Thin-film glasses, optically clear

Haruvy, Y., Heller, A., and Webber, S.E. (1992) Sol-gel preparation of optically clear supported thin film glasses embodying laser dyes, in Supramolecular Architecture Synthetic Control in Thin Films and Solids (ed. T. Bein), ACS Symposium Series, Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH, Weinheim. 

Sol—Gel Preparation of Optically Clear Supported Thin-Film Glasses Embodying Laser Dyes... 

Aguilar, J. O. Gomez-Daza, O. Brito, L. A. Nair, M. T. S. Nair, P. K. 2005. Optical and mechanical characteristics of clear and solar control laminated glass using zinc sulphide and copper sulphide thin films. Surface Coatings Technol. 200 2557-2565. 

Amorphous polymers characteristically possess excellent optical properties. Unlike all the other commercially available fluoropolymers, which are semicrystalline, Teflon AF is quite clear and has optical transmission greater than 90% throughout most of the UV, visible, and near-IR spectrum. A spectrum of a 2.77-mm-thick slab of AF-1600 is shown in Figure 2.5. Note the absence of any absorption peak. Thin films of Teflon AF have UV transmission greater Ilian 95% at 200 mm and are unaffected by radiation from UV lasers. The refractive indexes of Teflon AF copolymers are shown in Figure 2.6 and decrease with increasing FDD content. These are the lowest refractive indexes of any polymer family. It should be noted that the abscissa could also be labeled as glass transition temperature, Tg, since Tg is a function of the FDD content of the AF copolymer. Abbe numbers are low 92 and 113 for AF-1600 and AF-2400. 

Central Glass developed a combiner of selective reflective special screen applied on the inner surface of windshield for automotive information display system (Hattori, 1989 Makita, 1998). It is the world first example of utilization of sol-gel thin film for car windows. This application proved that the sol-gel film is highly potential as coatings for car windows it cleared extremely severe production standards for cars. Optical design, optical property and manufacturing process is explained in detail in next chapter. 

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