via BBC

A US-British team of scientists has successfully tested a cloak of invisibility in the laboratory.

The device mostly hid a small copper cylinder from microwaves in tests at Duke University, North Carolina.

It works by deflecting the microwaves around the object and restoring them on the other side, as if they had passed through empty space.

… The cloak consists of 10 fibreglass rings covered with copper elements and is classed as a “metamaterial” - an artificial composite that can be engineered to produce a desired change in the direction of electromagnetic waves.

…The metamaterial cloak channelled the microwaves around the object like water flows around the rock.

“These metamaterials have opened a new chapter in electromagnetism. We’ve opened the door into the secret garden,” co-author Professor John Pendry, from Imperial College London, told BBC News.