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# A radio continuum survey of the southern sky at 1420 MHz

## 1 Introduction

The present paper describes the observations of the South Celestial Hemisphere at a frequency of 1420 MHz carried out with one of the 30-m radio telescopes of the Instituto Argentino de Radioastronomía (IAR) at Villa Elisa, Argentina. This continuum survey is intended to complement the northern sky survey (Reich reich82 (1982); Reich & Reich reich+reich86 (1986)) made with the 25-m Stockert telescope near Bonn to an all-sky radio continuum survey at 1420 MHz.

There are many reasons for carrying out such a survey. Only all-sky surveys allow, under reasonable assumptions, modelling of the emission distribution in the Galaxy. The recognition and study of nearby large-scale features needs survey data as well as investigations of the Galactic emission spectrum when comparing well-calibrated survey data at different frequencies. One important aspect is the determination of the separation of thermal and non-thermal emission in addition to the non-thermal spectral index, which varies with frequency. A spectral index map based on the 408-MHz survey of Haslam et al. (haslam+82 (1982)) and the northern sky 1420-MHz survey by Reich & Reich (1988a ) showed rather unexpected flat spectra towards the anti-centre direction. In a subsequent discussion Reich & Reich (1988b ) proposed an explanation in terms of a cooling–convection halo model. Spectral information for the southern sky is needed to extend and refine this modelling. Galactic foreground emission components and their spectra are also of high interest for cosmic microwave background studies. Meanwhile, a number of sky-horn measurements were available up to short cm-wavelength (e.g. Platania et al. (platania+98 (1998)) and references therein), which give fairly consistent spectral data for the large-scale Galactic emission. However, due to the rather coarse angular resolution of sky-horns, no spatial details can be derived. These require data of higher angular resolution that are provided by single-dish telescopes.

In the following sections we describe the receiver (2), the observation procedure (3), the data acquisition system (4) and the data processing (5). The survey maps will be presented in a forthcoming paper. As examples we show the centre and the anti-centre region in comparison with the northern sky survey to demonstrate its similar performance.

## 2 Receiving equipment

A deep all-sky radio continuum survey requires receiving equipment having not only sufficient sensitivity to reach the confusion limit of the telescope, but also with the ability to measure the brightest regions of the sky. This is particularly important when regions of both low and high brightness will be crossed by the same scan. The high scanning speed ($`10\mathrm{°}`$/min) necessary to perform a large-area survey makes it impracticable to attenuate the signal from brighter objects during the observations. Thus, a receiver should possess a linear dynamic range in excess of 40 dB. In addition, many problems can be avoided if the receiver calibration is constant over long periods of time, even in storage or standby, for observing periods spaced at intervals of several months. The extra requirements of night-time observations avoiding solar and terrestrial interference make telescope scheduling difficult at times.

A receiver satisfying these requirements was developed and installed in the prime focus of one of the 30-m telescopes of the IAR. Figure 1 shows the block diagram of the receiver system.

The feed is a corrugated horn which, at 1420 MHz, illuminates the dish with a half power beam width of $`60\mathrm{°}`$. Its attenuation at the edge of the dish is $``$17 dB. The feed is followed by a ‘turnstile’, a passive device which picks up two linear or circular polarization components, depending on the adjustment. In our case the adjustment was made such as to allow the extraction of the left-hand and right-hand circular polarization of the signal with a polarization isolation larger than 30 dB. The connection between the feed and the turnstile is made by means of a circular waveguide and the two polarization components, extracted from the turnstile, are coupled out by a coaxial probe.

The two circular polarization components are amplified in two separate channels, each of which contains a GaAs FET low-noise amplifier (LNA) with an equivalent noise temperature of 60 K at room temperature. The system noise temperature, including the receiver, ground and sky contributions, is 90 K towards the coldest regions of the sky. Both channels of the receiver were calibrated by measuring the intensity of a standard noise diode, injected through a pair of directional couplers connected between the turnstile and the LNAs, with two optional levels of either 10 K or 50 K. Control signals from the control room can switch the noise source and select its level. The rest of the front-end receiver consists of bipolar amplifiers, interdigital filters, mixers, a local oscillator and an IF-stage with a centre frequency at 123.5 MHz. The IF-signals from the front-end were subsequently filtered with a phase-matched pair of filters and fed into an IF-polarimeter. This device was supplied by the MPIfR, Bonn, where similar polarimeter systems are used at the Effelsberg 100-m telescope (e.g. Schmidt & Zinz schmidt+zinz90 (1990)). The output is proportional to the four Stokes parameters I, V, U and Q. The linear polarization parameters U and Q are obtained from the in-phase and quadrature analogue correlation of the left-hand and right-hand circular signals coming out from the channels A and B of the receiver. The remaining two parameters, I and V, are formed from the sum and difference of the detected input signals. The receiver front-end is thermally controlled to a temperature of $`20\mathrm{°}\pm 2\mathrm{°}`$ C which results in a gain stability of about 0.1 dB for the system during four hours of observations. Special care was taken to match the cable lengths from the noise source to the directional couplers and from the local oscillator to the mixers. Also, in order to minimize the phase drift in the polarimeter due to differential changes in electrical lengths of channels A and B and to changes in temperature, the underground cables used for IF and LO between the front-end and the control room have low attenuation (Heliax type) and high phase stability. In addition, periodic phase calibrations were made to ensure that the phase tracking between channels was less than 5°. In Table 1 the specifications of the receiver are summarized.

The four-phase switching system is similar to the one used by Haslam et al. (haslam+74 (1974)) to perform a 408-MHz all-sky survey. With this scheme the receiver front-end cycles through four phases of 4 x 60 msec duration. The phases are:

Phase 1: Antenna signal

Phase 2: Antenna signal + Calibration

Phase 3: Antenna signal + Calibration + $`180\mathrm{°}`$

Phaseshift between LHC and RHC

Phase 4: Antenna signal + $`180\mathrm{°}`$ Phaseshift

This particular data acquisition sequence was chosen for optimal calibration because it permits simultaneous measurement and reduction of the effects of receiver gain variations, second-order terms in the correlator and variations of the correlator and voltage-to-frequency converters. For proper receiver data and antenna position synchronization and recording, two cycles of four phases were accumulated. An analogue output and a digital display were available for monitoring purposes and interference detection.

## 3 Observations

The observations were made in the total-power mode in two sequences. Between 1987 and 1989, we used a receiver centred at 1435 MHz avoiding H i line emission. The effective bandwidth was 14 MHz. Additional observations were made during a second period in 1993 and 1994. Due to serious problems with interference around 1450 MHz, the system was tuned at a new centre frequency of 1420 MHz. H i line emission was rejected with a band stop filter resulting in an effective bandwidth of 13 MHz. The major part of the observation was done during the first period. In both periods the observations were made exclusively during night time in order to minimize solar and terrestrial interference. Both periods yielded comparable results.

The data were obtained with the nodding scan technique (Haslam et al. haslam+74 (1974)). The telescope moved continously with a speed of $`10\mathrm{°}`$/min between a declination of $`10\mathrm{°}`$ and the southern celestial pole. In azimuth it pointed to the local meridian. That way, the survey covers 24 hours of right ascension spaced by one minute of time with a full sampling for all declinations. The northern limit of the observations provides an overlap of $`9\mathrm{°}`$ in declination with the northern sky survey, which has a lowest declination of $`19\mathrm{°}`$. This is essential for the matching of both surveys and improves the quality of data in this region.

As mentioned in Sect. 2, the Stokes parameter U and Q (corresponding to linear polarization) have also been recorded, but have not been reduced so far. However, the polarized intensities at 1.4 GHz at medium Galactic latitudes show unexpected structures almost uncorrelated with total intensities (e.g. Uyanıker et al. uyanik+99 (1999)). Modulation by the interstellar medium in front of highly polarized background emission is the most likely explanation. Therefore, the reduction of the polarization data for the southern sky promises interesting results. We summarize some observational parameters in Table 2.

Radio sources, used as flux and pointing calibrators, were observed each night. Maps of the calibration sources were obtained in declination at right ascension intervals of 1 minute. The main calibration sources used were PKS 0518$``$45 (Pictor A) and PKS 0915$``$11 (Hydra A), for which we adopt flux densities of 65.1 Jy and 42.5 Jy, respectively. Other strong radio sources were used as secondary calibrators. Their fluxes were measured relative to a main calibrator during one night. Table 3 lists 22 calibration sources and their adopted peak flux densities.

## 4 The data acquisition system

The data acquisition system used was built around two small microcomputers: a Commodore 64 (C64) and an IBM PC connected through a serial RS 232 channel transmitting in full duplex mode with a speed of 4800 bauds. This system separates signal and calibration, suppresses a radar signal from the neighbouring international airport of Buenos Aires (Ezeiza), and provides antenna position acquisition and control. In addition the separated data streams (approximately 100 bytes per second) were converted into a tabulated scan array, where a weighted sum of the data was formed for points separated in declination by 0$`\stackrel{}{.}`$25, the ‘tabular interval’, along the length of a scan. The interpolation was achieved using a tapered ‘sin(X)/X’ interpolation function whose width was matched to the telescope’s beamwidth. During the time interval between subsequent scans, where the telescope’s direction changes, the tabular scan was computed, formatted and stored on the IBM PC’s disc and printed out on request. Both the computer hardware and software developed for this survey were adapted from the observations carried out with the 25-m Stockert telescope for the northern sky. The subsequent analysis was made by using the NOD2 software library (Haslam haslam74 (1974)).

The acquisition module, attached to the on-line processing microcomputers, consists of two parts: a) signal conditioning amplifiers and voltage-to-frequency converters (V/F); b) Villa Elisa Interface (VEI) which connects the C64 with the V/F and the antenna positioning system. It performed the integration of each 60 msec receiver phase for each of the four channels and also provided the electronic timing for the four-phase cycle of the receiver front-end.

