The two-loop Lamb shift: the final missing contribution

Abstract

The last significant unknown contribution to the two-loop Lamb shift, namely the electron self-energy with vacuum-polarization insertion into the photon line, is determined including higher-order effects in the parameter $αZ$, with $α$ being the fine-structure constant and $Z$ the nuclear charge number. Our calculation improves the accuracy of theoretical predictions for energy levels and transition energies in heavy hydrogen-like and lithium-like ions by up to one order of magnitude, enabling more stringent comparisons between theory and available experimental results. These results pave the way for more precise tests of quantum electrodynamics in the strong-field regime, as well as for accurate determinations of nuclear charge radii.