# Does the Casimir effect give the correct value for Dark Energy?

My understanding is that the Casimir Effect is caused by vacuum energy. Quantum mechanics (QED) predicts vacuum energy, but gets the value grossly wrong, by a factor of $10^{120}$. On the other hand, from what I have read, Dark Energy is understood to be caused by vacuum energy.

Has anyone checked whether the measured value for the Casimir Effect fits the value required for Dark Energy to make up 70% of the energy in the universe? If it did, that would be an excellent validation of Dark Energy.

• The Casimir effect is ascribed to the difference between the vacuum energy between & outside of two conducting plates, which cannot give you the absolute value of the vacuum energy in free space, which is what the dark energy is supposed to be. More here: arxiv.org/abs/1205.3365 – Michael Brown Oct 21 '13 at 10:04
• @Michael That seems to clarify it. Can you make it into an answer so I can accept it? – hdhondt Oct 22 '13 at 0:01

## 1 Answer

Fill your imaginary box with lots of parralell plates and calculate the energy then scale by the age of the universe and you will have your answer.

• Could you explain in more detail; i.e. why this works? – Abhimanyu Pallavi Sudhir Nov 5 '13 at 10:52

## protected by Qmechanic♦Apr 17 '16 at 7:31

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