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# Critical Phenomena in the Einstein-Massless-Dirac System

## I Introduction

Beginning with an investigation of the spherically symmetric collapse of a massless scalar field Choptuik (1993), many studies of gravitational collapse have established that the threshold of black hole formation is characterized by critical phenomena analogous to those that accompany phase transitions in statistical mechanical systems. Briefly, (for a detailed review, see Gundlach (1998)), black-hole threshold phenomena arise from the consideration of families of spacetimes, (generally containing one or more matter fields), which are labeled by a family parameter, $`p`$, that controls the degree of self-gravitation in the spacetime. These families typically describe the implosion of an initially in-going concentration of matter-energy. For small values of $`p`$, the energy implodes in an essentially linear fashion, re-emerges and disperses to large distances. In contrast, for large $`p`$, the implosion results in black hole formation, with some fraction of the initial mass of the system trapped within a horizon. The threshold of black hole formation is defined by the specific (critical) parameter value, $`p^{}`$, at which a black hole first makes an appearance.

Empirically, and quite generically, a number of intriguing features are seen in the near-critical regime. These include the emergence of specific critical solutions with scaling, or time-translational, symmetries, scaling laws of dimensionful quantities such as the black-hole mass, and universality in the sense that these features do not depend on the details of the family used to generate the critical solution. There is now a relatively complete, though non-rigorous, understanding of this phenomenology. First, for a given matter model and symmetry restrictions (spherical, or axial symmetry for example), the black hole threshold apparently defines specific solutions of the coupled matter-Einstein equations. These solutions are essentially unique, up to certain rescalings, or at least are isolated in the overall solution space of the model. Second, these critical solutions, although unstable essentially by construction, tend to be minimally unstable in the sense of possessing a single (or perhaps a few) unstable modes in perturbation theory. The Lyapunov exponents associated with these modes can be immediately related to the exponents determined from empirically measured scaling laws.

In this paper we study the critical collapse of a massless spin-$`\frac{1}{2}`$ Dirac field coupled to the general relativistic gravitational field, within the context of spherical symmetry. Since a single spinor field cannot be spherically symmetric, we consider the incoherent sum of two independent fields so that the superposition has no net spin-angular momentum. Through direct solution of the 1+1 dimensional PDEs governing the dynamics, we demonstrate the existence of so-called Type II behavior in the model, in which black hole formation turns on at infinitesimal mass, and the critical solution is self-similar. In the current instance, the self-similarity is somewhat novel in that individual components of the Dirac field are discretely self-similar, but the overall geometry is continuously self-similar. As expected for this type of critical solution, we find a black hole mass-scaling law for solutions in the super-critical regime. We then directly construct the threshold solution using an appropriate self-similar ansatz for the geometry and matter fields and demonstrate, good agreement between it and the PDE solution.

## II Formalism

We consider a spherically symmetric system of spin-$`\frac{1}{2}`$ fields. We use the ADM formalism (see York (1979) for details), adopt units in which $`G=c=\mathrm{}=1`$, and express the metric in polar-areal coordinates:

$$ds^2=\alpha (t,r)^2dt^2+a(t,r)^2dr^2+r^2d\theta ^2+r^2\mathrm{sin}^2\theta d\varphi ^2.$$
(1)
The coordinate $`r`$ is the areal radius defined as $`(A/4\pi )^{\frac{1}{2}}`$, where $`A`$ is the proper area of a constant-$`r`$ $`2`$-sphere. The functions $`\alpha (t,r)`$ and $`a(t,r)`$ are to be determined using a subset of the $`3+1`$ form of Einstein’s equations, as described in more detail in Section II.3.

Before discussing how we separate the radial and angular dependences in our system to form a spin singlet, we begin with a brief review of spinors in curved spacetime (see Brill and Wheeler (1957), Unruh (1974), and Birrell and Davies (1982)). The evolution of a massless, spin-$`\frac{1}{2}`$ field coupled to gravity is governed by the curved space Dirac equation:

$$\gamma ^\mu _\mu \psi =0.$$
(2)
The curved space $`\gamma `$-matrices, $`\gamma ^\mu `$ satisfy

$$g^{\mu \nu }𝟙=\frac{\mathrm{𝟙}}{\mathrm{𝟚}}\{\gamma ^\mu ,\gamma ^\nu \}$$
(3)
where $`𝟙`$ is the $`4\times 4`$ identity matrix and $`g^{\mu \nu }`$ is the inverse metric. In flat spacetime, we have:

$$\eta ^{ab}𝟙=\frac{\mathrm{𝟙}}{\mathrm{𝟚}}\{\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^𝕒,\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^𝕓\}.$$
(4)
A particular choice of $`\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^a`$ that satisfy (4) with our metric signature $`(,+,+,+)`$ is:

$$\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^0=i\left(\begin{array}{cc}𝟙& 0\\ 0& 𝟙\end{array}\right),\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^j=i\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& \sigma ^j\\ \sigma ^j& 0\end{array}\right).$$
(5)
Here, the index $`j`$ ranges over the spatial values $`1,2,3`$ and the $`\sigma ^j`$ are the Pauli spin matrices, namely

$$\sigma ^1=\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 1\\ 1& 0\end{array}\right),\sigma ^2=\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& i\\ i& 0\end{array}\right),\sigma ^3=\left(\begin{array}{cc}1& 0\\ 0& 1\end{array}\right).$$
(6)
The general $`\gamma `$-matrices are related to their flat, Cartesian counterparts by

$$\gamma ^\mu =V_a{}_{}{}^{\mu }\stackrel{~}{\gamma }_{}^{a}$$
(7)
where there is an implied summation over the values $`0,1,2,3`$ of the “flat”, Latin index $`a`$, and the $`V_a^\mu `$ are known as vierbein.

The derivative operator in equation (2) is a spinor covariant derivative with spinor affine connections, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu `$. It acts in the following way on spinors,

$$_\mu \psi =\left(\frac{}{x^\mu }\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu \right)\psi ,$$
(8)
and on $`\gamma `$-matrices,

$$_\mu \gamma ^\nu =\frac{}{x^\mu }\gamma ^\nu +\mathrm{\Gamma }^\nu {}_{\mu \lambda }{}^{}\gamma _{}^{\lambda }\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu \gamma ^\nu +\gamma ^\nu \mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu .$$
(9)
However, it reduces to the usual covariant derivative when acting on tensors. We choose the spinor connections so that

$$_\mu \gamma ^\nu =0.$$
(10)
It can then be shown that the $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu `$ take the form

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mu =\frac{1}{8}[\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^a,\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^b]V_a{}_{}{}^{\nu }_{\mu }^{}V_{b\nu }.$$
(11)
We also note that when taking the covariant derivative of the vierbein, $`V_a^\mu `$, only one Christoffel connection appears, since there is only one curved, tensor (Greek) index.

### II.1 Representation

Having fixed the form of the spherically symmetric metric (1), we are ready to find a set of $`\gamma `$-matrices that satisfy equation (3). We choose as our representation:

$$\gamma ^t=\frac{\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^0}{\alpha },\gamma ^r=\frac{\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^3}{a},$$

$$\gamma ^\theta =\frac{\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^2}{r},\gamma ^\varphi =\frac{\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^1}{r\mathrm{sin}\theta }.$$
(12)
The spinor connections are

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_t=\frac{1}{2}\frac{\alpha ^{}}{a}\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^0\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^3,$$

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_r=\frac{1}{2}\frac{\dot{a}}{\alpha }\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^0\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^3,$$

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_\theta =\frac{1}{2}\frac{1}{a}\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^3\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^2,$$

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_\varphi =\frac{1}{2}\frac{\mathrm{sin}\theta }{a}\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^3\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^1+\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{cos}\theta \stackrel{~}{\gamma }^2\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^1.$$
(13)
where dots and primes denote differentiation with respect to $`t`$ and $`r`$ respectively. We note that we have complete freedom to choose any set of $`\gamma ^\mu `$ we wish provided they satisfy equation (3), and that our specific choice is made so that the Dirac equation can be easily separated into radial and angular parts.

Before proceeding to this separation, we introduce a further simplification based on the fact that we are dealing with a massless spin-$`\frac{1}{2}`$ field. Mathematically, such a field has a particular chirality (circular polarization); we adopt left-handed chirality which is expressed as:

$$\left(𝟙𝕚\gamma ^\mathrm{𝟝}\right)\psi =0.$$
(14)
Here, $`\gamma ^5`$ is defined by

$$\gamma ^5\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^0\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^1\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^2\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^3.$$
(15)
Equation (14) can be satisfied by taking

$$\psi =\left(\begin{array}{c}\psi _1(t,r,\theta ,\varphi )\\ \psi _2(t,r,\theta ,\varphi )\\ \psi _1(t,r,\theta ,\varphi )\\ \psi _2(t,r,\theta ,\varphi )\end{array}\right).$$
(16)
Substitution of this form for the spinor into equation (2) yields two identical sets of equations, each coupling the spinor components, $`\psi _1`$ and $`\psi _2`$. We of course only need to solve one set of equations for these variables, so we are left with two equations instead of the original four.

We now perform a separation of variables on the spinor components by writing:

$$\left(\begin{array}{c}\psi _1(t,r,\theta ,\varphi )\\ \psi _2(t,r,\theta ,\varphi )\end{array}\right)=\frac{1}{r\sqrt{a(t,r)}}\left(\begin{array}{c}F(t,r)H_1(\theta ,\varphi )\\ G(t,r)H_2(\theta ,\varphi )\end{array}\right).$$
(17)
With this new choice of variables, and with our previously chosen representation of the $`\gamma ^\mu `$ (12), the Dirac equation separates into a part that depends on $`(t,r)`$ (which we will refer to as the “radial” part), and a part that depends on $`(\theta ,\varphi )`$:

$`{\displaystyle \frac{ir}{\alpha }}\left(\begin{array}{c}\dot{F}/G\\ \dot{G}/F\end{array}\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{ir}{2}}{\displaystyle \frac{a^{}}{a^2}}\left(\begin{array}{c}F/G\\ G/F\end{array}\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{ir}{a}}\left(\begin{array}{c}F^{}/G\\ G^{}/F\end{array}\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{ir}{2}}{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha ^{}}{\alpha a}}\left(\begin{array}{c}F/G\\ G/F\end{array}\right)`$ (26)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{i}{\mathrm{sin}\theta }}\left(\begin{array}{c}H_{2,\varphi }/H_1\\ H_{1,\varphi }/H_2\end{array}\right)+\left(\begin{array}{c}H_{2,\theta }/H_1\\ H_{1,\theta }/H_2\end{array}\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\mathrm{cot}\theta \left(\begin{array}{c}H_2/H_1\\ H_1/H_2\end{array}\right)=0.`$ (33)
We note that although the factor $`(r\sqrt{a})^1`$ in (17) is not necessary for the separation of variables, it simplifies matters by reducing the number of terms in the resulting equation. Of particular importance is the elimination of a time derivative of $`a(t,r)`$ that would make numerical solution of the resulting system of PDEs somewhat more involved.

Considering our separated equation, we observe that since any change in $`\theta `$ or $`\varphi `$ cannot change the value of the $`(t,r)`$ part of (26), the $`(\theta ,\varphi )`$ part must be a constant. At this point, if our goal was to simply remove the angular dependence from the Dirac equation, we would be done. By replacing the angular part of (26) by a constant we would be restricting ourselves to some spinor that is an eigenfunction of the angular operators in the Dirac equation. In fact only one of its eigenvalues, rather than the precise form of the angular eigenfunction, would need to be known. However, our goal is not only to eliminate the angular dependence of our equation of motion, but also to have a matter source that generates a spherically symmetric spacetime. An individual spinor is not a spherically symmetric object (it always has a spin-angular momentum that breaks this symmetry) and therefore cannot by itself produce such a spacetime. What we require are multiple spinors where all the individual spin-angular momenta counterbalance each other so the system has no net spin. We will use two spinors, for simplicity, but any even number of the appropriate spinors could also be used. The spherically symmetric stress-energy tensor for the system, $`T_{\mu \nu }`$, is found from the sum of the stress-energy tensors of the individual spinor fields Unruh .

$$T_{\mu \nu }=T_{\mu \nu }^++T_{\mu \nu }^{}$$
(34)
Evaluating the right hand side of equation (34) does require the angular eigenfunctions that we will now compute.

