Effective action of the Horava theory: Cancellation of divergences

Abstract

We compute the one-loop effective action of the Horava theory, in its nonprojectable formulation. We take the quantization of the (2+1)-dimensional theory in the Batalin-Fradkin-Vilkovisky formalism, and comment on the extension to the (3+1) case. The second-class constraints and the appropriate gauge-fixing condition are included in the quantization. The ghost fields associated with the second-class constraints can be used to get the integrated form of the effective action, which has the form of a Berezinian. We show that all irregular loops cancel between them in the effective action. The key for the cancellation is the role of the ghosts associated with the second-class constraints. These ghosts form irregular loops that enter in the denominator of the Berezinian, eliminating the irregular loops of the bosonic nonghost sector. Irregular loops produce dangerous divergences; hence their cancellation is an essential step for the consistency of the theory. The cancellation of this kind of divergences is in agreement with the previous analysis done on the (2+1) quantum canonical Lagrangian and its Feynman diagrams.