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# A New Look at the Large-Scale H i Structure of the LMC

## 1 INTRODUCTION

The LMC plays a key role in our understanding of diverse areas in astronomy, including the extragalactic distance scale which uses the LMC as a zero-point (Feast 1999, Gibson 1999), the formation of star clusters (Johnson et al. 1999) and H ii regions (Oey 1996), molecular cloud astrophysics (Johansson et al. 1994), and for providing background stars with which to study possible microlenses in the Galactic halo (Alcock et al. 2000). With this in mind, Kim et al. (1998a) surveyed the LMC in H i at high spatial resolution with the Australia Telescope Compact Array (ATCA). This data has since served to help study the interaction between star-forming regions and the interstellar medium at small scales (e.g. Kim et al. 1998b; Kim et al. 1999; Points et al. 2000; Olsen, Kim & Buss 2001). However its use for large-scale studies (with notable exceptions, e.g. the study of the LMC disk and halo dynamics by Alves & Nelson 2000) is largely confined to morphological studies and comparisons (e.g. Wada, Spaans & Kim 2000). The reason for this is that, being an interferometer, the ATCA is insensitive to structure on an angular size scale larger than $`\lambda /B`$, where the shortest baseline is $`B=30`$ m ($`20`$ m when the finite antenna size is taken into consideration and when the sky is Nyquist-sampled by the antenna primary beams). This corresponds to $`0\stackrel{}{.}5`$ or about 0.4 kpc at the distance of the LMC (assumed here to be 50 kpc).

The missing large-scale structure means that H i column densities are difficult to derive. For example, accurate optical depths for X-ray photoelectric absorption cannot be obtained. It also makes it difficult to compare the H i structure of large shells against competing models of their formation, e.g. stellar winds (Dopita, Mathewson & Ford 1985), high-velocity cloud collisions (Braun 1996) and gamma-ray bursts (Efremov, Ehlerová & Palous̆ 1999). Similarly, the outer tidal structure of the LMC cannot be compared with the recent stellar results from 2MASS and DENIS (van der Marel 2001).

Observations sensitive to large spatial scales may be taken from the autocorrelations from the individual antennas of an interferometer. But this data is often not calibrated in a suitable way. Moreover, for a homogeneous interferometer such as the ATCA, there exists a serious gap in the UV-plane between the auto and cross-correlation data. It is usually more useful to collect data from a large single-dish antenna such as the Parkes telescope111The Parkes telescope is part of the Australia Telescope which is funded by the Commonwealth of Australia for operation as a National Facility managed by CSIRO. which, with a diameter of 64 m, is much larger than the smallest ATCA baseline. There are several excellent studies using Parkes of HI in the LMC, however none is particularly suitable for the present purpose. Needless to say, the older studies (McGee & Milton 1966) are not available digitally. The observations of Luks & Rohlfs (1992) do not cover a sufficient spatial area (they cut off the LMC disk north of Dec. $`66^{}`$) and are not Nyquist-sampled. The HIPASS observations (Putman et al. 2002) have insufficient velocity resolution and, since HIPASS was designed to detect compact extragalactic objects (Barnes et al. 2001), also impose a high-pass filter on the sky.

The task of mapping a large area such as the LMC at the Nyquist rate (5$`\stackrel{}{.}`$7 for Parkes at $`\lambda 21`$ cm) is not straightforward as $`10^4`$ pointings are required. Fortunately, the advent of a 21 cm multibeam receiver at Parkes (Staveley-Smith et al. 1996) makes the task easier, so observations were undertaken following the installation of new narrow-band filters in late-1998. We describe the Parkes observations in Section 2 and discuss the general morphology, tidal features and spatially integrated properties in Section 3. We also compare our results with previous work. In Section 4, we discuss halo gas in the LMC, particularly in the sightline from our Galaxy. In Section 5, we look again at the largest H i holes and associated high-velocity gas. Finally, in Section 6, we use the Galactic part of the velocity range to re-discuss foreground absorption. The combination of the existing data with the ATCA data is separately described in Kim et al. (2002), and some early results from the combined data set are discussed by Elmegreen, Kim & Staveley-Smith (2001) and Padoan et al. (2001).

## 2 OBSERVATIONS

Observations were taken with the inner seven beams of the Parkes 21 cm multibeam receiver \[Staveley-Smith et al. 1996\] on 1998 December 13 to 17. The telescope was scanned across the LMC in orthogonal great circles aligned approximately east-west and north-south. The receiver was continuously rotated such that the rotation angle was always at $`19\stackrel{}{.}1`$ to the scan trajectory, the appropriate angle in a hexagonal geometry for ensuring uniform spatial sampling of the sky. The area covered was 13° by 14° in RA and Dec, respectively, and centred on RA $`05^\mathrm{h}20^\mathrm{m}`$, Dec. $`68\mathrm{°}44\mathrm{}`$ (J2000). This corresponds to 8–9 disk scale lengths in the optical or infrared (Bothun & Thompson 1988, van der Marel 2001). In a single scan, the spacing between adjacent tracks is 9$`\stackrel{}{.}`$5, which is smaller than the mean FWHP beamwidth of 14$`\stackrel{}{.}`$1, but greater than the Nyquist interval ($`\lambda /2D`$) of 5$`\stackrel{}{.}`$7. Therefore, six scans were interleaved in each of the principal scan directions, resulting in a final track spacing of 1$`\stackrel{}{.}`$6. In total, $`12\times 6`$ RA scans and $`11\times 6`$ Dec. scans were made. Seven scans were dropped or edited out due to drive problems, leaving a total of 131 scans consisting of a total of 29 h of on-source integration on each of seven beams. The average integration time per beam area is 360 s (both polarisations).

The scan rate of the telescope was 1$`\stackrel{}{.}`$0 min-1 and the correlator was read every 5 s. Therefore, the beam was slightly broadened in the scan direction to 14$`\stackrel{}{.}`$5 \[Barnes et al. 2001\]. After averaging orthogonal scans, the effective beamwidth reduces to 14$`\stackrel{}{.}`$3. The central observing frequency was switched between 1417.5 and 1421.5 MHz, again every 5 s. This allowed the bandpass shape to be calibrated without spending any time off-source. A bandwidth of 8 MHz was used with 2048 spectral channels in each of two orthogonal linear polarisations. H i emission from the LMC (and the Galaxy) appeared within the band at both frequency settings. After bandpass calibration, the data from both settings were shifted to a common heliocentric reference frame. The velocity spacing of the multibeam data is 0.82 km s-1, but the final cube was Hanning-smoothed to a resolution of 1.6 km s-1. The useful velocity range in the final cube (i.e. after excluding frequency sidelobes of the LMC and the Galaxy, and band-edge effects) is $`66`$ to 430 km s-1.

Bandpass calibration, velocity shifting and preliminary spectral baseline fitting were all done using the aips++ LiveData task. Baselines were adaptively fitted using polynomials of degree 8. Subsequently, the data were convolved onto a grid of 4′ pixels using a Gaussian kernel with a FWHP of 8$`\stackrel{}{.}`$0. This broadens the effective, scan-broadened, beamwidth of the inner seven beams from 14$`\stackrel{}{.}`$3 to about 16$`\stackrel{}{.}`$4. Residual spectral baselines were removed by fitting polynomials in the image domain (miriad task contsub).

The multibeam data were calibrated relative to a flux density for PKS B1934-638 of 14.9 Jy at the observing frequency. The brightness temperature conversion factor of 0.80 K Jy-1 was established by an observation of S9 ($`T_B=85`$ K, Williams 1973). On the same scale, we measured a brightness temperature for pointing 416 (Stanimirović et al. 1999) in the SMC (RA $`00^\mathrm{h}47^\mathrm{m}52.6^\mathrm{s}`$, Dec. $`73{}_{}{}^{}02\mathrm{}19\stackrel{}{.}8`$, J2000) of $`T_B=133`$ K, compared with the 137 K measured by Stanimirović et al. The 3% difference is probably due to the different characteristics of the feeds used in the two observations, and residual uncertainties in absolute bandpass calibration. The rms noise in the line-free region of the cube is 27 mK, which is close to the theoretical value. This corresponds to a column density sensitivity of $`8\times 10^{16}`$ cm-2 across 1.6 km s-1, and $`4\times 10^{17}`$ cm-2 for linewidths of 40 km s-1, typical of those in the LMC.

