Timeline for Spectral sequences and Batalin-Vilkovisky formalism
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| Feb 10, 2015 at 10:15 | comment | added | Igor Khavkine | Also, I think it's incorrect to characterize the BV (or BV-BRST) formalism as a generalization intended for "supersymmetric gauge theories". The BV formalism applies quite happily to field theories with or without any kind of symmetries (gauge-, super- or otherwise). What BV can do that simple BRST cannot is to allow certain symmetry-related identities to hold only modulo the equations of motion. The Barnich-Brandt-Henneaux review you linked to in fact already covers the BV (aka "field-antifield") formalism, with evidently copious applications of methods of homological algebra. | |
| Feb 10, 2015 at 10:10 | comment | added | Igor Khavkine | I would voice a disagreement with a premise in this question, which is that "cohomology + spectral sequences = algebraic topology". Cohomology and various mathematical tools related to it make up the so-called subject of "homological algebra", essentially an advanced extension of what is considered elementary linear algebra. It may have originated in algebraic topology, but has since then transcended that subject and has found many applications in other branches of mathematics. In particular, you have noted that it has applications in mathematical physics, in quantization of gauge theories. | |
| Feb 10, 2015 at 8:43 | history | asked | ruadath | CC BY-SA 3.0 |