Underwater cloaking devices could be a step closer thanks to heated sheets of carbon nanotubes that deflect light from the surface of an object – just like a mirage.
Desert mirages occur when surfaces warmed by the sun bend light rays so that photons from the sky, rather than those reflected from the surface, reach an observer's eye – an effect known as "photothermal" deflection.
Existing invisibility cloaks use arrays of electromagnetic antennas to steer photons around an object, but these so-called metamaterials typically cover a narrow range of frequencies.
Ali Aliev and colleagues at the University of Texas in Dallas embedded a sheet of carbon nanotubes into aerogel, a foam-like material. When electrically heated, the nanotubes bent light waves to create a mirage, effectively cloaking the sheet and anything behind it.
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