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# Pairing of fermions in atomic traps and nuclei

## I Introduction

Pairing in Fermi systems is central for understanding superconductivity in condensed matter physics , superfluidity and glitches in neutron stars, excitations spectra and odd-even staggering of binding energies in nuclei , metallic clusters  and superconducting grains . New insight into the general properties of such Fermi systems can now be obtained from experiments with atomic gases  which recently have been cooled down to degenerate temperatures around 10% of the Fermi temperature . The interactions between trapped 6Li and 40K atoms have simultaneously been tuned above a Feshbach resonance, where they become strongly attractive, in order to produce optimal conditions for superfluidity . Atomic gases have widely tunable number of particles, densities, interaction strengths, temperatures, spin states, and other parameters which holds great promise for a more general understanding of pairing phenomena in solids, metallic clusters, grains, nuclei and neutron stars.

In the experiments with 6Li atoms the anisotropic expansion after sudden release from the trap is as predicted from hydrodynamics . This is compatible both with a strongly interacting superfluid and collisional hydrodynamics. The scattering length is attractive $`a<0`$ and large such that densities above $`\rho 1/|a|^3`$ are achieved and found mechanically stable against collapse. The interaction energy per particle, like Fermi energy, scales as $`\rho ^{2/3}`$  as predicted theoretically . The superfluid gaps in bulk are also expected to be of order the Fermi energy.

In nuclear physics pairing is observed directly in the odd-even staggering of binding energies, i.e., that nuclei with an even number of protons or neutrons are more strongly bound than nuclei with corresponding odd numbers by a pairing gap of order $`1`$ MeV. The same pairing gap also determines the excitation energies of ground state nuclei. On average the pairing energies in nuclei decrease with the number of protons and neutrons modulated with a distinct shell structure, i.e., they are smaller near closed shells. It would be most interesting if the pairing gaps of fermionic atoms in harmonic oscillator traps would display similar shell structure and scaling with the number of particles as nuclei.

The aim of this paper is to calculate pairing gaps in ultracold atomic Fermi gases in harmonic oscillator traps and in nuclei, which are then compared to data on odd-even staggering of nuclear binding energies. For the atomic traps existing pairing gap calculations  are extended to systems, where level spectra and shell effects play an important role. It is shown that such pairing mechanisms are similar in nuclei, which to first approximation can be considered as a finite system of fermions in a harmonic oscillator field with attractive delta function interactions. Another important common feature is the anharmonic fields that lead to splitting of the single particle states which reduce the pairing to the levels closest to the Fermi surface and leads to a distinct shell structure. For a wide range of interaction strengths and number of particles the trapped atomic clouds are predicted to display similar scaling and shell structure as nuclei as also seen in the experimental data on neutron and proton pairing. The scaling with particle number and the continuum or BCS limits are calculated for both large traps and nuclei and thereby the pairing gaps are estimated for nuclear matter, which also gives an idea about the superfluid gaps in neutron star matter.

The paper is organized as follows. In section II the basic properties of interacting fermions in harmonic oscillator traps are given, in particular the single particle level spectra. Pairing is treated in section III with individual subsections devoted to each pairing regime where the last three subsection outline the novel bulk, strongly interacting and multi-level pairing regime. In section IV we turn to nuclei and show that they belong to the class of multi-level pairing.

## II Dilute Fermi gases in harmonic traps

We treat a gas of $`N`$ fermionic atoms of mass $`m`$ in a harmonic oscillator (h.o.) potential at zero temperature interacting via a two-body interaction with attractive s-wave scattering length $`a<0`$. We shall mainly discuss a spherically symmetric trap and a dilute gas (i.e. where the density $`\rho `$ obeys the condition $`\rho |a|^31`$) of particles with two spin states with equal population. The Hamiltonian is then given by

$`H`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{N}{}}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{𝐩_i^2}{2m}}+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}m\omega ^2𝐫_i^2\right)+g{\displaystyle \underset{i<j}{}}\delta ^3(𝐫_i𝐫_j),`$ (1)
with the effective coupling $`g=4\pi \mathrm{}^2a/m`$. For a large number of particles $`N`$ at zero temperature the Fermi energy is for a non-interacting system

$`E_F=(n_F+3/2)\mathrm{}\omega \left(3N\right)^{1/3}\mathrm{}\omega ,`$ (2)
where $`n_F(3N)^{1/3}`$ is the h.o. quantum number at the Fermi surface. The h.o. shells are highly degenerate with states having angular momenta $`l=n_F,n_F2,\mathrm{},1`$ or 0 due to the $`U(3)`$ symmetry of the 3D spherically symmetric h.o. potential. However, interactions split this degeneracy. In the Thomas-Fermi (TF) approximation (see, e.g., ) the mean-field potential is

$`U(r)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}g\rho (r)=2\pi {\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{}^2a}{m}}\rho (r),`$ (3)
the Fermi energy

$`E_F={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{}^2k_F^2(r)}{2m}}+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}m\omega ^2r^2+U(r).`$ (4)
The density can be determined from the Kohn-Sham energy density functionals. In a dilute gas the mean field is small as compared to the Fermi energy and its effect on the density can ignored in the following. Thus

$`\rho (r)=k_F^3(r)/3\pi ^2\rho _0\left(1r^2/R_{TF}^2\right)^{3/2},`$ (5)
inside the cloud $`rR_{TF}=a_{osc}\sqrt{2n_F+3}`$, where $`a_{osc}=\sqrt{\mathrm{}/m\omega }`$ is the oscillator length, and $`\rho _0=(2n_F+3)^{3/2}/3\pi ^2a_{osc}^3`$ the central density.

The splitting of the h.o. shells degenerate levels $`l=n_F,n_F2,\mathrm{},1`$ or 0 in the shell $`n_F`$ by the mean-field potential can be calculated perturbatively in the dilute limit. An excellent approximation for the radial h.o. wave function with angular momentum $`l`$ and $`(n_Fl)/2`$ radial nodes in the h.o. shell when $`n_F1`$ is the WKB one

$`_{n_Fl}(r){\displaystyle \frac{2}{\sqrt{\pi }}}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{sin}(k_lr+\theta )}{k_lr}},`$ (6)
between turning points . The phase $`\theta `$ will not be important in the following. The WKB wave number $`k_l(r)`$ is given by

$`k_l^2(r)={\displaystyle \frac{2n_F+3}{a_{osc}^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{r^2}{a_{osc}^4}}{\displaystyle \frac{l(l+1)}{r^2}}.`$ (7)
The single particle energies are

$`ϵ_{n_F,l}`$ $``$ $`\left(n_F+{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}\right)\mathrm{}\omega ={\displaystyle U(r)|_{n_Fl}(r)|^2r^2𝑑r}`$ (8)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2}{3\pi }}{\displaystyle \frac{a}{a_{osc}}}(2n_F+3)^{3/2}\mathrm{}\omega \left[{\displaystyle \frac{4}{3\pi }}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\pi }}{\displaystyle \frac{l(l+1)}{n_F^2}}\right].`$ (9)
The latter result is calculated from the overlap between the mean field as given by Eqs. (3) and (5) and the WKB wave-functions as given by Eqs. (6) and (7) . It is exact within WKB for $`ln_F`$ and it compares well to numerical results for all $`l`$. For attractive interactions ($`a<0`$) the lowest-lying states have small angular momentum, which is opposite to nuclei.

An important quantity for pairing is the supergap which was introduced in Ref.  and will be discussed below

$`G={\displaystyle \frac{32\sqrt{2n_F+3}}{15\pi ^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{|a|}{a_{osc}}}\mathrm{}\omega .`$ (10)
In comparison the total shell splitting in a shell $`n_F`$ is from Eq. (9)

$`D|ϵ_{n_Fl=n_F}ϵ_{n_Fl=0}|{\displaystyle \frac{5(n_F+3/2)}{32}}G.`$ (11)
The pairing depends crucially on the shell splitting $`D`$ and the supergap $`G`$ as will be shown in the following section.

## III Pairing

Pairing in small systems as nuclei , metal clusters  and superconducting grains  appears in odd-even staggering of binding energies, i.e. that systems with even number of particles are more strongly bound than odd ones. In nuclei the pairing is also responsible for superfluid effects in collective motion .

Pairing in finite systems is described by the Bogoliubov-de Gennes equations  and take place between time-reversed states. As shown in  these states can be approximated by h.o. wave functions in dilute h.o. traps as long as the gap does not exceed the oscillator energy, $`\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{<}{}\mathrm{}\omega `$. The gap equation at zero temperature then reduces to

$$\mathrm{\Delta }_{nl}=\frac{g}{2}\underset{n^{},l^{}}{\overset{n^{}\stackrel{<}{}2n_F}{}}\frac{2l^{}+1}{4\pi }\frac{\mathrm{\Delta }_{n^{}l^{}}}{E_{n^{}l^{}}}_0^{\mathrm{}}𝑑rr^2_{nl}^2(r)_{n^{}l^{}}^2(r),$$
(12)
with quasi-particle energies

$`E_{n^{}l^{}}=\sqrt{(ϵ_{n^{}l^{}}\mu )^2+\mathrm{\Delta }_{n^{}l^{}}^2}.`$ (13)
The cut-off $`n\stackrel{<}{}2n_F`$ in the sum of the gap equation models as a first approximation the more rigorous regularization procedure described in Ref.  that is required for a delta-function pseudo-potential.

The chemical potential $`\mu `$ is related to the number of particles by

$`N=2{\displaystyle \underset{n^{}l^{}}{}}(2l^{}+1)\left[1{\displaystyle \frac{ϵ_{n^{}l^{}}\mu }{E_{n^{}l^{}}}}\right].`$ (14)
For weak interactions the chemical potential lies within $`\mathrm{\Delta }_{nl}`$ from the level energy at the Fermi surface $`ϵ_{nl}`$, except for closed levels where the chemical potential lies between the closed and next open level. For closed shells $`N=(n_F+1)(n_F+2)(n_F+3)/3`$, the gap vanishes for interactions below a critical value, $`GG_c=\mathrm{}\omega /2\mathrm{ln}(4\gamma n_F)`$.

The gap at the Fermi surface is most important and it is generally proportional to the critical temperature as discussed in the appendix. For half filled level (or shell), where $`\mu =ϵ_{n_Fl}`$, the gap is equal to the quasi-particle energy $`E_{n_Fl}=\mathrm{\Delta }_{n_Fl}`$. We will in the following refer to this gap as $`\mathrm{\Delta }E_{n_Fl}=\mathrm{\Delta }_{n_Fl}`$.

