2009 PIMS-CSC Seminar - 03

Recent work has shown that one physical interpretation of the coordinate transformation invariance of Maxwell's equations can be expressed as an electromagnetic material with transformed permittivity and permeability values defined in the original coordinates [Pendry et al., Science, 2006]. This means that the bending and stretching of electromagnetic fields specified by coordinate transformations can be implemented with specific electromagnetic materials, enabling unexpected and interesting solutions such as electromagnetic cloaking. Building on this idea, we have recently shown, through several different approaches, how this same concept can be extended to realize arbitrary manipulations of acoustic waves, including cloaking, using materials with specific properties determined by the coordinate transformation. This presentation will summarize the related concepts of transformation optics and transformation acoustics and will describe approaches for engineering composite materials with the properties needed to realize, in practice, the applications that can be imagined with this concept.