Superselection rules from Dirac and BRST quantization of constrained systems

Jul, 1991
19 pages
Published in:
  • Nucl.Phys.B 371 (1992) 415-433
  • Published: 1992
Report number:
  • DAMTP-91-29

Citations per year

19921994199619981998120
Abstract: (Elsevier)
Adopting the point of view that inequivalent quantisations correspond to superselection sectors, i.e. unitarily inequivalent representations of the algebra of observables, we show how the superselection sectors of a particle moving on a coset space G/H follow from its quantisation as a constrained system (the unconstrained system being the phase space T ∗ G). Both the Dirac and BRST method are examined; the former works well for compact H, whereas the latter runs into several difficulties. Accordingly, a possible improvement to the BRST procedure is suggested.
  • mechanics: classical
  • quantization: Hamiltonian formalism
  • quantization: Becchi-Rouet-Stora
  • algebra: cohomology
  • constraint
  • superselection rule
  • coset space
  • functional analysis