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# Towards a free-free template for CMB foregrounds

## 1 Introduction

Current CMB experiments are sensitive enough to measure the primordial fluctuations which have an amplitude in the range of $`20100\mu `$K over the $`\mathrm{}`$-range $`102000`$ which corresponds to angular scales of $`10^{}10`$ arcmin (Hanany et al. 2000; Mauskopf et al. 2000; Padin et al. 2001; Halverson et al. 2002; Scott et al. 2002). The angular power spectrum of these fluctuations contains a wealth of cosmological information. One of the crucial factors in determining an accurate power spectrum of these fluctuations is understanding and removing the foreground contamination. The amplitude of the foreground signal depends on frequency, angular scale and region of sky being observed. CMB foregrounds comprise point sources and diffuse Galactic foregrounds. Point sources are a particular problem at smaller angular scales ($`30`$ arcmin) , while diffuse foreground structures become dominant on larger angular scales. Here we concentrate on the problem of diffuse Galactic foregrounds at frequencies below $`<100`$ GHz, a frequency range which is used in current and upcoming CMB experiments such as the MAP and Planck satellites.

### 1.1 Galactic foregrounds

The diffuse Galactic foreground has 3 (possibly 4) components. i) Synchrotron emission from relativistic electrons spiralling in the Galactic magnetic field dominates at frequencies below 1 GHz with a spectral index ($`T\nu ^\beta `$) of $`\beta 2.73.2`$ (Davies et al. 1996). It is traced by low-frequency surveys such as those of Haslam et al. (1982), Reich & Reich. (1988) and Jonas et al. (1998) where it is seen to extend well above the plane - e.g. the North Polar Spur which extends to Galactic latitude $`b80^{}`$. ii) Free-free bremsstrahlung emission from thermal electrons has a flatter spectral index of $`\beta 2.1`$. It is the dominant foreground at frequencies between $`\nu =10100`$ GHz, where microwave CMB experiments operate (e.g. DASI, CBI, VSA, MAP, Planck). The optical H$`\alpha `$line is a good tracer of free-free emission although it requires corrections for dust absorption. iii) The vibrational emission from thermal dust is dominant at frequencies above $`100`$ GHz. This is thermal emission from warm dust and is well-traced at $`\lambda 100\mu `$m where it has its peak. iv) An anomalous component has recently been discovered (Kogut et al. 1996; Leitch et al. 1997; de Oliveira-Costa et al. 1997,1998,1999,2000,2002; Finkbeiner et al. 2002). Draine & Lazarian (1998) proposed that this could be due to $`spinning`$ dust grains emitting in a 1-2 octave band centred at $`20`$ GHz. It was first believed to be due to free-free emission (Kogut 1996), but this has been ruled out primarily by the lack of associated H$`\alpha `$emission.

The separation and quantifying of the individual CMB foreground components is a continuing challenge. Each component is of interest in its own right; its angular distribution and spectrum are basic parameters. They all contribute as foregrounds to the CMB and their removal is necessary to realize the full potential of current high sensitivity CMB surveys where $`C_l`$ values are to be measured to an accuracy of a few percent. Such separations are best made using templates for each component. With the advent of the H$`\alpha `$survey, such a template is now available for each of the 4 proposed components. Although some approaches to separation of components are being made which reduce the assumptions about the template parameters (e.g. Baccigalupi et al. 2000; Vielva et al. 2001) they still face difficulties where the components are correlated. For example all the foregrounds are quasi-correlated as they increase strongly towards the Galactic plane. Also, the H$`\alpha `$and (spinning) dust emissions show considerable correlation over most of the sky (see Section 7); this was at the root of the original misunderstanding of the anomalous component. If one has a good free-free template as we derive here, the other 3 foreground components can be well-characterized except possibly at the lowest Galactic latitudes.

### 1.2 Large-area H$`\alpha `$surveys

Extensive filamentary H$`\alpha `$emission regions, of galactic origin, were first found by Meaburn (1965, 1967) extending to high Galactic latitudes; Sivan (1974) demonstrated the wealth of H$`\alpha `$emission at low-intermediate latitudes but at a relatively low sensitivity of $`15R`$; we note that 1 Rayleigh $`(R)10^6/4\pi `$ photons s-1 cm-2 sr$`{}_{}{}^{1}2.41\times 10^7`$ erg s-1 cm-2 sr$`{}_{}{}^{1}2.25\mathrm{cm}^6\mathrm{pc}`$ for $`T_e=8000`$ K gas. Several large and very sensitive H$`\alpha `$surveys are now well under way. The most relevant surveys are listed in Table LABEL:halpha\_surveys.table.

In the northern sky covering declinations $`\delta 30^{}`$ the Wisconsin H Alpha Mapper project (WHAM) is the most sensitive H$`\alpha `$survey to-date, but is restricted to an angular resolution of $`1^{}`$ (Reynolds et al. 1998; Haffner 1999). The final sensitivity in each field is $`0.05R`$ and the data are calibrated to an accuracy conservatively estimated at 10 per cent. WHAM is a dual etalon Fabry-Perot spectrometer with a velocity resolution of 12 km s-1. The spectra can be used to remove the geocoronal H$`\alpha `$emission from the Earth’s upper atmosphere which varies in strength from 2-13 $`R`$; it is much brighter than the Galactic signals at high Galactic latitudes.

The ongoing Virginia Tech Spectral-line Survey (VTSS) is a complimentary narrow-band imaging survey of the northern sky covering $`\delta 15^{}`$ (Dennison, Simonetti & Topsana 1998). It has a resolution of 1.6 arcmin in each $`10^{}`$ diameter field, which will be good enough for almost all CMB experiments as most of the cosmological information is contained on scales between $`10^{}10`$ arcmin. However, on larger angular scales, it will most likely be limited by the geocoronal emission which appears as a time-varying background signal of unknown level. Star residuals which have not been subtracted correctly can also be a problem. In combination with the WHAM survey, this survey will be a powerful tool.

The recently published (Gaustad et al. 2001) Southern H Alpha Sky Survey Atlas (SHASSA) covers the southern sky $`\delta +15^{}`$ at an angular resolution of 0.8 arcmin in each $`13^{}`$ field. The sensitivity reaches $`2R`$ limited by geocoronal emission and star residuals which have been partially removed by median filtering. Smoothing this survey to a resolution of 4 arcmin allows features of about $`0.5R`$ to be detected. The intensity calibration is accurate to about 9 per cent.

Two other H$`\alpha `$surveys are in progress. The Manchester Wide-Field Camera (MWFC) can observe H$`\alpha `$with a $`32^{}`$ field of view with 7 arcmin resolution (e.g. Boumis et al. 2001) and a sensitivity of $`1R`$. This instrument is particularly sensitive to large scale features ($`1^{}`$) which may be missed by cameras with smaller fields. We have recently observed several selected fields to look for diffuse H$`\alpha `$emission, both in the northern and southern hemispheres. The AAO/UK Schmidt H$`\alpha `$survey has high angular resolution (1 arcsec) but is restricted to the Galactic plane at relatively low sensitivity (Parker & Phillips 1998) as given in Table LABEL:halpha\_surveys.table.

### 1.3 This paper

In this paper we describe the steps taken to derive a free-free emission template from recently published H$`\alpha `$surveys. In Section 2 we determine the absorption of the Galactic H$`\alpha `$emission by dust based on the 100 $`\mu `$m dust template given by Schlegel, Finkbeiner & Davis (1998), hereafter SFD98; a statistical estimate is made of the relative distribution of the H$`\alpha `$emission and the dust in the line of sight. Section 3 summarizes the expressions required to convert the dust-corrected H$`\alpha `$emission into microwave emission at frequencies relevant to current CMB experiments. The uncertainties in the relation are evaluated. This relationship is tested in Section 4 using available radio surveys. The final free-free template is presented in Section 5. The 408 MHz all-sky map of Haslam et al. (1982) corrected for free-free emission is derived in Section 6; it is the best available synchrotron template. We discuss the implications of the new template for upcoming CMB experiments and for interstellar medium (ISM) studies in Section 7. The final conclusions of this work are given in Section 8.

## 2 Correction of H$`\alpha `$for dust absorption

### 2.1 The Galactic distribution of absorption

It is clear that the use of H$`\alpha `$surveys as a template for free-free emission will be jeopardized in the Galactic plane where visual absorption is typically 1 magnitude per kiloparsec in the local arms and where the total absorption to the Galactic centre is $`20`$ magnitudes. At intermediate latitudes the absorption broadly follows a cosecant law with a vertical slab half-thickness of 0.1 to 0.2 blue magnitudes. Such a cosecant law was widely used in extragalactic astronomy. In order to take account of the known structure in the obscuration, the line integral of Hi combined with a factor derived from the Shane-Wirtanen galaxy counts was introduced by Burstein & Heiles (1978). This procedure took account of the possibility that the gas-to-dust ratio might not be constant and the fact that not all hydrogen is in the neutral atomic form. The Burstein-Heiles approach is limited by the angular resolution of Hi all-sky surveys which is currently $`30`$ arcmin.

A new approach which provides a resolution of 6.1 arcmin and has a complete all-sky coverage is offered by SFD98 who use far infra-red data from the COBE-DIRBE and IRAS satellites. This combination of data at a range of FIR wavelengths enabled a good zero level to be established, an adequate removal of zodiacal light and a more effective destriping than previously. Also, by comparing the DIRBE 240 $`\mu `$m and IRAS 100 $`\mu `$m to derive a dust temperature, an estimate could be made of the dust column density, $`D^T`$, measured in units of MJy sr-1, in terms of a 100 $`\mu `$m surface brightness at a fixed temperature of 18.2 K. This correction to a fixed temperature can only be made on the angular scale of the DIRBE observations, namely $`0^{}.7`$, and consequently is not strictly true on the $`6.1`$ arcmin scale of the $`D^T`$ dust maps. The dust temperatures are typically in the range $`1721`$ K which corresponds to a correction of up to a factor of $`5`$ in the dust column density (see SFD98).

### 2.2 Derivation of a H$`\alpha `$absorption template

We will adopt the $`D^T`$ dust template as the indicator of dust absorption. This then requires a conversion factor to estimate the absorption at 656.3 nm, the H$`\alpha `$wavelength. SFD98 use the $`(BV)`$ colours of some 470 galaxies at a wide range of Galactic coordinates to derive a best fit correlation with the $`D^T`$ value at the position of each galaxy. They find the $`E(BV)`$ colour can be estimated from $`D^T`$ with the expression $`E(BV)=(0.0184\pm 0.0014)D^T`$ magnitudes and claim that the reddening estimated in this way has a standard deviation of 16 per cent at any given position.

In order to estimate the absorption at the H$`\alpha `$wavelength we use the parametric extinction curve for optical wavelengths given by O’Donnell (1994) and find the Galactic absorption at H$`\alpha `$to be $`A(\mathrm{H}\alpha )=0.81A(V)`$. Assuming the dust is characterized by a reddening value $`R_V=A(V)/E(BV)=3.1`$, this leads to an absorption at H$`\alpha `$of

$$A(\mathrm{H}\alpha )=2.51E(BV)=(0.0462\pm 0.0035)D^T\mathrm{mag}$$
(1)
where $`D^T`$ is in units MJy sr-1. The values given in table 6 of SFD98 are 6 per cent higher than this, corresponding to a higher value of $`R_V`$.

A range of reddening laws, characterized by different values of $`R_V`$, are found in different directions in the Galaxy. The different laws are thought to derive from different grain chemistry and size distributions. Values of $`R_V`$ range from 2.5 to 5, with the higher values often in denser dust clouds. A value of 3.1 is widely adopted as representative of the diffuse ISM in directions away from dense dust clouds. However, it should be emphasized that this is only an average value and that any line of sight will have a scatter about this value. Putting all these statistical factors together we consider that the relationship between $`A(\mathrm{H}\alpha )`$ and $`D^T`$ is accurate to about 20 per cent.

