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# Star forming rates between 𝑧=0.25 and 𝑧=1.2 from the CADIS emission line survey.

## 1 Introduction

A number of studies of the star forming rate (SFR) were performed at different redshift regimes between the present epoch (Gallego et al. 1995) over intermediate redshifts (Tresse & Maddox 1998; Sullivan et al. (2000, 2001); Lilly et al. 1996; Cowie et al. 1997; Connolly et al. 1997) up to redshifts $`3`$ (Madau et al. 1996; Pettini et al. 1998). Their results suggest, that the SFR has declined from a maximum plateau at $`z1.5`$ to an one order of magnitude lower value in the present time.

The most direct way to determine the SFR is to observe the luminosity density of the H$`\alpha `$ line, which is little affected by extinction, excitation, and metallicity, and for which Kennicutt (1983, 1992) has derived a well established calibration relation. For redshifts higher than 0.4, however, it is necessary to use emission lines other than H$`\alpha `$, the luminosity of which are not so clearly related to SFR (Cowie et al. 1997; Hogg et al. 1998; Rosa-Gonzalez et al. 2002), or to observe in the near infrared (Yan et al. 1999; Teplitz et al. 2000; Pettini et al. 2001). Observations in the far infrared generally led to higher rates (Rowan-Robinson et al. 1997; Hughes et al. 1998; Flores et al. 1999)

As shown by Lilly et al. (1996), the star formation can also be derived from the UV luminosity of galaxies. Here however, the conversion to the SFR is severely affected by internal extinction, and for several years there was a huge gap between UV determined rates and the rates derived by other observational methods, since the proper extinction correction was not known. Recent studies of the reddening in starburst galaxies (Calzetti et al. 1994, Jansen et al. 2001) have succeeded to close this gap by providing more reliable correction factors.

Studies to relate the Balmer line luminosities to those of other emission lines and to the UV have been performed by Bell & Kennicutt (2001) for the local universe, by Sullivan et al. (2000) for $`z0.15`$, by Glazebrook et al. (1999) for $`z=0.9`$, and recently by Rosa-Gonzalez et al. (2002).

In the study presented here a new observational technique is applied to derive star forming rates and their evolution in the redshift range 0.25 to 1.2: The emission line luminosities for medium redshift galaxies are measured photometrically on deep narrow band images.

The search and classification of emission line galaxies is based on both the multi-color and the Fabry-Perot observations of the Calar Alto Deep Imaging Survey (CADIS). While in previous determinations of the star forming rates from emission line luminosity densities the object samples were selected via broad band magnitudes, in the present study it is based on the strength of the emission lines directly. Since spectrophotometric observations reach fainter limiting magnitudes than spectroscopic ones, the CADIS survey can reach galaxies with very low continuum brightnesses down to the extreme case of galaxies which are only detectable by their emission lines. In addition, the multi-color survey also provides UV luminosities, which allow within one and the same data base the comparison of the emission line luminosity densities with those in the UV.

The strategy of this deep imaging survey is to perform narrow band observations of relatively large fields in order to detect emission line objects down to very low line fluxes. In addition 15 broad and medium images are observed which are used to detect secondary emission lines and to derive spectral energy distributions for all detectable objects. These data are used to determine the spectral types and redshifts for a large number of galaxies by means of a multi-color classification routine.

Throughout this paper we use $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{m}=0.3`$, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=0.7`$; $`H_0=70`$ km sec-1 Mpc-1 if not parameterized by $`h`$.

## 2 Observations and data handling

### 2.1 Observations

The observational principle of the CADIS survey is described in Meisenheimer et al. (2002). In the present paper we will only address in detail the observational and reduction procedures relevant to the study of emission line galaxies.

The observations are performed on a number of fields distributed over the sky selected at areas of minimum IRAS 100 $`\mu `$m emission (low galactic extinction) and free of bright stars.

In order to detect emission line objects, narrow band observations were done in three wavelength windows, which are relatively free from OH night-sky emission. In each of these windows observations are performed with a scanning Fabry-Perot interferometer (FPI) at 8 or 9 equally spaced wavelength steps, thus providing a spectral line scan (henceforth called FP scan). The three wavelength windows are specified by A, B, and C, and are located at:

window FP-A : $`\lambda =702\pm 6`$ nm,
window FP-B : $`\lambda =820_6^{+4.5}`$ nm,
window FP-C : $`\lambda =918\pm 8`$ nm.

For selecting the correct interference order of the FPI, pre-filters with FWHMs of $`20`$ nm are used.

The FP observations in the B window were carried out with the CAFOS focal reducer at the 2.2 m telescope on Calar Alto, Spain; those in the A and C windows were carried out with the MOSCA focal reducer installed at the 3.5 m telescope. Both focal reducers are equipped with Fabry-Perot (Queensgate) etalons in the parallel beam, with free apertures of 50 and 70 mm, and with air gaps of $``$8 $`\mu `$m. By choosing the appropriate interference order, the spectral resolving power for both etalons was set, to $``$750 km s-1. The actual spectral resolutions used were 1.8, 2.0, and 2.4 nm. Exposures were also done with the pre-filters alone in order to measure the continuum level underneath the emission lines found in the FP scans. At the 2.2 m telescope a flux limit of $`F_{\mathrm{lim}}=3\times 10^{20}`$ W m-2 was achieved after 3 hours of integration, sufficient to detect line emission of a galaxy with a star forming rate of $``$1.0 M y-1 at redshift z=1.2.

Since this observational method bears no color selection effect a priori, one expects to find also emission line galaxies with very faint continua, such as distant H ii galaxies and primeval galaxies at high redshift, detectable only in the light of their Lyman-$`\alpha `$ lines.

In order to decide which emission line was detected in the FP scan, we placed for each FPI band a set of medium band filters at wavelengths where secondary prominent lines would show up (Fig. 1). Since these filters allow to exclude certain line classifications - e.g., the presence of a line in any of these filters excludes that the line detected in the FP scan is \[O ii\] or Ly$`\alpha `$ -, they are named veto filters. These veto filters (see Table 1) are included in a the set of 15 medium and broad band filters, which range from 400 to 2200 nm in wavelength and provide additional information about the spectral energy distribution (SED) of the line emitter and its spectral type. Table 1 lists for the redshift bins discussed in the present paper, the filters where the secondary lines are expected.

### 2.2 Data base

The present study is based on the data sets from four fields (size $`10\times 10`$ arcmin) of the CADIS emission line survey which are completely reduced up to now, as listed in Table 2. In these fields we selected the emission line galaxies detected in the light of their prominent emission lines H$`\alpha `$, \[O iii\]$`\lambda 500.7`$, or \[O ii\].

For the window B around 820 nm, the data of the 01h, 09h, and 16h fields were used to derive luminosity functions and star forming rates at redshifts of $`z=0.25`$ (H$`\alpha `$ line), 0.64 (\[O iii\] line), and 1.2 (\[O ii\] line). For the window A, around 702 nm, the data of the 09h, 16h, and 23h fields were used. Here the redshifts studied are $`z=0.40`$ (\[O iii\] line), and $`z=0.88`$ (\[O ii\] line). The H$`\alpha `$ galaxies appearing at redshift 0.08 are too rare to provide a useful database. The data of window C were only used for consistency checks, but not for deriving luminosity functions and star forming rates, since the classification for this window is not yet fully understood.

The number of galaxies found per field and redshift interval, with emission line fluxes above our detection limit is of order of 30, providing emission line galaxy samples large enough for statistical studies (see also Table 3).

The wavelengths can be set with the FP etalon within an accuracy of $`\pm 0.2`$ nm. The wavelength calibration was done several times during the night using the calibration lamp lines Rb 794.5 nm and Ne 692.95 nm, and was stable within 0.15 nm during the observations. This is roughly one order of magnitude less than the width of the instrumental profile of $`2.0`$ nm, which was adjusted by selecting the appropriate interference order of the FPI. Towards the edges of the fields, the transmitted wavelengths declined by 0.5 nm, due to the increasing angle of incidence in the FP etalon. In combination with the dithering used for the observations, this leads to an additional wavelength uncertainty of $`\pm 0.1`$ nm in the edges of the frames. Including the error of the line fit (see Sect. 2.5), the total uncertainty for a medium strong line thus arises to about $`\pm 0.4`$ nm in $`\lambda `$, or about $`\pm 0.0008`$ in redshift. A comparison of the redshift values for objects with $`z0.40`$, which can be seen in both the window A (by their \[O iii\] line) as well as in window C (by H$`\alpha `$) yields the same value for the redshift uncertainty.

### 2.3 Data reduction

The data reduction includes subtraction of bias, flatfielding, and removal of cosmics and detector defects by overlaying dithered images and replacing the bad pixels by the kappa-sigma-clipped mean of pixel values in the other images.

Special care has to be taken for the flatfielding, since internal reflections between the focal reducer optics and the Fabry-Perot etalon can give rise to straylight contributions in the central area of the flatfields, thus leading to a incorrect flux calibration of the FP data. In order to overcome this problem, flat field exposures are taken through a regularly spaced multi-hole mask, allowing to measure the instrument transmission without noticeable straylight contribution.

After overlaying all images to the same world coordinate system, the images for each wavelength setting and filter are then added up. For each of these sum frames the object search engine SExtractor (Bertin & Arnouts, 1996) is applied, with thresholds adjusted to their seeing and exposure depth. The object positions are corrected for the distortion of the camera optics, and the object lists are merged to a MASTER table with averaged positions. For merging all objects are considered to be identical which fall into a common error circle of 1″ radius.

The morphology parameters of an object are determined on the sum frame where the object shows the highest S/N ratio, using the photometry package MPIAPHOT (Meisenheimer & Röser, 1993). The photometry is performed on each individual frame, by integrating the photons at the centroid object positions, with a Gaussian weight distribution, the width of which is determined such that the convolution of the seeing PSF with the weight function results in a common PSF for all frames. The obtained flux is then calibrated by tertiary spectroscopic standard stars established in each CADIS field. Finally, the single frame flux values are S/N-weight averaged with errors derived from the counting statistics. Since the photometry weight function is normalized to give correct fluxes for stellar objects, the fluxes of extended objects are underestimated and need a correction according to their morphological parameters.

### 2.4 Selection of emission line galaxy candidates

The pre-selection of emission line galaxies is based on the fluxes in the FP images and in the pre-filter image. Candidates have to fulfill two criteria: (1) For at least one FP wavelength, the signal has to be larger than the upper limit of the noise distribution, typically located near 5$`\sigma `$. (2) The signal-to-noise ratio of the line feature in the FP scans above the pre-filter flux is higher than 2.5, equivalent to about $`2\times 10^{20}`$ W m-2 (here we choose a very low threshold in order to be complete; a much stricter selection is possible on the basis of the line fits described below). This pre-selection yields a few hundred of emission line galaxy candidates per field and wavelength window.

Due to reflections within the Fabry-Perot etalons employed in CADIS, bright objects, mostly stars, are accompanied by features about 6 magnitudes fainter than the father object, and appear at a fixed offset position (41″) away from it. Since in the pre-filter images no object should be seen at the same positions, these ghosts can be easily sorted out and rejected from the candidates list.

Another type of ghosts on the single FP frames is produced by reflections of bright objects in between FP etalon and pre-filter. These ghosts appear symmetrically to the optical axes and, due to dithering, they show up at different positions in every frame. Thus these are easily identifiable and already strongly suppressed by the correction for cosmic rays in the standard data reduction.

Spurious objects were found to occur in the wings of bright objects, due to variations in the extended wings of the point spread function. A scatter of the flux measured in the Fabry-Perot images at the position of a spurious object can pretend an emission line. In order to find and reject these artifacts, all candidates with a bright neighbour were flagged. Based on eye inspection, a simple criterion was derived, which separates real objects from artifacts rather successfully: If

$`m_\mathrm{R}(\mathrm{next}\mathrm{bright}\mathrm{object})+dist(\mathrm{arcsec})<m_{\mathrm{crit}}`$,

with $`m_{\mathrm{crit}}=24.0`$, the feature is considered as an artefact and removed from the list of candidates. It was verified that this procedure does not lead to a loss of any “good” objects.

