Screening in three-dimensional QED with arbitrary fermion mass

Abstract

We compute the quark--antiquark potential in three dimensional massive Quantum Electrodynamics for arbitrary fermion mass. The result indicates that screening prevails for any quark masses, contrary to the classical expectations, generalizing our previous result obtained for large masses. We also test the validity of several approximation schemes using a detailed numerical analysis. The classical result is still reproduced for small separation of the quarks.Comment: latex, 10 pages, 4 figures (6 ps-files