### 2.3 The absorption of Galactic H$`\alpha `$

The expression given in the preceding section applies to absorption of extragalactic objects at optical wavelengths. Here we are considering Galactic H$`\alpha `$emission which is mixed with the dust. At first sight it might be argued that since the dust and gas are uniformly mixed, then the ionized gas and the dust would also be uniformly mixed. The correlation between gas and dust will be discussed further in Section 7. The major part of the H$`\alpha `$seen from our position in the Galaxy is the result of ionization by the UV radiation field from young stars embedded in the dust plus the contribution from nearby regions of localized recent star formation. Such regions include the Gould Belt system which reaches to Galactic latitudes of $`40^{}`$ or more.

We seek a first-order absorption formula for correction of the H$`\alpha `$emission based on the dust distribution given by SFD98. If the ionized gas were uniformly mixed with the dust then the average absorption would be half the extragalactic value given in Section 2.2 on the assumption that the dust absorption is optically thin (say $`0.5`$ mag). We define $`f_d`$, the effective dust fraction in the line of sight actually absorbing the H$`\alpha `$ so that the actual absorption of H$`\alpha `$is given by $`f_d\times A(\mathrm{H}\alpha )`$, where $`A(\mathrm{H}\alpha )`$ is the full extragalactic absorption. For example, uniformly mixing of ionized gas and dust corresponds to $`f_d=0.5`$. There would be a systematic modification of this value if the z-distribution of the dust and the ionized gas were not the same. An example would be the ionization produced by the interstellar radiation field propagating away from the plane and ionizing the “under”-side of the gas clouds which were themselves optically thick to the UV ionizing radiation. This would lead to a narrower z-distribution of H$`\alpha `$emission than dust, which is assumed to be well-mixed with the gas, and to a reduced value of $`f_d`$.

We are now in the position to test the uniform mixing hypothesis by comparing at low and intermediate latitudes the z-distribution of neutral gas (Hi), ionized gas (H$`\alpha `$) and dust.

### 2.4 Galactic latitude scans

By plotting the H$`\alpha `$dependence on Galactic latitude $`b`$, and comparing this with the unabsorbed gas indicators of Hi and FIR dust ($`D^T`$), we can estimate the H$`\alpha `$absorption as a function of $`b`$ and determine a best-fitting value of $`f_d`$, the effective dust fraction producing absorption.

For neutral Hi gas we use the 1420 MHz Leiden-Dwingeloo northern sky survey (Hartmann & Burton 1997), H$`\alpha `$data from the WHAM survey and the SFD98 100 $`\mu `$m $`D^T`$ map to trace the dust. Each map was resampled onto a Galactic coordinate grid and smoothed to a resolution of 1. Along each 1-wide latitude strip, the values are averaged over a range of longitudes to give a representative value for that latitude. Fig. 1 shows the latitude dependence of the gas and dust in the region $`l=30^{}60^{}`$. Both the Hi gas and $`100\mu `$m dust follow similar cosecant-law trends. Assuming a homogeneous slab of material viewed at different latitudes $`b`$, the column density along a line of sight is expected to follow a cosecant law when viewed from the central plane;

$$I=A_0+A_1/\mathrm{sin}(|b|)$$
(2)
where $`A_0`$ is an offset and $`A_1`$ is the amplitude of the cosecant law. This is indeed found to be the case, with deviations occurring due to large concentrations of emitting material such as extended Hii regions and features like the Local System (Gould Belt). The region $`l=30^{}60^{}`$ is one of the “cleaner” regions of the plane where no large structures exist. This region includes are own spiral arm and the Sagittarius arm; here the dust emission on the Galactic ridge reaches an average of 500 MJy sr-1 corresponding to $`A`$(H$`\alpha `$)$`=23`$ mag for an extragalactic object. At intermediate and high latitudes ($`|b|>15^{}`$), $`D^T`$ is $`8`$ MJy sr-1 and the H$`\alpha `$absorption is therefore small.

The best-fitting cosecant law is a good match to the Hi and dust distributions as shown in Fig. 1. This figure also shows that the H$`\alpha `$intensity is greatly attenuated at low latitudes ($`|b|<15^{}`$) due to the increased dust absorption nearer to the plane. Note also that there is a significant offset $`A_0`$; this corresponds to the Sun being in a local “hole”. The $`A_0/A_1`$ values suggests that there is a $`3050`$ per cent deficit in the local slab density.

If one adopts equation (1) as the model for H$`\alpha `$absorption we can correct the H$`\alpha `$emission, adopting a value of $`f_d`$ as discussed in Section 2.3. We can then determine a value for $`f_d`$ by correcting the H$`\alpha `$latitude distribution for absorption, so that it matches that of the gas and dust distributions shown in Fig 1. By varying $`f_d`$ we find the best-fitting value is given by $`f_d=0.33_{0.15}^{+0.10}`$. The fit was made by deriving the cosecant law using data at $`|b|>20^{}`$ and fitting $`f_d`$ to this cosecant law over $`|b|=5^{}`$ to $`15`$°. For $`|b|<5^{}`$, the absorption is likely to be $`>1`$ mag and therefore any derived value for $`f_d`$ becomes unreliable. The value $`f_d=0.33`$ derived here is representative of the solar neighbourhood of our Galaxy within a few kilo-parsecs. Other longitudes gave similar results, although the cosecant fitting is difficult due to local structures such as the Gould Belt system and other bright extended Hii regions. Further information on the value of $`f_d`$ is obtained from the study of the radio free-free emission from several nearby Hii complexes given in Section 4.

The value of $`f_d`$ derived in this section is not consistent with uniform mixing of ionized gas and dust which requires $`f_d=0.5`$. However, there is a large uncertainty in $`f_d`$ and it is expected that $`f_d`$ will vary significantly across the sky. However, as a first-order approach, we will adopt the value $`f_d=0.33`$ when estimating the free-free template in Section 5. This lower value is indicative of non-uniform ionization; for example, a region of cloud is ionized by the interstellar radiation field which is in a narrower Galactic layer of O,B stars.

### 2.5 The H$`\alpha `$absorption template

Using equation (1) we can convert the $`D^T`$ dust map to an absorption map which can be applied to the H$`\alpha `$ intensity $`I_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }`$, using

$$I_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }^{\mathrm{corrected}}=I_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }\times 10^{D^T\times 0.0185\times f_d}$$
(3)
The value of $`f_d`$ is taken to be 0.33. The absorption template to be applied to Galactic H$`\alpha `$and smoothed to a resolution of $`1^{}`$ is shown in Fig. 2.

The template clearly shows that the absorption of H$`\alpha `$by dust is modest - less than 0.2 mag (20 per cent correction) for most of the sky. Beyond $`|b|50^{}`$, it is less than 0.05 mag (5 per cent correction). At $`|b|5`$°, the absorption increases beyond 1 mag for much of the Galactic plane. Individual dust clouds can have $`>1`$ mag of absorption at intermediate latitudes. For a major portion of the sky the dust correction clearly needs to be taken into account. For example, the correction of more than 50 per cent is required in a limited area of the sky such as the Gould Belt system.

It is interesting to note that the absorption can be low ($`<0.5`$ mag) close to the Galactic plane in the longitude range $`160^{}<l<260^{}`$. These regions may be useful in testing the dust absorption and H$`\alpha `$templates at low latitudes. However, for the remainder of the Galactic plane ($`|b|<5^{}`$) the absorption is too great to make any reasonable estimate of H$`\alpha `$emission.

The uncertainty in deriving the H$`\alpha `$absorption from the dust using equation (1) is considered to be 20 per cent (see Section 2.2). A second factor in the uncertainty is the relative distribution of gas (H$`\alpha `$) and dust in the line of sight ($`f_d`$). Near the Galactic plane where there are many clouds/features in the line of sight, our value of $`f_d=0.33`$ is realistic, while at higher latitudes where there are only a few clouds in the line of sight, the uncertainty (in a smaller total absorption) is greater. If we adopt a 20 per cent uncertainty in $`f_d`$ and combine it with a 20 per cent error in equation (1), we obtain a total uncertainty of 30 per cent in the correction to the H$`\alpha `$intensity for dust absorption. Thus if there is an H$`\alpha `$absorption ($`f_d\times A`$(H$`\alpha `$)) of 1.0 mag, the 30 per cent uncertainty in multiplying factor required to give the estimate of the true H$`\alpha `$intensity is $`2.5\pm 0.7`$. However for a total absorption of 0.2 mag the multiplying factor is $`1.20\pm 0.07`$. This illustrates the higher fractional accuracy of estimating the H$`\alpha `$intensity at lower levels of absorption. In summary, the absorption of H$`\alpha `$can be estimated up to a limit of $`1`$ mag; this corresponds to $`D^T=65`$ MJy sr-1 for $`f_d=0.33`$ and is shown as black on Fig. 2.

## 3 Conversion of H$`\alpha `$to free-free continuum emission

The ionized interstellar medium generates both radio free-free continuum and H$`\alpha `$emission. Ionized hydrogen alone is responsible for the H$`\alpha `$emission while ionized hydrogen and helium produce the radio continuum. Both the optical and radio emission are functions of electron temperature, $`T_e`$. A relationship between the two can be determined on certain assumptions. We will derive this relationship and give an estimate of the uncertainties which come from the theory and from the variation in the electron temperature at different locations within the Galaxy.

### 3.1 H$`\alpha `$emission

The Balmer line emission from ionized interstellar gas is well understood; a clear discussion is given by Osterbrock (1989). However, the H$`\alpha `$line intensity depends upon whether the emitting medium is optically thick (case B) or optically thin (case A) to the ionizing Lyman continuum. In the Hii regions and nebulae studied using H$`\alpha `$it is believed that case B applies (Osterbrock 1989). Knowing the emission coefficients for both case A and case B for H$`\beta `$ and using the Balmer decrements (Hummer & Storey 1987), the H$`\alpha `$emission can be readily calculated for the temperature range $`500020000`$ K both for case A and case B. Fig. 3 shows the H$`\alpha `$intensity per unit Emission Measure ($`EMn_e^2𝑑l`$) for $`T_e=5000,10000,20000`$ K for both case A and case B.

The emission coefficients are generally accepted to be accurate to $`1`$ per cent (Pengelly 1964; Hummer & Storey 1987). For case B, the intensity varies very weakly with number density, amounting to a few percent over 2 orders of magnitude in density. The values shown in Fig. 3 are for a density ($`n_e=10^2`$ cm-3) gas. Case A gives $`30`$ per cent lower intensity than case B over the likely temperature range.

The situation for intermediate and high latitudes appears to favour case B on the following arguments. For case B to apply, the optical depth $`\tau `$, to Lyman continuum photons ($`\lambda \stackrel{<}{_{}}900`$ Å) must be greater than unity in the emitting region. Pottasch (1983) gives the mean free path of Lyman continuum photons as $`0.052n_\mathrm{H}^1`$ pc, corresponding to an optical depth relation $`\tau =19.2n_\mathrm{H}l`$ where $`l`$ is path length in pc. For a typical Hii region in the Galactic plane $`n_en_\mathrm{H}=10^210^6`$ cm-3 on typical scales of $`110`$ pc and case B conditions are clearly satisfied with $`\tau 10^310^{10}`$. At intermediate latitudes faint H$`\alpha `$features with $`EM1`$ cm-6 pc can be identified with scale sizes of $`10100`$ pc. The corresponding $`n_e`$ is $`0.10.3`$ cm-3. The optical depth to Lyman continuum in these low density regions is then $`130`$, still satisfying the case B conditions.

