General Solution of Quantum Master Equation in Finite-Dimensional Case

Abstract

The general solution to the quantum master equation (and its $Sp(2)$ symmetric counterpart) is constructed explicitly in case of finite number of variables. It is shown that the finite-dimensional solution is physically trivial and thus can not be extended directly to cover the case of a local field theory. In this way we conclude that the locality condition plays an important role by making it possible to obtain nontrivial physical results when quantizing gauge field theories on the basis of field-antifield formalism.