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# 1 Introduction

## 1 Introduction

Gamma-ray bursts (GRBs), electromagnetically the most luminous events in the Universe, are short and intense flashes of cosmic high energy ($``$ 100 keV$``$1 MeV) photons. The emission from GRB afterglows, though similar in nature to the emission from supernovae, is more energetic by a few orders of magnitudes, as they release $`10^{51}10^{54}`$ ergs or more in a few seconds. Following the naming sequence, nova and supernova, it is therefore appropriate to call GRBs as hypernova. The origin of GRBs is a mystery even after about 30 years of their accidental discovery by the Vela satellites. Interest focused on where they came from and what they were, but was hampered by lack of sufficient data to even locate them. A major break through in our understanding of GRBs has been achieved in recent years (cf. Kulkarni et al. 1999; Galama et al. 1999; Castro-Tirado et al. 1999a and references therein) mostly due to multi-wavelength observations of the long-lived emission, known as afterglow of GRB, at $`X`$ray, optical and radio wavelengths which have become routine after launch of the Italian-Dutch $`X`$ray satellite BeppoSAX in mid-1996, as it provides the positions of GRBs with an accuracy better than 3$``$5 arc minutes within hours of occurrence. They indicate that most likely all GRBs are at cosmological distances.

The fireball plus blast wave is the most accepted current theoretical model for GRBs and their afterglows (see Piran 1999 for a review). The GRBs are thought to arise when a massive explosion, known as a fireball, releases a large ($`M_{}c^2`$) amount of kinetic energy into a volume of less than 1 light ms across. When this ultra-relativistic outflow of particles interacts with surrounding material, both forward and reverse shocks are formed. The GRB itself is thought to owe its multi-peaked light curve to a series of internal shocks within a relativistic flow while the afterglows are due to the external (forward) shocks driven in the interstellar medium surrounding the burster. As the external shock interacts with increasing amount of swept-up material, it becomes less relativistic, and produces a slowly fading afterglow of $`X`$ray, then ultra-violet, optical, infrared, millimeter and radio radiation. The afterglow emissions are most likely synchrotron radiation (Sari et al. 1998; Piran 1999 and references therein). Compared to the duration of the GRBs, afterglows in the long-wavelength bands can be long-lived. This makes now a days international multi-wavelength observing campaigns as integral part of a GRB research. The optical transient (OT) of a GRB has generally apparent $`R`$ magnitude between 18 to 22, if it is detected a few hours after the burst. The 1-m class optical telescopes equipped with CCD detector are therefore capable of detecting the optical early afterglow of a GRB. As the optical follow-up observations of the GRB afterglows are valuable for understanding the nature of these bursts, we started such observations at U.P. State Observatory (UPSO), Nainital in January 1999 using 104-cm telescope and CCD detector under an international collaborative programme coordinated by one of us (AJCT). So far, successful photometric observations have been carried out for 3 GRB afterglows from the UPSO, Nainital. The UPSO photometric observations for GRB 990123 have been presented by Sagar et al. (1999). The same for the other two, namely GRB 991208 and GRB 991216 are presented here. These in combination with data published in GCN Observational reports are used to study flux decay and spectral index in optical and near-infrared(IR) regions. An introduction to the GRBs studied here is given below.

### 1.1 GRB 991208

Hurley et al. (1999) reported Ulysses, Russian Gamma-Ray Burst Experiment (KONUS) and Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) detection of an extremely intense, 60 s long GRB on 1999 December 8 at 04:36:52 UT with a fluence $`>`$ 25 keV of $`10^4`$ erg cm-2 and considerable flux at $`>`$ 100 keV. Observations taken on 1999 December 10.92 UT with VLA at 4.86 GHz and 8.46 GHz by Frail et al. (1999) indicate presence of a compact source of spectral index of $`+1.4`$ at $`\alpha _{2000}=16^h33^m53.^s5;\delta _{2000}=+46^{}27^{^{}}21^{^{\prime \prime }}`$ with a strong candidacy for the afterglow from GRB 991208. At the same location, optical afterglow of GRB 991208 was identified first by Castro-Tirado et al. (1999b) and confirmed by optical observations reported by Stecklum et al. (1999) and Jensen et al. (1999a). Coincident (within errors) with the location of optical and radio afterglows, Shepherd et al. (1999) detected at millimeter wavelengths the brightest afterglow of a GRB reported so far. At 15 GHz and 240 GHz, the GRB 991208 afterglows have been observed by Pooley (1999a) and Bremer et al. (1999) respectively. As this GRB seems to be unusually bright at $`\gamma `$rays, optical, millimeter and radio wavelengths; its detailed study may provide new clues regarding the origin of GRB phenomena. The optical spectra of the GRB taken on 1999 December 13 and 14 with the SAO-RAS 6-m telescope (Dodonov et al. 1999b) indicate a redshift of $`z=0.7055\pm 0.0005`$, which was later also confirmed by Djorgovski et al. (1999a) with the Keck spectra taken on 1999 December 14 and 15.

### 1.2 GRB 991216

Kippen et al. (1999) reported Burst and Transient Source Experiment (BATSE) detection of an extremely bright $`\gamma `$ray burst on 1999 December 16 at 16:07:01 UT (trigger No. 7906) with total fluence above 20 keV $`2.6\times 10^4`$ erg/cm2. The event was also detected by NEAR. The burst is thus one of the brightest event detected by both BATSE and NEAR with spectral properties typical of a GRB. Its optical afterglow was detected by Uglesich et al. (1999) at $`\alpha _{2000}=05^h09^m31.^s29;\delta _{2000}=+11^{}17^{^{}}07^{^{\prime \prime }}`$. Coincident with this position, Taylor $`\&`$ Berger (1999) and Pooley (1999b) detected a radio source at 8.5 GHz and 15 GHz respectively, while Takeshima et al. (1999) discovered an $`X`$ray afterglow. Djorgovski et al. (1999b) detected the host galaxy of the burst at $`z`$ = 1.02 (Vreeswijk et al. 1999b), which extends out to $``$ 1$`^{^{\prime \prime }}`$ to the west of GRB 991216 afterglow.

## 2  Optical observations, data reduction and calibrations

The optical observations were carried out from 1999 December 12 to 14 for the GRB 991208 afterglow and on 1999 December 17 for the GRB 991216 afterglow. We used a 2048 $`\times `$ 2048 pixel2 CCD system attached at the f/13 Cassegrain focus of the 104-cm Sampurnanand telescope of the UPSO, Nainital. As GRB 991208 was located mostly in the day light sky, making optical observations was a herculean task. On all three nights, observations were obtained just before the morning twilight at large air-mass ($`>2`$) but in good photometric sky conditions. Long durations of nights at Nainital in the month of December helped us to carry out observations at least for an hour or so on each day. One pixel of the CCD chip corresponds to 0.$`^{^{\prime \prime }}`$38, and the entire chip covers a field of $`13^{^{}}\times 13^{^{}}`$ on the sky. Fig. 1 shows the location of the GRB 991208 and GRB 991216 afterglows on the CCD images taken from UPSO, Nainital. For comparison, images extracted from the Digital Palomar Observatory Sky Survey (DSS) are also shown where the absence of a GRB OT is clearly seen. Several short exposures upto a maximum of 15 minutes were generally given. In order to improve the signal-to-noise ratio of the OT, the data have been binned in $`2\times 2`$ pixel2 and also all images of a night have been stacked after correcting them for bias, non-uniformity in the pixels and cosmic ray events. Exposure times for the stacked images of GRB 991208 afterglow in $`I`$ were 400, 1800 and 3600 s on 1999 December 12, 13 and 14 respectively. The total exposure time for the stacked image of GRB 991216 afterglow in $`R`$ is 85 minutes on 1999 December 17. As the OTs were generally quite faint on the stacked images, DAOPHOT profile-fitting technique was used for the magnitude determination. On 1999 December 12 and 13 the GRB 991208 afterglow was sufficiently bright and we could derive its magnitude. However, on 1999 December 14 it had become too faint to be measured on the image. On 1999 December 13, we also observed Landolt (1992) standard stars to calibrate $`I`$ magnitudes of the GRB 991208 afterglow. The results of UPSO observations along with other photometric measurements of GRB 991208 OT are given in Table 1.

In the field of GRB 991216, three stars (as identified in Fig. 1) are photometrically calibrated in $`R`$ passband by Dolan et al. (1999) using Landoldt (1992) standard stars located in SA 93, SA 97 and SA 98 regions. The quoted uncertainty in the zero-point calibration is $`\pm `$0.03 mag. The $`R`$ magnitudes determined by Dolan et al. (1999) agree very well with an independent measurement carried out later on by Henden et al. (2000). This indicates that photometric calibration used in this work is secure. Present $`R`$ magnitude is relative to comparison star A (see Fig. 1). This along with other photometric measurements of GRB 991216 afterglow used in the present analysis are given in Table 1. In order to avoid errors arising due to different photometric calibrations, we have used only those $`R`$ measurements published in GCN Observational reports whose magnitudes could be determined relative to comparison stars shown in Fig. 1. In Gunn $`i`$ and $`JHK`$ filters, all published photometric measurements have been used.