## 3 RESULTS

### 3.1 Channel Maps

The area covered by the present observations is shown in Fig. 1 together with some prominent features, referred to later in the text. Relevant directions and proper motion vectors to the Galaxy and other parts of the Magellanic system are also plotted.

Channel maps, formed by averaging groups of six channels are shown in Fig. 2. Maps between heliocentric velocities of 185.9 and 359.0 km s-1 are shown, spaced by $`6\times 0.82=4.92`$ km s-1. Although this velocity range covers the main body of H i emission in the LMC, the emission does extend in a continuous manner down to $`100`$ km s-1 and up to $`425`$ km s-1, but at faint levels (see Section 4). There appears to be a small, but clean separation between H i in the LMC and H i in the Galaxy which extends from $`90`$ km s-1 through to $`50`$ km s-1. The Galactic component, important for extinction and photoelectric absorption estimates, is discussed in Section 6

The main feature in the channel maps between 186 and 211 km s-1 is the arm (hereafter arm ‘B’) of the LMC noted before in the Parkes observations by McGee & Newton (1986), the ATCA observations of Kim et al. (1998a), and in the HIPASS map presented by Gardiner, Turfus & Putman (1998). Arm B appears to be a tidal feature which directly connects the LMC with the Magellanic Bridge joining the LMC and SMC. We discuss this further in Section 3.4.

Between 220 and 240 km s-1, the southern part of the main body of the LMC becomes visible. The main body appears bounded by another arm (hereafter arm ‘S’) curving from RA $`05^\mathrm{h}30^\mathrm{m}`$, Dec. $`71\mathrm{°}30\mathrm{}`$ to RA $`04^\mathrm{h}20^\mathrm{m}`$, Dec. $`70\mathrm{°}00\mathrm{}`$ (J2000), and by a ‘figure-of-eight’ structure associated with the supergiant shell LMC2 (Points et al. 2000) and the gas complexes to the south of 30 Doradus (Mochizuki et al. 1994; Blondiau et al. 1997) which run from RA $`05^\mathrm{h}41^\mathrm{m}`$, Dec. $`72\mathrm{°}00\mathrm{}`$ to RA $`05^\mathrm{h}45^\mathrm{m}`$, Dec. $`69\mathrm{°}00\mathrm{}`$ (J2000).

Between 260 and 280 km s-1, the LMC begins to look remarkably like a barred spiral galaxy (e.g. NGC 1365). Two arms open out at approximately Dec. $`69\mathrm{°}`$, the one at RA $`04^\mathrm{h}45^\mathrm{m}`$ (hereafter arm ‘W’) extending north for 5°, and the one at RA $`05^\mathrm{h}40^\mathrm{m}`$ (hereafter arm ‘E’) extending south for 6°to at least the limit of the map. The two arms are connected by H i but not in a structure which looks like a bar, nor a structure which is similar in position or position angle to the optical bar. Arm E points directly towards the Leading Arm cloud at RA $`05^\mathrm{h}28^\mathrm{m}`$, $`80\mathrm{°}15\mathrm{}`$ (J2000), $`v_{LSR}=323`$ km s-1 ($`\mathrm{}=292\stackrel{}{.}4`$, $`30\stackrel{}{.}2`$, $`v_h=333`$ km s-1) shown in Putman et al. (1998). This cloud lies 11° (10 kpc, in projection) south of the start of arm E, and 4° beyond the edge of the present map. Deep HIPASS data show a continuous connection between the Leading Arm and Arm E at velocities between 260 and 300 km s-1, heliocentric. Throughout the velocity range from 260 and 280 km s-1, arm B also remains visible, showing that this gas is very disturbed and has velocity extent of at least 100 km s-1.

Above 300 km s-1, the northern half of the main body of the LMC is visible, and is dominated by: (a) the supergiant shell LMC4 (Meaburn 1980, Domgörgen, Bomans & de Boer 1995); (b) the supergiant shell LMC SGS 6 (Kim et al. 1999); and (c) the linear arm E, discussed above.

### 3.2 Integrated H i Maps and the Morphology of the LMC

The peak brightness-temperature image and the column density image of the LMC are shown in Fig. 8. The peak brightness temperature is 83.1 K at RA $`05^\mathrm{h}39^\mathrm{m}22^\mathrm{s}`$, Dec. $`69\mathrm{°}51\mathrm{}13\mathrm{}`$ (J2000), a position slightly south of N159 and the 30 Doradus H ii complex. The peak column density of $`5.6\times 10^{21}`$ cm-2 lies at the same position. Both values are $`50\%`$ higher than the values in the Luks & Rohlfs (1992, hereafter LR92) data (53 K and $`3.6\times 10^{21}`$ cm-2, respectively). Part of this difference is resolution. The present data were obtained with the multibeam receiver which has a mean beamwidth of 14$`\stackrel{}{.}`$1, broadened to 16$`\stackrel{}{.}`$4 after scanning and gridding effects are taken into account (Section 2). The LR92 data were taken with a feed with a beamwidth of $`15\mathrm{}`$ on an undersampled grid of spacing 12′ and interpolated onto a grid with similar spacing, presumably resulting in an effective resolution of $`20\mathrm{}`$. However, there must also be a calibration difference as the H i mass measured here is $`30`$ per cent higher than that of LR92 (Section 3.3). A pixel-by-pixel comparison of the LR92 column densities and the column densities in this paper shows that this is the case (Fig. 9). The column density ratio is $`N_{\mathrm{HI}}/N_{\mathrm{HI}}(\mathrm{LR92})=1.43`$. This sizeable calibration anomaly has been noted before (Blondiau et al. 1997 rescale LR92 temperatures by 1.5), and seriously affects use of LR92 column densities. As confirmed in Luks (1991), LR92 base their calibration on an earlier paper (Rohlfs et al. 1984). This paper quotes column densities and temperatures based on antenna temperature, $`T_A`$ rather than brightness temperature, $`T_B`$ (their equation 5 and legend to Table 1). They further state that their H i column density “can be converted approximately into true column density by multiplication with $`1/\eta _{mb}=1.25`$”. Assuming this factor has been neglected in LR92, the residual calibration difference then appears to be $`1.43/1.25=1.14`$. This may be explained by the high main beam efficiency (or low antenna efficiency) measured by Rohlfs et al. They measure a ratio $`T_B/S_\nu =0.775`$ K Jy-1 for the Parkes telescope. In contrast, other measurements with the same single-beam, hybrid-mode feed suggest $`T_B/S_\nu =0.85`$ to 0.93 K Jy-1 (Davies, Staveley-Smith & Murray 1989, Stanimirović et al. 1999), a similar factor ($`1.12\pm 0.05`$) higher.

Our peak column density of $`5.6\times 10^{21}`$ cm-2 is also higher than that of McGee & Milton (1966) who quote $`4.0\times 10^{21}`$ cm-2. This is probably a resolution difference because, as noted in Section 3.3, their total H i mass is virtually identical to ours. The ATCA data of Kim et al. (1998a) at 1′ resolution show a higher peak brightness temperature of 106 K, increasing to a true value of 138 K when combined with the present multibeam data (Kim et al. 2002).

