Testing perturbation theory on the Nf=0 static quark potential

The perturbative expansion of static force and potential is reanalyzed concerning its practical applicability. A well behaved perturbative prediction is given by the integration of the renormalization group equation for the coupling αqq(μ=1/r)=(Cf)−1r2F(r). Since the Lambda-parameter of the Nf=0 theory is known from [ALPHA Collaboration, S. Capitani, M. Lüscher, R. Sommer, H. Wittig, Nucl. Phys. B 544 (1999) 669], the perturbative prediction contains no free parameter. It is confronted with recent non-perturbative results. For α≲0.3 where the truncation error of the perturbative expression is naively estimated to be moderate, it is really quite accurate and large “non-perturbative terms” are excluded.