The signal conditioning amplifiers provided the necessary amplification for the required output levels of the polarimeter channels entering the V/F converter and an offset displacement to achieve the full dynamic range utilization of the V/F converter. The V/F converter, developed at the IAR, has an analogue-to-digital conversion of 100 kHz/V, high linearity and temperature drift stability. Its output is counted in 15 bit counters.

The VEI is connected with two channels: one is an 8-bit parallel interface from the user port of the C64 that allows reading of the 8-byte counter registers of the V/F converter, and the other one is a serial RS 232 interface built around a Versatile Interface Adapter (VIA) that interfaces with the antenna positioning system to read the actual position and to send control commands. In addition, the VEI provides all the signals necessary to synchronize the real-time acquisition process: integration time of the analogue-to-digital converters, reset of the counters, acquisition of Stokes parameter, antenna position request, noise source injection, phase switching, C64 interrupt and C64 to IBM PC transmission. The reference clock has a period of 60 msec, which is the minimum integration time. This value was chosen to achieve the minimum quantizing error compatible with receiver parameters, the large range of temperatures to scan and the maximum full-scale frequency of the V/F converter. It results in an 1.25$`\%`$ increase in noise due to digitalization with high 50 Hz frequency rejection. The error of the signal demultiplexing due to the curvature of the gaussian beam is about 0.44$`\%`$ of the antenna temperature for 60 msec integration time.

## 5 Data processing

The data processing is divided into three steps,

1. the on-line logging and analysis at the telescope.
2. the off-line analysis to edit and calibrate the data to form a set of raw maps.
3. combination of the maps via the NOD-2 program library (Haslam haslam74 (1974)) and absolute calibration

### 5.1 The on-line program

A two-level program was installed on the microcomputers. The first level was entered every 60 msec via an interrupt given by the VEI to the C64 and the tasks accomplished during its execution were:

a) Addition of two sets of the four-phase receiver cycles giving an approximate integration time of 0.5 sec.

b) Recording of the current sidereal time and declination from the antenna positioning system and computing of both the signal and calibration demultiplexing for the two total power, the Q and U channels.

c) Transmission of the recorded and computed values to the IBM PC via a 4800 baud RS 232 line.

The second software level provided the weighted tabular scan data. This IBM PC program runs at an asynchronous rate and performed the weighted tabular scan integration at declination intervals of 0$`\stackrel{}{.}`$25 and adds start, stop times and scan identification number. It displays the scan data in real time. A chart recorder permits an on-line check of both the quality of the astronomical data being processed and the performance of the total system.

At the end of each scan the transmission between both microcomputers was suspended to allow the IBM PC to perform the normalization process, i.e. a noise calibration average over all the scan calibration data and storage of the result on disc.

### 5.2 Off-line analysis and map formation

These reduction steps were performed at the MPIfR, Bonn. A flow diagram of the off-line analysis software is shown in Fig. 2.

An analysis of the raw data, namely TP1, TP2, U and Q and their corresponding calibration channels, revealed a significantly reduced quality of the data in one of the TP channels. Hence an additional coverage in order to reach the required sensitivity was required.

The tabular scan data were sorted in ascending right ascension, calibrated, plotted and inspected and edited for distortions or interference. By scanning in declination along the local meridian the sidelobe structure and the ground radiation will be similar for all scans, and therefore the contribution to the antenna temperature is equal for all points at a given declination. Numerous scans observed in regions of the sky where the emission is nearly constant ($`22^\mathrm{h}\mathrm{R}.\mathrm{A}.3^\mathrm{h}`$) were selected for the two different observing sequences and a lower envelope fitted to these data to determine the characteristic of the ground radiation. In the course of determining the ground radiation curve for the observation period 1993/1994 it became clear that this sequence had to be divided into two intervals. Figure 3 shows the ground radiation profiles for UP and DOWN scans at the three different observation periods.

We have no quantitative explanation as to why the ground radiation profiles are different for the three epochs nor why these curves show a different behaviour for UP- and DOWN-scans in period 2&3. Small systematic changes of the system temperature depending on elevation seem to be the most likely reason. These profiles were subtracted from each observed scan before applying the baseline correction procedure. In order to establish a consistent zero level for the observations, the temperature scale and zero level were found by comparison with the absolutely calibrated Stockert 1420-MHz survey in the overlapping area between $`19\mathrm{°}`$ and $`10\mathrm{°}`$ in declination. Each scan was corrected for the skew (‘nodding’) angle and precessed to equatorial coordinates epoch 1950.0. In the common declination range the mean temperature was calculated and compared with the Stockert survey. In this way, we fixed the upper end of a scan. For the lower end, we averaged the data below declinations of $`80\mathrm{°}`$ excluding compact sources and set it to a constant temperature. With this data set first raw maps were computed. The remaining “scanning effects” due to weather conditions and receiver instabilities were removed using the so-called method of unsharp masking (Sofue & Reich sofue+reich79 (1979)). We used an elliptical Gaussian beam of $`1\stackrel{}{.}5\times 0\stackrel{}{.}6`$ as a smoothing function. First- and then second-order polynomial fits to the difference temperatures from the smoothed data were utilised to minimize the scanning effects. For the maps observed during the second and third period we used the corrected map from the first observing period as a reference.

We ended up with four maps of the southern sky: two UP-scan and two DOWN-scan. These maps were separately transformed to Epoch 1950. We next computed the difference between the UP-scan map and the DOWN-scan map of each epoch and that between the maps observed in the same scanning direction but of the two different epochs in order to check the pointing accuracy, the temperature scale and whether the subtracted ground radiation profile was correct. We realized that the bandstop filter used during the second coverage to exclude the contribution from the local H i emission was ineffective in eliminating the H i emission from the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) and the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). Both areas were excluded from the second coverage, i.e. the area covering $`4^\mathrm{h}40^\mathrm{m}\mathrm{R}.\mathrm{A}.6^\mathrm{h}`$ and $`75\mathrm{°}\delta 60\mathrm{°}`$ and $`0^\mathrm{h}20^\mathrm{m}\mathrm{R}.\mathrm{A}.1^\mathrm{h}20^\mathrm{m}`$ and $`75\mathrm{°}\delta 70\mathrm{°}`$. The sensitivity was not reduced because the survey is oversampled in this declination range.

The final map was obtained by adding the four maps with the so-called PLAIT-algorithm (Emerson & Gräve emerson+graeve88 (1988)), which in addition destripes the maps. The first coverage was given a double weight.

The full-beam scaling was adopted from the Stockert survey (S/TB = 11.25 Jy/K), since no large-size antenna pattern could be observed for the IAR 30-m telescope. While the obtained r.m.s.-noise of the present data agrees with that of the Stockert northern sky survey, we note that the southern sky maps show significantly less scanning effects due to the more advanced software and processing power available today.

## 6 Absolute calibration

The Villa Elisa southern sky survey is tied to the Stockert northern sky survey in the region of overlap, but any residual large-scale temperature gradient towards the South Celestial Pole requires the determination of absolute temperatures. Absolute temperatures have been measured by Bensadoun et al. (bensadoun+93 (1993)), who have performed sky-horn measurements at various declinations of the northern but also of the southern sky by using the same equipment to determine the cosmic microwave background temperature at 1.47 GHz. The resolution of these data is $`30\mathrm{°}\times 27\mathrm{°}`$, to which we have convolved both the data of the northern and the southern sky. For the northern sky survey, which was absolutely calibrated by a comparison with data of Howell & Shakeshaft (howell+shake66 (1966)) and Pelyushenko & Stankevich (pely+stank69 (1969)) at a declination of $`30\mathrm{°}`$, we found a difference to the data of Bensadoun et al. (bensadoun+93 (1993)) of +0.53 K. The derived cosmic microwave background temperature by Bensadoun et al. (bensadoun+93 (1993)) at 1.47 GHz of $`2.26\pm 0.19`$ K differs by 0.44 K to that assumed by Reich & Reich (1988a ) of 2.7 K. However, there is an additional measurement of the cosmic microwave background of the northern sky at 1.4 GHz by Staggs et al. (staggs+96 (1996)). Their result is $`2.65_{0.30}^{+0.33}`$ K, rather close to the adopted temperature of 2.7 K for the northern sky. When subtracting a 2.7 K cosmic microwave background contribution from the 1420 MHz data of the northern sky a reliable spectral index map between 408 MHz and 1420 MHz (Reich & Reich 1988a ) was obtained. Any residual temperature offset at 1420 MHz must be small, e.g. not exceeding about 0.1 K, otherwise a spectral change as a function of intensity results.

We take an offset of +0.49 K (e.g. the mean of both the differences mentioned above) as the best compromise for a correction of the Bensadoun et al. data and added this value to the measurements at declination $`75\mathrm{°}`$ and the equatorial south pole. We end up with the following temperatures, averaged for the specified right ascensions, of 3.30 K ($`4^\mathrm{h}6^\mathrm{m}6^\mathrm{h}0^\mathrm{m}`$) and 3.28 K ($`3^\mathrm{h}42^\mathrm{m}4^\mathrm{h}42^\mathrm{m}`$) for $`\delta =75\mathrm{°}`$ and 3.58 K at the south pole ($`7^\mathrm{h}6^\mathrm{m}7^\mathrm{h}42^\mathrm{m}`$). The temperatures from the Villa Elisa 1420 MHz survey are 3.59 K, 3.58 K and 3.59 K, respectively. Clearly, the temperatures at the south pole agree quite well. However, the temperatures at $`75\mathrm{°}`$ declination are about 0.3 K higher than the sky-horn data and are nearly the same as measured at the south pole. We have at present no explanation for this discrepancy compared to the sky-horn data, although the rather steep ground radiation profiles (Fig. 6) in this declination range might influence the zero-level accuracy locally. There is, however, no indication of a significant temperature gradient towards the South Celestial Pole either from the 45 MHz survey of the southern sky (Alvarez et al. alvarez+97 (1997)) or the 408 MHz all-sky survey (Haslam et al. haslam+82 (1982)), which casts some doubt on the accuracy of the sky-horn data.

