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# Ion-trap quantum computing in the presence of cooling

## I Introduction

Very recently, considerable progress has been made in the experimental realisation of quantum computing schemes with cold trapped ions. In Innsbruck, the Cirac-Zoller controlled-NOT quantum gate cz  has been implemented with the help of six concatenated laser pulses individually addressing each of the two ions nature1 . At the same time, the group in Boulder demonstrated a robust high-fidelity geometric two-qubit phase gate in the laboratory. This was achieved with a sequence of laser pulses and without individual laser addressing of the ions nature2 . But are these schemes really suitable for quantum computing with many qubits? Finding reliable ways to scale present schemes to many qubits requires simplifications of the experimental setup without decreasing the precision of gate operations.

In this paper we present an alternative scheme for the realisation of two-qubit gate operations between cold trapped ions. The ions are stored inside a linear trap (see Figure 1) and can be coupled via a common vibrational mode. Each qubit is, as in simple , obtained from two different ground states of the same ion and the system remains during the whole computation in the ground state of the common vibrational mode. Quantum gate operations can be implemented within one step by applying different laser fields simultaneously. Depending on the gate operation, this requires individual addressing of the ions by one or two different lasers. Generalising the underlying idea to the many-ion case might enable us in the future to construct efficient schemes for the realisation of many-qubit gates and the generation of highly entangled many-particle states within one step future .

A disadvantage of the proposed scheme is that it allows for high gate success rates only in the case of very long gate operation times. If the gate is performed fast, so that its speed becomes comparable to other schemes nature1 , the gate success rate drops for certain initial states below $`80\%`$. However, this disadvantage might be compensated by the fact that the scheme is widely robust against parameter fluctuations, especially against variations of certain Rabi frequencies and detunings. In addition, the lasers for the cooling of the common vibrational mode are in the following applied continuously which should help to decrease decoherence effects due to heating eschner ; james . In the setup considered here, there is no need for sympathetic cooling of the ions with the help of a second ion species, as discussed in mo ; morigi .

The role of cooling in this paper is twofold. On one hand, it decreases the sensitivity of the proposed scheme with respect to heating. On the other hand, the presence of the cooling laser introduces an auxiliary decay channel into the system whose presence restricts the time evolution of the system onto a small subspace such that the implementation of quantum gate operations within one step becomes possible. Photon emissions due to cooling are nevertheless negligible since the system remains continuously in a decoherence-free state Palma ; Zanardi97 ; Beigenjp . If heating populates the vibrational mode or gate failure moves the system out of the decoherence-free subspace, then photons are emitted at a high rate wine79 ; leib . This can be detected and the computation can be restarted. For practical purposes, only the fidelity of gate operations must be close to one while the success rate can be significantly smaller. As long as the experiment is repeated if necessary, quantum computers can still be more efficient than conventional computers.

To achieve this, the scheme utilises an environment-induced quantum Zeno effect misra ; behe  originating from the measurements continuously performed by the cooling lasers on the common vibrational mode. This is possible since ground state cooling has the same effect as continuous measurements whether the ions are in the $`n=0`$ phonon mode or not. The underlying concept of the quantum computing scheme proposed here became known in the past as quantum computing using dissipation Letter  and has especially been used to construct simple and precise Ben  but also very robust pachos  quantum computing schemes for atom-cavity systems.

Many schemes for quantum computing with trapped ions have already been proposed. Some of them require cooling of the ions into the ground state of a common vibrational mode cz . That this is possible has been demonstrated in several experiments wine ; nature1 ; nature2 ; mon . Other schemes can be implemented with “hot” ions poy ; moelm ; sarah ; jonathan . For example, the proposal by Sørenson and Mølmer moelm  has been used to entangle up to four ions sackett  and to observe a violation of Bell’s inequality with massive particles david . However, most of these schemes are very sensitive to level shifts and require precise control of the ion-phonon interaction.

The paper is organised as follows. In the next section, we review the basic concept of quantum computing using dissipation. Concrete realisations of two-qubit gate operations with cold trapped ions are discussed in Section III. As examples we consider possible implementations of the CNOT gate, a two-qubit phase gate and the SWAP operation. Section IV analyses the robustness of the proposed quantum computing scheme with respect to fluctuations of detunings and other system parameters. Finally, we conclude our results in Section V.

## II Quantum computing using dissipation

An important feature of the proposed quantum computing scheme with cold trapped ions is the auxiliary dissipation channel introduced into the system by continuous laser cooling. Ground state cooling is a process where a detuned laser field transfers the ions into an excited and highly unstable atomic state whenever the phonon mode becomes populated. During spontaneous emission from this level there is a high probability for annihilation of a phonon so decreasing the energy in the vibrational mode. If the system returns into the ground state with $`n=0`$ phonons, the ions no longer see the cooling laser due to its detuning to the vibrational side band wine79 ; eschner ; leib  and the time evolution of the system can be described by a Schrödinger equation.

Although cooling is applied continuously, spontaneous emission from the ions is negligible. The reason for this is that the state of the system remains during the whole computation in a decoherence-free subspace (DFS) Palma ; Zanardi97 ; Beigenjp  and no other states become populated during gate operations. The DFS of a system is a subspace of states whose population does not lead to decoherence. In the presence of cooling, the system of cold trapped ions possesses a non-trivial DFS with respect to spontaneous photon emission. It includes all states with no phonons in the vibrational mode while the ions are in a qubit state or in a highly entangled auxiliary state.

To calculate the decoherence-free (DF) states of the system and the effective time evolution of the ions during gate operations we use in the following the quantum jump approach HeWi11 . This method is equivalent to the Monte Carlo wave-function approach HeWi2  and the quantum trajectory method HeWi3  and predicts that the initial atomic state $`|\psi `$ evolves under the condition of no photon emission as

$$|\psi ^0(t)=U_{\mathrm{cond}}(t,0)|\psi .$$
(1)
Here $`U_{\mathrm{cond}}(t,0)`$ is the no-photon time evolution operator and corresponds to the non-Hermitian conditional Hamiltonian $`H_{\mathrm{cond}}`$ HeWi11 . For convenience, $`H_{\mathrm{cond}}`$ has been defined such that

$$P_0(t,\psi )=U_{\mathrm{cond}}(t,0)|\psi ^2$$
(2)
is the probability for no emission in $`(0,t)`$.

The basic assumption of the quantum jump approach is that the effect of the environment on the state of a quantum optical system is the same as the effect of rapidly repeated measurements on the free radiation field whether a photon has been emitted or not schoen . The non-Hermiticity of the conditional Hamiltonian and the continuous decrease of the amplitude of the state vector $`|\psi ^0(t)`$ reflect that the observation of no photons reveals information about the system. The longer no photon is emitted the more unlikely it becomes that there is excitation that might cause an emission and the amplitude of a state with a spontaneous decay rate decreases exponentially in time cook ; heger .

Using the quantum jump approach, a state $`|\psi `$ is DF if $`P_0(t,\psi )=1`$ for all times $`t`$ Beigenjp . Hence, the DFS of a system is spanned by the eigenvectors of the conditional Hamiltonian with real eigenvalues $`\lambda _i`$. The eigenvectors $`|\lambda _i`$ of $`H_{\mathrm{cond}}`$ are in general non-orthogonal. It is therefore useful to introduce the reciprocal basis vectors $`|\lambda ^j`$ with $`\lambda ^j|\lambda _i=\delta _{ij}`$ and to write the conditional Hamiltonian as

$`H_{\mathrm{cond}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{i}{}}\lambda _i|\lambda _i\lambda ^i|.`$ (3)
Suppose that all non-DF states couple strongly to the environment and populating them leads typically to a photon emission within a time $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$. This time $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ is greater than a certain minimal size which can be determined from the quantum jump approach. Provided that the eigenvalues $`\lambda _k`$ corresponding to non-DF states fulfil the condition

$$\mathrm{e}^{\mathrm{i}\lambda _k\mathrm{\Delta }t/\mathrm{}}=0,$$
(4)
the no-photon time evolution operator becomes remark

$$U_{\mathrm{cond}}(\mathrm{\Delta }t,0)=\underset{i:|\lambda _i\mathrm{DFS}}{}\mathrm{e}^{\mathrm{i}\lambda _i\mathrm{\Delta }t/\mathrm{}}|\lambda _i\lambda _i|.$$
(5)
This operator projects every state onto the DFS. The action of the environment over a time $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ can therefore be interpreted as a measurement whether the system is DF or not. The probability for no emission in $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ equals the probability to be in a DF state.

The basic idea of quantum computing using dissipation is to utilise the no-photon time evolution (5) for the implementation of gate operations. As we see below, the continuous measurements caused by the environment on the quantum system lead to a realm of possibilities to induce a DF time evolution between the qubits. The reason for this is that the conditional Hamiltonian $`H_{\mathrm{cond}}`$ can easily be varied by an arbitrary but weak enough interaction without loosing the restriction of the system onto the DFS. As long as the typical time scale of the additional terms in the conditional Hamiltonian is much longer than $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ defined by condition (4) Letter , the resulting effective time evolution is given by (5) to a very good approximation and can be used to generate a unitary operation between the qubits.

The restriction of the system onto the DFS can intuitively be understood with the help of the quantum Zeno effect misra ; behe . Within $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$, a weak interaction can only transfer population proportional to $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ out off the DFS. During the next measurement the system is found in a non-DF state with a probability proportional to $`\mathrm{\Delta }t^2`$. Otherwise it is projected back onto the DFS by the time evolution operator (5). The probability to find the system always in a DF state, i.e. $`T/\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ times if $`T`$ is the gate operation time, goes in the limit of weak interactions, i.e. for $`\mathrm{\Delta }t/T0`$, to one. All transitions out of the DFS are therefore strongly inhibited.

