# Gravitational Lensing by Cold Dark Matter Catastrophes

## 1 Singularities in Projected Density

Particle dark matter naturally forms thin structures in phase space (Sikivie (1999)). In some cases, such as axions forming by Bose condensation, the peculiar velocities are exceptionally small, but even for thermally produced particles, adiabatic cooling creates a cool Hubble flow which resembles a 3D sheet ($`\stackrel{}{v}=H\stackrel{}{r}`$) in six-dimensional phase space. The fine-grained phase structure remains thin even after nonlinear collapse destroys the ordered Hubble flow. For systems which are not too dynamically old or too violently relaxed, the fine structure retains information about the nature of the dark matter and its dynamical history.

The fine-grained structure remains most conspicuous at the locations of caustics in the flow of matter. The most famous examples in cosmology are the Zel’dovich “pancakes” (Zeldovich (1970)). Similar caustics occur in general nonlinear collapses in smooth potentials: for example, shells in spherical similarity solutions (Fillmore & Goldreich (1984); Bertschinger (1985)), or ringlike tubes in collapses having less symmetry (Sikivie (1999)). Singularities are not an artifact of the symmetry: fold catastrophes (2D sheets) joining in cusp catastrophes (1D lines), which themselves join in various pointlike catastrophes, are a generic feature of any smooth 3D phase sheet mapping onto 3D space (Arnold (1984); Tremaine (1998)). Physically these structures are caused by turning points or focus points of orbits. They create formal singularities in density (sheets, lines and points) with universal density profiles. These features may be observable through their dynamical effects (Sikivie (1998)), though with insufficient resolution to reveal the fine structure of the dark matter phase sheet.

Here I discuss the projection of the phase sheet onto the sky and how discontinuities in surface density can manifest themselves in gravitational lensing. Lensing offers the advantage of very small background sources which can serve as microscopic probes of small scale phase structures. Observations of such events can yield physical information about the nature of the dark matter and its formation mechanism– for example, whether axions formed by condensation or string radiation.

The most common generic true spatial catastrophes of cold dark matter— a 3D phase sheet moving in a 3D subspace of 6D phase space— are “folds”, 2D structures of codimension and corank 1 (Tremaine (1998)). They terminate on linelike cusps which in turn terminate on pointlike swallowtail, elliptic umbilic and hyperbolic umbilic catastrophes. Folds form sheets with a formally divergent density, with a universal density profile: on one side $`\rho x^{1/2}`$, abruptly falling to $`\rho =0`$ on the other side.<sup>1</sup><sup>1</sup>1Note that these structures actually exist in the fine-grained halo density distribution. In principle, a detailed time history of the WIMP flux on Earth would show spikes of divergent flux every few million years. The integrated flux in these spikes however is small so in a real fossil record (such as tracks in mica) they would not stand out clearly against the background. However, when projected onto the sky the catastrophic divergence does not survive. Integrating the fold profile in projection produces instead a a simple jump in column density, with a sharp edge, along the line where a fold sheet is convex and tangent to the line of sight.

Consider a (generic) 2D fold of a 3D phase sheet in 3D space. Let the $`z`$ axis lie along the line of sight and tangent to the fold, the $`y`$ axis in the plane of the sky and tangent to the projection of the fold at $`x=0`$. The sheet lies at $`x_s(z)=z^2`$, so the 3D density to the right of the sheet is $`\rho =(xz^2)^{1/2}`$. The projected density is

$$\rho (x)=_{z=\sqrt{x}}^{z=+\sqrt{x}}\rho (z^{})𝑑z^{}=\{\begin{array}{cc}\pi \hfill & \text{for }x>0\hfill \\ 0\hfill & \text{for }x<0\text{,}\hfill \end{array}$$
(1)   
a discontinuous jump where the projected fold is tangent to the line of sight. The projected edges form lines on the sky with coherence scale $`\mathrm{}`$, along which the amplitude of the discontinuity slowly varies. The amplitude of the jump (which depends on the curvature of the fold in the invisible dimensions), and its coherence scale on the sky, depend on the dynamical substructure and history of the halo. Roughly speaking, a “smooth” halo which is $`N`$ orbital times old has about $`N`$ wraps and folds of its phase sheet, and about $`N`$ projected edges. A typical discontinuity has an amplitude $`\delta \mathrm{\Sigma }N^1\overline{\mathrm{\Sigma }}`$ where the mean halo surface density is $`\overline{\mathrm{\Sigma }}`$.

