Researchers Develop Purely Optical Cloaking

Technologies for making things invisible is always interesting. There are active and passive technologies that have been tried for this. My earlier posting Mercedes uses LEDs to create invisible car showed and active technology that used camera + huge LED display to make invisibility effect.

Yesterday I saw a new interesting passive one. Researchers Develop Purely Optical Cloaking posting at Slashdot tells that researchers at the University of Rochester have developed a remarkably effective visual cloak using a relatively simple arrangement of optical lenses. The method is unique in that it uses off-the-shelf components and provides cloaking through the visible spectrum. Bonus: The article includes instructions to build your own.

Researchers at the University of Rochester have developed a remarkably effective visual cloak using a relatively simple arrangement of optical lenses. The method is unique in that it uses off-the-shelf components and provides cloaking through the visible spectrum. Also, it works in 3-D. As one researcher put it, “This is the first device that we know of that can do three-dimensional, continuously multidirectional cloaking, which works for transmitting rays in the visible spectrum.” Bonus: The  ‘Cloaking’ device uses ordinary lenses to hide objects across range of angles article includes instructions to build your own. Their simple configuration improves on other cloaking devices, but it’s not perfect. It  can work for angles up to 15 degrees, or more.