format: text

text:
# The surface barrier in mesoscopic type I and type II superconductors

## I INTRODUCTION

In the last years there has been an important experimental and theoretical interest in the study of vortex physics in a mesoscopic scale. The smallness of these systems imply that the sample geometry and the interaction between the vortices and the sample surface become important. The interaction between vortices and the surface manifests itself fundamentally in the existence of a surface barrier, first studied by Bean and Livingston, which delays the vortex penetration and generates metastable states. If the surface effects are ignored, the penetration of magnetic field is energetically favorable at the first critical field $`H_{c1}`$. However the energy barrier of the surface prevents the vortex entry until a higher field $`H_p`$ at which the barrier vanishes. $`H_p`$, also known as the superheating field, is associated with the peak in the magnetization curves and is strongly influenced by the presence of surface irregularities.

The surface barrier has attracted a renewed interest recently in the study of mesoscopic superconductors. For example, Enomoto and Okada  by means of numerical simulations of the time-dependent Ginzburg-Landau equations (TDGL), studied the influence of temperature and surface irregularities on the surface barrier. Sonin and Traito  showed that the presence of the surface barrier affects the entry and exit of vortices influencing the surface resistance. They found a surface-induced suppression of the ac losses.

One important line of research of mesoscopic superconductors are the superconducting disks.  The study of small superconducting disks was started by Buisson et al.  for disks with radius $``$ 7 $`\mu `$m. Recent advances in the microfabrication technology and measurement techniques now allow the fabrication and study of superconducting disks with sizes comparable to the coherence length $`\xi `$, with radius as small as 0.3 $`\mu `$m. Most of the studies were done in Al disks, a material with $`\kappa 0.3`$, however for small samples the effective penetration depth $`\mathrm{\Lambda }=\lambda ^2/d`$ increases for decreasing disk thickness ($`d`$) resulting in effective $`\kappa `$ values in the type II region that can be studied theoretically using the equilibrium Ginzburg-Landau equations. In this regime the Al disk can develop Abrikosov multivortex states  and depending on the radius ($`R`$) and thickness of the disk it is possible to observe first or second order phase transitions, by increasing the disk sizes the second order reversible phase transition observed for small disk radius is replaced by a first order transition. There is also an intermediate regime where jumps in the magnetization appear associated with the vortex entrance. Other interesting phenomena have been studied for mesoscopic Al disks, for example in Ref. hysteresis in the magnetization curves was observed experimentally and explained in terms of the presence of a “Bean-Livingston” surface barrier and in Ref.  the behavior of the third critical field $`H_{c3}`$ was investigated for different sample sizes and geometries.

The time dependent Ginzburg-Landau (TDGL) equations have been proposed  as a time dependent generalization of the mean field approach of the Ginzburg-Landau theory. Gorkov and Eliasberg  obtained the TDGL equations from the microscopic BCS theory in the gapless case. In the last years, numerical simulations of the time dependent Ginzburg-Landau (TDGL) equations have been suscesfully used to study the magnetic properties and flux dynamics in superconductors.  Frah et al.  and Liu et al.  simulated the TDGL equations for $`\kappa =0.320`$, Kato et al.  and Machida and Kaburaki for $`\kappa =2`$, Aranson et al.  studied vortex dynamics in the $`\kappa =\mathrm{}`$ limit , and Vicente-Álvarez et al. studied the dynamics of $`d`$-wave superconductors. Only few studies of the TDGL equations have been done in superconductors with type I behavior, possibly because the theory is better to describe a superconductor near a second order phase transition at a temperature near $`T_c`$.

In this paper, we present a numerical simulation of the TDGL equations to study the surface barrier in mesoscopic samples for $`\kappa =0.152`$. We neglect demagnetization effects and therefore we assume that the sample is infinite in the direction of the external magnetic field (the $`\widehat{𝐳}`$ direction). We consider square samples that are mesoscopic in the $`xy`$ plane (perpendicular to the magnetic field) with linear sizes of $`530\lambda `$, with $`\lambda `$ the penetration depth.

The paper is organized as follows. In Sec.II we present the TDGL equations with their discretized form in finite differences, and we discuss their possible boundary conditions. In the Sec.III of the paper we study the dependence of the penetration field $`H_p`$ with the Ginzburg-Landau parameter $`\kappa `$ ($`\kappa =\lambda /\xi `$), exploring both the type I ($`\kappa <1/\sqrt{2}`$) and the type II region ($`\kappa >1/\sqrt{2}`$) for large samples. We study the effects of the surface barrier from a comparison of two types of boundary conditions. (i) The superconductor-insulator (S-I) boundary condition: consisting in the vanishing of the superconducting current perpendicular to the boundary ($`𝐉_𝐬\widehat{𝐧}=0`$). In this case we find an increase of $`H_p`$ with decreasing $`\kappa `$. (ii) The superconductor-normal (S-N) boundary condition: approximated as the vanishing of the superconducting order parameter at the boundary ($`\mathrm{\Psi }|_S=0`$). A different behavior is observed for the S-N boundary condition, the field $`H_p`$ is independent of $`\kappa `$ and nearly equal to $`H_c`$. In the Sec.IV we study the surface barrier in mesoscopic superconductors. In particular, in Sec.IVA we study magnetization curves in type II superconductors at different sample dimensions in the region where the transition from a macroscopic to a mesoscopic behavior takes place. In Sec.IVB we show that the discontinuities that appear in the magnetization curves of mesoscopic samples can be explained by considering that the vortices that are inside the sample induce a reinforcement of the surface barrier at fields greater than the first penetration field. In this way, it is possible to define a second, third, fourth, etc. penetration fields which are a consequence of the interaction between vortices and the surface currents. We study the sample size dependence of the first, second and third penetration fields and we show that for sufficiently large sample sizes the known macroscopic behavior is recovered, i.e. a continuous magnetization curve appears since $`H_{p3}H_{p2}H_p`$. Finally in Sec.V we give a summary of our results and conclusions.

## II MODEL AND DYNAMICS

### A TDGL equations

Our numerical simulations are carried out using the time-dependent Ginzburg-Landau equations complemented with the appropriate Maxwell equations. In the zero-electric potential gauge we have:

$`{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Psi }}{t}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{\eta }}[(iA)^2\mathrm{\Psi }+(1T)(1|\mathrm{\Psi }|^2)\mathrm{\Psi }]`$ (1)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{A}{t}}=(1T)\text{Im}[\mathrm{\Psi }^{}(iA)\mathrm{\Psi }]\kappa ^2\times \times A`$ (2)
where $`\mathrm{\Psi }`$ and $`A`$ are the order parameter and vector potential respectively and $`T`$ is the temperature. Equations (1) and (2) are in their dimensionless form. Lengths have been scaled in units of $`\xi (0)`$, times in units of $`t_0=4\pi \sigma \lambda ^2/c^2=\xi (0)^2/\eta D`$, $`A`$ in units of $`H_{c2}(0)\xi (0)`$ and temperatures in units of $`T_c`$. $`\eta `$ is proportional to the ratio of characteristic times for $`\mathrm{\Psi }`$ and $`A`$, $`\eta =t_\mathrm{\Psi }/t_0=c^2/(4\pi \sigma \kappa ^2D)`$, with $`t_\mathrm{\Psi }=\xi ^2/D`$, where $`\sigma `$ is the quasiparticle conductivity and $`D`$ is the electron diffusion constant. For superconductors with magnetic impurities we have $`D=c^2/(48\pi \kappa ^2\sigma )`$, and therefore $`\eta =12`$ in this case.

We have used the standard finite difference discretization scheme to solve equations (1) and (2).  The order parameter and vector potentials are defined at the nodes of a rectangular mesh ($`\stackrel{}{r}=(I,J)`$), and the link variables $`U_{{}_{\mu }{}^{}I,J}=\mathrm{exp}(ı\kappa h_\mu A_{\mu I,J})(\mu =x,y)`$ are introduced in order to maintain the gauge invariance under discretization.

In our simulations we have assumed a sample that has a square/rectangular shape in the $`x,y`$ direction with dimensions $`L_x\times L_y`$ and it is infinite in the $`z`$ direction. We apply the magnetic field parallel to the $`z`$ direction, the symmetry of the problem then implies for all mesh points $`A_{I,J}=(A_{xI,J},A_{yI,J},0)`$ and $`𝐁_{I,J}=(0,0,B_{zI,J})`$, where $`B_{{}_{z}{}^{}I,J}=(\times \stackrel{}{A})_z=(_xA_{{}_{y}{}^{}I,J}_yA_{{}_{x}{}^{}I,J})`$.

In this geometry the discretized form of equations (1) and (2) are:

$`{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Psi }}{t}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\eta }}({\displaystyle \frac{U_{{}_{x}{}^{}IJ}\mathrm{\Psi }_{I+1,J}2\mathrm{\Psi }_{I,J}+U_{{}_{x}{}^{}I1,J}\mathrm{\Psi }_{I1,J}}{(\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}+`$ (3)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{U_{{}_{y}{}^{}I,J}\mathrm{\Psi }_{I,J+1}2\mathrm{\Psi }_{I,J}+U_{{}_{x}{}^{}I,J1}\mathrm{\Psi }_{I,J1}}{(\mathrm{\Delta }y)^2}}+`$ (4)
$`+`$ $`(1{\displaystyle \frac{T}{T_c}})(1|\mathrm{\Psi }_{I,J}|^2)\mathrm{\Psi }_{I,J})`$ (5)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{A_{{}_{x}{}^{}I,J}}{t}}`$ $`=`$ $`(1{\displaystyle \frac{T}{T_c}}){\displaystyle \frac{\text{Im}[U_{{}_{x}{}^{}I,J}\mathrm{\Psi }_{I,J}^{}\mathrm{\Psi }_{I+1,J}]}{\mathrm{\Delta }x}}`$ (6)
$``$ $`\kappa ^2({\displaystyle \frac{B_{{}_{z}{}^{}I,J}B_{{}_{z}{}^{}I,J1}}{\mathrm{\Delta }y}})`$ (7)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{A_{{}_{y}{}^{}I,J}}{t}}`$ $`=`$ $`(1{\displaystyle \frac{T}{T_c}}){\displaystyle \frac{\text{Im}[U_{{}_{y}{}^{}I,J}\mathrm{\Psi }_{I,J}^{}\mathrm{\Psi }_{I,J+1}]}{\mathrm{\Delta }y}}`$ (8)
$``$ $`\kappa ^2({\displaystyle \frac{B_{{}_{z}{}^{}I,J}B_{{}_{z}{}^{}I1,J}}{\mathrm{\Delta }x}})`$ (9)
where $`\mathrm{\Delta }x`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }y`$ are the mesh widths of the spatial discretization.

### B Boundary conditions

The dynamical equations must be completemented with the appropriate boundary conditions for both the order parameter and the vector potential.

The boundary conditions for the vector potentials $`A_{\mu I,J}`$ are obtained by making

$$B=\times A=H_a$$

at the sample surface (where $`H_a`$ is the applied magnetic field).

The boundary conditions for the order parameter depend sensibly on the physical nature of the boundary. In general is given by:

$$(\stackrel{}{\mathrm{\Pi }}\mathrm{\Psi })|_n=(i\stackrel{}{A})|_n\mathrm{\Psi }=\frac{\mathrm{\Psi }}{b}$$
(10)
where $`b`$ is a surface extrapolation length which embodies the surface suppression (or enhancement if $`b<0`$) of the superconducting order parameter.

For the boundary between a superconductor and an insulator (or the vacuum) we have $`b\xi ^2(0)/a`$, with $`a`$ the interatomic distance. For low temperature superconductors $`b`$ is huge ($`1`$cm), and the superconductor-insulator (S-I) boundary condition is usually approximated with the limit $`b\mathrm{}`$:

$$(i\stackrel{}{A})|_n\mathrm{\Psi }=0$$
(11)
This boundary condition implies that the perpendicular component of the superconducting current is equal to zero at the surface ($`\stackrel{}{J}_s|_n=0`$). This is the most frequently used boundary condition because it also minimizes the free energy at the sample surface. More precisely, this boundary condition is valid for superconductors with interfaces for which $`b\xi (T)`$.

