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# Scalar and spinning particles in a plane wave field.

## 1 Introduction.

Many years ago we studied the quantum mechanical interaction of a relativistic material point (scalar particle) with an external radiation field using the Feynman path integral method . The eigenfunctions of this problem had been known for a long time , and a beautiful method of evaluating the Green’ s functions had been introduced by Fock and Schwinger through the solutions of the Heisenberg quantum equations of motion in the proper time representation . A direct calculation in terms of path integral had remained unexplored probably due to mathematical difficulties. However, looking at the problem in a a semiclassical way, in ref.  we found a canonical transformation which made it possible to evaluate in a closed form the Feynman kernel for a scalar particle interacting with an external electromagnetic wave field and to obtain an exact expression for the propagator of the theory.

Later on a lot of interest was devoted to theories involving anticommuting (Grassmann) variables. This was mainly raised by supersymmetries , but very soon the relevance of anticommuting variables in many other fields was realized, . In particular it was shown that Grassmann variables are suitable tools for giving a classical description of spin  and internal degrees of freedom of elementary particles . These dynamical theories described by Lagrangians involving ordinary c-numbers and anticommuting numbers (Grassmann variables) were called pseudoclassical theories and the general approach has been defined as pseudomechanics, due to the special nature of the variables occuring in the problem.

Having obtained a pseudoclassical description of many interesting physical systems it was very natural to investigate the quantization of such systems by path integrals, performed both on the ordinary and the Grassmann variables (for the general theory of integration on Grassmann algebras see ref. ). This program had already been developed in some cases; for instance it was shown that the Wilson loop could be reconstructed as a path integral on Grassmann variables describing the colour degrees of freedom . Other physical systems, such as non-relativistic spinning particles interacting with constant electric and magnetic field and relativistic spinning particles in external crossed static electromagnetic wave field were studied . In each case, the result was obtained in a quick and straightforward way, by solving the classical equations of motion both for position and Grassmann variables. Just a bit of caution had to be taken for systems involving an odd number of Grassmann variables, like for the non relativistic and for the massive relativistic spinning particle: it was shown in ref.  how to extend the path integral techniques in such circumstances, by separating from the total phase space a coupled one-dimensional system and studying the general solution for the latter. For a different approach to the path integral quantization for a non-relativistic and relativistic spinning particle by using BRST-invariant path integral see ref. .

A further powerful instrument that can be brought to bear to the present context is the well known external source approach (in our context real and Grassmann sources). Indeed the aim of this paper is to provide a rigorous determination of the Feynman propagator for a charged relativistic particle, both scalar and spinning, interacting with an arbitrary external electromagnetic wave field by using path integral and external sources formalism.

One can ask about the intrinsic interest of this approach apart from the pedagogical one. We would suggest that it is at least twofold. In the first place the development of new techniques to solve old problems usually increases their comprehension. Secondly, new techniques can produce new approximation methods to apply to new problems. In this particular case we would like to emphasize the use of these methods in statistical mechanics, where an impressive number of old problems was solved in a very fast way by using path integrals over Grassmann variables .

The paper is organized as follows. In section 2 we present the results for the relativistic material point in this new framework: they are certainly simpler, due to the simpler underlying physical model (scalar particle). Next, in section 3, we switch to the spinning particle and we prove that this approach works well in this case too and we evaluate the physical Feynman kernel. In the final section 4 we express the physical kernel on a spinor basis, obtaining a more transparent expression for the Feynman propagator.

## 2 The path integral for the scalar particle.

The Lagrangian describing the dynamics of a relativistic scalar particle interacting with an external electromagnetic field is given by

$$(x,\dot{x})=m\sqrt{\dot{x}^2}e(\dot{x}A).$$
(1)
This Lagrangian is singular, giving rise to the constraint

$$\chi =[(peA)^2m^2],$$
(2)
and to a vanishing canonical Hamiltonian. According to Dirac  we define an extended Hamiltonian

$$_E(x,p,\alpha _1)=\alpha _1[(peA)^2m^2],$$
(3)
and we require the usual form of canonical Poisson brackets

$$\{x^\mu ,p^\nu \}=\eta ^{\mu \nu },\eta ^{\mu \nu }=(+,,,).$$
(4)
The Lagrange multiplier $`\alpha _1`$ for the constraint $`\chi `$ must be chosen to be negative in order to have a definite positive kinetic part. The extended Lagrangian corresponding to $`_E`$ is

$$_E(x,\dot{x},\alpha _1)=\dot{x}^2/(4\alpha _1)e(\dot{x}A)+\alpha _1m^2.$$
(5)
We assume that the electromagnetic potential $`A^\mu `$ describes the field of an external plane wave and therefore is of the form

$$A^\mu =ϵ_1^\mu f(\varphi ),$$
(6)
where $`\varphi =(kx)`$, $`k^\mu =\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}(1,0,0,1)`$ is the propagation vector and $`ϵ_1^\mu `$ a transverse real polarization vector. We find it useful to introduce a second transverse vector $`ϵ_2^\mu `$ and the conjugate light-like vector $`\stackrel{~}{k}^\mu =\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}(1,0,0,1)`$: they satisfy the orthonormality relations

$$k^2=\stackrel{~}{k}^2=(kϵ_1)=(\stackrel{~}{k}ϵ_1)=(kϵ_2)=(\stackrel{~}{k}ϵ_2)=0,$$
(7)
$$(\stackrel{~}{k}k)=ϵ_1^2=ϵ_2^2=1.$$
(8)
We shall derive the amplitude for the propagation of the particle interacting with the external field, using the path-integral technique as developed by Feynman . If $`x_i=x(\tau _i)`$ is the initial point, and $`x_f=x(\tau _f)`$ is the final one $`(\tau _i<\tau _f)`$, we get

$$K_{fi}=K(x_f,\tau _f,x_i,\tau _i)=c\underset{(x_i,\tau _i)}{\overset{(x_f,\tau _f)}{}}𝒟[x(\tau )]\mathrm{exp}(.i\underset{\tau _i}{\overset{\tau _f}{}}d\tau _E(x,\dot{x},\alpha _1).)$$
(9)
where the constant c is determined by the condition

$$\underset{\tau _f\tau _i}{lim}K(x_f,\tau _f,x_i,\tau _i)=\delta ^4(x_fx_i)$$
(10)
and the physical propagator is obtained by the integral

$$K_{\mathrm{phys}}=\underset{\mathrm{}}{\overset{0}{}}d(\alpha _1\mathrm{\Delta }\tau )K_{fi}$$
(11)
where $`\mathrm{\Delta }\tau =\tau _f\tau _i`$. The calculation is done by introducing the shift $`x^\mu (\tau )=x_c^\mu (\tau )+y^\mu (\tau )`$ where $`x_c^\mu (\tau )`$ is the classical path which satisfies the equation of motion

$$\ddot{x}_c^\mu (\tau )=2\alpha _1eF_\nu ^\mu (x_c(\tau ))\dot{x}_c^\nu (\tau )$$
(12)
and by integrating over the deviation $`y^\mu (\tau )`$ from the classical path $`x_c^\mu (\tau )`$ with the boundary conditions $`y^\mu (\tau _f)=y^\mu (\tau _i)=0`$. In equation (12) $`F_\nu ^\mu `$ is the electromagnetic tensor of the potential $`A^\mu `$. A series expansion in terms of $`y^\mu `$ then gives

$`K_{fi}=e^{iS_c}{\displaystyle \underset{(0,\tau _i)}{\overset{(0,\tau _f)}{}}}𝒟[y(\tau )]\mathrm{exp}\{.i{\displaystyle \underset{\tau _i}{\overset{\tau _f}{}}}d\tau [.{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\alpha _1}}\dot{y}^2e(ϵ_1\dot{x}){\displaystyle \underset{n=2}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{f^{(n)}(\varphi )}{n!}}(ky)^n`$ (13)
$`e(ϵ\dot{y}){\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{f^{(n)}(\varphi )}{n!}}(ky)^n.].\}`$ (14)
where $`S_c=_{\tau _i}^{\tau _f}𝑑\tau _E(x_c,\dot{x}_c,\alpha _1)`$ is the classical action corresponding to the extended Lagrangian $`_E`$. By introducing the functional differential operators

$$P_n(k,J)=\frac{1}{n!}\underset{\mathrm{}=1}{\overset{n}{}}(.\frac{k_\nu _{\mathrm{}}}{i}\frac{\delta }{\delta J_\nu _{\mathrm{}}(\tau )}.)$$
(15)
the propagator takes the form

$`K_{fi}=e^{iS_c}\mathrm{exp}\{.i{\displaystyle \underset{\tau _i}{\overset{\tau _f}{}}}d\tau [.e(ϵ_1\dot{x}){\displaystyle \underset{n=2}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}f^{(n)}(\varphi )P_n(k,J)`$ (16)
$`e(ϵ_{1\nu _0}){\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}f^{(n)}(\varphi )P_n(k,J){\displaystyle \frac{d}{d\tau }}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{i}}{\displaystyle \frac{\delta }{\delta J_{\nu _0}(\tau )}}.].\}K[J]|_{J=0}`$ (17)
where

$$K[J]=\underset{(0,\tau _i)}{\overset{(0,\tau _f)}{}}𝒟[y(\tau )]\mathrm{exp}\{.i\underset{\tau _i}{\overset{\tau _f}{}}d\tau [.\frac{\dot{y}^2(\tau )}{4\alpha _1}+J_\mu (\tau )y^\mu (\tau ).].\}$$
(18)
is the path-integral for a free system in the presence of an external source $`J^\mu (\tau )`$. The latter is easily calculated and reads

$$K[J]=i(4\pi \alpha _1(\tau _f\tau _i))^2\mathrm{exp}\{.\frac{2i\alpha _1\mathrm{\Delta }(J)}{\tau _f\tau _i}.\}.$$
(19)
Here $`\mathrm{\Delta }(J)=_{\tau _i}^{\tau _f}𝑑\tau _{\tau _i}^\tau 𝑑\sigma (\tau _f\tau )J_\mu (\tau )J^\mu (\sigma )(\sigma \tau _i)`$ is the contribution of the source to the classical solution. By using the Green function of the classical free system, $`G(\tau ,\sigma )=[.(\tau _f\tau )(\sigma \tau _i)\vartheta (\tau \sigma )+(\tau _f\sigma )(\tau \tau _i)\vartheta (\sigma \tau ).]`$, a simple computation shows that

$$\frac{\delta }{\delta J_{\nu _i}(\tau )}e^{2i\alpha _1\mathrm{\Delta }\left(J\right)/\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }=(2i\alpha _1/\mathrm{\Delta }\tau )e^{2i\alpha _1\mathrm{\Delta }\left(J\right)/\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }_{\tau _i}^{\tau _f}𝑑\sigma G(\tau ,\sigma )J_{\nu _i}(\sigma )$$
(20)
and

$`{\displaystyle \frac{\delta }{\delta J_{\nu _i}(\tau )}}{\displaystyle \frac{\delta }{\delta J_{\nu _j}(\tau )}}e^{2i\alpha _1\mathrm{\Delta }\left(J\right)/\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }=(2i\alpha _1/\mathrm{\Delta }\tau )e^{2i\alpha _1\mathrm{\Delta }\left(J\right)/\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }g_{\nu _i\nu _j}G(\tau ,\tau )+`$ (21)
$`(4i\alpha _1/\mathrm{\Delta }\tau )e^{2i\alpha _1\mathrm{\Delta }\left(J\right)/\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }{\displaystyle _{\tau _i}^{\tau _f}}𝑑\sigma _1{\displaystyle _{\tau _i}^{\tau _f}}𝑑\sigma _2G(\tau ,\sigma _1)J_{\nu _i}(\sigma _1)G(\tau ,\sigma _2)J_{\nu _j}(\sigma _2).`$ (22)
Similar equations hold for the terms containing higher order derivatives.

We therefore see that both $`ϵ_{1\nu _0}P_n(k,J)\frac{d}{d\tau }\frac{1}{i}\frac{\delta }{\delta J_{\nu _0}\left(\tau \right)}\mathrm{exp}\{.2i\alpha _1\mathrm{\Delta }(J)/\mathrm{\Delta }\tau .\}|_{J=0}`$ and $`P_n(k,J)\mathrm{exp}\{.2i\alpha _1\mathrm{\Delta }(J)/\mathrm{\Delta }\tau .\}|_{J=0}`$, as well as the action of all possible mixed products of $`P_n`$ corresponding to different values of the proper time over $`\mathrm{exp}\{.2i\alpha _1\mathrm{\Delta }(J)/\mathrm{\Delta }\tau .\}`$, are vanishing at $`J^\mu =0`$ due to the relations (7). In other words

$`\mathrm{exp}\{.i{\displaystyle \underset{\tau _i}{\overset{\tau _f}{}}}d\tau [.e(ϵ_1\dot{x}){\displaystyle \underset{n=2}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}f^{(n)}(\varphi )P_n(k,J).].\}`$ (23)
$`\mathrm{exp}\{.i{\displaystyle \underset{\tau _i}{\overset{\tau _f}{}}}d\tau [.e{\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}f^{(n)}(\varphi )P_n(k,J)ϵ_{1\nu _0}{\displaystyle \frac{d}{d\tau }}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{i}}{\displaystyle \frac{\delta }{\delta J_{\nu _0}(\tau )}}.].\}K[J]|_{J=0}=K[J]|_{J=0}.`$ (24)
and we finally get

$$K_{fi}=i(4\pi \alpha _1(\tau _f\tau _i))^2e^{iS_c},$$
(25)
so that the propagator is expressed in terms of the classical action only. To evaluate the action $`S_c`$ we have therefore to solve the classical equations of motion (12) or by projecting on the basis $`k^\mu ,\stackrel{~}{k}^\mu ,ϵ_1^\mu ,ϵ_2^\mu `$ the equations

