Article ID Journal Published Year Pages File Type
1850387 Physics Letters B 2016 6 Pages PDF
Abstract

We present a simple general proof that Casimir force cannot originate from the vacuum energy of electromagnetic (EM) field. The full QED Hamiltonian consists of 3 terms: the pure electromagnetic term HemHem, the pure matter term HmattHmatt and the interaction term HintHint. The HemHem-term commutes with all matter fields because it does not have any explicit   dependence on matter fields. As a consequence, HemHem cannot generate any forces on matter. Since it is precisely this term that generates the vacuum energy of EM field, it follows that the vacuum energy does not generate the forces. The misleading statements in the literature that vacuum energy generates Casimir force can be boiled down to the fact that HemHem attains an implicit   dependence on matter fields by the use of the equations of motion and to the illegitimate treatment of the implicit dependence as if it was explicit. The true origin of the Casimir force is van der Waals force generated by HintHint.

Related Topics
Physical Sciences and Engineering Physics and Astronomy Nuclear and High Energy Physics
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