One-Way Transfer of Magnetic Fields

Jordi Prat-Camps creates magnetic metamaterials—structures that manipulate magnetic fields in unconventional ways. Over the last few years, the physicist, who is at the University of Sussex in the UK, and his colleagues have constructed a cloak that makes objects invisible to magnetic fields and a “wormhole” that directs a magnetic field between two points in space along an invisible tunnel, as well as other things. Their latest material—which acts as a magnetic diode—enables unidirectional transfer of a magnetic field between two objects. Prat-Camps says that such a device could increase the efficiency of magnetic-based wireless power-transfer systems.