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# An introduction to lattice QCD at non–zero temperature and density

## 1 Introduction

QCD at non-zero temperature and density is a rich subject discussed in many talks at this meeting: from the introductory lesson describing the theoretical discovery of the quark gluon plasma  to the subtle interrelations of gauge fields dynamics and charmonium suppresions , from the detailed analysis of the exotic phases at large baryon density  to the fascinating aspects of the QCD phase diagram with many flavor , from the time-honored theoretical subjects of the interplay between topology and confinement  to the challenging aspects of the interrelations of chiral and axial symmetries . These notes mostly aimed at the non-specialist might hopefully provide, besides some introductory material, a path among general idea as well as among the many new results presented in the lively topical session on the QCD phases.

The material is organised as follows: Section 2 reviews the imaginary time formulation of field theory thermodynamics, and gives the functional integral representation of the partition function $`𝒵`$. The representation of $`𝒵`$ naturally leads to a theoretical suggestion: the concept of universality which is singled out in a small Section on its own, because it is so important. Section 4 discusses the QCD chiral transition, Section 5 the QCD deconfinement transition, and Section 6 how to put together the two, eventually describing the complex phenomenology of the real world high temperature QCD phase transition. The equation of state is briefly mentioned here. Section 6 introduces the method used to obtain all of the results of the previous Sections: the lattice regularization. We shall see that introducing temperature is straightforward while a non–zero density poses specific problems. We will only mention the main proposals to circumvent such problems, referring to the most recent reviews  for details and recent results.

## 2 Formulation

Here we will concern ourselves with the path integral representation of the partition function. The basic property of equilibrium field theory is that one single function $`𝒵`$ ( the grand canonical partition function):

$$𝒵=𝒵(𝒱,𝒯,\mu )$$
(1)
determines completely the thermodynamic state of a system according to:

$`P`$ $`=`$ $`T{\displaystyle \frac{ln𝒵}{V}}`$ (2)
$`N`$ $`=`$ $`T{\displaystyle \frac{ln𝒵}{\mu }}`$ (3)
$`S`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{Tln𝒵}{T}}`$ (4)
$`E`$ $`=`$ $`PV+TS+\mu N`$ (5)
while physical observables $`<O>`$ can be computed as

$$<O>=TrO\widehat{\rho }/𝒵$$
(6)
Any of the excellent books on statistical field theory and thermodynamics can provide a more detailed discussion of these points. I would like to underscore, very shortly,that the problem is to learn how to represent $`𝒵`$ at non–zero temperature and baryon density, and how to design a calculational scheme.

### 2.1  $`𝒵`$ at non–zero temperature and chemical potential

$`𝒵`$ is the trace of the density matrix of the system $`\widehat{\rho }`$

$`𝒵`$ $`=`$ $`Tr\widehat{\rho }`$ (7)
$`\widehat{\rho }`$ $`=`$ $`e^{(H\mu \widehat{N})}/T`$ (8)
$`H`$ is the Hamiltonian, $`T`$ is the temperature and $`\widehat{N}`$ is any conserved number operator.

### 2.2 Chemical potential, relativistic and non-relativistic

It is worth stressing the main differences between the non relativistic and relativistic meaning of a chemical potential $`\mu `$, eqs (5) and (8).

In a non relativistic setting, the chemical potential tells us the energy ‘cost’ of adding an extra particle to the system: we thus have a different chemical potential for each type of particle. The term which is added to the Hamiltonian is $`\mu _kN_k`$, $`N_k`$ being indeed the number of particles belonging to the $`k`$–th species.

In a relativistic setting, particles can be created and destroyed, thus losing their individuality, so to speak: it only makes sense to have a chemical potential coupled to the 0-th component of a conserved current.

In practice, we will mostly concern ourselves with the current $`J_\mu =\overline{\psi }\gamma _\mu \psi `$, i.e. $`J_0=\overline{\psi }\gamma _0\psi =\psi ^{}\psi `$ will be the density of fermion (baryon) number, or, more precisely, the difference between the number of fermions and antifermions: $`J_0=N\overline{N}`$ . The chemical potential will then appear in the Lagrangian as a term $`\mu J_0`$ and we recognize immediately that a change of sign for the chemical potential corresponds to an exchange particles–antiparticles.

A second difference between non-relativistic and relativistic approach concerns the magnitude itself of $`\mu `$, which in a relativistic theory contains the particle rest mass.

From a technical point of view, a finite density is easily handled in a non–relativistic setting. From a relativistic field theoretic perspectives there are instead important technical problems. We will discuss these problems later on, and we just anticipate here that the explicit breaking of the particle–antiparticle symmetry induced by a chemical potential induces the loss of positivity of the effective gluonic Action–i.e. the breakdown of the condition which makes lattice calculations possible.

### 2.3 Temperature

Consider the transition amplitude for returning to the original state $`\varphi _a`$ after a time $`t`$:

$$<\varphi _a|e^{iHt}|\varphi _a>=𝑑\pi _{\varphi (x,0)=\varphi _a(x)}^{\varphi (x,t)=\varphi _a(x)}𝑑\varphi e^{i_0^t𝑑t{\scriptscriptstyle d^3x(\pi (\stackrel{}{x},t){\scriptscriptstyle \frac{\varphi (\stackrel{}{x},t)}{t}}H(\pi ,\varphi ))}}$$
(9)
Compare now the above with expression (2) for $`𝒵`$, and make the trace explicit:

$$𝒵=Tre^{\beta (H\mu \widehat{N})}=𝑑\varphi _a<\varphi _a|e^{\beta (H\mu N)}|\varphi _a>$$
(10)
We are naturally lead to the identification

$$\beta \frac{1}{T}it$$
(11)
We note - anticipating the discussions of Section below – that studying nonzero temperature on a lattice  is straightforward: one just takes advantage of the finite temporal extent of the lattice, while keeping the space directions much larger than any physical scale in the system.

By introducing the integral $`S(\varphi ,\psi )`$ of the Lagrangian density (from now on we will always use 1/T as the upper extreme for the time integration)

$$S(\varphi ,\psi )=_0^{1/T}𝑑td^3x(\varphi ,\psi )$$
(12)
$`𝒵`$ is written as

$$𝒵=𝑑\varphi 𝑑\psi e^{S(\varphi ,\psi )}$$
(13)
The only missing ingredient are the boundary conditions for the fields: basically, they follow from the (anti)commuting properties of the (fermi)bose fields which imply

$$\widehat{\varphi }(\stackrel{}{x},0)=\widehat{\varphi }(\stackrel{}{x},\beta )$$
(14)
for the bosons and

$$\widehat{\psi }(\stackrel{}{x},0)=\widehat{\psi }(\stackrel{}{x},\beta )$$
(15)
for the fermions.

Fermions and bosons obey antiperiodic and periodic boundary conditions, respectively, in the time direction.

The expression above, together with the boundary conditions just introduced, is the key to field theory thermodynamics.

## 3 Universality

It is intuitive that when the smallest significant length scale of the system $`l>>1/T`$ the system becomes effectively d–dimensional. Moreover, the description of the system can be effectively ‘coarse grained’, ignoring anything which happens on a scale smaller than $`l`$ .

This can become true when the system is approaching a continuous transition: the correlation length of the system $`\xi `$ is diverging. In such situation all the physics is dominated by long wavelength modes. Not only the system gets effectively reduced, but the coarse graining procedure become doable. As an effect of this procedure, systems which are very different one from another might well be described by the same model, provided that the long range physics is regulated by the same global symmetries: this is the idea of universality which provides the theoretical framework for the study of the QCD transition in two interesting (albeit non physical) cases which we review in the next two sections.

## 4 QCD chiral transition ($`m_q=0`$)

Let us recall the symmetries of the QCD action with $`N_f`$ flavors of massless quarks, coupled to a $`SU(N_c)`$ color group:

$$SU(N_c)_C\times SU(N_f)\times SU(N_f)\times Z_A(N_f)$$
(16)
$`SU(N_c)`$ is the gauge color symmetry. $`SU(N_f)\times SU(N_f)\times Z_A(N_f)`$ is the flavor chiral symmetry, after the breaking of the classical $`U_A(1)`$ symmetry to the discrete $`Z_A(N_f)`$.

We want to study the realization and pattern(s) of breaking of the chiral symmetries and we would like to know the interrelation of the above with the possibility of quark liberation predicted at high temperature and density.

### 4.1 Ordinary conditions: zero temperature and density

In normal conditions (zero temperature and density) the $`SU(N_f)_L\times SU(N_f)_R`$ chiral symmetry is spontaneously broken to the diagonal $`SU(N_f)_{L+R}`$.Let us note the isomorphism:

$$SU(2)\times SU(2)O(4)$$
(17)
which shows that the symmetry is the same as the one of an O(4) ferromagnet. The relevant degrees of freedom are the three pions, and the sigma particle, and the effective potential is a function of $`\sigma ^2+|\pi |^2`$ in the chiral space. Once a direction in the chiral sphere is selected (say in the $`\sigma `$ direction) chiral symmetry is spontaneously broken in that direction, according to the equivalent patterns:

$`SU(2)_R\times SU(2)_L`$ $``$ $`SU(2)_{L+R}`$ (18)
$`O(4)`$ $``$ $`O(3)`$ (19)
Massless Goldstone particles (in this case, the three pions) appear in the direction orthogonal to the one selected by the spontaneous breaking.

### 4.2 Increasing T

Disorder increases with temperature. Then, one picture of the high $`T`$ QCD transition can be drawn by using a ferromagnetic analogy of the chiral transition: $`\overline{\psi }\psi `$ can be thought of as a spin field taking values in real space, but whose orientation is in the chiral sphere. Chiral symmetry breaking occurs when $`<\overline{\psi }\psi >0`$, i.e. it corresponds to the ordered phase. By increasing T, $`<\overline{\psi }\psi >0`$, and the O(4) symmetry should be restored.

Combining this symmetry analysis with the general idea of dimensional reduction, Pisarski and Wilczek  proposed that the high temperature transition in two flavor QCD should be in the universality class of the O(4) sigma model in three dimensions. At high temperature when symmetry is restored there will be just one global minimum for zero value of the fields, and pion and sigma become eventually degenerate.

We have however to keep in mind possible sources of violation of this appealing scenario and, all in all, one has to resort to numerical simulations to measure the critical exponents, and verify or disprove the $`O(4)`$ universality. In turn, this gives information on the issues raised for instance in as well as on the possible restoration of the axial anomaly, see the discussion in Meggiolaro’s review.

In practice, one measures the chiral condensate as a function of the coupling parameter $`\beta `$, which in turns determines the temperature of the system. This gives the exponent $`\beta _{mag}`$ according to

$$<\overline{\psi }\psi >=B(\beta \beta _c)^{\beta _{mag}}$$
(20)
The exponent $`\delta `$ is extracted from the response at criticality:

$$<\overline{\psi }\psi >=Am^{1/\delta };\beta =\beta _c$$
(21)
The results for the critical exponents compare favorably with the O(4) results $`\beta _{mag}=.38(1)`$, $`\delta =4.8(2)`$, and definitively rule out mean fields exponents (which would have characterized a weak first order transition). However, the results can still be compatible with O(2) exponents, which would signal the persistence of some lattice artifact, and of course it is still possible that the final answer do not fit any of the above predictions, for instance if we were just observing some crossover phenomenon.

In conclusion the symmetry analysis of the (two flavor) QCD transition gives a definite predictions for the value of the critical exponents, which is possibly (slightly) violated by the numerical results. The numerical relevance of this violation (i.e. possible systematic errors) as well as the its physical implications are an interesting open problem.

The contribution by E. Meggiolaro covers in more detail these points.

### 4.3 Increasing density

Till two or three years ago, we thought that asymptotic freedom was the main physical agent behind the pattern of chiral symmetries at high density. Now it has been recognized that, at least at zero temperature, the main mechanisms are instability at the Fermi surface leading to color superconductivity . The review by Nardulli and Sannino cover these points which, unfortunately, are not yet amenable to a lattice study. At non–zero density the lattice approach (see contribution by M. D’Elia for developments presented at this meeting) is still limited to rather high temperature, where color superconductivity is most likely lost anyway.

## 5 QCD deconfinement transition ($`m_q=\mathrm{}`$)

When $`m_q=\mathrm{}`$ quarks are static and do not contribute to the dynamics: hence, the dynamic of the system is driven by gluons alone, i.e. we are dealing with a purely Yang-Mills model:

$$S=F_{\mu \nu }F^{\mu \nu }$$
(22)
In addition to the local gauge symmetry, the action enjoys the global symmetry associated with the center of the group, $`Z(N_c)`$. The order parameter is the Polyakov loop $`P`$

$$P=e^{i_0^{1/T}A_0𝑑t}$$
(23)
In practice, $`P`$ is the cost of a static source violating the $`Z(N_c)`$ global symmetry.

The interquark potential V(R,T) (R is the distance, T is the temperature) is

$$e^{V(R,T)/T}<P(\stackrel{}{0})P^{}(\stackrel{}{R})>$$
(24)
Confinement can then be read off the behavior of the interquark potential at large distance. When $`V(R)\sigma R`$ it would cost an infinite amount of energy to pull two quarks infinitely apart. Above a certain critical temperature $`V(R)`$ becomes constant at large distance: i.e. the string tension is zero, confinement is lost. The implication of this is that $`|P|^2=V(\mathrm{},T)`$ is zero in the confining phase, different from zero otherwise. P plays then a double role, being the order parameter of the center symmetry, and an indicator of confinement. We learn that in Yang Mills models there is a natural connection between confinement and realization of the $`Z(N_c)`$ symmetry. Hence, the confinement / deconfinement transition in Yang Mills systems is amenable to a symmetry description. By applying now the same dimensional reduction argument as above, we conclude that the Universality class expected of the three color model is the same as the one of a three dimensional model with $`Z(3)`$ global symmetry: Indeed, work by the Columbia, Tsukuba and APE group in the mid 80’s – see again Nicola Cabibbo’s talk for comments on this – found that the transition turns out to be ‘almost’ second order, i.e. very weakly first order, like the 3d three state Potts model.

