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How does the functional measure transform under a field redefinition?

Physics Asked on May 6, 2021

My question is: how does the path integral functional measure transform under the following field redefinitions (where $c$ is an arbitrary constant and $phi$ is a scalar field):
begin{align}
phi(x)&=theta(x)+c ,theta^3(x) tag{1}
phi(x)&=c,theta^3(x) tag{2}
phi(x)&=sinhbig(theta(x)big)tag{3}
end{align}

My naive guess for the transformation in Eq.(3) is
begin{align}
mathcal{D}phi&=mathcal{D}theta,,text{Det}Bigg[frac{delta phi(x)}{deltatheta(x’)}Bigg]=mathcal{D}theta ,,text{Det}bigg[cosh(theta(x))delta(x-x’)bigg]
&=mathcal{D}thetaexpbigg[text{Tr},Big(logbig(cosh(theta(x))delta(x-x’)big)Big)bigg]
&=mathcal{D}thetaexpbigg[int dx,,logBig(cosh(theta(x))delta(x-x’)Big)bigg]
end{align}

But that seems very wrong.

3 Answers

  1. It seems natural to generalize OP's setting to several fields $phi^{alpha}$ in $d$ spacetime dimensions. Under ultra-local field redefinitions$^1$ $$begin{align} phi^{primealpha}(x)~=~&F^{alpha}(phi(x),x)cr ~=~&phi^{alpha}(x)-f^{alpha}(phi(x),x),end{align}tag{1} $$ the Jacobian functional determinant in the path/functional integral is formally given as $$begin{align} J~=~&{rm Det} (mathbb{M})cr ~=~&exp {rm Tr}ln (mathbb{M})cr ~=~& expleft(-sum_{j=1}^{infty} frac{1}{j}{rm Tr} (mathbb{m}^j)right) cr ~=~& expleft(delta^d(0) int! d^dx ~{rm tr} (ln M(x))right),end{align} tag{2} $$ where we have defined $$begin{align} mathbb{M}~equiv~&mathbb{1}-mathbb{m},cr mathbb{M}^{beta}{}_{alpha}(x^{prime},x) ~:=~&frac{delta F^{beta}(x^{prime})}{deltaphi^{alpha}(x)}cr ~=~& M^{beta}{}_{alpha}(x^{prime})delta^d(x^{prime}!-!x),cr M^{beta}{}_{alpha}(x)~:=~& frac{partial F^{beta}(x)}{partialphi^{alpha}(x)}~=~delta^{beta}_{alpha}-m^{beta}{}_{alpha}(x),cr mathbb{m}^{beta}{}_{alpha}(x^{prime},x) ~:=~&frac{delta f^{beta}(x^{prime})}{deltaphi^{alpha}(x)}cr ~=~& m^{beta}{}_{alpha}(x^{prime})delta^d(x^{prime}!-!x),cr m^{beta}{}_{alpha}(x)~:=~& frac{partial f^{beta}(x)}{partialphi^{alpha}(x)}.end{align} tag{3}$$

  2. If we discretize spacetime, then the Jacobian becomes a product of ordinary determinants $$ J~=~prod_i det (M(x_i)), tag{4}$$ where the index $i$ labels lattice points $x_i$ of spacetime. The Dirac delta at zero $delta^d(0)$ is here replaced by a reciprocal volume of a unit cell of the spacetime lattice, which can viewed as a UV regulator, cf. e.g. my Phys.SE answer here.

  3. In dimensional regularization (DR), the Dirac delta at zero $delta^d(0)$ vanishes, cf. Refs. 1 - 3. Heuristically, DR only picks up residues of various finite parameters of the physical system, while contributions from infinite parameters are regularized to zero. As a consequence, in DR the Jacobian $J=1$ becomes one under local field redefinitions (if there are no anomalies present).

References:

  1. M. Henneaux & C. Teitelboim, Quantization of Gauge Systems, 1994; Subsection 18.2.4.

  2. G. Leibbrandt, Introduction to the technique of dimensional regularization, Rev. Mod. Phys. 47 (1975) 849; Subsection IV.B.3 p. 864.

  3. A.V. Manohar, Introduction to Effective Field Theories, arXiv:1804.05863; p. 33-34 & p. 51.

--

$^1$ Much of this can be generalized to local field redefinitions $$ begin{align}phi^{primealpha}(x)~=~&F^{alpha}(phi(x),partialphi(x),partial^2phi(x), ldots ,partial^Nphi(x) ,x)cr ~=~&phi^{alpha}(x)cr ~-~&f^{alpha}(phi(x),partialphi(x),partial^2phi(x), ldots ,partial^Nphi(x) ,x),end{align}tag{5}$$ and derivatives $partial^jdelta^d(0)$ of the Dirac delta at zero. A local field redefinition corresponds to insertion of UV-relevant/IR-irrelevant vertices in the action, i.e. it doesn't change low-energy physics.

Correct answer by Qmechanic on May 6, 2021

All three cases, (1)-(3), are local redefinitions, meaning that the value of $phi(x)$ for any given $x$ is determined only by the value of $theta(x)$ at that same value of $x$ (and conversely, assuming it's invertible).

