Asymptotic dynamics, large gauge transformations and infrared symmetries

Abstract: Infrared divergences in QED and other theories with massless particles show that in such theories the $S$ matrix cannot be defined in the usual way. Typically, this is not viewed as a big problem since one is interested in cross sections, in which the divergences cancel. Recently, one particular type of divergences known as soft theorems was connected to a symmetry principle - the antipodal matching of large gauge transformations. However, there is a way to define an IR finite $S$ matrix in QED and similar theories by dropping the assumption of trivial asymptotic dynamics. In the present paper we investigate the role of soft theorems and invariance under large gauge transformations in the context of the finite $S$ matrix. Before doing so, the construction of asymptotic dynamics is reviewed and extended. The key results are that subleading soft factors can be included in a natural way in the asymptotic dynamics. Once this is done, soft modes decouple from the IR finite $S$ matrix and this decoupling, which can be understood as a spontaneously broken symmetry, is equivalent to the invariance under large gauge transformations (or in other words to the antipodal matching). To show this equivalence a special property for field operators at null infinity, i.e. for the program of asymptotic quantization, is assumed. Finally, we speculate about the modification of the decoupling of soft modes in the presence of black holes.