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# Effect of flavor mixing on the time delay of massive supernova neutrinos

## Abstract

The neutrinos and antineutrinos of all the three flavors released from a galactic supernova will be detected in the water Cerenkov detectors. We show that even though the neutral current interaction is flavor blind, and hence neutrino flavor mixing cannot alter the total neutral current signal in the detector, it can have a non-trivial impact on the delay of massive neutrinos and alters the neutral current event rate as a function of time. We have suggested various variables of the neutral and charged current events that can be used to study this effect. In particular the ratio of charged to neutral current events can be used at early times while the ratio of the energy moments for the charged to the neutral current events can form useful diagnostic tools even at late times to study neutrino mass and mixing.

PACS: 14.60.Pq, 97.60.Bw, 95.55.Vj

Keywords: massive neutrinos, supernovae, neutrino mixing

The detection of the SN1987A neutrinos by the water Cerenkov detectors at Kamioka and IMB settled many important issues in the subject of type II supernova theory. The observation of neutrinos from any future galactic supernova event will answer the remaining questions regarding the understanding of the supernova mechanisms. A galactic supernova event will also bring in a lot of information on neutrino mass, which of late, has been an issue of much discussion. Among the various problems which demand non-zero neutrino mass are the atmospheric neutrinos anomaly , the solar neutrino problem  and the LSND experiment in Los Alamos . While all the three above mentioned experiments give information on the mass squared differences, the supernova neutrinos can be used to place direct limits on the $`\nu _\mu /\nu _\tau `$ masses and at the same time can also constrain the neutrino mixing parameters which will be useful in the understanding of the above three experiments.

About $`10^{58}`$ neutrinos, in all three flavors carrying a few times $`10^{53}`$ ergs of energy are released in a type II supernova. These neutrinos for a galactic supernova events can be detected by the current water Cerenkov detectors, the Super-Kamiokande (SK) and the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory (SNO). The effect of neutrino mass can show up in the observed neutrino signal in these detectors in two ways,

* by causing delay in the time of flight measurements
* by modifying the neutrino spectra through neutrino flavor mixing

Massive neutrinos travel with speed less than the speed of light and for typical galactic supernova distances $``$ 10 kpc, even a small mass results in a measurable delay in the arrival time of the neutrino. Many different analyses have been performed before to give bounds on the neutrino mass ( and references therein). Neutrino oscillations on the other hand convert the more energetic $`\nu _\mu /\nu _\tau (\overline{\nu }_\mu /\overline{\nu }_\tau )`$ into $`\nu _e(\overline{\nu }_e)`$ thereby hardening the resultant $`\nu _e(\overline{\nu }_e)`$ energy spectra and hence enhancing their signal at the detector . In a previous work  we studied quantitatively the effects of neutrino flavor oscillations on the supernova neutrino spectrum and the number of charged current events at the detector using a realistic supernova model. In this work we study the neutral current signal as a function of time in the water Cerenkov detectors, for a mass range of the neutrinos where both the phenomenon of delay and flavor conversion are operative. That the time response of the event rate in the detector is modified if the neutrinos have mass alone and hence delay is a well known feature . In this letter we stress the point that since neutrino flavor conversions change the energy spectra of the neutrinos, and since the time delay of the massive neutrinos is energy dependent, the time dependence of the event rate at the detector is altered appreciably in the presence of mixing. We suggest various variables which act as tools for measuring this change in the time response curve of the neutral current events and in differentiating the cases of (a) massless neutrinos (b) neutrinos with mass but no mixing and (c) neutrinos with mass as well as mixing. In particular we study the ratio of the charged current to neutral current ratio R(t), as a function of time in the SNO detector and show that the change in the value and the shape of R(t) due to flavor mixing cannot be emulated by uncertainties. We also study other variables like the normalized $`n`$-th energy moments of the neutral current events and the ratio of charged to the neutral current $`n`$-th moments as important diagnostic tools in filtering out the effects of neutrino mass and mixing.

The differential number of neutrino events at the detector for a given reaction process is

$$\frac{d^2S}{dEdt}=\underset{i}{}\frac{n}{4\pi D^2}N_{\nu _i}(t)f_{\nu _i}(E)\sigma (E)ϵ(E)$$
(1)
where $`i`$ runs over the neutrino species concerned, $`N_{\nu _i}(t)=L_{\nu _i}(t)/E_{\nu _i}(t)`$, are the number of neutrinos produced at the source where $`L_{\nu _i}(t)`$ is the neutrino luminosity and $`E_{\nu _i}(t)`$ is the average energy, $`\sigma (E)`$ is the reaction cross-section for the neutrino with the target particle, $`D`$ is the distance of the neutrino source from the detector (taken as 10kpc), $`n`$ is the number of detector particles for the reaction considered and $`f_{\nu _i}(E)`$ is the energy spectrum for the neutrino species involved, while $`ϵ(E)`$ is the detector efficiency as a function of the neutrino energy. By integrating out the energy from eq.(1) we get the time dependence of the various reactions at the detector. To get the total numbers both integrations over energy and time has to be done.

For the neutrino luminosities and average energies, though it is best to use a numerical supernova model, but for simplicity, we will here use a profile of the neutrino luminosities and temperatures which have general agreement with most supernova models. We take the total supernova energy radiated in neutrinos to be 3 $`\times 10^{53}`$ ergs. This luminosity, which is almost the same for all the neutrino species, has a fast rise over a period of 0.1 sec followed by a slow fall over several seconds in most supernova models. We use a luminosity that has a rise of 0.1 sec using one side of the Gaussian with $`\sigma `$ = 0.03 and then an exponential decay with time constant $`\tau `$ = 3 sec for all the flavors .

The average energies associated with the $`\nu _e,\overline{\nu }_e\mathrm{and}\nu _\mu `$ (the $`\nu _\mu ,\overline{\nu }_\mu ,\nu _\tau \mathrm{and}\overline{\nu }_\tau `$ have the same energy spectra) are 11 MeV, 16 MeV and 25 MeV respectively in most numerical models. We take these average energies and consider them to be constant in time. We have also checked our calculations with time dependent average energies and estimated its effect. The neutrino spectrum is taken to be a pure Fermi-Dirac distribution characterized by the neutrino temperature alone.

We will here be concerned with two important water Cerenkov detectors, the SK and the SNO. The column 1 of Table 1 lists all the important reactions in SK and SNO. In column 2 of Table 1 we report the calculated number of expected events for the various reactions in SNO, when neutrinos are assumed to be massless. The corresponding values for SK can be obtained by scaling the number of events in $`\mathrm{H}_2\mathrm{O}`$ to its fiducial volume of 32 kton. The detector efficiency is taken to be 1 and the energy threshold is taken to be 5 MeV for both SK and SNO . For the cross-section of the $`(\nu _ed),(\overline{\nu }_ed),(\nu _id)`$ and $`(\overline{\nu }_ep)`$ reactions we refer to . The cross-section of the $`(\nu _e(\overline{\nu }_e)e^{})`$ and $`(\nu _ie^{})`$ scattering has been taken from  while the neutral current $`(\nu _i^{16}O)`$ scattering cross-section is taken from . For the $`{}_{}{}^{16}O(\nu _ee^{})^{16}F`$ and $`{}_{}{}^{16}(\overline{\nu }_e,e^+)_{}^{16}N`$ reactions we refer to  and use it’s cross-sections for the detector with perfect efficiency. The expected number of events that we get agree quite well with the one reported in , where the results of a numerical supernova model was used.