### 2.5 Analysis of emission line objects

After pre-selection, the emission line galaxy candidates are classified, by analysing their emission line features in the FP scans as well as their SEDs, determined by the multi-filter observations. For the classification, three criteria are used: the shape of the emission line observed with the FPI, the emission line spectrum, derived from medium band veto filters placed at wavelength where prominent secondary lines are expected, and the continuum SED.

This analysis and classification procedure is performed in five steps, which are described in the following in detail.

#### (1) Line Fit:

First step is the analysis of the photometric FP data by line fitting. The width of the line profiles are fixed to the width of the instrumental profile (1.8, 2.0, and 2.4 nm for the windows A, B, and C respectively) for the particular wavelength window.

Line fluxes were derived from the areas under the fitted line curves. For the fit, a modified Gaussian function was chosen of the form

$`f(\lambda )=f_0\times exp\{1.96|(\lambda \lambda _0/\mathrm{\Delta }\lambda |^{1.5}\}`$,

where $`\mathrm{\Delta }\lambda `$ is the instrumental resolution (FWHM). This function has a more pronounced peak and broader wings than the normal Gaussian profile, and is rather close to the shape of the instrumental profile of the FP etalon. The area under this line profile is $`A=1.12f_0\times \mathrm{\Delta }\lambda `$. Accounting for the fact, that the wings of the real FP profile are somewhat broader than in the above function, we use $`A=1.25f_0\times \mathrm{\Delta }\lambda `$. This factor was verified by a comparison of the fluxes of the \[O iii\] lines from $`z0.4`$ galaxies as determined in the FP scans (window A), with those determined from the excess flux in the medium band filter located at $`\lambda =700`$ nm above the continuum.

Since the detected line can be any emission line occurring in the observed wavelength window at the appropriate redshift (e.g., H$`\alpha `$ at 0.25, \[O iii\] at 0.64, etc., for the B window at 820 nm), the classification routine has to investigate the solutions for all bright emission lines. Thus, we consider a total of eight possible line identifications in our fitting procedure: \[S ii\] 673, H$`\alpha `$, \[O iii\] 501 and 496 nm, H$`\beta `$, H$`\gamma `$, \[O ii\], and Lyman-$`\alpha `$. The number of galaxies expected to be seen in other lines is negligible (see Sect. 3.3) and does not justify to include them into this list. The H$`\alpha `$ line fit includes the \[N ii\] doublet. With the the spectral instrumental resolution of $`2.0`$ nm it is possible to separate the \[N ii\] 658.3 line in about 50% of the cases successfully from the H$`\alpha `$ line with \[N ii\]658.3/H$`\alpha `$ line flux ratios in between 0.1 and 0.5. This is generally the case for $`S/N(H\alpha )>4.4`$. For the ten strongest H$`\alpha `$ emitter the ratio is \[N ii\]/H$`\alpha =0.21\pm 0.05`$. The maximum line flux ratio \[N ii\]658.3/H$`\alpha `$ is limited to 0.5 in the fit.

In order to make use of the pre-filter fluxes, the line flux estimated from this line fit is subtracted from the pre-filter flux allowing for the filter transmission at the specific wavelength of the line. The line corrected pre-filter flux - and its error - is included as an additional continuum data point for an improved line fit. Examples for fits to different lines are shown in the right panels of Fig. 1, where the observed pre-filter fluxes are marked as solid bars with their errors, and the corrected pre-filter fluxes as dashed lines. Both values are also marked in the SED plots in the left panels.

#### (2) Continuum SED fit:

In the next step, for every of the eight redshifts determined above, template spectra published by Kinney et al. (1996) were fitted to the SED derived from the multi-filter photometry. This is done by means of colors, similar to the multi-color classification procedure described in Wolf et al. (2001), yielding a most probable template spectrum. In order to achieve better fits to the data, we allow for an extra reddening correction of the template spectra up to $`E_{\mathrm{B}\mathrm{V}}`$ of 0.3. The latter is important for distant samples which contain generally brighter and more massive galaxies with more reddening than the Kinney et al. templates (see sect. 3.5).

Since we want to determine the fluxes in the emission lines from the signal excesses in the veto filters above the continuum (see step 4), line free template spectra are needed. Thus, the Kinney-Calzetti template spectra were altered by cutting out the prominent emission lines. As a consequence, those filter data where secondary emission lines are expected, are not usable for the fit. Thus, the SED fit is purely based on the continuum part of the spectra.

For the template spectrum which fits best to the observed SED a reduced $`\chi ^2`$ is derived.

#### (3) Improved line fit:

The fit to the continuum spectrum provides, for each of the eight possible line identifications, also a new continuum level at the wavelength of the FP window, which is marked in either of the line plots in Fig. 1 as a dotted horizontal line. The error bar is estimated from the quality of the continuum fit, and is comparable to that of the pre-filter flux. Ideally, this continuum flux level should agree with the corrected pre-filter flux (step 1). A high discrepancy between the two values indicates that either the SED fit is bad (due to incorrect line classification), or the line feature seen in the FP scan is awkward. This information is used to produce another $`\chi ^2`$ contributor, calculated from the discrepancy and the intrinsic errors of the two flux levels.

Including the continuum level derived above, a new revised line fit is performed in the same way as in step 1. In this second iteration, however, bad line classifications become visible by large offsets between the continuum level given by the SED fit and the corrected pre-filter baseline, leading to a lower S/N ratio for the corresponding line fit. This also happens when the line feature in the FP data is in reality a fake detection due to a statistical fluctuation of the FP signals.

The new S/N value is later used as critical indicator for the reality of the line feature seen in the FP scan and whether the object will be accepted as an emission line galaxy.

#### (4) Line spectrum fit:

The continuum fit found this way serves as a baseline to determine the fluxes of the other (secondary) emission lines. For each of the eight possible line identifications, the fluxes for the secondary lines were derived from the difference between the flux measured in the ‘veto filters’ (the filters where other prominent lines would be expected) and the continuum level predicted from the template fit. For the calculation of the line strength, the excess flux was normalized by the transmission of the filter at the wavelength given by the redshift derived from the FP observation. In cases where the veto filter included more than one emission line which generally happens for the \[O iii\] 501/496 doublet, the line flux ratio was fixed to the canonical values. Fig. 1 shows such fits for several objects in the left panels. In all spectra, except for the \[O ii\] galaxy, a number of ‘secondary’ lines can be seen.

The thus determined line flux ratios are compared with a catalog of observed line ratios for about 500 nearby galaxies based on data from the literature, including a range of Seyfert galaxies to compact dwarfs, most notably from French (1980), McCall et al. (1985), Popescu & Hopp (2000), Veilleux & Osterbrock (1987), Vogel et al. (1993).

A $`\chi ^2`$ is estimated in the following way: In the multidimensional space made up by all line ratio combination possible for the respective classification of the line observed in the FPI window, the mean distance of the considered galaxy to the three closest tabulated ratios was normalized by the error ellipse of the observed ratios. This method prevents a bias towards the most common line ratios, but allows also galaxies with extreme line ratios, as long as there are some objects with similar ratios tabulated. Again, a $`\chi ^2`$ for the line ratios is estimated for each of the eight line cases.

#### (5) Finding the best solution:

To decide between the possible line identifications an overall reduced $`\chi ^2`$ is derived, which is the mean of the four $`\chi ^2`$ values, of the SED fit (see step 2), of the line fit (step 3), of the discrepancy of the baselines (step 3), and of the line ratios (step 4). This mean $`\chi ^2`$ is then converted into an overall probability for the line classification according to $`P=exp(\chi ^2/2)`$. The case with highest probability is then selected as the most probable classification.

Fig. 1 depicts three examples of SED and emission line fits for galaxies at redshifts 0.250, 0.638, and 1.192 with strong emission lines, together with an example for galaxy with a line signal near the S/N cutoff (see Sect. 3.1), which was classified as H$`\beta `$ at $`z=0.686`$, and verified spectroscopically to be at $`z=0.687`$. In the plot, the fluxes are given in units of photons sec-1 nm-1 m-2.

### 2.6 Comparison with spectroscopic observations

The decision, if an emission line galaxy candidate is considered as real or not is based on the S/N ratio of its line fit. To avoid contamination of the galaxy samples by fakes on the one hand and to be complete as possible on the other, an optimum S/N cutoff value has to be determined.

Spectroscopic follow-up observations were carried out for a number of emission line galaxy candidates with the MOSCA spectrometer at the 3.5m Calar Alto telescope, with LRIS at Keck, and with FORS1 at VLT. We use the results of these observations to compare them with the predictions from our emission line classification, and to find the optimum S/N for a reliable classification. This comparison is depicted in Fig. 2.

The diagram shows, that for a S/N cutoff at 3.3, and for $`R<25`$ mag (dotted lines), the probability for a correct classification is of the order of $`80\%`$. For fainter galaxies the continuum is obviously too weak and the signal too noisy to allow a reliable continuum fit. For a number of cases, the spectra showed a spatial offset between line emission and continuum object of up to 1″ (Maier et al. 2003). Considering that the slit generally centered on the continuum source is only 1.0″ wide, it seems possible that in those cases where an emission line detected in the FP scan could not be verified in the slit spectra (circles in Fig. 2), the slit actually missed the line emitting region. In those cases the photometric data derived from the imaging survey would tend to yield more reliable results than slit spectroscopy. A more careful analysis of the offsets between the continuum and line emission centroids resulting in excessive slit losses is currently in process.

## 3 Results

### 3.1 Final object selection

The emission line galaxy candidate samples, preselected according to the criteria described above, are now separated into the specific redshift ranges. The candidates are then subjected to a further selection procedure, where objects classified as quasars or stars in the multi-color classification are rejected. Both object types are also suspicious by very low overall probabilities $`P`$ of the line classification.

Fig. 3 shows that the dependence of the resulting line luminosity density on the choice of the S/N limit for the emission line is not severe. As mentioned, a value of 3.3 seems to be appropriate. Lowering the cutoff line to $`S/N=3.0`$, which would include many artifacts and wrong identifications (see Fig. 2), the luminosity density in the case of the $`z=1.2`$ sample increases by only about 10%. For the galaxy sample at redshift 0.25, which is more complete at the faint end, the effect is even smaller. The choice of the cutoff mainly affects the completeness at the low luminosity end of the line luminosity function.

### 3.2 Sample statistics

The total numbers of objects in the fields studied, classified as H$`\alpha `$ galaxies, as \[O iii\]$`\lambda `$500.7 galaxies, and as \[O ii\] galaxies at the appropriate redshifts is listed in Table 3.

The number for galaxies seen in the other emission lines is too small for a useful statistical study. The expected number of galaxies detected by their \[O iii\] 495.9 line in the B window, for example, can be readily estimated from the statistics of the brighter \[O iii\] 500.7 line. Since the line intensity ratio of these lines is 3:1, the expected number is about that of the number of \[O iii\] 500.7 nm with a S/N greater than $`3\times (S/N)_{\mathrm{lim}}=10.5`$, which is only 7 galaxies. Therefore, in the following, \[O iii\] always stands for the brighter, the \[O iii\] 500.7 line. A similar argument leads to a total of 8 for the expected number of H$`\beta `$ line galaxies.

The range of the equivalent widths at rest wavelength in which the emission line galaxies are detected, is plotted vs. MB in Fig. 4 for the H$`\alpha `$ galaxies at redshift 0.25 and for the \[O ii\] galaxies at $`z=1.2`$. The absolute blue magnitude is calculated by interpolating between the flux densities from the medium and broad band filters left and right of $`440(1+z)`$ nm, and calibrating with Vega. The dotted lines indicate the sensitivity limit of the survey, at $`F_{\mathrm{line}}=3\times 10^{20}`$ W m-2. Note that our minimum detection limit $`EW>0.2`$ nm caused by photometric uncertainties, does not affect the sample statistics.

