Create 'unprecedented' black material

The darkest material that science has ever known has been created in an American laboratory. It absorbs very strong light and is very reflexive. The material is made up of carbon nanotubes - carotene sheets that are only one coiled into a tube.

Researchers say it is closest to the ideal black material - the material that can absorb light at all angles and at all wavelengths. This discovery opens up applications in the field of electronics and solar power.

Carbon nanotubes are the basic ingredient of the nanotechnology industry. (Photo: BBC)

An ideal black material absorbs all the colors of light and does not reflect them. In theory, one can create things that achieve " maximum absorption ". But reality has proved very difficult.

Researchers at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York, have found carbon nanotubes (carbon nanotubes, a billionth of a meter in diameter) to have this unique property. The theory also conjectures that nanotubes can create super-black objects, and people begin to verify those guesses.

Dr. Pulickel Ajayan's team has developed a network of low-density vertical nanotubes, which measures its optical characteristics.

As a result, the surface of the material minimizes light reflection. Reflection is 3 times lower than previous results. This is considered to be " the darkest artificial material ever created ". The use of dark materials can be more efficient solar cells, and wherever people want to recover light.

T. An