Reflectivity Reaches a New Low 166
sporkme writes "A new nanocoating material developed by a team of researchers from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute has the lowest level of reflectivity ever seen ... or not seen in this case. The amount of light reflected by the composite of silica nanorods and aluminum nitride is almost the same amount reflected by air. From the article: 'Schubert and his coworkers have created a material with a refractive index of 1.05, which is extremely close to the refractive index of air and the lowest ever reported. Window glass, for comparison, has a refractive index of about 1.45. Using a technique called oblique angle deposition, the researchers deposited silica nanorods at an angle of precisely 45 degrees on top of a thin film of aluminum nitride, which is a semiconducting material used in advanced light-emitting diodes (LEDs). From the side, the films look much like the cross section of a piece of lawn turf with the blades slightly flattened.' Suggested applications include increased efficiency in solar cells, more energy-efficient lighting and advances in quantum mechanics."
Use for this stuff (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Refractivity? Or Reflectivity? (Score:3, Interesting)
I believe that there are three things that can happen when radiation encounters an object:
a) Reflect
b) Absorb
c) Pass through
In the case of "solar power", it strikes me that there is another application aside from PhotoVoltaic that could benefit from lower reflectivity, and that is solar thermal. I would think that surfaces designed to absorb solar thermal energy, such as solar water heaters, or solar concentrating power systems, that reduced reflectivity would mean greater absorbtion of solar thermal energy, and thus improved overall solar thermal efficiency
Great stuff... (Score:2, Interesting)