The main features of the H i distribution in Fig. 8 are:

* A well-defined, nearly circular disk forms the main body of the LMC, indicating a nearly face-on inclination if it is assumed that the LMC has an intrinsically circular disk. This agrees with other recent values based on this assumption (e.g. 22°-26° Weinberg & Nikolaev 2001; $`22\pm 6\mathrm{°}`$, Kim et al. 1998a), though not with values based in direct distance determination ($`42\mathrm{°}\pm 7\mathrm{°}`$, Weinberg & Nikolaev 2001; $`35\mathrm{°}\pm 6\mathrm{°}`$, van der Marel & Cioni 2001). The influence of tidal forces and non-circular motions in the outer parts of the disk doubtless contribute to this disagreement. van der Marel (2001) deduces an intrinsic ellipticity of 0.31 for the outer disk at near-infrared wavelengths. The bulk of the LMC H ii regions (Kennicutt et al. 1995, Kim et al. 1999) are contained within the gaseous disk.
* The body of the LMC is punctuated by large holes, and has a general mottled appearance. The main H i gaps are at RA $`05^\mathrm{h}32^\mathrm{m}`$, Dec. $`66\mathrm{°}45\mathrm{}`$ (J2000), corresponding to LMC 4 (Meaburn 1980) and, in the column density image, the large east-west gap centred at RA $`05^\mathrm{h}00^\mathrm{m}`$, Dec. $`70\mathrm{°}12\mathrm{}`$ (J2000) and bounded by LMC 2 and arm S. This void includes LMC 8, LMC SGS 4 (Meaburn 1980, Kim et al. 1999) but is substantially larger. This void is discussed in Section 4 and the population of H i holes is further discussed in Section 5.
* The body of the LMC exhibits limb-brightening in H i as shown in the surface density profile of Fig. 10. The azimuthally-averaged surface density peaks at $`2\times 10^{20}`$ cm-2 near the dynamical centre, but also again at radius 2.2 kpc where it reaches $`1.7\times 10^{20}`$ cm-2. The limb-brightening is accentuated by arm E and the body of gas near LMC 2 and 30 Doradus in the south-east, especially in the column density image, and by arms S and W in the south and west, respectively. The column density increase in the south-east is sometimes identified as compression arising from the proper motion of the LMC through the tenuous halo of the Milky Way (e.g. de Boer et al. 1998).
* Diffuse gas is present around much of the LMC, especially at pa’s from 90° to 330°. At 5 kpc radius, Fig. 10 shows that the mean column density remains $`1\times 10^{20}`$ cm-2. A logarithmic version of the surface density profile is shown in Fig. 11. This shows that, although there a rapid decrease in column density beyond 2.5 kpc, there is no cutoff. The surface density decrease is approximated by $`\mathrm{\Sigma }(\text{}\text{i})r^{3.3}`$. This is shallower than the exponential profile which seems to characterise the late-type dwarf galaxies studied by Swaters (1999).
* The main arms B and E both emanate, at different velocities, from the south-east of the LMC. These arms appear to be associated with much of the diffuse gas in the southern half of Fig. 8. These arms are unlikely to be coplanar (see Section 3.4). Arm S is also clearly visible, and appears to be associated with some of the diffuse gas in the west. Arm W is less visible and more curved in Fig. 8 than in the channel maps and may therefore be a superposition of several components. As has been noted by several authors recently (Kim et al. 1998a; Gardiner et al. 1998) that, although disturbed, the LMC has distinct spiral features. This is in contrast with the near-infrared map of the stellar distribution (van der Marel 2001) which, aside from the bar and bar-related arm-like features, is remarkably uniform.

The main features in the outer body of the LMC are summarised in Fig. 1.

### 3.3 Spatially Integrated Properties of the LMC

Assuming a distance of 50 kpc and optically thin emission, the column density image in Fig. 8 can be integrated to give a total H i mass for the LMC, $`M_{HI}=(4.8\pm 0.2)\times 10^8`$ M (Table 1). McGee & Milton (1966) quote a similar value, $`5.0\times 10^8`$ M (adjusted to the distance scale used here), though they applied an optical depth correction based on a spin temperature of 200 K. As already noted, LR92 quote a smaller value, $`3.1\times 10^8`$ M. Their survey was limited in spatial extent. When our image is integrated over the same area, the mass remains 30 per cent higher than quoted by LR92. Possible reasons for this have already been given. It is worth mentioning that our new mass estimate makes the LMC H i mass higher than that of the SMC which is $`4.2\times 10^8`$ M (Stanimirović et al. 1999). The isodensity ($`>10^{20}`$ cm-2) mass and disk mass (radius $`<3.5`$ kpc) of the LMC are also listed in Table 1.

For comparison with other late-type galaxies, the spatially-integrated H i spectrum of the LMC is shown in Fig. 12. The area integrated in this figure is centred on the dynamical centre of Kim et al. (1998a). The heliocentric velocity (mean and $`V_{50}`$) is 273 km s-1, similar to the Kim et al. (1998a) kinematic value of 279 km s-1 and the LR92 kinematic value of 274 km s-1. We summarise velocity and velocity width parameters in Table 1.

Table 1 shows that the ratio of the H i to total mass in the LMC disk is 8%, the H i mass to blue luminosity ratio is 0.21 M$`{}_{\mathrm{}}{}^{}/`$L, and the star formation timescale ($`M_{\mathrm{gas}}/`$SFR) is 2.4 Gyr, where we have assumed a 30% He contribution. The H i mass is a factor of 10 higher than the condensed molecular mass estimated by Fukui et al. (1999), and a factor of 60 higher than the diffuse molecular mass measured by Tumlinson et al. (2002). The H i diameter of the LMC at 1 M pc-2 is 9.3 kpc and the ratio of the H i diameter to the optical diameter is $`D_{\mathrm{HI}}/D_{25}=1.1`$, in line with the mean value for spirals of $`1.7\pm 0.5`$ (Broeils & Rhee 1997), though less than the mean value for late-type dwarf galaxies of $`3.3\pm 1.5`$ (Swaters 1999). As its absolute magnitude of $`M_B=17.9`$ mag and its morphology indicate, the LMC has properties somewhat closer to those of spiral galaxies than to those of late-type dwarf galaxies.

### 3.4 Tidal and other Interaction Features

In Section 3.1, we referred to arms B, E and W which are marked in Fig. 1. Arm B leads directly into the Magellanic Bridge where it appears to merge with SMC gas, possibly explaining the multiple-peaked emission profiles in this region (McGee & Newton 1986). The Bridge appears to be tidal in origin and, in the model of Gardiner & Noguchi (1996), was formed 0.2 Gyr ago. The existence of arm B demonstrates the presence of some LMC gas in the Bridge, although the major component is undoubtedly stripped from the lower-mass SMC. Arm B consists of at least two separate filaments with a separation of up to $`0.5\mathrm{°}`$ (see Figs 1 & 8). The velocity differential between the filaments was sufficient to warrant listing the position RA $`04^\mathrm{h}58^\mathrm{m}36^\mathrm{s}`$, Dec. $`73\mathrm{°}33\mathrm{}57\mathrm{}`$ (J2000) as the centre of the candidate supergiant shell LMC SGS 1 by Kim et al. (1999).

Arms E and W lead directly south and north, respectively, of their starting point in the LMC. As already noted, arm E points to the beginning of the Leading Arm clouds mapped by Putman et al. (1998). Although these clouds lie 4° beyond the edge of the present map, deep reprocessed HIPASS data (Putman et al. 2002) show a continuous connection between this point and the Leading Arm at heliocentric velocities between 260 and 300 km s-1. Arm W leads directly north, extending into the diffuse gas to the north-west at $`270`$ km s-1. As noted by Putman et al. (2002) and seen in their Fig.5, this gas then seems to bypass the Bridge and makes what appears to be a direct connection with the Magellanic Stream..

What causes the arm-like features arms E and W? As with spectacular systems such as NGC 4038/4039 (the “Antennae”; Hibbard et al. 2001), a plausible explanation is again tidal interaction. But in this case, the tidal force arises from the Galaxy and not the SMC. As Fig. 1 shows, the great circle to the Galactic Centre lies directly south222 For an LMC/Galaxy mass ratio of 0.01, the LMC-Galaxy Lagrangian L1 point only lies $`5`$ kpc in front of the LMC (and because of parallax, $`1\mathrm{°}`$ south). of the LMC, therefore the tidal force projects along this line, at more or less the same position angle as the two arms. The two arms E and W may be wound up due to the LMC’s clockwise rotation (Kroupa & Bastian 1997).

It is unusual that arms B and E appear to emanate from similar points at the south-east of the LMC, with the former flowing into the Bridge and the latter flowing into the Leading Arm. The chronology of events is likely to be that the gaseous tide in the LMC was disturbed by the SMC’s close passage 0.2 Gyr ago, funnelling a portion of the gas near the LMC-Galaxy Lagrangian L1 point into the Bridge. At the present time, the tidal force ($`M/R^3`$) from the Galaxy is likely to be many times stronger than that from the SMC. For an LMC total mass of $`5\times 10^9`$ M (Kim et al. 1998, Alves & Nelson 2000) a distance of 50 kpc, an SMC total mass of $`1.5\times 10^9`$ M and an SMC/LMC separation of 22 kpc (Staveley-Smith et al. 1998), the tidal force ratio333As an aside, the predicted tidal force of the Galaxy on the LMC in Milgrom’s (1983) theory of modified Newtonian dynamics (MOND) is more or less the same as the Newtonian prediction. However, because there is little requirement for dark matter in the SMC even in the Newtonian model, the tidal force in the MOND regime ($`M/R^2`$) will be relatively stronger. Thus the Magellanic system, and similar multiple systems may be useful laboratories for studying inertia and gravity at low accelerations). is $`30`$. However, for an encounter at 7 kpc the force ratio would be unity.

