Journal of High Energy Physics (Jan 2022)
Large N external-field quantum electrodynamics
Abstract
Abstract We advocate the study of external-field quantum electrodynamics with N charged particle flavors. Our main focus is on the Heisenberg-Euler effective action for this theory in the large N limit which receives contributions from all loop orders. The contributions beyond one loop stem from one-particle reducible diagrams. We show that specifically in constant electromagnetic fields the latter are generated by the one-loop Heisenberg-Euler effective Lagrangian. Hence, in this case the large N Heisenberg-Euler effective action can be determined explicitly at any desired loop order. We demonstrate that further analytical insights are possible for electric-and magnetic-like field configurations characterized by the vanishing of one of the secular invariants of the electromagnetic field and work out the all-orders strong field limit of the theory.
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