Nonmonotonic Thermal Casimir Force from Geometry-Temperature Interplay

Journal Article · Fri Jul 23 00:00:00 EDT 2010 · Physical Review Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PHYSREVLETT.105.040403· OSTI ID:21410927

Weber, Alexej ^[1]; Gies, Holger ^[2]

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1. Institut fuer Theoretische Physik, Universitaet Heidelberg, Philosophenweg 16, D-69120 Heidelberg (Germany)
2. Theoretisch-Physikalisches Institut, Friedrich-Schiller-Universitaet Jena, Max-Wien-Platz 1, D-07743 Jena (Germany)

The geometry dependence of Casimir forces is significantly more pronounced in the presence of thermal fluctuations due to a generic geometry-temperature interplay. We show that the thermal force for standard sphere-plate or cylinder-plate geometries develops a nonmonotonic behavior already in the simple case of a fluctuating Dirichlet scalar. In particular, the attractive thermal force can increase for increasing distances below a critical temperature. This anomalous behavior is triggered by a reweighting of relevant fluctuations on the scale of the thermal wavelength. The essence of the phenomenon becomes transparent within the worldline picture of the Casimir effect.

• OSTI ID: 21410927
• Journal Information: Physical Review Letters, Vol. 105, Issue 4; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.105.040403; (c) 2010 The American Physical Society; ISSN 0031-9007
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS
SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND SUPERFLUIDITY
71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS
GENERAL PHYSICS
CASIMIR EFFECT
CRITICAL TEMPERATURE
DIRICHLET PROBLEM
FLUCTUATIONS
GEOMETRY
SCALARS
TEMPERATURE DEPENDENCE
WAVELENGTHS
BOUNDARY-VALUE PROBLEMS
MATHEMATICS
PHYSICAL PROPERTIES
THERMODYNAMIC PROPERTIES
TRANSITION TEMPERATURE
VARIATIONS