text:
# I INTRODUCTION

## I INTRODUCTION

Careful studies at low temperatures of the thick films (from 2 to 12 monolayers) and monolayers of ortho-para hydrogen on boron nitride (BN) substrates revealed at low ortho-$`H_2`$ concentrations new short-range frozen structures. Besides the analogue of known quadrupolar glass (QG) phase, that emerges in monolayers below the concentration $`c_p=0.72`$ , which is apparently close to the site-percolation threshold in honeycomb lattice, the uncommon para-rotational (PR) phases denominated by PR-A and PR-B phases were discovered. They are demarcated by a crossover temperature $`T_x^{(\mathrm{exp})}(c)`$ at which the NMR frequency splitting passes through zero (see 2D diagram in Fig.1). Instead of the $`Pa3`$ structure known in the bulk hydrogen, the herring bone (HB) and pinwheel (PW) 2D long-range ordered structures have been the subject of scientific interest since 1979, when Harris and Berlinsky made their famous mean-field theory predictions. Meanwhile thorough experimental studies on grafoil and BN substrates registered only the PW orientational order at sufficiently high concentrations, i.e. above the percolation limit $`c_p`$.

Analysis is given within the scope of the site-disordered microscopic 2D $`(J=1)_c(J=0)_{1c}`$-rotor model, which is introduced on the basis of the 3D-rotor analog developed earlier for an indepth study of the QG phase. We will give a microscopic explanation of the observed temperature-concentration behavior for the orientational local-order parameters related to the NMR line shapes. We will show that the PR-A and PR-B short-range correlated structures are due to the interplay of the frustrated $`o`$-$`H_2`$-molecular exchange interaction with the molecule-substrate interaction.

## II MICROSCOPIC DESCRIPTION

Description of the orientational degrees of freedom of the site-disordered ortho-para-hydrogen system with pure electrostatic quadrupole-quadrupole (EQQ) intermolecular interactions has been discussed extensively within context of the 3D QG problem. In general, the thermodynamic rotational states of a given ortho-molecule located at a site $`i`$ are characterized by the a second rank local tensor that has only five independent components: the three principal local axes (given by vector $`𝐋_i`$) , and the alignment $`\sigma _i=<(13\underset{zi}{\overset{2}{\stackrel{}{J}}}/2)>_T`$ and the eccentricity $`\eta _i=<\underset{xi}{\overset{2}{\stackrel{}{J}}}\underset{yi}{\overset{2}{\stackrel{}{J}}}>_T`$ defined with respect to $`𝐋_i`$ axes. (Here $`\widehat{J}_{\alpha i}`$ stands for the angular-operator rotational moment of a given ortho-molecule located at site $`i`$, and $`<\mathrm{}>_T`$ refers to a thermodynamic average at temperature $`T`$.) A thermodynamic description, given in terms of the local molecular fields $`\epsilon _{\sigma i}`$, and $`\epsilon _{\eta i}`$ conjugate to the local order parameters and extended by the crystalline field $`h_i`$ can be introduced on the basis of the local-order-parameter fundamental equations, namely

$`\sigma _i`$ $`=`$ $`1{\displaystyle \frac{3\mathrm{cosh}(\sqrt{3}\epsilon _{\eta i}/2T)}{2\mathrm{cosh}(\sqrt{3}\epsilon _{\eta i}/2T)+\mathrm{exp}[3(\epsilon _{\sigma i}+h_i)/2T]}};`$ ()
$`\eta _i`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\sqrt{3}\mathrm{sinh}(\sqrt{3}\epsilon _{\eta i}/2T)}{2\mathrm{cosh}(\sqrt{3}\epsilon _{\eta i}/2T)+\mathrm{exp}[3(\epsilon _{\sigma i}+h_i)/2T]}},`$ ()
These equations follow from the conditions of local equilibrium and they are shown to be consistent with the density-matrix representation. In what follows, we restrict our consideration to a reduced set of local order parameters $`\{𝐋_i,\sigma _i\}`$ with $`\eta _i0`$ that corresponds to the so-called ”powder approximation” common in NMR theory applications. This description ignores the local field $`\epsilon _{\eta i}`$, conjugate to the local eccentricity $`\eta _i`$, and Eq. (1) (where $`\epsilon _{\sigma i}=\epsilon _i`$ and $`\epsilon _{\eta i}=0`$) is therefore reduced to

$$\frac{1\sigma _i}{1+2\sigma _i}=\mathrm{exp}[\frac{3}{2}\frac{(\epsilon _i+h_i)}{T}]\text{ with }\epsilon _i=\underset{ji}{\overset{z}{}}𝒥_{ij}\sigma _jc_j\text{.}$$
(1)
Here the effective exchange interaction $`𝒥_{ij}`$ and the crystalline field $`h_i`$ are given by

$$𝒥_{ij}=\frac{3}{2}\mathrm{\Gamma }_0P_{20}(L_{zi})P_{20}(L_{zj})\text{and}h_i=\frac{2}{3}V_0P_{20}(L_{zi}).$$
(2)
This reduced mean-field description formally follows from the truncated 2D Hamiltonian given for $`N`$ quantum rotors with $`z`$ neighbors placed in the plane, namely

$$\underset{N}{\overset{}{H}}=\underset{i=1}{\overset{N}{}}\underset{ji}{\overset{z}{}}𝒥_{ij}\underset{i}{\overset{}{\sigma }}\widehat{\sigma }_jc_ic_j\underset{i=1}{\overset{N}{}}h_i\underset{i}{\overset{}{\sigma }}c_i\text{with}\underset{i}{\overset{}{\sigma }}=1\frac{3}{2}\underset{zi}{\overset{2}{\stackrel{}{J}}}.$$
(3)
Here $`c_i`$ is a random occupation number whose mean, given by the configurational average, is the concentration: $`c=<c_i>__C`$; $`\underset{zi}{\overset{}{J}}`$ is a $`z`$-projection of the angular momentum operator in the local principal coordinate system. In turn, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_0`$ stands for the EQQ coupling constant and $`V_0`$ is the crystal-field amplitude; $`P_{20}(L_{zi})=(3\mathrm{cos}^2\mathrm{\Theta }_i1)/2`$ where $`\mathrm{\Theta }_i`$ is the polar angle of the principal molecular axis $`𝐋_j`$.

In bulk HCP solid ortho-para-hydrogen the coupling constant $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_0`$ and the amplitude $`V_0`$ are well established theoretically that is not the case of commensurate $`\sqrt{3}\times \sqrt{3}`$ solid monolayers. The magnitudes of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_0=6Q^2/(25R_0^5)`$ ($`Q`$ is the molecular electrostatic quadrupole moment and $`R_0`$ is the nearest-neighbor molecular separation) calculated for graphite and BN substrates are, $`0.534`$ $`K`$ and $`0.470`$ $`K`$, respectively. The approximate estimates for the crystal-field amplitude $`|V_0^{(\mathrm{exp})}|=0.60.8`$ $`K`$ for grafoil and $`|V_0^{(\mathrm{exp})}|0.6`$ $`K`$ for BN were derived from the observed NMR line shapes. As seen from Fig.1, the experimentally established position of the order-disorder boundary is consistent for the cases of grafoil and BN substrates (shown by crosses and triangles in Fig.1, respectively). On the other hand, the PW-PR boundary (restricted by points $`a`$ and $`b`$ in the insert of Fig.1) exists only for positive crystalline fields. These yield the following fundamental model parameters

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_0=0.50\pm 0.03K\text{ and }V_0=0.70\pm 0.10K$$
(4)
in order to specify our estimations based on the 2D $`(J=1)_c(J=0)_{1c}`$-rotor model given in Eq.(2).