## 7 Example maps

We show two example maps of the Villa Elisa southern sky survey in comparison to the northern sky Stockert data in their regions of overlap. These maps clearly illustrate the comparable quality of the data from both surveys as well as their common zero level and temperature scale.

Figures 4 and 5 display a region of $`30\mathrm{°}\times 20\mathrm{°}`$ along the Galactic plane north of the Galactic centre area. The corresponding T–T plot (temperature versus temperature plot) is shown in Fig. 6. In this region, rather high temperatures were observed and these data are therefore well suited to confirm the temperature scale of the two surveys. As seen from Fig. 6 both scales agree within about 2%.

As a second example we show in Figs. 7 and 8 a section of the Galactic Anti-centre. The emission level is rather low in this area, with just about 1 K above the cosmic microwave background even in the Galactic plane. The two surveys agree within one contour, which is 50 mK TB.

###### Acknowledgements.

We are indebted to Prof. Richard Wielebinski for his support through all stages of the survey project. We like to thank Dr. Glyn Haslam for providing the on-line software for the receiver control, data acquisition and formation of tabular scans. We also acknowledge the patience of Ursula Geisler for bookkeeping of the raw data of the survey. J.C.T. thanks the Max-Planck-Gesellschaft for financial support during his stay at the MPIfR. We would like to thank Dr. Tom Wilson and Dr. Axel Jessner for comments on the manuscript.


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# Instability of metal-insulator transition against thermal cycling in phase separated Cr-doped manganites

## I INTRODUCTION

Over the past few years, manganites of the general formula RE1-xAExMnO3 have been studied extensively. Although primary interest in these compounds is motivated by the discovery of colossal magnetoresistance, understanding the physical properties even in absence of magnetic field is still far from clear. In particular, the behavior of the resistivity ($`\rho `$) is intriguing. The well studied La0.67Ca0.33MnO3 compound with hole density of nh = 0.33 per Mn exhibits a paramagnetic insulator to a ferromagnetic metal transition upon cooling from high temperature at Tp = TC where TC is the ferromagnetic Curie temperature. For the same hole concentration, the residual resistivity spans over six orders of magntitude and Tp shifts down, either with different choices of the rare earth (RE) and the alkaline (AE) ions or by only varying their fraction as in (La1-yPry)0.67Ca0.33MnO3. The paramagnetic state of some other manganites like La0.7Sr0.3MnO3 is metallic instead of insulating. Metallic like resistivity behavior (d$`\rho `$/dT $`>`$0) in the paramagnetic state was also reported in RE1-xCaxMnO3 for x = 0.8-0.98 and RE = Pr, Nd, Sm, etc . Charge localization due to random Coulomb potential of RE3+, AE2+ ions and spin disorder scattering alone are inadequate to understand these results and other polaronic mechanisms involving strong electron-phonon-spin coupling have to be considered\[Millis1\].

One of the peculiar aspects of the manganites with high residual resistivity is that Tp occurs much below TC in contradiction to the double exchange mechanism which associates the onset of metallic conduction to the ferromagnetic alignment of Mn spins (Tp = TC). There are growing experimental evidences that in most, if not all of the compounds with lower TP ($`<`$150 K), insulator-metal transition is driven by percolation of the ferromagnetic metallic clusters in either paramagnetic or charge ordered insulating background.The huge hysteresis in resistivity of these percolation driven compounds suggests that the transition is of first order. However, kinematics of the transition is largely unknown except for two cases. Babushkina et al found that low the temperature zero field resistivity of (La0.5Nd0.5)0.7Ca0.3MnO3 thin film relaxes to lower values as a function of time. Anane et al reported that the magnetic field driven metallic state of Pr0.67Ca0.33MnO3 is unstable and the resistivity at a given temperature jumps abruptly from a low to a high value at a particular value of time after the removal of external magnetic field. The transition in both of these compounds is of isothermal type, involving growth of ferromagnetic metallic nuclei as a function of time in a charge ordered matrix in the former compound and vice versa in the latter. It is not clear whether time dependent growth of the low temperature phase is the general aspect of the first order transition in manganites. In this back ground, we have chosen Pr0.5Ca0.5Mn1-xCrxO3 compounds which are best known for the spectacular insulator-metal transition shown by them in absence of a magnetic field. The insulator -metal transition in these compounds is due to the percolation of the ferromagnetic clusters in the charge ordered antiferromagnetic matrix and the ferromagnetic phase fraction can be controlled by changing the composition (x) as well as the applied field (H) thus allowing us to study systematically. We will report a new form of insulator-metal transition in this series : The insulator-metal transition is unsually unstable with respect to thermal cycling in absence and in presence of a magnetic field.

## II EXPERIMENT

We measured four probe resistivity of polycrystalline Pr0.5Ca0.5Mn1-xCrxO3 (x = 0.015, 0.02, 0.025, and 0.03) in absence of magnetic field and in presence of H = 2 T, and 5T. The temperature was cycled down and up several times from the starting temperatures TS = 350 K, 300 K, 250 K, 160 K ,100 K, 60 K to the final temperature TF = 5 K at a constant sweep rate of 2.5 K/min. Magnetization under a weak magnetic field of H = 1 mT and also under H = 2 T were measured down and up in between TS = 300 K, 250 K,150 K and TF = 5 K.

## III RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

Figure 1(a) shows $`\rho `$(T) of x = 0.015 under H = 0 T when temperature is cycled down and up from TS = 250 K to TF = 5 K. The number of cycles is denoted by numeric 1,2,3 etc. The sample was not taken out the cryostat prior to the completion of all the thermal cycles. After the 1st cycle 300 K$``$5K$``$300 K, T is reduced to TS. In the 1st cycle, $`\rho `$ raises rapidly around 230 K due to charge-orbital ordering and changes from insulating (d$`\rho `$/dT $`<`$0) to metal like(d$`\rho `$/dT $`>`$0) behavior below Tp = 84 K. $`\rho `$(T) is hysteretic with warming curve below and above the cooling curve for T $`<`$ Tp and $`>`$ Tp respectively and both curves merge for T $`>`$280 K. During the 2nd cycle, Tp shifts down to 74 K and the value of the resistivity $`\rho _p`$ at Tp increases by more than a factor of 10. Upon further thermal cycling, $`\rho _p`$ increases to $``$ 1.95 x 105 and Tp decreases to 45 K in the 4th cycle and $`\rho `$ exceeds more than 106 $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ cm at 40 K in the 5th and 6th cycles. This effect is dominant only for T $`<`$Tp and T close but above Tp but for T $`>`$100 K, all $`\rho `$(T) curves overlap on each other. The variations of Tp and $`\rho _p`$ with number of cycles will be presented latter in Fig.3. The so obtained insulating state is stable and does not revert to the original behavior (1st cycle) when the sample is heated to 300 K and cycled between 300 K and 5 K several times. However, if the sample is air annealed at 1273 K for five hours, the 1st cycle is reproducible with identical Tp and $`\rho _p`$. It should be mentioned that the virgin sample was originally annealed at 1773 K  and annealing at 1273 K after thermal cycling is sufficient to remove any residual strain developed. We found that a shorter annealing time, for example 3 hours at 1273 K, reintroduces the insulator metal transition but with different Tp and $`\rho _p`$. A detailed annealing time dependence of the insulator metal transition is under investigation and will be published in future. For subsequent measurements to be rerported in this paper, we used small bars (3mm x 1mm x 1mm) cut from a single big virgin pellet . Although the insulator-metal transition in manganites is known to be sensitive to chemical doping, pressure, magnetic field etc., 1-9 this is the first time that a destruction of the insulator-metal transition just by thermal cyling is reported in manganites. Our results mimics the behavior of (La1-yAy)0.67Ca0.33MnO3 (y = Pr, Y etc) series whose Tp decreases and $`\rho _p`$ increases with increasing content of smaller Y rare earth ions.

The observed effect is strongly dependent on the composition and decreases with increasing x. Fig. 1(b) shows $`\rho `$ of x = 0.02. This compound exhibits higher Tp (= 120 K while cooling) and nearly ten times lower $`\rho _p`$ (= 4.8 $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ cm while cooling) than x = 0.015 (Tp = 84 K and $`\rho _p`$ = 136 $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ cm while cooling). There is a systematic trend in the behavior of $`\rho _p`$ (warm) and Tp (warm) with increasing the number of cycles: $`\rho _p`$(warm) is comparable to $`\rho _p`$(cool) in the 2nd cycles but becomes much lower than cooling as the number of cycles increases. The weak shoulder in $`\rho `$(warm) which develops around 105 K in the 3rd cycle becomes a prominent maximum in the 10th cycle. As for x = 0.015, resistivity curves in different cycles overlap on each other for T $`>`$$`>`$Tp. Compared to variations by several orders of magnitude in $`\rho _p`$ (cool) for x = 0.015, $`\rho _p`$ (cool) changes only by a factor of 5 in x = 0.02, even in 10th cycle and by less than a factor of 0.8 in x = 0.03 (see Fig. 1(c)). The resistivity of x $``$ 0.03 is unaffected by thermal cycling (not shown here). Fig. 1(d) shows $`\rho `$(T) of x = 0.015 under H = 2 T. We can clearly see the increase of the resistivity with increasing the number of cycles and the insulator-metal transition is abruptly lost in 8th cycle. A comparison of Fig. 1(a) and 1(d) suggests that it is impossible to predict what should be the value of residual or peak resistivity before the sample loses metallic behavior. In the rest of the paper we focus on x = 0.015 which shows the most dramatic effect.

