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Bringing Back the Magic In Metamaterials
Charliemopps writes: Though it's 30 years late, transparent aluminum, as predicted in the 1986 film Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, may finally be here. There have been many attempts to create transparent metals in the past few years, and some have been somewhat successful, if only for a few femtoseconds. But now, by modifying metals like silver and aluminum at the subwavelength scale, researchers are developing "Meta-Materials" that cause light to interact with these metals in new and interesting ways. One of their more promising goals is to create a "perfect lens" which would allow an everyday person to view things as small as a virus with the naked eye.
"in the pass few years" - just bad editing.
"the subwavelength scale" - pure unadulterated bullshit.
So, did they have to invert the polarity of the warp field? Give me a fucking break.
Yes, then you get a compound, that no longer has properties of the metal it is made from, like being electrically conductive. Sapphire is also ~20 less thermally conductive than aluminium too. You need to add zinc to make it conductive, which makes it less transparent.
Conductive metal would be good for LED's and solar panels if they out-perform indium tin oxide