Noncontact Atomic Force Microscopy - Yale School of Engineering ...

Noah Graham 1
Casimir Forces from Scattering Theory
1 Department of Physics, Middlebury College, Middlebury, VT USA
Mo-0930
Because the parallel-plate geometry of Casimir's original calculation is one of the most
difficult configurations in which to study the Casimir force experimentally, it is important
to be able to extend this calculation to other situations. I will describe a general set of
techniques that allow one to obtain precise theoretical predictions of the Casimir force for
a wide range of geometries and materials. It applies to any situation where the scattering
matrix of each individual object can be calculated (or measured), in any basis for which
the decomposition of a plane wave is known. Although this approach is simplest at large
distances, it also yields precise results at any separation, as long as the objects do not
overlap in the radial coordinates of the bases used for each object. In addition to the
usual situation where the objects are outside of each other, these results extend to the case
of one object inside another.
The work I will report on has been done in collaboration with Thorsten Emig
(Paris/Cologne) Robert L. Jaffe (MIT), Mehran Kardar (MIT), S. Jamal Rahi (MIT), and
Saad Zaheer (MIT).
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