Natural Science Forum / Physics / Optics / December 2006

Thanks for the pointer - I remember when it was first announced, and
wondering what next.
(I also remember my <prestigious> university electricity and magnetism text
book saying with great confidence that transistors had no future, being
limited to audio frequencies only!  And that was in 1959... )

A question, based on this statement:

"Unlike common optical materials or "normal" crystals, optical metamaterials
display exceptional properties such as, for instance, a negative refractive
index. This offers extensive capabilities for the use of these materials.
With their aid, "perfect" lenses can be produced in which diffraction does
not limit resolution. One conceivable possibility is new lithography
techniques for the fabrication of computer chips."

If so, how (and I'm not saying they can, just challenging about it) do such
lenses avoid breaking resolution rules that seem needed to preserve quantum
limitations on knowledge (consider the famous microscope example used by
Heisenberg by illustrate his famous uncertainty principle.)