Scientists build real-life invisibility cloak

Source: The Independent

Researchers have built a small box that could be used to completely hide small objects, like a real-life invisibility cloak.

Scientists have built systems that hide objects by bending light around them, so that they can’t be seen — but they have previously only been tiny and worked at small wavelength ranges. But scientists from the German Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) claimed to have built an invisibility cloak big enough to hide small objects, like phones, keys or a wheel of cheese.

To use the cloak, objects are put inside the small, long box that is coated with a special paint. The box bends light around it, meaning that the objects placed in it disappear from sight.

Like previous versions, the invisibility cloak works by bending light around the box. But doing that forces it to take a longer route that it normally would, posing a problem for the technology because it's not possible to speed the light up. But the KIT scientists have got round that issue by covering the whole box in a light-scattering material. In effect, that material slows down all of the light — which means that it can be sped back up again.

Read more: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/scientists-have-built-a-reallife-invisibility-cloak-10223418.html