## III Macroscopic Description

The phase diagram for the pure $`J=1`$ rotor system on a 2D triangle solid lattice was scaled by Harris and Berlinsky in terms of the EQQ coupling constant $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_0`$ and the crystal-field amplitude $`V_0`$ of both signs (see insert in Fig.1). The PR phase was postulated by a single ferromagnetic-type structure that can be given as $`\{\mathrm{\Theta }_i=0,\sigma _i=\sigma _0\}`$. Moreover, one can see that equation for the PR alignment $`\sigma _0`$ obtained by minimization of the relevant free energy (see Eq.(17) in Ref.) is equivalent to Eq.(2) with adopted $`z=6`$, $`\epsilon _i=\epsilon _0=9\mathrm{\Gamma }_0\sigma _0`$, $`𝒥_{ij}=3\mathrm{\Gamma }_0/2`$ and $`h_i=h_0=2V_0/3`$ that corresponds to a ferrorotational-type (FR-type) local-structure given by $`\mathrm{\Theta }_i=\mathrm{\Theta }_j=0`$ and $`\sigma _i=\sigma _0`$.

A description for the long-range orientationally disordered, but locally correlated PR-A phase is introduced through the short-range order parameter $`\sigma _A(c,T)=<\sigma _i(T)>__C^{(PRA)}`$, where a configurational average is limited by the temperature-concentration PR-A region shown in Fig.1. Application of this average procedure to both the sides of Eq.(4) can be presented in the following form, namely

$$\text{PR-A:}\frac{1\sigma _A}{1+2\sigma _A}=\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{V_0}{T}\frac{3}{2}(\frac{\epsilon _{1A}+\delta \epsilon _{1A}}{T})+\frac{9}{8}(\frac{\epsilon _{2A}}{T})^2\right].$$
(5)
Unlike the case of the QG, we assume here that fluctuations of the local alignment (or the quadrupolarization) are small. The same is referred to the crystalline field given by the mean $`h_{1A}=2V_0/3`$. The local fluctuations of the molecular field are introduced through the mean $`\epsilon _{1A}=𝒥_{1A}zc^{5/2}\sigma _A`$ (with $`𝒥_{1A}=3\gamma _{1A}\mathrm{\Gamma }_0/2`$ and with $`z=6`$) and the variance $`\epsilon _{2A}^2=3𝒥_{2A}^4zc(1c)(1\sigma _A^2)^2/8T^2`$, and are estimated within the Gaussian distribution justified in Ref.). With account of the Zeeman-field local polarization effects given by the mean $`\delta \epsilon _{1A}=𝒥_{2A}^2zc\sigma _A(1\sigma _A^2)/T`$, we have analyzed a concentration behavior of the observed NMR frequency splitting given in Fig. 8 in Ref. for $`T=0.65`$ $`K`$ and $`T=0.546`$ $`K`$. Analysis is given with the help of Eq.(2) where the polar-principal-axis correlation parameters $`\gamma _{1A}`$ and $`\gamma _{2A}`$, namely

$$\gamma _{1A}=<P_{20}(L_{zi})P_{20}(L_{zj})>_C^{(PRA)}\text{and }\gamma _{2A}=\sqrt{<P_{20}^2(L_{zi})P_{20}^2(L_{zj})>_C^{(PRA)}}$$
(6)
are treated as fitting parameters. In the particular cases of the FR-type ($`\mathrm{\Theta }_i=\mathrm{\Theta }_j=0`$) and AFR-type ($`\mathrm{\Theta }_i=0,\mathrm{\Theta }_j=\pi /2`$) locally correlated structures are characterized by $`\gamma _1=\gamma _2=1`$ and $`\gamma _1=\gamma _2=1/2`$, respectively. For the PR-A phase we have derived $`\gamma _{1A}^{(\mathrm{exp})}=1/3`$ and $`\gamma _{2A}^{(\mathrm{exp})}0.75`$. This local structure is in a way similar to that in the PW phase modified by orientations of in-plane rotors which show out-of-plane orientations.

As seen from Fig.1, the long-range disordered PR-B phase is stable at low temperatures ($`T<V_0`$) and low concentrations ($`c<c_p`$) where the site-dilution effects are expected to be more pronounced than in the PR-A phase. The short-range orientational arrangement results from the interplay between the random EQQ coupling and the random negative crystalline fields. Adopting for the latter a Gaussian distribution, and taking into account its variance $`h_{2B}`$ (with the mean $`h_{1B}=2V_0/3`$) one finds, after elaboration of the configurational average in Eq.(2a), the effective amplitude of the crystalline field can be introduced as

$$V(c,T)=V_0(1\frac{T_x{}_{}{}^{(\mathrm{exp})}(c)}{T})\text{ for }TT_x{}_{}{}^{(\mathrm{exp})}(c)\text{.}$$
(7)
Here $`T_x{}_{}{}^{(\mathrm{exp})}(c)`$ is a crossover temperature between the PR-A and the PR-B structures that provides a reconstruction of the local order from $`\sigma _A^{(\mathrm{exp})}(c,T)>0`$ to $`\sigma _B^{(\mathrm{exp})}(c,T)<0`$ (shown by dashed line in Fig.1). The explicit form in Eq.(4) follows from $`h_{2B}=(<\mathrm{\Delta }h_i^2>__C^{(PRB)})^{1/2}=2(2V_0T_x)^{1/2}/3`$ where $`T_x`$ is approximated by the observed PRA-PRB boundary. An analysis of the observed PR-B quadrupolarization $`\sigma _B`$ is given through averaged Eq.(4), namely

$$\text{PR-B:}\mathrm{ln}(\frac{1\sigma _B}{1+2\sigma _B})+\frac{V_0}{T}(1\frac{T_x{}_{}{}^{(\mathrm{exp})}(c)}{T})9(\frac{\gamma _{2B}\mathrm{\Gamma }_0}{T})^2c\sigma _B(1\sigma _B^2)=0.$$
(8)
Treating the PR-B phase as a precursor of the 2D QG phase, we have omitted in Eq.(5) all molecular-field local ordering effects. Similar to the QG case, we have therefore adopted $`<\epsilon _i>_C^{(PRB)}=\delta \epsilon _{1B}`$ employed in Eq.(3a) for the PR-A phase. Analysis of the available experimental data for $`c=0.44`$ (with $`T_x^{(\mathrm{exp})}=1.64`$ $`K`$ , see Fig. 12 in Ref. ) on temperature dependence of the short-range orientational order parameter in the PR-B given with the help of Eq.(5) results in, approximately, $`\gamma _{1B}=0`$, $`\gamma _{2B}=1`$, that in a way is characteristic for the QG local order.

