We introduce a cylindrical cloak to control the bending waves propagating in thin plates. This is achieved through radially dependent isotropic mass density and radially dependent and orthotropic flexural rigidity deduced from a coordinate transformation for the biharmonic propagation equation in the spirit of the paper of Pendry et al. [Science 312, 1780 (2006)]. We analyze the response of the cloak surrounding a clamped obstacle in the presence of a cylindrical excitation. We note that whereas the studied bending waves are of different physical and mathematical nature, they are cloaked in many ways as their electromagnetic and acoustic counterparts; e.g., when the source lies inside the coating, it seems to radiate from a shifted location (mirage effect).

• Received 3 December 2008

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.79.033102