If the neutrinos are massless then the time response of their signal at the detector reflect just the time dependence of their luminosity function at the source, which is the same for all the three flavors and hence the same for the charged current and neutral current reactions. If neutrinos have mass $`eV`$ then they pick up a measurable delay during their course of flight from the supernova to the earth. For a neutrino of mass m (in eV) and energy E (in MeV), the delay (in sec) in traveling a distance D (in 10 kpc) is

$$\mathrm{\Delta }t(E)=0.515(m/E)^2D$$
(2)
where we have neglected all the small higher order terms. The time response curve then has contributions from both the luminosity and the mass. We will now consider a scheme of neutrino masses such that $`\mathrm{\Delta }m_{12}^210^6eV^2`$ consistent with the solar neutrino problem  and $`\mathrm{\Delta }m_{13}^2\mathrm{\Delta }m_{23}^2110^4eV^2`$. The neutrino mass model considered here is one of several, given for the purpose of illustration only. In this scheme the atmospheric neutrino anomaly will have to be explained by the $`\nu _\mu \nu _{sterile}`$ oscillation mode . The mass range for the neutrinos as the hot component of hot plus cold dark matter scenario in cosmology is a few $`eV`$ only , which will conflict with the higher values in the range of $`m_{\nu _3}=1100eV`$ that we consider here if $`\nu _3`$ is stable. Hence, we assume that the $`\nu _3`$ state is unstable but with a large enough life time so that it is does not conflict with the observations of SN 1987A  (even though SN1987A observations did not correspond to any $`\nu _\tau `$ event, one can put limits on the $`\nu _3/\overline{\nu _3}`$ lifetime as the $`\nu _e/\overline{\nu }_e`$ state is a mixture of all the three mass eigenstates) and is also consistent with Big Bang Nucleosynthesis. In fact, from the ref.  we know that using the time delay technique, the SK and SNO can be used to probe neutrino masses down to $`50eV`$ and $`30eV`$ respectively. Hence we have presented all our results for a particular representative value of $`m_{\nu _3}=40eV`$. There have been proposals in the past for an unstable neutrino with mass $`30eV`$ and lifetime $`10^{23}sec`$ . Since direct kinematical measurements give $`m_{\nu _e}<5eV`$ , we have taken the $`\nu _e`$ to be massless and the charged current events experience no change. But since the $`\nu _\tau (\overline{\nu }_\tau )`$ pick up a detectable time delay (for the mass spectrum of the neutrinos that we consider here, the $`\nu _\mu (\overline{\nu }_\mu )`$ do not have measurable time delay), the expression for the neutral current events gets modified to,

$`{\displaystyle \frac{dS_{nc}^d}{dt}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{n}{4\pi D^2}}{\displaystyle }dE\sigma (E)\{N_{\nu _e}(t)f_{\nu _e}(E)+N_{\overline{\nu }_e}(t)f_{\overline{\nu }_e}(E)+N_{\nu _\mu }(t)f_{\nu _\mu }(E)+`$ (3)
$`+`$ $`N_{\overline{\nu }_\mu }(t)f_{\overline{\nu }_\mu }(E)+N_{\nu _\tau }(t\mathrm{\Delta }t(E))f_{\nu _\tau }(E)+N_{\overline{\nu }_\tau }(t\mathrm{\Delta }t(E))f_{\overline{\nu }_\tau }(E)\}`$ (4)
where $`dS_{nc}^d/dt`$ denotes the neutral current $`(nc)`$ event rate with delay $`(d)`$. Delay therefore distorts the neutral current event rate vs. time curve. By doing a $`\chi ^2`$ analysis of this shape distortion one can put limits on the $`\nu _\tau `$ mass .

We next consider the neutrinos to have flavor mixing as well. The mixing angle $`\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _{12}`$ can be constrained from the solar neutrino data ($`\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _{12}10^3`$)  while for $`\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _{13}`$ there is no experimental data to fall back upon, but from r-process considerations in the “hot bubble” of the supernova, one can restrict $`\mathrm{sin}^2\theta _{13}10^6`$ . In this scenario there will be first a matter enhanced $`\nu _e\nu _\tau `$ resonance in the mantle of the supernova followed by a $`\nu _e\nu _\mu `$ resonance in the envelope. The MSW mechanism in the supernova for the neutrino mass scheme that we consider here is discussed in details in ref. . As the average energy of the $`\nu _\mu /\nu _\tau `$ is greater than the average energy of the $`\nu _e`$, neutrino flavor mixing modifies their energy spectrum. Hence as pointed out in , the $`\nu _e`$ flux though depleted in number, gets enriched in high energy neutrinos and since the detection cross-sections are strongly energy dependent, this results in the enhancement of the charged current signal. The total number of events in SNO, integrated over time in this scenario with complete flavor conversion ($`P_{\nu _e\nu _e}=0`$) are given in column 2 of Table 1. Of course since the $`\overline{\nu }_e`$ do not have any conversion here, the $`\overline{\nu }_e`$ signal remains unaltered. Also as the neutral current reactions are flavor blind, the total neutral current signal remains unchanged. But whether the time response curve of the neutral current signal remains unchanged in presence of mixing, in addition to delay, is an interesting question.

If the neutrinos have mass as well as mixing, then the neutrinos are produced in their flavor eigenstate, but they travel in their mass eigenstate. The neutrino mass eigenstates will travel with different speeds depending on their mass and will arrive at the detector at different times. For the scenario that we are considering only $`\nu _3`$ and $`\overline{\nu }_3`$ will be delayed. Hence to take this delay in arrival time into account, the eq.(4) has to be rewritten in terms of the mass eigenstates. It can be shown that expression for the neutral current event rate in terms of the mass eigenstates is,

$`{\displaystyle \frac{dS_{nc}^{do}}{dt}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{n}{4\pi D^2}}{\displaystyle }dE\sigma (E)\{N_{\nu _1}(t)f_{\nu _1}(E)+N_{\overline{\nu }_1}(t)f_{\overline{\nu }_1}(E)+N_{\nu _2}(t)f_{\nu _2}(E)`$ (5)
$`+`$ $`N_{\overline{\nu }_2}(t)f_{\overline{\nu }_2}(E)+N_{\nu _3}(t\mathrm{\Delta }t(E))f_{\nu _3}(E)+N_{\overline{\nu }_3}(t\mathrm{\Delta }t(E))f_{\overline{\nu }_3}(E)\}`$ (6)
where $`N_{\nu _i}`$ is the $`\nu _i`$ flux at the source. If the neutrinos are produced at densities much higher than their resonance densities, all the mixings in matter are highly suppressed, and the neutrinos are produced almost entirely in their mass eigenstates. For the three generation case that we are considering, $`\nu _e\nu _3`$, $`\nu _\mu \nu _1`$ and $`\nu _\tau \nu _2`$. For the antineutrinos on the other hand, at the point of production in the supernova $`\overline{\nu }_e\overline{\nu }_1`$, $`\overline{\nu }_\mu \overline{\nu }_2`$ and $`\overline{\nu }_\tau \overline{\nu }_3`$. Hence the above expression for the neutral current event rate in the presence of delay and mixing can be written as,

$`{\displaystyle \frac{dS_{nc}^{do}}{dt}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{n}{4\pi D^2}}{\displaystyle }dE\sigma (E)\{N_{\nu _\mu }(t)f_{\nu _\mu }(E)+N_{\overline{\nu }_e}(t)f_{\overline{\nu }_e}(E)+N_{\nu _\tau }(t)f_{\nu _\tau }(E)+N_{\nu _\tau }(t)f_{\nu _\tau }(E)`$ (7)
$`+`$ $`N_{\overline{\nu }_\mu }(t)f_{\overline{\nu }_\mu }(E)+N_{\overline{\nu }_\mu }(t)f_{\overline{\nu }_\mu }(E)+N_{\nu _e}(t\mathrm{\Delta }t(E))f_{\nu _e}(E)+N_{\overline{\nu }_\tau }(t\mathrm{\Delta }t(E))f_{\overline{\nu }_\tau }(E)\}`$ (8)
Note that the above expression does not depend on the neutrino conversion probability as the neutral current interaction is flavor blind.

In fig. 1 we have plotted the neutral current event rate for the reaction ($`\nu _i+dn+p+\nu _i`$, where $`\nu _i`$ stands for all the 6 neutrino species) as a function of time for massless neutrinos along with the cases for mass but no mixing (eq.(4)) and mass along with mixing (eq.(8)). The figure looks similar for the other neutral current reactions as well, apart from a constant normalization factor depending on the total number of events for the process concerned. The curves corresponding to the massive neutrinos have been given for $`m_{\nu _\tau }=40eV`$. As expected, the shape of the neutral current event rate changes due to the delay of massive $`\nu _\tau `$. Since the delay given by eq.(2) depends quadratically on the neutrino mass, the distortion is more for larger masses . But the noteworthy point is that the presence of mixing further distorts the rate vs. time curve. The reason for this distortion can be traced to the fact that the time delay $`1/E^2`$. As the energy spectrum of the neutrinos change due to flavor mixing, the resultant delay is also modified and this in turn alters the neutral current event rate as a function of time. In fact the flavor conversion in the supernova results in de-energising the $`\nu _\mu /\nu _\tau `$ spectrum and hence the delay given by eq.(2) should increase. As larger delay caused by larger mass results in further lowering of the neutral current event rate vs. time curve for early times, one would normally expect that the enhanced delay as a result of neutrino flavor conversion would have a similar effect. But the fig. 1 shows that during the first second, the curve corresponding to delay with mixing is higher than the one with only time delay. This at first sight seems unexpected. But then one realizes that while the flavor conversion reduces the average energy of the massive $`\nu _\tau `$ increasing its delay and hence depleting its signal at early times, it energizes the massless and hence undelayed $`\nu _e`$ beam, which is detected with full strength. Therefore, while for no mixing the $`\nu _\tau `$ gave the larger fraction of the signal, for the case with mixing it is the $`\nu _e`$ that assume the more dominant role, and so even though the $`\nu _\tau `$ arrive more delayed compared to the case without mixing, the delay effect is diluted due to the enhancement of the $`\nu _e`$ fraction and the depletion of the $`\nu _\tau `$ fraction of the neutral current events. We have also checked that although it may seem that the curve with delay and mixing can be simulated by another curve with delay alone but with smaller mass, the actual shape of the two curves would still be different. This difference in shape though may not be statistically significant and hence one may not be able to see the effect of mixing in the time delay of the neutrinos just by looking at the time response of the neutral current event rate in the present water Cerenkov detectors. We therefore look for various other variables which can be studied to compliment this.

