Necessary Dependence of Currents on Fields They Generate

Abstract

It is shown that in local (proper) Lorentz-invariant theories involving axial-vector, or tensor currents (conserved or not), the latter must vanish, if they commute at equal times with the fields they generate. The need for explicit field dependence of currents is demonstrated for gradient-coupled spinless and massive spin-one fields, as well as for electrodynamics with minimal or nonminimal coupling. The field-dependence requirement is distinct from that (already needed for free fields) of "spreading points" to make the current operators well-defined. The relation between the two, however, essentially fixes the form of this dependence. Applications are made to partially conserved currents, ∂_μ^μ = αϕ; if j^0 commutes with ϕ, the latter vanishes.