### II.2 Equations of Motion

Setting the angular part of equation (26) equal to a constant, $`n`$, gives:

$$\left[\frac{i}{\mathrm{sin}\theta }\frac{}{\varphi }\frac{}{\theta }\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{cot}\theta \right]H_2=nH_1,$$
(35)
$$\left[\frac{i}{\mathrm{sin}\theta }\frac{}{\varphi }\frac{}{\theta }\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{cot}\theta \right]H_1=nH_2,$$
(36)
where we have multiplied the first and second components of the angular terms in (17) by $`H_1`$ and $`H_2`$ respectively, so that the bracketed terms in the above expression are the raising and lowering operators, $`ð`$ (eth) and $`\overline{ð}`$ (ethbar), respectively. These operators act on the spin weighted spherical harmonics, $`{}_{s}{}^{}Y_{lm}^{}`$, (see Penrose and Rindler (1984) and Goldberg et al. (1967)) in the following way:

$$ð({}_{s}{}^{}Y_{lm}^{})=\sqrt{(ls)(l+s+1)}({}_{s+1}{}^{}Y_{lm}^{})$$
(37)
$$\overline{ð}({}_{s}{}^{}Y_{lm}^{})=\sqrt{(l+s)(ls+1)}({}_{s1}{}^{}Y_{lm}^{}).$$
(38)
Our functions $`H_1`$ and $`H_2`$ have the spin weights $`s=\pm \frac{1}{2}`$:

$$H_1(\theta ,\varphi )={}_{\frac{1}{2}}{}^{}Y_{lm}^{}(\theta ,\varphi )$$
(39)
$$H_2(\theta ,\varphi )={}_{\frac{1}{2}}{}^{}Y_{lm}^{}(\theta ,\varphi ).$$
(40)
To form a spin singlet, all we require is one spinor constructed from $`{}_{\frac{1}{2}}{}^{}Y_{\frac{1}{2}\frac{1}{2}}^{}`$, $`{}_{\frac{1}{2}}{}^{}Y_{\frac{1}{2}\frac{1}{2}}^{}`$, and one spinor from $`{}_{\frac{1}{2}}{}^{}Y_{\frac{1}{2}\frac{1}{2}}^{}`$, $`{}_{\frac{1}{2}}{}^{}Y_{\frac{1}{2}\frac{1}{2}}^{}`$. These spin weighted spherical harmonics are:

$${}_{\frac{1}{2}}{}^{}Y_{\frac{1}{2}\frac{1}{2}}^{}=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2\pi }}e^{i\varphi /2}\mathrm{sin}\frac{\theta }{2},$$

$${}_{\frac{1}{2}}{}^{}Y_{\frac{1}{2}\frac{1}{2}}^{}=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2\pi }}e^{i\varphi /2}\mathrm{cos}\frac{\theta }{2},$$

$${}_{\frac{1}{2}}{}^{}Y_{\frac{1}{2}\frac{1}{2}}^{}=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2\pi }}e^{i\varphi /2}\mathrm{cos}\frac{\theta }{2},$$

$${}_{\frac{1}{2}}{}^{}Y_{\frac{1}{2}\frac{1}{2}}^{}=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2\pi }}e^{i\varphi /2}\mathrm{sin}\frac{\theta }{2}$$
(41)
and are solutions to (35) and (36) for $`n=1`$. Thus, for our two spinor fields, we have:

$$\psi ^+=\frac{1}{2\sqrt{\pi }}\frac{e^{i\varphi /2}}{r\sqrt{a(t,r)}}\left(\begin{array}{c}F(t,r)\mathrm{sin}(\theta /2)\\ G(t,r)\mathrm{cos}(\theta /2)\\ F(t,r)\mathrm{sin}(\theta /2)\\ G(t,r)\mathrm{cos}(\theta /2)\end{array}\right)$$
(42)
$$\psi ^{}=\frac{1}{2\sqrt{\pi }}\frac{e^{i\varphi /2}}{r\sqrt{a(t,r)}}\left(\begin{array}{c}F(t,r)\mathrm{cos}(\theta /2)\\ G(t,r)\mathrm{sin}(\theta /2)\\ F(t,r)\mathrm{cos}(\theta /2)\\ G(t,r)\mathrm{sin}(\theta /2)\end{array}\right).$$
(43)
From the above results, we can now derive the following radial equations of motion from (26):

$$\dot{F}_1=\sqrt{\frac{\alpha }{a}}_r\left(\sqrt{\frac{\alpha }{a}}F_1\right)+\frac{\alpha }{r}G_2$$
(44)
$$\dot{G}_1=\sqrt{\frac{\alpha }{a}}_r\left(\sqrt{\frac{\alpha }{a}}G_1\right)+\frac{\alpha }{r}F_2$$
(45)
$$\dot{F}_2=\sqrt{\frac{\alpha }{a}}_r\left(\sqrt{\frac{\alpha }{a}}F_2\right)\frac{\alpha }{r}G_1$$
(46)
$$\dot{G}_2=\sqrt{\frac{\alpha }{a}}_r\left(\sqrt{\frac{\alpha }{a}}G_2\right)\frac{\alpha }{r}F_1$$
(47)
where we have written the complex functions, $`F(t,r)`$ and $`G(t,r)`$ in terms of real functions via $`F(t,r)F_1(t,r)+iF_2(t,r)`$ and $`G(t,r)G_1(t,r)+iG_2(t,r)`$.

### II.3 Geometry

Although the spinors (42) and (43) both yield the same radial equations of motion (44)-(47), they have different stress-energy tensors. We calculate the stress-tensor for each field individually using:

$$T_{\mu \nu }=\frac{1}{2}\left[\overline{\psi }\gamma _{(\mu }_{\nu )}\psi \left(_{(\mu }\overline{\psi }\right)\gamma _{\nu )}\psi \right]$$
(48)
where the Dirac adjoint of $`\psi ,\overline{\psi }`$ is defined by

$$\overline{\psi }=\psi ^{}A.$$

Here, $`A`$ is the so-called Hermitizing matrix, needed in the computation of real-valued expressions (such as the current density or, in this case, the stress-energy tensor) from the complex-valued spinors. It is to be chosen so that both $`A`$ and $`iA\gamma ^\mu `$ are Hermitian, and we take $`A=i\stackrel{~}{\gamma }^0`$.

Computing $`T_{\mu \nu }`$ for each of the two spinors (42) and (43) and summing the results yields the following non-vanishing components of the spherically symmetric stress-energy tensor:

$$T_{tt}=\frac{\alpha }{2\pi r^2a}\left(\dot{F}_1F_2F_1\dot{F}_2+\dot{G}_1G_2G_1\dot{G}_2\right)$$

$$T_{tr}=\frac{1}{4\pi r^2}\left[F_1\dot{F}_2\dot{F}_1F_2+\dot{G}_1G_2G_1\dot{G}_2+\frac{\alpha }{a}\left(F_1^{}F_2F_1F_2^{}+G_1^{}G_2G_1G_2^{}\right)\right]$$

$$T_{rr}=\frac{1}{2\pi r^2}\left(F_1F_2^{}F_1^{}F_2+G_1^{}G_2G_1G_2^{}\right)$$

$$T_{\theta \theta }=\frac{1}{2\pi ra}\left(F_1G_1+F_2G_2\right)$$

$$T_{\varphi \varphi }=\frac{\mathrm{sin}^2\theta }{2\pi ra}\left(F_1G_1+F_2G_2\right).$$
(49)
Contracting the stress-energy tensor gives

$$T_\mu {}_{}{}^{\mu }=0,$$
(50)
which is expected since the massless Dirac system is conformally invariant. Having computed a stress-energy tensor that will generate a spherically symmetric spacetime, we can now write down the Einstein equations that will fix $`\alpha (t,r)`$ and $`a(t,r)`$.

Due to our choice of coordinates, the Hamiltonian constraint and the slicing condition comprise a sufficient subset of the Einstein equations to be used in our numerical solution. The Hamiltonian constraint is

$$\frac{a^{}}{a}+\frac{a^21}{2r}=\frac{2}{r^2}\left(2aF_1G_1+2aF_2G_2+rF_1F_2^{}rF_1^{}F_2+rG_1^{}G_2rG_1G_2^{}\right)$$
(51)
and is treated as an equation for $`a(t,r)`$. We note that the momentum constraint,

$$\dot{a}=\frac{2\alpha }{r}\left(F_1^{}F_2F_1F_2^{}+G_1^{}G_2G_1G_2^{}\right).$$
(52)
also yields an equation for $`a`$ (an evolution equation) that we use as a means to check the consistency of our equations, both at the analytic level, and during numerical evolutions. We note that in both equations (51) and (52), time derivatives of $`F`$’s and $`G`$’s have been eliminated using the equations of motion (44)-(47).

The slicing condition, which fixes $`\alpha (t,r)`$, is derived from the evolution equation for $`K^\theta _\theta `$ and the fact that for polar slicing we have

$$K=K^i{}_{i}{}^{}=K^r{}_{r}{}^{}+2K^\theta {}_{\theta }{}^{}=K^r_r$$

since $`K^\theta {}_{\theta }{}^{}(t,r)=0`$. To maintain $`K^\theta {}_{\theta }{}^{}(t,r)=0`$ for all time, we impose $`\dot{K}^\theta {}_{\theta }{}^{}(t,r)=0`$, which yields

$$\frac{\alpha ^{}}{\alpha }\frac{a^21}{2r}=\frac{2}{r}\left(F_1F_2^{}F_1^{}F_2+G_1^{}G_2G_1G_2^{}\right).$$
(53)
## III Numerics and Results

The above equations of motion were solved using a Crank-Nicholson update scheme, standard $`O(h^2)`$ spatial derivatives, and Berger-Oliger style adaptive mesh refinement (see Berger and Oliger (1984)) on the computational domain, $`0rr_{\mathrm{max}}`$, $`t0`$. To achieve stability, high frequency modes were damped using Kreiss-Oliger dissipation Kreiss and Oliger (1973). At $`r=0`$, the following regularity conditions were enforced:

$$\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill F_1(t,0)& =& 0\hfill \\ \hfill F_2(t,0)& =& 0\hfill \\ \hfill G_1(t,0)& =& 0\hfill \\ \hfill G_2(t,0)& =& 0.\hfill \end{array}$$
(54)
At $`r=r_{\mathrm{max}}`$, outgoing wave conditions are imposed on the matter fields:

$$\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill _tF_1& =& _rF_1,\hfill \\ \hfill _tF_2& =& _rF_2,\hfill \\ \hfill _tG_1& =& _rG_1,\hfill \\ \hfill _tG_2& =& _rG_2.\hfill \end{array}$$
(55)
We also have

$$a(t,0)=1,$$
(56)
which follows from the demand of regularity (local flatness) at $`r=0`$. At each time step, the Hamiltonian constraint is integrated outwards from $`r=0`$ using a point-wise Newton method. The slicing condition (53) is solved subject to the outer boundary condition $`\alpha (t,r_{\mathrm{max}})=1/a(t,r_{\mathrm{max}})`$, so that, provided that all of the matter remains within the computational domain, coordinate time and proper time coincide at spatial infinity. We note that the more natural normalization choice, from the point of view of critical collapse, is $`\alpha (t,0)=1`$. However, computationally, this choice would vitiate our ability to compute with a fixed Courant factor, $`\mathrm{\Delta }t/\mathrm{\Delta }r`$, particularly in the near-critical regime, and would thus unnecessarily complicate the numerical solution.

The results presented below were generated from the study of three distinct parametrized families of initial data, which we refer to as Gaussians, spatial derivatives of Gaussians, and kink–anti-kink. In all cases, the initial datasets were such that the pulses were essentially ingoing with positive energy at $`t=0`$. The specific forms used are as follows:

Gaussian:

$$F_1=0$$

$$F_2=0$$

$$G_1=pe^{(rr_0)^2/4\delta ^2}$$

$$G_2=pe^{(rr_0+\delta )^2/4\delta ^2}$$

Derivative of Gaussian:

$$F_1=0$$

$$F_2=0$$

$$G_1=p((r_0r)/(2\delta ^2))e^{(rr_0)^2/4\delta ^2}$$

$$G_2=p((r_0r\delta )/(2\delta ^2))e^{(rr_0+\delta )^2/4\delta ^2}$$

Kink anti-Kink:

$$F_1=0$$

$$F_2=0$$

$$G_1=(p/2)(\mathrm{tanh}((rr_0)/\delta )\mathrm{tanh}((r2r_0)/\delta ))$$

$$G_2=(p/2)(\mathrm{tanh}((rr_0+\delta )/\delta )\mathrm{tanh}((r2r_0+\delta )/\delta ))$$

In each case the family parameter, $`p`$, can be used to control whether the mass-energy of the system collapses to form a black hole, or if it implodes through the center ($`r=0`$) and disperses to spatial infinity. As discussed in the introduction, and in a process now familiar from many other studies of critical collapse, as $`p`$ is tuned to the black hole threshold $`p=p^{}`$, the single unstable mode associated with the critical solution is “tuned away” to reveal the critical solution per se.

