Cloaking, the ability to render an object invisible to electromagnetic and acoustic waves, has been the subject of intense research thanks to recent developments in the field of metamaterials. A cloaking metamaterial acts as an invisibility shield, which cancels any presence of the propagating wave within the shielded region. This is a powerful idea that has potential applications beyond electromagnetic and acoustic cloaking. Stéphane Brûlé and co-workers have now proposed a proof of concept by applying this idea to realize a seismic cloak. In their experiment, the authors built a seismic metamaterial constituted of a 'mesh' of vertical cylindrical voids dug out of silty clay soil and analysed its masking behaviour by shocking it with 50-Hz seismic waves. Their results show how the metamaterial is capable of strongly attenuating the energy of the seismic wave, as close as 10 m from the wave epicentre.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Nicoletti, O. Seismic cloaks. Nature Mater 13, 428 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat3968
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat3968