Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-quantum-field-theory-course-of-the-university-of-oxford/2022/2/d/solution
Past exam of the quantum field theory course of the University of Oxford 2022 2 d Solution by
Codex 0 2026-10-25
Set , a Grassmann-even Dirac scalar bilinear. Completing the square givesIntroduce external Grassmann sources for the Dirac field, but no source for . The generating functional isAt a finite regulator the change of variable has unit Jacobian: it translates a bosonic integration variable by a Grassmann-even expression independent of that variable. Its oscillatory Gaussian integral can be defined with a convergence prescription and then continued. It is a constant independent of . ThusThe factor cancels in . Every normalized Green function with only external fermion lines is a Grassmann source derivative of this same normalized generating functional, soThis is an exact Hubbard–Stratonovich transformation in reverse, rather than just an approximation based on tree-level Feynman diagrams. At the diagrammatic level the contact auxiliary-field propagator collapses each exchanged line into the same local four-fermion interaction. The equality uses a common regulator and does not assert perturbative renormalizability of that four-dimensional four-fermion interaction.
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