The Vacuum Polarization tensor in 1+1 dimensional space-time

Abstract

Quantum field theory (QFT) is supposed to be gauge invariant. However it has been well established that a direct calculation of the vacuum polarization tensor produces a non-gauge invariant result. In this paper it will be shown that this problem is due to the fact that there is a lower bound to the free field energy in QFT. The vacuum polarization tensor will be calculated in 1+1 dimensional space-time and is shown not to be gauge invariant. The gauge invariance of the theory can be restored through a regularization procedure which eliminates the non-gauge invariant terms. However it will be shown that this will impact the free field energy. If the free field energy is defined so that the vacuum state has an energy of zero then the impact of regularization is to introduce states whose free field energy is less than zero.