An optical illusion is an image of a real target perceived by the eye that is deceptive or misleading due to a physiological illusion or a specific visual trick. The recently developed metamaterials provide efficient approaches to generate a perfect optical illusion. However, all existing research on metamaterial illusions has been limited to theory and numerical simulations. Here, we propose the concept of a radar illusion, which can make the electromagnetic (EM) image of a target gathered by radar look like a different target, and we realize a radar illusion device experimentally to change the radar image of a metallic target into a dielectric target with predesigned size and material parameters. It is well known that the radar signatures of metallic and dielectric objects are significantly different. However, when a metallic target is enclosed by the proposed illusion device, its EM scattering characteristics will be identical to that of a predesigned dielectric object under the illumination of radar waves. Such an illusion device will confuse the radar, and hence the real EM properties of the metallic target cannot be perceived. We designed and fabricated the radar illusion device using artificial metamaterials in the microwave frequency, and good illusion performances are observed in the experimental results.
©2011 American Physical Society