Current numerical models predict that most of the gas in the Leading Arm (and the Stream) comes from the SMC, (Gardiner & Noguchi 1996; Li 1999), with the LMC merely serving to disrupt the Leading Arm which passes in front of it. However, it seems to be the case that, as with the Bridge, significant LMC gas is ‘leaking’ into the Leading Arm. Metallicity measurements of Leading Arm clouds such as HVC 287.5+22.5+240 (Lu et al. 1998) may give clues as to the ratio of LMC gas to the slightly less-enriched SMC gas.

Cepheid distances (Welch et al. 1987) suggest that the closest part of the LMC is at pa $`77{}_{}{}^{}\pm 42^{}`$ Recent AGB and RGB stellar distances give a more accurate near-side pa of $`32{}_{}{}^{}\pm 8^{}`$ (van der Marel & Cioni 2001). Therefore, the north-eastern part of the disk is the closest to the Galaxy, closest to the L1 point and the most easily perturbed by the SMC. This is not inconsistent with the point of origin of arms B and E.

A suggested geometry for the LMC tidal features is that arms B and E both arise from the outer parts of the LMC in the east. The arms extend southwards where they bifurcate at a position close to the LMC tidal radius. The low-velocity arm B swings around, probably upwards out of the plane of the LMC, curves around to the south-west where it eventually joins the Magellanic Bridge at somewhat larger distances than the LMC. This feature is evident in the simulations of Li (1999). The high-velocity arm E extends directly south, probably remaining at the same Galactocentric distance as the LMC. It then joins the general Leading Arm gas which mainly arises from the SMC. The large amount of star-formation in the 30 Doradus region may well be a manifestation of the tidal shear occurring in the region near the origin of arms B and E.

However, the question remains as to why the near-infrared stellar distribution is so smooth in the outer parts of the LMC. van der Marel (2001) reports no clearly discernable spiral structure at radii out to 9, which is beyond the radius surveyed in this paper. Tidal distortion must apply to stars as well as gas, and the usual argument that the H i is well outside the stellar distribution does not apply. Could it be that the evolved stars in the 2MASS and DENIS images are not tracing the same thin disk as the H i? Or has orbit-crossing and dissipation made the H i density evolve in a non-linear manner? The significant gas self gravity ($`10`$% of the total mass is in the form of H i and He; see Table 1) makes the latter a distinct possibility. Nevertheless, the stellar distribution shows strong evidence of tides. van der Marel (2001) argues that the distribution of stars is significantly elongated in the direction of the Galactic Centre, as predicted by tidal theory.

The diffuse gas in Fig 8, and labelled in Fig. 1 appears to be strongly related to the tidal arms. The gas in the south-east occurs at similar velocities to arm E. In the channel maps (Fig.2), some of this gas at 290 km s-1 itself falls into diffuse linear features. The more extensive HIPASS data again shows a connection to the Leading Arm. This would tend to argue for a tidal origin for this gas also. Weinberg (2000) also points out the dramatic effect of the Galaxy on the LMC’s stellar structure through torquing of disk orbits and tidal stripping, and suggests a mass-loss rate of $`3\times 10^8`$ M per orbit, even without the SMC. He also predicts tidally stripped stars some tens of kiloparsecs away from the LMC, which have possibly already been seen in the 2MASS data (Weinberg & Nikolaev 2001). With an LMC inclination of $`30^{}`$, and a line-of-nodes at pa $`0^{}`$, the spin vectors of the Galaxy and the LMC are perpendicular, a geometry not suitable for strong tidal interaction. However, if the higher values for the inclination and pa suggested by van der Marel (2001) are correct, then the spin vectors of the Galaxy and the LMC will be better aligned, and the current interaction will be stronger.

For the diffuse gas in the south-east, it is also worth noting that ram pressure is a viable alternative. Any gas outside the influence of the LMC which is slowed by ram pressure will tend to drop in its orbit around the Galaxy. By doing this, its angular velocity increases and it will tend to lead the LMC, unless dynamical friction on the LMC is more important (Moore & Davis 1994). Although Murali (2000) suggests that ram pressure is not a viable possibility for a remnant as old as the Magellanic Stream (otherwise there is too much evaporation), this argument does not apply to the clouds near the LMC. On the other side of the LMC, the diffuse gas to the south-west is clearly associated with the Bridge.

As well as having a strong tidal influence on the LMC and SMC, the Galaxy has left a clear tidal signature on the Sagittarius dwarf galaxy which is responsible for a trail of stars forming a great circle on the sky (Ibata et al. 2001). Martínez-Delgado et al. (2001) confirm the existence of tidal tails in Ursa Minor, a dwarf spheroidal galaxy lying at a distance of 70 kpc. Other objects such as the Carina dwarf spheroidal galaxy also appear to have stellar distributions which are radially truncated (Majewski et al. 2000). However, a lack of a clear understanding of the internal dynamical state of these systems has contributed to an uncertainty about whether the truncation can strictly be interpreted as tidal in origin.

The importance of tidal signatures in satellite galaxies lies in their usefulness in measuring the total mass of the Milky Way, the extent of its dark halo, and for detecting any sub-structure within the halo. Present results for the LMC and the Magellanic Stream appear to confirm the existence of a massive halo around the Galaxy, with the total mass out to a radius of 50 kpc of $`5\times 10^{11}`$ M. However, the existence of tidal debris around the LMC complicates interpretation of results from the MACHO experiment (Alcock et al. 2000) which attempted to measure the fraction of the Galaxy’s dark halo in the form of compact objects. Stars which are tidally stripped and lie slightly behind the LMC, rather than in a thin disk, substantially contribute to the frequency of microlensing events (Weinberg 2000). This implies that the measurement of the Galactic halo mass in the form of compact objects (currently $`10^{11}`$ M) should probably be regarded as an upper limit until the geometry of the halo of the LMC is better understood.

## 4 THE HALO OF THE LMC

Because the present study has velocity information, we can attempt to probe the LMC’s halo by searching for H i at anomalous velocities. Such gas is expected to occur due to outflows from star-forming regions and stripping of the outer disk due to tidal and ram pressure forces. Non-planar occurence of gas and stars has previously been reported or suggested by Luks & Rohlfs (1992), Zaritsky & Lin (1997), Wakker et al. (1998) and Graff et al. (2000) and, as reported by the latter, is an important factor in determining the self-lensing optical depth of the LMC. Of particular interest are the HVC complexes below $`+180`$ km s-1, whether they belong to the Galaxy or the LMC. de Boer, Morras & Bajaja (1990) use an H i strip scan to conclude that the gas at LSR velocities $`+70`$ and $`+140`$ km s-1 is Galactic in origin. Richter et al. (1999) concur, suggesting that the $`+120`$ km s-1 H2 absorption feature seen against HD269546 is an HVC originating in the disk of our Galaxy.

Fig. 13 shows the prominent HVCs (column densities over $`2\times 10^{18}`$ cm-2) with velocities in the range 115 to 176 km s-1 (heliocentric). They are extensive over much of the south-west LMC, but extend elsewhere in the field at lower column densities. Some or most of the emission in the south-west lies projected between arms B and S, and is likely related to the Bridge and the tidal interaction with the SMC. However, the peak column of $`2.4\times 10^{19}`$ cm-2 projects onto the position of the giant H i void containing LMC 8 (Meaburn 1980) and LMC SGS 4 (Kim et al. 1999) (see also Sections 3.2 and 5). Oey et al. (2002) show a high-resolution H i mosaic of this region which also contains the superbubbles DEM L25 and L50. Moreover, the HD269546 absorbing cloud seen by Richter et al. (1999), which has a peak column density $`1.0\times 10^{19}`$ cm-2, is at RA $`05^\mathrm{h}27^\mathrm{m}`$, Dec. $`68\mathrm{°}50\mathrm{}`$ (J2000) which corresponds to the H i void at LMC 3 (Meaburn 1980) and LMC SGS 12 (Kim et al. 1999). This suggests that this gas has been removed from the LMC disk. A position-velocity cut across both the HD 269546/LMC 3 and the LMC 8 clouds is shown in Fig. 14. The latter shows clear connections with LMC gas. The former shows a probable connection at low column density. At other pa’s, both complexes also appear to have gas at velocities higher than the LMC disk. This suggests an explosive origin for the gas, rather than a tidal or ram-pressure-stripped origin. However, the kinematics of the high-velocity gas are not simple, and certainly cannot be modelled as a simple expanding bubble, or double-sided mushroom cloud.