A useful and accurate expression for the H$`\alpha `$intensity based on data from Hummer & Storey (1987) is given by Valls-Gabaud (1998) for case B in units of $`\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{cm}^2\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{sr}^1`$:

$$I(\mathrm{H}\alpha )\stackrel{\mathrm{CaseB}}{=}9.41\times 10^8T_4^{1.017}10^{0.029/T_4}\times (EM)_{\mathrm{cm}^6\mathrm{pc}}$$
(4)
where $`T_4`$ is the electron temperature in units of $`10^4`$ K. This is plotted as a continuous curve along with the equivalent curve for case A in Fig. 3, which shows that the agreement of equation (4) with theory is better than 1 per cent over the temperature range $`500020000`$ K.

### 3.2 Radio continuum emission

The free-free radio continuum emission for an ionized gas at $`T_e<550,000`$ K and in Local Thermal Equilibrium (LTE) is well described in terms of a volume emissivity in units of $`\mathrm{erg}\mathrm{cm}^3\mathrm{s}^1\mathrm{Hz}^1`$ (Oster 1961):

$$ϵ_\nu ^{ff}=6.82\times 10^{38}Z^2n_\mathrm{e}n_{\mathrm{ion}}T_e^{1/2}e^{h\nu /kT}<\overline{g_{ff}}>$$
(5)
Here $`<\overline{g}_{ff}(Z,\nu ,T_e)>`$ is the velocity-averaged Gaunt factor. The Gaunt factor comprises all the terms by which the quantum mechanical expressions differ from the classical ones. The evaluation of the Gaunt factor has been refined over recent years since the work of Scheuer (1960) and Oster (1961) for a range of frequencies, temperatures. Karzas & Latter (1961) have given definitive expressions for $`\overline{g}_{ff}`$. Hummer (1988) has used these expressions to obtain an accurate analytical expansion for $`\overline{g}_{ff}`$ in terms of a two-dimensional Chebyshev fit covering a wide range of frequencies and temperatures. Table LABEL:gaunt\_factors.table lists accurate Gaunt factors (accurate to 0.7 per cent) derived from Hummer (1988) for a range of frequencies and temperatures relevant to CMB studies.

We now summarize the present situation for the frequencies ($`0.4100`$ GHz) covered by the observations analysed here and the observing range of the Low Frequency Instrument (LFI) on the Planck Surveyor satellite. The free-free spectral index $`\beta _{ff}`$ is a slow function of frequency and electron temperature (Bennett et al. 1992) as shown in Fig. 4. Over a wide range in frequencies this can lead to a significant discrepancy in the predicted radio emission if this is not accounted for. One should therefore still use the accurate formalism given by Oster (1961) who derives the optical depth for free-free emission as

$`\tau _c(\mathrm{Oster})=3.014\times 10^2T_e^{1.5}\nu _{\mathrm{GHz}}^{2.0}\times `$
$`\left\{\mathrm{ln}[4.955\times 10^2\nu ^1]+1.5\mathrm{ln}(T_e)\right\}\times (EM)_{\mathrm{cm}^6\mathrm{pc}}`$ (6)
The approximation given by Altenhoff et al. (1960) is often used:

$$\tau _c(\mathrm{AMWW})=8.235\times 10^2T_e^{1.35}\nu _{\mathrm{GHz}}^{2.1}\times (EM)_{\mathrm{cm}^6\mathrm{pc}}$$
(7)
For low frequencies ($`1`$ GHz) the error in this expression is of the order a few percent but increases to 5-20 per cent for frequencies above 10 GHz. Mezger & Henderson (1967) define a factor $`a(T,\nu )`$, the ratio between the two formulae as

$`a={\displaystyle \frac{\tau _c(\mathrm{Oster})}{\tau _c(\mathrm{AMWW})}}=0.366\nu _{\mathrm{GHz}}^{0.1}T_e^{0.15}\times `$
$`\left\{\mathrm{ln}[4.995\times 10^2\nu _{\mathrm{GHz}}^1]+1.5\mathrm{ln}(T_e)\right\}`$ (8)
Table LABEL:a\_factor.table gives accurate values of $`a`$ based on equation (8) for a range of temperatures and frequencies. The $`a`$ factor is convenient in that it allows a simple formula to be written down using a single spectral index and temperature dependence which are modified by the Gaunt factor.

The brightness temperature $`T_b`$ is given by

$$T_b=T_e(1e^{\tau _c})T_e\tau _c\mathrm{for}\tau _c<<1$$
(9)
For the frequencies relevant to CMB observations and the diffuse interstellar medium discussed here, the optically thin assumption is valid. At 1 GHz only the brightest Hii regions in the Galaxy are optically thick ($`EM10^6`$ cm-6 pc) while the Galactic ridge has $`\tau 10^3`$ ($`EM10^3`$ cm-6 pc $`500R`$) estimated for $`T_e=7000`$ K.

Finally, the brightness temperature in Kelvin can now be written as

$$T_b=8.235\times 10^2aT_e^{0.35}\nu _{\mathrm{GHz}}^{2.1}(1+0.08)\times (EM)_{\mathrm{cm}^6\mathrm{pc}}$$
(10)
where the factor (1+0.08) is the contribution from the fraction of He atoms, all of which are assumed to be singly ionized; $`a`$ is given by equation (8).

### 3.3 Electron temperatures in Galactic Hii regions

Optical determinations of electron temperatures in Hii regions using forbidden line ratios give values in the range 5000 to 20000 K with a mean value of $`8000`$ K (Reynolds 1985). These determinations refer to the solar neighbourhood within 1 or 2 kpc of the Sun.

Electron temperature determinations using extensive radio recombination line (RRL) data probe the greater part of the Galaxy and show a clear temperature gradient as a function of galacto-centric radius. The results of Shaver et al. (1983) for 67 Hii regions show a clear gradient in temperature increasing with galacto-centric radius from 5000 K at 4 kpc to 9,000 K at 12 kpc. This is due to the decreasing metallicity at larger radii (Panagia 1979). There is a spread of approximately 1000 K at a particular radius. The local value at $`R_0=8.5`$ kpc is $`T_e=7000`$ K and will be adopted as the typical value in the absence of other information.

### 3.4 Expected radio emission from H$`\alpha `$maps

The relationship between radio emission and H$`\alpha `$emission can now be calculated using equations (4) and (10), in units of mK/$`R`$ as

$$\frac{T_b^{ff}}{I_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }}=8.396\times 10^3a\times \nu _{\mathrm{GHz}}^{2.1}T_4^{0.667}10^{0.029/T_4}(1+0.08)$$
(11)
where $`T_4`$ is the electron temperature in units of $`10^4`$ K. The conversion factors for relevant frequencies are given in Table 4 for $`T_e=7000`$ K. Fig. 5 shows $`(T_b^{ff}/I_{\mathrm{H}\alpha })\nu _{\mathrm{GHz}}^2`$ over the frequency range 100 MHz to 100 GHz for $`T_e=4000,7000,10000`$ and $`15000`$ K. The increase in (negative) slope with frequency is due to the effect of $`a`$ arising from the Gaunt factor dependence. The variation in $`T_b^{ff}`$ at a given frequency corresponds to a factor of $`2.4`$ between 4000 and 15000 K.

It is of interest to compare our equation (11) with recent expressions given in the literature. Reynolds & Haffner (2002) give $`T_b^{ff}/I_{H\alpha }=7.4\nu _{30}^{2.14}\mu \mathrm{K}/R`$ at $`T_e=8000`$ K. Our value at 30 GHz and 8000 K would be 17 per cent lower at 6.35 $`\mu `$K$`/R`$. This difference may be attributed to the 17 per cent over-estimate of the Gaunt factor in equation (6) of Valls-Gabaud (1998) which are used by Reynolds & Haffner (2002). We have resolved this difference with help from David Valls-Gabaud (private communication). The coefficient in his equation (6) should be 3.96 and not 4.4; furthermore, a typographical error in his equation (11) gave the exponent of $`T_4`$ as 0.317 instead of 0.517. He agrees with the calculations of the Gaunt factors in Section 3.2. His new calculations also agree well with our equation (11). Equation (4), also from Valls-Gabaud (1998), is not affected.

The uncertainty in predicting the radio free-free emission from the H$`\alpha `$emission as given in equation (11) arises mainly from the uncertainty in the electron temperature. The $`\pm 1000`$ K uncertainty in the adopted solar neighbourhood value of 7000 K is an upper limit to the scatter of Hii region temperatures since it includes some measurement errors. The corresponding error in equation (11) is 10 per cent. The other possible uncertainty is in whether case A or case B applies in the lower density regions at intermediate and high Galactic latitudes of interest to CMB studies. For the reasons given in Section 3.1, we will adopt the generally assumed position that case B is correct and take the associated error in equation (4) to be 1 per cent. However, in the unlikely event that case A were to apply, the value of $`T_b/I_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }`$ given in equation (11) would be increased by 30 per cent. Uncertainties in equation (4) and in the ionized helium to hydrogen ratio in equation (10) are only a few per cent. We consider that the overall uncertainty in applying equation (11) to be $`10`$ per cent for a large sample of the sky, assuming case B applies.

## 4 Observational tests of the H$`\alpha `$to free-free relation

We now make an observational test of equation (11) which predicts the free-free radio emission for a given H$`\alpha `$intensity. In practice, the diffuse free-free emission is mixed with synchrotron emission so the free-free component must be identified and separated. The free-free emission can be identified in two ways. Firstly, by its associated radio recombination line emission and secondly, by its free-free spectrum using multi-frequency observations. Furthermore, a comparison between the radio and H$`\alpha `$will lead to an estimate of the H$`\alpha `$absorption by dust; this can be compared with $`A(H\alpha )`$ given by equation (1) to give a value of the absorbing factor of dust $`f_d`$ in front of the H$`\alpha `$.

### 4.1 Radio Recombination Lines

One advantage of using radio recombination lines (RRL’s) is that the ratio of the line temperature to continuum temperature can be used to derive an electron temperature $`T_e`$ for the Hii emission which can be substituted in equation (11) to give the radio emission expected from the observed H$`\alpha `$emission. Two extended regions of H$`\alpha `$emission which are sufficiently bright to have been studied in RRL’s are Barnard’s Arc and the Gum Nebula.

#### 4.1.1 Barnard’s Arc

Barnard’s Arc is an ionization-bounded Hii region at 460 pc photo-ionized by the Orion I OB star association (Reynolds & Ogden 1979). At radio frequencies Barnard’s Arc has a thermal spectral index (Davies 1963). Gaylard (1984) describes RRL observations at 2.272 GHz at 3 positions in the Arc. The radio data were converted from antenna to brightness temperatures using the factor 1.5 used by Gaylard (1984). The H$`\alpha `$observations from SHASSA and the $`D^T`$ dust map were smoothed to 20 arcmin resolution for this study. Table LABEL:RRL.table gives the observed brightness temperature $`T_b`$, $`T_e`$ and $`T_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }`$, the brightness temperature expected from the observed H$`\alpha `$intensity $`I_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }`$, uncorrected for absorption using $`T_e`$ values also given in Table LABEL:RRL.table. The small ($`<10`$ per cent) errors in the radio data for the 3 positions in Barnard’s arc, indicate that the calculated $`f_d`$ values are accurate to about $`\pm 0.15`$ and are therefore consistent with no or little absorption ($`f_d0`$) in all 3 positions. No absorption would be expected if the H$`\alpha `$-emitting gas were nearer than the dust, in this nearby ($`<500`$ pc) Gould Belt feature.

#### 4.1.2 The Gum Nebula

The Gum Nebula is a diffuse emission region centred on $`(l,b)=(258^{},2^{})`$ (Gum 1952). It is a complex at a distance of 500 pc containing both free-free and synchrotron features which are probably the consequence of supernova activity (Duncan et al. 1996; Reynosa & Dubner 1997). The RRL data from Woermann et al. (2000) for H$`\alpha `$features within the complex taken with 20 arcmin resolution are compared with the H$`\alpha `$and dust data as in Section 4.1.1 and are given in Table LABEL:RRL.table. The data tabulated are for the 3 strongest H$`\alpha `$features in the Gum Nebula. There is a large spread in $`f_d`$ values from $`1.4`$ to $`+1.0`$. The large error bars on the radio data ($`T_b,T_e`$) correspond to an error of approximately $`\pm 0.6`$ to $`\pm 1.0`$ in the derived $`f_d`$ values for the three Gum nebula positions. Little can be deduced about the value of $`f_d`$ without better radio data; negative values have no physical meaning except that the H$`\alpha `$prediction is larger than is measured in the radio.

