Harry Potter fans rejoice, we're one step closer to a working invisibility cloak. A researcher at Duke Engineering has managed to create a plastic device that deflects microwave beams.
The disk like object resembles a white vinyl record with a holes cut at various, specific points. The location, shape, and size of the holes are determined by a computer algorithm that calculates the combination necessary to make it "invisible" to microwave beams.
When an object is placed at the center of the disc and microwave beams are shot at it, the beams move past the object due to the design of the ring. To put it simply, the ring grabs the microwave beams and redirects them into a space where the object isn't.
Granted, hiding from microwave beams is very different from dodging higher wavelengths, such as visible light. However, Yaroslav Urzhumov, the creator and an assistant research professor in computer engineering at Duke's Pratt School of Engineering, thinks that this new development will lead the way for actual invisibility in the future. This potential advancement, known as "optical cloaking," would be what we actually imagine when the term invisibility cloak is thrown around.
Furthermore, Urzhumov claims to have run computer simulations on larger objects as well as larger cloaking radiuses. Additionally, Urzhumov's design was built using a standard 3D printer and took less than seven hours to print. An "affordable" 3D printer might run you several thousand dollars, but that's still a heck of a lot more inexpensive than you might have expected.
Once someone finally figures out how to apply this technology to visible light waves, we'll be up and ready for full blown invisibility devices. Until then, you better stick to hiding from your microwave.
You can read more about the project in Urzhumov's research paper here.
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