Top TechTop Tech #51: Cloaking Device, free electricity, and electromagnetic propulsion
Highlighting interesting or important innovations with long-term promise.
By Paul Worthington
Today’s Top Tech:
• Portable Cloaking Device
• Phone case draws power from signals
• NASA tests electromagnetic propulsion
Portable Cloaking Device
Not an actual cloak you can wear, mind you — more like the Star Trek devices that would hide a ship from view.
Bending light around an object can shield it from detection — in theory. Now researchers at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology developed a portable system that can make small objects disappear from sight.
The system combines a special polymer that scatters light, and a hollow metal cylinder. “By scattering light, the material slows down the effective propagation speed of the light waves through the medium. Then the light can be sped up again to make up for the longer path length around the hidden object,” the KIT news release says. “It can’t hide a human, but it can make small objects disappear from sight without specialized equipment.”
[Insert obligatory Harry Potter reference here.]
Phone case draws power from signals
There are plenty of radio frequency signals bouncing around us all these days — WiFi, Bluetooth, and LTE — and now an upcoming case for the iPhone will convert that RF into DC… direct current electricity, that is.
Nikola Technology says its proprietary energy harvesting circuit can power mobile devices wirelessly.
TechCrunch has the story here.
NASA tests electromagnetic propulsion
A group at NASA’s Johnson Space Center has successfully tested an electromagnetic propulsion drive in a vacuum – “a major breakthrough for a multi-year international effort” the space agency reports.
The thrust measurements of the EM Drive also “defy classical physics’ expectations” they it “should be unusable for space propulsion because of the law of conservation of momentum,” NASA adds. “The concept of an EM Drive… was that electromagnetic microwave cavities might provide for the direct conversion of electrical energy to thrust without the need to expel any propellant.”
Twin Peaks Vacation Rental
(Sponsor) Enjoy the natural beauty of a private home in the Sierra Nevadas, and experience Yosemite National Park now in the Spring — free from the crowds of Summer!
You’ll be comfortable in a large and fully-stocked house with a deck, great view, sunroom patio — all on 15 acres of mountain forest.
Just added: a new indoor hot tub.