The distribution shown in this figure is consistent with the EW distribution of the CFRS sample (Hammer et al. 1997, Tresse & Maddox 1998). The mean line equivalent width of the Tresse & Maddox sample at $`z0.2`$ is $`<`$log $`EW`$(H$`\alpha `$+\[NII\])$`>`$=1.59 nm as compared to our mean value of 1.54. The considerably higher equivalent widths seen in nearby galaxy samples (Gallego et al. 1996, Ho et al. 1997, Terlevich et al. 1991) are not comparable, since their spectrograph slits cover only the central parts of these galaxies.

For local galaxies Kennicutt (1992) established a mean ratio between \[O ii\] and H$`\alpha `$ eqivalent widths of 0.5. For galaxies identified in the B window by their H$`\alpha `$ line ($`z=0.25`$), we find a considerably higher ratio of $`0.9`$. This finding agrees with the CFRS results by Hammer et al. (1997), who explain the difference by a lower metallicity and hotter star temperatures in their $`z0.3`$ sample, and/or by the lower luminosities as compared to the local galaxy sample of Kennicutt. The latter explanation would be consistent with the result of Gallagher et al. (1989), who find a higher EW\[O ii\]/EW(H$`\alpha `$) ratio for blue local galaxies as well.

### 3.3 Sample contamination

The contamination or incompleteness of our samples due to wrongly classified galaxies is of the order of $`\pm `$10% (see Fig. 2). One has, however, also to consider contamination by galaxy types not included in our ELG templates, such as galaxies seen in \[O i\] or in Mg ii in the FP spectra, and AGNs in general.

For discriminating these contaminants, we selected those emission line galaxies for which the CADIS multi-color classification (Wolf et al. 2001) yields a different line solution or indicates a quasar. After eye inspection of the spectra, two galaxies initally classified at $`z=0.25`$ were found to be at redshift 0.30 (\[O i\] at $``$820nm). Two possible quasars at redshift 1.2 and another two at 1.9 (Mg ii in window B) were recognized and removed from the \[O ii\] sample. Among the ELGs seen in the A window no QSO was found.

The line ratios measured by the CADIS emission line survey have relatively large error bars and do not allow to recognize Seyfert 2 galaxies, neither does the multi-color classification. Spectroscopy of AGNs in the Chandra deep fields indicate a surface density of 450 Sy2 galaxies per square degree at $`R<24`$ and $`0.5<z<1`$ (Szokoly et al., 2002), equivalent to only three Sy2 in our $`z=1.2`$ sample. At lower redshifts even fewer objects are expected.

LINERS are, among other, recognizeable by a high \[Nii\]/H$`\alpha `$ line flux ratio. The line fits for the 30 strongest line emitters in our $`z=0.25`$ sample yield two LINERS ($`EW`$\[NII\]/$`EW`$(H$`\alpha `$)$`>`$0.6). The contamination of the total H$`\alpha `$ luminosity by the \[NII\] fluxes from these two LINERs is about 2%. In the CFRS no low-excitation AGN was found (Hammer et al. 1997). Thus, we are confident that the LINER contamination is negligible in all our samples.

### 3.4 Luminosity functions

Fig. 5 shows the $`M_\mathrm{B}`$ luminosity functions for the H$`\alpha `$ and \[O ii\] galaxies observed in window B (average over 3 CADIS fields), and for the \[O ii\] galaxies observed in window A (average over 3 fields). The data points for the mean density are in agreement to the luminosity function obtained for the late type galaxies (later than Sa) in the respective redshift ranges, derived from the multi-color survey of CADIS (Fried et al. 2001). The Schechter functions overlaid in the figure are also adopted from Fried et al. and represent the sum of the two LFs for starburst galaxies and spirals in their paper.

This agreement suggests that in principle all late type galaxies at these redshifts are emission line galaxies with lines bright enough to be detected in the CADIS Fabry-Perot observations.

### 3.5 Extinction correction

Since star forming regions are generally embedded in massive and dusty molecular clouds, extinction plays an important role in the determination of intrinsic line emission and can amount to more than a magnitude in the H$`\alpha `$ line.

The calibration factors used to convert the line luminosity densities into star formation rates are derived for unobscured line emission (Kennicutt 1983, 1992). So our line luminosities need to be corrected for extinction before deriving star formation rates. This correction is generally based on the H$`\beta `$/H$`\alpha `$ intensity ratio. In our data sample, the fluxes for the H$`\beta `$ line contain large relative errors, since the flux contained in the H$`\beta `$ line is in most cases not directly measurable, but only as blend with the \[O iii\] lines. Thus, a reddening correction for each individual galaxy is not possible.

There is, however, an observed trend in the sense that more luminous galaxies (disks) show higher reddening than less luminous ones, such as H ii galaxies, irregulars, BCDs (Gallego et al. 1997), which allows to perform a global correction based on the blue magnitude of each galaxy. This trend is clearly seen in the nearby galaxy sample used by Calzetti et al. (1994) to study the internal reddening. Their data suggest an increase of reddening according to

$`E_{\mathrm{B}\mathrm{V}}=0.10(M_\mathrm{B}+15.5)\pm 0.15`$.

with no difference between spirals and BCGs.

For a larger galaxy sample of nearby galaxies, Jansen et al. (2001) investigated the dependance of the \[O ii\]/H$`\alpha `$ emission-line ratio on other observables. They found that the large scatter of the observed ratio and its dependence on luminosity are greatly reduced when using reddening-corrected \[O ii\] fluxes. Their correlation between absolute magnitude and reddening, derived from the Balmer decrement after correction of the underlying stellar Balmer absorption, indicates a relation with a less steep slope:

$`E_{\mathrm{B}\mathrm{V}}=0.064(M_\mathrm{B}+14.8)\pm 0.10`$.

independent of the galaxy type. The large uncertainty, which is engendered by the large scatter of the data points and due to geometrical and excitation temperature effects, makes it impossible to predict the reddening for a particular galaxy. Since the present study, however, deals with global parameters instead of individual galaxies, it is appropriate to apply this relation for an averaged reddening correction. For faint galaxies ($`M_\mathrm{B}>15.6`$), we adopt a minimum reddening correction of $`E_{\mathrm{B}\mathrm{V}}=0.05`$ mag.

### 3.6 Luminosity functions for the emission line fluxes

The next step towards establishing global star forming rates is the determination of luminosity functions for the emission line fluxes. Fig. 6 shows these for the same three redshift intervals as in Fig. 5. In these diagrams, the sampling interval for the line luminosity was chosen as 0.4 dex, equivalent to 1 magnitude stepsize, in order to allow an easy comparison with the $`M_\mathrm{B}`$ luminosity functions.

In the $`L_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }`$ plot (top) the observed line luminosity data of Tresse & Maddox (1998) and by Cowie et al. (1997), after being converted to the cosmological parameters used in the present paper, are over plotted. In the $`z=1.2`$ panel, the Cowie et al. (1997) points are over plotted. Both agree satifactorily well with our data.

The extinction corrected luminosity functions are shown by filled symbols. For the case of the H$`\alpha `$ luminosity at $`z=0.25`$, the correction yields an increase of the total line luminosity by a factor of 1.6. For the $`z=1.2`$ sample the extinction correction amounts to a factor of about 4 in the total \[O ii\] line luminosity (see Table 4), due to both the higher blue luminosities of the galaxies and the shorter wavelength of the line.

In several studies (Gallego et al. 1995, Tresse & Maddox 1998, and Yan et al. 1999) line luminosity functions were successfully described by Schechter functions, the parameters of which were derived by the Vmax method. For small data samples, as it is the case in the present study, this procedure leads however to arbitrary results.

As can be seen in the plots, the H$`\alpha `$ luminosity density histogram (z=0.25) can be described with a Schechter function of the same shape as the respective blue magnitude function. The over plotted curves in Fig. 5 are fits to the observed distribution using the same $`\mathrm{\Phi }^{}`$ and $`\alpha `$ parameters as in the corresponding $`M_\mathrm{B}`$ luminosity functions. The reason for this agreement seems to be, that on the one hand the fainter galaxies are preferentially of type BCDs or Irr, leading to a steepening of the line luminosity function as compared to the blue magnitude function. On the other hand, the internal extinction acts preferentially on massive galaxies (Sect. 3.5), and thus its correction yields a stretching the luminosity function at its bright end, and thus partly cancelling the other effect. Therefore, we use for the Schechter function of the line luminosity functions the same shape parameters as those describing the blue magnitude luminosity functions.

We will first discuss the luminosity functions for the H$`\alpha `$ and for the \[O ii\] lines, which can more or less directly be used for the determination of the star forming rate. The \[O iii\] 501 line is discussed in Sect. 4.2.

## 4 Discussion

### 4.1 Star forming rate from emission lines

As shown by Kennicutt (1983) the total number of ionizing photons by newly produced stars is a good measure for the current star formation in a galaxy. Using updated evolutionary track, and assuming case B recombination and for a Salpeter IMF, Kennicutt (1998) derived a conversion factor for integral H$`\alpha `$ luminosity to star formation rate of

$`\mathrm{SFR}=0.79\times 10^{34}L_{\mathrm{H}\alpha }`$ \[M yr-1 W-1\].

A relation with similar conversion factor can be used for the galaxies seen in the light of the \[O ii\] line. For nearby galaxies, Kennicutt (1992) derived, for extinction corrected \[O ii\] luminosities $`\mathrm{SFR}=5\times 10^{34}L_{[\mathrm{O}\mathrm{II}]}`$ \[M yr-1 W-1\]. Gallagher et al. (1989) for blue galaxies and Cowie et al. (1997) for rapidly star-forming galaxies found a considerably lower conversion factor of $`1.0\times 10^{34}L_{[\mathrm{O}\mathrm{II}]}`$ M yr-1/W. For high redshifdt galaxies, Thompson & Djorgovski (1991) used a factor of $`1.2\times 10^{34}`$ for the \[O ii\] line emission.

For galaxies seen in the light of H$`\alpha `$ at $`z=0.25`$, the \[O ii\] line fluxes are measured with the CADIS filter at $`\lambda _\mathrm{c}=465`$ nm. (see top of Table 1). In Fig. 7 the line fluxes are plotted for the galaxies with $`(S/N)_{[\mathrm{O}\mathrm{II}]}>1`$. The average flux ratio results in $`F[\mathrm{O}\mathrm{II}]/F(\mathrm{H}\alpha )0.9`$, in good agreement with the values cited above. This ratio is roughly in the mean of the ratios derived by Kennicutt (1998) and Sullivan et al. (2000).

Although there is a difference of roughly 4 Gyr between the epochs for $`z=1.20`$ and $`z=0.25`$, the line ratio may not have changed significantly. Based on the CFRS galaxy sample with redshifts in the range $`0.5<z<1.0`$, Carollo & Lilly (2001) found a remarkable similarity of metallicities to that for local galaxies. Also, Pettini et al. (1998) and Teplitz et al. (2000) found the line spectra at high redshift to be very similar to those observed in local emission line galaxies. The calibration used in the present study for the \[O ii\] emission is therefore

$`\mathrm{SFR}=0.88\times 10^{34}L_{[\mathrm{O}\mathrm{II}]}`$ \[M yr-1 W-1\].

Rosa-Gonzalez et al. (2002) derived SFR estimators using the Calzetti extinction curve and accounting for the underlying stellar Balmer absorption. Applying their calibration to our non-extinction corrected \[O ii\] galaxy sample we would end up with about two times higher star forming rates.

### 4.2 Star forming rates from the \[O iii\] $`\lambda `$500.7 line.

Having detected and measured a large number of \[O iii\] emission lines at medium redshift, we will test how far this prominent line can be used as SFR estimator.