For the boundary between a superconductor and a normal metal we have $`b\frac{N}{N_N}\frac{1}{T_j}\frac{\xi (0)^2}{\xi _N}`$, with $`N`$ the local density of states at the Fermi surface, $`N_N`$ the bulk density of states, $`T_j`$ the transmission coefficient at the boundary and $`\xi _N`$ is the coherence length in the normal state.  Typically $`(N_N/N)T_j1`$ and $`b`$ is small when compared to $`\xi (T)`$. Therefore, the superconducting-normal (S-N) boundary condition can be approximated by $`b0`$, giving:

$$\mathrm{\Psi }|_S=0.$$
(12)
The case of $`b0`$ is also found for a ferromagnet-superconductor surface. Moreover, the condition $`\mathrm{\Psi }|_S=0`$ is similar to having a high density of defects at the interface and therefore a highly defective surface is also represented by (8). It is also interesting to note that for high $`T_c`$ superconductors even the superconductor-insulator boundary is better approximated by (8) since $`b\xi (0)^2/a\xi (T)`$ in a large range of temperatures, due to the smallness of $`\xi (0)`$ in this case. The boundary condition of (8) completely suppresses the currents at the boundary ($`\stackrel{}{J}_s^{}=\stackrel{}{J}_s^{}=0`$) and maximizes the surface Helmholtz free energy, which becomes equal to the free energy of a normal metal.

In the study of the surface barrier in Sec.III we will compare these two conceptually different boundary conditions of the order parameter. They represent the two limiting cases of Eq. (6) and we will call them, in short, the “S-I” boundary condition (Eq. (7)) and the “S-N” boundary condition (Eq. (8)). A previous discussion of these two types of boundary conditions was done by Buisson et al. , where the equilibrium solutions and eigenvalues of the linearized Ginzburg-Landau equations were compared to study the behavior near $`H_{c2}`$. However, for the vortex nucleation process at low magnetic fields the nonlinear terms of the Ginzburg-Landau equations should be considered.

## III SURFACE BARRIER IN MACROSCOPIC SAMPLES

When the magnetic field $`H`$ is increased starting from $`H=0`$ in a finite sample, the Meissner state is destroyed at a magnetic field $`H_p`$ which is typically higher than $`H_{c1}`$. This is due to the presence of a surface barrier for vortex entrance in finite samples. The surface barrier in macroscopic samples is sometimes known as the “Bean-Livingston barrier” since it was first studied by Bean and Livingston (BL) . In the BL work the surface barrier was obtained in the London approximation and for the ideal case of a semi-infinite superconductor, therefore vortex core nucleation effects and geometrical effects were both neglected. With this simplification, the BL work was able to identify one of the most relevant causes of the surface barrier: the screening currents near the surface circulate in the opposite direction to the superconducting currents around a vortex. This is typically viewed as a competition between the repulsion between the vortex and the surface shielding current and the attractive force between a vortex inside the sample and its image. This argument, which is based on the London model, yields the Bean-Livingston result for the penetration field, $`H_p^{\mathrm{London}}\frac{\sqrt{2}}{2}H_c`$, which is independent of $`\kappa `$. However, in addition to overcoming the barrier induced by the shielding Meissner currents, a vortex penetration event has also to deplet the superconducting order parameter $`|\mathrm{\Psi }|`$ at the surface, resulting in a higher penetration field $`H_p(\kappa )>H_p^{\mathrm{London}}`$. This later effect can be sensitive to the boundary conditions of the Ginzburg-Landau equations. In this section we will discuss the effect of boundary conditions on the surface barrier in macroscopic samples as a function of $`\kappa `$.

We start our study of the surface barrier by first analyzing the magnetization curves in large samples. The magnetization curves for the S-I boundary condition are summarized in Fig.1 and for the S-N boundary condition are summarized in Fig.2. In both cases the curves were obtained initializing the variables to a perfect Meissner state \[$`\mathrm{\Psi }(I,J,t=0)=1`$ and $`A(I,J,t=0)=0`$\] and increasing the magnetic field at subsequent steps, usually with $`\mathrm{\Delta }H=0.05H_{c2}`$. We take as the initial condition at a magnetic field $`H`$ the final state of $`\mathrm{\Psi }(I,J)`$ and $`A(I,J)`$ of the previous magnetic field value $`H\mathrm{\Delta }H`$. In this way we mimic the experimental procedure of increasing the magnetic field in a magnetization measurement. For each magnetic field we calculate the magnetization $`M`$ taking time averages of the time dependent magnetization $`M(t)`$:

$`4\pi M(t)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }x\mathrm{\Delta }_y}{L_xL_y}}{\displaystyle \underset{I,J}{}}B_z(I,J,t)H_a`$ (13)
$`M`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }t}{t_ft_o}}{\displaystyle \underset{t=t_0}{\overset{t_f}{}}}M(t),`$ (14)
where we start the average at a time $`t_0`$ after a steady state was reached. In the simulations we have taken $`T=0.5`$, $`\eta =12`$ and we used a mesh of $`120\times 120`$ points. In order to make efficient calculations we have chosen the time step ($`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$) and the spatial discretization ($`\mathrm{\Delta }x`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }y`$) depending on the value of $`\kappa `$. For example, for $`\kappa =0.15`$ we used $`\mathrm{\Delta }x=\mathrm{\Delta }y=0.05`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }t=0.0025`$; for $`\kappa =0.8`$, $`\mathrm{\Delta }x=\mathrm{\Delta }y=0.3`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }t=0.0025`$ and for $`\kappa =2`$, $`\mathrm{\Delta }x=\mathrm{\Delta }y=0.5`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }t=0.015`$. Since the TDGL equations considered here represent a mean field dynamics, the effect of thermal noise fluctuations beyond mean field are neglected, which is correct for low $`T_c`$ superconductors.

Figure 1(a) shows the case of a type I superconductor with $`\kappa =0.15`$. We can see that the TDGL equations reproduce the basic phenomenology of type I superconductivity characterized by a first-order magnetic transition. In this case the superconductivity disappears abruptly and there is no surface superconductivity. The field profile is described by a Meissner state and $`H=H_a\mathrm{exp}(x/\lambda )`$. In this simulation the intermediate state structures typical of type I superconductors are not found at equilibrium since the long range interactions between currents and demagnetization effects are neglected. Results for a type II superconductor with $`\kappa =2`$ are shown in Figure 1(c). In this case the superconductor is in the Meissner state until a penetration field $`H_p`$ is reached. At $`H_p`$ some vortices enter the sample and a peak in the magnetization curve is observed. Above $`H_p`$ the magnetization increases due to the penetration of vortices in the sample, until the establishment of surface superconductivity for fields in the range $`H_{c3}(T)>H>H_{c2}(T)`$. The criterion for surface superconductivity that we use is the existence of superconductivity in the surface (i.e. $`|\mathrm{\Psi }|0`$ in a contour around the surface of width equal to the discretization length, $`\mathrm{\Delta }x=0.5\xi `$ in this case) and the exact vanishing of superconductivity in the bulk (i.e. $`|\mathrm{\Psi }|=0`$ inside the region enclosed by the surface contour).

The S-N boundary condition leads to a different magnetic behavior as can be observed in Figure 2 where we have used similar parameters as those reported in Figure 1. We observe the following differences: (i) The magnetization is smaller for the same external magnetic field (there are less vortices). Since in this case the superconducting order parameter vanishes at the surface, the Meissner shielding currents are nucleated at a distance of a few $`\xi `$ inside the sample, instead of being right at the boundary. Therefore less vortices can stay inside the sample for a given magnetic field when compared with the S-I boundary. For example, for $`\kappa =2`$, we find that the shielding distance $`\delta `$ between the vortices and the sample surface is $`\delta _{SN}5\lambda `$ for the S-N interface while for the S-I interface we have $`\delta _{SI}3\lambda `$. In the general case, when the boundary condition is described by Eq.(6) with a finite $`b`$, one can expect that the shielding distance will have an intermediate value $`\delta _{SN}>\delta (b)>\delta _{SI}`$. (ii) There is no surface superconductivity above $`H_{c2}`$. This is an obvious and direct consequence of the S-N boundary condition that enforces $`\mathrm{\Psi }|_S=0`$. (iii) The first penetration field $`H_p`$ is smaller and therefore the surface barrier is lower, we will discuss this in detail in the following paragraphs.

In order to understand the difference in the surface barrier, let us study the dynamics of the first vortex penetration just at $`H=H_p`$. Figure 3 shows the dynamic evolution of the order parameter near a small region close to an S-I interface (Figure 3 left) and close to an S-N interface (Figure 3 right). If the interface is of the S-I type the order parameter at the boundary is different from zero in the Meissner state. When the condition for vortex entrance is fulfilled the order parameter at a boundary point has to decrease until reaching zero. Therefore there is an intermediate time interval when $`\mathrm{\Psi }=0`$ in a point at the boundary. Just in this moment a vortex can enter the sample and afterwards the order parameter at the boundary increases again and returns to a non-zero value. It is interesting to note that this process is always necessary for vortex penetration in S-I interfaces, there is always the need of an intermediate $`\mathrm{\Psi }=0`$ state at the boundary. On the contrary, a smooth entrance of vortices is observed for an S-N interface (Figure 3 right).

For this boundary condition the order parameter at the interface is already zero. A small deformation of the region of $`\mathrm{\Psi }=0`$ allows for the penetration of a vortex. Since there is no need of depressing the order parameter at the boundary, the surface barrier is much smaller in the S-N case. A similar dynamical behavior for vortex entrance would appear in an S-I interface with defects at the surface. At the defects the order parameter is depressed and therefore $`\mathrm{\Psi }=0`$ is already established at some boundary points, which are preferred points for vortex entrance.

From the magnetization curves we can obtain the first field for flux penetration $`H_p`$ as a function of $`\kappa `$ for the different boundary conditions, this is shown in Figure 4. The $`\kappa `$ dependence of the superheating field $`H_p`$ has been previosly calculated for the case of a semi-infinite medium with the Ginzburg-Landau equations. Matricon and Saint James obtained $`H_p(\kappa )`$ solving the semi-infinite one-dimensional GL equations, in Ref.  the stability of the superheated state under small fluctuations of the order parameter and the vector potential was discussed, and very recently Vodolazov  analyzed the effects of surface defects on $`H_p`$. In the case of a one dimensional semi-infinite medium, the Matricon-Saint James solution can be obtained solving the equations:

$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2\mathrm{\Psi }}{\kappa ^2dx^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`A^2\mathrm{\Psi }+\mathrm{\Psi }\mathrm{\Psi }^3,`$ (15)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2A}{dx^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{\Psi }^2A`$ (16)
with the boundary conditions:

$`H=H_a\text{and}{\displaystyle \frac{d\mathrm{\Psi }}{dx}}=0`$ at $`x=0`$ (17)
$`A=H=0\text{and}\mathrm{\Psi }=1`$ at $`x=\mathrm{}`$ (18)
Solving numerically equations (9) with the boundary condition (10) it is possible to find a relationship among $`H_a`$ and $`\mathrm{\Psi }(x=0)=\mathrm{\Psi }_o`$, where $`H_p`$ is the maximum value of $`H_a`$ that allows a physically meaningful $`\mathrm{\Psi }_o`$, i.e. $`0<\mathrm{\Psi }_o<1`$. The results obtained in this way are represented by the continuous-line of Figure 4. Our simulational results, on the other hand, are a numerical solution of the exact problem in a two dimensional square sample (which has geometrical effects) and are represented by closed circles. The $`H_p`$ values reported here are the peaks of the simulated dc-magnetization curves and the error bars correspond to the discrete field step used in the the magnetization curves. We see in Fig. 4 that the value of $`H_p`$ obtained for the S-I interface is always well above $`H_{c1}`$ in the type II region ($`H_{c1}(T)=[(\mathrm{ln}\kappa )/\sqrt{2}\kappa ]H_c(T)`$) and above $`H_c`$ in the type I region, supporting the existence of a “surface barrier” even in the type I case. Our numerical simulations show that for the S-I interface $`H_p`$ increases with decreasing $`\kappa `$ and $`H_p(\kappa )>H_c`$, with a behavior in good agreement with the result for the semi-infinite medium obtained by Matricon-Saint James. (However, for smaller mesoscopic samples the value of $`H_p`$ can be significantly larger than the Matricon-Saint James result, enhancing the geometrical effect of the square sample, see Sec. IV). For $`\kappa 0`$ our results agree with the known behavior of the superheating field in type I supeconductors, $`H_p1/\sqrt{\kappa }`$.  For $`\kappa \mathrm{}`$ we obtain that $`H_pH_c`$ in agreement with the result of Ref. . Figure 4 also shows that in the type II region the $`H_{c2}`$ values obtained from the S-I simulations (closed squares) are close to the expected values ($`H_{c2}(T)=\sqrt{2}\kappa H_c(T)`$, dotted line). Some differences in $`H_{c2}`$ appear at small $`\kappa `$ near the type I region, since in this region the field $`H_p`$ is close to $`H_{c2}`$ and a delay of the superconducting-normal transition could be expected.