Table 1. Photometric observations of the GRB 991208 and GRB 991216 afterglows. Total errors in magnitude measurements are mostly $``$0.1 while statistical errors are always $``$0.1.

| Time in UT | Filter | Magnitude | Source |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| GRB 991208 afterglow | | | |
| Dec 99 10.27 | R | 18.7$`\pm `$0.1 | Jensen et al. (1999a) |
| Dec 99 11.27 | R | 19.5$`\pm `$0.1 | Castro-Tirado et al. (1999c) |
| Dec 99 11.85 | R | 20.0$`\pm `$0.2 | Jensen et al. (1999a) |
| Dec 99 12.29 | R | 20.25$`\pm `$0.15 | Masetti et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 12.52 | R | 20.5$`\pm `$0.1 | Garnavich & Noriega-Crespo (1999) |
| Dec 99 13.29 | R | 20.3$`\pm `$0.2 | Masetti et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 13.53 | R | 20.92$`\pm `$0.06 | Halpern & Helfand (1999) |
| Dec 99 14.14 | R | 21.6$`\pm `$0.3 | Dodonov et al. (1999a) |
| Dec 99 14.29 | R | 21.25$`\pm `$0.15 | Masetti et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 15.29 | R | 21.6$`\pm `$0.3 | Masetti et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 11.21 | I | 19 to 19.5 | Stecklum et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 12.02 | I | 19.4$`\pm `$0.18 | Present work |
| Dec 99 13.02 | I | 19.9$`\pm `$0.14 | Present work |
| Dec 99 14.00 | I | $`>`$ 20 | Present work |
| Dec 99 16.68 | K | 19.31$`\pm `$0.15 | Bloom et al. (1999) |
| GRB 991216 afterglow | | | |
| Dec 99 17.148 | R | 18.63$`\pm `$0.02 | Dolan et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 17.152 | R | 18.64$`\pm `$0.02 | Dolan et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 17.179 | R | 18.73$`\pm `$0.05 | Henden et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 17.216 | R | 19.00$`\pm `$0.05 | Henden et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 17.293 | R | 19.06$`\pm `$0.05 | Henden et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 17.448 | R | 19.25$`\pm `$0.04 | Dolan et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 17.455 | R | 19.28$`\pm `$0.04 | Dolan et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 17.610 | R | 19.48$`\pm `$0.10 | Jha et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 17.733 | R | 19.89$`\pm `$0.13 | Giveon et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 17.780 | R | 19.70$`\pm `$0.08 | Present work |
| Dec 99 18.110 | R | 20.12$`\pm `$0.10 | Jensen et al. (1999b) |
| Dec 99 18.320 | R | 20.40$`\pm `$0.10 | Jensen et al. (1999b) |
| Dec 99 18.320 | R | 20.32$`\pm `$0.05 | Garnavich et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 18.400 | R | 20.30$`\pm `$0.06 | Diercks et al. (1999b) |
| Dec 99 18.560 | R | 20.57$`\pm `$0.05 | Garnavich et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 19.100 | R | 20.90$`\pm `$0.10 | Jensen et al. (1999b) |
| Dec 99 29.410 | R | 23.60$`\pm `$0.30 | Djorgovski et al. (1999b) |
| Jan 00 06.181 | R | 24.21$`\pm `$0.12 | Schaefer (2000) |
| Dec 99 17.214 | Gunn i | 19.10$`\pm `$0.20 | Diercks et al. (1999a) |
| Dec 99 17.462 | Gunn i | 19.90$`\pm `$0.20 | Diercks et al. (1999a) |
| Dec 99 17.350 | J | 16.99$`\pm `$0.05 | Garnavich et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 18.130 | J | 17.56$`\pm `$0.02 | Vreeswijk et al. (1999a) |
| Dec 99 18.300 | J | 18.25$`\pm `$0.06 | Garnavich et al. (1999) |
| Dec 99 18.130 | H | 16.74$`\pm `$0.02 | Vreeswijk et al. (1999a) |
| Dec 99 18.130 | K | 16.76$`\pm `$0.02 | Vreeswijk et al. (1999a) |

## 3 Prompt $`\gamma `$ray emission

For GRB 991208, prompt $`\gamma `$ray emissions were detected by KONUS and NEAR while in the case of GRB 991216, they were detected by BATSE and NEAR. We have downloaded the light curves from the archive and shown them in Figs. 2 and 3 for GRB 991208 and GRB 991216 respectively. Presence of multi-peaked spiky temporal profile in the energy distributions of both GRBs is an unambiguous indicator of a series of internal shocks within a relativistic flow. Further discussions on the $`\gamma `$ray light curves of each GRB are given below.

### 3.1 GRB 991208

Fig. 2 shows the light curve in two energy bands accumulated by KONUS in 50 – 200 keV and by NEAR in 100 – 1000 keV. The burst profile is dominated by two strong peaks, separated by about 55 s. Almost identical temporal as well as intensity structures in the light curves at both energy bands indicate that perhaps, dominant emission is in the 100 – 200 keV range as it is common in both observed energy bands. The burst began with a strong pulse which lasted for $``$ 6 s. It has a sharp rise and a relatively slow decline. This is followed by a relatively weak pulse starting at $``$ 40 s after the trigger. It is a relatively broad profile. Almost at the end of this pulse and $``$ 52 s after trigger of the burst, the strongest pulse of this GRB started and lasted for $``$ 20 s. This has almost the same rise and decline time, though the profile is multi-peaked, asymmetric and irregular. As expected, the spiky nature of the profile is clearly visible only on the 64 ms time resolution light curve. Duration (full width at half maxima) of the profile at trigger of the burst is only $``$ 2 s while that of the strongest one is more than 5 s. They also differ in temporal structures. The GRB is a long duration burst as it lasted for more than 70 s.

### 3.2 GRB 991216

We show in Fig. 3 the light curves of GRB 991216 in four energy bands, obtained by the BATSE on board the Compton Gamma-Ray Observatory satellite. The light curve obtained by NEAR is not shown here as it resembles to the BATSE highest energy light curve and also has poor time resolution. The burst has a complicated and irregular time profile. The event began with a weak precursor pulse lasting about 2 s, followed $``$ 15 s later by an intense multi-peaked complex. The main emission lasted for $``$ 17 s followed by a fainter tail that persisted for another $``$ 20 s (Fig. 3). The $`T_{50}`$ and $`T_{90}`$ durations of the burst, as measured in the 50 – 300 keV energy range, are 6.272$`\pm `$0.09 s and 15.168$`\pm `$0.11 s respectively (Kippen 1999) indicating that it is a long duration burst. The burst lasted for $``$ 60 s and it has peaks of width $``$0.5 s, yielding a value of the variability index as 120.

The overall shape of the GRB 991216 in all the energy bands can be described as a fast rise starting at $``$ 17 s; arrived maximum $``$ 21 s and then decayed slowly. Each phase of the burst profile contains a number of well-defined short duration (full width at half-maxima generally $``$ 0.5 s) sub-pulse or spikes within the burst. There are 14 such spikes. We list in Table 2 their time of occurrence and relative counts with respect to the first spike which has 24.3, 38.9, 49.1 and 8.5 K count/s above the background in the energy bands 20 – 50 keV, 50 – 100 keV, 100 – 300 keV and $`>`$ 300 keV respectively. Spikes 1, 2 and 3 are during ascending phase; 4, 5 and 6 are during maxima phase and others are during descending phase of the burst. The peak of spikes occurred almost simultaneously in all the four energy bands. The variations in relative count rates of a spike from higher to lower energy bands are similar for spikes of a phase but differ from the spikes of other phases. The relative count rates are nearly the same in all energy bands for the spikes during ascending phase; they are more in $`>`$ 100 keV energy range than in 20 – 100 keV range for spikes around maxima and they decrease systematically with increase in energy for spikes of descending phase. The light curves show that the low-energy emission persists longer and peaks later than high-energy emission. Particularly striking is the paucity of $`>`$ 300 keV emission during the shoulder about 32 s after trigger of the burst. In the highest energy band emission is maximum in spike 4 and is relatively much reduced at lower energy bands. Hard-to-soft spectral evolution thus observed in GRB 991216 is the typical one usually (but not always) seen throught the GRB and also in sub-pulses within a burst (Fishman et al. 1999 and references therein).

Table 2. List of well-defined $`\gamma `$ray spikes during GRB 991216. Time of its occurrence ($`T_p`$) in 20 – 50 keV energy band after trigger of the burst at 1999 December 16.671 UT along with their relative count rate with respect to first spike in all the four $`\gamma `$ray energy bands are given. Spikes are identified with the ascending, maxima and descending parts of the GRB 991216 burst.

| Spikes | $`T_p`$ | Relative count rate in keV energy band | | | | Phase |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|  | (s) | 20 – 50 | 50 – 100 | 100 – 300 | $`>`$ 300 |  |
| 1 | 17.3 | 1.000 | 1.000 | 1.000 | 1.000 | Ascending |
| 2 | 19.3 | 1.693 | 1.591 | 1.554 | 1.611 | Ascending |
| 3 | 19.7 | 1.771 | 1.804 | 1.810 | 1.705 | Ascending |
| 4 | 19.9 | 1.775 | 1.809 | 2.197 | 3.526 | Maxima |
| 5 | 20.6 | 2.381 | 2.356 | 2.561 | 2.586 | Maxima |
| 6 | 21.9 | 2.216 | 2.089 | 2.368 | 2.452 | Maxima |
| 7 | 22.4 | 1.610 | 1.360 | 1.212 | 0.847 | Descending |
| 8 | 22.7 | 2.402 | 2.402 | 2.470 | 1.752 | Descending |
| 9 | 23.0 | 2.072 | 1.719 | 1.187 | 0.589 | Descending |
| 10 | 23.7 | 1.313 | 0.978 | 0.601 | 0.307 | Descending |
| 11 | 25.6 | 1.124 | 0.836 | 0.575 | 0.313 | Descending |
| 12 | 26.8 | 1.033 | 0.679 | 0.369 | 0.154 | Descending |
| 13 | 29.5 | 1.887 | 1.614 | 1.291 | 0.918 | Descending |
| 14 | 31.1 | 1.940 | 1.616 | 1.244 | 0.713 | Descending |

In the energy band 50 – 300 keV, peak flux at 64, 256 and 1024 ms intervals are 19.93$`\pm `$0.24, 17.80$`\pm `$0.11 and 14.55$`\pm `$0.13 $`\mu `$erg/cm2/s respectively while the fluence in the BATSE energy channels 1, 2, 3 and 4 are 17.2637$`\pm `$0.053, 22.9693$`\pm `$0.054, 65.0656$`\pm `$0.136 and 150.204$`\pm `$1.167 $`\mu `$erg/cm2 respectively (Kippen 1999). The hardness ratio $`\frac{f_{100300}}{f_{50100}}`$ is thus = 2.83$`\pm `$0.02.

