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# Unstable particles, gauge invariance and the Δ⁺⁺ resonance parameters

## I Introduction

Elementary particles with spin larger than 1 have not been discovered yet. However, composite higher spin particles have been observed in nature as bound states of quarks.1 On the other hand, the formulation of a fully consistent quantum field theory for these particles is far from being complete. Thus, the description of the dynamics of such hadronic particles is usually done in terms of an effective Lagrangian model. Such relativistic models of classical fields are built using as a guide the relevant symmetries underlying the dynamics of the specific higher spin particles. Their use for phenomenological purposes remains consistent as long as we restrict to a tree-level description of the amplitudes for physical processes.

Here, we consider the case where spin 3/2 particles are unstable. To be more specific, we are interested in the case of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }(1232)`$ baryon resonance and in the way we introduce its finite width effects in their associated physical observables without destroying the symmetries of the effective Lagrangian (particularly, the electromagnetic gauge invariance and the invariance under contact transformations). Our goal is to provide a framework where the intrinsic properties of this particle, such as the mass, width, and magnetic dipole moment can be determined from experimental data in a consistent and well defined way. By this we mean that those properties share good physical requirements such as model independence (whenever it becomes possible), unitarity, independence upon ad hoc form factors, and invariance under the relevant symmetries of the interactions.

The $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ resonance has spin J=3/2 and isospin I=3/2. In some of the most popular Lagrangian formulations, its dynamics can be described in terms of a Rarita-Schwinger field $`\psi ^\mu (x)`$. The dynamics of its interactions with pions, nucleons and the electromagnetic field is governed by an effective non-renormalizable Lagrangian.2 Most of the problems related to the quantization of the free and the interacting theory of spin 3/2 particles3 (see the invited talk of Prof. Sudarshan at this meeting) are absent when we use the Feynman rules to compute amplitudes only at the tree-level, as it will be the case in the present work. For the purposes of this work, such an effective Lagrangian must be able to describe the production and decay of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ resonance in the elastic and radiative $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering. As in any effective theory of the strong and electromagnetic interactions, the physical (S-matrix) amplitudes derived from our Lagrangian must be invariant under strong isospin and electromagnetic gauge transformations. Furthermore, this model must be invariant also under the so-called contact transformations.4 The contact transformations are necessary to eliminate the unphysical components from the on-shell spin 3/2 fields. This does not prevent that the propagation of a virtual spin-3/2 resonance carries spin-1/2 components that contribute to the physical amplitude.5 An important ingredient of our model is to use a recipe2 to incorporate the finite width effects of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ resonance into the amplitude without spoiling the invariance under the above symmetries that is respected in the case of stable spin 3/2 particles.

A few more remarks are in order. The determination of the mass, width, and magnetic dipole moment (MDM) of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ resonance have been considered by many authors in the past (see the Particle Listings in Ref. ). Concerning the determination of the mass and width parameters, the definitions used by authors falls into two categories: the conventional and the pole parameters.6 In the conventional approach, these resonance parameters are determined by applying the method of partial-wave analyses that use generalized Breit-Wigner formulae to fit the experimental data. This definition of mass and width have a strong model dependence as far as each group has its own prescription for the treatment of analiticity, the choice of background and the particular parametrization of the Breit-Wigner formula.6 Furthermore, an unambiguous separation of resonance and background contributions in this case is hard to accomplish. In contradistinction, in the pole of the S-matrix approach the pole position is a physical property (a process- and model-independent property) of the S-matrix amplitude. Thus, the mass and width parameters of a resonance can be defined from this pole position in a more satisfactory way. It is worth to mention that the numerical values of the mass and width of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ defined from the pole position are significantly smaller7 (1.7% and 15%, respectively for the mass and width) than their counterparts in the conventional approach.

On another hand, the determination of the magnetic dipole moment of a resonance is necessarily model-dependent since one is forced to specify the photon couplings to other particles. Different prescriptions to enforce gauge invariance, to incorporate the resonance character of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$, and to introduce other structure-dependent effects (for example, some ad-hoc form factors) usually lead to different results for the MDM even using the same experimental data.1 Given this diversity of theoretical methods and approximations, the PDG1 prefers to quote an estimate for the magnetic dipole moment in the (rather wide) range $`3.5\mu _{\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}}7.5`$ (in units of nuclear magnetons).

The issue of gauge invariance for processes involving unstable particles has received great attention in the last years and deserves a separate comment. This was motivated by the necessity to have a consistent definition of mass and width for the $`Z^0`$ (and $`W`$) gauge boson in view of the very precise measurements carried out at LEP. More precisely, R. Stuart has pointed out in the early nineties that the definition of the mass of the $`Z^0`$ gauge boson in the on-shell scheme was not gauge-invariant.8 He has proposed to carry out a Laurent expansion of the full (calculated perturbatively) amplitude of $`e^+e^{}f\overline{f}`$ around the pole position and separate the amplitude into resonant and background term.8 The pole and background terms in the amplitude resulting from this expansion are separately gauge-invariant, and can provide a gauge-invariant definition for the mass and width of the $`Z^0`$ boson. This pole + background structure of the amplitude is the same as the one imposed by general arguments of the analiticity of the S-matrix that involves the production and decay of resonances.9 Later, using the Pinch Technique, Pilaftsis and Papavassiliou10 were able to obtain an unstable propagator which provided a definition of mass and width parameters of a gauge-boson resonance satisfying good physical properties and, in particular, gauge invariance.

In two recent papers11 we have extended these ideas to the sector of the baryonic $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ resonance. Using an effective Lagrangian model to describe the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ and its interactions with the $`\pi ^+,p`$ and the photon fields, we have been able to incorporate the finite width effects of this resonance without spoiling the symmetries of the model that are satisfied in the case of the zeroth-width approximation. In addition, the background contributions that originate from the exchange of intermediate states other than the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ (namely, the $`\rho ^0,\sigma ,\mathrm{\Delta }^0`$ and the neutron states) are also incorporated in our effective Lagrangian model. The full amplitude obtained in our approach has the pole plus background structure dictated by the analytic S-matrix theory.9 Each one of these terms in the amplitudes are separately gauge-invariant and the insertion of ad hoc form factors to restore gauge invariance is not necessary in our case.

In this talk we summarize the main aspects of our analysis. We emphasize from our results the model-independent aspects of the mass, width and magnetic dipole moment parameters that follows from our separation of pole and background contributions. In a first step, we fix the mass, the width and the strong coupling of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ from the elastic $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering. Then we obtain the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ MDM from the radiative $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering observables. It is interesting to note that the elastic scattering requires the contribution of the scalar $`\sigma `$ meson in the $`t`$-channel to get an improved fit of the data. The details of the different calculations and input data can be found in Ref. .

## II The effective Lagrangian

In this section we provide the pieces of the Lagrangian for the Rarita-Schwinger field $`\psi ^\mu (x)`$ that are relevant to describe the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ contributions to the elastic ($`\pi ^+p\pi ^+p`$) and radiative ($`\pi ^+p\pi ^+p\gamma `$) processes of our interest. The interaction Lagrangians for $`\rho ^0,\sigma `$ mesons and the neutron intermediate states that contribute to the background amplitude are well known and can be found for example in Ref. .

The Lagrangian that describes the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ and its interactions with the pion ($`\varphi `$), proton ($`\psi `$) and photon ($`A_\mu `$) fields is given by:

$$_\mathrm{\Delta }=_0+_{\mathrm{\Delta }\pi p}+_{\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{\Delta }\gamma }+_{\mathrm{\Delta }\pi p\gamma }.$$
(1)
The different pieces in this Lagrangian have explicitly forms:

$`_0`$ $`=`$ $`\overline{\psi }^\mu \mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mu \alpha }(A)G^{\alpha \beta }\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\beta \nu }(A)\psi ^\nu ,`$ (2)
$`_{\mathrm{\Delta }\pi p}`$ $`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{f_{\mathrm{\Delta }N\pi }}{m_\pi }}\right)\overline{\psi }^\mu \mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mu \nu }(A)\psi ^\nu \pi +h.c.`$ (3)
$`_{\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{\Delta }\gamma }`$ $`=`$ $`2e\overline{\psi }_\nu \mathrm{\Lambda }^{\nu \nu ^{}}(A)\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\nu ^{}\mu ^{}\alpha }\mathrm{\Lambda }^{\mu ^{}\mu }(A)\psi _\nu A^\alpha ,`$ (4)
$`_{\mathrm{\Delta }\pi p\gamma }`$ $`=`$ $`\left({\displaystyle \frac{ef_{\mathrm{\Delta }N\pi }}{m_\pi }}\right)\overline{\psi }^\mu \mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mu \nu }(A)\psi \pi A^\nu +h.c.`$ (5)
The rank two tensors introduced in the above Lagrangians are defined as follows:

$`G^{\alpha \beta }`$ $``$ $`g^{\alpha \beta }(i\partial ̸M)+{\displaystyle \frac{i}{3}}(\gamma ^\alpha \partial ̸\gamma ^\beta \gamma ^\alpha ^\beta ^\alpha \gamma ^\beta )+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{3}}M\gamma ^\alpha \gamma ^\beta ,`$ (6)
$`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mu \nu }(A)`$ $``$ $`g_{\mu \nu }+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(1+3A)\gamma _\mu \gamma _\nu .`$ (7)
We have defined the electromagnetic vertex of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ following Ref. :

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\alpha \beta \rho }=\left(\gamma _\rho \frac{i\kappa _\mathrm{\Delta }}{2M}\sigma _{\rho \sigma }k^\sigma \right)g_{\alpha \beta }\frac{1}{3}\left(\gamma _\rho \gamma _\alpha \gamma _\beta +\gamma _\alpha g_{\beta \rho }\gamma _\beta g_{\alpha \rho }\right),$$
(8)
where the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ MDM is given by:

$$\mu _{\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}}=2(1+\kappa _\mathrm{\Delta })\frac{e}{2M}$$
(9)
and $`\kappa _\mathrm{\Delta }`$ is the anomalous part of the magnetic dipole moment. In the above equations, $`m_\pi `$ and $`M`$ denote the pion and $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ masses while $`f_{\mathrm{\Delta }N\pi }`$ is the (strong) coupling constant of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }N\pi `$ vertex. The isospin-invariant version of the above Lagrangian can be found in Ref. . The Feynman rules associated to these Lagrangian can be found in Ref. .

The arbitrary parameters $`A`$ that appears in the tensor $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mu \nu }(A)`$ is associated to the contact transformations acting upon the Rarita-Schwinger field ($`a1/4`$):

$$\psi ^\mu \psi ^\mu +a\gamma ^\mu \gamma _\alpha \psi ^\alpha ,AA^{}=\frac{A2a}{1+4a}.$$
(10)
One can easily prove that the above (free and interacting) Lagrangian remains invariant under these contact transformations. As is was proven explicitly for the case of elastic and radiative $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering,2 the S-matrix amplitudes for these processes are independent of the arbitrary parameter $`A`$ as it should be. Furthermore, the following Ward identity between the propagator $`P^{\mu \nu }(p)`$ (see Ref. ) and the electromagnetic vertex of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ (see eq. (8))

$$P^{\mu \alpha }(P^{})\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\alpha \beta \rho }k^\rho P^{\beta \nu }(P)=P^{\mu \nu }(P)P^{\mu \nu }(P^{}),$$
(11)
assures that the S-matrix amplitude of the radiative $`\pi ^+p`$ process is also gauge-invariant.