The same reasoning tells us that the two color model is in the universality class of the three dimensional $`Z(2)`$ (Ising) model. This prediction has been checked with a remarkable precision by Engels and collaborators, and it is a spectacular confirmation of the general idea of universality and dimensional reduction.

## 6 Summary and Open Questions for the QCD High T Transition

What do we know about the real world: two (nearly) massless quark $`m_q<<\mathrm{\Lambda }_{QCD}`$, and one more heavy?

We can approach then the ’real’ world from two sides, either decreasing the mass from infinity, or increasing the quark mass from zero.

### 6.1 Approaching the physical point from infinite mass

Remember that in the infinite mass limit QCD reduces to the pure gauge (Yang Mills) model. Yang Mills systems have a deconfining transition associated with the realization of the global $`Z(N_c)`$ symmetry. This places the system in the Ising 3d universality class for two colors, and makes the transition weakly first order (near second, in fact) for three colors. General universality arguments are perfectly fulfilled by the deconfining transition.

The $`Z(N_c)`$ symmetry is broken by the kinetic term of the action when the quarks are dynamic ($`m_q<\mathrm{}`$) : this particular symmetry description of deconfinement only holds for infinite quark mass. When light quarks enter the game, the global $`Z(N_c)`$ symmetry observed at infinite mass is lost, and the simple description of confinement in terms of such symmetry is not possible any more. It should however remain true that color forces at large distance should decrease with temperature: the main mechanism, already at work at $`T=0`$, is the recombination of an (heavy) quark and antiquark with pairs generated by the vacuum: $`\overline{Q}Q\overline{q}Q+q\overline{Q}`$. At high temperature it becomes easier to produce light $`\overline{q}q`$ pairs from the vacuum, hence it is easier to ‘break’ the color string between an (heavy) quark and antiquark $`\overline{Q}Q`$. In other words, we expect enhanced screening of the color forces, which should be sharp at a phase transition (or rapid crossover). It is however worth mentioning that, even if the string ‘breaks’ bound states might well survive giving rise to a complicated, non–perturbative dynamics above the critical temperature. The physical scale of these phenomena is the larger physical scale in the system, i.e. the pion radius.

### 6.2 Approaching the physical point from zero mass

For zero bare mass the phase transition is chiral. For three colors, two flavors is second order with $`T_c170`$ MeV. The prediction from dimensional reduction + universality –$`O(4)`$ exponenents– is compatible with the data, but the agreement is not perfect.

If the agreement were confirmed, that would be an argument in favor of the non-restoration of the $`U_A(1)`$ symmetry at the transition, which is also suggested by the behavior of the masses spectrum. Remember in fact that the chiral partner of the pion is the $`f_0`$, which is in turn degenerate with the scalar $`a_0`$ with $`U_A(1)`$ is realized. All in all, $`U_A(1)`$ non–restoration across the chiral transition corresponds to $`m_\pi m_{f_0}m_{a_0}`$ which is the pattern observed in lattice calculations (once more I refer to meggiolaro’s talk).

The transition with three (massless) flavor turns out to be first order. The question is than as to whether the strange quark should be considered ‘light’ or ‘heavy’. In general, the real world will be somewhere in between two and three light flavor, and to really investigate the nature of the physical phase transition in QCD one should work as close as possible to the realistic value of the quark masses, which is a very demanding numerical task.

### 6.3 What do we know on the real QCD phase diagram

Among the most prominent open questions, there is of course the behavior of ‘real’ QCD, with two light flavor, and a third one of the order of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{QCD}`$, so how and when exactly the $`N_f=2`$ scenario morfs with the $`N_f=3`$? Also, why is $`T_\chi `$ much smaller that the pure gauge deconfining transition?

At a theoretical level the question is if it is possible to give an unified description of the two transitions, chiral and deconfining. This question is currently under active investigation: recent work suggests that a symmetry analysis of the deconfining transition can be extended also to theories with dynamical fermions. The physical argument is rooted in a duality transformation which allows the identification of magnetic monopoles as agent of deconfinement. The order parameter for deconfimenent would that be the monopole condensate . An alternative approach uses percolation as the common agent driving chiral and confining transitions .

One unifying description and perhaps the most dramatic evidence of a phase transition away from the ‘simple’ limits $`m_q=0`$ and $`m_q=\mathrm{}`$ comes from the equation of state: for $`T180`$ Mev we observe, from lattice calculations, a sharp increase of the internal energy: the behavior of the internal energy is a direct probe of the number of degrees of freedom, and indicates quark and gluon liberation .

Finally, the work  arrives at an interesting picture of the phase diagram of QCD by combining symmetry analysis and phenomenological consideration. Particularly interesting is the prediction of an endpoint of a first order line stemming from zero temperature chiral transition at finite density, which should be experimentally observable.

## 7 Methods for QCD at finite temperature and density

Here we will concern ourselves with computational schemes for QCD. The methods described here are those used to obtain the results reviewed above on the chiral transition, deconfinement and equation of state in QCD. We will give some details on these methods, we will explain why they are not immediately applicable at finite density and we will close up with a brief assessment of the current situation for finite density QCD.

The question is how to estimate the physical observables $`<O>=TrO\widehat{\rho }/𝒵`$ starting from the representation of the partition function

$$𝒵(\mu ,T)=_0^{1/T}𝑑te^{S_G+\overline{\psi }(\partial ̸+m+\mu \gamma _0)\psi }𝑑\overline{\psi }𝑑\psi 𝑑U$$

The need for two integrations (over bosons and over fermions) lends itself naturally to two different paths: either integrate gluons first, or fermions.

In the first case (if gluons are integrated out first) we end up with a purely effective fermionic model:

$$𝒵(T,\mu ,\overline{\psi },\psi ,U)𝒵(T,\mu ,\overline{\psi },\psi )$$
(25)
As the integration over gluons cannot be done exactly <sup>1</sup><sup>1</sup>1 There indeed a a systematic approach to QCD based on the strong coupling expansion which makes this integrations easy, but this is not in the scope of this introduction, such effective models are often build with the help of a symmetries’ analysis for QCD. The gauge fields enters the the game under the guise of coefficients for such models. Very important examples of this approach include instanton models, chiral perturbation theory, four fermion models such as those discussed by Nardulli and Sannino at this meeting.

The other way takes advantage of the bilinear nature of S in the fermionic fields, yielding the exact expression:

$$𝒵(T,\mu ,U)=𝑑Ue^{(S_glog(detM))}$$
(26)
The above integral needs being regulated, and scheme for calculating it has to be devised. Both tasks are accomplished within the lattice approach.

### 7.1  Lattice field theory at T,$`\mu `$ 0

Temperature comes for free on a lattice: the lattice has a finite extent $`N_ta`$, hence temperature is given by $`T=1/N_ta`$. The discretization can be carried out in complete analogy to $`T=0`$, and most of the techniques developed there (see e.g. the recent review for an introduction to lattice field theory at zero temperature) apply at finite temperature as well.

A finite density of baryons $`\mu _BJ_0`$ <sup>2</sup><sup>2</sup>2 Remember again that $`L(\mu )=L_0+\mu J_0`$, $`J_0=\overline{\psi }\gamma _0\psi `$, i.e. $`N\overline{N}=J_0`$ poses instead specific problems.

How to discretize $`\mu \overline{\psi }\gamma _0\psi `$

Recall first the ‘natural’ discretization of the matter fields $`\varphi (x)`$ and their derivatives $`_\mu \varphi (x)`$ on a regular lattice with spacing $`a`$:

$`\varphi _{LATT}(n_1,n_2,n_3,n_4)`$ $`=`$ $`\varphi (n_1a,n_2a,n_3a,n_4a)`$
$`\mathrm{\Delta }_\mu \varphi _{LATT}(n_1,n_2,n_3,n_4)`$ $`=`$ $`(\varphi (n_1a,(n_\mu +1)a,n_3a,n_4a)`$
$`\varphi (n_1a,(n_\mu a,n_3a,n_4a))/2a`$
This, for instance, is the correct prescription for the chiral condensate: $`m\overline{\psi }\psi m\overline{\psi }_{LATT}\psi _{LATT}`$ but not, as we will see in a moment, for the baryon density! $`\mu \overline{\psi }\gamma _0\psi \mu \overline{\psi }_{LATT}\gamma _0\psi _{LATT}`$ is not the correct lattice form , i.e. The naive discretization is not adequate for baryon density.

Let us then consider free fermions in the continuum

$$S=_0^\beta \overline{\psi }\gamma _mu_\mu \psi +m\overline{\psi }\psi +\mu \overline{\psi }\gamma _0\psi $$

The internal energy $`ϵ=\frac{1}{V}\frac{}{\beta }ln𝒵=\frac{4}{(2\pi )^4}d^4p\frac{(p_0+i\mu )^2}{(p_0+i\mu )^2+p^2+m^2}`$, after subracting the vacuum energy, is finite at $`T=0`$: $`lim_{T0}ϵ=\frac{\mu ^4}{4\pi ^2}`$ and gives the expect result

By use of the naive discretization, $`ϵ`$ would instead diverge in the continuum ($`a0`$): $`L=\overline{\psi }_x\gamma _\mu \psi _{x+\mu a}+m\overline{\psi }_x\psi _x+\mu \overline{\psi }_x\gamma _0\psi _xϵ\frac{\mu ^2}{a^2}_{a0}\mathrm{}`$

The solution : $`\mu `$ is an external field

Note the analogy: $`\overline{\psi }\gamma _\mu A_\mu \psi i\mu \overline{\psi }\gamma _0\psi `$. It shows us that $`\mu `$ looks like an external field in the time direction. But we know how to ’put’ external field on a lattice: they live on the lattice links: for instance, in electrodynamics $`A\theta =e^{iA}`$ (and, for the gauge fields, this implements in a natural and elegant way gauge invariance)

These considerations suggest how to put finite density on a lattice:

$$L(\mu )=\overline{\psi }_x\gamma _0e^{\mu a}\psi _{x+\widehat{0}}\overline{\psi }_{x+\widehat{0}}\gamma _0e^{\mu a}\psi _x$$
(27)
Indeed, this turns out to be the correct prescription: unphysical divergences disappear and the continuum limit is reproduced.

There is also a very expressive physical interpretation: as we can see, forward propagation is encouraged and backward propagation is suppressed: we are indeed inducing an asymmetry particles-antiparticles.

The 0-th component of the current $`j_0`$ counts indeed the differences between backward and forward propagation:

$$J_0=_\mu L=\overline{\psi }_x\gamma _0e^{\mu a}\psi _{x+\widehat{0}}+\overline{\psi }_{x+\widehat{0}}\gamma _0e^{\mu a}\psi _x$$
(28)
and reproduces the correct continuum limit.

Chemical potential and boundary conditions

By use of an unitary transformation of the fields it is possible to re-express $`L`$ as

$$L(\mu )=L(0)$$
(29)
with boundary conditions

$`\varphi (x+N_T)`$ $`=`$ $`e^{\mu N_T}\varphi (x)`$ (30)
$`\psi (x+N_T)`$ $`=`$ $`e^{\mu N_T}\psi (x)`$ (31)
It is of some interest to consider the effect of the chemical potential on the baryonic propagators in the two cases – when the chemical potential is included into the Action, and when instead affects only the boundary conditions. In the first case, (at zero temperature, and ignoring feedbacks) a term $`exp(N_c\mu )`$ multiplies the baryonic propagator: this produces an apparent decrease of the baryon mass

$$m_B=m_B3\mu $$
(32)
i.e. the baryon becomes massless at $`\mu =\mu _c=m_B/3`$. In the same situation, the chiral condensate remains constant till $`\mu _c`$, and then suddenly drops to zero. The behavior of the chiral condensate would be suggestive of a strong first order transition, while the behavior of the baryon mass would suggest a second order transition with $`\nu =1`$!

In the other formulation (when the chemical potential only affects the boundary conditions), at zero temperature the baryon mass is constant till $`\mu _c`$ : this is consistent with the behavior of the chiral condensate, and with the physical intuition that nothing should happen till the Fermi level is reached. Of course, nothing is wrong and the apparent contradiction is resolved by noticing that the apparent decrease of the baryon mass below $`\mu _c`$ merely reflects the change of the reference energy. The relationships above provide a link between the two pictures.

QCD at nonzero T and $`\mu `$ at a glance

The continuum formulation:

$`L`$ $`=`$ $`L_{YM}+\overline{\psi }(i\gamma _\mu D_\mu +m)\psi `$
$`+`$ $`\mu \overline{\psi }\gamma _0\psi `$
$`\mu `$ is explicitly included via the coupling to $`\mu J_0`$ , and the temperature is the reciprocal of the imaginary time.

On a lattice:

$`L`$ $`=`$ $`L_{YM}+{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{3}{}}}\overline{\psi }_xU\gamma _i\psi _{x+\widehat{i}}\overline{\psi }_{x+\widehat{i}}U^{}\gamma _i\psi _x`$
$`+`$ $`m\overline{\psi }\psi +\overline{\psi }_x\gamma _0e^{\mu a}U\psi _{x+\widehat{0}}\overline{\psi }_{x+\widehat{0}}U^{}\gamma _0e^{\mu a}\psi _x`$
$`\mu `$ appears as a link term, and the temperature is again the reciprocal of the imaginary time. The two formulations coincide in the limit $`a0`$.