## 4  Optical and near-IR photometric observations

Both GRB 991208 and GRB 991216 afterglow emissions have been photometred in optical and near-IR passbands and the results are published in GCN Observational reports. We have used these data in combination with the present measurements to study their flux decay and spectral index from 0.7 $`\mu `$m to 2.2 $`\mu `$m in the following sub-sections.

### 4.1  Light curves

In order to study the optical and near-IR photometric light curves of the GRB 991208 and GRB 991216 afterglows, we have plotted photometric measurements as a function of time in Fig. 4. The X-axis is log ($`tt_0`$) where $`t`$ is the time of observation given in Table 1 and $`t_0`$ is the time of the trigger of GRB event which is 1999 December 8.192 UT for GRB 991208 and 1999 December 16.671 UT for GRB 991216. All times are measured in unit of day. The decay of earlier GRB afterglows appears to be well characterized by a power law $`F(t)(tt_0)^\alpha `$, where $`F(t)`$ is the flux of the afterglow at time $`t`$ and $`\alpha `$ is the decay constant. Assuming this parametric form and by fitting least square linear regressions to the observed magnitudes as function of time, we derive below the value of flux decay constant for both GRB 991208 and GRB 991216 afterglows.

#### 4.1.1  GRB 991208

Present observations in combination with the publised ones have been used to derive flux decay constants of the OT of GRB 991208. Fig. 4(A) shows the light curve in $`R`$ and $`I`$ photometric passbands where the useful measurements in $`I`$ are only from UPSO, Nainital. The object is fading very fast, and no flattening of the light curves is observed. We obtained the following linear relations for the $`R`$ and $`I`$ magnitudes as function of time
$`R(t)=(16.95\pm 0.06)+(5.47\pm 0.09)log(tt_0)`$
$`I(t)=(16.52\pm 0.01)+(4.95\pm 0.01)log(tt_0)`$
These lines are also plotted in Fig. 4(A). In $`R`$, points which are discrepant by more than 3 $`\sigma `$ have been excluded from the analysis. If one includes them, then the slope becomes steeper with a value of 5.92$`\pm `$0.55. In $`I`$, the linear relation is derived only from the UPSO observations. Other observations in $`I`$ (see Table 1) are not accurate enough to be used for deriving the linear relation. Allowing for the factor $`2.5`$ involved in converting the flux to magnitude scale, the values of $`\alpha `$ are either $`2.15\pm 0.04`$ or 2.37$`\pm `$0.22 in $`R`$ and $`2`$ in $`I`$ passbands. This indicates that flux decays in $`R`$ and $`I`$ are almost similar and hence, we adopt a value of 2.2$`\pm `$0.1 as flux decay constant in further discussions. GRB 991208 afterglow is thus decaying much faster than afterglows of other GRBs observed so far including GRB 990123 afterglow observed earlier by us (cf. Sagar et al. 1999) where $`\alpha `$ is 1.1$`\pm `$0.06. This is also the brightest afterglow detected at millimeter wavelengths to date (Shepherd et al. 1999). Thus GRB 991208 OT presents an interesting case for understanding the origin of radiation from a $`\gamma `$ray burst across the entire electromagnetic band.

#### 4.1.2  GRB991216

In Fig. 4(B), we have plotted photometric measurements in $`R`$, Gunn $`i`$ and $`J`$ passbands as a function of time. The UPSO, Nainital measurement, identified in the figure, fits very well with the observed linear decay of the $`R`$ magnitude. The emission from GRB 991216 OT is fading in all 3 passbands. The light curves do not exhibit flattening in any passband, though observations in $`R`$ are until $``$ 20 days after the GRB. We obtained the following linear relations for the $`R`$, $`i`$ and $`J`$ magnitudes as function of time
$`R(t)=(19.69\pm 0.02)+(3.04\pm 0.10)log(tt_0)`$
$`i(t)=(19.91\pm 0.01)+(3.05\pm 0.01)log(tt_0)`$
$`J(t)=(17.55\pm 0.01)+(3.31\pm 0.01)log(tt_0)`$
These lines are also plotted in Fig. 4(B). In $`R`$, 16 points respresenting early observations ($`<`$ 2.5 day after the burst) seem to follow a linear relation and value of the slope is derived only based on them. In $`i`$ and $`J`$ passbands, linear relations are derived only from the two observations provided by Diercks et al. (1999a) and Garnavich et al. (1999) respectively. The $`J`$ magnitude of Vreeswijk et al. (1999a) at 1999 December 18.13 UT lies well above the linear relation (Fig. 4(B)). By including this point in the linear fit, the slope becomes flatter with a value of 2.77$`\pm `$0.89. Allowing for the factor $`2.5`$ involved in converting the flux to magnitude scale, the values of $`\alpha `$ are 1.22$`\pm `$0.04 in $`R`$, $`1.22`$ in $`i`$ and between 1.11$`\pm `$0.36 to 1.32 in $`J`$ passbands. A comparison of these indicates that at early times ($`<`$ 2.5 day after the burst), flux decays in optical and near-IR regions are almost similar and thus, the values of $`\alpha `$ are independent of wavelength at least in the range of 0.7 to 1.3 $`\mu `$m. For further discussions, we adopt a value of 1.2$`\pm `$0.1 for the flux decay constant of GRB 991216. This is in agreement with the early time decays of most of the GRB afterglows observed so far.

Extrapolation of the $`R`$ linear relation derived above at the times of $`R`$ measurements of 1999 December 29.41 UT and 2000 January 6.18 UT gives values which are brighter than the observed ones at $`2\sigma `$ level. Somewhat steeper index is needed to fit these observations. Fitting of the least square linear regression to the last three points, shown as dotted line in the figure, yields $`\alpha =1.45\pm 0.04`$. This indicates a steepening of $`\delta \alpha =0.23\pm 0.06`$ in the $`R`$ light curve. More photometric observations, including those of later dates are required to ascertain this observed steepening in the light curve.

### 4.2 Spectral index of the GRB 991208 and GRB 991216 afterglows

The flux distribution of both afterglows has been determined in the wavelength range of 0.7 $`\mu `$m to 2.2 $`\mu `$m using broadband photometric measurements listed in Table 1. We used the reddening map provided by Schlegel, Finkbeiner & Davis (1998) for estimating Galactic interstellar extinction toward the bursts and found negligible for GRB 991208 but a value of $`E(BV)=0.634`$ mag for GRB 991216. In converting the magnitudes into fluxes, we have used the effective wavelengths and normalisations by Bessell (1979) for $`R`$ and $`I`$ and by Bessell & Brett (1988) for $`J,H`$ and $`K`$. The fluxes thus derived are accurate to $``$ 10%. The Fig. 5 shows the spectrum for both GRB 991208 and GRB 991216 OTs. We fitted the observed flux distribution with a power law $`F_\nu \nu ^\beta `$, where $`F_\nu `$ is the flux at frequency $`\nu `$ and $`\beta `$ is the spectral index. Other details are given below.

#### 4.2.1 GRB 991208

We have constructed the GRB 991208 afterglow spectrum on 1999 December 16.68 UT. This epoch was selected for the long wavelength coverage possible at the time of observations of $`K`$ magnitude. Optical flux at the wavelengths of $`R`$ and $`I`$ passbands has been derived using the slope of the fitted light curve shown in Fig. 4(A) for the present epoch assuming that there is no interstellar absorption. The derived fluxes are 4.8, 5.8 and 12.3 $`\mu `$Jy at the effective wavelengths of $`R,I`$ and $`K`$ passbands respectively. They are plotted in Fig. 5(A). It is observed that as the frequency decreases the flux increases with $`\beta =0.75\pm 0.03`$. This agrees very well with the value of $`\beta =0.77\pm 0.14`$ given by Bloom et al. (1999) for the spectral index between optical to IR wavelengths. A day earlier on 1999 December 15.64, the fully calibrated Keck 10-m spectrum give the value of $`\beta =0.9\pm 0.15`$ between 0.385 $`\mu `$ to 0.885 $`\mu `$ (Djorgovski et al. 1999a) which agrees with the optical to IR spectral index.

