text:
# Simultaneous Optical and X-ray Observations of Flares and Rotational Modulation on the RS CVn Binary HR 1099 (V711 Tau) from the MUSICOS 1998 CampaignBased on observations obtained during the MUSICOS 98 MUlti-SIte COntinuous Spectroscopic campaign from Observatoire de Haute-Provence, France, Kitt Peak National Observatory, USA, ESO La Silla, Chile, Mt. Stromlo Observatory, Australia, Xinglong National Observatory, China, Isaac Newton Telescope, Spain, Laboratório Nacional de Astrofísica, Brazil, and South African Astronomical Observatory, South Africa. Contemporaneous observations from Catania, Italy and Fairborn Observatories, USA, and on data obtained with the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer.

## 1 Introduction

RS CVn binary systems consist of a chromospherically active evolved star tidally locked to a main-sequence or sub-giant companion. Short orbital periods of a few days are typically observed. The RS CVn high level of activity has been measured across the entire spectrum and, for fast rotators, it approaches the saturation limits for chromospheric, transition region and coronal emission. One of the striking aspects of these systems is their propensity to flare (Doyle et al. 1992). Moreover, RS CVns show optical photometric variations which are believed to arise from the rotational modulation of photospheric spots (Rodonò et al. 1986), large scale versions of dark solar spots, that provide evidence for large scale magnetic fields. The typical energies of the atmospheric magnetic fields in these systems are up to several orders of magnitude larger than on the Sun, thus allowing us to observe a range of energetic phenomena not occurring on the Sun. Short-period RS CVn-like systems, through their rotational modulation, can then provide information on the morphology and three-dimensional spatial distribution of spots in stellar atmospheres.

The system observed in this campaign is HR 1099 (V711 Tau, $`03^h36^m47^s`$ $`+00^o35^{}16^{\prime \prime }`$ (J2000), V=5.64, B$``$V=0.92) a close double-lined spectroscopic binary. At a distance of 29 pc (The Hipparcos and Tycho Catalogues (ESA 1997)), HR 1099 is the nearest and brightest of the classical RS CVns with a K1 IV primary and a G5 V secondary tidally locked in a $`2\stackrel{d}{.}8`$ orbit. Fekel (1983) provided the orbital parameters of the binary and obtained masses, radii, and spectral types for both components. The K sub-giant nearly fills its Roche lobe and is by far the most “active” of the two components (Ayres & Linsky 1982; Robinson et al. 1996). Evolutionary models suggest that mass transfer from the K primary onto the G secondary may begin within $`10^7`$ years (Fekel 1983). The primary exhibits conspicuous signatures of chromospheric activity, such as strong and variable Ca ii H & K and H$`\alpha `$ emission (Rodonò et al. 1987; Dempsey et al. 1996; Robinson et al. 1996), which is due to its tidally induced rapid rotation, combined with the deepened convection zone of a post-main- sequence envelope. Montes et al. (1997) revealed broad and variable wings of the H$`\alpha `$ chromospheric line on the primary star.

The G5 dwarf is probably also active, having a sufficiently deep convection zone and fast rotation to host an efficient dynamo. In particular, due to the presence of spots, G-type stars with rotation periods of about 3 days are expected to show V-band light curve amplitudes up to 0.10 mag, as can be inferred from the rotation-activity relations at photospheric levels (Messina et al. 2001). However, because of the small luminosity ratio in the V-band (LG5V/L$`{}_{\mathrm{K1IV}}{}^{}0.27`$), the contribution from the G5 component to the observed magnetic activity manifestations in the optical band is significantly smaller than from the K1 IV primary.

HR 1099 is one of the few RS CVn systems, along with UX Ari, II Peg, and DM UMa, that shows H$`\alpha `$ constantly in emission. Optical light curves have shown, via Doppler imagery, the presence of a long-lived ($`>`$11 yr) polar spot, together with transient ($`<`$1 yr) low-latitude spots on the surface of the active K star (Vogt et al. 1999). Strong magnetic fields of the order of 1000 G have also been detected on HR 1099 using the Zeeman Doppler Imaging technique (Donati et al. 1990, 1992; Donati 1999).

White et al. (1978) reported the first X-ray outburst in coincidence with a large radio flare on HR 1099. van den Oord & Barstow (1988) argued that the low amplitude variability of the HR 1099 light curve on time-scales of tens of minutes would indicate flare-like heating. This is in-keeping with the earlier work of Doyle & Butler (1985) who suggested that the corona of all late-type stars were heated via a flare-like process. Pasquini et al. (1989) suggested coronal temperatures of 3 MK and 25 MK based on spectral fits to the X-ray data. Several authors (Agrawal & Vaidya 1988; Drake et al. 1994; Audard et al. 2001) have reported periodic changes in the X-ray and UV light curves, which they attributed to rotational modulation of a starspot-associated bright coronal region. Dempsey et al. (1996) recorded, in coordinated IUE and GHRS observations, several flare enhancements in UV lines, one of which lasted more than a day. Wood et al. (1996) suggested a relationship between the broad wings in UV emission lines of HR 1099 and micro-flaring in its chromosphere and transition region. Brown et al. (1997) reported variability in high-energy bands with ASCA, RXTE, and EUVE: numerous small flares and a giant event lasting 3 days.

Many scientific programs, most of them linked to stellar physics (such as flare monitoring, stellar rotational modulation, surface structures, Doppler imaging) requires continuous spectroscopic coverage over several days. MUSICOS111http://www.ucm.es/info/Astrof/MUSICOS.html (MUlti-SIte COntinuous Spectroscopy) is an international project for setting up a network of high resolution spectrographs coupled to telescopes well distributed around the world. During the MUSICOS 1989 campaign on HR 1099, Foing et al. (1994) obtained complete phase coverage for Doppler imaging of spots. They observed the modulation of the Ca ii K line profile due to chromospheric plage-like regions. They also observed two white-light flares (one of them was the largest optical flare reported on an RS CVn system) with typical rise and decay times of 60-90 min, and with a remarkable spectral dynamic signature in H$`\alpha `$. The fifth MUSICOS campaign (MUSICOS 98), the largest campaign organised to date, involved 13 telescopes to address 6 distinct science programs. Fig. 1 shows the distribution of the participating sites. The main goals of the campaign for HR 1099 were to monitor for flare events, to probe the chromospheric line variability in order to diagnose the energetics and dynamics in active regions, and to produce photospheric Doppler images.

In this paper we present the results of the MUSICOS 98 campaign on HR 1099. Observations and data analysis are described in Sect. 2; in Sect. 3 we present the results, and in Sect. 4 we analyse the flares on HR 1099. The conclusions are given in Sect. 5. Note that the fragmentary results from a preliminary analysis published in conference proceedings (García-Alvarez et al. 2002a, b) are superseded by the final ones presented herein.

## 2 Observations and Data

### 2.1 MUSICOS 98 campaign: Optical Spectroscopy

The spectroscopic observations were obtained from 21 November to 13 December 1998 during the MUSICOS 98 campaign. It involved eight northern and southern sites, namely: Observatoire de Haute-Provence (OHP), Kitt Peak National Observatory (KPNO), European Southern Observatory (ESO), Mt. Stromlo Observatory (MSO), Xinglong National Observatory, Isaac Newton Telescope (INT), Laboratório Nacional de Astrofísica (LNA) and South African Astronomical Observatory (SAAO), using both echelle and long-slit spectrographs. A summary of the sites and instruments involved in the campaign and some of their most important characteristics are given in Table 1.

The spectra were extracted using the standard reduction procedures in the NOAO packages IRAF.222IRAF is distributed by the National Optical Astronomy Observatories, which is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., under cooperative agreement with the National Science Foundation. For OHP, HEROS and Xinglong observations, the MIDAS333ESO-MIDAS is the acronym for the European Southern Observatory Munich Image Data Analysis System, which is developed and maintained by the European Southern Observatory. package was used. Background subtraction and flat-field correction using exposures of a tungsten lamp were applied. The wavelength calibration was obtained by taking spectra of a Th–Ar lamp. A first-order spline cubic fit to some 45 lines achieved a nominal wavelength calibration accuracy which ranged from 0.06 to 0.11 Å. The spectra were normalized by a low-order polynomial fit to the observed continuum. Finally, for the spectra affected by water lines, a telluric correction was applied.

Apart from the chromospheric activity indicators, the spectra also include many lines important for spectral classification (i.e. Ca i triplet 6102, 6122, 6162 Å and Na i doublet 8183.3,8194.8 Å) and temperatures calibration purposes (i.e. V i 6251.8 Å and Fe i 6252.6 Å), as well as other lines normally used for the application of the Doppler imaging technique (i.e. Fe i 6411.7 Å, Fe i 6430.9 Å and Ca i 6439.1 Å). A summary of the observations, including Julian date, phase at mid-exposure and site (refer to Table 1), is given in Table 2. To produce a phase-folded light curve we adopted the ephemeris given in Eq. (1).

Appropriate data have been obtained to apply Doppler Imaging technique, based on the photospheric lines, to study the connection between spots, chromospheric emission and flares. These results will be presented in a separate paper (García-Alvarez et al. 2003).

### 2.2 RXTE X-ray Observations

The X-ray observations were obtained with the all-sky monitor (ASM) detector on board the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer (RXTE) (Levine et al. 1996). The ASM consists of three similar scanning shadow cameras, sensitive to X-rays in an energy band of approximately 2-12 keV, which perform sets of 90-second pointed observations (“dwells”) so as to cover 80% of the sky every 90 minutes. The analysis presented here makes use of light curves obtained from individual dwell data. Light curves are available in four energy bands: A (1.3-3.0 keV), B (3.0-4.8 keV), C (4.8-12.2 keV) and S (1.3-12.2 keV). Around 15 individual ASM dwells of HR 1099 were observed daily by RXTE, during MUSICOS 98. A summary of the observations, including date, number of dwell data and exposure time are given in Table 3. The data were binned in four-hour intervals, which is approximately 6% of the orbital period of HR 1099.

### 2.3 Photometry

During the MUSICOS 98 campaign, ground-based photoelectric observations were obtained with two different Automatic Photoelectric Telescopes (APTs): a) the 0.80-m APT-80 of Catania Astrophysical Observatory (CAO) on Mt. Etna, Italy (Rodonò et al. 2001); b) the 0.25-m T1 Phoenix APT of Fairborn Observatory at Washington Camp, AZ, USA, that is managed as a multiuser telescope (Boyd et al. 1984; Seeds 1995). Both telescopes are equipped with standard Johnson UBV filters and uncooled photoelectric photometers. HR 1099 has been regularly monitored since 1988 by the Phoenix (Rodonò & Cutispoto 1992) and since 1992 also by the Catania APT-80 (Cutispoto et al. 1995). Although repeated observations were scheduled on each night during the campaign to obtain complete rotation phase coverage, bad weather conditions resulted in light curve gaps around phases 0.30 and 0.70.