The behavior of $`H_p`$ vs $`\kappa `$ is very different when the S-N boundary condition is used. In this case, $`H_p`$ is independent of $`\kappa `$ and nearly equal to $`H_p^{\mathrm{London}}H_c`$ (see the open circles of Figure 4). This result shows that in the case of the S-N interface, when the condition $`\mathrm{\Psi }|_S=0`$ is enforced, the surface barrier is only due to the surface shielding currents and well described by the London approximation value of Bean and Livingston: $`H_p^{\mathrm{London}}`$. On the other hand, in the case of the S-I interface the penetration field $`H_p`$ is higher due to the extra contribution needed for the vanishing of the order parameter at the surface in a vortex penetration event. In a type I superconductor, the “surface barrier” can be interpreted as the barrier for penetration of the normal state from

the boundary. In the S-N interface of a type I superconductor there is no barrier, i.e. $`H_p=H_c`$, which is an obvious result since the boundary condition already enforces the normal phase ($`\mathrm{\Psi }=0`$) at the surface. On the contrary, in the S-I interface of a type I superconductor the barrier for nucleation of the normal phase at the boundary can be very high, $`H_pH_c`$, as can be seen in Fig.4.

In the general case, when the boundary condition of a superconducting sample is described by Eq.(6) with a finite $`b`$, we expect that $`H_p(b,\kappa )`$ will be in between the two limit cases studied here, $`H_p^{SN}(b=0,\kappa )<H_p(b,\kappa )<H_p^{SI}(b=\mathrm{},\kappa )`$. Ideally, most of the superconductors should be closer to the behavior of $`H_p^{SI}(b=\mathrm{},\kappa )`$ but the effect of a finite $`b`$ and the presence of defects at the surface will give a smaller value of $`H_p`$ with a lower bound given by $`H_p^{SN}(b=0,\kappa )`$.

## IV SURFACE BARRIER IN MESOSCOPIC SAMPLES

### A Finite-size effects in mesoscopic type II superconductors

The magnetic behavior of mesoscopic superconductors is different from the behavior of bulk samples. In the mesoscopic scale, several maxima appear in the magnetization curves which are related to the vortex entrance. This result is quite general and appears either in thin films at parallel fields  or mesoscopic superconducting disks.  In this section we study the magnetic behavior of superconducting samples of different sizes, in particular we cover the sample size region where a transition from a mesoscopic to a bulk behavior takes place.

Figure 5 shows the dc-magnetic behavior of superconducting square samples of different sizes with S-I boundary condition. The behavior of Fig.5(a) is typical of the macroscopic samples that we have studied in the previous section, however if we decrease the sample size to the mesoscopic region the continuous behavior disappears and some magnetization maxima followed by discontinuous jumps appear (see Figs.5(b) and (c)).

We find that the discontinuities in the magnetization correspond to the penetration of new vortices into the sample, this will be discussed in detail in Sec.IVB.

If we change the boundary condition and we use the ‘S-N’ condition we find, as it is shown in Figure 6, a different mesoscopic behavior: there is an appreciable decrease in the number of magnetization maxima and the transition between the states of the system with a different number of vortices seems more continuous. In other words, for the same sample size, fewer vortex penetration events are needed to arrive to the normal state. The decrease in the number of entrance events for the S-N boundary in mesoscopic samples is related to the fact that this boundary condition allows less vortices inside the sample, as discussed in the previous section. The fact that the S-N interface needs a larger shielding distance, $`\delta _{SN}>\delta _{SI}`$, has clearly stronger consequences in the magnetic behavior of a mesoscopic sample. At the same magnetic field the mean magnetization values of the Meissner state are lower in the S-N case than in the S-I case as can be observed comparing Figures 5(c) and 6(c). In general a mesoscopic sample with a boundary corresponding to $`0<b<\mathrm{}`$ in Eq.(6), will have a magnetization behavior in between the two limiting cases of Fig. 5 and Fig. 6.

The changes observed in the magnetization curves when going from the macroscopic to the mesoscopic behavior are quite general and do not depend on the sample geometry. We also study the magnetic behavior of a thin film with the field parallel to its faces. In this case there is only one relevant dimension, the thickness of the film ($`d`$). We work here in the case $`d>\lambda `$. Figure 7 shows the magnetic behavior of thin films with different thickness obtained using the S-I boundary condition. We observe that in this case the discontinuities in the magnetization curves appear at smaller film thickness and that they are less important than in squares samples, possibly because vortices in a mesoscopic square sample are more confined than in thin films of the same linear size. We have also done numerical calculations of the magnetic behavior in thin films using the S-N boundary condition (see Figure 8). In particular Figure 8(c) shows that for very small film thickness there is a continuous change in magnetization without the jagged structure observed in Fig.8(a-b). In this case vortex lines do not penetrate the sample and the superconducting state disappears gradually. This behavior is also present when we use the S-I boundary condition but it is necessary to explore lower sample sizes than the one shown in the corresponding figures.

### B Multiple penetration fields in mesoscopic samples

The behavior of the magnetization in mesoscopic type II samples is characterized by maxima followed by discontinuous jumps as a function of the external magnetic field. In Figure 9 we show in detail the case for a sample of size $`10\lambda \times 10\lambda `$ and $`\kappa =2`$. At the same time we plot the total number of vortices inside the sample, $`N_v=\frac{1}{\mathrm{\Phi }_o}(A+\frac{J_s}{|\mathrm{\Psi }|^2})𝑑l`$. We see that each discontinuous jump in $`M(H)`$ corresponds to an increase of $`\mathrm{\Delta }N_v=4`$ in the number of vortices. These jumps occur at succesive magnetic fields $`H_{pi}=H_{p1},H_{p2},H_{p3},\mathrm{}`$, which are indicated in the figure. In the regions of $`H_{pi}<H<H_{p(i+1)}`$ the number of vortices $`N_v`$ is constant. Therefore the only penetration events occur at $`H_{pi}`$, when one vortex enters in each of the four sides of the square sample. In the region of constant vorticity, $`H_{pi}<H<H_{p(i+1)}`$, one may think that no vortices enter the sample because they feel a surface barrier which is enhanced by the repulsion force exerted by the vortices already inside the sample.

To analyze this effect, let us extend the simple London approximation model of Bean and Livingston for the surface barrier to the case when there are extra vortices inside the sample and near the boundary. In the London approach, the Gibbs free energy ($`G`$) of a vortex line located a distance $`x`$ from the sample surface can be calculated as:

$$G=\frac{\mathrm{\Phi }_o}{4\pi }[H_a\mathrm{exp}(\frac{x}{\lambda })\frac{1}{2}\frac{\mathrm{\Phi }_o}{2\pi \lambda ^2}K_o(\frac{2x}{\lambda })+H_{c1}H_a]$$
(19)
where $`H_a`$ is the external magnetic field and $`K_o`$ is the modified Bessel function of the second kind. In normalized units the above expression reads:

$$\frac{4\pi G}{H_{c2}\mathrm{\Phi }_o}=[H_a\mathrm{exp}(\frac{x}{\lambda })\frac{1}{2k^2}K_o(\frac{2x}{\lambda })+\frac{\mathrm{ln}\kappa }{2\kappa ^2}H_a]$$
(20)
where we have used the relation $`H_{c1}=(\mathrm{ln}\kappa )/2\kappa ^2H_{c2}`$. The first term of Equations (12) and (13) is related with the repulsive interaction between the vortex line and the external field, the second term describes the attraction between the vortex and the surface currents, this term is usually interpreted as the interaction with an image vortex  and the third term is the vortex self energy.

The above expressions are valid when there are no vortices inside the sample. If there are vortices located inside the sample, some additional terms due to the interaction between the vortices are needed. In the following we will assume that there is only one vortex inside the sample located at position $`l`$ and that we are analysing the Gibbs free energy in the same line perpendicular to the sample surface. If $`l`$ is small, the new vortex that is trying to enter the sample now feels two additional terms. The first term is the repulsive force between the vortices and the second is the attractive interaction with the image of the vortex located inside the sample. The last term is needed in order to take into account the perturbation of the

vortex already inside the sample because of its proximity to the surface. Both contributions are more important in mesoscopic superconductors as we will show below. The free energy that gives the correct force expression is:

$`{\displaystyle \frac{4\pi G}{H_{c2}\mathrm{\Phi }_o}}=H_a\mathrm{exp}({\displaystyle \frac{x}{\lambda }}){\displaystyle \frac{1}{2\kappa ^2}}K_o({\displaystyle \frac{2x}{\lambda }})+{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{ln}\kappa }{4\kappa ^2}}H_a+`$ (21)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\kappa ^2}}K_o({\displaystyle \frac{lx}{\lambda }}){\displaystyle \frac{1}{\kappa ^2}}K_o({\displaystyle \frac{l+x}{\lambda }})`$ (22)
Equations (13) and (14) are approximate expressions and have the limitation that they are not valid near the sample surface, then we will only use it for $`x>\xi `$. It is useful to note that in a more exact treatment we should obtain that $`G0`$ when $`x0`$ because the Gibbs free energy of a vortex located outside the sample must be zero.

Figures 10(a), 10(b) and 10(c) were generated using Equation (13) for $`\kappa =2`$. The free energy of the vortex depends on both the applied magnetic field and the distance to the surface. For $`H<H_{c1}`$ the free energy associated with a vortex is positive at all $`x`$ values, as it is shown in Figure 10(a), vortices are then thermodynamically unstable inside the superconductor and there is an energy cost associated with the vortex entrance. The thermodynamic condition for vortex penetration is not fulfilled until $`H>H_{c1}`$, when the free energy of a vortex located well inside the superconductor becomes negative, see Figure 10(b). However, Figure 10(b) also shows that because of the attractive interaction between the vortex and the surface currents a barrier to vortex entrance appears nears the surface. This is the “Bean-Livingston” surface barrier originated by the screening currents. Taking into account Equation (13) it is possible to estimate $`H_p`$ as the magnetic field for which the expression $`(G/x)_{x=\xi }`$ becomes negative, i.e. when the maximum of $`G(x)`$ moves inside the region $`x<\xi `$. This condition is fulfilled at $`H_p=\frac{\sqrt{2}}{2}H_c`$ ($`H_p0.24H_{c2}`$ in Figure 10(c)). At $`H=H_p`$ some vortices penetrate the sample and the free energy associated with the entrance of a new vortex now must be calculated using an analogous to Equation (14), the exact expression depends on the number of vortices and their location inside the sample. Considering only one vortex located at $`x=l=3\lambda `$ and using Equation (14) we have calculated the free energy just after the first vortex entrance ($`H>0.24H_{c2}`$), the results are shown in Figure 10(d). Observe that the free energy changes considerably from Figure 10(c) to figure 10(d). Now there are three relevant regions: i) near $`x=3\lambda `$, there is a region where the Gibbs free energy increases with increasing $`x`$, the strong repulsive interaction with the vortex inside the sample dominates; ii) there is an intermediate region where G decreases at increasing $`x`$, this means that a vortex located in this region will be pulled inside the sample, it is possible to allocate vortices in this region and there is also a region iii) near the sample surface that repels vortex entrance, $`G`$ increases for increasing $`x`$. The existence of regions ii) and iii) means a reinforcement of the surface barrier induced by vortex penetration and allows magnetic field intervals of metastable states. This energy barrier reinforcement due to vortex entrance is more important in mesoscopic superconductors because, in small samples, vortices are confined by the potential well generated by the sample surface and even a vortex fixed in the center of the sample is very close to the surface. For example in an $`10\lambda \times 10\lambda `$ square sample, vortices are constrained to be located around the center of the sample at $`x=5\lambda `$, because of its interaction with the surface currents. As a consequence vortices stay at $`x5\lambda `$ generating a new surface barrier and it is necessary an important magnetic field increase to allow new vortex penetration. For macroscopic samples the situation is quite different, there is a nearly continuous vortex penetration. In macroscopic samples the vortices that are inside the sample are not confined and they do not have serious restrictions in their movement since they can be allocated very far from the surface. In this case, a small increase of the magnetic field is enough to accommodate new vortex lines, as can be observed in Figure 5(a).

From the analysis of Figure 9 and the previous discussion we can conclude that in mesoscopic samples there are preferred values of magnetic field for vortex penetration, in this case the process of vortex entrance is discontinuous in contrast with the continuous macroscopic regime. This behavior is a consequence of the barrier to vortex entrance that appears after each penetration event. In this way we can define a second penetration field $`H_{p2}`$, a third penetration field $`H_{p3}`$ and so on. We observe that after increasing the size of the sample the vortex penetration becomes continuous ($`H_{p3}H_{p2}H_p`$).