$`(k\ddot{x})=0,(ϵ_2\ddot{x})=0`$ (26)
$`(ϵ_1\ddot{x})=2\alpha _1e(k\dot{x})f^{}(\varphi ),(\stackrel{~}{k}\ddot{x})=4\alpha _1e(ϵ_1\dot{x})f^{}(\varphi )`$ (27)
where $`f^{}(\varphi )`$ is the derivative with respect to the argument. Letting $`\varphi _i=kx_i`$ and $`\varphi _f=kx_f`$, their solution, although somewhat lengthy, is straightforward and reads as follows:

$`(kx)(\tau )=(kx_i)+{\displaystyle \frac{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}{\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }}(\tau \tau _i)`$ (28)
$`(ϵ_1x)(\tau )=(ϵ_1x_i)+[.{\displaystyle \frac{(ϵ_1\mathrm{\Delta }x)}{\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }}+{\displaystyle \frac{2\alpha _1e}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi f(\varphi ).](\tau \tau _i){\displaystyle \frac{2\alpha _1e\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi }{}}}d\varphi f(\varphi )`$ (29)
$`(ϵ_2x)(\tau )=(ϵ_2x_i)+{\displaystyle \frac{(ϵ_2\mathrm{\Delta }x)}{\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }}(\tau \tau _i)`$ (30)
$`(\stackrel{~}{k}x)=(\stackrel{~}{k}x_i)+[.{\displaystyle \frac{(\stackrel{~}{k}\mathrm{\Delta }x)}{\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }}+{\displaystyle \frac{4\alpha _1e(ϵ_1\mathrm{\Delta }x)}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi f(\varphi )+{\displaystyle \frac{8\alpha _1^2e^2\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^3}}(.{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi f(\varphi ).)^2`$ (31)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{4\alpha _1^2e^2\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi f^2(\varphi ).](\tau \tau _i)[.4\alpha _1e{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\tau (ϵ_1\mathrm{\Delta }x)}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi }{}}}d\varphi f(\varphi )`$ (32)
$`+8\alpha _1^2e^2{\displaystyle \frac{(\mathrm{\Delta }\tau )^2}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^3}}(.{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi f(\varphi ).){\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi }{}}}d\varphi f(\varphi )4\alpha _1^2e^2{\displaystyle \frac{(\mathrm{\Delta }\tau )^2}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi }{}}}d\varphi f^2(\varphi ).]`$ (33)
where we have defined $`\mathrm{\Delta }x^\mu =(x_f^\mu x_i^\mu )`$.

The explicit form of the classical action turns out to be

$`S_c={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }{4\alpha _1}}[.({\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }x}{\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }})^2+4\alpha _1^2m^2.]{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha _1e^2\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi A^2(\varphi )+{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha _1e^2\mathrm{\Delta }\tau }{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}(.{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi A_\mu (\varphi ).)^2`$ (34)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{e\mathrm{\Delta }x^\mu }{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}𝑑\varphi A_\mu (\varphi )`$ (35)
and the final integration of (25) over $`\alpha _1\mathrm{\Delta }\tau `$, as in equation(11), gives the physical propagator in agreement with previous results .

## 3 The path integral for the spinning particle.

We now calculate the propagator for a spinning particle in an external plane wave. The pseudoclassical description of a spin-1/2 particle interacting with an arbitrary external electromagnetic field has been already described in  and the Lagrangian is

$$(x,\dot{x},\xi _\mu ,\dot{\xi }_\mu ,\xi _5,\dot{\xi }_5)=\frac{i}{2}(\xi _\mu \dot{\xi }^\mu +\xi _5\dot{\xi }_5)\sqrt{m^2ieF_{\mu \nu }\xi ^\mu \xi ^\nu }\sqrt{(\dot{x}^\mu \frac{i}{m}\xi ^\mu \dot{\xi }_5)^2}e\dot{x}_\mu A^\mu $$
(36)
Analogous results, with minor differences, were found in , while the general theory of quantization Fermi-Bose systems is explained in .

The Lagrangian (36) is singular and produces the two first class constraints

$$\chi =(peA)^2m^2+ieF_{\mu \nu }\xi ^\mu \xi ^\nu ,$$
(37)
$$\chi _D=(peA)\xi im\pi _5(m/2)\xi _5,$$
(38)
and the second class constraints

$$\chi _\mu =\pi _\mu (i/2)\xi _\mu .$$
(39)
The extended Hamiltonian, compatible with (37, 38) is

$$_E=\alpha _1[.(peA)^2m^2+ieF_{\mu \nu }\xi ^\mu \xi ^\nu .]+i\alpha _2(.(peA)\xi .)+m\alpha _2(.\pi _5\frac{i}{2}\xi _5.)$$
(40)
The further second class constraints

$$\chi _5=\pi _5+(i/2)\xi _5,$$
(41)
will be imposed directly on the states, thereby restricting the Hilbert space of the system. The relevant Dirac brackets are

$$\{\xi ^\mu ,\xi ^\nu \}=i\eta ^{\mu \nu },\{\pi _5,\xi _5\}=1.$$
(42)
According to the common practice for the path integration in quantum mechanics of an even number of Grassmann variable, , we substitute the $`\xi ^\mu `$ variables with their holomorphic combinations

$$\eta _1=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}(\xi ^0+\xi ^3),\overline{\eta }_1=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}(\xi ^0\xi ^3),$$
(43)
$$\eta _2=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}(\xi ^1+i\xi ^2),\overline{\eta }_2=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}(\xi ^1i\xi ^2),$$
(44)
(observe the useful identity $`z_\mu \xi ^\mu =(\overline{\eta }_\alpha z_\alpha +\eta _\alpha \overline{z}_\alpha )`$ ). For the path integration on the $`(\xi _5,\pi _5)`$ variables we follow the procedure given in . The propagator takes the form

$`K_{fi}={\displaystyle \frac{d\pi _{5f}}{i}e^{i\xi _{5f}\pi _{5f}}\underset{(\eta _i,x_i),\tau _i}{\overset{(\overline{\eta }_f,x_f),\tau _f}{}}𝒟(\eta ,\overline{\eta })𝒟(x)\underset{\xi _{5i},\tau _i}{\overset{\pi _{5f},\tau _f}{}}𝒟(\xi _5,\pi _5)}`$ (45)
$`e^{\left[{\displaystyle \frac{i}{2}}\left(\pi _{5f}\xi _5\left(\tau _f\right)+\pi _5\left(\tau _i\right)\xi _{5i}\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\left(\overline{\eta }_{\alpha f}\eta _\alpha \left(\tau _f\right)+\overline{\eta }_\alpha \left(\tau _i\right)\eta _{\alpha i}\right)\right]}e^{iS_E(\eta ,\overline{\eta },x)}`$ (46)
$`\mathrm{exp}\{.i{\displaystyle \underset{\tau _i}{\overset{\tau _f}{}}}[.{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(\dot{\pi }_5\xi _5+\dot{\xi }_5\pi _5)m\alpha _2(\pi _5{\displaystyle \frac{i}{2}}\xi _5).].\}`$ (47)
where

$`S_E={\displaystyle \underset{\tau _i}{\overset{\tau _f}{}}}d\tau \{.{\displaystyle \frac{i}{2}}(\overline{\eta }_\alpha \dot{\eta }_\alpha \dot{\overline{\eta }}_\alpha \eta _\alpha )+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\alpha _1}}\dot{x}^2+\alpha _1m^2`$ (48)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{i\alpha _2}{2\alpha _1}}(\dot{x}\xi )e(\dot{x}A)ie\alpha _1F_{\mu \nu }\xi ^\mu \xi ^\nu .\}`$ (49)
is the extended action. The shift from the classical or pseudoclassical path

$$x^\mu =x_c^\mu +y^\mu ,\eta _\alpha =\eta _{\alpha c}+\psi _a,\overline{\eta }_a=\overline{\eta }_{\alpha c}+\overline{\psi }_\alpha ,$$
(50)
$$\xi _5=\xi _{5c}+\psi ,\pi _5=\pi _{5c}+\chi ,$$
(51)
implies that the boundary conditions

$$y^\mu (\tau _i)=y^\mu (\tau _f)=0,\psi _\alpha (\tau _i)=\overline{\psi }_\alpha (\tau _f)=0,\psi (\tau _i)=\chi (\tau _f)=0$$
(52)
have to be imposed when integrating over the shifted variables.

We next observe that the propagator factorizes as

$$K_{fi}=K_5K_cK_q,$$
(53)
where the meaning of the three factors will be explained here below.

First of all it is rather evident that $`K_5`$ refers to the contribution of the path integral over $`\xi _5`$ and $`\pi _5`$. The explicit calculation has been developed in  and we quote the final result:

$$K_5=(\xi _{5f}\xi _{5i})m\alpha _2\mathrm{\Delta }\tau e^{\xi _{5f}\xi _{5i}/2}$$
(54)
The factor $`K_c`$ accounts for the classical contribution including the necessary surface terms, as explained in ,

$$K_c(\eta _i,\overline{\eta }_f,x_i,x_f)=\mathrm{exp}\{.\frac{1}{2}(\overline{\eta }_{\alpha f}\eta _{\alpha c}(\tau _f)+\overline{\eta }_{\alpha c}(\tau _i)\eta _{\alpha i})+iS_E(\eta _c,\overline{\eta }_c,x_c).\}$$
(55)
and the classical variables satisfy the equations of motion

$$\ddot{x}_c^\mu =2e\alpha _1F_\nu ^\mu \dot{x}_c^\nu i\alpha _2\dot{\xi }_c^\mu 2ie\alpha _1^2(\frac{}{x_\mu }F_{\nu \rho })\xi _c^\nu \xi _c^\rho ,$$
(56)
$$\dot{\xi }_c^\mu =\frac{\alpha _2}{2\alpha _1}\dot{x}_c^\mu 2e\alpha _1F_\nu ^\mu \xi _c^\nu .$$
(57)
The third factor $`K_q`$ represents the contribution of the quantum fluctuations and it is a straightforward generalization of that obtained in the scalar case. We can assume, without losing in generality, that the plane wave field is of the form

$$A^\mu (x)=2^{1/2}(ϵ^\mu +ϵ^\mu )f(\varphi )=ϵ_1^\mu f(\varphi )$$
(58)
with $`ϵ^\mu =\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}(0,1,i,0)`$ and $`ϵ^\mu =\frac{1}{\sqrt{2}}(0,1,i,0)`$. The corresponding electromagnetic tensor is therefore

$$F^{\mu \nu }(x)=f^{\mu \nu }f^{}(\varphi ),f^{\mu \nu }=k^\mu ϵ_1^\nu k^\nu ϵ_1^\mu $$
(59)
and we finally write

$`K_q={\displaystyle \underset{0,\tau _i}{\overset{0,\tau _f}{}}}𝒟[\psi _\alpha (\tau ),\overline{\psi }_\alpha (\tau )]𝒟[y(\tau )]\mathrm{exp}\{.i{\displaystyle \underset{\tau _i}{\overset{\tau _f}{}}}d\tau (.[.{\displaystyle \frac{i}{2}}(\psi \dot{\psi })+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4\alpha _1}}\dot{y}^2+i{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha _2}{2\alpha _1}}(\psi \dot{y}).]`$ (60)
$`[.e(\dot{x}ϵ_1){\displaystyle \underset{n=2}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{n!}}f^{(n)}(\varphi )(ky)^n+e(\dot{y}ϵ_1){\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{n!}}f^{(n)}(\varphi )(ky)^n`$ (61)
$`+ie\alpha _1\xi ^\mu \xi ^\nu f_{\mu \nu }{\displaystyle \underset{n=2}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{n!}}f^{(n+1)}(\varphi )(ky)^n+ie\alpha _1\psi ^\mu \psi ^\nu f_{\mu \nu }{\displaystyle \underset{n=0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{n!}}f^{(n+1)}(\varphi )(ky)^n`$ (62)
$`+2ie\alpha _1\xi ^\mu \psi ^\nu f_{\mu \nu }{\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{n!}}f^{(n+1)}(\varphi )(ky)^n.].).\}`$ (63)
Recalling the definition (15) of the functional differential operators and introducing Bose and Fermi external sources, $`J^\mu `$ and $`\lambda ^\mu `$ respectively, we have

$`K_q=\mathrm{exp}\{.i{\displaystyle \underset{\tau _i}{\overset{\tau _f}{}}}d\tau [.i{\displaystyle \frac{\alpha _2}{2\alpha _1}}{\displaystyle \frac{\delta }{\delta \lambda _\mu }}{\displaystyle \frac{d}{d\tau }}(.{\displaystyle \frac{1}{i}}{\displaystyle \frac{\delta }{\delta J^\mu }}.)e(\dot{x}ϵ_1){\displaystyle \underset{n=2}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}f^{(n)}(\varphi )P_n(k,J)`$ (64)
$`eϵ^{\nu _0}{\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}f^{(n)}(\varphi ){\displaystyle \frac{d}{d\tau }}(.{\displaystyle \frac{1}{i}}{\displaystyle \frac{\delta }{\delta J^{\nu _0}}}.)P_n(k,J)ie\alpha _1f_{\mu \nu }\xi ^\mu \xi ^\nu {\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}f^{(n+1)}(\varphi )P_n(k,J)`$ (65)
$`ie\alpha _1f_{\mu \nu }{\displaystyle \frac{\delta }{\delta \lambda _\mu }}{\displaystyle \frac{\delta }{\delta \lambda _\nu }}{\displaystyle \underset{n=0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}f^{(n+1)}(\varphi )P_n(k,J)2ie\alpha _1f_{\mu \nu }{\displaystyle \frac{\delta }{\delta \lambda _\mu }}\xi ^\nu {\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}f^{(n+1)}(\varphi )P_n(k,J).].\}`$ (66)
$`K[J]G[\lambda ]|_{(J=0,\lambda =0)}`$ (67)
Here $`K[J]`$ is given in (18,19), while

$`G[\lambda ]={\displaystyle \underset{0,\tau _i}{\overset{0,\tau _f}{}}}𝒟(\psi _\alpha ,\overline{\psi }_\alpha )\mathrm{exp}\{.i{\displaystyle \underset{\tau _i}{\overset{\tau _f}{}}}d\tau [.{\displaystyle \frac{i}{2}}\psi _\mu \dot{\psi }^\mu i\lambda _\mu \psi ^\mu .].\}`$ (68)
$`=\mathrm{exp}\{.{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}{\displaystyle \underset{\mathrm{}}{\overset{+\mathrm{}}{}}}du{\displaystyle \underset{\mathrm{}}{\overset{+\mathrm{}}{}}}ds[.\overline{\lambda }_\alpha (u)D(u,s)\lambda _\alpha (s).].\}.`$ (69)
where

$$D(u,s)=2\theta (\tau _fu)\theta (us)\theta (s\tau _i)$$
(70)
is the Green function of the free pseudoclassical system.