We also investigated whether the observed effect in x = 0.015 is dependent on the starting temperature TS. The resistivity curves for TS = 350 K, 300 K, and 200 K are identical to the data for TS = 250 K and hence we do not present them here for the lack of space. The main panel of Fig. 2(a) shows $`\rho `$(T) for TS = 100 K and the inset shows data for TS = 160 K. The value of $`\rho _p`$ in the 5th cycle decreases from $``$3 x 104 $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ cm for TS = 160 K to $``$575 $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ cm for TS= 100 K and for TS = 60 K (not shown here) whereas $`\rho `$ increases by less than a factor of 1.2. These results point to the fact that the number of cycles needed to destroy insulator-metal transition increases with lowering temperature below 200 K. Instead of varying TS, we also investigated the effect of varying TF. Fig. 2(b) shows $`\rho `$(T) for x = 0.015 with TS = 250 K but TF decreasing from 100 K to 10 K instep of 10 K. In none of the cycles, transition to metallic state is realized. Fig. 3 summarizes the variation of Tp and $`\rho _p`$ with the number of cycles and TS for x = 0.015 in presence and absence of magnetic field.

A doubt could be raised whether the increase of $`\rho `$ is caused by the elapse of time during thermal cycling. To verify this point we measured time dependence of the resistivity at 60 K in different cycles on a sample not submitted to thermal cycling earlier. The result presented in the inset of Fig. 2(a) in a normalized form ($`\rho `$(t)/$`\rho `$(t = 0), where $`\rho `$(t) is the resistivity after t seconds) clearly suggests that $`\rho `$ decreases with time as found by Kimura et al. in Nd0.5Ca0.5Mn0.98Cr0.02O3. This confirms that the observed increase of the resistivity is purely a temperature driven effect. Thus, two different antagonist mechanisms seems to act in thermal cycling and isothermal aging effects. The isothermal aging effect is possibly caused by growth of ferromagnetic clusters in size with time.

To understand the origin of the unstable I -M transition induced by thermal cycling, we carried out magnetization measurements. The main panel of Fig. 4(a) shows M(T) of x = 0.015 under H = 1 mT for TS = 250 K. The peak around 230 K is caused by charge-orbital ordering. Upon lowering temperature further ferromagnetic clusters form below 150 K. Charges are itinerant within these clusters by double exchange mechanism but the resistivity does not decrease as these clusters are isolated. As T decreases further intercluster interactions increase and when a percolating path between ferromagnetic clusters is established around 84 K, $`\rho `$(T) decreases as in Fig. 1(a). Fig. 4(a) clearly shows that the ferromagnetic transition broadens in temperature and its phase fraction decreases each time with temperature cycling. Interestingly, M decreases by about 30 % between the first two cycles but the overal change between the 1st and 5th cycles is only of about 46 %. It should be noted that M does not go to zero in the 5th cycle whereas metallic behavior is lost in resistivity (see Fig. 1(a)). When TS = 160 K, the overall decrease between the 1st and 5th cycles is only 19 %, (see inset of Fig. 4(a)).

Fig. 4(b) shows M(T) measured under a field of 2 T in the field cooled mode and the inset shows M(H) at 10 K made under zero field cooled mode. M(H) in the 1st cycle (see inset in Fig. 4(b)) shows a two phase behavior, one due to gradual alignment of ferromagnetic clusters in the field direction below 1.5 T and another due to field induced canting of spins in antiferromagnetic background above 1.5 T. The observed total magnetization is Mobs = fmMFM+(1-fm)MAF where fm and 1-fm are the volume fractions of the ferromagnetic and the antiferromagnetic phases with saturation magnetic moments MFM and MAFM respectivly. The spin only saturation moment of the Mn site cation is 3.485 $`\mu _B`$ if spins of Cr3+,Mn3+, Mn4+ ions are parallel and 3.395 $`\mu _B`$ if the moment of Cr3+ ion is reversed as suggested earlier. Assuming that the magnetization of the ferromagnetic phase completely saturates at 1.5 T, and the field induced canting of antiferromagnetic moment is negligible below this field, we can estimate the ferromagnetic phase fraction fm = Mobs/MFM =0.582/3.485 =16.7 %.which is slightly above the percolation limit of p$`{}_{c}{}^{}`$14.5 % in the continuum model. In the 8th cycle, fm decreases to 8.4 %.( Mobs/MFM = 0.2938/3.485 = 8.4 %). The values of fm are 17.2 % in the 1st cycle and 8.6 % if we take MFM = 3.395$`\mu _B`$. As a consequence of the decrease of fm, percolation is lost and so is the metallic character of the resistivity at low temperatures. Including a finite value for MAF due to canting at 1.5 T could modify the actual value of fm, but the decrease of the ferromagnetic phase fraction is still undisputable.

When the sample is field cooled under H = 2 T (main panel of Fig. 4(b)), the ferromagnetic phase fraction is 19.6 % and it reduces to 14.2 % ( $``$ pc) in the 8th cycle when the sample becomes insulator. These results clearly suggest that the increase of resistivity is related to the decrease of the ferromagnetic phase fraction. Since fm increases with lowering T below $``$150 K in the 1stcycle, the effect of thermal cycling upon the increase of resistivity also decreases with TS, lowering below 160 K.

At this moment a doubt could be raised : Is the decrease of M due to random freezing of moments of ferromagnetic clusters by local anisotroy fields instead of change in the ferromagnetic phase fraction ?. If cluster freezing is the dominant mechanism, the anisotropy energy is expected to increase in conjunction with the increase in resistivity and we can anticipate the maximum in the zero field cooled magnetization (ZFC) to shift up in the temperature with cycling. To verify this point we carried out the ZFC -M(T) in H = 1 mT and H = 2 T. Fig. 5(a) shows M(T) under H = 1 mT in the ZFC mode after cooling the sample in zero field from 250K to 10 K each time. The data were taken over a smaller temperature range compared to Fig. 4(a) but it serves our purpose. In the first cycle, M(T) increases smoothly from 10 K and exhibits a maximum around 57 K. However, in the second cycle M(T) decreases dramatically in value the temperature range 20 K-110 K and in the next two cycles the change is rather small. The dramatic decrease of M value in the 2nd cycle is not expected in a conventional cluster or spin glass We do not observe the anticipated upward shift of the maximum instead, the ZFC-M(T) curves in the second, third, and fourth cycles show a maximum at T $``$ 30 K. Fig. 5(b) shows M(T) under H = 2 T in the ZFC mode. All the curves again exhibit a maximum at the same temperature (T = 30 K) which also allows us to conclude that cluster freezing is not the dominant mechanism in reducing the value of the magnetization, but that the decrease in the ferromagnetic phase fraction is the the possible origin.

What could be the mechanism which drives the diminution of the ferromagnetic phase ? The ferromagnetic metallic (FMM) and the charge ordered insulating (COI) phases are expected to differ structurally because of the larger degree of Janh-Teller distortion in the latter phase and its absence in the former phase. Then, inhomogeneous strains exist in the interfacial regions. In a first order transition in which elastic interactions between the parent and the product phases are non negligible (example martensitic transition), growth of the product phase does not progress as a function of time as one would expect, but needs changes in the thermal energy. The rapid decrease in the magnetization between the first two cycles and the gradual decrease in the later cycles resemble the evolution of strain in the first few thermal cycles (known also as ’training’) in athermal martensitic materials. In charge ordered phase, d$`_{Z^2}`$ orbital ordering due to the Jahn-Teller distortion creates anisotropic strain. We observed changes neither in intensity nor in the value of the charge-orbital modulation vector q by electron microscopy at 92 K under thermal cycling (not shown here), however we cannot exclude possible changes in the interfacial regions. We also carried out an X-ray diffraction study at T = 300 K and at T = 100 K which is the lowest temperature limit in our X-ray instrument (Philips- X’pert) on a piece of a virgin sample and on a sample which has become an insulator after thermal cycling. We carried out the Rietveld analysis in pbmn settings. The results are presented in tables I and II. Although we find changes in the structural parameters between the two samples, errors in the parameters (see the numbers within brackets ) are too large to be reliable. It is possible that structural changes occur mostly in the interfacial regions between the ferromagnetic and the charge ordered phase which could not be detected in the present X-ray study due to smaller width of the interfacial regions. Millis et al showed that biaxial strain due to the Jahn-Teller distortion could lead to localization of charges and decrease the Curie temperature. Then, a plausible explanation is that upon thermal cycling the Jahn-Teller distortion of Mn3+O6 octahedras in the interfacial regions increases;as a result the interfacial elastic energy increases which impedes the growth of the ferromagnetic phase during thermal cycling similar to the martensitic transition. We do not think that granularity effects play any important role in our results since we find a systematics in the behavior of the thermal cycling effect with different x although all the compounds were prepared under identical conditions. Very recently, similar thermal cycling induced phenomena but less dramatic effect than our results was also reported in Gd5(Si1.95Ge0.25).

## IV
CONCLUSIONS

In conclusion, we have shown for the first time that the insulator-metal transition in the phase separated Pr0.5Ca0.5Mn1-xCrxO3 manganites is unstable with respect to thermal cycling. While the resistivity much above the I-M temperature is found to be unaffected, the resistivity close and below the I-M transition is strongly affected by repeated thermal cycling. Repeated thermal cycling is found to increase the low temperature resistivity and even destroys the metallic transition in x = 0.015. The effect is strongly dependent on the composition and decreases with increasing x. We have shown that the ferromagnetic phase fraction decreases with repeated thermal cycling. Our X-ray and electron diffraction studies do not show any clear evidence for change in structural parameters of the bulk, although changes in interfacial regions can not be excluded.We suggest that increase ofthe elastic energy in the ferromagnetic-charge ordered interface might be the origin of the instability of the I-M transition. In contrary to the thermal cycling effect, resistivity at a given temperature is found to decrease slowly as a function of time. Further experimental and theoretical studies are necessary to clarify the origin of the observed effects. It is also worth to investigate whether the observed effect is restricted to only Cr-doped charge ordered manganite or is is the generic behavior of the manganites for certain doping levels.

Acknowledgments:

R. M. thanks MENRT (France) for financial assistance and thanks Professor. A. K. Raychaudhuri, Professor. M. R. Ibarra, and Professor. D. I. Khomskii for useful discussions.