The line luminosity functions for the galaxies observed in the \[O iii\] line at $`z=0.40`$ and $`z=0.64`$ are shown in Fig. 8. Again the distributions are fitted with Schechter functions, the parameters $`\varphi `$ and $`\alpha `$ of which are taken from the $`M_\mathrm{B}`$ luminosity functions for the same redshift range (Fried et al. 2001).

Due to its high ionization level the luminosity of \[O iii\] 500.7 depends strongly on excitation and metallicity. In order to convert the \[O iii\] emission line luminosities into star formation rates, an averaged intensity ratio between H$`\alpha `$ and the ogygen line has therefore to be established. Since the population of galaxies may change with redshift, one has to use data sets measured at comparable redshifts for this.

For the galaxies observed at $`z=0.25`$ in H$`\alpha `$, the extinction corrected fluxes for \[O iii\] 500.7 are plotted versus the H$`\alpha `$ fluxes as diamonds in Fig. 9. Also shown in this graph, as squares, are the corrected line flux data for a sample of star forming galaxies at $`z=0.40`$. At this redshift, the H$`\alpha `$ line happens to occur in the atmospheric C window at $`\lambda 918`$ nm and, simultaneously, the \[O iii\] line in the A window at $`\lambda 702`$ nm. Thus, the fluxes for both lines can be derived from FP scans rather accurately.

While the data points in the \[O ii\]/H$`\alpha `$ plot (Fig. 7) appear nicely correlated - in accordance with the well defined sequence in the diagnostic diagram \[O ii\] 372.7/\[O iii\] 500.7 vs. \[O iii\] 500.7/H$`\beta `$ (Baldwin et al. 1981) -, the data points in the H$`\alpha `$ vs. \[O iii\] flux diagram scatter considerably. The mean flux ratio determined from the global line emission densities is 0.76.

For the galaxies seen in \[O iii\] at $`z=0.64`$, the \[O ii\] line shows up in the medium band filter at 611 nm (see Fig. 1, second panel). The mean flux ratio derived from the global line emission densities of these galaxies is $`F`$\[O iii\]/$`F`$\[O ii\]$`0.9`$, in good agreement with the \[O ii\]/H$`\alpha `$ and \[O iii\]/H$`\alpha `$ ratios derived above.

We thus use for \[O iii\] the calibration:

$`\mathrm{SFR}=1.00\times 10^{34}L_{[\mathrm{O}\mathrm{III}]}`$ \[M yr-1 W-1\].

### 4.3 Completeness correction

Table 4 lists the line luminosity densities as observed by summing up the data after extinction correction and completeness correction, combined with the star forming rates for $`H_0=70`$ km sec-1 Mpc-1.

The completeness correction is done by calculating the area under the Schechter function according to:

$`\mathrm{SFR}_{\mathrm{tot}}=\mathrm{\Phi }^{}\times L^{}\times \mathrm{\Gamma }(2+\alpha )`$

A comparison between the SFR derived from the sum of the observed galaxy line emissions and the area under the Schechter function using the parameters marked in the plots shows that for the case of $`z=0.25`$, the completeness correction is negligible, while for the $`z=1.2`$ sample it amounts to a factor $`>2`$.

Small uncertainties in the slope parameters $`\alpha `$ may lead to large errors in the total luminosity and SFR. For $`\alpha 1.4`$, which is the mean value in our curves, a variation of the slope parameter $`\alpha `$ by $`\pm 0.1`$ would alter the SFR by $`\pm 15\%`$.

### 4.4 Evolution of SFR

The SFR values (Table 4) show an increase by about a factor of 10 between $`z=0.25`$ and $`z=1.2`$. This is in good agreement with the slope of the SFR data published by Hogg et al. (1998), who used the \[O ii\] line for all redshifts from 0.2 to 1.2, and with the slope derived from UV flux densities (Lilly et al. 1996).

As can be seen, the values at $`z=0.88`$ and 1.2 are rather sensitive to the extinction correction applied. The dispersion of $`\pm 0.1`$ in the reddening relation (Sect. 3.5) yields a systematic error bar of $`\pm 40\%`$ for both SFR values.

The SFR densities derived from the \[O iii\] line follow the trend of the other data within the errors. Using a large sample of galaxies and averaged line ratios, this line yields satisfactory results.

### 4.5 Field to field variation

Large scale structure expresses itself in strongly varying number counts from field to field and from redshift to redshift. This effect can nicely be seen in the $`M_\mathrm{B}z`$ diagrams for the CADIS galaxies (Fried et al., 2001). Since the redshift intervals of our FP windows correspond roughly to the typical size of a LSS cell (50-100 Mpc), an even more distinct effect is expected here.

Indeed, the line luminosity density varies from field to field by a factor of about 2 (ratio of highest to lowest values for identical redshift intervals). An average over only three fields leaves an uncertainty of the order 40%.

### 4.6 Emission line luminosities versus UV luminosities

For optically selected galaxy samples the SFR can also be estimated by means of the UV emission. While the emission lines from H ii regions measure the rate of massive stars born less than a few million years ago, the integrated UV flux from short-lived stars indicates the star formation rate of a somewhat older star population. For large redshifts ($`z>2.8`$) where the observation of emission lines is extremely difficult and the L$`\alpha `$ line is often buried by internal dust extinction, Steidel et al. (1999) used the UV flux at 300 nm to derive star formation rates at high redshifts.

The conversion factor between UV flux and SFR is still a matter of debate and is sensitive to the metallicity and IMF used in the model calculation (Glazebrook et al. 1999), but also to the intrinsic dust extinction adopted.

We used for the extinction in the UV continuum the relation given by Calzetti et al. (1994): $`\tau _{\mathrm{B}}^{}{}_{}{}^{c}=0.5\tau _{\mathrm{B}}^{}{}_{}{}^{l}`$,
where $`\tau _{\mathrm{B}}^{}{}_{}{}^{c}`$ and $`\tau _{\mathrm{B}}^{}{}_{}{}^{l}`$ are the optical depths for starlight continuum emission and for line emission from the H ii regions, respectively.

For the redshifts discussed above, the 280 nm (rest frame) continuum corresponds to observed wavelengths inbetween 350 nm and 616 nm. Except for the lowest redshift bin ($`z=0.25`$), the UV flux density at 280 nm can thus be easily determined from the CADIS multi-filter data. In the case of $`z=0.25`$, we use the 396 nm filter data if available, corresponding to a rest wavelength of 316 nm instead of 280 nm. To account for this wavelength difference, a correction factor of (280/316)2 (corresponding to a flat spectrum $`F_\nu =constant`$) is applied to the UV flux densities.

The relation between UV continuum at 280 nm and emission line fluxes is shown in Fig. 11. In this graph, the \[O ii\] fluxes are scaled up by a factor 1.1 to account for the average line intensity ratio between H$`\alpha `$ and \[O ii\]. \[O iii\] line fluxes, which show a large scatter due to varying metallicity and excitation for individual galaxies, are not included; in the case of $`z=0.4`$, we however used the corresponding H$`\alpha `$ luminosities, measured in the atmospheric window C at 918 nm. The distribution shows no obvious deviation from proportionality over almost 4 decades, and it follows rather close the predictions from the Bruzual-Charlot model for solar abundance. Thus, the UV 280 nm continuum data for the CADIS galaxies are expected to yield a similar SFR as the line flux densities.

The CFRS galaxies at $`z0.9`$ studied by Glazebrook et al. (1999) (filled circles in the diagram) agree with our data. Their finding that the mean star formation rate derived their from H$`\alpha `$ data is three times as high as the ultraviolet estimates seems to become obsolete when the reddening correction proposed in a footnote in their table 2 is applied (1.6 for H$`\alpha `$ and of 3.1 for $`L(280)`$, almost identical with the corrections applied in the present paper and with the reddening correction proposed by Steidel et al., 1999). The remaining offset to higher luminosities of the Glazebrook galaxies as compared to our $`z=0.88`$ sample is due to the fact that the CFRS survey covers a larger volume than the present study, but is less deep in terms of emission line luminosities.

Sullivan et al. (2000, 2001) did a similar comparison based on a UV selected sample of galaxies in a redshift range $`0<z<0.4`$. They also find agreement with the Glazebrook et al. (1999) data for the bright end of the sample. At the faint end, however, the UV fluxes are too high as compared to the H$`\alpha `$ line emission, not explainable by insufficient dust extinction correction. Sullivan et al. explain this discrepancy by series of starbursts superimposed on underlying quiescent star formation of the galaxies. Interestingly our emission line selected galaxy samples show an effect in the opposite direction (taking each redshift bin separately), which can be explained by exactly the same effect. Whereas an emission line selected galaxy sample prefers those (faint) galaxies which just happen to be in a starburst phase, a UV selected sample preferentially selects those which are in a state about 108 years past their starburst.

### 4.7 Comparison with other studies

In Fig. 12, our values are inserted in a diagram similar to that presented by Glazebrook et al. (1999), with the lookback time as abscissae, showing the optical SFR values as well as those derived from FIR/sub-mm and UV luminosities. Here, all SFR values from UV studies are corrected by factors between 2.7 and 4.5, depending on the rest wavelength observed, but irrespective the galaxy brightnesses. This extinction correction is based on a global value $`E_{\mathrm{B}\mathrm{V}}=0.15`$, as proposed by Steidel et al. (1999). Note that this value corresponds to an emission line extinction correction with $`E_{\mathrm{B}\mathrm{V}}=0.3`$ (Calzetti et al. 1994), typical for a $`M_\mathrm{B}=20`$ mag galaxy. The diagram shows that with this correction the different approaches to determine the SFR lead to satisfactorily consistent distributions (the error bars do not include systematic errors).

While our SFR values for redshift below 1.0 are close to those published by other authors, our value at $`z=1.2`$ seems to be significantly higher, probably due to the greater depth of the CADIS survey.

It is remarkable how closely the SFR data from infrared and sub-mm observations follow those derived from optical observations, although IRAS and ISO observations show that a notable part of the IR radiation density arises from galaxies barely visible in the optical, such as ULIRGs and AGNs. This agreement expresses the consistency of the conversion factors for the different kind of data, and the plausibility of the corrections to be applied. A close agreement between SFR densities derived from different wavelength regimes was also presented by Rosa-Gonzalez et al. (2002), who used global factors for the extinction correction of the luminosity densities, independent of redshift.

The increase of the star forming rate with lookback time in Fig. 12 can be well described by SFR$`exp(t_{\mathrm{lookback}}/2.6)`$ (dotted line), with the lookback time given in Gyrs. This exponential relation fits better than the power law $`(1+z)^{3.9}`$ fit proposed by Lilly et al. (1996) for the UV luminosity evolution.

While the UV fluxes are closely correlated to the emission line luminosities, irrespective the redshift (Fig. 11), the flux density in the blue decreases by a factor of only $`4`$ between $`z=1`$ and today, compatible with passive evolution (Fried et al. 2001). Comparing the $`M_\mathrm{B}^{}`$ values from Fig. 5 with the corresponding $`L^{}`$ values marked in Fig. 6 (both Schechter functions have the identical $`\varphi `$ and $`\alpha `$ parameters), one can see, that the ratio between blue flux density and emission line flux density (star formation rate) increases by a factor $`5`$ between $`z=0.25`$ and 1.2. Thus, the star forming rate per blue luminosity unit increases drastically with time. The slower evolution of the blue luminosity density indicates that the relation between moderately young stars (age $`2`$ Gyr) to very young stars (age $`0.1`$ Gyr) evolves with time in that sense that a higher redshift starbursts were more frequent than today.

Two interpretations are possible for the exponential decay of the SFR. One is that on average the amount of gas available in the galaxies determines the SFR and thus young galaxies have larger star forming activities. The other interpretation is that independent of the gas content, a high star forming activity is induced by galaxy-galaxy interactions. In this case the interpretation would be that more interactions must have occurred at high redshifts. Both of these could have an exponential decay with time. The latter interpretation is supported by LeFevre et al. (2000) who find an increase of the interaction rate with $`(1+z)^{2.7}`$, resulting in a factor 8 between today and $`z=1.2`$. Model calculations show that an exponential law fits perfectly to the merger rates (Khochfar et al. 2003).

