Longitudinal and Transverse Ward–Takahashi Identities, Anomaly and Schwinger–Dyson Equation

Abstract

Based on the path integral formalism, we rederive and extend the transverse Ward–Takahashi identities (which were first derived by Yasushi Takahashi) for the vector and the axial vector currents and simultaneously discuss the possible quantum anomaly for them. Subsequently, we propose a new scheme for writing down and solving the Schwinger–Dyson equation in which the transverse Ward–Takahashi identity together with the usual (longitudinal) Ward–Takahashi identity are applied to specify the fermion–boson vertex function. Within this framework, we give an example of exactly soluble truncated Schwinger–Dyson equation for the fermion propagator in an Abelian gauge theory in arbitrary dimension when the bare fermion mass is zero. It is especially shown that in two dimensions, it becomes the exact and closed Schwinger–Dyson equation which can be exactly solved.