Nov 1, 2007 12:50 am US/Eastern
Invisibility Cloak More Fact Than Fiction
MIAMI (CBS) ―
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Daniel Radcliffe as Harry Potter in Warner Bros. "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix."
Warner Bros.
Harry Potter fans are quite familiar with the concept of an invisibility cloak. As its name suggests, when Harry Potter dons the cloak, he becomes invisible, able to see but not be seen. Sounds pretty plausible when you're reading about a fictional world filled with witches, wizards and magic, but in the real world, a garment like that would be impossible, right? Not so fast.
Far from the world of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, in a university tucked amid the rolling hills of Durham, North Carolina, Duke scientists have succeeded in designing a pioneering prototype that could lead to such a cloak.
"The cloak that we fabricated is really just a baby step toward the more impressive thing," said a Duke scientist.
The key to the Duke experiments is a unique concoction of metamaterials, a metal fabric of sorts that very simply put, deflects light directed toward it, potentially making an object appear invisible. Basically it's a mathematical breakthrough.
Here's how it works. When microwaves, which are normally disrupted as they encounter an object, are directed toward a ring of metamaterials, they give the appearance of going through it, rendering the object seemingly invisible.
In other words, everything tucked inside the metamaterials remains concealed from view because metamaterials can be tuned to bend electromagnetic radiation, radio waves and visible light, for example, in any direction.
Like a river streaming around a smooth boulder, light and all other forms of electromagnetic radiation would strike the cloak and simply flow around it, continuing on as if it never bumped up against an obstacle. That would give an onlooker the apparent ability to peer right through the cloak, with everything tucked inside concealed from view.
Harry Potter's movie magic triggered the experiment.
The theory expert behind the Duke team is Sir John Pendry. He says his wife, who is a Potter fan, urged him to apply his mathematics to do something exciting like make an object disappear. That's how the path to an invisibility cloak began and it has serious applications.
This is something being considered for use in war to make ships invisible to the enemy. The Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency supported the research, given the obvious military applications of such stealthy technology.
Meanwhile, one of Japan's leading scientists is working to perfect a different technique to become invisible using optical-camouflage technology.
So while you shouldn't hold your breath waiting for the marketing of a Harry Potter cloak this Halloween, the science behind this trick and treat is more fact than fiction.
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