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# Near-IR line-strengths in elliptical galaxies: evidence for IMF variations?

## 1 Introduction

During the last decade, the measurement and interpretation of blue optical line-strength indices in the spectra of early-type galaxies in the field have revealed the existence of an apparent spread of mean ages (González 1993; Faber et al. 1995; Jørgensen 1999) and element abundances ratios (Worthey 1998; Trager et al. 2000a), suggesting a variety of interpretations of scaling relations like the colour–magnitude or Mg2$`\sigma `$ relations (Bender, Burstein & Faber 1993; Kuntschner 2000; Trager et al. 2000b; Vazdekis et al. 2001). Since the picture from the blue is rather confused, if one wants to achieve a more complete understanding of the star formation history of these galaxies, it is necessary to look at other spectral regions in which the relative contribution of the distinct stellar types is very different. In this sense, the potential of the near-IR spectral range and, in particular, of the Ca ii triplet is still almost unexploited.

Since Ca is an $`\alpha `$-element like Mg, it should be enhanced compared to Fe in giant ellipticals (Es). However, as suggested by several authors, Ca seems to follow Fe (O’Connell 1976; Vazdekis et al. 1997; Worthey 1998; Mollá & García-Vargas 2000; Vazdekis et al. 2001; Proctor & Sansom 2002). Even so, given that variations of the Fe line-strengths among Es are not negligible (e.g. Gorgas, Efstathiou & Aragón-Salamanca 1990; González 1993; Davies, Sadler & Peletier 1993; Kuntschner 2000), one should not expect the small variation of the Ca ii triplet strength reported by previous work (Cohen 1979; Bica & Alloin 1987; Terlevich et al 1990; Houdashelt 1995). Furthermore, this result is difficult to interpret in the light of previous stellar population models (García-Vargas et al. 1998; Schiavon et al. 2000) which predict a high sensitivity of the Ca ii triplet to the metallicity of old, metal-rich stellar populations. Also, the absolute values of Ca ii in Es differ from the model predictions (Peletier et al. 1999; Mollá & García-Vargas 2000).

With the aim of clarifying the above inconsistencies, during the last years we have developed a new stellar library in the near-IR spectral range (Cenarro et al. 2001a, hereafter CEN01) with a homogeneous set of revised atmospheric parameters for the library stars (Cenarro et al. 2001b), deriving empirical fitting functions that describe the behaviour of new line-strength indices for the Ca ii triplet and the H Paschen series (CEN01; Cenarro et al. 2002) and other spectral features (Cenarro 2002, hereafter CEN02). Finally, in Vazdekis et al. (2002; hereafter VAZ02) we present a new evolutionary stellar population synthesis model which predicts both the integrated indices and the spectral energy distribution for single stellar populations (SSPs) of several ages, metallicities and initial mass functions (IMFs).

In this letter we present the first results for a spectroscopic sample of 35 early-type galaxies. After a brief description of observations and data reduction (Section 2), in Section 3 we describe the measurements of the new indices for the central regions of the galaxies and their relationship with the velocity dispersion. In Section 4 we discuss plausible interpretations of the data on the basis of new index–index diagrams derived from our model predictions.

## 2 Observations and data reduction

Our sample consists of 35 early-type galaxies (E – S0) spanning a wide range of absolute magnitudes ($`22.5<M_\mathrm{B}<16.5`$ mag, using H$`{}_{0}{}^{}=75`$ km s-1 Mpc-1) and central velocity dispersions ($`40\sigma _0370`$ km s-1). Most of them are field Es, although a few galaxies from Virgo (9) and one cD in the Coma cluster are also included.

Long-slit spectroscopy was carried out during three nights in 1999 using ISIS at the 4.2 m William Herschel Telescope (Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos, La Palma), providing 2.9 Å (FWHM) spectral resolution in the red arm (8355 – 9164 Å). The slit (2 arcsec width) was aligned with the major axis except for two S0s (along the minor axis). Exposure times of 1200 – 2000 s per galaxy allowed us to obtain signal-to-noise ratios per angstrom from 43 to 253 Å-1 in the central spectra. We followed a typical spectroscopic reduction procedure with REDucm E (Cardiel 1999, see also CEN01), taking special care on the sky subtraction and the correction for fringing and telluric absorptions. The availability of error spectra for each galaxy frame allowed us to estimate reliable uncertainties in the measurements of the indices. The spectra were relative-flux calibrated using 4 spectro-photometric standard stars (Oke 1990) observed several times at different air masses. Also, in order to correct for small differences between the spectro-photometric systems of the galaxies and the model predictions, a sample of 49 stars (from B to late M spectral types) in common with CEN01 were observed during twilights. They were also employed as templates for velocity dispersion determinations.

## 3 Index–$`\mathrm{log}\sigma _0`$ relations

In this section we present the behaviour of new line-strength indices in the near-IR spectral region (CaT\*, CaT, PaT, sTiO and MgI) as a function of the central velocity dispersion ($`\sigma _0`$) of the galaxy sample.

CaT and PaT measure the strength of the Ca ii triplet ($`\lambda \lambda 8498,8542,8662`$ Å) and three lines of the H Paschen series. CaT ($``$ CaT – 0.93 PaT) is an index corrected for the contamination by the Paschen series in stars of the earliest spectral types (see CEN01 for full details about their definitions). The sTiO index is a measurement of the slope of the continuum at the Ca ii region. It is mainly governed by TiO absorption bands which are prominent in mid-late M types and observed in the integrated spectra of early-type galaxies. Following CEN02, it is computed as the ratio between the CaT\* pseudo-continuum values ($`C(\lambda )`$) at the central wavelength of its reddest and bluest continuum bands, that is, sTiO $`=C(\lambda 8784.0)/C(\lambda 8479.0)`$. Finally, MgI measures the strength of the Mg i line at $`\lambda 8807`$ Å (Cenarro et al. 2001c; CEN02).

Central velocity dispersions for the galaxies were determined using the MOVEL and OPTEMA algorithms (described in González 1993) as explained in Pedraz et al. (2002). In each case, the template that was used was obtained as the mixture of 6 different spectral types (G5 V, G7 V, K0 III, K2 III, M3 III and M5 III) which minimizes intrinsic differences with the galaxy spectra. In order to avoid systematic differences between indices at diferent spectral resolutions, all the spectra were broadened up to the largest $`\sigma _0`$ of the galaxy sample ($`370`$ km s-1). The measured indices correspond to a central aperture of radius $`R_{\mathrm{eff}}`$/8 (or 1 arcsec for galaxies with $`R_{\mathrm{eff}}<8`$ arcsec) and were corrected to the system defined by the models. See http://www.ucm.es/info/Astrof/ellipt/CATRIPLET.html for a database with the indices and velocity dispersions.

Figure 1 shows the obtained relations of the indices and the central velocity dispersions of the galaxies. Although, at first sight, the two Ca ii triplet indices do not follow a neat linear behaviour with $`\mathrm{log}\sigma _0`$, the significance levels of Spearman rank-order tests (see the labels) show that negative trends with velocity dipersion are significant. This result is highly surprising since it is the first evidence for an anti-correlation between a metal-line index and the velocity dispersion. Note that classical metallicity indicators in the blue spectral range increase with $`\sigma _0`$ (e.g. Mg2, $`<`$Fe$`>`$). In any case, it is worth noting that the spread of CaT and CaT values is only $`5`$ per cent of the mean values. Probably, this is the reason why previous works did not find significant variations of the Ca ii triplet in their galaxy samples. For the sTiO and MgI indices we find clear increasing trends with $`\mathrm{log}\sigma _0`$, whereas we do not detect any significant trend for the PaT index. Only NGC 4742 significantly departs from the mean PaT value, revealing a central young stellar population in agreement with other determinations in the optical (Gorgas et al. 1990; Trager 1997).

Although a linear fit is representative of the general behaviour as a whole, different trends with velocity dispersion are apparent. While the indices CaT, CaT and sTiO of low mass Es ($`\mathrm{log}\sigma _02.20`$) are roughly independent of $`\sigma _0`$, galaxies with $`2.30\mathrm{log}\sigma _02.50`$ depart from the above trend showing lower (CaT and CaT) and larger (sTiO) values. Also, some of the most massive Es ($`\mathrm{log}\sigma _02.50`$) significantly deviate from the fit attaining the typical indices values of low mass Es.

## 4 Interpretation and discussion

To analyse the previous relations we make use of our SSP model predictions (VAZ02; CEN02), which were transformed to the spectral resolution of the data (370 km s-1) using specific polynomials corresponding to their own age, metallicity and IMF (see VAZ02).

Given that the time evolution of the near-IR indices is virtually null for SSPs of all metallicities and ages $`3`$ Gyr (VAZ02, CEN02), we can consider that the age has a negligible effect in this spectral range. Figure 2 shows the distribution of the galaxy sample in the CaT–sTiO and MgI–sTiO planes, with symbols indicating different ranges of $`\sigma _0`$. The insensitivity of the indices to age is apparent in Figs. 2a,b. From Fig. 2a, one immediately can notice that, while low-mass Es (filled circles) can be roughly fitted by with SSPs of metallicity below solar ($`0.4`$ dex), no age-metallicity combination can account for the low CaT values of massive Es (filled squares). The spread and location of the most massive Es (asterisks) will be further discussed. Moreover, typical random errors in CaT are not able to explain the spread among Es, suggesting that other parameters must be taken into account to explain the observed trend. In this sense, we consider the existence of i) non-solar abundance ratios (hereafter NSAR), and/or ii) systematic variations of the IMF, as possible solutions to the above inconsistency.

NSAR could play an important role to interpret Fig. 2a. In fact, the high MgI values in massive Es (Fig. 2b) confirm the behaviour found for Mg in the optical. In this scenario, the position of massive Es in Fig. 2a implies that Ca should be underabundant in these galaxies, as was already suggested by e.g. Vazdekis et al. (1997) using the Ca4227 Lick/IDS index. As discussed in VAZ02, the use of $`\alpha `$-enhanced scaled-solar isochrones (Salasnich et al. 2000) predicts even larger CaT values (by $`0.5`$Å) for metal rich, old SSPs. Therefore, given that overabundances of other $`\alpha `$-elements exist, and the contribution of Ca to the total metallicity is lower than 0.5 percent, massive Es should have extremely low abundances of Ca to account for the observed values. Isochrones with accurate degrees of enhancement for the different $`\alpha `$-elements as well as stellar spectral libraries with appropriate element ratios are indeed necessary to tackle with the above problem.

