Charge-Parity violating effects in Casimir-Polder potentials

TL;DR

This paper explores how charge-parity violation in molecules can influence Casimir-Polder interactions with non-reciprocal surfaces, revealing potential for detecting fundamental symmetry violations through electromagnetic surface effects.

Contribution

It identifies conditions under which CP violation effects manifest in Casimir-Polder forces and analyzes the role of non-reciprocal media in detecting such effects.

Findings

CP violation induces unique electric-magnetic cross-polarisability in molecules.

Non-reciprocal surfaces are necessary to detect CP violation effects.

Chern-Simons media can cause unusual atom-surface interactions.

Abstract

We demonstrate under which conditions a violation of the charge-parity (CP) symmetry in molecules will manifest itself in the Casimir-Polder interaction of these with a magnetodielectric surface. Charge-parity violation induces a specific electric-magnetic cross-polarisability in a molecule that is not chiral, but time-reversal (T) symmetry violating. As we show, a detection of such an effect via the Casimir-Polder potential requires a material medium that is also sensitive to time-reversal, i.e., it must exhibit a non-reciprocal electromagnetic response. As simple examples of such media we consider a perfectly reflecting non-reciprocal mirror that is a special case of a perfect electromagnetic conductor as well as a Chern-Simons medium. In addition, we show that Chern-Simons and related media can induce unusual atom-surface interactions for anisotropic molecules with and without a chiral response.