62 Chapter 3. The Dirac Field associated with this current is Q= f Be yp (0) (a) = ls a tr 2 (9895 +). or, if we ignore another infinite constant, Q= [oe Fa (*e shay — bslds). (3.113) So ag! creates fermions with charge +1, while bst creates antifermions with charge —1, When we couple the Dirac field to the electromagnetic field, we will see that Q is none other than the electric charge (up to a constant factor that depends on which type of particle we wish to describe; e.g., for electrons, the electric charge is Qe). In Quantum Electrodynamics we will use the spinor field ¢ to describe electrons and positrons. The particles created by ag are electrons; they have energy Ep, momentum p, spin 1/2 with polarization appropriate to €°, and charge +1 (in units of e). The particles created by bg' are positrons; they have energy Ep, momentum p, spin 1/2 with polarization opposite to that of £°, and charge —1. The state ¢_(x) |0) contains a positron at position 2, whose polarization corresponds to the spinor component chosen. Similarly, 7 is a state of one electron at position z. The Dirac Propagator Calculating propagation amplitudes for the Dirac field is by now a straight- forward exercise: (0| a (@)¥8o(u) 0} = Ooi Lvalooagtaye rom Pp 1 ine = (8.4 my f EBeghe i@—, (3.114) | wham DeyTB(pye reo Pp 1 (@n)3 2B, 0] Dy(yval2) |0) ety) (3.115) (9, +m), Just as we did for the Klein-Gordon equation, we can construct Green’s functions for the Dirac equation obeying various boundary conditions, For example, the retarded Green’s function is SB (a — y) = O(a — y") (0 {da(w), Foly)} 10) . (3.116) Tt is easy.to verify that Sr(w- y) if, +m)Dp(x—y), (3.117)