FIGURE CAPTIONS

: Resistivity of Pr0.5Ca0.5Mn1-xCrxO3 in number of thermal cycling under H = 0 T for x = 0.015 (a), 0.02 (b), 0.03 (c) and under H = 2 T for x = 0.015 (d). TS = starting temperature for thermal cycling. Arrows indicate the direction of temperature sweep.

: Resistivity of Pr0.5Ca0.5Mn0.985Cr0.015O3 in different thermal cycles under H = 0 T for TS = 100 K (main panel) and TS= 160 K (inset). (b) Resistivity under partial thermal cycling from a fixed TS = 250 K to a varying TF from 100 K by a step of -10 K. Inset : Time dependence of resistivity at T = 60 K in different thermal cycles.

: Variation of Tp (a) and $`\rho _p`$ (b) with number of cyles during cooling (closed symbols) and warming (open symbols) for TS = 250 K under H = 0 T, 2 T and 5 T for x = 0.015. O(1) and O(2) respectively stand for TS = 160 K and 100 K for H = 0 T.

: Temperature dependence magnetization of Pr0.5Ca0.5Mn0.985Cr0.015O3 under H = 1 mT for TS= 250 K(a) and TS = 160 K.(inset). M(T) under 2 T in 1st and 8th cycle (b) and field dependence of magnetization in 1st and 8$`^{_{th}}`$ cycles (inset). Hc -critical field for metamagnetic transition.

: M(T) of Pr0.5Ca0.5Mn0.985Cr0.015O3 under zero field cooled mode for (a) H = 1 mT and (b) H = 2 T.

TABLE CAPTIONS

Variation of lattice parameters and atomic positions of the virgin and the cycled Pr0.5Ca0.5Mn0.985Cr0.015O3 samples in Pbmn settings. The numbers in the bracket indicate error.

: Variation of bond distances and bond angles of the virgin and the cycled Pr0.5Ca0.5Mn0.985Cr0.015O3 samples in Pbmn settings. The numbers in the bracket indicate error.


text:
# Relativistic corrections in (𝒆,𝒆'𝒑) knockout reactions

## I Introduction

Exclusive ($`e,e^{}p`$) knockout reactions represent a very clean tool to explore the single-particle (s.p.) aspects of nuclear structure revealing the properties of proton-hole states contained in the hole spectral function .

Several high-resolution experiments were carried out at Saclay  and NIKHEF . The analysis of the missing energy and momentum dependence of the experimental cross sections allowed to assign specific quantum numbers and spectroscopic factors to the peaks in the energy spectrum. The calculations for this analysis were carried out with the program DWEEPY , within the theoretical framework of a nonrelativistic distorted wave impulse approximation (DWIA), where final-state interactions (FSI) and Coulomb distortion of the electron wave functions are taken into account. Phenomenological ingredients were used to compute bound and scattering states. The outgoing nucleon scattering wave functions are eigenfunctions of an optical potential determined through a fit to elastic nucleon-nucleus scattering data including cross sections and polarizations. Bound-state wave functions were calculated with a Woods-Saxon well, where the radius was determined to fit the experimental momentum distributions and the depth was adjusted to give the experimentally observed separation energy of the bound final state. This theoretical approach was able to describe, with a high degree of accuracy, in a wide range of nuclei and in different kinematics, the shape of the experimental momentum distributions at missing-energy values corresponding to specific peaks in the energy spectrum. In order to reproduce the size of the experimental cross sections, the normalization of the bound-state wave function was fitted to the data and identified with the spectroscopic factor. These values, however, are smaller than those predicted by many-body theories.

Similar models based on a fully relativistic DWIA (RDWIA) framework were developed in more recent years . In these approaches the bound nucleons are described by s.p. Dirac wave functions in the presence of scalar and vector potentials fitted to the ground-state properties of the nucleus, and the scattering wave function is solution of the Dirac equation with relativistic optical potentials obtained by fitting elastic proton-nucleus scattering data. Some of these approaches include also an exact treatment of the Coulomb distortion of the electron waves . Also RDWIA analyses were able to give a good description of the experimental momentum distributions. Thus, the shape of the distributions in DWIA and RDWIA calculations are similar, while the spectroscopic factors, obtained by scaling the calculated cross sections to the data, are in RDWIA about $`1020`$% larger than in DWIA analyses, and thus closer to theoretical predictions. The difference was attributed to the relativistic optical potential, which leads to stronger absorption. The nucleon-nucleus interaction exhibits characteristic non-localities which arise quite naturally in the Dirac approach and whose effect was not included in standard nonrelativistic DWIA calculations, but can be accounted for in the nonrelativistic treatment by a renormalization of the scattering wave function. The so-called Darwin normalization factor , that essentially changes the Schrödinger wave function into the upper component of the Dirac wave function, increases the absorption due to FSI and produces a quenching of the calculated cross section by about 15%, with a corresponding enhancement of the spectroscopic factor in agreement with the results obtained in RDWIA.

New data have recently become available from TJNAF. The cross section for quasielastic $`1p`$-shell proton knockout has been measured and the response functions and the asymmetry have been extracted in the 16O($`e,e^{}p`$) reaction at four-momentum transfer squared $`Q^2=0.8`$ (GeV/$`c`$)2 and energy transfer $`\omega 439`$ MeV . In the same kinematics also first polarization transfer measurements have been carried out for the 16O($`\stackrel{}{e},e^{}\stackrel{}{p}`$) reaction . The polarization of the ejected proton in the 12C($`e,e^{}\stackrel{}{p}`$) reaction has been measured at Bates with $`Q^2=0.5`$ (GeV/$`c`$)2 and outgoing-proton energy $`T_\mathrm{p}=274`$ MeV .

The analysis of these new data in kinematic conditions unaccessible in previous experiments, where $`Q^2`$ was less than 0.4 (GeV/$`c`$)2 and $`T_\mathrm{p}`$ generally around 100 MeV, requires a theoretical treatment where all relativistic effects are carefully and consistently included. Indeed these recent data are well described by RDWIA calculations.

Fully relativistic models based on the RDWIA have been developed by different groups . It was shown in Ref.  that the hadronic part of the relativistic transition amplitude can be written in terms of Schrödinger-like wave functions for bound and scattering states and of an effective nuclear current operator which contains the Dirac potentials. In this way, complications due to the solution of the Dirac equation can be avoided and spinor distortion can be accounted for solving a relativized Schrödinger equation, of the same type as that solved in ordinary nonrelativistic DWIA calculations with nonrelativistic or relativistic equivalent potentials, but Dirac scalar and vector potentials appear in the nuclear current operator. This so-called effective Pauli reduction does not represent an approximation. It is in principle exact and can be considered an alternative fully relativistic approach.

This approach was adopted in Refs.  with an effective momentum approximation (EMA) to incorporate spinor distortion into the effective current operator. In this approximation the momentum operators in the term $`𝝈𝒑`$, appearing in the lower components of the Dirac spinor and in the effective current operator, are replaced by their asymptotic values. This model contains approximations, but accounts for all the main relativistic effects and is able to give a good description of the most recent experimental results. The spectroscopic factor extracted in comparison with 16O($`e,e^{}p`$) data for $`1p`$-shell proton knockout is the same as in other RDWIA analyses, i.e. 0.7 .

Both nonrelativistic DWIA and RDWIA models are able to describe, with a good degree of accuracy, the ($`e,e^{}p`$) data at low energies, but the nonrelativistic DWIA approach is more flexible. Some relativistic corrections can be included in a nonrelativistic treatment, but a fully relativistic model is needed for the analysis of the data at higher energies that are now becoming available. It is thus important to establish a clear relationship between the nonrelativistic DWIA treatment that was extensively used in the analysis of low-energy data and RDWIA treatments, in order to understand the relevance of genuine relativistic effects and the limit of validity of the nonrelativstic model.

Relativistic effects as well as the differences between relativistic and norelativistic calculations have been widely and carefully investigated in different papers where RDWIA treatments have been developed. The differences, however, were usually investigated starting from the basis of a relativistic model where terms corresponding to relativistic effects are cancelled, such as, for instance, the lower components in the Dirac spinor and the Darwin factor, or where nonrelativistic approximations are included. Although very interesting, these investigations do not correspond to the result of a direct and consistent comparison between RDWIA and the DWIA calculations carried out with the program DWEEPY, that was used in the analysis of low-energy data. In fact, DWEEPY is based on a nonrelativistic treatment where some relativistic corrections are introduced: a relativistic kinematics is adopted and relativistic corrections at the lowest order in the inverse nucleon mass are included in the nuclear current operator , which is derived from the Foldy-Wouthuysen transformation . The Darwin factor can be simply included in a nonrelativistic treatment , but it was not explicitly considered in the data analyses carried out with DWEEPY.

Only indirect comparison between relativistic and norelativistic calculations can be obtained from the available data analyses carried out with DWEEPY and in RDWIA. In fact, the two types of calculations make generally use of different optical potentials and bound state wave functions, and the difference due to the different theoretical ingredients cannot be attributed to relativity. This problem was already clear in previous investigations of relativistic effects. Various attempts were made to reproduce the conditions of a nonrelativistic calculation from a relativistic approach, but a consistent and direct comparison has not yet been achieved.

The main aim of this paper is to make clear the relationship between the DWIA approach in DWEEPY and RDWIA treatments, and to investigate the relevance of genuine relativistic effects through a direct comparison between the results of the two calculations. A fully relativistic RDWIA treatment of the ($`e,e^{}p`$) knockout reaction has thus been developed. The effective Pauli reduction  has been adopted for the scattering state. For the bound state the numerical solution of the Dirac equation has been used, as in this case it does not represent a too difficult problem. Various computer programs are in fact available, able to explain the global and s.p. properties of a nucleus within the framework of a relativistic mean-field theory. For the scattering state, where a partial-wave expansion is performed, the effective Pauli reduction appears simpler and more flexible, and it is equivalent to the solution of the Dirac equation. From this point of view, our relativistic approach does not contain approximations, since the Schrödinger-like equation is solved for each partial wave starting from a relativistic optical potential and without assuming the EMA prescription in the effective current operator.