The exact delimitation of the macroscopic and mesoscopic regimes depends on the geometry of the sample. We will now study in detail the behavior of a thin film because is a simpler case with only one significant length scale. The size dependence of the penetration fields $`H_p,H_{p2},H_{p3}`$ obtained numerically from the TDGL equations in a thin film using the S-I boundary condition are summarized in Figure 11(a). For $`d>15\lambda `$ a continuous vortex penetration is observed, this is the region of a macroscopic behavior. The mesoscopic region is located at $`2\lambda d15\lambda `$ in which several penetration fields $`H_{p_i}`$ can be distinguished. For $`d<2\lambda `$ there is a gradual transition to the normal state without vortices. Figure 11(b) shows the sample size dependence of the first, second and third penetration field of thin films using an S-N boundary condition. For the S-N boundary the scales are shifted to larger sizes since the shielding length is larger ($`\delta _{SN}>\delta _{SI}`$), as we discussed before. The macroscopic behavior appears at $`d>18\lambda `$, the mesoscopic region is located between $`5\lambda d18\lambda `$ and for $`d<5\lambda `$ a continuous transition to the normal state appears.

It is interesting to note that $`H_p`$ is size dependent in the mesoscopic region. This size dependence can be explained by considering in Equation (13) the effect of two surfaces that are separated by a small distance $`d`$. The term generated by the magnetic field $`H\mathrm{exp}(x/\lambda )`$ now becomes $`H\mathrm{cosh}[(xd)/\lambda ]/\mathrm{cosh}(d/\lambda )`$ due to the proximity of the other surface, the magnetic force that pulls the vortex inside the sample decreases when the film thickness ($`d`$) decreases. The image term also changes because the vortex lines that are trying to enter the sample are now near both surfaces and new image lines are necessary in order to satisfy the boundary condition at both surfaces. The application of the image method to parallel surfaces gives an infinite number of images, but the net effect is the appearance of an attractive interaction to the new surface. Then, in the mesoscopic region, there is also a decrease in the net attractive image force. If we consider only three relevant terms in the image forces, the normalized force $`f=(4\pi /\mathrm{\Phi }_oH_{c2})\lambda (\delta G/\delta x)`$ that feels a vortex line that is trying to enter when the sample is in the Meissner state can be estimated by:

$`f=H_a{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{sinh}(\frac{xd/2}{\lambda })}{\mathrm{cosh}(d/2\lambda )}}+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\kappa ^2}}K_1({\displaystyle \frac{2x}{\lambda }})`$ (23)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\kappa ^2}}K_1({\displaystyle \frac{2d2x}{\lambda }})+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\kappa ^2}}K_1({\displaystyle \frac{2d+2x}{\lambda }})`$ (24)
where $`d`$ is the thickness of the film and we have chosen $`f`$ positive when it repels the vortex entrance. As we analyzed before, $`H_p`$ is usually obtained from $`f|_{x=\xi }=0`$.

This condition leads to the following expression for $`H_p`$:

$`H_p={\displaystyle \frac{[K_1(\frac{2\xi }{\lambda })K_1(\frac{2d2\xi }{\lambda })+K_1(\frac{2d+2\xi }{\lambda })]\mathrm{cosh}(\frac{d}{2\lambda })}{\kappa ^2\mathrm{sinh}(\frac{d2\xi }{2\lambda })}}`$ (25)
We have evaluated this behavior of $`H_p(d)`$ in Figure 11(c). As it can be observed, when we decrease the thickness of the film the repulsive magnetic force decreases faster than the attractive term, and the $`H_p`$ value increases. In Figure 11(c) we also estimate the behavior of the second penetration field $`H_{p2}`$ as a function of the sample size. The approximate expression used was obtained including in the Equation (15) the extra terms related with the presence of a vortex line inside the sample as we did in Equation (14). For simplicity we have considered one vortex located at the middle of the sample at $`x=d/2`$. Under this condition $`H_{p2}`$ becomes:

$`H_{p2}`$ $`=`$ $`[K_1({\displaystyle \frac{2\xi }{\lambda }})K_1({\displaystyle \frac{2d2\xi }{\lambda }})+K_1({\displaystyle \frac{2d+2\xi }{\lambda }})+`$ (26)
$`+`$ $`K_1({\displaystyle \frac{d2\xi }{2\lambda }})+K_1({\displaystyle \frac{d+2\xi }{2\lambda }})`$ (27)
$``$ $`K_1({\displaystyle \frac{3d+2\xi }{2\lambda }})]{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{cosh}(\frac{d}{2\lambda })}{\kappa ^2\mathrm{sinh}(\frac{d2\xi }{2\lambda })}}`$ (28)
this expression also reproduces the $`H_{p2}`$ sample size dependence observed in the numerical simulations.

## V SUMMARY

We have presented results on the study of the magnetization curves and the surface barrier for type I and type II superconductors. Our results show that the strength of the surface barrier depends on the boundary. If the interface is of the S-I type, the vortices that enter find a higher barrier for penetration since the order parameter at the surface has to go through an intermediate state of $`\mathrm{\Psi }=0`$, while for the S-N boundary condition the vortex entrance occurs more smoothly since the $`\mathrm{\Psi }=0`$ condition is already fulfilled by the interface. In this later case the surface barrier is only due to the Meissner shielding currents and the penetration field $`H_p`$ agrees well with the Bean-Livingston value, while in the S-I case $`H_p`$ is higher and dependent on $`\kappa `$. Superconductors with more realistic boundary conditions should lie in between these two cases.

We also characterized the reinforcement of the surface barrier due to the presence of vortex lines inside the sample in mesoscopic superconductors. We show that these new barriers allow for the existence of metastable states of constant vorticity as a function of magnetic field. Each metastable state becomes unstable at the $`i`$-th penetration field $`H_{pi}`$ in which one vortex enters in each side of the sample and the magnetization has a discontinuous jump. We study the magnetization curves at different sample dimensions and we obtain the sample size dependence of the first, second and third penetration fields. We finally show that for sufficiently large sample sizes the continuous macroscopic regimen is recovered, i.e. $`H_{p3}H_{p2}H_p`$.

###### Acknowledgements.

We acknowledge helpful discussions with Arturo López and Niels Grønbech-Jensen. A.D.H. acknowledges Oscar Arés and C. Hart for useful comments and help and the Centro Latino-Americano de Física (CLAF) for financial support. D.D. acknowledges support from Conicet and CNEA (Argentina). We also acknowledge the financial support for this project from ANPCyT and Fundación Antorchas.


text:
# On the nature of the microquasar V4641 Sagittarii

## 1 Introduction

The source SAX J1819.3-2525 attracted considerable attention after the detection of a giant optical outburst on 1999 September 15.7 UT, from the magnitudes 14.0 to 8.8 in the V-band (Stubbings, 1999). The source, in the direction of the galactic bulge, was centered on a star called V4641 Sgr in the catalog of variable stars and located in the constellation of Sagittarius (Kazarovets et al., 2000). Due to a confusion, most of the references of this X-ray source are reported to the name of GM Sgr. After this confusion was clarified by Williams (1999) and Samus et al. (1999), the source was newly designated V4641 Sgr (Kazarovets et al., 2000). The X-ray source XTE J1819-254 flared, from 1.6 to 12.2 Crab in the X-rays on 1999, September 14th, as observed by RXTE in the 2-12 keV band, through a brief but dramatic eruption (brightest source of X-rays in the sky), its position being coincident with the optical transient (Smith et al., 1999). Less than 10 hours later, the source was fainter than 50 mCrab. This source was identified with the previously detected faint X-ray transient, SAX J1819.3-2525, discovered by SAX on 1999, Feb 20th, (in’t Zand et al., 1999) (energy $`0.0120.3`$ Crab), and independently detected by RXTE, on 1999, Feb 18th (Markwardt et al., 1999), with an energy between $`<1`$ and $`80`$ mCrab in the 2-10 keV energy band.

Kato et al. (1999) reported an unusual optical activity prior to this giant optical and X-ray outburst, through a $`1`$ mag high-amplitude modulation 6 days before the giant outburst (on Sep. 8th), and a quasi-periodicity of 2.5 days, which they claimed to correspond to the orbital period. Three other eruptions followed each lasting less than two hours in the X-rays, ones of the fastest bursts ever seen. The observations by RXTE (Wijnands & van der Klis, 2000) allowed to observe some strong flaring activity: fluctuations by a factor of 4 on the timescale of seconds, and 500 on minutes. No QPO was detected, but some red noise at $`<`$ 30 Hz was present. The observations by SAX (in’t Zand et al., 2000) gave a best fit for the column density of $`N\text{(H)}0.05\pm 0.02\times 10^{22}\text{ cm}^2`$.

The VLA radio telescope detected on Sept. 16.02 UT a strong radio source of 0.4 Jy at 4.9 GHz, at the position of the variable star, at $`\alpha `$ = $`18^h19^m21\text{.}^s636`$, $`\delta `$ = $`25^{}24^{}25\text{.}^{\prime \prime }6`$ (J2000) (Hjellming et al., 1999a). The galactic coordinates are ($`l,b`$) = ($`6.774015^{},4.789045^{}`$). The flux decreased on a timescale of hours, with an e-fold decay time of 0.6 day. The source was resolved, with the presence of an elongation extending $`0.25^{\prime \prime }`$ between 0.6-1.2 day after the huge X-ray flare. On Sept. 17.93, 22.00 and 24.1 UT, the elongation was at the same position (Hjellming et al., 1999b). They claimed that the proper motion was $`0.5^{\prime \prime }`$ / day, but this is strongly dependent upon the time of the ejection. The jets seem to suggest a high inclination angle. This allowed to classify the source as a new microquasar (for a review on the jet sources see Mirabel & Rodríguez (1999)). An HI absorption experiment towards the source implied a distance $`d>0.4\text{ kpc}`$ (Hjellming et al., 2000), and these authors proposed a likely distance of $`0.5\text{ kpc}`$.

Orosz et al. (2000b) derived from ESO spectroscopic observations an optical mass function of $`2.74\pm 0.12\text{ }M_{}`$, which, combined with the information on the inclination, makes of V4641 a black hole system with a mass of the compact object $`8.73M_111.70\text{ }M_{}`$. They also found a spectroscopic period of $`2.81678\pm 0.00056`$ days, and assuming an extinction $`E(BV)=0.32\pm 0.10`$, quoted a distance between $`7.40`$ and $`12.31\text{ kpc}`$ (note that this is bigger than previously derived by Orosz et al. (2000a)).

Through our on-going ESO Target of Opportunity program aimed at observing new X-ray flaring sources, we got quickly NIR and optical imaging and spectroscopic observations of this new transient source during its outburst and we could follow it on its decline for a few months (from 1999, September to 2000, June). We report in Section 2 the main observations and results, and discuss them in Section 3. A more detailed study of this source is reported in Chaty et al. (in prep.).

## 2 Observations and results

The optical imaging and spectroscopic observations took place on 1999, September 16, 17, 28 and 29 and on 2000, March 21 and June, 24; and the infrared imaging and spectroscopic observations on 1999, September 19, 20, 22 and 24, and on 2000, March 20. All the observations took place at ESO, La Silla, but those of June, 24, which were performed at the 1.23 m telescope of the Centro Astronómico Hispano Alemán at Calar-Alto, with the CCD optical camera and exposure times between 30 and 60s (more details on these observations are reported in Martí et al. (2001)). The airmass during the observations was always between 1.008 and 1.020. The optical observations were performed with the NTT telescope and the instrument EMMI RILD. We imaged the source in V, R and I filters, and took some spectra with the grism #1. The exposure times were nearly 5 min each for the imaging and 15 min for the spectroscopy. The infrared observations were performed with the NTT and the instrument SOFI. The imaging was taken through the filters J, H and Ks, and the spectra with the Grism Red (GR) and 1” slit. The exposure times were chosen as 15 min for the infrared imaging and spectroscopy. The Tables 1 and 2 summarize respectively all the different optical and infrared observations. The lightcurves of the overall optical and infrared observations are respectively reported in Figures 1 and 2. The V-I and J-K colors during the outburst are respectively reported in Figures 3 and 4.

