Historical roots of gauge invariance

Abstract

Gauge invariance is the basis of the modern theory of electroweak and strong interactions (the so called Standard Model). The roots of gauge invariance go back to the year 1820 when electromagnetism was discovered and the first electrodynamic theory was proposed. Subsequent developments led to the discovery that different forms of the vector potential result in the same observable forces. The partial arbitrariness of the vector potential A brought forth various restrictions on it. div A = 0 was proposed by J. C. Maxwell; 4-div A = 0 was proposed L. V. Lorenz in the middle of 1860's . In most of the modern texts the latter condition is attributed to H. A. Lorentz, who half a century later was one of the key figures in the final formulation of classical electrodynamics. In 1926 a relativistic quantum-mechanical equation for charged spinless particles was formulated by E. Schrodinger, O. Klein, and V. Fock. The latter discovered that this equation is invariant with respect to multiplication of the wave function by a phase factor exp(ieX/hc) with the accompanying additions to the scalar potential of -dX/cdt and to the vector potential of grad X. In 1929 H. Weyl proclaimed this invariance as a general principle and called it Eichinvarianz in German and gauge invariance in English. The present era of non-abelian gauge theories started in 1954 with the paper by C. N. Yang and R. L. Mills.