### 7.2 From the formulation to the results

Let us write again:

$$S=S_{YM}(U)+\overline{\psi }M(U)\psi $$
(34)
By taking advantage of $`S`$ bilinearity in the fields $`\psi ,\overline{\psi }`$ we can write

$$𝒵=e^{S_{YM}(U)}𝑑etM(U)𝑑U$$
(35)
It is convenient to define an ’effective’ Action

$$S_{eff}(U)=S_{YM}(U)ln(detM(U))$$
(36)
Averages of purely gluonic observables can be expressed as

$$<f(U)>=Z^1𝑑Ue^{S_{eff}(U)}f(U)$$
(37)
while fermion bilinears can be evaluated with the help of Grassman algebra

$$<\overline{q}q>=Z^1𝑑Ue^{S_{eff}(U)}DetM(U)^1$$
(38)
In conclusion, if we know how to treat $`e^{S_{eff}(U)}𝑑U`$ we have access to all of the gluonic observables, chiral condensate, meson and baryons propagators (masses, decay constant, etc.) etc. much in the same way as at $`T=0`$.

In practical numerical works lattice discretization is combined with importance sampling: a configuration of gauge fields \[U\] is a ’point’ in a multidimensional integration space. A Markov chain of points is then created according to the prescription: $`P([U])e^{S_{eff}([U])}`$ Expectation values are then given by simple averages: $`<O>=lim_N\mathrm{}1/N_{i=1}^NO(U)`$.

The prescription above relies on importance sampling: $`S_eff([U])`$ must be positive <sup>3</sup><sup>3</sup>3If this is not the case, one might think of using $`S^{}`$ instead: this has to be used with care because it introduces extra degrees of freedom which might well be dangerous. In QCD (eq. above) $`M^{}(\mu )=M(\mu )`$ : importance sampling, hence MonteCarlo evaluation of physical observables, works for purely imaginary chemical potential, including, of course, $`\mu =0`$.

For QCD with two color, however, as well as for several fermionic models, the positivity condition is met by the Action at non zero $`\mu `$. All in all, we have a rather elaborate pattern of warnings and possibilities.

### 7.3 Results and possibilities for QCD at $`\mu 0`$

I would classify the many questions one can ask along two main lines:

Firstly, what can be done in order to learn about thegeneral behavior at nonzero baryon density?

Secondly, what can be done in order to learn about real QCD at nonzero baryon density?

I would say that to learn about the effects of a finite density of baryons, we can study two color QCD : here, not only one can study fermionic observables, but it is also possible to observe the effects of a density of baryons on the gauge fields. This is indeed an active field of research, and I refer to the proceedings of the Lattice meetings for details.

How about real QCD? there is a growing consensus that at least the high temperature, small density region is accessible: by increasing temperature it is easier to fluctuate light baryons, hence to explore a region with a moderate baryon density. At least three different, complementary approaches stem from this consideration:direct evaluation of derivatives at $`\mu `$ = 0, reweighting, analytic continuation from purely imaginary chemical potential . This last approach has been discussed by M. D’Elia at this meeting.

I hope to have managed at least to describe some of the aspects of a rapidly evolving field, and to convey a feeling of its many reasons of interest. A discussion of the recent results is not in the scope of this cursory introduction: for this, and for a complete set of references, I refer to the latest reviews  (not yet available at the time of the Frascati meeting).


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# Pair correlation densities of inhomogeneous quadratic forms II

## 1. Introduction

### 1.1.

Berry and Tabor  have conjectured that the local correlations of quantum energy levels of integrable systems are those of independent random numbers from a Poisson process. We will here present a proof of this conjecture for the two-point correlations of the sequence

$$0\lambda _1\lambda _2\mathrm{}\mathrm{}$$

given by the values of

$$𝒎𝜶^2=(m_1\alpha _1)^2+\mathrm{}+(m_k\alpha _k)^2$$

at lattice points $`𝒎=(m_1,\mathrm{},m_k)^k`$, for fixed $`𝜶=(\alpha _1,\mathrm{},\alpha _k)^k`$. These numbers represent the eigenvalues of the Laplacian

$$\mathrm{\Delta }=\frac{^2}{x_1^2}\mathrm{}\frac{^2}{x_k^2}$$

on the flat torus $`𝕋^k`$ with quasi-periodicity conditions

$$\phi (𝒙+𝒍)=\mathrm{e}^{2\pi \mathrm{i}𝜶𝒍}\phi (𝒙),𝒍^k,$$

and may therefore be viewed as energy levels of the quantized geodesic flow. Statistical properties of the above sequence were first studied by Cheng, Lebowitz and Major  in dimension $`k=2`$. We will here extend our studies  to dimensions $`k2`$.

Previous results on the Berry-Tabor conjecture for flat tori include  in dimension $`k=2`$ and  for $`k>2`$. For more details and references see .

### 1.2.

We are interested in the local correlations between the $`\lambda _j`$ on the scale of the mean spacing. Because the mean density is increasing as $`\lambda \mathrm{}`$, i.e.,

$$\frac{1}{\lambda }\mathrm{\#}\{j:\lambda _j\lambda \}=\frac{1}{\lambda }\mathrm{\#}\{𝒎^k:𝒎𝜶^2\lambda \}B_k\lambda ^{k/21},$$

where $`B_k`$ is the volume of the unit ball, it is necessary to rescale the sequence by setting

$$X_j=\lambda _j^{k/2}.$$

Then

$$\frac{1}{X}\mathrm{\#}\{j:X_jX\}=\frac{1}{X}\mathrm{\#}\{𝒎^k:𝒎𝜶^kX\}B_k$$

for $`X\mathrm{}`$, and hence the mean spacing is constant, as required.

### 1.3.

The pair correlation density of a sequence with constant mean density $`D`$ is defined as

$$R_2[a,b](X)=\frac{1}{DX}\mathrm{\#}\{ij:X_i,X_j[X,2X],X_iX_j[a,b]\}.$$

We recall the following classical result.

### 1.4. Theorem

If the $`X_j`$ come from a Poisson process with mean density $`D`$, one has

$$\underset{X\mathrm{}}{lim}R_2[a,b](X)=D(ba)$$

almost surely.

### 1.5.

We will here prove a similar result for the deterministic sequence in 1.1, which holds, however, only under diophantine conditions on $`𝜶`$. The vector $`𝜶=(\alpha _1,\mathrm{},\alpha _k)^k`$ is said to be diophantine of type $`\kappa `$, if there exists a constant $`C`$ such that

$$\underset{j}{\mathrm{max}}|\alpha _j\frac{m_j}{q}|>\frac{C}{q^\kappa }$$

for all $`m_1,\mathrm{},m_k,q`$, $`q>0`$. The smallest possible value for $`\kappa `$ is $`\kappa =1+\frac{1}{k}`$. In this case $`𝜶`$ is called badly approximable.

### 1.6. Theorem

Suppose $`𝛂`$ is diophantine of type $`\kappa <\frac{k1}{k2}`$ and the components of the vector $`(𝛂,1)^{k+1}`$ are linearly independent over $``$. Then

$$\underset{X\mathrm{}}{lim}R_2[a,b](X)=B_k(ba).$$

The condition in the theorem is satisfied, if for instance the components of $`(𝜶,1)`$ form a basis of a real algebraic number field of the degree $`k+1`$. In this case $`\kappa =1+\frac{1}{k}`$ .

The condition $`\kappa <\frac{k1}{k2}`$ in Theorem 1.6 is sharp:

### 1.7. Theorem

Let $`k>2`$. For any $`a>0`$, there exists a set $`C𝕋^k`$ of second Baire category, for which the following holds.

(i) All $`𝛂C`$ are diophantine of type $`\kappa =\frac{k1}{k2}`$, and the components of the vector $`(𝛂,1)^{k+1}`$ are linearly independent over $``$.

(ii) For $`𝛂C`$, we find arbitrarily large $`X`$ such that

$$R_2[a,a](X)\frac{\mathrm{log}X}{\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}X}.$$

(iii) For $`𝛂C`$, there exists an infinite sequence $`L_1<L_2<\mathrm{}\mathrm{}`$ such that

$$\underset{j\mathrm{}}{lim}R_2[a,a](L_j)=2\pi a.$$

In Theorem 1.7 (ii), $`\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}X`$ may be replaced by any slowly increasing positive function $`\nu (X)\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}X`$ with $`\nu (X)\mathrm{}`$ as $`X\mathrm{}`$.

Without imposing any diophantine condition, the rate of divergence may be even worse:

### 1.8. Theorem

For any $`a>0`$, there exists a set $`C𝕋^k`$ of second Baire category, for which the following holds.

(i) For $`𝛂C`$, the components of the vector $`(𝛂,1)^{k+1}`$ are linearly independent over $``$.

(ii) For $`𝛂C`$, we find arbitrarily large $`X`$ such that

$$R_2[a,a](X)\{\begin{array}{cc}\frac{\mathrm{log}X}{\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}X}\hfill & (k=2)\hfill \\ \frac{X^{(k2)/k}}{\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}X}\hfill & (k>2).\hfill \end{array}$$

(iii) For $`𝛂C`$, there exists an infinite sequence $`L_1<L_2<\mathrm{}\mathrm{}`$ such that

$$\underset{j\mathrm{}}{lim}R_2[a,a](L_j)=2\pi a.$$

Again, $`\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}X`$ may be replaced by any slowly increasing positive function $`\nu (X)\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}X`$ with $`\nu (X)\mathrm{}`$ as $`X\mathrm{}`$.

Theorems 1.7 and 1.8 are proved in Section 8.

## 2. Rescaling

### 2.1.

We shall see in this section, how Theorem 1.6, which is the central result of this paper, follows as a straightforward corollary from the asymptotics of the generalized pair correlation function

$$R_2(\psi ,\lambda )=\frac{1}{B_k\lambda ^{k/2}}\underset{i,j=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\psi (\frac{\lambda _i}{\lambda },\frac{\lambda _j}{\lambda },\lambda ^{k/21}(\lambda _i\lambda _j)),$$

with $`\psi \mathrm{C}_0(^+\times ^+\times )`$, i.e., continuous and of compact support.

### 2.2. Theorem

Let $`\psi \mathrm{C}_0(^+\times ^+\times )`$. Suppose the components of $`(𝛂,1)^{k+1}`$ are linearly independent over $``$, and assume $`𝛂`$ is diophantine of type $`\kappa <\frac{k1}{k2}`$. Then

$$\underset{\lambda \mathrm{}}{lim}R_2(\psi ,\lambda )=\frac{k}{2}_0^{\mathrm{}}\psi (r,r,0)r^{k/21}𝑑r+\frac{k^2}{4}B_k_{}_0^{\mathrm{}}\psi (r,r,s)r^{k2}𝑑r𝑑s.$$

### 2.3. Theorem 2.2 $``$ Theorem 1.6.

Let us now show how Theorem 2.2 implies Theorem 1.6. For $`\psi _1,\psi _2\mathrm{C}_0(^+)`$ with support in the compact interval $`I`$ not containing the origin 0, and $`\sigma \mathrm{C}_0()`$, we define

$$\psi (r_1,r_2,s)=\psi _1(r_1^{k/2})\psi _2(r_2^{k/2})\sigma (\rho (r_1,r_2)s),$$

with

$$\rho (r_1,r_2)=\frac{r_1^{k/2}r_2^{k/2}}{r_1r_2}=\{\begin{array}{cc}\underset{\nu =1}{\overset{k/2}{}}r_1^{k/2\nu }r_2^{\nu 1}\hfill & \text{(}k\text{ even)}\hfill \\ \frac{1}{r_1^{1/2}+r_2^{1/2}}\underset{\nu =1}{\overset{k}{}}r_1^{(k\nu )/2}r_2^{(\nu 1)/2}\hfill & \text{(}k\text{ odd)}.\hfill \end{array}$$

It is evident that we can find a constant $`\delta >0`$ such that

$$\delta <\rho (r_1,r_2)<\frac{1}{\delta }$$

uniformly for all $`r_1,r_2I`$.