Could it be that massive Es are much more metal rich than the models, i.e., much more than two times solar metallicity? In this case, the shift of the red giant branch to lower temperatures would predict a significant decrease in the CaT and CaT values. However, one would expect then sTiO values much larger than those observed (and also higher Fe values in the optical), but the measured indices are in reasonable agreement with the current model predictions.

The alternative to interpret the data on the basis of the current model predictions is to assume that the IMF may be varying among Es. Since age can be considered a secondary parameter, in Fig. 2c we plot the SSPs model predictions for 17.78 Gyr (a different age does not qualitatively alter the final conclusions) and different IMF slopes and metallicities. In this new scenario, the data can be interpreted by means of IMF slope and metallicity variations, suggesting that low-mass Es (filled circles) exhibit lower metallicities and lower IMF slopes (lower dwarf/giants ratio) than massive Es (filled squares). In the light of this interpretation, reading $`\mu `$ and \[Fe/H\] values from the grid in Fig. 2c allows us to fit a one-parameter relation between $`\mu `$, \[Fe/H\] and $`\mathrm{log}\sigma _0`$ for Es in the sense that, the larger $`\sigma _0`$, the larger the metallicity and the IMF slope (Figure 3). Note, however, that very massive Es (asterisks) deviate from the above relation exhibiting lower metallicities and slightly flatter IMFs. To guide the eye, solid lines represent simple polynomial fits to the data on the $`\mu `$–\[Fe/H\] and \[Fe/H\]–$`\mathrm{log}\sigma _0`$ planes, whilst the relation in the $`\mu `$$`\mathrm{log}\sigma _0`$ plane is readily derived from the two previous ones. Using Monte-Carlo simulations (following a procedure similar to that of Kuntschner et al. 2001), we have checked that this relation is not driven by a combined effect of Poisson noise and non-orthogonal diagnostic diagrams, thus concluding that Es can indeed be explained using $`\mu `$–\[Fe/H\]–$`\mathrm{log}\sigma _0`$ curves.

Although the universality of the IMF is a highly controversial question (see e.g. Eisenhauer 2001 for a review), there are theoretical arguments suggesting that the IMF of metal-rich star-forming regions must be biased towards low mass stars due to a more efficient cooling rate (e.g. Larson 1998). On this base, the universal IMF by Padoan et al. (1997) –which depends on the physical conditions of the star formation site– predicts such a behaviour. The observational $`\mu `$–\[Fe/H\] trend of Fig. 3c qualitatively agrees with these theoretical arguments, but it still needs to be related with the galactic mass (or $`\mathrm{log}\sigma _0`$). A time-extended (non-instantaneous) star formation history or several star-forming episodes could drive such a relation. If mergers and accretion of other galaxies with pre-enriched gas have been frequent phenomena during the evolution of massive Es, subsequent star formation episodes should increase the metallicity and, as a consequence, the IMF would gradually tend to produce a larger relative number of low mass stars. In this case, the infall of non-primordial, previously enriched, gas is needed to ensure the increasing metallicity. Although an extended star formation could be enough to explain the increasing metallicity, the addition of dissipative hierarchical scenarios would emphasize such a behaviour.

This interpretation implicitly characterizes the IMF as a time-dependent function (it gets steeper with time) in agreement with several previous work (e.g. Larson 1998), suggesting that the IMF in the early Universe could be biased towards very massive stars. A prompt initial enrichment –straight consequence of a time-dependent IMF– could account for the observed $`\alpha `$-enhancements (Vazdekis et al. 1996). This could also explain several keys like the G-dwarf problem, the scarcity of Population III stars, and the high abundance of heavy elements in the intergalactic medium of clusters of galaxies (Larson 1998). In addition, the existence of a $`\mu `$–\[Fe/H\]–$`\mathrm{log}\sigma _0`$ relation would also have important consequences for the interpretation of the blue spectra of Es. In particular, the $`<`$Fe$`>`$$`\mathrm{log}\sigma _0`$, H$`\beta `$$`\mathrm{log}\sigma _0`$, and the mass–luminosity (in $`B`$ band) relations could only be reconciled by introducing an age sequence in the sense that the larger $`\mathrm{log}\sigma _0`$ the lower the mean age in the central parts (CEN02). Another problem could be visual-infrared colors. For example, for a model with $`\mu =2.8`$, \[Fe/H\] $`=+0.2`$ and 12.6 Gyr one expects $`VK=3.52`$ (Blakeslee et al. 2001). This is just at the edge of the range of observational values for Es (e.g., $`VK3.50\pm 0.05`$ for Es in Frogel et al. 1978). However, and again, a younger mean age for the central regions would help to match the observed values ($`VK=3.27`$ for a model with $`\mu =2.8`$, \[Fe/H\] $`=+0.2`$ and 5.01 Gyr).

The interpretation with a varying IMF actually revisits the classic debate about the existence of a dwarf-enriched population in the nuclei of Es, based on the strengths of the near-IR Na i doublet, the Ca ii triplet and the FeH Wing-Ford band (Cohen 1978; Faber & French 1980; Carter et al. 1986; Alloin & Bica 1989; Couture & Hardy 1993). In particular, the weakness of the FeH band was used as an argument against this possibility. Since these results are mainly based on rather limited empirical synthesis models, they are not strong enough to directly exclude the possibility of a dwarf-heavy IMF. A proper calibration of its sensitivity to the stellar parameters (in particular to metallicity; see Carter et al. 1986) and its inclusion in modern stellar population models must be performed before extracting any conclusion. In any case, since several model uncertainties affect the absolute scale of the predicted index strengths (by $``$ 0.5 Å in the case of CaT; see VAZ02), the derived $`\mu `$–\[Fe/H\]–$`\mathrm{log}\sigma _0`$ relation must be considered on a relative basis.

Finally, we speculate on the very massive Es labelled with asterisks in Figs. 2 and 3. Whereas all (except one) are boxy Es, with slow rotation and resolved cores, the rest of the sample are mostly disky Es, fast rotators with power-law cores. According to Faber et al. (1997), disky Es are consistent with their formation in gas-rich mergers, whereas boxy Es could be the by-products of gas-free stellar mergers. In the context of our interpretation, this suggests that boxy Es should exhibit lower metallicities (and, therefore, lower sTiO values) at the time that keep a more primordial, flatter slope IMF than disky Es (thus leading to larger values of CaT and CaT), in agreement with what we observe in Figs. 1 and 3. Also, the fact that boxy Es seem to be older than disky Es (de Jong & Davies 1997; Ryden, Forbes & Terlevich 2001) favours the last interpretation.

We want to note that, at the time of submission of this letter, Saglia et al. (2002) presented similar anti-correlations between Ca ii indices and the velocity dispersion, using another large sample of high-quality spectra. Another paper by Falcón-Barroso et al. (2003) has been submitted with such anti-correlations for bulges of spiral galaxies.

To conclude, more work in the areas of SN yields, stellar interior models and stellar libraries is needed to clarify whether it is possible to explain the current discrepancy between Ca ii measurements and models using non-solar abundance ratios. Until this is accomplished, and in the light of the present models, the only way out is to advocate for variations in the IMF. By no means we think that we are presenting strong evidence against its universality. Furthermore, the scenario of a time-dependent IMF poses difficulties to explain other observables. More modern, careful work using indicators in the near-IR and the optical is needed to resolve the issue of a non-standard IMF.

## ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We are indebted to the anonymous referee for very useful suggestions. This work was supported by the Spanish research project No. AYA2000-977


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# Wrapping of a spherical colloid by a fluid membrane

## I Introduction and Motivation

Fluid lipid bilayers are one of the key structural elements of all living cells. On the one hand they partition and thereby organize the complex hierarchy of intracellular biochemical environments. On the other hand they provide controlled transport between neighboring compartments as well as the extracellular space. These transport mechanisms span quite a large range of particle sizes, all the way from sub-nanometer ions (which cross the membrane via protein channels) up to micron sized objects (like bacteria), which are engulfed in large-scale membrane deformations occurring during phagocytosis Lodish . Generally, such events require metabolic energy and are meticulously controlled by the cell. However, there are also cases where they happen passively as a consequence of generic physical interactions, for instance a sufficiently strong adhesion between the particle about to be transported and the membrane. An important and well studied example is provided by the route along which many animal viruses leave their host cells, namely, via the wrapping and subsequent pinch-off of a pre-assembled viral nucleoprotein capsid at the plasma membrane GaHe98 . Other examples, in which membrane deformations following binding to a small object are crucial, include certain gene transfection systems, in which DNA is complexed by positively charged polymers and the resulting condensed globule becomes internalized by the cell in an adhesion-driven invagination process BoLe95 ; or a host of modern biophysical experimental techniques, in which for instance microbeads CaYe01  or AFM tips HeOb00  are in contact with a membrane and become partially or fully wrapped.

These biological examples are complemented by more physically oriented experiments on the adsorption of micrometer sized beads onto model lipid bilayers. Studies have for instance focused on the wrapping of a latex bead by a vesicle DiAn97 , or on the interaction between several beads via membrane mediated forces KoRa99 . For these non-flat substrates, it is unfortunately difficult to extract detailed information about the membrane shape close to contact, especially for small colloids for which the bending contribution in the wrapping balance becomes more important DeGe02 . It is therefore desirable to have a better theoretical understanding of how physical parameters like bending stiffness, lateral tension, or adhesion strength control the shape of the complex and under which circumstances complete wrapping ensues. This question has been partially addressed in a recent work that considers the adhesion of a cylindrical rod to a membrane and estimates the force required for unbinding Bou02 . However, the description is limited to the regime of small wrapping, since it relies on a small gradient expansion of the elastic energy. In the present paper we determine the complete structural wrapping behavior of a spherical colloid by numerically solving the full nonlinear differential equations which describe the shape of an elastic fluid membrane under a prescribed lateral tension adhering to a spherical particle with some given strength. These exact results are then compared to analytical calculations employing a small gradient approximation. We find that in the latter case the shape of the complex is only predicted correctly for very small degrees of wrapping. However, the phase boundary toward envelopment is still accurately represented over a somewhat larger range of penetrations, essentially in the regime of low tension.

