Oregon State University
Skip navigation

Breakthroughs in Science

Breakthrough Made in Metamaterial Optics

December 5th, 2008

These “metamaterials,” which gain their properties from their structure rather than directly from their composition, have been seen as a key to a possible “super lens” that would have an extraordinary level of resolution and be able to “see” things the size of a nanometer – a human hair is 100,000 nanometers wide.

They could also be important in machine visions systems, electronics manufacturing, computers limited only by the speed of light, and a range of new communications concepts. A “cloaking device” to hide objects, although not exactly of the type made famous by Star Trek, is also a possibility.

Read more about this significant breakthrough here.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Comments are closed.