Multilayered Aspects of Casimir Energy

Abstract

We give a robust formulation to calculate the Casimir energy and Casimir force for plane-parallel multilayer setups with general dielectric constants. We derive recursion relations for multilayer reflection and transmission coefficients in the most general setups, which are essential ingredients for evaluating the Casimir energy. With the use of complex analysis techniques involving the argument principle, we carefully treat and subtract UV divergences and make clear the relation between the subtraction procedure and an actual physical setup. We also clarify the physical operational meaning of pole subtraction, which is required to utilize the argument principle in the calculation of the Casimir energy. Our formula is applicable to more general situations including chiral medium or Weyl semimetals.