scientific article; zbMATH DE number 1172121

Geometric quantization (53D50) Applications of global analysis to the sciences (58Z05) Two-dimensional field theories, conformal field theories, etc. in quantum mechanics (81T40) Anomalies in quantum field theory (81T50)

Review text

The Batalin-Vilkovsky (BV) method of quantization of the gauge systems is the most important one developed in recent years. This method uses the efficient structures of the Hamiltonian approach as the Poisson-like brackets (antibrackets), canonical transformations, etc. The method has been applied in the conformal field theory in two dimensions. In this framework it is easy to answer the question whether the conformal invariance of the classical theory is preserved at the quantum level or the theory becomes anomalous. Due to the work of Wess and Zumino it is well-known that all anomalies and Schwinger terms must satisfy some consistency conditions, which involve the symmetry of the classical theory. The general forms of these conditions have a very elegant formulation in the BV formalism. Therefore, if we denote the possible anomaly by the functional \({\mathcal A}\) and by \(S\) the proper solution of the classical master equation, the general form of the Wess-Zumino consistency condition reads: \[ (S,{\mathcal A})= 0,\tag{1} \] where \((,)\) is the antibracket defined in Section 2. This equation can be reformulated as a cohomology problem if we introduce the BRST differential \(s\), defined on arbitrary functions \({\mathcal F}\) of fields and antifields as \[ s{\mathcal F}= (s,{\mathcal F}).\tag{2} \] Its nilpotency \(s^2= 0\) is ensured by the Jacobi identity for antibrackets and the master equation. Using the properties of the antibrackets it is easy to see that the linear operator \(s\) is a differential on the algebra of all functionals of the fields and antifields. Thus, we can define its cohomology group (algebra) \[ H(s)= \ker(s)/\text{Im}(s)\tag{3} \] which is, by definition, the BRST cohomology. Since the differential \(s\) has the ghost number \((gh)\) equal to 1, \(H(s)\) can be computed in each subspace of functionals with a given ghost number \(gh= g\), separately, \(H^g(s)\). In this way, the invariant actions are members of \(H^0(s)\), the possible anomalies of \(H^1(s)\) and the Schwinger terms of \(H^2(s)\). These subspaces are of our main interest. However, it is often possible to compute \(H^g(s)\) for all possible values of \(g\). In this paper, we compute the BRST cohomology \(H(s)\) for a class of two-dimensional models which are conformally invariant at the classical level. We do not characterize these models by given conformally invariant classical actions, but only by their field and antifield content and the gauge invariance of the classical theory. In this precise framework, we compute \(H(s)\) in the space of the local functional of fields and antifields, and as a byproduct we compute the most general local classical action \(S_0\) as a member of \(H^0(s)\) in the space of antifield independent functionals. This is possible to be accomplished since in our case the BRST transformations of the fields do not depend on the antifields. We want to emphasize that this situation is not the general one and emphasize the fact that in \(W\)-gravity the transformations of some fields do depend on the antifields.

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