## 5 Conclusions

Based on the photometric emission line data the star formation rates for redshifts ranging from 0.25 and 1.2 are derived. This CADIS emission line survey used for the present study survey is deeper than similar studies performed up to now and thus the resulting luminosity densities and star formation rates are less affected by the completeness correction of the luminosity functions. All results, including broad band colors, are based on only one data set.

The SFR increases by $`20`$ from $`z=0`$ to $`z=1.2`$, following an exponential relation $`\mathrm{SFR}exp(t_{\mathrm{lookback}}/2.6)`$.

The (blue) luminosity functions derived from the line emission galaxy samples agree well with those derived from the multi-color survey of CADIS at comparable redshifts. Also, the emission line luminosity functions agree in shape ($`\mathrm{\Phi }^{}`$ and $`\alpha `$) with the corresponding blue magnitude luminosity functions, although $`L_{\mathrm{lines}}^{}`$ evolves $`5`$ times faster than $`M_\mathrm{B}^{}`$ within the studied redshift range of $`z=0.25`$ to 1.2.

A steep rise of SFR with lookback time up to 8 Gyrs is clearly indicated, and can well described with an exponential decay of SFR with time, with a (half) decay time of $`2.6`$ Gyrs.

The extinction correction plays an important role in the determination of the SFR and leads to major (systematic) uncertainties; for higher redshifts, where the Balmer line ratio cannot be determined accurate enough, the correction can be only carried out with global methods. A reddening correction depending on absolute magnitude leads to consistent results.

###### Acknowledgements.

We thank A. Aguirre and M. Alises from the Calar Alto Observatory for carefully carrying out observations in service mode. We also wish to thank Drs. Henry Lee, Eric Bell, Andreas Burkert and Sadegh Khochfar for valuable discussions.


text:
# Black Hole Entropy from a Highly Excited Elementary String *footnote **footnote * Talk at the Workshop on Field Theoretic Aspects of Gravity II, October 2-9, 2001, Ooty, India

## Abstract

Suggested correspondence between a black hole and a highly excited elementary string is explored. Black hole entropy is calculated by computing the density of states for an open excited string. We identify the square root of oscillator number of the excited string with Rindler energy of black hole to obtain an entropy formula which, not only agrees at the leading order with the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy, but also reproduces the logarithmic correction obtained for black hole entropy in the quantum geometry framework. This provides an additional supporting evidence for correspondence between black holes and strings.

It is now more than a decade since ’t Hooft suggested a complementarity between black holes and strings. Black hole horizon is governed by some conformal operator algebra on a two-dimensional surface. So is a string. These two may be equally fundamental pictures, related by a complementarity. As emphasized by ’t Hooft, it may be possible to provide a black hole interpretation of strings. Also conversely, black holes will have a string representation. This idea is substantially further developed by Susskind’s suggestion that the spectrum of a Schwarzschild black hole is described by the states of a highly excited (uncharged) string at Hagedorn temperature. This allows a determination of the black hole entropy by counting the number of states of an excited string. Thus we have a statistical interpretation of the black hole entropy. More evidence of this correspondence has been subsequently presented in refs. and many others, where a variety of cases of black holes, non-rotating and rotating, uncharged and charged, in different dimensions are studied from this perspective. In particular, Bekenstein-Hawking entropy of a Schwarzschild black hole in four and also arbitrary dimensions is reproduced from the density of states of an excited string.

The correspondence principle for the two spectra, of a black hole and a highly excited elementary string, may be understood as follows. As the string coupling $`g_{st}`$ ($`g_{st}^2=(\mathrm{}_P/\mathrm{}_S)^{d2}`$ in $`d`$ dimensions, $`\mathrm{}_P`$ is the Planck length and $`\mathrm{}_S`$ is the string length scale) increases, the Compton wave length of a high mass and low angular momentum string state shrinks to less than its Schwarzschild radius to become a black hole. On the other hand, as the coupling is reduced, the black hole eventually becomes smaller than the string size. The metric near the horizon then loses its meaning and instead of being a black hole such a system is better described as a string state. But at some intermediate size, when the black hole size and string size are equal, either description is admissible. This would imply a one-to-one correspondence between the spectra of black holes and strings.

At first this correspondence between the two sets of states appears to be beset with a difficulty. As functions of mass, there is an apparent striking difference between the black hole density of states and the density of string states. The latter in any dimensions grows exponentially in the first power of mass $`M`$ of the excited string. This implies string entropy as linearly proportional to mass $`M`$, $`S_{st}`$ $`\sqrt{\alpha ^{}}M`$$`\sqrt{N}`$, where $`\alpha ^{}`$ is the inverse of the string tension and $`N`$ is oscillator occupation number of the excited string state. In contrast, the density of states of a black hole grows exponentially with the second power of mass in four dimensions (and in general as $`M^{(d2)/(d3)}`$ in $`d`$ dimensions). The corresponding entropy then is proportional to square of the mass in four dimensions (or to $`M^{(d2)/(d3)}`$ in arbitrary $`d`$ dimensions). As suggested by Susskind, this apparent discrepancy can be cured by a proper identification that takes in to account a large mass-renormalization, a gravitational redshift. To do this use is made of the fact that the near horizon geometry of a Schwarzschild black hole is a Rindler space with a dimensionless time $`\tau _R`$ and a dimensionless energy $`E_R`$. The Rindler mass and ADM mass of a black hole are related by a huge redshift between the stretched horizon and asymptotic infinity. In $`d`$ dimensions $`(d4)`$ the dimensionless Rindler energy associated with a Schwarzschild black hole is given by

$$E_R=\left(\frac{2}{d2}\right)M^{(d2)/(d3)}\left(\frac{16\pi G}{(d2)A_{d2}}\right)^{1/(d3)}=\left(\frac{2}{d2}\right)Mr_{BH},$$
(1)
where $`A_{d2}`$ is the area of a unit sphere of $`d2`$ dimensions, $`G`$ is the Newton’s constant and $`r_{BH}`$ is the Schwarzschild radius associated with mass $`M`$. In terms of Rindler energy, the horizon ‘area’ $`A_H`$ and Bekenstein-Hawking entropy $`S_{BH}`$ of a Schwarzschild black hole in any arbitrary dimensions is given by

$$A_H=8\pi GE_R,S_{BH}=2\pi E_R.$$
(2)
That is, black hole density of states grows exponentially with Rindler energy in any dimensions. The string$``$black-hole correspondence is then obtained when Rindler energy $`E_R`$ is identified with the square root of the oscillator number $`\sqrt{N}`$ of the highly excited string in any dimension. In particular, in four dimensions, $`NE_R^2G^2M^4`$. This identification, then gives the same leading order expression for the density of black hole states and that for the string states allowing equality of Bekenstein-Hawking entropy of a black hole with that of an excited string in the leading order. Further support for this correspondence is the consequent identification of Hawking temperature of the black hole with red-shifted Hagedorn temperature associated with the excited string. Equivalently, the black hole size $`r_{BH}`$ will get identified with the string length scale $`l_S`$.

If the correspondence black-hole$``$string, with the identification of Rindler energy ($`E_R`$) with the square root of the oscillator occupation number ($`\sqrt{N}`$) of highly excited string, is strictly true, all other features of black holes must get reflected in the string description too. In this context, $`ln(area)`$ corrections to the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy, first discovered in the quantum geometry framework, is of interest. In this framework, boundary degrees of freedom of a black hole in four dimensional gravity are described by an $`SU(2)`$ Chern-Simons theory on the horizon, with coupling $`k`$ proportional to the horizon area. The dimensionality of boundary Hilbert space can thus be readily computed by counting the conformal blocks of $`SU(2)_k`$ conformal field theory on a two-sphere (spatial slice of the horizon) with a number of punctures carrying $`SU(2)`$ spin representations on them. Then for large horizon area $`A_H`$, the black hole entropy $`S_{bh}`$ has been found to be

$$S_{bh}=\frac{A_H}{4G}\frac{3}{2}ln\left(\frac{A_H}{4G}\right)+\mathrm{}\mathrm{}$$
(3)
There have also been other subsequent derivations of this $`ln(area)`$ correction with the same coefficient $`3/2`$ . It appears to be universal in the sense that it obtains for a variety of black holes and also in different dimensions.

Thus, if black-hole$``$string correspondence is indeed true, the same correction as in eqn.(3) should be reflected in the entropy of a highly excited string also. Over years, the counting of string states has been done in many places. In the following, we shall recalculate the level density of a highly excited open string beyond the leading order carefully taking into account contribution of the zero modes. It will be demonstrated that the string entropy does indeed receive a correction $`3/2ln\sqrt{N}`$ beyond the leading value proportional to $`\sqrt{N}`$. This may then be taken as an additional evidence in support of the black-hole$``$string correspondence.

An open string moving in a $`d`$ dimensional space-time is described by $`d`$ two-dimensional fields $`X^\mu (\sigma ,\tau ),`$ $`\mu =0,1,2,\mathrm{}.(d1)`$ with $`0\sigma \pi ,`$ satisfying the string equation $`^2X^\mu (\sigma ,\tau )^2X^\mu (\sigma ,\tau )=0`$ subject to boundary conditions reflecting no flow of momentum from the string ends: $`_\sigma X^\mu (\sigma ,\tau )=0`$ at $`\sigma =0`$ and $`\sigma =\pi .`$ The string equation is satisfied by

$`X^\mu =x^\mu +\mathrm{}_S^2p^\mu \tau +i\mathrm{}_S{\displaystyle \underset{n0}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{n}}\alpha _n^\mu e^{in\tau }cosn\sigma `$

where $`\mathrm{}_S=\sqrt{2\alpha ^{}}=1/\sqrt{\pi T}`$ is the fundamental string length (our units are $`\mathrm{}=c=1),`$ $`T`$ is string tension. The center of mass coordinate is $`x^\mu `$ and string momentum is $`p^\mu `$. The commutation relations satisfied by the various operators are

$`[x^\mu ,p^\mu ]=i\eta ^{\mu \nu },[\alpha _m^\mu ,\alpha _n^\nu ]=m\delta _{m+n,0}\eta ^{\mu \nu },`$

where $`\eta ^{\mu \nu }`$ is the flat metric in $`d`$ dimensional space-time. This theory has a reparametrization invariance $`(\sigma ,\tau )(\sigma ^{},\tau ^{})`$ generated by Virasoro constraints: $`(_\tau X^\mu \pm _\sigma X^\mu )^2=0.`$ This may be fixed by a gauge choice, in particular by light-cone gauge introducing a preferred longitudinal direction in space: $`X^+=x^++\mathrm{}_S^2p^+\tau `$, where the light-cone coordinates are $`X^\pm =(X^0\pm X^{d1})/\sqrt{2}`$. In this gauge all the oscillators $`\alpha _n^+=0`$ $`(n0)`$ and also the coordinates $`X^{}(\sigma ,\tau )`$ and hence $`p^{}`$ and $`\alpha _n^{}`$ are not independent. Only independent variables are transverse coordinates, momenta and oscillators: $`x^i`$, $`p^i`$, $`\alpha _n^i`$ $`(n0)`$ with $`i=1,2,3,\mathrm{}.d2`$. The $`\tau `$-translation generating Hamiltonian is given by

$$H=\mathrm{}_S^2p^+p^{}=\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{}_S^2(p^i)^2+𝒩a$$
(4)
where $`a=(d2)/24`$ is the normal ordering constant and $`𝒩=_{i=1}^{d2}_{m=1}^{\mathrm{}}\alpha _m^i\alpha _m^i`$ is the oscillator number operator whose eigenvalues are the occupation number of the state, $`𝒩|\psi _N>=N|\psi _N>`$.