However, the time evolution inside the DFS is not affected. Using first order perturbation theory with respect to the weak interaction, (5) and the assumption that the system is initially in a DF state, one can show that the conditional time evolution in $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ is the same as time evolution obtained from the Hamiltonian

$$H_{\mathrm{eff}}=IP_{\mathrm{DFS}}H_{\mathrm{cond}}IP_{\mathrm{DFS}}$$
(6)
using the same approximations. Here

$$IP_{\mathrm{DFS}}=\underset{i:|\lambda _i\mathrm{DFS}}{}|\lambda _i\lambda _i|$$
(7)
is the projector onto the DFS. The effective Hamiltonian $`H_{\mathrm{eff}}`$ is used in the following to find the appropriate laser configuration for the realisation of certain gate operations.

The reason for the simplicity of the resulting quantum computing schemes is that the DFS of the cold-ion system contains in addition to all ground states, highly entangled states. Through populating these states entanglement between qubits can be created during the effective time evolution even if this would not be possible using the weak interaction alone. In the next section we describe as an example the realisation of universal two-qubits gates within one step by applying different laser fields simultaneously.

Deviations from the effective time evolution occur if the applied interaction is not weak enough and the system moves in $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ slightly out of the DFS. We denote the (non-unitary) correction to the desired effective time evolution in the following by $`A_{\mathrm{corr}}(T,0)`$ so that

$$U_{\mathrm{cond}}(T,0)=U_{\mathrm{eff}}(T,0)A_{\mathrm{corr}}(T,0).$$
(8)
From (2) we then find that the gate success rate $`P_0(T,\psi )`$ equals

$$P_0(T,\psi )=12\mathrm{Re}\psi |U_{\mathrm{eff}}(T,0)A_{\mathrm{corr}}(T,0)|\psi $$
(9)
while the fidelity of a gate operations under the condition of no photon emission is given by

$$F(T,\psi )=\frac{|\psi |U_{\mathrm{eff}}(T,0)U_{\mathrm{cond}}(T,0)|\psi |^2}{P_0(T,\psi )}.$$
(10)
Using Equation (9) it can be shown that the fidelity equals one,

$`F(T,\psi )=1,`$ (11)
in first order in the correction $`A_{\mathrm{corr}}(T,0)`$. Dissipation can indeed be used to implement very precise quantum gates with success rates sufficiently close to one.

Let us now estimate the probability of finding the result of a whole computation assuming that each gate can be performed with maximum fidelity but only with a finite success rate $`P_0`$. The probability of implementing an algorithm of $`N`$ gates faultlessly is $`P_0^N`$ and decreases exponentially with $`N`$. On the other hand, if one always knows whether an algorithm has failed or not, the computation can be repeated until a result is obtained. The probability for not having a result after $`M`$ runs equals

$$P_{\mathrm{no}\mathrm{result}}=\left(\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}1}P_0^N\right)^M.$$
(12)
For large $`N`$ this is approximately $`\mathrm{exp}(MP_0^N)`$. Many repetitions might be necessary to implement a computation. However, for smaller numbers of $`N`$ and if $`P_0`$ is sufficiently close to unity, the failure probability is already nearly negligible for $`MN`$. For example, if $`P_0=95\%`$ and an algorithm with $`N=50`$ gates is performed, then repeating the computation 50 times yields already a success rate above $`98\%`$.

## III Single laser pulse gates

In this section we propose concrete realisations of two-qubit quantum gates for cold trapped ions. Each qubit is obtained from two different atomic ground states $`|0`$ and $`|1`$ of the same ion. In addition, a metastable state $`|2`$ and a rapidly decaying level 3 are required, as shown in Figure 2. First, the ions have to be cooled into the ground state of a common vibrational mode. Two strong laser fields detuned by the frequency $`\nu `$ of a common vibrational mode should be applied. The laser field coupling to the 1-2 transition establishes an “interaction” between the two qubits involved in the gate operation. The laser field driving the 1-3 transition represents the laser cooling setup and can be replaced by any other laser cooling configuration without changing the effective time evolution of the system.

In the following, we denote the spontaneous decay rate of level 3 by $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_3`$ while $`b`$ and $`b^{}`$ are the annihilation and creation operator of a phonon in the common vibrational mode. The coupling constant of this mode to the atomic 1-$`j`$ transition equals $`g_j\frac{1}{2}\eta _j\mathrm{\Omega }_j`$ where $`\mathrm{\Omega }_j`$ is the Rabi frequency of the applied laser field and $`\eta _j`$ is the Lamb Dicke parameter depending on the characteristics of the ion trap. Proceeding as in HeWi11 , one finds that the conditional Hamiltonian within the dipole and the rotating wave approximation and in the interaction picture with respect to the free Hamiltonian equals

$`H_{\mathrm{cond}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{2}{}}}\mathrm{i}\mathrm{}[g_2|1_i2|b^{}+g_3|1_i3|b^{}\mathrm{h}.\mathrm{c}.]`$ (13)
$`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{2}{}}}\frac{\mathrm{i}}{2}\mathrm{}\mathrm{\Gamma }_3|3_i3|.`$
Here the Lamb-Dicke regime and the condition $`\nu \mathrm{\Omega }_2`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_3`$ has been assumed, as in cz .

The DF states of the two ions are spanned by the eigenstates of the conditional Hamiltonian $`H_{\mathrm{cond}}`$ with no population in the unstable state $`|3`$. The DFS of the system therefore contains only superpositions of states with the ions either in the state $`|00`$ combined with an arbitrary state of the vibrational mode or both ions in $`|01`$, $`|10`$, $`|11`$ or in the antisymmetric state

$$|a\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}\left[|12|21\right]$$
(14)
while the vibrational mode is not populated. The DF states correspond indeed to the eigenvectors of $`H_{\mathrm{cond}}`$ with real eigenvalues. Here these are all zero eigenvalues and the system does not evolve as long as no additional interaction is applied.

To realise gate operations between the two qubits weak laser fields are required in addition to the strong lasers shown in Figure 2. Let us denote the Rabi frequency of the laser with respect to the $`j`$-2 transition in ion $`i`$ by $`\mathrm{\Omega }_j^{(i)}`$ and assume that

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_j^{(i)}g_2,g_3\mathrm{and}\mathrm{\Gamma }_3.$$
(15)
The laser Hamiltonian equals then

$`H_{\mathrm{int}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1,2}{}}{\displaystyle \underset{j=0,1}{}}\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{}\mathrm{\Omega }_j^{(i)}|j_i2|+\mathrm{h}.\mathrm{c}.`$ (16)
If the system is restricted onto the DFS, as predicted in the previous section, then the time evolution of the ions can be predicted with the effective Hamiltonian (6) which yields

$`H_{\mathrm{eff}}`$ $`=`$ $`\frac{1}{2\sqrt{2}}\mathrm{}[\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)}|01+\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)}|10`$ (17)
$`+(\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)}\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)})|11]a|+\mathrm{h}.\mathrm{c}.`$
The operation time $`T`$ should be chosen such that all population returns again into the qubit states at the end of each gate operation.

To analyse the no-photon time evolution of the ions in more detail and to determine the optimal parameter regime for quantum gate implementations the notation

$$|\psi ^0\underset{n=0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\underset{i,j=0}{\overset{3}{}}c_{n,ij}|n,ij$$
(18)
is introduced. Here $`c_{n,ij}`$ is the amplitude of the unnormalised state $`|\psi ^0`$ with respect to the state with $`n`$ phonons in the vibrational mode while the ions are in $`|ij`$. Under the condition that

$`\mathrm{\Omega }_j^{(i)}g_2,g_3\mathrm{and}\mathrm{\Gamma }_3,`$ (19)
the coefficients $`c_{n,ij}`$ of all non-DF states change on a much faster time scale than the coefficients of the DF states. They can therefore be eliminated adiabatically by setting their derivatives equal to zero. Using (13), (16) and the Schrödinger equation for the no-photon time evolution we obtain

$`\dot{c}_{0,00}`$ $`=`$ $`2k_1\left[\left(\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)2}+\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)2}\right)c_{0,00}+\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)}\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)}c_{0,10}+\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)}\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)}c_{0,01}\right]`$
$`\dot{c}_{0,01}`$ $`=`$ $`\frac{\mathrm{i}}{2\sqrt{2}}\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)}c_{0,a}k_1\left[\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)}\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)}c_{0,00}+\left(2\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)2}+\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)2}\right)c_{0,01}+\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)}\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)}c_{0,10}+\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)}\left(\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)}+\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)}\right)c_{0,11}\right]`$
$`\dot{c}_{0,10}`$ $`=`$ $`\frac{\mathrm{i}}{2\sqrt{2}}\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)}c_{0,a}k_1\left[\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)}\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)}c_{0,00}+\left(2\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)2}+\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)2}\right)c_{0,10}+\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)}\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)}c_{0,01}+\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)}\left(\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)}+\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)}\right)c_{0,11}\right]`$
$`\dot{c}_{0,11}`$ $`=`$ $`\frac{\mathrm{i}}{2\sqrt{2}}[(\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)}\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)})c_{0,a}k_1(\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)}+\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)})[\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)}c_{0,01}+\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)}c_{0,10}+(\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)}+\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)})c_{0,11}]`$
$`\dot{c}_{0,a}`$ $`=`$ $`\frac{\mathrm{i}}{2\sqrt{2}}\left[\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)}c_{0,01}\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)}c_{0,10}+\left(\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)}\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)}\right)c_{0,11}\right]k_2\left(\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)}\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)}\right)^2c_{0,a}`$ (20)
with

$$k_1\frac{g_3^2}{4g_2^2\mathrm{\Gamma }_3},k_2\frac{\mathrm{\Gamma }_3}{32g_3^2}+\frac{1}{8\mathrm{\Gamma }_3}\left[\frac{g_2^2}{g_3^2}+\frac{g_3^2}{g_2^2}1\right].$$
(21)
As long as the parameters $`k_1`$ and $`k_2`$ multiplied with the Rabi frequencies $`\mathrm{\Omega }_j^{(i)}`$ in the effective Hamiltonian (17) are much smaller than one, the system behaves indeed as predicted by the quantum Zeno effect.

