Conformal anomalies and the gravitational effective action: The TJJ correlator for a dirac fermion

We compute in linearized gravity all the contributions to the gravitational effective action due to a virtual Dirac fermion, related to the conformal anomaly. This requires, in perturbation theory, the identification of the gauge-gauge-graviton vertex off mass shell, involving the correlator of the energy-momentum tensor and two vector currents (TJJ), which is responsible for the generation of the gauge contributions to the conformal anomaly in gravity. We also present the anomalous effective action expanded in the inverse mass of the fermion as in the Euler-Heisenberg case. © 2010 The American Physical Society.