The h.o. traps provide a physical system in which the connection between these methods of pairing calculations can be demonstrated and analytical results can be given in various limits of interaction strength and particle number. The associated pairing regimes are displayed in Fig. 1 and will be discussed in the following subsections. The first three have been discussed in earlier publications  but contains additional details of derivations and sets the notation. In the remaining three subsections, which describe new pairing regimes, pairing gaps are calculated and the transitions to the other regimes are discussed. The last subsection treat the important regime of multi-level pairing which will be shown to be especially relevant for nuclei in the following section.

### A Single-level pairing

For very weak interactions pairing take place only between time-reversed states $`\psi _{lm}(𝐫_1)\psi _{lm}(𝐫_2)`$ within the $`l`$-level at the Fermi surface, i.e. $`l^{}=l`$. Maximal pairing between two particles in the level is achieved with the Cooper pair wave function

$`\varphi _0(n_F,l)={\displaystyle \underset{m}{}}lmlm|00\psi _{lm}(𝐫_1)\psi _{lm}(𝐫_2).`$ (15)
The pairing energy between only two particles in the level is twice the quasi-particle energy, and so

$`E_{n_Fl}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{g}{2}}\varphi _0(n_F,l)|\delta ^3(𝐫_1𝐫_2)|\varphi _0(n_F,l)`$ (16)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{g}{2}}{\displaystyle \frac{2l+1}{4\pi }}{\displaystyle _0^{\mathrm{}}}𝑑rr^2_{n_Fl}^4(r).`$ (17)
It follows from the seniority scheme (see, e.g., ) that this is generally the quasi-particle energy and excitation energy for any even number of particles in the level. Solving the gap Eq. (12) also gives $`E_{n_Fl}=\mathrm{\Delta }`$ for any number of particles in the level.

The pairing energies were given in Ref. . For the top levels $`ln_F`$ the h.o. wave functions are sufficiently simple that the pairing energy can be calculated exactly. For example, $`_{n_Fl=n_F}^2=(2/\mathrm{\Gamma }(l+3/2))r^{2l}\mathrm{exp}(r^2)`$, (in units where $`a_{osc}=1`$), which inserted in Eq. (17) gives the gap

$`E_{n_Fl=n_F}={\displaystyle \frac{|a|}{\sqrt{\pi }a_{osc}}}\mathrm{}\omega .`$ (18)
The h.o. wave function for $`l=0`$ can be approximated by the WKB one of Eq. (6) when $`n_F1`$. Inserting in Eq.(17) gives the pair gap

$`E_{n_Fl=0}={\displaystyle \frac{\sqrt{2}}{\pi \sqrt{n_F}}}{\displaystyle \frac{|a|}{a_{osc}}}\mathrm{}\omega .`$ (19)
Around midshell, i.e. away from closed ($`1l`$) and open ($`1n_Fl`$) shells, the WKB wave functions must be replaced near their turning points by Airy functions which removes a logarithmic singularity and in turn leads to a logarithm $`\mathrm{ln}(l)`$. We find

$`E_{n_Fl}={\displaystyle \frac{\sqrt{2}}{\pi ^2\sqrt{n_F}}}\mathrm{ln}(l){\displaystyle \frac{|a|}{a_{osc}}}\mathrm{}\omega ,1ln_F,`$ (20)
to leading logarithmic accuracy.

As shown in Fig. 1 the single-level pairing regime appears for sufficiently weak interactions and large number of particles ($`n_F\stackrel{>}{}50`$) such that $`DG`$. The corresponding pairing gaps can be seen in Fig. 2 at large $`n_F`$.

### B Single-shell pairing

When $`n_F`$ is sufficiently small the mean-field splitting $`D`$ is smaller than the pairing gaps and the pairing acts between all states in an oscillator shell and not just in a single $`l`$ multiplet, i.e. the full $`SU(3)`$ symmetry is effectively restored as compared to the $`SU(2)`$ symmetry of the single $`l`$ multiplet. This enhanced pairing is referred to as “$`SU(3)`$-pairing” or “super-pairing”.  We shall calculate the gap by writing down the “super”-pair wave function. As in single-level pairing, however, we obtain the same result by solving the gap equation.

Assuming $`SU(3)`$ symmetry the pairing can be calculated variationally with a pair wave function that is a generalization of Eq. (15) to a sum over $`l=n_F,n_F2,\mathrm{}.,1`$ or 0

$`\mathrm{\Phi }_0(n_F)={\displaystyle \frac{_l\alpha _l\varphi _0(n_F,l)}{[_l\alpha _l^2]^{1/2}}}.`$ (21)
The weights $`\alpha _l`$ can be found by a variational method with the overlap integrals $`_{nl}^2_{n^{}l^{}}^2r^2𝑑r`$ calculated numerically.  For large $`n_F`$ we find $`\alpha _l\sqrt{2l+1}`$ very accurately. The sums then reduce to the h.o. level density

$`{\displaystyle \underset{lm}{}}|\psi _{lm}(𝐫)|^2={\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\pi }}{\displaystyle \underset{l}{}}(2l+1)_{nl}^2={\displaystyle \frac{\rho _\sigma (r)}{n}}.`$ (22)
Here, $`\rho _\sigma =\rho /2`$ is the density of one spin state (see Eq. (5) for $`n=n_F`$) when shells up to energy $`(n+3/2)\mathrm{}\omega `$ are occupied and $`\rho (r)/n`$ is then the density of the $`n`$’th shell.

The sum over l-states in the gap equation simplifies enormously by using the Thomas-Fermi identity valid for $`n1`$

$`{\displaystyle \underset{l}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{(2l+1)}{4\pi }}_{nl}^2(r)={\displaystyle \frac{\rho _\sigma (r)}{n}}={\displaystyle \frac{\sqrt{2n+3}}{2\pi ^2a_{osc}^3}}\sqrt{1{\displaystyle \frac{r^2}{R_{TF}^2}}}.`$ (23)
The pairing energy is thus

$`E_{n_Fl}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{g}{2}}\mathrm{\Phi }_0(n_F)|\delta ^3(𝐫_1𝐫_2)|\mathrm{\Phi }_0(n_F)`$ (24)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{g}{2}}{\displaystyle \frac{𝑑rr^2[\rho _\sigma (r)/n|_{n_F}]^2}{𝑑rr^2\rho _\sigma (r)/n|_{n_F}}}=G,`$ (25)
where the supergap $`G`$ was given in Eq. (10). The condition for single-shell pairing in atomic h.o. traps is: $`D\stackrel{<}{}2\mathrm{\Delta }=2G`$, is thus $`n_F\stackrel{<}{}64/5`$ according to Eqs. (10) and (11) or, equivalently, to $`N\stackrel{<}{}10^3`$ trapped particles.

For more than two particles in the shell we may again invoke the seniority scheme. It applies approximately to many superpairs when the single-level gap is replaced by the supergap $`G`$, and the level degeneracy for a full h.o. shell $`\mathrm{\Omega }=(n_F+1)(n_F+2)`$. Numerical calculations for half filled shells confirms that the pairing energy per particle is given by the supergap for single-shell pairing .

The single-shell pair energy spectrum does, however, differ from that for single-level pairing. In the latter case, one can generally write the pairing wave function in Eq. (15) as any linear combination of the time-reversed two-particle states $`\psi _{lm}(𝐫_1)\psi _{lm}(𝐫_2)`$. Due to rotational $`SO(3)`$ symmetry the overlap integrals in a single-level are independent of $`m`$ and the spectrum of pairing energies is particularly simple: one state with $`2E_{n_Fl}`$ as given by Eqs.(18-20) and rest of the $`(2l+1)`$ states has zero energy per pair. In the shell, however, the overlap between the radial wave functions depend on $`l`$ and $`l^{}`$ the corresponding matrix for $`l,l^{}=n_F,n_F2,\mathrm{},1`$ or 0 has a non-trivial eigen-value spectrum: $`E_S2G/(2S+1)`$, $`S=0,1,\mathrm{},Int((n_F+1)/2)`$, when $`n_F1`$ . The corresponding eigen-vectors $`\alpha _l`$ are very well approximated by Chebyshev’s polynomia as function of $`x=(l/n_F)^2`$ in the large $`n_F`$ limit. Consequently, the excitation energy of a pair is only 2/3 of the energy $`2G`$ that it takes to break the pair completely. The richer spectrum is important for expressing an effective Hamiltonian for BCS pairing.

### C Multi-shell pairing

For increasing interaction strength pairing also take place between different shells, i.e. $`nn_F`$ contributes in the sum over $`n`$ in the gap equation (12). The pairing strength $`\mathrm{\Delta }_n`$ depends only weakly on $`n`$ for the shells around $`n=n_F`$ which mainly contribute to the pairing and we therefore approximate $`\mathrm{\Delta }_n\mathrm{\Delta }_{n_F}`$. For half filled shell $`\mu =ϵ_{n_Fl}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }_{n_Fl}=E_{N_Fl}=\mathrm{\Delta }`$. The gap equation then becomes

$`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ $`=`$ $`G+G{\displaystyle \underset{nn_F}{\overset{n\stackrel{<}{}2n_F}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }}{\sqrt{[(nn_F)\mathrm{}\omega ]^2+\mathrm{\Delta }^2}}}.`$ (26)
The sum can be converted into an integral when correcting the lower limit $`n=1`$ by $`\gamma =e^C`$ where $`C=0.577..`$ is Euler’s constant. It then gives to leading orders

$`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ $``$ $`G+2G{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }}{\mathrm{}\omega }}\mathrm{ln}\left({\displaystyle \frac{2\gamma n_F}{1+\sqrt{1+(\gamma \mathrm{\Delta }/\mathrm{}\omega )^2}}}\right),`$ (27)
which for $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{}\omega `$ gives

$`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{G}{12\mathrm{ln}(\gamma n_F)\frac{G}{\mathrm{}\omega }}}.`$ (28)
This is the multi-shell pairing gap valid for interactions such that $`G\mathrm{ln}(n_F)/\mathrm{}\omega \stackrel{<}{}1/2`$. The region of multi-shell pairing $`0.1\stackrel{<}{}G\mathrm{ln}(n_F)/\mathrm{}\omega \stackrel{<}{}1/2`$ extends the single-shell pairing gap $`G`$ up to stronger interactions where $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{}\omega `$ (see Fig. 1). Cooper pairs are still essentially only formed between states within the same shell. However, there is pairing in many shells besides that at the Fermi level resulting in a gap that is larger than $`\mathrm{\Delta }=G`$.

