A macroscopic approach to creating exotic matter

Abstract

Herein the Casimir effect is used to present a simple macroscopic view on creating exotic matter. The energy arising between two nearly perfectly conducting parallel plates is shown to become increasingly negative as the plate separation is reduced. It is proposed that the Casimir energy appears increasingly negative simply because the vacuum electromagnetic zero-point field performs positive work in pushing the plates together, transforming field energy into kinetic energy of the plates. Next, the inertial properties of exotic matter are considered. The parallel plates of the Casimir system are replaced with an enclosed cavity of identical dimensions that is subjected to an external force. It is found that zero-point radiation exerts an inertial force on the cavity in opposition to the external force. This ultimately leads to the conclusion that the inertial properties of exotic matter are identical to the inertial properties of ordinary matter.