The assumptions on $`\psi `$ in Theorem 2.2 are therefore satisfied, giving

$$\begin{array}{c}\underset{\lambda \mathrm{}}{lim}\frac{1}{B_k\lambda ^{k/2}}\underset{i,j=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\psi _1(\frac{\lambda _i^{k/2}}{\lambda ^{k/2}})\psi _2(\frac{\lambda _j^{k/2}}{\lambda ^{k/2}})\sigma (\lambda _i^{k/2}\lambda _j^{k/2})\hfill \\ \hfill =\frac{k}{2}\sigma (0)_0^{\mathrm{}}\psi _1(r^{k/2})\psi _2(r^{k/2})r^{k/21}𝑑r\\ \hfill +\frac{k^2}{4}B_k_{}_0^{\mathrm{}}\psi _1(r^{k/2})\psi _2(r^{k/2})\sigma (\rho (r,r)s)r^{k2}𝑑r𝑑s.\end{array}$$

With $`\rho (r,r)=\frac{k}{2}r^{k/21}`$ and the substitutions $`X=\lambda ^{k/2}`$, $`x=r^{k/2}`$ and $`ss/\rho (r,r)`$ we finally have

$$\begin{array}{c}\underset{X\mathrm{}}{lim}\frac{1}{B_kX}\underset{i,j=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\psi _1(\frac{X_i}{X})\psi _2(\frac{X_j}{X})\sigma (X_iX_j)\hfill \\ \hfill =\sigma (0)_0^{\mathrm{}}\psi _1(x)\psi _2(x)𝑑x+B_k_{}\sigma (s)𝑑s_0^{\mathrm{}}\psi _1(x)\psi _2(x)𝑑x.\end{array}$$

The first term on the right-hand side comes obviously from the diagonal terms $`X_i=X_j`$ (use the asymptotics in 1.2), so

$$\underset{X\mathrm{}}{lim}\frac{1}{B_kX}\underset{ij}{}\psi _1(\frac{X_i}{X})\psi _2(\frac{X_j}{X})\sigma (X_iX_j)=B_k_{}\sigma (s)𝑑s_0^{\mathrm{}}\psi _1(x)\psi _2(x)𝑑x,$$

which is a smoothed version of Theorem 1.6. We complete the proof by quoting a standard density argument (compare proof of Theorem 1.8 in ), in which the characteristic functions of the intervals $`[1,2]`$, $`[1,2]`$ and $`[a,b]`$ are approximated from above and below by smooth functions $`\psi _1`$, $`\psi _2`$ and $`\sigma `$, respectively. ∎

### 2.4.

It will be sufficient to restrict our attention to the following special case of Theorem 2.2. Put

$$R_2(\psi _1,\psi _2,h,\lambda )=\frac{1}{B_k\lambda ^{k/2}}\underset{i,j=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\psi _1(\frac{\lambda _i}{\lambda })\psi _2(\frac{\lambda _j}{\lambda })\widehat{h}\left(\lambda ^{k/21}(\lambda _i\lambda _j)\right),$$

Here $`\psi _1,\psi _2𝒮(_+)`$ are real-valued, and $`𝒮(_+)`$ denotes the Schwartz class of infinitely differentiable functions of the half line $`_+`$ (including the origin), which, as well as their derivatives, decrease rapidly at $`+\mathrm{}`$. $`\widehat{h}`$ is the Fourier transform of a compactly supported function $`h\mathrm{C}_0()`$,

$$\widehat{h}(s)=_{}h(u)e(\frac{1}{2}us)𝑑u,$$

with the shorthand $`e(z):=\mathrm{e}^{2\pi \mathrm{i}z}`$.

We will prove the following (Section 7).

### 2.5. Theorem

Let $`\psi _1,\psi _2𝒮(_+)`$ and $`h\mathrm{C}_0()`$. Suppose the components of $`(𝛂,1)^{k+1}`$ are linearly independent over $``$, and assume $`𝛂`$ is diophantine of type $`\kappa <\frac{k1}{k2}`$. Then

$$\begin{array}{c}\underset{\lambda \mathrm{}}{lim}R_2(\psi _1,\psi _2,h,\lambda )=\frac{k}{2}\widehat{h}(0)_0^{\mathrm{}}\psi _1(r)\psi _2(r)r^{k/21}𝑑r\hfill \\ \hfill +\frac{k^2}{4}B_k\widehat{h}(s)𝑑s_0^{\mathrm{}}\psi _1(r)\psi _2(r)r^{k2}𝑑r.\end{array}$$

### 2.6. Theorem 2.5 $``$ Theorem 2.2.

For any fixed $`ϵ>0`$ we find finite linear combinations (cf. Section 8.6 in )

$$\psi ^\pm (r_1,r_2,s)=\underset{\nu }{}\psi _{1,\nu }^\pm (r_1)\psi _{2,\nu }^\pm (r_2)\widehat{h}_\nu ^\pm (s)$$

of functions satisfying the conditions of Theorem 2.5 such that

$$\psi ^{}(r_1,r_2,s)\psi (r_1,r_2,s)\psi ^+(r_1,r_2,s)$$

and

$$(\psi ^+(r,r,s)\psi ^{}(r,r,s))r^{k2}𝑑r𝑑s<ϵ.$$

Theorem 2.5 tells us that

$$\underset{\lambda \mathrm{}}{lim}\frac{1}{B_k\lambda ^{k/2}}\underset{ij}{}\psi ^\pm (\frac{\lambda _i}{\lambda },\frac{\lambda _j}{\lambda },\lambda ^{k/21}(\lambda _i\lambda _j))=\frac{k^2}{4}B_k\psi ^\pm (r,r,s)r^{k2}𝑑r𝑑s$$

(recall the first term in that theorem comes trivially from the diagonal terms $`i=j`$). This implies

$$\underset{\lambda \mathrm{}}{lim\; sup}\frac{1}{B_k\lambda ^{k/2}}\underset{ij}{}\psi (\frac{\lambda _i}{\lambda },\frac{\lambda _j}{\lambda },\lambda ^{k/21}(\lambda _i\lambda _j))\frac{k^2}{4}B_k(\psi (r,r,s)r^{k2}𝑑r𝑑s+ϵ)$$

and

$$\underset{\lambda \mathrm{}}{lim\; inf}\frac{1}{B_k\lambda ^{k/2}}\underset{ij}{}\psi (\frac{\lambda _i}{\lambda },\frac{\lambda _j}{\lambda },\lambda ^{k/21}(\lambda _i\lambda _j))\frac{k^2}{4}B_k(\psi (r,r,s)r^{k2}𝑑r𝑑sϵ).$$

Because these inequalities hold for arbitrarily small $`ϵ>0`$, Theorem 2.2 must be true. ∎

## 3. Outline of the proof of Theorem 2.5

Using the Fourier transform we may write

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill R_2& (\psi _1,\psi _2,h,\lambda )\hfill \\ \hfill =& \frac{1}{B_k}\left(\frac{1}{\lambda ^{k/4}}\underset{j}{}\psi _1(\frac{\lambda _j}{\lambda })e(\frac{1}{2}\lambda _j\lambda ^{k/21}u)\right)\overline{\left(\frac{1}{\lambda ^{k/4}}\underset{j}{}\psi _2(\frac{\lambda _j}{\lambda })e(\frac{1}{2}\lambda _j\lambda ^{k/21}u)\right)}h(u)𝑑u\hfill \\ \hfill =& \frac{1}{B_k\lambda ^{k/21}}\left(\frac{1}{\lambda ^{k/4}}\underset{j}{}\psi _1(\frac{\lambda _j}{\lambda })e(\frac{1}{2}\lambda _ju)\right)\overline{\left(\frac{1}{\lambda ^{k/4}}\underset{j}{}\psi _2(\frac{\lambda _j}{\lambda })e(\frac{1}{2}\lambda _ju)\right)}h(\lambda ^{(k/21)}u)𝑑u.\hfill \end{array}$$

The sum

$$\theta _\psi (u,\lambda )=\frac{1}{\lambda ^{k/4}}\underset{j}{}\psi (\frac{\lambda _j}{\lambda })e(\frac{1}{2}\lambda _ju)$$

will be identified as a Jacobi theta sum living on a certain noncompact but finite-volume manifold $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ (Section 4). The integration in

$$R_2(\psi _1,\psi _2,h,\lambda )=\frac{1}{B_k}\lambda ^{(k/21)}\theta _{\psi _1}(u,\lambda )\overline{\theta _{\psi _2}(u,\lambda )}h(\lambda ^{(k/21)}u)𝑑u$$

amounts to averaging along a unipotent orbit on $`\mathrm{\Sigma }`$, which becomes equidistributed as $`\lambda \mathrm{}`$ (Section 5). Diophantine conditions on $`𝜶`$ are necessary to secure the convergence of the limit (Section 6).

The equidistribution theorem yields then

$$\frac{1}{\mu (\mathrm{\Sigma })}_\mathrm{\Sigma }\theta _{\psi _1}\overline{\theta _{\psi _2}}𝑑\mu h(u)𝑑u,$$

where $`\mu `$ is the invariant measure. The first integral can be calculated quite easily (Section 7), and we will see that

$$\frac{1}{\mu (\mathrm{\Sigma })}_\mathrm{\Sigma }\theta _{\psi _1}\overline{\theta _{\psi _2}}𝑑\mu h(u)𝑑u=\frac{k}{2}B_k\psi _1(r)\psi _2(r)r^{k/21}𝑑rh(u)𝑑u,$$

which finally yields

$$\frac{k}{2}B_k\widehat{h}(0)\psi _1(r)\psi _2(r)r^{k/21}𝑑r,$$

compare the first term in Theorem 2.5.

An additional contribution comes from an arc of the orbit, which vanishes into the cusp. Even though the length of that arc tends to zero, the average over the unbounded theta function gives a non-vanishing contribution

$$\frac{k^2}{2}B_k^2h(0)\psi _1(r)\psi _2(r)r^{k2}𝑑r=\frac{k^2}{4}B_k^2\widehat{h}(u)𝑑u\psi _1(r)\psi _2(r)r^{k2}𝑑r,$$

which corresponds to the second term in Theorem 2.5.

## 4. Theta sums

### 4.1.

Consider the semi-direct product group $`G^k=\mathrm{SL}(2,)^{2k}`$ with multiplication law

$$(M;𝝃)(M^{};𝝃^{})=(MM^{};𝝃+M𝝃^{}),$$

where $`M,M^{}\mathrm{SL}(2,)`$ and $`𝝃,𝝃^{}^{2k}`$; the action of $`\mathrm{SL}(2,)`$ on $`^{2k}`$ is defined canonically as

$$M𝝃=\left(\begin{array}{c}a𝒙+b𝒚\\ c𝒙+d𝒚\end{array}\right),M=\left(\begin{array}{cc}a& b\\ c& d\end{array}\right),𝝃=\left(\begin{array}{c}𝒙\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right),$$

where $`𝒙,𝒚^k`$. A convenient parametrization of $`\mathrm{SL}(2,)`$ can be obtained by means of the Iwasawa decomposition

$$M=\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& u\\ 0& 1\end{array}\right)\left(\begin{array}{cc}v^{1/2}& 0\\ 0& v^{1/2}\end{array}\right)\left(\begin{array}{cc}\mathrm{cos}\varphi & \mathrm{sin}\varphi \\ \mathrm{sin}\varphi & \mathrm{cos}\varphi \end{array}\right),$$

which is unique for $`\tau =u+\mathrm{i}v`$, $`\varphi [0,2\pi )`$, where $``$ denotes the upper half plane $`=\{\tau :\mathrm{Im}\tau >0\}`$.

### 4.2.

For any Schwartz function $`f𝒮(^k)`$ we define the Jacobi theta sum $`\mathrm{\Theta }_f`$ by

$$\mathrm{\Theta }_f(\tau ,\varphi ;𝝃)=v^{k/4}\underset{𝒎^k}{}f_\varphi ((𝒎𝒚)v^{1/2})e(\frac{1}{2}𝒎𝒚^2u+𝒎𝒙),$$

where

$$f_\varphi (𝒘)=_^kG_\varphi (𝒘,𝒘^{})f(𝒘^{})𝑑w^{},$$

with the integral kernel

$$G_\varphi (𝒘,𝒘^{})=e(k\sigma _\varphi /8)|\mathrm{sin}\varphi |^{k/2}e\left[\frac{\frac{1}{2}(𝒘^2+𝒘^{}^2)\mathrm{cos}\varphi 𝒘𝒘^{}}{\mathrm{sin}\varphi }\right],$$

where $`\sigma _\varphi =2\nu +1`$ when $`\nu \pi <\varphi <(\nu +1)\pi `$, $`\nu `$. The operators $`U^\varphi :ff_\varphi `$ are unitary, see  for details. Note in particular $`U^0=\mathrm{id}`$.

The proofs of the remaining statements in this section are found in Section 4 of .

### 4.3. Lemma

Let $`f_\varphi =U^\varphi f`$, with $`f𝒮(^k)`$. Then, for any $`R>1`$, there is a constant $`c_R`$ such that for all $`𝐰^k`$, $`\varphi `$, we have

$$|f_\varphi (𝒘)|c_R(1+𝒘)^R.$$

### 4.4.

Let us consider the following discrete subgroup in $`G^k`$.

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }^k=\{(\left(\begin{array}{cc}a& b\\ c& d\end{array}\right);\left(\begin{array}{c}ab𝒔\\ cd𝒔\end{array}\right)+𝒎):\left(\begin{array}{cc}a& b\\ c& d\end{array}\right)\mathrm{SL}(2,),𝒎^{2k}\}G^k,$$

with $`𝒔=(\frac{1}{2},\frac{1}{2},\mathrm{},\frac{1}{2})^k`$.

### 4.5. Lemma

$`\mathrm{\Gamma }^k`$ is generated by the elements

$$(\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 1\\ 1& 0\end{array}\right);\mathrm{𝟎}),(\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& 1\\ 0& 1\end{array}\right);\left(\begin{array}{c}𝒔\\ \mathrm{𝟎}\end{array}\right)),(\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& 0\\ 0& 1\end{array}\right);𝒎),𝒎^{2k}.$$

### 4.6. Proposition

The left action of the group $`\mathrm{\Gamma }^k`$ on $`G^k`$ is properly discontinuous. A fundamental domain of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }^k`$ in $`G^k`$ is given by

$$_{\mathrm{\Gamma }^k}=_{\mathrm{SL}(2,)}\times \{\varphi [0,\pi )\}\times \{𝝃[\frac{1}{2},\frac{1}{2})^{2k}\}.$$

where $`_{\mathrm{SL}(2,)}`$ is the fundamental domain in $``$ of the modular group $`\mathrm{SL}(2,)`$, given by $`\{\tau :u[\frac{1}{2},\frac{1}{2}),|\tau |>1\}`$.

### 4.7. Proposition

For $`f,g𝒮(^k)`$, $`\mathrm{\Theta }_f(\tau ,\varphi ;𝛏)\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_g(\tau ,\varphi ;𝛏)}`$ is invariant under the left action of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }^k`$.

