We made a special "tape" that can stick wireless power to a wall and guide it around so the signal doesn't just fade away.
arXiv · March 13, 2026 · 2603.11579
Why it matters
In open space, wireless power drops off rapidly as it spreads out in every direction. This flexible tape forces the energy to hug the surface, changing the math of power decay so that devices can receive significantly more electricity over much longer distances.
From the abstract
Millimeter-wave technologies are essential for future high-speed wireless communications. However, a fundamental challenge remains in the form of severe free-space path loss, where the power density decreases inversely with the square of the distance r (i.e., proportional to r^{-2}) as a spherical dependence. To overcome this limitation, we propose a flexible metasurface tape that is designed to guide electromagnetic energy as surface waves. Unlike conventional free-space propagation, this engin