By taking into account the results obtained in equation (24) for the scalar case, the further relations

$$f_{\mu \nu }(\delta /\delta \lambda _\mu )(\delta /\delta \lambda _\nu )=(\delta /\delta \overline{\lambda }_1)(.(\delta /\delta \lambda _2)+(\delta /\delta \overline{\lambda }_2).)$$
(71)
$$(\delta /\delta \overline{\lambda }_1)(.(\delta /\delta \lambda _2)+(\delta /\delta \overline{\lambda }_2).)\mathrm{exp}\{.\overline{\lambda }_\alpha \lambda _\alpha .\}|_{(\lambda =\overline{\lambda }=0)}=0$$
(72)
and

$$(.\frac{\delta }{\delta \lambda ^\mu }\frac{\delta }{\delta J_\mu }\xi ^\rho f_{\rho \sigma }\frac{\delta }{\delta \lambda _\sigma }k^\nu \frac{\delta }{\delta J^\nu }.)K[J]G[\lambda ]|_{(J=\lambda =0)}=0,$$
(73)
we finally have for $`K_q`$ the same result as in the scalar case, namely

$$K_q=i(4\pi \alpha _1\mathrm{\Delta }\tau )^2.$$
(74)
In conclusion, the propagator we are looking for is again fully determined once we compute the classical contribution $`K_c`$. We find it convenient to write the latter separating in the exponent the normalization factor of coherent states, the even Bose and even Fermi parts and the odd Fermi part, $`\mathrm{exp}\{.\overline{\eta }_{\alpha f}\eta _{\alpha i}.\}`$, $`E_B`$, $`E_F`$ and $`O_F`$ respectively, i.e.

$$K_c=\mathrm{exp}\{.\overline{\eta }_{\alpha f}\eta _{\alpha i}+iE_B+E_F+\beta _2O_F.\},(\beta _2=\alpha _2\mathrm{\Delta }\tau ).$$
(75)
$`E_B`$ $`E_F`$ and $`O_F`$ are obtained by solving the classical equations of motion. Explicitly, with $`\beta _1=\alpha _1\mathrm{\Delta }\tau `$,

$`E_B={\displaystyle \frac{(\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}{4\beta _1}}+\beta _1m^2{\displaystyle \frac{e^2\beta _1}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi A^2(\varphi )+{\displaystyle \frac{e^2\beta _1}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}(.{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi A(\varphi ).)^2`$ (76)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{e\mathrm{\Delta }x^\mu }{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}𝑑\varphi A_\mu (\varphi ),`$ (77)
$$E_F=\frac{2e\beta _1}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}\overline{\eta }_{1f}(\overline{\eta }_{2f}+\eta _{2i})(.f(\varphi _f)f(\varphi _i).),$$
(78)
$`O_F={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2\beta _1}}[.\overline{\eta }_{1f}(\stackrel{~}{k}\mathrm{\Delta }x)+\overline{\eta }_{2f}(ϵ^{}\mathrm{\Delta }x)\eta _{1i}(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)+\eta _{2i}(ϵ\mathrm{\Delta }x).]`$ (79)
$`e(\overline{\eta }_{2f}+\eta _{2i})f(\varphi _i)+{\displaystyle \frac{e}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}(\overline{\eta }_{2f}+\eta _{2i}){\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}𝑑\varphi f(\varphi )`$ (80)
$`+[.{\displaystyle \frac{e\mathrm{\Delta }x^\mu }{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi A_\mu (\varphi )+{\displaystyle \frac{e^2\beta _1}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi A^2(\varphi ){\displaystyle \frac{2e^2\beta _1}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^3}}(.{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi A(\varphi ).)^2`$ (81)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{2e^2\beta _1}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}(.f(\varphi _f)+f(\varphi _i).){\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi f(\varphi )+{\displaystyle \frac{2e^2\beta _1}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}f(kx_f)f(kx_i)`$ (82)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{e(ϵ^{}\mathrm{\Delta }x)}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}f(kx_f){\displaystyle \frac{e(ϵ\mathrm{\Delta }x)}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}f(kx_i).]\overline{\eta }_{1f}.`$ (83)
We now collect all the contributions $`K_5`$, $`K_q`$, $`K_c`$ and we integrate over the Lagrange multipliers associated to the first class constraints. We get an integrated kernel

$`K_{\mathrm{int}}={\displaystyle \underset{\mathrm{}}{\overset{0}{}}}d\beta _1{\displaystyle }d\beta _2{\displaystyle \frac{ie^{\overline{\eta }_{\alpha f}\eta _{\alpha i}}}{(4\pi \beta _1)^2}}e^{iE_B}e^{E_F}e^{\beta _2O_F}(.(\xi _{5f}\xi _{5i})m\beta _2e^{\frac{1}{2}\xi _{5f}\xi _{5i}}.)`$ (84)
$`={\displaystyle \underset{\mathrm{}}{\overset{0}{}}}𝑑\beta _1{\displaystyle 𝑑\beta _2\frac{ie^{\overline{\eta }_{\alpha f}\eta _{\alpha i}}}{(4\pi \beta _1)^2}e^{iE_B}(1+E_F)}`$ (85)
$`(.(1+\beta _2O_F)(\xi _{5f}\xi _{5i})m\beta _2e^{\frac{1}{2}\xi _{5f}\xi _{5i}}.)`$ (86)
This is not yet the true physical kernel. As already said, the second class constraint (41) imposes a restriction on the Hilbert space of the states. We will now produce the projection operator that does the job. Introducing, as in , the symbol $`\mathrm{\#}`$ to indicate a change of sign for all the odd variables inside the state vector, we have

$`K_{\mathrm{phys}}={\displaystyle }(.\psi _f^{}(\xi _{5f})_{\mathrm{phys}}\overline{\psi }_f(\eta _f)K_{\mathrm{int}}\psi _i(\overline{\eta }_i)^\mathrm{\#}\psi _i(\xi _{5i})_{\mathrm{phys}}^\mathrm{\#}.)d\mu (\eta _f)d\mu (\eta _i)d\xi _{5f}d\xi _{5i}`$ (87)
$`={\displaystyle }\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}^{1/4}(1,2^{1/2})(.{\displaystyle \genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{1}{\xi _{5f}}}.)\psi _f|\gamma _0|\eta _fK_{\mathrm{int}}\overline{\eta }_i|\psi _i\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}2}^{1/4}(1,\xi _{5i})(.{\displaystyle \genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{1}{2^{1/2}}}.)`$ (88)
$`d\mu (\eta _f)d\mu (\eta _i)d\xi _{5f}d\xi _{5i}`$ (89)
where $`|\psi `$ represents an arbitrary four component spinor.

## 4 The kernel in spinor basis.

The propagator contains the complete information on the quantum system and in particular the wave equation itself can be deduced from it. This is what we are going to do in this last section and to this purpose we begin by rewriting the different terms composing the physical kernel as matrix elements between states of the quantum space:

$$K_{\mathrm{phys}}=\underset{\mathrm{}}{\overset{0}{}}d\beta _1\frac{i}{(4\pi \beta _1)^2}e^{iE_B}\psi _f|\gamma _0(.\widehat{O}_F+\widehat{E_FO}_F+\frac{m\gamma _5}{\sqrt{2}}\widehat{E}_F+\frac{m\gamma _5}{\sqrt{2}}.)|\psi _i.$$
(90)
The appearance of $`\gamma _5`$ in equation(90) is due to the fact that in the basis chosen for the coherent states $`|\eta `$ we have the relation $`\gamma _5|\eta =|\eta `$ . It can be verified by a direct calculation that the explicit form of the operators reproducing the kernel (89) are the ones given here below.

$`\widehat{O}_F={\displaystyle \frac{(\mathrm{\Delta }x\widehat{\xi })}{2\beta _1}}{\displaystyle \frac{e\mathrm{\Delta }x^\mu }{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi (k\widehat{\xi })A_\mu (\varphi )+{\displaystyle \frac{2e^2\beta _1}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^3}}(.{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi A_\mu (\varphi ).)^2(k\widehat{\xi })`$ (91)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{e^2\beta _1(k\widehat{\xi })}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}(.{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi (.A^2(\varphi )+(A(\varphi _f)A(\varphi ))+(A(\varphi )A(\varphi _i)).)`$ (92)
$`(A(\varphi _f)A(\varphi _i)).)+{\displaystyle \frac{e}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}{\displaystyle }_{\varphi _i}^{\varphi _f}d\varphi (A(\varphi )\widehat{\xi })e(A(\varphi _i)\widehat{\xi })+(.{\displaystyle \frac{e(ϵ^{}\mathrm{\Delta }x)}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}f(\varphi _f)`$ (93)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{e(ϵ\mathrm{\Delta }x)}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}f(\varphi _i).)(k\widehat{\xi }),`$ (94)
$`\widehat{E_FO}_F={\displaystyle \frac{e}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}[.(k\widehat{\xi })(ϵ\widehat{\xi })(ϵ^{}\widehat{\xi })((ϵϵ^{})\mathrm{\Delta }x)`$ (95)
$`+(k\widehat{\xi })((ϵ+ϵ^{})\widehat{\xi })(\stackrel{~}{k}\widehat{\xi })(k\mathrm{\Delta }x).\left]\right(.f(\varphi _f)f(\varphi _i).),`$ (96)
and

$$\widehat{E}_F=\frac{2e\beta _1}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}(.(k\widehat{\xi })([A(\varphi _f)A(\varphi _i)]\widehat{\xi }).).$$
(97)
We must now choose a representation for the algebra of the operators $`\widehat{\xi }^\mu `$. Two possible choices are given by the following relations:

$$\widehat{\xi }^\mu =i\gamma ^\mu /\sqrt{2},\widehat{\xi }^\mu =\gamma _5\gamma ^\mu /\sqrt{2}.$$
(98)
By substituting (98) into equations (94,96,97), the operator which represents the physical kernel becomes

$`\widehat{K}_{\mathrm{phys}}(f,i)={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Gamma }}{\sqrt{2}}}{\displaystyle \underset{0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}ds{\displaystyle \frac{i}{(4\pi s)^2}}\mathrm{exp}\{.i[.{\displaystyle \frac{(\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}{4s}}m^2s+{\displaystyle \frac{e^2s}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi A^2(\varphi )`$ (99)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{e^2s}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}(.{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi A_\mu (\varphi ).)^2{\displaystyle \frac{e\mathrm{\Delta }x^\mu }{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi A_\mu (\varphi ).].\}`$ (100)
$`[.m+{\displaystyle \frac{\gamma \mathrm{\Delta }x}{2s}}+s{\displaystyle \frac{em}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}(k\gamma )(.(A(\varphi _f)A(\varphi _i))\gamma .)`$ (101)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{e}{2(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}(.(k\gamma )(A(\varphi _f)\gamma )(\mathrm{\Delta }x\gamma )(\mathrm{\Delta }x\gamma )(k\gamma )(A(\varphi _i)\gamma ).)`$ (102)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{e^2s}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}(k\gamma )(A(\varphi _f)\gamma )(A(\varphi _i)\gamma )+{\displaystyle \frac{e}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}𝑑\varphi (A(\varphi )\gamma )`$ (103)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{e}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}(k\gamma )\mathrm{\Delta }x^\mu {\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}𝑑\varphi A_\mu (\varphi )+{\displaystyle \frac{e^2s}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}(k\gamma ){\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}𝑑\varphi A^2(\varphi )`$ (104)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{2e^2s}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^3}}(k\gamma )(.{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi A_\mu (\varphi ).)^2`$ (105)
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{e^2s}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}(k\gamma ){\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi (.(A(\varphi _f)\gamma )(A(\varphi )\gamma )+(A(\varphi )\gamma )(A(\varphi _i)\gamma ).).],`$ (106)
where $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ turns out to be a factor $`i`$ for the first representation in equations (98) and $`\mathrm{\Gamma }=\gamma _5`$ for the second one. Notice that if we choose the first and simpler representation we have to perform a Pauli-Gursey transformation on the physical spinors

$$|\psi \mathrm{exp}\{.i\frac{\pi }{4}\gamma _5.\}|\psi ,$$
(107)
to obtain equation (106). In this case it is then easy to verify that

$$[.i\gamma ^\mu \frac{}{x_f^\mu }e\gamma ^\mu A_\mu (x_f)+m.]\mathrm{\Delta }_F(x_f,x_i|A)=i\sqrt{2}\widehat{K}_{\mathrm{phys}}.$$
(108)
where we have defined

$`\mathrm{\Delta }_F(x_f,x_i|A)={\displaystyle \underset{0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}ds{\displaystyle \frac{i}{(4\pi s)^2}}\mathrm{exp}\{.i[.{\displaystyle \frac{(\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}{4s}}m^2s+{\displaystyle \frac{e^2s}{k\mathrm{\Delta }x}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi A^2(\varphi )`$ (109)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{e^2s}{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)^2}}(.{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi A_\mu (\varphi ).)^2{\displaystyle \frac{e\mathrm{\Delta }x^\mu }{(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi A_\mu (\varphi ){\displaystyle \frac{es}{2(k\mathrm{\Delta }x)}}{\displaystyle \underset{\varphi _i}{\overset{\varphi _f}{}}}d\varphi \sigma ^{\mu \nu }F_{\mu \nu }(\varphi ).].\}.`$ (110)
and $`\mathrm{\Delta }_F(x_f,x_i|A)`$ satisfies the squared Dirac equation

$$[.\frac{}{x^\mu }\frac{}{x_\mu }+2ieA^\mu \frac{}{x^\mu }+e^2A^2+m^2+\frac{e}{2}\sigma ^{\mu \nu }F_{\mu \nu }.]\mathrm{\Delta }_F(x,y|A)=i\delta ^4(xy).$$
(112)
We therefore conclude that the physical kernel is indeed the propagator for a spinor particle in the external electromagnetic field, since it satisfies the Dirac equation

$$[.i\gamma ^\mu \frac{}{x^\mu }e\gamma ^\mu A_\mu (x)m.]\sqrt{2}\widehat{K}_{\mathrm{phys}}(x,y)=\delta ^4(xy).$$
(113)


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# Self-consistent equation for an interacting Bose gas

## 1 Introduction

The interest for a better understanding of Bose-Einstein condensation has been strongly stimulated in recent years by the beautiful experimental observations of condensates of cold atoms in traps .

