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Nanotubes Form The Darkest Material Yet Created

Posted by samzenpus on Thu Jan 17, 2008 03:08 AM
from the none-more-black dept.
Science
toxcspdrmn writes "Bad news for Spinal Tap fans. The BBC reports that researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York, have produced the darkest known material by manufacturing "forests" of carbon nanotubes. This forms a surface that absorbs or scatters 99.9% of all incidental light."
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Submission: None more black by toxcspdrmn (471013)
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Nanotubes Form The Darkest Material Yet Created 50 Comments More /

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  • Don't tell John Carmack! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Zymergy (803632) * on Thursday January 17 2008, @03:10AM (#22077920)
    He will incorporate this new 'blackest' black into Doom 4.
    (and you just thought you saw all possible shades of black and brown in Doom 3!)

  • Paint (Score:5, Funny)

    by milsoRgen (1016505) on Thursday January 17 2008, @03:16AM (#22077948) Homepage
    I can't wait to paint my nerd den with this stuff... light be damned!
  • ... can we get a screenshot?

  • wouldn't scattered light still be light? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by XaXXon (202882) <xaxxon@gmail. c o m> on Thursday January 17 2008, @03:22AM (#22077980) Homepage
    wouldn't it just be less 'mirror-like' and more matte if it scatters light? In order to be black from all angles, it would have to absorb all the energy. ?

  • I was going to ask... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Dr. Cody (554864) on Thursday January 17 2008, @03:23AM (#22077984)
    ...if anybody had found a picture of it. I'd see this article a few days ago and couldn't turn up anything.

    Unfortunately, posting on Slashdot provides me with the perspective to see how stupid a question it was.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by bar-agent (698856)
      I'd like to see a video. All the time, I read fictional accounts of materials that "glow" black, or look so black they're unreal, like a hole in space. I'm thinking this material might look pretty much like that. So, I want to see how it responds to ambient light as it's tilted around, and what happens when you shine a flashlight on it.

      Still, if even one photon in a hundred escapes, it can't be too black, now can it?

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by ndogg (158021)
      Did you really expect that an article on the blackest material ever made would be able to shine some light upon the subject?

  • How much more black? (Score:5, Funny)

    by LaskoVortex (1153471) on Thursday January 17 2008, @03:37AM (#22078052)
    "It's like, how much more black could this be? And the answer is none. None more black."

  • mapping this darkness on a scale (Score:4, Funny)

    by laejoh (648921) on Thursday January 17 2008, @03:38AM (#22078054)

    from 1 to 10 would yield us, what? 11?

  • Mr Desiato would like a word with them... (Score:5, Funny)

    by jamesh (87723) on Thursday January 17 2008, @03:50AM (#22078118)
    If the media release is accurate, a Mr Hotblack Desiato would like a word with them... his current ship isn't quite black enough.

  • Absorbtion (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Psychotria (953670) on Thursday January 17 2008, @03:52AM (#22078122)
    If the light is absorbed 99.9%, where does the energy go? Heat? If so, could this lead down the road to new power sources? Super-black nanotube network produces heat to produce steam to turn turbines... (??)

    • Black body radiation (Score:5, Interesting)

      by arrrrg (902404) on Thursday January 17 2008, @04:22AM (#22078286)
      IANAP but I think by being a great absorber, it becomes a great emitter too: Black body [wikipedia.org]. So it may not actually get much hotter than something less black. I guess it depends on where the equilibrium point is, and I don't have any intuition about that.

      • Re:Black body radiation (Score:5, Informative)

        by Psychotria (953670) on Thursday January 17 2008, @04:34AM (#22078352)
        I guess the article should really define "light" a bit more tightly. From your link:

        Although Planck's formula predicts that a black body will radiate energy at all frequencies, the formula is only applicable when many photons are being measured. For example, a black body at room temperature (300 K) with one square meter of surface area will emit a photon in the visible range once every thousand years or so, meaning that for most practical purposes, the black body does not emit in the visible range.

        My, possibly incorrect, interpretation (assumption?) of the article was "light" in the broad sense of all electromagnetic radiation. This, however, does not make your link less interesting; in fact, in makes it more interesting. Thank-you.

    • Re:Absorbtion (Score:4, Interesting)

      by blackest_k (761565) on Thursday January 17 2008, @05:32AM (#22078580) Homepage Journal
      From the BBC article
      "The application will be to things like more efficient solar cells, more efficient solar panels and any application where you need to harvest light," he added.