The numerical results of this RDWIA model have been compared with the results of DWEEPY. A consistent comparison requires the same kinematical conditions and the use of consistent theoretical ingredients in the two calculations. Thus, in DWEEPY we have adopted for the bound state the normalized upper component of the Dirac spinor and for the scattering state the solution of the same Schrödinger-equivalent optical potential of the relativistic calculation.

Different kinematics have been considered for the comparison, with the aim to investigate the relevance of relativistic effects not included in DWEEPY in different situations, at low energy, in the kinematical region where DWEEPY was extensively and successfully applied, and at higher energy, where relativistic effects are more evident, in order to establish the limit of validity of the nonrelativistic approach.

The relevant formalism is outlined in Sec. II. Relativistic and nonrelativistic calculations of the cross section and response functions for the 16O($`e,e^{}p`$) reaction are compared in Sec. III, where various relativistic effects are investigated. Even though the comparison with experimental data is not the main aim of this work, in Sec. IV we check the reliability of our approach in comparison with data. Some conclusions are drawn in Sec. V.

## II Formalism

### A Relativistic current

In the one-photon exchange approximation, where a photon is exchanged between the incident electron and the target nucleus, the coincidence cross section of the ($`e,e^{}p`$) reaction is given by the contraction between the lepton tensor, dependent only on the electron variables and completely determined by QED, and the hadron tensor, whose components are given by bilinear products of the transition matrix elements of the nuclear current operator. According to the impulse approximation, in which only one nucleon of the target is involved in the reaction, the nuclear current is assumed to be a one-body operator.

In RDWIA the matrix elements of the nuclear current operator, i.e.

$`J^\mu ={\displaystyle d𝒓\overline{\mathrm{\Psi }}_f(𝒓)\widehat{ȷ}^\mu \mathrm{exp}\{\mathrm{i}𝒒𝒓\}\mathrm{\Psi }_i(𝒓)},`$ (1)
are calculated with relativistic wave functions for initial bound and final scattering states.

We choose the electromagnetic current operator corresponding to the $`cc2`$ definition of Ref. , i.e.

$`\widehat{ȷ}^\mu =F_1(Q^2)\gamma ^\mu +\mathrm{i}{\displaystyle \frac{\kappa }{2M}}F_2(Q^2)\sigma ^{\mu \nu }q_\nu ,`$ (2)
where $`q^\nu =(\omega ,𝒒)`$ is the four-momentum transfer, $`Q^2=q^2\omega ^2`$, $`F_1`$ and $`F_2`$ are Dirac and Pauli nucleon form factors, $`\kappa `$ is the anomalous part of the magnetic moment, and $`\sigma ^{\mu \nu }=\mathrm{i}/2[\gamma ^\mu ,\gamma ^\nu ]`$. Current conservation is restored by replacing the longitudinal current by

$$J^\mathrm{L}=J^z=\frac{\omega }{q}J^0.$$
(3)
In our reference frame the $`z`$-axis is along $`𝒒`$ and the $`y`$-axis parallel to $`𝒒\times 𝒑^{}`$.

The bound state wave function

$`\mathrm{\Psi }_i=\left(\begin{array}{c}u_i\\ v_i\end{array}\right)`$ (4)
is obtained as the Dirac-Hartree solution from a relativistic Lagrangian with scalar and vector potentials. Several computer codes calculating the ground and excited state properties of nuclei are easily available in literature .

The ejectile wave function is obtained following the direct Pauli reduction method. It is well known that a Dirac spinor

$`\mathrm{\Psi }=\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{\Psi }_+\\ \mathrm{\Psi }_{}\end{array}\right)`$ (5)
can be written in terms of its positive energy component $`\mathrm{\Psi }_+`$ as

$`\mathrm{\Psi }=\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{\Psi }_+\\ \frac{𝝈𝒑}{E+M+SV}\mathrm{\Psi }_+\end{array}\right),`$ (6)
where $`S=S(r)`$ and $`V=V(r)`$ are the scalar and vector potentials for the nucleon with energy $`E`$. The upper component $`\mathrm{\Psi }_+`$ can be related to a Schrödinger-like wave function $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ by the Darwin factor $`D(r)`$, i.e.

$`\mathrm{\Psi }_+=\sqrt{D(r)}\mathrm{\Phi },`$ (7)
$`D(r)={\displaystyle \frac{E+M+S(r)V(r)}{E+M}}.`$ (8)
The two-component wave function $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ is solution of a Schrödinger equation containing equivalent central and spin-orbit potentials, which are functions of the scalar and vector potentials $`S`$ and $`V`$ and are energy dependent.

Inserting Eq. (7) into Eq. (6) and using the relativistic normalization, we obtain the wave function for the knocked out nucleon

$`\overline{\mathrm{\Psi }}_f`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{\Psi }_f^{}\gamma ^0=\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{E^{}+M}{2E^{}}}}\mathbf{\left[}\left(\begin{array}{c}1\\ \frac{𝝈𝒑}{C}\end{array}\right)\sqrt{D}\mathrm{\Phi }_f\mathbf{\right]}^{}\gamma ^0`$ (9)
$`=`$ $`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{E^{}+M}{2E^{}}}}\mathrm{\Phi }_f^{}\left(\sqrt{D}\right)^{}\mathbf{(}1;𝝈𝒑{\displaystyle \frac{1}{C^{}}}\mathbf{)}\gamma ^0,`$ (10)
where

$`C(r)=E^{}+M+S(r)V(r).`$ (11)
If we substitute Eqs. (2), (4), and (10) into Eq. (1), we obtain the relativistic nuclear current

$`J^0`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{E^{}+M}{2E^{}}}}\mathrm{}\mathrm{d}𝒓\mathrm{\Phi }_f^{}\left(\sqrt{D}\right)^{}\{F_1[u_i\mathrm{i}𝝈\mathbf{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{C^{}}}v_i]`$ (13)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{\kappa }{2M}}F_2[\mathrm{i}(𝝈\mathbf{}){\displaystyle \frac{1}{C^{}}}(𝝈𝒒)u_i+𝝈𝒒v_i]\}\mathrm{exp}\{\mathrm{i}𝒒𝒓\},`$
$`𝑱`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{E^{}+M}{2E^{}}}}\mathrm{}\mathrm{d}𝒓\mathrm{\Phi }_f^{}\left(\sqrt{D}\right)^{}\{F_1[\mathrm{i}(𝝈\mathbf{}){\displaystyle \frac{1}{C^{}}}𝝈u_i+𝝈v_i]`$ (16)
$`+\mathrm{i}{\displaystyle \frac{\kappa }{2M}}F_2[𝝈\times 𝒒u_i+\omega (𝝈\mathbf{}){\displaystyle \frac{1}{C^{}}}𝝈u_i`$
$`\mathrm{i}\omega 𝝈v_i+\mathrm{i}(𝝈\mathbf{}){\displaystyle \frac{1}{C^{}}}(𝝈\times 𝒒)v_i]\}\mathrm{exp}\{\mathrm{i}𝒒𝒓\},`$
where the operator $`𝒑`$ has been replaced by the gradient $`\mathrm{i}\mathbf{}`$, which operates not only on the components of the Dirac spinor but also on $`\mathrm{exp}\{\mathrm{i}𝒒𝒓\}`$.

### B Nonrelativistic current

In nonrelativistic DWIA the matrix elements of the nuclear current are

$`J_{nr}^\mu ={\displaystyle d𝒓\mathrm{\Phi }_f^{}(𝒓)\widehat{ȷ}_{nr}^\mu \mathrm{exp}\{\mathrm{i}𝒒𝒓\}\mathrm{\Phi }_i(𝒓)},`$ (17)
where the bound and scattering states are eigenfunctions of a Schrödinger equation.

In standard DWIA analyses phenomenological ingredients are usually adopted for $`\mathrm{\Phi }_i(𝒓)`$ and $`\mathrm{\Phi }_f(𝒓)`$. In this work and in order to perform a consistent comparison with RDWIA calculations, we employ for $`\mathrm{\Phi }_i(𝒓)`$ the upper component of the Dirac wave function $`u_i`$ and for $`\mathrm{\Phi }_f(𝒓)`$ the Schrödinger-like wave function that appear in the relativistic current of Eq. (16).

The nuclear current operator is obtained from the Foldy-Wouthuysen reduction of the free-nucleon Dirac current through an expansion in a power series of $`1/M`$, i.e.

$`\widehat{ȷ}_{nr}^\mu ={\displaystyle \underset{n=0}{\overset{N}{}}}\widehat{ȷ}_{(n)}^\mu .`$ (18)
In the program DWEEPY the expansion is truncated at second order ($`N=2`$).

### C Cross section and response functions

The coincidence cross section of the unpolarized ($`e,e^{}p`$) reaction is written in terms of four nuclear structure functions $`f_{\lambda \lambda ^{}}`$  as

$`\sigma _0=\sigma _\mathrm{M}E^{}|𝒑^{\mathbf{}}|\left\{\rho _{00}f_{00}+\rho _{11}f_{11}+\rho _{01}f_{01}\mathrm{cos}\alpha +\rho _{11}f_{11}\mathrm{cos}2\alpha \right\},`$ (19)
where $`\sigma _\mathrm{M}`$ is the Mott cross section and $`\alpha `$ the out of plane angle between the electron-scattering plane and the ($`𝒒,𝒑^{}`$)-plane. The coefficients $`\rho _{\lambda \lambda ^{}}`$ are obtained from the components of the lepton tensor and depend only on the electron kinematics. The structure functions $`f_{\lambda \lambda ^{}}`$ are given by suitable combinations of the components of the nuclear current as

$`f_{00}`$ $`=`$ $`<J^0\left(J^0\right)^{}>,`$ (20)
$`f_{11}`$ $`=`$ $`<J^x\left(J^x\right)^{}>+<J^y\left(J^y\right)^{}>,`$ (21)
$`f_{01}`$ $`=`$ $`2\sqrt{2}\mathrm{}\text{e}\left[<J^x\left(J^0\right)^{}>\right],`$ (22)
$`f_{11}`$ $`=`$ $`<J^y\left(J^y\right)^{}><J^x\left(J^x\right)^{}>,`$ (23)
where the brackets mean that the matrix elements are averaged over the initial and summed over the final states fulfilling energy conservation.

