FIELD AND PARTICLE EQUATIONS FOR A GAUGE-THEORY BASED ON THE (4,1) DE SITTER GROUP

Particle equations of motion are extracted from a set of gauge field equations based on the group SO 4,1. The mass is seen in the particle limit to be related to a set of quantities, m ab, which appear in the Lorentz-type equations of motion, transform under the adjoint representation of the gauge group and are covariant constant in the motion of the particle along its trajectory. The gauge-invariant expression 1/2 m ab m ab determines the actual rest mass of a point particle possessing a non-Abelian gauge interaction of de Sitter type. It appears that in the particle limit each gauge interaction gives rise to a separate mass contribution. Although shown in a particular example (SO 4,1) these results are valid for an arbitrary semi-simple gauge group. © 1979 Società Italiana di Fisica.