Nilpotent Symmetries of a Modified Massive Abelian 3-Form Theory: Augmented Superfield Approach

TL;DR

This paper develops off-shell nilpotent and anticommuting (anti-)BRST symmetry transformations for a modified massive Abelian 3-form gauge theory using an augmented superfield approach, introducing new CF-type restrictions.

Contribution

It introduces a novel combination of the horizontality condition and gauge invariant restriction within the augmented superfield approach to derive BRST symmetries for a St"uckelberg-modified massive Abelian 3-form theory, including new CF-type restrictions.

Findings

Derived off-shell nilpotent (anti-)BRST transformations.

Introduced new CF-type restrictions specific to the massive theory.

Demonstrated the role of combined HC and GIR in symmetry derivation.

Abstract

We derive the off-shell nilpotent and absolutely anticommuting (anti-)BRST symmetry transformations for any arbitrary D-dimensional St$\ddot u$ckelberg-modified massive Abelian 3-form theory within the framework of augmented version of superfield approach (AVSA) to Becchi-Rouet-Stora-Tyutin (BRST) formalism where, in addition to the horizontality condition (HC), we exploit the theoretical strength of the gauge invariant restriction (GIR) to deduce the proper transformations for the gauge, associated (anti-)ghost fields, auxiliary fields, St$\ddot u$ckelberg compensating field, etc. In fact, it is an elegant and delicate combination of HC and GIR (within the ambit of AVSA) that is crucial for all our discussions and derivations. One of the highlights of our present endeavor is the deduction of a new set of (anti-)BRST invariant Curci-Ferrari (CF)-type restrictions which are not found in the massless version of our present theory where only the HC plays an important role in the derivation of all the (anti-)BRST transformations and a very specific set of CF-type restrictions. The alternative ways of the derivation of the full set of the latter, from various theoretical considerations, are also interesting results of our present investigation.