### 4.8. Proposition

Let $`f,g𝒮(^k)`$. For any $`R>1`$, we have

$$\mathrm{\Theta }_f(\tau ,\varphi ;\left(\begin{array}{c}𝒙\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_g(\tau ,\varphi ;\left(\begin{array}{c}𝒙\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))}=v^{k/2}\underset{𝒎^k}{}f_\varphi ((𝒎𝒚)v^{1/2})\overline{g_\varphi ((𝒎𝒚)v^{1/2})}+O_R(v^R)$$

uniformly for all $`(\tau ,\varphi ;𝛏)G^k`$ with $`v>\frac{1}{2}`$. In addition

$$\mathrm{\Theta }_f(\tau ,\varphi ;\left(\begin{array}{c}𝒙\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_g(\tau ,\varphi ;\left(\begin{array}{c}𝒙\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))}=v^{k/2}f_\varphi ((𝒏𝒚)v^{1/2})\overline{g_\varphi ((𝒏𝒚)v^{1/2})}+O_R(v^R),$$

uniformly for all $`(\tau ,\varphi ;𝛏)G^k`$ with $`v>\frac{1}{2}`$, $`𝐲𝐧+[\frac{1}{2},\frac{1}{2}]^k`$ and $`𝐧^k`$.

### 4.9. Lemma

The subgroup

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_\theta ^{2k},$$

where

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_\theta =\{\left(\begin{array}{cc}a& b\\ c& d\end{array}\right)\mathrm{SL}(2,):abcd0mod2\}$$

is the theta group, is of index three in $`\mathrm{\Gamma }^k`$.

### 4.10. Lemma

$`\mathrm{\Gamma }^k`$ is of finite index in $`\mathrm{SL}(2,)(\frac{1}{2})^{2k}`$.

### 4.11.

Note: The theta sum defined in this section is related to the sum $`\theta _{\psi _1}(u,\lambda )`$ in Section 3 by

$$\theta _{\psi _1}(u,\lambda )\overline{\theta _{\psi _2}(u,\lambda )}=\mathrm{\Theta }_f(u+\mathrm{i}\frac{1}{\lambda },0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝜶\end{array}\right))\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_g(u+\mathrm{i}\frac{1}{\lambda },0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝜶\end{array}\right))}$$

with

$$f(𝒘)=\psi _1(𝒘^2),g(𝒘)=\psi _2(𝒘^2).$$

## 5. Equidistribution

### 5.1. Theorem

Let $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ be a subgroup of $`\mathrm{SL}(2,)^{2k}`$ of finite index, and assume the components of the vector $`(𝐲,1)^{k+1}`$ are linearly independent over $``$. Let $`h`$ be a continuous function $`_+`$ with compact support. Then, for any bounded continuous function $`F`$ on $`\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k`$ and any $`\sigma 0`$, we have

$$\underset{v0}{lim}v^\sigma _{}F(u+\mathrm{i}v,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))h(v^\sigma u)𝑑u=\frac{1}{\mu (\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k)}_{\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k}F𝑑\mu h(w)𝑑w$$

where $`\mu `$ is the Haar measure of $`G^k`$.

###### Proof.

For $`\sigma =0`$ the above statement is proved in , Theorem 5.7; see also Shah’s more general Theorem 1.4 in . The case $`\sigma >0`$ is easier and in fact follows from the result for $`\sigma =0`$, since the translate of the unipotent orbit is expanding at a faster rate:

As in , Section 5, we define the unipotent flow $`\mathrm{\Psi }^t:\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k`$ by right translation with

$$\mathrm{\Psi }_0^t=(\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& t\\ 0& 1\end{array}\right);\mathrm{𝟎}),$$

and furthermore the flow $`\mathrm{\Phi }^t:\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k`$ by right translation with

$$\mathrm{\Phi }_0^t=(\left(\begin{array}{cc}\mathrm{e}^{t/2}& 0\\ 0& \mathrm{e}^{t/2}\end{array}\right);\mathrm{𝟎}).$$

By Theorem 5.7 in , the orbit segment

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }\{(u+\mathrm{ie}^t,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right)):u[1,1]\}$$

is dense in $`\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k`$ in the limit $`t\mathrm{}`$. Hence we find a sequence $`\{u_t\}_{t_+}`$ with $`u_t[1,1]`$ such that

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }g_t:=\mathrm{\Gamma }(u_t+\mathrm{ie}^t,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))=\mathrm{\Gamma }(1;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))\mathrm{\Psi }^{u_t}\mathrm{\Phi }^t$$

converges in the limit $`t\mathrm{}`$ to a generic point in $`\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k`$. Theorem 2 in  implies then that for any constant $`B0`$

$$\begin{array}{c}\frac{1}{B\mathrm{e}^{\sigma t}}_0^{B\mathrm{e}^{\sigma t}}F(u_t+u+\mathrm{ie}^t,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))𝑑u=\frac{1}{B\mathrm{e}^{(1+\sigma )t}}_0^{B\mathrm{e}^{(1+\sigma )t}}F(g_t\mathrm{\Psi }^u)𝑑u\hfill \\ \hfill \frac{1}{\mu (\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k)}_{\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k}F𝑑\mu \end{array}$$

as $`t\mathrm{}`$. Because $`F`$ is bounded and $`u_t`$ is contained in a compact interval, note that

$$\begin{array}{c}\frac{1}{B\mathrm{e}^{\sigma t}}_0^{B\mathrm{e}^{\sigma t}}F(u_t+u+\mathrm{ie}^t,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))𝑑u=\frac{1}{B\mathrm{e}^{\sigma t}}_{u_t}^{B\mathrm{e}^{\sigma t}+u_t}F(u+\mathrm{ie}^t,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))𝑑u\hfill \\ \hfill =\frac{1}{B\mathrm{e}^{\sigma t}}_0^{B\mathrm{e}^{\sigma t}}F(u+\mathrm{ie}^t,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))𝑑u+O(\mathrm{e}^{\sigma t}).\end{array}$$

Therefore, for any constants $`\mathrm{}<A<B<\mathrm{}`$,

$$\underset{t\mathrm{}}{lim}\frac{1}{\mathrm{e}^{\sigma t}}_{A\mathrm{e}^{\sigma t}}^{B\mathrm{e}^{\sigma t}}F(u+\mathrm{ie}^t,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))𝑑u=\frac{(BA)}{\mu (\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k)}_{\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k}F𝑑\mu .$$

The theorem now follows from a standard approximation argument (approximate $`h`$ from above and below by step functions). ∎

## 6. Diophantine conditions

### 6.1.

In order to extend the equidistribution results to unbounded test functions such as $`\mathrm{\Theta }_f\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }}_g`$, let us study the following model functions, whose asymptotics in the cusp is similar to that of $`\mathrm{\Theta }_f\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }}_g`$. Let $`G=G^k`$ and $`\mathrm{\Gamma }=\mathrm{SL}(2,)^{2k}`$. Define furthermore the subgroup

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\mathrm{}}=\{\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& m\\ 0& 1\end{array}\right):m\}\mathrm{SL}(2,),$$

and put

$$v_\gamma :=\mathrm{Im}(\gamma \tau )=\frac{v}{|c\tau +d|^2},\text{ for }\gamma =\left(\begin{array}{cc}a& b\\ c& d\end{array}\right),$$

and $`𝒚_\gamma :=c𝒙+d𝒚`$. Let $`\chi _R`$ be the characteristic function of the interval $`[R,\mathrm{})`$,

$$\chi _R(t)=\{\begin{array}{cc}1\hfill & (tR)\hfill \\ 0\hfill & (t<R).\hfill \end{array}$$

For any $`f\mathrm{C}(^k)`$ of rapid decay (i.e., $`f(𝒘)`$ decays rapidly for $`w\mathrm{}`$) the function

$$F_R(\tau ;𝝃)=\underset{\gamma \mathrm{\Gamma }_{\mathrm{}}\backslash \mathrm{SL}(2,)}{}\underset{𝒎^k}{}f\left((𝒚_\gamma +𝒎)v_\gamma ^{1/2}\right)v_\gamma ^\beta \chi _R(v_\gamma ),R>1,$$

is invariant under the action of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$. If $`\tau `$ lies in the fundamental domain of $`\mathrm{SL}(2,)`$, given by $`_{\mathrm{SL}(2,)}=\{\tau :u[\frac{1}{2},\frac{1}{2}),|\tau |>1\}`$, then $`F_R(\tau ;𝝃)`$ has the representation

$$F_R(\tau ;𝝃)=\underset{𝒎^k}{}\left\{f\left((𝒚+𝒎)v^{1/2}\right)+f\left((𝒚+𝒎)v^{1/2}\right)\right\}v^\beta \chi _R(v).$$

The remaining sum over $`𝒎`$ is rapidly converging since $`f`$ is of rapid decay.

### 6.2.

The $`\mathrm{L}^1`$ norm of $`F_R`$ over $`\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G`$ is, for $`f0`$,

$$\mu (F_R)=_{\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G}F_R(\tau ;𝝃)𝑑\mu (\tau ,\varphi ;𝝃)$$

with Haar measure

$$d\mu (\tau ,\varphi ;𝝃)=\frac{dudvd\varphi dxdy}{v^2}.$$

We therefore have

$$\mu (F_R)=2\pi _^kf(𝒘)𝑑w_R^{\mathrm{}}v^{\beta k/22}𝑑v=2\pi \frac{R^{(k/2+1\beta )}}{k/2+1\beta }_^kf(𝒘)𝑑w$$

for $`\beta <k/2+1`$, and $`\mu (F_R)=\mathrm{}`$ otherwise. In the following we will be especially interested in $`\beta =k/2`$, for which

$$\mu (F_R)=2\pi R^1_^kf(𝒘)𝑑w.$$

### 6.3.

As in Section 6.4.  we may write the sum in $`F_R(\tau ;𝝃)`$ explicitly as

$$\begin{array}{c}F_R(\tau ;𝝃)=\underset{𝒎^k}{}\left\{f\left((𝒚+𝒎)v^{1/2}\right)+f\left((𝒚+𝒎)v^{1/2}\right)\right\}v^\beta \chi _R(v)\hfill \\ \hfill +\underset{𝒎^k}{}\left\{f\left((𝒙+𝒎)\frac{v^{1/2}}{|\tau |}\right)+f\left((𝒙+𝒎)\frac{v^{1/2}}{|\tau |}\right)\right\}\frac{v^\beta }{|\tau |^{2\beta }}\chi _R(\frac{v}{|\tau |^2})\\ \hfill +\underset{\begin{array}{c}(c,d)^2\\ \mathrm{gcd}(c,d)=1\\ c,d0\end{array}}{}\underset{𝒎^k}{}f\left((c𝒙+d𝒚+𝒎)\frac{v^{1/2}}{|c\tau +d|}\right)\frac{v^\beta }{|c\tau +d|^{2\beta }}\chi _R(\frac{v}{|c\tau +d|^2}).\end{array}$$

In what follows we will restrict our attention to the case $`\beta =k/2`$ and $`𝝃=(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array})`$.

### 6.4. Proposition

Let $`𝐲`$ be diophantine of type $`\kappa `$. Then, for any $`ϵ,ϵ^{}`$ with $`0<ϵ<1`$ and $`0<ϵ^{}<\frac{1}{\kappa 1}`$,

$$\underset{v0}{lim\; sup}v^{k/21}_{|u|>v^{1ϵ}}F_R(u+\mathrm{i}v;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))h(v^{k/21}u)𝑑u_{ϵ,ϵ^{}}R^{(\frac{1}{\kappa 1}k+2)/2}+R^{ϵ^{}/2}.$$

Note that the above expression vanishes, for $`R\mathrm{}`$, when $`\kappa <\frac{k1}{k2}`$. The second term is obviously only relevant in dimension $`k=2`$, since for $`k>2`$ we may chose $`ϵ^{}`$ in such a way that $`\frac{1}{\kappa 1}<ϵ^{}+k2`$.

The key ingredient in the proof is the following lemma.

### 6.5. Lemma

Let $`𝛂`$ be diophantine of type $`\kappa `$, and $`f\mathrm{C}(^k)`$ of rapid decay. Then, for any fixed $`A>1`$ and $`ϵ>0`$ with $`ϵ<\frac{1}{\kappa 1}`$,

$$\underset{d=1}{\overset{D}{}}\underset{𝒎^k}{}f\left(T(d𝜶+𝒎)\right)\{\begin{array}{cc}T^A\hfill & (DT^ϵ)\hfill \\ 1\hfill & (T^ϵDT^{\frac{1}{\kappa 1}})\hfill \\ DT^{\frac{1}{\kappa 1}}\hfill & (DT^{\frac{1}{\kappa 1}}),\hfill \end{array}$$

uniformly for all $`D,T>1`$.