In summary, the model for the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ and its interactions with other particles described in this section give rise to S-matrix amplitudes which are gauge-invariant and satisfy invariance under contact transformations. This conclusion holds as far as we consider the $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ as an stable particle. Introducing the decay width naively in the denominator of the propagator destroys gauge invariance. In the following section we discuss a mechanism to introduce consistently the finite width effects.

## III Recipe for unstable particles

Consider a radiative processes that is dominated by the production of a resonance in the $`s`$-channel. Using a propagator of an unstable as it is obtained from Dyson summation of bubble graphs and the on-shell renormalization scheme leads to an amplitude that is not invariant under electromagnetic gauge transformations. The radiative amplitude can be rendered gauge invariant if we replace $`m_0^2m^2im\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ in all the Feynman rules of the model, where $`m_0`$ is the bare mass of the particle and $`m(\mathrm{\Gamma })`$ is its physical mass (width). This complex mass recipe was proposed as a solution to recover electromagnetic gauge invariance of the amplitude of resonant processes in Ref. .

To illustrate the origin of this recipe, let us consider a resonant scalar particle as a simple example. As is well known, the self-interactions of this particle during his propagation transforms its bare propagator

$`D_0(q^2)={\displaystyle \frac{i}{q^2m_0^2}}`$into the renormalized propagator

$$D(q^2)=\frac{i}{q^2m^2iZ\text{Im}\mathrm{\Pi }(q^2)},$$
(12)
if we use the renormalization conditions $`m_0^2=m^2\text{Re}\mathrm{\Pi }(m^2),Z^1=1\text{Re}\mathrm{\Pi }^{}(m^2)`$. In this definition, $`m`$ becomes the renormalized mass. The unitarity condition of the S-matrix amplitude allows to identify $`Z\text{Im}\mathrm{\Pi }(q^2)=\sqrt{q^2}\mathrm{\Gamma }(q^2)`$, where $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(q^2)`$ is the decay width of the scalar particle with (virtual) mass $`q^2`$.

Let us consider now this renormalized propagator in a physical process. One of the simplest radiative process is the scattering reaction $`\pi ^+(p)\eta (q)\pi ^+(p^{})\eta (q^{})\gamma (k,ϵ)`$ which we assume to be dominated by the production of the charged scalar resonance $`a_0^+`$ in the $`s`$-channel (letters within parenthesis denote the four-momenta and $`ϵ`$ the photon polarization vector). There are three resonant contributions corresponding to the photon emitted from the external pion lines and from the internal $`a_0^+`$ propagator line. The transition amplitude is given by:

$$=eg^2\{\frac{p.ϵ}{p.k}D(Q^{})+\frac{p^{}.ϵ}{p^{}.k}D(Q)iD(Q)D(Q^{})(Q+Q^{}).ϵ\}.$$
(13)
We have introduced the variables $`Q=p+q,Q^{}=p^{}+q^{}`$ ($`Q=Q^{}+k`$) which denote the four-momenta of the intermediate $`a_0^+`$ resonance, and $`D(Q_i)`$ denote its resonant propagator as given in eq. (12). The factor $`g`$ denotes the coupling constant for the $`a_0\eta \pi `$ vertex.

We can easily check that the above amplitude is not gauge-invariant, namely that $``$ does not vanish when $`ϵ`$ is replaced by $`k`$. Gauge invariance is not satisfied due to the presence of the (energy-dependent) imaginary part of the propagator. Gauge invariance can be restored in different forms, introducing in this way an ambiguity in the amplitude. One can for instance include form factors in the strong vertices or additional contributions to the amplitude in an ad hoc way. A second possibility is to include the one loop corrections to the electromagnetic vertex of the $`a_0^+`$ meson in order to satisfy a Ward identity at the one-loop level. A third option consists in using a complex mass scheme as proposed in Ref. .

We consider here the complex mass scheme since it provides the simplest solution. For the illustrative example under consideration, let us consider only the absorptive corrections to the propagator. If we assume a renormalized mass for the $`a_0`$ from the beginning, we can write the absorptive part of the self-energy correction as follows:

$$\text{Im}\mathrm{\Pi }(s)=\sqrt{s}\mathrm{\Gamma }_{a_0}(s)=\frac{g^2}{16\pi s}\{(s(\mu +\mu ^{})^2)(s(\mu \mu ^{})^2\}^{1/2},$$
(14)
where $`\mu (\mu ^{})`$ denotes the mass of the $`\eta (\pi ^+)`$ meson running in the loop correction. In the limit of massless particles in the loop we can check that:

$$\text{Im}\mathrm{\Pi }(s)\frac{g^2}{16\pi }=M\mathrm{\Gamma },$$
(15)
where $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ is the decay width of the $`a_0^+`$ meson and $`M`$ its mass. Thus, the resonant propagator becomes:

$$D_{a_0}(s)\overline{D}_{a_0}(s)=\frac{i}{sM^2+iM\mathrm{\Gamma }}.$$
(16)
This propagator can be obtained from the bare propagator if we simply replace the bare mass by the pole position $`M^2iM\mathrm{\Gamma }`$, namely if we adopt the complex mass scheme. Owing to the identity:

$$\overline{D}_{a_0}(Q^{})\overline{D}_{a_0}(Q)=\frac{i}{(Q+Q^{}).k}\left\{\overline{D}_{a_0}(Q^{})\overline{D}_{a_0}(Q)\right\},$$
(17)
we can check that using the resonant propagator (16) in the limit of massless loop corrections, the amplitude eq. (13) becomes gauge invariant.

This simple example illustrates that the complex mass scheme and the absorptive one loop corrections to the electromagnetic vertex and the propagator (in the limit of massless particles running in loop corrections13) are equivalent methods to restore gauge invariance. Although this approximation (massless particles in loop corrections) can hardly be justified in the case of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ resonant propagator (because the proton in the loop is not massless in the chiral limit), the complex mass scheme provides the simplest solution to the gauge invariance problem for resonant amplitudes and it will be adopted here for our calculations.

## IV Fitting experimental data

Just to clarify our procedure, we repeat here the main steps of our analysis. First, we use the experimental data on the total cross section of $`\pi ^+p`$ elastic scattering to fix some relevant free parameters (mass, decay width and strong coupling of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$) of the model. Then, we use the data on radiative $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering to fix the MDM of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ which remains as the only free parameter in this reaction. The details of the fit procedure and further additional tests of the model can be found in Ref. . Here we focus on the discussion of the relevant features of the model and the results of the fit.

### A Elastic $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering

The model contributions to the $`\pi ^+p\pi ^+p`$ scattering includes the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ resonance ($`s`$-channel), the $`\rho `$ and $`\sigma `$ mesons ($`t`$-channel) and the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^0`$ and neutron states (crossed-channel) contributions. There are five Feynman diagrams corresponding to these contributions which can be found in Ref. . The experimental data for the total cross section is chosen to lie in the resonance region, which corresponds to pion kinetic energies $`T_{lab}=75300`$ in the lab system.14 In this kinematical region, the elastic scattering is dominated by the production of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ resonance and all other terms can be considered as small background contributions. This is indeed the case, as it can be checked from Figure 1.

The parameters entering the background contributions (except the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^0`$ mass and the couplings of the scalar meson) are taken from other low energy processes (see Ref. ). Their precise values are not of critical importance as far as they contribute as a small term to the amplitude. Therefore, the only free parameters of the model are the mass ($`M_\mathrm{\Delta }`$), width ($`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mathrm{\Delta }`$) and $`\mathrm{\Delta }N\pi `$ ($`f_{\mathrm{\Delta }N\pi }`$) coupling of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ and the effective coupling of the scalar meson ($`g_\sigma =g_{\sigma \pi \pi }g_{\sigma NN}`$).

In order to assess the influence of the different background terms, we have performed several fits to the total cross section by adding successively the different background contributions. For the mass of the scalar $`\sigma `$ meson we have chosen $`m_\sigma =650`$ MeV. We have allowed a wide variation of this mass, namely $`\mathrm{\Delta }m_\sigma =\pm 200`$ MeV, and have found that it is correlated mainly with the value of $`g_\sigma `$, while the other parameters are not affected in an important way. The results of the fit are shown in Table 1 and in Figure 1.

A few comments are in order:

$`(i)`$ The $`\chi ^2`$/dof drops from 121 to 10 in going from the top to the bottom of Table 1, which indicates the necessity of including in the fit some degrees of freedom other than the $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ resonance. The large contributions to the $`\chi ^2`$/dof come from the data points for the highest pion energies considered in the fit (see Figure 1). In Figure 1 we can observe the best results obtained for each case indicated in Table 1. Although the $`\chi ^2`$/dof is not indicative of a very good fit, we can expect that such a fit can be improved by considering effects of rescattering and other background terms excluded from the simple pole approximation implicit in our model.

$`(ii)`$ Since only the amplitude involving the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ resonance has an imaginary part, it can be easily checked that the complete amplitude does not satisfy unitarity. We can force our result to satisfy unitarity by adding a softly energy-dependent term to the amplitude. The presence of additional terms in the amplitude can be justified on the basis that we have kept only the pole term in our amplitude for the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ contribution.11 The result obtained from the fit when we impose unitarity is shown in the fifth row of Table 1. Namely, unitary only shifts the value of the decay width in the right direction to match the model-independent result7 shown in the last row of Table 1.

$`(iii)`$ The row denoted as ‘pole position’ in Table 1 contains the results of the fit obtained in a model-independent analysis of the same data for the cross section.7 The close agreement observed in Table 1 between our model-dependent results and the model-independent analysis of Ref.  indicates that our model describes very well not only the resonant but also the background contributions in the amplitude.

$`(iv)`$ Once the relevant parameters of the model are fixed from the total cross section, we can predict the differential cross section $`d\sigma /d\mathrm{\Omega }`$ for pions emitted at an angle $`\theta `$ with respect to the incident pion beam. Our model is able to reproduce two sets of data corresponding to kinetic energies of incident pions at $`T_{lab}=263`$ and $`291`$ MeV.11 The test of the model at these energies is important because the data used to extract the magnetic dipole moment of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ correspond to kinetic energies close to those values (see next section).

These important remarks indicates that our model is well suited to describe the dynamics of the $`\pi ^+p`$ reactions in the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ resonance region and provides good confidence to apply it in the description of other reactions. In the next section, we use it to extract the MDM of this resonance from the data on radiative $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering.

### B Radiative $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering

Once we have fixed the mass and width of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ and other relevant couplings of the model, it remains only one parameter to describe the radiative $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering: the magnetic dipole moment of $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$, namely $`\mu _{\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}}`$ or $`\kappa _\mathrm{\Delta }`$. In this section, we fit this parameter from experimental data on $`\pi ^+p\pi ^+p\gamma `$. From the 35 Feynman diagrams (see Ref. ) that contribute to this process in our model, seven correspond to photons emitted from process involving the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ intermediate states and 28 are associated with the $`\rho ^0,\sigma `$ and $`\mathrm{\Delta }^0,n`$ intermediate states.

