Metamaterials mock the heavens

Physicists could study black holes and chaotic planetary orbits in the laboratory, a team proposes

Tiny special materials may mimic astronomical events, including the trapping of light in black holes and the disruption of planetary orbits, a new report in the September Nature Physics proposes. The shape and design of such materials may allow scientists to do previously impossible experiments by replicating aspects of the heavens at the laboratory bench.