      There was an earlier article on /. with a related technology essentially printing small antennas on a plastic film which essentially create a high frequency ac voltage from heat and light energy , if the nanotubes are conductive perhaps the two technologies be combined to make some extremely efficient solar panels.

         

  • Where to put it (Score:5, Interesting)

    by xZoomerZx (1089699) on Thursday January 17 2008, @04:29AM (#22078336)
    Im wondering at the practical applications of this and how much it will have to be hidden or at least above the human zone (from the floor to about 7') I imagine extreme blackness would cause an effect similar to "The Blindspot" of sic-fi space travel. In effect the eye/brain would not 'see' the blackness and pull the visible edges together in an optical illusion.

    Case in point - I was once in a room that had contained a fire. The walls, floor, ceiling, and windows were all coated in a soft black soot that was perfectly uniform and ate all the light. The effect was very disconcerting and disorienting. None of the normal visual cues of highlights, textures, or reflections existed. Only the open door gave a reference point so that you didn't feel like you were floating in a void.

    The article posits several uses, but can you imagine a person clothed in this black in full sunlight? Could we even see them? or a building covered in it? or a car? Sight requires a least some photons to hit the retina. Anyone? I know I sound repetitive, its 0430 and didn't want to lose the train of thought to sleep.

    • Re:Where to put it (Score:5, Informative)

      by Jesus_666 (702802) on Thursday January 17 2008, @05:04AM (#22078480)
      Yes, we would. No incoming photons doesn't mean that our brain furiously tries to make our pattern filling work 1000% beyond what it normally does. It would mean a big black spot. Just because a person wearing a suit made out of this would look completely flat doesn't mean he'd be invisible.

      Even if your brain couldn't handle pure blackness, the rods still fire randomly, ensuring that some form if input is always present. You can verify this by closing your eyes in a very dark room - you should see a color that is not black. This color is called eigengrau [wikipedia.org].

      I think this will be of limited value for personal stealth measures - being that dark, you'd stand out even aginst regular dark surfaces. However, as another article pointed out, a stealth plane could profit from being able to absorb radar beams. Research into the absorption of non-visible wavelengths is already underway.

  • But (Score:5, Funny)

    by niceone (992278) on Thursday January 17 2008, @04:33AM (#22078350) Journal
    How much more is the the Macbook that is this colour going to cost???

  • Finally (Score:3, Funny)

    by Phyrexicaid (1176935) on Thursday January 17 2008, @04:41AM (#22078368)
    Ninja suits!

  • Stack of razorblades (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Wilson_6500 (896824) on Thursday January 17 2008, @04:43AM (#22078376)
    I always thought it was kinda interesting that a stack of razorblades makes a fair approximation of a blackbody. You can't grow stacks of razorblades on surfaces, natch, but for some applications I imagine you just need a small optical sink and don't want to spend a lot of money. Then again, this could be just trivia more than something that's useful to know.

    (Because of the potential for dangerous reflections, please don't shine lasers into a stack of razors trying to test their reflectivity--unless you know what you're doing and, hopefully, have an appropriate pair of laser goggles.)

    • Re:Stack of razorblades (Score:5, Funny)

      by NevarMore (248971) on Thursday January 17 2008, @08:23AM (#22079400) Homepage
      "(Because of the potential for dangerous reflections, please don't shine lasers into a stack of razors trying to test their reflectivity--unless you know what you're doing and, hopefully, have an appropriate pair of laser goggles.)"

      The fact that the razors are sharp and pointy can be safely ignored.

  • Great, now I have to update my livejournal! (Score:4, Funny)

    by bipbop (1144919) on Thursday January 17 2008, @05:17AM (#22078528)
    My soul is as black as the darkest carbon nanotube forest!

  • Perfect for Priests' Socks (Score:5, Funny)

    by clickety6 (141178) on Thursday January 17 2008, @05:57AM (#22078710)
    Father Ted - Series Three, Episode One

    DOUGAL: Anyway, what else did you order?

    TED: Priest socks. Really black ones.

    DOUGAL: I read somewhere, I think it was in an article about priest socks that priest socks are blacker than any other type of socks.

    TED: That's right Dougal. Sometimes you see lay people wear what look like black socks but if you look closely you'll see they're very, very, very, very, very, very, very dark blue.