### 6.6. Proof.

Let us divide the sum over $`d`$ into blocks of the form

$$\underset{0dT^{\frac{1}{\kappa 1}}}{}\underset{𝒎^k}{}f\left(T((b+d)𝜶+𝒎)\right).$$

The number of such blocks is $`DT^{\frac{1}{\kappa 1}}+1`$. Since $`𝜶`$ is of type $`\kappa `$ there is a constant $`C`$ such that, for all $`0<|q|T^{\frac{1}{\kappa 1}}`$ we have

$$\frac{C}{|q|T}\frac{C}{|q|^\kappa }\underset{j}{\mathrm{max}}|\alpha _j\frac{m_j}{q}|,$$

and thus

$$\underset{j}{\mathrm{max}}|q\alpha _jm_j|\frac{C}{T}.$$

For $`b`$ fixed, the minimal distance between the points $`(b+d)𝜶+𝒎`$ ($`0dT^{\frac{1}{\kappa 1}}`$, $`𝒎^k`$) is bounded from below by

$$\underset{0<|q|T^{\frac{1}{\kappa 1}},𝒎^k}{\mathrm{min}}q𝜶+𝒎\underset{0<|q|T^{\frac{1}{\kappa 1}},𝒎^k}{\mathrm{min}}\underset{j}{\mathrm{max}}|q\alpha _jm_j|\frac{C}{T}.$$

Hence any rectangular box with sides $`\frac{1}{T}`$ contains at most a bounded number of points. Because $`f`$ is rapidly decreasing, we therefore find

$$\underset{0dT^{\frac{1}{\kappa 1}}}{}\underset{𝒎^k}{}f\left(T((b+d)𝜶+𝒎)\right)1,$$

independently of $`b`$. This explains the second and third bound. The first bound is obtained from

$$d𝜶+𝒎\underset{j}{\mathrm{max}}|d\alpha _jm_j|\frac{C}{d^{\kappa 1}}\frac{C}{D^{\kappa 1}}$$

which holds for all $`d=1,\mathrm{},D`$. Since $`f`$ is rapidly decreasing, we have

$$\underset{d=1}{\overset{D}{}}\underset{𝒎^k}{}f\left(T(d𝜶+𝒎)\right)D(\frac{D^{\kappa 1}}{T})^B$$

for any $`B>1`$. ∎

### 6.7. Proof of Proposition 6.4

Let us assume without loss of generality that $`f`$ is positive and even, i.e., $`f0`$, $`f(𝒘)=f(𝒘)`$.

It follows from the expansion in 6.3 that, for $`v<1`$, the first term involving $`\chi _R(v)`$ vanishes and hence we are left with

$$\begin{array}{c}F_R(\tau ;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))=2\underset{𝒎^k}{}f\left(𝒎\frac{v^{1/2}}{|\tau |}\right)\frac{v^{k/2}}{|\tau |^k}\chi _R(\frac{v}{|\tau |^2})\hfill \\ \hfill +2\underset{\begin{array}{c}(c,d)^2\\ \mathrm{gcd}(c,d)=1\\ c>0,d0\end{array}}{}\underset{𝒎^k}{}f\left((d𝒚+𝒎)\frac{v^{1/2}}{|c\tau +d|}\right)\frac{v^{k/2}}{|c\tau +d|^k}\chi _R(\frac{v}{|c\tau +d|^2}).\end{array}$$

#### 6.7.1.

With regard to the first term in the above expansion, a change of variable $`u=vt`$ yields

$$\begin{array}{c}v^{k/21}_{|u|>v^{1ϵ}}2\underset{𝒎^k}{}f\left(𝒎\frac{v^{1/2}}{|\tau |}\right)\frac{v^{k/2}}{|\tau |^k}\chi _R(\frac{v}{|\tau |^2})h(v^{k/21}u)du\hfill \\ \hfill =2\underset{𝒎^k}{}_{|t|>v^ϵ}f\left(\frac{𝒎}{v^{1/2}(t^2+1)^{1/2}}\right)\frac{1}{(t^2+1)^{k/2}}\chi _R(\frac{1}{v(t^2+1)})h(v^{k/2}t)𝑑t\\ \hfill 2f(0)h(0)_{|t|>v^ϵ}\frac{dt}{(t^2+1)^{k/2}}0,\end{array}$$

as $`v0`$.

#### 6.7.2.

An upper bound for the remaining terms is obtained by dropping the condition $`|u|>v^{1ϵ}`$ in the integral. We then need to estimate

$$S(v)=\underset{\begin{array}{c}(c,d)^2\\ \mathrm{gcd}(c,d)=1\\ c>0,d0\end{array}}{}\underset{𝒎^k}{}J(v,c,d,𝒎)$$

with

$$J(v,c,d,𝒎)=v^{k/21}_{}f\left((d𝒚+𝒎)\frac{v^{1/2}}{|c\tau +d|}\right)\frac{v^{k/2}}{|c\tau +d|^k}\chi _R(\frac{v}{|c\tau +d|^2})h(v^{k/21}u)𝑑u.$$

Substituting $`u`$ by $`t=v^1(u+\frac{d}{c})`$ gives

$$\frac{1}{c^k}_{}f\left((d𝒚+𝒎)\frac{1}{\sqrt{c^2v(t^2+1)}}\right)\frac{1}{(t^2+1)^{k/2}}\chi _R(\frac{1}{c^2v(t^2+1)})h\left(v^{k/21}(vt\frac{d}{c})\right)𝑑t.$$

The range of integration is bounded by

$$R<\frac{1}{c^2v(t^2+1)},\text{i.e.}|t|\frac{1}{c\sqrt{vR}}.$$

Therefore $`|vt|v^{1/2}c^1R^{1/2}`$ is uniformly close to zero, and hence, because of the compact support of $`h`$, we find $`|d|cv^{(k/21)}`$. So

$$S(v)\underset{c=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\underset{0<|d|cv^{(k/21)}}{}\underset{𝒎^k}{}K(v,c,d,𝒎),$$

with

$$K(v,c,d,𝒎)=\frac{1}{c^k}_{}f\left((d𝒚+𝒎)\frac{1}{\sqrt{c^2v(t^2+1)}}\right)\frac{1}{(t^2+1)^{k/2}}\chi _R(\frac{1}{c^2v(t^2+1)})𝑑t.$$

#### 6.7.3.

To apply Lemma 6.5 with $`D=cv^{(k/21)}`$, $`T=(c^2v(t^2+1))^{1/2}>\sqrt{R}>1`$, split the range of integration into the ranges

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill (1):& cv^{(k/21)}(c^2v(t^2+1))^{ϵ/2}\hfill \\ \hfill (2):& (c^2v(t^2+1))^{ϵ/2}cv^{(k/21)}(c^2v(t^2+1))^{\delta /2}\hfill \\ \hfill (3):& cv^{(k/21)}(c^2v(t^2+1))^{\delta /2}\hfill \end{array}$$

with $`\delta =\frac{1}{\kappa 1}`$. Denote the corresponding integrals by $`K_1(v,c,d,𝒎)`$, $`K_2(v,c,d,𝒎)`$ and $`K_3(v,c,d,𝒎)`$, respectively.

#### 6.7.4.

Because $`R^{1/2}T^1`$, we find in the first range $`DT^ϵ`$ that

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill \underset{c>0}{}\underset{dcv^{(k/21)}}{}\underset{𝒎^k}{}K_1(v,c,d,𝒎)& R^{A/2}\underset{c>0}{}\frac{1}{c^k}_{(1)}\frac{1}{(t^2+1)^{k/2}}\chi _R(\frac{1}{c^2v(t^2+1)})𝑑t\hfill \\ & R^{A/2}\underset{c>0}{}\frac{1}{c^k}_{}\frac{1}{(t^2+1)^{k/2}}𝑑t\hfill \\ & R^{A/2}.\hfill \end{array}$$

#### 6.7.5.

For an upper bound the second range $`T^ϵDT^\delta `$ may be extended to $`T^ϵD`$, i.e.,

$$c^{1+ϵ}(t^2+1)^{ϵ/2}v^{k/21ϵ/2}.$$

We have therefore

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill \underset{c>0}{}\underset{dcv^{(k/21)}}{}\underset{𝒎^k}{}K_2(v,c,d,𝒎)& \underset{c>0}{}\frac{1}{c^k}_{(2)}\frac{dt}{(t^2+1)^{k/2}}\hfill \\ & \underset{c>0}{}\frac{1}{c^k}\left\{c^{1+ϵ}v^{(k/21ϵ/2)}\right\}^{(k/21)2/ϵ}_{}\frac{dt}{t^2+1}\hfill \\ & v^A\underset{c>0}{}c^B\hfill \end{array}$$

with

$$A=\left(\frac{k}{2}1\frac{ϵ}{2}\right)\left(\frac{k}{2}1\right)\frac{2}{ϵ}$$

and

$$B=\left(\frac{k}{2}1ϵ\right)\frac{2}{ϵ}=1\left(\frac{k}{2}1\frac{ϵ}{2}\right)\frac{2}{ϵ}.$$

If we chose $`ϵ`$ in a way that $`k2<ϵ<\delta =\frac{1}{\kappa 1}`$, we find that for $`k>2`$ we have $`A>0`$ and $`B>1`$. Hence

$$\underset{c>0}{}\underset{dcv^{(k/21)}}{}\underset{𝒎^k}{}K_2(v,c,d,𝒎)0$$

for small $`v`$. In the case $`k=2`$ we exploit the inclusion $`R^{ϵ/2}<T^ϵDc`$, which yields

$$\underset{c>0}{}\underset{dc}{}\underset{𝒎^2}{}K_2(v,c,d,𝒎)\underset{c>R^{ϵ/2}}{}c^2\frac{dt}{t^2+1}R^{ϵ/2},$$

compare .

#### 6.7.6.

In the third range, we have for $`v`$ sufficiently small

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill \underset{c>0}{}& \underset{dcv^{(k/21)}}{}\underset{𝒎^k}{}K_3(v,c,d,𝒎)\hfill \\ & \underset{c>0}{}\frac{1}{c^k}cv^{(k/21)}_{(3)}c^\delta v^{\delta /2}(t^2+1)^{(\delta k)/2}\chi _R(\frac{1}{c^2v(t^2+1)})𝑑t\hfill \\ & =v^{(\delta k)/2+1}\underset{c>0}{}c^{\delta k+1}_{(3)}(t^2+1)^{(\delta k)/2}\chi _R(\frac{1}{c^2v(t^2+1)})𝑑t\hfill \\ & v^{(\delta k)/2+1}_{}\left\{\underset{c=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}c^{\delta k+1}\chi _R(\frac{1}{c^2v(t^2+1)})\right\}(t^2+1)^{(\delta k)/2}𝑑t\hfill \\ & <v^{(\delta k)/2+1}_{}\left\{_0^{\mathrm{}}x^{\delta k+1}\chi _R(\frac{1}{x^2v(t^2+1)})𝑑x\right\}(t^2+1)^{(\delta k)/2}𝑑t\hfill \\ & =_{}\left\{_0^{\mathrm{}}x^{\delta k+1}\chi _R(\frac{1}{x^2})𝑑x\right\}(t^2+1)^1𝑑t\hfill \\ & =_{}\left\{\frac{x^{\delta k+2}}{\delta k+2}\right\}_0^{R^{1/2}}(t^2+1)^1𝑑t\hfill \\ & =\pi \frac{R^{(\delta k+2)/2}}{\delta k+2}.\hfill \end{array}$$

The proof of Proposition 6.4 is complete. ∎

### 6.8.

Let us define the characteristic function on $`\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k`$

$$X_R(\tau )=\underset{\gamma \{\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\mathrm{}}(1)\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\mathrm{}}\}\backslash \mathrm{SL}(2,)}{}\chi _R(v_\gamma ),$$

where $`\chi _R`$ is the characteristic function of $`[R,\mathrm{})`$. Proposition 6.4 allows us now to extend the equidistribution theorem 5.1 to unbounded functions which are dominated by $`F_R`$, i.e. that is, for some fixed constant $`L>1`$ we have

$$|F(\tau ,\varphi ;𝝃)|X_R(\tau )L+F_R(\tau ;𝝃)$$

for all sufficiently large $`R>1`$, uniformly for all $`(\tau ,\varphi ;𝝃)G^k`$.

### 6.9. Theorem

Let $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ be a subgroup of $`\mathrm{SL}(2,)^{2k}`$ of finite index. Let $`h`$ be a continuous function $`_+`$ with compact support. Suppose the continuous function $`F0`$ is dominated by $`F_R`$. Fix some $`𝐲𝕋^k`$ such that the components of the vector $`(𝐲,1)^{k+1}`$ are linearly independent over $``$. Then, for any $`ϵ`$ with $`0<ϵ<1`$,

$$\underset{v0}{lim\; inf}v^{k/21}_{|u|>v^{1ϵ}}F(u+\mathrm{i}v,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))h(v^{k/21}u)𝑑u\frac{1}{\mu (\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k)}_{\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k}F𝑑\mu h.$$

Assume furthermore that $`𝐲`$ is diophantine of type $`\kappa <\frac{k1}{k2}`$. Then, for any $`ϵ>0`$,

$$\underset{v0}{lim\; sup}v^{k/21}_{|u|>v^{1ϵ}}F(u+\mathrm{i}v,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))h(v^{k/21}u)𝑑u\frac{1}{\mu (\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k)}_{\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k}F𝑑\mu h.$$

###### Proof.

The theorem follows from Theorem 5.1 and Proposition 6.4 in the identical manner as Theorem 7.3 in . ∎

### 6.10.

The subgroup $`\mathrm{\Gamma }=\mathrm{\Gamma }^k`$ is a subgroup of finite index in $`\mathrm{SL}(2,)(\frac{1}{2})^{2k}`$ rather than $`\mathrm{SL}(2,)^{2k}`$ (Lemma 4.10). We therefore need to rephrase Theorem 6.9 slightly. Define the dominating function $`\widehat{F}_R`$ on $`\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k`$ by $`\widehat{F}_R(\tau ;𝝃)=F_R(\tau ;2𝝃)`$, with $`F_R`$ as in 6.8.

