Final answer:
The JPA dependency can be used to connect a Spring application to a SQL database by providing a standard way to interact with the database and perform various operations.
Step-by-step explanation:
The dependency that can be used to connect your Spring application to a SQL database is JPA (Java Persistence API). JPA is a Java specification that provides a standard way to interact with databases. It allows you to map Java objects to database tables, write queries in a database-independent language (JPQL), and perform various database operations.
When using JPA, you also need to configure a database connection with the appropriate JDBC driver. The driver depends on the specific SQL database you are using. For example, if you are using MySQL, you would need to include the MySQL Connector/J dependency in your Spring Boot project.
Other dependencies mentioned in the question are not directly related to connecting to a SQL database. The DevTools dependency provides additional development tools and features, the Web dependency is for building web applications, and the H2 dependency is an in-memory database often used for testing purposes.