Electromagnetic duality anomaly in curved spacetimes
arXiv:1607.08879 · doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.118.111301
Abstract
The source-free Maxwell action is invariant under electric-magnetic duality rotations in arbitrary spacetimes. This leads to a conserved classical Noether charge. We show that this conservation law is broken at the quantum level in presence of a background classical gravitational field with a non-trivial Chern-Pontryagin invariant, in a parallel way to the chiral anomaly for massless Dirac fermions. Among the physical consequences, the net polarization of the quantum electromagnetic field is not conserved.
5 pages. Typos corrected. Some points clarified. To appear in Phys. Rev. Lett
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