It is convenient to introduce the standard oscillators:

$`a_{m}^{i}{}_{}{}^{}={\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{m}}}\alpha _m^i,a_m^i={\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{m}}}\alpha _m^im>0`$

which satisfy the standard oscillator commutation relations:

$`[a_m^i,a_{n}^{j}{}_{}{}^{}]=\delta _{mn}\delta ^{ij}.`$

The occupation number operator in terms of number operators $`𝒩_m`$ for these standard oscillators is

$$𝒩=\underset{m=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}m𝒩_m\underset{m=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\underset{i=1}{\overset{d2}{}}ma_{m}^{i}{}_{}{}^{}a_m^i,$$
(5)
where $`𝒩_m`$ has the standard oscillator eigenvalues $`0,1,2,3\mathrm{}..`$.

The mass of an excited string of level $`N`$ is given by $`\mathrm{}_S^2M_N^2=2(Na)`$. To count the quantum states of such a string, we write the partition function as a function of a complex parameter $`\tau `$ as (we set $`\mathrm{}_S=1`$ in the following):

$$Z(\tau )=Tre^{2\pi iH\tau }=Trexp\left[2\pi i\tau \left(\frac{(p^i)^2}{2}+𝒩a\right)\right].$$
(6)
Here $`Tr`$ represents integration over the transverse string momentum $`p^i`$ and trace over the oscillator states. That is,

$$Z(\tau )=\left(d^{d2}p^i\right)e^{\pi i\tau (p^i)^2}trexp\left[2\pi i\tau \left(𝒩a\right)\right]=\left(\frac{1}{i\tau }\right)^{(d2)/2}e^{2\pi i\tau a}trexp\left[2\pi i\tau 𝒩\right],$$
(7)
where now $`tr`$ represents trace over the oscillator states only. Notice that

$`tre^{2\pi i\tau 𝒩}={\displaystyle \underset{m=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}e^{2\pi im\tau 𝒩_m}=\left({\displaystyle \underset{N=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}p(N)e^{2\pi iN\tau }\right)^{d2}`$

where $`p(N)`$ is the number of partitions of $`N`$ in terms of positive integers. Now there is a standard formula in number theory:

$`f^1(\tau ){\displaystyle \underset{N=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}p(N)e^{2\pi iN\tau }={\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}\left(1e^{2\pi in\tau }\right)^1.`$

The function $`f(\tau )`$ is related to Dedekind eta function as: $`\eta (\tau )=exp(i\pi \tau /12)f(\tau )`$. Thus the partition function is

$`Z(\tau )=\left({\displaystyle \frac{1}{i\tau }}\right)^{(d2)/2}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\left[\eta (\tau )\right]^{d2}}}.`$

Next note Dedekind eta function has the property: $`\eta (1/\tau )=(i\tau )^{1/2}\eta (\tau ).`$ Using this, the partition function can be written as

$$Z(\tau )=\frac{1}{\left[\eta (1/\tau )\right]^{d2}}=\frac{e^{2\pi ia/\tau }}{\left[f(1/\tau )\right]^{d2}}$$
(8)
To find the density $`d(N)`$ of string states with occupation number $`N`$, we write

$$Z(\tau )=\underset{N=0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}d(N)e^{2\pi i(Na)\tau }.$$
(9)
Equating the two expressions in eqns.(8) and (9) and inverting for the level density, we have

$$d(N)=𝑑\tau \frac{exp\left[2\pi i\left((Na)\tau (a/\tau )\right)\right]}{\left[f(1/\tau )\right]^{d2}}.$$
(10)
For large $`N`$, this can now be approximately evaluated by the saddle point method. The saddle point is at $`\tau _0=i\sqrt{a/(Na)}`$. Expanding around this point $`\tau =\tau _0+u`$ and performing the Gaussian integration over $`u`$ yields the level density as

$`d(N)\left({\displaystyle \frac{a^{1/2}}{2(Na)^{3/2}}}\right)^{1/2}exp\left(4\pi \sqrt{a(Na)}\right),`$

where $`f(1/\tau _0)1`$ for large $`N`$ has been used. Finally density of string states for large occupation number $`N`$ can be asymptotically written as:

$$d(N)C\frac{aexp\left(4\pi \sqrt{aN}\right)}{(aN)^{3/4}}+\mathrm{}\mathrm{},$$
(11)
where $`C`$ is an $`N`$ independent irrelevant constant and $`a=(d2)/24`$. This is the same formula as that obtained by Carlip for density of states with eigenvalues of Virasoro operator $`L_0`$ as $`\mathrm{\Delta }=Na`$ in a general rational conformal field theory of central charge $`c=24a`$. The asymptotic level density of string states has been calculated in many places, the earliest computation for a string in $`d=26`$ dimensions was done in refs. where the rapidly growing exponential dependence on $`\sqrt{N}`$ was correctly obtained. However, there is now an additional factor of $`N^{3/4}`$. This introduces a logarithmic correction to the entropy $`S_{st}`$ of a highly excited string:

$$S_{st}=lnd(N)4\pi \sqrt{aN}\frac{3}{2}ln\sqrt{aN}+lna\mathrm{}\mathrm{}$$
(12)
Finally following Susskind we identify Rindler energy of the black hole with $`\sqrt{N}`$ as $`E_R=2\sqrt{aN}`$, and rewrite the entropy of a highly excited string as

$$S_{st}=2\pi E_R\frac{3}{2}lnE_R\mathrm{}\mathrm{}$$
(13)
Clearly this entropy has same logarithmic correction beyond the Bekenstein-Hawking area law as that obtained for the black hole entropy in quantum geometry framework. This correction exits not only for excited strings describing Schwarzschild black holes in any arbitrary dimensions as above, but also all other cases discussed in refs.. We emphasize that this thus provides an additional evidence in favour of the excited-string$``$black-hole correspondence.

In the derivation of level density above, it is important to take account of the zero modes carefully. This has been done by including the integration over $`p^i`$ in the partition function in eqn.(7). If this were not included, then non-exponential part of level density formula (11) above would have changed from dimension independent factor $`N^{3/4}`$ to $`N^{(d+1)/4}`$ as has been found in some of the early calculations of level density (for example, see ref. for the case of $`d=26`$).

Our discussion here has been for generic black holes, say, Schwarzschild black holes in any dimensions. Though level density above has been calculated for an open string, the asymptotic formula (11) is valid in general in any string theory. In particular, this also obtains for the level density of BPS elementary string states of the superstring theories. For extremal black holes of these superstring theories for which no mass renormalization takes place, the correspondence between strings and black holes sharing the same macroscopic quantum numbers may be applied directly. This allows a counting of weakly coupled BPS string states which can be directly related to degeneracy of these extremal black holes reproducing the Bekeintein-Hawking entropy in the leading order. The correction beyond Bekenstein-Hawking entropy obtained here holds for the Bogomol’nyi saturated elementary string states too.

Like black holes, entropy of de Sitter space can also be given a string interpretation. Here also geometry near the cosmological horizon is given by a Rindler space. Thus de Sitter space may well be described by a string on the stretched horizon through the same identification of Rindler energy with square root of the oscillator number. The entropy so calculated, beyond the usual area law would also have the same logarithmic correction as discussed above.

Acknowledgement: Discussions with S. Kalyana Rama are gratefully acknowledged.


text:
# A new view of k-essence

## I Introduction

One of the greatest challenges in modern cosmology is understanding the nature of the dark energy responsible for the observed acceleration of the present Universe acce . A popular framework, known as quintessence, involves scalar field models in which the field slow-rolls down a potential, with its potential energy acting analogously to that of early Universe inflation quin ; trac  models. However, recently a second possibility, that of an effective scalar field theory described by a Lagrangian with a non-canonical kinetic term, has also been proposed. Such a model may lead to early time acceleration, where it is named k-inflation ADM ; GM , or acceleration in the present Universe under the name k-essence COY ; AMS1 ; AMS2 . It is worth noting that tachyon dark energy models tach  may be seen as special cases of k-essence.

Allowing the dark energy to be dynamical provides an opportunity to study the so-called coincidence problem, which asks why dark energy domination begins just at the epoch when we cosmologists exist to observe it. Traditional quintessence models appear promising in this regard, as they can support scaling or tracking solutions, in which the scalar field energy density follows that of the dominant source of matter trac . Unfortunately, these models require a fine-tuning of parameters, making them not particularly more attractive than a pure cosmological constant in the cases considered so far. Alternatively, a class of k-essence models AMS1 ; AMS2  has been claimed to solve the coincidence problem in a generic way; after a long period of perfect tracking, the domination of dark energy is triggered by the transition to matter domination, a time period during which structures — and cosmologists — can form. Therefore, it is important to understand the extent to which these models differ from quintessence models. In particular, one would like to understand whether these models suffer from the same sort of fine tuning issues as quintessence, and also whether observations can differentiate between the two models. We will address this question by employing field redefinitions which allow k-essence models to be recast in a form similar to quintessence, though we stress immediately that in general the two ideas are distinct and it is not possible to write an arbitrary k-essence model in quintessence form.

Throughout this article a prime denotes a derivative with respect to the argument of the function to which it is applied, and a dot denotes a derivative with respect to time.

## II K-essence

To begin with, we wish to be absolutely clear in our terminology. Although the literature contains different usages, particularly of the word quintessence, it is important that our own usage be unambiguous. We will use the word ‘quintessence’ exclusively to refer to models which feature a single scalar field with a canonical kinetic term (whereas in some other papers the definition of quintessence is so general as to include k-essence within it).

We now introduce the k-essence model. Neglecting for now the part of the Lagrangian containing ordinary matter, the action for a k-essence field $`\varphi `$ is given by

$$S=\mathrm{d}^4x\sqrt{g}\left[\frac{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^2}{16\pi }R+K(\varphi )\stackrel{~}{p}(X)\right],$$
(1)
where we assume $`K(\varphi )>0`$ and $`X=\frac{1}{2}_\mu \varphi ^\mu \varphi `$. The name of the model suggests that the field should be driven only by its kinetic energy. For that to be strictly true one should impose $`\stackrel{~}{p}(0)=0`$, otherwise that term could be separated as a potential term independent of $`_\mu \varphi `$. Indeed, for sufficiently small $`X`$, one could even write $`\stackrel{~}{p}(X)\stackrel{~}{p}(0)+\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(0)X`$ and, after field redefinition, obtain a canonical scalar field with a potential. However this condition is not imposed in most k-essence papers, e.g. Refs. AMS1 ; AMS2 , and we will not impose it either.

In order to be even more general, one may include a separate potential term $`\overline{U}(\varphi )`$ in the Lagrangian, now setting $`\stackrel{~}{p}(0)=0`$ MMOT . Obviously, this model includes the one given by Eq. (1). We give an extension of our results to this more general possibility in the appendix.

Now, we recall some properties summarized in Ref. AMS2 . Using the perfect fluid analogy, the pressure and the energy density are given by

$`p`$ $`=`$ $`K(\varphi )\stackrel{~}{p}(X),`$ (2)
$`\epsilon `$ $`=`$ $`K(\varphi )\stackrel{~}{\epsilon }(X),`$ (3)
where

$$\stackrel{~}{\epsilon }(X)=2X\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(X)\stackrel{~}{p}(X).$$
(4)
The equation of state parameter is given by

$$w_\mathrm{k}=\frac{\stackrel{~}{p}(X)}{\stackrel{~}{\epsilon }(X)}=\frac{\stackrel{~}{p}(X)}{2X\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(X)\stackrel{~}{p}(X)},$$
(5)
while the effective sound speed is given by

$$c_{\mathrm{sk}}^2=\frac{\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(X)}{\stackrel{~}{\epsilon }^{}(X)}=\frac{\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(X)}{\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(X)+2X\stackrel{~}{p}^{\prime \prime }(X)}.$$
(6)
This definition comes from the equation describing the evolution of linear perturbations in a k-essence dominated Universe GM , and therefore is relevant when studying the stability of the theory. We note, however, that, as shown in Ref. CHT , $`c_{\mathrm{sk}}^2>0`$ is not a sufficient condition for the theory to be stable. It is important to notice that the effective sound speed is not always equal to $`1`$, as it is in quintessence models. Therefore, the behaviour of perturbations in this case is genuinely different from that in the case of canonical scalar fields and this difference may be observable sosp . Also, note that the definition given in Eq. (6) is different from the thermodynamic definition of the isentropic sound speed

$$c_\mathrm{s}^2=\left(\frac{p}{\epsilon }\right)_S=\frac{\dot{p}}{\dot{\epsilon }}.$$
(7)
As explained in Ref. KS , the difference arises from the fact that “a well-defined concept of sound speed does not exist for classical scalar fields” and therefore their density perturbations behave quite differently from the usual hydrodynamic case.

