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First Black Hole For Light Created On Earth
An anonymous reader writes "An electromagnetic 'black hole' that sucks in surrounding light has been built for the first time. The device, which works at microwave frequencies, may soon be extended to trap visible light, leading to an entirely new way of harvesting solar energy to generate electricity. A theoretical design for a table-top black hole to trap light was proposed in a paper published earlier this year by Evgenii Narimanov and Alexander Kildishev of Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. Their idea was to mimic the properties of a cosmological black hole, whose intense gravity bends the surrounding space-time, causing any nearby matter or radiation to follow the warped space-time and spiral inwards."
That sucks ...
How much energy does it "take?" Its a metamaterial structure, and the refractive properties are caused by its shape alone.
... so if you were going to put a solar panel in the middle, as the article describes, then it will likely require cooling if its placed in bright conditions.
That said, all that incident EM radiation is gonna really heat it up
Unless they're very clever with creating it, such that only wavelengths usable by the solar panel are refracted into the centre. Anyway, if they think they can do that by the end of 2009, can they make me a man-sized invisible hamsterball? Invisible zorbing would be an interesting experience.
Interesting culture you've got there. Where I work the theorists/computational groups find the experimentalists indispensible and vice versa. The experimentalists provide the grounding in reality and provide the final fruition of all the theory/computer work. The theory+computation guides the experiments and increases the odds that the experiments'll work the first time out. Everyone's better off, and everyone knows it, with the exception of just one guy who's generally hard to deal with anyway (even the other experimentalists don't get on with him.)
--PM
They need to stop calling it a black hole or the ignorant masses will decide it's going to end the world.
In the current uber-politically correct climate, they're more likely to lose their funding after being accused of racism.
As long as the dolphins are still here, we're safe.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Now is only the could work in Cold Fusion and Death Panels!
Now is only the could work in sentence structure!
Apologies if you made this post without the aid of caffeine... or if you're quoting verbatim from Palin's blog (which I kinda doubted at first since it uses the words "cold fusion" but that COULD be some obscure Alaskan sexual practise)
Now is only the could work in Cold Fusion and Death Panels!
Cold fusion is what happens when two ice cubes stick together.
Free Martian Whores!
Are we looking at the next generation of stealth technology?
If you're looking at it wouldn't it be the last generation stealth technology ?
If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error.
If none of the radar bounces come back, you must be moving away at at the speed of light. Definitely over the limit.