The Renormalization Group and the Effective Action

Abstract: The renormalization group is used to sum the leading-log (LL) contributions to the effective action for a large constant external gauge field in terms of the one-loop renormalization group (RG) function beta, the next-to-leading-log (NLL) contributions in terms of the two-loop RG function etc. The log independent pieces are not determined by the RG equation, but can be fixed by the anomaly in the trace of the energy-momentum tensor. Similar considerations can be applied to the effective potential V for a scalar field phi; here the log independent pieces are fixed by the condition V'(phi=v)=0.