Concerning rigorous results on the existence of Bose-Einstein condensation in an interacting gas with pair interactions, we quote the work of Lieb and Seiringer . The authors show the existence of off-diagonal long-range order in the ground state of a system of Bose particles confined by an external potential in the dilute limit in which the Gross-Pitaewski equation becomes exact. Süto shows condensation for the trapped gas at non zero temperature . In  Lauers, Verbeure and Zagrebnov prove the existence of a Bose-Einstein phase transition for the homogeneous gas under the assumption that there is an energy gap at the bottom of the one-particle spectrum. However, to our knowledge, there is still no proof of Bose-Einstein condensation in the interacting gas when there is no trap and no gap. In the present work we revisit this venerable many-body problem with a new point of view, the technique of quantum Mayer graphs.

In order to provide orientation and motivation for our approach we recall some facts pertaining to the mean-field 111Here we use ”mean field” in the sense of van der Waals, that is collective effects of a long range interaction. The same word is also used in the context of the dilute limit  leading to the Gross-Pitaewski regime. In fact, in the latter case, the situation is the opposite: dominant effects of the interaction are due to rarefied local binary collisions. Bose gas at an heuristic level. The Hamiltonian of $`N`$ Bose particles in a volume $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ interacting with a constant repulsive potential of strength $`a/|\mathrm{\Lambda }|,a>0`$, reads

$$H_{\mathrm{mf},N}=H_{0,N}+\frac{a}{|\mathrm{\Lambda }|}\frac{N(N1)}{2}$$
(1)
where $`H_{0,N}`$ is the total kinetic energy. It leads to the free energy density

$$f_{\mathrm{mf}}(\beta ,\rho )=f_0(\beta ,\rho )+\frac{a}{2}\rho ^2$$
(2)
where $`\rho `$ is the particle density, $`\beta `$ is related to the temperature $`T`$ by $`\beta =1/k_BT`$, $`k_B`$ denotes the Boltzmann constant, and $`f_0(\beta ,\rho )`$ is the free energy of the non-interacting Bose gas. Differenciating with respect to $`\rho `$ yields the relation

$$\mu _0(\beta ,\rho )=\mu _{\mathrm{mf}}(\beta ,\rho )a\rho $$
(3)
between the chemical potential $`\mu _0(\beta ,\rho )`$ of the free gas and the chemical potential $`\mu _{\mathrm{mf}}(\beta ,\rho )`$ of the mean-field gas as functions of the density. Since the grand canonical densities $`\rho _0`$ of the free gas and the density $`\rho _{\mathrm{mf}}`$ of the mean-field gas, considered as functions of the respective chemical potentials, are the inverse functions of $`\mu _0(\beta ,\rho )`$ and $`\mu _{\mathrm{mf}}(\beta ,\rho )`$ at fixed $`\beta `$, (3) is equivalent to the self-consistent equation

$$\rho _{\mathrm{mf}}(\beta ,\mu )=\rho _0(\beta ,\mu a\rho _{\mathrm{mf}}(\beta ,\mu ))$$
(4)
In (4)

$$\rho _0(\beta ,\mu )=\frac{1}{(2\pi \lambda ^2)^{3/2}}\underset{q=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\frac{e^{\beta \mu q}}{q^{3/2}}$$
(5)
which is the well known formula for the grand canonical density of the free gas with

$$\lambda =\mathrm{}\sqrt{\beta /m}$$
(6)
representing the thermal wavelength .

The series (5) converges for $`\mu 0`$, so that the self-consistent equation (4) is meaningful whenever $`\nu \mu a\rho _{\mathrm{mf}}(\beta ,\mu )0`$, namely for $`\mu \mu _c`$ where the critical chemical potential $`\mu _c`$ is given by

$$\mu _ca\rho _{\mathrm{mf}}(\beta ,\mu _c)=0.$$

Thus $`\mu _c`$ has the value $`\mu _c=a\rho _{0,c}(\beta )`$ where $`\rho _{0,c}(\beta )=\rho _0(\beta ,\mu =0)`$ is the critical density of the free gas.

At this point it is worth noting that the solution $`\rho _{\mathrm{mf}}(\mu )`$ of (4) for $`\mu \mu _c`$ can be extended to the range $`\mu >\mu _c`$ by continuity. Indeed, we differentiate equation (4) with respect to the chemical potential to obtain 222We keep the temperature fixed and omit from now on $`\beta `$ in the notation.

$$(\rho _{\mathrm{mf}})^{}(\mu )=\frac{(\rho _0)^{}(\nu )}{1+a(\rho _0)^{}(\nu )}$$
(7)
One sees from (5) that $`(\rho _0)^{}(\nu )=\mathrm{}`$ for $`\nu >0`$. Hence $`(\rho _{\mathrm{mf}})^{}(\mu )=1/a,\nu >0`$ and requiring the continuity of the density at $`\mu =\mu _c`$ gives

$$\rho _{\mathrm{mf}}(\mu )=\frac{\mu }{a},\mu >\mu _c$$
(8)
Equations (4) and (8) define the density for all values of the chemical potential. For $`\mu >\mu _c`$, there is a Bose condensate of density $`\rho _{\mathrm{mf}}(\mu )\rho _{0,c}`$. These facts have been established with full mathematical rigor in several works  and see  for a review. In particular they are obtained for the Kac interparticle potential

$$V_\gamma (𝐫)=\gamma ^3V(\gamma 𝐫)$$
(9)
in the scaling limit of $`\gamma `$ tending to zero. When $`\gamma 0`$, the potential $`V_\gamma (𝐫)`$ extends its range to infinity whereas its amplitude tends to zero in such a way, that the mean potential energy

$$𝑑𝐫\gamma ^3V(\gamma 𝐫)=a$$
(10)
stays constant. It is well known that in classical statistical mechanics this is the appropriate limit to rigorously recover the van der Waals mean field theory . Also the methods of Mayer graphs enable to calculate corrections to the mean field limit for small $`\gamma `$ .

In this paper we propose a similar approach to study an interacting Bose gas with non-singular repulsive interactions. In section 2 we recall the ”polymer” representation of the Bose gas in thermal equilibrium. Combining the Feynman-Kac functional integral representation of the Gibbs weight together with the decomposition of permutations into cycles, one finds the grand-canonical partition function in the classical-like form of a gas of interacting polymers. Polymers are Brownian closed loops associated with a number of Bose particles belonging to a permutation cycle. Each loop has a self energy and there is a loop-loop pair potential. In the space of polymers, all the techniques of classical statistical mechanics are available, in particular the analysis of the partition function and of the density with the Mayer diagrammatic techniques. In this way we show in section 3 how the mean field equation (4) can be recovered by summing the tree graphs.

In section 4 we treat an interacting gas with a general short range repulsive two-body potential and establish that its density obeys an exact equation of the form

$$\rho (\mu )=F(\mu a\rho (\mu ))$$
(11)
The function $`F(\mu )`$ is defined as the sum of multiply connected Mayer graphs. We prove with the help of the Penrose tree-graph inequality that the corresponding diagrammatic expansion of $`F`$ is convergent at low density, namely if the chemical potential is sufficently negative. Equation (11) provides a generalization of the mean-field equation (4) to the interacting gas: indeed if one introduces a Kac potential $`V_\gamma (𝐫)`$, it is seen that $`F_\gamma (\mu )`$ reduces to the density $`\rho _0(\mu )`$ of the free gas as $`\gamma 0`$, thus recovering equation (4). The central goal then is to extend the validity of equation (11) to higher densities (hopefully up to a critical density), that is, to approach the Bose transition point from the dilute phase, as in the mean field theory.

In section 5 we discuss the mathematical problems that arise at this point. The study of the critical point will require the control of the asymptotic behaviour of the partition function of a single long repulsive polymer as well as the mutual interactions between different polymers. One should note however that the polymers occuring in the representation of the Bose gas differ from the standard self-repelling classical polymers because of the specifically quantum mechanical ”equal time interaction” introduced by the Feynman-Kac formula. Hence, the results of the theory of classical polymers cannot be used without further consideration. As first investigation in this direction, we give lower and upper bounds on the partition function of a single polymer indicating that equation (11) continues to hold for a range of chemical potentials larger than that assuring the convergence of the Mayer series. Moreover we can calculate the effects of mutually interacting polymers at lowest order in the Kac parameter $`\gamma `$ by summing up the ring diagrams in a closed form. Concluding remarks are presented in section 6. Proofs of some lemmas are relegated to appendices 1 and 2, and appendix 3 is devoted to the extension of our methods to an inhomogeneous Bose gas confined by an external potential.

## 2 The polymer representation of the Bose gas

We consider bosons of mass $`m`$ in three dimensions with Hamiltonian

$$H_N=\frac{\mathrm{}^2}{2m}\underset{i=1}{\overset{N}{}}\mathrm{\Delta }_i+\underset{0i<jN}{}V(𝐫_i𝐫_j)$$
(12)
enclosed in a box $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ being the Laplacian with Dirichlet conditions at the boundary of $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$. The pair potential $`V(𝐫)`$ is short range, repulsive and without singularities:

$$V(𝐫)0,𝑑𝐫V(𝐫)a<\mathrm{},\underset{𝐫}{sup}V(𝐫)\overline{V}<\mathrm{}$$
(13)
We assume moreover that its Fourier transform $`\stackrel{~}{V}(𝐤)`$ is positive.

The polymer representation of the grand-partition function at chemical potential $`\mu `$ and inverse temperature $`\beta `$ arises when the Gibbs statistical weight is expressed in terms of the Feynman-Kac path integral where quantum fluctuations are represented by Brownian trajectories. The open trajectories associated with exchange contributions are reorganized in larger closed loops (or polymers) containing several particles according to the decomposition of permutations into cycles. The result is that the grand partition function of the Bose gas can be written in a classical-like form as (the so-called magic formula)

$$\mathrm{\Xi }_\mathrm{\Lambda }=\underset{n=0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\frac{1}{n!}\underset{i=1}{\overset{n}{}}d_iz(_i)\mathrm{exp}[\beta U(_1,\mathrm{},_n)]$$
(14)
provided that suitable definitions of the phase space integration and of the interaction are given. In one form or another, this representation has been known since a long time in various contexts starting with the work of Ginibre on the convergence of quantum virial expansions . It is also used to implement numerical simulations of the Bose gas . The present form (14) has been derived and applied by Cornu  to Coulomb systems and we follow here the definitions given in Chap.V of . A self contained derivation can also be found in .

An element $``$ of the phase space, called a loop or a polymer,

$$=(𝐑,q,𝐗(s),\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}\hspace{0.33em}0}sq)$$
(15)
is specified by its position $`𝐑`$ in space, the number $`q`$ of particles belonging to it and its shape $`𝐗(s)`$. The $`q`$ particles are located at positions

$$𝐫_k=𝐑+\lambda 𝐗(k1),k=1,\mathrm{},q,q+11$$
(16)
and

$$𝐫_{k,k+1}(s)=𝐑+\lambda 𝐗(k1+s),0s1$$
(17)
is an open path joining the $`k`$ particle at $`𝐫_k`$ to the $`k+1`$ particle at $`𝐫_{k+1}`$ where $`\lambda `$ is the thermal wave length (6). The loop can be viewed as an extended object at $`𝐑`$ that has internal degrees of freedom $`(q,𝐗)`$ with $`q`$ the number of particles belonging to a permutation cycle and $`𝐗`$ the shape of the loop, see Fig. 1.

The thermal wavelength $`\lambda `$ (the only place where the Planck constant occurs) gives the extent of quantum fluctuations. The shape of the loop $`𝐗`$ is a Brownian bridge (a closed Brownian path), parametrized by the ”time” $`s`$ running in the ”time interval” $`[0,q]`$ with $`𝐗(0)=𝐗(q)=0`$. It is distributed according to the normalized Gaussian measure $`D_q(𝐗)\mathrm{}`$, with covariance

$$D_q(𝐗)X_\mu (s_1)X_\nu (s_2)=\delta _{\mu \nu }q\left[\mathrm{min}(\frac{s_1}{q},\frac{s_2}{q})\frac{s_1}{q}\frac{s_2}{q}\right]$$
(18)
where $`X_\mu ,\mu =1,2,3`$ are the Cartesian coordinates of $`𝐗`$. Integration on phase space means integration over space and summation over all internal degrees of freedom of the loop

$$𝑑\mathrm{}=\underset{q=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}D_q(𝐗)_\mathrm{\Lambda }𝑑𝐑\mathrm{}$$
(19)
Because of the Dirichlet boundary condition, the paths $`𝐗`$ are constrained to stay in the volume $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, but we do not write this constraint explicitly since it will be removed later in the infinite volume limit.

