Constraining new forces in the Casimir regime using the isoelectronic technique

Authors

R. S. Decca
D. Lopez
H. B. Chan
E. Fischbach
D. E. Krause
C. R. Jamell

Published in:

Physical Review Letters 94,24 (2005) 240401;

Link to original published article:

doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.94.240401

Abstract

We report the first isoelectronic differential force measurements between an Au-coated probe and two Au-coated films, made out of Au and Ge. These measurements, performed at submicron separations using soft microelectromechanical torsional oscillators, eliminate the need for a detailed understanding of the probe-film Casimir interaction. The observed differential signal is directly converted into limits on the parameters alpha and lambda which characterize Yukawa-like deviations from Newtonian gravity. We find alpha less than or similar to 10(12) for lambda similar to 200 nm, an improvement of similar to 10 over previous limits.

Keywords

mu-m;; dimensions;; gravity

Date of this Version

January 2005