In the following subsections we discuss in detail three concrete quantum gate implementations, starting with the CNOT gate. This gate, as well as the phase gate, constitutes together with the single-qubit rotation a universal set of quantum gates michael . Another gate, which as we will see can easily be performed with a very high fidelity and success rate is the SWAP operation.

### III.1 CNOT gate

If ion 1 contains the target qubit and ion 2 provides the control qubit, then the CNOT gate is given by the time evolution operator

$$U_{\mathrm{gate}}=|0000|+|0101|+|1011|+|1110|.$$
(22)
The easiest way to realise this gate is when one laser couples with the (real) Rabi frequency $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ to the 1-2 transition of ion 1 and another one with the same Rabi frequency to the 0-2 transition of ion 2, i.e.

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)}=\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)}\mathrm{\Omega }\mathrm{and}\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)}=\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)}=0.$$
(23)
This parameter choice corresponds to the effective Hamiltonian

$`H_{\mathrm{eff}}`$ $`=`$ $`\frac{1}{2\sqrt{2}}\mathrm{}\mathrm{\Omega }\left[|10|11\right]a|+\mathrm{h}.\mathrm{c}.`$ (24)
If the duration of the laser pulse equals

$$T=2\pi /\mathrm{\Omega },$$
(25)
the resulting time evolution is exactly the desired CNOT operation.

From (III) and first order perturbation theory we find that the correction of the no-photon time evolution to the effective time evolution of the DF states equals in first order in $`k_i\mathrm{\Omega }`$

$`A_{\mathrm{corr}}(T,0)`$ $`=`$ $`2\mathrm{\Omega }^2k_1T|0000|`$ (26)
$`+\frac{1}{4}\mathrm{\Omega }^2(7k_1+k_2)T[|1011|+\mathrm{h}.\mathrm{c}.]`$
$`+\frac{1}{4}\mathrm{\Omega }^2(5k_1k_2)T\left[|1010|+|1111|\right]`$
$`2\sqrt{2}\mathrm{i}\mathrm{\Omega }k_1[|10a|+|11a|+\mathrm{h}.\mathrm{c}.]`$
$`+\left[1\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{\Omega }^2(k_1+k_2)T\right]|aa|.`$
This leads to the no-photon probability and gate success rate

$`P_0(T,\psi )`$ $`=`$ $`14\mathrm{\Omega }^2k_1T|c_{0,00}|^2`$ (27)
$`\mathrm{\Omega }^2(5k_1k_2)T\mathrm{Re}\left[c_{0,10}c_{0,11}^{}\right]`$
$`\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{\Omega }^2(7k_1+k_2)T\left[|c_{0,10}|^2+|c_{0,11}|^2\right]`$
$`4\sqrt{2}\mathrm{\Omega }k_1\mathrm{Im}\left[c_{0,a}c_{0,10}^{}+c_{0,a}c_{0,11}^{}\right]`$
which is very close to one as long as $`k_1T`$ and $`k_2T`$ are small. Using (26) one can calculate the gate fidelity under the condition of no photons. As expected, it equals one in first order in $`k_i\mathrm{\Omega }`$.

Let us now determine the parameters that maximise the minimal gate success rate $`P_0(T,\psi )`$ on average, this means independent from the initial qubit state. From (2) we find that

$$P_0(T,\psi )\underset{i}{\mathrm{min}}\left\{\left|\mu _i\right|^2\right\}$$
(28)
if $`\mu _i`$ are the eigenvalues of the conditional time evolution operator (26). These are always smaller but close to one. Calculating them we find that up to first order in $`k_i`$ one has

$$P_0(T,\psi )1\mathrm{\Omega }^2\mathrm{max}\{(k_1+k_2)T,\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}6}k_1T\}.$$
(29)
Optimising this we find that for a fixed ratio of $`\mathrm{\Omega }/g_2`$ the CNOT gate works most reliable if

$$g_{3\mathrm{o}\mathrm{p}\mathrm{t}}=\sqrt{2}g_2\mathrm{and}\mathrm{\Gamma }_{3\mathrm{o}\mathrm{p}\mathrm{t}}=2\sqrt{37}g_2.$$
(30)
For these parameters one has, for all qubit states $`|\psi `$,

$$P_{0\mathrm{o}\mathrm{p}\mathrm{t}}(T,\psi )13\pi \mathrm{\Omega }/(\sqrt{37}g_2).$$
(31)
The success rate of the gate operation assumes its minimum if $`|\psi `$ is a superposition of the states $`|10`$ and $`|11`$. For all other initial qubit states the success rate is even closer or equal to one.

Figure 3 results from a numerical solution of the no-photon time evolution given by the sum of the Hamiltonians (13) and (16). The success rate $`P_0`$ is in good agreement with the theoretical predictions (31). For very small Rabi frequencies, the gate success rate and fidelity is for all initial states close to one. For larger values of $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$, the gate success rate decreases and can for $`\mathrm{\Omega }=0.2g_2`$ be as low as $`73\%`$. The gate fidelity is in this case still above $`98.4\%`$. The smallest gate success rate is found when the atoms are initially in $`|10`$, $`|11`$ or in a superposition of these two states. Success rates $`P_0>90\%`$ are achieved as long as $`\mathrm{\Omega }<0.07g_2`$. The fidelity $`F(T,\psi )`$ is in this case larger than $`99.8\%`$ and the gate duration time $`T`$ is about $`90/g_2`$.

Finally, we would like to comment on the role of the spontaneous decay rate of level 3 in the scheme. Figure 4 shows the fidelity of a single CNOT gate as a function of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_3`$ and for $`g_3=\mathrm{\Gamma }_3`$. In the chosen parameter regime, the effective damping rate of unwanted population in non-DF states can be shown to equal $`g_3^2/\mathrm{\Gamma }_3=\mathrm{\Gamma }_3`$ to a very good approximation and the effective decay rate of non-DF states increases linearly in $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_3`$. Figure 4 confirms that the presence of the auxiliary dissipation channels is crucial for the scheme to work! For small damping rates the mechanism which restricts the time evolution of the system onto the computational subspace fails and the minimum gate fidelity is well below $`50\%`$. If performed with ions with a larger spontaneous decay rate $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_3`$, the scheme works precisely – although this parameter should also not be too large since this would introduce an additional fast time scale into the system and the assumptions made to derive the differential equations (III) would no longer be valid.

### III.2 Phase gate

Another two-qubit quantum gate, whose realisation is even simpler than the realisation of the CNOT gate, is the phase gate that changes the sign of the amplitude of the qubit state $`|01`$ but leaves all other basis states unchanged. It requires only one weak laser pulse in addition to the laser excitation shown in Figure 2 simple . This pulse addresses the 0-2 transition in atom 1 and one should choose

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)}\mathrm{\Omega }\mathrm{and}\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)}=\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)}=\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)}=0.$$
(32)
From (17) we see that this choice of parameters corresponds to the effective Hamiltonian

$`H_{\mathrm{eff}}`$ $`=`$ $`\frac{1}{2\sqrt{2}}\mathrm{}\mathrm{\Omega }|01a|+\mathrm{h}.\mathrm{c}.`$ (33)
and the weak laser field should be turned off after a time

$$T=2\sqrt{2}\pi /\mathrm{\Omega }.$$
(34)
To change the sign of the qubit state $`|10`$ one can proceed in exactly the same way but with $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)}\mathrm{\Omega }`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)}=\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)}=\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)}=0`$.

Using the differential equations (III) and first order perturbation theory we find that the correction $`A_{\mathrm{corr}}(T,0)`$ to the effective time evolution equals in first order $`k_1\mathrm{\Omega }`$

$`A_{\mathrm{corr}}(T,0)`$ $`=`$ $`\sqrt{2}\pi k_1\mathrm{\Omega }\left[\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}4}|0000||0101|\right].`$ (35)
This leads to the no-photon probability

$`P_0(T,\psi )`$ $`=`$ $`12\sqrt{2}\pi k_1\mathrm{\Omega }\left[\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}4}|c_{0,00}|^2+|c_{0,01}|^2\right]`$ (36)
which is very close to unity as long as $`k_1\mathrm{\Omega }1`$. Calculating the fidelity under the condition of no photon emission (10) one finds again that it does not differ from one in first order.

Figure 5 results from a numerical solution of the no-photon time evolution of the system for the same parameters as in Figure 3. The success rate and the conditional fidelity of a single phase gate are of similar size as in the previous subsection and the scheme works very well for small Rabi frequencies $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$. As initial states we considered only the the qubit states $`|00`$ and $`|01`$ since they are the only ones affected by the laser field. If the ions are initially in $`|10`$ or $`|11`$, the fidelity and success rates of the phase gate are exactly one.