#### 4.2.2 GRB 991216

We have constructed the GRB 991216 afterglow spectrum at about 35 hr after the burst, which was selected for the long wavelength coverage possible at the time of $`JHK`$ observations (see Table 1). Using the linear equations drawn in Fig. 4(B) and the measurements listed in Table 1, we obtained for this epoch $`R=20.2,i=20.4,J=17.9,H=16.7`$ and $`K=16.8`$ mag with an uncertainty of $`0.2`$ mag. The Gunn $`i`$ magnitude has been converted into Cousins $`I`$ using $`R`$ measurement and the relations given by Wade et al. (1979) and Bessell (1979). This yields $`I=19.5\pm 0.2`$ mag. These $`R,I,J,H`$ and $`K`$ magnitudes have been first corrected for Galactic interstellar extinction of $`E(BV)=0.634`$ mag, which correspond to $`A_{Rc}=1.64,A_{Ic}=1.24,A_J=0.56,A_H=0.35`$ and $`A_K=0.21`$ mag for the standard reddening curve given by Mathis (1990) and then converted to fluxes. The fluxes thus obtained are 115, 130, 190, 305 and 150 $`\mu `$Jy at the effective wavelengths of $`R,I,J,H`$ and $`K`$ passbands respectively. The results are plotted in Fig. 5(B) for both the observed and the dereddened magnitudes, in order to demonstrate the effect of Galactic extinction on the shape of the energy distribution of the afterglow. This shows that reddened spectrum becomes steeper. It is observed that as the frequency decreases the flux increases upto $`H`$ passband and then it turns over. The spectrum thus may not be described by a single power law. We find that between $`R`$ and $`H`$ the spectral slope is $`1.01\pm 0.12`$. By ignoring the turnover, a spectral slope of $`0.45\pm 0.30`$ is found between $`R`$ and $`K`$.

The continuum flux of the GRB 991216 afterglow determined at 1999 December 18.372 UT using $`J`$ band spectrophotometry by Joyce et al. (1999) rises from $``$ 150 $`\mu `$Jy at 1.12 $`\mu `$m to $``$ 220 $`\mu `$Jy at 1.23 $`\mu `$m, and remains approximately constant at $``$ 220 $`\mu `$Jy out to 1.33 $`\mu `$m. It is thus not particularly well described by a single power law in agreement with our findings. This suggest that either not all of the near-IR flux seen is due to synchrotron emission, or a break in the synchrotron spectrum was near 1.25 $`\mu `$m at the time of observation.

## 5  The energetics of the GRBs

Redshift determination of $`z=0.7055`$ (Dodonov et al. 1999b) for the GRB 991208 afterglow and of $`z=1.02`$ for the host of GRB 991216 (Djorgovski et al. 1999b), yields a minimum corresponding luminosity distances of 4.2 Gpc and 6.2 Gpc respectively for a standard Friedmann cosmological model with Hubble constant $`H_0`$ = 65 km/s/Mpc, cosmological density parameter $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0`$ = 0.2 and cosmological constant $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_0`$ = 0 (if $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_0>0`$ then the inferred distances would increase). Considering isotropic energy emission and observed fluence above 25 keV of $`10^4erg/cm^2`$ (Hurley 1999) for GRB 991208 and observed fluence $`>`$ 20 keV of 255.5 $`\mu `$erg/cm2 (Kippen 1999) for GRB 991216 and using the corresponding inferred luminosity distances, we estimate the $`\gamma `$ray energy release to be $`1.3\times 10^{53}`$ erg $`0.07M_{}c^2`$ for GRB 991208 and 6.7$`\times 10^{53}`$ erg $``$ 0.4 $`M_{}c^2`$ for GRB 991216.

Of the dozen GRBs with known redshifts, five with total fluence energies $`>`$ 20 keV in excess of 1053 erg (assuming isotropic emission) are GRB 991216 and GRB 991208 (discussed here); GRB 990510 (Harisson et al. 1999); GRB 990123 (Andersen et al. 1999; Galama et al. 1999) and GRB 971214 (Kulkarni et al. 1998). The name hypernova, coined recently, to describe such energetic events is therefore seems to be most appropriate. Recent observations suggest that GRBs are associated with stellar deaths, and not with quasars or the nuclei of galaxies as some GRBs including the present GRB 991216 (see Djorgovski et al. 1999b) are found off-set from their host galaxy. However, release of huge amount of isotropic energy of $`10^{53}`$ erg or more is essentially incompatible with the popular stellar death models (coalescence of neutron stars and death of massive stars). The large energy release can also not be understood with exotic models such as that of baryon decay (Perna & Loeb 1998), as the entire or a good fraction of rest mass energy of neutron stars is released in such models. There are two ways namely gravitational lensing and non-isotropic emission to reduce the enormous energy release. The possibility of the burst being amplified by gravitational lensing has been discussed at length by Kulkarni et al. (1999) in the case of GRB 990123. However, direct observational evidence for lensing lacks in GRB 990123 and others (cf. Marani et al. 1999). On the other hand, evidence for beaming seems to be present in the case of a few GRBs including GRB 991208 discussed below. Indeed, almost all energetic sources in astrophysics such as pulsars, quasars and accreting stellar black holes display jet-like geometry and hence, non-isotropic emission. Beaming reduces the estimated energy by a factor of 10 - 300, depending upon the size of its opening angle (Sari et al. 1999). The $`\gamma `$ray energy released then becomes $`10^{52}`$ erg, a value within reach of current popular models for the origin of GRBs (see Piran 1999 and references therein).

## 6 Discussions and Conclusions

Using optical and near-IR observations (see Table 1), we obtained the values of flux decay constant and spectral index as 2.2$`\pm `$0.1 and $`0.75\pm 0.03`$ for GRB 991208 OT and 1.2$`\pm `$0.1 and $`1.01\pm 0.12`$ for the early time flux decay of GRB 991216 afterglows. These values indicate that flux decay of the GRB 991216 is normal but that of GRB 991208 is fastest in the GRBs observed so far. The GRB 991216 OT light curve in $`R`$ becomes steeper by $`\delta \alpha =0.23\pm 0.06`$ at late time ($`>`$ 2 to 2.5 day after the burst). Before deriving any conclusion from the flux decays of these GRBs, we compare them with other well studied GRBs. Except GRB 990123 and GRB 990510, all exhibit, at both early and late times a single power-law decay, generally $``$ 1.2, a value reasonable for spherical expansion in the standard model. However, rapid decays and flat spectra ($`\beta 1.2`$) in optical and near-IR region of the OTs of GRB 980326 with $`\alpha `$=1.7$`\pm `$0.13 and $`\beta =0.66\pm 0.7`$ (Castro-Tirado & Gorosabel 1999, Sari et al. 1999); GRB 980519 with $`\alpha `$ = 2.05$`\pm `$0.04 and $`\beta =1.05\pm 0.10`$ (Halpern et al. 1999) and GRB 991208 with $`\alpha `$ = 2.2$`\pm `$0.1 and $`\beta =0.75\pm 0.03`$ (discussed here), can not be understood in terms of standard models but can either be explained by a jet (Sari et al. 1999) or by a circumstellar wind model (Chevalier & Li 1999).

Recent theoretical models on beaming of the relativistic outflow predict a break and a marked steepening in the afterglow light curve (Mészáros & Rees 1999; Rhoads 1999; Sari et al. 1999). In such models, a break in the light curve is expected when the jet makes the transition to sideways expansion after the relativistic Lorentz factor drops below the inverse of the opening angle of the initial beam. Slightly later, the jet begins a lateral expansion which causes a further steepening of the light curve. The time of occurrence of break and extent of steepening in the afterglow light curve thus depend upon the opening angle of the transient collimated outflow. At late times, when the evolution is dominated by the spreading of the jet, the value of $`\alpha `$ is expected to approach the electron energy distribution index with values between 2.0 and 2.5 while the value of $`\beta `$ is expected to be $`\alpha /2`$, if cooling frequency has passed the observed frequency and $`\frac{(\alpha 1)}{2}`$ otherwise (Sari et al. 1999). The expected values of $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$ are thus in excellent agreement with the corresponding observed values of $`2.4\pm 0.02`$ and $`0.61\pm 0.12`$ for GRB 990510 (Stanek et al. 1999) and 2.2$`\pm `$0.1 and $`0.75\pm 0.03`$ for GRB 991208 (discussed here). Fast optical flux decay and flat broadband spectrum observed in GRB 991208 here may therefore be due to effects of beaming like in GRB 990510.

Observational evidence for a break was found first in the optical light curve of GRB 990123 afterglow (Castro-Tirado et al. 1999a; Kulkarni et al. 1999) and recently in that of GRB 990510 afterglow (Stanek et al. 1999), where the light curve steepened 1.5 to 2 days after the burst. The value of $`\alpha =1.13\pm 0.02`$ for early time (3 hr to 2 day) of the GRB 990123 light curve becomes 1.75$`\pm `$0.11 at late times (2-20 day) while the corresponding slopes for GRB 990510 are 0.76$`\pm `$0.01 and 2.40$`\pm `$0.02 respectively with the break time 1.57$`\pm `$0.03 day. If the steepening observed in both cases are due to beaming, then one may conclude that it occures within $`<`$ 2 days of the burst. We therefore argue that observed steep decay in the optical light curve of GRB 991208 afterglow may be due to beaming which occurred before the start of its optical observations which is $``$ 2.1 day after the burst. However, a break in the light curve of GRB afterglow can occur due to a number of causes other than beaming (Kulkarni et al. 1999; Wei & Lu 1999). We are presently unable to understand the possible cause of steepening by 0.23$`\pm `$0.06 in the $`R`$ light curve of GRB 991216 between 2 to 2.5 day after the burst, as beaming steepens the light curve by $``$ 1 dex.

Prompt $`\gamma `$ray emission light curves of both long duration bursts GRB 991208 and GRB 991216 show complicated and irregular time profile. Presence of multi-peaked and spiky temporal profile in the light curves of both GRBs is an unambiguous indicator of a series of internal shocks within a relativistic flow.

