You can't see it!

[BobGreenwade]

I don't know if anyone besides me can look at this article from Science magazine, but apparently some researchers have developed materials that "could funnel light and electromagnetic radiation around any object and render it invisible."

 

According to the article, "Cloaking devices for radio waves could appear within 5 years... and cloaks for visible light are conceivable."

 

Wow. It kind of makes those Romulan cloaking devices seem quaint, doesn't it?

[Erkenfresh]

Re: You can't see it!

 

And they could use the technology to shield a Dyson sphere from being detected.

[Savinien]

Re: You can't see it!

 

Ha ha. The reason I can't see it is because of the fee...

[keithcurtis]

Re: You can't see it!

 

Here's something from Nature. Same stuff?

 

Keith "Googler" Curtis

[BobGreenwade]

Re: You can't see it!

 

Here's something from Nature. Same stuff?

 

Keith "Googler" Curtis

Looks like it. (No pun intended. This time.)

[Midas]

Re: You can't see it!

 

"Things like airplanes are very complex objects -- complex shape and complex materials -- and I do not know to what extent our concept can be applicable to that," From the Nature link.

 

[thread Hijack]

How would it work on, oh, I donno, saucer shaped things?

[end hijack]

 

I always took the Romulan cloaks to work something like this. They aren't invisibility devices, in the truest sense of the word, but devices that make the bearer so non emmitive that searchers couldn't see them at Trek scale distances. By the time of Picard, the Warbird that Kirk fought was easily spotted (IMHO), but the emmiter dampeners of Picard time were also more effective. Kinda like how the shields were penetrable to more advanced teleporters.

 

Midas

[Nyrath]

Re: You can't see it!

 

I dunno if this is the same research item, but the last time I read about this, the fine print said it only worked on something that was no larger than the size of a speck of dust.

 

http://www.adastragames.com/news.cgi?msgid=550

[Basil]

Re: You can't see it!

 

Back in 1998, researchers led by Thomas Ebbesen of the Louis Pasteur University in Strasbourg, France shone light on a sheet of gold foil that contained millions of tiny holes. The holes were smaller than the wavelength of the light, and Ebbesen expected no light to get through. Amazingly, more light came out the other side than what hit the holes.

That could be bad news. One of the leading ideas regarding light sails has been the "perforated light sail," where the reflective material used for the sail is filled with holes (pardon the oxymoron), to the point where there is more space in holes than in material. So long as the holes are small enough, the fraction of light reflected is as good as if the material had no holes.

 

However, if "plasmons" occur in any substance with small holes, the perforated light sail is unworkable. Contrarily, if only certain substances exhibit "plasmons," then no problem.

[Susano]

Re: You can't see it!

 

Ooohh.... Ghost in the Shell opt-cam cloaks!