### D Bulk superfluidity

For a large system the local superfluid field is related to that in a uniform system. In the TF approximation the local pairing field then depends on radius

$`\mathrm{\Delta }(r)=\kappa {\displaystyle \frac{k_F^2(r)}{2m}}\mathrm{exp}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\pi }{2ak_F(r)}}\right),`$ (29)
where $`k_F(r)=(3\pi ^2\rho (r))^{1/3}=\sqrt{2n_Fr^2/a_{osc}^2}/a_{osc}`$ is the TF wave number. The prefactor is $`\kappa =8/e^2`$ without and $`\kappa =(2/e)^{7/3}`$ with corrections from induced interactions .

When the attractions are sufficiently strong and/or the number of particles in the trap large enough such that $`G\mathrm{ln}(\gamma n_F)\stackrel{>}{}\mathrm{}\omega `$, the pairing field exceeds the h.o. frequency in the bulk of the trap except in a narrow surface region. For that reason the low lying single particle excitations  and the collective modes are surface modes with typical excitation energies of order $`\mathrm{}\omega `$ . For example, the lowest s-wave excitation (the monopole) is $`\omega _0=2\omega `$ in the collisionless limit. This is contrast to the weakly interacting system, i.e. below the bulk superfluidity region of Fig.1, where $`\omega _0=\mathrm{\Delta }`$ for open shells. We refer to Ref.  for a discussion of such modes.

Here, we concentrate on the bulk superfluid field inside the trap and will relate it to that in a uniform system. Contrary to the surface states, the excitations at higher energies are less affected by the pairing field and the Bogoliubov wave functions are approximately given by the unperturbed h.o. wave functions. Consequently, the intra-shell paring condition discussed in Ref. , which leads to the gap equations (12) and (26), are approximately valid for these states. However, the gap is to be understood as an average superfluid gap $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ in bulk. The gap equation (27) is readily solved when $`\mathrm{\Delta }\stackrel{>}{}\mathrm{}\omega `$

$`\mathrm{\Delta }2n_F\mathrm{}\omega \mathrm{exp}(\mathrm{}\omega /2G).`$ (30)
We now observe that the exponent in Eq. (30) coincides with that in the TF-BCS Eq. (29) when the Fermi wave number is replaced by its spatial average in a finite system:

$`k_F(r){\displaystyle \frac{k_F^2(r)d^3r}{k_F(r)d^3r}}={\displaystyle \frac{32}{15\pi }}k_F(0),`$ (31)
where $`k_F(0)=\sqrt{2n_F}/a_{osc}`$. That the spatial average should be performed over $`k_F(r)^2`$ follows from Eq. (10) where the factor $`\rho (r)/nk_F(r)`$ of Eq. (23) enters twice. By definition of the supergap we find that: $`\mathrm{}\omega /G=\pi /2|a|k_F(r)`$, and the two exponents match. The prefactors differ due to the approximate cutoff $`n\stackrel{<}{}2n_F`$ in the gap equation, the approximate treatment of the of the overlap integrals and their $`n`$-dependence in the gap equation leading to Eq. (30).

### E Dense liquid

The dense or strongly interacting limit, $`k_F|a|\stackrel{>}{}1`$, can be encountered near a Feshbach resonance where $`a\mathrm{}`$. In this regime the dilute gas approximation implicit in the interactions in the Hamiltonian (1) is no longer valid and a new scaling region appears . Both the energy per particle and the pairing gap approach a finite fraction of the Fermi energy. Recent Greens function Monte Carlo calculations  find that the interaction energy is -0.56 times the kinetic energy and that the odd-even staggering energy or pairing gap in bulk is $`\mathrm{\Delta }0.54E_F`$.

### F Multi-level pairing

We finally address the intermediate regime, $`G\stackrel{>}{}D\stackrel{>}{}\mathrm{\Delta }`$, (see Fig. 1), which lies between the single-level, single-shell and multi-shell pairing regions studied above. Here, pairing takes place between multiple $`(l,l^{})`$ levels lying close to the Fermi surface $`\mu \epsilon _{n_F,l}`$, and will therefore be referred as multi-level pairing. This region overlaps into the regions studied in the above subsections and therefore applies to most systems of trapped fermions except traps with very few (single-shell), very many (single-level) or strongly interacting fermions (multi-shell). As we shall see below nuclei can also be considered to belong to the multi-level regime.

For large level splitting $`D\mathrm{\Delta }`$ the detailed structure of the overlap integrals in Eq. (12) becomes important. We shall calculate these analytically using WKB as well as numerically from the exact h.o. radial wave functions. Inserting the latter in the gap equation we calculate the pairing gaps as shown in Figs. 2+3 for half filled levels, i.e., for $`\mu =\epsilon _{n_Fl}`$, where $`E_{n_Fl}=\mathrm{\Delta }_{n_Fl}=\mathrm{\Delta }`$.

A qualitative understanding of these results can be obtained from analytical WKB calculations. At large $`n_F`$ the WKB wave functions $`_{n_Fl}`$ of Eq. (6) are excellent approximations except for the multi-level overlap, $`l=l^{}`$ where a logarithmic singularity appear, which was responsible for the $`\mathrm{ln}(l)`$ in Eq. (20). Otherwise, when $`0<|l^2l^2|n_F^2`$ the overlap integral of the WKB wave functions of Eq. (6) is dominated by the overlap near the turning points. Defining: $`\xi =2n_F(r/a_{osc})^2(r/a_{osc})^4`$, the overlap is

$`{\displaystyle _0^{\mathrm{}}}𝑑rr^2_{n_Fl}^2(r)_{n_Fl^{}}^2(r)`$ $``$ $`({\displaystyle \frac{4}{\pi }})^2{\displaystyle \frac{dr}{\sqrt{\xi l^2}\sqrt{\xi l^2}}}`$ (32)
$``$ $`\mathrm{ln}(|xx^{}|),`$ (33)
to leading logarithmic order, where $`x=(l/n_F)^2`$ and $`x^{}=(l^{}/n_F)^2`$. This logarithmic dependence of the matrix element has the interesting consequence that it leads to a double log in the gap equation. When the energy factor $`1/E_{nl^{}}(D^2(xx^{})^2+\mathrm{\Delta }^2)^{1/2}`$ is summed over $`l^{}`$ or, equivalently when $`n_F1`$, integrated over $`x^{}`$, it leads to the (usual) factor $`\mathrm{ln}(D/\mathrm{\Delta })`$. The other logarithm appears from the matrix element of Eq. (33) which, when summed over $`l^{}`$ in the gap equation with the energy factor, attains the lower cutoff at $`|xx^{}|\mathrm{\Delta }/D`$. It is assumed that the $`l`$-dependence of the gap is sufficiently weak within the levels over which pairing take place, i.e. $`\mathrm{\Delta }D`$, which is supported by numerical results (see Figs. 2+3). The gap equation then reduces to:

$`1`$ $``$ $`\alpha (x)G{\displaystyle _0^1}𝑑x^{}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{ln}|xx^{}|}{\sqrt{D^2|xx^{}|^2+\mathrm{\Delta }^2}}}`$ (34)
$``$ $`\alpha (x){\displaystyle \frac{G}{D}}\mathrm{ln}^2(\beta (x)D/\mathrm{\Delta }),`$ (35)
to leading logarithmic orders. The factors $`\beta (x)`$ and $`\alpha (x)`$ both depend on $`x=(l/n_F)^2`$, but not on $`l`$ or $`n_F`$ separately. Only $`G`$ and $`D`$ depend on $`n_F`$ explicitly.

The resulting multi-level gap is

$`\mathrm{\Delta }=\beta (x)D\mathrm{exp}\left[\sqrt{D/G\alpha (x)}\right].`$ (36)
At mid-shell, $`x=1/2`$, the exponent can be calculated: $`\alpha (1/2)15/32\sqrt{2}`$, and the prefactor: $`\beta (1/2)=2e`$, to leading logarithmic order for large $`n_F`$. Near open ($`l=0`$) and closed ($`l=n_F`$) shells there are generally only half as many states to pair with which reduces $`\alpha (x=0)`$ and $`\alpha (x=1)`$ by a factor $`1/2`$ on average. However, as the matrix elements are larger for $`ln_F`$ but smaller for $`l=0`$ (see Eq.(33)), the gaps become asymmetric with a maximum above midshell. Such a shell structure is also found in the multi-level pairing regime when the gap equation is solved numerically with the exact h.o. wave functions as is shown in Figs.(2+3).

Two illustrative examples are shown in Figs. (2+3). In the first the coupling is sufficiently weak, $`a=0.01a_{osc}`$, that the pairing undergoes transitions from from single-shell at small $`n_F`$ to multi-level for $`10\stackrel{<}{}n_F\stackrel{<}{}40`$ and finally single-level pairing for large $`n_F`$. In Fig. 3 the coupling is stronger, $`a=0.04a_{osc}`$, and the pairing undergoes transitions from from single-shell to multi-level and approaches multi-shell pairing for large $`n_F`$. These transitions between pairing regimes are illustrated in Fig. 1.

The multi-level gap of Eq. (36) is quite robust and applies to many systems as long as $`G\stackrel{>}{}D\stackrel{>}{}\mathrm{\Delta }`$. Its validity for nuclei will be discussed below. The formula for the multi-level gap can be generalized by relating the shell splitting to the density of states at the Fermi surface as $`n/ϵ=\mathrm{\Omega }/D`$, where $`\mathrm{\Omega }=n_F^2`$ is the number of states in the shell. Likewise, the supergap is related to the coupling constant as $`Gg\mathrm{\Omega }`$. If the level spectrum of Eq. (9) is changed, the multi-level gap remains valid, if the shell splitting is correspondingly scaled with the level density. In other words the double log does not depend on the details of the level spectrum but is generic for systems like h.o. traps, because the one log is associated with the overlap matrix elements between nearby states and the other is associated with the quasi-particle energy in the gap equation.

The appearance of a double log is not unique for multi-level pairing but also occurs in the case of color superconductivity in quark matter . The physical mechanism behind is, however, different. Within perturbative QCD the singular quark-quark interaction $`g_{QCD}/q^2`$, where $`q`$ is the momentum transfer carried by a gluon, is dynamically screened by Landau damping. When the interaction is integrated over momentum and energy transfer, the dynamical screening leads to a logarithm of the gap. Thus it is the interactions that are responsible for the second logarithm and not the wave function overlap of nearby states as in the h.o. trap.