After the big outburst (from V=14 to 8.8 mag), there was still some flaring activity in V, R and I with variations of $`0.5`$ mag with no significant change in the colors. In NIR there was also some flaring activity with variation of $`1`$ mag in J and K, with a significant change in the J-K color during the post-outburst (between 2 and 5 days after the giant outburst). This suggests an increased K-contribution compared to J, which can be explained either by the emission of a jet, or the appearance of heated dust (as seen in the case of $`\text{GRS }1915+105`$ by Mirabel et al. (1996)), or even by the interaction with the interstellar medium.

We report the normalized optical spectra offset to get an easier reading in Figure 5. The first striking fact is that on a timescale of one day, the lines were changing from emission to absorption. All the Balmer serie is visible: H$`\alpha `$, $`\beta `$, $`\gamma `$, $`\delta `$, $`ϵ`$, $`\zeta `$… The H$`\alpha `$ emission line is extraordinarily strong: one day after the outburst, its equivalent width was $`100\AA `$, with a FWZI of $`6700\text{ km\hspace{0.17em}s}^1`$ and a blue wing. There was also a strong He I $`5876\AA `$. The Na-D absorption line equivalent width of $`0.45\AA `$ gives E(B-V) = 0.25 (Munari & Zwitter, 1997) implying $`N\text{(H)}=0.14\times 10^{22}\text{ cm}^2`$ (Bohlin et al., 1978). There is a strong variability of the lines: Balmer H$`\alpha `$, H$`\beta `$ and also of He I. The He II $`4680\AA `$ line was claimed to be prominent in emission nearer to the outburst time by Ayani et al. (1999). Since we could not detect it, this line was also very variable. We can also note the blue continuum, visible on the flux calibrated spectra, suggesting the emission from an accretion disk, or from a corona.

In the NIR, the He I and Br $`\gamma `$ lines were observed as strong lines by Charles et al. (1999), in a UKIRT/CGS4 spectrum taken on Sept 17.22 UT. He I exhibited an equivalent width of 2.1 nm, and Br $`\gamma `$ of 1.4 nm, both showing extended blue wings (FWZI=5900 km/s), suggesting a high velocity wind component (Charles et al., 1999). The continuum of our NIR spectrum was blue, like the spectrum from Charles et al. (1999). However, our NIR spectrum shows only very faint HeI, He II and Br$`\gamma `$ lines, which appear therefore to be strongly variable. The emission lines and the variability suggest the accretion of matter onto a compact object with a high-velocity wind component ($`6000\text{ km\hspace{0.17em}s}^1`$), also perhaps the presence of a cocoon or a jet.

## 3 Discussion

### 3.1 Nature of the system: the companion star

We plotted on a color-magnitude diagram (CMD, Figure 6) the optical and NIR magnitudes when the source was faint. We plotted in this figure the absolute magnitudes corrected for three different values of the absorption, and corresponding to ten different values of the distance of the source. The values of the absorption correspond to $`0.05`$, $`0.1`$ and $`0.15\times 10^{22}\text{ cm}^2`$, derived from our observations and from SAX observations (in’t Zand et al., 2000). The values of the distance of the source go from 1 to $`10\text{ kpc}`$. If we constrain the companion object of the binary system to be a main sequence star, its location on the CMD, taking into account the uncertainty on the absorption, suggests that the distance is constrained to $`3<d<8\text{ kpc}`$. Its spectral type is in this case consistent with an early type B3 - A2 V main sequence star.

However, it is interesting to note that the companion star could be crossing the Hertzsprung gap (U. Kolb, private communication), as for GRO J1655-40 (Kolb et al., 1997), although the mass of the companion star in the case of V4641 Sgr is bigger than for GRO J1655-40. In this view, the location on the CMD would be above the main sequence, the distance of the object could then be still bigger than $`3<d<8\text{ kpc}`$, this range becoming its minimum distance, and the spectral type would be B3 - A2 IV. In both possibilities the mass is constrained between 2 $`<`$ M $`<`$ 10 $`\text{ }M_{}`$, suggesting that it is an IMXB or a HMXB. This is consistent with the results derived by Orosz et al. (2000b).

### 3.2 The jets: a new microquasar?

If the elongation seen in the radio was a moving component, the proper motion was between $`224<\mu <788`$ mas/d depending on the exact time of the ejection. For the sake of discussion, we will assume that this is the approaching (brighter) condensation with $`\mu _a=500`$ mas/d. Since $`D\frac{c}{\sqrt{\mu _a\mu _r}}`$, and from our results $`D3\text{ kpc}`$, we conclude that the apparent velocity in the plane of the sky would be strongly superluminal, $`v_a`$ greater than $`8c`$ at the distance of $`3\text{ kpc}`$. However, no movement of this elongation was detected between Sept. 16.02 and 24.1. This suggests an interaction with surroundings at $`0.25^{\prime \prime }`$ $`1.5\times 10^3`$ AU at the distance of 6 kpc. This is possible if the ejections began to take place at least 10 days before the radio detection e.g. on September, $`8^{th}`$, and we can see from Figure 3 that the source was already active in the optical at this date.

It seems therefore that the activity of this source was not as sporadic as we could have thought at the beginning. Indeed, a previous optical outburst occured in 1999, August (Watanabe, 1999), and RXTE could detect this source during 270 days before the giant outburst (in’t Zand; Markwardt, these proceedings). Furthermore, during 5 days before the giant outburst, the source was in the optical continuously 2 magnitudes brighter than immediately after, showing a modulation at the orbital period, with no X-ray emission (typical upper limit of 12 mCrab, in’t Zand et al. (2000)). All these facts, combined to the high X-ray variability, show that, although the Orosz et al. (2000b) results suggest that the accretion in the system is of Roche-lobe overflow type, it could exist in addition a mass loss from the vicinity of the compact object. At a distance of $`6\text{ kpc}`$, the maximum luminosity of the source is $`4\times 10^{38}\text{ erg\hspace{0.17em}s}^1`$, therefore close to the Eddington limit of a $`10\text{ }M_{}`$ object ($`1.3\times 10^{39}\text{ erg\hspace{0.17em}s}^1`$). If the transfer rate is highly super-Eddington such a wind could arise. This wind could be the reason why surrounding matter was present, allowing the interaction between further ejections and surrounding matter to take place. In this case, the companion star is more likely to be a main sequence star (U. Kolb, private communication).

Finally, it is interesting to note that Martí et al. (2001) observed this source to look for minute to hour variability, discovering a 0.1 mag variability on the time scale of hours. Among the different interpretations considered by them, it is suggested that this variability could originate in an extended corona surrounding the jets, by analogy with SS 433. If this interaction between the jets and the surrounding medium is confirmed, this source could therefore be added to the short list of microquasars where such an interaction has been detected (see e.g. Mirabel & Rodríguez (1999) & Chaty et al. (2001)).

## 4 Conclusions

From our optical and the SAX observations we constrained $`0.05<N\text{(H)}<0.15\times 10^{22}\text{ cm}^2`$. From our optical and NIR colors the distance is $`3<D<8\text{ kpc}`$, and the companion star would be a main sequence star of spectral type B3 - A2 V. If the source is crossing the Hertzsprung gap, this determination of the distance would become its minimum distance, and the spectral type of the companion star would be B3 - A2 IV. The system is therefore an IMXB or a HMXB. From the radio images, the NIR colors, and the optical spectra, there is a strong suggestion of interaction of the ejecta of the source with its surroundings. This surrounding matter could have originated from a wind created by fluctuations around the central object, and in this case the companion star would more certainly be a main sequence star. Further observations would be useful to confirm this existence of surrounding matter.

## acknowledgements

S.C. thanks Rob Hynes for poiting out this new flaring source on September 1999, Bob Hjellming for all the spontaneous communications he gave on the radio observations of this source, and Ulrich Kolb for many stimulating discussions and careful rereading of the manuscript. S.C. is very grateful to the ESO staff for their availability and skills to perform service observations for override programs, and in particular to the NTT team: Leonardo Vanzi, Olivier Hainaut, Stéphane Brillant and Vanessa Doublier. S.C. acknowledges support from grant F/00-180/A from the Leverhulme Trust. IFM acknowledges partial support from Conicet/Argentina. JM acknowledges partial support by DGICYT (PB97-0903) and Junta de Andalucía (Spain).


text:
# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

The origin of baryon (matter-antimatter) asymmetry in the present universe is one of the fundamental problems in particle physics as well as in cosmology. Recently, leptogenesis  becomes very attractive among various baryogeneis scenarios, since there are now convincing evidences of neutrino oscillations, especially the atmospheric neutrino oscillation reported by the Superkamiokande collaboration . The small but nonzero masses of neutrinos suggested from neutrino-oscillation experiments strongly indicate the existence of lepton-number violation, which is a crucial ingredient of the leptogenesis. It is extremely interesting in the leptogenesis scenario that the baryon asymmetry of the present universe is closely related to observable low-energy physics, namely, neutrino masses and mixings.

Among various mechanisms  for leptogenesis proposed so far, the leptogenesis of Affleck-Dine (AD) mechanism  is naturally expected to work once one introduces supersymmetry (SUSY) in the standard model together with the nonzero neutrino mass. Recently, a detailed analysis on this mechanism (AD leptogenesis ) has been performed , which has shown that the dynamics of the flat direction field is drastically changed by thermal effects, as pointed out in Refs. . Actually, it has been shown  that the resultant baryon asymmetry is indeed suppressed for relatively high reheating temperatures $`T_R`$, and an ultralight neutrino is required in order to obtain the sufficient baryon asymmetry $`n_B/s`$ in the present universe. (Here $`n_B`$ and $`s`$ are the baryon number and entropy density in the present universe, respectively.)

In this paper, we perform a reanalysis on the AD leptogenesis, and emphasize that the present baryon asymmetry $`n_B/s`$ is determined mainly by the mass of the lightest neutrino $`m_{\nu _1}`$ for $`T_R10^5`$$`10^{12}`$ GeV, and its dependence on the reheating temperature $`T_R`$ is rather mild. Here, we include an additional thermal effect observed recently in Ref. , which makes the dependence of the resultant baryon asymmetry on the reheating temperature even milder. Notice that in many baryogenesis scenarios the obtained baryon asymmetry depends crucially on the reheating temperature $`T_R`$ of the inflation. Thus, it is very attractive that the baryon asymmetry in our universe is predicted almost independently of the reheating temperature $`T_R`$ in the AD leptogenesis.

Furthermore, this reheating-temperature independence of the AD leptogenesis means that the mass of the lightest neutrino $`m_{\nu _1}`$ can be determined from the present baryon asymmetry $`n_B/s`$. Actually, we show that the observed baryon asymmetry $`n_B/s(0.4`$$`1)\times 10^{10}`$  predicts $`m_{\nu _1}(0.1`$$`3)\times 10^9`$ eV. Thus, neutrinos can not be degenerate in mass, and the masses of the two heavier neutrinos are also determined from the neutrino-oscillation experiments for the atmospheric and the solar neutrinos, that is, $`m_{\nu _3}\sqrt{\delta m_{\mathrm{atm}}^2}(3`$$`8)\times 10^2`$ eV  and $`m_{\nu _2}\sqrt{\delta m_{\mathrm{sol}}^2}10^3`$$`10^2`$ eV .

Although it is hard to confirm the mass of such an ultralight neutrino $`\nu _1`$, it can be tested indirectly. A crucial observation here is that such a small mass of the lightest neutrino together with the masses and mixings of the neutrinos obtained from neutrino-oscillation experiments suggests a high predictability on the rate of neutrinoless double beta ($`0\nu \beta \beta `$) decay. We show that the $`\nu _e`$$`\nu _e`$ component of the neutrino mass matrix, $`m_{\nu _e\nu _e}`$, contributing to the $`0\nu \beta \beta `$ decay, is determined with high accuracy, depending on the solution to the solar neutrino deficits and the $`e`$$`3`$ component of the neutrino mixing matrix, $`U_{e3}`$. For the case of large angle MSW solution, which is favored from the recent Superkamiokande experiments , a sizable $`m_{\nu _e\nu _e}`$, say, $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|10^2`$$`10^3`$ eV is predicted. It is very encouraging that such a large $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ is accessible at future experiments for the $`0\nu \beta \beta `$ decay such as GENIUS . On the other hand, we find that the obtained $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ depends highly on $`U_{e3}`$ for the case of small angle MSW and LOW solution. We also stress that this predictability on the $`0\nu \beta \beta `$ decay is a generic consequence of the mass hierarchy $`m_{\nu _1}m_{\nu _{2,3}}`$.

Finally, we propose an explicit model based on a Froggatt-Nielsen (FN) mechanism , in which such an ultralight neutrino is naturally predicted. Here, we impose a discrete $`Z_6`$ group as the FN symmetry.