In the current case, we find strong indications from such studies that the critical solution for the spherically symmetric EMD (Einstein-massless-Dirac) system describes a continuously self-similar (CSS) geometry. Typical evidence for this claim is shown in Fig. 3, which displays near-critical evolution of the scale invariant quantity, $`a`$. In contrast, the Dirac fields themselves appear to be discretely self-similar (DSS) (see Fig. 4).

As usual, associated with the Type II critical solution is a scaling law for the black hole mass near criticality:

$$M_{bh}|pp^{}|^\gamma ,$$
(57)
and, as expected, we find strong evidence that the scaling exponent, $`\gamma `$, is universal in that it is independent of the family of initial data used to generate the critical solution. The values of $`\gamma `$ computed for the different families are summarized in Table 1, and we note that there is uncertainty in the third digit of the quoted values.

The data in Fig. 1 does not oscillate about the fit line since the geometry is continuously self-similar. This lack of regular oscillations about the fit line is shown more clearly in Fig. 2.

## IV Self-Similar Ansatz

Given the numerical evidence suggesting the existence of a self-similar solution at the black hole threshold, we proceed to an ab initio computation of the critical solution based on the application of a self-similar ansatz to our system. The development here closely parallels the work done by Hirschmann and Eardley Hirschmann and Eardley (1995), who considered the case of a massless, complex scalar field.

By definition, a self-similar spacetime has a homothetic Killing vector, $`\xi `$, that obeys

$$_\xi g_{\mu \nu }=2g_{\mu \nu }$$
(58)
where the factor $`2`$ is simply a matter of convention. We want to define coordinates, $`(\tau ,x)`$ that are adapted to this self-similar symmetry. Specifically with $`\tau `$ adapted to the vector field $`\xi ^\mu `$, (58) can be written as:

$$\frac{}{\tau }g_{\mu \nu }(\tau ,x)=2g_{\mu \nu }(\tau ,x).$$
(59)
Performing a separation of variables on the metric tensor and then solving (59) for the $`\tau `$-dependent part yields

$$g_{\mu \nu }(\tau ,x)=e^{2\tau }\stackrel{~}{g}_{\mu \nu }(x),$$
(60)
where $`\stackrel{~}{g}_{\mu \nu }(x)`$ is the part of the metric that depends only on $`x`$. The original coordinates $`(t,r)`$ are related to $`(\tau ,x)`$ by:

$$\tau =\mathrm{ln}\left|\frac{t^{}t}{L}\right|,x=\frac{r}{t^{}t}.$$
(61)
The equations of interest will take the same form for any value of the constant factor, $`L`$, and without loss of generality, we subsequently take $`L=1`$. The time $`t^{}`$ is the value of coordinate time to which the self-similar solution asymptotes as it propagates down to arbitrarily small scales, and, from the point of view of critical evolution, is a natural temporal origin for use in describing the dynamics. Further, as mentioned previously, in analyzing self-similar critical solutions, it is natural to adopt a parameterization of the $`t`$=constant surfaces, such that $`t`$ coincides with central proper time. We thus adopt such a normalization, and additionally adjust $`t`$ so that $`t^{}=0`$.

In these new coordinates, the metric (1) becomes

$$ds^2=e^{2\tau }\left[(\alpha (x)^2+x^2a(x)^2)d\tau ^2+2xa(x)^2d\tau dx+a(x)^2dx^2+x^2d\theta ^2+x^2\mathrm{sin}^2\theta d\varphi ^2\right].$$
(62)
We note that the $`\tau `$ coordinate is timelike, and, as can be verified by comparing the right hand sides of (60) and (62), that the functions, $`\alpha `$ and $`a`$ are functions of the spacelike coordinate, $`x`$, alone.

In $`(\tau ,x)`$ coordinates, the spinors (42) and (43) become

$$\psi ^+=\frac{e^\tau }{2\sqrt{\pi }}\frac{e^{i\varphi /2}}{x\sqrt{a(x)}}\left(\begin{array}{c}F(\tau ,x)\mathrm{sin}(\theta /2)\\ G(\tau ,x)\mathrm{cos}(\theta /2)\\ F(\tau ,x)\mathrm{sin}(\theta /2)\\ G(\tau ,x)\mathrm{cos}(\theta /2)\end{array}\right)$$
(63)
$$\psi ^{}=\frac{e^\tau }{2\sqrt{\pi }}\frac{e^{i\varphi /2}}{x\sqrt{a(x)}}\left(\begin{array}{c}F(\tau ,x)\mathrm{cos}(\theta /2)\\ G(\tau ,x)\mathrm{sin}(\theta /2)\\ F(\tau ,x)\mathrm{cos}(\theta /2)\\ G(\tau ,x)\mathrm{sin}(\theta /2)\end{array}\right),$$
(64)
where these expressions were found by transforming the $`(t,r)`$ parts of (42) and (43) as scalars.

In order to find spinor components that are only functions of $`x`$, we require knowledge of the $`\tau `$ dependence of our field quantities. This is determined by performing the coordinate transformations on the equations of motion (44)-(47) and the geometric equations (51) and (53), and then ascertaining what $`\tau `$ dependence is needed in $`F`$ and $`G`$ to produce a set of $`\tau `$ independent ODEs. A suitable ansatz is

$$F(\tau ,x)=e^{\tau /2}e^{i\omega \tau }x(P_1(x)+iP_2(x))$$
(65)
$$G(\tau ,x)=e^{\tau /2}e^{i\omega \tau }x(Q_1(x)+iQ_2(x)).$$
(66)
where the $`\mathrm{exp}(i\omega t)`$ terms reflect the fact that, as the PDE solutions have revealed, we expect the matter fields to exhibit discrete self-similarity. Note that $`\omega `$ as defined here corresponds to $`2\pi /\mathrm{\Delta }`$ (see Hirschmann and Eardley (1995)) where $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ is the echoing exponent originally defined in Choptuik (1993). Additionally, the extra factor of $`x`$ is introduced to cast the resulting equations in a more convenient form. Inserting this ansatz into (44)-(47), (51) and (53), we find

$$P_1^{}=\frac{1}{x+\alpha /a}\left[\frac{1}{2}P_1\omega P_2\frac{1}{2}\frac{\alpha }{a}\left(\frac{a^2+1}{x}\right)P_1+2\alpha P_1(P_1Q_1+P_2Q_2)+\frac{\alpha }{x}Q_2\right]$$
(67)
$$P_2^{}=\frac{1}{x+\alpha /a}\left[\frac{1}{2}P_2+\omega P_1\frac{1}{2}\frac{\alpha }{a}\left(\frac{a^2+1}{x}\right)P_2+2\alpha P_2(P_1Q_1+P_2Q_2)\frac{\alpha }{x}Q_1\right]$$
(68)
$$Q_1^{}=\frac{1}{x\alpha /a}\left[\frac{1}{2}Q_1\omega Q_2+\frac{1}{2}\frac{\alpha }{a}\left(\frac{a^2+1}{x}\right)Q_12\alpha Q_1(P_1Q_1+P_2Q_2)+\frac{\alpha }{x}P_2\right]$$
(69)
$$Q_2^{}=\frac{1}{x\alpha /a}\left[\frac{1}{2}Q_2+\omega Q_1+\frac{1}{2}\frac{\alpha }{a}\left(\frac{a^2+1}{x}\right)Q_22\alpha Q_2(P_1Q_1+P_2Q_2)\frac{\alpha }{x}P_1\right]$$
(70)
$$\frac{a^{}}{a}=\frac{1a^2}{2x}+2x\left(P_1P_2^{}P_1^{}P_2+Q_1^{}Q_2Q_1Q_2^{}\right)+4a\left(P_1Q_1+P_2Q_2\right)$$
(71)
$$\frac{\alpha ^{}}{\alpha }=\frac{a^21}{2x}+2x\left(P_1P_2^{}P_1^{}P_2+Q_1^{}Q_2Q_1Q_2^{}\right).$$
(72)
We note that we can cast this system into a canonical form suitable for numerical integration, by using (67)-(70) to eliminate the derivatives of $`P`$ and $`Q`$ that appear in the right hand side of the equations for $`a`$ (71) and $`\alpha `$ (72).

## V Numerical Solution of the Self-Similar ODEs

Having rewritten our equations in a coordinate system adapted to self-similar symmetry, we can now solve the resulting ODEs to determine what we expect will be the CSS critical solution seen at the black hole threshold in the EMD model. Following Hirschmann and Eardley Hirschmann and Eardley (1995), we use a multi-parameter shooting method to integrate the equations subject to regularity and analyticity conditions.

We first observe that the system (67)-(72) has singularities at $`x=0`$ and at $`x=x_2=\alpha /a`$ (the similarity horizon). Of the infinitely many solutions to the ODEs, we seek one that is analytic at both of these points, as the CSS solution found via solution of the PDEs has this property. Our unknown problem parameters (“shooting” parameters) include the values of some of the fields at the origin, the value of $`\omega `$ appearing in the ansatz (65)-(66), as well as the value of $`x_2`$ (the position of the similarity horizon). Following Eardley and Hirschmann we shoot outwards from $`x=0`$ and inwards from $`x_2=\alpha /a`$, comparing solutions at some intermediate point $`x_1`$. This process is automated by starting from some initial guess, then using Newton’s method to determine the shooting parameters for subsequent iterations. In the Newton iteration, we use the square of the differences of the values of the functions and their derivatives at $`x_1`$ (computed from the inwards and outwards integrations) as the goodness-of-fit indicator, which is driven to 0 as the iteration converges.

At $`x=0`$ we have the following:

$$P_1(0)=0$$

$$P_2(0)=Q_0$$

$$Q_1(0)=Q_0$$

$$Q_2(0)=0$$

$$\alpha (0)=1$$

$$a(0)=1.$$

Regularity at the origin gives $`P_1=Q_2`$ and $`P_2=Q_1`$. We use the global $`U(1)`$ invariance of our system (67)-(72) to set $`P_1=0`$. This leaves $`Q_0`$ as a shooting parameter.

As noted previously, the location of the similarity horizon (outer boundary of the integration domain) $`x_2`$ is itself a shooting parameter, and is the value $`x`$ where $`\alpha (x)/a(x)=x`$. In the limit $`xx_2`$ we have the following:

$$P_1(x_2)=\frac{1}{2a^2}\left(4\alpha Q_2^3\omega 4\alpha Q_1^2Q_2\omega +2a\omega Q_1+Q_2a^3\right)$$

$$P_2(x_2)=\frac{1}{2a^2}\left(4\alpha Q_1Q_2^2\omega +4\alpha Q_1^3\omega +2a\omega Q_2Q_1a^3\right)$$

$$Q_1(x_2)=Q_1$$

$$Q_2(x_2)=Q_2$$

$$\alpha (x_2)=x_2a$$

$$a(x_2)=a.$$

The shooting parameters at the outer boundary are: $`x_2`$, $`Q_1(x_2)`$, $`Q_2(x_2)`$, and $`a(x_2)`$. The final shooting parameter is the frequency, $`\omega `$, for a total of six undetermined parameters.

We find an approximate solution given by

$$x_2=5.6740230\pm 0.0000004$$

$$\omega =4.698839\pm 0.000001$$

$$Q_1(0)=0.747912623\pm 0.000000006$$

$$Q_1(x_2)=0.00151341532\pm 0.00000000007$$

$$Q_2(x_2)=0.01103266083\pm 0.00000000005$$

$$a(x_2)=1.1183631604\pm 0.0000000009.$$

where the quoted uncertainty was estimated by solving the system for many different values of $`x_1`$ and observing the changes in the shooting parameters.

## VI Comparison of PDE/ODE Solutions

In this section we compare the solution computed from the self-similar ansatz, as just described, to the near-critical solutions calculated from the full PDEs in the $`(t,r)`$ coordinate system. The ODE solution is the theoretically predicted self-similar solution while the PDE solution can be thought of as collected data. For this comparison, we used data from the Gaussian family. The idea is to treat the ODE solution as the model function and fit it to the PDE data. We perform the fit “simultaneously” at all times by working with the functions as $`2`$-dimensional solution surfaces in $`t`$ and $`r`$. This process is automated by starting from some initial guess for the fitting parameters, then using Newton’s method to determine these parameters for subsequent iterations. In the Newton iteration, we use the least squares of the two solutions:

$$\underset{j=1}{\overset{N}{}}\left(u_j^{ODE}u_j^{PDE}\right)^2$$
(73)
as the goodness-of-fit indicator, which is driven towards 0 as the iteration converges. When this happens, we compute the $`l_2`$-norm of the difference of the two solutions:

$$u_2=\left(\frac{1}{N}\underset{j=1}{\overset{N}{}}\left(u_j^{ODE}u_j^{PDE}\right)^2\right)^{1/2}$$
(74)
as an error estimate. In computing both the least squares and the $`l_2`$-norm, the solution to the ODEs and the solution to the PDEs are treated as $`N`$-element vectors where $`N`$ is the total number of grid points on the $`2`$-dimensional grid in $`t`$ and $`r`$.

