An acoustic Casimir effect

Theoretical and experimental results are presented for the force law between two rigid, parallel plates due to the radiation pressure of band-limited acoustic noise. Excellent agreement is shown between theory and experiment. While these results constitute an acoustic analog for the Casimir effect, an important difference is that band-limited noise can cause the force to be attractive or repulsive as a function of the distance of separation of the plates. Applications of the acoustic Casimir effect to background noise transduction and non-resonant acoustic levitation are suggested. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V.