### III.3 SWAP operation

Another quantum gate that can be implemented relatively easy is the SWAP operation. It transforms the state $`|01`$ into $`|10`$ and vice versa but leaves $`|00`$ and $`|11`$ unchanged. The realisation of this gate does not require individual laser addressing of the ions and one should choose

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)}=\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)}\mathrm{\Omega }\mathrm{and}\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)}=\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)}=0.$$
(37)
For these Rabi frequencies the effective Hamiltonian (17) becomes

$`H_{\mathrm{eff}}`$ $`=`$ $`\frac{1}{2\sqrt{2}}\mathrm{}\mathrm{\Omega }\left[|01+|10\right]a|+\mathrm{h}.\mathrm{c}.`$ (38)
and the duration of the weak laser pulse should equal

$$T=2\pi /\mathrm{\Omega }.$$
(39)
The SWAP gate can be very useful. It exchanges the states of two qubits without that the corresponding ions have to swap their places physically.

Proceeding as in the previous subsection, the correction to the desired effective time evolution reads

$`A_{\mathrm{corr}}(T,0)`$ $`=`$ $`2\pi k_1\mathrm{\Omega }[\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}4}|0000|+|0101|+|1010|`$ (40)
$`+|0110|+|1001|]|0_{\mathrm{vib}}0|`$
and the gate success rate becomes

$`P_0(T,\psi )`$ $`=`$ $`14\pi k_1\mathrm{\Omega }[\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}4}|c_{0,00}|^2+|c_{0,01}|^2+|c_{0,10}|^2`$ (41)
$`+2\mathrm{Re}\left(c_{0,01}c_{0,10}^{}\right)].`$
Again, the fidelity under the condition of no photon emission can be shown to equal one in first order $`k_1\mathrm{\Omega }`$. A comparison with (27) shows that the success rate of each SWAP gate is of similar size as for the phase gate discussed in the previous subsection.

### III.4 Dissipation-assisted quantum gates

A closer look at the differential equations (III) reveals that for fixed gate operation times relatively small corrections to the effective time evolution (17) are obtained if

$$\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)}\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)}=0\mathrm{and}\mathrm{\Gamma }_3g_3.$$
(42)
Then all terms proportional to $`k_2`$ vanish in (III) and the terms proportional to $`k_1`$ become relatively small. The corresponding gates are relatively easy to realise because they require only one weak laser field applied to the 0-2 transition in each atom. The effective Hamiltonian is in this case given by

$`H_{\mathrm{eff}}`$ $`=`$ $`\frac{1}{2\sqrt{2}}\mathrm{}\left[\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(1)}|01+\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(2)}|10\right]a|+\mathrm{h}.\mathrm{c}.`$
and can be realised with $`\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(1)}=\mathrm{\Omega }_1^{(2)}=0`$. The above described phase gate and SWAP operation are examples for quantum gates that can be implemented in this way and they are the only gates for whom the presence of the auxiliary dissipation channel is not crucial for the scheme to work.

Remarkable about the effective time evolution (III.4) is that cooling plays indeed a different role for its realisation than in the case of the CNOT gate which only works because of dissipation. Suppose the quantum Zeno effect provides the basic mechanisms that restricts the system onto the DFS. Then one would expect that the quantum gate works the better if one increases the value of $`g_3^2/\mathrm{\Gamma }_3`$ since this number relates directly to the spontaneous decay rate of non-DF states. Instead it can be shown that the phase gate and the SWAP operation work the better the smaller $`g_3^2/\mathrm{\Gamma }_3`$ since this implies smaller values for $`k_1`$. Both gates can even be implemented in the absence of cooling for $`g_3=\mathrm{\Gamma }_3=0`$ simple .

The mechanism which yields the effective Hamiltonian (III.4) in this subsection is adiabaticity resulting from the presence of two different times scales in the system. One is given by the weak Rabi frequencies $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0^{(i)}`$ and the other one by the coupling constant $`g_2`$. To guarantee a success rate close to one, quantum gates based on adiabatic passages are as slow as gates based on a quantum Zeno effect. Advantages arise when the system is operated outside the adiabatic regime with gate operation times of about the same size as $`1/g_2`$. In this regime, cooling has the same effect as error detection measurements. Under the condition of no photon emission, the system behaves as predicted by adiabaticity. The presence of the auxiliary dissipation channel exponentially damps away the population that accumulates due to non-adiabaticity in unwanted states. The resulting process can be called a dissipation-assisted adiabatic passage simple . The price one pays for the speed up of gate operations is a decrease of the gate success rate $`P_0`$.

Figure 6 shows the fidelity of a single phase gate under the condition of no photon emission for a wider range of Rabi frequencies $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ than assumed in Figures 3 and 5. The fidelity of the finally obtained state is for $`g_3=\mathrm{\Gamma }_3=0`$ very close to one as long as $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ is much smaller than $`g_2`$ (see Figure 6(a)). Note that the same fidelity close to one can be achieved for higher Rabi frequencies, and therefore also for shorter gate operation times, in the presence of dissipation (see Figure 6(b)). Choosing $`g_3=g_2`$ and $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_3=0`$ improves the precision of the performed gate operation even further, corresponds to the gate success rate $`P_01`$ but does not provide cooling of the ions during gate operations (see Figure 6(c)).

## IV Robustness against parameter fluctuations

In this Section we discuss in detail the robustness of the proposed quantum computing scheme with respect to parameter fluctuations and analyse the effect of variations of Rabi frequencies and the presence of detunings. The independence of the scheme from the precise value of most experimental parameters is a big advantage of the proposed quantum computing scheme and applies to quantum computing schemes using dissipation in general.

### IV.1 Effect of detunings

In the following we denote the detuning of the laser field that establishes the coupling of the ions to the common vibrational mode by $`\mathrm{\Delta }_2`$. The reason for the independence of the no-photon time evolution of the system from this parameter arises from the different role of the ion-phonon interaction in the present scheme compared to other quantum computing schemes with cold trapped ions. Here the interaction does not cause a transfer of excitation into a common vibrational mode. Instead, its presence introduces a fast time scale into the system which prevents transitions into unwanted states. During gate operations, the phonon mode becomes only virtually populated.

To visualise the role of the vibrational mode in the scheme it is useful to have a look at all levels and transitions involved in the time evolution of the system. As an example we survey in the following the phase gate which has been introduced in Section III.2. Its level scheme is shown in Figure 7 and is much simpler than the level configurations for the CNOT gate and the SWAP operation. Still, the independence of detunings described here applies to single laser pulse gates with cold trapped ions in general and can be shown for all other gates in the same way.

If initially only qubit states are populated, then the time evolution of the system during a phase gate implementation involves only the eleven levels shown in Figure 7. Let us define the interaction-free Hamiltonian $`H_0`$ as

$`H_0`$ $`=`$ $`H_{\mathrm{ions}}+H_{\mathrm{phonons}}\mathrm{}\mathrm{\Delta }_2[|1,101,10|`$
$`+|1,111,11|+|0,300,30|+|0,s_{13}0,s_{13}|],`$
where $`\mathrm{\Delta }_2`$ is the detuning of the strong laser field driving the 1-2 transition of each ion and

$$|s_{1j}\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}\left[|1j+|j1\right].$$
(45)
In the interaction picture with respect to this Hamiltonian, the Hamiltonian describing the no-photon time evolution of the system becomes

$`H_{\mathrm{cond}}`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{i}\mathrm{}g_2\left[|0,201,10|+\sqrt{2}|0,s_{12}1,11|\right]`$ (46)
$`+\mathrm{i}\mathrm{}g_3\left[|1,100,30|+\sqrt{2}|1,110,s_{13}|\right]`$
$`+\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{}\mathrm{\Omega }[|0,000,20|+\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}|0,010,s_{12}|`$
$`+\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}|0,010,a|]+\mathrm{h}.\mathrm{c}.+\mathrm{}\mathrm{\Delta }_2[|1,101,10|`$
$`+|1,111,11|]\mathrm{}(\frac{\mathrm{i}}{2}\mathrm{\Gamma }_3\mathrm{\Delta }_2\left)\right[|0,300,30|`$
$`+|0,s_{13}0,s_{13}|].`$
One can easily check that the effective Hamiltonian (6) of the system does not depend on the detuning $`\mathrm{\Delta }_2`$. In a first approximation, the time evolution of the system does not change, even if the detuning $`\mathrm{\Delta }_2`$ is about the same size as $`g_2`$.

This is in good agreement with the numerical results shown in Figure 8 which has been obtained by solving the no-photon time evolution of the system with the Hamiltonian (IV.1). As expected, the presence of the detuning $`\mathrm{\Delta }_2`$ has only a small effect on the success rate of the scheme. The fidelity of the gate operation under the condition of no photon emission decreases less than one percent even if $`\mathrm{\Delta }_2`$ becomes as big as the ion-phonon coupling constant $`g_2`$. However, the amplitude of the finally prepared state collects a phase factor in the presence of detuning. Depending on the initial qubit state, this phase can differ up to $`12^{}`$ from the desired phase (see Figure 8).

Analogously, it can be shown that detunings in the cooling laser setup affect the effective time evolution of the system only slightly. Detunings of the weak laser field with Rabi frequency $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ have to be taken into account because they lead to an additional term in the effective Hamiltonian (6).