In reality the catastrophes are concentrated in the central, dynamically old parts of a halo and display a chaotic structure reflecting the dynanical history of the system; only the younger folds, representing particles on their first or second orbits, show coherence on the scale of the halo itself. Although the statistical properties of the edges in realistic models have not been studied in detail, they are apparent in 2D projections of dynamically young systems in high-resolution N-body simulations (J. Stadel, private communication). Edges disappear if the matter is too hot or if the experiment is too coarse-grained compared to the scale of the dynamical wraps.

At the finest resolution, the sharpness of the edge discontinuities is in principle limited only by the intrinsic width of the dark matter phase sheet. This scale is typically much smaller than the angular scale $`\mathrm{}`$ of the dynamical folding, in which case the lensing effects can be treated as a one-dimensional problem.

## 2  Lensing by Projected Folds

### 2.1 Lenses with 1D Translational Symmetry

We follow the notation of Blandford and Narayan (1986), describing relativistic bending in the thin-screen approximation by a two-dimensional potential $`\psi `$ on the plane of the sky $`(x,y)`$. We study line discontinuities on the $`y`$ axis and because of the translational symmetry the two-dimensional Poisson equation reduces to one dimension,

$$\frac{^2\psi }{x_I^2}=2\frac{\mathrm{\Sigma }(x_I)}{\mathrm{\Sigma }_c}.$$
(2)   
The critical surface density $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_c=c^2(4\pi GD)^1=0.35\mathrm{g}\mathrm{cm}^2(D/1\mathrm{G}\mathrm{p}\mathrm{c})^1`$ is determined by the combination $`D=D_dD_{ds}/D_s`$ of the angular diameter distances to the lens $`D_d`$ and the source $`D_s`$, and between them $`D_{ds}`$; at this density a uniform sheet of matter would just focus radiation from the source at the observer. The positions of the images $`x_I`$ are determined by the lens equation

$$x_I=x_s+\frac{\psi (x_I)}{x_I}$$
(3)   
where $`x_s`$ is the direction of the source. The image distortions and magnifications are determined by the extrinsic curvature tensor

$$K_{ij}=\frac{\theta _{Si}}{\theta _{Ij}}=\left[\begin{array}{cc}\kappa +\mu & 0\\ 0& \kappa \mu \end{array}\right]$$
(4)   
where the principal axes for lensing are the same as those set by the discontinuity, $`\theta _1=x`$ and $`\theta _2=y`$. Here $`\kappa =1(\mathrm{\Sigma }/\mathrm{\Sigma }_c)`$ denotes the expansion, and $`\mu `$ denotes the shear associated with image distortion. By symmetry in this situation, the $`yy`$ term of $`K`$ is unity, determining a particular relation between expansion and shear: $`\kappa \mu =1`$, and hence $`\mu =(\mathrm{\Sigma }/\mathrm{\Sigma }_c)`$. The magnification of an image is given by $`M=|\kappa ^2\mu ^2|^1`$ and hence

$$M=\left|12\frac{\mathrm{\Sigma }}{\mathrm{\Sigma }_c}\right|^1;$$
(5)   
images are stretched in the $`x`$ direction by this factor.

### 2.2 Folded 2D phase sheet

Some dissipative structures (such as cold disks) resemble a 2D phase sheet, whose projection onto the sky can create high density features resembling a fold catastrophe in projection (for example, stellar shells around elliptical galaxies; Quinn (1984); Hernquist & Spergel (1992)). In reality these sheets are not as thin as intrinsically 3D dark matter phase structures although they may produce recognizable pseudo-catastrophe events.

In the plane of the sky consider a fold on the $`y`$ axis at $`x=0`$. The universal surface density profile is

$$\frac{\mathrm{\Sigma }(x)}{\mathrm{\Sigma }_c}=\{\begin{array}{cc}x^{1/2}\hfill & \text{for }x>0\hfill \\ 0\hfill & \text{for }x<0\hfill \end{array}$$
(6)   
We have used the scaling freedom to set $`\mathrm{\Sigma }=\mathrm{\Sigma }_c`$ at $`x=1`$. The solution of the lens equation yields the mapping between source and image positions,

$$x_I=\{\begin{array}{cc}(2\pm \sqrt{4+x_S})^2\hfill & \text{for }x_I>0\hfill \\ x_S\hfill & \text{for }x_I<0\hfill \end{array}$$
(7)   
Three images in a line are produced for $`x_S`$ in the vicinity of the fold, $`4<x_S<0`$. The magnifications of the images at $`x_I>0`$ are

$$M_\pm =|12x_I^{1/2}|^1=\left|1\pm \left(1+\frac{x_S}{4}\right)^{1/2}\right|.$$
(8)   
These formulae describe a universal family of solutions characterized by one parameter. However, the approximation breaks down on a scale determined by the temperature of the 2D phase sheet; while it might serve as a good description of some baryonic lenses, we cannot use this as a probe of dark matter.