The physical observable of our interest is the five-fold differential cross section $`d\sigma /d\omega _\gamma d\mathrm{\Omega }_\gamma d\mathrm{\Omega }_\pi `$ of the radiative $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering. In this observable, $`\omega _\gamma `$ is the photon energy, $`d\mathrm{\Omega }_\gamma `$ is the element of solid angle where photons are emitted with respect to final pions, and $`d\mathrm{\Omega }_\pi `$ is the solid angle for final state pions measured with respect to the direction of incident pions. We use the data corresponding to incident pions of energies $`T_{lab}=269`$ and $`298`$ MeV.15 As we have pointed out in the previous section, our model is still good to describe the data at those energies. The kinematical range of photon energies is $`0\omega _\gamma 100`$ MeV, where we can expect, in a conservative way, that the soft-photon approximation is valid and that other structure dependent terms or higher electromagnetic multipoles contributions are small. In addition, we consider a few set of photon angular configurations where the differential cross section is more sensitive to the effect of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ MDM (see Ref. ).

The results of the fits for the most sensitive observables are shown in Table 2 (the definition of the ‘anomalous’ part $`\kappa _\mathrm{\Delta }`$ of the MDM was given in Eq. (9)):

Again, a few remarks are worth to be mentioned:

$`(i)`$ In Figure 2 we show the best fits for a few samples of the differential cross section as a function of the photon energies for $`T_{lab}=269`$ MeV. Just to show the sensitivity of the chosen configurations (G1, G4 and G7) to the effect of the magnetic dipole moment, in Figure 2 we compare the best fits of Table 2 (solid lines) with the curves corresponding to a reference value $`\kappa _\mathrm{\Delta }=1`$ (dashed curves).

$`(ii)`$ Other (less sensitive to $`\kappa _\mathrm{\Delta }`$) measured angular configurations were also considered in the analysis. The description of data is very good as it can be checked in Ref. .

$`(iii)`$ The set of values determined for $`\kappa _\mathrm{\Delta }`$ (see Table 2) is remarkable consistent. This allows to quote a meaningful weighted average from the six values of $`\kappa _\mathrm{\Delta }`$ shown in Table 2. We obtain:

$$\mu _{\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}}=2(1+\kappa _\mathrm{\Delta })\frac{e}{2m_\mathrm{\Delta }}=(6.14\pm 0.51)\frac{e}{2m_p}$$
(18)
Note that the last numerical value is given in units of nuclear magnetons.

## V Remarks and Conclusions

The contributions of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ resonance to the elastic and radiative $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering is revisited in the light of a consistent effective Lagrangian model for the spin-3/2 unstable particle and its interactions. Our proposal respects two very important symmetries of a theory of the spin-3/2 particles: the invariance under contact and electromagnetic gauge transformations. We have shown that introducing the finite width effects of the resonance through a complex mass scheme, namely replacing $`M^2M^2iM\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ in all the Feynman rules that involve the spin-3/2 particle, do not spoil these symmetries of the effective theory. Such a recipe is well motivated by recent studies concerning the search a proper (gauge-invariant) definition of the mass of an unstable gauge-boson in the framework of perturbative gauge theories.

We have performed a phenomenological analysis of this effective Lagrangian to test its viability as an acceptable model for the low energy $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering processes. Our approach is closely related to the one of the analytic S-matrix; namely, we try to give a physical meaning to the mass and width of the resonance from an explicit separation of resonant and background contributions in the S-matrix amplitude for the elastic scattering. By introducing the complex mass scheme in the propagator of the resonance we are able to isolate the pole contributions in a simple and clean way. The background contributions are given in our model by the exchange of the $`\rho ^0,\sigma ,\mathrm{\Delta }^0`$ and neutron intermediate states. In the case of elastic $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering, we have found that the mass and width of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ resonance are in excellent agreement (within the approximations inherent to our model) with the values obtained in the framework of the model-independent analytic S-matrix approach (see Table 1). The description of the elastic scattering data for the total cross section is very good in a wide region considered around the resonance peak. The differential cross section of elastic scattering is predicted to be in good agreement with a set of data for pion kinetic energies to the right side of the resonance peak.

We have considered also the radiative $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering in view of extracting a value of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ magnetic dipole moment from the experimental data. Electromagnetic gauge invariance is fulfilled for the resonance contributions to the amplitude owing to a simple Ward identity that is satisfied between the propagators and the electromagnetic vertex of the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ in the complex mass scheme. Our model provides a very simple solution to the gauge invariance problem for the resonance contributions to the radiative amplitude in the presence of finite width effects. Within our approach we do not need to introduce ad hoc form factors or additional contributions to obtain a gauge-invariant amplitude.

Using the most sensitive set of data for the five-fold differential cross section of the radiative $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering we are able to give a good fit with only one free parameter: the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ magnetic dipole moment. The results for the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ MDM are described in section IV.2 and can be found in Table 2 and equation (18). Our determination of the MDM are in good agreement with recent theoretical calculations that incorporate the QCD corrections in a chiral bag model16 and with the predictions of a phenomenological quark model17 that includes the non-static effects of pion exchange and orbital excitation. Our determination of the MDM is, however, a bit larger that some calculations based on the SU(6) spin-flavor symmetry.18

In summary, we have shown that the data on the elastic and radiative $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering near the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ resonance region can be well described in the framework of an effective Lagrangian model for this spin-3/2 particle. This model is free from the very well known inconsistencies present in the quantum field theory formulations of spin-3/2 particles as far as we use the model only at the tree-level. The calculations of the scattering amplitudes fully exploit the model-independent separation of the amplitude into the resonant and background contributions advocated by the analytic S-matrix theory. This allows us to give a physical meaning to the mass and width values extracted for the $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ resonance and, by extension, to its the magnetic dipole moment parameter.

## VI Acknowledgements

I would like to thank D. V. Ahluwalia and M. Kirchbach for their kind invitation to this meeting. The partial financial support from Conacyt is gratefully acknowledged.

## VII References

1K. Hagiwara et al, Review of Particle Physics, Phys. Rev. D66 Part I, (2002).

2M. El-Amiri, G. López Castro and J. Pestieau, Nucl. Phys. A543, 673 (1992).

3K. Johnson and E. C. G. Sudarshan, Ann. Phys. 13, 126 (1961);

4L. M. Nath, B. Etemadi and J. D. Kimel, Phys. Rev. D3, 2153 (1971); R. D. Peccei, Phys. Rev. 176, 1812 (1968); R. E. Behrends and C. Fronsdal, Phys. Rev. 106, 277 (1958); J. Urías, Ph. D. Thesis, Universit’e catholique de Louvain, Belgium 1976.

5M. Benmerrouche, R. M. Davidson and N. C. Mukhopadhyay, Phys. Rev. C39, 2339 (1989); V. Pascalutsa and R. Timmermans, Phys. Rev. C60, 042201 (1999).

6 An interesting discussion about these definitions can be found in pp. 696-698 of the 2000 Edition of the Review of Particle Physics.

7A. Bernicha, G. López Castro and J. Pestieau, Nucl. Phys. A597, 623 (1996).

8R. G. Stuart, Phys. Lett. B262, 113 (1991); ibid 272, 353 (1991).

9 R. Peierls, in E. H. Bellami, R. G. Moorhouse (Eds.), Proc. 1954 Glasgow Conf. on Nucl. and Meson Physics, ( Pergamon Press, 1955) p. 296; R. Eden, P. Landshoff, D. Olive and J. Polkinghorne, “The Analytic S-matrix” (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1966); M. Lévy, Nuovo Cimento 13, 115 (1958).

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Table Captions

Table 1:

Fit results to the total cross section of $`\pi ^+p`$ elastic scattering.

Table 2:

Anomalous $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++}`$ magnetic dipole moment extracted from radiative $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering.

Figure Captions

Fig. 1:

Total cross section of elastic $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering: comparison of model and experimental data.

Fig. 2
Differential cross section of radiative $`\pi ^+p`$ scattering and best fits results for $`T_{lab}=269`$ MeV and three angular configurations of photon energies.

Table 1:

| Intermediate state | $`f_{\mathrm{\Delta }N\pi }^2/4\pi `$ | $`m_\mathrm{\Delta }`$ (MeV) | $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\mathrm{\Delta }`$ (MeV) | $`g_\sigma /4\pi `$ | $`\chi ^2`$/dof |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++,0}`$ | 0.281$`\pm `$0.001 | 1201.7$`\pm `$0.2 | 69.8$`\pm `$0.2 |  | 121.1 |
| $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++,0},N`$ | 0.331$`\pm `$0.003 | 1208.6$`\pm `$0.2 | 87.5$`\pm `$0.3 |  | 17.6 |
| $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++,0},N,\rho `$ | 0.327$`\pm `$0.001 | 1207.4$`\pm `$0.2 | 85.6$`\pm `$0.3 |  | 15.6 |
| $`\mathrm{\Delta }^{++,0},N,\rho ,\sigma `$ | 0.317$`\pm `$0.003 | 1211.2$`\pm `$0.4 | 88.2$`\pm `$0.4 | 1.50$`\pm `$0.12 | 10.5 |
| Unitarity | 0.317 | 1211.7 | 92.2 | 1.50 | 9.8 |
| Pole position |  | 1212.2$`\pm `$0.3 | 97.1$`\pm `$0.4 |  |  |

Table 2:

| $`T_{lab}`$ (MeV) | Geometry | $`\theta _\gamma `$ | $`\varphi _\gamma `$ | $`\kappa _\mathrm{\Delta }`$ | $`\chi ^2`$/dof |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|  | G7 | 1200 | 00 | 3.27$`\pm `$0.76 | 1.99 |
| 269 | G4 | 1400 | 00 | 3.01$`\pm `$0.67 | 2.48 |
|  | G1 | 1600 | 00 | 2.74$`\pm `$0.87 | 1.73 |
|  | G7 | 1200 | 00 | 3.10$`\pm `$0.87 | 2.68 |
| 298 | G4 | 1400 | 00 | 2.90$`\pm `$0.75 | 4.75 |
|  | G1 | 1600 | 00 | 2.61$`\pm `$1.00 | 1.47 |

Fig. 1:

Fig. 2:


format: text

text:
# The universal ln²𝑠 increase in total cross sections

## 1 Introduction

Recent analyses of high energy forward scattering data  have confirmed that the cross sections rise as $`\mathrm{ln}^2s`$, a behaviour first suggested by Heisenberg , and proportional to *Froissart-Martin Bound* . Similar behaviour has been suggested by Giddings  in non conformal gauge/gravity duality. He finds the high energy scattering cross section is $`\sigma =M^2\mathrm{ln}^2s`$, with $`M`$ the mass of the lightest Kaluza-Klein excitation. The coefficient $`B`$ of the $`\mathrm{ln}^2s`$ term in the fit to the cross section is found to be independent of the hadronic reaction studied ($`\overline{p}p,pp,\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}p,\pi ^\pm p`$, and $`K^\pm p`$), while for $`\gamma p`$ and $`\gamma \gamma `$, the the equivalent coefficents are written as $`B_\gamma =\delta B`$ and $`B_{\gamma \gamma }=\delta ^2B`$ respectively with the same constant $`\delta `$ as expected from factorization of the $`\gamma `$ cross sections. From all of these cross-sections the value $`B=0.313(9)\mathrm{mb}`$ is determined. Note that this constant is two orders of magnitude smaller than the Lukaszuk-Martin limiting value,

$$B\frac{\pi }{m_\pi ^2}=62\mathrm{m}\mathrm{b}.$$
(1)
This observation raises the question of identifying the physics responsible for the value of $`B`$.

Dosch, Gauron and Nicolescu  have recently proposed that Heisenberg’s original model can be extended to obtain the value of $`B\pi /(4M^2)`$, where $`M`$ is a glueball mass.

