No Arabic abstract
An extension of the notion of classical equivalence of equivalence in the Batalin--(Fradkin)--Vilkovisky (BV) and (BFV) framework for local Lagrangian field theory on manifolds possibly with boundary is discussed. Equivalence is phrased in both a strict and a lax sense, distinguished by the compatibility between the BV data for a field theory and its boundary BFV data, necessary for quantisation. In this context, the first- and second-order formulations of non-Abelian Yang--Mills and of classical mechanics on curved backgrounds, all of which admit a strict BV-BFV description, are shown to be pairwise equivalent as strict BV-BFV theories. This in particular implies that their BV-complexes are quasi-isomorphic. Furthermore, Jacobi theory and one-dimensional gravity coupled with scalar matter are compared as classically-equivalent reparametrisation-invaria
These notes give an introduction to the mathematical framework of the Batalin-Vilkovisky and Batalin-Fradkin-Vilkovisky formalisms. Some of the presented content was given as a mini course by the first author at the 2018 QSPACE conference in Benasque.
We show how the BV-BFV formalism provides natural solutions to descent equations, and discuss how it relates to the emergence of holographic counterparts of given gauge theories. Furthermore, by means of an AKSZ-type construction we reproduce the Chern-Simons to Wess-Zumino-Witten correspondence from infinitesimal local data, and show an analogous correspondence for BF theory. We discuss how holographic correspondences relate to choices of polarisation relevant for quantisation, proposing a semi-classical interpretation of the quantum holographic principle.
We show how to derive asymptotic charges for field theories on manifolds with asymptotic boundary, using the BV-BFV formalism. We also prove that the conservation of said charges follows naturally from the vanishing of the BFV boundary action, and show how this construction generalises Noethers procedure. Using the BV-BFV viewpoint, we resolve the controversy present in the literature, regarding the status of large gauge transformation as symmetries of the asymptotic structure. We show that even though the symplectic structure at the asymptotic boundary is not preserved under these transformations, the failure is governed by the corner data, in agreement with the BV-BFV philosophy. We analyse in detail the case of electrodynamics and the interacting scalar field, for which we present a new type of duality to a sourced two-form model.
This is a survey of our program of perturbative quantization of gauge theories on manifolds with boundary compatible with cutting/pasting and with gauge symmetry treated by means of a cohomological resolution (Batalin-Vilkovisky) formalism. We also give two explicit quantum examples -- abelian BF theory and the Poisson sigma model. This exposition is based on a talk by P.M. at the ICMP 2015 in Santiago de Chile.
We construct a formal global quantization of the Poisson Sigma Model in the BV-BFV formalism using the perturbative quantization of AKSZ theories on manifolds with boundary and analyze the properties of the boundary BFV operator. Moreover, we consider mixed boundary conditions and show that they lead to quantum anomalies, i.e. to a failure of the (modified differential) Quantum Master Equation. We show that it can be restored by adding boundary terms to the action, at the price of introducing corner terms in the boundary operator. We also show that the quantum GBFV operator on the total space of states is a differential, i.e. squares to zero, which is necessary for a well-defined BV cohomology.