### 4.2 Multi-frequency scans across H$`\alpha `$features

An alternative method of identifying and measuring the radio free-free emission from an H$`\alpha `$feature is to use multi-frequency scans across it to separate the free-free from the underlying synchrotron emission. The brightest features of Barnard’s Arc are ideal since they lie some $`20^{}`$ from the Galactic plane where the background synchrotron emission is weak and relatively smooth. We have used the 408 MHz map of Haslam et al. (1982) in the destriped form given by Davies et al. (1996) and the 2326 MHz map of Jonas et al. (1998) to make 3 Galactic longitude scans across the Barnard Arc feature at $`b=18^{},20^{}`$ and $`22^{}`$ centred on $`l212`$°. These are illustrated in Fig. 6 along with the corresponding H$`\alpha `$scans from WHAM data; all data are at a resolution of 1°. The amplitudes of the best-fitting gaussians to the feature centred on each H$`\alpha `$position are given in Table LABEL:scans.table. Values of $`f_d`$ are estimated as in Section 4.1 for $`T_e=7000`$ K (the average local value) and $`T_e=5100`$ K (the weighted average of $`T_e`$ from Table LABEL:RRL.table). The derived $`f_d`$ values are accurate to about $`\pm 0.1`$ to $`\pm 0.2`$ and are significantly negative when $`T_e=7000`$ K is assumed, indicating the radio emission is greater than expected from the H$`\alpha `$brightness with no foreground absorption. However, when the average measured value of $`T_e`$ (5100 K) is used, the derived $`f_d`$ values are consistent with no absorption ($`f_d=0`$). This clearly shows the importance of having accurate electron temperatures. In this case, the lower electron temperature corresponds to a $`25`$ per cent reduction in $`T_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }`$. A further consideration is the full-beam to main-beam correction (see Sections 6 & 7) which can lead to a factor of $`1.5`$ for objects comparable in size to the beam. For Barnard’s Arc, which is extended ($`5^{}`$) in one direction and $`1^{}.5`$ in the perpendicular direction, the correction is likely to be the square root of this factor ($`1.2`$). This further correction would lead to a slightly positive ($`0.2`$) value for $`f_d`$.

### 4.3 Identifying H$`\alpha `$morphology in radio maps

The morphology of extended bright H$`\alpha `$regions can be identified in the low frequency continuum maps even in the presence of significant synchrotron emission. By subtracting a template from the radio continuum maps proportional to the H$`\alpha `$intensity, it is possible to estimate the amplitude of the free-free emission. A first-order approach is illustrated for the Orion region in Fig. 7. The 408 MHz, 2326 MHz, WHAM H$`\alpha `$and the $`D^T`$ dust maps are first smoothed to 1 resolution. Different amplitudes of the free-free emission expected from the H$`\alpha `$maps are subtracted from the radio maps until the correlation with the H$`\alpha `$maps disappears from the radio maps; we are left with the synchrotron features only. Then using the absorption expected from the $`D^T`$ dust map, an estimate is made of $`f_d`$ for the field. In this case, assuming a nominal electron temperature of $`T_e=7000`$ K, both the $`\lambda `$-Orionis nebula $`(l,b)(195^{},11^{})`$ and Barnard’s Arc give $`f_d=0.2\pm 0.1`$, suggesting no dust absorption. The error bars are estimated by comparing maps with different amounts of H$`\alpha `$. As shown in Section 4.2, the effect of a lower average temperature for these regions and/or the full-beam to main-beam correction, may bring the H$`\alpha `$estimate in agreement with the radio data ($`f_d0)`$.

A similar study was made of the Gum Nebula where $`f_d`$ was found to be $`0.2\pm 0.2`$, and the Ophiuchus Hii region $`l(0^{})(20^{})`$, $`b(+15^{})(+30^{})`$ where $`f_d=0\pm 0.2`$. The increased error in the estimate is due to the complexity of the emission across each region. In general, the H$`\alpha `$predictions assuming $`T_e=7000`$ K are correct when a factor of $`0.71.0`$ is included into the H$`\alpha `$estimates (Fig. 7).

In summary, the raw H$`\alpha `$predictions in these selected regions are slightly too large to fit the current low-frequency data by up to $`30`$ per cent. This may be accounted for by lower than average electron temperatures (probably the case in some parts of the Orion region) which will vary the conversion factor from H$`\alpha `$to radio continuum by up to $`30`$ per cent within a temperature range of $`500010000`$ K. The full-beam to main-beam correction may also be a significant correction; up to $`50`$ per cent, but $`2030`$ per cent in elongated structures. The resulting $`f_d`$ values for these regions are consistent with little or no absorption ($`f_d0`$). This might be expected since these regions are at relatively high Galactic latitudes ($`|b|>10^{}`$) and therefore nearby objects in which the geometry of the ionization, as seen from the Sun’s position in the Galactic plane, produces ionization on the near side of the gas/dust clouds.

## 5 The best-estimate free-free template

We are now in a position to move from the observed H$`\alpha `$maps of the northern and southern skies to produce a full-sky dust-corrected H$`\alpha `$map at an angular resolution of 1°. Then, using equation (11) we can derive all-sky free-free maps except in areas near the Galactic plane where the predicted dust absorption becomes uncertain.

### 5.1 Full-sky H$`\alpha `$map corrected for dust absorption

We obtain a full-sky H$`\alpha `$map by using the northern WHAM H$`\alpha `$data at $`1^{}`$ resolution and the higher angular resolution Southern SHASSA H$`\alpha `$data. The H$`\alpha `$map produced from WHAM data was made by interpolating the irregularly spaced data grid using the Interactive Data Language (IDL) routines triangulate and trigrid, which are based on Delauney triangulation, as suggested by the WHAM team (L.M. Haffner, private communication). The median filtered, continuum subtracted composite SHASSA map was used as given by the SHASSA team (J.E. Gaustad, private communication). Where the maps overlap, the WHAM map is used because of its higher sensitivity and better zero-level certainty, except for declinations $`<15^{}`$ where SHASSA data are preferred. The observed maps are regridded onto an over-sampled Cartesian Galactic coordinate grid and smoothed to $`1^{}`$ resolution. We then use the $`D^T`$ map of 100 $`\mu `$m dust emission to correct for dust absorption at each point on the H$`\alpha `$map according to equation (1). The fraction of the dust $`f_d`$ lying in front of the H$`\alpha `$is taken to be 0.33 as shown in Section 2.4 and discussed in Section 4.

Fig. 5.1 shows a colour representation of the dust-corrected full-sky H$`\alpha `$map in Mollweide projection. Regions where the dust absorption correction is greater than 1.0 mag are shown as grey; H$`\alpha `$data become unreliable in these regions. The Local System (Gould’s Belt) is clearly seen beneath the plane at $`l180^{}`$ and above the plane at $`l0^{}`$, reaching to $`|b|30^{}`$ or more.

It should be remembered that both the WHAM and SHASSA surveys are in the early stages of analysis and further revisions are anticipated. Baseline effects are still visible in the data as presented in Fig. 5.1. For example, the WHAM data cannot accurately subtract the geocoronal emission near the ecliptic pole ($`(l,b)(96^{},30^{}`$)), while the SHASSA data have artifacts due to the varying geocoronal emission in each $`13^{}\times 13^{}`$ field which results in a residual power on these scales in the region near ($`(l,b)(320^{},45^{}`$)). The typical level of these baseline variations are $`\stackrel{<}{_{}}1R`$.

### 5.2 A free-free all-sky template

We can now use Fig. 5.1 to produce an all-sky free-free template at any radio frequency using equation (11). For illustration we generate the template for 30 GHz, a frequency which is widely used for CMB studies such as the space projects MAP and Planck and the ground-based arrays CBI, DASI and VSA. In applying equation (11) we have taken $`T_e=7000`$ K, the appropriate value for the region of Galaxy sampled by the H$`\alpha `$maps at $`|b|10`$°. At 30 GHz, $`T_b=5.83\mu `$K/$`R`$ (Table LABEL:conversions.table).

The all-sky template for 30 GHz free-free emission is shown in Fig. 9. The amplitude of the free-free signal is $`<10\mu `$K for $`|b|>30^{}`$ at most Galactic longitudes, although in the Local System $`T_b`$ can be as large as 100 $`\mu `$K. At higher frequencies the free-free emission falls as $`\nu ^{2.15}`$ and accordingly at 70 to 100 GHz, where foreground contamination of the CMB is least, the $`T_b`$ values will be 5-10 times less than shown in Fig. 9. At these frequencies free-free and vibrational dust emission are the dominant foregrounds. Only the Galactic ridge ($`|b|<5^{}10^{}`$) and isolated regions such as Orion have $`T_b>1020\mu `$K at frequencies $`70100`$ GHz.

We discuss the contribution of free-free emission to the CMB foregrounds in Section 7.3.

## 6 AN IMPROVED LOW-FREQUENCY TEMPLATE

The 408 MHz all-sky map (Haslam et al. 1982) made at $`0^{}.85`$ resolution is widely used as a template for the Galactic synchrotron foreground. Our present study allows us to correct this map for free-free emission at 408 MHz to obtain a clean synchrotron template. The free-free correction is estimated from the dust-corrected H$`\alpha `$template of Fig. 5.1 using $`T_b=51.2`$ mK/$`R`$ as given by equation (11) and Table LABEL:conversions.table with $`T_e=7000`$ K.

Over much of the sky the free-free features are weaker than the synchrotron features at 408 MHz. However in regions such as the Local System at intermediate latitudes and the Gum Nebula at lower latitudes, the free-free features can be brighter than the synchrotron features. This is demonstrated in the Orion region in Fig. 7 where significant free-free emission is seen at both 408 MHz and 2326 MHz. In such regions the correction is clearly important.

To estimate the level at which free-free emission is present at 408 MHz, the r.m.s. fluctuation of the 408 MHz map smoothed to $`1^{}`$ resolution, are compared with that given by the free-free template map. Table LABEL:408mhz\_rms.table gives the results for different Galactic latitude cuts. The estimate of free-free contamination suggests that at high Galactic latitude ($`|b|>40^{}`$), away from bright H$`\alpha `$features, the free-free component is a few per cent compared with the synchrotron component. At lower latitudes, the fraction increases to $`10`$ per cent. The all-sky value will be considerably underestimated since the corrections for dust absorption near the Galactic plane ($`|b|<5^{}`$) are uncertain. These estimates agree well with previous best estimates of the ratio of synchrotron and free-free. For example, the 10,15 and 33 GHz Tenerife experiments combined with the 5 GHz Jodrell Bank interferometer show that the synchrotron and free-free components at intermediate latitudes are approximately equal at $`10`$ GHz (Jones et al. 2001). Assuming spectral indices of $`3.0`$ and $`2.1`$ for the synchrotron and free-free respectively, the ratio at 408 MHz extrapolated from 10 GHz predicts $`6`$ per cent of 408 MHz emission is in the form of free-free, in good agreement with the H$`\alpha `$values given in Table LABEL:408mhz\_rms.table.

Higher frequency maps will necessarily have higher fractions of free-free emission. The widely used maps at 1420 MHz (Reich & Reich 1988) and 2326 MHz (Jonas 1998) are used for estimating the Galactic contribution at higher frequencies. Using the estimate of $`6`$ per cent at 408 MHz, the free-free fluctuations at 1420 MHz will contribute $`15`$ per cent compared to the synchrotron component at intermediate latitudes, while at 2326 MHz this increases to $`24`$ per cent. By correcting the 408 MHz map for free-free emission, a better synchrotron map can be made. This is particularly important for cross-correlation analyses which assume that the templates are not correlated.

