Kaluza-Klein reduction and consistency of the massive spin-3/2 theory with external interaction

Abstract

A gauge-invariant Rarita-Schwinger theory of a massive spin-3/2 particle interacting with external electromagnetic, gravitational and dilaton fields is obtained by Kaluza-Klein reduction of a massless Rarita-Schwinger theory with graviational interaction. Fermionic gauge invariance serves to determine the background equations of motion. The couplings with external fields obtained by the Kaluza-Klein reduction are shown to lead to the absence of the classical Velo-Zwanziger problem and on quantizing using Dirac's procedure, the field anticommutators are found to be positive definite.