Is electromagnetic gauge invariance spontaneously violated in superconductors? (Q2565559)

This review paper is devoted to discussion of the possibility of spontaneous breaking down gauge invariance in a superconductor. The author answers this question negatively. First, it is discussed the danger of statement about spontaneous violation of the gauge invariance in a superconductor for correct description of superconductivity in terms of an effective field theory, but also microscopic model Hamiltonians and trial wave functions. In particular, it is shown that the BCS ground state is fully gauge invariant. Then, the nature of the order parameter in superconductors is discussed to being finite systems, which always possess a unique ground state. This consideration is based on analogy to quantum antiferromagnets, also possessing a unique and rotationally invariant ground state for finite systems. Further, the effective field theory of a superconductor at low temperature is motivated and elaborated. One contains the theory of a neutral superfluid as the special case, where the charge is set to zero. The particle density and current as well as the energy and momentum density are obtained from the physical symmetries of the theory, invariance under global U(1) phase rotations of the order parameter and invariance under translations in time and space. Then, it is obtained a gauge invariant generalization of Anderson's characteristic equations of superfluidity to the case of superconductors. Next, it is discussed the phenomenology of superconductors as compared to neutral superfluids or the Higgs mechanism. For simply connected superconductors, the author solves the motion equations, obtains electric and magnetic screening, London's equation, the Bernoulli-Hall effect and the balance of the Lorentz force. It is demonstrated, that the Higgs mechanism never corresponds to a spontaneous violation of a gauge symmetry. Finally, there are reviewed quantum effects, namely: the quantization of magnetic flux in superconductors, phase slippage, and the Josephson effect in both neutral superfluids and superconductors. In these effects Planck's constant manifests itself in the phenomenology through the compactness of the order parameter phase field. These effects require either a non-trivial topology or more than one superfluid. In total, this review is very well motivated and valided in pedagogical sense and may be useful students studying superconductivity and superfluidity.