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Strong Casimir force reduction through metallic surface nanostructuring

Journal Article · · Nature Communications
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms3515· OSTI ID:1623926
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [4];  [5];  [6];  [4];  [7];  [3]
  1. Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States). Theoretical Div.; DOE/OSTI
  2. National Inst. of Standards and Technology (NIST), Gaithersburg, MD (United States). Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology; Univ. of Maryland, College Park, MD (United States). Maryland Nanocenter
  3. Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States). Center for Nanoscale Materials
  4. National Inst. of Standards and Technology (NIST), Gaithersburg, MD (United States). Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology
  5. Sandia National Lab. (SNL-NM), Albuquerque, NM (United States). Applied Photonics and Microsystems
  6. Indiana Univ.-Purdue, Indianapolis, IN (United States). Dept. of Physics
  7. Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States). Theoretical Div.
The Casimir force between bodies in vacuum can be understood as arising from their interaction with an infinite number of fluctuating electromagnetic quantum vacuum modes, resulting in a complex dependence on the shape and material of the interacting objects. Becoming dominant at small separations, the force has a significant role in nanomechanics and object manipulation at the nanoscale, leading to a considerable interest in identifying structures where the Casimir interaction behaves significantly different from the well-known attractive force between parallel plates. Here we experimentally demonstrate that by nanostructuring one of the interacting metal surfaces at scales below the plasma wavelength, an unexpected regime in the Casimir force can be observed. Replacing a flat surface with a deep metallic lamellar grating with sub-100 nm features strongly suppresses the Casimir force and for large inter-surfaces separations reduces it beyond what would be expected by any existing theoretical prediction.
Research Organization:
Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States); Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC02-06CH11357; AC52-06NA25396
OSTI ID:
1623926
Journal Information:
Nature Communications, Journal Name: Nature Communications Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 4; ISSN 2041-1723
Publisher:
Nature Publishing GroupCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

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Cited By (38)

A small-gap electrostatic micro-actuator for large deflections journal December 2015
Strong geometry dependence of the Casimir force between interpenetrated rectangular gratings journal January 2021
Casimir switch: steering optical transparency with vacuum forces journal June 2016
Tailoring optical metamaterials to tune the atom-surface Casimir-Polder interaction text January 2016
The Casimir-Operated Microdevice for Application in Optical Networks book September 2018
Measurement of non-monotonic Casimir forces between silicon nanostructures journal January 2017
Building a Casimir metrology platform with a commercial MEMS sensor journal April 2019
Critical Casimir forces between planar and crenellated surfaces journal May 2015
Sensitivity and accuracy of Casimir force measurements in air journal August 2019
Casimir-Lifshitz force out of thermal equilibrium between dielectric gratings journal August 2014
Kelvin probe force microscopy of metallic surfaces used in Casimir force measurements journal December 2014
Enhanced near-field thermal radiation and reduced Casimir stiction between doped-Si gratings journal June 2015
Nonequilibrium atom-surface interaction with lossy multilayer structures journal June 2018
Polaritonic contribution to the Casimir energy between two graphene layers journal December 2019
Experimental and theoretical investigation of the angular dependence of the Casimir force between sinusoidally corrugated surfaces journal June 2014
Spatial dispersion in atom-surface quantum friction journal April 2017
Sensitivity of chaotic behavior to low optical frequencies of a double-beam torsional actuator journal July 2019
Casimir effect in active matter systems journal July 2014
Repulsive Casimir Effect with Chern Insulators journal February 2014
Phonon-Mediated Casimir Interaction between Mobile Impurities in One-Dimensional Quantum Liquids journal April 2014
Strong Thermal and Electrostatic Manipulation of the Casimir Force in Graphene Multilayers journal March 2017
Giant Casimir Torque between Rotated Gratings and the θ = 0 Anomaly journal January 2020
Materials perspective on Casimir and van der Waals interactions journal November 2016
Active Particles in Complex and Crowded Environments journal November 2016
Tailoring optical metamaterials to tune the atom-surface Casimir-Polder interaction journal February 2018
The effect of roughness and correlation on the Casimir torque between two plates journal December 2017
Detection of “anomalies” inside microcavities through parametric fluorescence: a formalism based on modulated commutation relations and consequences on the concept of density of states journal January 2019
Casimir force between two plasmonic metallic plates from a real frequency perspective journal January 2019
Spoof polariton enhanced modal density of states in planar nanostructured metallic cavities journal January 2014
Modal approach to optical forces between waveguides as derived by transformation optics formalism journal January 2019
Repulsive Casimir Effect with Chern insulators text January 2013
Casimir Effect in Active Matter Systems text January 2014
Critical Casimir forces between planar and crenellated surfaces text January 2014
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Nonequilibrium atom-surface interaction with lossy multi-layer structures text January 2018
Polaritonic Contribution to the Casimir Energy between two Graphene Layers text January 2019

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