Many of you have probably read The Invisible Man written by H.G. Wells more than one hundred years ago. The book had been and still is included in the science fiction genre, fiction being the key word here. Now however, a research breakthrough may very well turn the concept into a verified fact.

A team of scientists, led by Xiang Zhang, working at the University of California, Berkeley, has managed to find a way to cloak 3D objects with the use of especially designed materials that have the ability to redirect light. Up to this point, only thin 2D objects had been turned invisible.

The information will be presented later on this week in the publications Nature and Science.

This ongoing project will eventually enable researchers to cloak people and any type of objects; obviously enough, such an ability could be used in an incredibly wide range of situations and applications. Military actions would greatly benefit from such a breakthrough.

For hiding the objects, metamaterials were used; they are made up of metal and several other "ingredients," including ceramic, Teflon and fiber composite. These materials are designed to deflect the visible light that normally falls onto any given object.

Everyone has seen at least one movie in which stealth technology is mentioned; this is quite different, as it only applies to aircrafts or other types of machines which become invisible to radars alone. Once this project takes off, situations similar to those found in the aforementioned book will actually become possible.

The research was a joint effort of he U.S. Army Research Office and the National Science Foundation's Nano-Scale Science and Engineering Center.