It has long been recognised  that the eikonal representation of the total cross section can lead to cross sections rising as $`\mathrm{ln}^2s`$. In this paper we study three models for the eikonal and determine the coefficient $`B`$ for these models.

The three models for the eikonal studied are

1. a factorisable exponential model, motivated by meson exchange ,
2. a non-factorisable gaussian model, motivated by multiperiphal models ,
3. the QCD motivated model of Block and co-workers .

We are able to obtain exact results for the cross section for cases 1 and 2, in terms of incomplete gamma functions and their derivatives. Examination of the asymptotic behaviour gives the expected $`\mathrm{ln}^2s`$ rise at large $`s`$, and determines the coefficient $`B`$ in each case.

For case 3, we have been unable to find an exact solution in terms of known functions, but an approximate evaluation of the cross section gives $`\mathrm{ln}^2s`$ behaviour, and determines its coefficient.

## 2 The eikonal representation of the total cross-section

In terms of the eikonal function $`\chi (b,s)`$ the scattering amplidude is represented as

$$f(s,t)=ı_0^{\mathrm{}}b𝑑bJ_0(b\sqrt{t})\left(1e^{\chi (b,s)}\right)$$
(2)
and the total cross-section is thus

$$\sigma _t=4\pi \mathrm{Im}f(s,0)=4\pi _0^{\mathrm{}}b𝑑b\left(1e^{\chi (b,s)}\right),$$
(3)
where the eikonal is approximated as purely real corresponding to the black-disc collision at high energies.

Strictly, for $`pp`$ and $`\overline{p}p`$ scattering we should introduce eikonals $`\chi _\pm (b,s)=\frac{1}{2}\left(\chi _{pp}(b,s)\pm \chi _{\overline{p}p}(b,s)\right)`$ to write crossing-even and crossing-odd forward amplitudes. For other processes similar $`\chi _\pm (b,s)`$ eikonals are constructed. At high energies, we may neglect the $`\chi _{}`$ contribution, and so we use $`\chi `$ to simply mean $`\chi _+`$, the crossing-even amplitude. Physically $`\chi (b,s)`$ is made of all elementary inelastic collision cross section of parton-pairs $`\sigma _0`$ and overlaps of convoluted structure functions of parton pairs at impact parameter $`b`$. Following the normalization conventions used in mini-jet models, we parametrize the eikonal such that

$$\chi (b,s)d^2𝐛=\sigma _0(s)$$
(4)
In cases where $`\chi (b,s)`$ is written as the product of a function of $`b`$ and a function of $`s`$, the eikonal is said to be factorisable, as it is in the Chou-Yang model .

Our technique for evaluating the integral is most straightforward for the gaussian case which we consider first in the following.

### 2.1 The Non-factorisable Gaussian Eikonal

The gaussian representation of the eikonal is motivated by the multi-Pomeron representation of multiperipheral ladder exchanges . One writes

$$\chi (b,s)=\frac{\pi \lambda }{B(s)}s^\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{exp}\left\{\frac{b^2}{B(s)}\right\}.$$
(5)
The parameters $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ and $`B(s)`$ are determined by the Pomeron trajectory $`\alpha _P(t)=\alpha _P(0)+\alpha _P^{}(0)t,`$ consistent with shrinkage of the forward peak in differential cross sections,

$$\mathrm{\Delta }=\alpha _P(0)1\mathrm{and}\mathrm{B}(\mathrm{s})=2\alpha _\mathrm{P}^{}(0)\mathrm{ln}\mathrm{s}+\mathrm{k}$$
(6)
where $`k`$ is a constant111There is an unfortunate conflict in notation between reference , which uses $`B`$ for the coefficient of $`\mathrm{ln}^2s`$, and reference , which uses $`B(s)`$ as the gaussian scale parameter. We follow this usage, warning the reader to note carefully whether $`B`$ is a constant or a function of $`s`$. The logarithmic dependence of $`B(s)`$ leads to a typical shrinkage of the forward peak in the differential cross-section.

The use of $`\chi `$ as the variable of integration  enables us to write the exact result for the total cross-section:

$$\sigma _t(s)=2\pi B(s)\left(\mathrm{ln}C(s)+\gamma +E_1(C(s))\right)$$
(7)
where $`C(s)=\left(\pi \lambda /B(s)\right)s^\mathrm{\Delta }=\chi (b=0,s)`$ is the opacity of the eikonal , $`\gamma `$ is Euler’s constant, and $`E_1(x)=_x^{\mathrm{}}e^t𝑑t/t`$ is the exponential integral .

For large $`x`$, $`E_1(x)(e^x/x)(1+O(x^1)`$, and so the large energy behaviour of the cross-section is

$$\sigma _t(s)2\pi B(s)\left(\mathrm{ln}C(s)+\gamma \right),$$
(8)
and the leading term in this gives

$$\sigma _t(s)=4\pi \alpha _P^{}(0)\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{ln}^2s+O(\mathrm{ln}s),$$
(9)
defining the constant $`B`$ in terms of the properties of the Pomeron. Clearly $`B`$ is a universal constant. With $`\alpha _P^{}=0.25\mathrm{GeV}^2`$  and with the value $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ in the range$`(0.1,0.4)`$, determined from deep inelastic scattering data , we obtain

$$B(0.12,0.48)\mathrm{mb},$$
(10)
values which compare favourably with the observed value of $`0.31\mathrm{mb}`$.

This method also gives the $`\mathrm{ln}s`$ and the constant terms in the total cross section, but the coefficients of those terms are not process independent, so we do not quote them here.

### 2.2 The factorizable exponential eikonal

The eikonal in this case takes the form

$$\chi (b,s)=\frac{\lambda }{2\pi b_0^2}s^\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{exp}\left\{\frac{b}{b_0}\right\},$$
(11)
and corresponds to massive particle exchange, with $`b_0`$ being determined by the mass of the lightest exchanged meson. One can again use the eikonal as the variable of integration in the eikonal expression for the total cross section, which then becomes exactly

$`\sigma _t(s)`$ $`=`$ $`2\pi b_0^2(\mathrm{ln}^2C(s)+[{\displaystyle \frac{\pi ^2}{6}}+\gamma ^2+2\mathrm{ln}C(s)\gamma ]`$ (12)
$`[\mathrm{\Gamma }_1(0,C(s))2\mathrm{ln}C(s)\mathrm{\Gamma }(0,C(s))]),`$
where $`C(s)=\frac{\lambda }{2\pi b_0^2}s^\mathrm{\Delta }`$, $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(\alpha ,x)=_x^{\mathrm{}}t^{\alpha 1}e^t𝑑t`$ is the upper incomplete gamma function, and $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_1(\alpha ,s)`$ is its partial derivative with respect to $`\alpha `$.

The terms involving $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_1(0,C(s))`$ and $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(0,C(s))`$ are exponentially small for large $`s`$, and the high energy behaviour is again dominated by the $`\mathrm{ln}^2s`$ term

$$\sigma _t(s)=2\pi b_0^2\mathrm{\Delta }^2\mathrm{ln}^2s+O(\mathrm{ln}s)$$
(13)
with the coefficient $`B=2\pi b_0^2`$. In this case $`b_0^1`$ is the mass of the exchanged meson, which can be universally taken to be the lightest glueball. Then with $`b_0^1=1.4GeV`$, and the previous range of values for $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$, $`B(0.006,0.1)\mathrm{mb}`$, rather smaller than the observed value of the coefficient, but, for the larger values of $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$, or $`1/b_0`$, or both, the same order of magnitude for the coefficient can readliy be obtained.

### 2.3 The QCD inspired eikonal

Block *et al*  have introduced the eikonal

$$\chi =\sigma _{gg}(s)W(b;\mu _{gg})+\sigma _{qg}W(b;\mu _{qg})+\sigma _{qq}W(b;\mu _{qq})$$
(14)
where $`\sigma _{gg},\sigma _{qg}`$ and $`\sigma _{qq}`$ represent gluon-gluon, quark-gluon and quark-quark interaction cross sections, and $`W(b;\mu )`$ are overlap functions normalised so that $`2\pi _0^{\mathrm{}}b𝑑bW(b;\mu )=1`$. The parameterisation adopted in , which is the Fourier transform of a dipole form factor squared, is

$$W(b;\mu )=\frac{\mu ^2}{96\pi }(\mu b)^3K_3(\mu b),$$
(15)
where $`K_3(x)`$ is the modified Bessel function of the second kind. Note the behaviour of $`x^3K_3(x)`$ for small $`x`$

$$x^3K_3(x)=8+O(x^2)$$
(16)
and for large $`x`$

$$x^3K_3(x)=\sqrt{\frac{\pi }{2}}x^{5/2}e^x(1+O(x^1).$$
(17)
We approximate the eikonal with an exponential form,

$$\chi _a(b,s)=C(s)e^{b/b_0(s)},$$
(18)
reducing the calculation to the previous case. $`C(s)`$ is chosen to be the opacity of the eikonal we are approximating, and $`b_0(s)`$ is determined so that

$$_0^{\mathrm{}}b𝑑b\chi (b,s)=_0^{\mathrm{}}b𝑑b\chi _a(b,s),$$
(19)
giving

$$C(s)=\sigma _{gg}(s)\frac{\mu _{gg}^2}{12\pi }+\sigma _{qg}(s)\frac{\mu _{qg}^2}{12\pi }+\sigma _{qq}(s)\frac{\mu _{qq}^2}{12\pi },$$
(20)
and

$$2\pi b_0^2(s)=\left(\sigma _{gg}(s)+\sigma _{qg}(s)+\sigma _{qq}(s)\right)/C(s).$$
(21)
Note that if a single elementary collision process dominates over other terms $`b_0`$ becomes $`\sqrt{6}/\mu `$, independent of $`s`$, where $`\mu `$ is the scale parameter of the dominant process.

Applying the analysis of the previous section, the leading large $`s`$ behaviour of the total cross section is

$$\sigma _t(s)=2\pi b_0^2(s)\mathrm{ln}^2C(s)$$
(22)
Block *et al*  show that in the large $`s`$ region, the eikonal is dominated by the gluon-gluon scattering term, which has the structure

$$\sigma _{gg}(s)\lambda \left(\frac{s}{m_0^2}\right)^ϵ\mathrm{ln}\left(\frac{s}{m_0^2}\right),$$
(23)
where $`ϵ`$ is obtained from the gluon structure function $`f_g(x)=N_g(1x)^5x^{(1+ϵ)}`$. The cross section again has the Heisenberg $`\mathrm{ln}^2s`$ dependence at high energies, with the universal coefficient

$$B=12\pi \mu _{gg}^2ϵ^2.$$
(24)
Block *et al* use the numerical values $`ϵ=0.05,\mu _{gg}=0.73\mathrm{GeV}`$, which give $`B=0.069\mathrm{mb}`$, in the range of values given by the exponential eikonal, and rather smaller than the empirical value. However, recent results on $`ϵ`$  give a range of values $`ϵ(0.08,0.4)`$ which give $`B(0.18,4.42)`$mb, covering the empirical value.

## 3 Conclusion

In the light of the results of , it is no longer sufficient to develop models for high energy scattering which show cross sections rising as $`\mathrm{ln}^2s`$. It is now important to demonstrate that the coefficient, $`B`$, of the $`\mathrm{ln}^2s`$ term is a universal constant, independent of the hadronic reaction under consideration.

