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Scientists: Turning invisible might be possible

I had wonder if someone wasn’t playing an April Fool’s joke in August, but this story appears to be legit.

Scientists say they are a step closer to developing materials that could render people and objects invisible. Researchers have demonstrated for the first time they were able to cloak three-dimensional objects using artificially engineered materials that redirect light around the objects.

That’s from an AP report posted on Wired.com.

The findings, by scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, led by Xiang Zhang, are to be released later this week in the journals Nature and Science… . People can see objects because they scatter the light that strikes them, reflecting some of it back to the eye. Cloaking uses materials, known as metamaterials, to deflect radar, light or other waves around an object, like water flowing around a smooth rock in a stream.

Of course, being invisible would have some significant military implications. No wonder the research is funded, in part, by the U.S. Army Research Office.

• August 11, 2008 — Richard Core

• tags: invisibility, research, science