2004/03/15 by Davide Iannuzzi, Mariangela Lisanti, Federico Capasso · 4 citations
Engineering · Physics and Astronomy · #Attraction #Casimir effect #Casimir pressure #Chemical physics #Classical mechanics #Condensed matter physics #Counterintuitive #Dielectric #Experimental and Theoretical Physics Studies #Hydrogen #Materials science #Nanotechnology #Optics #Optoelectronics #Physics #Quantum Electrodynamics and Casimir Effect #Quantum mechanics #Thermal Radiation and Cooling Technologies #quant-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1073/pnas.0400876101
published as Proc. Nat. Ac. Sci. USA 101 (2004) 4019 · 7 pages, 5 figures
openalex publication_date 2004/03/15 · arxiv created 2004/03/19 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
We present systematic measurements of the Casimir force between a gold-coated plate and a sphere coated with a hydrogen-switchable mirror. Hydrogen-switchable mirrors are shiny metals that can become transparent upon hydrogenation. Despite such a dramatic change of the optical properties of the sphere, we did not observe any significant decrease of the Casimir force after filling the experimental apparatus with hydrogen. This counterintuitive result can be explained by the Lifshitz theory that describes the Casimir attraction between metallic and dielectric materials.