The interaction energy of two loops $`_i,_j`$ is the sum of pair Feynmam-Kac potentials between the particles associated to the loops

$`V(_i,_j)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{k=1}{\overset{q_i}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{\mathrm{}=1}{\overset{q_j}{}}}{\displaystyle _0^1}𝑑sV\left(𝐑_i+\lambda 𝐗_i(k1+s)𝐑_j\lambda 𝐗_j(\mathrm{}1+s)\right)`$
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle _0^{q_i}}𝑑s_i{\displaystyle _0^{q_j}}𝑑s_j\stackrel{~}{\delta }(s_is_j)V(𝐑_i+\lambda 𝐗_i(s_i)𝐑_j\lambda 𝐗_j(s_j))`$
In (LABEL:2.7), the distribution

$$\stackrel{~}{\delta }(s)=\underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}e^{2i\pi ns}$$
(21)
is the periodic Dirac function of period $`1`$.

The activity $`z()`$ of a loop is related to the chemical potential $`\mu `$ of the particles by

$$z()=\frac{z^q}{q(2\pi q\lambda ^2)^{3/2}}\mathrm{exp}(\beta U()),z=e^{\beta \mu }$$
(22)
It incorporates the interactions $`U()`$ of the particles in the same loop (the self energy of the loop)

$`U()={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}{\displaystyle _0^q}𝑑s_1{\displaystyle _0^q}𝑑s_2\stackrel{~}{\delta }(s_1s_2)V(\lambda (𝐗(s_1)𝐗(s_2))){\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}qV(0)`$
(23)
The last term substracts out the self energy of the particles. $`U()`$ can as well be written as

$$U()=\frac{1}{2}_0^q𝑑s_1_0^q𝑑s_2\stackrel{~}{\delta }(s_1s_2)(1\delta _{[s_1],[s_2]}^{Kr})V(\lambda (𝐗(s_1)𝐗(s_2)))0$$
(24)
making manifest that $`U()`$ is a positive quantity (in the Kronecker delta symbol $`[s]`$ denotes the integer part of $`s`$). As a direct consequence one gets the bound

$$0z()\frac{e^{\beta \mu q}}{q(2\pi q\lambda ^2)^{3/2}}z^{(0)}(q)$$
(25)
From the structure (14) of the partition function and the above definitions, it is clear that the calculation rules of classical statistical mechanics apply to the system of loops. We shall take advantage of this fact to analyze the system of loops first and derive from there the results for the original quantum gas of particles. In particular all the powerful techniques of Mayer graphs are available to expand the loop density and the loop correlations in powers of the loop activities $`z()`$. It is convenient to introduce the abbreviated notation $`_i=i`$ and $`d_i=di`$. Mayer bonds are defined by

$$f(i,j)=e^{\beta V(i,j)}1$$
(26)
and weights at vertices by $`z(i)`$ (22). Integration at vertices $`di`$ has to be performed according to (19).

Notice that the bond is integrable over space since from the positivity of $`V(𝐫)`$,

$$|f(i,j)|\beta V(i,j)$$
(27)
and from (LABEL:2.7)

$`{\displaystyle 𝑑R_j|f(_i,_j)|}`$ $``$ $`\beta {\displaystyle 𝑑R_jV(_i,_j)}`$ (28)
$`=`$ $`\beta {\displaystyle _0^{q_i}}𝑑s_i{\displaystyle _0^{q_j}}𝑑s_j\stackrel{~}{\delta }(s_is_j){\displaystyle 𝑑𝐑V(𝐑)}`$
$`=`$ $`\beta aq_iq_j`$
The loop density $`\rho _{\mathrm{loop}}()`$ is given by the standard expansion

$$\rho _{\mathrm{loop}}(1)=\underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}nB_n(1)$$
(29)
where

$$B_n(1)=\underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\frac{1}{n!}d2\mathrm{}𝑑nz(1)z(2)\mathrm{}z(n)u(1,2,\mathrm{},n)$$
(30)
and

$$u(1,2,\mathrm{},n)=\underset{\mathrm{\Gamma }_n}{}\underset{(i,j)\mathrm{\Gamma }_n}{}f(i,j)$$
(31)
is the Ursell function. The sum runs over all labelled connected graphs $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_n`$ with $`n`$ vertices. We have directly written the loop density (30) in the infinite volume limit, namely extending the spatial integrals $`d𝐑_2,\mathrm{}d𝐑_n`$ at vertices $`2,\mathrm{},n`$ over the whole space, whereas the vertex $`1`$ (the root point of the graph) carries no spatial integration. The existence of the infinite volume limit of individual Mayer graphs follows from the translation invariance and integrability of the Mayer bond as in the classical case. As a consequence $`\rho _{\mathrm{loop}}()=\rho _{\mathrm{loop}}(q,𝐗)`$ does not depend of the location $`𝐑`$ of the loop $``$ in space.

Finally, to obtain the original particle density $`\rho (\mu )`$ from the loop density, we have to sum $`\rho _{\mathrm{loop}}()`$ over the internal variables of $``$,

$$\rho (\mu )=\underset{q=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}qD_q(𝐗)\rho _{\mathrm{loop}}(q,𝐗)$$
(32)
the aditionnal $`q`$ factor taking into account that the loop $``$ carries $`q`$ particles.

Although classical methods have been used, it is important to stress the difference between the loop representation of the equilibrium state of the quantum Bose gas and that of a gas of genuine classical polymers. First the chemical potential $`\mu `$ is not the variable thermodynamically conjugate to the polymer number, but to the original particle number. Moreover, the loop interactions differ from the classical polymer intractions by the quantum mechanical ”equal time prescription” which originates from the Feynman-Kac formula. This equal time prescription is manifested in (LABEL:2.7) and (23) by the occurence of the periodic delta function $`\stackrel{~}{\delta }(s_1s_2)`$. In the classical interaction, every segment of a polymer interacts pairwise with any other segment, which would correspond to the potentials (LABEL:2.7) and (23) without the equal time prescription. The purely classical gas of point particles interacting by means of the two-body potential $`V(𝐫)`$ is recovered if the thermal lenth $`\lambda `$ is set equal to zero and if only terms with $`q=1`$ (Boltzmann statistics) are retained.

## 3 Mean field limit and tree graph summation

Let us first show how the self-consistent mean field Bose gas is recovered in the diagrammatic analysis. To this end we split the bond $`f(i,j)`$ into its part linearized in the potential and higher order terms

$`f(i,j)`$ $`=`$ $`f^{(a)}(i,j)+f^{(b)}(i,j)`$
$`f^{(a)}(i,j)`$ $`=`$ $`\beta V(i,j)`$
$`f^{(b)}(i,j)`$ $`=`$ $`e^{\beta V(i,j)}1+\beta V(i,j)`$ (33)
These bonds are represented in Fig. 2.

This simply enlarges the previous class of graphs $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ to graphs (still denoted by $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$) where each bond can be either $`f^{(a)}(i,j)`$ or $`f^{(b)}(i,j)`$.

In the mean field limit $`\gamma 0`$, the contributions of order $`𝒪(1)`$ in $`\gamma `$ due to the scaled potential $`\gamma ^3V(\gamma 𝐫)`$ will come from the linearized bonds

$$f_\gamma ^{(a)}(i,j)=\beta \gamma ^3_0^{q_i}𝑑s_i_0^{q_j}𝑑s_j\stackrel{~}{\delta }(s_is_j)V(\gamma (𝐑_i𝐑_j)+\gamma \lambda (𝐗_i(s_i)𝐗_j(s_j)))$$
(34)
and from the vertex weights

$$z^{(0)}(i)=\frac{z^{q_i}}{q_i(2\pi q_i\lambda ^2)^{3/2}}$$
(35)
The bond $`f_\gamma ^{(a)}(i,j)`$ will give contributions of order $`𝒪(1)`$ since under scaling (10) its total spatial integral

$$𝑑𝐑_jf_\gamma ^{(a)}(_{i,j})=\beta aq_iq_j$$
(36)
is independant of $`\gamma `$. In the activity (22) we simply disregard the self-energy $`U_\gamma ()`$ since the latter is $`𝒪(\gamma ^3)`$.

Proposition 1

The density $`\rho _{\mathrm{tree}}(\mu )`$ calculated as the the sum of all tree graphs with bonds (34) and vertices (35) verifies the mean field equation (4).

Consider a rooted tree graph $`T_{n+1}`$ with vertices $`(0,1,\mathrm{},n)`$ for which the root point is of degree $`1`$ ($`0`$ is the label of the root point) 333The degree of a point is the number of lines incident at this point., Fig. 3. Hence the root point is linked to the rest of the graph by a single bond, say $`f^{(a)}(0,1)`$. Call $`T_n`$ the subgraph of $`T_{n+1}`$ with vertices $`(1,2,\mathrm{},n)`$ and $`t_n(1)`$ the value of this subgraph once integrated on the vertices $`2,\mathrm{},n`$. Then the value $`t_{n+1}(_0)`$ of the rooted graph $`T_{n+1}`$ is

$$t_{n+1}(_0)=\beta z^{(0)}(q_0)𝑑_1V_\gamma (_0,_1)t_n(_1)$$
(37)
The root point $`0`$ can be linked to any of the n vertices of the graph $`T_n`$. The resulting tree graphs are different beacuse they contain different links with the root point. Moreover, because of translational invariance $`t_n(1)=t_n(q_1,𝐗_1)`$ does not depend on the position $`𝐑_1`$ of the loop $`_1`$. Thus the spatial integration over $`𝐑_1`$ can be performed on $`V_\gamma (_0,_1)`$ as in (36) so that the total contribution reads

$$nt_{n+1}(_0)=z^{(0)}(q_0)(\beta aq_0)\left[\underset{q_1=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}q_1D(𝐗_1)nt_n(q_1,𝐗_1)\right]$$
(38)
According to equations (29) and (32) the quantity in the bracket is precisely the contribution to the particle density $`\rho _{\mathrm{tree}}(\mu )`$ of the graph $`T_n`$. Therefore the sum of all tree graphs having a root point of degree $`1`$ is $`z^{(0)}(q_0)[\beta aq_0\rho _{\mathrm{tree}}(\mu ))`$. The sum of all tree graphs with root point of degree $`n`$ is $`z^{(0)}(q_0)(\beta aq_0\rho _{\mathrm{tree}}(\mu )]^n/n!`$ (the factor $`1/n!`$ takes care of the fact that the labelling of vertices belonging to different branches attached to the root point can be permuted without giving rise to new Mayer graphs). Finally, summing on all trees rooted at the point $`0`$ gives the density of loops. According to (32), to obtain the particle density we still have to sum on the internal variables $`q_0,𝐗_0`$ of the root loop with a factor $`q_0`$. Hence using (35) we find

$`\rho _{\mathrm{tree}}(\mu )`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{q_0=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{n=0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{q_0z^{(0)}(q_0)}{n!}}(\beta aq_0\rho _{\mathrm{tree}}(\mu )(^n`$ (39)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{q_0=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{exp}(\beta (\mu a\rho _{\mathrm{tree}}(\mu )))}{(2\pi q_0\lambda ^2)^{3/2}}}`$
$`=`$ $`\rho _0(\mu a\rho _{\mathrm{tree}}(\mu ))`$
which is the mean field equation (4).

We now come back to the general Mayer series (30) and prove its convergence at low density.

Proposition 2

The Mayer series (30) converges for $`\mu a\rho _{0,c}`$ with $`\rho _{0,c}=\rho _0(\beta ,\mu =0)`$ the critical density of the free gas.

We use the Penrose tree graph inequality for positive potentials which states that the the sum of the tree graphs provides an upper bound for the Ursell function

$`u(1,2,\mathrm{},n)`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{T_n}{}}{\displaystyle \underset{(i.j)T_n}{}}|f(i,j)|`$ (40)
$``$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{T_n}{}}{\displaystyle \underset{(i.j)T_n}{}}(\beta V(i,j))`$
the second inequality being a consequence of (27). Moreover, if in the series (30) we use the inequality (25), we see that the tree summation with bonds $`|f^{(a)}(i,j)|=\beta V(i,j)`$ and vertices $`z^{(0)}(i)`$ provides also an upper bound. According to the Proposition 1 the latter series sums up to a function $`\overline{\rho }(\mu )`$ that obeys

$$\overline{\rho }(\mu )=\rho _0(\mu +a\overline{\rho }(\mu ))$$
(41)
This is the mean field equation of a Bose system for the negative potential $`V(𝐫)`$: It has a finite solution provided $`\mu +v\overline{\rho }(\mu )0`$ which is equivalent to $`\mu \beta a\rho _{0,c}`$. We conclude that

$$\rho (\mu )\overline{\rho }(\mu ))<\mathrm{},\mu a\rho _{0,c}$$
(42)
Notice that in the case of the scaled potential $`V_\gamma (𝐫)`$, the convergence of the series (30) defining $`\rho _\gamma (\mu )`$ is not only absolute but also uniform with respect to $`\gamma `$ . This follows from the fact that in the evaluation of the tree-graph contributions one encounters only the integrated bonds

$$𝑑𝐑_j|f_\gamma ^{(a)}(_{i,j})|=\beta aq_iq_j$$

The Penrose inequality yields thus a $`\gamma `$-independent upper bound.

Now we show that in Kac limit, the density converges to the mean-field value.

Proposition 3

Let $`\rho _\gamma (\mu )`$ be the density associated with the scaled potential $`V_\gamma (𝐫)=\gamma ^3V(\gamma 𝐫)`$. Then

$$\underset{\gamma 0}{lim}\rho _\gamma (\mu )=\rho _{\mathrm{mf}}(\mu ),\mu a\rho _{0,c}$$
(43)
Consider first a graph $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_n`$ with vertices $`1,2,\mathrm{},n`$ (rooted at point $`1`$) which is not a tree, i.e it contains at least one cycle. Delete some bonds in such a way that the graph thus obtained is a connected tree $`T_n`$ with value $`t_n(1)`$. In order to find an upper bound for the value $`g_{n,\gamma }(1)`$ of $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_n`$ we use the inequalites

$$|f_\gamma (i,j)|\beta V_\gamma (i,j)$$
(44)
for the bonds remaining in the tree and

$$|f_\gamma (i,j)|\gamma ^3\beta q_iq_j\overline{V}$$
(45)
for each deleted bond. Notice that (45) is obtained by replacing the pair potential in (34) by its supremum $`\overline{V}`$. Moreover the activity $`z(i)`$ is bounded by $`z^{(0)}(i)`$ (25). Spatial integration of a bond $`(i,j)`$ of the tree yields the factor $`\beta aq_iq_j`$ as before so that with (45) a vertex $`(i)`$ of degree $`k_i`$ in $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_n`$ receives a factor $`q_i^{k_i}`$ multiplied by the activity $`z^{(0)}(q_i)`$. If $`\mathrm{}`$ bonds have been deleted, the resulting inequality has the form

$$|g_{n,\gamma }(1)|(\gamma ^3\overline{V})^{\mathrm{}}(\beta a)^{n1}\underset{q_2,\mathrm{},q_n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}q_1^{k_1}\mathrm{}q_n^{k_n}z^{(0)}(q_1)\mathrm{}z^{(0)}(q_n)$$
(46)
In view of the exponential factor $`e^{\beta \mu q}`$ in (25), the $`q`$-series in (46) is convergent for $`\mu <0`$. Hence the presence of one cycle in $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_n`$ implies that $`g_{n,\gamma }(1)`$ tends to zero not slower than $`\gamma ^3`$ for $`\gamma 0`$ (and as $`\gamma ^3\mathrm{}`$ if $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_n`$ has $`\mathrm{}`$ cycles).