The Catania APT-80 observed HR 1099 differentially with respect to the comparison star HD 22796 (V=5.55, B$``$V=0.94) and the check star HD 22819 (V=6.10, B$``$V=1.00). The Phoenix APT observed HR 1099 differentially with respect to the comparison star HD 22484 (V=4.28, B$``$V=0.58), while HD 22796 (V=5.56, B$``$V=0.94) served as a check star. After subtraction of sky background and correction for atmospheric extinction, the instrumental differential magnitudes were converted into the standard Johnson UBV system. In order to obtain a homogeneous data set the measurements from the two telescopes were first converted into differential values with respect to the same comparison star HD 22796 and then converted into standard values. Details on the observation techniques, reduction procedures and accuracy of the Phoenix and the Catania APT-80 photometry are given in Rodonò & Cutispoto (1992) and Cutispoto et al. (2001), respectively.

The V-band flux modulation shown by HR 1099 in 1998.89 (see top panel of Fig. 2) can be attributed to the presence of a stationary spot pattern, mainly on the photosphere of the K1 IV primary, whose visibility is modulated by the stellar rotation. The HR 1099 light curve was computed using Fekel (1983) ephemeris:

$$HJD=2442766.080+2.83774E$$
(1)
All the APT observations included the faint visual tertiary companion HD 22468B (Vter=8.83, Eggen (1966)), which is 6 arcsec away from the spectroscopic binary. Its contribution to the observed light curve is $`\mathrm{\Delta }V=0.061`$ mag. Before performing spot modelling, the V-band differential magnitudes were corrected for the third component’s contribution:

$$\mathrm{\Delta }V\text{=}2.5\mathrm{log}(10^{0.4\mathrm{\Delta }V_{\mathrm{obs}}}10^{0.4(V_{\mathrm{ter}}V_{\mathrm{comp}})})$$
(2)
From the light curve maximum V$`{}_{\mathrm{max}}{}^{}=5.744`$ at the 1998.89 epoch and assuming V $`=`$ 7.2 for the magnitude of the G5 component (Henry et al. 1995), the maximum of the primary K1 IV was estimated to be V $`=`$ 6.074.

## 3 Results

### 3.1 Radial Velocity and Orbital Solution

According to Fekel (1983), the orbital period has remained constant over 60 years. Therefore, to compute the observed phases for our analysis, we adopted his ephemeris (see Eq. (1)). The uncertainty in the period (0.00001 d) is small enough to ensure that, in the three week interval of our campaign, any possible phase drift is less than 0.001 cycles. We therefore solved for the following orbital parameters: $`\varphi _0`$ (phase of conjunction with the K1 IV sub-giant in front), $`\gamma `$ (systemic velocity), $`K_{pri},K_{sec}`$ (semi-amplitudes of the velocity curves for the K1 IV and G5 V star, respectively). The radial velocities were determined by using a two-Gaussian fitting technique to each profile of Fe i 6430.84 Å and Ca i 6439.07 Å observed with HEROS on the Dutch 0.9 m telescope at ESO. This site was the only one that observed those photospheric lines during almost all the campaign. The individual profiles of each component were resolved and the velocity shifts were measured with respect to the laboratory wavelengths of the Fe i and Ca i lines. We obtained altogether 100 new velocities (25 for each component in the two photospheric lines) and used them to recompute the orbital parameters of HR 1099. These velocities are listed in Table 4. In order to obtain the orbital parameters, the radial velocity curves were fitted by a double-lined spectroscopic binary (SB2) model. Observations near phase conjunction between the components were not used because of line blending. The orbital parameters are listed in Table 5. Fig. 4 shows the observed and computed radial velocity curves for the two components of HR 1099, along with their (O-C) residuals.

In Table 6 we compare our derived orbital parameters with previous determinations. The results of our analysis are in good agreement with those obtained by previous authors. The value we found for $`\varphi _0`$ seems to support previous results by Donati (1999) and Strassmeier & Bartus (2000), who suggested a slow but significant variation of the orbital phase at superior conjunction with time; providing evidence for orbital period variation. Applegate (1992), and most recently Lanza & Rodonò (1999), interpreted such a variation as a change of the quadrupole-moment of the primary, along the activity cycle, arising from cyclic exchanges between kinetic and magnetic energy driven by a hydromagnetic stellar dynamo. Such a mechanism has been used by Kalimeris et al. (1995) to explain the orbital period variations in another RS CVn system: SZ Psc. Fekel (1983) estimated an orbital inclination of $`33^o\pm \mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}^o`$, this value also used by Vogt & Penrod (1983) and Vogt et al. (1999). Although Donati (1999) preferred a value of $`40^o\pm \mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}5}^o`$, we keep the inclination fixed at $`33^o`$ for all further calculations. Adopting this inclination angle and the values of $`K_{\mathrm{pri}}`$ and $`K_{\mathrm{sec}}`$, the derived masses of the components of HR 1099 are: $`M_1=1.45M_{\mathrm{}}`$; $`M_2=1.14M_{\mathrm{}}`$.

### 3.2 Photometry and Spot Modelling

The properties of the photospheric spotted regions or, more precisely, of the total spotted area and its distribution versus stellar longitude, can be obtained by analysing the rotational modulation of the optical band flux. However, due to the low information content of wide-band photometry, the derived maps are not unique. In order to obtain unique and stable solutions, some a priori constraints on the properties of the photospheric maps, that is a regularization criterion, must be assumed. In the present study we used both the Maximum Entropy method (hereafter ME, Vogt et al. 1987) and the Tikhonov criterion (hereafter T, Piskunov et al. 1990).

The star’s surface is divided into pixels and the specific intensity of the $`i`$-th pixel is assumed to be given by

$$I_i=f_iI_s+(1f_i)I_u$$
(3)
where Iu and Is = Cs Iu are the specific intensity of the unspotted and spotted photosphere of the $`i`$-th pixel (Cs is the brightness contrast which we assume to be constant) and $`0f_i1`$ is the pixel fraction covered by spots. The final map is obtained by finding the distribution of $`f_i`$ that gives a constrained extreme of the ME or T functionals, subject to a $`\chi ^2`$ limit. A detailed description of our modelling approach, source of errors and accuracy can be found in Lanza et al. (1998).

The numerical code we used to compute the solutions adopts Roche geometry to describe the surfaces of the components and Kurucz’s444http://cfaku5.harvard.edu atmospheric models to compute the surface fluxes and linear limb-darkening in the V-band (Lanza et al. 2001). Gravity darkening and reflection effect coefficients were introduced according to the procedure outlined by Lanza et al. (1998). The stellar and model parameters adopted to compute the final maps are listed in Table 7.

As shown in Figs. 2 & 3, a single large spotted region is present on the K1 IV primary, centered around phase 0.85. A much smaller spotted region in the ME map, about 45 degrees apart from the primary, is not resolved in the T solution, which represents the smoothest map that fits the light curve. Spots are also present on the secondary G5 component, centered around phase 0.0 and their area is smaller than on the K1 IV component.

The resulting spot pattern appears to be concentrated on the northern hemispheres of both components. This is due to the fact that spots located at latitudes below $`33^{}`$ cannot contribute to the variation of the observed flux because of the low value ($`i33^{}`$) of the inclination of the rotation axis. The ME modelling tends to minimize the total spotted area (A$`{}_{\mathrm{ME}}{}^{}=5.49\%`$ for K1 IV, A$`{}_{\mathrm{ME}}{}^{}=1.60\%`$ for G5 V), giving more compact and darker surface inhomogeneities. The T modelling tends to smooth the intensity fluctuations correlating the filling factors of nearby pixels and leads to photospheric maps with huge and smooth spots (A$`{}_{\mathrm{T}}{}^{}=5.65\%`$ for K1 IV, A$`{}_{\mathrm{T}}{}^{}=3.14\%`$ for G5 V). Lanza et al. (1998) pointed out that the regularized maps should be regarded as an intermediate step of the analysis. They must be used to derive quantities not depending on the regularizing criterion adopted, that is the distribution of the spots vs. longitude and its variation in time. Actually, apart from the different total spotted area between the ME and T solutions, both regularizing criteria reproduce a similar distribution of spotted area versus stellar longitude.

Absolute properties of the spots cannot be extracted from single-band data because systematic errors arise from the unknown unspotted light level, which we had to assume to coincide with the brightest magnitude at the 1998.89 epoch, and the assumption of single-temperature spots.

It is interesting to point out that both optical flares detected during the MUSICOS 98 campaign at JD 2451145.51 and JD 2451151.07, started around phase=0.80, that is at the rotation phase where the largest active region on the K1 IV component was facing the observer. Unfortunately, no simultaneous photometric observations were obtained at those epochs because of bad weather conditions.

### 3.3 Chromospheric Activity Indicators

The spectra presented in this paper allow us to study the behaviour of the different optical chromospheric activity indicators such as: Na i D1, D2 doublet, (formed in the upper photosphere), Ca ii H & K lines (lower chromosphere), H$`\alpha `$, H$`\beta `$ (middle chromosphere), and He i D3 (upper chromosphere), as well as a large number of photospheric lines which can in some instances be affected by chromospheric activity (i.e. Fe i 3906.5 Å, Mn i 5341.1 Å, Fe i 5430.0 Å .. see Doyle et al. (2001)).

In Figs. 5-8 we show the time series of the Ca ii H & K lines, H$`\alpha `$, H$`\beta `$, Na i D1, D2 doublet and He i D3 observed during the MUSICOS 98 campaign. The vertical axis represents the accumulative orbital phase, the first orbital revolution beginning at zero orbital phase.

We have measured the equivalent width (EW) for six lines with respect to a local continuum interpolated by a linear fit to line-free nearby continuum portions included within the covered spectral interval. The wavelength intervals are 6557.5–6566.5 Å for H$`\alpha `$, 5883.0–5903.0 Å for Na i D1, D2 doublet, 5872.0–5877.5 Å for He i D3, 4857.5–4865.5 Å for H$`\beta `$, 3964.5–3972.5 Å for Ca ii H and 3929.7–3937.7 Å for Ca ii K. In this analysis we consider positive and negative values of the EW as referring to lines in absorption and emission, respectively. In Fig. 9 we plot the equivalent width measured for the H$`\alpha `$, Na i D1, D2 doublet, He i D3, H$`\beta `$ , Ca ii H and Ca ii K lines, versus Julian date and the orbital phase.

