A 3D field-theoretic example for Hodge theory

\n\nWe focus on the continuous symmetry transformations for the three (2 + 1)-dimensional (3D) system of a combination of the free Abelian 1-form and 2-form gauge theories within the framework of Becchi-Rouet-Stora-Tyutin (BRST) formalism. We establish that this combined system is a tractable field-theoretic model of Hodge theory. The symmetry operators of our present system provide the physical realizations of the de Rham cohomological operators of differential geometry at the algebraic level. Our present investigation is important in the sense that, for the first time, we are able to establish an odd dimensional (i.e., D = 3) field-theoretic system to be an example for Hodge theory (besides earlier works on a few interesting (0 + 1)-dimensional (1D) toy models as well as a set of well-known ${\\mathcal {N}} = 2$ SUSY quantum mechanical systems of physical interest). For the sake of brevity, we have purposely not taken into account the 3D Chern-Simon term for the Abelian 1-form gauge field in our theory which allows the mass as well as the gauge invariance to co-exist together.\n