Invisibility cloak hides parts of objects, leaves other parts visible

When Harry Potter walks around with a visible head but an invisible body, the performance seems strongly rooted in fantasy. But in a new study, scientists have designed and fabricated an invisibility cloak that may make such a feat possible. The new cloak can conceal some arbitrarily chosen parts of objects while leaving other parts visible, making it a localized invisibility cloak.

The researchers, led by Professor Tie Jun Cui at Southeast University in Nanjing, China, have published their paper on localized transformation optics devices in a recent issue of Applied Physics Letters.

"The potential application of a localized invisibility cloak is to make an object partly invisible and leave other parts visible," Cui told Phys.org. "Although it is difficult to allow a person to be partly visible and partly invisible in current technology, we believe it is completely possible in the future."