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New CT Cloak?

bonavada

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i wonder if ace baker or the webfairy have seen the below? from HERE
i can see loads of twoofish mileage in this.....

British Army Trials Invisible Tank Technology

It has been claimed that the Ministry of Defence has revealed new technology which, when applied to tanks, effectively renders them invisible. It is alleged that under-cover trials were carried out in the last few days, in which, according to the British Army, a vehicle was made to disappear entirely from view. The Army added that the in-service debut of an invisible tank could only be five years away.
The technology is understood to employ the use of cameras and projectors, which transmit images of the surrounding terrain onto the tank itself. Consequently, those surveying the space where the tank is present will be able to view only the backdrop.
Comments have been provided by a soldier who participated in the trials. Describing the technology as “incredible”, he added: “If I hadn't been present I wouldn't have believed it”
“I looked across the fields and just saw grass and trees - but in reality I was staring down the barrel of a tank gun."

MoD Keeping Invisibility Technology Under Wraps

Data on the exact specifications of the technology remains classified, but it is thought that the Ministry of Defence is simultaneously exploring its use on clothing.
Theories of invisibility and associated powers are reminiscent of the likes of James Bond, but the technology is real, as far as Armed Forces International has been able to establish.
Its creator is Imperial College London’s Professor Sir John Pendry, who, describing the principles behind it, said the only snag was the operability of the cameras/ projectors used. "The next stage...”, he added, “..is to make the tank invisible without them - which is intricate and complicated, but possible."
The Ministry of Defence is quoted as having said: “We’ve already had some success in making vehicles invisible and it’s still early days.”

BV
http://www.armedforces-int.com/products-and-services/tanks/
 
JAStewart said:
How do we know that website is legit?
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seems that at least some of their sources are ....LINK.... and it looks like the US DARPA have a quite visible finger in the pie:-

Scientists conjure true 'cloaking' device

A way to vanish matter before your eyes has become a serious possibility thanks to theoretical research announced today by British and American scientists.
When built, the device theorised by the research could achieve a similar magical effect to that seen in Harry Potter movies, where the trainee wizard dons a special cape and becomes invisible.
The research suggests a way to build a 'cloaking' or shielding device that renders whatever is placed inside it invisible. It would also nullify the effects of other electromagnetic radiation - meaning that objects sitting within the cloak would be impervious to radar detection.
The scientists from Imperial College London and Duke University, USA, announced their findings in a paper published in Science Express today (26 May).
john_pendry1.jpg

"Just as in the Harry Potter film, nobody would be able to see an object if it was cloaked, as it's in a spacewarp, and that's exactly what our stuff would do," says Professor Sir John Pendry of the Department of Physics at Imperial College London and first author of the research.
The researchers propose to build a special material that wraps around an object and which would 'grab' light heading towards it and make it flow smoothly around the object rather than strike it. To an observer the light would appear to have behaved as if there was nothing there.
Sir John explains the concept by likening it to water flowing around a stick in a stream. "Water flows around the obstacle and continues smoothly on behind the stick downstream. That's the idea behind our theory."
Study co-authors David Schurig and David Smith of Duke University, are now attempting to build the special material, called a metamaterial, that will do the grabbing of light and achieve this effect in reality. The first device is likely to be at a very small scale, just a few tenths of a centimetre across.
However, the special effects of the cloaking device would not be limited just to light rays, but would extend to all other field lines, including lines of force. This suggests other novel uses, for example in an interventional MRI scanner, where metallic instruments and other sensitive measuring equipment cannot be used due to the scanner's very strong magnetic fields. Instruments contained within such a cloaking device could however be used safely.
Unlike other stealth or cloaking solutions currently under development, the proposed device would also operate across a range of frequencies, not just one. "Ours would be a broadband cloak," says Sir John.
Since the cloak could also be tuned to apply to any ranges of frequency on the electromagnetic spectrum, it could also shield objects at the radio frequencies used by radar. In fact, says Sir John, this is where the device may eventually make the biggest impact.
Fortunately, he says, the technical challenge of making the device is less exacting than that for another of his ideas, the perfect lens, and he expects the first to be made within one or two years, for radar applications.
"If you can make the right metamaterials you will be almost there. They should be much easier to make than those required for perfect lenses, since our cloaking device doesn't need to be made to a perfect quality to achieve the right result."
The inspiration for the theory builds on work undertaken by Sir John and a former graduate student Andrew Ward over a decade ago, which demonstrated not only a theoretical new way of steering light but, as it was later realised, a means of 'ripping' a hole in space.
"What this device would really do is a bit like making a black hole" said Sir John,"There would be no communication between the object that is cloaked and the outside world."
The research was supported with funding from EPSRC (Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, UK) and DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, US).

For more information please contact:
Abigail Smith
Imperial College London Press Office
Tel: +44 (0)20 7594 6701
Mob: +44 (0)7803 886248
Email: abigail.smith@imperial.ac.uk

BV
 
Camouflage has always been around. IR thermal sights aren't so easily fooled.
 
Gravy said:
Camouflage has always been around. IR thermal sights aren't so easily fooled.
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Yep. I'm guessing the expense of this optical cloaking technology would far outweigh the benefits for it to be widely employed on tanks, if at all.
 
TV Presenter & Scrapheap Challenge winner, Lt Col (retired), Dick Strawbridge did something similar - in his series Crafty Tricks of War - with a land rover a very large flat screen display on one side, and a camera on the other.

From a distance, the land rover became completely invisible, even when moving slowly.
 
I bet other scientests are already working on counter measures to this.
As an ex US Army Grunt,I agree that this will be another system that looks great on paper but turns out to be a flop in the field.
 
Gravy said:
...until the ads for the defense contractors who developed the technology came on screen....
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Or the screensaver kicked in!
"Why is there a giant swimsuit model in my back yard? Not that I'm complaining..."
 
Gravy said:
Camouflage has always been around. IR thermal sights aren't so easily fooled.
Click to expand...
Well technically we are talking about two different things in this discussion which partially has to do with optical camoflage and partially to do with legitimate cloaking. The legitimate cloaking would in fact be impossible to detect unless you walk into the thing.
 
The Invisible tank and the cloak are different technologies. The cloak is a material that currently bends radio waves about an object. They believe that the princples can be used to create one that bends light. It would end up being little more then a wrap for an item since you can't see through it either way. Handy for hiding things parked near the battlefield, but not when they are involved in the battle. The projected idea sounds good and has been tried a few times, but there is a major problem with perspective that screws it up. People standing at three different points would expect to see three different backgrounds, but wouldn't meaning that the illusion would be thrown off.
 
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