Innovations & technologies

China Claims a Major Stealth Breakthrough, but Is It True?

Chinese scientists claim they have developed a new kind of material for making aircraft less detectable by radar.
But the development probably is not the breakthrough that some observers claim it is.
Prof. Luo Xiangang and colleagues at the Institute of Optics and Electronics, part of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Chengdu, said they had created the first-ever mathematical model to precisely describe the behavior of electromagnetic waves when they “strike a piece of metal engraved with microscopic patterns,” according to South China Morning Post.
The newspaper cited a statement Luo’s team posted on the academy’s website on July 15, 2019.
“With their new model and breakthroughs in materials fabrication, they developed a membrane, known as a ‘metasurface,’ which can absorb radar waves in the widest spectrum yet reported,” South China Morning Post reported.
At present, stealth aircraft mainly rely on special geometry – their body shape – to deflect radar signals, but those designs can affect aerodynamic performance. They also use radar absorbing paint, which has a high density but only works against a limited frequency spectrum.