Repulsive inverse-distance interatomic interaction from many-body quantum electrodynamics.

Interactions between objects can be classified as fundamental or emergent. Fundamental interactions are either extremely short-range or decay inversely with the separation distance, such as the Coulomb potential between charges or the gravitational attraction between masses. In contrast, emergent quantum van der Waals (vdW) and Casimir interactions decay considerably faster (R-6 or R-7) with distance R. Here, we apply perturbative quantum electrodynamics (QED) to a many-body (MB) system of atoms modeled as charged harmonic oscillators, and reveal a persistent inverse-distance MB-QED interaction stemming from the coupling between virtual photons and molecular plasmons in the nonretarded regime. This interaction, scaling with the third power of the fine-structure constant, is reminiscent of the Lamb shift for a single atom. Although weaker than vdW forces, this MB-QED R-1 interaction may substantially surpass gravitational attraction in future experiments probing quantum gravity at microscopic scales.