Symmetry Breaking through Bell-Jackiw Anomalies

In models of fermions coupled to gauge fields certain current-conservation laws are violated by Bell-Jackiw anomalies. In perturbation theory the total charge corresponding to such currents seems to be still conserved, but here it is shown that nonperturbative effects can give rise to interactions that violate the charge conservation. One consequence is baryon and lepton number nonconservation in $V\ensuremath{-}A$ gauge theories with charm. Another is the nonvanishing mass squared of the $\ensuremath{\eta}$.