It is rare for arcane physics and childhood fantasy to come together in the same sentence. Yet this week, newspapers, radio and TV could not help comparing two scientific papers on invisibility shields to Harry Potter's invisibility cloak, the fantastic garment that lets Harry and his pals go places undetected and have adventures that no muggle could conceive of. The scientific papers are lucid, and the ideas they propose, if not the technologies, are simple. However, the analogy with Harry's most prized possession is not so straightforward.
展开▼