If $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_n`$ is a tree we decompose the Mayer bonds as in (33). Since

$$|f^{(b)}(i,j)|\frac{1}{2}\left(V(i,j)\right(^2\frac{1}{2}\gamma ^3\beta q_iq_j\overline{V}(\beta V(i,j))$$
(47)
all the contributions to $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_n`$ containing $`f^{(b)}(i,j)`$ bonds vanish as $`\gamma 0`$.

As we have seen from the Penrose estimate and from Proposition 2, the Mayer series constituting $`\rho _\gamma (\mu )`$ is absolutly convergent uniformly with respect to $`\gamma `$. By dominated convergence, the limit of the diagrammatic sum can be calculated term by term. Therefore we are left with the sum of trees where all the bonds are of the type $`f_\gamma ^{(a)}(i,j)`$ and where the activites $`z_\gamma (i)`$ can be replaced by $`z^{(0)}(i)`$ as $`\gamma 0`$. This is exactly the situation of the Proposition 1 thus proving Proposition 3.

## 4  The self-consistent equation for the interacting gas

The reasoning which led to equation (39) was restricted to the tree diagrams. We now show how it can be generalized to provide an implicit equation for the exact density $`\rho (\mu )`$. To this end we consider the complete set of expanded Mayer graphs with the two types of bonds $`f^{(a)}(i,j)`$ and $`f^{(b)}(i,j)`$ defined in (33) and call $`f^{(a)}(i,j)`$ a single interaction bond. A graph is said multiply connected 444In the context of Feynman diagrams, such graphs are also called one-line irreducibles. if it cannot be disconnected by cutting a single interaction bond. Then we define $`I()`$ to be the value of the sum of all multiply connected graphs with one root point $``$, see Fig. 4.

Because of translation invariance, $`I()`$ does not depend on the position $`𝐑`$ of $``$. Denoting here the chemical potential by $`\nu `$ , we define the function

$$F(\nu )=\underset{q=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}qD_q(𝐗)I()$$
(48)
For $`\nu a\rho _{0,c}`$, the function $`F(\nu )`$ is represented by a convergent sum since it is a subseries of the absolutly convergent Mayer expansion (Proposition 2).

Proposition 4 For $`\mu a\rho _{0,c}`$, $`\rho (\mu )`$ verifies the equation

$$\rho (\mu )=F(\mu a\rho (\mu ))$$
(49)
To establish (48) and (49), we proceed as in Proposition 1. Considering now a general structure of Mayer graphs we say that a vertex $`(i)`$ in a graph has a star structure if there is a number of incident single interaction lines at $`(i)`$ such that cutting any one of them disconnects the graph. Consider first a vertex $`(i)`$ having a star structure consisting of one single interaction line. This interaction line, say $`f^{(a)}(i,1)`$, links the vertex $`(i)`$ to a subgraph $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_n`$ with vertices $`(1,2,\mathrm{},n)`$; $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_n`$ has no other links with the rest of the graph, Fig. 5. Once integrated on the points $`(2,\mathrm{},n)`$, its value $`g_n(1)`$ does not depend on the position $`𝐑_1`$ of the loop $`_1`$. Thus the spatial integration over $`𝐑_1`$ can be performed on the bond $`[\beta V(_i,_1)]`$ yielding the factor $`(\beta aq_iq_1)`$. Taking finally into account that the graph $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_n`$ can be attached through a single interaction line to the vertex $`(i)`$ by any of its $`n`$ vertices we find (as in (37)) that its total contribution to the vertex $`(i)`$ equals

$$z(_i)(\beta aq_i)\left[\underset{q_1=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}q_1D_{q_1}(𝐗_1)ng_n(q_1,𝐗_1)\right]$$
(50)
But from (32), the quantity in the square bracket is the contribution of the graph $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_n`$ to the exact density. Thus the sum of all such graphs contributes to the vertex $`(i)`$ as $`z(_i)(\beta aq_i\rho (\mu ))`$. Continuing the reasoning along the lines of the proof of Proposition 1 we consider next the sum all star structures at $`(i)`$ having $`n`$ single interaction lines. Their contribution equals $`z(_i)[\beta aq_i\rho (\mu )]^n/n!`$. Finally, summing all possible star structures at $`(i)`$ we arrive at the formula for an effective activity

$$z^{}(_i)=z(_i)e^{\beta a\rho (\mu )q_i}=\frac{e^{\beta (\mu a\rho (\mu ))q_i}}{q_i(2\pi q_i\lambda ^2)^{3/2}}e^{\beta U(_i)}$$
(51)
This is precisely the previous activity $`z(_i)`$ (22) evaluated at the shifted chemical potential $`\nu =\mu a\rho (\mu )`$.

¿From this analysis we see that $`\rho (\mu )`$ can as well be obtained by summing all multiply connected graphs with bonds $`f^{(a)}(i,j)`$ and $`f^{(b)}(i,j)`$ with effective activities $`z^{}(_i)`$ at vertices. Indeed, by construction, any graph in these series is an original Mayer graph. Conversely, each Mayer graph does appear therein. This can be shown by the following reasoning. Consider any connected graph made of the bonds $`f^{(a)}(i,j)`$ and $`f^{(b)}(i,j)`$ and remove all single interaction lines $`f^a(i,j)`$ whose presence makes it not mutliply connected (by definition removal of such a line disconnects the root point from a part of the graph). Then the remaining subgraph connected to the root point is a multiply connected graph from which the original Mayer graph is obtained in a unique way by forming star structures. This concludes the proof since, in view of formula (51), by forming $`F(\nu )`$ according to these rules we find the density equal to the value of this function at the shifted argument $`\nu =\mu a\rho (\mu )`$.

As a corollary of Propositon 3, we have that if $`F_\gamma (\nu )`$ is calculated with the scaled potential $`V_\gamma (𝐫)`$ then $`lim_{\gamma 0}F_\gamma (\nu )=\rho _0(\nu )`$.

We can write $`I()`$ appearing in the definition (48) of function $`F_\gamma (\nu )`$ as the sum

$$I()=z()[1+I_{\mathrm{cycle}}()]$$
(52)
of the pure root point term plus all the multiply connected graphs containing cycles and $`f^{(b)}(i,j)`$ bonds. It is clear from the proof of Proposition 3 that the mean field density arises solely from the root point $`z()`$ whereas $`I_{\mathrm{cycle}}()`$ becomes vanishingly small in the mean field limit.

All the results presented so far are valid within the convergence radius of the Mayer series determined by $`\mu <a\rho _{0,c}`$. The question then arises if the density, as solution of (49), can be extended to larger values of $`\mu `$, as it was possible in the strict mean field case. An investigation of this question and of the mathematical difficulties involved is presented in the next section.

## 5  The Bose gas beyond mean field

5.1 Vertex contribution: the single polymer partition function

In this section we study the structure of function $`F(\nu )`$ in a more detailed way. The first term $`f^{(0)}(\nu )`$ of the expansion of $`F(\nu )`$ in multiply connected graphs corresponds to the root point $`z()`$ which is a single vertex contribution

$`f^{(0)}(\nu )`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{q=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}q{\displaystyle D_q(𝐗)z()}`$ (53)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(2\pi \lambda ^2)^{3/2}}}{\displaystyle \underset{q=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{e^{\beta \nu q}}{q^{3/2}}}\kappa (q)`$
Here we have introduced the mean value of the Boltzmann factor

$$\kappa (q)=<e^{\beta U}>_qD_q(𝐗)e^{\beta U(q,𝐗)}$$
(54)
of a single closed polymer carrying the repulsive energy (23). The Brownian bridge measure defining the average $`<\mathrm{}>_q`$ is normalized to $`1`$, namely if $`U(q,𝐗)=0`$, one has $`\kappa (q)=1`$ and $`f^{(0)}(\nu )`$ reduces then to the free gas density (5). Moreover, for positive potentials we have $`0\kappa (q)1`$. Clearly, the radius of convergence of the series ( 53) is determined by the asymptotic behaviour of $`\kappa (q)`$ for $`q\mathrm{}`$. The following bounds can be established

Lemma 1

There exists $`\nu _+`$ such that

$$\kappa (q)e^{\beta q\nu _+}$$
(55)
This lower bound follows from Jensen inequality

$$\kappa (q)\mathrm{exp}(\beta U_q)$$
(56)
where

$$U_q=D_q(𝐗)U(q,𝐗)$$
(57)
is the average energy of the polymer. The value of $`\nu _+`$ results from a direct calculation of $`U_q`$ presented in Appendix 1.

There is also an upper bound:

Lemma 2

Let $`r`$ be a fixed integer $`r2`$. There exists $`\nu _{}`$ (depending on $`r`$) such that $`0<\nu _{}<\nu _+`$ and

$$\kappa (qr)r^{3/2}\mathrm{exp}(\beta qr\nu _{})$$
(58)
The upper bound is derived by splitting the closed loop $`𝐗(s),\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0}sq,𝐗(0)=𝐗(q)=0`$, into the union of two open Brownian paths $`𝐗_1(s),\mathrm{\hspace{0.17em}0}sq_1`$ and $`𝐗_2(s),q_1sq`$, and disregarding the (positive) interactions between the two paths $`𝐗_1`$ and $`𝐗_2`$. The details and the form of $`\nu _{}`$ are given in Appendix 2.

The lemmas imply that $`f^{(0)}(\nu )`$ is finite if $`\nu \nu _{}`$ and diverges for $`\nu >\nu _+`$. Let us suppose for a moment that there exists a critical value $`\nu _c`$ such that

$`f^{(0)}(\nu )`$ $`<`$ $`\mathrm{},\nu \nu _c`$
$`f^{(0)}(\nu )`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{},\nu >\nu _c`$ (59)
In this case, there will be a critical density $`\rho _c=f^{(0)}(\nu _c)`$ and a critical chemical potential $`\mu _c=a\rho _c+\nu _c`$. From the lemmas 1 and 2, one has necessarily $`\nu _{}\nu _c<\nu _+`$.

The determination of the possible existence of $`\nu _c`$ requires the knowledge of the exact asymptotic behaviour of $`\kappa (q)`$ as $`q\mathrm{}`$. In this respect let us make the following comment concerning the theory of classical polymers, defined as those interacting via the standard pairwise repulsion

$`U_{\mathrm{cl}}()={\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}{\displaystyle _0^q}𝑑s_1{\displaystyle _0^q}𝑑s_2V(𝐗(s_1)𝐗(s_2))`$ (60)
It is firmly established, although not rigorously proved, that the normalized partition function of a single classical closed polymer behaves (in three dimensions) as

$$\kappa _{\mathrm{cl}}(q)=D_q(𝐗)e^{\beta U_{\mathrm{cl}}()}C\frac{e^{\beta Aq}}{q^{3(\nu _{\mathrm{pol}}1/2)}},q\mathrm{}$$
(61)
where $`A`$ is a constant depending of the choice of the potential $`V(𝐫)`$ and $`\nu _{\mathrm{pol}}=0,589`$ is the universal critical exponent for a swollen polymer. Inserting this asymptotic behaviour in the series (53) gives $`\nu _c=A`$ and a finite critical density $`\rho _c`$ since the series is convergent at $`\nu =\nu _c`$. It is an open question to find out whether a similar situation holds for the ”quantum” polymers subjected to the ”equal time” interaction (23).

5.2 Bond contributions: interacting polymers

Interaction between different polymers occurs in multiply connected graphs having bonds $`f^{(a)}(i,j)`$ or $`f^{(b)}(i,j)`$. It turns out that the subseries $`I_{\mathrm{ring}}()`$ of $`I_{\mathrm{cycle}}()`$ defined as the sum of all multiply connected graphs having exactly one cycle of interaction bonds can be summed in a closed form, see Fig. 6 (the first term of the series corresponds to the quadratic term $`V^2(i,j)/2`$ in the expansion of $`f^{(b)}(i,j)`$, (33)). The result is

$$I_{\mathrm{ring}}()=\frac{1}{2}𝑑𝐤_0^q𝑑s_0^q𝑑te^{i\lambda 𝐤(𝐗(s)𝐗(t))}\underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\frac{(\beta \stackrel{~}{V}(𝐤))^2\alpha _n^2(𝐤)}{1+\beta \stackrel{~}{V}(𝐤)\alpha _n^2(𝐤)}e^{2i\pi n(st)}$$
(62)
Here $`\stackrel{~}{V}(𝐤)`$ is the Fourier transform of the potential and the positive coefficients $`\alpha _n^2(𝐤)`$

$$\alpha _n^2(𝐤)=\underset{q=0}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}q_0^q𝑑sD_q(𝐗)z()e^{i\lambda 𝐤𝐗(s)}e^{2i\pi ns}$$
(63)
come from the summation on the internal degrees of freedom of loops at vertices. A derivation of formula (62) can be found in  where the effective loop-loop potential is calculated as the sum of all chain graphs. $`I_{\mathrm{ring}}()`$ is given precisely by the formula (84) in  restricted to a single species of bosonic particles and with the Fourier transform $`4\pi /|𝐤|^2`$ of the Coulomb potential replaced by the present short range potential $`\stackrel{~}{V}(𝐤)`$ (in  the coefficients $`4\pi \beta \alpha _n^2(𝐤)`$ are noted $`\kappa ^2(𝐤,n)`$).