## IV Pairing in nuclei

The nuclear mean field is often approximated by a simple h.o. form and the residual effective pairing interaction by a delta force in order to obtain some qualitative insight into single particle levels, pairing, collective motion, etc., (see, e.g., ). We can therefore compare pairing in nuclei to that in traps as investigated above, once the h.o. potential is adjusted to describe nuclei. We emphasize that we do not intend to calculate the quantitative pairing gaps for each individual nucleus which would require detailed knowledge of the individual level spectra, deformation, many-body effects, etc. Instead we aim at qualitative results for the pairing gap dependence on mass number, shell effects, and to extrapolate to very large nuclei, nuclear and neutron star matter.

Large nuclei have approximately constant central density $`\rho _00.14`$ fm-3 and Fermi energy $`E_F`$ in bulk. Therefore the h.o. frequency, which is fitted to the nuclear mean field, decreases with the number of nucleons $`A=N+Z`$, where $`N`$ now is the number of neutrons and $`Z`$ the number of protons in the nucleus, as

$`\mathrm{}\omega E_F/n_F41\mathrm{M}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}A^{1/3}.`$ (37)
In the valley of $`\beta `$-stability the number of protons is $`ZA/(2+0.0155A^{2/3})`$.

Secondly, the nuclear mean field deviates from a h.o. potential by being almost constant inside the nucleus and vanish outside. The resulting net anharmonic nuclear field is stronger and opposite in sign to the corresponding (anharmonic) mean field in atomic traps. Therefore, the level splitting is larger and the ordering of the l-levels is reversed. In addition, a strong spin-orbit force splits the single particle states of total angular momentum $`j=l\pm 1/2`$, such that the $`j=n_F+1/2`$ is lowered down to the shell ($`n_F1`$) below.

Proton and neutron pairing gaps are typical of order $`1`$ MeV in nuclei, i.e., smaller than both $`\mathrm{}\omega `$ and $`D`$ but of order the average splitting between two adjacent j-levels. Consequently, nuclei can be considered as h.o. traps with a level splitting $`D`$ such that they fall into the multi-level pairing regime. However, the number of particles in nuclei is relatively small that nuclei are close to the single shell pairing regime. Furthermore, the interactions are so strong that multi-shell pairing also becomes important. From the results of Sec. III we can predict several features of neutron and proton pairing gaps:

* Mass scaling: Since $`\mathrm{}\omega `$ scale as $`A^{1/3}`$ and $`a_{osc}n_F^{1/2}`$ (see Eq. (10)) the single-shell pairing gap also scales as $`GA^{1/3}`$. The level splitting tend to reduce the pairing towards the multi-level gap but is compensated by multi-shell pairing. Therefore, the pairing gaps in light and medium mass nuclei scale approximately as: $`\mathrm{\Delta }GA^{1/3}`$.
* Shell structure: The pairing gaps should exhibit a strong shell structure similar to those for multi-level pairing (Figs. 2+3), however with reversed $`l`$ since $`D`$ is negative for nuclei. Due to the strong spin-orbit force the $`j=l\pm 1/2`$ states are split and the $`j=n_F+1/2`$ is lowered down to the shell below. The magic numbers become $`N,Z=8,14,28,50,82,126,184,..`$, etc. rather than the h.o. filled shell particle numbers $`N,Z=2,8,20,40,70,112,168,240,\mathrm{}`$, etc.
* Bulk limit for large nuclei/nuclear matter: For very large nuclei multi-shell pairing becomes important and pairing approaches that in bulk matter. By fitting the effective nucleon coupling constant to pairing gaps in finite nuclei we will below estimate the pairing in nuclear matter from Eq. (29).

These predictions agree qualitatively with experimental data (see Figs. 4+5).

For a more quantitative calculation the level spectrum must be specified. Instead of fitting the level spectrum for each nucleus with a correspondingly large number of adjustable parameters, we make the following simplifying approximation analogous to the single particle spectrum of Eq. (9)

$`ϵ_{nj}=\left(n+{\displaystyle \frac{3}{2}}\right)\mathrm{}\omega D{\displaystyle \frac{j(j+1)}{(n+1/2)(n+3/2)}}.`$ (38)
The level splitting is approximated by $`D=0.13(n_F+3/2)\mathrm{}\omega `$ in analogy with Eq. (11) and based on nuclear structure calculations, which generally find that the level splitting increase with shell number and is of order $`D\mathrm{}\omega `$ for heavy nuclei ($`n_F6`$). The spin-orbit splitting and resulting change in magic numbers are incorporated to first approximation by simply moving the lowest level in each shell down to the shell below, i.e., $`D=\mathrm{}\omega `$ for $`j=n_F+1/2`$.

The pairing gaps and quasi-particle energies can now be calculated by solving the gap equation inserting the h.o. matrix elements and with $`\mathrm{}\omega `$ and level splitting as given by Eqs. (37) and (38). The effective strength $`a`$ is then the only adjustable parameter.

The data on neutron and proton pairing is obtained from the odd-even staggering of nuclear binding energies $`B(N,Z)`$. It has been shown that mean field contributions can be removed  by using the three-point filter

$`\mathrm{\Delta }^{(3)}(N)`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{(1)^N}{2}}[B(N1,Z)+B(N+1,Z)`$ (40)
$`2B(N,Z)],`$
when $`N`$ is an odd number of neutrons. The analogous relation is valid for protons.

The total binding energies are elaborate sums over quasi-particle energies weighted with occupation numbers. Mean field energies and single particle energies should also be included self consistently. Furthermore, the Bogoliubov transformation does not preserve exact particle number and does not treat a single un-paired particle that appears in odd-number systems. Also nuclear spectra are complicated by deformations and the finite range, spin and spin-orbit dependences of the nucleon-nucleon interaction . For these reasons we cannot calculate $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{(3)}`$ directly. Instead we will for simplicity compare to the quasi-particle energies and pairing gaps, which are calculated directly from the gap equation as function of $`\mu (N,Z)`$. It has been argued (see, e.g.  and refs. herein) that mean-field effects cancel in the quasi-particle energy for odd particle number and that it therefore may be compared to the corresponding three-point energies. However, as particle number fluctuations, deformations, possible mean field energy corrections and other effects are not included, the pairing gaps are also shown in Figs. (4+5) for comparison. They are equal to the quasi-particle energy for half-filled levels only and generally smaller especially at the magic numbers where the gaps vanish in several cases.

We compare in Fig. 4 to the experimental $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{(3)}(N)`$ averaged over isotopes with the calculated gaps $`\mathrm{\Delta }_{n_Fl}`$, and in Fig. 5 the analogous for protons $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{(3)}(Z)`$ averaged over isotones. In the calculations the effective coupling is the only parameter fitted to experimental data. For both neutrons and protons we extract $`a0.41`$ fm.

We note that although the neutron pairing gaps in Fig. 4 generally are larger than the proton ones in Fig. 5, this is not reflected in the effective coupling constants. The reason is the asymmetry of heavy nuclei. For example, for $`N=82`$ the mass number is $`A140`$ whereas for $`Z=82`$ it is $`A208`$. The mass numbers enter both $`D`$ and $`G`$ and lead to a reduction of the proton pairing gap relative to the neutron one by just the right amount so that the experimental data on neutron and proton odd-even staggering can be fitted with the same pairing strength $`a=0.41`$ fm.

Considering the simplicity of the model it describes a large number of experimental gaps fairly well on average. In a number of cases, however, the calculated pairing gaps differ significantly from the measured neutron gaps. Some of these deviations can be attributed to the crude single particle level spectra assumed. If the single particle level energies are adjusted according to more detailed mean field calculations (see, e.g., ) the agreement with experimental pairing gaps improves in several cases.

The pairing gaps are sensitive to the shell splitting and the coupling. The uncertainty in the coupling is smaller because the changes in $`D`$ affects both the exponent and the prefactor in the gap of Eq. (36) in a compensating way. Another uncertainty arise from the upper cutoff. Whereas h.o. traps can pair between shells up to $`2n_F`$, nuclei have a continuum of states at about the binding energy per nucleon $`E_B8`$ MeV above the Fermi level. Therefore the sum over shells in the gap equation has been limited to $`n\stackrel{<}{}(E_F+E_B)/\mathrm{}\omega `$, which for medium mass nuclei corresponds to $`n\stackrel{<}{}n_F+1`$, with a smooth cutoff as in Ref. . The pairing gaps are, however, only logarithmically sensitive to this cutoff.

Nuclei can also be deformed around mid-shell which increase pairing . These and other nuclear many-body effects must be included in a more quantitative study of pairing in individual nuclei. For this purpose it will be useful also to study pairing in elongated atomic traps with deformations like in nuclei. Near closed shells pairing reduce or inhibit deformations. The effect of pairing is also observed in rotational spectra where the moment of inertia is reduced from the rigid to superfluid or irrotational value . In traps the external h.o. potential generally dominates over the mean field interaction energy and thus does not deform spontaneously  as in nuclei \- unless of course if the h.o. trap itself is deformed.

Nuclei cannot directly be placed in any of the various pairing phases of Fig. 1 because the level splitting is larger than for trapped atoms. The effective scattering length $`a=0.41`$ fm and $`a_{osc}1`$fm$`/\sqrt{n_F}`$ would place nuclei with masses up to $`A=250`$ corresponding to $`n_F\stackrel{<}{}6`$ in the upper left corner of Fig. 1 in the multi-shell region. However, because $`D`$ is much larger in nuclei than for trapped atoms, the multi-level pairing region extends down to lower $`n_F`$ and up to larger strengths $`|a|`$. Furthermore, the continuum of states in nuclei reduce the effect of multi-shell pairing as discussed above. Therefore, nuclei rather belong to the transition region between single-shell, multi-shell and multi-level pairing.

The best fit to odd-even staggering energies of nuclei determines $`a=0.41`$ fm accurately. Systematic errors may, however, be expected from the approximations implicit in the level splitting, the cut-off, and in approximating $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{(3)}`$ by $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$. However, because the multi-level and the multi-shell pairing partly compensate, a good approximation to the average gap in nuclei is the single-shell supergap

$`\mathrm{\Delta }G{\displaystyle \frac{|a|}{0.41\mathrm{fm}}}{\displaystyle \frac{5.5\mathrm{MeV}}{A^{1/3}}}.`$ (41)
This supergap is also shown in Figs. (4+5). It does not depend on the level-splitting or cut-off and is therefore a robust prediction for the average magnitude and mass scaling of pairing gaps in nuclei.