## II General energy considerations

We consider a spherical colloid of radius $`a`$ adsorbed on a deformable surface, as depicted in Fig. 1. Following Helfrich Hel73 , the elastic energy associated with some membrane deformation is, per unit area,

$$e_\text{H}=\sigma +\frac{\kappa }{2}(c_1+c_2)^2,$$
(1)
with $`c_1`$ and $`c_2`$ the local principal curvatures, $`\kappa `$ the bending modulus, and $`\sigma `$ the lateral tension. From the two elastic constants we can construct a length, $`\lambda `$, according to

$$\lambda =\sqrt{\frac{\kappa }{\sigma }}.$$
(2)
For instance, with a tension of $`\sigma 0.02\text{dyn/cm}`$ (a value commonly found for cell membranes MoHo01 ) and a typical bending modulus of $`\kappa 20k_\mathrm{B}T`$ (where $`k_\mathrm{B}T`$ is the thermal energy) we obtain $`\lambda 64\text{nm}`$ (which, incidentally, is about the same size as many viral nucleocapsids BaOl99 ). Membrane deformations on a length scale smaller than $`\lambda `$ are mainly controlled by bending energy, while tension is predominant on larger scales. In this study, we will restrict ourselves to the bending-dominated low tension regime, $`a\lambda `$. We will see that even then a comparatively low tension can play an important role.

A natural parameter specifying the coverage of the colloid by the membrane is the degree of wrapping $`z=1\mathrm{cos}\alpha `$. It ranges from $`z=0`$, when the colloid just touches the surface, up to $`z=2`$, in the fully enveloped state. The equilibrium value of $`z`$ results from the adhesion of the colloid, driven by a contact energy per unit area, $`w`$, being balanced by the requirement to bend the membrane as well as the work of pulling excess membrane toward the wrapping site against the prescribed lateral tension $`\sigma `$.

Energies pertaining to the *adhering* part can be calculated easily: The adhesion energy equals $`2\pi a^2zw`$, while bending and tension contributions are found to be $`4\pi z\kappa `$ and $`\pi a^2z^2\sigma `$, respectively. The bending and tension energies of the *free* part of the membrane are more difficult to evaluate, since they require the determination of the equilibrium membrane profile, a task that will be pursued below. Before solving the full variational problem, it is worth noting that the situation is greatly simplified for a membrane with no lateral tension. In this special case the equilibrium profile is quickly seen to be a *catenoid*, a minimal surface with zero mean curvature. Hence, the only energy contributions stem from the wrapped part of the membrane. We then find that, for $`\sigma =0`$, colloids do not adhere at low adhesion energy $`w<w_\mathrm{c}=2\kappa /a^2`$, whereas full wrapping occurs above $`w_\mathrm{c}`$, with no energy barrier to be overcome.

## III Nonlinear shape equations

As a first approach, it would be tempting to approximate the energy of the free section of the membrane by a phenomenological line energy. However, neither the relation between the line tension constant and the membrane properties $`\kappa `$ and $`\sigma `$ would be known, nor is the implied dependency on the degree of wrapping correct. In order to draw indubitable conclusions, it is thus advisable to determine the exact membrane profile.

The energy $`E_{\mathrm{free}}`$ of the free membrane is the surface integral over the local bending and tension contributions and is thus a *functional* of the shape. By solving the corresponding Euler-Lagrange equations one obtains the “ground state” profile and thereby its energy. Much work along these lines has for instance led to a detailed understanding of vesicle conformations Sei97 . In the present context, and using the parameterization indicated in Fig. 1, the shape equations can be written as

$`\dot{\psi }`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{p_\psi }{2r}}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{sin}\psi }{r}},`$ (3a)
$`\dot{r}`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{cos}\psi ,`$ (3b)
$`\dot{h}`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{sin}\psi ,`$ (3c)
$`\dot{p}_\psi `$ $`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{p_\psi }{r}}p_h\right)\mathrm{cos}\psi +\left({\displaystyle \frac{2r}{\lambda ^2}}+p_r\right)\mathrm{sin}\psi ,`$ (3d)
$`\dot{p}_r`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{p_\psi }{r}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{p_\psi }{4r}}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{sin}\psi }{r}}\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{2}{\lambda ^2}}(1\mathrm{cos}\psi ),`$ (3e)
$`\dot{p}_h`$ $`=`$ $`0.`$ (3f)
The dot indicates the derivative with respect to the arc length $`s`$ along the membrane profile, and the $`p`$’s are the “momenta” canonically conjugate to the coordinates $`\psi `$, $`r`$, and $`h`$. These equations are integrated numerically for an asymptotically flat membrane that touches the colloid tangentially at a specific point of detachment. The determination of the appropriate boundary conditions far from the colloid raises a few subtle technical questions, and we refer the reader to Refs. JuSe94  and Des  for further details. From the numerical solution we finally obtain $`E_{\mathrm{free}}`$ – and thus the total energy – as a function of the degree of wrapping $`z`$.

The structural phase diagram depicted in Fig. 2 follows directly. We find that the transition from the free to the partially wrapped state is continuous and occurs at the same value $`w_\mathrm{c}=2\kappa /a^2`$ for any value of the tension. In contrast to that, an energy barrier separates the partially wrapped from the the fully enveloped state, rendering this transition discontinuous. The transition lines merge at a triple point $`(w_\mathrm{c},0)`$, as expected. Our approach also allows us to determine the *height* of the energy barrier (see Fig. 3), which surprisingly originates predominantly from tension. For $`\sigma =0.02\text{dyn/cm}`$ (typical cellular tension MoHo01 ), $`a=30`$nm (capsid radius of Semliki Forest Virus, an often studied example) and $`\kappa =20k_\mathrm{B}T`$, the barrier has the substantial value of $`E_{\mathrm{barrier}}22k_\mathrm{B}T`$, showing that it cannot be overcome by thermal fluctuations. This point is also illustrated in Fig. 2 by showing the two spinodal lines at which the barrier vanishes. Incidentally, starting with a fully enveloped state and reducing the adhesion $`w`$, the unwrapping-spinodal is crossed only once one is already in the unbound regime, *i.**e.*, the hysteresis would be so pronounced that one “skips” the partially wrapped region upon unbinding.

The energy of the free section of the membrane vanishes in the limit of full wrapping, $`z2`$, which is reminiscent of the case of an ideal neck connecting two vesicles FoMi94 . The reason is essentially that as the neck contracts, the necessary membrane back-bending must occur on a length scale much smaller than $`\lambda `$ and is thus entirely dominated by the bending energy. But then the membrane will just assume the shape of a catenoid which, even though highly deformed, has zero mean curvature and thus does not cost any bending energy.

## IV Small gradient expansion, rigorous results

The exact shape equations (3) are nonlinear and can only be solved numerically. In order to get analytical information about the triple point at $`(w_\mathrm{c},0)`$, we use a single-valued (Monge-) parameterization of the surface profile $`h(𝒓)`$, where $`𝒓=(x,y)`$ spans the flat reference plane at $`h=0`$. This representation does not allow for overhangs and therefore can only describe the first stages of the wrapping process. Assuming moreover that membrane deflections out of the horizontal remain small, *i.**e.*, $`|h|1`$, the energy of the free part of the membrane is

$$E_{\mathrm{free}}=\mathrm{d}^2𝒓\left\{\frac{\kappa }{2}\left(^2h\right)^2+\frac{\sigma }{2}\left(h\right)^2\right\}.$$
(4)
This quadratic expansion is valid only for small deformations but it has the advantage to render analytical calculations tractable. The equilibrium profile arises from the stationarity condition $`\delta E_{\mathrm{free}}/\delta h=0`$ and satisfies the *linear* Euler-Lagrange equation

$$^2\left(^2\lambda ^2\right)h=0.$$
(5)
The general solution of eq. (5) is $`h(r)=h_1+h_2\mathrm{ln}(r/\lambda )+h_3K_0(r/\lambda )+h_4I_0(r/\lambda )`$, with $`K_0`$ and $`I_0`$ the modified Bessel functions AbSt70 . Far from the colloid, the energy density has to remain finite and integrable, so that $`h_2=h_4=0`$. The integration constants $`h_1`$ and $`h_3`$ easily follow from the boundary conditions requiring the profile and its slope to be continuous at the point of detachment. The minimum energy of the functional in eq. (4) is then found to be

$$E_{\mathrm{free}}=\pi \kappa \frac{a}{\lambda }\left(\frac{k^3}{1k^2}\right)\frac{K_0\left(ka/\lambda \right)}{K_1\left(ka/\lambda \right)},$$
(6)
where we introduced the abbreviation $`k=\sqrt{z(2z)}`$.

The small gradient expansion and the exact membrane profiles are shown in Fig. 4 for different values of the detachment angle. As expected, the quality of the approximation declines as the degree of penetration increases (note that the parameterization itself fails much later, namely for $`z>1`$). To further illustrate the discrepancy between the exact and the approximate solution, we plot in Fig. 5 the energy of the free part of the membrane. The inset shows the energy difference between the small gradient expansion and the nonlinear result. We see that the approximation is fairly reasonable for degrees of penetration up to $`z0.1`$. Beyond this value, one has to solve the full shape equation in order to give an accurate description of the deformation energy.

