Dispersion forces in inhomogeneous planarly layered media: A one-dimensional model for effective polarisabilities
Abstract
Dispersion forces such as van der Waals forces between two microscopic particles, the Casimir--Polder forces between a particle and a macroscopic object or the Casimir force between two dielectric objects are well studied in vacuum. However, in realistic situations the interacting objects are often embedded in an environmental medium. Such a solvent influences the induced dipole interaction. With the framework of macroscopic quantum electrodynamics, these interactions are mediated via an exchange of virtual photons. Via this method the impact of a homogeneous solvent medium can be expressed as local-field corrections leading to excess polarisabilities which have previously been derived for hard boundary conditions. In order to develop a more realistic description, we investigate on a one-dimensional analog system illustrating the influence of a continuous dielectric profile.
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Cite
@article{arxiv.1906.01488,
title = {Dispersion forces in inhomogeneous planarly layered media: A one-dimensional model for effective polarisabilities},
author = {Johannes Fiedler and Fabian Spallek and Priyadarshini Thiyam and Clas Persson and Mathias Boström and Michael Walter and Stefan Yoshi Buhmann},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1906.01488},
year = {2019}
}