Empirically the pairing term in Bethe-Weiszäcker liquid-drop formula, $`\mathrm{\Delta }12`$ MeV$`A^{1/2}`$, fits the odd-even staggering energies of nuclei with $`A\stackrel{<}{}250`$ averaged over shell effects. The scaling with mass number can now be understood in terms of the supergap with shell corrections. If $`D`$ was a constant times $`\mathrm{}\omega `$ then the multi-level gap of Eq. (36) would also scale as $`A^{1/3}`$. However, because $`D`$ increase with $`n_FA^{1/3}`$, the multi-level gap decrease faster with $`A`$ for small and medium mass nuclei but slower for heavy nuclei due to multi-shell pairing. Both are in accordance with the empirical mass dependence.

The pairing in nuclear matter can also be estimated once the effective interaction has been determined. Inserting in Eq. (29) $`a=0.41`$ fm and $`k_F=1.33`$ fm-1 at nuclear saturation density, $`\rho _0=0.15`$ fm-1, we obtain the proton and neutron pairing gaps

$`\mathrm{\Delta }1.1\mathrm{MeV},`$ (42)
in the bulk of very large nuclei and in symmetric nuclear matter at nuclear saturation density. This number is compatible with earlier calculations  of the $`{}_{}{}^{1}S_{0}^{}`$ pairing gap in nuclear and neutron star matter around normal nuclear matter densities. A smaller value for bulk pairing might have been expected from Figs. (4+5) by extrapolating the odd-even staggering energies of heavy nuclei to higher mass numbers. However, as $`An_F^3`$ becomes large the multi-shell pairing contribute with the increasing term $`\mathrm{log}(n_F)`$ in the gap equation. Therefore the bulk value is larger than the pairing gap in heavy nuclei which also have a smaller cutoff due to continuum states as discussed above.

Neutron star matter has a wide range of densities and is very asymmetric, $`Z/A0.1`$. One can attempt to estimate of the pairing gaps as function of density from the gap in bulk, Eq. (12), with $`a0.41`$ fm and the neutron or proton Fermi wave numbers $`k_F^{N,Z}=(3\pi ^2\rho _{N,Z})^{1/3}`$ as function of densities. However, the effective interaction $`a`$ is density dependent. At higher densities we expect the effective interaction to become repulsive as is the case for the nuclear mean field at a few times nuclear saturation density. At lower densities the effective scattering length should approach that in vacuum which for neutron-neutron scattering is $`a(^1S_0)18`$ fm. This dilute limit $`k_F|a|1`$ does, however, require extremely low densities as compared to normal nuclear matter density.

## V Summary

Pairing gaps have been calculated for ultracold atomic Fermi gases in harmonic oscillator traps and compared to nuclei. The pairing mechanism was found to be similar for these systems in the sense that the spacing between single particle states (and shells) reduce the pairing over several of these levels near the Fermi surface referred to as multi-level pairing. At low particle densities the shell structures in traps are pronounced as they are in nuclei and the level degeneracies are important for the size of the gaps which can differ substantially from those known from homogeneous systems  and systems with continuous level densities.

Neutron and proton pairing gaps in nuclei were calculated and with an effective coupling strength $`a=0.41`$ fm a qualitative description of their shell structure could be given, and the average pairing gaps were found to scale with mass number approximately as $`\mathrm{\Delta }5.5`$ MeV$`/A^{1/3}`$ as predicted from the supergap. Eventually for large mass number the gap approaches the $`{}_{}{}^{1}S_{0}^{}`$ superfluid gap in uniform nuclear matter which was calculated from the as $`\mathrm{\Delta }1.1`$ MeV for both neutrons and protons.

Mixing fermionic with bosonic atoms improve cooling  to lower temperatures so that weak pairing can also be studied, and the additional induced interactions between fermions and bosons generally enhance pairing . Furthermore, the shell splitting can be changed in a controlled way by the number of bosons in the trap and the sign and strength of their interaction with the fermions.

The similarity of multi-level and bulk pairing in atomic traps and nuclei may provide new insight into pairing and superfluidity in nuclei and neutron star matter from tabletop experiments at low temperatures.

## A Critical temperatures

The pairing gaps generally decrease with increasing temperature from its zero temperature value $`\mathrm{\Delta }(T=0)`$, that was calculated above, to the critical temperature $`T_c`$, where it vanishes. The temperature dependence of the gap and $`T_c`$ itself are determined from

$`\mathrm{\Delta }_{n_F,l}(T)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{n^{}l^{}}{}}[12f(E_{n^{},l^{}}/T)]{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }_{n^{},l^{}}(T)}{E_{n^{},l^{}}}}{\displaystyle \frac{g}{4\pi }}`$ (A2)
$`\times {\displaystyle _0^{\mathrm{}}}drr^2_{nl}^2(r)_{n^{}l^{}}^2(r),`$
with $`E_{n^{}l^{}}=\sqrt{(ϵ_{n^{}l^{}}\mu )^2+\mathrm{\Delta }^2(T)}`$.

As shown in  $`T_c`$ is exactly half of the zero temperature gap

$`T_c=G/2(12\mathrm{ln}(\gamma n_F)G/\mathrm{}\omega )={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\mathrm{\Delta }(T=0),`$ (A3)
in the single-shell and multi-shell pairing regimes, and this also applies to the single-level pairing regime.

In uniform Fermi gases the critical temperature is

$`T_c={\displaystyle \frac{\gamma }{\pi }}\kappa E_F\mathrm{exp}(2/\pi ak_F)={\displaystyle \frac{\gamma }{\pi }}\mathrm{\Delta }(T=0).`$ (A4)
The ratio $`T_c/\mathrm{\Delta }(T=0)=\gamma /\pi 0.567`$ is the same irrespective of whether induced interactions are included or not.

In the multi-level regime $`T_c`$ can be determined from Eq. (A2) with overlap integrals as given in Eq. (33). To leading logarithmic order we find for large $`n_F`$

$`T_c={\displaystyle \frac{\gamma }{\pi }}\mathrm{\Delta }(T=0).`$ (A5)
That $`T_c/\mathrm{\Delta }(T=0)=\gamma /\pi `$ as in the uniform Fermi gas is mainly because the pairing take place over several l-levels and the level density therefore is effectively continuous. The overlap integrals do not change this ratio to leading logarithmic order.

Although $`T_c/\mathrm{\Delta }(T=0)=\gamma /\pi 0.567`$ is close numerically to the value 1/2 found in the single-shell, single-level and multi-shell regimes, the difference reveals the qualitative differences in the underlying level spectrum, namely, continuous vs. discrete respectively.

Near a Feshbach resonance the strongly interacting Fermi gas becomes unstable towards molecule formation and $`T_c`$ for BCS superfluidity is expected cross-over towards the slightly smaller critical temperature for forming a Bose-Einstein condensate of molecules . Both the BCS and BEC critical temperatures are, however, above the lowest temperatures achieved recently for trapped Fermi atoms  if we assume $`T_c0.5\mathrm{\Delta }`$ as in Eqs. (A3-A5) and take $`\mathrm{\Delta }=0.54E_F`$ according to Ref. .


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# Revisiting the Hanbury Brown-Twiss set-up for fractional statistics

## Abstract

The Hanbury Brown-Twiss experiment has proved to be an effective means of probing statistics of particles. Here, in a set-up involving edge-state quasiparticles in a fractional quantum Hall system, we show that a variant of the experiment composed of two sources and two sinks can be used to unearth fractional statistics. We find a clear cut signature of the statistics in the equal-time current-current correlation function for quasiparticle currents emerging from the two sources and collected at the sinks.

The statistics of indistinguishable particles is manifested in the fate of the common wavefunction for two particles located at positions $`r_1`$ and $`r_2`$ under exchange:

$$\mathrm{\Psi }(r_1,r_2,r_3,\mathrm{},r_n)=e^{\pm i\pi \nu }\mathrm{\Psi }(r_2,r_1,r_3,\mathrm{},r_n),$$
(1)
where, in general, other particles may be present at positions ‘$`r_i`$’, $`i1,2`$. The values $`\nu =2n`$ and $`\nu =2n+1`$ for integers ‘$`n`$’ correspond to the familiar instances of bosonic and fermionic statistics, respectively. In two dimensions, where the concept of exchange can be unambiguously defined, $`\nu `$ can assume fractional values corresponding to anyonic statistics. A landmark example of this phenomenon occurs for Laughlin statesMr.Bob  in the fractional quantum Hall (FQH) set-up. In this system, the anyonic nature of quasiparticle/quasihole excitations has been demonstratedHalperin  and, in particular, the gaining of the phase factor $`e^{\pm i\pi \nu }`$ by quasiparticlesJain1  and quasiholesArovas ; Wenrev ; Eduardo  under exchange, where $`\nu `$ is the filling fraction. Of late, a variety of novel proposals for testing the statistics of edge-state quasiparticles in Laughlin states have come forthKane ; TM .

In this Letter, we propose a set-up consisting of two edge state quasiparticle sources and two sinks, and the measurement of current-current correlation for currents emerging at the two sources and collected at the sinks. At equal times, the correlator is found to depend only on average values of currents and a factor $`\mathrm{cos}\pi \nu `$ coming from statistics. As a function of time difference for when currents are correlated, it shows oscillations with a period that depends on the fractional charge of the quasiparticle.

Returning to the common wave function of Eq.(1), one can extract from it various properties, such as filling in of available states, and $`N`$-point correlation functions. A quantity sensitive to statistics is the two-particle correlation function

$$g(r_1,r_2)=N(N1)𝑑r_3\mathrm{}𝑑r_n|\mathrm{\Psi }(r_1,r_2\mathrm{}r_n)|^2,$$
(2)
where ‘$`N`$’ is the total number of particles. In systems composed of a single species of non-interacting particles, for fermions $`g(r_1,r_2)`$ necessarily drops to zero at $`r_1=r_2`$ and typically levels off to the uncorrelated value for $`r_1r_2`$ much greater than the mean particle spacing. For uncondensed bosons, wave-function symmetrization allows $`g(r_1,r_2)`$ to reach twice its uncorrelated value. Our purpose here is to study processes that enable the probing of anyonic systems for their statistical information. Specifically, two-particle correlations are manifested in events such as the ones shown in Fig.1, where particles need not scatter, but may merely be detected within a correlation region in time and space to feel the effect of statisticsGordon .

