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arXiv · 0711.1178

Functional Determinants in Quantum Field Theory

Gerald V. Dunne
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Abstract

Functional determinants of differential operators play a prominent role in theoretical and mathematical physics, and in particular in quantum field theory. They are, however, difficult to compute in non-trivial cases. For one dimensional problems, a classical result of Gel'fand and Yaglom dramatically simplifies the problem so that the functional determinant can be computed without computing the spectrum of eigenvalues. Here I report recent progress in extending this approach to higher dimensions (i.e., functional determinants of partial differential operators), with applications in quantum field theory.

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Gerald V. Dunne. 2007-11-07. Functional Determinants in Quantum Field Theory. https://doi.org/10.1088/1751-8113%2F41%2F30%2F304006

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