Casimir interaction between inclined metallic cylinders Articles uri icon

authors

  • RODRIGUEZ LOPEZ, PABLO
  • Emig, Thorsten

publication date

  • March 2012

start page

  • 1

end page

  • 9

issue

  • 3 (032510)

volume

  • 85

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)

  • 1050-2947

Electronic International Standard Serial Number (EISSN)

  • 1094-1622

abstract

  • The Casimir interaction between one-dimensional metallic objects (cylinders, wires) displays unconventional features. Here we study the orientation dependence of this interaction by computing the Casimir energy between two inclined cylinders over a wide range of separations. We consider Dirichlet, Neumann, and perfect-metal boundary conditions, both at zero temperature and in the classical high-temperature limit. For all types of boundary conditions, we find that at large distances the interaction decays slowly with distance, similarly to the case of parallel cylinders, and at small distances scales as the interaction of two spheres (but with different numerical coefficients). Our numerical results at intermediate distances agree with our analytical predictions at small and large separations. Experimental implications are discussed.