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Nanostructured Super-Black Optical Materials

Award Information
Agency: National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Branch: N/A
Contract: NNX13CP46C
Agency Tracking Number: 115822
Amount: $699,423.00
Phase: Phase II
Program: SBIR
Solicitation Topic Code: S2.02
Solicitation Number: N/A
Timeline
Solicitation Year: 2011
Award Year: 2013
Award Start Date (Proposal Award Date): 2013-07-22
Award End Date (Contract End Date): 2015-07-21
Small Business Information
MA
Waltham, MA 02451-1063
United States
DUNS: 153008631
HUBZone Owned: No
Woman Owned: No
Socially and Economically Disadvantaged: No
Principal Investigator
 David Carnahan
 Principal Investigator
 (781) 609-2722
 dcarnahan@nano-lab.com
Business Contact
 David Carnahan
Title: Business Official
Phone: (781) 609-2722
Email: dcarnahan@nano-lab.com
Research Institution
 Stub
Abstract

Need: NASA faces challenges in imaging and characterizing faint astrophysical objects within the glare of brighter stellar sources. Achieving a very low background requires control of both scattered and diffracted light.Significance of the Innovation: Aligned arrays of carbon nanotubes have recently been recognized as having world-leading optical absorption, far above competing state of the art materials. The nanotube array's diffuse reflectance (10-7) was demonstrated at two orders of magnitude lower than commercially available low reflectance carbons (10-5). The integrated total reflectance 0.045%, bested the field of competing materials, which are typically>1% at optical wavelengths. However, these arrays were produced on silicon, so they have limited utility for aerospace applications. NanoLab identified the potential to grow these arrays on flexible substrates, and proposed a Phase I effort to explore their properties.

* Information listed above is at the time of submission. *

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