WELCOME TO THE SANTA MARIA EXPERIMENT!

Below we have a wide variety of links to news stories covering various research efforts in the area of invisibility. We must point out, however, that careful reading is required to fully understand the implications of this research compared to that on display at the Santa Maria Experiment exhibit. What you will find is that none of the work reported on involves the accomplishment of optical invisibility, despite the fact that many of the headlines of these media stories seem to indicate that that is what has been achieved!

The clear and substantiated facts are that the first published case of successful, private sector optical invisibility research was in July of 1994 in Purpose magazine, a local publication from Columbus, Ohio. In that issue was the article on the research of Marshall Barnes, along with the first ever published photo of the Santa Maria appearing to vanish from sight! That original article, along with the photograph, will be on display as part of the Santa Maria Experiment exhibit, along with many of the other articles that followed in the 1990s - a decade before any of these current efforts, which have not come close to the same level of invisibility yet!   

This clearly places Marshall Barnes at the forefront of this effort, and Columbus, which has a long and rich history of technological development and advancements, as the site where it all began.  

The Santa Maria Experiment exhibit thus serves as an educational and historic testament to this accomplishment and is the first major marker of Columbus being a true 21st Century City.