### 3.4 Rotational Modulation

We have observed an increase in emission in the EW of the He i D3 line and the Na i D1, D2 doublet, between $`\varphi =`$0.5 and $`\varphi =`$1.0 (see the second and third right panel of Fig. 9). These changes in EW are consistent with rotational modulations in the He i D3 line, that could be attributed to pumping of the chromospheric emission by coronal X-rays from an overlying active region. A similar behaviour can be seen in the EW of the H$`\alpha `$ line with an increase in emission between $`\varphi =`$0.7 and $`\varphi =`$1.0 (see the top right panel of Fig. 9). These enhancements are unlikely to be a temporary, flare-like phenomenon, since they have been observed for almost nine rotations of the star. Note that the flares observed during the campaign correspond to significantly larger increases in emission in the EW (see Fig. 9). The H$`\beta `$ and the Ca ii H & K lines do not show any obvious rotational modulation. Such rotational modulation behaviour in chromospheric lines has been observed previously in other RS CVn systems (Rodonò et al. 1987; Busà et al. 1999; Padmakar et al. 2000). It may indicate that the distribution of chromospheric active regions is ascribed to localised regions and not uniformly distributed over the stellar surface, which would not produce any rotational signature. This vertical structure would resembles that of solar active regions.

The observed behaviour in the Na i D1, D2 doublet, the He i D3 and H$`\alpha `$ lines, seems to show a sort of anti-correlation with the optical light curve (cf. Figs. 2 & 3). It means that the chromospheric emission maximum is in close coincidence with the minimum of the light curve (when the largest spotted region is facing the observer).

## 4 Flares Analysis

During the campaign, two optical flares were observed, one at JD 2451145.51 (28-11-98) lasting about 0.63 days and a second flare at JD 2451151.07 (03-12-98) lasting about 1.1 days (see Fig. 9).

### 4.1 The Hydrogen Balmer lines

#### 4.1.1 The H$`\alpha `$ and H$`\beta `$ lines

The emission or filling-in of the H$`\alpha `$ (6562.8 Å) and H$`\beta `$ (4861.3 Å) lines is one of the primary optical indicators of chromospheric activity in RS CVn systems.

The first optical flare, at JD 2451145.51, shows an increase in emission in the measured EW by almost a factor of two in H$`\alpha `$. Broad components are observed at the beginning and at the maximum of this flare (see left panel of Fig. 10). The H$`\alpha `$ profile at the start of the flare has a full-width half maximum (FWHM) of 2.87 Å (equivalent to 131 $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$) and shows a noticeable blue wing excess in four flare spectra. The largest FWHM, with a value of 4.52 Å (207 $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$), was obtained for the spectrum at $`\varphi `$=0.7981. The spectrum at $`\varphi `$=0.8571, which corresponds to the maximum H$`\alpha `$ emission, has a FWHM of 3.47 Å (159 $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$). A narrow absorption feature was also observed in this spectrum (see Fig. 10). Observations of the H$`\beta `$ line were not made during most of the flare, however, the spectrum observed around flare maximum, at $`\varphi `$=0.8571, did show a filling-in of the H$`\beta `$ line (see Fig. 9 and top right panel in Fig. 10).

The second optical flare, at JD 2451151.07, shows an increase in emission in the measured EW by a factor of four in H$`\alpha `$. The left panel in Fig. 11 shows very broad components at the beginning and at the maximum of this event. The H$`\alpha `$ profile at the start of the second flare, $`\varphi `$=0.6203, has a FWHM of 3.13 Å (equivalent to 141 $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$). The largest FWHM, with a value of 3.82 Å (175 $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$), was obtained for the spectrum at $`\varphi `$=0.8141. The spectrum at $`\varphi `$=0.8354, which corresponds to the maximum H$`\alpha `$ emission, has a FWHM of 3.71 Å (170 $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$). The spectra before and after flare maximum show a symmetrical broadening, with a base width for the blue and red wings, of 6.25 Å (286 $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$). Similar values for the FWHM were found by Foing et al. (1994) for another flare in the HR 1099 system. During this second optical flare, the H$`\beta `$ line turns into emission (see right panel of Fig. 11). We measured a FWHM of 2.33 Å (144 $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$) for the spectrum at $`\varphi `$=0.8144. It is slightly larger than the FWHM obtained during the flare maximum at $`\varphi `$=0.8354, which was 2.14 Å (132 $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$). The absorption feature in the H$`\beta `$ emission spectra around flare maximum may be due to the secondary star.

Apart from the two optical flares, H$`\alpha `$ showed flux enhancements around JD 2451143.0, 2451156.5 and 2451157.3. These JDs correspond to phases between 0.8 and 0.9. Also two enhancements were observed in the H$`\beta `$ line at around JD 2451155.0 and 2451157.3. Hereafter, we will refer as flare-like to those events which show an enhancement in the average line emission although, they may not be proper flares.

#### 4.1.2 The Balmer Decrement

Balmer decrements (flux ratio of higher series members to H$`\gamma `$) have been used to derive plasma densities and temperatures in flare star chromospheres (Kunkel 1970; Gershberg 1974; Katsova 1990; García-Alvarez et al. 2002). Lacking H$`\gamma `$ data in our spectra, we have instead calculated the Balmer decrement from the $`\mathrm{EW}_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }/\mathrm{EW}_{\mathrm{H}\beta }`$ ratio. During quiescent phases we obtained values around 1 for the $`\mathrm{EW}_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }/\mathrm{EW}_{\mathrm{H}\beta }`$ ratio, while during the first flare we obtained slightly larger values (2-3). During the second flare the ratio even reached values of 8. This behaviour shows (unsurprisingly) a significant change in the properties of hydrogen emitting regions during the flare. Kunkel (1970) showed that this behaviour is possible if the Balmer lines are driven toward local thermodynamic equilibrium (LTE) conditions within an emitting region with an electron density of $`n_\mathrm{e}`$1013 cm-3, an electron temperature of $`T_\mathrm{e}`$2$`\times 10^4`$ K, and a micro-turbulence velocity $`\xi `$20 $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$.

### 4.2 The Na i D1, D2 doublet

The Na i D1 5895.92 Å and D2 5889.95 Å lines are well known temperature and luminosity indicators. These resonance lines are collisionally-controlled in the atmospheres of late-type stars, providing information about chromospheric activity (Montes et al. 1997) and for M dwarfs they have been used to construct model atmospheres (Andretta et al. 1997). Unfortunately, the observations of the Na i D1, D2 doublet were not made during most of the first optical flare. However, the spectra observed around flare maximum, at $`\varphi `$=0.8571, did show a slight filling-in (see Fig. 9 and the top middle panel of Fig. 10). During the second optical flare, the Na i D1, D2 doublet showed a strong filling-in, which during the maximum of this event, turned into emission reversal (see the middle panel of Fig. 11). Another flare-like event seems to have happened at around JD 2451155.0.

### 4.3 The He i D3 line

Perhaps the most significant observation in support of flare-like events is the detection of emission in the He i D3 line at 5876 Å. This line has a very high excitation level. It has been previously detected in absorption in active stars and attributed to plages or coronal radiation (Huenemoerder 1986). It has also been seen in emission during stellar flares (Montes et al. 1997, 1999; Oliveira & Foing 1999). In the Sun, it is in emission in the strongest flares (Tandberg-Hanssen 1967). As for Na i, observations of He i D3 were not made during most of the first optical flare. However, the only spectrum observed around flare maximum, at $`\varphi `$=0.8571, did not show any apparent change (see the top middle panel in Fig. 10). During the second optical flare, the He i D3 line turns into emission (see the middle panel of Fig. 11). We measured a maximum FWHM of 0.88 Å (45 $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$) for the spectra at $`\varphi `$=0.7983. During flare maximum, $`\varphi `$=0.8354, we measured a FWHM of 0.83 Å (42 $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$). Fig. 9 shows that, during the second optical flare, the He i D3 line peaks before the Balmer lines, in agreement with the emission line behaviour observed in late-type star flares (Garcia Alvarez 2000; Oliveira & Foing 1999). Three flare-like events seem to happen at around JD 2451148.0, 2451156.5 and 2451159.6. These JDs correspond to phases between 0.8 and 0.9.

### 4.4 The Ca ii H & K lines

The Ca ii H & K resonance lines have long been the traditional diagnostic of chromospheric activity in cool stars since they were studied by Wilson (1978). Observations of the Ca ii H & K lines were not made during most of the first optical flare. However, the spectra observed around the maximum during both flares, did show a small increase in flux (see the bottom panels of Fig. 9 and Fig. 10). Note that the Ca ii H & K lines peaked later than the Balmer lines, at around $`\varphi `$=0.95. This behaviour has been observed in flares on late-type stars (Rodonò et al. 1988; Garcia Alvarez 2000).

### 4.5 Flare Location

In Fig. 4, together with the radial velocity calculated using the photospheric lines, we have plotted the radial velocity for the two monitored flares. These radial velocities have been calculated by fitting a single Gaussian to the H$`\alpha `$ profile. The velocity shifts were measured with respect to the rest wavelength of the H$`\alpha `$ line. Despite the broad component developed by the H$`\alpha `$ line during flares, this seems to be a reliable fit. As a result, we notice that during both flares, the radial velocity is slightly displaced (15-20 $`\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$) compared to the center of gravity of the primary. This could arise if both flares took place off the disk of the primary star.

Note that both flares took place at around the same phase (0.85), but $``$6 days apart suggesting a link between them and the active region complex, which was crossing the central meridian around that phase. The largest photospheric active region on the K1 IV component was indeed centered around $`\varphi `$=0.85 (see Fig. 2 and Fig. 3). This behaviour is consistent with the proposed link between flares and surface active regions. During the MUSICOS 89 campaign, Foing et al. (1994) reported on a flare that took place again at a similar phase (0.87), suggesting that, if this is indeed the same active region, it is a long-lived feature. Vogt et al. (1999) analysed Doppler Images of HR 1099 and also proposed similar long-lived active regions.