For the case of $`a(t,r)`$, we use $`t^{}`$ as the fitting parameter. Once $`t^{}`$ is found, the $`l_2`$-norm of the difference of the two solutions is $`0.00159`$. We display the results of this fitting process as a sequence of snapshots in time in Fig. 3.

Comparing the Dirac fields is a little more involved since there are a number of unspecified parameters and phases that must be determined. From the ansatz (65)-(66) we have:

$$F_1(t,r)=\frac{rA_1}{(t^{}t)^{\frac{1}{2}}}\left[P_1(t,r)\mathrm{cos}(\omega \mathrm{ln}(t^{}t)+\varphi _1)P_2(t,r)\mathrm{sin}(\omega \mathrm{ln}(t^{}t)+\varphi _1)\right]$$

$$F_2(t,r)=\frac{rA_2}{(t^{}t)^{\frac{1}{2}}}\left[P_1(t,r)\mathrm{sin}(\omega \mathrm{ln}(t^{}t)+\varphi _2)+P_2(t,r)\mathrm{cos}(\omega \mathrm{ln}(t^{}t)+\varphi _2)\right]$$

$$G_1(t,r)=\frac{rA_2}{(t^{}t)^{\frac{1}{2}}}\left[Q_1(t,r)\mathrm{cos}(\omega \mathrm{ln}(t^{}t)+\varphi _2)Q_2(t,r)\mathrm{sin}(\omega \mathrm{ln}(t^{}t)+\varphi _2)\right]$$

$$G_2(t,r)=\frac{rA_1}{(t^{}t)^{\frac{1}{2}}}\left[Q_1(t,r)\mathrm{sin}(\omega \mathrm{ln}(t^{}t)+\varphi _1)+Q_2(t,r)\mathrm{cos}(\omega \mathrm{ln}(t^{}t)+\varphi _1)\right].$$
(75)
We note that $`F_1`$ and $`G_2`$ have the same phase, $`\varphi _1`$, while the pair $`F_2`$ and $`G_1`$ have the same phase $`\varphi _2`$. This is expected from the coupling of (44)-(47). The equations of motion may be invariant under changes of these phases, but (51) and (53) are not. In order to have the entire system be invariant under changes in the phases, we must have:

$$A_1A_2=\frac{1}{\mathrm{cos}(\varphi _1\varphi _2)}$$

We see that the amplitudes of the fields must change only if the relative phase, $`\varphi _1\varphi _2`$, changes. We merely note this fact for completeness but do not use it to reduce the number of fit parameters.

The comparison of the fields as found from the PDEs and ODEs is carried out in much the same way as it is done for the metric variable, $`a(t,r)`$. The goodness-of-fit is again defined to be the least squares of the two solutions but this time, the parameter $`t^{}`$ is kept fixed and the phase $`\varphi _j`$ and amplitude $`A_j`$ are used as fitting parameters ($`j=1,2)`$. The $`l_2`$-norm of the difference of the solutions for $`F_1`$ is $`0.000195`$. The $`l_2`$-norm of the difference of the solutions for $`G_1`$ is $`0.00024`$. Fig. 4 illustrates the results of this comparison of the ODE and PDE solutions for $`F_1`$.

## VII Conclusions

We have investigated the spherically symmetric Einstein-massless-Dirac system at the threshold of black hole formation. We have found strong evidence for a Type II critical solution, and an associated mass scaling law with a universal exponent $`\gamma 0.26`$. The solution exhibits continuous self-similarity in the geometric variables and discrete self-similarity in the components of the Dirac fields, the latter characterized by an echoing exponent $`\mathrm{\Delta }1.34`$. Using a self-similar ansatz, we then reduced the equations of motion governing the model to a set of ODEs whose solution, given appropriate regularity conditions, is in very good agreement with the critical solution obtained from the original PDEs.

###### Acknowledgements.

We would like to thank Bill Unruh, Luis Lehner, and the rest of the members of the numerical relativity group at the University of British Columbia for useful discussions. We would also like to thank Daniel A. Steck and Douglas W. Schaefer, who worked with us on investigating dynamic solutions of the massive Dirac problem that was the original inspiration for this work. That project was, in turn, inspired by a paper written by Finster, Smoller, and Yau Finster et al.  in which solutions for a static, massive Einstein-Dirac field were presented. We would like to acknowledge financial support from the National Science Foundation grant PHY9722068 and from a grant from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC). This work was also supported in part by grant NSF-PHY-9800973 and by the Horace Hearne Jr. Institute for Theoretical Physics.


text:
# Optical absorption spectra in SrCu₂O₃ two-leg spin ladder

## Abstract

We calculate the phonon-assisted optical-absorption spectra in $`\mathrm{SrCu}_2\mathrm{O}_3`$ two-leg spin-ladder systems. The results for two models proposed for $`\mathrm{SrCu}_2\mathrm{O}_3`$ are compared. In the model including the effects of a cyclic four-spin interaction, the shoulder structure appears at $`978\mathrm{c}\mathrm{m}^1`$ and the peak appears at $`1975\mathrm{c}\mathrm{m}^1`$ in the spectrum for polarization of the electric field parallel to the legs. In the other model which describes a pure two-leg ladder, the peak appears around the lower edge of the spectrum at $`1344\mathrm{c}\mathrm{m}^1`$. The feature can be effective in determining the proper model for $`\mathrm{SrCu}_2\mathrm{O}_3`$.

Intensive studies for $`S=1/2`$ two-leg spin-ladder systems have revealed fascinating aspects of elementary excitations as well as thermodynamic properties of the system dagotto . Using several theoretical methods, it was shown that $`S=0`$ and $`S=1`$ two-triplet bound states lie below the two-triplet continuum in addition to the one-triplet mode koto1 ; sach ; koto2 ; jb ; moni1 ; moni2 ; uhrig ; SCES ; nun . Furthermore, the effects of a cyclic four-spin interaction on the $`S=1/2`$ two-leg spin-ladder systems have attracted a great amount of attention recently mizuno1 ; sh ; cyc ; ins ; mizuno2 ; hh ; hn ; hmh ; lst ; mvm ; Haga2 . From the analysis of the experimental results for $`\mathrm{La}_6\mathrm{Ca}_8\mathrm{Cu}_{24}\mathrm{O}_{41}`$ observed by inelastic neutron-scattering experiments, it was corroborated that a cyclic four-spin interaction is necessary to explain the observed dispersion relation of the one-triplet mode ins .

For $`\mathrm{SrCu}_2\mathrm{O}_3`$, which is considered to be a typical $`S=1/2`$ two-leg spin-ladder material, two models were proposed to reproduce the temperature dependence of the susceptibility. One model includes the effects of a cyclic four-spin interaction mizuno1 , while the other model describes a pure two-leg ladder Johnson . It seems, thus, difficult to decide the proper minimal model only from thermodynamic quantities such as the susceptibility. On the basis of the observations, dynamical structure factors have been investigated for the two models mizuno2 ; Haga2 . Although the dispersion relation for the model including the effects of a cyclic four-spin interaction becomes flatter, the difference in the distribution of the weights between the two models may be difficult to be observed by inelastic neutron-scattering experiments Haga2 . Other methods to detect characteristics of dynamical properties are required to decide the proper model for $`\mathrm{SrCu}_2\mathrm{O}_3`$.

The midinfrared optical-absorption spectra measured, e.g., by optical conductivity in low-dimensional cuprates can be successfully analyzed in terms of the phonon-assisted absorption mechanism \[23-31, 9, 10\]. In this mechanism, an absorbed photon simultaneously creates a $`\mathrm{Cu}\mathrm{O}`$ bond-stretching phonon and a multitriplet excitation with a singlet coupling. This simultaneous excitation enables us to probe a phonon-weighted sum of the $`S=0`$ multitriplet excitation from the entire Brillouin zone. In fact, it was confirmed from the optical-conductivity measurements that the $`S=0`$ two-triplet bound state exists below the two-triplet continuum in a $`S=1/2`$ two-leg spin-ladder material $`(\mathrm{Ca},\mathrm{La})_{14}\mathrm{Cu}_{24}\mathrm{O}_{41}`$ .

In this paper, we investigate the optical-absorption spectra caused by the phonon-assisted two-triplet excitation in $`\mathrm{SrCu}_2\mathrm{O}_3`$ two-leg spin-ladder systems on the basis of the proposed two minimal models. Using a continued fraction method based on the Lanczos algorithm GB87 , we first calculate the wave-number-resolved $`S=0`$ two-triplet excitation spectra . We then calculate the optical-absorption spectra and discuss characteristics of the results for the two models of $`\mathrm{SrCu}_2\mathrm{O}_3`$.

We start our discussion with the following Hamiltonian:

$``$ $`=`$ $`J_{}{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{N/2}{}}}\left(𝑺_{1,i}𝑺_{1,i+1}+𝑺_{2,i}𝑺_{2,i+1}\right)`$ (1)
$`+`$ $`J_{}{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{N/2}{}}}𝑺_{1,i}𝑺_{2,i}`$
$`+`$ $`J_{\mathrm{cyc}}{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{N/2}{}}}\{4[(𝑺_{1,i}𝑺_{1,i+1})(𝑺_{2,i+1}𝑺_{2,i})`$
$`+`$ $`(𝑺_{1,i}𝑺_{2,i})(𝑺_{1,i+1}𝑺_{2,i+1})`$
$``$ $`(𝑺_{1,i}𝑺_{2,i+1})(𝑺_{1,i+1}𝑺_{2,i})]`$
$`+`$ $`(𝑺_{1,i}𝑺_{1,i+1})+(𝑺_{1,i+1}𝑺_{2,i+1})+(𝑺_{2,i+1}𝑺_{2,i})`$
$`+`$ $`(𝑺_{1,i}𝑺_{2,i+1})+(𝑺_{1,i+1}𝑺_{2,i})+(𝑺_{2,i}𝑺_{1,i})\}`$
$`+`$ $`J_{\mathrm{diag}}{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{N/2}{}}}[(𝑺_{1,i}𝑺_{2,i+1})+(𝑺_{1,i+1}𝑺_{2,i})],`$
where $`𝑺_{l,i}`$ denotes the $`S=1/2`$ spin operator in the $`i`$th rung of the $`l=1,2`$ chain, $`N`$ is the total number of spins, and $`J_{}`$ and $`J_{}`$ are the coupling constants along the leg and rung, respectively. The coupling constants for a cyclic four-spin interaction and a diagonal interaction are denoted as $`J_{\mathrm{cyc}}`$ and $`J_{\mathrm{diag}}`$, respectively. The coupling constants used in the two models for $`\mathrm{SrCu}_2\mathrm{O}_3`$ are (i) $`J_{}=150\mathrm{m}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V},J_{}=195\mathrm{m}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V},J_{\mathrm{cyc}}=18\mathrm{m}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V},J_{\mathrm{diag}}=3\mathrm{m}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}`$ (Ref. 11) and (ii) $`J_{}=86\mathrm{m}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V},J_{}=172\mathrm{m}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V},J_{\mathrm{cyc}}=J_{\mathrm{diag}}=0`$ (Ref. 22). The periodic boundary condition is applied along the chain.

The wave-number-resolved $`S=0`$ two-triplet excitation spectra for polarization of the electric field parallel to the legs ($`𝑬\mathrm{legs}`$) can be expressed as

$`R^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,q_y;\omega )`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\pi }}\mathrm{}\mathrm{\Psi }_0|𝒜_{}^{\mathrm{leg}}{}_{q_x,q_y}{}^{}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{z}}𝒜_{}^{\mathrm{leg}}{}_{q_x,q_y}{}^{}\mathrm{\Psi }_0`$ (2)
$`=`$ $`F^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,q_y)C^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,q_y;\omega ),`$
where $`q_x`$ and $`q_y(=0,\pi )`$ are the wave numbers along the leg and rung, respectively, $`|\mathrm{\Psi }_0`$ is the eigenfunction of the lowest eigenvalue $`E_0`$, and $`z=\omega +i\epsilon +E_0`$. The operator $`𝒜_{q_x,q_y}^{\mathrm{leg}}=(1/\sqrt{N})_{l,j}e^{\mathrm{i}(q_xj+q_yl)}𝑺_{l,j}𝑺_{l,j+1}`$ is the Fourier transform of the operator for the locally exciting $`S=0`$ two-triplet state on the neighboring sites in a chain. We set $`\mathrm{}=1`$ and $`\epsilon =3.0\times 10^2`$. The energy is measured in units of $`J_{}`$. In the expression (2), $`C^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,q_y;\omega )`$ can be represented in the form of the continued fraction, which can be calculated numerically by a Lanczos algorithm GB87 . The total contribution of $`C^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,q_y;\omega )`$ for fixed $`q_x`$ and $`q_y`$ is normalized to unity, because the following sum rule has to be satisfied: $`F^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,q_y)=_0^{\mathrm{}}d\omega R^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,q_y;\omega )`$. We use the two sets of coupling constants corresponding to the two models for $`\mathrm{SrCu}_2\mathrm{O}_3`$: (i) $`J_{}/J_{}=0.769`$, $`J_{\mathrm{cyc}}/J_{}=0.0923`$, and $`J_{\mathrm{diag}}/J_{}=0.0153`$ (Ref. 11) and (ii) $`J_{}/J_{}=0.5`$ and $`J_{\mathrm{cyc}}=J_{\mathrm{diag}}=0`$ (Ref. 22).