Nevertheless, the small-gradient expansion improves our understanding of the system, since it allows us to work out the asymptotic phase boundaries. We consider first the transition between the free and the partially wrapped state. For small degrees of penetration the total energy of the system can be expanded up to quadratic order in $`z`$, giving

$`E`$ $`=`$ $`\pi a^2\{2z(ww_\mathrm{c})+`$
$`\sigma z^2[14\gamma 2\mathrm{ln}{\displaystyle \frac{\sigma z}{w_\mathrm{c}}}]+𝒪(z^2)\},`$
where $`\gamma =0.5772\mathrm{}`$ is the Euler-Mascheroni constant AbSt70 . For sufficiently small $`z`$ the quadratic term is negligible and wrapping sets in as soon as the prefactor of the linear term becomes negative. This confirms the numerical finding that the initial wrapping transition is *continuous* and always takes place at $`w=w_\mathrm{c}`$, no matter what the value of the tension is.

Even though the final state of the second transition toward full envelopment cannot be described within a small gradient expansion, its *energy* is exactly known, since the free membrane does not contribute to it. The location of this second transition can therefore also be predicted by equating the energy of the partially wrapped state, eq. (IV), with the energy of the fully enveloped state, $`E=4\pi a^2(\sigma w)+8\pi \kappa `$. Since this yields a transcendental equation, the relation between $`\sigma `$ and $`w`$ on the phase boundary cannot be expressed in terms of simple functions. However, the asymptotic behavior at zero tension, which remains quite accurate over the whole regime of low tension, is surprisingly simple: We find that, up to a complicated but small logarithmic correction, the transition is given by $`\sigma =ww_\mathrm{c}`$ (see Fig. 2).

Unfortunately, the concomitant energy barrier cannot be obtained in small gradient expansion. Even if the transition toward envelopment takes place at small $`z`$, where the approximation still works, the barrier occurs at large penetrations, $`z>1`$ (see *e.**g.* inset of Fig. 3). This is even beyond the range of applicability of the Monge parameterization $`h=h(x,y)`$.

## V Discussion

The combination of both numerical an analytical approaches presented in this work has provided a complete description of the equilibrium wrapping behavior. The structure of the wrapping complex, the transition lines in the wrapping diagram, and the barriers of the discontinuous envelopment boundary can be predicted, and the low tension regime can even be treated analytically. One particular consequence of the wrapping scenario is that colloid engulfment is extremely sensitive to the particle size. As long as the tension is low enough ($`\sigma <w/2`$ will do), a large sphere is wrapped much more easily than a small one. This could be checked experimentally for instance by spreading a bilayer across a hole separating two compartments and adding a polydisperse colloidal solution to one side. If there exists some generic attraction between the colloids and the bilayer, a population of bilayer-coated colloids should emerge in the other compartment with a different polydispersity distribution: The frequency of large colloids is significantly enhanced, and too small ones do not occur at all.

An important issue that we have not addressed here is the effect of thermally excited membrane fluctuations. At very low tension, the undulations might prevent the beads from adhering to the membrane. An initial study of finite-size effects on the Helfrich repulsion shows that the (entropic) barrier to overcome in order to reach the surface *increases* with particle size Bickel . This would provide an interesting counterbalance to the tendency to engulf preferentially large spheres.

The level of description in this work is that of generic physical mechanisms, but several examples mentioned in the introduction are taken from biology, where a host of different effects often occur at the same time. Notwithstanding this difficulty, we believe it to be worthwhile to analyze these examples – in particular, viral budding – in terms of the mechanisms discussed here. For instance, the adhesion strength of viral capsids to membranes can be modified by changing the biochemistry or simply the chemical potential of the binding proteins which in most cases are responsible for the attachment. Moreover, the membrane tension of cells increases or decreases during times of heightened endo- or exocytosis activity, respectively, and is generally under active control of the cell MoHo01 . Thus, processes like viral budding and its later counterpart of unwrapping (after infection of a different host cell and fusion with its membrane) invariably involve a movement in the structural phase diagram of Fig. 2 along both axes. The concomitant “phase changes” predicted that way thus offer an understanding of the observed (un)wrapping processes in terms of the physical forces driving them.

###### Acknowledgements.

We would like to thank Bill Gelbart, Shelly Tzlil, and Avinoam Ben-Shaul for many stimulating discussions on the subject. MD also gratefully acknowledges financial support of the German Science Foundation under grant De775/1-1.


text:
# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

There is by now a great deal of evidence that the correspondence between type IIB string theory on AdS5 $`\times `$ S5 and $`𝒩=4`$ super-Yang-Mills theory in four dimensions  extends to a more general duality between any gravitational theory on anti-de Sitter spaces and conformal field theories residing on the boundary of AdS . Such a duality represents an explicit realization of the holographic principle . In three dimensions, pure Einstein-AdS gravity was known to be related to a two-dimensional conformal field theory  even before the advent of the AdS/CFT correspondence. This is based on the fact that pure Einstein gravity in three dimensions can be written as a Chern-Simons theory , which is known to reduce to a WZNW model in presence of a boundary . The boundary conditions for asymptotically AdS spaces  provide then the constraints for a Hamiltonian reduction from the WZNW model to Liouville field theory 111The results of  have been generalized to three-dimensional extended AdS supergravity in .. Recently the equivalence of pure gravity in three dimensions and two-dimensional Liouville theory has been extended in  to the case of positive cosmological constant, providing thus an explicit example of the proposed correspondence between de Sitter gravity and Euclidean conformal field theories 222Cf.  for earlier work..

Much less is known for two-dimensional anti-de Sitter gravity , which, in the spirit of AdS/CFT, should have a dual description in terms of a conformal quantum mechanical system 333Cf. also  and references therein.. Progress in this direction has been made in , where it was shown that two-dimensional Jackiw-Teitelboim-AdS gravity  induces on the spacetime boundary a conformally invariant dynamics that can be described in terms of a de Alfaro-Fubini-Furlan (DFF) model  coupled to an external source444Cf.  for related work..

In the present paper we will extend the results of  to topological AdS2 supergravity. Making use of its gauge theory formulation , we will be able to show in a clear and transparent way how the superconformal algebra appears in this system, and how the dynamics can be reduced to that of a superconformally invariant quantum mechanics.

The remainder of this paper is organized as follows: In section 2, the formulation of topological AdS2 supergravity as a gauge theory (BF theory) is briefly reviewed. In section 3, we translate the boundary conditions for asymptotically AdS2 spaces  into conditions for the bosonic fields appearing in the gauge theory. Furthermore, suitable boundary conditions on the fermions are defined. Subsequently, we show that the gauge transformations preserving this asymptotic behaviour generate a super-Virasoro algebra, and compute its central charge. Using this in Cardy’s formula for the asymptotic level density, we exactly reproduce the thermodynamical entropy of AdS2 black holes. In the following section, it is shown that the dynamics of the dilaton and its superpartner reduces to that of superconformal transformations that leave invariant one chiral component of the stress tensor supercurrent of a two-dimensional conformal field theory. This dynamics turns out to be governed by a supersymmetric extension of the DFF model of conformal quantum mechanics. In section 5, we generalize the considerations of sections 3-4, which refer to AdS gravity, to the de Sitter case. Again, a microstate counting yields precisely the entropy of two-dimensional de Sitter space. We close our paper with some final remarks, followed by an appendix that contains our conventions.

## 2 Two-dimensional anti-de Sitter supergravity as topological gauge theory

We consider the minimal supersymmetric extension of the Jackiw-Teitelboim (JT) model , which contains the zweibein $`e_\mu ^a`$, a Rarita-Schwinger field $`\psi _{i\mu }`$, the dilaton $`\eta `$ and dilatino $`\lambda _i`$. The action is given by

$$I=\frac{\beta }{2}d^2x\sqrt{g}\eta (R2\mathrm{\Lambda })+\frac{\beta }{4l}\eta \psi \gamma _5\overline{\psi }+\frac{\beta }{4}\overline{\lambda }D\psi ,$$
(2.1)
where $`\beta `$ denotes a dimensionless coupling constant, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }=1/l^2`$ is the cosmological constant555Notice that for the $`(+,)`$ signature used here, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is positive for AdS and negative for dS. and

$$(D\psi )_j=d\psi _j\frac{1}{4}(\gamma _{ab})_j^k\omega ^{ab}\psi _k+\frac{i}{2l}(\gamma _a)_j^ke^a\psi _k.$$
(2.2)
$`\psi _{i\mu }`$ and $`\lambda _i`$ are Majorana spinors, i. e. $`\lambda _i=ϵ_{ij}\overline{\lambda }^i`$ etc., where $`ϵ_{12}=1`$.

The scalar curvature $`R`$ is calculated using the spin connection that solves the torsion-free condition

$$T^a=de^a+\omega _b^ae^b+\frac{i}{4}(\gamma ^a)_k^j\psi ^k\psi _j=0.$$
(2.3)
Notice that, throughout the paper, the product of two fermions differs by a factor $`i`$ from the standard Grassmann product fulfilling $`(ab)^{}=b^{}a^{}`$.

The supergravity model (2.1) can be formulated as an Osp$`(1|2)`$ topological gauge theory . This is similar to the three-dimensional case, where the Einstein-AdS supergravity action can be written as a sum of two Chern-Simons actions . Let us introduce the superconnection

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }=A^A\tau _A+\psi _iR^iA+\psi ,$$
(2.4)
and the scalar multiplet

$$S=\varphi ^A\tau _A+\lambda _iR^i\varphi +\lambda $$
(2.5)
in the adjoint representation of Osp$`(1|2)`$. In (2.4) and (2.5), the $`\tau _A`$ and $`R^i`$ are respectively the bosonic and fermionic generators of the graded Lie algebra osp$`(1|2)`$ (cf. appendix A.1).

The action describing AdS2 supergravity is given by666(2.6) can also be obtained from the super-Chern-Simons action $`I=\frac{k}{4\pi }\mathrm{STr}(\widehat{\mathrm{\Gamma }}d\widehat{\mathrm{\Gamma }}+\frac{2}{3}\widehat{\mathrm{\Gamma }}\widehat{\mathrm{\Gamma }}\widehat{\mathrm{\Gamma }})`$ using the dimensional reduction ansatz $`\widehat{\mathrm{\Gamma }}=\mathrm{\Gamma }+Sdz`$.

$$I=\frac{\beta }{2}\mathrm{STr}(S),$$
(2.6)
where

$$=d\mathrm{\Gamma }+\mathrm{\Gamma }\mathrm{\Gamma }$$
(2.7)
denotes the Osp$`(1|2)`$ field strength.