In the following we use a different definition of the structure functions, that is

$`R_\mathrm{L}`$ $`=`$ $`(2\pi )^3f_{00},R_\mathrm{T}=(2\pi )^3f_{11},`$ (24)
$`R_{\mathrm{LT}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{(2\pi )^3}{\sqrt{2}}}f_{01},R_{\mathrm{TT}}=(2\pi )^3f_{11}.`$ (25)
If the electron beam is longitudinally polarized with helicity $`h`$, the coincidence cross section for a knocked out nucleon with spin directed along $`\widehat{𝒔}`$ can be written as

$`\sigma _{\text{h},\widehat{\text{s}}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\sigma _0\left[1+𝑷\widehat{𝒔}+h\left(A+𝑷^{}\widehat{𝒔}\right)\right],`$ (26)
where $`\sigma _0`$ is the unpolarized cross section of Eq. (19), $`𝑷`$ the induced polarization, $`A`$ the electron analyzing power and $`𝑷^{}`$ the polarization transfer coefficient. We choose for the polarimeter the three perpendicular directions: $`𝑳`$ parallel to $`𝒑^{\mathbf{}}`$, $`𝑵`$ along $`𝒒\times 𝒑^{\mathbf{}}`$, and $`𝑻=𝑵\times 𝑳`$. The corresponding polarization observables can be written in terms of new structure functions, which contain explicitly the polarization direction of the emitted nucleon. In coplanar kinematics $`(\alpha =0,\pi )`$, only $`P^\text{N}`$, $`P^\text{L}`$, and $`P^\text{T}`$ survive .

## III Relativistic effects in the 16O($`𝒆,𝒆^{}𝒑`$) reaction

The reaction 16O($`e,e^{}p`$)15N has been chosen as a well suited process for testing the relativistic program and investigating the differences with respect to the nonrelativistic program DWEEPY . A large experience concerning theoretical calculations is available on this reaction and a considerable amount of experimental data at different energies and kinematics has been published, including polarization measurements.

The relativistic bound-state wave functions used in the calculations have been obtained from the program ADFX of Ref. , where relativistic Hartree-Bogoliubov equations are solved. The model is applied in the mean-field approximation to the description of ground-state properties of spherical nuclei . Sigma-meson, omega-meson, rho-meson and photon field contribute to the interaction and their potentials are obtained by solving self-consistently Klein-Gordon equations. Moreover, finite range interactions are included to describe pairing correlations and the coupling to particle continuum states. The corresponding wave function for the nonrelativistic calculation has been taken as the upper component of the relativistic Dirac four-component spinor with the proper normalization, i.e. normalized to one in the coordinate and spin space. This is not the best choice for DWEEPY, but a consistent use of the theoretical ingredients is necessary to allow a clear comparison between the two approaches.

The relativistic nuclear current was taken as in Eq. (2). This expression is not only more fundamental than the other forms recovered from the Gordon decomposition, but it is also consistent with the nonrelativistic current used in DWEEPY, where the relativistic corrections up to order $`1/M^2`$ are obtained from a Foldy-Wouthuysen transformation applied to the interaction Hamiltonian where the nuclear current has the same form as in Eq. (2). The Dirac and Pauli form factors $`F_1`$ and $`F_2`$ are taken in both calculations from Ref. .

The outgoing-proton wave function is calculated by means of the relativistic energy-dependent optical potential of Ref. , which fits proton elastic scattering data on several nuclei in an energy range up to 1040 MeV. The program GLOBAL of Ref. , which generates the scalar and vector components of the Dirac optical potential, has been used. Different fits, available from the code, were explored. The Schrödinger equivalent potentials calculated in the same program were used for the nonrelativistic calculation.

The comparison between the results of the two approaches is not restricted to the cross section, but involves also the structure functions, which can be experimentally separated and show a different sensitivity to the treatment of the theoretical ingredients and to relativistic effects.

A kinematics with constant ($`𝒒`$,$`\omega `$), or perpendicular kinematics, was chosen as convenient for the comparison, but some calculations were performed also in parallel kinematics. In both kinematics the incident electron energy and the outgoing proton energy are fixed. In the kinematics with constant ($`𝒒`$,$`\omega `$) the electron scattering angle is calculated by imposing the condition $`|𝒒|`$ = $`|𝒑^{}|`$. Changing the angle of the outgoing proton, different values of the recoil or missing momentum $`p_\mathrm{m}`$, with $`𝒑_\mathrm{m}=𝒒𝒑^{}`$, can be explored. In parallel kinematics $`𝒒`$ is parallel or antiparallel to $`𝒑^{}`$, and different values of $`p_\mathrm{m}`$ are obtained changing the electron scattering angle, and thus $`𝒒`$.

The beam energy $`E_0`$ was fixed in the present work at 2 GeV, in order to minimize the effect of the Coulomb distortion, which is included in the relativistic program only through the effective momentum approximation . Calculations were performed for an outgoing proton energy up to 400 Mev. The missing momentum was explored in a range up to $``$400 MeV/$`c`$.

### A Relativistic $`𝒗`$$`𝒔`$ nonrelativistic results

In this Section the results of the comparison between the DWIA calculations performed with DWEEPY and RDWIA calculations are discussed. DWEEPY is based on a nonrelativistic treatment, but does already contain some relativistic corrections in the kinematics and in the nuclear current through the expansion in $`1/M`$. Therefore, the results of DWEEPY cannot be obtained from the relativistic program simply by dropping relativistic effects, such as the lower components of the Dirac spinor and applying the proper normalizations. Here the comparison is done between the results of the two independent programs. In the first place we checked the numerical consistency of the two programs and verified that they give the same result in the same situation, i.e. when all the differences are eliminated. This numerical check gives us confidence that we are not interpreting the contribution of different ingredients as a relativistic effect.

The comparison between the results of the new RDWIA program and DWEEPY is shown in Figs. 1–6, for the structure functions and the cross section of the 16O($`e,e^{}p`$)15Ng.s. reaction in a kinematics with constant ($`𝒒`$,$`\omega `$), at three values of the proton energy, i.e. $`T_\mathrm{p}`$ = 100 MeV, 200 MeV and 300 MeV.

It is clear from these figures that the differences rapidly increase with the energy. Moreover, the relativistic result is smaller than the nonrelativistic one. This is a well known effect, which was found in all the relativistic calculations and which is essentially due to the Darwin factor  of Eq. (8). In addition, the relativistic calculations include the typical normalization factor $`(E+M)/2E`$ (see Eq. (10)), which has the value 0.95 at 100 MeV and decreases to 0.87 at 300 MeV.

A significant difference is found for the transverse structure function $`R_\mathrm{T}`$ even at $`T_\mathrm{p}`$ = 100 MeV, where a reduction of about 15% is obtained with respect to the nonrelativistic calculation. The reduction grows up to about 25% at 200 MeV, and 40% at 300 MeV. The difference is sensibly reduced, mainly at lower energies, by including in the nuclear current the terms to the order $`1/M^3`$.

Only small differences are found for the longitudinal structure function $`R_\mathrm{L}`$ at all the considered proton energies. Its size, however, decreases when the energy increases and therefore its contribution to the cross section becomes less important.

Large differences are generally found for the interference structure function $`R_{\mathrm{L}T}`$. The combined relativistic effects on $`R_\mathrm{T}`$ and $`R_{\mathrm{L}T}`$ are responsible for the different asymmetry in the cross section at positive and negative values of $`p_\mathrm{m}`$, where the mismatch between the two structure functions adds up on the one side and compensates on the other side.

Large relativistic effects are also found on $`R_{\mathrm{T}T}`$, which is anyhow much smaller than the other structure functions and gives only a negligible contribution to the cross section.

As relativistic effects increase with the energy, the conclusion of this comparison is that DWEEPY can be used with enough confidence at energies around 100 MeV, and, with some caution, up to about 200 MeV. Higher-order terms in the nuclear current can account for a part of the difference in this kinematical region. A fully relativistic calculation is anyhow convenient at 200 MeV and necessary above 300 MeV. This result is consistent with the old one of Ref. , where the validity of the relativistic corrections to the nuclear current, calculated as an expansion on $`1/M`$, were discussed and an upper limit of $`|𝒒|`$ 600 MeV/$`c`$ was stated for the nonrelativistic calculations.

A calculation was performed also in parallel kinematics at $`T_\mathrm{p}`$ = 100 and 200 MeV. In this kinematics only the longitudinal $`R_\mathrm{L}`$ and the transverse structure function $`R_\mathrm{T}`$ survive. The results are shown in Figs. 7 and 8. Also in this case small differences are found for $`R_\mathrm{L}`$, while $`R_\mathrm{T}`$ is significantly reduced in RDWIA. The reduction increases with the outgoing proton energy, and, at a given values of $`T_\mathrm{p}`$, is larger at positive $`p_\mathrm{m}`$, when the momentum transfer decreases. This is mainly due to the fact that the leading term of the spin current, proportional to $`𝒒`$, is the same in the relativistic and nonrelativistic expressions.

### B Darwin factor and spinor distortion of the scattering state

In this Section we shall discuss the effect of the optical potential in the Pauli reduction of the four-component Dirac spinor for the scattering state. We do not discuss the corresponding effect on the bound state, as in our calculations the bound-state wave function is taken directly from the solution of the relativistic Dirac equation.

The effect of the optical potential on the Pauli reduction is twofold: the Darwin factor $`D(r)`$ of Eq. (8), which directly multiplies the Schrödinger-equivalent eigenfunction, and the spinor distortion $`C(r)`$ of Eq. (11), which applies only to the lower component of the Dirac spinor. The distortion of the scattering wavefunction, which is calculated through a partial wave expansion, is always included in the calculation and affects in a similar way the relativistic and nonrelativistic result.