We now check that $`I_{\mathrm{ring}}()`$ is also well defined in the range $`\nu <\nu _{}`$ (or possibly $`\nu <\nu _c`$ if there is a critical value $`\nu _c`$ (59)). As the modulus of the phase factors in (62) equals $`1`$ the positivity of $`\beta \stackrel{~}{V}(𝐤)\alpha _n^2(𝐤)`$ implies the inequality

$`I_{\mathrm{ring}}(){\displaystyle \frac{q^2}{2}}{\displaystyle 𝑑𝐤(\beta \stackrel{~}{V}(𝐤))\underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\alpha _n^2(𝐤)}`$ (64)
¿From (63) and (21)

$`{\displaystyle \underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}\alpha _n^2(𝐤)={\displaystyle \underset{q=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}q{\displaystyle D_q(𝐗)z()\left[_0^q𝑑se^{i\lambda 𝐤𝐗(s)}\stackrel{~}{\delta }(s)\right]}f^{(1)}(\nu )`$ (65)
We have defined

$`f^{(k)}(\nu )={\displaystyle \underset{q=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}q^{k+1}{\displaystyle D_q(𝐗)z()}={\displaystyle \underset{q=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}q^k{\displaystyle \frac{e^{\beta \nu q}}{(2\pi q\lambda ^2)^{3/2}}}\kappa (q)`$ (66)
and the inequality follows from the fact that the bracket $`[\mathrm{}]`$ is less or equal to $`q`$ . Hence the contribution of the ring diagrams $`F_{\mathrm{ring}}(\nu )`$ to the function $`F(\nu )`$,

$$F_{\mathrm{ring}}(\nu )=\underset{q=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}qD(𝐗)z()I_{\mathrm{ring}}()$$
(67)
is bounded by

$$F_{\mathrm{ring}}(\nu )\frac{1}{2}𝑑𝐤(\beta \stackrel{~}{V}(𝐤))^2f^{(1)}(\nu )f^{(2)}(\nu )$$
(68)
where the inequality (25) has been also used. In view of the Lemma $`1`$, it is clear that $`f^{(k)}(\nu )`$ (66) is finite for $`\nu <\nu _{}`$ and thus $`F_{\mathrm{ring}}(\nu )`$ is also well defined in this extended range of chemical potentials.

The ring contribution is expected to be small for a scaled potential $`V_\gamma `$ when $`\gamma 0`$. Indeed if the Fourier transform $`\stackrel{~}{V}_\gamma (𝐤)=\stackrel{~}{V}(𝐤/\gamma )`$ of $`V_\gamma `$ is introduced in (68) and the $`𝐤`$ integration variable is changed into $`𝐤=\gamma 𝐩`$ we find immediately

$$F_{\mathrm{ring},\gamma }(\nu )\frac{\gamma ^3}{2}𝑑𝐩(\beta \stackrel{~}{V}(𝐩))^2f_\gamma ^{(1)}(\nu )f_\gamma ^{(2)}(\nu )=𝒪(\gamma ^3),\nu <\nu _{}$$
(69)
In (69), $`f_\gamma ^{(k)}(\nu )`$ are still dependent on $`\gamma `$ through the single polymer partition function $`\kappa _\gamma (q)`$.

If one introduces the scaled potential in the full expression (62) (setting $`𝐤=\gamma 𝐩`$) one observes the subtle dependence of the parameter $`\gamma `$. There is an overall $`\gamma ^3`$ prefactor that manifests the smallness of the scaled potential as in the classical case. A $`\gamma `$ factor occurs also in the phase in the integrands of (62) and (63) in the combination $`\gamma \lambda `$, representing the ratio of the thermal wave length and the potential range. The importance of these phases will therefore depend of the value of this ratio. Finally, $`\gamma `$ appears in the loop activity $`z_\gamma ()`$ in (63). For $`\gamma `$ small and $`\gamma \lambda 1`$ we can replace the above mentionned phase factors by $`1`$ and approximate

$$F_{\mathrm{ring}}(\nu )\frac{\gamma ^3}{2}f^{(2)}(\nu )𝑑𝐩\frac{(\beta \stackrel{~}{V}(𝐩))^2f_\gamma ^{(1)}(\nu )}{1+\beta \stackrel{~}{V}(𝐩)f_\gamma ^{(1)}(\nu )},\gamma 0$$
(70)
This will be the dominant term in the expansion of $`I_{\mathrm{cycle}}(\nu )`$ since terms with $`k>1`$ cycles will obtain an overall $`\gamma ^{3k}`$ prefactor.

## 6 Concluding remarks

The use of quantum Mayer graphs proved useful in discovering the existence of an implicit equation (49) defining the density of an interacting Bose gas as function of its chemical potential. The knowledge of the precise form of the equation requires the resummation of all multiply connected diagrams including the single vertex contribution. It should be recalled that in a series of papers, Lee and Yang have developped a diagrammatic formalism for the quantum statistical mechanical many-body problem that enables to calculate the thermodynamical quantities in terms of Boltzmann-type Ursell functions together with rules taking quantum statistics into account (see  for the general formalism and  for application to bosons). Working in the occupation number representation in momentum space, these authors also obtain a formally exact integral equation for the average occupation of modes, and in particular for the condensate density. The latter equation (a generalization of the Bogoliubov condensate equation) was shown to be exact in the thermodynamic limit by Ginibre , and it has also been established in the framework of infinitely extended states of Bose systems . Our formulation is different in the sense that it provides a closed equation for the density of the interacting gas at fixed chemical potential that is particularly well adapted to the exploration of the neighborhood of the mean field limit. Moreover it provides an interesting link with the theory of polymers.

Suppose that the resummation of multiply connected diagrams leading to (49) can been performed. It is then not excluded that the resulting non-perturbative equation remains valid beyond the radius of convergence of the Mayer series. If so, the question of the Bose-Einstein condensation in an interacting gas could be examined on the basis of (49). At least one example supports this hope: such an extension to the transition region agrees with rigorous results in the case of the mean field limit. This fact motivates the study of the self-consistent relation (49) beyond the mean field limit. We formulated this problem here using the scaling (9) of the pair potential. In order to derive the form of function $`F_\gamma `$ defining the relation (49) for the scaled potential one needs to know the small $`\gamma `$ asymptotics of

* (i) the mean value of the Boltzmann factor of a single polymer (or normalized partition function)
* (ii) the sum of ring diagrams representing the contribution of interacting polymers

In the study of point (i) we could not use directly the known results (61) because of equal time condition imposed by quantum mechanics on interactions between different elements of polymers (see (LABEL:2.7)). The existence and localization of the Bose-Einstein condensation depends in a crucial way on the behavior of (i) for extended polymers. This however remains an open problem. Our paper provides only exact upper and lower bounds which, what is interesting, turn out to be qualitatively compatible with the classical result (61). There are some indications that in the $`\gamma 0`$ limit the quantum calculation approaches the classical one. However, this question is at present not yet understood. We based the analysis of point (ii) on the remarkable fact that quantum Mayer ring diagrams can be summed in closed analytical form. We thus arrived at an analytic expression (62) for the sum of the relevant ring diagrams. However here again the small $`\gamma `$ limit of (62) involves the normalized single polymer partition function whose asymptotics for extended polymers remains to be derived. We hope that the continuation of the study of quantum Mayer graphs along these lines and progress in the understanding of polymer partition functions will eventually lead to the determination of functional relation (49) beyond the mean field theory.

Acknowledgments

We thank B. Duplantier for a stimulating discussion on links with the theory of polymers. One of us (JP) greatly acknowledge the hospitality at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne where this research has been performed.

Appendices

Appendix 1 : Proof of lemma 1

The average energy (57) is calculated from its definition (23) (introducing also the Fourier transform $`\stackrel{~}{V}(𝐤)`$ of the potential)

$$U_q=J(q)q\frac{V(0)}{2}$$
(71)
where

$`J(q)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}{\displaystyle D_q(𝐗)_0^q𝑑s_1_0^q𝑑s_2\stackrel{~}{\delta }(s_1s_2)V(\lambda (𝐗(s_1)𝐗(s_2)))}`$
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}{\displaystyle 𝑑𝐤\stackrel{~}{V}(𝐤)_0^q𝑑s_1_0^q𝑑s_2\stackrel{~}{\delta }(s_1s_2)D_q(𝐗)e^{i\lambda 𝐤[𝐗(s_1𝐗(s_2)]}}`$
¿From the basic rules for Fourier transforms of Gaussian measures we have using the covariance (18)

$$D_q(𝐗)e^{i\lambda 𝐤[𝐗(s_1𝐗(s_2)]}=\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{\lambda ^2k^2}{2}C_q(s_1s_2)\right],k=|𝐤|$$
(73)
where

$$C_q(s)=|s|\left(1\frac{|s|}{q}\right)$$
(74)
Since both $`\stackrel{~}{\delta }(s)`$ and $`C_q(s)`$ can be considered as periodic functions of period $`q`$ the double time integral in (LABEL:A.2) reduces to

$`{\displaystyle _0^q}𝑑s_1{\displaystyle _0^q}𝑑s_2\stackrel{~}{\delta }(s_1s_2)\mathrm{exp}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{\lambda ^2k^2}{2}}C_q(s_1s_2)\right]`$ (75)
$`=`$ $`q{\displaystyle \underset{n=0}{\overset{q1}{}}}\mathrm{exp}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{\lambda ^2k^2}{2}}C_q(n)\right]=q{\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{q1}{}}}\mathrm{exp}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{\lambda ^2k^2}{2}}C_q(n)\right]q`$
When this is introduced in (LABEL:A.2) and (71) (noting that $`𝑑𝐤\stackrel{~}{V}(𝐤)=V(0)`$) one obtains finally

$$U_q=q𝑑𝐤\stackrel{~}{V}(𝐤)g(k,q)$$
(76)
with

$$g(k,q)=\frac{1}{2}\underset{n=1}{\overset{q1}{}}\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{\lambda ^2k^2}{2}C_q(n)\right]=\underset{n=1}{\overset{q/2}{}}\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{\lambda ^2k^2}{2}C_q(n)\right]$$
(77)
The last equality results from the symmetry $`C_q(n)=C_q(qn)`$. If $`nq/2`$, one has obviously $`C_q(n)n/2`$ which leads to the bound

$$g(k,q)\underset{n=1}{\overset{q/2}{}}\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{\lambda ^2k^2}{4}n\right]\frac{1}{\mathrm{exp}(\frac{\lambda ^2k^2}{4})1}$$
(78)
hence

$$U_qq\nu _+,\nu _+=𝑑𝐤\frac{\stackrel{~}{V}(𝐤)}{\mathrm{exp}(\frac{\lambda ^2k^2}{4})1}$$
(79)
thus proving Lemma 1.

It is instructive to exhibit the behaviour of $`\nu _+`$ in the scaling limit of a Kac potential $`\stackrel{~}{V}_\gamma (𝐤)=\stackrel{~}{V}(𝐤/\gamma )`$. Setting $`𝐤=\gamma 𝐩`$ in (79) gives

$$\nu _+=\gamma ^3𝑑𝐩\frac{\stackrel{~}{V}(𝐩)}{\mathrm{exp}(\frac{\gamma ^2\lambda ^2p^2}{4})1}\frac{4\gamma }{\lambda ^2}𝑑𝐩\frac{\stackrel{~}{V}(𝐩)}{p^2},\gamma 0$$
(80)
Appendix 2 : Proof of lemma 2

We denote $`F_W=E(F|𝐗(0)=0)`$ the normalized Wiener expectation of a functional $`F(𝐗)`$ of paths $`𝐗(t)`$ starting from the origin at time $`t=0`$ and $`E(F|𝐗(t_1)=𝐑_1,𝐗(t_2)=𝐑_2)`$ the conditional Wiener expectation for paths starting in $`𝐑_1`$ at time $`t_1`$ and ending in $`𝐑_2`$ at time $`t_2`$. One has in particular

$`F_W={\displaystyle 𝑑𝐑E(F|𝐗(0)=0,𝐗(t)=𝐑)},t>0`$
$`E(1|𝐗(t_1)=𝐑_1,𝐗(t_2)=𝐑_2)={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{exp}(\frac{|𝐑_1𝐑_2|^2}{2(t_2t_1)})}{(2\pi (t_2t_1))^{3/2}}},t_2>t_1`$ (81)
The fact that Brownian motion is an homogeneous process implies the following symmetry relations under time and space translation, and space inversion:

$`E(F|𝐗(t_1)=𝐑_1,𝐗(t_2)=𝐑_2)`$ $`=`$ $`E(F_\tau |𝐗(t_1+\tau )=𝐑_1,𝐗(t_2+\tau )=𝐑_2)`$ (82)
$`=`$ $`E(F_𝐑|𝐗(t_1)=𝐑_1+𝐑,𝐗(t_2)=𝐑_2+𝐑)`$
$`=`$ $`E(F_{}|𝐗(t_1)=𝐑_1,𝐗(t_2)=𝐑_2)`$
with $`F_\tau (𝐗())=F(𝐗(+\tau ))`$, $`F_𝐑(𝐗())=F(𝐗()+𝐑)`$ and $`F_{}(𝐗())=F(𝐗())`$. Consider now the functional

$$F_{q_1,q_2}(𝐗)=\mathrm{exp}\left[\frac{\beta }{2}_{q_1}^{q_2}𝑑s_{q_1}^{q_2}𝑑t\stackrel{~}{\delta }(st)(1\delta _{[s_1],[s_2]}^{Kr})V(𝐗(s)𝐗(t))\right]$$
(83)
where the index $`(q_1,q_2)`$ means that the functional depends on the path only when $`t`$ is in the interval $`[q_1,q_2]`$. In the present notation the normalized Brownian bridge average of a functional $`F`$ reads

$$D_q(𝐗)F(𝐗)=(2\pi q)^{3/2}E(F|𝐗(0)=0,𝐗(q)=0)$$
(84)
and therefore the vertex function $`\kappa (q)`$ (54) for a q-particle loop $`𝐗`$ is

$$\kappa (q)=(2\pi q)^{3/2}E(F_{0,q}|𝐗(0)=0,𝐗(q)=0)$$
(85)
In $`F_{0,q}(𝐗)`$ we suppress the interaction between the sets of particles $`1,\mathrm{},q_1`$ and $`q_1+1,\mathrm{},q`$. Since $`V`$ is positive this leads to the inequality

$$F_{0,q}(𝐗)F_{0,q_1}(𝐗)F_{q_1,q}(𝐗)$$
(86)
implying in (85) in view of the Markov property of the Brownian motion

