ON THE CUTTING EDGE: Life Imitates The Romulans
An experiment by American and British researchers suggests that it is possible to create a cloaking device. An effective cloaking device would force light to pass around an object – like a fighter jet - instead of reflecting it. An object is visible because some of the light bouncing off of it is reflected back into our eyes. The object also casts a shadow. Ideally, the cloak would be transparent - the object would not reflect light – and there would be no shadow. In this experiment – occurring just five months after Duke University scientists theorized that cloaking was possible - microwaves were used as a stand-in for light waves. The cloak created an optical illusion that "hid" a copper cylinder in two dimensions – there was some reflection and a small shadow, so the background behind the cylinder was visible but a bit darkened. The next challenge is to achieve invisibility in three dimensions without any detectable shadow.
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