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.
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