$`\kappa (q)`$ $``$ $`(2\pi q)^{3/2}{\displaystyle 𝑑𝐑E(F_{0,q_1}|𝐗(0)=0,𝐗(q_1)=𝐑)E(F_{q_1,q}|𝐗(q_1)=𝐑,𝐗(q)=0)}`$
$`=`$ $`(2\pi q)^{3/2}{\displaystyle 𝑑𝐑E(F_{0,q_1}|𝐗(0)=0,𝐗(q_1)=𝐑)E(F_{0,q_2}|𝐗(0)=0,𝐗(q_2)=𝐑)}`$
with $`q=q_1+q_2`$. The second line follows from the symmetry relations (82) and the fact that the potential is invariant under space translations and inversion. Considering now the Wiener expectation of $`F_{0,q}(𝐗)`$ we establish in the same way

$$F_{0,q_1+q_2}_WF_{0,q_1}_WF_{0,q_2}_W$$
(88)
again as a consequence of the Markov property of the Brownian process and the invariance (82). We exploit the inequalities (LABEL:A.15) and (88) as follows. We first use (LABEL:A.15) to relax the constraint of closed path, noting from (81) that $`E(F_{0,q_2}|𝐗(0)=0,𝐗(q_2)=𝐑)(2\pi q_2)^{3/2}`$ and from (LABEL:A.15)

$$\kappa (q)\left(1+\frac{q_1}{q_2}\right)^{3/2}F_{0,q_1}_W,q=q_1+q_2,q_21$$
(89)
Then we set $`q_1=nq_0,q_2=n,q=n(q_0+1)`$ for some fixed integer $`q_01`$. From (89) and the iteration of (88)

$$\kappa (n(q_0+1))(1+q_0)^{3/2}(F_{0,q_0}_W)^n$$
(90)
If one sets

$$\nu _{}=\frac{1}{\beta (q_0+1)}\mathrm{ln}F_{0,q_0}_W>0,r=q_0+1$$
(91)
one obtains the result of the lemma 2.

Appendix 3: The Bose gas in an external potential

Motivated by the experimental situation of Bosonic atoms in traps, we briefly show in this Appendix how the formalism works in presence of an external field (more details can be found in ). If a one-body external potential $`V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)`$ is introduced, the formula for the grand canonical partition function $`\mathrm{\Xi }`$ is still given by (14) with the only change that the loop activity $`z()`$ is replaced by

$`\stackrel{~}{z}()`$ $`=`$ $`z()e^{\beta V^{\mathrm{ext}}()}`$
$`V^{\mathrm{ext}}()`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle _0^q}𝑑sV^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐑+\lambda 𝐗(s))`$ (92)
Since the the density is non uniform, it is appropriate to consider here the average total particle number $`N`$

$`N`$ $`=`$ $`\beta ^1{\displaystyle \frac{}{\mu }}\mathrm{ln}\mathrm{\Xi }`$ (93)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{n!}}{\displaystyle 𝑑_1\mathrm{}𝑑_n\left(\underset{\mathrm{}=1}{\overset{n}{}}q_{\mathrm{}}\right)\underset{k=1}{\overset{n}{}}\stackrel{~}{z}(_k)u(_1,\mathrm{},_n)}`$
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(n1)!}}{\displaystyle 𝑑_1\mathrm{}𝑑_nq_1\underset{k=1}{\overset{n}{}}\stackrel{~}{z}(_k)u(_1,\mathrm{},_n)}`$
where we have introduced the Mayer expansion of $`\mathrm{ln}\mathrm{\Xi }`$ and $`u(_1,\mathrm{},_n)`$ is the Ursell function (31).

The external potential will be chosen positive and confining with sufficiently fast growth at infinity so that $`𝑑𝐫\mathrm{exp}(\beta V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫))<\mathrm{}`$. In order to allow for a well defined infinite particle number limit it is necessary to scale the external potential as

$$V_\omega ^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)=V^{\mathrm{ext}}(\omega 𝐫)$$
(94)
with $`V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)`$ a fixed positive confining potential. As the scaling parameter $`\omega `$ tends to $`0`$, $`V_\omega ^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)`$ becomes less confining and the average particle number $`N(\beta ,\mu ,\omega )`$ diverges. The proper quantity that remains finite in the limit is the product $`\omega ^3N(\beta ,\mu ,\omega )`$. The experimental situation for atoms in traps appears to be well described in this asymptotic regime . We have indeed

Proposition 5

In the range of convergence of the Mayer series for the uniform Bose gas, $`lim_{\omega 0}\omega ^3N(\beta ,\mu ,\omega )𝒩(\beta ,\mu )`$ exists and

$$𝒩(\beta ,\mu )=𝑑𝐫\rho (\beta ,\mu V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫))$$
(95)
with $`\rho (\beta ,\mu )`$ the density of the uniform Bose gas.

In the scaling limit defined by (94), the gas is locally uniform at point $`𝐫`$ with a space dependent chemical potential $`\mu (𝐫)\mu V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)`$.

We write $`V_\omega ^{\mathrm{ext}}()=V^{\mathrm{ext}}(\omega 𝐑,q,\omega 𝐗)`$ and $`u(_1,\mathrm{},_n)=u(𝐑_1,q_1,𝐗_1,\mathrm{},𝐑_n,q_n,𝐗_n)`$. The spatial part of the integral in the nth order term of the series (93) reads (with the additional factor $`\omega ^3`$)

$$\omega ^3𝑑𝐑_1𝑑𝐑_2\mathrm{}𝑑𝐑_n\underset{k=1}{\overset{n}{}}e^{\beta V^{\mathrm{ext}}(\omega 𝐑_k,q_k,\omega 𝐗_k)}u(𝐑_1,q_1,𝐗_1,𝐑_2,q_2,𝐗_2,\mathrm{},𝐑_n,q_n,𝐗_n)$$

$`={\displaystyle 𝑑𝐫e^{\beta V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫,q_1,\omega 𝐗_1)}}`$ $`\times `$ $`{\displaystyle 𝑑𝐑_2\mathrm{}𝑑𝐑_n\underset{k=2}{\overset{n}{}}e^{\beta V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫+\omega 𝐑_k,q_k,\omega 𝐗_k)}}`$ (96)
$`\times `$ $`u(0,q_1,𝐗_1,𝐑_2,q_2,𝐗_2,\mathrm{},𝐑_n,q_n,𝐗_n)`$
where one has made the sucessive change of variables $`𝐑_k𝐑_k+𝐑_1,k=2,\mathrm{},n`$, then $`\omega 𝐑_1=𝐫`$ and used that the Ursell function is translation invariant with respect to its spatial variables. Since $`lim_{\omega 0}V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫+\omega 𝐑_k,q_k,\omega 𝐗_k)=q_kV^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)`$ and the Ursell function is jointly integrable on $`𝐑_2,\mathrm{},𝐑_k`$ the expression (96) tends by dominated convergence to

$$𝑑𝐫\left[\underset{k=1}{\overset{n}{}}e^{q_kV^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)}\right]\left[𝑑𝐑_2\mathrm{}𝑑𝐑_nu(0,𝐗_1,q_1,𝐑_2,𝐗_2,q_2,\mathrm{},𝐑_n,𝐗_n,q_n)\right]$$
(97)
The first bracket, when combined with the loop activity $`z()`$ (22), simply yields the shifted local chemical potential $`\mu (𝐫)=\mu V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)`$ whereas the second bracket is the spatial part of the integral of the Ursell function occuring in the loop density series (29) of the uniform gas evaluated at point $`𝐑_1=0`$. When this is introduced in the series (93) for $`\omega ^3N(\beta ,\mu ,\omega )`$ and the integrations on the internal degrees of freedom of the loops are taken into account (using also (32)), one obtains the result (95) in the limit $`\omega 0`$.

To show convergence, one introduces the expresssion (96) in the series (93) and majorize factors $`e^{\beta V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫+\omega 𝐑_k,q_k,\omega 𝐗_k)}`$ by $`1`$, $`k=2,\mathrm{},n`$ :

$`\omega ^3N(\beta ,\mu ,\omega )`$ $``$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{n=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{(n1)!}}{\displaystyle \underset{q_1=1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}q_1{\displaystyle D_{q_1}(𝐗_1)𝑑𝐫e^{\beta V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫,q_1,\omega 𝐗_1)}}`$ (98)
$`\times `$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{k=1}{\overset{n}{}}}z(_k){\displaystyle 𝑑_2\mathrm{}𝑑_nu(_1,_2,\mathrm{},_n)}`$
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{q_1}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}}q_1{\displaystyle D_{q_1}(𝐗_1)𝑑𝐫e^{\beta V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫,q_1,\omega 𝐗_1)}\rho _{\mathrm{loop}}(_1)}`$
where $`\rho _{\mathrm{loop}}(_1)`$ is the Mayer series (29) for the uniform system evaluted at $`_1=(0,q_1,𝐗_1)`$. Using again the positivity of $`V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)`$ and Jensen inequality we have

$`{\displaystyle D_{q_1}(𝐗_1)𝑑𝐫e^{\beta V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫,q_1,\omega 𝐗_1)}}`$ (99)
$``$ $`{\displaystyle }D_{q_1}(𝐗_1){\displaystyle }d𝐫\mathrm{exp}(\beta {\displaystyle _0^1}dsV_{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫+\omega \lambda 𝐗(s))`$
$``$ $`{\displaystyle }D_{q_1}(𝐗_1){\displaystyle _0^1}ds{\displaystyle }d𝐫\mathrm{exp}(\beta V_{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫+\omega \lambda 𝐗(s))={\displaystyle }d𝐫e^{\beta V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫))}`$
The convergence of Mayer series (29) is established in Proposition 2 with bounds that are independant of the shape $`𝐗_1`$ of the loop $`_1`$. Combining this previous analysis with (99), one gets eventually

$$\omega ^3N(\beta ,\mu ,\omega )\overline{\rho }(\mu )𝑑𝐫e^{\beta V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)}$$
(100)
with $`\overline{\rho }(\mu )`$ defined in Proposition 2. Since estimates are uniform with respect to $`\omega `$, the existence of the limit (95) follows again by dominated convergence.

Moreover if the two-body potential is scaled according to (9), one obtains immediately from Proposition 3 the mean field limit for the trapped Bose gas

$$𝒩_{\mathrm{mf}}(\beta ,\mu )\underset{\gamma 0}{lim}𝒩(\beta ,\mu ,\gamma )=𝑑𝐫\rho _{\mathrm{mf}}(\beta ,\mu V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫))$$
(101)
This result is established by other methods in  in a sligtly different situation: the external potential considered in  has support in a box of volume $`L^3`$ and is scaled according to the size of the box (namely $`\omega =\frac{1}{L}`$ in (94)).

The thermodynamics of the mean field trapped gas can be studied in detail from (101). If $`\mu \mu _c=a\rho _{0,c}`$ (the critical chemical potential of the homogeneous mean field gas), then $`\mu (𝐫)=\mu V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)\mu _c`$ for all $`𝐫`$, so condensation does not occur anywhere. If $`\mu >\mu _c`$ there is a local condensate of density $`\left[\mu (𝐫)/a\rho _{0,c}\right]`$ at all points $`𝐫`$ such that $`\mu (𝐫)>\mu _c`$, namely in the region of space $`\mathrm{\Delta }=\{𝐫|V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)<\mu \mu _c\}`$. Then the total amount of condensate is

$$𝒩_{\mathrm{cond}}(\beta ,\mu )=_\mathrm{\Delta }𝑑𝐫\left[\mu (𝐫)/a\rho _{0,c}\right]$$
(102)
Obviously $`𝒩_{\mathrm{cond}}(\beta ,\mu )`$ vanishes at $`\mu =\mu _c`$ so the critical temperature $`T_c(𝒩)`$ as function of the total particle number is defined as the solution of (101) when $`\mu =\mu _c`$ and $`𝒩`$ is fixed, namely

$$𝒩_{\mathrm{mf}}(\beta _c,\mu (\beta _c))=𝒩,\mu (\beta )=a\rho _{0,c}(\beta )$$
(103)
As an example, for an harmonic potential $`V^{\mathrm{ext}}(𝐫)=b|𝐫|^2/2`$, one finds a critical behaviour of the condensate fraction $`𝒩_{\mathrm{cond}}(\beta ,𝒩)/𝒩`$ of the form (keeping now the particle number $`𝒩=𝒩_{\mathrm{mf}}(\beta ,\mu )`$ fixed)

$$\frac{𝒩_{\mathrm{cond}}(\beta ,𝒩)}{𝒩}\left(1\frac{T}{T_c}\right)^{5/2},TT_c$$
(104)
This is to be contrasted with the behaviours of the same fraction for the homogeneous free or mean field gas ($`1\left(\frac{T}{T_{0,c}}\right)^{3/2}`$) and for the free gas in an harmonic potential ($`1\left(\frac{T}{T_{\mathrm{trap},c}}\right)^3`$) when $`T`$ approaches the corresponding critical temperatures.

Clearly, when corrections to the mean field density of the homogeneous gas are known, they can be implemented in equation (95) and thus will also give interesting informations on imperfect trapped gases.