The observed order parameters $`\sigma _A^{(\mathrm{exp})}`$ and $`\sigma _B^{(\mathrm{exp})}`$ vanish at a certain crossover temperature $`T_x(c)`$ associated with the PRA-PRB boundary $`T_x^{(\mathrm{exp})}(c)`$ (shown by the dashed line Fig. 1). For concentrations $`cc_p`$, this boundary can be therefore deduced from the conditions $`\sigma _A(c,T_x)=\sigma _B(c,T_x)=0`$. To satisfy the boundary observation conditions, the interplay between the fluctuating crystalline and Zeeman-type molecular fields for $`T{}_{0}{}^{}<TT_x`$ is made implicit in the form $`8V_0(TT{}_{0}{}^{})9\epsilon _2^2(c,T)=0`$, where $`T_0`$ ($`=9h_2^2/8V_0`$) plays a role of $`T_x`$ when the competing fluctuations the EQQ field are ignored. The variance $`h_2`$ was studied in detail for the 3D disordered PR phase in o-p-$`H_2`$ systems for temperatures $`0.80<T<4.9`$ $`K`$ . As seen from the right insert in Fig.2, unlike the mean of the crystal-field $`h_1^{(3D)}`$, its variance depends strongly on the overall concentration, i.e. , $`h_2^{(3D)}c(c_Mc)`$ and disappears at the highest concentration for the 3D QG state, $`c_M=0.55`$ (for the 3D phase diagram see Fig. 2 in Ref. ). In the 2D case $`c_M`$ is very close to the threshold concentration $`c_p`$. Therefore, we adopt $`V_2`$ $`c(c_pc)`$ that reduces the aforegiven boundary observation condition to the following cubic equation

$$T_x^3T_0(c)T_x^2\left(\frac{3}{2}\gamma _2\mathrm{\Gamma }_0\right)^4\frac{c(1c)}{2V_0}=0\text{with}T_0=8V_0\left[\lambda \frac{c}{c_p}(1\frac{c}{c_p})\right]^2.$$
(9)
Treating $`\lambda `$ as an adjustable parameter characterizing a scale of the crystal-field fluctuations, we analyze in Fig. 2 the physical solution $`T_x`$ of Eq. (6) by comparing it with the observed PRA-PRB boundary. Taking into account the above analysis for PR-B and PR-A phases, we adopt $`\gamma _2=1`$ as a typical value. As seen from Fig.2, the idea that the disordered PRB phase is constructed from mostly disordered ”in-plane” rotors is corroborated by experimental observations. On the other hand, our consideration of the reduced orientational degrees of freedom fails to give quantitative descriptions above $`c=0.45`$. The unphysical value $`\gamma _2>1`$ deduced from experimental data in Fig.2 signals the existence of ignored local order parameters (e.g. $`q_\sigma \sigma ^2`$), which (similar to the case of the 3D QG given in Eq.(6) in Ref.) can play an appreciable role near the crossover temperature. A complete analysis should be given beyond the ”powder approximation” and based on fundamental order-parameter equation (1) given for both the local alignment and the eccentricity.

## IV CONCLUSIONS

We have discussed the short-range orientationally correlated structures discovered in monolayers of ($`o`$-$`H_2`$)c($`p`$-$`H_2`$)1-c on BN substrate. Analysis of the temperature-concentration behavior for the observed NMR line shapes, related to the short-range order parameter $`\sigma (c,T)`$, is given on the basis of the 2D ($`J=1)_c`$-($`J=0)_{1c}`$-rotor model, for which a 3D analog was employed earlier for the QG problem. In the current study the focus is on the nearest-neighbor correlated structures observed by the NMR spectroscopy in the orientationally disordered phases (shown in Fig.1). In spite of the fact that fundamental order-parameter equations are consistent with the corresponding Eq.(17) in Ref., the observed PR-A and the PR-B structures are rather ”antiferromagnetic” than ”ferromagnetic” as suggested in Ref. for a unique PR phase. This conclusion follows from our analysis of the observed macroscopic quadrupolarizations $`\sigma _A(c,T)`$ and $`\sigma _B(c,T)`$ adjusted through the polar-axis correlation parameters given in Eq.(3b). We have shown that the short-range correlated PR-A phase is driven by positive crystalline fields, for which thermal and spatial fluctuations overwhelm those of the short-range EQQ interactions. With decreasing temperature, the interplay between the EQQ coupling and the crystalline fields, which are both sensitive to the site-dilution and thermal-fluctuation effects, results in the PRA-PRB boundary $`T_x^{(\mathrm{exp})}(c)`$, along which both the quadrupolarizations are zero (see analysis in Fig.2). The low-temperature PR phase, denominated as the PR-B phase, is driven by negative crystalline field given near the boundary $`T_x^{(\mathrm{exp})}`$ in Eq.(4). Similar to the case of the QG phase (see Fig.4 in Ref.), this phase is expected to be richer than the PR-A phase, and more order parameters are therefore needed to give a complete description of the observed $`\sigma _B^{(\mathrm{exp})}(c,T)`$. Unfortunately, this data (such as on $`\mathrm{\Delta }q_B=<`$ $`\sigma _i^2(T)\eta _i^2(T)>__C^{(PRB)}`$) is at present time not available experimentally.

Acknowledgments - The authors acknowledge financial support by the CNPq (V.B.K.) and by the NSF-DMR-98 (N.S.S.).

Figure Captures

Fig.1. Phase diagram for site-disordered monolayers of ortho-para-hydrogen $`(o`$-$`H_2)_c(p`$-$`H_2)_{1c}`$ mixtures. The symbols refer to observed changes in the NMR line shapes reported in the literature: crosses for hydrogen monolayers on graphite, Ref. ; open triangles for commensurate hydrogen monolayers on BN, Ref. . The solid symbols refer to NMR studies of Ref.: solid circles, transitions to the quadrupolar glass (QG) state; diamonds, transitions to the hindered rotor (HR) state. The inverted triangles refer to the vanishing of the small splitting of the NMR lines in the para-rotational state. Insert: theoretical phase diagram from Fig. 2 in Ref.; $`a`$ and $`b`$ are the tricritical points, and $`c`$ is the minimum in the observed PR-PW transition temperatures.

Fig.2. Pararotational A-B crossover temperature against concentration. The symbols refer to the experimental points represented in Fig. 1: solid inverted triangles, vanishing of NMR doublet, Ref.; open triangles, onset of PW state in the anomalous upturn region of the phase transition boundary, Ref.. The lines designate solutions of Eq. (6) for an adjustable parameter $`\lambda =2.3`$. Other parameters shown include the fitting parameter $`\gamma _2`$. Insert: Left; Concentration dependence of the effective crystalline field at distinct temperatures derived from experiment using Eq.(4); right, the variance of the crystalline field in bulk ortho-para-$`H_2`$ (squares, from insert in Fig. 5 of Ref. ).


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# Disappearing Dark Matter in Brane World Cosmology: New Limits on Noncompact Extra Dimensions

## I INTRODUCTION

There is currently considerable interest in the possibility that our universe could be a submanifold embedded in a higher-dimensional spacetime. This brane-world paradigm is motivated by the D-brane solution found in ten-dimensional superstring theory. Technically, in type IIB superstrings, an $`AdS_5\times S^5`$ geometry is formed near the stacked D3-branes M1 ; GKP1 ; W1 ; Poly1 . In simple terms this means that a model can be proposed Randall  whereby our universe is represented as a thin three-brane embedded in an infinite five-dimensional bulk anti-de Sitter space ($`AdS_5`$). In such Randall-Sundrum (RSII) models, physical particles are trapped on a three-dimensional brane via curvature in the bulk dimension. Gravitons can reside as fluctuations in the background gravitational field living in both the brane and bulk dimension. This representation of large extra dimensions is an alternative to the standard Kaluza-Klein (KK) compactification.

