Boller (1992), though further investigation was required for some galaxies not in that paper161616 The assignment of galaxies to groups or to the field is not an exact process, even when done with more care than has been used here. Whether a galaxy is gravitationally bound to a group depends upon the group’s total mass, which is poorly known for even the best-studied groups; and upon distances in three dimensions to all galaxies in the area, which are not known for most of the galaxies in the Local Volume. And even were it possible to determine bound members of all groups, there would still be a population not bound to, but still greatly affected by, a nearby group. For the purpose of detecting gross differences in the two populations, however, the division carried out here should be sufficient.. Apparent magnitude and type have already been listed in Table 1; the derived absolute magnitude, NED extinction, and group assignments are listed in Table 6.

The data are plotted in Figures 16 and 17. Deviation from the various flow models is shown as a function of absolute magnitude; in addition, symbols designate morphological classes of galaxies.

These figures represent a very remarkable result. Over a range of ten magnitudes in luminosity there is no systematic variation in the peculiar velocity dispersion. Further, there is no apparent variation with galaxy type.

Could these plots actually be dominated by the effects of observational errors, rather than real motions? That would require Cepheid and TRGB distance uncertainties to be something like three times their normally estimated size, which seems unlikely. In addition, a dispersion due solely to distance errors would be Gaussian in shape, which these are not; would require a dispersion which increased with distance, which as Figure 18 shows, is not true171717Since the number of galaxies in the sample is roughly constant with distance, clear from the plot, it is a posteriori unnecessary to deal with Malmquist and related biases.; and would require that the underlying, physical velocity dispersion be almost zero, a very difficult thing to manage theoretically (as noted above) and hard to believe in the context of a galaxy group.

There is the possibility of errors due to other sources. The photometry found in NED is admittedly hetrogeneous, and measurement of the total light from the diffuse and faint outskirts of a galaxy is notoriously difficult. But a comparison of various photometric measurements in NED (where galaxies have been measured more than once) shows a remarkable agreement, figures seldom diverging by as much as 0.2 magnitude. The exceptions are those visually estimated from photographic plates, which have claimed accuracies of about $`\pm `$ 0.5 magnitude. Being conservative and allowing points in Figures 16 and 17 to move sideways a full magnitude, and postulating some unknown process which preferentially biased high the photometry for galaxies with high peculiar velocities, the shape of the plots remains.

Extinction is another fruitful source of error. But only two of the points in Figure 17 have as much as half a magnitude of extinction. Though both are outliers, removal still leaves the shape intact.

It appears, then, that the constancy of the peculiar velocity dispersion with absolute magnitude is a real effect. What would we actually expect?

Naively, for any two-body interaction, the velocities of galaxies should be changed in inverse proportion to their masses; for a completely relaxed system, with kinetic energy equally partitioned, the random velocities should be inversely proportional to the square root of the masses. Suppose that the mass-to-light ratio lowers by a factor of 100 between absolute magnitude -10 and -20 (for which extreme value there is no evidence). Then there should still be a change in dispersion by a factor of ten; while apparently there is none at all.

Searching for more sophisticated predictions, one quickly encounters one major problem with concentrating on the Local Volume: it is much smaller than the regions dealt with in studies of structure formation. In Jenkins et al. (1998), Figure 10, for instance (which shows predicted velocity dispersions for various length scales), a volume of 10 Mpc radius is beyond the small-scale edge of the curves drawn. One can extrapolate them, but the result is quite uncertain; they might predict a velocity dispersion of anywhere from 50 to 500 km s-1.

Of more use for the question at hand, Inagaki, Itoh & Saslaw (1992) compared the analytic expression for velocity dispersion in Saslaw et al. (1990) with a series of n-body calculations. They found a rather small difference in rms velocity dispersion with mass: 169 compared to 179 (in scaled units) for sets of galaxies differing in mass by a factor of 100. However, they note that in their work the tendency for smaller galaxies to be affected more by gravitational interactions is offset by the tendency for larger galaxies to be found in rich clusters. Within the Local Volume there are no rich clusters. For such an effect to operate here, one would have to have groups made up of similarly-sized galaxies: dwarf groups and giant groups. This is certainly not true, each group in the Volume having galaxies with a wide distribution of size and brightness.

This brings us to the question of field and group galaxies. Inagaki, Itoh & Saslaw (1992) predict that field galaxies should have much smaller peculiar velocities than cluster galaxies. This is a quite plausible prediction: field galaxies should have little or no interactions which take them away from the Hubble flow, while group (and cluster) galaxies should be at least in the process of virializing. The situation with the present sample is shown in Figures 19 and 20.

There is no tendency for brighter galaxies to occur in groups, and no obvious tendency for group galaxies to have a larger velocity dispersion. To compare the situations quantitatively, we again use the dispersions about the models and employ (cautiously) the F-ratio test. For the 98-galaxy sample, isotropic model, the group dispersion is 120 km s-1 against a field dispersion of 113 km s-1. The F-ratio test gives a 64% significance to this; the difference is probably not significant. For the 98-galaxy anisotropic model the group dispersion is 93 km s-1 against 122 km s-1 for the field, giving a 95% significance—but with the field galaxies having a higher dispersion.

For the 35-galaxy isotropic model the field and group dispersions are 68 and 98 km s-1, respectively, for a significance of 87%; the anisotropic model has 47 and 86 km s-1 for 82%. Here it appears that we have a true group versus field effect, and acting in the right direction. But these figures for significance are, as noted, to be treated cautiously. Also, with only 13 galaxies in the field category, we are hardly better off than Ekholm et al. (2001) from the standpoint of small-number statistics. I argue that an effect which appears only with a small sample of data (albeit one with better quality) and goes away (or reverses) with a larger sample is not real, especially in light of the quantitative unreliability of standard statistical measures when dealing with these samples.