We have been able to determine the cross section exactly for both gaussian and exponential eikonals, and not only demonstrate the $`\mathrm{ln}^2s`$ asymptotic behaviour, but also determine its coefficient. Each of the three eikonal models we have considered give a universal $`B`$. The numerical value of $`B`$ is sensitive to both the choice of eikonal model, and the choice of parameters within that model. Both the gaussian eikonal and the QCD inspired eikonal give values of $`B`$ consistent with the observed value, and the factorisable exponential eikonal value is of the correct order of magnitude.

## Acknowledgements

The authors express their thanks to President C. W. Kim for the hospitality and support of the Korean Institute for Advanced Study.

This work was supported in part by the US DOE Contract DE-FG-02-91ER40688-Task A, and in part by the Australian Research Council.


text:
# References

SEARCH FOR A “GRAVITOID” THEORY

J. A. Nieto111nieto@uas.uasnet.mx and M. C. Marín

Departamento de Investigación en Física de la Universidad de Sonora,

83190, Hermosillo Sonora, México

and

Facultad de Ciencias Físico-Matemáticas de la Universidad Autónoma

de Sinaloa, 80010, Culiacán Sinaloa, México222permanent address

Abstract

By combining the concepts of graviton and matroid, we outline a new gravitational theory which we call gravitoid theory. The idea of this theory emerged as an attempt to link the mathematical structure of matroid theory with M-theory. Our observations are essentially based on the formulation of matroid bundle due to MacPherson and Anderson-Davis. Also, by considering the oriented matroid theory, we add new observations about the link between the Fano matroid and $`D=11`$ supergravity which was discussed in some of our recent papers. In particular we find a connection between the affine matroid $`AG(3,2)`$ and the $`G_2`$symmetry of $`D=11`$ supergravity.

.

Pacs numbers: 04.60.-m, 04.65.+e, 11.15.-q, 11.30.Ly

February, 2003

I. INTRODUCTION

It is known that the theory called M-theory1-3 was suggested by duality symmetries interrelating the five known superstring theories4 in 9+1 dimensions (i.e., nine space and one time), Type I, Type IIA, Type IIB, Heterotic SO(32) and Heterotic E$`{}_{8}{}^{}\times `$ E$`_8.`$ If the strong/weak coupling duality transformations allow to relate these superstrings theories then it is no longer appropriate to see them as distinct theories, but rather as different manifestations of an underlying unique theory: M-theory. Roughly speaking, we can say that duality implies M-theory.

It turns out that in an apparent complete different area and in another time an analogue conclusion led Whitney5 to the discovery of the concept of matroid in 1935. In effect, it is known that not all of the graphs have an associated dual graph. If one insists on extending the duality property to any graph, not only for plane graphs, one is inevitably led to the mathematical structure of matroids. From this point of view, we can also say that duality implies a matroid scenario.

Now, the arising question is whether these two conclusions are not a coincidence. But, why to ask, first of all, for a coincidence if M-theory and matroid structure appear, at first sight, as two totally different formalisms. This scenario seems to be similar to the case of the two apparently unrelated subjects: Newton’s gravitational theory and the mathematics of Riemann geometry. The equivalence principle, among other things, suggested to look for a mathematical structure beyond the Euclidean geometry used in Newton’s gravitational theory. It is well known that in 1915 it was discovered that the use of the Riemann geometry makes possible the accomplishment of such a quest. Similarly, a duality principle in M-theory may suggest the search of a singular mathematical structure beyond the mathematical formalism used in string theory. In three previous works6-8 we provided enough evidence to prove that a duality principle in M-theory may have a mathematical support in the well-developed formalism of matroid-theory9-13. In fact, in these references it was shown that Fano matroid and the matroid-Tutte polynomial are connected to $`D=11`$ Supergravity, Chern-Simons theory and string theory, which are essential parts of M-Theory.

Further, the connection between matroid theory and $`D=11`$ supergravity may naturally lead to the need of a mathematical structure that combines matroids and fiber bundles. The reason for this is that in order to have a realistic four dimensional theory it is necessary to compactify seven dimensions out of the eleven space-like dimensions of $`D=11`$ supergravity. The traditional method to achieve such a compactification is via the Kaluza-Klein mechanism. But, as it is well known, this mechanism is closely related to the mathematical structure of fiber bundles.

Fortunately, the concept of matroid bundle has already been developed by the mathematicians. In fact, in 1993 MacPherson14 defined for the first time matroid bundles in connection with combinatorial differential manifolds. Since then the matroid bundles structure has been refined and developed by Anderson and Davis,15,25 and others$`^{1617}.`$ Roughly speaking, matroid bundles are the combinatorial analogue of vector bundles. The central idea in matroid bundles is to allow oriented matroids18 to play the role of tangent spaces or, more generally, vector spaces.

Now, vector bundles provide an important tool in the formulation of the four dimensional gravitational theory contained in $`D=11`$ supergravity. Therefore, one should expect that matroid bundles may lead to a new gravitational structure. We call this expected new gravitational object the “gravitoid” because it combines the concepts of graviton and matroid. Our conjecture is that the gravitoid theory should play a crucial role not only in $`D=11`$ supergravity but also in M-theory itself. Since every matroid has an associated unique dual it is reasonable to expect that the gravitoid should have an associated unique dual gravitoid and this fact should lead to a dual invariant partition function for the gravitoid.

The plan of this work is as follows: In section II, we briefly review oriented matroid theory. In section III, we closely follow the Ref. 6 adding new information about the connection between matroid theory and $`D=11`$ supergravity. In particular, we discuss a link between the affine matroid $`AG(3,2)`$ and $`G_2`$symmetry of $`D=11`$ supergravity via self-duality. In section IV, we introduce the concept of matroid bundle and develop the gravitoid theory. Finally, in section V, we remark the importance of gravitoid theory and matroid bundles for further research and make some final comments.

II. A BRIEF REVIEW OF ORIENTED MATROIDS

Matroid theory9-13 arose in 1935 from the abstract properties of vector spaces and graph theory. Whitney5 seems to be the first mathematician to have noticed such properties. Looking at Whitney’s previous work19 on non-separable graph theory, one wonders if the lack of duality on nonplanar graphs, such as the complete graph $`K_5`$ and the bipartite graph $`K_{3,3},`$ provided his main motivation to introduce such abstract properties. Indeed, as it is known, in graph theory only planar graphs have an associated dual graph. As the Kuratowski’s theorem assures, the complete graph $`K_5`$ and the bipartite graph $`K_{3,3},`$ which are nonplanar, do not have a corresponding dual graph. On the other hand, matroid theory has the attractive feature that every matroid has an associated unique dual matroid. In particular, the matroid associated to $`K_5`$, let us say $`M(K_5)`$, has the dual matroid $`M^{}(K_5)`$, but $`M^{}(K_5)`$ turns out to be not representable by means of a graph.

In connection with vector spaces, the matroid duality is realized by the orthogonality of matrices. But the notion of orthogonality in vector spaces is extended by matroid theory in the sense that not all matroids are realizable by matrices. In fact, there are matroids, such as the non-Pappus matroid,9 that are not realizable by a subset of a vector space or by matrices.

A natural generalization of graph theory is provided by oriented graph theory. In this generalized case, the edges of a graph are labeled with a plus or minus sign. Similarly, a natural generalization of matroid theory is the oriented matroid theory. The origin of oriented matroid theory can be traced back to the Gutierrez-Novoa’s work20on signed bases, in 1965. However, it seems that the formal axiomatic notion of orientability for matroids was not proposed before 1978 (see Ref. 18 for details). One of the attractive features of oriented matroids is that they capture the sign properties of vector spaces without losing the duality properties of the underlying non-oriented matroids. At present, oriented matroid theory is a well-developed mathematical structure in combinatorics with a very interesting connection in differential topology, as we shall discuss in section IV.

An oriented matroid $``$ is a pair $`(E,𝒞)`$, where $`E`$ is a non-empty finite set, and $`𝒞`$ is a non-empty collection of subsets of $`E`$ (called signed circuits) satisfying the following properties:

$`(𝒞i)`$ no circuit properly contains another circuit,

$`(𝒞\mathrm{𝑖𝑖})`$ if $`𝒞_1`$ and $`𝒞_2`$ are two distinct signed circuits, $`𝒞_1𝒞_2,`$ and $`c𝒞_1^+𝒞_2^{}`$ then there exists a third circuit $`𝒞_3𝒞`$ with $`𝒞_3^+(𝒞_1^+𝒞_2^+)\backslash \{c\}`$ and $`𝒞_3^{}(𝒞_1^{}𝒞_2^{})\backslash \{c\}`$.

An alternative, but equivalent, way to define an oriented matroid is as follows: An oriented matroid $``$ is a pair $`(E,\chi ),`$ where $`E`$ is a non-empty finite set and $`\chi `$ (called chirotope) is a mapping $`E^r\{1,0,1\}`$, with $`r`$ the rank on $`E`$, satisfying the following properties.

$`(\chi i)`$ $`\chi `$ is not identically zero,

$`(\chi ii)\chi `$ is alternating,

$`(\chi iii)`$ for all $`x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_r`$ and $`y_1,y_2,\mathrm{},y_r`$ such that

$$\chi (x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_r)\chi (y_1,y_2,\mathrm{},y_r)0,$$
(1)
there exists an $`i\{1,2,\mathrm{},r\}`$ such that

$$\chi (y_i,x_2,\mathrm{},x_r)\chi (y_1,y_2,\mathrm{},y_{i1},x_1,y_{i+1,}\mathrm{},y_r)=\chi (x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_r)\chi (y_1,y_2,\mathrm{},y_r).$$
(2)
For a vector configuration the chirotope $`\chi `$ can be identified as

$$\chi (i_1,\mathrm{},i_r)signdet(v_{i_1},\mathrm{},v_{i_r})\{1,0,1\}$$
(3)
and in this case (2) becomes connected with the Grassmann-Plucker relation.

It can be proved that the definition of the underlying matroid $`M`$ of $``$ follows from the chirotope definition for oriented matroids. In fact, from the chirotope definition it follows that if $``$ is the set of $`r`$-subsets of $`E`$ such that

$$\chi (x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_r)0,$$
(4)
for some ordering of $`(x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_r)`$ of $``$, then $``$ is the set of bases of the matroid $`M`$. Formally, the definition of $`M`$ in terms of the bases is as follows:

A matroid $`M`$ is a pair $`(E,)`$, where $`E`$ is a non-empty finite set and $``$ is a non-empty collection of subsets of $`E`$ (called bases) satisfying the following properties:

$`(`$ $`i)`$ no base properly contains another base;

$`(`$ $`\mathrm{𝑖𝑖})`$ if $`B_1`$ and $`B_2`$ are bases and if $`b`$ is any element of $`B_1,`$ then there is an element $`g`$ of $`B_2`$ with the property that $`(B_1\{b\})\{g\}`$ is also a base.

The dual of $`M`$, denoted by $`M^{},`$ is defined as a pair $`(E,^{}),`$ where $`^{}`$ is a non-empty collection of subsets of $`E`$ formed with the complements of the bases of $`M`$. An immediate consequence of this definition is that every matroid has a dual and this dual is unique. It also follows that the double-dual $`M^{}`$ is equal to $`M`$.

