The force of nothing:
Attraction and Repulsion in the Quantum Void
The Voice of Space: Rene Magritte 1928
Summary
I. Casimir force:
High precision experimental confirmation with scanning probes:
MEM device applications require control of this force (stiction)
II. Repulsion?
III. Earnshaw's theorem:
No levitation is possible with electrostatic interactions:
No levitation is possible with Casimir forces with dielectric composites:
IV. Out of equilibrium levitation is possible:
Classical radiation pressure:
Non-classical (near field) counterpart
V. Dynamic phenomena: Friction of vacuum!
A rotating dielectric will slow down in vacuum:
Acknowledgements
Thosten Emig, Noah Graham, Robert Jaffe
Jamal Rahi, Matthias Krueger
Mohammad Maghrebi, Vlad Golyk
M. Hertzberg, A. Scardicchio, A. Rodriguez, S. Johnson, U. Mohideen, R. Zandi