Although massive particles can indeed be trapped on the brane, they are also, however, expected to be metastable dubovsky . That is, for both scalar and fermion fields, the quasi-normal modes are metastable states that can decay into continuum KK modes in the higher dimension. From the viewpoint of an observer on the three-brane, massive particles will appear to propagate for some time and then literally disappear into the bulk fifth dimension.

In the RSII model, curvature in the bulk dimension is introduced as a means to suppress the interaction of massless particles with the continuum of KK states in the bulk dimension. However, introducing a mass term into the higher-dimensional action leads to nonzero coupling to that KK continuum. The mathematical realization of this decay is simply that the eigenvalues for the mass modes of the field theory are complex.

The simplest model to illustrate this is the case of a free scalar field to which a bulk mass term $`\mu `$ has been added dubovsky . In this case, the imposition of radiation (outgoing-wave) boundary conditions on the solution to the five dimensional Klein-Gordon equation leads to complex eigenvalues of the form,

$$m=m_0i\mathrm{\Gamma },$$
(1)
where, quasi-discrete four-dimensional masses are given by

$$m_0^2=\mu ^2/2,$$
(2)
with $`\mu `$ being the bulk mass term in the $`AdS_5`$ field equation. The width $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ is given by

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }=(\pi /16)(m_0^3/L^2),$$
(3)
where $`L`$ is the metric curvature parameter of the bulk dimension. That is, we write the five-dimensional metric,

$$ds^2=\mathrm{exp}^{2|z|L}\eta _{\mu \nu }dx^\mu dx^\nu +dz^2,$$
(4)
where $`z`$ is the bulk dimension and the bulk curvature parameter is,

$$L=\sqrt{\mathrm{\Lambda }_5/6},$$
(5)
where, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_5`$ is the negative bulk cosmological constant. A construction of the propagator for particles on the brane then has a pole at complex $`p^2`$ which corresponds to an unstable particle with mass $`m_0`$ and width $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$. Thus, the comoving density of massive scalar particles can be expected to decay over time with a rate, $`(\rho a^3)\mathrm{exp}[\mathrm{\Gamma }t]`$, where $`a`$ is the scale factor.

It is well known Bajc  that fermion fields cannot be localized on a brane with positive tension by gravitational interactions only. One must invoke a localization mechanism. A simple example dubovsky  is to form a domain wall by introducing a scalar field $`\chi `$ with two degenerate vacua $`\chi =\pm v`$ separated by a domain wall at the brane. A fermion field is then introduced with a Yukawa coupling to the scalar field, $`g\chi \overline{\psi }\psi `$, which confines fermions to the brane. Similar to the treatment of scalar particles, solving the Dirac equation for fermions with a bulk mass term $`\mu `$, leads to complex mass eigenvalues. In the limit that the bulk mass is much less than the curvature scale, $`\mu <<L`$, the width for decay into the bulk dimension becomes

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\mathrm{fermion}}=\left(m_0/2L\right)^{2gv/L}(2\pi L/[\Gamma (gv/L+1/2)]^2).$$
(6)
where, $`\Gamma `$ on the r.h.s. is the normal gamma function. In the limit, $`\mu >>L`$ one similarly obtains

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\mathrm{fermion}}=M\left(m_0/2M\right)^{2M/L}\mathrm{exp}\{2M/L\},$$
(7)
where $`M=\sqrt{(gv)^2+\mu ^2}`$.

Clearly, in each of these expressions, the largest width for tunneling into the bulk dimension is for the heaviest particle. In this case we argue that a heavy ($`{}_{}{}^{}{}_{}{}^{>}`$ TeV) dark matter particle \[e.g. the lightest supersymmetric particle, (LSP)\] may have the shortest lifetime to tunnel into the bulk. In this paper, therefore, we consider the possibility that cold dark matter (CDM) disappears into the extra dimension. The comoving density of the CDM will then diminish over time as $`(\rho _{CDM}a^3)\mathrm{exp}[\mathrm{\Gamma }t]`$.

In principle, normal standard-model particles (e.g. baryons) would decay in this way as well. This would have many far reaching consequences in astrophysics and cosmology. However, the decay width of such light particles is likely to be suppressed relative to that of a heavy dark-matter particle by some power of the ratio of their masses \[e.g. by $`(m_{baryon}/M_{LSP})^{2gv/L}(0.001)^{2gv/L}`$ for a TeV fermion (e.g. neutralino) LSP\]. We also note, that even a light (axion-like) scalar dark matter particle could also be made to have a short disappearance time relative to normal fermionic matter (by Eq. 6) as long as $`(m_0/2L)<1`$, and $`gv/L`$ is sufficiently large to suppress the disappearance of normal fermionic matter.

In what follows, we analyze cosmological constraints on such disappearing dark-matter particles and show that this hypothesis is consistent with and even slightly preferred by all cosmological constraints, including primordial nucleosynthesis, the present observations of Type Ia supernovae at high redshift, the mass-to-light ratio vs. redshift relation of galaxy clusters, the fraction of X-ray emitting gas in rich galactic clusters and the cosmic microwave background (CMB).

Cosmological constraints on decaying matter have been considered in many papers, particularly with regard to the effects of such decays on big-bang nucleosynthesis (cf. malaney ; kawasaki  and Refs. therein). The present discussion differs from the previous considerations in that the decaying particles do not produce photons, hadronic showers, or residual annihilations in our four-dimensional spacetime. To distinguish the disappearance of dark matter in the present application from the previous decay applications, we shall refer to it here as disappearing dark matter.

In the present application, however, there are some complications. One is that, an energy flow into the bulk can induce a back reaction from the background gravitational field. This leads to residual gravity waves in the 3-brane from the exiting particles Gregory . Another effect is an enhanced electric part of the bulk Weyl tensor Langlois . Together these effects will comprise the so-called “dark radiation” as analyzed below. Another consideration is that particles which enter the bulk can still interact gravitationally with particles on the brane. The strength of this interactions, however, is greatly diminished Giddings  by a factor of $`(R/z)`$, where $`z`$ is the distance between the bulk and the brane, and $`R=1/L`$ is the ”radius” of the bulk dimension. For a typical value of $`L=10^4`$ GeV, we have $`R10^4`$ fm. So, even though gravity can reside in the bulk, the residual gravity between particles in the bulk and brane is strongly suppressed.