Redshift determinations yield a minimum distance of 4.2 Gpc for GRB 991208 and 6.2 Gpc for the GRB 991216, if one assumes standard Friedmann cosmology with $`H_o=65`$ km/s/Mpc, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0=0.2`$ and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_0=0`$. Both GRBs are thus at cosmological distances. Considering isotropic energy emission, we estimate enormous amount of the $`\gamma `$ray energy release ($`1.3\times 10^{53}`$ erg for GRB 991208 and $`6.7\times 10^{53}`$ erg for GRB 991216). These high energetics are reduced if the emission is not isotropic but collimated, as suggested by the flat spectrum and steep decay in the optical light curve of GRB 991208.

The quasi-simultaneous spectral energy distributions are determined for both GRB afterglows in optical and near-IR region. The flux decreases with frequency in both cases and follows an exponential relation with not too different spectral slopes. There are indications that the synchrotron spectrum of GRB 991216 afterglow breaks near 1.2 $`\mu `$m.

Acknowledgements The authors are thankful to Prof. D. Bhattacharya for providing useful comments and suggestions. This research has made use of data obtained through the High Energy Astrophysics Science Archive Research Center Online Service, provided by the NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center.

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Caption to Figure

Figure 1. Finding charts are produced from the CCD images taken from UPSO, Nainital. North is top and East is left. For GRB 991208 field, the image is in $`I`$ passband taken on 1999 December 13.0 UT while for GRB 991216, it is on 1999 Dec 17.78 UT in $`R`$ passband. The optical transient (OT) is located inside the circle. Here only 2.$`{}_{}{}^{^{}}4\times 2.^{^{}}`$4 field of view is presented. The region corresponding to CCD image is extracted from the Digital Palomar Observatory Sky Survey and marked as DSS. A comparision of both images of the same field shows the absence of GRB afterglows on the DSS images. In the case of GRB 991208, also shown are the three comparison stars A and B (Jha et al. 1999) and C (Henden et al. 1999) calibrated by Dolan et al. (1999) in $`R`$ band.

Figure 2. The NEAR and KONUS light curves of GRB 991208 in two energy ranges 50 – 200 keV and 100 – 1000 keV.

Figure 3. The BATSE light curves of GRB991216 in four energy ranges 20 – 50 keV; 50 – 100 keV; 100 – 300 keV and $`>`$ 300 keV.

Figure 4. Light curve of (A) GRB 991208 afterglow in optical $`R`$ and $`I`$ photometric passbands from 2 to 4 days after the burst while that of (B) GRB991216 afterglow is from 1 to 20 days after trigger of the burst in $`R`$, Gunn $`i`$ and $`J`$ photometric passbands. For both GRBs, measurements from UPSO, Nainital have been marked.

Figure 5. The spectral flux distribution of the afterglows of (A) GRB 991208 and (B) GRB 991216 at $``$ 8.5 day and $``$ 35 hr after the corresponding bursts. For GRB 991216 both reddened (crosses) and unreddened (filled circles) spectra are presented.


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# Coexistence of Singlet and Triplet Attractive Channels in the Pairing Interactions Mediated by Antiferromagnetic Fluctuations

\[

## Abstract

We propose a phase diagram of quasi-low-dimensional type II superconductors in parallel magnetic fields, when antiferromagnetic fluctuations contribute to the pairing interactions. We point out that pairing interactions mediated by antiferromagnetic fluctuations necessarily include both singlet channels and triplet channels as attractive interactions. Usually, a singlet pairing is favored at zero field, but a triplet pairing occurs at high fields where the singlet pairing is suppressed by the Pauli paramagnetic pair-breaking effect. As a result, the critical field increases divergently at low temperatures. A possible relation to experimental phase diagrams of a quasi-one-dimensional organic superconductor is briefly discussed. We also discuss a possibility that a triplet superconductivity is observed even at zero field.

\]

Pairing interactions mediated by a spin fluctuations have been discussed as a possible mechanism of anisotropic superconductivity  in exotic superconductors such as organic superconductors, heavy fermion superconductors, high-$`T_\mathrm{c}`$ cuprate superconductors, and ruthenate superconductors. For example, in a ruthenate superconductor $`\mathrm{Sr}_2\mathrm{RuO}_4`$, pairing interaction mediated by ferromagnetic fluctuations is a candidate for the mechanism of the superconductivity. The superconductivity in this compound is considered to be due to triplet pairing from experimental results such as those obtained in Knight shift measurements  and $`\mu SR`$ experiments .

On the other hand, in the organics, cuprates, and heavy fermion superconductors, anisotropic singlet pairing intereactions mediated by antiferromagnetic fluctuations have been examined by many authors, because these compounds are in proximities to antiferromagnetic phases. However, in some of the quasi-one-dimensional organic superconductors and the heavy fermion superconductors, triplet superconductivities have been supported by some experimental results . In particular, in some of the heavy fermion superconductors, the triplet pairing seems to be established.

In a quasi-one-dimensional organic superconductor $`(\mathrm{TMTSF})_2\mathrm{PF}_6`$, triplet pairing is supported by recent Knight shift measurements by Lee et al. , but it may appear to contradict the proximity to an antiferromagnetic phase. We will briefly discuss later that it does not necessarily contradict the mechanism of superconductivity with pairing interactions mediated by antiferromagnetic fluctuations. There is another contradiction between the thermal conductivity measurements  and the NMR experiments  in $`(\mathrm{TMTSF})_2\mathrm{ClO}_4`$. The former indicates a nodeless gap, while the latter suggests an existence of line nodes. However, this contradiction can be consistently explained also in terms of the pairing interactions mediated by antiferromagnetic fluctuations .

In the cuprate high-$`T_\mathrm{c}`$ superconductors, experiments with $`\pi `$-junction suggest an anisotropic pairing which is conventionally called a $`d`$-wave pairing. Pairing interactions mediated by spin fluctuations have been discussed by many authors since the discovery of the high-$`T_\mathrm{c}`$ superconductors, for example, Miyake et al.  and the present author et al. . However, it is not established to what extent the spin fluctuations contribute to the pairing interactions.

In this paper, we discuss a phase diagram of quasi-low-dimensional type II superconductors on a $`T`$-$`H`$ plane. We consider a situation in which a singlet pairing is favored at zero field because of pairing interactions induced by the exchange of antiferromagnetic spin fluctuations. We restrict our discussion to parallel magnetic fields so that we can regard the orbital pair-breaking effect as weak.

The pairing interactions mediated by spin fluctuations are written as

$$H^{}=g\underset{ij}{}\chi _{ij}\stackrel{}{S}_i\stackrel{}{S}_j,$$
$`(1)`$
where $`i`$ and $`j`$ denote lattice sites and $`\chi _{ij}`$ is the expression of the spin susceptibility in real space. The dynamical effects and strong coupling effects can be taken into account by developing a perturbation theory in more basic models such as Hubbard models . However, since it is not essential for the purpose of this paper, we discuss pairing interactions of the form of eq. (1) for a while. Equation (1) can be rewritten as

$$\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill H^{}& =& \frac{g}{N}\underset{\mathrm{𝐤𝐤}^{}}{}\chi (𝐤𝐤^{})[\frac{1}{4}(\psi _{11}^{}(𝐤)\psi _{11}(𝐤^{})\hfill \\ & & +\psi _{1,1}^{}(𝐤)\psi _{1,1}(𝐤^{})+\psi _{10}^{}(𝐤)\psi _{10}(𝐤^{}))\hfill \\ & & \frac{3}{4}\psi _{00}^{}(𝐤)\psi _{00}(𝐤^{})]\hfill \end{array}$$
$`(2)`$
where

$$\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill \psi _{11}(𝐤)& =& c_𝐤c_𝐤\hfill \\ \hfill \psi _{1,1}(𝐤)& =& c_𝐤c_𝐤\hfill \\ \hfill \psi _{10}(𝐤)& =& \frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}(c_𝐤c_𝐤+c_𝐤c_𝐤)\hfill \\ \hfill \psi _{00}(𝐤)& =& \frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}(c_𝐤c_𝐤c_𝐤c_𝐤).\hfill \end{array}$$
$`(3)`$
When the antiferromagnetic fluctuations are strong, the factor $`\chi _{ij}`$ changes its sign depending on the distance between the sites $`i`$ and $`j`$. In general, the factor $`\chi _{ij}`$ is positive for the sites $`(i,j)`$ on the same sublattice, while $`\chi _{ij}`$ is negative for the sites $`(i,j)`$ on the different sublattices, for the antiferromagnetic correlations. Here, it is easily verified from eq. (2) that the spin correlations between the different sublattices ($`\chi _{ij}<0`$) favor singlet pairing, while they on the same sublattices ($`\chi _{ij}>0`$) favor triplet pairing.

For example, in tight binding models near the half-filling, the factor $`\chi _{ij}`$ changes its sign alternately. For the nearest-neighbor sites $`(i,j)`$, $`\chi _{ij}\overline{\chi }_1<0`$, while for the next-nearest-neighbor sites $`\chi _{ij}\overline{\chi }_2>0`$. The former $`\overline{\chi }_1<0`$ favor the singlet pairing, while the latter $`\overline{\chi }_2>0`$ contribute to the next-nearest-neighbor triplet pairing.

The triplet pairing interactions between the next-nearest-neighbor sites have not been considered to be important so far, because the nearest-neighbor singlet pairing interactions are usually much stronger than the next-nearest-neighbor triplet pairing interactions. However, we could not ignore the triplet pairing interactions between electrons with parallel spins at high fields where the singlet pairing is suppressed by the Pauli pair-breaking effect.

