Conformal anomalies revisited: closed form effective actions in D ≥ 4

Abstract

We present closed-form coordinate invariant effective actions, for both types of Weyl anomalies, in all D ≥ 4 that vary into the respective anomalies and confirm that their nonlocalities match (as they must) the underlying diagrammatics. In particular, despite contrary appearances, generalized Polyakov form type A actions both yield the correct anomalies and reproduce the lowest order pole structure. However, already to lowest order, these actions cannot be obtained from integrating out a physically acceptable local compensating field action. For type B, a previous candidate with the wrong analytic behavior indeed fails to vary properly. Instead, correct type B actions are given that reflects their UV origin and logarithmic scale dependence; they are constructed in terms of novel Weyl invariant tensor operators.