The association of some high-velocity clouds with the LMC implies that the outflow velocities, however they are attained, are substantial. In the case of the HD269546 cloud, the mean velocity differs by 126 km s-1 from systemic. In the case of the LMC 8 cloud, the mean velocity differs by 97 km s-1 from systemic. Outflows at these velocities ought to be accompanied by X-ray as well as the H$`\alpha `$ emission already known to be present. However, the strength depends on the density of the medium being shocked. Because a substantial H i column is present in the HD269546 cloud, its temperature is lower than $`10^4`$ K, but higher than the lower limit to the H2 excitation temperature of $`10^3`$ K measured by Bluhm et al. (2001). These clouds probably exist in a cocoon of hotter material. Bluhm et al. (2001) suggest a neutral hydrogen fraction of 5–20%, from observations of O and O+.

The height of the neutral clouds above the LMC disk can only be speculated. The projected radii of LMC SGS 4 and 12 (Kim et al. 1999) provides a weak lower limit of $`0.5`$ kpc. The $`30`$° inclination of the LMC possibly provides an upper limit of a few kpc, otherwise the non-planar gas would project elsewhere on the LMC disk (though this may indeed be the case for much of the gas in Fig. 13).

## 5 H i HOLES

Several holes, or gaps in the H i column density image in Fig. 8 are apparent. As originally noted by Westerlund & Mathewson (1966), the positions of some holes show a very strong correlation with stellar associations, H ii regions and SNRs. Six of the nine candidate supergiant H$`\alpha `$ shells listed by Meaburn (1980) are clearly associated with holes. These shells are marked in Fig. 15. LMC 1, 4 and 5 are well-aligned with an H i hole; LMC 2 and 3 are more complex than simple circular holes; and LMC 8 is associated with an H i hole that is at least twice as large as the H$`\alpha `$ shell. In addition to the six Meaburn shells shown in Fig. 15, Kim et al. (1999) list a further 17 supergiant shells. Some of the largest of these (LMC SGS 6, 17 and 23) are also clearly visible as H i holes in Fig. 15.

As discussed by Kim et al. (1999), there is a good association between H i and H ii regions, and some evidence for regions of star-formation providing direct mechanical input into the expansion of the shells and therefore the evacuation of the H i. However, Wada et al. (2000) point out that thermal and gravitational instabilities can also lead to the formation of cavities and filaments. In cases like LMC 4, numerous studies (Dopita et al. 1985, Domgörgen et al. 1995, Efremov & Elmegreen 1998, Olsen et al. 2001) paint a picture of progressive star-formation propagating outwards from the centre of the shell. Ionization, dynamical pressure and conversion to molecules and stars depletes the H i, with the remainder forming a rim where the newest star-formation occurs. In other cases such as LMC 2, the geometry is more complex and, although energy input by stellar winds and supernovae (Weaver et al. 1977) may dominate, the simple model of outwardly propagating star-formation requires modification (Points et al. 1999, 2000). Finally, in cases such as LMC SGS 6 (Kim et al. 1999), no correlation between H i and anything else is evident. In these cases, it is possible that an older population of stars whose initial mass function was skewed towards higher mass stars is responsible. However, it is also possible that other dynamical events are responsible.

For each of the holes marked in Fig. 15, we have plotted a position-velocity slice in Fig. 16. These slices commonly show a dip in the column density at the position of the hole (except where the image is saturated), evidence for a velocity gradient which reflects the rotation of the LMC, and, in some cases, evidence for high-velocity gas. LMC 2, 4 and LMC SGS 17 and 23 show evidence for multiple velocity components close to the systemic velocity ($`\mathrm{\Delta }V20`$ km s-1) and which may be construed as continued slow momentum or pressure-driven expansion of gas away from the interior of the evacuated shell. In addition, most of the holes (except LMC 4 and LMC SGS 6) show evidence for higher velocity gas ($`\mathrm{\Delta }V100`$ km s-1) at low column densities (as discussed in Section 4 for LMC 3 and 8). The origin of this gas and its definite association with the H i holes remains unclear. However, expulsion by stellar and supernova shocks, or other explosive events, remains a good possibility. Further studies of the coronal gas towards such regions (e.g. Bomans et al. 1996, Wakker et al. 1998) are desirable.

## 6 THE GALACTIC FOREGROUND

Its closeness, favourable inclination and low internal extinction make the LMC an ideal object to study in the optical for many purposes. However, its mean Galactic latitude of $`34\mathrm{°}`$ means that foreground extinction is of some importance. IRAS is unable to separate LMC dust from Galactic dust (although Schwering & Israel 1991 attempted to incorporate low resolution H i data to isolate the foreground component). For example, the LMC, SMC and M31 are not removed from the IRAS/DIRBE extinction maps of Schlegel, Finkbeiner & Davis (1998). Around the outskirts of the LMC, the maps of Schlegel et al. (1998) show a variation from $`E_{BV}=0.04`$ to the north-west of the LMC to around 0.12 in the south-west, implying that extinction is significant, and variable. The SMC, lying slightly further from the Galactic Plane appears to lie in a region with foreground extinction at the lower end of this range. A strong linear feature, now known to be associated with Galactic gas and dust also complicates the picture (de Vaucouleurs 1955, McGee et al. 1986).

Because there appears to be no Galactic gas $`>100`$ km s-1, or LMC gas $`<100`$ km s-1, there is a clean separation of the Galactic and LMC components in the H i data. Fig. 17 shows the peak brightness-temperature and column density images for the Galactic component using the same intensity range as the LMC images in Fig. 8. The Galactic component is smoother with a maximum column density around a quarter of that in the LMC, and a maximum temperature of around two-thirds of the LMC value. There is a significant column-density gradient from north-west to south-east and a significant filament extending from the north at RA $`05^\mathrm{h}38^\mathrm{m}`$, Dec. $`62\mathrm{°}26\mathrm{}`$ (J2000) to RA $`04^\mathrm{h}39^\mathrm{m}`$, Dec. $`70\mathrm{°}50\mathrm{}`$ (J2000) in the south-east. Contours of H i column density are shown in Fig. 18 along with $`E_{BV}`$ contours based, for reference, on equation (7) of Burstein & Heiles (1978).

Over the disk of the LMC, the mean Galactic extinction is $`<E_{BV}>=0.06`$ mag with a range between 0.01 and 0.14, and an rms of 0.02 mag. The extinction gradient is from north-west to south-east, with a systematic variation of $`\mathrm{\Delta }E_{BV}0.1`$ mag over the full field. Although significant in $`B`$ ($`\mathrm{\Delta }A_B0.4`$ mag), the variation in $`H`$ is small ($`\mathrm{\Delta }A_H0.06`$ mag) and should only affect the details of infrared structural results (Weinberg & Nikolaev 2001, van der Marel & Cioni 2001) rather than modify their overall conclusions. As pointed out by Schwering & Israel (1991), 30 Doradus has a low foreground extinction ($`E_{BV}=0.05`$). The LMC values agree with: the mean of $`0.06\pm 0.02`$ mag and range of 0.00 to 0.15 mag from the cool star data of Oestreicher, Gochermann & Schmidt-Kaler (1995) (see also Zaritsky 1999); a mean of 0.06 mag from a combination of polarisation and H i data by Bessell (1991); and the range 0.07 to 0.17 mag suggested by Schwering & Israel (1991) from a combination of H i and IRAS data.