The action (2.6) is invariant under the gauge transformations

$`\delta _\mathrm{\Xi }\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ $`=`$ $`d\mathrm{\Xi }+[\mathrm{\Gamma },\mathrm{\Xi }],`$ (2.8)
$`\delta _\mathrm{\Xi }S`$ $`=`$ $`[S,\mathrm{\Xi }].`$ (2.9)
The equations of motion following from (2.6) read

$``$ $`=`$ $`0,`$ (2.10)
$`DS`$ $``$ $`dS+[\mathrm{\Gamma },S]=0,`$ (2.11)
so that the solutions are those of flat Osp$`(1|2)`$ connections in two dimensions.
To make contact with gravity, one decomposes the fields $`A`$ and $`\varphi `$ according to

$$A^A=(l^1e^a,\omega ),\varphi ^A=(\varphi ^a,4\eta ),$$
(2.12)
where $`\omega =\omega _{\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}\hspace{0.33em}1}}^0`$ and $`a=0,1`$. Using (2.12), the bosonic part $`FdA+AA+\psi \psi `$ of the field strength (2.7) reads

$$F^A=(l^1T^a,d\omega +l^2e^0e^1\frac{1}{4}\psi \gamma _5\overline{\psi }),$$
(2.13)
where $`T^a`$ will correspond to the torsion tensor given in (2.3). Inserting (2.13) into the action (2.6), we see that vanishing torsion is enforced by the Lagrange multipliers $`\varphi ^a`$. Eliminating the $`\varphi ^a`$ by going to the second order formalism, and rescaling $`\psi \psi /\sqrt{l}`$, $`\lambda \lambda \sqrt{l}`$, we recover (2.1)777The formulation of the supergravity theory defined by the action (2.1) as a gauge theory involves the identification of non-abelian gauge transformations with gravitational symmetries. For subtleties concerning this point cf. ..

## 3 Asymptotic symmetries

### 3.1 Boundary conditions

An asymptotically AdS2 geometry is one for which the bosonic fields $`A`$ and $`\varphi `$ behave for $`r\mathrm{}`$ as

$`A`$ $`=`$ $`\left[{\displaystyle \frac{r}{l^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{T_B(t)}{2\eta _0r}}\right]\tau _0dt+\left[{\displaystyle \frac{r}{l^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{T_B(t)}{2\eta _0r}}\right]\tau _2dt+{\displaystyle \frac{dr}{r}}\tau _1,`$
$`\varphi `$ $`=`$ $`\left[\alpha (t){\displaystyle \frac{r}{l^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{\beta (t)}{r}}\right]\tau _0+\left[\alpha (t){\displaystyle \frac{r}{l^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{\beta (t)}{r}}\right]\tau _2+\gamma (t)\tau _1,`$ (3.1)
where the functions $`T_B(t),\alpha (t),\beta (t),\gamma (t)`$, that depend only on the boundary coordinate $`t`$, parametrize the subleading behaviour. $`\eta _0`$ is a constant to be specified below. As we will see later, $`T_B(t)`$ plays the role of the bosonic part of the energy-momentum tensor of a two-dimensional conformal field theory, hence the notation.

Actually the asymptotics (3.1) seems slightly more restrictive than that given in , which corresponds to the boundary conditions defined in  in terms of the gravitational fields. However, it will turn out that (3.1) is still weak enough to allow for an asymptotic symmetry algebra larger than SL$`(2,\text{})`$. In other words, (3.1) is, up to trivial gauge transformations, the most general asymptotically AdS2 solution. If we translate (3.1) in terms of the metric, we get

$$ds^2=\left(\frac{r}{l}\frac{T_B(t)l}{2\eta _0r}\right)^2dt^2\frac{l^2}{r^2}dr^2,$$
(3.2)
which (for zero fermions) is an exact solution of the equations of motion for arbitrary $`T_B(t)`$888This is similar to the three-dimensional case, where two arbitrary functions appear .. This means that (3.2) is locally isometric to AdS2; however, solutions with different $`T_B(t)`$ are in general not globally equivalent.

Consider now the bosonic background of the supergravity theory (2.1) studied in ,

$`ds^2`$ $`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{r^2}{l^2}}a^2\right)dt^2\left({\displaystyle \frac{r^2}{l^2}}a^2\right)^1dr^2,`$ (3.3)
$`\eta `$ $`=`$ $`\eta _0{\displaystyle \frac{r}{l}},`$ (3.4)
where $`a`$ and $`\eta _00`$ denote integration constants. Following Ref. , the solutions with $`a^2`$ positive, negative or zero will be denoted by AdS$`{}_{}{}^{+}{}_{2}{}^{}`$, AdS$`{}_{}{}^{}{}_{2}{}^{}`$ and AdS$`{}_{}{}^{0}{}_{2}{}^{}`$ respectively. Note that due to the presence of the dilaton, which represents a position-dependent coupling constant, the solutions with different sign of $`a^2`$ are physically inequivalent . In particular, the solution with positive $`a^2`$ represents a black hole with event horizon at $`r=al`$. The black hole mass and Bekenstein-Hawking entropy are respectively given by

$$M=\frac{1}{2l}\eta _0a^2,S=2\pi \eta _0a.$$
(3.5)
Applying the diffeomorphism $`rr+a^2l^2/4r`$ to the metric (3.3) yields

$$ds^2=\left(\frac{r}{l}\frac{a^2l}{4r}\right)^2dt^2\frac{l^2}{r^2}dr^2.$$
(3.6)
Comparing this with (3.2), we see that in this case one has $`T_B(t)=\eta _0a^2/2=Ml`$, so it essentially coincides with the black hole mass.

The boundary conditions (3.1) must of course be completed by giving the asymptotic behaviour of the fermions, which can be obtained by following the general scheme introduced in . Namely, one takes a generic configuration satisfying the above asymptotic boundary conditions with vanishing fermions, and acts on it with the exact symmetries of AdS$`{}_{}{}^{0}{}_{2}{}^{}`$. This will create new terms, from which one can infer the desired asymptotic behaviour.

In order to determine the exact fermionic symmetries of AdS$`{}_{}{}^{0}{}_{2}{}^{}`$, one solves the Killing spinor equation

$$\delta _ϵ\psi =dϵ+[A,ϵ]=0,$$
(3.7)
with the connection $`A`$ given by (3.1) with $`T_B(t)=0`$. The solution $`ϵ=ϵ_1R^1+ϵ_2R^2`$ of (3.7) reads

$$ϵ_{1,2}=\sqrt{\frac{l}{r}}\left(1\frac{rt}{l^2}\right)ϵ_0^{(1)}\pm \sqrt{\frac{r}{l}}ϵ_0^{(2)},$$
(3.8)
where $`ϵ_0^{(1,2)}`$ denote two arbitrary constant spinors.

Notice that the variation of the dilatino under supersymmetry transformations generated by $`ϵ`$ is given (for a bosonic background with $`\lambda =0`$) by

$$\delta _ϵ\lambda =[\varphi ,ϵ].$$
(3.9)
The scalar field $`\varphi `$ corresponding to AdS$`{}_{}{}^{0}{}_{2}{}^{}`$ is

$$\varphi =4\eta _0\frac{r}{l}(\tau _0+\tau _2),$$
(3.10)
i. e. $`\alpha (t)=4\eta _0l`$, $`\beta (t)=\gamma (t)=0`$. Using (3.10), one gets

$$[\varphi ,ϵ]=4\eta _0\sqrt{\frac{r}{l}}\left(1\frac{rt}{l^2}\right)ϵ_0^{(1)}(R^1R^2),$$
(3.11)
so it vanishes only for $`ϵ_0^{(1)}=0`$. This means that the non-zero scalar field $`\varphi `$ (3.10) breaks half of the supersymmetries. This is the supersymmetric analogue of the observation made in  that a nonvanishing field $`\varphi `$ breaks the SL$`(2,\text{})`$ isometry group of AdS2 down to the subgroup of time translations. We thus encounter a spontaneous partial supersymmetry breaking: The theory has osp$`(1|2)`$ invariance, but the vacuum preserves only an s(2) subalgebra999s(2) denotes the superalgebra introduced by Witten to formulate supersymmetric quantum mechanics ..

After this small digression, we come back to the determination of the boundary conditions for the fermions. Acting on a generic background (3.1) with the exact AdS$`{}_{}{}^{0}{}_{2}{}^{}`$ supersymmetries (3.8), one obtains for the gravitino variation (3.7)

$$\delta _ϵ\psi =\frac{T_B(t)}{2\eta _0\sqrt{rl}}ϵ_0^{(2)}(R^1+R^2)dt,$$
(3.12)
so that we will impose

$$\psi =\frac{T_F(t)}{2\eta _0\sqrt{2rl}}(R^1+R^2)dt$$
(3.13)
as the appropriate boundary condition on the gravitinos, where $`T_F(t)`$ is an arbitrary function. Below we will see that $`T_F(t)`$ is the fermionic superpartner of the bosonic stress tensor $`T_B(t)`$.

For a generic field $`\varphi `$ given in (3.1), Eq. (3.9) yields a dilatino asymptotics of the form

$$\lambda =\left(\mu (t)\sqrt{\frac{2r}{l}}+\nu (t)\sqrt{\frac{2l}{r}}\right)R^1+\left(\mu (t)\sqrt{\frac{2r}{l}}+\nu (t)\sqrt{\frac{2l}{r}}\right)R^2,$$
(3.14)
with $`\mu (t)`$ and $`\nu (t)`$ some functions.

Notice that the field strength $``$ (2.7) still vanishes for an arbitrary function $`T_F(t)`$ in (3.13) and for any $`T_B(t)`$ in (3.1), so that we have found an exact solution that contains two undetermined functions $`T_{B,F}(t)`$. Note also that the functions $`\alpha (t)`$, $`\beta (t)`$, $`\gamma (t)`$, $`\mu (t)`$ and $`\nu (t)`$ that occur in $`\varphi `$ (3.1) and $`\lambda `$ (3.14) are not arbitrary; imposing the equations of motion (2.11) yields a dynamics for these fields. In section 4, it will be shown that the resulting dynamics is that of superconformal mechanics.