The Darwin factor gives a reduction of about 5-10% at 100 MeV, which is consistent with the qualitative prediction of Ref. . On the contrary, spinor distortion produces an enhancement of the cross section, so that the combined effect of the two corrections is in general small. Moreover, it decreases with the energy. The result is qualitatively in agreement with the ones of Ref. .

In Figs. 9 and 10 the comparison between the two results is shown in the kinematics with constant ($`𝒒,\omega `$) at $`T_\mathrm{p}`$ = 100 MeV, for the structure functions and the cross section, respectively. The effect is always small. Spinor distortion enhances the cross section at high and negative recoil momenta, but this effect seems absent at $`p_\mathrm{m}>0`$ or it is pushed to very high momenta.

The effect is larger on $`R_\mathrm{L}`$ than on $`R_\mathrm{T}`$. Thus, at higher energies, where $`R_\mathrm{T}`$ becomes larger than $`R_\mathrm{L}`$, the effect of spinor distortion on the cross section decreases.

### C Effective momentum approximation

In this Section the validity of EMA is discussed. This prescription, which consists in evaluating the momentum operator in the effective nuclear current using the asymptotic value of the outgoing proton momentum, simplifies considerably the numerical calculations, avoiding the evaluation of the gradient in Eq. (16). It is exact in plane wave impulse approximation (PWIA), where the scattering wave functions are eigenfunctions of the momentum, but in DWIA it disregards the spreading of the distorted proton wave function in momentum space due to FSI.

This approximation was used in some relativistic calculations, and in particular in the model of Refs.  for bound and scattering states. Since in our approach the bound-state wave function is taken directly from the solution of the Dirac equation, we investigate the validity of EMA only for the scattering state.

We have to notice that in our calculations EMA does not change the nuclear current operator, which is calculated with the cc2 formula and therefore does not depend on the momentum. The only dependence is contained in the Pauli reduction of the scattering wave function.

The effect of EMA in our RDWIA approach is shown in Figs. 9 and 10, where the the structure functions and the cross section calculated with EMA in the kinematics with constant ($`𝒒,\omega `$) at $`T_\mathrm{p}`$ = 100 MeV are displayed and compared with the exact result. At 100 MeV the difference is indeed sensible, but it rapidly decreases with the energy. At 200 MeV it is much smaller, and becomes really negligible at $``$ 400 MeV, and therefore at the energy of the TJNAF experiment. This behaviour can be understood if one considers that distortion effects decrease with the energy, so that at high energy DWIA approaches the PWIA result, where EMA is exact.

## IV Comparison with experimental data

In this Section we shall discuss the comparison of our RWDIA results with experimental data. Data are available at low energies, where DWEEPY was extensively and successfully applied, and, more recently, at higher energies, where other RDWIA calculations have given an excellent agreement. Even though a precise description of experimental data is not the main aim of this work, it is interesting to test the predictions of our relativistic approach in comparison with data that have been already and successfully described by other theoretical models.

### A  The 16O($`𝒆,𝒆^{}𝒑`$) reaction

Low-energy data are presented in terms of the reduced cross section , which is defined as the cross section divided by a kinematical factor and the elementary off-shell electron-proton scattering cross section, usually $`\sigma _{cc1}`$ of Ref. .

In Fig. 11 the reduced cross sections measured at NIKHEF  for the 16O($`e,e^{}p`$) knockout reaction and for the transitions to the $`1/2^{}`$ ground state and the $`3/2^{}`$ excited state of 15N are displayed and compared with the results given by our RDWIA program and by DWEEPY. The experiment was carried out in parallel kinematics at $`T_\mathrm{p}`$ = 90 MeV.

The relativistic results are lower than the nonrelativistic ones and the corresponding spectroscopic factors are approximately 10% larger than those deduced from nonrelativistic analyses. Thus, the normalization (spectroscopic) factor, applied in Fig. 11 to the calculated results in order to reproduce the size of the experimental data, is 0.70 for RDWIA and 0.65 for DWEEPY. The same value is adopted for the two final states.

As we already stated in Sec. III, only small differences are found at this proton energy between the two models. Thus, the results of the two calculations are almost equivalent in comparison with data, which are reasonably described by both calculations. A better agreement is found for the $`1/2^{}`$ than for the $`3/2^{}`$ state. In any case, it is not as good as in the DWIA analysis of Ref.  performed with DWEEPY. This result is expected, as we already claimed that the theoretical ingredients, bound state and optical potential, used in the present calculation do not represent the best choice for DWEEPY, but are here adopted in order to allow a consistent comparison between the relativistic and nonrelativtsic approaches.

In Figs. 1215 the cross sections and the structure functions measured at TJNAF  for the 16O($`e,e^{}p`$) knockout reaction and for the transitions to the $`1/2^{}`$ ground state and the $`3/2^{}`$ excited state of 15N are displayed and compared with the results of our RDWIA model. The experiment was carried out in a kinematics with constant ($`𝒒,\omega `$), with $`E_0=`$ 2.4 GeV and $`\omega `$ 439 MeV. Only RDWIA calculations are shown in the figure, since we know from the investigation of Sec. III that at the proton energy of this experiment relativistic effects are large and a relativistic analysis is necessary. In order to study the sensitivity to different optical potentials, we compare in the figures results obtained with the EDAD1 and EDAI-O fits of Ref. . Only small differences are given by the two optical potentials. The agreement with data is satisfactory and of about the same quality as in other RDWIA analyses, but for the interference structure function $`R_{\mathrm{L}T}`$ for the $`1/2^{}`$ state at intermediate missing momenta. A better description of data might be obtained with a more careful determination of the theoretical ingredients.

It is interesting to notice that the spectroscopic factor applied to all the calculatations in Figs. 1215 is the same, i.e. 0.7, as that found in the comparison with NIKHEF data shown in Fig. 11. A spectroscopic factor of about 0.7 was also obtained in previous RDWIA analyses of the same TJNAF data .

### B The 12C($`𝒆,𝒆^{}\stackrel{}{𝒑}`$) and 16O($`\stackrel{}{𝒆},𝒆^{}\stackrel{}{𝒑}`$) reactions

The induced polarization of the outgoing proton $`P^\mathrm{N}`$ was measured at Bates for the 12C($`e,e^{}\stackrel{}{p}`$) reaction . Data were taken in a kinematics with constant ($`𝒒,\omega `$) at $`E_0=`$ 579 MeV and $`\omega `$ 290 MeV. In Fig. 16 these data are displayed and compared with our RDWIA calculations. Results obtained with the EDAD1 and EDAI-C optical potentials are compared in the figure. The EDAD1 curve gives a better description of the experimental data at high values of the missing momentum, but both calculations are in fair agreement with data. With EDAD1 potential, we also plot results after eliminating the negative energy components in the bound state.

As already shown in Ref.  the polarization $`P^\mathrm{N}`$ is enhanced by the presence of the negative energy components of the relativistic bound state wave function. This result is confirmed in Fig. 16 by the dashed line which gives a smaller $`P^\mathrm{N}`$.

A slightly higher polarization is obtained in Ref.  with the nuclear current written in the cc1 form according to Ref. .

The components of the polarization coefficient $`P^\text{L}`$ and $`P^\mathrm{S}`$ were measured at TJNAF  for the 16O($`\stackrel{}{e},e^{}\stackrel{}{p}`$) reaction and for the transitions to the $`1/2^{}`$ ground state and the $`3/2^{}`$ excited state of 15N. The experiment was performed in the same kinematics as in Ref. , that is the one of Figs. 1215. The experimental data are compared with our RDWIA calculations in Fig. 17 for $`1/2^{}`$and in Fig. 18 for the $`3/2^{}`$ state. The two curves in the figures show the results obtained with the EDAD1 and EDAI-O fits. Both results are in satisfactory agreement with data.

## V Summary and conclusions

In order to clarify the differences between the usual nonrelativistic approach and a relativistic description of exclusive $`(e,e^{}p)`$ knockout reactions, we have performed a fully relativistic calculation and compared it with the nonrelativistic results of the DWEEPY code, that was successfully used to analyse a large number of experimental data. The transition matrix element of the nuclear current operator is written in RDWIA using the relativistic bound state wave functions obtained in the framework of the mean field theory, and the direct Pauli reduction method with scalar and vector potentials for the ejectile wave functions. Correspondingly, the nonrelativistic DWIA matrix elements are computed in a consistent way to allow a direct comparison with the relativistic results.

The main aim of this paper was not to make a precise analysis of the existing experimental data, but to discuss the use of a nonrelativistic approach at energies higher than those generally considered up to few years ago, and to clarify the possible relativistic effects arising also at lower energies.

We have used the new RDWIA and DWEEPY codes to perform calculations for several kinematical conditions. The relativistic results are always smaller than the nonrelativistic ones and the difference increases with energy. The transverse and interference structure functions are particularly sensitive to relativistic effects, much more than the longitudinal structure function. $`R_\mathrm{T}`$ is sensibly reduced even at low energy: inclusion of higher order terms in the nonrelativistic nuclear current can reduce the difference, but a fully relativistic calculation is necessary above $`T_\text{p}`$ 200 MeV.

The effect of the scalar and vector potentials in the Pauli reduction for the scattering state has been discussed. These potentials appear in the relativistic treatment and are absent in the nonrelativistic one. The combined contribution of the reduction due to the Darwin factor and of spinor distortion, which enhances the effects of the lower components of the Dirac spinor, is always small.

The validity of EMA in the scattering state of relativistic calculations has been studied. The differences with respect to the exact results are sensible at $`T_\mathrm{p}`$ = 100 Mev, but rapidly decrease with the energy and become negligible at $`T_\text{p}`$ 400 MeV.

We have tested our new RDWIA calculations in comparison with experimental data that have already been described by other models. The agreement is satisfactory and comparable with other relativistic analyses.