One such variable which carries information about both the neutrino mass and their mixing is R(t), the ratio of charged to neutral current event rate as a function of time. In fig. 2 we give the ratio R(t) of the total charged current to the neutral current event rate in $`\mathrm{D}_2\mathrm{O}`$ in SNO as a function of time. Plotted are the ratios (i) without mass, (ii) with only mixing, (iii) with delay but zero mixing and (iv) with delay and flavor mixing. The differences in the behavior of R(t) for the four different cases are clearly visible. For no mass R(t)=0.3 and since the time dependence of both the charged current and neutral current reaction rates are the same, their ratio is constant in time. As the presence of mixing enhances the charged current signal keeping the neutral current events unaltered, R(t) goes up to 0.61 for only mixing, remaining constant in time, again due to the same reason. With the introduction of delay the ratio becomes a function of time as the neutral current reaction now has an extra time dependence coming from the mass. At early times as the $`\nu _\tau `$ get delayed the neutral current event rate drops increasing R(t). These delayed $`\nu _\tau `$s arrive later and hence R(t) falls at large times. This feature can be seen for both the curves with and without mixing. The curve for only delay starts at R(t)=0.52 at t=0 sec and falls to about R(t)=0.26 at t=10 sec. For the delay with mixing case the corresponding values of R(t) are 0.83 and 0.51 at t=0 and 10 sec respectively. The important point is that the curves with and without mixing are clearly distinguishable and should allow one to differentiate between the two cases of only delay and delay with neutrino flavor conversion.

In order to substantiate our claim that the two scenarios of only delay and delay with mixing are distinguishable in SNO, we divide the time into bins of size 1 second. The number of events in each bin is then used to estimate the $`\pm 1\sigma `$ statistical error in the ratio R(t) in each bin and these are then plotted in fig. 2 for the typical time bin numbers 1, 4 and 7. From the figure we see that the two cases of delay, with and without mixing, are certainly statistically distinguishable in SNO for the first 6 seconds.

We next focus our attention on $`M_n^{nc}(t)`$, the neutral current $`n`$-th moments of the neutrino energy distributions  observed at the detector, defined as

$$M_n^{nc}(t)=\frac{d^2S}{dEdt}E^n𝑑E$$
(9)
while the corresponding normalized moments are given by

$$\overline{M}_n^{nc}(t)=\frac{M_n^{nc}(t)}{M_0^{nc}(t)}$$
(10)
We have shown the behavior of the 1st normalized moment $`\overline{M}_1^{nc}(t)`$ in fig. 3 as a function of time in SNO. For massless neutrinos, the $`\overline{M}_1^{nc}`$ has a value 40.97, constant in time, as this is again a ratio and hence the time dependence gets canceled out as in the case of R(t). For the case where the $`\nu _\tau `$ is massive and hence delayed, it assumes a time dependence. Since the delay $`1/E^2`$ and since the neutrinos are produced at the source with an energy distribution, hence at each instant the lower energy $`\nu _\tau `$ will be delayed more than the higher energy $`\nu _\tau `$. Therefore $`\overline{M}_1^{nc}(t)`$, which gives the energy centroid of the neutral current event distribution in $`\mathrm{D}_2\mathrm{O}`$, starts from a low value 38.76 at t=0 sec as all the $`\nu _\tau `$ are delayed, rises sharply as the higher energy neutrinos arrive first and then falls slowly as the lower energy delayed $`\nu _\tau `$ start arriving. If the $`\nu _\tau `$ are allowed to mix with the $`\nu _e`$, then they are de-energized and the above mentioned effect is further enhanced. To make an estimate of whether SNO would be able to distinguish the three cases discussed above, we compute the $`\pm 1\sigma `$ statistical errors in the $`1^{st}`$ normalized moment for the two scenarios of delay, with and without mixing, and show them for the $`1^{st}`$, $`6^{th}`$ and $`11^{th}`$ bins. We see that the errors involved are large enough to completely wash out the differences between the energy moments with and without neutrino mass and mixing. Hence the normalized energy moments fail to probe neutrino mass and mixing as at early times we don’t see much difference between the different cases considered, while at late times the number of events become very small so that the error in $`M_0^{nc}(t)`$ becomes huge, increasing the error in $`\overline{M}_1^{nc}(t)`$.

The variable that can be a useful probe for differentiating the case for delay with mixing from the case for delay without mixing is the ratio of the unnormalized moment of the charged to neutral current events

$$r_n(t)=\frac{M_n^{cc}(t)}{M_n^{nc}(t)}$$
(11)
We present in fig. 4, for SNO, the $`r_n(t)`$ vs. time plots (for n=1) for the cases of (a) massless neutrinos (b) with mixing but no delay (c) with delay but no mixing and (d) with delay as well as mixing. Since this is a ratio, the supernova flux uncertainties get canceled out to a large extent and since the unnormalized moments have smaller statistical errors, this is a better variable than the normalized moments to observe the signatures of neutrino mixing. In the figure we have shown the $`\pm 1\sigma `$ statistical errors in $`r_1(t)`$ for the two cases of delay alone and delay with mixing, for the $`1^{st}`$, $`8^{th}`$ and $`15^{th}`$ bins in time, and the two cases are clearly distinguishable in SNO for early as well as late times. Note that $`r_1(t)`$ is different from the ratio R(t) as it gives information about the ratio of the energy centroids of the charged current and neutral current distributions as a function of time, while the latter gives only the ratio of the number of events as a function of time.

The advantage of using ratios is that, they are not only sensitive to the mass and mixing parameters but are also almost insensitive to the details of supernova models. Since they are a ratio they are almost independent of the luminosity and depend only on some function of the ratio of neutrino temperatures. All the calculations presented so far are for fixed neutrino temperatures. In order to show that the time dependence of the neutrino temperatures does not alter our conclusions much, we present our analysis with time dependent neutrino temperatures. We take

$$T_{\nu _e}=0.16\mathrm{log}t+3.58,T_{\overline{\nu }_e}=1.63\mathrm{log}t+5.15,T_{\nu _\mu }=2.24\mathrm{log}t+6.93$$
(12)
These forms for the neutrino temperatures follow from fits to the results of the numerical supernova model given in Totani et al. . In fig. 5 we compare the ratio R(t) for the cases of delay and delay with mixing for the two cases of fixed temperatures and the time dependent temperatures. It is clear from the figure that that the time dependence of the neutrino temperatures does not have much effect on the time dependence of the ratio of the charged current to neutral current rates. In fact the two curves corresponding to fixed and time dependent temperatures, fall within $`\pm 1\sigma `$ statistical errorbars for both the cases of only delay and delay with mixing.

In conclusion, we have shown that even though neutrino flavor mixing cannot alter the total neutral current signal in the detector - the neutral current interaction being flavor blind, it can have a non-trivial impact on the delay of massive neutrinos, which alters the neutral current event rate as a function of time. The neutral current event rate though does not depend on the neutrino conversion probability. In order to study the effect of neutrino mass and mixing we have suggested various variables. Of the different variables that we have presented here, the ratio of the charged to neutral current event rate R(t), can show the effect of mixing during the first few seconds, while the charged to neutral current ratio of the energy moments are useful diagnostic tools for all times. These variables are not just sensitive to flavor mixing and time delay, they are also insensitive to supernova model uncertainties and hence are excellent tools to study the effect of flavor mixing on the time delay of massive supernova neutrinos.

In this letter we have considered a mass spectrum for the neutrinos where only the $`\nu _\tau `$ have a measurable delay. The model considered is one of many, but one can easily extend the above formalism to include more general classes of neutrino models . In addition to the energy moments that we have presented here, the $`n`$-th order moments of the arrival time of the neutrinos as a function of energy can also be analyzed to study the effect of neutrino mass and mixing, and we plan to present them in a future work .

The authors thank S. Goswami, P.B. Pal, S. Mohanty and D. Majumdar for discussions.