### 3.2 Asymptotic symmetries

Having now at hand the boundary conditions for both the bosons (3.1) and fermions (3.13), (3.14), we can determine the asymptotic symmetries, i. e. the gauge transformations that preserve these conditions. It will turn out that the asymptotic symmetries form a super-Virasoro algebra.

Acting on the superconnection $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ with an infinitesimal gauge transformation $`\mathrm{\Xi }=\mathrm{\Lambda }^A\tau _A+ϵ_iR^i`$, we get

$`\delta _\mathrm{\Xi }\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ $`=`$ $`d\mathrm{\Lambda }^A\tau _A+dϵ_iR^i`$ (3.15)
$`+`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{r}{l^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{T_B(t)}{2\eta _0r}}\right)(\mathrm{\Lambda }^1\tau _0+\mathrm{\Lambda }^0\tau _1+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}ϵ_1R^1{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}ϵ_2R^2)dt`$
$`+`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{r}{l^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{T_B(t)}{2\eta _0r}}\right)(\mathrm{\Lambda }^2\tau _1+\mathrm{\Lambda }^1\tau _2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}ϵ_2R^1{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}ϵ_1R^2)dt`$
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{T_F(t)}{4\sqrt{2rl}\eta _0}}[(ϵ_1+ϵ_2)(\tau _2\tau _0)(ϵ_1ϵ_2)\tau _1(\mathrm{\Lambda }^0+\mathrm{\Lambda }^2)(R^1R^2)\mathrm{\Lambda }^1(R^1+R^2)]dt`$
$`+`$ $`(\mathrm{\Lambda }^2\tau _0\mathrm{\Lambda }^0\tau _2+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}ϵ_2R^1+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}ϵ_1R^2){\displaystyle \frac{dr}{r}}.`$
In order to preserve the asymptotic form of the superconnection, the parameters $`\mathrm{\Lambda }^A`$ and $`ϵ_i`$ of the gauge transformation have to be of the form

$`\mathrm{\Lambda }^0`$ $`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{r}{l^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{T_B(t)}{2\eta _0r}}\right)\chi (t)+{\displaystyle \frac{l^2}{2r}}\chi ^{\prime \prime }(t)+{\displaystyle \frac{l}{4\sqrt{2}\eta _0r}}T_F(t)ϵ_0(t),`$
$`\mathrm{\Lambda }^1`$ $`=`$ $`\chi ^{}(t),`$
$`\mathrm{\Lambda }^2`$ $`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{r}{l^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{T_B(t)}{2\eta _0r}}\right)\chi (t){\displaystyle \frac{l^2}{2r}}\chi ^{\prime \prime }(t){\displaystyle \frac{l}{4\sqrt{2}\eta _0r}}T_F(t)ϵ_0(t),`$
$`ϵ_1`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{2r}{l}}}ϵ_0(t)+\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{2l}{r}}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{T_F(t)}{4\eta _0l}}\chi (t)lϵ_0^{}(t)\right),`$
$`ϵ_2`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{2r}{l}}}ϵ_0(t)+\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{2l}{r}}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{T_F(t)}{4\eta _0l}}\chi (t)lϵ_0^{}(t)\right),`$ (3.16)
where $`\chi (t)`$ and $`ϵ_0(t)`$ denote arbitrary bosonic and fermionic functions respectively. This means that the asymptotic symmetry algebra is in fact infinite-dimensional.

Under a gauge transformation with the parameters (3.16), the fields $`T_B(t)`$ and $`T_F(t)`$ transform as

$`\delta T_B`$ $`=`$ $`T_B^{}\chi +2T_B\chi ^{}{\displaystyle \frac{c}{12}}l^2\chi ^{\prime \prime \prime }{\displaystyle \frac{l}{2}}T_F^{}ϵ_0{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}lT_Fϵ_0^{},`$ (3.17)
$`\delta T_F`$ $`=`$ $`T_F^{}\chi +{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}T_F\chi ^{}+2T_Bϵ_0{\displaystyle \frac{c}{3}}l^2ϵ_0^{\prime \prime },`$ (3.18)
with

$$c=12\eta _0.$$
(3.19)
Eqns. (3.17) and (3.18) are exactly the transformation laws of a CFT stress tensor $`T_B`$ and a spin $`3/2`$ supercurrent $`T_F`$ under superconformal transformations, with a central charge given by (3.19)101010By introducing the dimensionless time variable $`\tau =t/l`$, and replacing $`\chi `$ by $`l\chi `$, (3.17) and (3.18) assume the usual form, that does not involve the length scale $`l`$.. This can be easily verified by using the superconformal Ward identities and the OPE111111Note that the resulting transformation laws are those of active transformations, whereas (3.17) and (3.18) are passive, so that some signs have to be changed.

$`T_B(z)T_B(0)`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{c}{2z^4}}+{\displaystyle \frac{2}{z^2}}T_B(0)+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{z}}T_B(0),`$
$`T_B(z)T_F(0)`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2z^2}}T_F(0)+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{z}}T_F(0),`$
$`T_F(z)T_F(0)`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2c}{3z^3}}+{\displaystyle \frac{2}{z}}T_B(0).`$ (3.20)
The transformation rules of the fields $`\alpha (t)`$, $`\beta (t)`$, $`\gamma (t)`$, $`\mu (t)`$ and $`\nu (t)`$ appearing in the scalar $`S`$, can be readily obtained from (2.9), but will not be reported here.

Note that the central charge (3.19) coincides with the one computed in  for the bosonic case by different methods. This means that the central charge for AdS2 dilaton supergravity is the same as the one for pure dilaton gravity, similar to the three-dimensional case .

It is instructive to translate the gauge transformations (3.16) in terms of gravitational symmetries. To this end, we consider for a moment only the bosonic case. On shell, a diffeomorphism $`\delta x^\mu =v^\mu (x)`$ is equivalent to a gauge transformation with parameter $`\mathrm{\Lambda }=v^\mu A_\mu `$ . Thus, the asymptotic symmetries (3.16) correspond to diffeomorphisms

$`\delta t`$ $`=`$ $`\chi +{\displaystyle \frac{l^2\chi ^{\prime \prime }}{\frac{2r^2}{l^2}\frac{T_B(t)}{\eta _0}}},`$
$`\delta r`$ $`=`$ $`\chi ^{}r,`$ (3.21)
that leave the form of the metric (3.2) invariant, with $`T_BT_B+\delta T_B`$, and $`\delta T_B`$ given by (3.17) with $`ϵ_0(t)=0`$.

### 3.3 Statistical entropy of AdS2 black holes

In the preceding subsection we found that the asymptotic symmetries of AdS2 form a superconformal algebra, with central charge (3.19). AdS2 quantum gravity is thus a holomorphic sector of a superconformal field theory. The asymptotic growth of the number of states is given by the Cardy formula

$$S=2\pi \sqrt{\frac{cL_0}{6}}.$$
(3.22)
Using $`L_0=Ml`$, with the black hole mass $`M`$ given in (3.5), and the central charge (3.19), one exactly reproduces the thermodynamical entropy (3.5) of the AdS2 black hole.

Similar to the case of three dimensions , we are led to identify the zero mass black hole AdS$`{}_{}{}^{0}{}_{2}{}^{}`$ ($`a^2=0`$ in (3.3)) with the Ramond ground state of the superconformal field theory, whereas AdS$`{}_{}{}^{}{}_{2}{}^{}`$ with $`a^2=1`$ (which is AdS2 in global coordinates) corresponds to the Neveu-Schwarz ground state. The NS ground state has a mass shift

$$L_0=\frac{c}{24}=\frac{1}{2}\eta _0,$$

so that $`M=L_0/l`$ coincides exactly with the mass (3.5) of AdS$`{}_{}{}^{}{}_{2}{}^{}`$ for $`a^2=1`$. Further evidence for this identification comes from the fact that the covariantly constant spinors for AdS$`{}_{}{}^{}{}_{2}{}^{}`$,

$`ϵ_1`$ $`=`$ $`\left(ϵ_0^{(1)}\mathrm{cos}{\displaystyle \frac{t}{2l}}+ϵ_0^{(2)}\mathrm{sin}{\displaystyle \frac{t}{2l}}\right)\mathrm{cosh}{\displaystyle \frac{\zeta }{2}}+\left(ϵ_0^{(1)}\mathrm{sin}{\displaystyle \frac{t}{2l}}+ϵ_0^{(2)}\mathrm{cos}{\displaystyle \frac{t}{2l}}\right)\mathrm{sinh}{\displaystyle \frac{\zeta }{2}},`$
$`ϵ_2`$ $`=`$ $`\left(ϵ_0^{(1)}\mathrm{cos}{\displaystyle \frac{t}{2l}}+ϵ_0^{(2)}\mathrm{sin}{\displaystyle \frac{t}{2l}}\right)\mathrm{sinh}{\displaystyle \frac{\zeta }{2}}+\left(ϵ_0^{(1)}\mathrm{sin}{\displaystyle \frac{t}{2l}}ϵ_0^{(2)}\mathrm{cos}{\displaystyle \frac{t}{2l}}\right)\mathrm{cosh}{\displaystyle \frac{\zeta }{2}},`$
where $`ϵ_0^{(1,2)}`$ denote arbitrary constant spinors, and $`\mathrm{sinh}\zeta r/l`$, are antiperiodic under $`tt+2\pi l`$.

Notice in this context that the coordinate transformation

$`t`$ $``$ $`ie^{it/l}{\displaystyle \frac{r}{\sqrt{1+\frac{r^2}{l^2}}}},`$ (3.23)
$`r`$ $``$ $`le^{it/l}\sqrt{1+{\displaystyle \frac{r^2}{l^2}}},`$
maps the AdS$`{}_{}{}^{0}{}_{2}{}^{}`$ metric (the Ramond ground state) to the AdS$`{}_{}{}^{}{}_{2}{}^{}`$ metric with $`a^2=1`$, i. e. , to the Neveu-Schwarz ground state. But near the boundary $`r\mathrm{}`$, Eq. (3.23) becomes precisely the map from the line to the circle with circumference $`2\pi l`$.