In Fig. 1, $`R^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,0;\omega )`$ and $`R^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,\pi ;\omega )`$ in the two models are shown for $`N=28`$. The weight is proportional to the area of the full circle. In model (i) the convergences have the relative errors of about $`O(10^{10})`$ for $`\omega <3`$ and $`O(10^2)O(10^5)`$ for $`\omega >4`$, while in model (ii) they have the relative errors of about $`O(10^{12})`$ for $`\omega <3`$ and $`O(10^3)O(10^5)`$ for $`\omega >4`$. In both models, the large weights for given $`q_x`$ lie in the lowest excited states in $`q_x0.4\pi `$.

To discuss whether such lowest excited states form a lower edge of the excitation continuum or an isolated mode of the bound state, we next investigate the finite-size effects of the poles and their residues com  of the continued fraction $`C^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,q_y;\omega )`$ taka ; ys . As reported in Refs. 34-36 and 18, a pole which belongs to an excitation continuum tends to have an appreciable size dependence of at least either its position or its residue. Since the size dependence of the position of the pole is hardly seen, we only show the size dependence of the residue in the following. In Fig. 2, we first show $`R^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,0;\omega )`$ and the size dependence of the lowest excited states of $`C^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,0;\omega )`$ for $`J_{}/J_{}=1`$ and $`J_{\mathrm{cyc}}=J_{\mathrm{diag}}=0`$. In $`q_x>0.5\pi `$, the size dependence is scarcely seen. Thus, the lowest excited states in $`q_x>0.5\pi `$ form an isolated mode of the $`S=0`$ two-triplet bound state, while those in $`q_x<0.5\pi `$ form the lower edge of the excitation continuum. The results are consistent with those obtained for the other two methods uhrig ; nun .

In Fig. 3, we show the size dependence of the residue for the lowest excited states. In $`C^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,\pi ;\omega )`$, the residues for both models have a noticeable size dependence in $`0q_x\pi `$, indicating that the lowest excited states of the $`q_y=\pi `$ mode become the lower edges of the excitation continuum in the thermodynamic limit. In $`C^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,0;\omega )`$ for model (ii), on the other hand, the size dependence in $`q_x>0.5\pi `$ is very weak, while the residue in $`q_x<0.5\pi `$ decreases with increasing $`N`$. Therefore, the lowest excited states of the $`q_y=0`$ mode in model (ii) form an isolated mode in $`q_x>0.5\pi `$, and those in $`q_x<0.5\pi `$ become the lower edge of the continuum. In $`C^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,0;\omega )`$ for model (i), the residues around $`q_x0.6\pi `$ and $`0.8\pi `$ decrease slightly with increasing $`N`$. Although it is difficult to draw a definite conclusion, the observations may indicate that the lowest excited states of the $`q_y=0`$ mode in model (i) become the lower edge of the excitation continuum in $`q_x>0.6\pi `$. In fact, the size dependence of the residue in $`q_x>0.6\pi `$ is quite similar to that for the $`S=1/2`$ isotropic Heisenberg chain in $`q>0.6\pi `$ ys , where the lowest excited states form the lower edge of the two-spinon continuum. Note that in Ref. 10, it is argued that the $`S=0`$ two-triplet bound state exists in a larger $`J_{\mathrm{cyc}}`$. To develop more definite finite-size analysis, a larger system has to be calculated.

The optical-absorption coefficient for $`𝑬\mathrm{legs}`$ is given by lz ; le ; gel ; les

$$\alpha ^{\mathrm{leg}}(\omega )=\alpha _\mathrm{o}\omega I^{\mathrm{leg}}(\omega \omega _\mathrm{o}),$$
(3)
where $`\alpha _\mathrm{o}`$ is a constant depending on the material, $`\omega _\mathrm{o}`$ is the frequency of the $`\mathrm{Cu}\mathrm{O}`$ bond-stretching phonon, and $`I^{\mathrm{leg}}(\omega )=_{q_x,q_y}f_{q_x,q_y}^{\mathrm{leg}}R^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,q_y;\omega )`$ with the phonon form factors $`f_{q_x,0}^{\mathrm{leg}}=\mathrm{sin}^4(q_x/2)`$ and $`f_{q_x,\pi }^{\mathrm{leg}}=\mathrm{sin}^2(q_x/2)+\mathrm{sin}^4(q_x/2)`$. To calculate $`I^{\mathrm{leg}}(\omega \omega _\mathrm{o})`$, we apply the spline interpolation to the lowest excited states of $`R^{\mathrm{leg}}(q_x,q_y;\omega )`$ in the $`q_x`$ direction.

In Fig. 4, we show $`I^{\mathrm{leg}}(\omega \omega _\mathrm{o})`$ thus obtained for the two models in $`N=28`$. The dashed line and dotted line represent the spectra from the $`q_y=0`$ mode and $`q_y=\pi `$ mode, respectively, and the solid line indicates their sum. A noticeable difference between the results for the two models appears. In $`I^{\mathrm{leg}}(\omega \omega _\mathrm{o})`$ of model (i), the shoulder appears at $`\omega \omega _\mathrm{o}0.7`$ and the peak appears at $`\omega \omega _\mathrm{o}1.2`$. In $`I^{\mathrm{leg}}(\omega \omega _\mathrm{o})`$ of model (ii), on the other hand, the peak appears at the lower edge of the spectrum: $`\omega \omega _\mathrm{o}1.0`$. In model (i), the dispersion relation for the lowest excited states of the $`q_y=0`$ mode becomes flatter, which yields the peak at $`\omega \omega _\mathrm{o}1.2`$. The shoulder structure is caused by the lowest excited states of the $`q_y=\pi `$ mode, which lies below those of the $`q_y=0`$ mode in $`q_x0.8\pi `$. Note that when we set $`J_{\mathrm{cyc}}=0`$ in model (i), the lowest excited states of the $`q_y=\pi `$ mode lie above those of the $`q_y=0`$ mode and no shoulder structure emerges. Therefore, such shoulder and peak structures in model (i) are caused by the cyclic four-spin interaction. In model (ii), the dispersion relation of the lowest excited states in the $`q_y=0`$ mode lies below that of the $`q_y=\pi `$ mode. Thus, in model (ii) no shoulder appears and the peak structure is seen at the lower edge of the spectrum.

In Fig. 5(a) we show the size dependence of the excitation energies for the shoulder and peak, and in Fig. 5(b) we show the size dependence of their weights. As mentioned above, the shoulder is caused by the $`q_y=\pi `$ mode (see the dotted lines in Fig. 4) and the peak is caused by the $`q_y=0`$ mode (see the dashed lines in Fig. 4). In model (i), the extrapolated excitation energies for the shoulder and peak at $`N\mathrm{}`$ are $`\omega \omega _\mathrm{o}0.240`$ and $`\omega \omega _\mathrm{o}0.874`$, respectively. The extrapolated weights of the shoulder and peak at $`N\mathrm{}`$ are $`0.0996`$ and $`0.474`$, respectively. Therefore, in model (i) the shoulder and peak structures in the optical-absorption spectrum are intrinsic. In model (ii), the extrapolated excitation energies for the shoulder and peak at $`N\mathrm{}`$ almost coincide and take the values $`\omega \omega _\mathrm{o}0.540`$ and $`0.536`$ with corresponding weights of $`0.0553`$ and $`0.876`$. Thus, in model (ii) only one peak appears around the lower edge in the optical-absorption spectrum.

Using $`J_{}=195\mathrm{m}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}`$ in model (i) mizuno1 , $`J_{}=172\mathrm{m}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}`$ in model (ii) Johnson , and $`\omega _\mathrm{o}=600\mathrm{c}\mathrm{m}^1`$ commonly evaluated in cuprates legex , the excitation energies for the shoulder and peak in the model (i) can be evaluated as $`978\mathrm{c}\mathrm{m}^1`$ and $`1975\mathrm{c}\mathrm{m}^1`$, respectively, while the peak in the model (ii) can be evaluated as $`1344\mathrm{c}\mathrm{m}^1`$. Since $`\alpha ^{\mathrm{leg}}(\omega )`$ can be observed experimentally by the optical conductivity, such different characteristics between the optical-absorption spectra in the two models are probably detectable. The observed findings can be effective in determining the appropriate minimal model for $`\mathrm{SrCu}_2\mathrm{O}_3`$.

In summary, we have investigated the phonon-assisted optical-absorption spectra on the basis of the two models proposed for $`\mathrm{SrCu}_2\mathrm{O}_3`$. Characteristics of the lowest excited states have been discussed in connection with the shoulder and peak structures in the optical-absorption spectra. In the model including the effects of a cyclic four-spin interaction, the shoulder and peak structures appear at $`978\mathrm{c}\mathrm{m}^1`$ and $`1975\mathrm{c}\mathrm{m}^1`$, respectively, in the optical-absorption spectrum for $`𝑬\mathrm{legs}`$. In the other model which describes a pure two-leg ladder, no shoulder appears and the peak appears around the lower edge of the optical-absorption spectrum for $`𝑬\mathrm{legs}`$ at $`1344\mathrm{c}\mathrm{m}^1`$.

Our computational programs are based on TITPACK version 2 by H. Nishimori. Numerical computations were carried out at the Yukawa Institute Computer Facility, Kyoto University, and the Supercomputer Center, the Institute for Solid State Physics, University of Tokyo. This work was supported by a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology, Japan.


text:
# On Generalized Moment Maps for Symplectic Compact Group Actions

## 1 McDuff moments and genus $`2`$ surfaces

Let $`\sigma :S^1\times MM`$ be a symplectic non-Hamiltonian $`S^1`$-action on $`(M,\omega )`$ . The construction of a McDuff moment map goes as follows : an invariant symplectic form $`\omega ^{\prime \prime }`$ with a rational cohomology class is chosen near $`\omega `$ , preserving the non-Hamiltonian property. Then $`\omega ^{}=k.\omega ^{\prime \prime }`$ is in an integral class for some $`k`$ . Now, trying to define the moment map in the usual manner as

$$\mu ^{usu}(x)=_{\gamma _x}i_{X_\eta }\omega ^{}\text{ }xM,\gamma _x:[0,1]M,\gamma _x(0)=\stackrel{~}{x},\gamma _x(1)=x$$

for some base point $`\stackrel{~}{x}`$ , we see that the obstructions lie in the non-vanishing of the periods $`_Ci_{X_\eta }\omega ^{}`$ for some 1-cycles in M. But those periods are in $``$ , because $`C`$ can be pushed to a 2-cycle $`\sigma (C):[0,1]^2M:(s,t)(\mathrm{exp}s\eta ).C(t)`$ and

$$_{\sigma (C)}\omega ^{}=_{[0,1]^2}\omega _{(\mathrm{exp}s\eta ).C(t)}^{}(X_\eta ((\mathrm{exp}s\eta ).C(t)),(\mathrm{exp}s\eta )_{}(\dot{C}(t))=_Ci_{X_\eta }\omega ^{}$$

where the invariance and the integrality of $`\omega ^{}`$ was used. The McDuff moment $`\mu `$ is then simply $`\mu ^{usu}`$ seen as a map to $`/`$ . The properties of $`\mu `$ recalled in the introduction are either immediate or consequence of the fact that $`\mu `$ is a Morse-Bott function with critical points of even indices (see ).

###### Remark 1.1 (Aside)

It is possible to render $`\mu `$ fiber-connected.

Indeed, the non-existence of a local extremum for $`\mu `$ implies that $`\mu `$ is an open map onto $`S^1`$ , and defining as in  the equivalence relation $``$ on $`M`$ by saying $`xy`$ if $`\mu (x)=\mu (y)`$ and $`x`$ and $`y`$ belong to the same connected component of $`\mu ^1(\mu (x))`$ , we see that $`\stackrel{~}{\mu }:(M/)=\stackrel{~}{M}S^1`$ is a finite covering. Such a covering is always of the form $`\pi :S^1S^1:tt^k`$ for some $`k`$, whence $`\mu `$ factorizes as

$$M\stackrel{\mu ^{fc}}{}\stackrel{~}{M}S^1\stackrel{\pi }{}S^1$$

where $`\mu ^{fc}`$ is fiber-connected. We will discuss implications of this observation below in section 4 and in the Appendix.

