We discuss under what conditions the duality between electric and magnetic fields is a valid symmetry of macroscopic quantum electrodynamics. It is shown that Maxwell’s equations in the absence of free charges satisfy duality invariance on an operator level, whereas this is not true for Lorentz forces and atom-field couplings in general. We prove that derived quantities such as Casimir forces, local-field corrected decay rates, as well as van der Waals potentials are invariant with respect to a global exchange of electric and magnetic quantities. This exact symmetry can be used to deduce the physics of new configurations on the basis of already established ones.

• Received 13 June 2008

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.102.140404