## 4 Reduction to superconformal quantum mechanics

As we mentioned above, the functions $`\alpha (t)`$, $`\beta (t)`$, $`\gamma (t)`$, $`\mu (t)`$ and $`\nu (t)`$ that appear in $`\varphi `$ (3.1) and $`\lambda `$ (3.14) are not arbitrary; imposing the equations of motion (2.11) one obtains

$`T_B^{}\alpha +2T_B\alpha ^{}{\displaystyle \frac{c}{12}}l^2\alpha ^{\prime \prime \prime }{\displaystyle \frac{l}{2}}T_F^{}\mu {\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}lT_F\mu ^{}=0,`$ (4.1)
$`T_F^{}\alpha +{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}T_F\alpha ^{}+2T_B\mu {\displaystyle \frac{c}{3}}l^2\mu ^{\prime \prime }=0,`$ (4.2)
and

$`{\displaystyle \frac{c}{6}}\beta `$ $`=`$ $`T_B\alpha +{\displaystyle \frac{l}{2}}T_F\mu +{\displaystyle \frac{c}{12}}l^2\alpha ^{\prime \prime },`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{c}{3}}l\nu `$ $`=`$ $`T_F\alpha {\displaystyle \frac{c}{3}}l^2\mu ^{},`$
$`\gamma `$ $`=`$ $`\alpha ^{}.`$ (4.3)
For given stress tensor $`T_B(t)`$ and spin $`3/2`$ current $`T_F(t)`$, the equations (4.1), (4.2) determine $`\alpha (t)`$ and $`\mu (t)`$. From the remaining relations (4.3) one obtains then the functions $`\beta (t)`$, $`\gamma (t)`$ and $`\nu (t)`$. Comparing (4.1) and (4.2) with (3.17) and (3.18), we see that $`\alpha (t)`$ and $`\mu (t)`$ correspond to superconformal transformations that leave the stress tensor and its superpartner invariant. Since Eqns. (4.1), (4.2) result from the equation of motion (2.11) for the scalar multiplet $`S`$, this is not surprising: $`S`$ generates gauge transformations (2.8) that do not change the superconnection $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$.

What is less obvious, and comes as a surprise, is that the dynamics described by (4.1) and (4.2) is precisely that of superconformal mechanics. To show this, we multiply Eq. (4.1) by $`12\alpha /cl^2`$, and add this to (4.2), multiplied (from the right) by $`12\mu /cl`$, to obtain

$$\left(\alpha \alpha ^{\prime \prime }\frac{1}{2}\alpha ^2\frac{12}{cl^2}T_B\alpha ^2+\frac{18}{cl}T_F\alpha \mu 4l\mu ^{}\mu \right)^{}=0.$$
(4.4)
Defining

$$\alpha =:q^2,$$
(4.5)
one gets from integration of (4.4)

$$q^{\prime \prime }\frac{g}{q^3}\frac{6}{cl^2}T_Bq\frac{2l\mu ^{}\mu }{q^3}+\frac{9}{clq}T_F\mu =0,$$
(4.6)
where $`g`$ denotes an integration constant. Next, we multiply Eq. (4.2) by $`q`$, and add this to (4.6), multiplied by $`cl^2\mu /3`$. This yields

$$\varsigma ^1=\frac{q^2}{\sqrt{g}}\varsigma _{}^{2}{}_{}{}^{},$$
(4.7)
where the spinors $`\varsigma ^{1,2}`$ are defined by

$`\varsigma ^1`$ $`:=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{l}{q}}\mu ,`$ (4.8)
$`\varsigma ^2`$ $`:=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{q^2}{\sqrt{g}}}\varsigma _{}^{1}{}_{}{}^{}{\displaystyle \frac{3T_Fq^3}{cl\sqrt{g}}}.`$ (4.9)
Using the definitions of $`\varsigma ^{1,2}`$ in (4.6), one finally obtains

$$q^{\prime \prime }\frac{g}{q^3}\frac{6}{cl^2}T_Bq+\frac{\sqrt{g}}{lq^3}[\varsigma ^1,\varsigma ^2]+\frac{3}{cl^2}T_F\varsigma ^1=0.$$
(4.10)
(4.7), (4.9) and (4.10) are precisely the equations of motion of the osp$`(2|2)`$ superconformal quantum mechanics considered in  (the $`𝒩=2`$ superextension of the DFF model ), with an additional coupling of the fields $`q(t)`$ and $`\varsigma ^1(t)`$ to the external sources $`T_B(t)`$ and $`T_F(t)`$. These equations of motion result from the action

$$I=𝑑t\left(\frac{1}{2}q^2\frac{1}{2l}\varsigma ^1\varsigma _{}^{1}{}_{}{}^{}\frac{1}{2l}\varsigma ^2\varsigma _{}^{2}{}_{}{}^{}\frac{g}{2q^2}+\frac{\sqrt{g}}{2lq^2}[\varsigma ^1,\varsigma ^2]+\frac{3}{cl^2}T_Bq^2\frac{3}{cl^2}T_F\varsigma ^1q\right).$$
(4.11)
Note that $`T_{B,F}`$, being external sources, are not varied. The partition function computed with the action (4.11) is the generating functional for correlators of the composite operators $`q^2`$ and $`\varsigma ^1q`$.

If we define the $`𝒩=1`$ superfield

$$\mathrm{\Phi }(t)=q(t)+\theta \varsigma ^1(t),$$
(4.12)
and the supercurrent

$$𝒯(t)=T_F(t)+2\theta T_B(t),$$
(4.13)
the source term in (4.11) can be written as

$$I_s=\frac{3}{2cl^2}𝑑t𝑑\theta \mathrm{\Phi }^2𝒯.$$
(4.14)
In the bosonic case, the emergence of the DFF model of conformal quantum mechanics, coupled to an external source, was first shown in .

It is clear that a model of conformal quantum mechanics like the DFF model cannot be invariant under the whole Virasoro algebra. However, when it is coupled to an external field of conformal dimension 2 (e. g. , a stress tensor) that transforms appropriately, it can have such an invariance. The key point is the following observation:121212For simplicity we consider the bosonic case only. The calculation is easily generalized to the supersymmetric model. Start from the DFF model with action

$$I=𝑑t\left(\frac{q^2}{2}\frac{g}{2q^2}\right).$$
(4.15)
If we generalize the transformations considered by DFF , $`t=g(\tau )`$, $`q=Q\sqrt{\dot{g}(\tau )}`$, where a dot denotes a derivative with respect to $`\tau `$, to arbitrary functions $`g(\tau )`$, (4.15) goes over (modulo total derivatives) into

$$I=𝑑\tau \left(\frac{\dot{Q}^2}{2}\frac{g}{2Q^2}\frac{Q^2}{4}\{g,\tau \}\right),$$
(4.16)
where

$$\{g,\tau \}=\frac{2\stackrel{\dot{}\dot{}\dot{}}{g}\dot{g}3\ddot{g}^2}{2\dot{g}^2}$$
(4.17)
is the Schwarzian derivative. DFF considered only PSL$`(2,\text{})`$ transformations with

$$g(\tau )=\frac{A\tau +B}{C\tau +D},ADBC=1,$$
(4.18)
for which the Schwarzian vanishes, so that the action (4.15) remains invariant. One can obtain invariance under the whole Virasoro algebra, corresponding to arbitrary functions $`g(\tau )`$, by coupling the field $`q`$ to an external source $`T_B(t)`$, that transforms like a stress tensor,

$$\left(\frac{dt}{d\tau }\right)^2T_B(t)=\stackrel{~}{T}_B(\tau )\frac{c}{12}\{t,\tau \}.$$
(4.19)
The transformation law of the coupling term $`q^2T_B(t)`$ involves then a Schwarzian derivative that can compensate the one in (4.16), so that the action enjoys invariance under the whole Virasoro algebra.

## 5 De Sitter gravity

In this section we generalize the above considerations to the case of two-dimensional de Sitter gravity. For related work, cf. . Unlike in higher dimensions, the two-dimensional de Sitter algebra so$`(2,1)`$ admits superextensions that do have unitary highest weight representations. Nevertheless, to keep things simple, we will consider below the bosonic case only. The inclusion of supersymmetry should be straightforward.

The action is given by the bosonic part of (2.1), where now $`\mathrm{\Lambda }=1/l^2`$. Adapting the conventions as in appendix A.2, this model can again be formulated as an so$`(2,1)`$ $``$ sl$`(2,\text{})`$ topological gauge theory , with action

$$I=\frac{\beta }{2}\mathrm{Tr}(\varphi F),$$
(5.1)
where $`F=dA+AA`$ denotes the sl$`(2,\text{})`$ field strength, and $`\varphi `$ is an sl$`(2,\text{})`$ valued scalar field. The gravity action is recovered by decomposing the connection $`A`$ and the scalar $`\varphi `$ according to (2.12).

Up to trivial gauge transformations, the boundary conditions for asymptotically ($`t\mathrm{}`$) de Sitter spaces given in  read in terms of the gauge fields

$`A`$ $`=`$ $`\left[{\displaystyle \frac{t}{l^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{T_B(\sigma )}{2\eta _0t}}\right]\tau _1d\sigma +\left[{\displaystyle \frac{t}{l^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{T_B(\sigma )}{2\eta _0t}}\right]\tau _2d\sigma +{\displaystyle \frac{dt}{t}}\tau _0,`$
$`\varphi `$ $`=`$ $`\left[\alpha (\sigma ){\displaystyle \frac{t}{l^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{\beta (\sigma )}{t}}\right]\tau _1+\left[\alpha (\sigma ){\displaystyle \frac{t}{l^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{\beta (\sigma )}{t}}\right]\tau _2+\gamma (\sigma )\tau _0,`$ (5.2)
where the functions $`T_B(\sigma )`$, $`\alpha (\sigma )`$, $`\beta (\sigma )`$ and $`\gamma (\sigma )`$, that depend on the boundary coordinate $`\sigma `$, parametrize the subleading behaviour. The meaning of the constant $`\eta _0`$ will become clear below. Notice that the connection $`A`$ in (5.2) is flat for arbitrary $`T_B(\sigma )`$. The metric

$$ds^2=\frac{l^2}{t^2}dt^2\left(\frac{t}{l}\frac{T_B(\sigma )l}{2\eta _0t}\right)^2d\sigma ^2,$$
(5.3)
resulting from (5.2) satisfies thus the field equations for any $`T_B(\sigma )`$.