### 4.6 Energy released

In order to estimate the energy released in the observed optical chromospheric lines during both optical flares, we converted the excess EW (flare EW minus quiet EW of the studied lines) into absolute surface fluxes and luminosities. Since we have not observed the entire flare, and several important lines are missing (e.g., Ly$`\alpha `$, Mg ii h&k, He i 10830 Å), our estimates are only lower limits to the total flare energy in the chromospheric lines. We have used the calibration of Hall (1996) to obtain the stellar continuum flux in the H$`\alpha `$ region as a function of ($`BV`$) and then converted the EW into absolute surface flux. For the other lines, we have used the continuum flux at H$`\alpha `$ corrected for the continuum flux ratio $`F_{\lambda 6563}/F_\lambda `$. This $`F_\lambda `$ is given by a blackbody, with contribution of both the cool and the hot component of HR 1099 at $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=\mathrm{4\hspace{0.17em}840}\mathrm{K}`$ and $`T_{\mathrm{eff}}=\mathrm{5\hspace{0.17em}460}\mathrm{K}`$, respectively. The contribution factors for each component has been obtained following the method by Montes et al. (1995). We converted these fluxes into luminosities using the radius $`R=3.9R_{\mathrm{}}`$, since we have assumed that both optical flares took place on the K1 IV component. Table 8 shows the energy released by the chromospheric optical lines for both flares. We obtained the flare energies by integrating the measured fluxes in time. Adding the energies for all the observed chromospheric lines during each flare, we obtained a total flare energy of $`\mathrm{1.3\; 10}^{34}`$ erg for the first flare and $`\mathrm{5.5\; 10}^{34}`$ erg for the second flare, integrating over a period of $``$7.3 and $``$5.5 hours respectively. These values for the energy released are comparable to other RS CVn flares (Doyle et al. 1991; Foing et al. 1994).

## 5 X-ray data

X-ray observations of HR 1099, with ASM on board RXTE, were carried out at the same time as the MUSICOS 98 campaign took place. In Fig. 12 we show the X-ray light curve of HR 1099 obtained by RXTE in the S band.

### 5.1 Long- and Short-Term Variability

The long-term light curve displays evident variability on short and long time-scales. We can divide the RXTE observations into three intervals, according to the observed activity levels. The X-ray data show a medium variability level between JD 2451139 and JD 2451145. In this first interval, which covered around two rotations, we see three possible flare-like events. A interval of low variability follows, covering approximately 1.5 rotations, between JD 2451145 and JD 2451149. Finally, the third interval, between JD 2451149 and JD 2451160, covering four rotations, exhibits strong variability. During this third term six possible X-ray flare-like events were observed. The flare-like events observed in the first and third intervals were only detected in the S and A bands but not in the B and the C bands. This suggests that these X-ray events were soft.

### 5.2 X-ray and Optical Flare Correlation

We have found that most of the optical flares show a X-ray counterpart. During the X-ray event at JD 2451143.02, a small increase in the emission of the H$`\alpha `$ was seen (see the top left panel of Fig. 9), as well as a filling-in in the Na i D1, D2 doublet. The optical flare observed at JD 2451151.07 was also observed in the X-ray range. The X-ray flare observed at JD 2451155.24 shows an optical counterpart in H$`\beta `$ line (see Fig. 9) and filling-in of the Na i D1, D2 doublet, although no clear variation was seen in either H$`\alpha `$ or He i D3.

The flare-like event at JD 2451156.74 shows a small increase in the emission of H$`\alpha `$ and a small filling-in of the He i D3 line (see Fig. 9). This enhancement was also observed in Ca ii H (not in K) suggesting that it reflects variability from H$`ϵ`$. The possible flare observed at JD 2451157.24 shows a small increase in the H$`\alpha `$ and Ca ii H & K lines with also a small filling-in of the H$`\beta `$ line, but no changes are observed in the other lines. Conversely, the optical flare at JD 2451145.51 was not observed in any of the X-ray bands.

### 5.3 Flare Periodicity

We noted that most of the X-ray flares and flare-like events observed, took place either at $`\varphi `$0.31 (2451149.63 d, 2451152.54 d, and 2451155.24 d) or at $`\varphi `$0.91 (2451143.02 d, 2451151.23 d, 2451157.24 d and 2451159.64 d). Based on this fact one could say that there were two active regions, which flared during the same epoch. The flares of each active region show a rotation periodicity which lasted for almost three consecutive orbits, from JD 2451149 to JD 2451158, during what we have called the strong variability interval.

The possibility of rather persistent active longitudes in the photosphere is well known in the solar case. Leto et al. (1997) found evidence of a frequently flaring and persistent active longitude on EV Lac. This, coupled with rotation, may give rise to spurious periodicities or abnormally long-lasting flare events. Note that the X-ray flare-like event which would have been expected at JD 2451154.2, coupling with the one at JD 2451152.54, is not covered by X-ray observations. However, increases in the H$`\beta `$ and Ca ii H & K lines were observed at that epoch.

The observed rotational periodicity could have been caused by two very large flares, one on each active region, lasting for three consecutive orbits, which means that we have observed flares which lasted more than eight days!. This kind of long duration flares on active RS CVn stars has been previously observed by Montes & Ramsey (1998). However, one would expect an a exponential decay in the X-ray flux, which was not observed, and a much larger X-ray flux maximum, which was not observed either. So we discard a possible very long duration flare as an explanation for the observe X-ray light curve. Another possibility is suggested by the behaviour of the light curve at JD 2451150, JD 2451153 and JD 2451156. The X-ray flux appears to peak at $`\varphi `$0.31, after which it diminishes until it reaches a minimum when the G5 V star is in front of the active K1 IV star ($`\varphi `$=0.5), in agreement with other authors (Drake et al. 1994; Audard et al. 2001; Sanz-Forcada et al. 2002). Similarly, Foing et al. (1994), observed a sudden flux decrease in an optical flare, that they suggest was caused by the occultation of the flaring active region, due to the rotation of the system. However, as a consequence of X-rays being optically thin, the rotational modulation they might produce would modulate the flare in an on-off fashion, but would not produce spiky flares as we observe in the X-ray light curve. Another possibility, is that we are looking at periodic flaring. Several authors have searched for such periodicity with mixed results (e.g. Lukatskaya 1976; Pettersen 1983; Doyle et al. 1990; Mullan & Johnson 1995; Mavridis et al. 1995). The confirmation of such a periodicity would support the idea of a “flare reservoir”, in other words, an active region with a certain amount of stored energy which is then released either as a single flare or as multiple of smaller events. Mullan & Johnson (1995) reported X-ray periodicities in late-type flare stars. They found that the observations were consistent with the hypothesis that resonant absorption of MHD waves were occurring at certain times in coronal loops. However, the preferred frequency inferred by Mullan & Johnson (1995) are much lower than the one we observed in HR 1099. The larger-scale magnetic structure obtained in the photospheric maps, around phase 0.85, and the periodicity of the flares might imply that the reheating events of the same magnetic loop originate in an interaction between the star and some external trigger, explaining partially the observed X-ray periodicity.

We believe that the two active regions, flaring at the same epoch, are responsible for the observed behaviour of the X-ray light curve. Following Doyle et al. (1990), the probability that the three flares arise out of a chance process is rather small ($`0.5\%`$ and $`0.6\%`$ for the active region at $`\varphi `$=0.31 and at $`\varphi `$=0.91, respectively). We conclude that the flares for each assumed active region show significant periodicity, lasting almost three consecutive orbits (from JD 2451149 to JD 2451158). Doyle et al. (1990) suggested that the different flares they observed on the eclipsing binary YY Gem originated in the same active region close to the stellar surface and were caused by the same trigger mechanism. In the case of YY Gem, the explanation was given in terms of filament oscillating with a period of 48 mins. It is unlikely that the 2.8 day interval observed here could be explained by a similar mechanism, and thus it is more likely that the different groups of flares orginate from the same active region complex. The radial velocities measured for both large optical flares discussed in Sect. 4, indicates that they originate from a region on the K1 IV component, thus providing some support for this scenario.

## 6 Conclusions

We have observed the binary system HR 1099 continuously for more than seven orbits in the optical spectral range (at high spectral resolution over a wide wavelength domain). Contemporary photometric and X-ray observations were performed during the campaign.

Photospheric maps of both components obtained by using Maximum Entropy and Tikhonov regularizing criteria show the K1 IV primary to be the most active with a large spotted region in the northern hemisphere, centered around phase 0.85. The detection of optical flare events around the same phase is in good agreement with a spatial link between flares and active regions.

We have determined radial velocity curves making use of photospheric lines. The orbital parameters were obtained by fitting the radial velocity curves with a double-lined spectroscopic binary (SB2) model. The results of this analysis are in good agreement with previously published results. The value we found for $`\varphi _0`$ seems to support a slow but significant variation in the orbital phase at the first conjunction with time, i.e. a change of the orbital period. It can be explained as a consequence of the cyclic variation of the quadrupole-moment of the primary along the magnetic activity cycle.

Two large optical flares were monitored during the campaign, one of them lasting more than one day. From the flare analysis, we observe that, although both flares show an increase in H$`\alpha `$ emission with a broad component, the second flare produced a bigger increase in intensity and lasted longer. We have also observed that the first flare showed filling-in of H$`\beta `$, which turned into emission during the second flare. The He i D3 line was seen in emission during the second flare. The Na i D1, D2 doublet showed a filling-in in both flares, being stronger during the second one. A similar behaviour was seen in the Ca ii H & K lines. We found a lower limit to the total flare energy of $`\mathrm{1.3\; 10}^{34}`$ erg and $`\mathrm{5.5\; 10}^{34}`$ erg for the first and second flare, respectively, comparable to other RS CVn flares. We noticed that the He i D3 line was only seen in emission in the second, and larger, flare. This is due to the fact that the helium lines are produced under generally higher excitation conditions than other chromospheric lines and they are usually not detected except in the strongest events. The change of behaviour in the H$`\beta `$ line, from weak absorption in the first flare to strong emission in the second flare was also due that the latter was strongest. Note that both flares took place at around the same phase (0.85), but $``$6 days apart suggesting a link between them and the large photospheric active region on the K1 IV component, obtained from the photospheric spot modelling, which is centered around the same orbital phase.

We have detected rotational modulation in the H$`\alpha `$ and He i D3 lines and in the Na i D1, D2 doublet, that may indicate non axi-symmetry in the distribution of coronal active regions. In other words, this rotational modulation may be due to the emission of an active region (or regions), which goes on and off as the star rotates. Lines formed at different heights in the atmosphere, would be affected, in a different way, by the active region. This will produce rotational modulation for certain lines but not necessarily for all of them. However, one has to bear in mind that a group of active regions uniformly distributed over the stellar surface would not produce any rotational signature.