Finally, it should be emphasised that the H i data alone has zero-point problems due to a combination of spillover radiation and intrinsic variations in gas-to-dust ratio. However, the range of IRAS/DIRBE extinctions around the LMC (0.04 to 0.12) is similar to the range, derived from the present H i data (0.01 to 0.14), implying no large systematic problem (the random errors are negligible). Both results are consistent with the combined Galactic and LMC extinctions, measured by Dutra et al. (2001) using background galaxies, of $`E_{BV}=0.12\pm 0.10`$.

## 7 SUMMARY

Parkes multibeam observations have been made of neutral hydrogen in and around the Large Magellanic Cloud. The major results are:

* The LMC has a total H i mass of $`(4.8\pm 0.2)\times 10^8`$ M (for an assumed distance of 50 kpc), of which $`3.8\times 10^8`$ M lies within a well-defined disk. This is 8% of the total mass and is a factor of 10 more than the molecular mass so far identified.
* We measure H i column densities which are 43% higher than the previous survey by Luks & Rohlfs (1992).
* Outer tidal arms are identified. These arms appear to channel gas into: (a) the Magellanic Bridge, (b) the Magellanic Stream, and (c) the Leading Arm, and appear to be a result of the two-way interaction of the LMC with both the Galaxy and the Small Magellanic Cloud. The gas at $`r>4\mathrm{°}`$ does not follow the outer stellar contours, suggesting that shocks, self-gravity or, possibly, external ram pressure contribute to their appearance. The existence of tidal shearing in the LMC argues for the presence of a massive Galactic halo, and as emphasised by Weinberg (2000), suggests that care needs to be taken to eliminate self-lensing when LMC gravitational microlensing events are used to measure the density of compact objects in the Galaxy’s halo.
* High-velocity clouds, previously seen in absorption against LMC stars appear mainly to belong to the LMC in cases where their heliocentric velocity exceeds about 100 km s-1, and not to the Galactic disk or halo.
* Some of the high-velocity clouds appear to be coincident with H i voids (e.g. LMC 3 and 8), suggestive that these voids were created by explosive events. However, most of the H i voids are just that – they show no clearly defined shells of expanding gas. Presumably, if created by supernova and stellar winds, the giant voids accessible for study at the resolution of the Parkes telescope (i.e. $`>0.7`$ kpc) have already expanded well outside of the thickness of the LMC disk.
* The Galactic foreground H i emission has been used to provide an image, at 16$`\stackrel{}{.}`$4 resolution, of the likely foreground dust extinction over the field of the LMC. The mean Galactic extinction is $`<E_{BV}>=0.06`$ mag within the disk of the LMC. Over the full field imaged, there is an extinction gradient from north-west to south-east of $`\mathrm{\Delta }E_{BV}0.1`$ mag, corresponding to $`\mathrm{\Delta }A_B0.4`$ mag and $`\mathrm{\Delta }A_H0.06`$ mag.

## Acknowledgments

We thank Christian Brüns and Agris Kalnajs for helpful discussions, the staff at the Parkes telescope for assistance during the commissioning of the narrow-band system, and Warwick Wilson and the AT electronics group for making the hardware and software work efficiently.


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# Coulomb-enhanced dynamic localization and Bell state generation in coupled quantum dots

## I Introduction

Quantum-state engineering via optical or electrical manipulation over the coherent dynamics of suitable quantum-mechanical systems has become a fascinating prospect of modern physics. A very intriguing result in the study of a single particle in a double-trap system exposed to a time-dependent external field is the dynamic localization phenomenon, i.e., for appropriate field parameters, a localized wave packet remains dynamically localized during the subsequent time evolution. This driving induced trapping has been theoretically and experimentally studied in many physical and chemical systems.

When two or more interacting particles are present, apart from the highly nontrivial question of whether the strong many-body interaction can be overcome for the particles to create and preserve localization, the possibility of entanglement of the many-body wave functions arises. Entanglement is an essential ingredient in any scheme of quantum information processing. Recently, quantum dot realizations of the entanglement have received increasing attention. Various schemes based on electron spins and electron-hole pairs have been proposed to implement quantum computer hardware architectures. Although there have been some numerical studies on interacting electron systems driven by an AC field, there is still little theoretical understanding of the observed effects beyond the phenomenology level at the present time.

In this paper, we address the dynamic localization and quantum entanglement of two interacting electrons in a double quantum dot system driven by an AC field (see Fig. 1). We show that with certain choice of parameters, in contrast to direct intuition, the Coulomb repulsion may enhance the localization due to the level crossing associated with different symmetries of a dynamic parity operation (discussed in more detail later). We also show that the maximally entangled Bell state can be prepared and maintained with a pulse of an AC field. Our study provides useful information for the future exploitation of coherent control of two-electron states in quantum dots.

In Sec. II we present the Hamiltonian for two interacting electrons in a double-dot system. A simplified spin-1 representation of the Hamiltonian is given in Sec. III. In Sec. IV we discuss the phenomenon of Coulomb-enhanced localization. The field excitation procedure to generate the maximally entangled Bell state is showed in Sec. V. A summary is given in Sec. VI.

## II Theoretical model

The Hamiltonian which we use to describe the dynamics of two interacting electrons in a coupled quantum dot driven by electric field is

$$H(t)=\underset{i=1,2}{}h(𝐫_i,𝐩_i,t)+V_C(|𝐫_1𝐫_2|),$$
(1)
$$h(𝐫,𝐩,t)=\frac{𝐩^2}{2m^{}}ezF(t)+V_t(𝐫)+V_l(𝐫),$$
(2)
$$V_C(|𝐫_1𝐫_2|)=\frac{e^2}{\kappa |𝐫_1𝐫_2|},$$
(3)
where $`V_C(|𝐫_1𝐫_2|)`$ is the Coulomb interaction and $`h`$ the single-particle Hamiltonian. The time-dependent electric field $`F(t)`$ is applied along the inter-dot axis. The dielectric constant $`\kappa `$ and the effective mass $`m^{}`$ are material parameters. The potential $`V_t`$ in $`h`$ describes the in-plane confinement, whereas $`V_l`$ models the longitudinal double-well structure. The transverse coupling of the dots is modeled by a harmonic potential

$$V_t(x,y)=\frac{m^{}\omega _t^2}{2}(x^2+y^2).$$
(4)
It has been shown in experiments with electrically gated quantum dots in a two-dimensional electron system that the electronic spectrum is well described by a simple harmonic oscillator. In describing the confinement $`V_l`$ along the inter-dot axis, we use a (locally harmonic) double well potential of the form

$$V_l=\frac{m^{}\omega _l^2}{8a^2}(z^2a^2)^2,$$
(5)
which, in the limit of large inter-dot distance, separates into two harmonic wells (one for each dot) of frequency $`\omega _l`$. Although in principle a square-well potential would be a more accurate description of the real potential than the harmonic double well, there is no qualitative difference between the results presented below obtained with harmonic potential and the corresponding results using square-well potential.

We assume the transverse confinement is strong enough. Thus, the $`(x,y)`$ degrees of freedom are frozen in the dynamics and the two-electron wave function can be written as $`|\mathrm{\Psi }(𝐫_1,𝐫_2,t)=|\varphi (x_1,y_1)|\varphi (x_2,y_2)|\mathrm{\Phi }(z_1,z_2,t)`$, where $`|\varphi (x,y)`$ is the transverse ground state. Considering the fact that the external electric field is applied along the longitudinal direction, the approximation of frozen in-plane motion is reasonable and has been employed in previous work. After integrating over the $`(x,y)`$ degrees of freedom, the time dependent Schrödinger equation becomes

$`i\mathrm{}{\displaystyle \frac{|\mathrm{\Phi }(z_1,z_2,t)}{t}}`$ $`=`$ $`[{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{}^2}{2m^{}}}({\displaystyle \frac{^2}{z_1^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{^2}{z_2^2}})+V(z_1)+V(z_2)`$ (6)
$`+V_C(|z_1z_2|)eF(t)(z_1+z_2)]|\mathrm{\Phi }(z_1,z_2,t),`$
where $`V_C`$ is the effective one-dimensional Coulomb interaction

$$V_C(|z_1z_2|)=𝑑x_1𝑑x_2𝑑y_1𝑑y_2\frac{e^2\varphi ^2(x_1,y_1)\varphi ^2(x_2,y_2)}{\kappa |𝐫_1𝐫_2|}.$$
(7)
We use the effective mass $`m^{}`$ and dielectric constant $`\kappa `$ of GaAs. The other parameters are chosen as $`\mathrm{}\omega _l=20`$meV and $`a=20`$nm.