## II Cosmological Model

The five-dimensional Einstein equation for the brane world can be reduced to an effective set of four-dimensional equations on the brane Shiromizu ; Yokoyama ; Tanaka  by decomposing the five-dimensional Riemann tensor into a Ricci tensor plus the five dimensional Weyl tensor. The four-dimensional effective energy-momentum tensor contains the usual $`T_{\mu \nu }`$ term of ordinary and dark matter plus a new term quadratic in $`T_{\mu \nu }`$, and a residual term containing the five-dimensional Weyl tensor with two of its indices projected along a direction normal to the brane. The (0,0) component of the effective four-dimensional Einstein equation can then be reduced to a new generalized Friedmann equation Kraus ; Binetruy ; Hebecker ; Ida ; Mukohyama ; Vollick  for the Hubble expansion as detected by an observer on the three brane,

$$H^2=\left(\frac{\dot{a}}{a}\right)^2=\frac{8\pi G_\mathrm{N}}{3}(\rho +\rho _{DR})\frac{k}{a^2}+\frac{\mathrm{\Lambda }_4}{3}+\frac{\kappa _5^4}{36}\rho ^2.$$
(8)
Here, $`a(t)`$ is the scale factor at cosmic time $`t`$, and $`\rho =\rho _B+\rho _\gamma +\rho _{DM}`$, with $`\rho _B`$ and $`\rho _\gamma `$ the usual contributions from nonrelativistic (mostly baryons) and relativistic particles, respectively. In the present application we presume that only the dark matter can decay into the extra dimension. Hence, we write $`\rho _{DM}=Ce^{\mathrm{\Gamma }t}/a^3`$, where $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ is the decay width into the extra dimension.

In equation (8), several identifications of cosmological parameters were required in order to recover standard big-bang cosmology. For one, the first term on the right hand side is obtained by relating the four-dimensional gravitational constant $`G_\mathrm{N}`$ to the five-dimensional gravitational constant, $`\kappa _5`$. Specifically,

$$G_\mathrm{N}=M_4^2=\kappa _5^4\tau /48\pi ,$$
(9)
where $`\tau `$ is the brane tension and

$$\kappa _5^2=M_5^3.$$
(10)
where $`M_5`$ the five-dimensional Planck mass. Secondly, the four-dimensional cosmological constant $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_4`$ is related to its five-dimensional counterpart $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_5`$,

$$\mathrm{\Lambda }_4=\kappa _5^4\tau ^2/36+\mathrm{\Lambda }_5/6.$$
(11)
A negative $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_5`$ (and $`\kappa _5^4\tau ^2/36|\mathrm{\Lambda }_5/6|`$) is required for $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_4`$ to obtain its presently observed small value.

Standard big-bang cosmology does not contain the $`\rho _{DR}`$ and $`\rho ^2`$ terms of Eq. (8). The $`\rho ^2`$ term arises from the imposition of a junction condition for the scale factor on the surface of the brane. Physically, it derives from the fact that matter fields are initially confined to the brane. This term decays rapidly as $`a^8`$ in the early radiation dominated universe and is not of interest here.

In the present formulation, $`\rho _{DR}`$ includes two contributions, $`\rho _{DR}=\rho _E+\rho _{GW}`$. One is the $`\rho _E`$ term which derives from the electric part of the Bulk Weyl tensor. The second ($`\rho _{GW})`$ arises from residual gravity waves left on the brane Gregory . Since these gravity waves are associated with the disappearing particles, their dynamics can be formally absorbed together with $`\rho _E`$ into a Bianchi identity for the effective four-dimensional Einstein equation. This leads to,

$$\dot{\rho }_{DR}+4H\rho _{DR}=\mathrm{\Gamma }\rho _{DM}.$$
(12)
When $`\mathrm{\Gamma }=0`$, $`\rho _{DR}`$ scales as $`a^4`$ like normal radiation even though it has nothing whatsoever to do with electromagnetic radiation. Hence, the name ‘dark radiation’. Upper and lower limits on such dark radiation can be deduced from big-bang nucleosynthesis Ichiki . In the present paper we will keep the same name, even though in this more general context $`\rho _{DR}`$ no longer scales as $`a^4`$.

The introduction of the dark radiation term into Eq. (8) leads to new cosmological paradigms. For example, Figure 1 illustrates the evolution of a a simple flat, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_4=k=0`$, disappearing dark matter cosmology with negligible $`\rho ^2`$ term. This cosmology separates into four characteristic regimes identified on Figure 1. These are: I) The usual early radiation dominated era ($`z>10^5`$); II) a dark-matter dominated era ($`t<<2\mathrm{\Gamma }^1`$, $`10<z<10^5`$); III) a late dark radiation dominated era ($`t>>2\mathrm{\Gamma }^1`$, $`0<z<0.2`$); and IV) Eventually, a baryon-dominated regime also exists.

Early on the contribution from the dark radiation component evolves (from Eq.(12)) as $`\rho _{DR}a^1`$ or $`\rho _{DR}a^{3/2}`$ during regimes I and II, respectively, and can be neglected. Thus, the dark radiation does not affect (nor is it constrained by) primordial nucleosynthesis. Similarly, the dark radiation does not contribute much mass energy during the epoch of CMB photon decoupling (at $`z10^3`$), though it can become comparable to and even in excess of the dark matter contribution in epoch III and therefore affects the look-back time to the CMB epoch.

The most interesting region for our purpose is during the transition from epoch II to epoch III. This occurs at intermediate times $`t2\mathrm{\Gamma }^1`$ and redshifts of $`0<z<2`$ as indicated on Figure 1. Here, the fact that there is both more dark matter and more dark energy at higher redshifts means that the universe decelerates faster during the redshift regime $`1<z<2`$ than during the more recent epoch $`0<z<1`$. As far as cosmological constraints are concerned, the most important effect is from the changing dark matter contribution. This is because the dark radiation does not become significant until the most recent ($`z_{}^<0.05`$) epoch even for this extreme cosmology. The changing dark matter contribution in particular, can nevertheless have important observable consequences, for example on the luminosity-redshift relation, galaxy mass-to-light ratios, and the cosmic look-back time. Hence, this model is constrainable by the observations of supernovae and galaxy mass-to-light ratios at high redshift, and the power spectrum of the cosmic microwave background as we now show.

## III Supernova Constraint

The apparent brightness of the Type Ia supernova standard candle with redshift is given Carroll  by a simple relation which we slightly modify to incorporate the brane-world cosmology given in Eq. (8). The luminosity distance becomes,

$`D_L`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{c(1+z)}{H_0\sqrt{\mathrm{\Omega }_k}}}sinn\{\sqrt{\mathrm{\Omega }_k}{\displaystyle _0^z}dz^{}[\mathrm{\Omega }_\gamma (1+z^{})^4`$ (13)
$`+(\mathrm{\Omega }_{DM}(z^{})+\mathrm{\Omega }_B)(1+z^{})^3`$
$`+\mathrm{\Omega }_k(1+z^{})^2+\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }+\mathrm{\Omega }_{DR}(z^{})]^{1/2}\},`$
where $`H_0`$ is the present value of the Hubble constant, and $`sinn(x)=\mathrm{sinh}x`$ for $`\mathrm{\Omega }_k>0`$, $`sinn(x)=x`$, for $`\mathrm{\Omega }_k=0`$ and $`sinn(x)=\mathrm{sin}x`$ for $`\mathrm{\Omega }_k<0`$. The $`\mathrm{\Omega }_i`$ are the usual closure quantities, i.e. the contribution from all relativistic particles is $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\gamma =8\pi G\rho _\gamma /3H_0^2`$, the baryonic contribution is $`\mathrm{\Omega }_B=8\pi G\rho _B/3H_0^2=0.039`$ Ichiki  (for $`H_0=71`$ km s-1 Mpc-1). The curvature contribution is $`\mathrm{\Omega }_k=k/a_0^2H_0^2`$, and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=\mathrm{\Lambda }/3H_0^2`$ is the vacuum energy contribution. In the present context, we have added a redshift-dependent contribution from the dark radiation, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{DR}=8\pi G\rho _{DR}(z)/3H_0^2`$. The dark matter contribution $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{DM}`$ becomes a function of redshift through, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{DM}\mathrm{\Omega }_{DM}^0\mathrm{exp}\{\mathrm{\Gamma }(t_0t)\}`$, where $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{DM}^0=8\pi G\rho _{DM}^0/3H_0^2`$ is the present dark-matter content, and the look-back time $`t_0t`$ is a function of redshift,

