Drastic change of the Casimir force at the metal-insulator transition

The dependence of the Casimir force on material properties is important for both future applications and to gain further insight on its fundamental aspects. Here we apply the general Lifshitz theory of the Casimir force to low-conducting compounds, or poor metals. For distances in the micrometer range, the Casimir force for a large variety of such materials is described by universal equations containing a few parameters: the effective plasma frequency omega(p), dissipation rate gamma of the free carriers, and electric permittivity epsilon(infinity) for omega >=omega(p) (in the infrared range). This theory of the Casimir force for poor metals can also describe inhomogeneous composite materials containing small regions with different conductivity. The Casimir force for systems involving samples made with compounds that have a metal-insulator transition shows a drastic change of the Casimir force within the transition region, where the metallic and dielectric phases coexist. Indeed, the Casimir force can increase by a factor of 2 near this transition.