Experimental Evidence of the Thermal Cloak Based on the Path Design of the Heat Flux

Abstract

We recently showed theoretically that the infinite singularity of the thermal cloak designed by transformation thermodynamics could be eliminated by a new method—the path design of the heat flux without any approximation. In this paper, we present the experimental evidence of such a new strategy of thermal cloak, that is, a truly singularity-free thermal cloak. We fabricate such a transient thermal cloak device without using extreme material parameters. The experimental results show fully controlled, transient cloaking behavior, which are perfectly consistent with the theoretical derivations and simulated results. Since one can flexibly design the path of heat flux in the cloak, it has the large degree-of-freedom to construct thermal cloaks with the specific distributions of material parameters. The new method provides a new blue print for the transient thermal protection of a specific target.