1997/09/30 by J. W. van Holten · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #hep-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.1016/s0550-3213(98)00382-4
published as Nucl.Phys. B529 (1998) 525-543 · 23 pages
arxiv created 1998/02/06 · arxiv updated 2009/11/30
In this paper we consider classical point particles in full interaction with an arbitrary number of dynamical scalar and (abelian) vector fields. It is shown that the requirement of stability ---vanishing self-force--- is sufficient to remove the well-known inconsistencies of the classical theory: the divergent self-energy, as well as the failure of Lorentz-covariance of the energy-momentum when including the contributions of the fields. As a result, in these models the mass of a point particle becomes finitely computable. It is shown how these models are connected to quantum field theory via the path-integral representation of the propagator.