As example of the use of McDuff moment maps, we will now provide a proof of Theorem 0.1. Compact connected group actions on surfaces are naturally not very mysterious (see e.g. the full classification of $`S^1`$-actions on compact surfaces in ), the point here is to show that a symplectic argument can be relevant. The starting point is the following theorem of Ono, obtained from the properties of McDuff moments :

###### Theorem 1.1 ()

Let $`(M,\omega )`$ be a closed symplectic manifold.

1. if the second homotopy group $`\pi _2(M)`$ vanishes, then a circle group action on $`M`$ preserving $`\omega `$ has no fixed point.
2. Moreover if every abelian subgroup of $`\pi _1(M)`$ is cyclic, there is no circle group action on $`M`$ preserving $`\omega `$ .

It is also useful to collect here some standard facts about (symplectic) $`G`$-actions on $`(M,\omega )`$ :

* isotropy groups $`G_x=\{gG|g.x=x\}`$ are divided into conjugation classes characterizing the ”orbit type” of point in $`M`$ .
* There is only a finite number of orbit types (, prop.27.4 or  prop. 2.2.3)
* There exists a ”principal” orbit type s.t. the corresponding points (the ”principal stratum” $`M_{princ}`$ ) in $`M`$ form a dense open subset.
* For $`H`$ a closed subgroup of $`G`$, define

$$M_H=\{xM|G_x=H\}.$$

Then each connected component of $`M_H`$ is a symplectic submanifold of $`M`$ ( p.203)

Proof of theorem 0.1 : We remark that contradicting the conclusion of the theorem amounts to the existence of some non-trivial $`S^1`$-action $`\sigma `$ preserving a symplectic form $`\omega `$ on $`S`$ : for 1. it follows from the fact that the isometry group of a Riemann structure on $`S`$ is a compact Lie transformation group (, p.39) preserving the induced (symplectic) volume form ; for 2. it is obvious ; for 3. we get an holomorphic transformation invariant metric $`g`$ by use of the uniformization theorem (, theorem 4.4.1) and the fact that holomorphic transformations of the hyperbolic half-plane are isometries (,pp.28-29). $`\omega `$ is again the Riemannian volume $`v_g`$ .

Since $`\pi _2(S)=0`$ , part 1. of the Ono theorem applies and $`\sigma `$ has no fixed point. From the fact that the $`M_H`$ are symplectic and in particular even dimensional, we deduce that $`S=S_{princ}`$ , i.e. all points have the same isotropy group $`/k`$ for some $`k`$ . $`\sigma `$ can then be replaced by a free action, so that $`S`$ becomes a principal $`S^1`$-bundle over a 1-dimensional compact base, forcing $`SS^1\times S^1`$ contradicting the genus hypothesis.

$``$

###### Remark 1.2

Hurwitz’s theorem ( p.88) states that the order of the group of holomorphic transformations of $`S`$ is at most $`84(g1)`$ , and it is even known that it reduces to identity when $`g3`$ ( p.276). Naturally, our technique doesn’t give access to those finer results.

## 2 The basic lemmas

The two lemmas below will legitimate the definition of generalized moments in the next section.

###### Lemma 2.1

Let $`H`$ be a dense connected Lie subgroup of G, and suppose given an Hamiltonian action of $`H`$ on $`(M,\omega )`$ . If this action extends to $`G`$, the extension is Hamiltonian too.

###### Remark 2.1

No question of equivariance is considered until the next section.

The tools we need are :

1. Symplectic actions are always Hamiltonian when the group is semisimple (by the Whitehead lemmas and Theo. 26.1 in )
2. Up to a covering that is not relevant here, $`G=K\times T`$ , where $`K`$ is compact semisimple and $`T`$ is a torus ( p.297)
3. If a torus $`T`$ acts symplectically on $`(M,\omega )`$ and $`S^1T`$ is a circle subgroup acting in a non-Hamiltonian way, then the modified symplectic form $`\omega ^{}`$ used to define the associated McDuff moment can be chosen $`T`$-invariant. (this follows from the starting argument of the proof of the next lemma).
4. Near each fixed point $`x`$ of a symplectic $`T`$-action, there exists a local moment map which reads in an appropriate Darboux chart $`(x_1,\mathrm{},x_n,y_1,\mathrm{},y_n)`$ as

$$\mu (x_i,y_j)=\mu (0)+\frac{1}{2}\underset{i=1}{\overset{n}{}}\alpha _i(x_i^2+y_i^2)$$

where the $`\alpha _i𝒯^{}`$ are the weights of the linearized $`T`$-action on the tangent space $`T_xM`$ ( p.250). Those weights are independant of the choice of $`\omega `$ or $`\omega ^{}`$ above and belong to the weight lattice in $`𝒯^{}`$, meaning that they take integral values on the $`^n`$ lattice $`\mathrm{ker}\mathrm{exp}`$ in $`𝒯`$ .

Proof of lemma 2.1: By continuity considerations, the $`G`$-action is symplectic. Also, by tools 1) and 2) above, it is readily seen that the question reduces to the case of a dense 1-parameter subgroup $`H`$ in a torus $`T`$, the $`H`$-action being Hamiltonian. The associated Hamiltonian $`f_H:M`$ takes a minimum value ($`M`$ is compact) at some $`H`$-fixed point $`pM`$ . Then $`p`$ is $`T`$-fixed, and in the notations of tool 4. above $`f_H`$ can be written near $`p`$ as

$$f_H=f_H(p)+\frac{1}{2}\underset{i=1}{\overset{n}{}}\alpha _i(h)(x_i^2+y_i^2)$$

with $`\alpha _i(h)0i`$ , $`h`$ being some generator of the Lie algebra of $`H`$. Since the coordinates of $`h`$ are $``$-linearly independent in a natural basis $`\{e_1,\mathrm{},e_r\}`$ of $`𝒯`$ on which the $`\alpha _i`$ take integral values, we see that $`\alpha _i(h)=0`$ is only possible if $`\alpha _i=0`$ in $`𝒯^{}`$ , and that $`\alpha _i(h)>0`$ otherwise. Now we can choose linearly independent vectors $`r_1,\mathrm{},r_r`$ in $`𝒯`$ with rational coordinates in the basis $`\{e_k\}`$ and close enough to $`h`$ to have $`\alpha _i(r_j)>0j,\alpha _i0`$. Each $`r_j`$ generates a circle subgroup $`C_j`$ of $`T`$. The lemma will be proved if we show that every $`C_j`$-action on $`M`$ is Hamiltonian. If not then the action of at least one circle, say $`C_1`$, admits a McDuff moment $`\mu _1:MS^1`$. But, using the independence of the weights to a small change of symplectic structure in tool 4. above, we see that near $`p`$ and in well-chosen coordinates on $`M`$ and $`S^1`$, $`\mu _1`$ looks like

$$\mu _1(p)+\frac{1}{2}\underset{i=1}{\overset{n}{}}\alpha _i(r_1)(x_i^2+y_i^2)$$

furnishing a local extremum of $`\mu _1`$. This is impossible.

$``$

###### Remark 2.2

This lemma is perhaps true even without compactness assumption on $`G`$.

In fact it is linked with the important Flux Conjecture (see ) that we now restate :

###### Definition 2.1

an Hamiltonian isotopy on $`(M,\omega )`$ is a family $`\mathrm{\Phi }_t`$ of symplectomorphisms obtained from a smooth family of Hamiltonian functions $`H_t:Mt[0,1]`$ as the flow of the time-dependent vector field $`X_t`$ s.t. $`i_{X_t}\omega =dH_t`$.

The set $`\text{Ham}(M,\omega )=\{\mathrm{\Phi }_1|\mathrm{\Phi }_t\text{ is a Hamiltonian isotopy }\}`$ is a normal path-connected subgroup of the identity component $`\text{Symp}_o(M,\omega )`$ of the symplectomorphism group (see  p.311). The Flux Conjecture asserts :

$`\text{Ham}(M,\omega )`$ is $`C^1`$-(or/and)$`C^0`$-closed in $`\text{Symp}_o(M,\omega )`$ ”

Our lemma for more general $`G`$ would be a corollary of the conjecture as follows : since each element in $`H`$ belongs to $`\text{Ham}(M,\omega )`$ the Flux Conjecture gives that the entire $`G`$ belongs to $`\text{Ham}(M,\omega )`$. Now every smooth path $`\mathrm{\Psi }_t\text{Ham}(M,\omega )`$ is generated by Hamiltonian vector fields (Prop. 10.17 in ). This implies that $`X𝒢`$, the 1-parameter subgroup $`\{\mathrm{exp}tX\}`$ in $`G`$ corresponds to a Hamiltonian isotopy $`\mathrm{\Phi }_t^X`$ s.t. $`\mathrm{\Phi }_{t+t^{}}^X=\mathrm{\Phi }_t^X\mathrm{\Phi }_t^{}^X`$ . Then it is easy to show that the corresponding Hamiltonian $`H_t^X`$ is time-independent, providing the desired Hamiltonian function $`H^X`$ .

Back to the compact $`G`$ case and a symplectic action $`\sigma `$ on $`(M,\omega )`$ remember that every subtorus $`T^i`$ in a torus $`T^n`$ has a complementary subtorus $`T^{ni}`$ with $`T^n=T^i\times T^{ni}`$. Then we deduce from lemma 2.1 that (up to an irrelevant covering) $`G`$ decomposes as a direct product $`C\times T^r`$ where $`C`$ is compact connected, $`T^r`$ a r-torus, $`\sigma `$ being Hamiltonian on $`C`$ and totally non-Hamiltonian on $`T^r`$ (i.e. $`i_{X_\eta }\omega `$ is non-exact $`\eta 𝒯`$ ).
In order to define the generalized moment map, we first want to replace $`\omega `$ with an integral symplectic 2-form s.t. the just mentioned decomposition remains valid.

###### Lemma 2.2

The situation being as just described, there exists an integral $`G`$-invariant symplectic form $`\omega ^{}`$ on $`M`$ with $`i_{X_\xi }\omega `$ exact $``$ $`i_{X_\xi }\omega ^{}`$ exact, $`\xi 𝒢`$.

proof : borrowing an argument from , we deduce from the compacity of $`M`$ that it is of ”finite integral rank” i.e.

$$H^i(M,)H^i(M,)$$

as a consequence of the universal coefficients formula in cohomology when the cochain complex is finitely generated (Ex.2 p.172 in ).
So we can write $`\omega `$ as

$$\omega =a_1\omega _1+\mathrm{}+a_l\omega _l\text{ }a_i,\omega _iH^2(M,)$$

and since averaging over $`G`$ has no consequence on the cohomology class, we can furthermore assume that each $`\omega _i`$ is $`G`$-invariant. Now let $`\{\xi _1,\mathrm{},\xi _c\}`$ be a basis of the Lie algebra $`𝒞`$ of $`C`$ , consisting of circle generators satisfying $`\mathrm{exp}_G(\xi _i)=e,\mathrm{exp}_G(t\xi _i)et(0,1)`$ . Let $`\{\eta _1,\mathrm{},\eta _r\}`$ be such a basis for $`𝒯`$, and denote $`\{\mu _k\}`$ the union of these two basis. Let $`\gamma _1,\mathrm{},\gamma _s`$ be smooth 1-cycles generating the 1-homology of $`M`$. Then the Hamiltonian character of the action is reflected in the properties

$$(A)\text{ }_{\gamma _i}i_{X_{\xi _j}}\omega =0=\underset{k=1}{\overset{l}{}}a_k_{\gamma _i}i_{X_{\xi _j}}\omega _k$$

$`i=1\mathrm{}s,j=1\mathrm{}c`$ and also $`j=1\mathrm{}r,k_j\{1\mathrm{}s\}`$ s.t.

$$(B)\text{ }_{\gamma _{k_j}}i_{X_{\eta _j}}\omega 0$$

Now we can as in section 1 push the 1-cycles with the various circle actions to obtain various 2-cycles $`\sigma _{\mu _j}\gamma _i`$ and prove that

$$i,j,k,\text{ }_{\gamma _i}i_{X_{\mu _j}}\omega _k$$

So $`(a_1,\mathrm{},a_l)^t^l`$ is a non-zero solution of a system of linear equations of the form $`A.a=0,A^{s\times l}`$. The solution space of this system can thus be generated by vectors in $`^l`$. We may then replace $`(a_1,\mathrm{},a_l)`$ by an arbitrary close rational vector $`(q_1,\mathrm{},q_l)`$ s.t.

$$\omega ^{\prime \prime }=q_1\omega _1+\mathrm{}+q_l\omega _l$$

remains non-degenerate and still satisfies properties (A) and (B). Choosing $`\omega ^{}=k.\omega ^{\prime \prime }`$ for a large enough integer $`k`$ concludes this proof.

