Demonstration of the Casimir force between ferromagnetic surfaces of a Ni-coated sphere and a Ni-coated plate

Abstract

We demonstrate the Casimir interaction between two ferromagnetic boundary surfaces using the dynamic atomic force microscope. The experimental data are found to be in excellent agreement with the predictions of the Lifshitz theory for magnetic boundary surfaces combined with the plasma model approach. It is shown that for magnetic materials the role of hypothetical patch potentials is opposite to that required for reconciliation of the data with the Drude model.