### IV.2 Fluctuations of Rabi frequencies

Let us now assume again zero detunings and discuss the effect of fluctuations of Rabi frequencies on the desired time evolution of the system. The analysis in Section III showed already that the performance of the proposed quantum gate operations does not depend on the size of the ion-phonon coupling constants $`g_2`$ and $`g_3`$ and the decay rate $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_3`$ as long as these rates are big enough. In the formalism this is reflected by the fact that the effective Hamiltonians (24), (33) and (38) depend only on $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$. In this subsection we show that the scheme is also widely robust against fluctuations of the weak Rabi frequency $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$.

The reason for this robustness is that the effective Hamiltonian can be written as $`H_{\mathrm{eff}}=\mathrm{\Omega }M`$ where $`M`$ is a time independent operator. This is the case for all three quantum gates discussed in the previous Section. Let us assume that the Rabi frequency $`\mathrm{\Omega }=\mathrm{\Omega }(t)`$. The effective time evolution operator of the system is then given by

$`U_{\mathrm{eff}}(T,0)`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{exp}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{i}}{\mathrm{}}}{\displaystyle _0^T}dt\mathrm{\Omega }(t)M\right]`$ (47)
and depends only on the integral $`_0^Tdt\mathrm{\Omega }(t)`$. High fidelities require therefore only precise control of this time integral. With respect to fluctuations of system parameters, quantum computing schemes using dissipation share some features with schemes that employ holonomies or geometrical time evolutions pachoszanardi  or similar dynamical processes to implement quantum gate operations.

Finally, we would like to comment on the effect of shaped laser pulses on the quantum gate performance. As an example we consider again the phase gate and assume

$$\mathrm{\Omega }(t)=2\mathrm{\Omega }_0\mathrm{sin}^2\left[\frac{1}{2\sqrt{2}}\mathrm{\Omega }_0t\right]$$
(48)
while the gate operation time should be chosen as

$$T=2\sqrt{2}\pi /\mathrm{\Omega }_0.$$
(49)
The integral $`_0^Tdt\mathrm{\Omega }(t)`$ is then the same as in Subsection III.2 and the Rabi frequency $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ equals zero at the end of the gate operation. Motivation for assuming a time dependence as in (48) is to minimise the corrections to the desired time evolution and to increase the fidelity of the finally prepared state without increasing the gate operation time.

Figure 9 results from a numerical simulation of the no-photon time evolution of the system and shows that $`F(T,\psi )`$ can be improved even further. The gate fidelity is now for many initial states closer to one and for all initial states above $`99.2\%`$, even if $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0=0.2g_2`$. A comparison of Figure 9 with Figure 5 reveals that the price one has to pay for this improvement of the precision of the scheme is a reduction of the gate success rate $`P_0(T,\psi )`$ for certain initial qubit states by a few percent. (Note that the gate operation times $`T`$ are in both Figures the same when $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0`$ are the same.) Similar results can be derived for other single-laser pulse quantum gates with cold trapped ions.

## V Conclusions

We discussed the possibility to implement precise quantum gates between cold trapped ions in the presence of cooling of a common vibrational mode within one step. That the proposed quantum computing scheme is feasible with present technology has recently been demonstrated in an experiment in Innsbruck nature1 . The setup for the realisation of the Cirac-Zoller CNOT gate with Calcium ions reported in nature1  is very similar to the setup needed for the implementation of the two-qubit phase gate and the SWAP operation presented in this paper. Both quantum computing schemes require cooling of the ions to the vibrational ground state and a strong laser field to establish a coupling between the ions. In addition only one laser pulse is needed. To implement the phase gate, this laser has to excite one of the ions resonantly.

Because of its simplicity and robustness, the proposed scheme might help to increase the number of qubits in present quantum computing experiments. One of its advantages is that it offers a great variety of ways to implement gate operations, which can all be performed within one step. Laser cooling is not only possible between computations but should be applied continuously. An additional ion species for sympathetic cooling, as proposed in morigi , is not required. Although the system remains continuously in the ground state of a common vibrational mode, the presence of the cooling laser setup decreases the probability for heating even if no photons are actually scattered from the ions eschner .

Another major benefit of the proposed quantum computing scheme is its independence from fluctuations of most experimental parameters. To guarantee a high precision of gate operations only one of the applied laser fields has to be controlled relatively well. Its Rabi frequency integrated over the gate operation time has to equal a certain value. All other Rabi frequencies, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_2`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }_3`$, do not enter the effective time evolution of the system and the scheme does not depend on their concrete value as long as they are big enough. The proposed setup can also tolerate a detuning of the laser field which establishes the coupling of the ions to the vibrational mode, even if this detuning is of the same size as the ion-phonon coupling constant $`g_2`$.

Error detection is already included in the scheme simple . If a gate operation fails or heating leads to the population of higher phonon modes, then photons are emitted at a high rate. This can easily be detected and the whole computation can be restarted if necessary. In this way, the system is protected against certain kinds of errors. As long as the gate success rate is sufficiently close to one, quantum computing can still be more efficient than performing the same computation on a conventional computer.

A disadvantage of the presented quantum computing scheme is that its gate operation times are longer than in many other setups. For example, the implementation of a single two-qubit phase gate requires the time $`T=2\sqrt{2}\pi /\mathrm{\Omega }`$ where $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ can be as large as $`0.1`$ times the ion-phonon coupling constant $`g_2`$. Under the condition of no photon emission, this guarantees a fidelity above $`99.6\%`$ and a gate success rate above $`85\%`$, independent of the initial state of the ions (see Figure 5). Higher fidelities and success rates are obtained for smaller Rabi frequencies and longer gate operation times.

Acknowledgement. A.B. would like to thank Ferdinand Schmidt-Kaler, Wolfgang Lange and David J. Wineland for helpful and interesting comments. This work was supported by the Royal Society in form of a University Research Fellowship and by the EPSRC and the European Union in part.


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# An H𝛼 survey aiming at the detection of extraplanar diffuse ionized gas in halos of edge–on spiral galaxies Based on observations collected at the European Southern Observatory, Chile (ESO No. 63.N–0070, ESO No. 64.N–0034, ESO No. 65.N.–0002).

## 1 Introduction

In recent years observations revealed the presence of an extraplanar diffuse ionized gas (eDIG) layer (e.g., Rand 1996; Rossa & Dettmar 2000) in a few late–type spiral galaxies, similar to the Reynolds layer in the Milky Way (e.g., Reynolds et al. 1999). The occurrence of such a layer in a galaxy is most likely a direct consequence of the strength of SF activity in the disk of each individual galaxy. The strength of SF activity both on local and global scales plays an important role. It was already assumed in previous studies that the star formation activity in the disk of spiral galaxies is correlated with the presence of DIG and its extent in the halos of these galaxies.

Current models, trying to explain the gas and energy transport from the disk into the halo, have been developed over a decade ago (e.g., Norman & Ikeuchi 1989) where the gas from the disk emanates into the halo, the so called chimney phenomenon, driven by collective SNe. A few theoretical concepts for outflow phenomena besides chimneys have been established as well, such as galactic fountains (e.g., Shapiro & Field 1976; Bregman 1980), or the superbubble outbreak scenario (Mac Low & McCray 1988). Observations have confirmed a disk–halo connection. This was successfully demonstrated for several edge–on spirals (e.g., Dettmar 1990; Rand et al. 1990; Pildis et al. 1994; Rand 1996; Rossa & Dettmar 2000).

The models can explain some of the observed outflow phenomena of the interstellar gas, but they are far away from giving a coherent picture of the whole situation. As it is argued by Lehnert & Heckman (1996) many starburst galaxies follow the condition of a superwind, which drives the outbraking gas from bubbles into the halo. The theory of such a superwind was developed in the mid eighties (Chevalier & Clegg 1985). Recent studies of actively star–forming regions in edge–on galaxies gave evidence for a superwind (for a recent review see Heckman 2001), such as in the case of NGC 4666 (Dahlem et al. 1997). Similar conditions apply for M 82 and NGC 4631 (Bland & Tully 1988), and for NGC 3079 (Cecil et al. 2002). It is, however, currently unclear whether it is also a superwind that causes outflows in galaxies with much lower SF activity.

Most of the recent studies focused on the different morphology of the DIG (e.g., plumes, filaments, loops) in order to describe the overall distribution and structure in halos, for example the spectacular filaments of the nearby galaxy NGC 55 (Ferguson et al. 1996). Only one recent study addressed the correlation with global properties from a larger sample of objects. However, this study (Lehnert & Heckman 1995, hereafter LH95) selected only measures such as the IR–luminosity as the primary selection criterion, but this can be biased by strong local star–forming activity. Therefore, their sample is strongly biased against low luminosity galaxies which are not covered at all.

It is therefore important to consider selection criteria in addition to the IR properties. To study an unbiased sample (in the sense of FIR emission), it is essential to deal with a distribution of IR–luminosities, containing galaxies with low and high values of the IR–fluxes, rather than selecting only IR bright galaxies, in order to find the division between those galaxies showing outflows, and those which do not bear any signs of disk–halo interaction at all. Furthermore, it could be important to make use of a sample which includes also different galaxy types in the sense of evolution, covering early–type spirals (Sa) as well as late–type spirals (Sc). Since there are indications for DIG in early–type spirals (cf. Dettmar 1992), this aspect has to be investigated, too. Indeed, there were a few cases where strong star formation has been found among some early–type face–on spirals (e.g., Hameed & Devereux 1999).