$`t_0t`$ $`=`$ $`H_0^1\{{\displaystyle }_0^z(1+z^{})^1[\mathrm{\Omega }_R(1+z^{})^4`$ (14)
$`+`$ $`(\mathrm{\Omega }_B+\mathrm{\Omega }_{DM})(1+z^{})^3`$
$`+`$ $`\mathrm{\Omega }_k(1+z^{})^2+\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }+\mathrm{\Omega }_{DR}]^{1/2}dz^{}\}.`$
Figure 2 compares various cosmological models with some of the recent combined data from the High-Z Supernova Search Team garnavich ; tonry  and the Supernova Cosmology Project perlmutter . The lower figure highlights the crucial data points at the highest redshift which are most relevant to this study. Shown are the K-corrected magnitudes $`m=M+5\mathrm{log}D_L+25`$ vs. redshift. Curves are plotted relative to an open $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{DM},\mathrm{\Omega }_B,\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda },\mathrm{\Omega }_{DR}=0`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_k=1`$ cosmology. Of particular interest are the highest redshift points (e.g. SN1997ff Riess ; tonry  at $`z=1.7`$). These points constrain the redshift evolution during the important dark-matter dominated decelerating phase relevant to this paper.

It is noteworthy that an optimum standard flat $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.3`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0.7`$ ($`S\mathrm{\Lambda }CDM`$) cosmology passes somewhat above the five points with $`z0.9`$. Indeed, the newest ”Fall 1999” data tonry  (shown in the lower box of Figure 2) are consistently brighter than the best-fit standard flat $`S\mathrm{\Lambda }CDM`$ cosmology in the epoch at $`z>0.9`$. This is made more relevant in view of the fact that dust around SN1997ff would cause that inferred data point to be even lower on this plot Riess . Thus, we find that the data all slightly favor the disappearing dark matter ($`\mathrm{\Lambda }DCDM`$) cosmology.

The contours labeled SNIa of Figure 3 show 1$`\sigma `$, 2$`\sigma `$, and 3$`\sigma `$ confidence limit regions of constant goodness of fit to the $`z>0.01`$ data of tonry  in the parameter space of disappearance lifetime $`\mathrm{\Gamma }^1`$ versus $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ plane. For these data we use a simple $`\chi ^2`$ measure of the goodness of fit as in tonry .

$$\chi ^2(Y_i^{data}Y_i^{calc})^2/\sigma _i^2,$$
(15)
where, $`\sigma _i`$ includes the velocity uncertainty added to the distance error.

The SNIa data imply a shallow minimum for $`\mathrm{\Gamma }^10.3`$ Gyr and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0.78`$. The reduced $`\chi ^2`$ per degree of freedom at this minimum is $`\chi _r^2=0.94`$ for 171 degrees of freedom. This is to be compared with compared with $`\chi _r^2=0.96`$ for a standard $`\mathrm{\Lambda }CDM`$ cosmology tonry . The $`1\sigma `$ confidence limit corresponds to $`\mathrm{\Gamma }^110`$ Gyr, but the $`2\sigma `$ region is consistent with a broad range of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ as long as $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0.75\pm 0.15`$.

## IV Galaxy Cluster $`M/L`$ Constraint

Another interesting cosmological probe comes from galaxy cluster mass-to-light ratios as also shown on Figure 3. This is the traditional technique to obtain the total universal matter content $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M`$. A most recent average value of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.17\pm 0.05`$ has been determined in bahcall  based upon 21 galaxy clusters out to $`z1`$ corrected for their color and evolution with redshift. The very fact that the nearby cluster data seem to prefer a smaller value of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M`$ than the value of $`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.27\pm 0.02`$ deduced WMAP  from the distant microwave background surface of photon last scattering is consistent with the notion of disappearing dark matter as discussed below.

In the present disappearing dark matter paradigm, the dark matter content diminishes with time, while the normal baryonic luminous matter remains mostly confined to the brane. Therefore, the $`M/L`$ ratio should increase with look-back time. This is complicated, however, by two effects. One is that clusters at high redshift have had less time to evolve and dim. Hence, their $`M/L`$ ratios are expected to decline with redshift. This effect is corrected in Table 1 of bahcall . Another complication is an observational bias due to the fact that at high redshift a larger fraction of high-temperature clusters is observed. In essence, higher temperature clusters have deeper gravitational wells and are expected to have more dark matter and larger $`M/L`$ ratios. Nevertheless, we have corrected for this temperature bias by using the power-law analysis described in bahcall  to adjust all clusters to a common temperature. Even after applying this correction we find a residual trend of increasing cluster $`M/L`$ ratio with redshift which can be attributed to disappearing dark matter as depicted in Figure 4.

Our standard $`\chi ^2`$ goodness of fit to the data of bahcall  (corrected for evolution and temperature bias) is labeled as Cluster M/L on Figure 3. We find a minimum $`\chi ^2`$ per degree of freedom of $`\chi _r^2=0.61`$ for $`\mathrm{\Gamma }^1=34`$ Gyr as shown on Figures 3 and 4. This is an improvement over the fit with a fixed $`M/L`$ (shown as the straight dashed line on Figure 4) for which $`\chi _r^2=0.67`$. The 2$`\sigma `$ (95% confidence level) limits from the galaxy cluster data correspond to $`\mathrm{\Gamma }^17`$ Gyr for our flat $`\mathrm{\Lambda }DCDM`$ model as shown in Figure 3. This limit is concordant with the previously discussed Type Ia supernova analysis.

Clearly, more work is needed to unambiguously identify evidence for enhanced dark matter in the past. In this regard we note that there is complementary data ettori  to the cluster $`M/L`$ ratios from BeppoSax and the ROSAT X-ray observations of rich clusters at high redshift. In this case, the X-ray emitting gas mass can be determined from the X-ray luminosity and the total mass deduced from the gravitational mass required to maintain the X-ray gas in hydrostatic equilibrium. There is, however, uncertainty in this method due to the model dependence of the inferred gas fractions ettori . Nevertheless, the observations clearly exhibit a trend of diminishing gas fraction for systems with $`z>1`$. Figure 5 shows a comparison of the deduced gas fractions for various cosmological models. These data are consistent with an increasing total mass content for these systems as predicted in this disappearing dark matter paradigm.

## V CMB Constraint

As noted above, the matter content ($`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.27\pm 0.02`$) deduced from the recent high-resolution WMAP analysis WMAP  of the cosmic microwave background is larger than that deduced ($`\mathrm{\Omega }_M=0.17\pm 0.05`$) from nearby galaxy cluster mass-to-light ratios bahcall . This in itself is suggestive of the disappearing dark matter paradigm proposed here. However, this cosmology can also involve a shorter look back time and different expansion history between now and the epoch of photon last scattering. In particular there will be more dark matter at earlier times leading to earlier structure formation. There will also be a smaller integrated Sachs-Wolf effect (ISW) at early times, and a larger ISW effect at late times as photons propagate to the present epoch. Thus, the amplitudes and locations of the peaks in the power spectrum of microwave background fluctuations hu  can in principle be used to constrain this cosmology.

