Abstract
We introduce a new diagrammatic approach to perturbative quantum field theory, which we call flow-oriented perturbation theory (FOPT). Within it, Feynman graphs are replaced by strongly connected directed graphs (digraphs). FOPT is a coordinate space analogue of time-ordered perturbation theory and loop-tree duality, but it has the advantage of having combinatorial and canonical Feynman rules, combined with a simplified iε dependence of the resulting integrals. Moreover, we introduce a novel digraph-based representation for the S-matrix. The associated integrals involve the Fourier transform of the flow polytope. Due to this polytope’s properties, our S-matrix representation exhibits manifest infrared singularity factorization on a per-diagram level. Our findings reveal an interesting interplay between spurious singularities and Fourier transforms of polytopes.
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Borinsky, M., Capatti, Z., Laenen, E. et al. Flow-oriented perturbation theory. J. High Energ. Phys. 2023, 172 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP01(2023)172
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP01(2023)172