Electrophoretic Deposition of Carbon Nanotubes for Anti-Reflective Coatings

Abstract

Space observatory missions requires the development of low-reflectivity surfaces for space-borne instruments, such as seeker telescopes, optical sensors, etc., to minimize stray and reflected light across the visible and infrared wavebands for facilitating the direct exoplanet detection and characterization. For example, in order to improve the sensitivity of missile-defense sensors and seekers, baffles are used within optical telescopes to reduce stray light. Some materials (e.g., aluminum, beryllium, etc.) are too reflective to use as absorptive baffles without surface processing, although they have lightweight and good thermo-structural properties, and survive harsh environments. Black surface coating treatments have been demonstrated as effective approaches to obtain low reflective surfaces. The surface features and intrinsic properties of the coating materials play an important role for scattering, absorbing, or trapping light. The excellent optical absorption performance and light weight of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) make them as ideal coating materials for obtaining low reflectivity surfaces. In this presentation, we will discuss the feasibility of a low-cost, efficient and scalable manufacturing process for the deposition of durable, low reflectivity carbon nanotube black coatings based on the use of pulse and pulse reverse electrophoretic deposition technology. The low-reflectivity CNT coatings have been successfully deposited on various surfaces, including flat, bent, and sharp substrates. The CNT coatings show the reflectance of 0.4% ~ 0.8% across visible to near infrared (NIR) wavebands.Within this context, Faraday Technology Inc. demonstrated the feasibility of a low-cost, efficient and scalable manufacturing process for the deposition of durable, low reflectivity carbon nanotube black coatings based on the use of pulse and pulse reverse electrophoretic deposition. As shown in Figure 1, the uniform CNT coatings are formed on an aluminum (Figure 1, Inset (Right)), and the diffuse reflectance of the CNT coatings is ~ 0.5% over the visible range. We also demonstrated the potential to apply CNT coating on the internal diameter of cylinders at room temperature (Figure 1, Inset (Lef)t). Faraday are currently working on developing CNT coatings on the surface of absorptive baffle materials, such as beryllium and aluminum. The developed economic and scalable technology for producing CNT black coatings on desired substrates can not only be used for minimizing stray and reflected light for space-borne instruments, but also offer potential applications in other optical related devices which request low reflective surfaces, such as solar cells. Acknowledgements: The financial support of NASA SBIR/STTR program through contracts No. 80NNSC18P2062 & 80NSSC19C0177 is acknowledged. Figure 1