The predictions of Inagaki, Itoh & Saslaw (1992) have been found to agree closely with observations on scales up to 50 $`h_{100}^1`$ Mpc (Raychaudhury & Saslaw, 1996), as well as n-body calculations, so they may be taken to be well-established. Other techniques which match structure with motions on large scales also seem to work well (for example, those described in Courteau, Strauss, & Willick (2000)). On smaller scales, dynamical modeling of galaxy clusters and individual galaxies has become quite sophisticated and successful. In between, it appears, something different is happening.

### 4.3 Dynamics of the Peculiar Velocity Dispersion

A peculiar velocity distribution which ignores completely such things as absolute magnitude and the presence or absence of galaxy groups requires some explanation. The picture of motions generated by gravity, with that gravity field related to observable (luminous) matter in some simple way, does not appear to work in the Local Volume. There are a number of possible expanations:

1. Light does not trace mass, in that each observable galaxy is contained in a dark halo of about the same mass. Of course this contradicts otherwise successful simulations of large scale structure (for example, Springel et al. (2001); Mathis et al. (2002)). It is hard to see how the extreme variations in amounts of luminous matter (a factor of something like 10,000 over a ten-magnitude range) could come about within similar-sized halos. It is also hard to see how such a uniform field of dark matter halos themselves could come about. Alternatively, there could be a range of masses in dark matter halos, but no relation between their masses and the luminous matter within them; again, it is difficult to produce such a variation.

2. Light does not trace mass, in that the peculiar velocities of observable galaxies are produced by interaction with totally dark objects, which are so much more massive than galaxy halos that the latter are all equally affected by them. This has the attraction that such dark objects could be clustered similarly to galaxies on larger scales (allowing them to define the Supergalactic Plane, for instance) and still not interfere with the internal dynamics of galaxy groups. It is difficult to understand, however, how the most massive dark matter objects could manage to avoid accreting any luminous matter at all.

3. The observed velocities of galaxies are not those of their dark matter halos; the luminous matter is “sloshing around” inside the dark potential well. This is probably a more attractive idea than the previous two, though a mechanism for such internal motion is lacking.

4. Peculiar velocities on this scale are not produced by gravitational interaction, but perhaps by some remnant of “primeval turbulence.” This is an old idea in the context of the formation of galaxies. Heisenberg (in Hoyle (1949)) required some original motion in order for matter to clump together in galaxies; but this kind of motion is probably unimportant on galactic scales (Peebles, 1993) (page 541).

5. We might have had bad luck with data, an unfortunate set of observations giving a misleading result of the sort that Ekholm et al. (2001) encountered. Of course this is harder to arrange with a much larger sample, and in particular it is hard to understand how the very even distribution of peculiar velocity with absolute magnitude could have been produced by any reasonable selection of data. It has indeed been argued above that the data sets at hand do not sample the true underlying dynamics well; but that is in the context of a particular model (isotropic or simple anisotropic expansion).

6. That idea leads on to the possibility that we are using the wrong kinematic model. There is indeed a general expansion of the Local Volume; but perhaps there is some different motion. This is a most attractive idea in that no current notions of cosmology or physics need necessarily be discarded or even greatly revised; however, it is not obvious to how to pursue it. The fact that no clear trend shows up in the plots of deviation versus the various spatial directions shows that no simple modification of the present models (including, for instance, a nonlinear effect of Virgocentric flow) is likely to be of use.

## 5 Summary

An examination of the kinematics of galaxies within 10 Mpc of the Milky Way has thrown up some surprises and one deep puzzle. An overall anisotropic expansion, expected from the distribution of galaxies in the Local Volume, can be calculated; but the uncertainty of its details and its strong dependence on the particular data set chosen indicate that it is not a useful description.

A mismatch between (on one hand) the calculated standard error of various model parameters and (on the other) the change of those parameters between data sets indicates that the present data do not form a good sample of the underlying kinematics, at least in the context of the models at hand. At least part of this is due to a selection bias against nearby galaxies with high radial velocities.

There is no variation in the width of the peculiar velocity dispersion with absolute magnitude over a range of ten magnitudes. Neither is there any apparent relationship with galaxy type, or between field and cluster galaxies. This is difficult to understand, as the tendencies which even out peculiar velocities among masses on larger scales are not at work. Mass may have no relation to light on these scales; or peculiar velocities might be produced by other than gravitational interactions among galaxies; or the set of data at hand might somehow be terribly misleading; or the reference kinematic model might be wrong.

To clarify the kinematics of this volume, and to shed light on (much less clear up) the puzzle, much additional data will be necessary. In particular, to define the shape of the peculiar velocity histogram many more galaxies need to be added. Unfortunately, accurate distances to objects between 2 and 10 Mpc require careful observations with the larger telescopes, and distances to a useful fraction of hundreds of galaxies will take much time to compile. It will be worthwhile to target, initially, bright and massive galaxies; those at high supergalactic latitude; those in the field; and those of high radial velocity but possibly still nearby.

It is a pleasure for the author to thank Donald Lynden-Bell for bringing the Hubble Tensor to his attention and for many helpful conversations. His debt to the indefatigable data collection efforts of Igor Karachentsev and his various coworkers should be evident in Table 1. The comments of an anonymous referee have very much clarified and improved this paper. This work has been supported in part by the Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge and in part by the Physics Department, U. S. Naval Academy.