In an approach to study the star–forming activity, which is traced by the diffuse ionized gas (DIG), we have defined specific selection criteria concerning the sample of our program galaxies. For this reason we have observed a large sample of galaxies, comprising edge–on spiral galaxies with very different FIR luminosities and different Hubble types. Since the SFR is correlated with the FIR luminosity, we will try to trace the fainter end of the FIR luminosity distribution, to find the division between galaxies with high star formation activity (e.g., starbursts) and galaxies with low star formation activity (non–starbursts) via the detection/non–detection of star–formation–driven outflows. By clearly showing non–detections (at the level of our sensitivity limit) of any DIG features in the less active galaxies of this sample, we will be able to derive the minimal SFR per unit area which is necessary to lead to such outflows. This is important for the understanding of the physics of the interstellar medium and for the evolution of galaxies, since this process is closely related to mass loss and chemical evolution. Finally, these observations can be compared with recent theoretical models, such as the superbubble outbreak scenario (Mac Low & Ferrara 1999).

Some of the basic questions we want to address in this investigation are the following: How common are galactic gaseous halos and what is the morphology of eDIG? What properties (parameters) determine the presence of galactic outflows? Is there a minimal SFR per unit area, at which gaseous outflows can be detected?

## 2 H$`\alpha `$ survey selection criteria

The diffuse ionized gas (DIG), frequently also called WIM (warm ionized medium) is best traced by the relatively bright H$`\alpha `$ emission. From a first sub–sample, which was discussed in detail in Rossa & Dettmar (2000), it became clear that there is a need for a larger sample in order to quantify the observed outflows (i.e. to derive a measure for the minimal SF activity per unit area), and to have a large sample for good statistical information as well. Whereas FIR bright galaxies have already been studied in detail in the context of disk–halo interaction (Lehnert & Heckman 1995, 1996), there was a need for studying a broader distribution in FIR flux coverage. The target galaxies for our unbiased (in the sense of SF activity) H$`\alpha `$ survey have been selected primarily by the broad coverage of the FIR luminosity (for those with high and those with low FIR luminosities) and the edge–on character of the galaxies, where the halo separates from the disk very well in projection. Moreover, the selected galaxies should not be too large, in order to fit into the field of view (FOV) of the used instruments and to avoid assembling a mosaic from several sub–frames, which would be time consuming. This constraint applies to almost all of our target galaxies. On the other hand the galaxies should not be too small, so that the possible DIG features cannot be resolved. Therefore, a minimum apparent diameter of $`3^{}`$ was chosen, to make an useful investigation. To study any DIG features in the halos, the galaxies should be almost edge–on. We chose a minimum inclination angle of $`76^{}`$, determined by the galaxy axial ratios (see below). The selection of the final target galaxies was based on the RC3 catalog (de Vaucouleurs et al. 1991), and also on the Flat Galaxy Catalogue (FGC), published by Karachentsev et al. (1993). To see, whether or in how far companion galaxies may trigger active star formation, we have included in our sample some edge–on galaxies with associated companions (also taken from the above mentioned catalogs), to study this aspect, too. The observations for this survey have been divided into three individual observing runs on the southern hemisphere, and two on the northern hemisphere, to cover the complete R.A. interval and to have an even more homogeneous sample.

The final selection criteria for our H$`\alpha `$ survey are shortly summarized below

* spiral galaxies
* unbiased galaxy sample with respect to the FIR flux
* broad coverage of SF activity
* $`i76^{}`$ (majority has $`i80^{}`$)
* $`3^{}D_{25}12^{}`$
* $`v_{\mathrm{rad}}6000\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$
* availability of the desired H$`\alpha `$ filters according to redshifts of the galaxies

The observations for the northern hemisphere galaxies have been performed with CAFOS111Calar Alto Faint Object Spectrograph in direct imaging mode, attached to the CAHA 2.2 m telescope (Spain). The southern hemisphere galaxies have been observed with DFOSC222Danish Faint Object Spectrograph Camera in imaging mode, attached to the Danish 1.54 m telescope at La Silla/Chile. More observational details are presented in our second paper, which gives the full details on each individual galaxy (Rossa & Dettmar 2003).

All the galaxies, which did fit the above mentioned selection criteria, were first inspected visually on the basis of the Digitized Sky Survey (DSS). Initially, about 200 galaxies were regarded as suitable candidates for our investigation. However, further constraints did arise. In several cases bright foreground stars, that were projected onto the galaxy disk, have been detected on the DSS images. Those galaxies have been rejected, since bright stars will cause artifacts which make it difficult to locate DIG. Furthermore, galaxies in compact groups have been rejected as well, since close galaxy pairs may also trigger outflows through interactions. However, we did include wide pairs of galaxies in a few cases. A certain fraction of the galaxies that were in our initial list have already been observed by other investigators (e.g., Pildis et al. 1994; Lehnert & Heckman 1995; Rand 1996; Hoopes et al. 1999). Except in a very few cases (for comparison with our sensitivities) we did refrain from re–observing these galaxies. Moreover, several galaxies have been dropped from our list, since their redshifts were in conflict with the wavelength coverage of the available H$`\alpha `$ filters.

Finally, about 120 galaxies did fulfill all of our selection criteria. We observed 65 of these galaxies, given the object visibility at our various scheduled observing runs. Adding the nine observed galaxies from our recent study (Rossa & Dettmar 2000), our survey consists of 74 galaxies in total. Although this is the largest H$`\alpha `$ survey to date investigating DIG in edge–on galaxies, it should be mentioned that it is not a statistically complete sample. Nevertheless, we have carefully selected our galaxies, to study the fainter end of the FIR luminosity distribution. In fact, 12 of our galaxies have not been detected with IRAS in the FIR. We therefore do have a sufficiently high fraction of galaxies, with very low FIR–fluxes, which populate the faint end of the FIR–distribution, in which we were interested in.

## 3 Results

In the following we present some important properties of the survey galaxies. In Fig. 1 we have plotted a histogram showing the distribution of the galaxy types of our survey galaxies. It is evident from this plot that the early–type spirals are underrepresented, as we gave more weight to the late–type spirals.

The distribution of the radial velocities of the survey galaxies is shown in Fig. 2. Most of the survey galaxies have velocities of less than $`v_{\mathrm{rad}}4000\mathrm{km}\mathrm{s}^1`$. The inclinations of the galaxies have been determined using the following formula (Hubble 1926)

$$\mathrm{cos}^2i=\frac{q^2q_0^2}{1q_0^2}$$
(1)
where $`q=b/a`$ denotes the axial ratio of the galaxy, and $`q_0`$ is an intrinsic flattening parameter of the ellipsoid representing the galaxy. A value of $`q_0`$=0.20 has been derived by Holmberg (1946), which is often adopted.

In Fig. 3 we present a histogram of the distribution of the FIR flux ratio ($`S_{60}/S_{100}`$) for the 62 IRAS detected survey galaxies, as well as for the LH95 starburst sample, clearly showing the parameter space covered in the LH95 study ($`S_{60}/S_{100}0.4`$), and our survey galaxies peaking at values of 0.2–0.35.

In Fig. 4 we have plotted the distribution of the FIR luminosity of the 62 IRAS detected survey galaxies, logarithmically in units of solar luminosities, ranging from a few $`10^8\mathrm{L}_{\mathrm{}}`$ to $`10^{11}\mathrm{L}_{\mathrm{}}`$. The FIR luminosities have been calculated according to (Lonsdale et al. 1989)

$$L_{\mathrm{FIR}}=3.1\times 10^{39}D^2[2.58S_{60}+S_{100}],$$
(2)
where $`D`$ is the distance to the galaxy in Mpc, $`S_{60}`$ and $`S_{100}`$ are the FIR flux densities in Jansky at 60$`\mu `$m and 100$`\mu `$m, respectively.

## 4 Physical properties of the survey galaxies

### 4.1 Diagnostic DIG diagrams

In Fig. 5. we have plotted the Diagnostic DIG Diagram (cf. Rossa & Dettmar 2000) for our survey galaxies, together with the starburst sample studied by LH95. The FIR color ($`S_{60}/S_{100}`$) for the 62 edge–on galaxies of our H$`\alpha `$ survey, which have been detected with IRAS is plotted as a function of the FIR luminosity per unit area. The filled symbols indicate galaxies where eDIG has been detected. They separate clearly from the eDIG non–detections (denoted by open squares) in this diagram. All IRAS warm galaxies ($`S_{60}/S_{100}0.4`$) show eDIG. This is valid for the LH95 sample, as well as for our investigated galaxies, even though they have much lower values of $`L_{\mathrm{FIR}}/D_{25}^2`$. These targets are mainly Sd type spirals. The $`S_{60}/S_{100}`$ is a measure of the warm dust temperature, and is described by interstellar dust models (e.g., Désert et al. 1990).

As we zoom into the parameter space of our studied galaxies (see Fig. 6), the separation can be seen in more detail. We have also included in this plot the positions of galaxies studied by other researchers (e.g., Pildis et al. 1994; Rand 1996; Hoopes et al. 1999). These galaxies with/without eDIG detections are denoted by filled/open triangles, respectively. Two galaxies (NGC 973 and NGC 5403) studied by Pildis et al. (1994), however, seem to have discordant values in this diagram. They claim non–detections for these two objects, but refrain from presenting the images. These two galaxies need to be re–observed by more sensitive observations to either justify their findings, or to disprove their claims, in case there is eDIG present.