The time evolution of the two electrons is obtained by numerically solving the Schrödinger equation (4) using an extension of the Crank-Nicholson method to two spatial dimensions. The initial state used in this investigation is the field-free ground state, which is obtained by propagating a trial two-particle wave packet in the imaginary time domain and shown in Fig. 2(a). As illustrated by the spatial symmetry under the particle exchange, the ground state is a singlet, as expected. Since Eq. (4) contains no mixing between the singlet and triplet sub-spaces, the dynamics of the system will always be confined to the singlet sub-space.

## III Spin-1 representation of the Hamiltonian

To understand the underlying physics behind the numerical results we employ the Hund-Mulliken (HM) approximation by introducing the orthonormalized one-particle wave functions $`|\mathrm{\Phi }_{\pm a}=(|\phi _{\pm a}g|\phi _a)/\sqrt{12Sg+g^2}`$, where $`|\phi _{\pm a}`$ are the single-particle ground states for the right and left dots, $`S=\phi _{+a}|\phi _a`$ denotes the overlap integral, and $`g=(1\sqrt{1S^2})/S`$. Using $`|\mathrm{\Phi }_{\pm a}`$, we construct three singlet basis functions with respect to which we diagonalize the two-electron Hamiltonian: Two states with double occupation in each dot, $`|RR=|\mathrm{\Phi }_{+a}(z_1)|\mathrm{\Phi }_{+a}(z_2)`$, $`|LL=|\mathrm{\Phi }_a(z_1)|\mathrm{\Phi }_a(z_2)`$, and one state with single occupation in each dot, $`|LR=(1/\sqrt{2})[|\mathrm{\Phi }_{+a}(z_1)|\mathrm{\Phi }_a(z_2)+|\mathrm{\Phi }_{+a}(z_2)|\mathrm{\Phi }_a(z_1)]`$. Calculating the matrix elements of the Hamiltonian in this orthonormal basis, we obtain

$$H_{HM}(t)=uJ_z^2+2wJ_x\mu (t)J_z,$$
(7)
where we have dropped a constant energy term that makes no contribution to the dynamics. In Eq. (6) $`u=LL|V_C|LLLR|V_C|LR`$ is the difference between the intradot and interdot Coulomb interaction, $`w=\mathrm{\Phi }_{\pm a}|h(za)|\mathrm{\Phi }_a+LR|V_C|LL`$ denotes the single-particle tunneling induced by dot-dot coupling and the Coulomb interaction, $`\mu (t)=2eF(t)a(1g^2)/(12Sg+g^2)`$ describes the electron-field coupling, and $`J_x`$ and $`J_z`$ are the $`x`$\- and $`z`$\- components of the spin-1 operator. The localized two-particle state $`|LL`$ is equivalent to the eigenstate $`j_z=1`$ of $`J_z`$ and $`|RR`$ to the state $`j_z=1`$, while the delocalized state $`|LR`$ is identical to the state $`j_z=0`$. According to the expression for $`u`$ and $`w`$, using the material parameters given below Eq. (5) we obtain $`u=12`$meV and $`w=0.4`$meV.

In the absence of an external driving, the eigenenergies of $`H_{HM}`$ are $`E_1=(u\sqrt{u^2+16w^2})/2,`$ $`E_2=u`$, and $`E_3=(u+\sqrt{u^2+16w^2})/2`$, and the corresponding eigenstates are

$$|\phi _1=|LLE_3/(\sqrt{2}w)|LR+|RR,$$
(8)
$$|\phi _2=(|RR|LL)/\sqrt{2},$$
(9)
$$|\phi _3=|LLE_1/(\sqrt{2}w)|LR+|RR.\text{ }$$
(10)
The symmetric ground state $`|\phi _1`$ is dominated by the delocalized state $`|LR`$ due to the strong Coulomb repulsion, whereas the other two eigenstates are nearly degenerate and dominated by the two localized states $`|LL`$ and $`|RR`$. The superposition of the two localized states $`|LL`$ and $`|RR`$ implies that the spatial wave functions of the two electrons have been entangled and correlated, in the usual sense that they cannot be factorized into single-particle states. The nonlinear term in $`H_{HM}`$ can be exploited to generate entangled states. The ground state of Eq. (7) is plotted in Fig. 2(b). Clearly the HM approximation describes the ground state very well when compared with the exact numerical solution \[Fig. 2(a)\].

## IV Coulomb-enhanced Dynamic localization

To investigate dynamic localization, one must start with a localized wave packet. This can be realized from the unperturbed ground state by two separate methods: One is to suddenly switch on a DC field with the strength satisfying the resonance condition $`\mu _0=u`$. At time $`t\pi /(\sqrt{2}w)`$, the delocalized ground state $`|\phi _1`$ evolves into a localized state $`|RR`$ with two electrons occupying the same right dot. The alternative method is to adiabatically switch on a constant electric field. Then as shown in Fig. 2(c), the ground state configuration develops a series of Coulomb stairs as a function of the field amplitude, corresponding to a series of avoided crossing in the energy spectrum \[see Fig. 2(d)\].

After preparing a localized state, say $`|RR`$, by adiabatic evolution in the presence of a DC field, the DC field is suddenly swiched off and an AC field of the form $`F_1\mathrm{sin}(\omega t)`$ is swiched on. We show now that the localization can be dynamically maintained by the AC field even when the field strength is small compared to the Coulomb repulsion between the two electrons. Time periodicity of the Hamiltonian enables us to describe the dynamics within the Floquet formalism. In addition, since the Hamiltonian is invariant under the combined dynamic parity operation $`zz`$; $`tt+\pi /\omega `$, each Floquet state is either odd or even. Quasienergies of different parity may cross, otherwise an avoided crossing may occur. Figures 3(a)-(b) show the quasienergy spectra of $`H_{HM}(t)`$ as a function of $`F_1`$ with the presence and absence of the Coulomb interaction, respectively. Two prominent features can be identified from the comparison of these two cases: (i) the strong Coulomb interaction removes the level crossings among three two-particle states and thus induces avoided crossings; (ii) in the weak field regime, there occurs a crossing between the quasienergies $`\epsilon _2`$ and $`\epsilon _3`$, which develop from the unperturbed eigenenergies $`E_2`$ and $`E_3`$. To illustrate the effect of this crossing on the system’s dynamics, we begin with the initial state $`|RR`$ and follow the time evolution of the probability $`P_{RR}(t)`$ for finding the two electrons in the right dot. The result is shown in Fig. 3(c). It is clear that $`P_{RR}`$ always remains near 1 as if the two electrons were frozen in the same right dot. This dynamic localization seems counterintuitive at first as the Coulomb repulsion is very strong compared to the AC field, preventing the two electrons occupying the same dot. The localization shown in Fig. 3(c) has no correspondence in a non-interacting case, since no level crossings occur in the weak field regime if the Coulomb interaction is absent. Therefore, the present localization effect results from an interplay of the Coulomb interaction and an AC field. Furthermore, we find that even if the Coulomb interaction is strong enough, the dynamic localization can still occur at the crossing of the quasienergies $`\epsilon _2`$ and $`\epsilon _3`$. Slightly away from the crossing point, the life time for finding two electrons in the right dot is very long. This makes the experimental realization of the dynamic localization more realistic. The ratio $`2\mu _1/\omega `$ at the first crossing is about $`2.4`$, a root of the zero-order Bessel function, suggesting that the two-electron localization can be approximated by a two-state model composed of $`|\phi _2`$ and $`|\phi _3`$.

