Soft breaking of BRST symmetry and gauge dependence

Abstract

We continue investigation of soft breaking of BRST symmetry in the Batalin-Vilkovisky (BV) formalism beyond regularizations like dimensional ones used in our previous paper [JHEP 1110 (2011) 043, arXiv:1108.4820 [hep-th]]. We generalize a definition of soft breaking of BRST symmetry valid for general gauge theories and arbitrary gauge fixing. The gauge dependence of generating functionals of Green's functions is investigated. It is proved that such introduction of a soft breaking of BRST symmetry into gauge theories leads to inconsistency of the conventional BV formalism.

1+11 pages, presentation improved, comparison with the results from the paper arXiv:1108.4820 [hep-th] clarified in details