Regularization versus renormalization: Why are Casimir energy differences so often finite?

Abstract

One of the very first applications of the quantum field theoretic vacuum state was in the development of the notion of Casimir energy. Now field theoretic Casimir energies, considered individually, are always infinite. But differences in Casimir energies (at worst regularized, not renormalized) are quite often finite --- a fortunate circumstance which luckily made some of the early calculations, (for instance, for parallel plates and hollow spheres), tolerably tractable. We shall explore the extent to which this observation can be made systematic. For instance: What are necessary and sufficient conditions for Casimir energy differences to be finite (with regularization but without renormalization)? And, when the Casimir energy differences are not formally finite, can anything useful nevertheless be said by invoking renormalization? We shall see that it is the difference in the first few Seeley--DeWitt coefficients that is central to answering these questions. In particular, for any collection of conductors (be they perfect or imperfect) and/or dielectrics, as long as one merely moves them around without changing their shape or volume, then physically the Casimir energy difference (and so also the physically interesting Casimir forces) are guaranteed to be finite without invoking any renormalization.Comment: V1: 23 pages; Based on a talk given at the "Quantum Vacuum and Gravitation" conference,QVG2015, MITP, Gutenberg University, Mainz, June 2015. V2: Now 28 pages; note change in title; significant extra discussion and references. This e-print closely parallels the published versio