Let us now consider the solutions

$`ds^2`$ $`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{t^2}{l^2}}a^2\right)^1dt^2\left({\displaystyle \frac{t^2}{l^2}}a^2\right)d\sigma ^2,`$ (5.4)
$`\eta `$ $`=`$ $`\eta _0{\displaystyle \frac{t}{l}},`$ (5.5)
studied in , with $`a`$ and $`\eta _00`$ denoting integration constants. In the static patch $`0tal`$, $`t`$ becomes a spacelike coordinate, whereas $`\sigma `$ becomes timelike. One can associate to the cosmological event horizon at $`t=al`$ the mass and entropy

$$M=\frac{1}{2l}\eta _0a^2,S=2\pi \eta _0a.$$
(5.6)
Applying the diffeomorphism $`tt+a^2l^2/4t`$ to the metric (5.4) yields

$$ds^2=\frac{l^2}{t^2}dt^2\left(\frac{t}{l}\frac{a^2l}{4t}\right)^2d\sigma ^2.$$
(5.7)
Comparing this with (5.3), we see that in this case one has $`T_B(t)=\eta _0a^2/2=Ml`$, so it essentially coincides with the de Sitter mass.

The gauge transformations

$`\delta _\mathrm{\Lambda }F`$ $`=`$ $`dF+[F,\mathrm{\Lambda }],`$
$`\delta _\mathrm{\Lambda }\varphi `$ $`=`$ $`[\varphi ,\mathrm{\Lambda }],`$ (5.8)
that preserve the asymptotic behaviour (5.2) are generated by

$`\mathrm{\Lambda }^0`$ $`=`$ $`\chi ^{}(\sigma ),`$
$`\mathrm{\Lambda }^1`$ $`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{t}{l^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{T_B(\sigma )}{2\eta _0t}}\right)\chi (\sigma )+{\displaystyle \frac{l^2}{2t}}\chi ^{\prime \prime }(\sigma ),`$ (5.9)
$`\mathrm{\Lambda }^2`$ $`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{t}{l^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{T_B(\sigma )}{2\eta _0t}}\right)\chi (\sigma ){\displaystyle \frac{l^2}{2t}}\chi ^{\prime \prime }(\sigma ).`$
As the function $`\chi (\sigma )`$ is arbitrary, the asymptotic symmetry algebra is infinite-dimensional. Under a gauge transformation with parameters (5.9), $`T_B(\sigma )`$ transforms like a stress tensor,

$$\delta T_B=T_B^{}\chi +2T_B\chi ^{}\frac{c}{12}l^2\chi ^{\prime \prime \prime },$$
(5.10)
with central charge

$$c=12\eta _0.$$
(5.11)
This central charge appearing in the algebra of asymptotic symmetries was found by different methods in .

Using the Cardy formula (3.22) with $`L_0=Ml`$, and mass $`M`$ given by Eq. (5.6), we recover precisely the thermodynamical entropy of de Sitter space.

On shell, one finds for the functions $`\alpha (\sigma )`$, $`\beta (\sigma )`$ and $`\gamma (\sigma )`$ that parametrize the subleading behaviour of the scalar field $`\varphi `$,

$`T_B^{}\alpha `$ $`+`$ $`2T_B\alpha ^{}{\displaystyle \frac{c}{12}}l^2\alpha ^{\prime \prime \prime }=0,`$ (5.12)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{c}{6}}\beta `$ $`=`$ $`T_B\alpha {\displaystyle \frac{c}{12}}l^2\alpha ^{\prime \prime },`$
$`\gamma `$ $`=`$ $`\alpha ^{}.`$
Again, the dynamics (5.12) of the field $`\alpha `$ is that of conformal transformations that leave the CFT stress tensor $`T_B`$ invariant. Like in section 4, defining $`\alpha =:q^2`$, one finds that (5.12) is equivalent to the equation of motion following from the action

$$I=𝑑\sigma \left(\frac{1}{2}q^2\frac{g}{2q^2}+\frac{3}{cl^2}T_Bq^2\right),$$
(5.13)
which is the DFF model131313Aspects of the DFF model in the context of particle motion in spacetimes containing Killing horizons are studied in . coupled to the spin two current $`T_B`$.

Let us finally comment on the fact that dS2 has two conformal boundaries, the past boundary $`^{}`$ and the future boundary $`^+`$, so in principle one expects a dual description in terms of a quantum mechanical system living on a disconnected manifold. Of course the same problem appears in the AdS2 case, since two-dimensional anti-de Sitter space, unlike its higher-dimensional cousins, has two boundaries. A possible way to eliminate the second boundary is to cut the spacetime at $`r=0`$ ($`t=0`$ in the dS2 case), in order that the position-dependent coupling constant represented by the dilaton (cf. Eqns. (3.4) and (5.5)) is positive . Note in this context that the coordinates used e. g. in (5.4) are not global for $`a^2>0`$, so using this coordinate system we implicitely restricted ourselves to one boundary only.

## 6 Final remarks

In this paper we investigated the asymptotic dynamics of topological anti-de Sitter supergravity in two dimensions. We showed that the asymptotic symmetries form a super-Virasoro algebra. Using the central charge of this algebra in Cardy’s formula, we exactly reproduced the thermodynamical entropy of AdS2 black holes. Furthermore, we saw that the dynamics of the dilaton and its superpartner reduces to that of superconformal transformations that leave invariant one holomorphic component of the stress tensor supercurrent of a two-dimensional conformal field theory. It was then shown that this dynamics is governed by a supersymmetric extension of the de Alfaro-Fubini-Furlan model of conformal quantum mechanics.

We also considered two-dimensional de Sitter gravity, and computed the dS2 entropy by counting CFT states. Again, the result coincides with the thermodynamical entropy of dS2.

We do not expect that the superconformal structure discovered here is due to the topological nature of the underlying supergravity model. This can be checked by considering more general (non topological) supergravity theories141414Note in this context that also the CGHS model of two-dimensional dilaton gravity can be formulated as a topological gauge theory, based on the centrally extended Poincaré group . that admit AdS2 vacua, studying the asymptotic symmetries and determining the dynamics of the fields that parametrize the subleading asymptotic behaviour. Such an analysis should be considerably simplified using the formulation of two-dimensional dilaton gravity as a Poisson-Sigma-model 151515See  for a review of dilaton gravity in two dimensions.. Work in this direction is in progress.

## Acknowledgements

This work was partially supported by INFN, MURST and by the European Commission RTN program HPRN-CT-2000-00131, in which S. C. , D. K. and D. Z. are associated to the University of Torino.

## Appendix A Conventions

### A.1 Anti-de Sitter

We denote the bosonic osp$`(1|2)`$ generators by $`\tau _A`$, $`A=0,1,2`$, and the fermionic ones by $`R^i`$, $`i=1,2`$. The $`\tau _A`$ satisfy the sl$`(2,\text{})`$ commutation relations

$$[\tau _A,\tau _B]=ϵ_{ABC}\tau ^C,$$
(A.1)
where $`ϵ_{012}=1`$, and indices are raised and lowered with the metric $`(\eta _{AB})=\mathrm{diag}(1,1,1)`$. Furthermore one has

$$[\tau _A,R^i]=f_{Aj}^iR^j,\{R^i,R^j\}=f_A^{ij}\tau ^A,$$
(A.2)
with $`f_{Aj}^i=(\tau _A)_j^i`$ and $`f_A^{ij}=ϵ^{ik}(\tau _A)_k^j`$, $`ϵ^{12}=1`$. We choose the explicit representation

$$\tau _0=\frac{1}{2}\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 1\\ 1& 0\end{array}\right),\tau _1=\frac{1}{2}\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 1\\ 1& 0\end{array}\right),\tau _2=\frac{1}{2}\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& 0\\ 0& 1\end{array}\right)$$
(A.3)
of the sl$`(2,\text{})`$ generators.

The superalgebra osp$`(1|2)`$ admits an invariant, supersymmetric, nondegenerate bilinear form $`\mathrm{STr}`$ defined by

$$\mathrm{STr}(\tau _A\tau _B)=\frac{1}{2}\eta _{AB},\mathrm{STr}(R^iR^j)=\frac{1}{2}ϵ^{ij}.$$
(A.4)
For the gamma matrices in two dimensions we take $`\gamma ^a=2i\tau ^a`$, where $`a=0,1`$. They satisfy

$$\{\gamma ^a,\gamma ^b\}=2\eta ^{ab},$$
(A.5)
with $`(\eta ^{ab})=\mathrm{diag}(1,1)`$. Furthermore we defined $`\gamma ^{ab}=\frac{1}{2}[\gamma ^a,\gamma ^b]`$, and the parity matrix $`\gamma _5=\gamma _0\gamma _1`$.

Finally, $`dtdr`$ is chosen to have positive orientation.

### A.2 De Sitter

In order to cover the case of de Sitter gravity, we choose the sl$`(2,\text{})`$ generators $`\tau _A`$ such that

$$\mathrm{Tr}(\tau _A\tau _B)=\frac{1}{2}\eta _{AB},$$
(A.6)
where now $`(\eta _{AB})=\mathrm{diag}(1,1,1)`$. A possible representation is

$$\tau _0=\frac{1}{2}\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& 0\\ 0& 1\end{array}\right),\tau _1=\frac{1}{2}\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 1\\ 1& 0\end{array}\right),\tau _2=\frac{1}{2}\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 1\\ 1& 0\end{array}\right).$$
(A.7)