So if they manage to bend light equally at all frequencies exactly the right amount (Yeah, right) they will then have a teensy weensy problem. Not only will nobody be able to see them, but they, themselves will be in total darkness.

The stealthed troops are easy to not see in the pic but did anyone else notice the Hobbit wearing Sauron's ring, Harry Potter in his cloak, the Predator and the invisible man are also not visible in the pic - not to mention the Klingon Bird of Prey you cannot see hovering over the field.

Once again, El Reg surpasses all othe media outlets with this ground-breaking photo...

IGMC - it's the one hanging on the apparently empty peg...

How do you know just because you haven't seen them does not mean they are not there.

Just as G.W. is seen hanging around the women's beach volleyball area, a sudden breakthrough in invisibility occurs.

Military's probably had this for 10 years, he is CiC after all, putting tax dollars to a purpose at least half the electorate would approve of is surely a first?

That picture is a fake! I can see where the troops have been photoshopped out!

/Mines the invisible one.

Metal Gear Paintball!!

Also, does this mean paint and dyes will be a restricted weapon on the battlefield?

I wonder if there'd be a blur as you moved or if it'd be absolutely transparent?

Also, does it work both close-up and further away (as the convergence / divergence of the images both eyes see changes)

Does it work all the way around the object, or could it be defeated by the tactic known as "stepping to the left and looking for a suspicious vertical line"?

Can it work with really intense light, or will it be defeated by a half decent laser diode?

Does it work with all visible spectrum light, or can it just make you invisible if all the surrounding light is of a certain wavelength?

Just a few questions, but they seem like the sort of things an "invisibility" system would fall down on...

Can't see any foot prints or tracks, photo must be a fake!

You cannae bend the laws of physics, Captain!

... or at least not that we've seen yet.

Mine's the one on the empty coat peg with the faintly detectable shimmer

I can see them in the picture. They were also on my bus the other day.

Wouldn't poking the eyes out of the observer achieve the same results?

"Of course, that last bit's complete nonsense."

Ahhhh, but is it?

Would the object doing the cloaking have to be spherical?

Would there be a focal length inside which its distortion would be noticeable, like the eddies behind a rock in a stream which makes the presence of the rock known for a short distance downstream?

Also a moving (and extremely fast) camera would be able to spot them as the light would be slowed up by having to travel a: further and b: through a material so distant objects would blur. Admittedly it would be an almost unbelievably fast (optical processing, not movement) camera, but we are talking about invisibility shields here.

Paris as her knickers are already made of this meta-material.

I'm sure we did.

Now, as then, my comment is that even if you make the tanks, trucks and squaddies invisible, how are you going to make the exhausts, tracks, bent foliage and noise go away? And while squillions are spent on this technology, better weapons and light-weight body armour might be just as effective and much, much cheaper.

Of course, if you apply it to Black Helicopters (TM), you just might have something.

when you have metamaterials at optical wavelengths. Just flow the outside scenery through an itty bitty hole in the wall, and keep the high thermal resistance wall in between.

Be able to save great gobs of energy that way, none of this Luddite thermally leaky glass rubbish.

But I can't find it.

Mine's the one on the 'empty looking' hanger, I think...

That tree in the photo is a rather obvious hiding place. If that's the secret to invisibility, they had better improve...

David Copperfield did something clever like this a few years ago, making a number of things invisible?

Can't they just clone him and shove him into whatever it is they want to make invisible?

0) You can't see out of it.

1) It'll be more of an Invisibility Container

As understand it, a perfect example of such a container (for you couldn't really wear or drive it) would be undetectable in (a portion of) the EM spectrum at whatever velocity it was moving.

Is this material going to be IRR and somehow body heat dispersing / insulating?

I'm all with Adam Foxton. I really wonder if it is possible to coat an object in something which warps light PERFECTLY around it so as to become invisble. Given the difficulties in getting perfection in ordinary optics (even apochromatic lenses are just corrected for three wavelenghts, not all) I very much doubt we could make stuff which perfectly blends you into the background, in all wavelengths, from all angles.

I would bet there would eb some refraction effects which make the wearer similar to some sort of lens which would certainly distort the scene behind it to some extent. You might be well camouflaged, but not invisible.

Are the boffins doing this research actually saying that these meta materials can in theory be used on large scale objects like tanks and people? Or are they hinting that, and just riding the wave of cash flowing from the military top brass, who seem more and more to be influenced by childhood sci-fi? I'm not a physicist, but my gut instinct is that someone is being economical with the truth. The analogy with light and a flowing fluid is flawed. I'd guess at the very best this system would when working results in some kind of adaptive camouflage. I don't think its going to allow me stand unnoticed in Paris' bathroom.

Can I use it at the office to avoid detection by stupid managers?

...but isn't current research in this area limited to very small objects (ie, several molecules in size)?

Seems too good to be true if it can do big stuff.

Also my house from here

At least I assume Darpa would have had a hand in this, what with their freaky-tech background.

Message begins:

Video evidence or STFU

Message ends.

Steven R

A few questions:

If you bend all the light around you, how do you see where you're going?

Does painting the object pink first help?

How closely does the material resemble a towel?

"Every washing machine ever made already has this feature. Put two socks in, run a cycle - short or long, doesn't matter - look inside tub and only one sock is visible."

Doesn't work that way here. I put in one pair of socks, I get out 2 socks - each from completely different pairs. I blame the extra-dimensional portal in the back of my washer, but take solace in knowing that a version of myself in another dimension is having the same trouble...

PS Invisibility is easy. Every time my boss comes towards me carrying a piece of paper, I disappear from sight immediately...

I'll take all the other stuff a superlens can do, and his group is working on those as well. I find it odd they announced in this manner, unless I misunderstand the discovery, this is a material with a negative refraction index in the visible wavelengths. This same technology is what they are planning on using to boost optical media sizes through the roof, and drop lithography die sizes down to the silicon limit. It trumps the diffraction limit or so I've read.

@Charles Manning: yes it took them 20 yrs but Canada and NY both now have superconducting power lines yes?

Maybe they'll give some to the Brits - give them a sporting chance of not getting shot in the back.