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Nonlocal Structure of Higher Spin Fields
Author(s) -
Capri Anton Z.
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
fortschritte der physik
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.469
H-Index - 71
eISSN - 1521-3978
pISSN - 0015-8208
DOI - 10.1002/1521-3978(200205)50:5/7<512::aid-prop512>3.0.co;2-2
Subject(s) - superluminal motion , electromagnetic field , spin (aerodynamics) , physics , field (mathematics) , magnetic field , theoretical physics , classical mechanics , mathematics , quantum mechanics , pure mathematics , thermodynamics
We first review the problem of superluminal propagation or even loss of propagation for higher spin fields minimally coupled to an external electromagnetic field, discovered by Velo and Zwanziger in the 1960's. Then, we show that these fields have a nonlocal structure. This indicates that these fields have internal structure and should not be considered as elementary. The main tool in this investigation is the use of a Peirce decomposition of the algebra of the matrices occuring in the first order wave equations for these fields.