X-ray observations were performed with ASM on board RXTE. We have observed clear variability on short and long time-scales. A number of flares and flare-like events were detected, some of which correlated well with the optical observations. We noted that most of the X-ray events observed, took place either at $`\varphi `$0.31 or at $`\varphi `$0.91.

We plan to compare these results with Doppler Imaging based on the photospheric lines, to study the connection between spots, chromospheric emission and flares.

###### Acknowledgements.

We wish to thanks all those who have contributed to the MUSICOS 98 campaign. Research at Armagh Observatory is grant-aided by the Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure for Northern Ireland. DGA wishes to thank the Space Science Department at ESTEC for financial support. DM is supported by the Spanish Programa Nacional de Astronomía y Astrofísica, under grant AYA2001-1448. JMO research work was supported by the Praxis XXI grant BD9577/96 from the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, Portugal. This paper made use of quick look data provided by the RXTE ASM team at MIT and GSFC. Stellar activity research at Catania Astrophysical Observatory of the National Institute of Astrophysics and at Department of Physics and Astronomy of Catania University is supported by the MIUR “Ministero dell’Istruzione, Universitá e Ricerca” and by the Regione Sicilia that are gratefully acknowledged. We also thank the referee M. Guedel for helpful comments.


format: text

text:
# Towards quantum superpositions of a mirror

## Abstract

We propose a scheme for creating quantum superposition states involving of order $`10^{14}`$ atoms via the interaction of a single photon with a tiny mirror. This mirror, mounted on a high-quality mechanical oscillator, is part of a high-finesse optical cavity which forms one arm of a Michelson interferometer. By observing the interference of the photon only, one can study the creation and decoherence of superpositions involving the mirror. All experimental requirements appear to be within reach of current technology.

In $`1935`$ Schrödinger pointed out that according to quantum mechanics even macroscopic systems can be in superposition states schroedinger . The quantum interference effects are expected to be hard to detect due to environment induced decoherence decoherence . Nevertheless there have been proposals on how to create and observe macroscopic superpositions in various systems bec ; bose ; armour , and experiments demonstrating superposition states of superconducting devices squidexp  and fullerene molecules c60 . One long-term motivation for this kind of experiment is the question of whether unconventional decoherence processes such as gravitationally induced decoherence or spontaneous wave-function collapse collapse ; penrose  occur.

Here we present a scheme that is close in spirit to Schrödinger’s original discussion. A small quantum system (a photon) is coupled to a large system (a mirror) in order to create a macroscopic superposition. The basic principle of the experiment as described in Ref. penrose  grew out of discussions in 1997 schmiedmayer . It consists of a Michelson interferometer in which one arm has a tiny moveable mirror. The radiation pressure of a single photon displaces the tiny mirror. The initial superposition of the photon being in either arm causes the system to evolve into a superposition of states corresponding to two distinct locations of the mirror. In the present proposal a high-finesse cavity is used to enhance the interaction between the photon and the mirror. The observed interference of the photon allows one to study the creation of coherent superposition states periodic with the motion of the mirror. We perform a detailed analysis of the requirements for such an experiment.

The proposed setup is shown in Fig. 1. In the cavity in arm A one of the mirrors is very small and attached to a micromechanical oscillator, similar to the cantilevers in atomic force microscopes. While the photon is in the cavity, it exerts radiation pressure on the mirror. Under the conditions that the oscillator period is much longer than the photon roundtrip time, and the amplitude of the mirror’s motion is small compared to the cavity length, the system can be described by a Hamiltonian law

$`H=\mathrm{}\omega _ca^{}a+\mathrm{}\omega _mb^{}b\mathrm{}ga^{}a(b+b^{}),`$ (1)
where $`\omega _c`$ is the frequency of the photon in the cavity for the (empty) cavity length $`L`$, $`a`$ is the creation operator for the photon, $`\omega _m`$ and $`b`$ are the frequency and phonon creation operator for the center of mass motion of the mirror, and the coupling constant is $`g=\frac{\omega _c}{L}\sqrt{\frac{\mathrm{}}{2M\omega _m}}`$, where $`M`$ is the mass of the mirror. To start with, let us suppose that initially the photon is in a superposition of being in either arm $`A`$ or $`B`$, and the mirror is in a coherent state $`|\beta =e^{|\beta |^2/2}\underset{n=0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\frac{\beta ^n}{\sqrt{n!}}|n`$, where $`|n`$ are the eigenstates of the harmonic oscillator. Then the initial state is $`|\psi (0)=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}(|0_A|1_B+|1_A|0_B)|\beta `$. After a time $`t`$ the state of the system will be given by mancini

$`|\psi (t)={\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}}e^{i\omega _ct}(|0_A|1_B|\beta e^{i\omega _mt}+`$
$`e^{i\kappa ^2(\omega _mt\mathrm{sin}\omega _mt)}|1_A|0_B|\beta e^{i\omega _mt}+\kappa (1e^{i\omega _mt})),`$ (2)
where $`\kappa =g/\omega _m`$. In the second term on the r.h.s. the motion of the mirror is altered by the radiation pressure of the photon in cavity $`A`$. The parameter $`\kappa `$ quantifies the displacement of the mirror in units of the size of the coherent state wavepacket. In the presence of the photon the mirror oscillates around a new equilibrium position determined by the driving force.

The maximum possible interference visibility for the photon is given by twice the modulus of the off-diagonal element of the photon’s reduced density matrix. By tracing over the mirror one finds from Eq. (2) that the off-diagonal element has the form

$`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}e^{\kappa ^2(1\mathrm{cos}\omega _mt)}e^{i\kappa ^2(\omega _mt\mathrm{sin}\omega _mt)+i\kappa \text{Im}[\beta (1e^{i\omega _mt})]}`$ (3)
where Im denotes the imaginary part. The first factor is the modulus, reaching a minimum after half a period at $`t=\pi /\omega _m`$, when the mirror is at its maximum displacement. The second factor gives the phase, which is identical to that obtained classically due to the varying length of the cavity. For general $`t`$ the phase depends on $`\beta `$, i.e. the initial conditions of the mirror. However, the effect of $`\beta `$ averages out after every full period.

In the absence of decoherence, after a full period, the system is in the state $`\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}(|0_A|1_B+e^{i\kappa ^22\pi }|1_A|0_B)|\beta `$, such that the mirror is again disentangled from the photon. Full interference can be observed if the photon is detected at this time. If the environment of the mirror “remembers” that the mirror has moved, then, even after a full period, the photon will still be entangled with the mirror’s environment, and thus the interference for the photon will be reduced. Therefore the setup can be used to measure the decoherence of the mirror.

In practice the mirror will be in a thermal state, which can be written as a mixture of coherent states $`|\beta `$ with a Gaussian probability distribution $`(1/\pi \overline{n})e^{|\beta |^2/\overline{n}}`$, where $`\overline{n}=1/(e^{\mathrm{}\omega _m/kT}1)`$ is the mean thermal number of excitations. In order to determine the expected interference visibility of the photon at a time $`t`$ for an initial mirror state which is thermal, one has to average the off-diagonal element Eq. (3) over $`\beta `$ with this distribution. The result is

$`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}e^{\kappa ^2(2\overline{n}+1)(1\mathrm{cos}\omega _mt)}e^{i\kappa ^2(\omega _mt\mathrm{sin}\omega _mt)}.`$ (4)
As a consequence of the averaging of the $`\beta `$-dependent phase in Eq. (3), the off-diagonal element now decays on a timescale $`1/(\kappa \omega _m\sqrt{\overline{n}})`$ after $`t=0`$, i.e. very fast for the experimentally relevant case of $`\kappa 1`$ and large $`\overline{n}`$. However, remarkably, it still exhibits a revival bose  at $`t=2\pi /\omega _m`$, when photon and mirror become disentangled and the phase in Eq. (3) is independent of $`\beta `$, such that the phase averaging does not reduce the visibility. This behaviour is shown in Fig. 2. The magnitude of the revival is reduced by any decoherence of the mirror.

The revival demonstrates the coherence of the superposition state that exists at intermediate times. For $`\kappa ^21`$ the state of the system is a superposition involving two distinct mirror positions. More precisely, for a thermal mirror, the state of the system is a mixture of such superpositions. However, this does not affect the fundamentally non-classical character of the state. We now discuss the experimental requirements for achieving such a superposition and observing its recoherence at $`t=2\pi /\omega _m`$.

Firstly, we require $`\kappa ^21`$, which physically means that the momentum kick imparted by the photon has to be larger than the initial quantum uncertainty of the mirror’s momentum. Let $`N`$ denote the number of roundtrips of the photon in the cavity during one period of the mirror’s motion, such that $`2NL/c=2\pi /\omega _m`$. This allows us to rewrite the condition $`\kappa ^21`$ as

$`{\displaystyle \frac{2\mathrm{}N^3L}{\pi cM\lambda ^2}}1,`$ (5)
where $`\lambda `$ is the wavelength of the light. The factors entering Eq. (5) are not all independent. The achievable $`N`$, which is determined by the quality of the mirrors, and the minimum mirror size (and hence $`M`$) both depend strongly on $`\lambda `$. The mirror’s lateral dimension should be an order of magnitude larger than $`\lambda `$ to limit diffraction losses. Its thickness in order to achieve sufficiently high reflectivity depends on $`\lambda `$ as well.

Eq. (5) allows one to compare the viability of different wavelength ranges. While the highest values for $`N`$ are achievable for microwaves (up to $`10^{10}`$), this is counteracted by their cm wavelengths. On the other hand there are no good mirrors for highly energetic photons. The optical regime seems optimal. Here we propose an experiment with $`\lambda `$ around 630 nm.

The cavity mode needs to have a very narrow focus on the tiny mirror, which requires the other cavity end mirror to be large due to beam divergence. The maximum cavity length is therefore limited by the difficulty of making large high quality mirrors. We propose a cavity length of 5 cm, and a small mirror size of $`10\times 10\times 10`$ microns, leading to a mass of order $`5\times 10^{12}`$ kg.

Such a small mirror on a mechanical oscillator can be fabricated by coating a silicon cantilever with alternating layers of SiO2 and a metal oxide. The best current mirrors are made in this way. A larger silicon oscillator has been coated with SiO2/Ta2O5 and used as part of a high-finesse cavity in Ref. schiller .

