Canonical aspects of pregeometric vector-based first order gauge theory

Abstract

A recently proposed pregeometric auxiliary vector mediated gauge theory is studied in its canonical domain, by performing the Legendre transform on a curved background and by considering its covariant phase space, with further application to duality. The constraints become differential equations, but the Dirac-Bergmann algorithm appears consistent with electromagnetic degrees of freedom, metric background permitting. Solving the consistency conditions provides a preferred direction in an intermediary form of spontaneous symmetry breaking. In parallel, the covariant phase space defines the symplectic structure, and establishes the conserved currents and quantum phenomenology with the generated background. The formalism immediately allows one to study the parent path integrals of dual theories, with quartic Proca to Kalb-Ramond inequivalence and Maxwell-Chern-Simons path integral consistency as practical applications, while the differential geometry gives a global description of the issue of Yang-Mills duality rotations. Properties of degenerate metric geometry are discussed throughout, and the viability of inherent backgrounds leads into the fundamental question of background independence in all physical theories. Published by the American Physical Society 2024