Surprisingly, we find that in the strong field regime, the presence of Coulomb repulsion may help to enhance the dynamic localization when compared with the non-interacting case. From Eq. (7) we see that due to the strong Coulomb interaction, $`|RR(1/\sqrt{2})(|\phi _2+|\phi _3)`$. Thus the initial localized state can be approximated by a superposition of the degenerate Floquet states developed from the nearly-degenerate states $`|\phi _2`$ and $`|\phi _3`$, which leads to a complete suppression of tunneling at the crossing of the quasienergies $`\epsilon _2`$ and $`\epsilon _3`$ even in the weak field limit. In the absence of the Coulomb interaction, the initial localized state $`|RR`$ is a superposition of all three eigenstates, suggesting dynamic localization at the crossing among three quasienergies. However, the fundamental difference lies in the fact that when the strong interaction is present, the tunneling coupling is $`LL|H_{HM}|RR4w^2/u`$, whereas in the absence of the Coulomb interaction the tunneling coupling is $`2w`$. Thus the coupling between the two localized states greatly decreases in the presence of strong Coulomb interaction, which leads to the enhancement of localization effects.

We emphasize that the localization only occurs at the crossing of the quasienergies developed from the high-energy eigenstates $`|\phi _2`$ and $`|\phi _3`$, in which case the delocalized ground state $`|\phi _1`$ is a dark state during time evolution. For comparison, Figure 3(d) shows $`P_{RR}(t)`$ with the field parameters corresponding to the crossing of the quasienergies $`\epsilon _1`$ and $`\epsilon _3`$. It reveals that dynamic localization disppears and the two electrons start to oscillate between two dots. This fact highlights the essential difference between a single-particle system and an interacting two-particle system. The level crossing of $`\epsilon _1`$ and $`\epsilon _3`$ induces strong participation of the Floquet state evolved from the unperturbed ground state. As its largest component is the delocalized two-particle state $`|LR`$, dynamic localization will be completely destructed, as shown in Fig. 3(d).

## V Bell state generation

In this section we investigate the field excitation procedure to obtain a maximally entangled Bell state of the form $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_{Bell}=(|RR+e^{i\varphi }|LL)`$ with an arbitrary phase angle $`\varphi `$. Figure 4(a) plots the Floquet quasienergies of $`H_{HM}(t)`$ as a function of the driving frequency $`\omega `$. It shows that when $`\omega =u`$, an avoided crossing is formed between the quasienergies $`\epsilon _1`$ and $`\epsilon _2`$. Choosing the field parameters at this avoided crossing and starting with the unperturbed ground state, we present in Fig. 4(b) the probabilities $`P_{LR}(t)`$ for finding the two electrons in different dots, $`P_{LL}`$ in the left dot, and $`P_{RR}`$ in the right dot. It shows that the two electrons oscillate between the delocalized state $`|LR`$ and two localized states $`|LL`$ and $`|RR`$. The occupations of two localized states are always the same and the oscillations are always in-phase. Figure 4(c) shows the probability $`\rho _{Bell}`$ for finding the maximally entangled Bell state with $`\varphi =\pi `$. One can see that $`\rho _{Bell}`$ varies with time, reaching a maximum value of 1 when $`P_{LR}=0`$ (the two electrons are maximally entangled with $`\rho _{Bell}=1`$). A direct numerical solution of Eq. (4) gives the same prediction.

Once the two electrons are in the maximally entangled Bell state, they can remain maximally entangled by suddenly turning off the AC field. We show this effect in Figure 5. Figure 5(a) plots the time evolution of the occupations of three two-particle states, and Figure 5(b) the probability $`\rho _{Bell}`$ with $`\varphi =\pi `$ (solid line). It is clear from Fig. 5(a) that a pulse of an AC field induces the two electrons to stay in the same dot, while each of them occupies either of the dots with the same probability. As shown in Fig. 5(b) (solid line), the two electrons remain maximally entangled after the electric field is turned off. Therefore, the maximally entangled Bell state can be created and maintained by applying a pulse of a resonant AC field.

We derive an approximate analytical solution to highlight the physical aspect of the Bell-state generation procedure. Taking into account symmetric properties of the three unperturbed eigenstates of the system, the dynamics shown in Fig. 5 is determined by the one-photon transition between the ground state $`|\phi _1`$ and the first excited state $`|\phi _2`$, whereas the transition from $`|\phi _1`$ to $`|\phi _3`$ is prohibited due to their identical symmetry. In this case, we can approximate the Hamiltonian $`H_{HM}(t)`$ in a Hilbert space spanned by the states $`|\phi _1`$ and $`|\phi _2`$

$$H_{HM}^r(t)=\left(\begin{array}{cc}E_1& \sqrt{2}\mu (t)/X\\ \sqrt{2}\mu (t)/X& E_2\end{array}\right),$$
(11)
where $`X=\sqrt{4w^2+E_3^2}/\sqrt{2}w`$. In the case of one-photon resonance $`E_2E_1=\omega `$ and after applying the rotating-wave approximation we obtain the expression for the probability of finding the maximally entangled Bell state

$$\rho _{Bell}(t)=\frac{1}{2}(1\mathrm{cos}\varphi )\mathrm{sin}^2(w\mu _1t/u),$$
(12)
in the interaction representation and weak coupling limit $`uw`$. We can see from Eq. (9) that the quantum state of the system at time $`\tau =\pi u/(2w\mu _1)`$ corresponds to a $`\varphi =\pi `$ maximally entangled Bell state $`(|RR|LL)/\sqrt{2}`$.

The result of Eq. (9) is shown in Fig. 5(c) (dotted line). Clearly, in comparison with the exact numerical solution (solid line), our two-state approximation describes the system evolution very well. Therefore we arrive at the conclusion that a selective pulse of an AC field with duration $`\tau =\pi u/(2w\mu _1)`$ can be used to create and maintain a maximally entangled Bell state in the system of two electrons in two coupled quantum dots.

We notice from Eq. (9) that Bell-state generation time is significantly shortened by increasing the amplitude of the AC field. This is important because shorter Bell-state generation time is fundamental to the experimental observation of such maximally entangled state, which is impeded by inevitable decoherence occurred in the realistic double quantum dot system. The decoherence is the most problematic issue pertaining to most quantum computing processing. In the present entangled state proposal, the decohering time depends partly on the fluctuation of the single particle energy caused by the modification of the confining potential due to phononic excitations. There is also a quantum electrodynamic contribution because of coupling to the vacuum modes. In addition, impurity scattering and phonon emission also have contributions to the decoherence. However, in principle, their effects can be minimized by more precise fabrication technology and by cooling the system.

## VI Summary

In summary, we have shown how the dynamic localization and entanglement of two interacting electrons in a coupled quantum dot system can be generated and maintained using an AC field. The Bell-state generation time has been calculated by an analytical approach. Exact numerical calculation confirms these two kinds of Coulomb-involved phenomena. We hope the present study will shed some light on the future development of the coherent control of electrons in quantum dot systems.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

This work is supported by CNSF under Grant No. 69625608 and by US-DOE.

Figure Captions

FIG. 1. Sketch of two interacting electrons in a coupled quantum dot driven by electric fields.

FIG. 2. (a) Two-electron ground state versus the longitudinal coordinates of the two electrons along diagonal direction $`z_1=z_2=z`$, obtained via numerically integrating Eq. (4) with no AC field; (b) Two-electron ground state obtained analytically via the Hund-Mulliken approximation; (c) Electron-number distribution of the right dot in the ground state as a function of DC electric field; (d) Low-energy spectrum versus DC field.

FIG. 3. (a) Quasienergy spectrum for two interacting electrons for $`\omega =4.01`$meV; (b) Quasienergy spectrum with no Coulomb interaction; (c) Probability $`P_{RR}`$ that two electrons occupy the same right dot for an AC field of $`F_1=1.078`$kV/cm, which produces an exact crossing between two quasienergies that developed from nearly-degenerate two-particle eigenenergies; (d) $`P_{RR}`$ for $`F_1=0.76`$kV/cm and $`\omega =6.4`$meV, corresponding to a crossing between two quasienergies, one of which originates from unperturbed ground-state.

FIG. 4. (a) Floquet spectrum versus the driving frequency of an AC field with a strength $`F_1=1`$kV/cm; (b) Probabilities that the two electrons are in different combinations of two quantum dots, for a driving frequency $`\omega =12`$meV, corresponding to the avoided crossing shown in (a); (c) Probability $`\rho _{Bell}`$ as a function of time.

FIG. 5. (a) Probabilities that the two electrons are in different combinations of two quantum dots, with the AC field switched off after $`t=8.1`$ps; (b) Probability $`\rho _{Bell}`$ as a function of time. The numerical and analytic results are shown with the solid and dotted lines, respectively.