An equivalence of two mass generation mechanisms for gauge fields

TL;DR

This paper proves the equivalence of two gauge field mass generation mechanisms in abelian theories and discusses their properties in nonabelian cases, highlighting their theoretical consistency and implications.

Contribution

It demonstrates the equivalence of two different mass generation mechanisms for gauge fields in abelian theories and explores their properties in nonabelian contexts.

Findings

Equivalence of topological and localization-based mass mechanisms in abelian gauge theories.

The topological mechanism yields a unitary, renormalizable massive vector field in nonabelian theories.

The mechanisms are consistent with gauge invariance and quantum field theory principles.

Abstract

Two mass generation mechanisms for gauge theories are studied. It is proved that in the abelian case the topological mass generation mechanism introduced in hep-th/9301060, hep-th/9512216 is equivalent to the mass generation mechanism defined in hep-th/0510240, hep-th/0605050 with the help of ``localization'' of a nonlocal gauge invariant action. In the nonabelian case the former mechanism is known to generate a unitary renormalizable quantum field theory describing a massive vector field.