We caution, however, that there is a complication with using the CMB constraint. Inflation generated metric fluctuations which contribute to the CMB should also induce fluctuations in the dark radiation component. Unfortunately, however, calculations of the power spectrum from five dimensional gravity are complicated and beyond the scope of the present work. A straight forward application of this disappearing dark matter paradigm without a proper treatment of the fluctuation power spectrum from the dark radiation should therefore probably be viewed with caution. Nevertheless, under the assumption that fluctuations in the dark radiation contribute insignificantly to the power spectrum at the surface of photon last scattering, a straight forward study of the CMB constraints on the disappearing dark matter cosmology is possible.

We have done calculations of the CMB power spectrum, $`\mathrm{\Delta }T^2=l(l+1)C_l/2\pi `$ based upon the CMBFAST code of Seljak & Zaldarriaga cmbfast . We have explicitly modified this code to account for the the disappearing dark matter cosmology described in Eq. (8). Figure 6 shows an illustration of a disappearing dark matter model which can be ruled out by the CMB. In this example $`\mathrm{\Gamma }^1=5`$ Gyr, and all other cosmological parameters set to their best fit WMAP values WMAP .

Nevertheless, it is quite possible to have a finite $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ and still fit the WMAP data. As an illustration of this, we have simultaneously varied $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, and marginalized over the parameters of the matter power spectrum, while maintaining other cosmological parameters at the best fit WMAP values. The likelihood functions we computed from a combination of Gaussian and lognormal distributions as described in Verde et al. Verde . These were used to generate contours of 1, 2, and 3$`\sigma `$ confidence limits for fits to the WMAP power spectrum Hinshaw ; Kogut  as shown on Figure 3.

An important point is that we find that equivalent fits to that of the best-fit WMAP parameters WMAP  can be obtained for a broad range of values for $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }`$. This means that the CMB does not rule out this paradigm. On the contrary, the 2$`\sigma `$ CMB contours nicely overlap the region allowed by the cluster $`M/L`$ ratios. A $`2\sigma `$ concordance region of $`15\mathrm{\Gamma }^180`$ Gyr survives this constraint. The essential requirements to fit the CMB in this model is that the matter content during photon decoupling be at the (higher) WMAP value, and that the dark radiation be an insignificant contributor to the background energy density during that epoch.

## VI Conclusion

Obviously, there is great need for better Type Ia supernova data in the crucial $`z>1`$ regime as well as more galactic cluster mass-to-light ratios at high redshifts. Although the evidence for disappearing dark matter is of marginal statistical significance at the present time, the purpose of this paper is nevertheless to emphasize the potential importance of future studies aimed at unambiguously determining the decay width. If such a finite value of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ were to be established, it would constitute the first observational indication for noncompact extra dimensions. It would also provide valuable insight into the physical parameters of the higher-dimensional space.

Rewriting the equation for the decay width, along with the relations (Eqs. 9 \- 11) between various quantities in the modified Friedmann equation, i.e. $`\kappa _5`$, $`G_N`$, $`M_4`$, $`M_5`$, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_4`$, and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_5`$, leads to the following relation between the five-dimensional Planck mass $`M_5`$ and quantities which can be measured in the four dimensional space time, $`M_5^6=(M_4^4/64\pi ^2)[\pi m_0^3/16\mathrm{\Gamma }+\mathrm{\Lambda }_4]`$. Other fundamental parameters in five dimensions, e.g. $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_5`$ and the brane tension $`\tau `$, are derivable from $`M_5`$ via equations (9) and (11). This implies that, should the dark-matter mass $`m_0`$ ever be known, all of the five-dimensional parameters could be determined. For example, a dark matter mass of $`m_01`$ TeV (as expected for the LSP), and a most optimistic decay lifetime of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }^1=15`$ Gyr, would imply $`(M_5/M_4)4(m_0/\mathrm{TeV})^{1/2}(\mathrm{\Gamma }^1/15\mathrm{Gyr})^{1/6}`$.

###### Acknowledgements.

One of the authors (MY) would like to thank K. Ghoroku for helpful discussions. We also acknowledge Y. Fujita, T. Tanaka and Y. Himemoto for discussions which improved an earlier version of this paper. Work at NAOJ has been supported in part by the Sasakawa Scientific Research Grant from the Japan Science Society, and also by the Ministry of Education, Science, Sports and Culture of Japan through Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research (12047233, 13640313, 14540271), and for Specially Promoted Research (13002001). Work at the University of Notre Dame was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy under Nuclear Theory Grant DE-FG02-95-ER40934.


text:
# Star Formation Rate estimators: [O II]𝝀3727 vs. H𝜶 for local star-forming galaxies

## 1. Introduction

Measuring the evolution of the SFR density of the universe as a function of look-back time is essential to understand the formation and evolution of galaxies. The H$`\alpha `$ luminosity is one of the best optical estimators of the current SFR, modulo the Initial Mass Function (e.g., Kennicutt 1992, 1998). Unfortunately, H$`\alpha `$ can only be observed with optical CCDs out to $`z0.4`$. At higher redshifts, the \[O ii\]$`\lambda `$3727 line is frequently used as a SFR estimator due to its availability in optical spectroscopic samples. However, the transformation between the number of ionising photons (which is a direct consequence of the current SFR) and the intensity or equivalent width ($`EW`$) of this line is strongly dependent on the excitation conditions and metallicity. Previous empirical calibrations of the SFR in terms of the \[O ii\] line (e.g., Gallagher, Bushouse, & Hunter 1989; Kennicutt 1992; Guzmán et al. 1997) vary within a factor of a few. Among other problems, these calibrations may suffer from small number statistics, incompleteness in luminosities, starburst ages and/or physical conditions of their samples, and uncertain extinction corrections.

We have analysed the \[O ii\] emission line properties of a local sample of H$`\alpha `$-selected star forming galaxies (the UCM sample) and derived reasonably precise empirical calibrations between the \[O ii\] and H$`\alpha `$ luminosities as a function of the galaxy population properties. In a recent paper, Jansen, Franx & Fabricant (2001) carried out a similar study for the Nearby Field Galaxy Survey (NFGS, Jansen et al. 2000a,b) and found, among other things, that the observed \[O ii\]/H$`\alpha `$ ratio varies by a factor of 7 at luminosities near $`M_B^{}`$, and that the \[O ii\]/H$`\alpha `$ ratio is inversely correlated with luminosity. Our study is, in many ways, complementary of that of Jansen et al., but we use an H$`\alpha `$-selected (thus SFR-selected) sample of galaxies instead of a $`B`$-band selected one. We confirm most of the findings of Jansen et al., but we also demonstrate that using an extra piece of information, namely the $`EW`$ of \[O ii\], much of the scatter in the \[O ii\]/H$`\alpha `$ ratio can be removed, allowing a much more accurate calibration of \[O ii\] vs. SFR.

