Calculation of the One- and Two-Loop Lamb Shift for Arbitrary Excited Hydrogenic States

Abstract

General expressions for quantum electrodynamic corrections to the one-loop self-energy [of order alpha(Zalpha)^6] and for the two-loop Lamb shift [of order alpha^2(Z\alpha)^] are derived. The latter includes all diagrams with closed fermion loops. The general results are valid for arbitrary excited non-S hydrogenic states and for the normalized Lamb shift difference of S states, defined as Delta_n = n^3 DeltaE(nS) - DeltaE(1S). We present numerical results for one-loop and two-loop corrections for excited S, P and D states. In particular, the normalized Lamb shift difference of S states is calculated with an uncertainty of order 0.1 kHz.