### 2.3 Sharp Edge from Folded 3D Phase Sheet

The more interesting case is the projection of generic catastrophes caused by folds of the very cold 3D CDM phase sheet, which create discontinuities with extremely sharp edges, and a projected profile

$$\frac{\mathrm{\Sigma }(x)}{\mathrm{\Sigma }_c}=\{\begin{array}{cc}\sigma _0\hfill & \text{for }x>0\hfill \\ 0\hfill & \text{for }x<0\text{.}\hfill \end{array}$$
(9)   
The lensing solution is simply

$$x_I=\{\begin{array}{cc}x_S/(12\sigma _0)\hfill & \text{for }x_I>0\hfill \\ x_S\hfill & \text{for }x_I<0\hfill \end{array}$$
(10)   
There are no multiple images for $`2\sigma _0<1`$. The mapping from $`S`$ to $`I`$ receives a stretch in the $`x`$ direction to the right of the edge. There is an abrupt change in magnification from one side of the edge to the other, from $`M=1`$ to $`M=|12\sigma _0|^1`$, which would appear as a sudden change in the brightness of a small moving source. The discontinuity can also be observed in image structure if there is an extended background source (such as a compact jet or edge-on disk) which lies in a straight line: at the location of the edge the image displays a sudden bend.

If $`2\sigma _0>1`$, two images form if $`x_S<0`$ (at $`x_I>0`$ and $`x_I<0`$) and no images form if $`x_S>0`$. A source moving towards the edge from $`x<0`$ appears as two images approaching each other with a uniform magnification (one image with $`M=1`$, the other with $`M=|12\sigma _0|^1`$, both moving with angular velocity $`M`$) until it reaches the edge, when the images meet and both suddenly disappear. The image of an extended object at $`x_S<0`$ appears reflected across the line, stretched and parity-reversed; that is, the surface brightness at $`(x,y)`$ is duplicated at $`(Mx,y)`$.

These very simple solutions only apply over angles much smaller than $`\mathrm{}`$; particularly in the supercritical case there are nontrivial macroimages with a larger-scale structure not described here. However, these solutions accurately illustrate the unique effects near the edges.

## 3 Observing the Innermost Phase Structures

Physically, the edge discontinuity is the most interesting case since the width of the edge reveals the initial dark matter velocity dispersion. An extreme example is condensed axions, with dispersion at the redshift of collapse $`z_{coll}`$ (Sikivie (1999))

$$\delta v_a/c3\times 10^{17}(m_a/10^5eV)^1(1+z_{coll}).$$
(11)   
A more typical case is thermally produced WIMPs which have

$$\delta v_W/c10^{11}(m_W/GeV)^{1/2}(1+z_{coll}).$$
(12)   
This dispersion creates a range of energies at a given initial position, translating after one orbit to a dispersion of turnaround radii for the first fold and smearing the projected edge to a fraction of the halo size $`\delta v/v_{vir}`$ where $`v_{vir}`$ ($`10^3c`$) is the halo dispersion. This ratio is very small— adopting $`z_{coll}`$ 3 to 10 typical of CDM models, it is about $`10^{12}`$ for axions and $`10^7`$ for WIMPS. If the edge results from a fold of angular size $`\mathrm{}`$, its angular width is about $`\delta x\mathrm{}\delta v/v_{vir}`$. The edges are therefore very sharp, ranging from a few milliarcsec for WIMP edges in our local halo ($`\mathrm{}0.1`$, $`\delta x10^8`$)) to a few picoarcsec for axion edges in clusters or halos at high redshift ($`\mathrm{}10^4`$, $`\delta x10^{16}`$.

Resolving the structure in these extraordinarily sharp edges— the interesting goal if we want to use them to probe dark matter— requires small (and hence faint) background sources. For halo-scale folds ($`10^{23}`$ cm), normal solar-type stars ($`10^{11}`$ cm) are about the right size to resolve the axion edge. Bright sources such as quasars and supernovae ($`10^{15}`$ cm) are too large to resolve the axion edge but have the advantage that they are visible at high redshift, and can still resolve edges produced by thermal WIMPs. In principle at least, realistic background sources can probe the initial dark matter distribution function.