A minimal SFR per unit area based on the FIR properties can be obtained from this diagram, as the detections with the lowest $`L_{\mathrm{FIR}}/D_{25}^2`$ ratio at low ($`S_{60}/S_{100}`$) ratios are at $`(3.2\pm 0.5)\times 10^{40}\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{kpc}^2`$. Positive detections at smaller values of $`L_{\mathrm{FIR}}/D_{25}^2`$ are reached only at considerably higher $`S_{60}/S_{100}`$ ratios of $`0.3`$, where we define a threshold of $`1\times 10^{40}\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{kpc}^2`$. Even fainter values of $`L_{\mathrm{FIR}}/D_{25}^2`$ with eDIG detections are only found among IRAS warm galaxies, such as in the case of ESO 274–1, which has the lowest $`L_{\mathrm{FIR}}/D_{25}^2`$ ratio of our studied galaxies, but also one of the highest $`S_{60}/S_{100}`$ ratios among our targets (Rossa 2001; Rossa & Dettmar 2003).

### 4.2 Energy input rate per unit area

In an investigation of a small sample of edge–on galaxies Dahlem et al. (1995) found evidence for the presence of radio halos for galaxies which exceed a certain threshold of energy input per unit area $`\dot{\mathrm{E}}_\mathrm{A}`$. We follow this approach, and calculate $`\dot{\mathrm{E}}_\mathrm{A}`$ for our survey galaxies, based on FIR properties. This energy input rate can be written as

$$\dot{\mathrm{E}}_\mathrm{A}\frac{\mathrm{dE}_{\mathrm{SN}}}{\mathrm{dt}}/\mathrm{A}_{\mathrm{SF}}=\nu _{\mathrm{SN}}\mathrm{E}_{\mathrm{SN}}/\pi \mathrm{r}_{\mathrm{SF}}^2,$$
(3)
with $`\mathrm{E}_{\mathrm{SN}}`$ as the energy released by a supernova (energy input per SN), for which we use $`\mathrm{E}_{\mathrm{SN}}=10^{51}`$ erg. $`\nu _{\mathrm{SN}}`$ is the SN rate, in units of \[$`\mathrm{yr}^1`$\]. $`\mathrm{A}_{\mathrm{SF}}`$ denotes the area of the SF activity, which is proportional to the SF disk radius squared. We use the definition given in Condon (1992) to derive the SN rate, which is $`\nu _{\mathrm{SN}}0.041\mathrm{SFR}(\mathrm{M}>5\mathrm{M}_{})`$. The SFRs have been calculated according to Kennicutt (1998) which can be written in the following expression $`SFR[\mathrm{M}_{}\mathrm{yr}^1]=4.5\times 10^{44}\mathrm{L}_{\mathrm{FIR}}[\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{s}^1]`$. The SF disk radius has been measured from our H$`\alpha `$ images. The energy injection rates per unit area are calculated in Table 1 (including 4 galaxies of a sub–sample cf. Paper II) and found to range from 1.4$`\times 10^4`$ to 5.9$`\times 10^3\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{cm}^2`$. In Fig. 7 we have plotted the $`S_{60}/S_{100}`$ ratio as a function of the energy injection per unit area ($`\dot{E}_A`$), coded with symbols for detections and non–detections. We have compared our calculated SN rates with the ones derived from radio properties by Dahlem et al. (1995) for e.g., NGC 891, which are in reasonable agreement.

The diagram above (Fig. 7), however, does not show a clear correlation as in the case for the FIR luminosity per unit area. The energy injection as a function of $`S_{60}/S_{100}`$ reveals a larger scatter. There is one discordant data point (NGC 7064), which has a much too low $`\dot{E}_A`$ value for its high $`S_{60}/S_{100}`$ ratio, given the fact that NGC 7064 shows eDIG presence. If that data point is not taken into account, there is a slight correlation visible, where galaxies with large values of $`\dot{E}_A`$ also have a large $`S_{60}/S_{100}`$ ratio, and smaller $`\dot{E}_A`$ tends to have also a smaller $`S_{60}/S_{100}`$ ratio. In a study of a much smaller sample of 16 galaxies Irwin et al. (1999) came up with a better correlation, although one data point did also show a discordant value. However, it should be stressed that their parameter space was substantially smaller, and if we plot our galaxies covering this particular parameter space, the correlation comes out significantly better. The scatter in the energy injection can be explained by the fact that galaxies with large intrinsic SF radii tend to have low values of $`\dot{E}_A`$, but strong local SF region can also show outflows and thus a mixture of galaxies with low and high values of $`\dot{E}_A`$ is the result.

## 5 Discussion

The presence of galactic gaseous halos is usually regarded as the result of strong SF activity in the underlying galaxy disks. Although detailed kinematic information has mostly eluded us to confirm an associated outflow, many pieces of evidence, that have been gathered in the last couple of years, strengthen the concept of a disk–halo interaction.

Alternatively, the gas could also be arising from infalling high–velocity clouds (HVCs) in the halo, which are seen in our Milky Way (e.g., Wakker & van Woerden 1997) or could maybe originating from galaxy interactions or past mergers.

From the theoretical perspective several scenarios have been suggested for the gas transport from the galactic disk into the halo, among them the galactic fountains (Shapiro & Field 1976; de Avillez 2000), chimneys (Norman & Ikeuchi 1989), superbubble outbreak (Mac Low & Ferrara 1999), or superwinds (Heckman et al. 1990).

Past observations have indicated that several edge–on galaxies show DIG at large extraplanar distances, whereas on the other side examples were found where no eDIG has been detected (Rand 1996). The present H$`\alpha `$ survey has contributed significantly to the question on the occurrence of gaseous halos in normal spiral galaxies. This first systematic approach has investigated galaxies with a broad distribution of FIR luminosities.

### 5.1 Galactic gaseous halos – constraints and dependency

It is the strength of the SF activity, both locally and on global scales, and the high values of the FIR flux ratio S60/S100 (a measure of the warm dust temperature), that determines the presence of extraplanar DIG in halos of several edge–on spiral galaxies.

Despite possible differences in the ionization mechanism of the halo gas in normal and starburst galaxies (photoionization by hot O and B stars and SNe driven superwinds, respectively), it is interesting to note the generally good correlation between the SFR per unit area and the FIR flux ratio at 60 $`\mu `$m and 100 $`\mu `$m.

The normal galaxies represent the fainter extension of the starburst regime with an obvious soft transition. While the SFR per unit area is a good tracer for eDIG in this diagram (see Fig. 5), the diagnostic diagram with $`\dot{E}_A`$ shows a less obvious correlation (cf. Sect. 4.2). However, individual galaxies which have not been investigated yet in the disk–halo interaction (DHI) context can be selected according to their position within the DDD, to be used for a comparison study in multifrequency investigations.

Comparing the observed morphology with data presented by other researchers (e.g., Rand 1996; Hoopes et al. 1999), the results are generally in very good agreement. Furthermore most galaxies, including all previous studied samples, follow the above mentioned correlation very well. However, it should be noted that a very few individual cases show subtle differences (cf. Sect. 4.1).

Galaxies with extraplanar DIG either fall in the upper right or in the upper left corner region of the diagnostic DIG diagram (DDD). Galaxies with detectable, but less prominent gaseous halos populate the region adjacent to these regions (middle part of the DDD), whereas galaxies with no detectable gaseous halos are located in the lower left corner. In addition to that, there are two regions that are not occupied by any galaxies. These are the extreme upper left and lower right corners in the DDD. Obviously in those parts there is no physical meaningful parameter space for galaxies. In spite of the current calculation of the SFR from the FIR, the FIR may be low in some cases with still a significant SFR if the amount of dust is small. On the other side, a high dust temperature also demands a high star formation rate, although high dust temperatures do not necessarily imply high SFRs per unit area. For the subluminous IRAS bright (warm) galaxies strong local SF activity with a high $`S_{60}/S_{100}`$ ratio also leads to strong local gaseous outflows (e.g., ESO 274–01)! This area is dominated by the extreme late–type and irregular galaxies such as ESO 274–01. However, this region is also occupied at least by one observed Seyfert galaxy (NGC 4235), whose activity (powered by an AGN) is restricted to the nuclear region.

In Table 2 all galaxies of this current H$`\alpha `$ survey are listed in order of decreasing SF rate per unit area ($`L_{\mathrm{FIR}}/D_{25}^2`$). Those galaxies of our H$`\alpha `$ survey, which have also been investigated by other protagonists, are indicated by an asterisk. We list in Table 2 for all galaxies the $`S_{60}/S_{100}`$ ratio, in addition to the distances of the galaxies, the major axis diameter $`a_{25}`$ in arcminutes, the above mentioned SF rate per unit area, and also the observed DIG morphology. As previously mentioned, from the total of 74 galaxies there were 12 galaxies with no measured FIR fluxes. We have therefore listed them (in order of increasing R.A.) at the end of this table.

The galaxy with the highest SFR per unit area in our sample is NGC 5775, reaching a value of about 21.5 (in units of $`10^{40}\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{kpc}^2`$), which was also included in the sample by LH95. We have included four galaxies of their sample also into our survey. We have calculated the $`S_{60}/S_{100}`$ ratio and the $`L_{\mathrm{FIR}}/D_{25}^2`$ ratio for the galaxies of the LH95 sample. The resulting numbers are listed in Table 4, where we have marked the five galaxies, that we have studied as well, with an asterisk. One further galaxy of the LH95 sample recently has been studied by Collins et al. (2000), and this galaxy is marked in Table 4 with a dagger. Finally, all other normal galaxies studied in the DIG context by various researchers have been listed in Table 3, for which we have also calculated the diagnostic ratios.