It might be considered that the contributions to the triplet pairing interactions from $`\overline{\chi }_2>0`$ may be completely canceled by the larger negative contributions from $`\overline{\chi }_1<0`$. In order to illustrate that an attractive channel remains as a total, let us consider an example in which there are only two kinds of $`\chi _{ij}`$ with opposite signs, and write them $`\overline{\chi }_1`$ and $`\overline{\chi }_2`$. For example, in a one-dimensional tight binding model, if we truncate $`\chi _{ij}`$ at the next-nearest-neighbor sites, we obtain $`\overline{\chi }_1<0`$ and $`\overline{\chi }_2>0`$ and $`|\overline{\chi }_1|>|\overline{\chi }_2|`$.

Then, the gap equations are written in a matrix form

$$\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{\Delta }_1\\ \mathrm{\Delta }_2\end{array}\right)=V\left(\begin{array}{cc}\overline{\chi }_1W_{11}& \overline{\chi }_1W_{12}\\ \overline{\chi }_2W_{21}& \overline{\chi }_2W_{22}\end{array}\right)\left(\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{\Delta }_1\\ \mathrm{\Delta }_2\end{array}\right),$$
$`(4)`$
where $`V=3g/8>0`$ for the singlet pairing and $`V=g/8<0`$ for the triplet pairing. The matrix elements $`W_{nm}`$ are defined by

$$W_{nm}=\frac{1}{N}\underset{𝐤}{}\gamma _n(𝐤)\frac{\mathrm{tanh}\frac{ϵ_𝐤}{2T}}{2ϵ_𝐤}\gamma _m(𝐤),$$
$`(5)`$
where $`\gamma _n(𝐤)`$ are the momentum dependent factors to expand the gap function. For example, when we consider one dimensional systems with interactions up to the next-nearest-neighbor sites, $`\gamma _n(𝐤)`$ are defined by

$$\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill \gamma _1(k_x)& =& \sqrt{2}\mathrm{cos}k_x\hfill \\ \hfill \gamma _2(k_x)& =& \sqrt{2}\mathrm{cos}2k_x\hfill \end{array}$$
$`(6)`$
for the singlet pairing, and

$$\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill \gamma _1(k_x)& =& \sqrt{2}\mathrm{sin}k_x\hfill \\ \hfill \gamma _2(k_x)& =& \sqrt{2}\mathrm{sin}2k_x\hfill \end{array}$$
$`(7)`$
for the triplet pairing. Extensions to two dimensional systems are straightforward. For example, $`\gamma _n`$ are defined by

$$\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill \gamma _1(𝐤)& =& \mathrm{cos}k_x\mathrm{cos}k_y\hfill \\ \hfill \gamma _2(𝐤)& =& \mathrm{cos}2k_x\mathrm{cos}2k_y\hfill \end{array}$$
$`(8)`$
for a $`d`$-wave-like pairing, while they are defined by

$$\begin{array}{ccc}\hfill \gamma _1(𝐤)& =& \sqrt{2}\mathrm{sin}k_x\hfill \\ \hfill \gamma _2(𝐤)& =& 2\mathrm{sin}k_x\mathrm{cos}k_y\hfill \end{array}$$
$`(9)`$
for a $`p`$-wave-like pairing. The matrix elements $`W_{12}=W_{21}`$ are not equal to zero for non-half-filling.

Now, we show that the two eigen values of the matrix on the right hand side of eq. (4) have opposite signs in general. They are equal to

$$\begin{array}{ccc}\multicolumn{3}{c}{\lambda _\pm =\frac{1}{2}[(\overline{\chi }_1W_{11}+\overline{\chi }_2W_{22})}\\ & & \pm \sqrt{(\overline{\chi }_1W_{11}+\overline{\chi }_2W_{22})^24\overline{\chi }_1\overline{\chi }_2(W_{11}W_{22}W_{12}^2)}].\hfill \end{array}$$
$`(10)`$
Since $`\overline{\chi }_1\overline{\chi }_2<0`$ and $`W_{11}W_{22}W_{12}^2>0`$, the second term in the square root is positive and thus the two eigen values $`\lambda _\pm `$ have opposite signs. $`W_{11}W_{22}W_{12}^2>0`$ can be proved as follows. First, we consider an average

$$\mathrm{}\frac{1}{N}\underset{𝐤}{}\frac{\mathrm{tanh}\frac{ϵ_𝐤}{2T}}{2ϵ_𝐤}(\mathrm{}).$$
$`(11)`$
Then, since an inequality $`(\gamma _1x\gamma _2)^2>0`$ is satisfied for arbitrary real number $`x`$, we obtain

$$\gamma _1\gamma _2^2\gamma _{1}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}\gamma _{2}^{}{}_{}{}^{2}<0.$$

Thus, $`W_{11}W_{22}W_{12}^2>0`$ is proved.

The fact that the two eigen values have opposite signs means that both the singlet and triplet interactions have attractive channels. For antiferromagnetic fluctuations, the attractive triplet interaction is weaker than the attractive singlet interaction as we discussed above. Thus, usually, the singlet pairing should occur at zero field. However, at high fields where the singlet pairing is suppressed, the triplet pairing takes place. With an assumption that magnetic field of the order of $`\mu _eH\mathrm{\Delta }_0`$ does not change the feature of the spin fluctuations drastically, we could predict a phase diagram as shown in Fig.1 on a $`T`$-$`H`$ plane.

Since the magnetic field is parallel to the highly conductive layers, the orbital pair-breaking effect is not efficient. Thus, the transition temperature of the triplet superconductivity of parallel spin pairing is reduced only slightly by the magnetic field. Hence, the triplet superconductivity appears at high fields.

The upturn of the critical field ($`^2H_c/T^2>0`$) of singlet superconductivity at low temperatures in Fig.1 is due to an appearance of Fulde-Ferrell-Larkin-Ovchinnikov state (FFLO state or LOFF state) . In low dimensional systems, the FFLO state is enhanced by Fermi-surface effects at low temperatures . A reentrant transition to a triplet superconductivity might be observed at higher fields , but the transition temperature could recover only up to the zero field value at most.

Our schematic phase diagram is consistent with the experimental results in $`(\mathrm{TMTSF})_2\mathrm{ClO}_4`$  and $`(\mathrm{TMTSF})_2\mathrm{PF}_6`$ . The observed critical field also shows an upturn at low temperatures ($`^2H_c/T^2>0`$), and tends to increase divergently in a low temperature limit ($`H_c/T\mathrm{}`$), although the observated transitions have widths and are rather ambiguous.

In the FFLO state, the singlet and the triplet order parameters are mixed in general, since the finite center-of-mass momentum $`𝐪`$ of the pairs breaks a symmetry in the real space, and at the same time the magnetic field breaks the rotational symmetry in the spin space. Hence, the FFLO state includes a component of a triplet superconductivity of antiparallel spin pairing. Matsuo et al. examined the mixing of the order parameters in an FFLO state, and found that the critical field is remarkably enhanced . In particular, the tri-critical temperature of the normal, BCS, FFLO phase is enhanced.

The lower critical fields of the FFLO state and the tri-critical point are not drawn in Fig.1, since it is difficult to assert their locations. It is also difficult to predict the orders of the transitions at the lower critical fields. In $`(\mathrm{TMTSF})_2\mathrm{ClO}_4`$, since first order transitions below the upper critical fields have not been observed, the FFLO state might be suppressed in this compound by impurity scatterings or some other reasons. In such a situation, the upturn of the critical field does not occur in our phase diagram. Such a suppression of the FFLO state might be a reason of the widths of the transitions at the upper critical fields in $`(\mathrm{TMTSF})_2\mathrm{ClO}_4`$.

In our phase diagram, we should be careful about the choice of the ratio of the transition temperatures of the singlet pairing and the triplet pairing at zero field. The transition temperatures are extremely sensitive to the strengths of the pairing interactions, Coulomb repulsive interactions, impurity scatterings for anisotropic pairings, and so on. For example, if the triplet pairing interactions are too weak although they exist, triplet superconductivity at high fields is not observed in practice.

On the other hand, the result of the recent Knight shift measurements in $`(\mathrm{TMTSF})_2\mathrm{PF}_6`$  might be explained by taking a larger ratio of the transition temperatures. In this compound, triplet superconductivity is supported by the Knight shift measurements in a strong magnetic field $`B=2.38[\mathrm{T}]`$, and the superconducting transition temperature was still about $`40\%`$ of the zero field transition temperature $`T_{\mathrm{c}}^{}{}_{}{}^{(0)}=1.18[\mathrm{K}]`$ in spite of the high magnetic field. If the superconductivity at zero field is due to a singlet pairing mediated by antiferromagnetic fluctuations, the strong magnetic field $`B=2.38[\mathrm{T}]`$ may favor a triplet pairing, since the pairing interactions include attractive triplet channels.

We have illustrated the existence of an attractive triplet channel in the interactions mediated by antiferromagnetic fluctuations in restricted cases. However, it is plausible that this feature is general. For example, the interactions between distant sites were calculated in a perturbation theory based on the quasi-one-dimensional Hubbard model, and it was found that triplet pairing interactions can be attractive .

