Possibility of measuring the thermal Casimir interaction between a plate and a cylinder attached to a micromachined oscillator

Journal Article · Mon Nov 15 04:00:00 EST 2010 · Physical Review. A

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PHYSREVA.82.052515· OSTI ID:21528636

Decca, R S ^[1]; Fischbach, E ^[2]; Klimchitskaya, G L ^[3]; Krause, D E ^[2]; Lopez, D ^[4]; Mostepanenko, V M ^[5]

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1. Department of Physics, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, Indianapolis, Indiana 46202 (United States)
2. Department of Physics, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana 47907 (United States)
3. North-West Technical University, Millionnaya Street 5, St. Petersburg 191065 (Russian Federation)
4. Center for Nanoscale Materials, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, Illinois 60439 (United States)
5. Noncommercial Partnership 'Scientific Instruments', Tverskaya Street 11, Moscow 103905 (Russian Federation)

We investigate the possibility of measuring the thermal Casimir force and its gradient in the configuration of a plate and a microfabricated cylinder attached to a micromachined oscillator. The Lifshitz-type formulas in this configuration are derived using the proximity force approximation. The accuracy of the obtained expressions is determined from a comparison with exact results available in ideal metal case. Computations of the thermal correction to both the Casimir force and its gradient are performed in the framework of different theoretical approaches proposed in the literature. The correction to the Casimir force and its gradient due to lack of parallelism of the plate and cylinder is determined using the nonmultiplicative approach. The error introduced in the theory due to the finite length of the cylinder is estimated. We propose that both static and dynamic experiments measuring the thermal Casimir interaction between a cylinder and a plate using a micromachined oscillator can shed additional light on the thermal Casimir force problem. Specifically, it is shown that the static experiment is better adapted for the measurement of thermal effects.

• OSTI ID: 21528636
• Journal Information: Physical Review. A, Journal Name: Physical Review. A Journal Issue: 5 Vol. 82; ISSN 1050-2947; ISSN PLRAAN
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS
GENERAL PHYSICS
ACCURACY
APPROXIMATIONS
CALCULATION METHODS
CASIMIR EFFECT
COMPARATIVE EVALUATIONS
CYLINDERS
ELECTRONIC EQUIPMENT
ELEMENTS
EQUIPMENT
ERRORS
EVALUATION
INTERACTIONS
METALS
OSCILLATORS
PLATES