Table 1

The expected number of neutrino events in SNO. To get the number of events in SK, one has to scale the number of events in $`\mathrm{H}_2\mathrm{O}`$ given here to its fiducial mass of 32 kton. The column A corresponds to massless neutrinos, column B to neutrinos with complete flavor conversion The $`\nu _i`$ here refers to all the six neutrino species.

reactions in 1 kton $`\mathrm{D}_2\mathrm{O}`$  A  B    $`\nu _e+dp+p+e^{}`$ 75 239  $`\overline{\nu }_e+dn+n+e^+`$ 91 91  $`\nu _i+dn+p+\nu _i`$ 544 544  $`\nu _e+e^{}\nu _e+e^{}`$ 4 6  $`\overline{\nu }_e+e^{}\overline{\nu }_e+e^{}`$ 1 1  $`\nu _{\mu ,\tau }(\overline{\nu }_{\mu ,\tau })+e^{}\nu _{\mu ,\tau }(\overline{\nu }_{\mu ,\tau })+e^{}`$ 4 3  $`\nu _e+^{16}Oe^{}+^{16}F`$ 1 55  $`\overline{\nu }_e+^{16}Oe^++^{16}N`$ 4 4  $`\nu _i+^{16}O\nu _i+\gamma +X`$ 21 21  reactions in 1.4 kton $`\mathrm{H}_2\mathrm{O}`$    $`\overline{\nu }_e+pn+e^+`$ 357 357  $`\nu _e+e^{}\nu _e+e^{}`$ 6 9  $`\overline{\nu }_e+e^{}\overline{\nu }_e+e^{}`$ 2 2  $`\nu _{\mu ,\tau }(\overline{\nu }_{\mu ,\tau })+e^{}\nu _{\mu ,\tau }(\overline{\nu }_{\mu ,\tau })+e^{}`$ 6 5  $`\nu _e+^{16}Oe^{}+^{16}F`$ 2 86  $`\overline{\nu }_e+^{16}Oe^++^{16}N`$ 6 6  $`\nu _i+^{16}O\nu _i+\gamma +X`$ 33 33

Figure Captions

Fig.1 The neutral current event rate as a function of time in $`\mathrm{D}_2\mathrm{O}`$ in SNO. The solid line corresponds to the case of massless neutrinos, the long dashed line to neutrinos with only mass but no mixing, while the short dashed line gives the event rate for neutrinos with mass as well as flavor mixing.

Fig.2 The ratio R(t) of the total charged current to neutral current event rate in SNO versus time. The solid line is for massless neutrinos, the short dashed line for neutrinos with complete flavor conversion but no delay, the long dashed line for neutrinos with only delay and no flavor conversion and the dotted line is for neutrinos with both delay and complete flavor conversion. Also shown are the $`\pm 1\sigma `$ statistical errors for delay with and without mixing in the $`1^{st}`$, $`4^{th}`$ and the $`7^{th}`$ time bins.

Fig. 3 The 1st normalized energy moment of the neutral current events in SNO $`\overline{M}_1^{nc}(t)`$ versus time. The solid line corresponds to the case of massless neutrinos, the long dashed line to neutrinos with only mass but no mixing, while the short dashed line gives the event rate for neutrinos with mass as well as flavor conversion. Also shown are the $`\pm 1\sigma `$ statistical errors for delay with and without mixing in the $`1^{st}`$, $`6^{th}`$ and the $`11^{th}`$ time bins.

Fig. 4 The variation of $`r_1(t)`$ with time in SNO. The solid line is for massless neutrinos, the short dashed line for neutrinos with complete flavor conversion but no delay, the long dashed line for neutrinos with only delay and no flavor conversion and the dotted line is for neutrinos with both delay and complete flavor conversion. Also shown are the $`\pm 1\sigma `$ statistical errors for delay with and without mixing in the $`1^{st}`$, $`8^{th}`$ and the $`15^{th}`$ time bins.

Fig. 5 The ratio R(t) in SNO for the two cases of fixed and time dependent neutrino temperatures. The solid line and the long dashed line give R(t) for the cases of fixed temperatures and varying temperatures respectively for only delay, while the short dashed line and the dotted line give the corresponding R(t) for delay with mixing. We have also given the $`\pm 1\sigma `$ statistical errors in the $`1^{st}`$ and the $`4^{th}`$ time bin, for the both the curves for fixed and time dependent temperatures.


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# Effect of incoherent scattering on shot noise correlations in the quantum Hall regime

## I Introduction

The effect of incoherent scattering on transport and noise in mesoscopic structures has been of interest in a number of previous works (for review see ). In this paper we are interested in the effect of inelastic and quasi-elastic scattering on the correlations of the current in a structure submitted to a strong magnetic field so that the current is carried by edge states propagating along the boundary of the sample (see figure 1).

To demonstrate the reality of edge states  (despite their small contribution to the overall density of states) the possibility of creating a non-equilibrium population  has been crucial. Several experiments have investigated the equilibration of edge states selectively populated with the help of various contacts by transport measurements . A natural problem is to investigate the effect of inter-edge state scattering on the noise on such structures.

Recently, Hanbury Brown and Twiss (HBT) experiments studying current correlations using partially degenerate stream of fermions were performed , starting from the idea  of using the edge states in a conductor submitted to a strong magnetic field. A Y-structure is discussed in Ref.  and a HBT experiment without a magnetic field has also been realized . Here we are interested in the experimental arrangement of Oberholzer et al.  which is depicted in figure 1, with the only difference that the magnetic field, in this experiment, was adjusted in such a way that only one spin-degenerate edge state (filling factor $`\nu =2`$) carries the current, and not two, as it is represented on the figure. Contact 1, which is at a potential $`eV`$ above the potentials of the two other contacts, acts as a carrier source and contacts 2 and 3 as detectors for the beams of electrons. The incident beam is splitted at two quantum point contacts (QPC) which can be tuned by applied voltages. In the following we will denote by $`T_1`$ and $`R_1=1T_1`$ the transmission and reflection coefficients at QPC at contact 1, and introduce $`T_3`$ and $`R_3`$ for QPC at contact 3. The quantity of interest in this experiment, revealing statistical properties of the carriers, is the correlation $`S_{23}=\mathrm{\Delta }I_2\mathrm{\Delta }I_3`$ between the current at the two contacts. Compared to the initial experiment by Henny et al.  the experiment by Oberholzer et al.  introduces fluctuations in the incident beam and thus the current correlations are not determined already from current conservation alone. In the following we will be interested in the case where the distance between the QPC’s is long so that incoherent processes may occur along this edge. If only one edge state is populated, phase breaking processes are of little interest since $`S_{23}`$ measures quantum-statistical properties of the carriers revealed by the separation of the beam at QPC 3, and what happens before this separation is of little importance. We can indeed check that the introduction of incoherent processes within the framework that will be used in the following does not affect the auto-correlations (noise) and the correlations if only one edge state is present.

In contrast, when several edge states are populated, inter-edge state scattering along one boundary may cause a redistribution of the carriers between the edge states and thus modify the noise properties of each channel. This is the situation that will interest us in this paper. Inter-edge state scattering centers were investigated experimentally very recently . We will not take into account the spin degeneracy which only would multiply the conductances and the noise by a factor 2.

The inelastic  and quasi-elastic scattering  are modeled by introducing an additional probe at the edge along which incoherent scattering occurs (see figure 2). We have to impose that the current through this probe is zero at any time. This approach, followed in a number of works  (see  for a review), has the advantage to reduce the problem to the study of coherent scattering in a conductor with one additional contact. The method will be recalled in more detail in the following.

In the first section we are interested in the situation where only coherent scattering is present. In the following section we describe the influence of incoherent scattering along the long edge of the sample.

## II Coherent Scattering

We first discuss the situation when only elastic scattering is present in the system. We consider the situation depicted in figure 1 where the magnetic field is chosen so that two edge states are populated. The edge state associated with the lowest Landau level (LL) is perfectly transmitted at the two QPC’s whereas the second edge state associated with the second LL is only partially transmitted at the QPC’s. We are interested in the current correlations between contacts 2 and 3.

The noise spectrum is defined as $`S_{\alpha \beta }(\omega )2\pi \delta (\omega +\omega ^{})=\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{I}_\alpha (\omega )\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{I}_\beta (\omega ^{})+\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{I}_\beta (\omega ^{})\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{I}_\alpha (\omega )`$ with $`\mathrm{\Delta }\widehat{I}_\alpha (\omega )=\widehat{I}_\alpha (\omega )\widehat{I}_\alpha (\omega )`$, where $`\widehat{I}_\alpha (\omega )`$ is the Fourier transform of the current operator at contact $`\alpha `$. (For a recent presentation of the formalism and notations, see ). The zero frequency limit will be denoted: $`S_{\alpha \beta }=S_{\alpha \beta }(\omega =0)`$. Following the scattering approach, we construct the scattering matrix for the system to calculate the noise :

$$S_{\alpha \beta }=\frac{2e^2}{h}dE\underset{\gamma ,\lambda }{}Tr\left\{A_{\gamma \lambda }^\alpha A_{\lambda \gamma }^\beta \right\}f_\gamma (1f_\lambda ),$$
(1)
where the matrices $`A`$’s are related to the on-shell $`S`$-matrix: $`A_{\gamma \lambda }^\alpha =\delta _{\alpha \gamma }\delta _{\alpha \lambda }s_{\alpha \gamma }^{}(E)s_{\alpha \lambda }(E)`$, $`f_\alpha `$ being the Fermi-Dirac distribution at the contact $`\alpha `$. We consider the case of zero temperature and will discuss at the end the effect of temperature on some of the results.