Although models with negative energy density, super-negative or diverging equation of state and/or imaginary or diverging sound speed have been studied, e.g. Refs. COY ; AMS1 ; AMS2 , it is possible to restrict the class of models by imposing one or more of the following independent constraints:

$$\begin{array}{ccc}\epsilon >0\hfill & & 2X\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(X)>\stackrel{~}{p}(X),\hfill \\ w_\mathrm{k}>1\hfill & & \stackrel{~}{\epsilon }(X)\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(X)>0,\hfill \\ c_{\mathrm{sk}}^2>0\hfill & & 2X\stackrel{~}{p}^{\prime \prime }(X)\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(X)>\stackrel{~}{p}^2(X).\hfill \end{array}$$
(8)
From the action Eq. (1), in the case of a flat Robertson–Walker metric

$$\mathrm{d}s^2=\mathrm{d}t^2+a^2(t)\mathrm{d}𝐱^2,$$
(9)
the Euler–Lagrange equation for the k-essence field is

$$\stackrel{~}{\epsilon }^{}(X)\ddot{\varphi }+3H\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(X)\dot{\varphi }+\frac{K^{}(\varphi )}{K(\varphi )}\stackrel{~}{\epsilon }(X)=0,$$
(10)
where $`H=\dot{a}/a`$. We see that if $`\stackrel{~}{\epsilon }^{}(X)=0`$ at some $`X_\mathrm{c}`$, so that $`c_{\mathrm{sk}}^2`$ diverges, the equation is singular and reduces to a first-order equation which gives a constraint on $`\varphi `$. Some problems may arise at this singularity, but we leave this issue for future investigation. In any case, regions separated by a diverging sound speed are disconnected and may be considered as different models. In each such region the Euler–Lagrange equation may be rewritten as

$$\ddot{\varphi }+3Hc_{\mathrm{sk}}^2(X)\dot{\varphi }+\frac{K^{}(\varphi )}{K(\varphi )}\frac{\stackrel{~}{\epsilon }(X)}{\stackrel{~}{\epsilon }^{}(X)}=0.$$
(11)
Finally, note that, for models in which $`\stackrel{~}{p}(X)`$ is analytic and equal to $`0`$ at the origin, then if $`\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(X=0)<0`$ the function $`\stackrel{~}{\epsilon }(X)`$ must be negative for some $`X`$. Given that $`\stackrel{~}{p}(X)`$ is analytic at the origin, we then have

$$\stackrel{~}{p}(X)=p_nX^n+𝒪(X^{n+1}),$$
(12)
which implies

$$\stackrel{~}{\epsilon }(X)=p_n(2n1)X^n+𝒪(X^{n+1}),$$
(13)
with $`n`$ a positive integer and where $`p_n>0`$ is the first non-zero co-efficient. Hence $`\stackrel{~}{\epsilon }<0`$ for some range of $`X`$.

In the models described in Ref. AMS2 , $`\stackrel{~}{p}(X)`$ is negative for small $`X`$ and therefore, if $`\stackrel{~}{p}(0)=0`$ then $`\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(X)`$ must be negative close to the origin. Hence $`\stackrel{~}{\epsilon }(X)<0`$ over some range of $`X`$. As a result, for these models, if one imposes $`\epsilon (X)>0`$ and the analyticity of $`\stackrel{~}{p}(X)`$ at the origin, then $`\stackrel{~}{p}(0)`$ must be non-zero and, as explained above, this implies that one has, in effect, introduced a potential term.

## III Dynamical equivalence

In this section we present a model which is dynamically equivalent to the k-essence model. Consider a new action

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill S=& \mathrm{d}^4x\sqrt{g}\{\frac{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^2}{16\pi }R\hfill \\ & +K(\varphi )[\stackrel{~}{p}(\chi )+(\frac{1}{2}_\mu \varphi ^\mu \varphi \chi )\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(\chi )]\},\hfill \end{array}$$
(14)
in which we have introduced a field $`\chi `$, which acts like a Lagrange multiplier. The variational principle with respect to $`\chi `$ gives

$$\stackrel{~}{p}^{\prime \prime }(\chi )\left(\chi \frac{1}{2}_\mu \varphi ^\mu \varphi \right)=0,$$
(15)
and therefore — as long as $`\stackrel{~}{p}^{\prime \prime }(\chi )0`$ — the action Eq. (14) is dynamically equivalent to Eq. (1). Note, however, that, when quantized, the theories will no longer be equivalent. Now perform a field transformation

$$Q_{\varphi _0}^\varphi \sqrt{K(\sigma )}d\sigma ,$$
(16)
which leads to

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill S=& \mathrm{d}^4x\sqrt{g}\{\frac{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^2}{16\pi }R\hfill \\ & +\frac{\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(\chi )}{2}_\mu Q^\mu Q+V(Q)[\stackrel{~}{p}(\chi )\chi \stackrel{~}{p}^{}(\chi )]\},\hfill \end{array}$$
(17)
where $`V(Q)K[\varphi (Q)]`$. From now on, for simplicity, we assume that $`\stackrel{~}{p}^{\prime \prime }(X)`$ has a constant sign, although this is not a particularly strong assumption. This allows us to define a new field by computing a modified Legendre transformation

$`\psi `$ $``$ $`\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(\chi ),`$ (18)
$`W(\psi )`$ $``$ $`\chi \stackrel{~}{p}^{}(\chi )\stackrel{~}{p}(\chi ),`$ (19)
which finally gives

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill S=& \mathrm{d}^4x\sqrt{g}[\frac{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^2}{16\pi }R\hfill \\ & +\frac{\psi }{2}_\mu Q^\mu QV(Q)W(\psi )].\hfill \end{array}$$
(20)
This action is very simple, but contains a non-dynamical field $`\psi `$ coupled non-canonically to a canonical scalar field $`Q`$. Clearly, if we impose $`\epsilon >0`$, then the condition $`w_\mathrm{k}>1`$ implies that $`\psi `$ is positive, and therefore that the kinetic term has the canonical sign. In the opposite case, the kinetic term has the sign of the phantom model introduced by Caldwell phan .

For the flat Robertson–Walker metric (9), the energy density and pressure of this two-field component of matter are

$`\rho _{\mathrm{Q}\psi }`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\psi }{2}}\dot{Q}^2+V(Q)W(\psi ),`$ (21)
$`p_{\mathrm{Q}\psi }`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\psi }{2}}\dot{Q}^2V(Q)W(\psi ).`$ (22)
The Euler–Lagrange equation for $`Q`$ is given by

$$\psi \ddot{Q}+(3H\psi +\dot{\psi })\dot{Q}+V^{}(Q)W(\psi )=0,$$
(23)
and the constraint equation for $`\psi `$ is given by

$$W^{}(\psi )=\frac{\dot{Q}^2}{2V(Q)}.$$
(24)
If $`\psi `$ is positive and remains almost constant, the field $`Q`$ plays the role of a canonical scalar field. Indeed, by renormalizing $`Q`$ as $`\stackrel{~}{Q}=\sqrt{\psi }Q`$ we obtain an (almost) equivalent quintessence model which should mimic the k-essence field during the time period for which the assumption of approximately constant $`\psi `$ holds. If this is the case when k-essence starts dominating, it will not be possible to distinguish it observationally from a quintessence field, unless one takes into account perturbations. As described in Refs. COY ; AMS1 ; AMS2  the k-essence field can undergo several attractor regimes during which its kinetic energy remains constant. Hence, $`\psi `$ is indeed constant over those periods of time. Thus, during some time periods, the homogeneous part of the k-essence field will behave exactly like a quintessence field.

## IV Examples

In this section we study two examples of k-essence models. We first study the model described in Ref. COY  and given by

$`K(\varphi )`$ $`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{\varphi }{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}}}\right)^\alpha ,`$ (25)
$`\stackrel{~}{p}(X)`$ $`=`$ $`P_0\left[{\displaystyle \frac{X}{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4}}+\left({\displaystyle \frac{X}{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4}}\right)^2\right].`$ (26)
It is easy to check that this is a rather unconventional model; for some ranges of $`X`$ we can have $`\epsilon <0`$, $`w_\mathrm{k}<1`$ or $`c_{\mathrm{sk}}^2<0`$, and $`w_\mathrm{k}`$ and $`c_{\mathrm{sk}}^2`$ diverging at $`X_w=m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4/3`$ and $`X_c=m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4/6`$ respectively. Nevertheless, this model features an interesting behaviour — in the presence of a dominating fluid with equation of state parameter $`w_\mathrm{f}`$ there exists a stable scaling solution for which $`X`$ is constant and

$$w_\mathrm{k}=\frac{(1+w_\mathrm{f})\alpha }{2}1.$$
(27)
Using the transformation described in the last section, we find

$$V(Q)=(\beta /\alpha )^\beta \left(\frac{Q}{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}}\right)^\beta ,$$
(28)
where

$`\beta `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2\alpha }{2\alpha }},`$ (29)
$`\psi `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{P_0}{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4}}\left[1+{\displaystyle \frac{2\chi }{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4}}\right],`$ (30)
$`W(\psi )`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{(\psi m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4+P_0)^2}{4P_0}}.`$ (31)
Provided that $`X`$ is constant during the scaling regime (so that $`\psi `$ is constant), the k-essence field behaves like an inverse power-law quintessence field in its well-known tracker regime. The transformation described in Section III allows us to find the appropriate power. We normalize the kinetic term and obtain

$$\stackrel{~}{V}(\stackrel{~}{Q})=\stackrel{~}{V}_0\left(\frac{\stackrel{~}{Q}}{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}}\right)^\beta .$$
(32)
where $`\stackrel{~}{V}_0=\psi ^{\beta /2}(\beta /\alpha )^\beta (\psi m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4+P_0)^2/4P_0`$. Obviously, as soon as the scaling solution is modified (for instance at matter–radiation equality) $`\psi `$ evolves until the k-essence field enters a new scaling solution with a new quintessence-like behaviour. In Fig. 1 we show the evolution of $`\psi `$ for a cosmologically-realistic model, and also the evolution of the equation of state parameter $`w`$ for the k-essence field and for the almost equivalent quintessence model. The value of $`\stackrel{~}{V}_0`$ has been chosen so that both models yield the same value of the equation of state parameter in the present epoch. Clearly, as long as $`\psi `$ does not remain exactly constant, the equivalence is not perfect and therefore the two models may in principle be distinguished from one another. However in practice we see in Fig. 1 that the evolution of $`w`$ is almost exactly the same in the two cases out to high redshift.

