Surrey NanoSystems, a British company, has created a "strange, alien" material "so black that it absorbs all but 0.035 percent of visual light, setting a new world record," The Independent reports.
The material, named Vantablack, which is grown on sheets of aluminum foil and made with a coating of carbon nanotubes, is so dark that it's unrecognizable to the human eye. When the material covers the aluminum foil sheets, it's impossible to see the creases and wrinkles underneath it. Vantablack was described in the Optics Express journal and will be shown at the Farnborough International Airshow this week.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Create an account with the same email registered to your subscription to unlock access.
-
DOJ settles with Nassar victims for $138MSpeed Read The settlement includes 139 sexual abuse victims of the former USA Gymnastics doctor
-
14 recent scientific breakthroughsIn Depth From photos of the infant universe to an energy advancement that could save the planet
-
Who will win the 2024 presidential election?In Depth Election year is here. Who are pollsters and experts predicting to win the White House?
-
Blind people will listen to next week's total eclipseSpeed Read While they can't see the event, they can hear it with a device that translates the sky's brightness into music
-
Melting polar ice is messing with global timekeepingSpeed Read Ice loss caused by climate change is slowing the Earth's rotation
-
An amphibian that produces milk?speed read Caecilians, worm-like amphibians that live underground, produce a milk-like substance for their hatchlings
-
Jupiter's Europa has less oxygen than hopedspeed read Scientists say this makes it less likely that Jupiter's moon harbors life
-
Why February 29 is a leap daySpeed Read It all started with Julius Caesar
-
US spacecraft nearing first private lunar landingSpeed Read If touchdown is successful, it will be the first U.S. mission to the moon since 1972
-
Scientists create 'meaty' rice for eco-friendly proteinSpeed Read Korean scientists have invented a new hybrid food, consisting of beef muscle and fat cells grown inside grains of rice
-
New images reveal Neptune and Uranus in different colours than originally thoughtSpeed Read Voyager 2 images from the 1980s led to 'modern misconception'
