Vantablack

Composition and Properties of Vantablack

Vantablack is a pigment coating developed in 2014 by the British company Surrey Nanosystems. The name is an acronym for Vertically Aligned Nano Tube Array Black. Materials coated with this pigment absorb 99,965% of the incident light which made it the blackest known pigment at the time of its discovery. The chemical stability and lightfastness of this pigment are exceedingly high. The coated material has to be protected from touching and other possibilities of abrasion.The material is coated by an array of nanotubes made of pure carbon which are vertically aligned and more or less regularly spaced on the surface. The pattern of the nanotubes is not unlike an array of trees in a forest. The light falling on the coated material enters the space between the nanotubes and is then repeatedly reflected off the nanotubes until it is absorbed.The scientists at MIT have since produced another material not yet named absorbing 99,995% of incident light and which is 10 times blacker than Vantablack