Metamaterials make for a broadband breakthrough

Since 2008, frequent fliers have relished the luxury of onboard Internet connections. Today, service relies on a fixed antenna that picks up signals from a nationwide network of cell towers. But that method offers low bandwidth at sometimes ridiculous prices. New antennas based on metamaterials, though, may soon rescue Web-addicted travelers from poor and pricey connections in the air, and a group at the patent-licensing firm Intellectual Ventures (IV) thinks that it can implement the new technology by 2014.