NASA's new superblack material

[aliendude777]

http://www.nasa.gov/topics/technology/fe...erial.html looks an awful lot like the beginning of perfect optics superabsorbers.

[PortalHunter]

Hey, that NASA article was posted in 2011. I did some rooting around and that's approximately around the time when NASA and the US Army began funding for carbon nanotube telescope shielding.

Quote from Wikipedia's Super black

In 2011, NASA and the US Army began funding research in the use of nanotube based super black coatings in sensitive optics.[5]

I'm pretty sure Vantablack is commercially available now. It had some popularity on social media sites last year.


http://www.surreynanosystems.com/

Vantablack is reported to absorb up to 99.965% of visible light.

[aliendude777]

Oh, cool! I didn't notice the article's age though, oops. I'll have to see how expensive it is, and where I can get some...

[PortalHunter]

Oops. I was being pretty vague by saying 'commercially available.' From what I've read on the Internet, buying this stuff for anything other than scientific research / military applications is pretty dang hard. Most news articles say that Surrey NanoSystems won't reveal its price other than the fact that it's very, very expensive. Their website doesn't reveal much, either...

[viperzerofsx]

If you get a better picture, try looking at it head on and "seeing" it. its hard right?

[PortalHunter]

If you get a better picture, try looking at it head on and "seeing" it. its hard right?

I'd really like to try it in real life.

[Matterplay1]

Looks like fuligin, from Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun series, has already seen (and absorbed) the light of day. :-)