Proper-time evaluation of the effective action: unequal masses in the loop

Abstract

The Fock-Schwinger proper-time method is used to derive the effective action in the field theory with the chiral $U(3)\times U(3)$ symmetry explicitly broken by unequal masses of heavy particles. The one-loop effective action is presented as a series in inverse powers of heavy masses. The first two Seeley-DeWitt coefficients of this expansion are explicitly calculated. This powerful technique opens a promising avenue for studying explicit flavor symmetry breaking effects in the effective field theories.

20 pages

References in corpus (3)

• Spontaneous electromagnetic superconductivity of vacuum in strong magnetic field: evidence from the Nambu--Jona-Lasinio model
• Strange quark matter in the presence of explicit symmetry breaking interactions
• Proper-time method for unequal masses