‘Invisibility Cloak’ Uses Mirages to Make Objects Vanish

Yeah...this isn't so much 'invisibility' as a simple reflection caused by heat rising - see mirage.

Meh.
 
It's basically turning into a refraction mirror, it's kind of like the distortion effect you get when you look at a gas leak or the surface of a car on a hot day.
 
Im sure on infrared that thing lights up like a Christmas tree. The Romulans are not impressed.
 
I think the crowd here is just upset because it won't be integrated into a case mod anytime soon... Still very cool. Not an application I'd think of for a superconductor.
 
Hamish Campbell said:
"No body here but us trees"
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I'm not that impressed, it is definitely taking place underwater...are we going to use this to hide from sharks?
From the original article:
It can hide objects from view, works best underwater and even has a near-instant on/off switch.
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You can do a lot of things when you can control factors of refraction, it's being able to do it in real world conditions that makes it so difficult.
 
so what's going on? current goes through wires, which instantly heats up the water causing a different index of refraction and from this precise angle (and more notably only this angle) it appears to make something vanish?
 
It doesn't vanish,as it still can be seen,come back when they can actually make a object invisible with no tell-tale lines.
 
If this is using heat to generate a quick mirage, that is going to make you glow like a mofo to IR, which just about every foot soldier and their mom now has at their disposal.
 
The institution name is incorrect. It is the University of Texas at Dallas, NOT University of Dallas which is also in the Dallas, Texas area.
 
Probably because the people commenting in this thread are all geniuses.

I met someone at Caltech who was working on nanotube technology. Their basic idea was screw around with the nanotubes and come up with anything, but they didn't know what they were trying to come up with exactly. Sounded so crazy to me at the time and still does.

And what is with everyone talking about IR being a problem? Way too much FPS for you guys. There is more than trying to hide from someone shooting at you in the real world to have a cloaking device.

Steve said:
An "on demand" mirage isn't cool?

Wow, tough crowd. :eek:
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A portable 20 foot flexible mirror you can use to cover a tank either as rigid plates, tarp, or stickon vanyl.(Altho you'll probably cook whoever's inside).

It's probably going to give off so much heat, it'll attract missiles like a giant flare.
 
On second thought, it doesn't necessarily have to be overly hot. Just hotter than the surrounding air, with enough temperature difference to cause the light refraction.

If the surroundings were already hot. Would it have to generate even more heat to induce the mirage effect?
 
Achron said:
Yeah...this isn't so much 'invisibility' as a simple reflection caused by heat rising - see mirage.

Meh.
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Yea go a head and totally dismiss the most major step forward in developing anything that can turn a material near entirely transparent for even a small amount of time. Because we can all replicate this technology with a tooth pick and a used gum wrapper.

:rolleyes:
 
Since it's a blank white background, he could also just use put a white piece of paper in front of the object. I might be slightly more impressed if they had a complex background. Next time Harry Potter is in a snowstorm, he can use this technology or a white towel to hide.
 
Ohhkay, so we've got invisiblity on the way.... where's our room temperature super-conductors so we can breach the 1Thz barrier?!?
 
I saw this last year, I believe it was a Chinese person that did this before. I think its pretty cool actually
 
Everyone is crying about IR radiation... What would it matter if this thing was integrated into your trenchcoat and you turned it on for 2 minutes while you robbed a bank or turned it on for 30 seconds while you gunned down a public official. See what I'm getting at? Who cares if there's IR if you're just trying to hide your identity or conceal yourself for a few minutes? No one is going to have IR pointed at you in a situation like that. Even if they did, who cares?
 
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