$``$

## 3 Definition and equivariance of the generalized moment

Everything to guarantee the existence of generalized moment maps is now established. Keeping the notations of the preceding section, here is again the definition :

###### Definition 3.1

A generalized moment map for $`\sigma `$ is a map

$$\mu :M𝒞^{}\times (S^1)^r$$

where the first factor $`\mu _1:M𝒞^{}`$ is a genuine Hamiltonian moment map and the r other factors are McDuff moments associated to each circle factor of a decomposition $`T^r(S^1)^r`$ , all this evaluated relative to a unique integral invariant symplectic form $`\omega ^{}`$

This definition is the one that appears to us the closest in spirit to the original McDuff’s construction.

###### Remark 3.1

Many choices are implicit in this definition, but we will study properties unaffected by those choices.

###### Remark 3.2

The possibility of defining a moment map taking values in some cylinder obtained by quotienting $`𝒢^{}`$ adequately is already discussed in , in a completely general situation. The problem is to prevent this cylinder from being reduced to a point ; this is the reason for our integrality obsession here, and for our seemingly limited framework.

One of the important constructions allowed in the Hamiltonian case is Marsden-Weinstein reduction, working as follows (our reference here is ) :
let $`\mu :M𝒢^{}`$ be the moment map associated with an Hamiltonian action of a Lie group $`G`$ on $`(M,\omega )`$. Then there exists a (unique) affine action $`a_\theta `$ of $`G`$ on $`𝒢^{}`$ defined by a 1-cocycle $`\theta :G𝒢^{}`$ for the coadjoint action, giving the $`\mu `$-equivariance ($`\mu (g.x)=a_\theta (g)\mu (x)`$).
Given a weakly regular value $`v\mu (M)𝒢^{}`$ , $`G_v`$ its $`a_\theta `$ isotropy group, $`G_v^o`$ its neutral component, the reduced space associated to $`v`$ is

$$M_{red}^v=\mu ^1(v)/G_v^o\text{ or }M_{red}^v=\mu ^1(v)/G_v$$

In many circumstances, $`M_{red}`$ is still a manifold (or an orbifold) and has a naturally induced symplectic structure. This reduction scheme appears as a very useful tool in symplectic geometry.

Now a fundamental observation is that the only global property of the moment used to construct the reduced space and its symplectic structure is its equivariance. This leads us to consider equivariance properties of our generalized moments. The starting point is that, when $`G`$ is compact and the action is Hamiltonian, $`\mu `$ can always be chosen $`Ad^{}`$-equivariant, i.e. $`\theta =0`$ (). This brings our first equivariance property :

###### Lemma 3.1

Let $`\mu :M𝒞^{}\times (S^1)^r`$ be a generalized moment map for a symplectic $`G`$-action.
Then the first factor $`\mu _1:M𝒞^{}`$ can be chosen $`Ad^{}(C)`$-equivariant and $`T^r`$-invariant, the second factor $`\mu _2:M(S^1)^r`$ being $`C`$-invariant.

proof : Starting with an $`Ad^{}(C)`$-equivariant $`\mu _1^{}`$, we observe as in  that averaging $`\mu _1^{}`$ over the $`T^r`$-action still delivers an $`Ad^{}(C)`$-equivariant moment (now $`T^r`$-invariant!) $`\mu _1`$ for the $`C`$-action. The $`G`$-invariance of $`\mu _2`$ is then natural since by the defining property of a moment map, infinitesimal $`T`$-invariance of $`\mu _1`$ means

$$\omega ^{}(X_\xi ,X_\eta )=0\text{ }\xi 𝒞,\eta 𝒯$$

But this is equivalent to the infinitesimal $`C`$-invariance of $`\mu _2`$. $`C`$ being connected, this implies the full $`C`$-invariance of $`\mu _2`$.

$``$

The equivariance property expected from the Hamiltonian situation is contained in the following definition

###### Definition 3.2

$`\mu `$ is naturally equivariant if $`\mu _1`$ is $`Ad^{}(C)`$-equivariant, $`T^r`$-invariant, and $`\mu _2`$ is $`G`$-invariant.

Natural equivariance is not always obtainable :

###### Example 3.1 (The 2-torus)

Consider the standard action of $`T^2^2/^2`$ on itself :
$`[p,q].[r,s]=[p+r,q+s]`$. The invariant and integral symplectic form
$`\omega =\mathrm{"}dxdy/^2\mathrm{"}`$ gives a generalized moment map

$$\mu :T^2T^2:[p,q][q,p]$$

which can of course not be chosen as $`T^2`$-invariant.

This simple example shows that natural moment equivariance is not the rule for non-Hamiltonian actions, but there is a situation where things remain nice :

###### Proposition 3.1

If any fixed point exists for the $`T^r`$-action on $`M`$ , $`\mu `$ can be chosen naturally equivariant .

###### Remark 3.3

The existence of a fixed point for a symplectic torus action simplifies in many cases the analysis radically by forcing the action to be Hamiltonian.

This is so e.g. when

* $`M`$ is Kähler or of Lefschetz type (see  p.150)
* $`M`$ is 4-dimensional (see )
* $`M`$ is monotone (see  p.152)
* The action is semifree with isolated fixed points (see )
* The action is effective and $`dimT=dimM/2`$ (see )

Nevertheless the subject of non-Hamiltonian symplectic actions with fixed points on a compact $`(M,\omega )`$ is not empty, as shown by a 6-dimensional example in .

The proof of prop. 3.1 will be based on the following two facts about symplectic actions :

1. For a torus $`T`$, any generalized moment $`\mu `$ for the $`T`$-action is $`T`$-invariant if and only if the $`T`$-orbits are isotropic in $`(M,\omega ^{})`$(̇see  prop. 3.5.6)
2. Near any isotropic $`G`$-orbit $`𝒪`$ in $`(M,\omega ^{})`$ the equivariant isotropic embedding theorem provides a model for a G-invariant neighbourhood of $`𝒪`$ in $`(M,\omega ^{})`$, as described e.g. in , prop. 2.5 :

###### Proposition 3.2 (local normal form for the moment map)

Let $`H`$ be the stabilizer of $`p𝒪`$ and $`V`$ be the symplectic slice to the orbit $`𝒪`$. Then a neighbourhood of $`𝒪`$ is equivariantly symplectomorphic to a neighbourhood of the zero section of $`Y=G\times _H(m^{}\times V)`$ with the equivariant $`G`$-moment map $`J`$ given by the formula

$$J([g,\mu ,v])=Ad^{}(g)(\mu +\mathrm{\Phi }_V(v))$$

We will not explain the notations here, the important fact is that any isotropic orbits possesses an invariant neighbourhood on which the action is Hamiltonian with an $`Ad^{}`$-equivariant moment.

Proof of prop. 3.1 : By Lemma 3.1, we see that it is enough to prove $`T`$-invariance for generalized moment maps of symplectic $`T`$-actions with fixed points, $`T`$ being a torus. By fact 1) above it is equivalent to show that every $`T`$-orbit is isotropic. Clearly, since the isotropy of the orbit through $`xM`$ is equivalent to

$$\omega ^{}(X_\xi ,X_\eta )=0\text{ }\xi ,\eta 𝒯,$$

the set of points with isotropic orbits in $`M`$ is closed. But the Sjamaar-Lerman proposition in fact 2), applied to the torus case, imply the existence of a (genuine) equivariant moment map on an invariant neighbourhood of any isotropic orbit, hence again by fact 1) the isotropy of every orbit in this neighbourhood. So the set of points with isotropic orbit is open and closed in $`(M,\omega ^{})`$, and nonempty by the fixed point hypothesis. $`M`$ being connected, the proposition follows.

$``$

Our next goal is to see that some equivariance in the Libermann-Marle sense above remains whithout any fixed point assumption. Namely we will prove :

###### Proposition 3.3

There exists a matrix $`Z^{r\times r}`$ with zero diagonal, defining an affine action $`Aff^Z`$ of $`T^r`$ on itself, s.t.

$$\mu _2(t.x)=Aff^Z(t)\mu _2(x)\text{ }tT^r,xM$$

###### Remark 3.4 (Definition of $`Aff^Z`$)

The affine action $`Aff^Z`$ is defined by :

$$Aff^Z(s_1,\mathrm{},s_r)(t_1,\mathrm{},t_r)=(\underset{j}{}(s_j)^{Z_{1j}}.t_1,\mathrm{},\underset{j}{}(s_j)^{Z_{rj}}.t_r)$$

In the two-torus example, $`Z=\left(\begin{array}{cc}0& 1\\ 1& 0\end{array}\right)`$.

proof of prop. 3.3 : we see $`\mu _2`$ as taking values in $`^r/^r`$, and then providing an ordinary moment $`\mu _O:M𝒯^{}^r`$ on each open set $`OM`$ around a point $`o`$, s.t. $`\mu _2(O)\mu _2(o)+[\frac{1}{2},+\frac{1}{2}[^r`$.
Let us choose the following data : two nested finite covers $`𝒪=\{𝒪_i\}𝒱=\{𝒱_i\}`$ of $`M`$ (compact!), with $`\mu _2|_{𝒱_i}`$ an ordinary moment and an inversion-invariant identity neighbourhood $`UT^r`$ small enough to have $`t_1.t_2.𝒪_i𝒱_it_1,t_2U`$. Then a localization of the argument of Théo. 3.2 in  gives :
$`i,x𝒪_i,tU,\mu _2|_{𝒱_i}(t.x)=a_i(t,\mu _2|_{𝒱_i}(x))`$, where $`a_i(t,v)=Ad^{}(t)v+\theta _i(t)`$, $`\theta _i:UT^r𝒯^{}`$ being a 1-cocycle for the coadjoint action :
$`\theta _i(t_1.t_2)=\theta _i(t_1)+Ad_{t_1}^{}\theta _i(t_2)`$.
The coadjoint action being trivial in the torus case, we have

$$a_i(t,v)=v+\theta _i(t)\text{ }\theta _i(t_1.t_2)=\theta _i(t_1)+\theta _i(t_2)$$

Now, using the connectedness of $`M`$, we deduce that the $`\theta _i`$ in fact are not dependent on $`i`$, so there is a unique (local) cocycle $`\theta :UT^r𝒯^{}`$ associated to $`\mu _2`$. We have to show that $`\theta `$ can be extended from $`U`$ to $`T`$, keeping its relation to $`\mu _2`$. Remark that we are interested in the image of $`\theta `$ up to the $`^r`$-lattice. The integrality assumption on $`\omega ^{}`$ is crutial at this point : let $`\mu _2^1,\mathrm{},\mu _2^r`$ be the $`r`$ McDuff components of $`\mu _2`$, $`S_1^1,\mathrm{},S_r^1`$ the corresponding circles in $`T^r`$, $`\eta _1,\mathrm{},\eta _r𝒯`$ the corresponding ’unit’ vectors, $`\stackrel{~}{x}M`$ a base point, $`C_1=S_1^1.\stackrel{~}{x},\mathrm{},C_r=S_r^1.\stackrel{~}{x}`$ r 1-cycles generated by the action. Define

$$Z_{ij}=_{C_j}i_{X_{\eta _i}}\omega ^{}\text{ }^{r\times r}.$$

Then it is not hard to see that $`\theta `$ induces the homomorphism

$$T^rT^r:sAff^Z(s)(e)$$

and that $`\mu _2`$ is equivariant with respect to $`Aff^Z`$.

$``$

###### Remark 3.5

In the Hamiltonian case, $`\theta `$ is global and induces an homomorphism $`T^r^r`$, forcing $`\theta `$ to be zero.

###### Remark 3.6

This result was deduced from a corresponding discussion about affine Poisson structures in .

###### Corollary 3.1

If $`Aff^Z`$ is free on some subtorus $`T^sT^r`$, then $`M`$ is a (trivial) $`T^s`$-principal bundle.

###### Corollary 3.2

If $`Z`$ is of rank r, then the $`T^r`$-action is locally free, i.e. every point in $`M`$ has a finite stabilizer.

Those equivariance properties in principle give access to the machinery of symplectic reduction along the Hamiltonian lines. It may seem strange physically to look at objects constructed from a different symplectic structure (unless $`\omega `$ is integral); for us one motivation is to understand results as in , where the philosophy is to show that certain symplectic actions have to be Hamiltonian by using properties of an associated ’generalized moment’.

## 4 Convexity

In this section the acting group is supposed to be a torus $`S`$, and we look at the image of the generalized moment

$$\mu :M𝒞^{}\times (S^1)^r𝒞^{}\times ^r/^r$$

where $`C`$ is the maximal subtorus in $`S`$ with Hamiltonian action, r its codimension in $`S`$. Then, by the Atiyah-Guillemin-Sternberg convexity theorem, we know that $`\mu _1(M)=\mathrm{\Delta }`$, a convex polytope in $`𝒞^{}`$.

