What is it about?
A solid film of vanadium dioxide switches from transparent to shiny when heated. We made nanofins of vanadium dioxide that switch to a darker colour when heated, allowing much greater emission of heat with only a ten degree change in temperature. The amount of switching varies with thickness.
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Why is it important?
Vanadium dioxide has the fascinating property that heat switches it from a semiconductor to a conductor (as seen in self-darkening glasses). A solid film of this material switches from transparent to shiny, which is fine for some applications but not others, such as a thermal regulator that needs to be much more emitting when hot than cold. By producing vanadium dioxide nanofins, we were able to produce a coating that emits much more heat when it is hot.
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Design, control, and characterisation of switchable radiative cooling, September 2018, SPIE,
DOI: 10.1117/12.2323877.
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