In quantum physics, in order to quantize a gauge theory, like for example Yang-Mills theory, Chern-Simons or BF model, one method is to perform a gauge fixing. This is done in the BRST and Batalin-Vilkovisky formulation. Another is to factor out the symmetry by dispensing with vector potentials altogether (they're not physically observable anyway) and work directly with Wilson loops, Wilson lines contracted with other charged fields at its endpoints and spin networks.
Older approaches to quantization for Abelian models use the Gupta-Bleuler formalism with a "semi-Hilbert space" with an indefinite sesquilinear form. However, it is much more elegant to just work with the quotient space of vector field configurations by gauge transformations.
An alternative approach using lattice approximations is covered in (Wick rotated) lattice gauge theory.
To establish the existence of the Yang-Mills theory and a mass gap is one of the seven Millennium Prize Problems of the Clay Mathematics Institute.
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