Cloaking technology has hit a standstill, but one professor says he and his team have made a major breakthrough, and the Pentagon is interested in finding out more.
The device’s technical name is called a “dielectric metasurface cloak,” and what it describe is a thin, non-metal material capable of changing the way electromagnetic waves hit an object, Army Times reports.
Basic radar detection requires signals bouncing back from the object to the receiver. Seeing an object requires light to bounce off the object into the eye, but according to professor Boubacar Kante at the University of California-San Diego, his team has found a way to manipulate electromagnetic waves to prevent sensors from detecting an object—at least in certain cases.
Kante wants to submit a proposal to the Department of Defense before the month is over.
While the invisibility cloak reached the proof of concept stage back in 2006, its utility was severely limited because it only worked on microwaves. Additionally, it only operated on two dimensions.
“This is the first time where we show that you can actually take electromagnetic waves and wrap them around some region that you want to conceal and restore them on the other side,” Duke University physicist David R. Smith said at the time.
New material made of Teflon substrate is capable of beating old limitations, which called for materials 10 times as thick as the wavelength it was evading.
If a wavelength was three centimeters, the coating needed to be a foot. Now, three centimeters would only need a three millimeter coat.
The military has expressed significant interest in the project. Kayla Matola, research analyst for Homeland Defense & Security Information Analysis Center, told Army Times that the design pioneered by Kante’s team “could provide the military with air superiority.”
With any cloaking technology, there are limits. First, the cloak can’t simultaneously evade both visual and radar detection. Second, the cloak only works effectively within a six-degree angle range.
Still, the cloak isn’t confined to mathematics. The cloak can be produced tomorrow, but the military will likely take anywhere from 5-10 years to put the material through rigorous testing before approving it for use.
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