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« Low blows | Main | Philosophywatch, Oct. 15-22 » Monday, October 23, 2006When you just want to disappear...Fans of Dungeons & Dragons and other fantasy worlds -- I am not among them, for the record -- will be pleased to know that scientists have taken a small but significant step toward the invention of a cloak of invisibility. Mind you, the device works only on microwaves; is barely 8-cm wide; only works in two dimensions (I don't really get that); and can only reduce back scatter and forward scatter (ditto). But still. "The concept that you can cloak something and make something invisible can now be demonstrated by this method," said Duke University physicist David R. Smith. He and his partner at Duke University's Pratt School of Engineering were excited enough that they they've been keeping some secrets while they worked on this: Engineers David Schurig and David Smith of Duke University say they were concealing something themselves last May when they and their colleagues reported their proposal: "We had a cloak we liked pretty well in May, and it got better from there," Schurig reveals. Crafty devils. Posted by Evan Hughes at 01:55 PM
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