Using this expression and the $`S`$-matrix we can compute the correlations between the currents at contacts $`2`$ and $`3`$, which is eventually found to be :

$$S_{23}=\frac{2e^2}{h}|eV|R_3T_3T_1^2,$$
(2)
where $`R_1`$, $`T_1`$ and $`R_3`$, $`T_3`$ are the reflection and transmission coefficients for the edge state corresponding to the second LL at QPC 1 and 3, respectively. Since the first edge state is totally transmitted through QPC’s, it carries a noiseless current and does not contribute to the noise or to the correlations. The $`R_3T_3`$ factor is the usual partition factor due to the separation of the electron beam at QPC 3. The $`T_1^2`$ term is due to the fact that the processes leading to correlations between contacts 2 and 3 involve two electrons transmitted through the QPC 1, which happens with probability $`T_1^2`$.

Before discussing the effect of inelastic and quasi-elastic scattering, we may consider first the effect of coherent scattering between the two edge states along the upper edge. This question might seem academic but it will be important to have this result in mind, to appreciate the difference in the correlations $`S_{23}`$ when the two edge states exchange carriers coherently or incoherently. Let us recall that in the presence of coherent scattering, it was proven that correlations between two contacts are always negative as a consequence of the fermionic nature of the carriers*** The proof applies only to conductors which are part of a zero-impedance external circuit. . To describe coherent scattering between edge states we introduce the probability $`\epsilon `$ that an electron, starting in one of the two channels, is scattered into the other edge state when it travels between the two QPC’s. Here we do not need to enter into more details about the scattering however let us mention that it has been studied within a microscopic approach in . After having constructed the $`S`$-matrix, formula (1) gives the correlations:

$`S_{23}^{\mathrm{coh}}={\displaystyle \frac{2e^2}{h}}|eV|R_3[(1\epsilon )^2T_3T_1^2+\epsilon ^2T_3`$ (3)
$`+\epsilon (1\epsilon )(12R_3T_1+T_1^2)].`$ (4)
Let us now discuss a few limiting cases. If $`\epsilon =0`$ (no inter-edge state elastic scattering) we fall back to the previous situation (2). If $`\epsilon =1`$, the two edge states are perfectly exchanged between the QPC’s and the current separated by QPC 3 issues from the first edge state, perfectly transmitted at QPC 1 and we have simply $`S_{23}^{\mathrm{coh}}=\frac{2e^2}{h}|eV|R_3T_3`$. Note that the outer edge state in contact 3 is not noiseless but these fluctuations are not correlated with fluctuations at contact 2 and then do not contribute to $`S_{23}`$ since this edge state is not splitted at QPC 3.

If $`T_1=0`$ the correlation is $`S_{23}^{\mathrm{coh}}=\frac{2e^2}{h}|eV|[R_3T_3\epsilon ^2+\epsilon (1\epsilon )R_3]`$. The first term is the partition noise for the beam separated at QPC 3; this term is proportional to the probability $`\epsilon ^2`$ that two electrons are transmitted from the first edge state to the second. The second term is the partition noise due to the separation of the beam between QPC’s. In this process, after the separation of the beam, one electron is transmitted with probability $`1`$ in the first edge state towards contact 3 and the other is reflected with probability $`R_3`$ towards contact 2.

Another interesting case occurs for $`T_3=0`$. Then the two edge states are perfectly separated at QPC 3. The first edge state flows towards contact 3 whereas the second goes to contact 2. This situation is particularly interesting since it allows us to study separately the noise spectrum of each edge state after having travelled along the upper edge of the conductor. In the absence of scattering between edge states, the currents remain uncorrelated, whereas if redistribution of charges occurs between edge states, it may induce correlations. For coherent scattering, we find: $`S_{23}^{\mathrm{coh}}=\frac{2e^2}{h}|eV|\epsilon (1\epsilon )R_1^2`$. The only separation of the beam that can cause correlations occurs along the edge with usual partition factor $`\epsilon (1\epsilon )`$; the factor $`R_1^2`$ ensures that, if the currents in the two channels are noiseless before exchanging carriers along the upper edge, they remain noiseless and uncorrelated. Let us also give the currents auto-correlations: $`S_{22}^{\mathrm{coh}}=\frac{2e^2}{h}|eV|[R_1T_1(1\epsilon )^2+\epsilon (1\epsilon )R_1]`$ and $`S_{33}^{\mathrm{coh}}=\frac{2e^2}{h}|eV|[R_1T_1\epsilon ^2+\epsilon (1\epsilon )R_1]`$. The noise spectral densities have contributions from the splitting of the beam at the first QPC and from the redistribution of the charges between the QPC’s. Let us finally mention the value of the noise when $`\epsilon =1/2`$, i.e. when the average currents in the two edge states are equally equilibrated due to scattering, then

$$S_{23}^{\mathrm{coh}}=\frac{e^2}{h}|eV|\frac{R_1^2}{2}\text{ for }T_3=0,\epsilon =1/2$$
(5)
and

$$S_{22}^{\mathrm{coh}}=S_{33}^{\mathrm{coh}}=\frac{e^2}{h}|eV|\frac{1+T_1}{2}R_1.$$
(6)
Next we proceed to treat incoherent scattering.

## III Introduction of incoherent scattering

As we have already evoked, the presence of inelastic or quasi-elastic scattering will be treated by adding a fictitious contact at the edge along which incoherent scattering is expected to occur . Let us remark that the only place where it can have some influence on the correlations is the edge between the two QPC’s where we have introduced it (see figure 2). Since the current is obviously conserved along the edge, we have to impose that the current $`I_4`$ through this contact is zero at any time. The consequence is that the potential $`\mu _4`$ at this probe is fluctuating.

The average currents are related to the potentials by the conductance: $`I_\alpha =\frac{1}{e}dE_\beta G_{\alpha \beta }(E)\overline{f}_\beta (E)`$, where we recall that $`G_{\alpha \beta }=\frac{e^2}{h}(N_\alpha \delta _{\alpha \beta }Tr\{s_{\alpha \beta }^{}s_{\alpha \beta }\})`$, $`N_\alpha `$ being the number of open channels at contact $`\alpha `$. We first discuss the inelastic case  for which we require that the current is zero on average $`I_4=0`$ and that the average distribution function at the fictitious contact is an equilibrium Fermi distribution. This leads to the following expression for the average chemical potential at contact $`4`$:

$$\overline{\mu }_4=\mu _0+\frac{1+T_1}{2}eV.$$
(7)
The fact that $`I_4`$ is zero on average determines the average distribution function at contact $`4`$. We have also to ensure that the fluctuating part of $`I_4`$ remains zero. At contact $`\alpha `$ the current may be written as $`I_\alpha =\frac{1}{e}dE_\beta G_{\alpha \beta }f_\beta +\delta I_\alpha `$, where $`\delta I_\alpha `$ is the intrinsic part of the fluctuations, whose spectrum is given by (1). We now write the currents as $`I_\alpha =I_\alpha +\mathrm{\Delta }I_\alpha `$. Imposing that the fluctuating current is zero $`\mathrm{\Delta }I_4=0`$ leads to the relation $`\delta I_4=\frac{1}{e}G_{44}(\mu _4\overline{\mu }_4)`$ which gives the expression of the fluctuating part of the current:

$$\mathrm{\Delta }I_\alpha =\delta I_\alpha \frac{G_{\alpha 4}}{G_{44}}\delta I_4,$$
(8)
the first term corresponds to intrinsic fluctuations of the current and the second term to the fluctuations due to the existence of a fluctuating potential at contact $`4`$.

In the quasi-elastic case  we impose that not only the total current $`I_4=dEj_4(E)`$ is zero on average but the contribution to the current of the states of energy $`E`$ is zero $`j_4(E)=0`$, which gives the averaged distribution function at contact $`4`$:

$$\overline{f}_4(E)=\frac{1+T_1}{2}f_1(E)+\frac{R_1}{2}f_2(E).$$
(9)
The distribution function at the fictitious probe is plotted in the two cases in figure 3. Since the integral of these two distribution functions are equal, the currents in the two edge states are equally equilibrated by these two kinds of incoherent scattering. Indeed, if we compute the average currents for $`T_3=0`$, when the two edge states are directed each to a different contact, we find in the two cases: $`I_2=I_3=\frac{e^2}{h}\frac{1+T_1}{2}V`$.

