Perturbative quantum gauge theories on manifolds with boundary (Q2413059)

In this long technical paper, the authors introduce a general perturbative quantization scheme for gauge-like theories over manifolds with boundary by lifting the Atiyah-Segal functorial approach to the cochain level by the aid of the cohomological symplectic (BV-BFV) formalism. Explicit examples are also worked out: abelian \(BF\) and \(BF\)-like theories and their perturbations in detail, moreover non-abelian \(BF\) theories, \(2D\) Yang-Mills theories, Poisson sigma-models, first order quantum mechanics and Chern-Simons theories are also considered. This paper is a step towards quantize more realistic i.e., physical (possibly non-supersymmetric) gauge theories with similar tools in the future. In more detail, recall that according to the by-now classical Atiyah-Segal formulation of topological quantum or conformal field theory respectively, \textit{quantization} is a functor -- the ``Feynman integral'' -- from the category whose objects are manifolds-with-boundary equipped with various structures and whose morphisms being the corresponding cobordisms, into a monoidal category (e.g. finite dimensional complex vector spaces with linear maps). The basic problem which arises when one tries to apply this or any other quantization procedure to classical field theories possessing gauge symmetry is that all of them suffer from various ambiguities and get ill-posed, caused by the presence of the huge gauge symmetry in the theory. The authors' basic idea in the article is to treat the overall ambiguity stemming from gauge-dependence by replacing the Atiyah-Segal single target vector space with a complex (in the sense of homological algebra) and define states, propagators, etc. as cohomology classes in the corresponding cohomology theory; in this framework one can look at gauge transformations as modifications of things by exact terms. This allows one to work out a rigorous perturbative quantization procedure. The first main result of the article is a systematic construction of the general framework for this approach (see Section 2 in the article). The second main result is an application, namely a perturbative quantization of \(BF\)-theories, \(2D\) Yang-Mills theory, nonlinear sigma-model and quantum mechanics in the first order formalism (for a precise statement see Theorem on p. 636 and Sections 3--4 for more details). Some technical background like Hodge theory on manifolds-with-boundary, propagator gluing, etc. is also incorporated in the form of six appendices.