Ward's identity in critical dynamics

We consider the relaxation of an order-parameter fluctuation of wave numberk in a system undergoing a second-order phase transition. In general, close to the critical point, wherek ^{–1 –1} (the correlation length) the relaxation rate has a linear dependence on/k of the form (k, ) = (k, 0)x(1–a/k). In analogy with the use of Ward's identity in elementary particle physics, we show that the numerical coefficienta is readily calculated by means of a mass insertion. We demonstrate, furthermore, that this initial linear drop is the main feature of the full/k dependence of the scaling functionR ^–x (k,), wherex is the dynamic critical exponent andR=(k²+ ²)^1/2 is the distance variable.