In fact, in the 1950’s, Hanbury Brown and Twiss performed both astronomical and table-top experiments to measure correlations in light intensities at two detectors, which strikingly reflected bosonic statisticsHBT ; Gordon . More recently, laboratory experiments measuring analogous correlations in semi-conductors and in free space have brought out the fermionic statistics of electronsCS . Turning our attention to Laughlin states, as anyons are only known to exist only within the strongly correlated quantum Hall fluid, simplistic measurements requiring particles to be detected outside the system would fail. Moreover, manipulations of quasiparticles within the bulk are not feasible at present. However, it has been suggestedMatKane  and experimentally ascertained for $`\nu =1/3`$ statespicc , that weak tunneling of Laughlin quasiparticles between edge states of a single Hall bar produces shot noise characteristic of particles with quantized charge $`\nu e`$. Given the evidence for fractionally charged quasiparticles, we propose a tunneling geometry that realizes the events depicted in Fig.1 for these particles. We show that appropriate current-current correlation measurements in this geometry bring out the fractional statistics of the quasiparticles.

Our proposed set-up is as shown in Fig.2. Four leads at the corners of the Hall bar define four edge states denoted by $`\beta =A,B,C,D`$. Low-energy excitations of the FQH system correspond to long-wavelength density distortions of the edge. These excitations can be described by the chiral Luttinger liquid modelWen ; Wenrev ; Eduardo , and thus each of the edge states is characterized by the Hamiltonian

$$H_0^\beta =\frac{1}{4\pi \nu }(_x\varphi _\beta )^2𝑑x_\beta ,$$
(3)
where the bosonic fields $`\varphi `$ obey the commutation relations $`[\varphi _\beta (x),\varphi _\gamma (x^{})]=i\pi \nu \mathrm{sign}(\mathrm{x}\mathrm{x}^{})\delta _{\beta \gamma }`$, and their gradients are proportional to density distortions. Here, we have set the edge-state velocity to unity. Gates allow for pinching the edge states close to one anotherpicc  to form the cruciform pattern shown in Fig.2, thus enabling inter-edge quasiparticle tunneling. For each edge state $`\beta `$, we assume the tunneling to take place from points $`x_j`$ where $`j=1,2,3,4`$ for $`\beta =A,B,C,D`$ respectively. Here, we require that the region formed by the tunneling points be comparable to the size of the quasiparticles. Unlike in the bulk, a second-quantized description of edge-state quasiparticles is relatively straightforward to formulate. We describe particles at the tunneling points by the creation operators $`\psi _j^{}=\kappa _je^{i\varphi _\beta (x_j)}`$, where the $`\kappa `$ denote Klein factors. The commutation relations for the bosonic fields of Eq.(3) ensure that these quasiparticles, when exchanged with others residing on the same edge, exhibit the statistics of Eq.(1). The Klein factors ensure that they do so when exchanged with particles from neighboring edge states. We pick the convention

$$\psi _j^{}\psi _k^{}=e^{i\pi \nu }\psi _k^{}\psi _j^{},$$
(4)
where $`j<k`$ for $`j=1,2,3`$, and $`k=1`$ for $`j=4`$. Tunneling of these quasiparticles to neighboring edge states can be controlled by means of gate voltages. It is described by the tunneling Hamiltonian

$$^{jk}=u_{jk}\psi _j^{}\psi _k+\mathrm{h}.\mathrm{c}.,$$
(5)
where ‘h.c.’ denotes Hermitian conjugation, $`\psi `$’s are as in Eq.(4), and the $`u`$’s denote tunable bare tunneling strengths. As a variant of the Hanbury Brown-Twiss (HBT) experiment, we select the points $`m=1,3`$ as quasiparticle sources, and $`n=2,4`$ as sinks by raising the potentials of the edge states $`A`$ and $`C`$ with respect to $`B`$ and $`D`$ by a voltage $`V`$. As all tunneling occurs in a fixed geometry, two-particle correlation functions cannot be studied as a function of spatial separation. However, current-current correlations can be measured as a function of temporal separation. These tunneling currents take the form

$$I_{mn}(t)=\frac{ie^{}}{\mathrm{}}(u_{mn}\psi _m^{}\psi _ne^{i\stackrel{~}{V}t}\mathrm{h}.\mathrm{c}.),$$
(6)
where $`e^{}=\nu e`$ is the charge of the quasiparticle Mr.Bob ; Eduardo ; MatKane , and $`\stackrel{~}{V}=e^{}V/\mathrm{}`$. Edge states then carry measurable currents

$`I_I={\displaystyle \frac{\nu e^2}{h}}VI_{12}I_{14}`$ ; $`I_{II}=I_{12}+I_{32}`$
$`I_{III}={\displaystyle \frac{\nu e^2}{h}}VI_{32}I_{34}`$ ; $`I_{IV}=I_{34}+I_{14},`$ (7)
where in Fig.(2), $`I_\alpha `$ are currents going into leads ‘$`\alpha `$’.

The finite-temperature average values of these currents can be calculated using non-equilibrium Keldysh techniques that treat tunneling perturbatively (see, for e.g., Ref.MatKane .) To summarize the treatment, from Eq.(3), we derive an action for each of the four edge states. Away from the tunneling points $`x_j`$, the edge states are described by free fields, whose form is explicitly obtained in terms of the fields at the tunneling points using equations of motion. These free fields are integrated out to obtain an effective action described by fields $`\varphi _j`$ at points $`x_j`$. We then introduce a generating functional in terms of backwards and forwards real-time paths $`\varphi _j^\pm (t)`$, which enables us to obtain expectation values. In equilibrium, the correlation function $`C_j\phi _j\phi _j`$ and response function $`R_j\stackrel{~}{\phi }_j\phi _j`$ , where $`\varphi ^\pm \phi \pm \frac{1}{2}\stackrel{~}{\phi }`$, satisfy the fluctuation-dissipation theorem $`C_j(\omega )=\mathrm{coth}(\mathrm{}\omega /2kT)R_j(\omega )`$. The effect of tunneling is treated perturbatively.

To second order in tunneling, the technique described above gives the following form for the average currents:

$`I_{mn}(t)`$ $`=\nu e\left({\displaystyle \frac{2u_{mn}}{\mathrm{}}}\right)^2{\displaystyle 𝑑t_a}`$ (8)
$`\times \mathrm{sin}\stackrel{~}{V}(t_at)\mathrm{sin}F(t_at)e^{f(t_at)},`$
where $`F(t)\nu 𝑑\omega \omega ^1\mathrm{sin}\omega t`$ and $`f(t)2\nu 𝑑\omega \omega ^1\mathrm{coth}(\mathrm{}\omega /2kT)(\mathrm{sin}\omega t/2)^2`$ originate from response and correlation functions respectively. Evaluating the above gives for the differential conductance contributions, $`\frac{dI_{mn}}{dV}=V^{2\nu 2}𝒢(e^{}V/kT)`$, $`𝒢(x\mathrm{})\mathrm{const}.`$, which increases with decreasing voltage. Thus, at low temperatures, which is desirable for keeping thermal noise minimal, the voltage $`V`$ must be held large compared to the bare tunneling strength for the perturbative treatment to remain valid.

We now analyze current correlations of particles emerging from the two sources detected at the two sinks. In principle, a variety of current-current correlators contain information on statistics. As was originally shown by Hanbury Brown and Twiss, even particles from a single source can be distributed into two detectors to exhibit statistical correlationsHBT ; Gordon . Thus, focusing on one set of source-drain edge states and measuring correlations between the transmitted and reflected currents Buttiker  along the source edge state, as was done for the integer quantum Hall systemCS , can give statistical information. Alternatively, the current-current correlations between currents from one source collected at two different drains can be calculatedButtiker , as has been done explicitly for the FQH set-upTM . Here, we find that a clear-cut signature of anyonic statistics comes from events shown in Fig.1. To extract information on statistics from these events, we propose the measurement of the following time-translation invariant current-current correlator:

$$𝒞(tt^{})\mathrm{\Delta }I_{12}(t)\mathrm{\Delta }I_{34}(t^{})+\mathrm{\Delta }I_{14}(t)\mathrm{\Delta }I_{32}(t^{}),$$
(9)
where $`\mathrm{\Delta }III`$.

The correlator $`𝒞`$ can be obtained from three sets of measurements. The first would measure correlations $`\mathrm{\Delta }I_{II}(t)\mathrm{\Delta }I_{IV}(t^{})`$ for currents $`I_{II}`$ and $`I_{IV}`$ measured $`\mathrm{\Delta }t=tt^{}`$ apart. The other two sets of measurements would be performed in the absence of sources ‘$`1`$’ and ‘$`3`$’, respectively, realized by controlling the appropriate tunneling strengths $`u_{mn}`$ by means of gate voltages. It is important to note that these other sets of measurements do not require a change in sample, but can be achieved merely by applying the required gate voltages in a single sample. In each of these instances, currents into leads $`II`$ and $`IV`$ would have the form $`\stackrel{~}{I}_{II}=I_{m2}`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{I}_{IV}=I_{m4}`$ with $`m=3`$ and $`m=1`$, respectively. Then, one could measure cross-correlations ‘$`\stackrel{~}{C}`$’, for current from one source held at the same potential $`V`$ as in the first case, into two drains, where $`\stackrel{~}{C}_m(\mathrm{\Delta }t)=\mathrm{\Delta }I_{m2}(t)\mathrm{\Delta }I_{m4}(t^{})`$, with $`m=3,1`$ respectively, and $`\mathrm{\Delta }t=tt^{}`$. These correlations themselves carry statistical information, but are complicated by the fact that the source edge states are endowed with their own dynamics. Nevertheless, as seen in Ref.TM , one can procure valuable information from them similar to that contained in our sought-after correlator $`𝒞(tt^{})`$ of Eq.9. This correlator $`𝒞`$ can now be obtained by subtracting the contributions of the latter two measurements from the first:

$$𝒞(\mathrm{\Delta }t)=\mathrm{\Delta }I_{II}(t)\mathrm{\Delta }I_{IV}(t^{})\stackrel{~}{C}_1(\mathrm{\Delta }t)\stackrel{~}{C}_3(\mathrm{\Delta }t).$$
(10)
In fact, Ref.Buttiker  proposes completely analogous sets of measurements in a similar four point tunneling set-up in the integer quantum Hall system, and there too, a correlator analogous to $`𝒞`$ provides key information on statistics.