With H$`\alpha `$data alone it is not possible to construct a free-free correction template at lower Galactic latitudes. Fig. 5.1 shows regions along the Galactic plane where the dust absorption is too large to estimate an accurate dust-free H$`\alpha `$intensity. We plan to use multi-frequency maps of the Galactic plane to separate the free-free and synchrotron components at low latitudes. The narrow free-free latitude distribution along the plane has a peak brightness at 408 MHz which varies from 40 to 80 per cent that of the broader synchrotron distribution at $`l=10^{}`$ to $`50^{}`$ (Large, Mathewson & Haslam 1961) . Accordingly, the correction of the 408 MHz map for free-free emission is important at low latitudes.

The other factor in constructing a template at $`1^{}`$ resolution from the low frequency radio maps is the effect of the main-beam to full-beam ratio ($`1.5`$) on angular scales of a few degrees; we note that the brightness temperature scale of the published maps is on the full-beam scale ($`5^{}10^{}`$). The result is that temperatures on the main-beam scale ($`1^{}`$) should be multiplied by a factor $`1.5`$ to bring them to the correct brightness temperature scale. This procedure has been considered in Sections 4.2 and 4.3 and clearly needs to be taken into account for accurate free-free and synchrotron predictions. This scale-dependence to true brightness temperature has been noted before (e.g. Jonas et al. 1998) and is currently under review when applying it to existing full-sky maps.

## 7 DISCUSSION

### 7.1 Precision of the free-free template

The H$`\alpha `$intensities given by WHAM and SHASSA have quoted calibration accuracies of 10 and 9 per cent respectively. The corresponding zero level uncertainties are approximately 0.2 and 0.5 $`R`$. The accuracy is likely to be improved as these surveys are refined. The largest uncertainty in the H$`\alpha `$intensity is in the dust absorption correction as discussed in Section 2. At intermediate and higher Galactic latitudes where $`f_d\times A_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }0.2`$ mag, the error in the corrected $`I_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }`$ is $`5`$ per cent; this error increases to $`30`$ per cent where $`f_d\times A_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }`$ is 1 mag nearer the Galactic plane.

On converting the dust-corrected $`I_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }`$ to $`T_b`$, the free-free brightness temperature, a further uncertainty is introduced by the spread in $`T_e`$, the electron temperature, in the local region of the Galaxy covered by the H$`\alpha `$maps. For $`T_e=7000\pm 1000`$ K, the $`T_b`$ uncertainty is $`\pm 10`$ per cent as derived from equation (11). As far as the emission theory used in Section 3 is concerned, we believe that the Gaunt factor and the analytical relations given are accurate to 1-2 per cent. It is assumed throughout that the H$`\alpha `$emission is given by the case B emission formulae; the observed radio $`T_b`$ values are consistent with this assumption.

### 7.2 The contribution to other templates

A radio-independent method of determining a free-free template has a significant benefit in establishing the other Galactic foreground templates for CMB studies. We have already shown in Section 6 that an improved synchrotron template can be derived from the 408 MHz map by correcting for the known free-free emission. This method breaks down for the small area along the Galactic plane where the dust absorption of the H$`\alpha `$becomes too high; other methods of determining the free-free emission are available here.

Spinning dust radiating in the region 10-40 GHz is proposed as a Galactic foreground (Draine & Lazarian 1998); observations appear to confirm this scenario (Kogut et al. 1996; Leitch et al. 1997; de Oliveira-Costa et al. 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2002; Finkbeiner et al. 2002). A strong confirmation of the presence of spinning dust radio emission correlated with the SFD98 dust template requires a clean separation of the free-free component beforehand. This is important because the dust and H$`\alpha `$are generally thought of as being correlated. An example of a region of the Galaxy where the correlation is relatively strong is $`l=(90^{}120^{}),b=(20^{}40^{})`$. This is illustrated in Fig. 10(a) which shows the correlation between H$`\alpha `$and ($`D^T`$) from SFD98 at $`1^{}`$ resolution. The relation between $`I_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }`$ and $`D^T`$ for the region in Orion $`l=(180^{}210^{}),b=(20^{}`$ to $`40^{})`$ is given in Fig. 10 (b) where it is seen that the correlation is less strong. The distribution of H$`\alpha `$and dust for the Orion region is shown in Fig. 11. The situation is clearly complex on the scale of $`1^{}`$ as would be expected for a star-forming region and underscores the necessity of removing the free-free emission before investigating spinning dust.

### 7.3 Free-free contribution to the CMB foregrounds

We will now estimate the free-free contribution to the CMB foregrounds at $`30`$ GHz. If not subtracted from the data, the foreground signal will add in quadrature to the CMB signal in the power spectrum since they will be uncorrelated on the sky. The free-free template allows statistical estimates to be made of the free-free component on angular scales $`\stackrel{>}{_{}}1^{}`$ compared to the primordial CMB fluctuations. At angular scales of $`1^{}`$ ($`\mathrm{}200`$), the CMB has r.m.s. fluctuations of $`75\mu `$K, falling to $`30\mu `$K at smaller and larger angular scales. Over a large portion of the higher latitude sky ($`|b|>40^{}`$), the average contribution of free-free emission is $`9\mu `$K at 30 GHz on scales of $`1^{}`$. This amounts to a $`1`$ per cent increase in the power spectrum at $`\mathrm{}=200`$. However, individual regions may be contaminated at a much higher level depending on their position. At higher frequencies ($`70100`$ GHz), the free-free contribution will be $`\stackrel{<}{_{}}1\mu `$K and will be negligible at high latitudes.

We can also compare the estimates for specific regions of the sky where CMB observations have been made. The VSA has observed three regions of the sky measuring angular scales of $`0^{}.32^{}.0`$ ($`\mathrm{}150900`$) covering a total area of 101 square degrees at a frequency of 34 GHz (Taylor et al. 2002). The contamination from free-free emission using the free-free template is estimated to give an r.m.s. temperature of $`0.60.8\mu `$K at the $`1^{}`$ scale and hence the free-free contamination is negligible in these selected regions.

The North Celestial Pole (NCP) region has been studied by the Saskatoon group (Wollack et al. 1997). The Saskatoon data show an anomalous component which cannot be explained on conventional grounds. Using the free-free template, the r.m.s. variations are $`3.4\mu `$K in a $`15^{}`$-diameter circle centred on the NCP on smoothing the H$`\alpha `$map to a resolution of $`1^{}.45`$ and assuming a conversion factor of $`7\mu `$K$`/R`$. Simonetti et al. (1996) use their H$`\alpha `$data to estimate an upper limit of $`4.6\mu `$K at 27.5 GHz in this region. These values of $`4\mu `$K can be compared with the $`40\mu `$K r.m.s. variations in the Saskatoon data. It therefore seems clear, that the anomalous emission is not in the form of free-free emission from gas at $`T_e10000`$ K. The current view is that it may be due to spinning dust emission as proposed by Draine & Lazarian (1998).

## 8 CONCLUSIONS

The recent publication of H$`\alpha `$surveys covering the majority of the sky has provided a break-through in obtaining a free-free Galactic foreground template of importance for CMB and ISM studies. Having derived the free-free template it is then possible to determine a better synchrotron template and to make real progress in constructing a spinning dust template. The free-free template has many other applications which include a re-analysis of the COBE-DMR data (Banday et al., in preparation) and a free-free power spectrum analysis (Dickinson et al., in preparation).

We can look forward to an improved all-sky free-free template at higher resolution than the $`1^{}`$ used in the present work. A combination of the high resolution (arcmin scale) narrow-band filter surveys such as SHASSA and VTSS combined with the high sensitivity Fabry-Perot survey at a $`1^{}`$ scale would be ideal. At lower Galactic latitudes where the dust absorption of the H$`\alpha `$emission is significant, multi-frequency continuum surveys should be able to separate the strong synchrotron and free-free components. Recombination line surveys such as those being undertaken with HIPASS in the South (Barnes et al. 2001) and HIJASS in the North (Kilborn 2002) will provide a confirmation of the low latitude free-free template and distinguish it from spinning dust which will have a very similar latitude distribution. The recombination line data will also lead to a kinematic 2-dimensional picture of the ionized gas distribution in the Galaxy using kinematic distances since they contain velocity information.

### Acknowledgments

CD acknowledges a PPARC research grant. WHAM is funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF). The Southern H-Alpha Sky Survey Atlas (SHASSA) is supported by the National Science Foundation. We thank the WHAM/SHASSA teams for making their surveys available and answering our queries. We also thank David Valls-Gabaud for verifying the calculation of the Gaunt factor.


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# A modern view of wide-angle exclusive scattering

## 1 Introduction

Recently a new approach to hard Compton scattering (CS) off protons has been proposed where the process amplitudes factorize into a hard parton-level subprocess, Compton scattering off quarks, and generalized parton distributions (GPDs) which encode the soft physics (see Fig. 1). This so-called handbag mechanism applies to deep virtual Compton scattering (DVCS)  characterized by a large virtuality, $`Q^2`$, of the incoming photon and a small squared invariant momentum transfer, $`t`$, from the incoming to the outgoing proton ($`t/Q^21`$). Subsequently it has been realized that the handbag mechanism also applies to wide-angle CS  for which $`t`$ (and $`u`$) are large but the photon virtuality is small or even zero ($`Q^2/t1`$). It is believed now that the handbag mechanism is the relevant physics for a large number of deep virtual and wide-angle exclusive reactions such as electroproduction of mesons or two-photon annihilations into pairs of hadrons.

Wide-angle exclusive reactions and in particular real CS are the subject of my talk. The handbag mechanism in CS is described in Sect. 2. The large $`t`$ behaviour of GPDs and form factors is discussed in Sect. 3 and predictions for CS are given. Characteristic results for other wide-angle exclusive processes are presented in Sect. 4.

## 2 Wide-angle Compton scattering

For Mandelstam variables $`s`$, $`t`$ and $`u`$ that are large as compared to a typical hadronic scale $`\mathrm{\Lambda }^2`$ where $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ being of order $`1\mathrm{GeV}`$, it can be shown that the handbag diagram shown in Fig. 1 describes CS. To see this it is of advantage to work in a symmetrical frame which is a c.m.s rotated in such a way that the momenta of the incoming ($`p`$) and outgoing ($`p^{}`$) proton momenta have the same light-cone plus components. In this frame the skewness, defined as

$$\xi =\frac{(pp^{})^+}{(p+p^{})^+},$$
(1)
is zero. The bubble in the handbag is viewed as a sum over all possible parton configurations as in deep ineleastic lepton-proton scattering (DIS). The crucial assumptions in the handbag approach are that of restricted parton virtualities, $`k_i^2<\mathrm{\Lambda }^2`$, and of intrinsic transverse parton momenta, $`𝐤_𝐢`$, defined with respect to their parent hadron’s momentum, which satisfy $`k_i^2/x_i<\mathrm{\Lambda }^2`$, where $`x_i`$ is the momentum fraction parton $`i`$ carries.

