Implementation of Universal Broadband Visible Antireflection Coating for Various Glass Substrates Using Ion-Assisted Deposition

Abstract

A normal-incidence universal broadband visible antireflection (AR) coating design, suited for commonly used glass substrates with refractive indices ranging from 1.472 to 1.750, was simulated using a spiral search approach, and then seven different substrates were coated simultaneously in one single deposition run to reduce their visible spectral reflectances by ion-assisted deposition. It was shown that the universal visible AR coating design of various substrates with refractive indices of 1.472, 1.517, 1.552, 1.619, 1.672, 1.718, and 1.750, obtained using the spiral search algorithm of a 2-material 10-layer system, was simplified to an 8-layer design, and the total average visible reflectance of practical AR-coated substrates was reduced from 5.55% for uncoated substrates to below 0.340%; the universal visible AR performance was found suitable. Moreover, this normal-incidence universal broadband visible AR coating also revealed an acceptable wide-angle visible antireflective effect for an incident angle range of 0–30°.