### 6.11. Corollary

Let $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ be a subgroup of $`\mathrm{SL}(2,)(\frac{1}{2})^{2k}`$ of finite index, $`h`$, $`𝐲`$ as in Theorem 6.9, and $`F:\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k`$ a continuous function which is dominated by $`\widehat{F}_R`$. If $`𝐲`$ is diophantine of type $`\kappa <\frac{k1}{k2}`$. Then, for any $`ϵ`$ with $`0<ϵ<1`$,

$$\underset{v0}{lim}v^{k/21}_{|u|>v^{1ϵ}}F(u+\mathrm{i}v,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))h(v^{k/21}u)𝑑u=\frac{1}{\mu (\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k)}_{\mathrm{\Gamma }\backslash G^k}F𝑑\mu h.$$

###### Proof.

The proof is analogous to that of Corollary 7.6 in . ∎

## 7. The Main Theorem

### 7.1. Main Theorem

Suppose $`f(𝐰)=\psi _1(𝐰^2)`$ and $`g(𝐰)=\psi _2(𝐰^2)`$ with $`\psi _1,\psi _2𝒮(_+)`$ real-valued. Let $`h`$ be a continuous function $``$ with compact support. Assume that the components of $`(𝐲,1)^{k+1}`$ are linearly independent over $``$ and that $`𝐲`$ is diophantine of type $`\kappa <\frac{k1}{k2}`$. Then

$$\begin{array}{c}\underset{v0}{lim}v^{k/21}_{}\mathrm{\Theta }_f(u+\mathrm{i}v,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_g(u+\mathrm{i}v,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))}h(v^{k/21}u)𝑑u\hfill \\ \hfill =\frac{k^2}{2}B_k^2h(0)_0^{\mathrm{}}\psi _1(r)\psi _2(r)r^{k2}𝑑r\\ \hfill +\frac{k}{2}B_k_{}h(u)𝑑u_0^{\mathrm{}}\psi _1(r)\psi _2(r)r^{k/21}𝑑r,\end{array}$$

where $`B_k`$ is the volume of the $`k`$-dimensional unit ball.

We will need the following two lemmas.

### 7.2. Lemma

We have

$$\frac{1}{\mu (\mathrm{\Gamma }^k\backslash G^k)}_{\mathrm{\Gamma }^k\backslash G^k}\mathrm{\Theta }_f(\tau ,\varphi ;𝝃)\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_g(\tau ,\varphi ;𝝃)}𝑑\mu =_^kf(𝒘)\overline{g(𝒘)}𝑑w.$$

Note that if $`f(𝒘)=\psi _1(𝒘^2)`$ and $`g(𝒘)=\psi _2(𝒘^2)`$, we have

$$f(𝒘)\overline{g(𝒘)}𝑑w=\frac{k}{2}B_k_0^{\mathrm{}}\psi _1(r)\psi _2(r)r^{k/21}𝑑r.$$

###### Proof.

A short calculation shows that

$$_{𝕋^{2k}}\mathrm{\Theta }_f(\tau ,\varphi ;𝝃)\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_g(\tau ,\varphi ;𝝃)}𝑑\xi =f_\varphi (𝒘)\overline{g_\varphi (𝒘)}𝑑w.$$

Since $`f_\varphi =U^\varphi f`$ with $`U^\varphi `$ unitary, we have

$$f_\varphi (𝒘)\overline{g_\varphi (𝒘)}𝑑w=f(𝒘)\overline{g(𝒘)}𝑑w.$$

### 7.3. Lemma

Suppose $`f(𝐰)=\psi _1(𝐰^2)`$ and $`g(𝐰)=\psi _2(𝐰^2)`$. For any $`\frac{1}{2}<\gamma <1`$, we have

$$\begin{array}{c}\underset{v0}{lim}v^{k/21}_{|u|<v^\gamma }\mathrm{\Theta }_f(u+\mathrm{i}v,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_g(u+\mathrm{i}v,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))}h(v^{k/21}u)𝑑u\hfill \\ \hfill =\frac{k^2}{2}B_k^2h(0)_0^{\mathrm{}}\psi _1(r)\psi _2(r)r^{k2}𝑑r.\end{array}$$

###### Proof.

From Proposition 4.8 we know that

$$\mathrm{\Theta }_f(\frac{1}{\tau },\mathrm{arg}\tau ;\left(\begin{array}{c}𝒚\\ \mathrm{𝟎}\end{array}\right))\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_g(\frac{1}{\tau },\mathrm{arg}\tau ;\left(\begin{array}{c}𝒚\\ \mathrm{𝟎}\end{array}\right))}=\frac{v^{k/2}}{|\tau |^k}f_{\mathrm{arg}\tau }(\mathrm{𝟎})\overline{g_{\mathrm{arg}\tau }(\mathrm{𝟎})}+O_R((\frac{v}{|\tau |^2})^R)$$

holds uniformly for $`|u|<v^{1/2}<1`$. The remainder vanishes for $`|u|<v^\gamma <1`$. Now

$$\begin{array}{c}f_{\mathrm{arg}\tau }(\mathrm{𝟎})\overline{g_{\mathrm{arg}\tau }(\mathrm{𝟎})}=\frac{|\tau |^k}{v^k}\{e(\frac{1}{2}𝒘^2\frac{u}{v})f(𝒘)𝑑w\}\overline{\{e(\frac{1}{2}𝒘^2\frac{u}{v})g(𝒘)𝑑w\}}\hfill \\ \hfill =\frac{|\tau |^k}{v^k}\frac{k^2}{4}B_k^2_0^{\mathrm{}}e(\frac{(r_1r_2)u}{2v})\psi _1(r_1)\psi _2(r_2)r_1^{k/21}𝑑r_1r_2^{k/21}𝑑r_2\end{array}$$

(substitute $`𝒘`$ by polar coordinates) and so, as $`v\mathrm{}`$,

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill _{|u|<v^\gamma }& v^{k/21}\mathrm{\Theta }_f(u+\mathrm{i}v,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_g(u+\mathrm{i}v,0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝒚\end{array}\right))}h(v^{k/21}u)du\hfill \\ & v^1\frac{k^2}{4}B_k^2_{|u|<v^\gamma }_0^{\mathrm{}}e(\frac{(r_1r_2)u}{2v})\psi _1(r_1)\psi _2(r_2)\hfill \\ & r_1^{k/21}dr_1r_2^{k/21}dr_2h(v^{k/21}u)du\hfill \\ & \frac{k^2}{2}B_k^2h(0)_{2|u|<v^{\gamma 1}}_0^{\mathrm{}}e((r_1r_2)u)\hfill \\ & \psi _1(r_1)\psi _2(r_2)r_1^{k/21}dr_1r_2^{k/21}dr_2du\hfill \\ & \frac{k^2}{2}B_k^2h(0)_{}_0^{\mathrm{}}e((r_1r_2)u)\psi _1(r_1)\psi _2(r_2)\hfill \\ & r_1^{k/21}dr_1r_2^{k/21}dr_2du\hfill \\ & =\frac{k^2}{2}B_k^2h(0)_0^{\mathrm{}}\psi _1(r)\psi _2(r)r^{k2}𝑑r\hfill \end{array}$$

by Parseval’s equality. ∎

### 7.4. Proof of the Main Theorem

We may assume without loss of generality that in Theorem 7.1 $`h`$ is positive. Split the integration on the left-hand-side of 7.1 into

$$_{}=_{|u|<v^{1ϵ}}+_{|u|>v^{1ϵ}},$$

for some small $`ϵ>0`$. The first integral gives, by virtue of Lemma 7.3, the contribution

$$\frac{k^2}{2}B_k^2h(0)_0^{\mathrm{}}\psi _1(r)\psi _2(r)r^{k2}𝑑r$$

Corollary 6.11, together with Lemma 7.2, yields the second term on the right-hand-side of 7.1. Compare Section 8.4 in  for more details. ∎

### 7.5. Proof of Theorem 2.5

We have by construction

$$R_2(\psi _1,\psi _2,h,\lambda )=\frac{1}{B_k}v^{k/21}_{}\mathrm{\Theta }_f(u+\mathrm{i}\frac{1}{\lambda },0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝜶\end{array}\right))\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_g(u+\mathrm{i}\frac{1}{\lambda },0;\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{𝟎}\\ 𝜶\end{array}\right))}h(v^{k/21}u)𝑑u$$

with $`v=\lambda ^1`$. Recall that $`2h(0)=\widehat{h}(s)𝑑s`$ by Fourier inversion and thus we have finally $`h(u)𝑑u=\widehat{h}(0)`$. ∎

## 8. Counter examples

We assume throughout this section that $`k>2`$. The case $`k=2`$ is studied in , Section 9.

### 8.1.

Suppose $`\alpha _{k1},\alpha _k`$ are both rational and $`(\alpha _1,\mathrm{},\alpha _{k2})`$ is a badly approximable $`(k2)`$-tuple. In this case we find a constant $`C`$ such that

$$\underset{1jk}{\mathrm{max}}|\alpha _j\frac{m_j}{q}|\underset{1jk2}{\mathrm{max}}|\alpha _j\frac{m_j}{q}|>\frac{C}{q^{1+\frac{1}{k2}}}$$

for all $`m_1,\mathrm{},m_j,q`$, $`q>0`$, and so $`𝜶`$ is of type $`\kappa =\frac{k1}{k2}`$. On the other hand we have

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill \mathrm{\#}\{(𝒎,𝒏)& ^k\times ^k:𝒎𝒏,\hfill \\ & 𝒎𝜶^kX,𝒏𝜶^kX,𝒎𝜶^k=𝒏𝜶^k\}\hfill \\ \hfill \mathrm{\#}\{(𝒎,𝒏)& ^k\times ^k:𝒎𝒏,(m_1,\mathrm{},m_{k2})=(n_1,\mathrm{},n_{k2}),\hfill \\ & 𝒎𝜶^kX,𝒏𝜶^kX,𝒎𝜶^2=𝒏𝜶^2\}.\hfill \end{array}$$

This is easily seen to be bounded from below by

$$\begin{array}{c}X^{(k2)/k}\mathrm{\#}\{(m_{k1},m_k,n_{k1},n_k)^4:\hfill \\ \hfill |m_{k1}|,|m_k|,|n_{k1}|,|n_k|X^{1/k},(m_{k1},m_k)(n_{k1},n_k),\\ \hfill (m_{k1}\alpha _{k1})^2+(m_k\alpha _k)^2=(n_{k1}\alpha _{k1})^2+(n_k\alpha _k)^2\}\\ \hfill X^{(k2)/k}\times \stackrel{~}{c}_𝜶X^{2/k}\mathrm{log}X,\end{array}$$

as $`X\mathrm{}`$, for some constant $`\stackrel{~}{c}_𝜶>0`$ (compare Section 9 in ). We conclude that, for $`X`$ large enough,

$$\begin{array}{c}\frac{1}{X}\mathrm{\#}\{(𝒎,𝒏)^k\times ^k:𝒎𝒏,𝒎𝜶^kX,𝒏𝜶^kX,\hfill \\ \hfill 𝒎𝜶^k=𝒏𝜶^k\}c_𝜶\mathrm{log}X,\end{array}$$

for some constant $`c_𝜶>0`$.

### 8.2.

By a similar argument, one has for $`𝜶^k`$

$$\begin{array}{c}\frac{1}{X}\mathrm{\#}\{(𝒎,𝒏)^k\times ^k:𝒎𝒏,𝒎𝜶^kX,𝒏𝜶^kX,\hfill \\ \hfill 𝒎𝜶^k=𝒏𝜶^k\}c_𝜶X^{(k2)/k}\end{array}$$

for $`X\mathrm{}`$. This can be derived, e.g. in the case $`𝜶=\mathrm{𝟎}`$, from the asymptotics

$$_0^1\mathrm{\Theta }_f(u+\mathrm{i}\frac{1}{\lambda },0;\mathrm{𝟎})\overline{\mathrm{\Theta }_g(u+\mathrm{i}\frac{1}{\lambda },0;\mathrm{𝟎})}𝑑ub\lambda ^{k/21},$$

compare, e.g., Theorem 6.1 .

### 8.3. Proof of Theorem 1.7

Let $``$ be a countable dense set of badly approximable $`(k2)`$-tuples. Enumerate the quadratic forms $`𝒙𝜶_j^2`$ with $`𝜶_j\times ^2`$ as $`P_1,P_2,P_3,\mathrm{}`$. Because of the bound derived in 8.1, given any $`X>1`$, there exists an $`M_j>X`$ such that

$$R_2^{𝜶_j}[0,0](M_j)\frac{\mathrm{log}M_j}{\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}M_j}.$$

We find a small $`ϵ_j=ϵ_j(M_j)>0`$ such that

$$R_2^𝜶[a,a](M_j)R_2^{𝜶_j}[0,0](M_j)$$

for all $`𝜶B_j`$, where $`B_j`$ is the open set of all $`𝜶`$ with $`𝜶𝜶_j<ϵ_j`$. Individually, the sets $`B_j`$ shrink to a point as $`X\mathrm{}`$, but the union

$$\underset{j:M_jX}{}B_j$$

is open and dense in $`𝕋^k`$. Therefore

$$B=\underset{X=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\underset{j:M_jX}{}B_j$$

is of second Baire category. So if $`𝜶B`$, then, given any $`X`$, there exists some $`MX`$, such that

$$R_2^𝜶[a,a](M)\frac{\mathrm{log}M}{\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}M}.$$

Note that the proof remains valid if $`\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}`$ is replaced by any slowly increasing positive function $`\nu \mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}\mathrm{log}`$ with $`\nu (X)\mathrm{}`$ ($`X\mathrm{}`$).

