Fractional θ angle, ’t Hooft anomaly, and quantum instantons in charge-q multi-flavor Schwinger model

Abstract

Abstract This work examines non-perturbative dynamics of a 2-dimensional QFT by using discrete ’t Hooft anomaly, semi-classics with circle compactification and bosonization. We focus on charge-q N-flavor Schwinger model, and also Wess-Zumino-Witten model. We first apply the recent developments of discrete ’t Hooft anomaly matching to theories on ℝ2 and its compactification to ℝ× S L 1 . We then compare the ’t Hooft anomaly with dynamics of the models by explicitly constructing eigenstates and calculating physical quantities on the cylinder spacetime with periodic and flavor-twisted boundary conditions. We find different boundary conditions realize different anomalies. Especially under the twisted boundary conditions, there are Nq vacua associated with discrete chiral symmetry breaking. Chiral condensates for this case have fractional θ dependence eiθ/Nq , which provides the Nq-branch structure with soft fermion mass. We show that these behaviors at a small circumference cannot be explained by usual instantons but should be understood by “quantum” instantons, which saturate the BPS bound between classical action and quantum-induced effective potential. The effects of the quantum-instantons match the exact results obtained via bosonization within the region of applicability of semi-classics. We also argue that large-N limit of the Schwinger model with twisted boundary conditions satisfy volume independence.