Cool Science!
Wow! I've just found this article in The Guardian : -
Invisibility cloaks in sight
The development of new materials could see items such as invisibility cloaks, a key weapon in the trickery of Harry Potter and countless science fiction plots, become a reality within five years.
Two research groups have published technical blueprints for making "metamaterials" which can change how light and other forms of radiation bend around an object, in a way similar to water flowing around a rock.
An observer would see whatever was behind the object as if it were not there, said Professor Ulf Leonhardt of St Andrews University, whose research was published in the latest edition of the journal Science.
David Smith from Duke University in the US, who has been independently pioneering the development of metamaterials with John Pendry of Imperial College London said the cloak would act "like you've opened up a hole in space".
"All light or other electromagnetic waves are swept around the area, guided by the metamaterial to emerge on the other side as if they had passed through an empty volume of space," Prof Smith told the Financial Times.
The developments have led to concerns about the ethics that might govern how such technology could be used. "Innovations such as these - as fantastic, imaginative and useful as they might be - would be disruptive to society today," said Patrick Lin, the research director of the US-based Nanoethics Group.
"For instance, the ability to become invisible will have profound implications for privacy as well as national security."
I want one..........
there is more info at: -
The New Scientist ,
boing boing
Science Magazine
Science Magazine (again)
Invisibility cloaks in sight
The development of new materials could see items such as invisibility cloaks, a key weapon in the trickery of Harry Potter and countless science fiction plots, become a reality within five years.
Two research groups have published technical blueprints for making "metamaterials" which can change how light and other forms of radiation bend around an object, in a way similar to water flowing around a rock.
An observer would see whatever was behind the object as if it were not there, said Professor Ulf Leonhardt of St Andrews University, whose research was published in the latest edition of the journal Science.
David Smith from Duke University in the US, who has been independently pioneering the development of metamaterials with John Pendry of Imperial College London said the cloak would act "like you've opened up a hole in space".
"All light or other electromagnetic waves are swept around the area, guided by the metamaterial to emerge on the other side as if they had passed through an empty volume of space," Prof Smith told the Financial Times.
The developments have led to concerns about the ethics that might govern how such technology could be used. "Innovations such as these - as fantastic, imaginative and useful as they might be - would be disruptive to society today," said Patrick Lin, the research director of the US-based Nanoethics Group.
"For instance, the ability to become invisible will have profound implications for privacy as well as national security."
I want one..........
there is more info at: -
The New Scientist ,
boing boing
Science Magazine
Science Magazine (again)
posted by chris at 5:23 pm
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