One can then show  that the subprocess Mandelstam variables $`\widehat{s}`$ and $`\widehat{u}`$ are the same as the ones for the full process, Compton scattering off protons, up to corrections of order $`\mathrm{\Lambda }^2/t`$:

$`\widehat{s}=(k_j+q)^2(p+q)^2=s,\widehat{u}=(k_jq^{})^2(pq^{})^2=u.`$ (2)
The active partons, i.e. the ones to which the photons couple, are approximately on-shell, move collinear with their parent hadrons and carry a momentum fraction close to unity, $`x_j,x_j^{}1`$. Thus, like in DVCS, the physical situation is that of a hard parton-level subprocess, $`\gamma q\gamma q`$, and a soft emission and reabsorption of quarks from the proton. The light-cone helicity amplitudes  for wide-angle CS then read

$`M_{\mu ^{}+,\mu +}(s,t)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{e}{2}}[T_{\mu ^{}+,\mu +}(s,t)(R_V(t)+R_A(t))`$ (3)
$`+T_{\mu ^{},\mu }(s,t)(R_V(t)R_A(t))],`$
$`M_{\mu ^{},\mu +}(s,t)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{e}{2}}{\displaystyle \frac{\sqrt{t}}{2m}}\left[T_{\mu ^{}+,\mu +}(s,t)+T_{\mu ^{},\mu }(s,t)\right]R_T(t).`$
$`\mu ,\mu ^{}`$ denote the helicities of the incoming and outgoing photons, respectively. The helicities of the protons in $`M`$ and of the quarks in the hard scattering amplitude $`T`$ are labeled by their signs. $`m`$ denotes the mass of the proton. The hard scattering has been calculated to next-to-leading order perturbative QCD , see Fig. 1. To this order the gluonic subprocess, $`\gamma g\gamma g`$, has to be taken into account as well. The form factors $`R_i`$ represent $`1/\overline{x}`$-moments of GPDs at zero skewness. This representation which requires the dominance of the plus components of the proton matrix elements, is a non-trivial feature given that, in contrast to DIS and DVCS, not only the plus components of the proton momenta but also their minus and transverse components are large here. It is interesting to note that the DVCS amplitudes

$`M^{\mathrm{DVCS}}`$ $``$ $`\overline{u}(p^{})\gamma ^+u(p){\displaystyle _1^1}𝑑\overline{x}H(\overline{x},\xi ,t)\left[{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{x}\xi +iϵ}}+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\overline{x}+\xi iϵ}}\right]`$ (4)
$`+E,\stackrel{~}{H},\stackrel{~}{E}\mathrm{terms},`$
although being derived for large $`Q^2`$ and small $`t`$, embodies the wide-angle amplitudes (3) as can easily been seen by setting $`\xi =0`$ and evaluating the kinematical factors in front of the integral at large $`t`$. The integrals over $`H`$, $`E`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{H}`$ turn into the form factors $`R_V`$, $`R_T`$ and $`R_A`$, respectively. The GPD $`\stackrel{~}{E}`$ does not contribute at $`\xi =0`$.

The handbag amplitudes (3) lead to the following result for the Compton cross section

$`{\displaystyle \frac{d\sigma }{dt}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{d\widehat{\sigma }}{dt}}\{{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}[R_V^2(t)(1+\kappa _T^2)+R_A^2(t)]`$ (5)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{us}{s^2+u^2}}[R_V^2(t)(1+\kappa _T^2)R_A^2(t)]\}+O(\alpha _s),`$
where $`d\widehat{\sigma }/dt`$ is the Klein-Nishina cross section for CS of massless, point-like spin-1/2 particles of charge unity. The parameter $`\kappa _T`$ is defined as

$$\kappa _T=\frac{\sqrt{t}}{2m}\frac{R_T}{R_V}$$
(6)
Another interesting observable in CS is the helicity correlation, $`A_{LL}`$, between the initial state photon and proton or, equivalently, the helicity transfer, $`K_{LL}`$, from the incoming photon to the outgoing proton. In the handbag approach one obtains

$$A_{LL}=K_{LL}\frac{s^2u^2}{s^2+u^2}\frac{R_A}{R_V}+O(\kappa _T,\alpha _s),$$
(7)
where the factor in front of the form factors is the corresponding observable for $`\gamma q\gamma q`$. The result (7) is a robust prediction of the handbag mechanism, the magnitude of the subprocess helicity correlation is only diluted somewhat by the ratio of the form factors $`R_A`$ and $`R_V`$. On the other hand, the helicity correlation for sideways polarized protons (i.e. perpendicular to the proton’s three-momentum and in the scattering plane), is very sensitive to details of the approach. It reads

$$A_{LS}=K_{LS}\frac{t}{su}\frac{R_A}{R_V}\kappa _T\left[1+\frac{2m}{\sqrt{s}}\frac{\sqrt{t}}{\sqrt{s}+\sqrt{u}}\kappa _T^1\right]+O(\alpha _\mathrm{s}).$$
(8)
## 3 The large-$`t`$ behaviour of GPDs

In oder to make actual predictions for CS however models for the soft form factors or rather for the underlying GPDs are required. A first attempt to parameterize the GPDs $`H`$ and $`\stackrel{~}{H}`$ at zero skewness has been given in

$`H^a(\overline{x},0;t)`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{exp}\left[a^2t{\displaystyle \frac{1\overline{x}}{2\overline{x}}}\right]q_a(\overline{x}),`$
$`\stackrel{~}{H}^a(\overline{x},0;t)`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{exp}\left[a^2t{\displaystyle \frac{1\overline{x}}{2\overline{x}}}\right]\mathrm{\Delta }q_a(\overline{x}),`$ (9)
where $`q(\overline{x})`$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }q(\overline{x})`$ are the usual unpolarized and polarized parton distributions in the proton 111The parameterization (9) can be motivated by overlaps of light-cone wave functions which have a Gaussian $`\stackrel{}{k}_{}`$ dependence .. $`a`$, the transverse size of the proton, is the only free parameter and even it is restricted to the range of about 0.8 to 1.2 $`\mathrm{GeV}^1`$. Note that $`a`$ essentially refers to the lowest Fock states of the proton which, as phenomenological experience tells us, are rather compact. The model (9) is designed for large $`t`$. Hence, forced by the Gaussian in (9), large $`\overline{x}`$ is implied, too. Despite of this the normalization of the model GPDs at $`t=0`$ is correct.

With the model GPDs (9) at hand one can evaluate the various form factors by taking appropriate moments, e.g.

$$F_1=\underset{q}{}e_q_1^1𝑑\overline{x}H^q(\overline{x},0;t),R_V=\underset{q}{}e_q^2_1^1\frac{d\overline{x}}{\overline{x}}H^q(\overline{x},0;t).$$
(10)
Results for the form factors are shown in Fig. 2. Obviously, as the comparison with experiment  reveals, the model GPDs work quite well in the case of the Dirac form factor. The scaled form factors $`t^2F_1`$ and $`t^2R_i`$ exhibit broad maxima which mimick dimensional counting in a range of $`t`$ from, say, $`5`$ to about $`20\mathrm{GeV}^2`$. The position of the maximum of any of the scaled form factors is approximately located at

$$t_04a^2\frac{1\overline{x}}{\overline{x}}_{F(R)}^1.$$
(11)
The mildly $`t`$-dependent mean value $`(1\overline{x})/\overline{x}`$ comes out around $`1/2`$. A change of $`a`$ moves the position of the maximum of the scaled form factors but leaves their magnitudes essentially unchanged.

The Pauli form factor $`F_2`$ and its Compton analogue $`R_T`$ contribute to proton helicity flip matrix elements and are related to the GPD $`E`$ analogously to (10). This connection suggests that, at least for not too small values of $`t`$, $`R_T/R_V`$ roughly behaves as $`F_2/F_1`$. Thus, on the basis of the SLAC data  on $`F_2/F_1`$, one expects $`R_T/R_Vm^2/t`$ while the recent JLab data  rather indicate a behaviour as $`m/\sqrt{t}`$. If the first estimate is correct the contribution from the form factor $`R_T`$ to Compton scattering can be ignored while in the second case it is to be taken into account since it contributes to the same order in $`\mathrm{\Lambda }/\sqrt{t}`$ as the other form factors. Since it is not yet clear which behaviour is the correct one, predictions for Compton observables are given for two different scenarios. Both $`R_T`$ and $`\alpha _\mathrm{s}`$ corrections are omitted in scenario B but taken into account in A where the ratio $`\kappa _T`$ is assumed to have a value of 0.37 as estimated from the JLab form factor data .

Employing these model GPDs and the corresponding form factors, various Compton observables can be calculated . The predictions for the differential cross section are in fair agreement with experiment. The approximative $`s^6`$-scaling of the predictions is related to the broad maximum the scaled form factors exhibit, see Fig. 2. JLab will provide accurate cross section data soon which will allow a detailed examination of the handbag mechanism.

Predictions for $`K_{LL}`$ and $`K_{LS}`$ are shown in Fig. 3. The JLab E99-114 collaboration  has presented a first measurement of $`K_{LL}`$ and $`K_{LS}`$ at a c.m.s. scattering angle of $`120^{}`$ and a photon energy of $`3.23\mathrm{GeV}`$. These still preliminary data points are in fair agreement with the predictions from the handbag given the small energy at which they are available. The kinematical requirement of the handbag mechanism $`s,t,u\mathrm{\Lambda }^2`$ is not well satisfied and therefore one has to be aware of large dynamical and kinematical corrections. Among them there are proton mass effects which have been investigated in Ref. .

There is an alternative to the handbag factorization. This is the leading-twist scheme  where all valence quarks the involved hadrons are made up participate in the hard scattering and not just a single one. Although it is believed for good reasons that the leading-twist scheme dominates for asymptotically large $`s`$, it is not clear theoretically which of the two approaches provides the appropriate description of wide-angle Compton scattering at, say, $`t10\mathrm{GeV}^2`$. The ultimate decision is to be made by experiment. In fact, leading-twist calculations, e.g. , reveal difficulties with the size of the Compton cross section, the numerical results are way below experiment. Moreover, the leading-twist approach leads to a negative value for $`K_{LL}`$ at angles larger than $`90^{}`$ where the handbag predictions are positive (see Fig. 3). $`K_{LS}`$ is zero to leading-twist order.

For large $`t`$ and $`\overline{x}\stackrel{>}{}0.6`$, the zero-skewness GPDs (9) can be parameterized as

$$H^q(\overline{x},0,t)f_q\overline{x}(1\overline{x})^{b_q}\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{a^2t}{2}\frac{1\overline{x}}{\overline{x}}\right],$$
(12)
and analogously for the other ones; evolution is ignored for simplicity. The various form factors, see for instance (10), imply integrals over GPDs from 0 to 1. However, for $`t\stackrel{>}{}10\mathrm{GeV}^2`$, the exponential in (12) cuts off the small $`\overline{x}`$ region and, as can easily be checked numerically, it suffices to integrate from 0.6 to 1. Hence, one can work out the large $`t`$ behaviour of the form factors from the parameterization (12).

For very large values of $`t`$, well above $`100\mathrm{GeV}^2`$, the form factors behave as

$$F_1^q,R_{V,A}^q(1/t)^{b_q+1}.$$
(13)
This correspondence between the large-$`\overline{x}`$ behaviour of the parton distributions and the large $`t`$ behaviour of the form factors is analogous to the Drell-Yan-West relation . The asymptotic behaviour (13) emerges very slowly; for $`t`$ near $`10\mathrm{GeV}^2`$ the form factors effectively behave $`t^2`$ as can be seen from Fig. 2.

Using $`b_u=b_d3`$ and $`b_{sea}7`$ in agreement with overlaps evaluated from SU(6) symmetric wave functions  222In the phenomenological parton distributions, see e.g. Ref. , $`b_d`$ is rather 4 than 3 with the consequence of suppressed $`d`$-quark contributions to the electromagnetic proton and neutron form factors for large $`t`$. In the large-$`\overline{x}`$ region however, the errors in the phenomenological parton distributions are substantial., one sees that the active quarks in the handbag are valence quarks for large $`t`$. This does not imply that the proton is only made of valence quarks; the bubble in the handbag, see Fig. 1, represents a sum over all parton configurations allowed by the conservation laws. Evaluating the form factors from (12) and the above powers $`b_q`$, one finds for the ratios of neutron over proton form factors

$$\frac{d}{u}\rho =\frac{f_d}{f_u},\frac{F_{1n}}{F_{1p}}\frac{\rho +e_d/e_u}{1+e_d/e_u\rho },\frac{R_{1n}}{R_{1p}}\frac{\rho +(e_d/e_u)^2}{1+(e_d/e_u)^2\rho },$$
(14)
which approximately hold for $`t\stackrel{>}{}10\mathrm{GeV}^2`$. Since the vector form factor dominates the Compton cross section, the ratio of neutron over proton cross sections is approximatively given by

$$d\sigma _n/d\sigma _p\left[\frac{\rho +(e_d/e_u)^2}{1+(e_d/e_u)^2\rho }\right]^2.$$
(15)
Measurements of the parton distributions for $`\overline{x}\stackrel{>}{}0.6`$ and of the neutron form factors at sufficiently large $`t`$ would thus allow further tests of the handbag mechanism. It is to be stressed that the relations (14) do not rely on details of the parameterization (12), required is only a sufficiently strong suppression of contributions from the low-$`\overline{x}`$ region. The asymptotic behaviour (13), however, demands more. The effective range of $`\overline{x}`$ must shrink to unity with increasing $`t`$ ( $`[1+c/t,1]`$ with $`c>0`$ ).