Our basic dataset comes from Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM) survey of H$`\alpha `$ selected galaxies. Optical spectroscopy (Gallego et al. 1996; 1997) and optical and near-infrared photometry (Pérez-González et al. 2000, 2002; Gil de Paz et al. 2000) are available for this sample. Based on their spectroscopic properties, the UCM galaxies have been roughly divided into two main classes: H ii-like and disk-like galaxies (see Gil de Paz et al. 2000). We will compare the properties of the UCM galaxies with those of the NFGS galaxies of Jansen et al. A detailed description of our study can be found in Aragón-Salamanca et al. (2002). We assume $`H_0=50`$km s$`^1`$Mpc-1 throughout.

## 2. Results:

In Figure 1 we plot the $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}/\mathrm{H}\alpha `$ ratio (both observed and corrected from extinction using the Balmer decrement111Throughout this paper $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}^0`$ and $`\mathrm{H}\alpha ^0`$ indicate extinction-corrected emission-line fluxes.) for the UCM and NFGS galaxies as a function of absolute $`B`$\- and $`K`$-band magnitudes and $`EW(`$\[O ii\]$`)`$. There is a large scatter in the $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}/\mathrm{H}\alpha `$ and $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}/\mathrm{H}\alpha ^0`$ ratios for all the galaxies, but the scatter in the extinction-corrected $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}^0/\mathrm{H}\alpha ^0`$ ratio is considerably smaller, indicating that much of this scatter is due to differences in extinction.

Figure 1 also reveals significant difference in the median $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}/\mathrm{H}\alpha `$ and $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}/\mathrm{H}\alpha ^0`$ ratios for the UCM and NFGS galaxies. These ratios are considerably smaller for the UCM galaxies. However, the extinction-corrected $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}^0/\mathrm{H}\alpha ^0`$ ratios for both samples agree quite well, indicating that the line ratio differences between both samples are mainly due to a difference in the mean extinction. This is readily explained by the fact that the NFGS sample has been selected in the $`B`$-band, while the UCM sample was selected in the red (H$`\alpha `$), and thus it is not surprising that galaxies with higher extinction are underrepresented in the blue selected sample. Therefore, differences in sample selection can yield very large differences in the line emission properties.

The third conclusion from these plots is that the $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}/\mathrm{H}\alpha `$ and $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}/\mathrm{H}\alpha ^0`$ ratios for disk-like and H ii-like galaxies are very different. However, the average $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}^0/\mathrm{H}\alpha ^0`$ ratio is the same for both classes of galaxies. Again, the mixture of galaxy types in a given sample can have large effects in the line ratios.

We also find that, although with significant scatter, the $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}/\mathrm{H}\alpha `$ and $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}/\mathrm{H}\alpha ^0`$ ratios are reasonably well correlated with the absolute $`B`$\- and $`K`$-band magnitudes and with $`EW(\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]})`$. However, the extinction-corrected $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}^0/\mathrm{H}\alpha ^0`$ ratio is largely independent of these quantities, indicating that extinction is the main driver of these correlations. This is supported by Figure 2, which shows quite reasonable correlations between the extinction and the absolute magnitudes of the galaxies. The extinction is also correlated with $`EW(\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]})`$. This figure also shows that the typical extinction for the NFGS galaxies is significantly smaller than for the UCM galaxies.

These correlations could allow us to statistically predict—with varying degrees of accuracy—the observed and even extinction-corrected H$`\alpha `$ fluxes from the observed \[O ii\] flux using the information contained in the $`EW(\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]})`$ and/or the absolute magnitudes, provided that the sample selection effects are correctly taken into account. Indeed, it is very important to stress that these correlations apply, strictly speaking, to samples with similar properties to the ones presented here. If the selection of the sample is different, significant systematics could be present, as shown by the differences in behavior between the UCM and the NFGS galaxies. Moreover, there is no guarantee that high redshift galaxy samples would not show significant evolution in their line ratios (e.g., due to chemical evolution) which could, in principle, invalidate any locally-derived calibration.

Any calibration derived from these empirical correlations would have a significant intrinsic scatter, and thus the predictions for individual galaxies will be quite uncertain. However, if one is only interested in statistical properties of large samples (e.g., determining the star-formation rate density of large regions of the Universe), the problem of the large scatter would be alleviated. But it is crucial to take into account the properties of the sample, in particular the selection criteria, luminosity range and mixture of galaxy types, since important systematic effects are also present on top of the large scatter. Obviously, just using large samples would not solve the systematic problems.

Finally, there is another problem we have not discussed and needs to be considered: the effect of galaxies with no \[O ii\] emission on the statistical determination of SFRs and SFR densities. A significant fraction of the UCM galaxies (20%) have H$`\alpha `$ emission but no detectable \[O ii\] emission ($`EW(\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}>5`$Å). This means that by only counting the \[O ii\] emitting UCM galaxies, we would miss $`15`$% of the extinction-corrected H$`\alpha `$ flux, i.e., $`15`$% of the SFR. This problem becomes negligible for a blue-selected sample such as the NFGS since, due mainly to its lower average extinction, virtually all NFGS galaxies with H$`\alpha `$ emission have detectable \[O ii\].

### Acknowledgments.

This research was supported in part by the Spanish Programa Nacional de Astronomía y Astrofísica. AAS acknowledges generous financial support from the Royal Society. AGdP acknowledges financial support from NASA. PGPG acknowledges financial support from the Spanish Ministerio de Educación y Cultura. CEGD acknowledges financial support from the UCM.

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## Discussion

Kennicutt: I was surprised by the large shift in $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}/\mathrm{H}\alpha `$ ratio between your UCM disk galaxy sample and the NFGS objects because my impression was that the types of galaxies were similar (despite the different selection methods). Could part of the difference arise because your spectra sample only the central parts of the galaxies?

Aragón-Salamanca: I don’t think so. The UCM spectra were taken with slit widths that approximately match the size of the galaxies (at the expense of spectral resolution). Thus the spectra used here are close to “global” spectra. Note that the majority of the UCM galaxies are significantly more distant than the NFGS galaxies, and therefore have much smaller angular sizes. Moreover, the fact that the extinction-corrected $`\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]}^0/\mathrm{H}\alpha ^0`$ ratios of the UCM and NFGS galaxies match very well gives us confidence that extinction is the main driver of the observed differences, and that the intrinsic ratios are indeed the same.

R. Terlevich: In a recent analysis I did with Elena Terlevich and Daniel Rosa we found that using the $`\mathrm{H}\alpha /\mathrm{H}\beta `$ ratio without taking into account the the underlying Balmer absorption you tend to overestimate the extinction. Could this be related to the relation found between the $`EW(\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]})`$ and extinction?

Aragón-Salamanca: It is true that the observed $`\mathrm{H}\alpha /\mathrm{H}\beta `$ ratio can be affected by stellar absorption and thus bias the extinction measurements. But the NFGS Balmer decrement measurements were corrected for stellar absorption, and the trend between $`EW(\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]})`$ and extinction is similar to the one found for the UCM galaxies (albeit, with higher average extinction, as discussed above; cf. Figure 2c). Moreover, being aware of this problem, we only attempted to determine Balmer-decrement extinctions for UCM galaxies with reasonably strong emission lines ($`EW(\mathrm{H}\beta )<5`$Å), where this effect should be smaller. It is interesting to note that $`EW(\text{[O }\text{ii}\text{]})`$ anti-correlates with extinction and luminosity (Figure 2). Because of the luminosity-metallicity relation, it is not unreasonable to expect metal-rich galaxies to have more dust and thus more extinction.