STAGGERED FERMIONS AND CHIRAL-SYMMETRY BREAKING IN TRANSVERSE LATTICEREGULATED QED

Staggered fermions are constructed for the transverse lattice regulari zation scheme. The weak perturbation theory of transverse lattice nonc ompact QED is developed in the light-cone gauge, and we argue that for fixed lattice spacing this theory is ultraviolet finite, order by ord er in perturbation theory. However, by calculating the anomalous scali ng dimension of the link fields, we find that the interaction Hamilton ian becomes nonrenormalizable for g2(a) > 4pi, where g (a) is the bare (lattice) QED coupling constant. We conjecture that this is the criti cal point of the chiral-symmetry-breaking phase transition in QED. Non perturbative chiral-symmetry breaking is then studied in the strong-co upling limit. The discrete remnant of chiral symmetry that remains on the lattice is spontaneously broken, and the ground state to lowest or der in the strong-coupling expansion corresponds to the classical grou nd state of the two-dimensional spin-1/2 Heisenberg antiferromagnet.