    DOUGAL: Actually that's true. I thought my uncle Tommy was wearing black socks but when I looked at them closely they were just very, very, very, very, very, very, VERY, very, very, very dark blue.

    TED: Never buy black socks in a normal shop. They'll shaft you every time!
  • Imagine being in a room completely covered with these carbon nanotubes. Even with a bright lamp with you, you'd feel as though you're sitting in outer space. Worse even, since you'd see no stars. It would be quite stunning, and could make a cool exhibit at some science museum.

    I wonder what it would cost to do? It would be wicked cool to do this to a bedroom!!!!

  • That's incident light, and asymptotic to boot (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Ancient_Hacker (751168) on Thursday January 17 2008, @07:53AM (#22079196)
    Um, although this thing is by some measure "three times blacker", that's no big deal, in an energy absorption sense.

    It just means instead of using cheap carbon black, 99.6% blac, you use expensive and fragile nanotubes, 99.9% black.

    Not a significant increase in energy absorption, and not economical either.

    • Re:Why wont this change the world? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by famebait (450028) on Thursday January 17 2008, @05:37AM (#22078606)
      I was thinking along the same lines.

      But while his material would undoubtedly be very efficient for absorbing heat, it does not represent any revolution in that area: we can already absorb sunlight for heat with reasonably high efficiency with just basically black paint. This invention is better, by many percentage points, but it is still only an incremental step up from what we can already easily get per square meter.

      Also, as always, the economics come into play: it will often be a lot more attractive to use a cheaper and much simpler solution, and spend slightly more surface area to compensate for the lower efficiency.
      Extruded black plastic will probably still be hard to beat in the real world for a while.

      I think it will be much more useful in light sensitive applications.

    • Re:Why wont this change the world? (Score:4, Informative)

      by Nyh (55741) on Thursday January 17 2008, @08:14AM (#22079354)

      If Earth's solar constant is 1366 W/m2, and this 'color' absorbs 99.9% of the incoming light's energy (which wavelengths? all of them?), wouldn't this mean that it would be almost trivial to boil water in containers covered with this, and thus power steam turbines? Shouldn't this then be basically the solution to all out energy problems, or is there something i am missing?

      Well, let us do some math on the trivial boiling of water with black containers.

      Take a container with 1 kg of water. For ease of calculation we will take a 0.1 m x 0.1 m x 0.1 m container.
      Let us assume one side of the container faces the sun. Area is 0.1 x 0.1 = 0.01 m2
      The staring temperature is 20C, boiling temperature is 100C. Delta t is also 80 C. Specific heat of water is about 4200 J/K/kg.
      To make the 1 kg of water boil you need 80 x 4200 = 336 kJ.
      Energy received on the side of the container is 0.01 x 1366 = 13.66 W.
      Time needed to get 336 kJ with this power is 336000/13.66 = 24597 s (=6 hours and 50 min).

      Oops, not so trivial after all...

      If you make a large area (1m2) container containing 1 kg water you need get a container of 1 m x 1 m x 0.001 m. This container would boil water in 336000/1366 = 245 s (about 4 min). Problem with such a container is a large area at the cool side of the container and the specific heat of the container is a lot higher than the specific heat of the water it contains. So you need to design a container with a very low specific heat compared to the specific heat of the water it contains, a large surface area to collect the solar energy and good isolation at the shade side to minimize heat losses. Welcome to the interesting world of designing solar collectors.

      And for the very black material: going from 99% black to 99.9% black gives only (99.9-99)/99 = 0.9% increase of efficiency. The problem of solar collectors is not the black not being black enough. A new blacker black won't revolutionize solar collectors.

      Nyh

      • Re:Why wont this change the world? (Score:5, Informative)

        by Nyh (55741) on Thursday January 17 2008, @07:22AM (#22079062)

        The "solar constant" is measured "on the outer surface of [the] atmosphere", most certainly NOT at ground level. Down here, you get around 100W/m2, during daylight, in the summer, with no cloud cover, etc.


        You are wrong here. The 1366 W/m2 is indeed at the upper atmosphere. Lower in the atmosphere it is less, how much depends on the current state of the atmosphere. About 1000W/m2 is the right value.

        The 100W/m2 is the energy output of a not so good photovoltaic module.

        Nyh

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