For the above dimensions the condition (5) is satisfied for $`N=5.6\times 10^6`$. Correspondingly, we are aiming for a photon loss per reflection not larger than $`3\times 10^7`$, about a factor of 4 below the best reported values for such mirrors rempe , and for a transmission of $`10^7`$, consistent with the $`10\mu `$m mirror thickness hood . For these values, about 1% of the photons are still left in the cavity after a full period of the mirror. For the above values of $`N`$ and $`L`$ one obtains a frequency $`\omega _m=2\pi \times 500`$ Hz. This leads to a quantum uncertainty for the mirror position of order $`10^{13}`$ m, which corresponds to the necessary displacement in the superposition in order to achieve $`\kappa ^21`$.

The fact that a relatively large $`L`$ is needed to satisfy Eq. (5) implies that the creation of superpositions following the related proposal of Ref. bose , which relies on a micro-cavity, imposes requirements that are probably beyond the reach of current technology. A large $`L`$ is helpful because, for a given $`N`$, it allows one to use a lower frequency $`\omega _m`$, and thus a more weakly bound mirror that is easier to displace by the photon.

Secondly, the requirement of observing the revival puts a bound on the acceptable environmental decoherence. To estimate the expected decoherence we model the mirror’s environment by an (Ohmic) bath of harmonic oscillators. The effect of this environment can approximately be described by a decoherence rate $`\gamma _D=\gamma _mkTM(\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2/\mathrm{}^2`$ governing the decay of off-diagonal elements between different mirror positions decoherence . Here $`\gamma _m`$ is the damping rate for the mechanical oscillator, $`T`$ is the temperature of the environment, which is constituted mainly by the internal degrees of freedom of the mirror and cantilever, and $`\mathrm{\Delta }x`$ is the separation of two coherent states that are originally in a superposition. This approximation is strictly valid only for times much longer than $`2\pi /\omega _m`$ and for $`\mathrm{\Delta }x`$ large compared to the width of the individual wavepackets. A more rigorous description would follow Ref. strunz  and take into account the movement of the mirror. Our analysis indicates that the order of magnitude of the decoherence is well captured by $`\gamma _D`$. Assuming that the experiment achieves $`\kappa ^21`$, i.e. a separation by the size of a coherent state wavepacket, $`\mathrm{\Delta }x\sqrt{\frac{\mathrm{}}{M\omega _m}}`$, the condition $`\gamma _D\omega _m`$ can be cast in the form

$`Q{\displaystyle \frac{kT}{\mathrm{}\omega _m}}=\overline{n},`$ (6)
where $`Q=\omega _m/\gamma _m`$ is the quality factor of the mechanical oscillator. Bearing in mind that $`Q10^5`$ has been achieved mamin  for silicon cantilevers of approximately the right dimensions and frequency, this implies that the temperature has to be 3 mK or less.

Thirdly, the stability requirements for the experiment are very strict. The phase of the interferometer has to be stable over the whole measurement time. This means that the distance between the large cavity end mirror and the equilibrium position thermal  of the small mirror has to be stable to of order $`\lambda /20N=0.6\times 10^{14}`$m. The required measurement time can be determined in the following way. A single run of the experiment starts by sending a weak pulse into the interferometer, such that on average 0.1 photons go into either cavity. This probabilistically prepares a single-photon state as required to a good approximation. The two-photon contribution has to be kept low because it causes noise in the interferometer. From Eq. (4) the width of the revival peak is $`2/\kappa \omega _m\sqrt{\overline{n}}`$. This implies that only a fraction $`1/\pi \sqrt{\overline{n}}`$ of the remaining photons will leak out in the time interval of the revival. It is therefore important to work at the lowest possible temperature. A temperature of 60 $`\mu `$K has been achieved with a nuclear demagnetization cryostat yao .

Considering the required low value of $`\omega _m`$ and the fact that approximately 1% of the photons remain after a full period for the assumed loss, this implies a detection rate of approximately 100 photons per hour in the revival interval, given a detection efficiency of 70 %. Thus a measurement time of order $`10`$ minutes should give statistically significant results. After one such measurement period the interferometer can be readjusted, and the experiment can be repeated. Stability of order $`10^{13}`$m/min for an STM inside at 8 K was achieved with a rather simple suspension stipe . Gravitational wave observatories using interferometers also require very high stability in order to have an length sensitivity of $`10^{19}`$m over timescales of a ms or greater ligo , for arm lengths of order $`1`$ km.

The experiment requires ultra-high vacuum conditions in order to ensure that events where an atom hits the cantilever are sufficiently rare not to cause significant errors, which is at the level of about 5/s. Background gas particle densities of order 100/cm3 have been achieved gabrielse  and are sufficient for our purposes.

After every single run of the experiment the mirror has to be damped to reset it to its initial (thermal) state. This could be done by electric or magnetic fields, e.g. following Ref. damping , where a Nickel sphere was attached to the cantilever, whose $`Q`$ could then be changed by three orders of magnitude by applying a magnetic field.

There are several ways in which the total measurement time could be decreased, thus relaxing the stability requirements. Switchable cavity mirrors would allow coupling the photon into and out of the cavity at any desired time, instead of relying on postselection. This allows the data collection in the revival interval to be increased by three orders of magnitude. The transmission of a distributed Bragg reflector (DBR) can be changed by altering the refractive index of one of the two materials. Highly reflective mirrors have been fabricated from alternating layers of GaAs and AlAs sale . The refractive index of GaAs can be changed dramatically by optical pumping huang . A change from $`3.6`$ to $`3.15`$ on a ps timescale was observed at a probe wavelength of 830nm for pump intensities in the range $`1`$ kJ/m2 (just below the damage threshold of the material). Such a large change in refractive index would allow efficient optical switching scalora  and is a promising avenue that deserves experimental investigation. The main open question is whether the absorption of the materials sturge  can be made low enough to match our very strict demands.

Since the width of the revival peak scales like $`1/\sqrt{T}`$, the required measurement time can also be decreased by decreasing the temperature below 60 $`\mu `$K. Passive cooling techniques may be improved. In addition, active cooling of mirror oscillators has been proposed mancinicooling , and even implemented experimentally for a large mirror cohadon . The mirror’s movement is sensed via the output light of an optical cavity, and a feedback loop is used to damp the motion. Applying the theory of Ref. mancinicooling  to our mirror, one finds that cooling even to the ground state of the center of mass motion is conceivable. This would reduce the required measurement time, and thus the stability requirements, by a factor of 50.

In principle the proposed setup has the potential to test wave function reduction models, in particular the one of Ref. penrose . Based on penrose  and strunz , we estimate that an improvement of the ratio $`Q/T`$ by about five orders of magnitude from the values discussed in this paper ($`Q=10^5`$ and $`T=60\mu `$K) would make the predicted wavefunction decoherence rate comparable to the environmental decoherence rate. Improvements in $`Q`$ are certainly conceivable. In particular, $`Q`$ is known to increase with decreasing temperature mamin . Active cooling methods for the mirror’s center of mass motion as described above could in principle also be used to indirectly cool the mirror’s internal degrees of freedom. Whether such sympathetic cooling is a realistic avenue is in itself a fascinating subject for further study.

We have performed a detailed study of the experimental requirements for the creation and observation of quantum superposition states of a mirror consisting of $`10^{14}`$ atoms, approximately nine orders of magnitude more massive than any superposition observed to date. Our analysis suggests that, while very demanding, this goal appears to be in reach of current technology. It is remarkable that a tabletop experiment has the potential to test quantum mechanics in an entirely new regime. Preliminary experiments on components of the proposal are currently under way.

This work was supported by the E.U. (IST$`199910033`$). W.M. is supported by EPSRC (award no. 00309297). C.S. is supported by a Marie Curie Fellowship of the E.U. (no. HPMF-CT-2001-01205). R.P. thanks the NSF for support under contract 00-90091 and the Leverhulme Foundation for an Emeritus Fellowship. We would like to thank S. Bose, M. Davies, R. Epstein, T. Knuuttila, R. Lalezari, J. Pethica, and J. Roberts for useful discussions.


text:
# Theory for Slightly Doped Antiferromagnetic Mott Insulators

## Abstract

Trial wavefunctions, constructed explicitly from the unique 2-dimensional Mott insulating state with antiferromagnetic order, are proposed to describe the low-energy states of a Mott insulator slightly doped with holes or electrons. With the state behaving like charged quasi-particles with well-defined momenta, a rigid band is observed. These states have much less pairing correlations than previously studied ones. Small Fermi patches obtained are consistent with recent experiments on high $`T_c`$ cuprates doped lightly with holes or electrons. States showing the incoherent and spin-bag behaviors are also discussed. Using these wavefunctions, a number of results obtained by exact calculations are reproduced.

With the continuous improvement of experimental technique and sample making, it has recently become possible to study in detail the phenomena in the lightly doped high $`T_c`$ cuprates. Indeed, many intriguing behaviors concerning the physics of doping the two-dimensional(2D) Mott insulator in this very undedoped regime are observed. Recent angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) results unearth contrasting behaviors between lightly hole-doped $`Ca_{2z}Na_zCuO_2Cl_2`$ ($`Na`$-CCOC)  and electron-doped $`Nd_{2x}Ce_xCuO_2`$ (NCCO) high $`T_c`$ cuprates . Although ARPES on the undoped (i.e. $`z`$=$`x`$=0) insulating state shows an identical energy dispersion of a single hole created below the charge gap, results at a little higher dopings are demonstrated to be different: while a small hole patch is observed to be centered clearly at momentum ($`\pi `$/2,$`\pi `$/2) in the $`Na`$-CCOC at even $`z`$=0.1, small electron patches centered at ($`\pi `$,0) and (0,$`\pi `$) are observed for $`x`$=0.04 in NCCO. Moreover, the in-plane transport in lightly doped systems shows high mobility of the charge carriers . This and the recent high-resolution scanning tunneling microscopy/spectroscopy results indicate the signature of the quasi-particle behavior .

The single hole/electron behavior and its dispersion have been studied using various approaches on the $`t`$-$`t^{}`$-$`t^{\prime \prime }`$-$`J`$ model . However, these studies on doping holes and electrons into the system only emphasize the asymmetry resulting from the different signs of $`t^{}`$ and $`t^{\prime \prime }`$ for the corresponding Hamiltonians. It is unclear whether the same physics is working for these two systems with different Hamiltonians. Should one try to construct a different theory when electron-doped cuprates are considered? Furthermore, do the models predict small Fermi surfaces and quasi-particles?