The definition of the corresponding dual oriented matroid $`^{}`$ is straightforward. One introduces the dual chirotope $`\chi ^{}`$ such that

$$\chi ^{}:E^{nr}\{1,0,1\}$$
(5)
and

$$(x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_{nr})\chi (x_1^{},x_2^{},\mathrm{},x_r^{})sign(x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_{nr},x_1^{},x_2^{},\mathrm{},x_r^{}),$$
(6)
where $`(x_1^{},x_2^{},\mathrm{},x_r^{})`$ means some permutation of $`E\backslash (x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_{nr})`$ and

$$sign(x_1,x_2,\mathrm{},x_{nr},x_1^{},x_2^{},\mathrm{},x_r^{})$$

is the parity of the number of inversions of $`(1,2,\mathrm{},n).`$ It is not difficult to see that, as in the case of ordinary matroids, every oriented matroid $`(E,\chi )`$ has an associated unique dual $`^{}(E,\chi ^{}).`$ Furthermore, it is found that $`^{}=`$.

Another interesting and important result is that

$$(_1_2)^{}=_1^{}_2^{},$$
(7)
where $`_1_2`$ is the direct sum of two connected oriented matroids $`_1`$ and $`_2`$.

III. ORIENTED MATROIDS, OCTONIONS, $`G_2`$-SYMMETRY AND $`D=11`$ SUPERGRAVITY

In this section, we shall extend the discussion presented in Ref.6, 7 and 8 on the connection between matroid theory and $`D=11`$ supergravity. In particular, we show that the complementary relation in seven dimensions between the Fano matroid $`F_7`$ and octonions can be extended to eight dimensions by means of the affine matroid $`AG(3,2)`$. We also prove that the self-duality condition on the octonionic structure in eight dimensions (necessary to account for the $`G_2`$-symmetry in $`D=11`$ supergravity) is in concordance with the self-duality of $`AG(3,2)`$. At the same time, the idea of this section is to prepare the motivation and notation to consider matroid bundles and the gravitoid theory in the next section.

It is known that in order to get a realistic four dimensional theory from $`D=11`$ supergravity it is necessary to compactify seven space-like dimensions out of the eleven dimensions. At this respect, the Englert’s compactification21 of $`D=11`$ supergravity provides us with one of the most attractive solutions. In this case, the $`D=11`$ manifold $`B^{11}`$ is compactified in the form $`B^4\times S^7`$, where $`B^4`$ is a four dimensional space-time manifold and $`S^7`$ is the seven dimensional sphere. Such a solution turns out to be connected to the parallelizable properties of $`S^7`$, which in turn are related to octonions.22 Moreover, in the Englert´s mechanism of compactification the mapping $`M^{11}M^4\times S^7`$ is made via the Kaluza-Klein formalism which mathematically can be understood in terms of fiber bundles.

The Fano matroid $`F_7`$ is one of the most important on matroid theory essentially because, among other things, it is the only minimal binary irregular matroid. The ground set for $`F_7`$ is

$$E=\{1,2,3,4,5,6,7\}.$$
(8)
The bases of $`F_7`$ are all those subsets of $`E`$ with three elements except the seven subsets $`f_1=\{1,2,3\},`$ $`f_2=\{5,1,6\},`$ $`f_3=\{6,4,2\},`$ $`f_4=\{4,3,5\},`$ $`f_5=\{4,7,1\},`$ $`f_6=\{6,7,3\}`$ and $`f_7=\{5,7,2\}`$. The dual $`F_7^{}`$ of $`F_7`$ can be obtained from the complements of the bases of $`F_7`$.

In order to link $`F_7`$ with octonions let us introduce the set

$$=\{e_1,e_2,e_{3,}e_{4,}e_5,e_6,e_7\}.$$
(9)
We shall denote by $`p_1=\{e_1,e_2,e_3\}`$, $`p_2=\{e_5,e_1,e_6\}`$, $`p_3=\{e_6,e_4,e_2\}`$, $`p_4=\{e_4,e_3,e_5\}`$, $`p_5=\{e_4,e_7,e_1\}`$, $`p_6=\{e_6,e_7,e_3\}`$ and $`p_7=\{e_5,e_7,e_2\}`$ the corresponding subsets $`f_i`$, with $`i=1,2,\mathrm{}7`$. Let us write an octonion in the form

$$q=q_0e_0+q_1e_1+q_2e_2+q_3e_3+q_4e_4+q_5e_5+q_6e_6+q_7e_7,$$
(10)
where $`e_0`$ denotes the identity. The imaginary units $`e_i`$ determine the product of octonions through the formula

$$e_ie_j=\delta _{ij}+\psi _{ij}^ke_k,$$
(11)
where $`\delta _{ij}`$ is the Kronecker delta and $`\psi _{ijk}=`$ $`\psi _{ij}^l\delta _{lk}`$ are the fully antisymmetric structure constants. By taking the $`\psi _{ijk}`$ equal to $`1`$ or $`1`$ for each of the seven combinations $`p_i`$ we can obtain every value of $`\psi _{ijk}`$.

The basic associator of any three imaginary units $`e_i,e_j`$ and $`e_k`$ is

$$e_i,e_j,e_k=(e_ie_j)e_ke_i(e_je_k)=\phi _{ijkm}e_m,$$
(12)
where $`\phi _{ijkl}`$ is a fully antisymmetric four index tensor. This means that the octonion (Cayley) algebra is not associative and in fact it is an alternative algebra. It turns out that $`\phi _{ijkl}`$ and $`\psi _{ijk}`$ are dual to each other. Specifically, they are related by

$$\phi _{ijkl}=(1/3!)ϵ_{ijklmnr}\psi _{mnr},$$
(13)
where $`ϵ_{ijklmnr}`$ is the fully antisymmetric Levi-Civita tensor, with $`ϵ_{12\mathrm{}7}=1`$.

Anticipating a connection between $`F_7`$ and octonions we observe that giving the numerical values $`f_i`$ for the indices of $`\psi _{mnr}`$ and using (13) we get the other seven subsets of $`E`$ with four elements used to define $`F_7^{}.`$ For instance, if we consider $`f_1`$ then we have $`\psi _{123}`$ and (13) gives $`\phi _{4567}`$ which leads to the circuit subset $`\{4,5,6,7\}`$ of $`F_7^{}.`$

Now, consider the matrix

$$A=\left(\begin{array}{ccccccc}1& 0& 1& 0& 1& 0& 1\\ 1& 1& 0& 0& 0& 1& 1\\ 0& 1& 1& 1& 0& 0& 1\end{array}\right).$$
(14)
If we denote by $`v_i`$ the columns of this matrix, it is found that the bases of the matrix $`A`$ are those subsets with three columns except the subsets $`h_1=\{v_1,v_2,v_3\}`$, $`h_2=\{v_5,v_1,v_6\}`$, $`h_3=\{v_6,v_2,v_4\}`$, $`h_4=\{v_4,v_3,v_5\}`$, $`h_5=\{v_4,v_7,v_1\}`$, $`h_6=\{v_6,v_7,v_3\}`$ and $`h_7=\{v_5,v_7,v_2\}.`$ This shows that $`F_7`$ is not only realizable by the matrix $`A`$ but also that it is a binary matroid. Actually, we have performed the map $`\phi (i)=v_i`$ and consequently the ground set $`\{1,2,3,4,5,6,7\}`$ becomes $`\{v_1,v_2,v_3,v_4,v_5,v_6,v_7\}`$ and the subsets $`f_i`$ are mapped to $`h_i`$

In principle, we can associate the chirotope

$$\chi (i_1,i_2,i_3)=signdet(v_{i_1},v_{i_2},v_{i_3})$$
(15)
to $`F_7`$. But one of the intriguing properties of $`F_7`$ is that it is not orientable matroid. Without formally proving this fact (see Ref. 9 for a formal proof), one can verify by hand that $`\chi (i_1,i_2,i_3)`$ does not satisfy property $`(\chi iii)`$. Anyhow, a relationship between $`\chi (i_1,i_2,i_3)`$ and the structure constants for octonions $`\psi _{i_1i_2i_3}`$ can be accomplished by means of the formula

$$\psi _{i_1i_2i_3}+\chi (i_1,i_2,i_3)=C_{i_1i_2i_3},$$
(16)
where $`C_{i_1i_2i_3}\{1,1\}`$ can be identified with the chirotope of the uniform matroid $`U_{3,7}`$ which is an excluded minor for $`GF(5)`$-representability, where $`GF(q)`$ denotes a finite field of order $`q.`$ The expression (16) shows that $`\psi _{i_1i_2i_3}`$ and $`\chi (i_1,i_2,i_3)`$ determine $`C_{i_1i_2i_3}`$. This means that $`F_7`$ and the octonions are complementary concepts of the oriented uniform matroid $`(U_{3,7})`$ structure.

In order to understand further the formula (16) let us compute $`\chi (i_1,i_2,i_3)`$ for the different values of the indices $`i_p`$. Since the different $`h_i`$ correspond to linear dependent vector columns of $`A`$ we find that the chirotope $`\chi (i_1,i_2,i_3)`$ vanishes for the different $`h_i`$. Hence, using (15) we find that the only nonvanishing terms of $`\chi (i_1,i_2,i_3)`$ are

$$\begin{array}{ccccccc}124+& 125+& 126& 127+& 134& 135+& 136\\ 137& 145+& 146& 157& 167+& 234& 235+\\ 236+& 237+& 245+& 247+& 256+& 267& 346\\ 347& 356+& 357+& 456+& 457+& 467& 567+.\end{array}$$
(17)
On the other hand, for the different non-zero values of the octonions structure constants $`\psi _{i_1i_2i_3}`$, we can choose any consistent sign values for the different $`h_i`$. We shall make the following choice

$$\begin{array}{ccccccc}123+& 147& 156& 246+& 257& 345& 367.\end{array}$$
(18)
We observe that $`\chi `$ takes sign values different from zero precisely when the corresponding $`\psi `$ takes sign values equal to zero and vice versa. Therefore, this is another way of showing that $`\chi `$ and $`\psi `$ are complementary concepts.

Now if we put together the sign set combinations (17) and (18) according to (16) we get the sign values for $`C_{i_1i_2i_3}\{1,1\}`$ which can be identified with the chirotope of the oriented uniform matroid $`(U_{3,7}).`$ From (17) we can check by a direct computation that $`F_7`$ is not orientable , while from (17) and (18) we can verify the orientability of $`U_{3,7}`$.