In the quasi-elastic case, the distribution function $`f_4`$ is itself a fluctuating quantity. Imposing that the contribution of the states of energy $`E`$ to the fluctuating part of the current at the fictitious contact is zero, $`\mathrm{\Delta }j_4(E)=0`$, leads to a relation between the fluctuating part of the distribution $`f_4\overline{f}_4`$ and the contribution of those states to the intrinsic noise $`\delta j_4(E)`$. This relation is of the same form as (8): $`\mathrm{\Delta }j_\alpha (E)=\delta j_\alpha (E)\frac{G_{\alpha 4}}{G_{44}}\delta j_4(E)`$.

Finally we find for the two different kinds of incoherent scattering the current correlations $`S_{\alpha \beta }^{\mathrm{in},\mathrm{qe}}=\mathrm{\Delta }I_\alpha \mathrm{\Delta }I_\beta `$:

$$S_{\alpha \beta }^{\mathrm{in},\mathrm{qe}}=S_{\alpha \beta }\frac{G_{\alpha 4}}{G_{44}}S_{\beta 4}\frac{G_{\beta 4}}{G_{44}}S_{\alpha 4}+\frac{G_{\alpha 4}G_{\beta 4}}{G_{44}^2}S_{44}.$$
(10)
They involve the conductances $`G_{\alpha \beta }`$ and the intrinsic correlations $`S_{\alpha \beta }=\delta I_\alpha \delta I_\beta `$ for the four-terminal conductor of figure 2, calculated with formula (1) where the distribution function at contact 4 is either a step like Fermi function for the potential $`\overline{\mu }_4`$ in the inelastic case (7), or the average distribution $`\overline{f}_4`$ given by (9) in the quasi-elastic case (see figure 3).

Let us now come to the results. First, for the quasi-elastic case, we find:

$$S_{23}^{\mathrm{qe}}=\frac{e^2}{h}|eV|\frac{R_3}{4}\left[2T_3(1+T_1)^2+(1+T_3)R_1^2\right].$$
(11)
In particular, in the interesting limit $`T_3=0`$ where the two edge states are perfectly separated at QPC 3, we get: $`S_{23}^{\mathrm{qe}}=\frac{e^2}{h}|eV|\frac{R_1^2}{4}`$, i.e. half of the result (5) obtained when scattering between edge states is coherent. The auto-correlations take the values: $`S_{22}^{\mathrm{qe}}=S_{33}^{\mathrm{qe}}=\frac{e^2}{h}|eV|\frac{R_1}{2}\frac{1+3T_1}{2}`$.

More surprising is the result obtained for inelastic scattering:

$$S_{23}^{\mathrm{in}}=\frac{e^2}{h}|eV|\frac{R_3}{2}\left[2T_3(1+T_1)(1+T_3)R_1T_1\right]$$
(12)
leading to the possibility of positive correlations, as figure 4 shows (let us recall again that correlations in the presence of coherent scattering only are always negative due to the fermionic nature of carriers ). If $`T_3=0`$, we get $`S_{23}^{\mathrm{in}}=+\frac{e^2}{h}|eV|\frac{R_1T_1}{2}`$. This result means that this modelization of inelastic scattering gives the possibility for a fluctuation of the potential $`\mu _4`$ to inject in a correlated way in the two channels some current. Let us also mention the result for the noise in this limit: $`S_{22}^{\mathrm{in}}=S_{33}^{\mathrm{in}}=\frac{e^2}{h}|eV|\frac{R_1T_1}{2}`$.

If $`T_1=T_3=0`$, only one edge state is transmitted at QPC $`1`$, the currents in the two channels are equilibrated by inelastic processes between QPC’s, and finally the two edge states are separated by QPC 3. We remark that in this case the correlations and the noise vanish. This shows that this modelization of inelastic process does not introduce noise when it distributes the current of a noiseless channel into two channels. (This is not the case if coherent or quasi-elastic scattering occurs between edge states: $`S_{23}^{\mathrm{coh}}=\frac{e^2}{h}|eV|\frac{1}{2}`$ and $`S_{23}^{\mathrm{qe}}=\frac{e^2}{h}|eV|\frac{1}{4}`$).

Note that if more than two edge states carry the current, still with only one partially transmitted and all others being perfectly transmitted, the region in the paramater space where the correlations are positive diminishes.

Finally we would like to discuss the effect of a finite temperature on the result (12) for $`T_3=0`$. We will show that for a high enough temperature $`S_{23}^{\mathrm{in}}`$ is negative. For a finite temperature $`T`$, the Fermi distributions at the three contacts are smoothed as well as the average distribution $`\overline{f}_4`$ at the fictitious contact. For $`T_3=0`$, equation (1) gives:

$`S_{23}^{\mathrm{in}}={\displaystyle \frac{e^2}{h}}[k_BT(2+R_1+R_1T_1)`$ (13)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{R_1T_1}{2}}eV\mathrm{coth}{\displaystyle \frac{eV}{2k_BT}}].`$ (14)
If $`T=0`$ we indeed recover the positive result $`S_{23}^{\mathrm{in}}=+\frac{e^2}{h}|eV|\frac{R_1T_1}{2}`$ for the shot noise, and if $`V=0`$ we find $`S_{23}^{\mathrm{in}}=\frac{2e^2}{h}k_BT\left(1+\frac{R_1}{2}\right)`$, which is the result of the fluctuation-dissipation theorem: $`S_{23}^{\mathrm{in}}=2k_BT(G_{23}^{\mathrm{in}}+G_{32}^{\mathrm{in}})`$ where $`G_{\alpha \beta }^{\mathrm{in}}=G_{\alpha \beta }\frac{G_{\alpha 4}G_{4\beta }}{G_{44}}`$ is the conductance of the three-terminal conductor in the presence of incoherent scattering.

Let us define $`T_c`$, the critical temperature above which the correlations $`S_{23}^{\mathrm{in}}`$ are negative. For small transmission $`T_11`$ we find: $`k_BT_c|eV|\frac{T_1}{6}`$, and for large transmission $`R_11`$: $`k_BT_c|eV|\frac{R_1}{4}`$. The transmission that maximizes the critical temperature is $`T_1=3\sqrt{6}0.55`$. In this case we have: $`k_BT_c^{\mathrm{max}}|eV|\frac{5\sqrt{6}12}{2(6\sqrt{6}12)}\frac{|eV|}{21.8}`$.

## IV Summary

To summarize we have shown that incoherent scattering can have a strong effect on the correlations in a HBT situation. In our modelization, inelastic scattering is responsible for positive correlations in a certain parameter range. We emphasize that the investigation of the correlations with the conductor of figure 1 for $`T_3=0`$ provides direct information about inter-edge state scattering: in the absence of inter-edge state scattering the correlation $`S_{23}`$ vanishes, for elastic scattering and for quasi-elastic scattering it is negative and for inelastic scattering it is positive. In principle it is possible to discriminate also between elastic inter-edge state scattering and quasi-elastic scattering: in the case of elastic scattering a single parameter ($`\epsilon `$) determines the noise spectra and the conductances if $`T_1`$ and $`T_3`$ are known.

We have constructed here only the limiting case of a fictitious contact. Partially transmitting contacts would allow to interpolate between fully coherent inter-edge state scattering and fully quasi-elastic or fully inelastic inter-edge state scattering.

## Acknowlegments

Interest in the topic of this work was stimulated by a question of Bart J. van Wees. We acknowledge Yaroslav M. Blanter and Andrew M. Martin for very interesting discussions. This work was supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation and by the TMR Network Dynamics of Nanostructures.