## 2 Affleck-Dine leptogenesis

The Affleck-Dine (AD) flat direction scalar field for leptogenesis is

$`H_u=L_i={\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}}\varphi _i,`$ (1)
and along this direction we have effective dimension-five operators in superpotential;

$`W={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2M_i}}\left(L_iH_u\right)^2={\displaystyle \frac{m_{\nu _i}}{2H_u^2}}\left(L_iH_u\right)^2,`$ (2)
where $`H_u=\mathrm{sin}\beta \times 174`$ GeV and $`\mathrm{tan}\beta H_u/H_d`$. Here $`H_u`$ ($`H_d`$) and $`L_i`$ are Higgs field which couple to up (down) type quarks and SU$`(2)_L`$-doublet lepton fields, respectively. (They denote chiral superfields or their scalar components.) Hereafter, we take $`\mathrm{sin}\beta 1`$. Note that the scale $`M_i`$ are related to the neutrino masses $`m_{\nu _i}`$ through the seesaw formula $`m_{\nu _i}=H_u^2/M_i`$ . Here we have taken a basis where the mass matrix for neutrinos $`\nu _i`$ is diagonal, and for simplicity we will suppress the family index $`i`$ ($`=1,2,3`$) unless we denote it explicitly.

Before discussing the detailed dynamics of the $`\varphi `$ field, we first roughly describe the evolution of $`\varphi `$ and note the relevant epoch for the AD leptogenesis. After the end of inflation, the inflaton $`\chi `$ starts a coherent oscillation. (At this stage the energy density of the universe is dominated by the oscillating inflaton $`\chi `$ and the Hubble parameter $`H`$ of the expanding universe decreases with cosmic time $`t`$ as $`H=(2/3)t^1`$ .) After that, when the Hubble parameter $`H`$ becomes comparable to the decay rate of the inflaton, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\chi T_R^2/M_{}`$ ($`M_{}=2.4\times 10^{18}`$ GeV is the reduced Planck mass), the energy density of the radiation starts to dominate the universe. The evolution of the $`\varphi `$ field is as follows. During the inflation, the $`\varphi `$ field takes a large value determined from the effective potential discussed below. After the end of inflation, the value of $`\varphi `$ gradually decreases as the Hubble parameter $`H`$ decreases and then, at some time, the $`\varphi `$ starts its coherent oscillation. As we will see, the net lepton number is fixed when the flat direction field $`\varphi `$ starts the coherent oscillation.

Let us discuss the dynamics of the $`\varphi `$ field. The method of the following analysis in this section is based on Ref. . First, we show the total effective potential for the flat direction field $`\varphi `$ relevant to the leptogenesis. In addition to the usual $`F`$-term potential and SUSY-breaking terms, there are additional SUSY-breaking terms caused by the nonzero energy density of inflaton, which depend on the Hubble parameter $`H`$, and also there are thermal potential terms depending on the temperature $`T`$. It turns out that the total potential is given by the following form;111The thermal potential proportional to $`T^4\mathrm{log}\left(|\varphi |^2\right)`$ in Eq. (3), which has been recently found out in Ref. , was not considered in Ref. .

$`V_{\mathrm{total}}`$ $`=`$ $`\left(m_\varphi ^2H^2+{\displaystyle \underset{f_k|\varphi |<T}{}}c_kf_k^2T^2\right)|\varphi |^2`$ (3)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{m_{3/2}}{8M}}(a_m\varphi ^4+H.c.)+{\displaystyle \frac{H}{8M}}(a_H\varphi ^4+H.c.)`$
$`+a_g\alpha _s^2T^4\mathrm{log}\left({\displaystyle \frac{|\varphi |^2}{T^2}}\right)`$
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4M^2}}|\varphi |^6.`$
We explain each terms by turns. First of all, the $`F`$-term potential directly comes from the superpotential Eq. (2);

$`V_F={\displaystyle \frac{1}{4M^2}}|\varphi |^6.`$ (4)
Next, the SUSY-breaking potential for $`\varphi `$ is given by

$`\delta V_0=m_\varphi ^2|\varphi |^2+{\displaystyle \frac{m_{3/2}}{8M}}(a_m\varphi ^4+H.c.),`$ (5)
where $`m_\varphi `$ and $`m_{3/2}a_m`$ are SUSY-breaking mass parameters. They are expected to be $`m_\varphi m_{3/2}1`$ TeV and $`|a_m|1`$.222In this paper we assume the gravity-meditation model of SUSY-breaking.

During the inflation and during the oscillation period of inflaton $`\chi `$ after the end of inflation, the energy density of the universe is dominated by the inflaton $`\chi `$. Thus, there appears additional SUSY-breaking effects caused by the nonzero energy density of $`\chi `$ ;

$`\delta V_{\mathrm{inf}}=c_HH^2|\varphi |^2+{\displaystyle \frac{H}{8M}}(a_H\varphi ^4+H.c.),`$ (6)
where $`c_H`$ and $`a_H`$ are real and complex constants, respectively. Hereafter, we assume $`c_H|a_H|1`$, since we find that the conclusions in the present paper do not depend much on these parameters unless $`c_H1`$.333See, for example, Ref. .

The rests in Eq. (3) correspond to the thermal effects which we discuss now. Although the energy density is dominated by the inflaton $`\chi `$ during the inflaton-oscillation period, there is a dilute plasma consisting of the decay products of the inflaton $`\chi `$ even in this period. The temperature of this dilute plasma is given by

$`T=\left(T_R^2M_{}H\right)^{1/4}.`$ (7)
This dilute plasma has crucial effects on the dynamics of the $`\varphi `$ field. First, the fields $`\psi _k`$ which couple to $`\varphi `$ are produced by the inflaton decay and/or by thermal scatterings if their effective masses are less than the temperature;

$`f_k|\varphi |<T,`$ (8)
and hence the flat direction field $`\varphi `$ receives a thermal mass of order $`f_kT`$. Here, $`f_k`$ denote Yukawa or gauge coupling constants of $`\psi _k`$ to $`\varphi `$. The induced thermal mass term is given by ;

$`\delta V_1^{\mathrm{th}}={\displaystyle \underset{f_k|\varphi |<T}{}}c_kf_k^2T^2|\varphi |^2,`$ (9)
where $`c_k`$ are real positive constants of order unity. (Details for $`c_k`$ and couplings $`f_k`$ relevant to the flat direction $`\varphi `$ can be seen in Ref. .)

Moreover, it has been recently pointed out  that there is another thermal effect. In the $`\varphi /\sqrt{2}=L=H_u`$ flat direction in Eq. (1), the SU$`(3)_C`$ gauge group is not broken, and gluons, gluinos and down-type (s)quarks remain massless. These fields generate a free energy which is proportional to $`g_s(T)^2T^4`$ at two loop order,444In this flat direction, the down type (s)quarks also generate a free energy of order $`𝒪(y_b^2)`$, where $`y_b`$ is the Yukawa coupling of the bottom quark. This gives an analogous free energy, which does not, however, give a dominant effect as long as $`y_{b}^{}{}_{}{}^{<}1`$. where $`g_s`$ is the coupling constant of the SU$`(3)_C`$ gauge field. On the other hand, the evolution of the running coupling $`g_s`$ is given by;

$`{\displaystyle \frac{d}{d\mathrm{log}\mu }}g_s(\mu )={\displaystyle \frac{g_s^3}{16\pi ^2}}\left(3C_2+{\displaystyle \underset{f_i|\varphi |<\mu }{}}\mathrm{T}(R_i)\right),`$ (10)
where $`C_2=3`$ and $`T(R_i)=1/2`$ for fundamental representations. Notice that the evolution changes when the scale $`\mu `$ passes through an effective mass of a field, $`f_i|\varphi |`$, as shown in Fig. 1. In our case $`f_i`$ denote Yukawa couplings of up-type quarks.

Thus, the coupling constant of SU$`(3)_C`$ depends on $`|\varphi |`$ as follows;

$`g_s(T)|_{y_u|\varphi |>T}=g_s(T)|_{\varphi =0}+{\displaystyle \frac{g_s(M_G)^3}{32\pi ^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{y_u|\varphi |>T}{}}\mathrm{T}(R_u)\mathrm{log}\left({\displaystyle \frac{y_u^2|\varphi |^2}{T^2}}\right),`$ (11)
where $`y_u`$ are Yukawa coupling constants of up-type quarks and $`M_G`$ is the ultraviolet scale where $`g_s`$ is fixed. Then, there is an additional potential through the modification of the gauge coupling constant in Eq. (11);

$`\delta V_2^{\mathrm{th}}=a_g\alpha _s^2T^4\left({\displaystyle \underset{y_u|\varphi |>T}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{2}{3}}\mathrm{T}(R_u)\right)\mathrm{log}\left({\displaystyle \frac{|\varphi |^2}{T^2}}\right),`$ (12)
where $`a_g`$ is a constant which is a bit larger than unity  and $`\alpha _sg_s^2/(4\pi )`$. Hereafter, we take the factor $`(2/3)T(R)`$ to be unity since it does not change the result much.555At least the top Yukawa coupling $`f_t`$ always satisfies $`f_t|\varphi |>T`$ before the oscillation of $`\varphi `$. Thus, the resultant baryon asymmetry changes by only a factor of $`\sqrt{3}`$ at most. See Eq. (16).

Now we obtain the total effective potential Eq. (3), i.e., $`V_{\mathrm{total}}=V_F+\delta V_0+\delta V_{\mathrm{inf}}+\delta V_1^{\mathrm{th}}+\delta V_2^{\mathrm{th}}`$. The evolution of $`\varphi `$ is described by the equation of motion with this $`V_{\mathrm{total}}`$ as

$`\ddot{\varphi }+3H\dot{\varphi }+{\displaystyle \frac{V_{\mathrm{total}}}{\varphi ^{}}}=0,`$ (13)
where the dot denotes a derivative with time.

During the inflation, there is no plasma and hence no thermal effects. In this stage the Hubble parameter $`H`$ takes a constant value which is much larger than the soft SUSY-breaking mass $`m_\varphi `$. Thus, the potential is dominated by the Hubble-induced terms $`\delta V_{\mathrm{inf}}`$ in Eq. (6) and $`|\varphi |^6`$ term in Eq. (4), and hence the flat direction $`\varphi `$ rolls down to the minimum of the potential,

$`|\varphi |`$ $``$ $`\sqrt{MH}`$
$`\mathrm{arg}(\varphi )`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{arg}(a_H)+(2n+1)\pi }{4}},n=03.`$ (14)
Note that we have assumed the Hubble-induced mass squared is negative ($`c_H+1>0`$).

After the inflation ends, the inflaton $`\chi `$ starts to oscillate and its decay produces a dilute plasma. However, the potential is still dominated by Hubble-induced terms and $`|\varphi |^6`$ term at the first stage of the oscillation. Thus, the flat direction field $`\varphi `$ is trapped for a while in the above minimum given in Eq. (2.

Then, as the Hubble parameter decreases, the negative Hubble-induced mass term is eventually exceeded by another term in the potential;

$`H_{}^{2}{}_{}{}^{<}m_\varphi ^2+{\displaystyle \underset{f_k|\varphi |<T}{}}c_kf_k^2T^2+a_g\alpha _s^2(T){\displaystyle \frac{T^4}{|\varphi |^2}}.`$ (15)
As we shall see below, it is this time when the oscillation of $`\varphi `$ starts. Let us denote the Hubble parameter at this time by $`H_{\mathrm{osc}}`$. Using the relations $`|\varphi |\sqrt{MH}`$ and $`T=\left(T_R^2M_{}H\right)^{1/4}`$, it can be calculated from Eq. (15) as;

$`H_{\mathrm{osc}}\mathrm{max}[m_\varphi ,H_i,\alpha _sT_R\left({\displaystyle \frac{a_gM_{}}{M}}\right)^{1/2}],`$ (16)
where $`H_i`$ comes from the effect of the coupling $`f_i`$ and is given by

$`H_i\mathrm{min}\{{\displaystyle \frac{1}{f_i^4}}{\displaystyle \frac{M_{}T_R^2}{M^2}},\left(c_i^2f_i^4M_{}T_R^2\right)^{1/3}\}.`$ (17)
The evolution of the $`\varphi `$ after $`HH_{\mathrm{osc}}`$ depends on which term in Eq. (3) dominates the effective potential. There are basically three cases; the potential is dominated by (i) $`m_\varphi ^2|\varphi |^2`$ term, (ii) $`T^2|\varphi |^2`$ term, or (iii) $`T^4\mathrm{log}(|\varphi |^2)`$ term. First, if the potential is dominated by the $`m_\varphi ^2|\varphi |^2`$ term, the equation of motion Eq. (13) is given by

$`\ddot{\varphi }+3H\dot{\varphi }+m_\varphi ^2\varphi =0.`$ (18)
It is clear that the field $`\varphi `$ oscillates around the origin ($`\varphi =0`$) and the amplitude of the oscillation dumps as $`|\varphi |Ht^1`$. Second, when the potential is dominated by the thermal mass term $`c_kf_k^2T^2|\varphi |^2`$, the $`\varphi `$ field oscillates around $`\varphi =0`$ and the amplitude dumps as $`|\varphi |H^{7/8}t^{7/8}`$ . The third case is given when the $`a_g\alpha _s^2T^4\mathrm{log}(|\varphi |^2/T^2)`$ term dominates the potential. If we neglect the time dependence of $`T^4`$, the damping rate of the oscillation amplitude due to such a flat potential, $`V\mathrm{log}(|\varphi |^2)`$, can be estimated by using the virial theorem, and it is given by $`|\varphi |H^2t^2`$ . In the actual case, however, the potential itself gradually decreases with time as $`T^4t^1`$. We have numerically checked that the amplitude dumps as $`|\varphi |H^\alpha t^\alpha `$ with $`\alpha 1.5`$. Notice that, in all above cases, the dumping rate is faster than the rate before the beginning of the $`\varphi `$’s oscillation ($`|\varphi |H^{1/2}t^{1/2}`$).