How practical is it to use these occurrences as a probe? One type of experiment would be MACHO-style (Alcock et al. (1997); Paczynski (1996)): monitor a large number of background sources (such as a galaxy of stars) and watch for sources crossing edges in a foreground halo. Clearly, the light curves caused by edge transits are very different from the “standard” MACHO events of point-mass microlensing (Paczynski (1986)). The number of edges across the face of a halo is about the number of orbits since it formed, say $`N10`$ to 100. Each background star traverses the angular scale of the halo in a dynamical time $`t_{halo}10^8`$ yr so monitoring $`10^8`$ stars for a year will show 10 to 100 of them crossing edges. The timescale for the brightness to change (assuming the source resolves the edge) is the transit time of the edge $`t_{halo}(\delta v/v_{vir})`$, about an hour for the axion edge and years for thermal WIMPs.

Unfortunately the amplitude $`\sigma _0\overline{\mathrm{\Sigma }}/N`$ of the jumps is less than $`10^6`$ for Local Group experiments, which is not observable given limitations of photometric accuracy and the stability of the background sources. To find large-amplitude or “appearing/disappearing” events, sources must be monitored at high redshift where $`\sigma _0`$ in typical halos can approach unity.

This requires surveys which are simultaneously larger, deeper, and better sampled in time than is possible with current telescopes. If the goal is to resolve the axion edge, one must detect a solar-size star in an hour at the Hubble length, which takes a 1000m telescope (fortunately, this is also large enough to resolve a galaxy this far away into stars). With a 100m telescope— which is at least being contemplated— the experiment could be done with giant stars as targets, the events lasting of the order of days.

In the short term it is more realistic to study these effects via imaging. Discontinuities can be found by sharp bends in images of extended linear objects, such as jets or edge-on galaxies. Imaging of jets with mmVLBI (with resolution potentially as high as $`\delta x10^{10}`$) or VLBA ($`\delta x10^8`$) can verify the presence of sharp edges and test for the cold character of the primordial phase sheet. Although the accessible angular scales are not nearly small enough to probe axions, they can reach the WIMP scale and test for warmer forms of dark matter.

Most interesting are high amplitude supercritical edges ($`2\sigma _0>1`$) in dense halos and clusters at high redshift with $`\overline{\mathrm{\Sigma }}>\mathrm{\Sigma }_c`$. They create double images of extended objects, reflected about a sharp line and stretched perpendicular to the line. A jet would not only appear to bend sharply, it would appear the same (but mirror-reversed) on the two sides of the bend except for a constant stretch factor in $`x`$ (and no stretch in $`y`$). The sharp character of the edge is apparent if the resolution is better than the coherence scale $`\mathrm{}`$ of the folds, which may be almost as large as the macrolens itself in dynamically young systems. A fresh fold in a young cluster, many arcseconds across, could reflect a whole galaxy image. Edge lensing might even appear in high-resolution images of galaxies and quasars in known macrolenses (e.g. Kochanek et al. (1998)). Note that lensing conserves surface brightness so there must be image structure on scales below $`\mathrm{}`$ for the edge to be visible.

Even though it may be possible to resolve the predicted scale of the thermal WIMP candidates, we will have to get lucky to find a source this small lying right behind an edge. One can imagine searching for jets behind the small fraction of the sky (about $`10^3`$) with supercritical surface density in a foreground halo. Suppose we are looking at jets with a size $`x_j`$; a fraction $`x_j/\mathrm{}`$ will happen to transect a young edge in the halo. This means that about a fraction $`10^3x_j/\mathrm{}`$ of all jets will be suitably placed; if we imagine that there are $`10^8`$ jets on the sky (judging from the total number of galaxies and their duty cycle as AGN), we ought to be able to find $`10^5x_j/\mathrm{}`$ of them (times whatever aspect ratio they have) which probe edges on the scale $`\delta xx_j`$— or about $`10^2`$ for WIMPs. So, it is realistic to expect to probe well below the halo dispersion for the coldness of the dark matter, but probably not reasonable to test models of WIMPS.

The ultimate goal of using this effect to probe the primordial phase structure of particle CDM is therefore still some way off. However, relatively coarse resolution still offers a test of scenarios designed to smooth halo substructure or soften halo cores (e.g., Ghigna et al. (1998); Moore et al. (1997)): for example, reducing small-scale fluctuation power would increase the fold coherence scale, and raising $`\delta v`$ would increase the thermal smearing scale, ultimately eliminating the edges altogether. Observation of a sharp dark matter edge on sub-halo scales could rule out hot dark matter candidates. Although the theoretical predictions need to be sharpened, it seems likely that some of these tests can be performed using current technology, even using background galaxies as sources, with a sufficiently large survey.

I am grateful to S. Phinney, G. Lewis, C. Stubbs, D. Brownlee, and S. D. M. White for useful comments and discussions. This work was supported by NASA at the University of Washington, and by a Humbolt Research Award at the Max Planck Instibute für Astrophysik.