The magical "invisibility cloak" from the Harry Potter books has moved closer to reality.

Scientists at the University of Rochester in New York have discovered a way to hide large objects from sight using inexpensive and readily available lenses.

Cloaking is the process that allows an object to become hidden from view, while everything around it appears undisturbed.

"A lot of people have worked on a lot of different aspects of optical cloaking for years," professor of physics at the New York school, John Howell, said.

The so-called Rochester Cloak is not really a tangible cloak at all. The device actually looks like equipment used by an optometrist. When an object is placed behind the layered lenses it seems to disappear.

Loading...

Previous cloaking methods have been complicated, expensive and not able to hide objects in three dimensions when viewed at varying angles, creators of the new device said.

"From what we know this is the first cloaking device that provides three-dimensional, continuously multidirectional cloaking," said graduate student Joseph Choi, who helped develop the technology.

In their tests, the researchers have cloaked a hand, a face and a ruler, making each object appear "invisible" while the image behind the hidden object remains in view.

Part of a hand "disappears" using the multidirectional "perfect paraxial" cloak. ( Supplied: J. Adam Fenster/University of Rochester )

The implications of the discovery were endless, they said.

Professor Howell said cloaking could effectively let a surgeon "look through his hands to what he is actually operating on".

"It can be used for surgery, in the military, in interior design, art," Mr Choi said.

The device cost the scientists about $1,000 in materials. A patent is pending but simple instructions on how to create a Rochester Cloak at home for under $100 have been released.

Reuters