Constraints and Conserved Charges for Modified Massive and Massless Abelian 1-Form and 2-Form Theories: A Brief Review

Abstract: We demonstrate that the generators for the local, continuous and infinitesimal classical gauge symmetry transformations in the cases of (i) the St$\ddot u$ckelberg-modified massive Abelian 1-form and 2-form theories, and (ii) the massless Abelian 1-form and 2-form free theories owe their origin to the first-class constraints of the these theories. We establish a connection between the standard forms of the generators and the Noether conserved charges for the modified massive and massless versions of the above theories. We discuss the appearance of these constraints, within the framework of Becchi-Rouet-Stora-Tyutin (BRST) formalism, through the physicality criteria w.r.t. the conserved and nilpotent (anti-)BRST charges. One of the highlights of our present investigation is the observation that, in the context of the modified massive and massless Abelian 2-form theories, the modified forms of the standard Noether (anti-)BRST charges are required which are found to be off-shell nilpotent and they lead to the appearance of the operator forms of the first-class constraints through the physicality criteria at the quantum level. We also comment on (i) the existence of the Curci-Ferrari (CF)-type restrictions on the Abelian 2-form theories (with and without mass), (ii) the modifications in the St$\ddot u$ckelberg-technique for the massive 2D Abelian 1-form and 4D Abelian 2-form theories and their consequences, and (iii) the off-shell nilpotent version of the conserved co-BRST charge and its role in the physicality criteria for the St$\ddot u$ckelberg-modified 4D massive Abelian 2-form theory.