Casimir Inc., founded and led by Harold G. "Sonny" White—a prominent physicist who previously headed NASA's EagleWorks laboratory and worked on DARPA projects involving advanced propulsion, including warp drive concepts—has emerged from stealth mode. The company has announced plans to commercialize its MicroSparc technology by 2028. This microchip reportedly extracts energy directly from the quantum vacuum, eliminating the need for batteries or recharging.
How it works (according to the company)
At its core lies the well-known Casimir effect: in the quantum realm, "empty" space is not actually empty, but rather filled with fluctuations of electromagnetic fields and virtual particles. When two conducting plates are placed just tens of nanometers apart, a negative pressure is generated, causing the plates to attract one another.
Ordinarily, this "device" is a one-time event: once the plates merge, no further energy can be extracted. White and his team have taken the concept further. They developed static Casimir cavities on a substrate where the plates are fixed and unable to move. At the center of each cavity are microscopic pillars or antennas (micropillars) that are electrically isolated from the walls.
The external quantum vacuum actively bombards the electrons within the cavity walls. Through quantum tunneling, electrons occasionally penetrate the cavity and reach the central pillars. Returning to their origin is much more difficult, as the interior environment is relatively "quiet." This creates a directed flow of electrons—essentially a constant, low-level electric current. The company likens this mechanism to a "quantum ratchet."
Current results and objectives
Casimir Inc. has already manufactured hundreds of prototypes at MIT.nano and Texas A&M’s AggieFab nanofabrication facilities. Testing was conducted in shielded chambers using precision electrometers. According to White, the devices demonstrate voltages ranging from millivolts to volts with currents in the picoampere range—levels well above background noise.
The commercial target is a 5 x 5 mm chip designed to output approximately 1.5 V at 25 µA (roughly 37–40 microwatts). This would be sufficient for ultra-low-power sensors, wearable electronics, and IoT devices. Long-term, the company envisions scaling the technology for more power-hungry applications, from smartphones to infrastructure and even space systems.
Important caveats
The technology faces justifiable skepticism within the scientific community. Many physicists note that attempts to harvest "free" energy from the vacuum often conflict with the laws of conservation of energy and momentum. White himself points out that the fundamental physics—the Casimir effect and quantum tunneling—have been experimentally verified for years, and that the innovation lies in the engineering of static cavities and nanofabrication. While the company has published a related article in a peer-reviewed journal, broad independent verification of their results is still lacking.
Why this matters
If the technology truly scales, it could radically transform the world of low-power electronics, particularly in remote or extreme environments such as space, deep-sea systems, or isolated sensors. For everyday life, it is likely to serve as a supplement to existing energy sources rather than a complete replacement in the near term.
For now, it remains a promising but industrially unproven development. The year 2028 will reveal whether MicroSparc can successfully move from the laboratory into real-world products. Casimir Inc. is certainly worth watching—even if achieving full "energy from nothing" proves more difficult than promised, the secondary technological breakthroughs in nanophotonics and quantum materials could be valuable in their own right.