###### Theorem 4.1 (Atiyah-Guillemin-Sternberg for $`\mu `$)

The image of $`\mu `$ is
$`\mu (M)=\mathrm{\Delta }\times (S^1)^r`$ (convexity property), and $`\mu `$ is an open map from $`M`$ to $`\mu (M)`$.

Tool : we will use the local form of the image of a (non-necessarily equivariant) moment map for the $`S`$-action given by Theorem 32.3 of  : the image of a (non-necessarily invariant) neighbourhood $`U`$ of a point $`xM`$ for a local moment map $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ is given by

$$\mathrm{\Phi }(U)=U^{}(\mathrm{\Phi }(x)+s_1^{}Co^+(\alpha _1,\mathrm{},\alpha _n)),$$

where $`S_1`$ is the identity component of the the isotropy group at $`x`$, $`s_1`$ its Lie algebra and $`s_1^{}`$ its annihilator in $`s^{}`$, $`\alpha _1,\mathrm{},\alpha _ns_1^{}s^{}`$ are the weights of the isotropy representation of $`S_1`$ on $`T_xM`$, and
$`Co^+(\alpha _1,\mathrm{},\alpha _n)\stackrel{def}{=}\{_i\lambda _i\alpha _i|\lambda _i^+\}`$.
Moreover, $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ is open as a map $`U\mathrm{\Phi }(U)`$ (see ).

Proof of theo.4.1 : The inclusion $`\mu (M)\mathrm{\Delta }\times (S^1)^r`$ is trivial. We will show that a set $`\mu (U)`$ described as $`\mathrm{\Phi }(U)`$ above is always open in $`\mathrm{\Delta }\times (S^1)^r`$, using again that McDuff moments have no local extrema. Combined with the fact that $`\mu (M)`$ is closed in $`\mathrm{\Delta }\times (S^1)^r`$, this will give the result.

Now if $`\mu (U)`$ is not open, this means that $`Co^+(\alpha _1,\mathrm{},\alpha _n)`$ is not $`s_1^{}`$. Let $`Vs^{}`$ be the subspace generated by $`s_1^{}Co^+(\alpha _1,\mathrm{},\alpha _n)`$. Then $`W=V^{}s_1`$ is rationnaly generated (see a similar argument in the proof of lemma 2.2) so it is the algebra of a subtorus $`ZS`$. We claim that $`ZC`$ ; otherwise there would exist some circle in $`Z`$, not contained in $`C`$. This circle would have a non-Hamiltonian action on $`M`$, whose McDuff moment would be constant on an open set, a contradiction. Now by looking at $`\mu _1`$ and by usual Hamiltonian arguments, one sees that $`U`$ is the identity component of the generic stabilizer (corresponding to the principal orbit type) of the points of $`M`$ for the $`C`$-action. This shows that in fact $`V=W^{}`$ is independent of the point $`xM`$ and the neighbourhood $`U`$ chosen, and is given by $`>\mathrm{\Delta }<𝒯^{}`$. Let us write $`S=WK`$, with $`K`$ the algebra of a complementary torus to $`Z`$ in $`S`$.

We aim to show $`\mu (U)=U^{}(\mathrm{\Delta }𝒯^{})=U^{}V(\mathrm{\Delta }𝒯^{})`$. If $`V=s_1^{}Co^+(\alpha _1,\mathrm{},\alpha _n)`$, we are done. Otherwise, by the elementary properties of convex cones, $`s_1^{}Co^+(\alpha _1,\mathrm{},\alpha _n)`$ is a finite intersection of half-spaces in $`V`$, of the form

$$H_y^+=\{vV|v(y)0\}\text{ }0yKS_1$$

Again by rationality considerations, $`>y<`$ is the algebra of a circle in $`K`$, and if $`y𝒞`$ we are led to a contradiction by creating an extremum for a McDuff moment. So $`y𝒞`$, and the conclusion comes from the well-known openness of $`\mu _1`$.

$``$

###### Corollary 4.1

If a n-torus $`T^n`$ acts in a totally non-Hamiltonian way on a compact connected symplectic manifold $`(M,\omega )`$, then $`nb_1(M)`$.

proof : Let $`\mu :M(S^1)^r`$ be a generalized moment map. Then by the surjectivity and the openness of $`\mu `$, it is possible to build n 1-cycles $`\gamma _1,\mathrm{},\gamma _n`$ in $`M`$ whose $`\mu `$-image are (perhaps up to an integral multiple due to the non-connectedness of the fibers of McDuff moments, which can force to make several revolutions before being back in the right component) the 1-cycles in $`T^n`$ corresponding to the n $`S^1`$-factors. It is then easy to see that the subgroup generated by $`\gamma _1,\mathrm{},\gamma _n`$ in $`H_1(M,)`$ is a free subgroup of rank n, giving $`b_1(M)n`$.

$``$

###### Remark 4.1

This result has to be related to the ”cohomologically free” actions in .

From the cycle construction in Corollary 4.1, we also obtain the other

###### Corollary 4.2

Let $`\mu :M𝒞^{}\times (S^1)^r`$ be a generalized moment for a symplectic torus action. Let $`(c,s)=(c,s_1,\mathrm{},s_{r1})𝒞^{}\times (S^1)^{r1}`$. Then there exists a 1-cycle $`\gamma `$ in $`M`$ with $`\mu (\gamma )=(c,s_1,\mathrm{},s_{r1})\times (S^1)`$.

This has an implication on the reduction side :

###### Corollary 4.3

Suppose that $`\mu `$ in Corollary 4.2 is naturally equivariant. Decompose $`\mu `$ as $`\mu =(\mu _1,\mu _2)`$ where $`\mu _1:M𝒞^{}\times (S^1)^{r1}`$ and $`\mu _2:MS^1`$. If $`(c,s)`$ is a regular value of $`\mu _1`$ and $`M_{red}=\mu _1^1(c,s)/C\times (S^1)^{r1}`$ is a smooth reduced space, then the last $`S^1`$ factor action induces a symplectic non-Hamiltonian action on $`M_{red}`$.

proof: For clarity, we write $`K`$ for the last $`S^1`$ factor.
Let $`i`$ denote the inclusion of $`M_{cs}=\mu _1^1(c,s)`$ in $`M`$, $`\pi `$ the quotienting map $`\pi :M_{cs}M_{red}`$. Then we see by standard arguments that $`i^{}(\mu _2)`$ is a S-invariant function, furnishing a function $`\stackrel{~}{\mu }_2:M_{red}S^1`$ which is a generalized moment for the K-action on $`M_{red}`$. The cycle $`\gamma `$ in Corollary 4.2 sits in $`M_{cs}`$, and projects in $`M_{red}`$ to a cycle $`\stackrel{~}{\gamma }`$ with $`\stackrel{~}{\mu }_2(\stackrel{~}{\gamma })=S^1`$, showing that really $`\stackrel{~}{\mu }_2`$ is a McDuff moment corresponding to a non-Hamiltonian action.

$``$

###### Remark 4.2

Starting with a generalized moment $`\mu :M𝒞^{}\times (S^1)^r`$, we can apply to each McDuff factor $`\mu _2,\mathrm{},\mu _{r+1}:MS^1`$ the procedure of Remark 1.1, to obtain a ”moment” $`\mu ^{fc}:M𝒞^{}\times (S^1)^r`$ where each $`S^1`$ factor is fiber-connected. It is not difficult to check that every result in this section remains true for $`\mu ^{fc}`$.

###### Remark 4.3

As reasonable extension of the result given here, we expect the Kirwan convexity theorem  to be true in our context (see also ). Generalizations to symplectic orbifolds are also imaginable.

## Appendix A Relation with a result of M.K. Kim

As application of the ”non-Hamiltonian heredity” in Corollary 4.3, we propose a reformulation of the main theorem in . We have no familiarity with symplectic orbifolds, but we cannot avoid their appearance in some arguments below, so we will make the following
Assumption : the results used here and that we have proved in the manifold context are still valid in the symplectic orbifold context.

The interesting main result stated by Kim is the

###### Proposition A.1

Let $`\sigma :T^{(n)}\times M^{(2n+2)}M^{(2n+2)}`$ be an effective symplectic torus action action on a compact connected symplectic manifold $`(M,\omega )`$, the supscripts indicating the respective dimensions. Then $`\sigma `$ is Hamiltonian whenever it possesses a fixed point.

Suppose from now on that the proposition is false. Then a generalized moment $`\mu :M𝒞^{}\times (S^1)^r`$ exists, and can be chosen naturally equivariant because of the fixed point hypothesis. We will first prove a little lemma :

###### Lemma A.1

In the hypotheses of the proposition, there exists a decomposition $`T=C\times (S^1)^{r1}\times K,KS^1`$, and a regular value $`(c,s)𝒞^{}\times (S^1)^{r1}`$ of $`\mu _1`$ (notation of Corollary 4.3) such that $`M_{cs}`$ contains a $`C\times (S^1)^{r1}`$-orbit of $`K`$-fixed points. Equivalently, the $`K`$-action on $`M_{red}`$ has a fixed point.

Proof: We use the already invoked local form of any local moment map near a fixed point $`pM`$, in a coordinate system $`(x_i,y_i)`$ centered at $`p`$ :

$$\mu (x_i,y_j)=\mu (0)+\frac{1}{2}\underset{i=1}{\overset{n+1}{}}\alpha _i(x_i^2+y_i^2).$$

By usual arguments, the effectiveness of the action implies $`>\{\alpha _i\}<=𝒯^{}`$. Looking at the set $`\{V_\alpha \}`$ of (n-1)-dimensional subspaces in $`𝒯^{}`$ of the form
$`>\alpha _1,\mathrm{},\widehat{\alpha }_i,\mathrm{},\widehat{\alpha }_j,\mathrm{},\alpha _{n+1}<`$, and their annihilators $`>\xi _\alpha <𝒯`$, we see that the $`\xi _\alpha `$’s are circle generators and at least one of thoses circles acts on $`M`$ in a non-Hamiltonian way by dimensionality reason. Pick one ”non-Hamiltonian” $`\xi _\alpha `$, call $`K`$ the corresponding circle. For notation ease, reorder the coordinates so that the corresponding $`V_\alpha `$ is $`>\alpha _3,\mathrm{},\alpha _{n+1}<`$. Remark that every point in $`M`$ having coordinates $`(x_i,y_i)`$ with $`x_1=x_2=y_1=y_2=0`$ is $`K`$-fixed. Let $`F`$ be the relatively open cone $`F=\{_{i=3}^{n+1}\lambda _i^+\alpha _i|\lambda ^+_0^+\}`$ Choose a subgroup $`C\times (S^1)^{r1}T`$ such that $`C\times (S^1)^{r1}\times K`$ covers $`T`$, and denote $`i_1^{}:𝒯^{}𝒞^{}\times (s_1^{})^{r1}`$ the dual of the inclusion $`𝒞\times (s_1)^{r1}𝒯`$. Let also $`\mu =(\mu _1,\mu _2):M𝒞^{}\times (S^1)^{r1}\times K`$ be a corresponding naturally equivariant generalized moment. Then, using for example Sard’s theorem to avoid singularities coming from outside our coordinate system, we see that there exists a regular value $`(c,s)`$ of $`\mu _1`$ in the regio near $`\mu _1(p)`$ corresponding to $`i_1^{}(F)`$, satisfying our requirements.

$``$

###### Remark A.1

Again, this result remains valid if we replace $`\mu `$ by a $`\mu ^{fc}`$ as in Remark 4.2.

Proof of Kim’s result : Still assuming that the result is false, consider a naturally equivariant ”fiber-connected” moment $`\mu ^{fc}`$. Thanks to the results proved before, we see that a classical ”reduction in stages” procedure allows to construct from $`M`$ and $`\mu ^{fc}`$ a connected compact 4-dimensional orbifold endowed with a non-Hamiltonian $`K`$-action possessing some fixed point. Our assumption that orbifolds behave like manifolds, applied to the McDuff result that symplectic $`S^1`$-actions on compact connected 4-manifolds are Hamiltonian in the presence of fixed points (), furnishes our contradiction.

$``$

###### Remark A.2

Without a way to produce connected reduced spaces, the arguments above fail because there is a priori no reason for a ”reduced” fixed point to be in a ”non-Hamiltonian” reduced component. This is why we used this somewhat inelegant trick with $`\mu ^{fc}`$.

Acknowledgments :
Whithout the insistant encouragements of my friends at U.L.B., this paper would not exist. Many thanks to them all, with a special thought to Céline Azizieh and Vincent Denolin.