The Casimir effect as a candidate of dark energy

TL;DR

This paper explores whether the Casimir effect, with proper renormalization and finite temperature considerations, can account for the Universe's accelerated expansion as dark energy.

Contribution

It demonstrates that zero temperature Casimir energy and finite temperature corrections can explain the observed cosmic acceleration.

Findings

Casimir energy can account for dark energy effects

Finite temperature corrections influence the magnitude of the effect

Proper renormalization is essential for accurate results

Abstract

It is known that the simply evaluated value of the zero point energy of quantum fields is extremely deviated from the observed value of dark energy density. In this paper, we consider whether the Casimir energy, which is the zero point energy brought from boundary conditions, can cause the accelerating expansion of the Universe by using proper renormalization method and introducing the fermions of finite temperature living in $3+n+1$ space-time. We show that the zero temperature Casimir energy and the finite temperature corrections can explain the current accelerated expansion of the Universe.