The correlation can be evaluated in the perturbative Keldysh approach outlined above. To lowest non-vanishing order, i.e., fourth order in tunneling, it takes the form

$$𝒞(\mathrm{\Delta }t)=I_{12}(t)I_{34}(t^{})+I_{14}(t)I_{32}(t^{})+𝒞_{\mathrm{}}(\mathrm{\Delta }t).$$
(11)
The function $`𝒞_{\mathrm{}}(\mathrm{\Delta }t)`$ is the piece in the perturbation that connects all points $`14`$ of Fig. 2, and thus contains information on the statistics. Explicitly, it is given by

$`𝒞_{\mathrm{}}(\mathrm{\Delta }t)`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{cos}\pi \nu (e^{})^2{\displaystyle \underset{m,n}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{2u_{mn}}{\mathrm{}}}{\displaystyle }dt_adt_b\times `$ (12)
$`[\mathrm{cos}\stackrel{~}{V}(t+t^{}t_at_b)\mathrm{cos}\stackrel{~}{F}e^{\stackrel{~}{f}}],`$
where $`m=1,3`$ and $`n=2,4`$. Here, $`\stackrel{~}{F}1/2_{j=a,b}(F(tt_j)+F(t^{}t_j))`$ and similarly $`\stackrel{~}{f}`$, involve the functions $`F`$ and $`f`$, which appear in Eq.(8). When the time difference $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ is small, i.e. $`\mathrm{}/\mathrm{\Delta }tkT,e^{}V`$, one expects the correlations to be maximalGordon . In fact, in this limit and for uniform scattering $`u_{mn}=u`$ (which we assume from here on), upon evaluating Eq.(12), the current correlation defined in Eq.(9) reduces to the simple and suggestive form

$$𝒞(\mathrm{\Delta }t0)=2[1+\mathrm{cos}\pi \nu ]I_{12}I_{34},$$
(13)
where the behavior of the average currents $`I`$ is given in Eq.(8). This is consistent with the fermionic limit $`𝒞(0)=0`$, $`\nu =1`$, which reflects the fact that two electrons cannot be in the same place simultaneously, and the bosonic limit of maximal “bunching” for $`\nu =0`$.

The function $`𝒞(\mathrm{\Delta }t)`$ for finite $`\mathrm{\Delta }t`$ carries telling information on two-particle correlations for edge-state quasiparticles. At $`T=0`$, the integral of Eq.(12) can be evaluated using contour integration to give

$`{\displaystyle \frac{𝒞_{\mathrm{}}(\mathrm{\Delta }t)}{2\mathrm{cos}\pi \nu }}=\left[{\displaystyle \frac{4u^2e^{}}{\mathrm{}^2}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{V}{ϵ_0}}\right)^{2\nu }{\displaystyle \frac{e^{e^{}V/ϵ_0}}{V}}{\displaystyle \frac{\pi \mathrm{cos}\stackrel{~}{V}\mathrm{\Delta }t/2}{\mathrm{\Gamma }(2\nu )\mathrm{\Gamma }(12\nu )}}\right]^2`$
$`\times \left[\mathrm{Re}\left\{\mathrm{e}^{\mathrm{i}\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{V}}\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{t}/2}{\displaystyle _0^{\mathrm{}}}\mathrm{e}^\mathrm{r}\mathrm{r}^\nu (\mathrm{r}+\mathrm{i}\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{V}}\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{t})^\nu \right\}\right]^2,`$ (14)
where $`ϵ_0`$, the excitation gap for the bulk Hall fluid, acts as a high-energy cut off. The resulting behavior of the current-current correlations is shown in Fig.3.

The function $`𝒞(\mathrm{\Delta }t)`$ contains three different aspects of the edge state quasiparticles. First, central to our problem and akin to the two-particle correlation function of Eq. 2, it shows maximal statistical correlation at $`\mathrm{\Delta }t=0`$. As shown by the factor of $`\mathrm{cos}\pi \nu `$ in Eq.(13), it can either be smaller or larger than the uncorrelated value, depending on the (anti-)bunching nature of the quasiparticles. Second, $`𝒞(\mathrm{\Delta }t)`$ reveals oscillations of period $`h/e^{}V`$ and identifies $`e^{}=\nu e`$ as the quantum of quasiparticle charge that couples to the applied voltage. Note that for Laughlin quasiparticles, statistics and charge are directly related to one another, in that the phase factor acquired under exchange may be interpreted as the Aharnov-Bohm term picked up by the charged quasiparticleArovas ; Wenrev . However, as the connection between charge and statistics is more complicated for non-Laughlin states,Eduardo2 ; Wenrev , in these cases, $`𝒞(\mathrm{\Delta }t)`$ becomes important in bearing information on both aspects, distinct from one another. While the dependence on charge and statistics ought to hold regardless of the effective theory used to describe the FQH system, the third feature reflects the chiral Luttinger liquid description of the edge state ; at large separation time, $`𝒞`$ decays to the uncorrelated value in the power-law form $`𝒞_{\mathrm{}}(\mathrm{\Delta }t)|\stackrel{~}{V}\mathrm{\Delta }t|^{2\nu }`$, $`|\stackrel{~}{V}\mathrm{\Delta }t|\mathrm{}`$, where the power-law behavior is characteristic of Luttinger liquids. \[Note also that the static correlation function of Eq.(2) decays as $`g(r_1,r_2)|r_1r_2|^{2\nu }`$ within a single edge state, in contrast to the $`|r_1r_2|^2`$ decay appropriate to electrons in a 1-dimensional Fermi liquid.\] At finite temperatures, as seen from Eq.(11) and Eq.(12), we expect the maximal correlation function $`𝒞(\mathrm{\Delta }t=0)`$ to cross over to its uncorrelated value at temperatures $`kTe^{}V`$

In conclusion, we have seen that the principle of extracting information on statistics by means of two-point measurements can be applied equally well to fractional particles realized in current laboratory conditions as to the fermions and bosons found in Nature. Characteristic correlations in the detection of two particles at zero separation in space and time, their decay in space or time, and their oscillations over conjugate sets of variables, be they energy and time or position and momentumGordon , hitherto observed for fermions and bosons, are seen to be manifest in processes involving anyons. Given the current cutting-edge experimental developments in quantum Hall physics, measurements on edge-state quasiparticles such as the ones proposed here and in other workKane ; TM  ought to be within experimental reach, and thus may provide signatures of fractional statistics for the first time.

Warm and deep gratitude to E. Ardonne, G. Baym, M. P. A. Fisher, E. Fradkin, P. Goldbart and C. Kane for invaluable comments and discussions, and their caring support. This work was supported by the grants NSF EIA01-21568, DOE DEFG02-96ER45434 and NSF PHY00-98353.


text:
# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

The measurements of the deep-inelastic scattering structure function (SF) $`F_2`$ in HERA  have permitted the access to a very interesting kinematical range for testing the theoretical ideas on the behavior of quarks and gluons carrying a very low fraction of momentum of the proton, the so-called small $`x`$ region. In this limit one expects that non-perturbative effects may give essential contributions. However, the reasonable agreement between HERA data and the next-to-leading order (NLO) approximation of perturbative QCD that has been observed for $`Q^2>1`$GeV2 (see the review in Ref. ) indicates that perturbative QCD could describe the SF evolution up to very low $`Q^2`$ values, traditionally explained by soft processes 111The agreement can be explained  by an effective coupling constant scale essentially higher then $`Q^2`$ (see review  and references therein).. It is of fundamental importance to find out the kinematical region where the well-established perturbative QCD formalism can be safely applied at small $`x`$.

The standard program to study the small $`x`$ behavior of quarks and gluons is carried out by comparison of data with the numerical solution of the DGLAP equations by fitting the parameters of the $`x`$ profile of partons at some initial $`Q_0^2`$ and the QCD energy scale $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ (see, for example, ). However, if one is interested in analyzing exclusively the small $`x`$ region ($`x0.01`$), there is the alternative of doing a simpler analysis by using some of the existing analytical solutions of DGLAP in the small $`x`$ limit (see, for example, Ref.  for review). This was done so in Refs. - where it was pointed out that the HERA small $`x`$ data can be interpreted in terms of the so called doubled asymptotic scaling phenomenon related to the asymptotic behavior of the DGLAP evolution discovered in  many years ago.

Here we compile results obtained in -, where the contributions of higher-twist (HT) operators (i.e. twist-four ones and twist-six ones) of the Wilson operator product expansion are taken into account 222Refs. and the present note deal with the contributions of HT operators only in the renormalon model approach (see ). The complete analysis of the HT contributions to the SF $`F_2`$, $`dF_2/d\mathrm{ln}(Q^2)`$ and $`F_L`$ will be presented in .. The importance of the contributions of HT operators at small-$`x`$ has been demonstrated in many studies (see ).

We would like to note that the results of  are the extension to the NLO QCD approximation of previous leading order (LO) studies . The main ingredients are:

1. Both, the gluon and quark singlet densities are presented in terms of two components ($`{}_{}{}^{}+_{}^{}`$ and $`{}_{}{}^{}_{}^{}`$) which are obtained from the analytical $`Q^2`$ dependent expressions of the corresponding ($`{}_{}{}^{}+_{}^{}`$ and $`{}_{}{}^{}_{}^{}`$) parton distributions moments.

2. The $`{}_{}{}^{}_{}^{}`$ component is constant at small $`x`$, whereas the $`{}_{}{}^{}+_{}^{}`$ component grows at $`Q^2Q_0^2`$ as $`\mathrm{exp}(\sigma _{NLO})`$, where

$`\sigma _{NLO}=2\sqrt{(\widehat{d}_+s+\widehat{D}_+p)\mathrm{ln}x},`$
and the LO term $`\widehat{d}_+=12/\beta _0`$ and the NLO one $`\widehat{D}_+=\widehat{d}_{++}+\widehat{d}_+\beta _1/\beta _0`$ with $`\widehat{d}_{++}=412f/(27\beta _0)`$. Here the coupling constant $`a_s=\alpha _s/(4\pi )`$, $`s=\mathrm{ln}(a_s(Q_0^2)/a_s(Q^2))`$ and $`p=a_s(Q_0^2)a_s(Q^2)`$, $`\beta _0`$ and $`\beta _1`$ are the first two coefficients of QCD $`\beta `$-function and $`f`$ is the number of active flavors.

## 2 Basical formulae

Thus, our purpose is to demonstrate the small $`x`$ asymptotic form of parton distributions in the framework of the DGLAP equation starting at some $`Q_0^2`$ with the flat function:

$`f_a^{\tau 2}(Q_0^2)=A_a(\text{ hereafter }a=q,g),`$ (1)
where $`f_a^{\tau 2}`$ are the leading-twist (LT) parts of parton (quark and gluon) distributions multiplied by $`x`$ and $`A_a`$ are unknown parameters that have to be determined from data. Through this work at small $`x`$ we neglect the non-singlet quark component.