Property (iii) follows from Theorem 1.6 by the same string of arguments used in Section 9.3 . ∎

### 8.4. Proof of Theorem 1.8

Follows from the relation in Section 8.2. The proof is otherwise identical to the proof of Theorem 1.13 . ∎


text:
# Molecular Gas in M 82: Resolving the Outflow and Streamers

## 1 Introduction

M 82 is the prototypical nearby starburst galaxy; innumerous studies of M 82 have been performed in the last decades. Most of these studies focused on the extreme starburst properties and the related prominent outflow emerging from the inner 1 kpc of M 82 (at a distance of 3.9 Mpc, 1$`{}_{}{}^{}1.1`$ kpc; Sakai & Madore 2001). The tremendous star forming activity in M 82’s central region can be traced by the high FIR luminosity (e.g., Telesco & Harper, 1980), the filamentary H$`\alpha `$ outflow (e.g., Bland & Tully, 1988; Devine & Bally, 1999), the extended X–ray outflow (e.g., Strickland, Ponman & Stevens, 1997) and the existence of $``$ 20 compact radio sources identified as supernova (SN) remnants and compact HII regions (e.g., Kronberg et al., 1981, Pedlar et al. 1999). The central starburst is believed to be fueled by the large amount of molecular gas present in M 82’s center (M$`{}_{\mathrm{tot}}{}^{}2.3\times 10^8`$M, e.g., Weiß et al. 2001).

This central concentration of molecular gas is very strong in CO emission and has been the subject of many studies. Most of these studies were done with single dish telescopes (e.g., Stark & Carlson, 1982; Young & Scoville, 1984; Wild et al. 1992; Mao et al. 2000; Seaquist & Clark, 2001; Taylor, Walter, & Yun, 2001) addressing both the excitation conditions and the large scale distribution of the molecular gas. Some of these studies already provided evidence for extended CO emission around M 82’s center. Interferometric CO studies of M 82’s molecular component have so far been limited to the central kpc (Shen & Lo 1993, Neininger et al. 1998, Weiß et al. 1999, Weiß et al. 2001). In this letter, we present the first results of our extensive mapping campaign of the central $`2.8`$ kpc$`\times 3.9`$ kpc of M 82 at a resolution of $`3.6^{\prime \prime }`$ ($``$70 pc).

## 2 Observations

We observed M 82 in the CO(1$``$0) transition using Caltech’s Owens Valley Radio Observatory’s millimeter array (OVRO) in C, L and H configurations (10 pointing mosaic). This mosaic covers a $`2.5^{}\times 3.5^{}`$ field, including a significant fraction of the optical disk of M 82 as well as its prominent $`\mathrm{H}\alpha `$ outflow. The central pointing was centered near the 2.2$`\mu `$m peak at $`\alpha =09^h55^m52^s.2,\delta =69^{}40^{}47.1^{\prime \prime }`$ (J2000.0). The other 9 pointings were shifted by $`30^{\prime \prime }`$ (OVRO primary beam: $`60^{\prime \prime }`$ at 115 GHz), the field of view is indicated in Fig. 1 (right). Data were recorded using a correlator setup with 240 MHz bandwidth and 2 MHz resolution, resulting in a velocity resolution of 5.2 km s-1 with a total bandwidth of 600 km s-1 at 115 GHz.

For image generation and processing we used the miriad software package. Because extended structure was missed in our interferometer data, the data cube was zero–spacing corrected using the IRAM 30 m data described in Weiß et al. (2001). The combination was done by replacing visibilities shorter than the shortest baseline in the final processed data cube by visibilities computed from the single dish data (this technique is described in more detail in Weiß et al. 2001). The final data cube presented here has a spatial resolution of $`3.6^{\prime \prime }\times 3.6^{\prime \prime }`$ and an rms noise level of 25 mJy beam-1 (0.18 K) in a 5.2 km s-1 channel.

## 3 Data Presentation and Analysis

### 3.1 Global properties

The integrated intensity distribution of our combined mosaic is shown in Fig. 1. The physical properties (CO flux, molecular mass, linear size) of the newly detected features are summarized in Tab. 1. In converting the observed CO luminosity to H2 column densities we applied two conversion (‘$`X`$’) factors 1) $`X_{\mathrm{M}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}82}}=N(\mathrm{H}_2)/\mathrm{I}(\mathrm{CO})=0.5\times 10^{20}\mathrm{cm}^2(\mathrm{K}\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1)^1`$, an average value for M 82’s central disk (Weiß et al. 2001), and 2) $`X_{\mathrm{Gal}}=1.6\times 10^{20}\mathrm{cm}^2(\mathrm{K}\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1)^1`$, the Galactic conversion factor (Hunter et al. 1997) which is presumably a more realistic value for a non–starburst environment (such as the molecular streamers S1-S4, see Fig. 1, right). The total flux detected in the field of view is 17680 Jy km s-1 (estimated error: $`10\%`$). Using $`X_{\mathrm{M}\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}82}}`$ for the disk and the outflow O-S + O-N (which presumably consists of warm gas emerging from the disk, see Fig. 1, right) and $`X_{\mathrm{Gal}}`$ for the molecular streamers S1–S4, we derive a total molecular mass of M 82 of $`1.3\times 10^9`$M (total masses using other conversion factors can be easily derived from Tab. 1).

### 3.2 Seperating the CO Components in M 82

The different CO emitting components in M 82 (disk, streamers, outflow/halo) have clear kinematic signatures which can be seperated by inspecting consecutive channel maps. We used this velocity information to subdivide the full OVRO CO data cube into three sub–cubes out of which individual integrated intensity maps were created for the disk, streamer and outflow/halo component. These components are shown in Fig. 3 (overlaid as countours on an H$`\alpha `$ map by Shopbell et al. 1998): The yellow contours represent M 82’s central disk only (see Sec. 3.3); streamers S1–S4 are shown in orange (Sec. 3.4), and the red contours represent an intensity map of the outflow/halo (Sec. 3.5).

### 3.3 The Central Molecular Disk

The central 1 kpc of M 82’s CO distribution is dominated by the well known triple–peaked molecular distribution (Fig. 1, see also yellow contours in Fig. 3) which has been discussed in previous high–resolution CO studies. This region coincides with the strong central star formation and forms the base of the prominent outflow visible in $`\mathrm{H}\alpha `$ and X–rays. It is striking that only about a third of M 82’s total CO flux is associated with the center (see Tab. 1). Depending on the employed X–factor this corresponds to a molecular mass fraction of $`<30\%`$ for the central molecular disk.

### 3.4 Molecular Streamers

Several molecular streamers are detected west, east and south–east of the central molecular concentration (labeled S1 to S4 in Fig. 1, see also orange contours in Fig. 3). The most prominent streamer is located west of the molecular disk (S1). Its orientation is shaped in a similar fashion and has the same velocity as the prominent H I streamer which points towards M81 (the M81–M 82 tidal tail, streamer ‘S’ in Yun, Ho & Lo 1993). A weaker streamer forms the extension of the molecular disk towards the north–east (S2), roughly following another large–scale H I streamer (streamer ‘N’ in Yun, Ho & Lo 1993). S1 and S2 follow very closely the dust absorption features seen in optical images (Fig. 2). Two additional molecular streamers are visible south–east (S3) and east (S4); in contrast to S1 and S2, these two structures are situated away from the optical plane of the galaxy (see also Figs. 1, 3 and 5, bottom). Based on the available data, we can not rule out a potential interaction between S3/S4 and the outflow/halo gas. A summary of the fluxes of S1-S4 is given in Tab. 1.

### 3.5 Molecular Gas in the Outflow/Halo

Masses: Molecular gas is clearly associated with the outflow south (O–S) and north (O–N) of the central molecular disk. The molecular gas in the outflow/halo is visible up to 0.8 kpc north and 1.2 kpc south of the disk. The total mass of molecular gas in the outflow/halo accounts to an impressive amount of $`3.3\times 10^8`$ M, even employing the lower conversion factor $`X_{\mathrm{M82}}`$.

Outflow morphology: Interestingly, the CO emission in the outflow/halo (Fig. 3, red contours) has an almost spherical shape with a diameter of $`1.5`$kpc (this is similar in size to the dust halo discussed in Alton et al. 1999). In addition, there is a striking correlation between the H$`\alpha `$ outflow and the molecular gas in the south. The correlation is less prominent in the north–east of the outflow but clearly visible in the north–west. The chimney of shocked molecular gas detected in SiO by García-Burillo et al. (2001) can not be clearly identified in our CO data.

Kinematics: For the first time CO line splitting is detected in the outflow of M 82. Fig. 4 shows a pV diagram of the CO gas along the outflow axis of M 82. Here, a position angle of 150 was chosen to allow a comparison with published H$`\alpha `$ velocities (see caption). The CO line splitting is clearly visible between $`20^{\prime \prime }`$ and $`35^{\prime \prime }`$ below the disk; the velocities agree well with the H$`\alpha `$ velocities. The blue–shifted CO component is not detected below $`35^{\prime \prime }`$ but the other component is traced at similar velocities as the H$`\alpha `$ up to $`70^{\prime \prime }`$. At $`35^{\prime \prime }`$ (660 pc below the plane), the CO is blueshifted by $`130`$ km s-1with respect to the systemic velocity (vsys=220 km s-1). Correcting for M 82’s inclination (80, de Vaucouleurs et al. 1991) and our derived cone angle of 50 (see below) we derive a deprojected maximum outflow velocity of $`130`$ km s-1/sin$`(35^{})230\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$. The situation is more complex in the northern part of the outflow – here the molecular gas seems to be entrained in the H$`\alpha `$ outflow. As is obvious from Fig. 4, most of the projected velocities are lower than this value and we estimate an average outflow velocity of the gas of order $`100`$ km s-1. Based on the escape velocities presented in Martin (1998, Figure 9) we estimate that of order 10% of the outflow gas ($`3.3\times 10^7`$ M, i.e., a few percent of the total gas mass) may be lost to the intergalactic medium (IGM).

Outflow cone angle: Fig. 5 presents pV diagrams along and parallel to the major axis. In the north, the rotation curve is flattened which can be interpreted as conservation of angular momentum in the outflow. A similar morphology is seen towards the southern pV diagram as well; however, this region is clearly disturbed by the features S3 and S4.

To determine the orientation of the outflow cone, we derived ‘flow–lines’ of the molecular gas (as first proposed by Seaquist & Clark 2001). The basic assumption is that the angular momentum of the gas in the outflow is conserved. For each distance from the plane $`z`$ we calculated the angular momentum $`Lrv_\mathrm{t}`$ where $`v_\mathrm{t}`$ is the terminal velocity at distance $`r`$ from the minor axis. We took $`v_\mathrm{t}`$ from our first moment map of our ‘outflow cube’ (see above); these values give a reasonable approximation for the true $`v_\mathrm{t}`$ (see also the discussion in Seaquist & Clark 2001). The result of this analysis is plotted as contours in Fig. 6 – each contour represents an iso–angular momentum (‘$`L`$’) line and describes the flow–line of an individual particle in the outflow. It is striking how similar the $`L`$–contours (derived entirely from kinematic information) are compared to the morphology of the ionized gas in the outflow (e.g., Fig. 3). From the third contour (counting from the minor axis) in Fig. 6, we derive an average cone angle of $`55^{}`$ (north: $`60^{}`$, south: $`50^{}`$), similar to what has been found in previous optical studies (optical: $`3035^{}`$, Bland & Tully 1988, McKeith et al. 1995, to $`6065^{}`$, Heckman, Armus & Miley 1990). We note that Seaquist & Clark (2001) derived an angle of $`40^{}`$ for the northern and $`90^{}`$ for the southern molecular outflow; the discrepancy in the south can be explained by confusion of their velocity field by S3 and S4 in their low–resolution data.

Energetics: To calculate an order of magnitude estimate of the kinetic energy of the outflow, we assume that the molecular gas in the outflow ($`3.3\times 10^8`$M) has an average outflow velocity of $`100`$ km s-1 (see discussion above). This gives a kinetic energy of $`3.3\times 10^{55}`$ erg. Extrapolating the current SN rate in M 82 of 0.1 yr-1 (Kronberg et al. 1981) back to the age of the current starburst ($`5\times 10^7`$ yr, O’Connell et al. 1995) yields a total mechanical input by SNe of $`5\times 10^{57}`$ erg. Assuming an average outflow velocity of 100 km s-1 and a distance of $`1`$ kpc it takes of order $`1\times 10^7`$ yr to build up the molecular outflow, similar to the age of the starburst. This implies that of order $`1\%`$ of the released mechanical energy of M 82’s central starburst has been converted to kinetic energy in the molecular outflow gas.

## 4 Concluding Remarks

Our high–resolution OVRO observations of the prototypical starburst galaxy M 82 provide new exciting insights on the properties of the molecular gas around the galaxy’s center. The newly detected molecular streamers (both in and below the galaxy’s plane) suggest that the molecular gas in the inner few kpc is severely affected by the interaction with M 81. This redistribution of molecular gas is likely the trigger for the strong starburst activity in M 82’s center. An impressive amount of molecular gas is detected in the halo of M 82. It is striking that most of the outflow gas is distributed in an almost spherical halo; at large distances from the plane its morphology looks remarkably similar to that of the ionized gas. The gas in the halo is rotating slower than in the disk; we find that the CO kinematics in the halo can be used to constrain the outflow cone angle of the molecular gas ($`55^{}`$). Our estimated CO outflow velocities imply that a significant amount of molecular gas is not only transported to the halo but may also escape the galactic potential. This has important implications for the chemical evolution of the starburst host galaxy and for the chemical enrichment of the IGM, especially in the early universe when much more violent starbursts took place.

FW acknowledges NSF grant AST 96-13717. AW acknowledges DFG grant SFB 494. We thank P. Shopbell for providing us with his M 82 Fabry–Perot H$`\alpha `$ data.