As a second example, consider the model described in Ref. AMS1  given by

$$K(\varphi )=\left(\frac{\varphi }{M_0}\right)^2,$$
(33)
and

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill \stackrel{~}{p}(X)=& M_0^4[2.01+2\sqrt{1+X/M_0^4}\hfill \\ & +3\times 10^{17}(X/M_0^4)^310^{24}(X/M_0^4)^4],\hfill \end{array}$$
(34)
where $`M_0\sqrt{3/8\pi }m_{\mathrm{Pl}}`$. The constants appearing in this expression are very specific, and it may be that there are simpler versions, but so far this is the best example that we know of in the literature that features an interesting property: the transition between an exact tracker regime and the domination of the k-essence field is triggered by matter–radiation equality and therefore, in a sense, the coincidence problem is solved. Again, for some ranges of $`X`$, contrary to what is assumed in the first part of Ref. AMS1 , we can have $`\epsilon <0`$, $`w_\mathrm{k}<1`$ or $`c_{\mathrm{sk}}^2<0`$ and $`w_\mathrm{k}`$ and $`c_{\mathrm{sk}}^2`$ diverging at $`X=X_w2.1\times 10^7M_0^4`$ and $`X=X_c1.6\times 10^7M_0^4`$ respectively. Nevertheless, as long as we take $`XX_c`$, we have $`\epsilon >0`$, $`w_\mathrm{k}>1`$ and $`c_{\mathrm{sk}}^2>0`$ and, as explained in Section II, we know that the field cannot cross this boundary.

Using the transformation described in Section III we find

$$V(Q)=e^{2Q}.$$
(35)
Note that, since $`\stackrel{~}{p}^{\prime \prime }(X)`$ changes sign at $`X1.6\times 10^6M_0^4`$ and $`X1.5\times 10^7M_0^4`$, the Legendre transformation described in Section III cannot be computed. Nevertheless we still define $`\psi `$ as $`\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(X)`$, though $`W`$ can no longer be expressed as a function of $`\psi `$.

We have performed a numerical simulation in order to reproduce the result given in Ref. AMS1 , that is to say a stable scaling solution during radiation domination which then evolves to k-essence domination after matter–radiation equality. As an aside, we find that the basin of attraction of this solution does not seem to be very large. Indeed, random initial conditions, even with a subdominant k-essence field, almost never lead to the desired solution, but instead to an early period of k-essence domination, or in some cases the solution even ceases to exist when, after a finite time, it reaches the singularity $`X_\mathrm{c}`$. However we will not pursue this further here, but leave it for a future investigation.

In Fig. 2 we show the evolution of $`\psi `$ for this model. Clearly $`\psi `$ is almost constant during radiation domination, then evolves to another constant soon after matter–radiation equality, remaining nearly constant even during the transition to k-essence domination. Consequently, we know that during these two time periods the k-essence field behaves like a quintessence field. Renormalizing $`Q`$ in order to have a canonical kinetic term, we find two exponential potential quintessence models given by

$$\stackrel{~}{V}(\stackrel{~}{Q})\mathrm{exp}(\alpha _i\stackrel{~}{Q})(i=1\mathrm{or}2),$$
(36)
with $`\alpha _15.8m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^1`$ and $`\alpha _273m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^1`$, which mimic the k-essence field during the two time periods described above respectively.

In order to mimic the k-essence field during these two time periods with only one quintessence model one may add both potentials to obtain a double exponential quintessence model nunes . In this case we have normalized the potential to fit the late-time behaviour of the k-essence field. The evolution of the energy density for all these models is shown in Fig. 3 and it is evident that the quintessence models closely mimic the k-essence field while $`\psi `$ is constant. Moreover, as expected, the double exponential model allows us to mimic the k-essence field for early times as well as for the late-time evolution of the universe.

In Fig. 4 we reproduce the plots shown in Ref. AMS1 , adding the quintessence models described here. Again, the quintessence models very closely mimic the k-essence model during the period for which they are equivalent; for instance the second exponential potential model gives indistinguishable evolution of $`\rho _\mathrm{k}/\rho _\mathrm{m}`$ and $`w`$ back to redshifts of several hundred (though note that this potential does not exhibit tracker behaviour). Accordingly, observations studying the homogeneous evolution, such as supernovae observations, are not able to distinguish between such models. For the double exponential model, the mimicking is not perfect during the recent past and therefore one might be able to tell the difference.

## V Discussion

Quintessence and k-essence are two attempts to explain, in terms of scalar fields, the current observation of an accelerating universe. Although they are similar in that they both involve the dynamics of light scalar fields, they differ in that quintessence relies on precise functional forms for the potential of the field, whereas k-essence derives its particular behaviour from the presence of non-canonical kinetic terms associated with the field. Given that both models attempt to explain the same observations, and that both models involve evolving scalar fields, a natural question that arises is whether it is possible to write one model in terms of the parameters of the other. In regimes where the effective equation of state parameter for the k-essence field becomes less than -1, such a relationship is not possible whilst maintaining conventional canonical kinetic terms for the quintessence fields, but for $`w_\mathrm{k}`$ greater than -1 such equivalences may exist.

In particular, in this paper we have addressed this question by attempting to rewrite k-essence models in terms of quintessence potentials, relating the two sets of fields through field redefinitions. Our results are intriguing; we have found a dynamically-equivalent action which has similarities with a canonical scalar field action and may be easier to study. We have examined two cases from the literature, and shown that during some regimes the homogeneous part of the k-essence field can behave exactly like a quintessence field, and have obtained exact equivalences in those cases.

It could well prove impossible to differentiate between the two models, quintessence and k-essence, by measuring the evolution of the equation of state parameter. To distinguish between the models, it appears necessary to combine such studies with searches for subtle effects on the perturbations from the different sound speed in the two models sosp .

###### Acknowledgements.

M.M. was supported by the Fondation Barbour, the Fondation Wilsdorf, the Janggen-Pöhn-Stiftung and the ORS Awards Scheme, and A.R.L. in part by the Leverhulme Trust. The work of MT is supported in part by the National Science Foundation under grant PHY-0094122. We thank Nicola Bartolo, Pier-Stefano Corasaniti and Paul Steinhardt for discussions.

## Appendix A Extension to k-essence models with a general potential

In this section, we briefly extend our discussion to a more general model MMOT  given by

$$S=\mathrm{d}^4x\sqrt{g}\left[\frac{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^2}{16\pi }R+K(\varphi )\stackrel{~}{p}(X)\overline{U}(\varphi )\right],$$
(37)
where we assume $`K(\varphi )>0`$, $`\stackrel{~}{p}(0)=0`$ and $`X=\frac{1}{2}_\mu \varphi ^\mu \varphi `$. The pressure and the energy density are given by

$`p`$ $`=`$ $`K(\varphi )\stackrel{~}{p}(X)\overline{U}(\varphi ),`$ (38)
$`\epsilon `$ $`=`$ $`K(\varphi )\stackrel{~}{\epsilon }(X)+\overline{U}(\varphi ),`$ (39)
where $`\stackrel{~}{\epsilon }(X)`$ is still defined by Eq. (4). As usual, the equation of state parameter is given by $`w_\mathrm{k}=p/\epsilon `$ and the sound speed is still defined by Eq. (6).

Now, we consider the action

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill S=& d^4x\sqrt{g}\{\frac{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^2}{16\pi }R+K(\varphi )[\stackrel{~}{p}(X)\hfill \\ & +(\frac{1}{2}_\mu \varphi ^\mu \varphi \chi )\stackrel{~}{p}^{}(X)]\overline{U}(\varphi )\}.\hfill \end{array}$$
(40)
and, using a method similar to that in Section III, and defining $`U(Q)\overline{U}[\varphi (Q)]`$, it is possible to find an equivalent model described by the action

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill S=& \mathrm{d}^4x\sqrt{g}[\frac{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^2}{16\pi }R\hfill \\ & +\frac{\psi }{2}_\mu Q^\mu QV(Q)W(\psi )U(Q)].\hfill \end{array}$$
(41)
The dynamical equations resulting from this action are

$`\rho _{\mathrm{Q}\psi }`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\psi }{2}}\dot{Q}^2+V(Q)W(\psi )+U(Q),`$ (42)
$`p_{\mathrm{Q}\psi }`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\psi }{2}}\dot{Q}^2V(Q)W(\psi )U(Q).`$ (43)
The Euler–Lagrange equation for $`Q`$ is given by

$$\psi \ddot{Q}+(3H\psi +\dot{\psi })\dot{Q}+V^{}(Q)W(\psi )+U^{}(Q)=0,$$
(44)
and the constraint equation for $`\psi `$ is still given by Eq. (24).

Canonically normalizing $`Q`$ via $`\stackrel{~}{Q}\sqrt{\left|\psi \right|}Q`$, the equation of motion for the field $`\stackrel{~}{Q}`$ is then

$$\begin{array}{cc}\hfill \ddot{\stackrel{~}{Q}}& +3H\dot{\stackrel{~}{Q}}\pm \stackrel{~}{V}^{}(\stackrel{~}{Q})W(\psi )\pm \stackrel{~}{U}^{}(\stackrel{~}{Q})\hfill \\ & \frac{3H\stackrel{~}{Q}\dot{\psi }}{2\psi }+\frac{\stackrel{~}{Q}\dot{\psi }^2}{4\psi ^2}\frac{\stackrel{~}{Q}\ddot{\psi }}{2\psi }=0,\hfill \end{array}$$
(45)
where “$`\pm `$” stands for the sign of $`\psi `$ and

$`\stackrel{~}{V}(\stackrel{~}{Q})`$ $``$ $`V\left(\stackrel{~}{Q}/\sqrt{\left|\psi \right|}\right),`$ (46)
$`\stackrel{~}{U}(\stackrel{~}{Q})`$ $``$ $`U\left(\stackrel{~}{Q}/\sqrt{\left|\psi \right|}\right).`$ (47)
In addition, the constraint equation transforms to

$$\dot{\stackrel{~}{Q}}^22\left|\psi \right|W^{}(\psi )\stackrel{~}{V}(\stackrel{~}{Q})\frac{\stackrel{~}{Q}\dot{\stackrel{~}{Q}}\dot{\psi }}{\psi }+\frac{\stackrel{~}{Q}^2\dot{\psi }^2}{4\psi ^2}=0.$$
(48)
In the limit in which the approximation $`\psi \mathrm{constant}`$ applies, the equation of motion becomes

$$\ddot{\stackrel{~}{Q}}+3H\dot{\stackrel{~}{Q}}\pm \stackrel{~}{V}^{}(\stackrel{~}{Q})W(\psi )\pm \stackrel{~}{U}^{}(\stackrel{~}{Q})=0,$$
(49)
and the constraint equation simplifies significantly to become

$$\dot{\stackrel{~}{Q}}^22\left|\psi \right|W^{}(\psi )\stackrel{~}{V}(\stackrel{~}{Q})=0.$$
(50)
Thus, even in this extended class of models, if $`\psi `$ remains constant during some time period, the dynamics will be equivalent to that of a quintessence model or a phantom model for this period.

As a simple example, consider the k-essence example of Ref. MMOT , in which the equation state $`w<1`$ is obtained. This has $`p(X)=P_0\left[\mathrm{exp}(\alpha X/m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4)1\right]`$, where $`\alpha >0`$ and $`P_0>0`$, and unspecified functions for $`K(\varphi )`$ and $`\overline{U}(\varphi )`$. This means that the translation to our new action is effected by

$`\psi `$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha P_0}{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4}}\mathrm{exp}\left(\alpha \chi /m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4\right),`$ (51)
$`W(\psi )`$ $`=`$ $`P_0+{\displaystyle \frac{\psi m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4}{\alpha }}\left[1\mathrm{ln}\left({\displaystyle \frac{\psi m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4}{\alpha P_0}}\right)\right].`$ (52)
Note that $`\alpha P_0/m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4<\psi <0`$ so that this model does indeed correspond to $`w<1`$. The condition that the energy density be positive becomes

$$\frac{U(Q)}{V(Q)}>\frac{\psi m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4}{\alpha }\left[2\mathrm{ln}\left(\frac{\psi m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4}{\alpha P_0}\right)1\right]P_0.$$
(53)
Further, a necessary condition for stability of the theory is that the sound speed be positive $`c_s^2>0`$. This condition becomes

$$\psi <\frac{\alpha P_0}{m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4}\mathrm{exp}\left(1/2\right),$$
(54)
which is satisfied for $`X<X_\mathrm{c}=m_{\mathrm{Pl}}^4/2\alpha `$. Therefore we assume the theory to be valid until some cut-off below $`X_\mathrm{c}`$.