Measurement of the Casimir Force between 0.2 and 8 mum: Experimental Procedures and Comparison with Theory

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We present results on the determination of the differential Casimir force between an Au-coated sapphire sphere and the top and bottom of Au-coated deep silicon trenches performed by means of the micromechanical torsional oscillator in the range of separations from 0.2 to 8 $\upmu$m.

• The random and systematic errors in the measured force signal are determined at the 95\% confidence level and combined into the total experimental error.
• The role of surface roughness and edge effects is investigated and shown to be negligibly small.
• The distribution of patch potentials is characterized by Kelvin probe microscopy, yielding an estimate of the typical size of patches, the respective r.m.s.