
A Step Towards an Invisibility Cloak 172
An anonymous reader alerts us to work out of Purdue University in Indiana, where researchers have produced a design for a method of cloaking objects of any shape and size at a single wavelength of visible light. The math for such an invisibility effect was worked out last year at Duke and in the UK, but the new work, to be published in Nature Photonics this month, is the first practical design. The lead researcher, Vladimir Shalaev, notes that even though the current design works only at a single wavelength, and so would not convey true invisibility, it could still be useful — against, for example, night-vision goggles or laser target designators. Shalaev calls the technical challenge of producing an all-wavelengths cloak "doable in principle."
Invisible to lasers, anyway. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Invisible to lasers, anyway. (Score:5, Interesting)
I have absolutely no experience/knowledge of these laser targetters, but how much more expensive would it be to be able to use different wavelengths of light?
1. Try wavelength X: Oh darn, they're protecting against that with a shiny cloaking device, so...
2. Try wavelength Y: Profit!!!/explosions
The bomb or whathaveyou is searching for a very specific wavelength(X) right? But still doesn't seem like it should be impossible to program it to cycle through 2-3 wavelengths(X->Y->Z) until it finds your dot to lock onto.
Still, it's a neat toy they're working on. I wouldn't mind one once they build one that's less selective.
One step towards the most duped story (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:*yawn* (Score:2, Interesting)
Following suit with that article about the RIAA pushing for pretexting in California, I could just see them getting their hands on invisibility cloaks.
Be careful pirating music, the RIAA could be in the corner watching!
Re:Invisible to lasers, anyway. (Score:5, Interesting)
Invisible to laser speed checks would have some non military applications.
Michael
Problem with Invisibility Cloaks in General ... (Score:2, Interesting)
So wouldn't it make two dark spots on the ground? that could be used to identify if someone is using an invisibility cloak.
Re:Invisible to lasers, anyway. (Score:2, Interesting)
Don't get me wrong, I think it's still cool and a good first step, just not with any militarily robust applications.
Re:Serious Note: Foreign Students & Critical T (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:A little note about free speech (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Invisible to lasers, anyway. (Score:3, Interesting)
However, if this horribly complex and expensive sound cloaking technology (against just 1 wavelength) ever become a threat, it would be trivial to upgrade the military lasers to a tunable one. There are numerous ways, including using free electron lasers which can be tuned to a wide range of wavelengths at will. Or...other ways. Really, I don't see it being a problem, the researchers saying it could be "useful" are just be sensationalistic. Or perhaps they want military funding, which in my opinion is a waste because it seems incredibly unlikely that nanoscale invisibility armor will ever be practical.
(well, it might be SOMEDAY, but I suspect that era would be around the same era when machines do all the fighting, and we have different considerations.
Dirt/damage resilience? (Score:3, Interesting)
I see this as a general problem with light-bending nanomaterials - while they might work in a lab environment, real-world environments have enough ways of disrupting them to make them much less useful.
Re:Invisible to lasers, anyway. (Score:3, Interesting)
I have not RTFA and do not know what "one wavelength" means.
Re:Invisible to lasers, anyway. (Score:2, Interesting)