The sign of the dipole-dipole potential by axion exchange

We calculate a dipole-dipole potential between fermions mediated by a light pseudoscalar, axion, paying a particular attention to the overall sign. While the sign of the potential is physical and important for experiments to discover or constrain the axion coupling to fermions, there is often a sign error in the literature. The purpose of this short note is to clarify the sign issue of the axion-mediated dipole-dipole potential. As a by-product, we find a sign change of the dipole-dipole potenital due to the different spin of the mediating particle. (C) 2017 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V.