In a 1/4-filled Hubbard model with electron dispersion

$$ϵ_𝐤=2t\mathrm{cos}k_xa2t^{}\mathrm{cos}k_yb\mu ,$$
$`(12)`$
a perturbation theory within an RPA gives pairing interactions $`V(𝐑_{ij}=m𝐚+n𝐛)V_{mn}`$ shown in Table I and II, where $`𝐚`$ and $`𝐛`$ are lattice vectors. In these tables, we find oscillations of the interactions in the real space. For triplet pairing, for example, $`V_{10}<0`$ and $`V_{40}<0`$ are attractive interactions. The former favors the intra-chain nearest-neighbor component of the gap function $`\mathrm{\Delta }_{10}\mathrm{sin}(k_xa)`$, which does not have a node on the open Fermi-surfaces. On the other hand, the latter favors the gap function of the form $`\mathrm{\Delta }_{40}\mathrm{sin}(4k_xa)`$, which has line nodes on the Fermi-surface near $`𝐤=(\pm \pi /4a,\pm \pi /2b)`$ for 1/4-filling. In practice, a superposition up to more distant components gives the gap function localized around the Fermi-surfaces with a width related to the spin fluctuations.

In conclusion, we point out that the pairing interactions mediated by antiferromagnetic fluctuations necessarily accompany attractive channels of triplet pairing interactions. Therefore, in quasi-low-dimensional type II superconductors in magnetic fields parallel to the highly conductive layers, if the origin of the pairing interactions is the exchange of antiferromagnetic fluctuations, a triplet pairing occurs at high fields where the singlet pairing is suppressed by the Pauli pair-breaking effect. We propose a schematic phase diagram which may explain the experimental observation in $`(\mathrm{TMTSF})_2\mathrm{ClO}_4`$.

We have discussed quasi-low-dimensional systems in a strong parallel magnetic field. However, if some extra mechanism suppresses the singlet pairing more than the triplet pairing, antiferromagnetic fluctuations can give rise to a triplet pairing superconductivity even at zero field, or even in three dimensional systems. For example, intersite Coulomb repulsions may suppress the pairing between electrons on nearest- and next-nearest-neighbor sites. Also, the suppression of anisotropic superconductivity due to impurity scatterings would be different depending on the pairing anisotropy. The quasi-one-dimensional organic superconductors $`(\mathrm{TMTSF})_2\mathrm{X}`$ have open Fermi-surfaces. Thus, the triplet pairing of the form $`\mathrm{\Delta }(𝐤)\mathrm{sin}(k_xa)`$, which was discussed by Belin et al. , does not have a node on the Fermi-surface. Such a nodeless gap function might have some advantage in comparison to the other anisotropic gap functions with line nodes. These possibilities will be examined in a separate paper.

This work was supported by a grant for CREST from JST.


text:
# Separability properties of tripartite states with U⊗U⊗U-symmetry

## I Introduction

One of the difficulties in the theory of entanglement is that state spaces are usually fairly high dimensional convex sets. Therefore, to explore in detail the potential of entangled states one often has to rely on lower dimensional “laboratories”. An example of this was the role played by a one-dimensional family of bipartite states , which has come to be known as “Werner states”. In this paper we present a similar laboratory, designed for the study of entanglement between three subsystems. The basic idea is rather similar to , and we believe this set shares many of the virtues with its bipartite counterpart. Firstly, the states have an explicit parametrization as linear combinations of permutation operators. This is helpful for explicit computations. Secondly, there is a “twirl” operation which brings an arbitrary tripartite state to this special subset. This proved to be very helpful for the discussion of entanglement distillation of bipartite entanglement: the first useful distillation procedures worked by starting with Werner states, applying a suitable distillation operation, and then the twirl projection to come back to the simple and well understood subset, thus allowing iteration. Geometrically this means that the subset we investigate is both a section of the state space by a hyperplane and the image of the state space under a projection. The basic technique for getting such subsets is averaging over a symmetry group of the entire state space. Such an averaging projection preserves entanglement if it is an average only over local (factorizing) unitaries (see  for a recent example different from ours).

The third useful property of the states we study is that they can be defined for systems of arbitrary finite Hilbert space dimension $`d`$, which is again important for the discussion of distillation. Surprisingly, it even turns out that in the parametrization we choose all the sets we investigate are also independent of dimension.

We now describe the entanglement (or separability) properties we will chart for these special states. Of course, we can split the system into just two subsystems and apply the usual separability/entanglement distinctions. A split $`1|23`$ then corresponds to the grouping of the Hilbert space $`_1_2_3`$ into $`_1(_2_3)`$. We call a density operator $`\rho `$ on this Hilbert space $`1|23`$-separable ($`\rho _1`$), or just biseparable if the partition is clear from the context, if we can write

$$\rho =\underset{\alpha }{}\lambda _\alpha \rho _\alpha ^{(1)}\rho _\alpha ^{(23)},$$
(1)
with $`\lambda _\alpha 0`$ and density operators $`\rho _\alpha ^{(23)}`$ on $`_2_3.`$ Furthermore, as it is a necessary condition for biseparability (cf. Peres ), we are going to look at those states having a positive partial transpose with regard to such a split. Recall that the partial transpose $`AA^{T_1}`$ of operators on $`_1_2`$ is defined by

$$(\underset{\alpha }{}A_\alpha B_\alpha )^{T_1}=\underset{\alpha }{}A_\alpha ^TB_\alpha ,$$
(2)
where $`A^T`$ on the right hand side is the ordinary transposition of matrices with respect to a fixed basis.

As a genuinely “tripartite” notion of separability, we consider states, called triseparable (or “three-way classically correlated”), which can be decomposed as

$$\rho =\underset{\alpha }{}\lambda _\alpha \rho _\alpha ^{(1)}\rho _\alpha ^{(2)}\rho _\alpha ^{(3)},$$
(3)
where $`\lambda _\alpha 0`$, and the $`\rho _\alpha ^{(i)}`$ are density operators on the respective Hilbert spaces.

The detailed computations leading to the results presented here will be published elsewhere, together with the discussion of further aspects, such as violations of Bell inequalities, and some distillability relations.

## II Description of the states

We consider only the case, where $`_1=_2=_3=`$ is $`d`$-dimensional ($`2d<\mathrm{}`$). Then the set of states we are going to study, which will be denoted by $`𝒲`$, is the set of density operators, which commute with all unitaries of the form $`UUU`$. The subsets of $`𝒲`$ we will compute will be denoted by $`_1`$, for the $`1|23`$-biseparable states, $`𝒫_1`$ for the states with positive partial transpose with respect to $`1|23`$, and by $`𝒯`$ for the triseparable states. Of course, $`𝒯_1𝒫_1𝒲`$. We will see that all these inclusions are strict, even if we take biseparability with respect to all three partitions: $`𝒯(_1_2_3)`$.

It is a fundamental fact from the representation theory of classical groups  that these states are precisely those which can be written as a linear combination of permutation operators

$$\rho 𝒲\rho =\underset{\pi }{}\mu _\pi V_\pi $$
(4)
with coefficients $`\mu _\pi `$ and the unitary permutation operators $`V_\pi `$ defined by

$$V_\pi \varphi _1\varphi _2\varphi _3=\varphi _{\pi ^11}\varphi _{\pi ^12}\varphi _{\pi ^13}$$

implementing the permutation symmetry of the three sites. For density operators hermiticity and normalization reduce the $`3!=6`$ complex parameters to five real ones (an explicit choice will be made below).

As usual, the integral

$$𝐏\rho =𝑑U(UUU)\rho (UUU)^{},$$
(5)
with respect to the normalized invariant measure “$`dU`$” of the unitary group $`\mathrm{U}_d`$ defines a twirl operation with the property $`\rho 𝒲𝐏\rho =\rho `$.

Up to here all statements generalize easily to an arbitrary number of factors, and some are even valid for an arbitrary averaging operation with respect to a compact symmetry group. However, to carry the analysis further one needs at least a precise description of the range of the coefficients $`\mu _\pi `$ in equation (4), such that the sum indeed represents a density operator. In general this is difficult, although sometimes  one even gets a simplex. In the case we study in this paper, the positivity of (4) is best seen by using the following basis, rather than the set of permutation operators themselves.

$`R_+`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{6}}\left(𝟙+V_{(12)}+V_{(23)}+V_{(31)}+V_{(123)}+V_{(321)}\right)`$ (7)
$`R_{}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{6}}\left(𝟙V_{(12)}V_{(23)}V_{(31)}+V_{(123)}+V_{(321)}\right)`$ (8)
$`R_0`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}}\left(2𝟙V_{(123)}V_{(321)}\right)`$ (9)
$`R_1`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}}\left(2V_{(23)}V_{(31)}V_{(12)}\right)`$ (10)
$`R_2`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{3}}}\left(V_{(12)}V_{(31)}\right)`$ (11)
$`R_3`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{i}{\sqrt{3}}}\left(V_{(123)}V_{(321)}\right),`$ (12)
where we have used cycle notation to represent permutations. Then $`R_+,`$ $`R_{}`$ and $`R_0`$ are orthogonal projections commuting with all $`V_\pi `$, and adding up to one. The $`R_i`$ for $`i=1,2,3`$ fulfill the Pauli commutation relations $`[R_i,R_\pm ]_{}=\mathrm{𝟎},`$ $`R_i^2=R_0`$, and $`R_1R_2=iR_3`$ and cyclic. Now every operator $`\rho `$ in the linear span of the permutations can be decomposed into the orthogonal parts $`R_+\rho `$, $`R_{}\rho `$, and $`R_0\rho `$, and positivity of $`\rho `$ is equivalent to the positivity of all three operators. This leads to the following Criterion:

###### Criterion 1

For any operator $`\rho `$ on $``$, define the six parameters $`r_k(\rho )=tr(\rho R_k)`$, for $`k\{+,,0,1,2,3\}`$. Then $`r_k(𝐏\rho )=r_k(\rho )`$. Moreover, each $`\rho 𝒲`$ is uniquely characterized by the tuple $`(r_+,r_{},r_0,r_1,r_2,r_3)^6`$, and such a tuple belongs to a density matrix $`\rho 𝒲`$ if and only if

$`r_+,r_{},r_00,`$ $`r_++r_{}+r_0=1`$ (13)
$`\mathrm{and}`$ $`r_1^2+r_2^2+r_3^2r_0^2.`$ (14)
Taking $`r_0=1r_+r_{}`$ to be redundant, we get a simple representation of $`𝒲`$ as a convex set in $`5`$ dimensions.

