Renormalization flow of QED

Abstract

We investigate textbook QED in the framework of the exact renormalization group. In the strong-coupling region, we study the influence of fluctuation-induced photonic and fermionic self-interactions on the nonperturbative running of the gauge coupling. Our findings confirm the triviality hypothesis of complete charge screening if the ultraviolet cutoff is sent to infinity. Though the Landau pole does not belong to the physical coupling domain owing to spontaneous chiral symmetry breaking (chiSB), the theory predicts a scale of maximal UV extension of the same order as the Landau pole scale. In addition, we verify that the chiSB phase of the theory which is characterized by a light fermion and a Goldstone boson also has a trivial Yukawa coupling.