There are other issues concerning the model itself which have been bothersome. The studies applying the projected $`d`$-wave superconducting, or the resonating-valence-bond (RVB), state with the antiferromagnetic long range order (AFLRO) also suggest that away from half-filling, the superconductivity (SC) revives and the ground state shows both SC and AFLRO. But so far most experiments do not support the coexistence. In addition, there has been not enough understanding on various properties found in the exact results of the $`t`$-$`J`$ type models on finite clusters  in terms of the many-particle wave functions (WF’s).

In this paper, we discuss our recent proposal of a theory based on the variational approach to understand these issues . Specific trial wavefunctions (TWF’s) are constructed to describe both the low-energy states of the associated $`t`$-$`t^{}`$-$`t^{\prime \prime }`$-$`J`$ models with lightly doped holes and electrons. These WF’s are generalizations of the single-hole WF first written down by Lee and Shih . In contrast to other TWF’s, ours are constructed solely from the optimized one at half-filling and include no hopping amplitudes $`t^{}`$ and $`t^{\prime \prime }`$. Yet, surprisingly, a number of properties including dispersion relations, momemtum distributions, spectral weight etc. are obtained correctly for both hole-doped and electron-doped systems. In the following, the Lee-Shih WF for one doped hole is used and generalized for several holes as well as electron-doped systems. All numerical results reported below are from variational Monte Carlo (VMC) calculations for an $`8\times 8`$ lattice with periodic boundary conditions.

At half-filling, the system is described by the Heisenberg Hamiltonian

$$_J=J\underset{i,j}{}(𝐒_i𝐒_j\frac{1}{4}n_in_j),$$
(1)
where $`i,j`$ denotes nearest-neighbor ($`n.n.`$) sites. Each site is occupied by only one single electron. As holes or electrons are doped into the system, we consider the Hamiltonian $``$=$`_{tt^{}t^{\prime \prime }}`$+$`_J`$ including $`n.n.`$ and longer range hoppings. Here $`_{tt^{}t^{\prime \prime }}`$=$`t_{i,j\sigma }`$ $`\stackrel{~}{c}_{i\sigma }^{}\stackrel{~}{c}_{j\sigma }t^{}_{i,l\sigma }`$ $`\stackrel{~}{c}_{i\sigma }^{}\stackrel{~}{c}_{l\sigma }t^{\prime \prime }_{i,m\sigma }`$ $`\stackrel{~}{c}_{i\sigma }^{}\stackrel{~}{c}_{m\sigma }`$+H.c. with $`i,l`$ and $`i,m`$ representing the second $`n.n.`$ and third $`n.n.`$ site pairs. Note that $`\stackrel{~}{c}_{i\sigma }`$ in $`_{tt^{}t^{\prime \prime }}`$ creates different kind of holes from single-electron-occupied sites at half-filling: empty holes (0e-hole) for hole doping and two-electron-occupied holes (2e-hole) for electron doping . Operator $`\stackrel{~}{c}_{i\sigma }`$ is actually equal to $`c_{i\sigma }(1n_{i,\sigma })`$ or $`c_{i,\sigma }n_{i\sigma }`$ for hole or electron doped case, respectively. Therefore, despite the constraints, states in the two cases are in one-to-one correspondence after a local transformation $`c_{i\sigma }c_{i,\sigma }^{}`$ is made. However, because of the Fermi statistics, the exchange of a single spin with a 2e-hole has an extra minus sign as compared to the 0e-hole. Hence, the only difference between the hole-doped and electron-doped $`t`$-$`t^{}`$-$`t^{\prime \prime }`$-$`J`$ model is $`t^{}/tt^{}/t`$ and $`t^{\prime \prime }/tt^{\prime \prime }/t`$ after we change the $`c_{i\sigma }`$ on B sublattice sites to $`c_{i\sigma }`$ . With all these, we then treat the hole and electron doped cases in the same manner with the Lee-Shih WF originally proposed only for a single hole. The VMC results presented in this paper are for $`J/t=0.3`$, $`t^{}/t=(+)0.3`$ and $`t^{\prime \prime }/t=+()0.2`$ in the hole(electron) doped case following the values usually used .

We shall apply the standard VMC method that enforces the local constraint exactly. Following the work by Lee and Shih , the TWF for one doped hole with momentum $`𝐪`$ and $`S_z`$=$`1/2`$ is constructed to have $`(N_s/2)1`$ singlet pairs of electrons and a single unpaired electron with momentum $`𝐪`$ and $`S_z`$=$`1/2`$,

$`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1`$ $`=`$ $`P_dc_𝐪^{}[{\displaystyle \underset{𝐤}{}}{}_{}{}^{}(A_𝐤a_𝐤^{}a_𝐤^{}+B_𝐤b_𝐤^{}b_𝐤^{})]^{(N_s/2)1}|0.`$ (2)
The prime on the summation symbol indicates that the momentum $`𝐪`$ is excluded from the sum if $`𝐪`$ is within the sublattice Brillouin zone (SBZ), otherwise, $`𝐪𝐐`$ is excluded. $`N_s`$ here is the total number of sites and Q=$`(\pi ,\pi )`$.

$`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1`$ is explicitly constructed from the optimized half-filled WF $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_0=P_d[_𝐤(A_𝐤a_𝐤^{}a_𝐤^{}+B_𝐤b_𝐤^{}b_𝐤^{})]^{N_s/2}|0`$ and it does not contain any information about hoppings, $`t^{}`$, $`t^{\prime \prime }`$ and neither explicitly $`t`$, of the doped hole or electron. However, the effect of $`t`$ is included in the RVB uniform bond $`\chi `$=$`_\sigma c_{i\sigma }^{}c_{j\sigma }`$ which describes the large quantum fluctuation and spin singlet formation. There is also no need to introduce $`t^{}`$ and $`t^{\prime \prime }`$ in the TWF as they are compatible with AFLRO. Here the coefficients $`A_𝐤`$ and $`B_𝐤`$ are functions of $`\xi _𝐤`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }_𝐤`$. $`\pm \xi _𝐤`$= $`\pm (ϵ_𝐤^2+(Jm_s)^2)^{\frac{1}{2}}`$ are energy dispersions for the two spin density wave (SDW) bands with $`ϵ_𝐤`$=$`\frac{3}{4}J\chi (cos\mathrm{k}_x+cos\mathrm{k}_y)`$ and the staggered magnetization $`m_s`$=$`S_A^z`$=$`S_B^z`$, where the lattice is divided into A and B sublattices. $`a_{𝐤\sigma }`$ and $`b_{𝐤\sigma }`$ represent the operators of the lower and upper SDW bands, respectively, and are related to the original electron operators $`c_{𝐤\sigma }`$ and $`c_{𝐤+𝐐\sigma }`$ with $`𝐐`$=$`(\pi ,\pi )`$ set for the commensurate SDW state. $`\mathrm{\Delta }_𝐤`$= $`\frac{3}{4}J\mathrm{\Delta }d_𝐤`$ with $`d_𝐤`$=$`cos\mathrm{k}_xcos\mathrm{k}_y`$ here is for the $`d`$-wave RVB ($`d`$-RVB) order parameter. The projection operator $`P_d`$ enforces the constraint of no doubly occupied (or vacant) sites for cases with finite hole (or electron) doping . At half-filling, $`N_s`$ equals the total number of electrons. Notice that the sum in $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_0`$ is taken over SBZ. There are two variational parameters: $`\mathrm{\Delta }/\chi `$ and $`m_s/\chi `$ in these WF’s.

The energy dispersion obtained from $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1`$ for one doped hole has been shown by Lee and Shih to agree very well with that of exact calculations, self-consistent Born approximations (SCBA), and Green function Monte Carlo methods etc.. As for the case of having an extra up-spin electron with momentum $`𝐪`$ doped into the half-filled state, the energy dispersion can be calculated with this same WF $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1`$. The only difference is signs of $`t^{}/t`$ and $`t^{\prime \prime }/t`$ are changed in the Hamiltonian.

The variational energies for one doped electron are shown as black dots in Fig.1. This result agrees well with that of Xiang and Wheatley obtained by SCBA. The optimal variational parameters are ($`\mathrm{\Delta }/\chi ,m_s/\chi `$)=(0.25,0.125). The ground state is at momentum $`𝐪=(\pi ,0)`$. The VMC results can be fitted simply by $`E_{1𝐤}`$=$`E_𝐤2t_{eff}(cos\mathrm{k}_x+cos\mathrm{k}_y)4t_{eff}^{}cos\mathrm{k}_xcos\mathrm{k}_y2t_{eff}^{\prime \prime }(cos(2\mathrm{k}_x)+cos(2\mathrm{k}_y))`$ with parameters described in the caption of Fig.1. The dispersion thus seems to be simply the combination of the mean-field band at half-filling and the coherent hoppings .

To examine further the physical properties of $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1`$, we calculated the momentum distribution function $`n_\sigma ^h(𝐤)`$ for the ground state of a single hole with momentum $`𝐪=(\pi /2,\pi /2)`$ and $`S_z`$=$`1/2`$. Results are shown in Fig.2(a) and (b). Note that the dips or pockets at $`(\pi /2,\pi /2)`$ and anti-dips at $`(\pi /2,\pi /2)`$ found by Leung  for the exact results of 32 sites are also clearly seen here. It is quite amazing that $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1`$, including no $`t^{}`$ and $`t^{\prime \prime }`$, not only produces the correct energy dispersions for a single doped hole or electron it also provides a correct picture about the momentum distribution.

The momentum distribution functions $`n_\sigma ^e(𝐤)`$ for electron doped systems could be also calculated from $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1`$ if we perform the transformation, $`c_{i\sigma }c_{i,\sigma }^{}`$, and $`t`$ is chosen to be positive. In fact, it is easy to show that $`n_\sigma ^e(𝐤)`$ $`=1n_\sigma ^h(𝐐𝐤)`$. The results for the ground state of a single doped electron with momentum $`𝐤=(\pi ,0)`$ and spin $`S_z`$=$`1/2`$ are shown in Fig.2(c) and (d). There are peaks at $`𝐤=(\pi ,0)`$ and an anti-peak at $`𝐤=(0,\pi )`$.

