No folks I am not talking about the Star Trek movie here. I am talking about Transparent seemingly pellucid Metals. It does not have to be Alluminum. Are there metals out there that allow any light to pass through them? Anyone know? If not, why? Is there a fundamental of all metals that prohibits this? I know in Japan they are experimenting with a new solid that is not a plastic that is completely see through. But that is not a metal. Who’s got the dope?
Not naturally occuring, but…
Metals made transparent by photonic layer structure
I thought I read somewhere that they actually succeded in making transparent aluminum, but I’m probably mistaken.
Not really an answer to your question, but I remember seeing something about ‘splat cooling’ of glass a while ago; a thin stream of molten glass was sprayed at a rapidly moving heatsink, resulting in the ejection of a very thin streamer of glass that had been cooled almost instantly; it was silvery and very flexible (something like videotape in appearance).
But that’s almost the complete opposite of what you asked about, so I’ll shut up and go away now.
Classical physics says that light is electromagnetic radiation, and metals reflect it by shorting out its electric field. Someone more knowledgeable than I am may be able to say if a quantum mechanical effect could get around that.
What you may have heard about was transparent alumina which is an aluminum oxide. Alumina is an opaque white ceramic. Apparently they recently figured out how to make it with a different crystal structure or something.
BTW, ruby is alumina doped with chromium.
The alkali metals (lithium, potassium, sodium, cesium, rubidium, and presumably francium, although I don’t think this has been verified for the last one) are transparent in the ultraviolet. Odd little-known fact.
Of course, they’re incredibly soft and incredibly reactive, so don’t go building anything out of them.
The alkali metals (lithium, potassium, sodium, cesium, rubidium, and presumably francium, although I don’t think this has been verified for the last one) are transparent in the ultraviolet. Odd little-known fact.
Of course, they’re incredibly soft and incredibly reactive, so don’t go building anything out of them.
Conducting materials by their very nature are reflective over most of the electro-magnetic spectrum. Each material will have a small range of frequencies at which it is transparent. I do not know of any existing conducting materials which are transparent in the visual light region, but it’s not inherently impossible.
Well I did find some information about transparent Alumina here:http://www.rense.com/general20/transparentalum.htm
Sounds very interesting, but I could not read the whole page as I do not read German.
I suppose the Defense department would be quite interested in a transparent metal…not exactly sure why though. I could see how an invisible missle or a transparent bullet would be nice, or on those same lines imagine a transparent F-14 … Wow when you let your mind go a little transparent metals could be quite nice for a wide array of reasons…
There certainly are transparent conductive materials – the transparent electrodes put on Pockels Cells, for instance. But those are oxides, not metals.
There are lots of transparent conductors which aren’t m,etals, and therefore not subject to the stipulations you list.Alkali Halide crystals containing color centers are conductors, as well (if poor ones). So are liquid solutions of electrolytes.
Semiconductors like Germanium and Silicon, although opaque to visible light, transmit in the near infrared.
But alkali matels are the only metals I know that transmit “light” (broadly defined to include visible, UV, and IR).
There certainly are transparent conductive materials – the transparent electrodes put on Pockels Cells, for instance. But those are oxides, not metals.
There are lots of transparent conductors which aren’t m,etals, and therefore not subject to the stipulations you list.Alkali Halide crystals containing color centers are conductors, as well (if poor ones). So are liquid solutions of electrolytes.
Semiconductors like Germanium and Silicon, although opaque to visible light, transmit in the near infrared.
But alkali matels are the only metals I know that transmit “light” (broadly defined to include visible, UV, and IR).
If I walk about two blocks east from here, there’s an enormous mass of transparent, electrically conductive material that stretches all the way to Europe.