How is the above matroid-octonions scenario related to $`G_2`$-holonomy of $`D=11`$ supergravity? As it is known recent investigations of M-theory have suggested to take $`G_2`$-holonomy seriously for the $`7D`$ manifold of $`D=11`$ supergravity. In particular, by a generalization of the self-duality condition in four dimensions to eight dimensions Nishino and Rajpoot23 have shown a mechanism that implements the $`G_2`$symmetry in supersymmetric models in $`D8`$. The interesting thing about this mechanism is that it opens the possibility of obtaining the supersymmetric vector multiplet with the full $`SO(7)`$ Lorentz covariance reduced to $`G_2`$ by dimensional reduction. The generalized self-duality condition used by Nishino and Rajpoot can be derived from the definitions

$$F_{[mnr8]}\psi _{mnr}$$
(19)
and

$$F_{ijkl}\phi _{ijkl},$$
(20)
and by using (13). In fact, from (13), (19) and (20) it is found that $`F_{\mu \nu \alpha \beta }`$, with the Greek indices running from $`1`$ to $`8`$, satisfies the self-duality formula

$$F^{\mu \nu \alpha \beta }=(1/4!)ϵ^{\mu \nu \alpha \beta \lambda \gamma \rho \sigma }F_{\lambda \gamma \rho \sigma }.$$
(21)
This extension of the octonionic relation (13) from $`7D`$ to $`8D`$ must have his corresponding extension in matroid theory in connection with $`F_7`$. In particular, this observation suggested the extension of the formula (16) to the form

$$F_{\mu _1\mu _2\mu _3\mu _4}+\chi (\mu _1,\mu _2,\mu _3,\mu _4)=C_{\mu _1\mu _2\mu _3\mu _4}.$$
(22)
Our task is now to find now the mathematical meaning of $`\chi (\mu _1,\mu _2,\mu _3,\mu _4)`$ and $`C_{\mu _1\mu _2\mu _3\mu _4}.`$ First of all, since the chirotopes are defined in terms of the bases of a matroid, it follows that $`\chi (\mu _1,\mu _2,\mu _3,\mu _4)`$ should correspond to a four-rank matroid. Further, $`\chi (\mu _1,\mu _2,\mu _3,\mu _4)`$ must have the property to be reduced to the chirotope $`\chi (i_1,i_2,i_3)`$ associated to $`F_7.`$ This means that such a four-rank matroid should provide an extension of $`F_7.`$ In other words $`F_7`$ should be a minor of such a four-rank matroid. Moreover, the self-duality of $`F_{\mu _1\mu _2\mu _3\mu _4}`$ should imply a self-duality not only for $`\chi (\mu _1,\mu _2,\mu _3,\mu _4)`$ but also for $`C_{\mu _1\mu _2\mu _3\mu _4}`$. This means that the four-rank matroid must be a self-dual matroid. Happily, there is a four rank matroid satisfying all these requirements. In fact, the affine matroid $`AG(3,2)`$ is a self-dual four-rank matroid and among its minors it has the matroid $`F_7.`$ Specifically, $`AG(3,2)`$ is not graphic, nor cographic, and every single-element deletion is isomorphic to $`F_7^{}`$ and every single-element contraction is isomorphic to $`F_7`$. Furthermore, one finds that the chirotope $`\chi (\mu _1,\mu _2,\mu _3,\mu _4)`$ associated to $`AG(3,2)`$ is self dual and has all the desired properties.

In connection with $`C_{\mu _1\mu _2\mu _3\mu _4},`$ we already mentioned that this object should be self-dual. It must also correspond to the chirotope of a four rank matroid. Since $`F_{\mu _1\mu _2\mu _3\mu _4}0`$ when $`\chi (\mu _1,\mu _2,\mu _3,\mu _4)=0`$ and $`F_{\mu _1\mu _2\mu _3\mu _4}=0`$ when $`\chi (\mu _1,\mu _2,\mu _3,\mu _4)0`$ we find that $`C_{\mu _1\mu _2\mu _3\mu _4}`$ should be associated to a four-rank matroid with an underlying set $`E=\{1,2,\mathrm{},8\}`$ and with its bases given by all of the four element subsets of $`E`$. The candidate is, of course, the uniform matroid $`U_{4,8}`$ which is orientable. In general, the uniform matroid $`U_{p,q}`$ has the self dual property $`U_{pq,q}=U_{p,q}`$ and therefore we discover that $`U_{4,8}`$ is also self-dual as required.

IV. GRAVITOID THEORY

A physical theory that combines the concepts of matroid and graviton we shall call it gravitoid theory. From this definition it turns out that the connection of the Fano matroid $`F_7`$ and the affine matroid $`AG(3,2)`$ with $`D=11`$ supergravity discussed in the previous section can be considered as part of the gravitoid theory.

Perhaps the simplest motivation to be interested in gravitoid theory may follow from the heuristic observation that since the graviton can be represented classically as a symmetric second-rank matrix tensor and a matroid is a more general concept than a matrix one should expect that a graviton-matroid connection may lead to an extension of the concept of the graviton. (It seems to be reasonable to call such a generalized gravitational structure the gravitoid.) The real motivation, however, may arise from the idea of establishing a duality principle in M-theory. As we mentioned in the introduction, duality is one of the most attractive features in matroid theory. In a certain sense, matroid theory is the theory of duality. Therefore, matroid theory offers an excellent mathematical framework to incorporate a duality principle in M-theory. It turns out that although the gravitoid theory may be interesting by itself, it can also teach us, among other things, how to achieve such a quest.

Before we discuss the formal expected approach for the gravitoid theory, it is first convenient to briefly mention the recently proposed mathematical formalism of matroid bundle. This mathematical structure is the combinatorial analogue of real vector bundles in which a ”base space” is a simplicial complex and the ”fibers” are oriented matroids. The idea of matroid bundles arose from the concept of combinatorial differential manifolds introduced by MacPherson14 in 1993 and evolved very rapidly on several fronts. In particular, a close connection between matroid bundle theory and characteristic classes has emerged.24,25

Two main ideas make the matroid bundle structure possible: oriented matroids and simplicial complexes. In order to define formally matroid bundles we closely follow Anderson’s work (see Ref. 15). Let $`\xi :B`$ be a real vector bundle, where $`B`$ is a $`n`$dimensional base space. We assume $`B`$ to be a triangulable compact space, i.e., $`B`$ has an associated simplicial complex. For each point $`b`$ of $`B`$ the vectors $`\{e_1(b),\mathrm{},e_n(b)\}`$ span the space $`\xi ^1(b)`$. We can associate an oriented matroid with underlaying set $`E=\{1,2,\mathrm{},n\}`$ to the vectors $`\{e_1(b),\mathrm{},e_n(b)\}`$.

A rank-$`k`$ matroid bundle is a pair $`(S_B,)`$ where $`S_B`$ is a partially ordered set and $``$ is a rank-$`k`$ oriented matroid associated to each element $`b`$ so that $`(b)`$ weakly maps to $`(b^{})`$ whenever $`bb^{^{}}`$. Intuitively, and in analogy to the case of a real vector bundle, $`S_B`$ corresponds to the base space $`B`$ and the oriented matroid $``$ to the fiber of the bundle $``$ (For a complete exposition see Ref. 15).

In particular, in the case of tangent matroid bundles one associates an oriented matroid to each tangent space and one realizes a differentiable manifold by a combinatorial differential manifold. In what follows, we shall focus our attention on this special kind of matroid bundle.

In order to introduce the gravitoid concept it is first convenient to recall, in brief, how the metric is introduced in a tangent bundle. Consider a tangent bundle over the differentiable manifold $`B`$:

$$T(B)=\underset{bB}{}T_b(B).$$
(23)
Here, the tangent space $`T_b(B)`$ plays the role of the fiber of $`T(B)`$. (We assume that $`B`$ is a triangulable manifold.) Of course, $`T_b(B)`$ is a vector space and consequently $`T(B)`$ provides an example of a real vector bundle. The dual of $`T(B)`$ is the cotangent bundle $`T^{}(B)`$ defined in the form

$$T^{}(B)=\underset{bB}{}T_b^{}(B),$$
(24)
where $`T_b^{}(B)`$ is the dual vector space of $`T_b(B)`$. Thus, whereas $`T_b(B)`$ is a vector space of contravariant vectors, $`T_b^{}(B)`$ is a vector space of covariant vectors (1-forms). Moreover, it can be proved that the dimension of $`T_b^{}(B)`$ is equal to the dimension of $`T_b(B)`$.

Take $`\frac{}{b^\mu }`$ $`(1\mu n)`$ as the base vectors of $`T_b(B)`$ and $`db^\mu `$ as the corresponding bases (one forms) of $`T_b^{}(B)`$. Consider a vector $`V^\mu \frac{}{b^\mu }`$ and its dual one-form $`V_\mu db^\mu `$. The tangent space isomorphism

$$g:T_b(B)T_b^{}(B)$$
(25)
has the component representation

$$V_\mu =g_{\mu \nu }V^\nu .$$
(26)
Expressions (25) or (26) can be used to define an inner product $`\omega ,V:T_b^{}(B)T_b(B)R`$, where $`R`$ is the set of real numbers. In component representation this leads to

$$\omega ,V=\omega _\mu V^\mu ,$$
(27)
which by virtue of (26) can also be written as

$$\omega ,V=g_{\mu \nu }\omega ^\mu V^\nu .$$
(28)
Usually the matrix $`g_{\mu \nu }`$ is called a metric if it is symmetric and positive definite, so $`V,V`$ has the meaning of square norm of $`V`$. However, in the case of a pseudo Riemannian space the positive definite condition can be dropped and we can still call the matrix $`g_{\mu \nu }`$ a metric (or pseudometric). Moreover, in nonsymmetric gravitational theories the matrix $`g_{\mu \nu }`$ does not even satisfy the symmetric condition. Therefore, in order to be as general as possible we shall call a metric just the isomorphism (25), without specifying any additional condition.

Let us now return to our goal of finding a mathematical structure for the gravitoid system. In the case of a tangent matroid bundle, $`T_b(B)`$ is replaced by an oriented matroid $`_{T_b}`$ and the base space is replaced by a simplicial complex $`S_B`$. Just like one can associate to $`T_b(B)`$ the dual tangent space $`T_b^{}(B),`$ one can associate to $`_{T_b}`$ the dual oriented matroid $`_{T_b}^{}.`$ Thus, one should expect that the isomorphism $`g:T_b(B)T_b^{}(B)`$ leads to the corresponding isomorphism

$$𝒢_g:_{T_b}_{T_b}^{}.$$
(29)
In general if an oriented matroid is realizable, its dual is also realizable. Therefore, if $`_{T_b}`$ is realizable then $`_{T_b}^{}`$ is also realizable. Let us denote by $`A`$ the $`k\times n`$ matrix over a field $`R`$ representing the vector matroid $`_{T_b}[A].`$ The ground set $`E`$ of $`_{T_b}[A]`$ are the columns of $`A`$. Similarly let us denote by $`A^{}`$ the corresponding matrix associated to the dual vector matroid $`_{T_b}^{}[A].`$ In this context the map (29) has the component representation

$$a_i=𝒢_{ij}a^j,$$
(30)
where $`a^jA`$ and $`a_iA^{}`$.

Now, the question arises whether there is a relation between the two maps $`g`$ and $`𝒢`$. The map $`𝒢`$ can be understood as the combinatorial analogue of the metric $`g`$. For this reason we shall call $`𝒢_{ij}`$ the matroid metric. Since the simplicial complex $`S_B`$ is homeomorphic to the smooth manifold $`B,`$ i.e., $`\lambda :S_BB`$ is a homeomorphism, we have the induced map $`\eta :_{T_b}V_b(B)`$, where $`V_b(B)`$ is a finite set of vectors in $`T_b(B)`$. Hence, (25) and (29) imply that there must exist a map $`\eta ^{}:_{T_b}^{}V_b^{}(B)`$, where $`V_b^{}(B)`$ is a finite set of covectors in $`T_b^{}(B)`$ and $`\eta ^{}=g\eta 𝒢^1`$. This result establishes the connection between $`g`$ and $`𝒢`$.

Our next step is to associate a gravitational theory to the matroid metric $`𝒢_{ij}`$. For this purpose we first need to introduce the combinatorial analogue of a connection and curvature. At this respect we shall relay on Ref. 24. The idea is to define 1-cocycle $`\mathrm{\Theta }`$ and 2-cocycle $`\rho ^{}\mathrm{\Omega }=\delta \mathrm{\Theta }`$ on each local system on $`S_B`$. It is worth mentioning that, in order to find a combinatorial formula for the Pontrjagin classes, Gelfand and MacPerson consider $`\mathrm{\Theta }`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ as the combinatorial analogue of connection and curvature of $`B`$, respectively.