Finally, we derive the resultant lepton asymmetry generated by the AD leptogenesis mechanism. Since the $`\varphi `$ field carries lepton charge, its number density is related to the lepton number density $`n_L`$ as

$`n_L={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}i\left(\dot{\varphi }^{}\varphi \varphi ^{}\dot{\varphi }\right).`$ (19)
From Eqs. (3), (13) and (19), the evolution of $`n_L`$ is given by

$`\dot{n}_L+3Hn_L={\displaystyle \frac{m_{3/2}}{2M}}\mathrm{Im}\left(a_m\varphi ^4\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{H}{2M}}\mathrm{Im}\left(a_H\varphi ^4\right).`$ (20)
A nontrivial motion of $`\varphi `$ along the phase direction can generate a net lepton asymmetry. Although the $`\varphi `$ field almost traces one of the valleys in Eq. (2), the phase of $`\varphi `$ is slightly kicked by the relative phase between $`a_m`$ and $`a_H`$ in the total potential in Eq. (3) during its rolling towards the origin. Thus, the first term in Eq. (20) plays a role of the source of the lepton asymmetry.666The contribution to the lepton asymmetry from the second term in Eq. (20) is always less than or comparable to that from the first term, since $`\mathrm{Im}(a_H\varphi ^4)`$ is suppressed. See Eq. (2).By integrating Eq. (20), we obtain the resultant lepton asymmetry at the time $`t`$,

$`\left[R^3n_L\right](t)`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{m_{3/2}}{2M}}{\displaystyle ^t}𝑑t^{}R^3\mathrm{Im}\left(a_m\varphi ^4\right),`$ (21)
where $`R`$ denotes the scale factor of the expanding universe, which scales as $`R^3H^2t^2`$ in the universe dominated by the oscillation energy of the inflaton $`\chi `$. We can see that the total lepton number increases with time as $`R^3n_Lt`$ until the oscillation of $`\varphi `$ starts ($`H>H_{\mathrm{osc}}`$), since $`\varphi ^4H^2`$ and hence $`R^3\varphi ^4const`$ in this stage. On the other hand, after the $`\varphi `$ starts its oscillation, the production of lepton number is strongly suppressed. This is because $`\mathrm{Im}\left(a_m\varphi ^4\right)`$ changes its sign rapidly due to the oscillation of $`\varphi `$, and also because the amplitude of $`\varphi `$’s oscillation damped as $`R^3\varphi ^4t^n`$ with $`n>1`$. \[See discussion below Eq. (18).\] Therefore, as mentioned in the beginning of this section, the net lepton asymmetry is fixed when the oscillation of $`\varphi `$ starts. The generated lepton number at this epoch is given approximately by

$`n_L={\displaystyle \frac{m_{3/2}}{2M}}\mathrm{Im}\left(a_m\varphi ^4\right)t|_{H=H_{\mathrm{osc}}}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}}m_{3/2}MH_{\mathrm{osc}}\delta _{\mathrm{eff}},`$ (22)
where $`\delta _{\mathrm{eff}}\mathrm{sin}(4\mathrm{arg}\varphi +\mathrm{arg}a_m)`$ represents an effective $`CP`$ violating phase. From Eq. (22), the lepton-to-entropy ratio is estimated as777In deriving Eq. (23) we have assumed that the lepton number is fixed before the reheating process of the inflation completes, namely, $`H_{\mathrm{osc}}^{}{}_{}{}^{>}T_R^2/M_{}`$, which is satisfied as long as $`T_{R}^{}{}_{}{}^{<}10^{17}`$ GeV for $`m_{\nu }^{}{}_{}{}^{<}10^6`$ eV.

$`{\displaystyle \frac{n_L}{s}}={\displaystyle \frac{MT_R}{12M_{}^2}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{m_{3/2}}{H_{\mathrm{osc}}}}\right)\delta _{\mathrm{eff}},`$ (23)
when the reheating process of inflation completes. This lepton asymmetry is partially converted  into the baryon asymmetry through the “sphaleron” effects , since it is produced before the electroweak phase transition at $`T10^2\text{GeV}`$. The present baryon asymmetry is given by 888In the present analysis we neglect the relative sign between the produced lepton and baryon asymmetries.

$`{\displaystyle \frac{n_B}{s}}={\displaystyle \frac{8}{23}}{\displaystyle \frac{n_L}{s}}.`$ (24)
Thus, after all, the present baryon asymmetry is give by

$`{\displaystyle \frac{n_B}{s}}={\displaystyle \frac{2}{69}}{\displaystyle \frac{MT_R}{M_{}^2}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{m_{3/2}}{H_{\mathrm{osc}}}}\right)\delta _{\mathrm{eff}}.`$ (25)
We see that the produced baryon asymmetry becomes larger as the scale $`M`$ increases, i.e., as the neutrino mass $`m_\nu `$ decreases. Therefore, the relevant flat direction for the AD leptogenesis corresponds to the first family field, i.e., $`\varphi /\sqrt{2}=L_1=H_u`$.

Fig. 2 shows the contour plot of the produced baryon asymmetry in the $`m_\nu `$$`T_R`$ plane. (Here we have used the relation $`m_\nu =H_u^2/M`$.)

As shown in the figure, the present baryon asymmetry $`n_B/s`$ is determined almost independently of the reheating temperature for a wide range of $`10_{}^{5}{}_{}{}^{<}T_{R}^{}{}_{}{}^{<}10^{12}`$ GeV. In particular, for a relatively high reheating temperature $`10_{}^{8}{}_{}{}^{<}T_{R}^{}{}_{}{}^{<}10^{12}`$ GeV, the baryon asymmetry derived from the Eqs. (16) and (25) is given by the following simple from;

$`{\displaystyle \frac{n_B}{s}}10^{11}\delta _{\mathrm{eff}}\times \left({\displaystyle \frac{m_{\nu _1}}{10^8\mathrm{eV}}}\right)^{3/2}\left({\displaystyle \frac{m_{3/2}|a_m|}{1\mathrm{TeV}}}\right).`$ (26)
The reason why it is independent of the reheating temperature $`T_R`$ is that the oscillation time $`H_{\mathrm{osc}}`$ is determined by the thermal potential $`T^4\mathrm{log}(|\varphi |^2)`$ in the higher temperature regime, and $`T_R`$ dependence is canceled out in Eq. (25). Even in the lower reheating temperature region $`10_{}^{5}{}_{}{}^{<}T_{R}^{}{}_{}{}^{<}10^8`$ GeV, where $`H_{\mathrm{osc}}`$ is determined by the thermal-mass term potential $`T^2|\varphi |^2`$, $`T_R`$ dependence is still mild, i.e., $`n_B/sT_R^{1/3}`$. The reheating-temperature independence discussed here is a very attractive and remarkable feature of the present mechanism since the produced baryon asymmetry crucially depends on $`T_R`$ in many other baryogenesis scenarios.

In Fig. 2, we have taken $`\delta _{\mathrm{eff}}=1`$. It is expected that $`\delta _{\mathrm{eff}}𝒪(1)`$, say, $`\delta _{\mathrm{eff}}0.1`$$`1`$, unless there is an unnatural cancellation between $`\mathrm{arg}(a_m)`$ and $`\mathrm{arg}(a_H)`$. Thus, the present baryon asymmetry in our universe $`n_B/s(0.4`$$`1)\times 10^{10}`$ suggests an ultralight neutrino of a mass $`m_{\nu _1}(0.1`$$`3)\times 10^9`$ eV for $`T_R10^5`$$`10^{12}`$ GeV and $`\delta _{\mathrm{eff}}0.1`$$`1`$. We consider the region of $`10_{}^{5}{}_{}{}^{<}T_{R}^{}{}_{}{}^{<}10^{12}`$ GeV throughout this paper, since it is the case for a large class of the inflation models proposed in the framework of supergravity . In Sec. 4 we will propose a model in which such an ultralight neutrino can be naturally obtained.

## 3 Prediction on the rate of neutrinoless double beta decay

The neutrinoless double beta ($`0\nu \beta \beta `$) decay, if observed, is the strongest evidence for the lepton number violation. The crucial parameter to determine the $`0\nu \beta \beta `$ decay rate is $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}||_iU_{ei}^2m_{\nu _i}|`$, where $`U_{\alpha i}`$ is the mixing matrix which diagonalize the neutrino mass matrix.999As for general studies of the $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ using the neutrino masses and mixings, see, for example, Ref.  and references therein. If the mass of the lightest neutrino is actually so small, $`m_{\nu _1}10^9`$ eV, as discussed in the previous sections, the contribution from $`m_{\nu _1}`$ to $`m_{\nu _e\nu _e}`$ can be completely neglected and hence the parameter $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ is written in terms of masses and mixings of two other neutrinos as

$`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|=|U_{e2}^2m_{\nu _2}+U_{e3}^2m_{\nu _3}|.`$ (27)
Therefore, the $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ is determined by $`U_{e3}`$ and the parameters of atmospheric and solar neutrino oscillations; $`\delta m_{\mathrm{atm}}^2m_{\nu _3}^2`$, $`\delta m_{\mathrm{sol}}^2m_{\nu _2}^2`$ and $`\mathrm{tan}^2\theta _{\mathrm{sol}}|U_{e2}/U_{e1}|^2`$. Namely, it is given by

$`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|\left|\left(1|U_{e3}|^2\right)\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _{\mathrm{sol}}\sqrt{\delta m_{\mathrm{sol}}^2}+|U_{e3}|^2e^{i\alpha }\sqrt{\delta m_{\mathrm{atm}}^2}\right|,`$ (28)
where $`\alpha `$ denotes the relative phase between the two terms.

We calculate the predicted value of $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ for the large angle MSW, the small angle MSW and the LOW solutions, taking the parameters allowed for atmospheric and solar neutrino oscillations that are shown in Fig. 4  and Fig 4 . In the case of large angle MSW solution, $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ is sensitive mainly to the parameter of the solar neutrino oscillation, $`\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _{\mathrm{sol}}\sqrt{\delta m_{\mathrm{sol}}^2}`$. The predicted value of $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ for the large angle MSW solution is shown in Fig. 6. Here, we have required $`|U_{e3}|<0.15`$ from the CHOOZ experiment . For a comparison, we also show the possible values of $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ when we allow $`m_{\nu _1}`$ to be relatively large as $`m_{\nu _1}(1/\sqrt{2})m_{\nu _2}`$. We see from Fig. 6 that the $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ is predicted in a narrow range. It is very encouraging that the predicted $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ can be large enough to be accessible at future experiments such as GENIUS . Furthermore, if the $`U_{e3}`$ becomes more constrained by future experiments , $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ is predicted in a much narrower range as shown in Fig. 6, where we have required $`|U_{e3}|<0.10`$.

On the other hand, the $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ is sensitive to $`|U_{e3}|`$ in the case of the small angle MSW and the LOW solutions. The results are shown in Fig. 8 and 8. Because $`|U_{e3}|`$ is highly constrained by the CHOOZ experiment, the predicted value of $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ is so small. Even in these cases the contribution from $`m_{\nu _1}`$ can not enhance $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ because it is too small.

