  We report on a quantum electrodynamic (QED) investigation of the interaction
between a ground state atom with another atom in an excited state. General
expressions, applicable to any atom, are indicated for the long-range tails
which are due to virtual resonant emission and absorption into and from vacuum
modes whose frequency equals the transition frequency to available lower-lying
atomic states. For identical atoms, one of which is in an excited state, we
also discuss the mixing term which depends on the symmetry of the two-atom wave
function (these evolve into either the gerade or the ungerade state for close
approach), and we include all nonresonant states in our rigorous QED treatment.
In order to illustrate the findings, we analyze the fine-structure resolved van
der Waals interaction for nD-1S hydrogen interactions with n=8,10,12 and find
surprisingly large numerical coefficients.
