Exploring the van der Waals atom-surface attraction in the nanometric range M. Fichet, G. Dutier, A. Yarovitsky, P. Todorov, I. Hamdi, I. Maurin, S. Saltiel, D. Sarkisyan, M.-P. Gorza, D. Bloch and M. Ducloy EPL, 77 5 (2007) 54001 Published online: 23 February 2007 DOI: 10.1209/0295-5075/77/54001