Homotopy algebras of differential (super)forms in three and four dimensions (Q1630341)

Homotopy associative algebras, which appeared in the 1960's in [\textit{J. D. Stasheff}, Trans. Am. Math. Soc. 108, 275--292, 293--312 (1963; Zbl 0114.39402)], are a natural generalization of a differential graded associative algebra. It was since the 1990's that people have found out such structures in string physics and geometry [\textit{M. R. Gaberdiel} and \textit{B. Zwiebach}, Nucl. Phys., B 505, No. 3, 569--624 (1997; Zbl 0911.53044); Phys. Lett., B 410, No. 2--4, 151--159 (1997; Zbl 0911.53046)], [\textit{M. Kontsevich} and \textit{Y. Soibelman}, in: Symplectic geometry and mirror symmetry. Proceedings of the 4th KIAS annual international conference, Seoul, South Korea, August 14--18, 2000. Singapore: World Scientific. 203--263 (2001; Zbl 1072.14046); \textit{Y. Soibelman}, J. Math. Phys. 45, No. 10, 3742--3757 (2004; Zbl 1071.32023); \textit{P. Bressler} and \textit{Y. Soibelman}, J. Math. Phys. 45, No. 10, 3972--3982 (2004; Zbl 1071.53053)]. The authors of this paper aim at investigating such algebraic entities related to the basic gauge (super) field theories on the lines of the second author's papers [J. High Energy Phys. 2010, No. 3, Paper No. 056, 32 p. (2010; Zbl 1271.81151); J. Phys. A, Math. Theor. 42, No. 35, Article ID 355401, 12 p. (2009; Zbl 1176.81107); Commun. Math. Phys. 303, No. 2, 331--359 (2011; Zbl 1287.81056)]. This paper, consisting of 4 sections, studies homotopy algebras related to superfield theories together with their transfers. In \S 2 the authors examine the \(N=2\) \(D=3\) Chern-Simons theory in the superfield formulation with recourse to the corresponding Batalin-Viklkovsisky action, constructing the superfield counterpart of the de Rham complex in three dimensions, which turns out to be a homotopy algebra in place of the usual differential graded algebra. \S 2 is a good introduction to the authors' ideas. \S 3 addresses the Yang-Mills theory in its usual second-order and first-order forms, describing the corresponding \(A_{\infty}\)-algebras and showing how they are related to the Batanin-Vilkovisky formalism, where the first-order formulation yields merely a differential graded algebra, while the second-order formulation reveals an \(A_{\infty}\)-algebra with all the operations from the quadrilinear one vanishing. The authors conclude \S 3 by showing that these two \(A_{\infty}\)-algebras are related by the transfer formula, which is one of the simplest natural example of the transfer formula. \S 4 is concerned with generalizations of these results to the supersymmetric case, using the superfield formulation of \(N=2\)\ supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory and investigating the homotopical algebras in the second-order and first-order formulations. The authors' present work is well related to [\textit{O. Hohm} and \textit{B. Zwiebach}, Fortschr. Phys. 65, No. 3--4, 1700014, 33 p. (2017; Zbl 1371.81261)] and [\textit{M. Movshev} and \textit{A. Schwarz}, Prog. Math. 244, 473--523 (2006; Zbl 1229.81281)].