Clapway: Harry Potter

Friday, September 18, 2015

In a little bit of science #magic, scientists have developed an #invisibilitycloak, much to the joy of #HarryPotter fans. - http://clapway.com/2015/09/18/invisibility-cloak123/

Great news for all Harry Potter fans out there! An invisibility cloak is currently being developed at the University of California, Berkeley. It may just be better than magic, because science is making it a reality.

The team at Berkeley was able to create a miniature sized device that forms to an object, making it invisible in certain wavelengths of light. Although it can only cover extremely small objects, about 1,500 microns in size, the researchers are planning to create a larger invisibility cloak in the future.

This is a significant accomplishment, as the previous attempt at the project ultimately resulted in an extremely large version of the cloak that took a massive amount of material to produce. Moreover, it failed to make an object completely invisible to the naked eye, as the contours of the shape were still visible.

How this invisibility cloak works

This new “metamaterial” is only able to cover cells at the moment. It also has to be formed to the particular object that it’s concealing because of the nature of the material. To conceal an object, scientists use tiny antennas and mini blocks made of gold to scatter the light hitting an item so that its surface appears flat, rather than multi-dimensional.

The problem, as previously mentioned, is that the invisibility cloak can only cover what it was specifically created for. It can essentially serve as a camouflage for one particular area at a particular light wavelength. In order to produce a larger version of the cloak, scientists would first need to modify the material.

WHAT WOULD THE CLOAK BE USED FOR?

There are many practical applications for this technology once it is fully developed. It could, for example, be used to create an illusion or a multidimensional image out of a two dimensional one. Moreover, due to its ability to make an item appear differently from what it actually is, the material could be use in the military.

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Invisibility Cloak will Soon Become a Real Thing

Friday, July 10, 2015

Futuristic Invisibility Cloak Becoming a Reality - http://clapway.com/2015/07/10/futuristic-invisibility-cloak-becoming-a-reality987/

Any true Harry Potter fan knows that the invisibility cloak has been made before, but real-life ones tend to fall short of the magical results the book’s famous accessory achieved. The original attempts proved to be bulky and overly layered, which really defeats the purpose of having the cloak in the first place. Computer engineers from the University of California have figured out a way to make a cloak with a single layer of material.

What was wrong with older invisibility cloak designs?

Previous studies suggested that the only possible way to make something invisible was through many layers of material that were used to alter wavelengths of light, which made an object look like the flat surface it was on. Various forms of this thick type of cloak have been made and tested, however, none yielded results as positive as this new, thinner invisibility cloak.

new materials, new principles

Previous cloaks used metal particles that actually absorbed light, rather than reflected it. This caused the cloaks to not look as vibrant as their surroundings, making it obvious that something wasn’t right about what you were looking at.

This new invisibility cloak design distorts light to make it seem like it’s on a flat surface, using ceramics and Teflon. Together, these materials better reflect light rather than absorb it, and they are tailored to be very small in the cloak so that the reflecting light beams scatter in different directions. The alternating directions of the beams are what cause the surface of the cloak to look flat. The cloak itself is made of a thin Teflon sheet and has tiny ceramic particles embedded in it.

The Invisible Future

“Doing whatever we want with light waves is really exciting,” said Boubacar Kanté, senior author of the new study, published in Progress In Electromagnetics Research. The team at the University is hoping to contribute to a cloak that eventually won’t reduce any vibrancy in the reflection of light. Other companies have tried producing various types of invisible products, such as the Rochester Cloak and the Invisibility Box. This is clearly an idea that many people hope becomes a reality.

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Futuristic Invisibility Cloak Becoming a Reality