We would like to note that new HERA data  demonstrate a rise of SF $`F_2`$ at low $`Q^2`$ values ($`Q^2<1`$GeV2) when $`x0`$ (see Fig.2, for example). The rise can be explained in natural way by incorporation of HT terms in our analysis (see section 2.2).

We shortly compile below the main results found in  at the LO approximation (the LT results at the NLO approximation may be found in ). The full small $`x`$ asymptotic results for parton distributions and SF $`F_2`$ at LO of perturbation theory is:

$`F_2(x,Q^2)=e\left[f_q^{\tau 2}(x,Q^2)+f_q^{h\tau }(x,Q^2)+f_g^{h\tau }(x,Q^2)\right],`$ (2)
where $`e=(_1^fe_i^2)/f`$ is the average charge square. The LT parts $`f_a^{\tau 2}(x,Q^2)`$ and the HT ones $`f_a^{h\tau }(x,Q^2)`$ can be represented as sums of the $`{}_{}{}^{}+_{}^{}`$ and $`{}_{}{}^{}_{}^{}`$ components

$`f_a^{\tau 2}(x,Q^2)`$ $`=`$ $`f_a^{\tau 2,+}(x,Q^2)+f_a^{\tau 2,}(x,Q^2),`$
$`f_a^{h\tau }(x,Q^2)`$ $`=`$ $`f_a^{h\tau ,+}(x,Q^2)+f_a^{h\tau ,}(x,Q^2).`$ (3)
### 2.1 The LT contribution

The small $`x`$ asymptotic results for parton distributions have the form

$`f_g^{\tau 2,+}(x,Q^2)`$ $`=`$ $`(A_g+{\displaystyle \frac{4}{9}}A_q)\stackrel{~}{I}_0(\sigma )e^{\overline{d}_+(1)s}+O(\rho ),`$ (4)
$`f_q^{\tau 2,+}(x,Q^2)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{f}{9}}(A_g+{\displaystyle \frac{4}{9}}A_q)\rho \stackrel{~}{I}_1(\sigma )e^{\overline{d}_+(1)s}+O(\rho ),`$ (5)
$`f_g^{\tau 2,}(x,Q^2)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{4}{9}}A_qe^{d_{}(1)s}+O(x),`$ (6)
$`f_q^{\tau 2,}(x,Q^2)`$ $`=`$ $`A_qe^{d_{}(1)s}+O(x),`$ (7)
where $`\overline{d}_+(1)=1+20f/(27\beta _0)`$ and $`d_{}(1)=16f/(27\beta _0)`$ are the regular parts of $`d_+`$ and $`d_{}`$ anomalous dimensions, respectively, in the limit $`n1`$ 333From now on, for a quantity $`k(n)`$ we use the notation $`\widehat{k}(n)`$ for the singular part when $`n1`$ and $`\overline{k}(n)`$ for the corresponding regular part. . The functions $`\stackrel{~}{I}_\nu `$ ($`\nu =0,1`$) are related to the modified Bessel function $`I_\nu `$ and to the Bessel function $`J_\nu `$ by:

$`\rho ^\nu \stackrel{~}{I}_\nu (\sigma )=\{\begin{array}{cc}\rho ^\nu I_\nu (\sigma ),\hfill & \text{ if }s0\hfill \\ (\overline{\rho })^\nu J_\nu (\overline{\sigma }),\overline{\rho }=i\rho ,\overline{\sigma }=i\sigma ,\hfill & \text{ if }s<0\hfill \end{array}.`$ (10)
The variables $`\sigma `$ and $`\rho `$ are given by

$`\sigma =2\sqrt{\widehat{d}_+s\mathrm{ln}(x)},\rho =\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{\widehat{d}_+s}{\mathrm{ln}(x)}}}={\displaystyle \frac{\sigma }{2\mathrm{ln}(1/x)}}`$ (11)
### 2.2 The HT contribution

Using the results in  (which are based on calculations ), we demonstrate the effect of HT corrections in the renormalon model case (see recent review of renormalon models in ). We sketch below the basical results making the following substitutions in the corresponding twist-two results presented in Eqs.(4)-(7) (complete formulae can be found in ):

$`f_g^{\tau 2,+}(x,Q^2)`$ and $`f_q^{\tau 2,+}(x,Q^2)`$ (see Eqs.(4) and (5)) $`f_g^{h\tau ,+}(x,Q^2)`$ and $`f_q^{h\tau ,+}(x,Q^2)`$ by

$`A_a\stackrel{~}{I}_0(\sigma )`$ $``$ $`A_a{\displaystyle \frac{16f}{15\beta _0^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{m=1}{\overset{2}{}}}k_m{\displaystyle \frac{(\mathrm{\Lambda }_{m,a})^{2m}}{Q^2}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{2}{\rho }}\stackrel{~}{I}_1(\sigma )\mathrm{ln}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Lambda }_{m,a}^2}{Q^2}}\right)\stackrel{~}{I}_0(\sigma )\right),`$ (12)
$`A_a\rho \stackrel{~}{I}_1(\sigma )`$ $``$ $`A_a{\displaystyle \frac{128f}{45\beta _0^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{m=1}{\overset{2}{}}}k_m{\displaystyle \frac{(\mathrm{\Lambda }_{m,a})^{2m}}{Q^2}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{2}{\rho }}\stackrel{~}{I}_1(\sigma )\mathrm{ln}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Lambda }_{m,a}^2}{Q^2}}\right)\stackrel{~}{I}_0(\sigma )\right),`$ (13)
where $`k_1=1`$, $`k_2=8/7`$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{1,a}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{2,a}`$ are magnitudes of twist-four and twist-six corrections.

$`f_g^{\tau 2,}(x,Q^2)`$ and $`f_q^{\tau 2,}(x,Q^2)`$ (see Eqs.(6) and (7)) $`f_g^{h\tau ,}(x,Q^2)`$ and $`f_q^{h\tau ,}(x,Q^2)`$ by

$`A_q`$ $``$ $`A_q{\displaystyle \frac{16f}{15\beta _0^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{m=1}{\overset{2}{}}}k_m{\displaystyle \frac{(\mathrm{\Lambda }_{m,q})^{2m}}{Q^2}}\mathrm{ln}\left({\displaystyle \frac{Q^2}{x^2\mathrm{\Lambda }_{m,q}^2}}\right),`$ (14)
$`A_q`$ $``$ $`A_q{\displaystyle \frac{128f}{45\beta _0^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{m=1}{\overset{2}{}}}k_m{\displaystyle \frac{(\mathrm{\Lambda }_{m,q})^{2m}}{Q^2}}\left(\mathrm{ln}\left({\displaystyle \frac{Q^2}{x\mathrm{\Lambda }_{m,q}^2}}\right){\displaystyle \frac{11}{3}}\right)\mathrm{ln}\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{x}}\right).`$ (15)
From Eqs.(12)-(15) one can notice that the higher-twist terms modify the flat condition Eq.(1). They lead to a rise of parton distributions and, thus, SF $`F_2`$ at low value $`Q_0^2`$, when $`x0`$. This is in excellent agreement with the recent low $`Q^2`$ HERA data .

## 3 Results of the fits

With the help of the results obtained in the previous section we have analyzed $`F_2`$ HERA data at small $`x`$ from the H1 and ZEUS collaborations . In order to keep the analysis as simple as possible we have fixed the number of active flavors $`f`$=4 and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\overline{\text{MS}}}(n_f=4)=250`$ MeV, which is a reasonable value extracted from the traditional (higher $`x`$) experiments. Moreover, we put $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{1,a}=\mathrm{\Lambda }_{2,a}`$ in agreement with . The initial scale of the parton densities was also fixed into the fits to $`Q_0^2=1`$ GeV2, although later it was released to study the sensitivity of the fit to the variation of this parameter. The analyzed data region was restricted to $`x<0.01`$ to remain within the kinematical range where our results are accurate.

Fig. 1 shows $`F_2`$ calculated from the fit (based only on LT formulae) with Q2 $`>`$ 1 GeV2 in comparison with 1994 H1 data (first article in ). Only the lower $`Q^2`$ bins are shown. One can observe that the NLO result (dot-dashed line) lies closer to the data than the LO curve (dashed line). The lack of agreement between data and lines observed at the lowest $`x`$ and $`Q^2`$ bins suggests that the flat behavior should occur at $`Q^2`$ lower than 1 GeV2. In order to study this point we have done the analysis considering $`Q_0^2`$ as a free parameter. Comparing the results of the fits (see ) one can notice the better agreement with the experiment at fitted $`Q_0^2=0.55`$ GeV2 (solid curve) is apparent at the lowest kinematical bins.

Fig. 2 shows $`F_2`$ calculated from the fit at LO (based on LT $`\&`$ HT formulae) in comparison with 1995 H1 and ZEUS data . One can observe that these results (solid line) lies closer to the data than the twist-two results (dashed line). We have done the analysis considering $`Q_0^2`$ as a free parameter. Comparing the results of the fits (see ) one can notice the better agreement with the experiment at fitted $`Q_0^2=0.61`$ GeV2, which is close to $`Q_0^2`$ in the analysis of 1994 H1 data (see Fig. 1).

## 4 Conclusions

We have shown that the results developed recently in \-  have relatively quite simple form and reproduce many properties of parton distributions at small $`x`$, that have been known from global fits.

We found very good agreement between our approach based on QCD and HERA data, as it has been observed earlier with other approaches (see the review ). The (renormalon-type) higher-twist terms lead to the natural explanation of the rise of $`F_2`$ at low $`x`$ for the lowest values of $`Q^2`$ ($`1`$ GeV2). The rise has been discovered in recent HERA experiments .

As next step of our investigations, we plan to study contributions of HT operators to relations between parton distributions and deep inelastic structure functions, observed, for example, in .

Acknowledgments. One of the authors (A.V.K.) would like to express his sincerely thanks to the Organizing Committee of XVI International Baldin Seminar on High Energy Physics Problems “Relativistic Nuclear Physics and Quantum Chromodynamics” for the kind invitation. A.V.K. and G.P. were supported in part, respectively, by INTAS grant N366 (at the first time of the study) and by Alexander von Humboldt fellowship (at the end of the study) and by Galician research funds (PGIDT00 PX20615PR) and Spanish CICYT (FPA2002-01161).


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# Deterministic secure communication without using entanglement

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