Conceptually, the parameter $x$ is just a continuous index labeling different integration variables. In fact, the most generally-applicable way we have for defining a functional integral (at least in QFT) is to replace this continuous parameter with a discrete index. Then you have an ordinary multi-variable integral, and the rule for changing integration variables is the usual one. So the cases (1)-(3) just describe changes-of-variable in a bunch of single-variable integrals.

Thinking about things this way (with $x$ discretized) should help track down what's really going on with the $delta(x-x')$ factor.

Answered by Chiral Anomaly on May 6, 2021

Consider the more general case of a (not necessarily local) field redefintion of the form: begin{equation} phi(x)=int d y ,,f(x,y),gbig(theta(y)big)tag{1} end{equation} For example, in the question above we have begin{equation} phi(x)=int d y ,,delta(x-y),sinhbig(theta(y)big) end{equation} which is an example of a local field redefinition. In the discrete case where we think of the path integral as taking place on a lattice, Eq.(1) takes the form, where $phi_i$ is shorthand for the discrete variable $phi(x_i)$: begin{equation} phi_i=sum_j F_{ij}, g(theta_j) tag{2} end{equation} where $F_{ij}=F(x_i,x_j)$ can be thought of as a matrix and $F_{ij}=delta_{ij}$ corresponds to the case of a local transformation. Discretizing the path integral we can write the change of variables in Eq.(2) as (here $wedge$ denotes the wedge product, which is always present for the tensor density $d^dx$ but I make it explicit here only to make the presence of the Jacobian apparent) begin{align} int mathcal{D}phi&=int dphi_1wedge dphi_2wedge...wedge dphi_n &= int frac{1}{n!}epsilon_{i_1...i_n}dphi^{i_1}wedge...wedge dphi^{i_n} &=int frac{1}{n!}epsilon_{i_1...i_n},,frac{partialphi^{i_1}}{partialtheta^{i_1'}}...frac{partialphi^{i_1}}{partialtheta^{i_n'}}dtheta^{i_1'}wedge...wedge ,dtheta^{i_n'} &=int frac{1}{n!}epsilon_{i_1...i_n},,bigg(F^{i_1i_1'}frac{d g(xi)}{dxi}biggvert_{xi=theta_{i_1'}}bigg)...bigg(F^{i_ni_n'}frac{d g(xi)}{dxi}biggvert_{xi=theta_{i_n'}}bigg)dtheta^{i_1'}wedge...wedge ,dtheta^{i_n'} &=intfrac{1}{n!}epsilon_{i_1'...i_n'}text{Det}bigg[F^{ii'}frac{d g(xi)}{dxi}biggvert_{xi=theta_{i'}}bigg]dtheta^{i_1'}wedge...wedge ,dtheta^{i_n'} &=inttext{Det}bigg[F^{ii'}frac{d g(xi)}{dxi}biggvert_{xi=theta_{i'}}bigg]dtheta^{i_1'}wedge...wedge ,dtheta^{i_n'} &=int dtheta^{i_1'}wedge...wedge ,dtheta^{i_n'},,expbigglbracetext{Tr}bigg(logbigg[F^{ii'}frac{d g(xi)}{dxi}biggvert_{xi=theta_{i'}}bigg]bigg)biggrbracetag{3} end{align} So for example if we have a local field redefintion $F_{ij}=delta_{ij}$ then we encounter the term $Tr(log(delta_{ij}))=log(n)$, where $n$ is the number of lattice sites. In the continuous case where $F_{ij}rightarrow f(x,y)=delta^{d}(x-y)$ we encounter the highly singular term begin{equation} Tr(log(delta^d(x-y)))=int d^dx,,logbigg(delta^{d}(x-x)bigg)=int d^dx,,logbigg(delta^{d}(0)bigg) end{equation} So to answer the original question, I think the measure transforms as: begin{align} mathcal{D}phi=mathcal{D}theta,,expbigg(int dx,logbig(delta(0)big)+logbig(1+3ctheta^2)big)bigg)tag{1} mathcal{D}phi=mathcal{D}theta,,expbigg(int dx,logbig(delta(0)big)+logbig(3ctheta^2big)bigg)tag{2} mathcal{D}phi=mathcal{D}theta,,expbigg(int dx,logbig(delta(0)big)+logbig(cosh(theta(x))big)bigg)tag{3} end{align} Apparently one can ignore the $delta^d(0)$ when working in dimensional regularization as we can interpret $delta^d(0)$ as the volume of spacetime, which in $d-epsilon$ dimensions is begin{equation} delta^{d}(0)=frac{2pi^{d/2}}{Gamma(d/2)}frac{Gamma(-d)}{Gamma(1-d)} end{equation} which is $frac{1}{epsilon}$ dependent and hence we can use $frac{1}{epsilon}$ dependent counterterms to get rid of this term. However $exp(log(g'))$ terms still remain and it is unclear to me how to show that correlation functions will be unaffected by this term.

Answered by Luke on May 6, 2021

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