Renormalized strong-coupling quenched QED in four dimensions

Abstract

We study renormalized quenched strong-coupling QED in four dimensions in an arbitrary covariant gauge. Above the critical coupling leading to dynamical chiral symmetry breaking, we show that there is no finite chiral limit. This behavior is found to be independent of the detailed choice of photon-fermion proper vertex in the Dyson-Schwinger equation formalism, provided that the vertex is consistent with the Ward-Takahashi identity and multiplicative renormalizability. We show that the finite solutions previously reported lie in an unphysical regime of the theory with multiple solutions and ultraviolet oscillations in the mass functions. This study is consistent with the assertion that in four dimensions strong coupling QED does not have a continuum limit in the conventional sense.