The galaxy with the lowest SFR per unit area (0.2 in same units) in our survey is ESO 274–01. It shows extended H$`\alpha `$ emission locally. Although this galaxy fails to represent a continuous halo, there are a few bright local features, whereas on other positions in the disk there is almost no detectable H$`\alpha `$ emission at all. However, the fact that strong local extended emission in this galaxy is detected, is not too surprising, as it has one of the highest $`S_{60}/S_{100}`$ ratios among our survey galaxies. In Table 2 we further indicate whether or not radio thick disks (or radio halos), and X–ray halos have been detected by other investigators for the studied galaxies. Positive detections are marked by a bullet ($``$), and non–detections are marked by a circle ($``$). For galaxies where neither one of the two symbols are indicated, no radio continuum and/or X–ray observations have been performed yet in search of extended emission.

In Tables 2+3 we further indicate whether or not radio thick disks and X–ray halos have been detected for the studied galaxies. If we compare the presence of gaseous halos with further evidence of the disk–halo interaction, coming from these other wavelength regimes, we generally find a good correlation of both the presence of radio thick disks and extended H$`\alpha `$ emission in several cases. However, it should be stressed that there are still many galaxies of our survey, which have not been observed in the radio regime with sufficiently high resolution, which would allow a detailed comparison. In the X–ray regime there is also the demand for more sensitive observations of nearby edge–on galaxies. Besides the detection of X–ray halos in several nearby starburst galaxies, information on X–ray halos in non–starburst galaxies are yet still very scarce. NGC 891 is one of the best studied cases in this respect (Bregman & Pildis 1994). But with the currently available more sensitive X–ray telescopes such as XMM/Newton and Chandra things will hopefully change soon. A very recent XMM/Newton EPIC pn detection of NGC 3044 confirms the presence of extended soft X–ray emission (Rossa et al., in prep.).

### 5.2 Clustered SNe as a cause of galactic halos

In the theories of chimneys and supperbubble outbreak (Norman & Ikeuchi 1989; Mac Low & McCray 1988) the presence of gaseous halos have their origin in gas ejections from the disk into the halo, triggered by clustered and correlated SNe. Whether all bubbles, created by clustered SNe, lead to an energy and momentum flux sufficiently high enough to entrain gaseous matter well above the disk–halo interface (i.e. a blowout) has been investigated by Heiles (1990). Koo et al. (1992) have shown that some of the detected worms of earlier works by Heiles (1984) appear to be ionized. The general picture is that OB associations produce supershells in the surrounding ISM and if these supershells expand to large scale–heights they appear as worms. Large OB associations can produce up to 7000 supernova progenitors (McKee & Williams 1997).

Following Heiles (1990) we calculate the number of clustered SNe at the nadir of a filament which corresponds to our determined threshold of SF activity per unit area. Taking the adjusted relation of Heiles (1990)

$$N=222L(\mathrm{obs})_{38}\tau _{\text{}\text{ii},7},$$
(4)
where $`\tau _{\text{}\text{ii},7}`$ is the lifetime of a cluster’s H ii region in units of $`10^7`$ yrs, and $`L(\mathrm{obs})_{38}`$ is the H$`\alpha `$ luminosity in units of $`10^{38}\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{s}^1`$, we compare this with our derived SF threshold per unit area $`\dot{E}_{A\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}25}}^{\mathrm{thres}}L_{\mathrm{FIR}}/D_{25}^2(3.2\pm 0.5)\times 10^{40}\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{kpc}^2`$. This will be only a simplistic estimate, as we know that the exact value is difficult to assess from many uncertainties and assumptions being made. The expression derived by Heiles (1990) rests on observational data of a sample of Sb galaxies by Kennicutt et al. (1989), galaxies which are similar to our studied edge–on spirals.

We use the conversion factor of the H$`\alpha `$ to FIR luminosity of 1/176 given by Kennicutt (1998). Even values of 1/550 have been derived from the literature for several late–type spirals. This can be calculated from H$`\alpha `$ data published in the literature (e.g., Rossa & Dettmar 2000; Boselli & Gavazzi 2002), and from the determined FIR luminosities (cf. Lonsdale et al. 1989). However, in those cases (H$`\alpha `$ measurements of edge–on spirals) there is always an uncertainty involved due to extinction by dust.

With a mean effective area of the SF filament (approximated by $`A_{\mathrm{fil}}=\pi r_{\mathrm{fil}}^2`$), this yields with $`\tau _{\text{}\text{ii},7}=2`$ (cf. Heiles 1990) the following expression

$$N=254\dot{E}_{40}^{\mathrm{thres}}r_{\mathrm{fil}}^2[\mathrm{kpc}].$$
(5)
Using our derived minimal SF area in units of $`10^{40}\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{kpc}^2`$, multiplied with the area of a filament at the nadir in the disk $`<A_{\mathrm{fil}}>`$, for IC 5052, which is $`<r_{\mathrm{fil}}>=37.5`$ pc, this yields $`N4`$ clustered SNe.

Although this is a very rough estimation, this number of clustered SNe would correspond to our derived SF activity per unit threshold.

In an alternative simple approach we calculate the number of SNe which are corresponding to our derived SF threshold at the nadir of a filament. Taking the energy to be released by one supernova and ejected into the ambient ISM ($`10^{51}`$ erg), we calculate the required number of SNe in a time interval of $`\tau =10^7`$ yr and per kpc2 following

$$N/A_{\mathrm{SF}}[\mathrm{kpc}^2]=\frac{\dot{\mathrm{E}}_{40}^{\mathrm{thres}}\tau }{\mathrm{E}_{\mathrm{kin}}}.$$
(6)
Multiplying this with the area of the smallest filament $`(A_{\mathrm{fil}}=\pi r_{\mathrm{fil}}^2)`$ and inserting the determined value of the filament radius ($`r_{\mathrm{fil}}`$ = 37.5 pc), this yields $`N45`$ SNe.

Concluding, the derived numbers are in reasonable agreement to support the working hypothesis that warm gaseous halos are a direct consequence of SF driven outflows. Even given the great uncertainty in calculating these numbers, it is evident that only a modest number of clustered SNe are required in order to yield outflows at the derived threshold.

The observed morphology of outflows is different from the starburst galaxies, at least from nucleated starbursts, as in almost no cases a nuclear outflowing cone is detected. The outflowing structures (i.e. filaments) emanate from strong SF regions in the disk, which are distributed along the disk (not necessarily confined to the nuclear regions). It has to be emphasized, however, that there may also be a small contribution of infalling gas (e.g., from HVCs). Unless kinematic information is available, which has up to now mostly eluded us, it is hard to predict the fraction of the latter contribution.

## 6 Summary

We have introduced the selection criteria for our H$`\alpha `$ survey, consisting of 74 nearby ($`D85`$ Mpc), mostly late–type, edge–on spiral galaxies with inclinations of $`i76^{}`$. It is the largest H$`\alpha `$ survey to date, investigating extraplanar DIG. We have shown some optical and FIR properties of the selected galaxies.

Our survey galaxies populate the fainter end of the FIR luminosity distribution, in contrast, to starburst galaxies which populate the high luminosity range. The parameter space of the $`S_{60}/S_{100}`$ ratio for our galaxies is also filled in the lower range, as most galaxies fall in between values of 0.2 and 0.4. We covered also an overlap area of the starburst galaxies. The starburst sample by LH95 has values of $`0.4`$ (IRAS warm galaxies). The FIR luminosities of our studied galaxies range from a few $`10^8`$$`\mathrm{L}_{}`$ up to $`10^{11}`$$`\mathrm{L}_{}`$. Whereas the SFR per unit area in starburst galaxies have considerably higher values of up to 480 in units of $`10^{40}\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{kpc}^2`$, the values for our galaxies range from 0.2–21.5 in the same units. We have detected eDIG in 30 of our studied galaxies. It can be concluded that, despite the fact that eDIG is not encountered in all late–type spirals, however, a significant fraction of our studied galaxies (41 %) possesses eDIG. Therefore, eDIG seems to be omnipresent in late–type spirals with high SF activity above $`(3.2\pm 0.5)\times 10^{40}\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{kpc}^2`$. There is, however, also a dependence on the $`S_{60}/S_{100}`$ ratio, and therefore the minimal threshold is also a function of $`S_{60}/S_{100}`$, as already evidenced in our study of a sub–sample (Rossa & Dettmar 2000).

In our second paper (Rossa & Dettmar 2003) the actual results for the individual galaxies are presented. There we will present the detailed morphology of eDIG of the studied galaxies, and in particular show several cases of galaxies with extended warm gaseous halos. Concluding, our working hypothesis is further justified and corroborated, that the presence of gaseous halos in late–type spirals is a direct consequence of SF activity in the underlying galactic disk.

###### Acknowledgements.

It is our sincere pleasure to express our thanks to Dr. Francisco Prada for carrying out some of the observations at Calar Alto in an emergency case. We owe special thanks to Dr. Michael Dahlem for providing us with the data on NGC 3936, kindly observed by Dr. Eva Grebel. We would also like to thank the anonymous referee for his/her comments which helped to improve the clarity of the text in a few places. The authors would like to thank Deutsches Zentrum für Luft– und Raumfahrt (DLR) for financial support of this research project through grant 50 OR 9707. Additional travel support for the Calar Alto observing runs is acknowledged from the DFG through various grants. This research has made extensive use of the NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database (NED) which is operated by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.