The Dirac delta function cannot be applied to complex

arguments
Sergei Winitzki
February 3, 2006
There are claims in the literature [1] that (x ia) may be dened as an analytic function such that
_
f(x)(x ia)dx = f(ia), (1)
where the integration may proceed along some contours in the complex plane, not necessarily passing
through x = ia. The purpose of the present note is to explain that this statement holds only under certain
stringent constraints on f(x) and is incorrect for general f(x).
Let us begin with the well-known denition of the function,
lim
0
1

2
exp
_

(x x
0
)
2
2
2
_
= (x x
0
) . (2)
The limit in Eq. (2) is usually understood in the distributional sense, i.e. both sides are functionals dened
on integrable and continuous base functions. What if one takes x
0
to be a complex number? For instance,
if x
0
= ia, where a is real, will the distributional limit be equal to (x ia) and if so, what exactly does
(x ia) mean?
The answer is that the distributional limit does not exist, i.e.
lim
0
1

2
exp
_

(x ia)
2
2
2
_
is undened. (3)
More precisely: For some base functions f (x) the limit
lim
0
_
+

f (x)
1

2
exp
_

(x ia)
2
2
2
_
dx (4)
exists, but for some other functions f (x) this limit does not exist. Therefore, there is no meaning to be
assigned to (x ia) in the distributional limit; (x ia) is not a distribution dened on continuous base
functions.
To demonstrate this statement explicitly, consider the application of the functional (3) to a continuous
base function f(x),
lim
0
1

2
_
+

dxf (x) exp

_

(x ia)
2
2
2
_
, (5)
and choose the base function f(x) as an almost step function,
f (x) =
_
1, |x| < 1,
almost 0, |x| > 1.
(6)
(The phrase almost 0 means that we choose f (x) as a continuous function which rapidly goes to zero
when |x| > 1. An explicit representation can be found easily.) Then the integral in Eq. (5) can be expressed
as
1

2
_
+

dxf (x) exp

_

(x ia)
2
2
2
_
=
1
2
_
erf
_
1 ai

2
_
+ erf
_
1 + ai

2
__
, (7)
1
where erf(...) is the error function. The asymptotic behavior of erf z at large complex z is
erf z 1
1
z

exp
_
z
2
_
+ ..., |z| , (8)
which indicates that
lim
0

erf
1 ai

=
_
1, |a| 1,
, |a| > 1.
(9)
Therefore at small the function in Eq. (7) tends to 1 when |a| 1 but oscillates and diverges to
when |a| > 1. Thus the distributional limit 0 does not yield a well-dened functional on continuous
functions.
Let us try to use a different distributional limit for the -function, for instance,
(x) =
1

lim
0

x
2
+
2
.
We nd that the distributional limit
1

lim
0

(x ia)
2
+
2
= 0
for real a = 0. A quick way to verify this: for real x,

(x ia)
2
+
2

<

x
2
+ a
2
< a
2
0 as 0. (10)
These results are perhaps not surprising since analytic continuations, such as f(ia), are undened if
f(x) is merely continuous. One may then ask whether the distributional limit (3) exists if f (x) is an
analytic function. Indeed, in that case f (ia) is well-dened and indeed under suitable restrictions on f (x)
we can compute
lim
0
_
+

f (x)
1

2
exp
_

(x ia)
2
2
2
_
dx = f (ia) (11)
by shifting the integration contour so that it passes through x = ia. For example, consider the test function
f(x) =
1
1 + x
2
. (12)
By shifting the contour of integration to the line z = ia + x, one easily nds
lim
0
_
+

f (x)
1

2
exp
_

(x ia)
2
2
2
_
f(x)dx =
_
f(ia), |a| = 1
, |a| = 1
. (13)
Therefore the limit (11) at 0 does represent f(ia) for some analytic test functions f(x), but not for
every analytic function.
Finally, we show that Eq. (11) holds only under the following restrictions on f(x). To perform the
integration in Eq. (11), one should be able to shift the contour of integration such that it passes through the
point ia in the complex plane. If the contour must intersect a pole of f(x) during this shifting, each such
pole must be located at a point within the domain given by Re (x ia)
2
> 0 in the complex x plane. In
that case, the residues will vanish in the limit 0. Since this condition is a rather complicated set of
technical restrictions on f(x), it is natural to regard the cases when the limit (11) holds as accidental, and
the notion of an analytic -function as either ill-dened or having a rather limited range of applications.
References
[1] I.V. Lindell, Am. J. Phys. 61 (5), 1993, p. 438.
2