The quest now is to find a relation between $`𝒢`$ and $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$. In principle, we can achieve this by applying a Palatini method to certain proposed action $`I=I(𝒢,\mathrm{\Omega }).`$ The question is, therefore, what is the form of $`I(𝒢,\mathrm{\Omega })`$? A partial answer to this question may come from the link between matroid theory and Chern-Simons theory found in Ref. 7. For this reason let us briefly review the main ideas of Ref. 7.

It is known that if we choose $`B^3=S^3,`$ $`G=SU(2)`$ and $`\rho _r=C^2`$ for all the link components then the Witten’s partition function

$$Z(L,k)=DA\mathrm{exp}(S_{cs})\underset{r=1}{\overset{n}{}}W(L_r,\rho _r),$$
(31)
where $`S_{CS}`$ is the Chern-Simons action

$$S_{CS}=\frac{k}{2\pi }_{M^3}Tr(AdA+\frac{2}{3}AAA)$$
(32)
and $`W(C_i,\rho _i)`$ is the Wilson line

$$W(L_r,\rho _r)=Tr_{\rho _r}P\mathrm{exp}(\underset{L_r}{}A_i^aT_a𝑑x^i)$$
(33)
reproduces the Jones polynomial

$$Z(L,k)=V_L(t).$$
(34)
Here, $`A=A_i^aT_adx^i`$, with $`T_a`$ the generators of the Lie algebra of a gauge group $`G`$ and the symbol $`P`$ means the path-ordering along the knots $`L_r.`$ The parameter $`t`$ is

$$t=e^{\frac{2\pi i}{k}}$$
(35)
and $`V_L(t)`$ denotes the Jones polynomial satisfying the skein relation;

$$t^1V_{L_+}tV_L_{}=(\sqrt{t}\frac{1}{\sqrt{t}})V_{L_0},$$
(36)
where $`L_+,L_{}`$ and $`L_0`$ are the standard notation for overcrossing, undercrossing and zero crossing.

On the other hand, Thistlethwaite26 showed that if $`L`$ is an alternating link and $`G(L)`$ the corresponding planar graph, then the Jones polynomial $`V_L(t)`$ is equal to the Tutte polynomial $`T_G(t,t^1)`$ up to a sign and a factor power of $`t.`$ Specifically, we have

$$V_L(t)=(t^{\frac{3}{4}})^{w(L)}t^{\frac{(rn)}{4}}T_G(t,t^1),$$
(37)
where $`w(L)`$ is the writhe and $`r`$ and $`n`$ are the rank and the nullity of $`G,`$ respectively. Here, $`V_L(t)`$ is the Jones polynomial of the alternating link $`L`$. The Tutte polynomial associated to each graph $`G`$ is a polynomial $`T_G(x,x^1)`$ with the property that if $`G`$ is composed solely of isthmus and loops then $`T_G(x,x^1)=x^Ix^l,`$ where $`I`$ is the number of isthmuses and $`l`$ is the number of loops. The polynomial $`T_G`$ satisfies the skein relation

$$T_G=T_G^{^{}}+T_{G^{^{\prime \prime }}},$$
(38)
where $`G^{}`$ and $`G^{\prime \prime }`$ are obtained by deleting and contracting respectively an edge that is neither a loop nor an isthmus of $`G`$.

A theorem due to Tutte allows to compute $`T_G(t,t^1)`$ from the maximal trees of $`G`$. In fact, Tutte proved that if $``$ denotes the set of maximal trees in a graph $`G`$, $`i()`$ denotes the number of internally active edges in $`G,`$ and $`e(B)`$ refers to the number of the externally active edges in $`G`$ (with respect to a given maximal tree $`B`$) then the Tutte polynomial is given by the formula

$$T_G(t,t^1)=\underset{B}{}x^{i(B)}x^{e(B)},$$
(39)
where the sum is over all elements of $``$. It is worth mentioning that the Tutte polynomial $`T_G(t,t^1)`$ computed according to (39) uses the concept of a graphic matroid $`M(G)`$ defined as the pair $`(E,)`$, where $`E`$ is the set of edges of $`G`$.

Therefore, we have the connections $`M(G)T_G(t,t^1)V_L(t)Z(L,k)`$. These bridges allow to transfer information from $`M(G)`$ to $`Z(L,k)`$ and conversely. In particular, if we change the notation $`T_G(t,t^1)T_{M(G)}(t)`$ and $`Z(L,k)Z_{M(G)}(k)`$ one discovers that the duality property of the Tutte polynomial

$$T_G(t,t^1)=T_G^{}(t^1,t)$$
(40)
can be expressed as

$$T_{M(G)}(t)=T_{M^{}(G)}(t^1)$$
(41)
and consequently from (34) and (37) we find that the partition function $`Z_{M(G)}(k)`$ gets the dual property

$$Z_{M(G)}(k)=Z_{M^{}(G)}(k),$$
(42)
(see Ref. 7 for details). This expression is of special relevance because it is exactly the kind of symmetry that one may expect in M-theory. Writing $`k=\mathrm{ln}\tau `$, where $`\tau `$ is a constant parameter (perhaps complex) one finds that the symmetry (42) in $`Z_{M(G)}(k)`$ is related to the S-duality symmetry $`\tau \frac{1}{\tau }`$ which is one of the key symmetries linking different superstring theories.

In the gravitoid theory one should expect similar, but not quite the same construction as the matroid-Chern-Simons approach. First of all, the Chern-Simons action in (31) is not written in abstract combinatorial terms. (Perhaps, here again the Gelfand-MacPerson24 procedure could be useful.) Secondly, the matroid theory enters in the scenario via graph theory. But graph theory is just an example of the simplicial complex formalism, so one needs the analogue for the Tutte polynomial for higher dimensional simplexes and, as far as we know, no such a mathematical structure is available in the mathematical literature. Nevertheless, let us just simply write the expected abstract symmetry that the gravitoid partition function should have, namely

$$Z_{_{T_b}}(𝒢,\mathrm{\Omega })=Z_{_{T_b}^{}}(𝒢^{},\mathrm{\Omega }^{}),$$
(43)
where $`\mathrm{\Omega }^{}`$ is the 2-cocycle associated to $`𝒢^{}`$. Since every matroid $``$ satisfies

$$^{}=$$
(44)
we should have $`𝒢^{}=𝒢^1`$. The fact that any matroid has its corresponding dual matroid is translated as a dual symmetry of the partition function $`Z_{_{T_b}}(𝒢,\mathrm{\Omega })`$. This is a remarkable consequence of using matroid theory as a mathematical framework. In order to have a complete picture in the expression (43) it is necessary to find the combinatorial analogue of the concept of classical action. Although this seems to be not a trivial problem, we can speculate that the answer should be something similar to the combinatorial formula for the Pontrjagin classes due to Gelfand and MacPherson.24 Oriented matroids and the simplicial complex formalism allowed these authors to find the combinatorial analogue of the Chern-Weil formula

$$\stackrel{~}{p}_i(E)=(1)^i\pi _{}\mathrm{\Omega }^{(e2+2i)}.$$
(45)
Here, $`\pi _{}`$ represents an integration over a fiber. In Chern-Weil theory the curvature is defined by $`\rho ^{}\mathrm{\Omega }=d\mathrm{\Theta },`$ where $`\mathrm{\Theta }`$ is a one form induced by the connection on the bundle $`E`$. In (45) $`e`$ is the fiber dimension of $`E`$. The combinatorial analogue of (45) proposed by Gelfand and MacPherson is

$$\stackrel{~}{p}_i(X)[X]=(1)^i\pi _{}(\frac{1}{2}\mathrm{\Omega })^{(n2+2i)}\varphi ),$$
(46)
where $`\varphi `$ is a fixing cycle for the simplicial complex $`X`$ (For details and further information we refer the reader to the original Ref. 24 of Gelfand and MacPherson.)

Since in matroid theory we have that any two connected matroids $`_1`$ and $`_2`$ satisfy the expression $`(_1_2)^{}=_1^{}_2^{}`$ we discover the remarkable result that

$$Z_{_{1T_b}}=Z_{_{1T_b}^{}}$$
(47)
and

$$Z_{_{2T_b}}=Z_{_{2T_b}^{}}$$
(48)
if and only if

$$Z_{_{1T_b}_{2T_b}}=Z_{(_{1T_b}_{2T_b})^{}}.$$
(49)
Besides its importance in gravitoid theory, the equation (43) may motivate a similar construction for M-theory. As it was mentioned before the five known superstring theories in 9+1 dimensions can be understood via duality as a different vacuum of the M-theory. Therefore, one should expect that the partition function associated to M-theory should be invariant under certain duality symmetry such as (42) or (43).

VI. COMMENTS

Matroid bundle is a remarkable mathematical structure that promises many interesting applications not only in mathematics but also in physics. In the present work we have shown the possibility of using matroid bundle as a framework for a new gravitational theory called gravitoid theory. The essential idea in this theory is to combine the concepts of graviton and matroid. One of the hopes is that gravitoid theory shows us how to develop M-theory from M(atroid)-theory. In essence we have proposed a partition function with a duality symmetry for the gravitoid system which may suggest a similar structure for M-theory.

Our procedure was focused on realizable tangent matroid bundles. However, since not all of the oriented matroids are realizable there must be more general tangent matroid bundles and therefore a more general gravitoid theory. Mathematically, a similar question has been considered in Ref. 14 where it was raised the question whether all combinatorial differential manifolds are topological manifolds.

One of the attractive features of matroid bundle is that it offers the possibility of using new combinatorial techniques to study characteristic classes. In particular, it has been proved that matroid bundles may be the basis for new studies on characteristic classes of differential manifolds. Examples of this fact is the Gelfand-MacPherson’s combinatorial formula24 for the Pontrjagin classes and the Anderson-Davis’s combinatorialization25 of the Stiefel-Whitney classes and Euler classes. These characteristic classes play an essential role in theoretical physics. For instance, Stiefel-Whitney classes are useful to determine the spin structure of a smooth manifold and Euler classes and Pontrjagin classes are useful topological invariants in the formulation of the MacDowell-Mansouri’s formalism (see Refs. 27 and references there in) in supergravity. These observations suggest and motivate the search of a link between the gravitoid theory and these combinatorial characteristic classes.

Gravitoid theory can be understood as the combinatorialization of the bosonic sector of supergravity in any dimension and in particular in $`D=11`$. In view of the MacPherson´s conjecture14,16 that all characteristic classes of a vector bundle should have their corresponding characteristic classes in matroid bundle one should expect combinatorialization of Chern-Simons theory and topological gravity28. From this perspective it is tempting to speculate about the possibility that gravitoid theory may contain, in fact, the combinatorialization of topological gravity.

There are many other open questions. Is gravitoid theory an alternative for quantum gravity? What is the supersymmetrization of the gravitoid theory? What is the precise relation between the gravitoid theory and $`D=11`$ supergravity? It seems that the combinatorialization of the Pontrjagin classes implies an exotic combinatorial $`7D`$ sphere. Is the gravitoid theory related to this exotic structure via $`D=11`$ supergravity? Our hope is that the present work stimulates a research to answer these and other related questions.

Acknowledgment: We would like to thank C. Austin for calling our attention about the Anderson and Davis’s references. We also like to thank to J. Saucedo and G. Compoy for helpful comments.