Scalar-dependent gauge fixing

For the polar parametrization of the Abelian Higgs field with $D=\partial +ieA$, adding $-H^2/(2\xi )$ cancels quadratic vector-phase mixing. The cross terms reduce, modulo a total derivative, to $-2e(1+h/f)\pi A^{\mu }{\partial }_{\mu }h$; interactions remain. The Faddeev-Popov operator is proportional to $\square +\xi e^2(f+h{)}^2$, so the Faddeev-Popov ghosts couple to $h$. The vector propagator falls as $k^{-2}$ at fixed finite $\xi$, but the polar kinetic and nonlinear gauge fixing vertices include terms of mass dimension above four. Manifest polynomial power counting instead uses Cartesian scalar variables with conventional R-xi gauge.

With the specified scalar-dependent gauge fixing, the Faddeev-Popov determinant depends on the radial Higgs mode even though the gauge group is Abelian. Besides a ghost mass squared $\xi e^2{f}^2$, the Lagrangian density contains $-2\xi e^{2}fh\bar{c}c-\xi e^2{h}^2\bar{c}c$. These Faddeev-Popov ghosts do not decouple for generic $\xi$; their interactions vanish in the $\xi \to 0$ Landau gauge limit. Free ghosts in pure Abelian Lorenz gauge rely on a field-independent determinant, rather than merely on commutativity of the gauge group.

The Faddeev-Popov ghost field couples to both the gauge field and the adjoint scalar field. In a convention with $D_{\mu }={\partial }_{\mu }+[A_{\mu },\cdot ]$, the ghost action after integration by parts contains $f^{abc}({\partial }_{\mu }{\bar{c}}^a)A_{\mu }^b{c}^c$ and $f^{abc}(n\cdot \partial {\bar{c}}^a){\varphi }^b{c}^c/\sqrt{2}$.

For gauge fixing with $F^a=\partial \cdot A^a+(n\cdot \partial {\varphi }^a)/\sqrt{2}$, integrating out the Nakanishi-Lautrup field produces gauge-scalar mixing. The Schur complement of the free gauge-field kernel cancels the extra $(n\cdot p{)}^2/2$ in the scalar kernel, leaving $⟨{\varphi }^a(p){\varphi }^b(-p)⟩={\delta }^{ab}/p^2$. This is independent of the gauge vector $n$, but still depends on the full momentum $p$.