Note that in this parametrization the set $`𝒲`$ does not depend on the dimension $`d`$ with one exception: for $`d=2`$ the anti-symmetric projection $`R_{}`$ is simply zero, so for qubits we get the additional constraint $`r_{}=0.`$ Although in the case of three Qubits the dimensionality of the set is the same as in  the two sets differ. In fact the set presented in  can be obtained by averaging over a group of local unitaries of order 24.

With this parametrization we can describe the 5 dimensional set $`𝒲`$ by the points lying in the $`(r_+,r_{})`$ plane together with a point $`(r_1,r_2,r_3)`$ in the corresponding Bloch sphere of radius $`r_0=1r_+r_{}`$. We note that a state $`\rho 𝒲`$ is invariant under cyclic permutations iff $`r_1=r_2=0`$, invariant under the interchange $`23`$ iff $`r_2=r_3=0`$, and invariant under all permutations iff $`r_1=r_2=r_3=0`$. The latter set will be denoted by $`𝒲^0`$.

## III Results

The basic results are summarized in Figure 1. On the one hand, each point in this triangle corresponds to a density matrix $`\rho 𝒲`$ with $`r_1=r_2=r_3=0`$, i.e., a permutation invariant state. On the other hand, each such point stands for the collection of states with the specified $`(r_+,r_{})`$, and arbitrary $`(r_1,r_2,r_3)`$, all of which are projected to the state with vanishing $`(r_1,r_2,r_3)`$ upon permutation averaging. For qubits, one always has $`r_{}=0`$, so only the abscissa EB remains. Otherwise all statements are valid in any dimension $`d`$.

### A Triseparable States

The black triangle ABC in Figure 1 is the set of triseparable states. Its vertices are obtained by taking suitable pure product states $`|\mathrm{\Psi }\mathrm{\Psi }|`$ with $`\mathrm{\Psi }=\varphi _1\varphi _2\varphi _3`$, ($`\varphi _i=1`$), and applying the averaging projection $`𝐏`$. Then one gets the points A,B,C, if for $`ij`$

$`A`$ $`:`$ $`\varphi _i|\varphi _j=0`$ (15)
$`B`$ $`:`$ $`\varphi _i|\varphi _j=1`$ (16)
$`C`$ $`:`$ $`\varphi _i|\varphi _j=\mathrm{cos}(2\pi /3).`$ (17)
Note that the “Mercedes Star” configuration for $`C`$ requires only two dimensions, whereas $`A`$ requires $`d3`$. The technique for getting all of $`𝒯`$ is similar: an arbitrary pure product state is projected into $`𝒲`$, and $`𝒯`$ is computed as the convex hull of these points. This is more difficult than it sounds, and the details will be presented elsewhere. The result can be summarized as follows.

###### Criterion 2

A state $`\rho 𝒲`$ is triseparable if and only if the following inequalities are satisfied:

* $`0r_{}\frac{1}{6}`$
* $`\frac{1}{4}(12r_{})r_+(15r_{})`$
* $`(3r_3^2+[13r_+]^2)(16r_{})(r_1+r_+r_{})((r_12r_++2r_{})^23r_2^2).`$

All extreme points other than $`A=(\frac{1}{6},\frac{1}{6},0,0,0)`$ are in the plane $`r_{}=0`$, i.e., they can also be realized by three qubits. For fixed $`(r_+,r_{})`$, the shape of $`𝒯`$, as embedded in the Bloch sphere parametrized by $`(r_1,r_2,r_3)`$ is shown in Figure 2 (innermost convex set). Its threefold symmetry is the residue of the permutations of the three sites.

### B Biseparable States

We fix the partition $`1|23`$ of the system. Since the projection of permutation averaging does not preserve biseparability with respect to this partition, we now have to distinguish two sets in Figure 1: those which are biseparable states with $`r_1=r_2=r_3=0`$, hence permutation invariant (represented as dark grey or black), and those which are the images of some biseparable state under permutation averaging (represented as light grey). So a light grey point in Figure 1 has the property that for some suitable $`(r_1,r_2,r_3)`$ one gets a biseparable state. Special points with this property are represented by white circles, as opposed to filled circles, which lie in the plane.

One interesting point in Figure 1 is $`G=(\frac{1}{5},0)`$. It is biseparable and also permutation invariant. In particular, it is biseparable for any partition of the system. But it is not triseparable and, in fact, the only extreme point of the permutation invariant biseparable set, which is not triseparable. It can be obtained by applying $`𝐏`$ to the pure state with vector $`\mathrm{\Psi }=(|112|121\sqrt{3}|122)/\sqrt{5}`$.

The basic technique for computing $`_1`$ is the same as in the triseparable case: one takes pure states with vectors of the form $`\mathrm{\Psi }=\varphi _1\varphi _{23}`$, and computes the convex hull of their images under $`𝐏`$. Some special extreme points of $`_1`$ are given below. They have the additional property of being invariant under the exchange of systems $`2`$ and $`3`$, which is equivalent to $`r_2=r_3=0`$. The following table lists the tuples $`(r_+,r_{},r_1)`$, and the vector $`\mathrm{\Psi }`$, in a suitable basis.

$`B:`$ $`(1,0,0)`$ $`|111`$ (18)
$`D:`$ $`({\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}},0,{\displaystyle \frac{2}{3}})`$ $`|122`$ (19)
$`E:`$ $`(0,0,1)`$ $`(|112|121)/\sqrt{2}`$ (20)
$`F:`$ $`(0,{\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}},{\displaystyle \frac{2}{3}})`$ $`(|123|132)/\sqrt{2}.`$ (21)
In addition to these four points there is a sphere of extreme points extending also into the $`r_2`$ and $`r_3`$-dimensions, which is tangent to the line connecting $`D`$ and $`E`$. The inequalities describing the biseparable set $`_1`$ are given in the following

###### Criterion 3

A state $`\rho 𝒲`$ is biseparable with respect to the partition $`1|23`$ if and only if $`0r_{}\frac{1}{3}`$, and one of the following conditions holds:

* $`(3r_{}1)(1+r_1r_{}2r_+)0`$ and

$`3r_2^2+3r_3^2+(1+2r_1`$ $`+`$ $`r_{}r_+)^2`$
$``$ $`(2+r_14r_{}2r_+)^2.`$
* $`0(1+r_1r_{}2r_+)(13r_{})`$ and

$$3r_2^2+3r_3^2+(13r_{}3r_+)^2(r_1+2r_{}2r_+)^2.$$

For a typical point in Figure 1, the subset $`_1`$ in the Bloch sphere is depicted in Figure 2. Note that the boundary is composed of two quadratic surfaces, corresponding to the two alternatives in the above criterion.

### C States with Positive Partial Transpose

Holding the partition $`1|23`$ fixed we can compare the set of states with positive partial transpose with respect to the first subsystem ($`𝒫_1`$) to $`_1`$. If Peres’ Criterion were valid in this case, we would have equality in $`𝒫_1_1`$. It turns out that the inclusion is strict, but in several respects the criterion is amazingly good. To begin with, the intersections of both sets with two important hyperplanes coincide: namely (1) the $`r_{}=0`$ plane (in particular, for three qubits), and (2) the $`r_2=r_3=0`$ plane, i.e. for states which are invariant under the $`23`$ interchange. In particular, the projections to the permutation invariant subset coincide, so no difference can be seen in Figure 1.

Despite this similarity the technique for computing $`𝒫_1`$ is completely different. The key is the observation that partial transposition in the first factor maps operators commuting with all unitaries $`(UUU)`$ to operators commuting with all unitaries of the form $`(\overline{U}UU)`$. Obviously, the latter set is again an algebra, which even happens to be isomorphic to the algebra $`(UUU)`$-invariant operators: two one-dimensional summands plus the $`2\times 2`$-matrices. Hence positivity of partial transposes can be decided along the same lines as in Criterion 1.

###### Criterion 4

Let $`\rho 𝒲`$ be a density operator with expectations $`r_k=tr(\rho R_k)`$, $`k=+,,1,2,3`$. Then the partial transpose of $`\rho `$ with respect to the first tensor factor is positive, i.e. $`\rho 𝒫_1`$, if and only if

$`s_11r_15r_{}r_+`$ $``$ $`0`$ (23)
$`s_21r_1+r_{}+5r_+`$ $``$ $`0`$ (24)
$`\text{and}r_2^2+r_3^2`$ $``$ $`s_1s_2/3.`$ (25)
Note that condition (25) is exactly the same as the quadratic inequality in Criterion 3, Part(b). Therefore, we need not even provide a new plot for the set $`𝒫_1`$: In Figure 2, this set can be obtained simply by extending the quadratic surface, which wraps around $`𝒯`$, all the way to the boundary of the Bloch sphere. In other words, the difference between $`_1`$ and $`𝒫_1`$ is only that states in $`_1`$ have to satisfy an additional quadratic inequality, which is represented in Figure 2 by the surface tangent to the Bloch sphere.

## Acknowledgements

We would like to thank M. Horodecki for discussions and the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) for supporting this work.