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# I Introduction

## I Introduction

The shape and the intensity of the intergalactic UV background radiation are crucial factors in determining the ionization balance of the intergalactic medium and therefore influence the structure formation in the universe. Knowledge of this radiation field is thus necessary for the understanding of the early universe. AGNs are believed to be the major contributors to this background, though a significant contribution from star forming galaxies can not be ruled out. Detailed calculations of the propagation of AGN like ionizing radiation through intergalactic space, taking into account the absorption and reradiation by the galactic and intergalactic material, have been carried out by Haardt and Madau (1996, hereafter HM96). They have determined the frequency and redshift dependence of the background. Observationally, the intensity of the radiation has been determined in recent years, by studying the proximity effect in the Lyman alpha forest of the absorption lines in the spectra of QSOs (Bajtlik, Duncan & Ostriker 1988). This analysis is insensitive to the shape of the radiation (Bechtold, 1994 and Das and Khare, 1997). Values of the intensity of the background at the Lyman limit, J$`_{\nu _{\mathrm{LL}}}`$, obtained by Bechtold (1994) and Cooke et al (1996) are considerably higher than the value expected from the distribution of visible QSOs. Several sources of uncertainty in the value of the flux obtained by the proximity effect analysis have been considered by various authors (Bechtold, 1994, 1995, Srianand and Khare, 1995, Das and Khare, 1997). It has also been suggested (Fall & Pei 1993) that the actual number of QSOs may be larger than their observed number and that several QSOs may be rendered invisible due to dust extinction in the intervening absorbers. It is possible that the background radiation gets a significant contribution from star forming galaxies (Madau & Shull 1996, Giroux & Shapiro 1996, Khare and Ikeuchi, 1998). Here we try to obtain an independent estimate of the background flux by studying the ionization state of the QSO absorption systems for which an estimate of the particle density is available from the observations of the fine structure excited lines of C II. Where ever possible, we also try to estimate the contribution of the galactic flux to the total ionizing flux for the systems. In section II we present our analysis, the results are discussed in section III.

## II Data and Analysis

Several absorption systems reported in the literature, have the absorption lines of C II, C II\*, C IV, H I, Si II, Si IV etc. Particle density in the absorber can be obtained from the column densities of C II and C II\*. The column density ratio of C II to C IV is a good indicator of the ionization parameter as it changes rapidly with change in the ionization parameter, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }=\frac{\mathrm{\Phi }}{\mathrm{c}\mathrm{n}_\mathrm{H}}`$, where $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ is the flux of the ionizing radiation i.e. the number of photons cm-2 s-1, $`\mathrm{n}_\mathrm{H}`$ is the particle density and c is the velocity of light. This ratio is insensitive to the particle density and the abundance of carbon, but is very sensitive to the neutral hydrogen column density, N$`_{\mathrm{H}\mathrm{I}}`$, in the absorber, specially for N$`{}_{\mathrm{H}\mathrm{I}}{}^{}>10^{17}`$ cm-2 (Bergeron and Stasinska 1986 ). This particular column density ratio is also very sensitive to the shape of the ionizing radiation. This is shown in Fig.1 which shows the ratios for neutral hydrogen column densities of 1017 cm-2 and 1019 cm-2 for (i) spectral shape as given by HM96 for a redshift of 2.5, (ii) galactic spectra as taken from Bruzal (1983) and (III) a combination of both the above with the AGN flux taken to be same as the actual value given by HM96 for z=2.5. These results have been obtained from the code ’CLOUDY’, kindly supplied to us by Prof. Ferland. The galactic spectra produces much smaller values of the ratio compared to the AGN or power law spectra. This is due to the fact that the galactic spectra has much smaller number of photons having sufficient energy to produce C IV. Thus it is necessary to know the shape of the ionizing radiation to determine the ionization parameter from the C II to C IV ratio. In order to get information about the intensity and the shape of the radiation field we can make use of the column density ratio of other ions. Si II to Si IV ratio is an useful ratio for this purpose. In Fig. 2 we have plotted the ratio of column densities of Si II to Si IV for the three cases listed above. This ratio is not very sensitive to the shape and can be used with the C II to C IV ratio to constrain the shape as well as the intensity of the ionizing radiation. Fe II to Fe III and Al II to Al III ratios can also be used for this purpose. These ratios are also plotted in Fig. 2. We have, therefore, selected from the literature, absorption systems for which the column densities of H I, C II and C II\*, or limits on their values, have been determined and for which additional ions like the C IV, Si II, Si IV, Fe II, Fe III etc are also available. The details are given in Table 1.

The fine structure excited level of C II is primarily populated by collisions with electrons for the absorption systems considered here, which are either the Lyman limit or the damped Lyman alpha systems, while the collisions with H I and also the collisional deexcitations by electrons can be ignored (Bahcall and Wolfe, 1968, Morris et al 1986). As we are considering the absorption systems at high redshifts, the excitation of the finestructure level by the absorption of the cosmic microwave background photons may be important. In order to check this we calculated the excitation temperatures of C II\* from the observed column densities. These are much higher than the corresponding temperatures of the microwave background at the redshifts of the absorbers as can be seen from Table 2. We have therefore, ignored the excitation by the microwave background photons and have assumed the electron densities (assumed to be equal to the proton density) to be given by ne = 21 \[$`\frac{\mathrm{N}_{\mathrm{C}\mathrm{II}}}{\mathrm{N}_{\mathrm{C}\mathrm{II}}}`$\] (Morris et al 1986). The hydrogen density obtained by adding the neutral hydrogen density to the electron density, corrected for the electrons coming from He II and He III, for each system is also given in Table 2. For a few of the systems, only an upper limit on C II\*/C II was available. For these systems only an upper limit on the particle density could be obtained. For these systems we have assumed a lower limit on particle density to be 0.045 cm-2, which is smaller than all the lower limits to the particle densities obtained for the systems considered here and is also considerably lower than the mean interstellar particle density. For each absorption system we have constructed a number of photoionization models for the observed neutral hydrogen column density and different spectral shapes. The AGN spectral shape at the redshift of the absorption system is taken from HM96. For some of the systems only the total neutral hydrogen column density is available, while C II\* has been observed in some particular velocity component of the absorption line. For such systems we have assumed the neutral hydrogen column density in individual components to be in the same ratio as the Si II column densities, as the ionization potential of Si II is close to that of H I. Details of the models and comparison of their predictions with the observations are discussed below for individual absorption systems. The results are given in Table 2. Note that all the absorption systems are sufficiently far away from the respective QSOs (relative velocity is greater than 15000 km s-1) and can be considered to be intervening (however, see Richards et al, 1999) so that the radiation of the parent QSO can be ignored. In the following analysis we have only used the ratios of the column densities of different ions of the same element. Our conclusions are, therefore, independent of the assumed values of chemical abundances.

### A z=1.7765 system towards Q1331+170

This QSO has been observed by Kulkarni et al (1996). However, for this system C IV column density has not been reported and so we could not constrain the spectral shape. Errors on column densities have not been reported by the authors and we assumed errors of 25$`\%`$ in the column densities. Neutral hydrogen column density in the component showing C II\* has been obtained from the total H I column density (Green et al 1995) by assuming the H I column densities to be in the same ratio as the Si II column densities. Analysis of the Si lines assuming HM96 spectral shape for z=2 yields -2.4 $`>\mathrm{\Gamma }>2.6`$ giving 3.2 $`\times 10^7\mathrm{\Phi }1.4\times 10^8`$. This is considerably higher than the value of HM96 flux at the redshift of the absorption system. It is, however, possible that the excess flux comes from the galaxies. We explored this possibility by constructing photoionization models with the shape as well as the intensity of the background as given by HM96 at the redshift of the absorber, the rest coming from the galaxies. For these models the limits become -2.7 $`>\mathrm{\Gamma }>2.9`$ giving 1.5 $`\times 10^7\mathrm{\Phi }_\mathrm{G}6.9\times 10^7`$, $`\mathrm{\Phi }_\mathrm{G}`$ being the galactic flux in cm-2 s-1.

### B z=2.279 system towards Q2348-14

This QSO has been observed by Pettini et al (1994). An upper limit on the column density ratio of Si II to Si IV gives, for HM96 spectral shape for z=2.5, a lower limit of -2.2 for log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$. However, as only an upper limit on the particle density could be obtained, this can not be converted to a limit on the flux. Assuming the minimum value of the particle density to be 0.045 cm-3, which is smaller than the observed upper limit by 1.2 dex, requires the flux to be larger than 8.5 $`\times 10^6`$. The column density ratio of Al II to Al III gives -1.3 $`>`$ log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }>1.4`$, giving $`5.3\times 10^7<\mathrm{\Phi }<1.2\times 10^9`$. Taking the actual value of the HM96 flux and assuming the rest of the contribution from the galactic sources requires -1.4 $`>`$ log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }>1.5`$, giving the galactic flux to be between 4.1 $`\times 10^7`$ and 9.7 $`\times 10^8`$.

### C z=2.638 system towards PKS 2126-158

This system has been observed by Giallongo et al (1993) and has 7 components spread over a velocity width of 270 km s-1. A neutral hydrogen column density for the whole system has been obtained by Young et al (1979) to be 1.1 $`\times 10^{19}`$ cm-2. We have assumed the neutral hydrogen column density in individual components to be in the same ratio as the Si II column densities. C II\* is observed in two of the components. These are considered below.