## 4 The handbag mechanism in other wide-angle reactions

The handbag approach has been applied to several other high-energy wide-angle reactions. Thus, as shown in Ref. , the calculation of real Compton scattering can be straightforwardly extended to virtual Compton scattering provided $`Q^2/t1`$. The handbag approach also applies to reactions like $`\gamma p\gamma \mathrm{\Delta }(N^{})`$. New GPDs, parameterizing the soft proton-$`\mathrm{\Delta }(N^{})`$ matrix elements, occur in these reactions . For the wide-angle region, however, such processes have not yet been calculated.

Photo- and electroproduction of mesons have also been discussed within the handbag approach  using, as in deep virtual electroproduction , a one-gluon exchange mechanism for the generation of the meson. The normalization of the photoproduction cross section is not yet understood. Either vector meson dominance contributions are still predominant or the generation of the meson by the exchange of a hard gluon underestimates the handbag contribution. Despite of this the handbag contribution to photo- and electroproduction has several interesting properties which perhaps survive an improvement of the approach. For instance, the helicity correlation $`\widehat{A}_{LL}`$ for the subprocess $`\gamma q\pi q`$ is the same as for $`\gamma q\gamma q`$, see (7). $`A_{LL}`$ for the full process is diluted by form factors similar to the case of Compton scattering. Another interesting result is the ratio of the cross sections for the photoproduction of $`\pi ^+`$ and $`\pi ^{}`$ which is approximately given by

$$\frac{d\sigma (\gamma n\pi ^{}p)}{d\sigma (\gamma p\pi ^+n)}\left[\frac{e_du+e_us}{e_uu+e_ds}\right]^2.$$
(16)
The form factors which, for a given flavor, are the same as those appearing in CS, cancel in the ratio. The prediction (16) is in fair agreement with a recent JLab measurement  which, at $`90^{}`$, provides values of $`1.73\pm 0.15`$ and $`1.70\pm 0.20`$ for the ratio at beam energies of $`4.158`$ and $`5.536\mathrm{GeV}`$, respectively.

Elastic hadron-hadron scattering can be treated as well. Details have not yet been worked out but it has been shown that form factors of the type discussed in Sect. 3 control elastic scattering, too . The experimentally observed scaling behaviour of these cross sections can be attributed to the broad maxima the scaled form factors show, see Fig. 2 and Eq. (11).

Two-photon annihilations into pairs of hadrons can also be calculated, the arguments for handbag factorization hold as well as has recently been shown in Ref.  (see also Ref. ). The cross section for the production of a pair of pseudoscalar mesons or baryons read

$`{\displaystyle \frac{d\sigma }{dt}}(\gamma \gamma M\overline{M})`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{8\pi \alpha _{\mathrm{elm}}^2}{s^2\mathrm{sin}^4\theta }}\left|R_{M\overline{M}}(s)\right|^2`$
$`{\displaystyle \frac{d\sigma }{dt}}(\gamma \gamma B\overline{B})`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{4\pi \alpha _{\mathrm{elm}}^2}{s^2\mathrm{sin}^2\theta }}\left\{\right|R_A^B(s)+R_P^B(s)|^2`$ (17)
$`+`$ $`\mathrm{cos}^2\theta |R_V^B(s)|^2+{\displaystyle \frac{s}{4m^2}}|R_P^B(s)|^2\}.`$
In analogy to Eq. (10) the form factors represent integrated two-hadron distribution amplitudes which are time-like versions of GPDs. The angle dependencies are in fair agreement with experiment.

A characterisic feature of the handbag mechanism in the time-like region is the intermediate $`q\overline{q}`$ state implying the absence of isospin-two components in the final state. A consequence of this property is

$$\frac{d\sigma }{dt}(\gamma \gamma \pi ^0\pi ^0)=\frac{d\sigma }{dt}(\gamma \gamma \pi ^+\pi ^{}),$$
(18)
which is independent of the soft physics input and is, in so far, a robust prediction of the handbag approach. The absence of the isospin-two components combined with flavor symmetry allows one to calculate the cross sections for other $`B\overline{B}`$ channels using the form factors for $`p\overline{p}`$ as the only soft physics input.

## 5 Summary

I have reviewed the theoretical activities on applications of the handbag mechanism to wide-angle scattering. There are many interesting predictions, some are in fair agreement with experiment, others still awaiting their experimental examination. It seems that the handbag mechanism plays an important role in wide-angle exclusive reactions for momentum transfers of the order of $`10\mathrm{GeV}^2`$. However, before we can draw firm conclusions more experimental tests are needed. The leading-twist approach, on the other hand, typically provides cross sections which are way below experiment. As is well-known the cross section data for many hard exclusive processes exhibit approximate dimensional counting rule behaviour. Infering from this fact the dominance of the leading-twist contribution is premature. The handbag mechanism can explain this approximate power law behaviour (and often the magnitude of the cross sections), too. It is attributed to the broad maxima the scaled form factors show and, hence, reflects the the transverse size of the lowest Fock states of the involved hadrons.

I finally emphasize that the structure of the handbag amplitude, namely its representation as a product of perturbatively calculable hard scattering amplitudes and $`t`$-dependent form factors is the essential result. Refuting the handbag approach necessitates experimental evidence against this factorization.


text:
# Does the thermal-spike affect low-energy ion-induced interfacial mixing?

## I Introduction

With the appearance of nanotechnology the importance of thin films increased considerably. Either during making thin films by any kind of various sputtering processes or in thin film analysis (various kinds of sputter depth profiling techniques) the thin film system is subjected to low energy ion bombardment. For this reason the study of the effects of the low energy ion irradiation of thin film structures is of high importance.

One of the effects of ion bombardment is interfacial ion beam mixing. This term is used for that process when an originally sharp interface (IF) between pure A and B materials gets broader due to ion bombardment. The ion mixing (IM) phenomenon is known for a long time . The majority of our knowledge refers to cases when the interface to be mixed is relatively deep in the matrix (that is, far from the free surface) and consequently the ion energy applied is in the range of 100 keV .

Several theoretical approaches and techniques have also been developed and a rather coherent picture seems to have emerged . Though there is no principal difference between the low and high energy ion mixing still the previous experimental and theoretical techniques cannot be directly applied for the low energy case. The most important difference between the high and low energy ion mixing is that (i) the latter occurs close to the free surface and (ii) its extent is obviously much less than that of high energy mixing.

With the increasing computation speed MD simulations have become a standard tool to study the low energy ion beam surface interaction, and interface mixing as well. MD simulation of IM has been the subject of several studies in the last decades . IM in multilayer system has also been investigated by several groups using MD . A common feature of these studies is that only a single ion impact has been considered during the simulations. Experimental analysis of interfacial mixing in multilayer metals, however, always deal with a series of ion impacts. For instance, Auger depth profiling analysis of multilayers should lead to the removal of the target during analysis . As a first step, we in this study focus on understanding the single-ion process. To go beyond this level we will employ a series of ion impacts in the next study.

The other common feature of the studies available is that they use a normal angle of incidence. We should like to model ion milling and destructive depth profiling techniques . Based on experimental evidences we know that for the optimum application of these methods one should apply low energy ion bombardment with grazing angle of incidence (to minimize the surface morphology development). This arrangement, however, is far from the previous one. First, the angle of incidence is grazing in contrast to normal angle of incidence. Second, Pinzon et al.  recently showed by MD calculation that the damage structure changes with angle of incidence. At grazing angle of incidence ion bombardment the defects are confined close to the surface.

Another interesting aspect of ion-beam mixing is theoretical. It is still unclear whether the mechanism of IM is purely ballistic or heat spikes play essential role in the magnitude of interfacial mixing . In particular within the thermal spike (TS) model  the heat of mixing ($`\mathrm{\Delta }H_m`$) is found to be a key quantity in determining the magnitude of mixing. The role of heat of mixing on governing mixing processes is questioned by R. Kelly et al. . They emphasized the role of residual defects in mixing (long ranged effects). Although the thermal spike concept is widely accepted, its applicability for low-energy bombardments is not straightforward. MD simulation of cascades have been reported with evidence that local melting occurs during the termal spike phases which persists for several ps in the $`35`$ keV energy regime . Our intention is to study IM in the case of low energy impact at $`1`$ keV. This energy regime is around the lower limit of the TS model , and the number of simulation studies in this field is limited . Gades and Urbassek  reported MD simulations for pure Cu at 1 keV which supports the phenomenological model of Cheng et al.. However, it is not clear whether the TS model will apply for multilayers with different constituents at low ion energies. The reason we are particularly interested in 1 keV Ar bombardment is its relevance to Auger depth profiling .

The reported MD simulations, in accordance with the model of Cheng et al. , show that the interfacial mixing (IFM) exhibits an inverse-square dependence on the cohesive energy; however they also show a non-linear variation of the interface broadening with $`\mathrm{\Delta }H_m`$. It is therefore interesting to study the effect of thermodynamic properties such as the heat of mixing $`\mathrm{\Delta }H_m`$ on mixing at low ion energies. Studying high energy IM of Ti/Pt Kim et al.  concluded that the mixing is governed by TS. Cirlin et al.  measured the depth resolution of AES depth profiling on Ti/Pt system and concluded that even at 1 keV the mixing is partially determined by TS.

In this communication we report on MD calculation of Ti/Pt layered structure applying grazing angle of incidence $`Ar^+`$ bombardment at 1 keV. Though the crystal lattice and the mass of atoms will be determined according to the basic feature of Ti and Pt, the Pt-Ti mixed part of the potential will be varied to determine the effect of $`\mathrm{\Delta }H_m`$ on the mixing.

## II The multilayer sample and the simulation method

Classical molecular dynamics simulations were used to simulate collisional mixing using the PARCAS code developed by Nordlund et al. . Here we only shortly summarize the most important aspects. Its detailed description is given in . The classical equations of motion were solved according to the Gear fifth-order predictor-corrector algorithm. A velocity dependent variable time step of integration was used. Periodic boundary conditions were applied to the fixed-size simulation cells. The electronic stopping power was included in the runs as a nonlocal frictional force affecting all atoms with a kinetic energy higher then 10 eV.

The sample consists of 37289 atoms for the interface system with 4 Ti top layers and a bulk which is Pt. The Ti (hcp) and Pt (fcc) layers at the interface are separated by $`2.8`$ Å. The computational cell has a size of roughly $`85\times 85\times 85`$ Å. This simulation cell is of our particular interest because preliminary calculations indicate that 1 keV Ar<sup>+</sup> with grazing angle of incidence provides the interesting situation when the recoils penetrates approximately 4 layers deep below the surface. Therefore the average center of the cascade is positioned close the interface. The lattice mismatch is optimized properly at the interface in order to reduce the interfacial strain to less then $`2`$ %. The best match of Ti (hcp) and Pt (fcc) layers are carried out by probing various structures put together by hand. The most favorably matched system have been selected for further simulations.

