On the continuum limit of the lattice chiral anomaly trace relation

Abstract

Different aspects concerning the rigorous definition of the traces and determinants of the operators involved in a procedure ---proposed by Neuberger and others--- for avoiding fermion doublers on the lattice, are considered. A result of the analysis is that it seems unclear that the consequences derived from the independent treatment of the traces of the two operators contributing to the index relation on the lattice, as carried out in recent manuscripts, can be given rigorous mathematical footing, in particular, that these treatments can commute with the continuum limit ---the lattice regularized trace being additive all the way through the limit, while the otherwise regularized trace in the continuum is not so.