(i) z=2.6376: We obtain log NHI = 17.92. As Si IV lines are not observed we take a 3 $`\sigma `$ upper limit on equivalent width, which translates to an upper limit of 1013.23 cm-2 on the column density of Si IV, assuming a velocity dispersion parameter of 24.2 km s-1, same as that for C IV. Assuming AGN shape, we get -3.1 $`>`$ log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ $`>`$ -3.3, giving 1.6 $`\times 10^6\mathrm{\Phi }1.4\times 10^8`$. Taking the AGN flux to be that given by HM96 for z=2.5, and additional flux from the galaxies, the observed column density ratios can not be explained and a minimum flux of 9.4 $`\times 10^5`$ from the AGN is required, needing a total of -2.9 $`>`$ log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ $`>`$ -3.1, giving 1.6 $`\times 10^6\mathrm{\Phi }_\mathrm{G}2.3\times 10^8`$. Note that the Al II to Al III ratio can not, however be explained by the same range of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ for any shape and requires log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }3.3`$.

(ii) z=2.6364. We obtain log NHI = 16.4. As Si II and Si IV lines have not been detected for this system, we could not obtain any constraints on the relative contribution from galaxy to the radiation flux. Taking all of the radiation to be AGN type, we obtained limits on the ionization parameter to be -2.7 $``$ log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }3.3`$ so that the flux lies between 1.05$`\times 10^6`$ and 6.97$`\times 10^8`$. Taking the actual value of the AGN flux (HM96 value at z=2.5), the rest coming from galaxy, requires log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }1.0`$, giving $`\mathrm{\Phi }_\mathrm{G}1.2\times 10^{10}`$.

### D z=2.6522 system towards Q2231-00

This Lyman limit system has been analysed in details by Prochaska (1999). We have reanalysed this system taking the shape of the background to be that given by HM96 for z=2.5. We determined the column density ratios for various ions for log NHI of 19.12. The Fe II to Fe III and Si II to Si IV column density ratios constrain the ionization parameter to between -2.4 to -2.55 resulting in a background flux between 3.9$`\times 10^6`$ and 8.5$`\times 10^6`$. This is considerably higher than the value of 8.59$`\times 10^5`$ for HM96 for z=2.5. Models with the shape as well as the intensity of the background as given by HM96 for z=2.5, the rest of the flux coming from galaxy fail to yield a result as the column density ratios of Si and Fe can not simultaneously be produced by a single value (range) of ionization parameter. By gradually increasing the value of the flux contributed by the AGN background above the HM96 value, we find that a minimum AGN flux of 3.3 $`\times 10^6`$ was needed to explain the ion ratios, for which we get -2.4 $`>`$ log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ $`>`$ -2.6, requiring $`\mathrm{\Phi }_\mathrm{G}`$ to be between 6.7 $`\times 10^5`$and 5.2 $`\times 10^6`$. Thus the minimum of AGN type flux required is more than a factor of 3.8 larger than that obtained by HM96.

### E z=2.844 system towards HS1946+7658

This system has been observed and analysed by Fan and Tytler (1994). Cloudy models with HM96 spectral shape at z=3 give -2.3 $`>`$ log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }>`$ -2.8, giving $`10^8\mathrm{\Phi }10^9`$. A minimum flux of 8.4$`\times 10^7`$ of the HM96 type is needed, with -1.9 $``$ log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }2.6`$, giving 1.9 $`\times 10^8\mathrm{\Phi }_\mathrm{G}3.9\times 10^9`$. Thus almost all of the flux is being contributed by galaxy. Note that the flux for z=3 of HM96 is 7.8$`\times 10^5`$.

### F z=3.025 system towards Q0347-38

This QSO has been observed by Prochaska and Wolfe (1999). Only a lower limit is available for the C II to C IV ratio, so that the galactic fraction of the flux could not be constrained. AGN shape for z=3.0 for the radiation gives -2.6 $`>`$ log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }>2.8`$, giving 2.1 $`\times 10^6\mathrm{\Phi }9.8\times 10^7`$, for the assumed minimum value of the particle density. Taking the actual value of the HM96 flux for z=3 and assuming the rest of the contribution from the galactic sources requires -2.5 $``$ log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }2.7`$, giving 1.9 $`\times 10^6\mathrm{\Phi }_\mathrm{G}1.2\times 10^8`$, for the assumed minimum value of nH.

### G z=3.6617 system towards Q2212-1626

This QSO has been observed by Lu et al (1996). Only a lower limit is available for the C II to C IV ratio, so that the galactic fraction of the flux could not be constrained. AGN shape for z=3.5 for the radiation gives -2.5 $`>`$ log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }>2.6`$, giving $`3.4\times 10^6\mathrm{\Phi }1.1\times 10^8`$ for the assumed minimum value of nH. Taking the actual value of the HM96 flux at z=3.5 and assuming the rest of the contribution from the galactic sources requires -2.4 $`>`$ log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }>2.5`$, giving $`3.8\times 10^6\mathrm{\Phi }_\mathrm{G}1.4\times 10^8`$, for the assumed minimum value of nH. Note that the value of flux for HM96 for z=3.5 is 5.0 $`\times 10^5`$.

### H z=4.0803 system towards Q2237-0608

This QSO has been observed by Lu et al (1996). Only a lower limit is available for the C II to C IV ratio, so that the galactic fraction of the flux could not be constrained. AGN shape for z=4 for the radiation gives -2.6 $`>`$ log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }>2.7`$, giving $`2.6\times 10^6\mathrm{\Phi }2.1\times 10^7`$ for the assumed minimum value of nH. Taking the actual value of the HM96 flux at z=4 and assuming the rest of the contribution from the galactic sources requires -2.4 $``$ log $`\mathrm{\Gamma }>2.5`$, giving $`4.0\times 10^6\mathrm{\Phi }_\mathrm{G}3.3\times 10^7`$ , for the assumed minimum value of nH. Note that the value of flux for HM96 for z=4 is 2 $`\times 10^5`$

## III Discussion

For 5 of the systems we could derive the range of flux values assuming the radiation to be AGN type. All of these are higher than the corresponding HM96 values by minimum factors ranging from 1.2 to 158. Note that we have taken into account the uncertainties in the column densities of all the ions which is the reason for obtaining large ranges for the flux values. For three of these systems we could obtain a minimum value for the flux of the AGN background. These values are 1.1, 3.8 and 98.8 times higher than the HM96 values at the appropriate redshifts. For these systems a large flux is needed from galaxies. For 4 other systems a lower limit to the flux could only be obtained with an assumption of the lower limit on the particle density to be 0.045 cm-3, which is about half of the mean interstellar value of the particle density and which indicates that the actual C II column densities are higher than the observed lower limits by 0.64 to 1.37 dex. This is a reasonable lower limit as the systems being considered are Lyman limit or damped Lyman alpha systems and also as this value is considerably lower than the range of density values for systems for which the values could be obtained from the observations. For these systems, the required values of flux are higher than the HM96 values by minimum factors of 2.7 to 62. On the other hand, assuming the AGN flux to be that given by HM96, and assuming the rest of the required flux to be of local, galactic origin, very high galactic flux is required. For most of the systems, this high flux requires the absorption systems to be present with in 100 parsecs of typical O stars. The typical radius of the Stromgren spheres of these stars is of the same order, indicating that the absorption systems are inside the H II regions. Such conclusions have earlier been rejected on the basis of statistical arguments about the properties of the absorption systems (Srianand and Khare, 1994). The flux could come from QSOs which happen to lie close to the lines of sight at redshifts similar to the redshifts of the absorption systems. We have searched the catalogues for presence of any such QSOs near the line of sight to Q2231-00. However, no QSO is found to lie closer than 1000 Mpc to the line of sight within the required redshift range. The high values of the flux indicated by our analysis for almost all the systems, may be interpreted to indicate the presence of an unseen population of dust extinct QSOs.

Note that in all our analysis we have assumed that all the ions producing absorption in a given velocity range in an absorption system are physically located in the same region (cloud). This may not be always valid. Kirkman and Tytler (1999) and Churchill and Charlton (1999) have found evidence for ions with the same velocity structure in their absorption lines belonging to a given redshift system, arising in physically different gaseous components. If C IV ions are from a more widely distributed component, then, the C II/C IV column density ratio in the region of interest will be smaller and may require lower values of the flux.

## acknowledgement

This work was partially supported by a grant (No. SP/S2/013/93) by the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India. A.S. is supported by a C.S.I.R. fellowship.

Figure Captions
Figure 1. Column density ratios of C II to C IV as a function of the ionization parameter, for different shapes of the background radiation spectrum as explained in the text. The solid lines are for NHI=1017 cm-2 and dashed lines are for NHI=1019 cm-2.
Figure 2. Column density ratios of Si II to Si IV, Al II to Al III and Fe II to Fe III. for the three shapes of the background radiation spectrum as explained in the text, for NHI=1018 cm-2. Solid, dotted and dashed lines are for galactic spectra, AGN (HM96) spectra and AGN together with the galactic spectra respectively.