In all cases, the $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ is predicted with high accuracy, depending on the solar and atmospheric neutrino oscillation parameters and $`U_{e3}`$. Therefore, the presence of such an ultralight neutrino indicated from the present baryon asymmetry can be tested at near future experiments. However, notice that the results shown in this section is a generic consequence of the mass hierarchy $`m_{\nu _1}m_{\nu _{2,3}}`$. Thus, we consider that the $`0\nu \beta \beta `$ decay provides only a consistency test for our hypothesis $`m_{\nu _1}10^9`$ eV.

## 4 A model for the ultralight neutrino

In Sec. 2 we have shown that the baryon asymmetry in the present universe predicts the mass for the lightest neutrino in a narrow region, $`m_{\nu _1}(0.1`$$`3)\times 10^9`$ eV. Together with neutrino masses required to solve the solar and atmospheric neutrino anomalies, this suggests a very large mass hierarchy between the lightest and the heavier two neutrinos. In this section we show an explicit model based on a Froggatt-Nielsen (FN) mechanism , in which such an large mass hierarchy is naturally obtained.

We adopt a discrete $`Z_6`$ as the FN symmetry instead of a continuous U$`(1)_{\mathrm{FN}}`$. We see that the discrete symmetry is crucial to produce the required large mass hierarchy in the neutrino sector. Before describing our model, we briefly review the FN model , which explains the observed hierarchies in quark and lepton mass matrices. This model is based on a U$`(1)_{\mathrm{FN}}`$ symmetry that is broken by the vacuum-expectation value of $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$, $`\mathrm{\Phi }0`$. Here $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ is a gauge singlet FN field carrying the FN charge $`Q_\mathrm{\Phi }=1`$. Then, all Yukawa couplings arise from nonrenormalizable interactions of $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ and are given by the following form;

$`W`$ $`=`$ $`h_{ij}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Phi }}{M_{}}}\right)^{Q_i+Q_j}\mathrm{\Psi }_i\mathrm{\Psi }_jH_{u(d)}`$ (29)
$`=`$ $`h_{ij}ϵ^{Q_i+Q_j}\mathrm{\Psi }_i\mathrm{\Psi }_jH_{u(d)},`$
where $`h_{ij}`$ are $`𝒪(1)`$ coupling constants, $`Q_i`$ are the FN charges of various chiral superfields $`\mathrm{\Psi }_i`$ and $`ϵ\mathrm{\Phi }/M_{}`$. The observed mass hierarchies for quarks and charged leptons are well explained by taking suitable FN charges for them. For instance, we assign FN charges ($`a`$, $`a`$, $`a+1`$) for lepton doublets $`L_i`$, while giving charges ($`0`$, $`1`$, $`2`$) to the right-handed charged leptons $`E_i`$, with $`ϵ0.05`$$`0.1`$ . Here, we take $`a=0`$ or $`1`$ . Charges for the quarks are determined if one assumes the SU$`(5)`$ grand unified theory .

The mass matrix for the neutrinos in this model is determined by the FN charges for the lepton doublets $`L_i`$ . To see this we first discuss the mass matrix for the heavy right-handed neutrinos $`N_i`$, which is given by;

$`M_{Rij}=g_{ij}ϵ^{Q_i+Q_j}M_0,`$ (30)
where $`M_0`$ represents some right-handed neutrino mass scale and $`g_{ij}`$ are coupling constants of $`𝒪(1)`$ like $`h_{ij}`$. Hereafter, we will take a basis where the mass matrix for the charged leptons is diagonal.101010One might wonder if the mixing matrix from the charged lepton sector would change the discussion above, since the mass matrix for the charged leptons has off-diagonal elements in the FN mechanism. However, the correction from this effect yields higher order terms in $`ϵ`$, and hence we can safely neglect it. The charges for the lepton doublets $`L_i`$ and right-handed neutrinos $`N_i`$ are listed in Table. 1.

Then, the neutrino Dirac mass matrix $`m_D`$ and the right-handed neutrino mass matrix $`M_R`$ are given by the following forms;

$`m_D`$ $`=`$ $`H_u\left(\begin{array}{ccc}ϵ^{a+1}& 0& 0\\ 0& ϵ^a& 0\\ 0& 0& ϵ^a\end{array}\right)\left(\begin{array}{ccc}h_{11}& h_{12}& h_{13}\\ h_{21}& h_{22}& h_{23}\\ h_{31}& h_{32}& h_{33}\end{array}\right)\left(\begin{array}{ccc}ϵ^d& 0& 0\\ 0& ϵ^c& 0\\ 0& 0& ϵ^b\end{array}\right),`$ (40)
$`M_R`$ $`=`$ $`M_0\left(\begin{array}{ccc}ϵ^d& 0& 0\\ 0& ϵ^c& 0\\ 0& 0& ϵ^b\end{array}\right)\left(\begin{array}{ccc}g_{11}& g_{12}& g_{13}\\ g_{12}& g_{22}& g_{23}\\ g_{13}& g_{23}& g_{33}\end{array}\right)\left(\begin{array}{ccc}ϵ^d& 0& 0\\ 0& ϵ^c& 0\\ 0& 0& ϵ^b\end{array}\right).`$ (50)
We obtain the neutrino mass matrix as

$`m_\nu `$ $`=`$ $`m_D{\displaystyle \frac{1}{M_R}}m_D^T`$ (57)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{ϵ^{2a}H_u}{M_0}}\left(\begin{array}{ccc}ϵ& 0& 0\\ 0& 1& 0\\ 0& 0& 1\end{array}\right)\left(\{h_{ij}\}\right)\left(\{g_{ij}\}\right)^1\left(\{h_{ij}\}\right)^T\left(\begin{array}{ccc}ϵ& 0& 0\\ 0& 1& 0\\ 0& 0& 1\end{array}\right)`$
$``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{ϵ^{2a}H_u}{M_0}}\left(\begin{array}{ccc}ϵ^2& ϵ& ϵ\\ ϵ& 1& 1\\ ϵ& 1& 1\end{array}\right).`$ (61)
As shown in Ref. , this mass matrix can naturally lead to a large $`\nu _\mu `$$`\nu _\tau `$ mixing angle, which is suggested from the atmospheric neutrino oscillation . It is very crucial that the FN charges of the right-handed neutrinos are completely canceled out in the neutrino mass matrix in Eq. (57) and hence the masses of the neutrinos are determined only by the charges of the lepton doublets, ($`a`$, $`a`$, $`a+1`$). This gives a mild mass hierarchy,

$`m_{\nu _3}:m_{\nu _2}:m_{\nu _1}1:1:ϵ^2𝒪(1):𝒪(1):𝒪(10^2).`$ (62)
Now let us turn to our FN model. To change the above point, we suppose that the broken FN symmetry is not a U$`(1)_{\mathrm{FN}}`$ but a discrete symmetry $`Z_n`$ with $`n=2d`$. Then, the mass matrix for the right-handed neutrino $`M_R`$ changes into the following form;

$`M_R=M_0\left(\begin{array}{ccc}g_{11}& g_{12}ϵ^{c+d}& g_{13}ϵ^{b+d}\\ g_{12}ϵ^{c+d}& g_{22}ϵ^{2c}& g_{23}ϵ^{b+c}\\ g_{13}ϵ^{b+d}& g_{23}ϵ^{b+c}& g_{33}ϵ^{2b}\end{array}\right).`$ (66)
Here we assume $`0bc<d`$. Notice that the Majorana mass for $`N_1`$ is no longer suppressed by the power of $`ϵ`$, which is a basic point to yield an extremely small neutrino mass $`m_{\nu _1}`$. However, the structure of the neutrino mass matrix looks similar to the original one;

$`m_\nu `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{ϵ^{2a}H_u}{M_0}}\left(\begin{array}{ccc}ϵ& 0& 0\\ 0& 1& 0\\ 0& 0& 1\end{array}\right)\left(\{h_{ij}\}\right)\left(\begin{array}{ccc}g_{11}ϵ^{2d}& g_{12}& g_{13}\\ g_{12}& g_{22}& g_{23}\\ g_{13}& g_{23}& g_{33}\end{array}\right)^1\left(\{h_{ij}\}\right)^T\left(\begin{array}{ccc}ϵ& 0& 0\\ 0& 1& 0\\ 0& 0& 1\end{array}\right)`$ (76)
$``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{ϵ^{2a}H_u}{M_0}}\left(\begin{array}{ccc}ϵ^2& ϵ& ϵ\\ ϵ& 1& 1\\ ϵ& 1& 1\end{array}\right).`$ (80)
We see that one of the mass eigenvalue of this mass matrix strongly suppressed as $`ϵ^{2(1+d)}`$. This suppression is also understood directly by taking the determinant of the above mass matrix. For the mass hierarchy required from the successful AD leptogenesis, it is suitable to take $`d=3`$ ($`Z_6`$).

To demonstrate our point, we randomly generate $`𝒪(1)`$ couplings $`h_{ij}`$ and $`g_{ij}`$. Namely we calculate the mass matrix for neutrinos, taking the magnitudes of the couplings $`h_{ij}`$ and $`g_{ij}`$ to be in a range $`0.5`$$`1.5`$ and their phases to be $`0`$$`2\pi `$. We also take $`ϵ=0.05`$$`0.1`$ randomly.111111A similar calculation was done in Ref. , where they adopted the U$`(1)_{\mathrm{FN}}`$ model. Here, we have required the parameters $`r\delta m_{\mathrm{sol}}^2/\delta m_{\mathrm{atm}}^2=(m_{\nu _3}^2m_{\nu _2}^2)/(m_{\nu _2}^2m_{\nu _1}^2)`$, $`\mathrm{sin}^22\theta _{\mathrm{atm}}4|U_{\mu 3}|^2\left(1|U_{\mu 3}|^2\right)`$ and $`\mathrm{tan}^2\theta _{\mathrm{sol}}|U_{e2}/U_{e1}|^2`$ to be consistent with the parameter regions shown in Figs. 4 and 4. We have here required $`|U_{e3}|<0.15`$ to satisfy CHOOZ limit .

Fig. 9 shows the obtained mass of the lightest neutrino, $`m_{\nu _1}`$. We can see that, an ultralight neutrino of mass $`m_{\nu _1}(0.1`$$`3)\times 10^9`$ eV is naturally obtained.

## 5 Discussion and conclusions

In this paper we have performed a reanalysis on Affleck-Dine (AD) leptogenesis taking into account of all the relevant thermal effects. Then, we have pointed out that the baryon asymmetry is produced almost independently of the reheating temperature $`T_R`$ and it is determined mainly by the mass of the lightest neutrino $`m_{\nu _1}`$ in a wide range of the reheating temperature $`T_R10^5`$$`10^{12}`$ GeV. Notice that such reheating temperatures, $`T_R10^5`$$`10^{12}`$ GeV, are naturally realized in a large class of SUSY inflation models . This reheating-temperature independence is a very attractive feature of the AD leptogenesis.

Furthermore, we have shown that the present baryon asymmetry predicts the mass for the lightest neutrino in a very narrow region, $`m_{\nu _1}(0.3`$$`1)\times 10^9`$ eV. We have also proposed an explicit model based on a Froggatt-Nielsen mechanism  with a discrete symmetry $`Z_6`$, where such an ultralight neutrino indicated from the AD leptogenesis is naturally obtained.

Such a small mass of the lightest neutrino means that the mass parameter $`m_{\nu _e\nu _e}`$ contributing to the $`0\nu \beta \beta `$ decay is determined by the masses and mixings of two other neutrinos. Actually, we have shown that $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ can be predicted with high accuracy, by observable neutrino oscillation parameters such as $`\delta m_{\mathrm{atm}}^2`$, $`\delta m_{\mathrm{sol}}^2`$, $`\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _{\mathrm{sol}}`$ and $`U_{e3}`$. In particular, when the large angle MSW solution is the case and $`\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _{\mathrm{sol}}\sqrt{\delta m_{\mathrm{sol}}^2}`$ is relatively large, the value of $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|`$ is predicted as $`|m_{\nu _e\nu _e}|10^3`$$`10^2`$ eV, which may be testable at future $`0\nu \beta \beta `$ decay experiments such as GENIUS .

## Acknowledgements

The work of K.H. was supported by the Japanese Society for the Promotion of Science. T.Y. acknowledges partial support from the Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research from the Ministry of Education, Sports, and Culture of Japan, on Priority Aerea \# 707: “Supersymmetry and Unified Theory of Elementary Particles”.