Now we shall generalize the Lee-Shih WF $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1`$ to the case of two holes. The simplest possible way is just to take out the unpaired spin from $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1`$ if we are interested in the state with zero total momentum and $`S_z`$=$`0`$, which turns out to be the lowest energy state. The TWF for two holes with momenta $`𝐪`$ and $`𝐪`$ is

$`|\mathrm{\Psi }_2`$ $`=`$ $`P_d[{\displaystyle \underset{𝐤}{}}{}_{}{}^{}(A_𝐤a_𝐤^{}a_𝐤^{}+B_𝐤b_𝐤^{}b_𝐤^{})]^{(N_s/2)1}|0.`$ (3)
Note that the momentum $`𝐪`$ is not included in the summation. It is most surprising to find that although $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_2`$ has zero total momentum irrespective of $`𝐪`$, its energy varies with the missing momentum or the hole momentum $`𝐪`$. The dispersion turns out to be very similar to that of a single electron as shown in Fig.1 . The state with momentum $`𝐪`$=$`(\pi ,0)`$ has the lowest energy for two electrons. The values of the two parameters $`\mathrm{\Delta }/\chi `$ and $`m_s/\chi `$ are the same for $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_2`$ and $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1`$.

Using WF $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_2`$, the energy dispersion for two holes doped into the half-filled state again has an almost identical form as that of a single hole and the minimum is at $`𝐪=(\pi /2,\pi /2)`$ . The lowest energy obtained is $`26.438(3)t`$ which is much lower than the variational energy, $`25.72(1)t`$, using the TWF applied by Himeda and Ogata . Even if we include $`t^{}`$ and $`t^{\prime \prime }`$, the variational energy $`25.763(7)t`$, is still much higher than ours . We also found that the hopping amplitudes for $`n.n.`$, second $`n.n.`$ and third $`n.n.`$ of two holes are almost twice that of one hole. The momentum distribution function for this state (not shown) has dips at $`(\pi /2,\pi /2)`$ and $`(\pi /2,\pi /2)`$. This is in good agreement with the exact result for the $`t`$-$`t^{}`$-$`t^{\prime \prime }`$-$`J`$ model with 2 holes in 32 sites.

It is then straightforward to write down the same type of TWF for three holes with momenta $`𝐪`$, $`𝐪^{}`$ and $`𝐪^{}`$:

$`|\mathrm{\Psi }_3`$ $`=`$ $`P_dc_𝐪^{}[{\displaystyle \underset{𝐤}{}}{}_{}{}^{}(A_𝐤a_𝐤^{}a_𝐤^{}+B_𝐤b_𝐤^{}b_𝐤^{})]^{(N_s/2)2}|0,`$ (4)
where $`𝐪^{}`$ and $`𝐪`$ are excluded from the summation. Just like the case with two holes or two electrons energy dispersions are proportional to the sum of the three single hole energies at momenta $`𝐪`$, $`𝐪^{}`$ and $`𝐪^{}`$. In Fig.3, the dispersions are plotted as functions of $`𝐪`$. For the electron doped (i.e. with three 2e-holes) case in Fig.3(a), the lowest energy state is at $`𝐪=(3\pi /4,0)`$ (shown as an open circle) within the SBZ after the first two electrons occupy $`𝐪^{}=(\pi ,0)`$. With three doped holes (Fig.3(b)), after the two electrons at $`(\pi /2,\pi /2)`$ are removed the ground state is now at $`(\pi /2,\pi /2)`$ (the open circle). As shown clearly in Fig.3, the dispersions follow nicely the single hole one.

Values of the staggered magnetization $`m`$=$`N_{s}^{}{}_{}{}^{1}_i(1)^iS_i^z`$ are computed and compared for several 0e-hole and 2e-hole concentrations. With the same variational parameters, it is found that the preference of $`(\pi /2,\pi /2)`$ for 0e-holes causes clearly larger disturbance of the AF order than for the electron doped case where 2e-holes with momentum $`(\pi ,0)`$ shows much less influence on the AF order . This is consistent with previous work . It is also consistent with experimental results that AF phase is more stable for electron doping than hole doping .

So far, based on the $`t`$-$`t^{}`$-$`t^{\prime \prime }`$-$`J`$ model we have proposed a TWF to describe the low energy states of slightly doped antiferromagnetic Mott insulators. Exactly the same TWF’s are proposed to account for the behavior of both hole doping and electron doping, after we employed the particle-hole transformation. Different energy dispersions for these two cases are due to the different signs of $`t^{}/t`$ and $`t^{\prime \prime }/t`$ which is a direct consequence of the constraint that electron doped system has 2e-holes while hole doped system only has 0e-holes. Rigid band and quasi-particle behavior are demonstrated for both cases. The theory provides an explanation of recent ARPES results. In lightly hole-doped cuprates, small Fermi pocket is around $`(\pi /2,\pi /2)`$. In electron-doped cuprates, the patch is around $`(\pi ,0)`$ as shown in the inset of Fig.1 with doping at about 3%.

Another important property of our WF’s is that holes are essentially independent of each other as they obey the same energy dispersions (with very little renormalization of parameters). Exactly because this quasi-particle like property is unchanged after doping, our WF has AFLRO but very little superconducting pairing correlations. The presence of superconducting state certainly will change the excitation spectra. In particular, the $`d`$-wave SC, which coexists with AFLRO in some of the previous variational studies, should have low energy excitations along the nodes. This is certainly not seen in our TWF’s. In addition, the holes are not attractive to each other in our WF’s. In Fig.4 the hole-hole correlation function for our TWF and the WF used by authors in  are compared for 4 holes in an 8$`\times `$8 lattice. The lack of attraction between holes is consistent with Leung’s low energy states obtained exactly for two holes in 32 sites. Long range $`d`$-wave pairing correlation defined  for our TWF and that in Himeda-Ogata one are, on average, about $`0.002`$, and $`0.018`$, respectively. Thus the $`d`$-RVB pairing for spins assumed by our WF’s are not in any way implying the pairing of charges.

Although our TWF’s or the Lee-Shih WF’s has reproduced many numerical results obtained by exact diagonalization, SCBA, etc. for one or two holes or electrons, there exists, however, some inconsistancy in the detail of the comparison. Namely, at some momenta $`𝐤`$’s the spectral weights $`Z_𝐤=|\mathrm{\Psi }_𝐤|c_{𝐤\sigma }|\mathrm{\Psi }_0|^2/\mathrm{\Psi }_0|c_{𝐤\sigma }^{}c_{𝐤\sigma }|\mathrm{\Psi }_0`$ computed for the one doped hole case using $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_𝐤=|\mathrm{\Psi }_1`$ are much larger than the exact results . This may indicate that the quasi-particle states do not exist everywhere in the Brillouin zone. In fact, the ARPES on the undoped ($`z=0`$) $`Na`$-CCOC also show well-defined peaks only locally in the high-symmetry directions .

We have constructed TWF’s with which small spectral weights are realized at particular $`𝐤`$ points . For the single hole doped case, state described by WF

$`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1^{^{}}`$ $`=`$ $`P_dc_{𝐪_s}^{}[{\displaystyle \underset{[𝐤𝐪_h]}{}}{}_{}{}^{}(A_𝐤a_𝐤^{}a_𝐤^{}+B_𝐤b_𝐤^{}b_𝐤^{})]^{(N_s/2)1}|0`$ (5)
with the hole momentum $`𝐪_h=(\pi /2,\pi /2)`$ has also one singlet bond less than the half-filled case, but the unpaired spin momentum $`𝐪_s`$ is chosen here not to be the same as $`𝐪_h`$. Note that only $`𝐪_h`$ is excluded within the sum for $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1^{^{}}`$. With the same parameters $`\mathrm{\Delta }/\chi `$ and $`m_s/\chi `$, it is found that $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1^{^{}}`$ can have lower variational energy than that of the quasi-particle state $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1`$ at some $`𝐪_s`$’s. Apparently, many states could be constructed with same $`𝐪_s`$ but different $`𝐪_h`$. These states constitutes the continuum at higher energy.

Substituting WF $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1^{^{}}`$ and the quasi-particle $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1`$ into $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_𝐤`$ and computing $`Z_𝐤`$ suffices to reproduce the variation of the spectral weights obtained in the exact results . States described by $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1^{^{}}`$ have smaller $`Z_𝐤`$’s and are thus with a strong incoherent character. We also found that more quasi-particle states have lower energy below the continuum in the pure $`t`$-$`J`$ model with $`t^{}=t^{\prime \prime }=0`$  than in the $`t`$-$`t^{}`$-$`t^{\prime \prime }`$-$`J`$ model. This is consistent with what has been known in the exact results .

To understand the incoherent states more, the hole-spin correlations for $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1^{^{}}`$ with different $`𝐪_s`$’s are examined . The spin configurations around the hole are quite different from that of the quasi-particle states. Spin moments around the hole in the quasi-particle state $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1`$ can have values larger than the average at that momentum, thus the unpaired spin seems to be bound to the hole. However, in the incoherent state the staggered magnetization is suppressed around the hole, this is like a spin-bag state. The unpaired spin is no longer associated with the hole and this is now a spin-charge separated state. The amazing difference between these two wave functions could be understood quite easily. When we apply the spin flipping operator, $`S^{()}(𝐤^{^{}};𝐪^{^{}}=𝐪[=𝐪_h])=_𝐪^{^{}}c_{𝐪^{^{}}+𝐤^{^{}}()}^{}c_{𝐪^{^{}}()}|_{𝐪^{^{}}=𝐪}`$ with $`𝐪^{^{}}+𝐤^{^{}}=𝐪_s`$, to the quasi-particle state, the unpaired spin $`𝐪`$ is excited to a new momentum $`𝐪_s`$ in the state $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_1^{^{}}`$. Thus the unpaired spin is no longer bound to the hole. Furthermore, the spin-spin correlations across the hole with $`𝐪_s=(\pi ,0)`$ show the anti-phase domain, i.e. AF correlation at the same sublattice. These features reproduce what have been obtained in the exact calculations .

In summary, we have discussed new TWF’s describing the low-energy states of the $`t`$-$`t^{}`$-$`t^{\prime \prime }`$-$`J`$ model at lightly doping. These states reproduce various exact numerical results and, also, show consistent behaviors with what have been observed in the experiments.

We are grateful to Drs. A. Damascelli, F. Ronning and Prof. Z.-X. Shen for sharing their ARPES data prior to publication, and Profs. C.-T. Shih and P. W. Leung for some supporting results and invaluable discussions. TKL is supported by the grant NSC89-2112-M-001-103 (R.O.C.) and NN is supported by Priority Areas Grants and Grant-in-Aid for COE research from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology of Japan.