The crystallite is kept at 0 K at the beginning of the simulations. The entire iterfacial system is equilibrated prior to the irradiation simulations and the temperature scaled softly down towards zero at the outermost three atomic layers during the cascade events . Since in the present study we are interested in the fundamental mechanism of interfacial mixing, we choose 0 K as the ambient temperature seems to be appropriate to prevent any thermally activated effects from complicating the analysis. A study of temperature dependence of IFM is planned in a further study. The collision cascade were initiated by placing an Ar atom outside the surface and giving it a kinetic energy of $`1`$ keV towards the surface. The initial velocity direction of the impacting atom was $`83`$ degree with respest to the surface normal.

To obtain a representative statistics, the impact position of the incoming ion is varied randomly up to $`15`$ events. We find considerable variation of mixing as a function of the impact position of the recoil. The simulations are terminated at about $`20`$ ps after the projectile impact.

During the simulations, an atom was labeled ”liquid” if the average kinetic energy of it and its nearest neighbours was above an energy corresponding to the melting point of the material through the usual relation between temperature and kinetic energy, $`E=\frac{3}{2}kT`$. It is then possible to carry out liquid atom analysis, which allows us to estimate the spatial extent of the cascade or the thermal spike region (the local melt). The liquid phase (typically occurs at $`0.10.5`$ ps with a sharp ”ballistic” peak ) is the direct result of thermalization of ballistic recoils and in this sense these liquid atoms do not correspond to the classical concept of a liquid in any meaningful way . However, if the temperature of the atoms persists above the melting temperature longer then 1-2 ps then it can be called as a liquid which corresponds to a thermal spike. The liquid region corresponds to a classical liquid in the sense that the pair distribution function resembles that of a liquid in equilibrium .

The Berendsen temperature control is used throughout the simulations . A complete analysis of the structural output file (movie file) has been carried out for each irradiation event for some chosen time steps (mixing, liquid, vacancy, adatom etc. analysis).

An atom is labeled mixed if it moves beyond the interface during the simulation by more then the half of the Ti-Pt interfacial distance in the initial sample ($`1.4\AA `$).

Vacancies were recognized in the simulations using a very simple analysis. A lattice site with an empty cell was considered to be a vacancy where the diameter of the cell sphere is set to $`2\AA `$ (the radius of a sphere around the relocated atom around its original position) which is about $`60\%`$ of the average atomic distance in this system. We find this criterion is suitable for counting the number of vacancies. We monitored the change in the surface location, and it is less than $`0.3\AA `$ during the simulation time. It is therefore does not affect the efficiency of the method used for vacancy, adatom and mixing analysis.

Our simulation method  used in this study allows us to assign the value of heat of mixing of the metal pair relatively easily . The attractive part of the Cleri-Rosato many-body potential  used in this study

$$V^i(r_{ij})=(\underset{j}{}\xi ^2e^{2Q(r_{ij}/r_01)})^{1/2},$$
(1)
where $`r_{ij}`$ represents the interatomic distance between atoms $`i`$ and $`j`$, $`r_0`$ is the first-neighbour distance. The total cohesive energy of the system is then

$$E_c=\underset{i}{}(E_R^i+E_B^i),$$
(2)
where $`E_R^i`$ is a repulsive term of the Born-Mayer type .

By varying the parameter $`\xi `$ in Eq. (1) the heat of mixing can easily be varied without influencing other parameters of the crystall. The heat of mixing is calculated in the usual way,

$$\mathrm{\Delta }H_m=0.5(E_A+E_B)E_{AB},$$
(3)
where $`E_A`$, $`E_B`$ and $`E_{AB}`$ are the total energies/atom of the corresponding constituents. The heat of mixing of Ti/Pt is substantial ($`75`$ kJ/mol) according to the Miedema calculation . Varying $`\xi `$ in the range of $`02.55`$ the heat of mixing calculated from Eq. (3) varies in the range of $`+75141`$ kJ/mol, the Miedema value can be achieved by taking $`\xi 2.35`$.

## III Single ion impact on the Ti/Pt system

The most important technical problem of the simulation is that the various parameters describing the change of the sample due to ion impact including mixing strongly depends on the position of the ion impact. Thus we always consider $`15`$ events with random impact positions and the average and the scatter of the parameters will be given. FIGs (1)-(4) show final and intermediate states of the samples after $`20`$ and at $`2`$ ps after a single ion impact for $`\xi =2.35`$. FIGs (1)-(2) depict a strongly and (FIGs (3)-(4)) a weakly mixed sample with different impact positions. Originally the upper 4 layers were pure Ti. For the present case we can conclude that a single ion causes a heavy distortion in the sample. Pt and Ti appears in the originally pure Ti and Pt regions, respectively, that is, considerable mixing occurs. Besides the mixed atoms we can recognize several vacancies, interstitials and adatoms. For the shown cases in these events the number of mixed atoms, $`N_{mix}52`$ and $`9`$, respectively.

Considering all $`15`$ events $`N_{mix}`$ varies between $`952`$. Comparing FIGs (1)-(2) we see the heavily distorted structure at $`2`$ ps and the considerable mass transport of Pt in the Ti phase. Comparing FIGs (3)-(4) the difference between the relaxed ($`20`$ ps) and the distorted structures is even more remarkable. In particular FIG (1) shows us that the system remained distorted even after relaxation. From the point of view of the mechanism, however, these figures are not satisfactorily informative.

If we would like to correlate IFM with the TS, we should consider time evolution of the number of liquid atoms and the average local temperature of the liquid atoms. This is shown in FIGs (5)-(6) for various events, in case for low, medium and high mixing rates. For simplicity we display only two mixing cases on FIG (6). The curves are rather similar. All are dominated by a huge peak at around $`150`$ fs (characteristic ballistic peak). The thermal spike period can be attributed  to the tails of the curves. Its length and magnitude depends on the number of mixed atoms. The higher the number of mixed atoms the longer is the TS period. However, all liquid atoms disappear at around $`1.5`$ ps. Thus if the mixing is governed by TS then it should occur until $`1.5`$ ps. The average local temperature of the liquid atoms (FIG (6)) remains above the melting temperature during the TS which indicates that there is a local melt already at 1 keV which persists until 1-1.5 ps. The number of liquid atoms abruptly scales down to zero at $`t1.75`$ ps (the end of the TS) due to the solidification of the local melt.

In FIGs (7)- (8) the time evolution of IFM, that is the number of mixed Ti and Pt atoms as a function of time is given for a weakly and strongly mixed sample. It is obvious that the two figures show similar features and thus we can conclude that the time evolution does not depend on the magnitude of mixing.

These curves show some unexpected features. First of all mixing is strongly asymmetric. In case of high mixing (FIG (7)) the number of the mixed (heavier) Pt atoms starts to increase just after the ballistic process is terminated and reaches a maximum during the TS period ($`1`$ ps). With the decrease of the number of liquid atoms to zero at $`1.75`$ ps the number of mixed Pt atoms also decreases. But after this local minimum an additional increase comes. It reaches about the same value at about $`2`$ ps which is at $`1`$ ps but at $`2`$ ps there is no liquid atom present. This feature is shown in an even more striking way in FIG (8). In the case of low mixing the first peak of Pt appears at about $`0.5`$ ps, while the number of liquid atoms disappears at $`0.25`$ ps (see FIG (5). On the other hand the general behaviour of the curves in FIG (7) and FIG (8) are similar and it seems that the time evolution of the number of mixed atoms is independent of the magnitude of mixing for Pt. However, we see somewhat different behaviour for Ti. In FIG (8) Ti reaches its maximum more rapidly then in FIG (7). The number of the mixed Ti atoms starts to increase when the number of mixed Pt atoms reached a maximum. With the increase of the number of mixed Ti atoms the decrease of the number of mixed Pt atoms takes place, however, we see no evidence for such a process for the weakly mixed sample on FIG (8). During these processes the number of liquid atoms is zero. To sum up we see the decoupling of mixing of Pt and Ti during the TS and coupling sets in after a while the TS.

The time evolution of the adatoms, shown in FIG (9), somewhat resembles that of mixed Pt atoms. It is a double peaked curve, which abruptly decreases at $`3`$ ps when the number of mixed Pt atoms reaches a quasi-constant value. On the other hand the time evolution of the vacancies differs from that of adatoms (FIG (10)). There is a smaller peak in the vacancy time evolution in the $`01`$ ps range. Between $`13`$ ps the number of vacancies reaches a minimum with a low value of $`4`$, and it begins to rise at $`3`$ ps to reach a constant value of about $`20`$ at $`5`$ ps. We note that the increase of the number of mixed Ti atoms starts somewhat earlier (at $`2`$ ps) and reaches a constant value at $`3`$ ps.

Based on these observations it seems to be clear that a simple TS model cannot account for the mixing process. Rather it seems that the mixing occurs as a relaxation process. Surprisingly, IFM starts with a considerable mass transport of Pt and partly coincides with the TS, but as it is shown for the weakly mixed sample (FIG (8)), it might be independent from it.

The reasonable correlation with the number of the Ti adatoms suggests that the IFM process of Pt is strongly influenced by the presence of the free surface. After the first phase of Pt mixing is over the Ti atoms starts to move and with some delay considerable number of vacancies appear. Both changes can be explained as a relaxation process, which decreases the energy of the system.

Based on the above discussion we might conclude that the IFM is independent of the TS. If it is so, then the mixing cannot depend on the heat of mixing. With the change of the Ti-Pt interaction potential by means of changing $`\xi `$ we can produce systems which are basically similar is mass, crystal structure etc. but their heat of mixing is different. FIG (11) shows the dependence of the number of mixed atoms on $`\mathrm{\Delta }H_m`$ based on 15 simulations with random impact positions/point. As we have already mentioned, the magnitude of mixing is strongly impact position dependent. Anyhow, having this statistics we cannot see any dependence on $`\mathrm{\Delta }H_m`$, which supports the discussion above although the high rate of incertainties at each of the points seen in FIG (11) does not prove solidly our findings above. In particular our findings are in contrast with the results of Gades et al. . They found a strong dependence of mixing on $`\mathrm{\Delta }H_m`$ in agreement with the phenomenological models . Although that study is confined to the case of mixing of pure Cu and of various model metals having the same crystall structure and therefore the unsymmetrical nature of mixing does not occur. What could be the role of TS if any in this mixing process? To answer this question we also show the time evolution of the center of the liquid zone in FIG (12). The dotted lines at $`z=35.5`$ and at $`27`$ ($`z`$ is the depth position in $`\AA `$) mark the free surface and the interface, respectively. For higher mixing rate the center of the liquid zone (the average of the $`z`$-coordinate of the hot atoms) is nearly confined close to the interface, while for the case of lowest mixing it moves towards the surface. As it was mentioned in the case of the weakly mixed sample, the magnitude of the overall mixing scales with the duration of the liquid phase. Since the center of the liquid phase is at the interface, one might argue that considerable energy is concentrated around the interface which later partly after the freezing of the TS relaxes causing IFM.

But the liquid phase energy depends only on the conditions of ion impact and will not change upon $`\mathrm{\Delta }H_m`$. Thus we explained that though the liquid phase creation is strongly connected to the magnitude of mixing, still the mixing is independent of $`\mathrm{\Delta }H_m`$.

## IV Conclusion

Molecular-dynamic simulation was carried out for the Ti/Pt system to explain the ion bombardment induced mixing at 1 keV $`Ar^+`$ ion bombardment at grazing angle of incidence. We have found that the mixing does not depend on the heat of mixing, as might have been expected. That is, it is not the thermal spike process which governs the mixing in this case. Though we found that the magnitude of mixing is scaling with the number and position of the liquid atoms, this does not depend on the heat of mixing. Rather the majority of the mixing processes are taking place in that time, when liquid atoms are not present. Moreover it was found that the mixing of Ti and Pt are not correlated. We propose that the mixing occurs as a relaxation prcoess.

## V acknowledgement

This work is supported by the OTKA grants F037710 and T30430 from the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and from EU contract no. ICAI-CT-2000-70029.