Apple’s patent suggests borrowing some Vantablack tricks for the Black MacBook

Before starting to make all laptops out of aluminum, Apple offered a MacBook with a matte black finish, but so far it has been difficult to reproduce on all metal computers.But the new patent is from Apple Gives the latest MacBook a matte black finish It uses a clever technique to trap and prevent light from bouncing off the surface.

If you recently bought a MacBook, the closest thing to killing it is Apple Space Gray Option It’s dark, but far from black. The problem is that in order to apply a color finish to an aluminum device, its surface needs to be anodized to provide a more adhesive surface for pigments to adhere to. As Apple points out Patent number 20200383224The anodized metals remain a glossy finish, and due to all the light they reflect, the black paint work instead looks dark gray.

However, as discovered by a British company called Surrey Nano Systems, there is one way to create the perfect black matte finish for almost every object. The Vantablack paint is made from fine carbon nanotubes that can trap and absorb more than 99.97% of the visible light that hits it, so it looks so dark that it is completely invisible to the human eye. 2018 museum visitors Famously fell into a hole Instead, it is painted in Vantablack material, which looks like a large black dot on the floor. The problem for Apple is that in 2016 artist Anish Kapoor Secure exclusivity Use Vantablack. In other words, the company can’t actually use it on a MacBook. However, Anish Kapoor’s exclusive possession is the science of how Vantablack works, and Apple researchers are working to reproduce it using other methods.

Through the process of anodizing the surface of a metal substrate (such as the aluminum lid of a MacBook), injecting colored particles into the fine pores of the resulting metal oxide layer, and applying the final layer of light absorption function, the metal surface The reflectance is It will be dramatically reduced. One example of the last step outlined in this patent is to etch a series of irregular peaks and pits that differ in height by only 2 micrometers. This traps the light and bounces it in random directions, producing a more diffuse reflection. It looks like a mat that is dull to the human eye.

Without a lustrous glow, embedded color pigments like black would have a more pronounced look, so Apple is no longer limited to space gray as the darkest shade option. Does the dark finish look as dramatic as Vantablack, which is dark enough to hide all the physical features of the object? No, but Apple probably doesn’t want that, given how much they like to promote their design prowess and highlight the physical features of their device. This is a Vantablack technology that will allow future iPhones and MacBooks to offer vibrant color options like last year’s iMac with Apple’s fruit theme while maintaining the strength and durability of the aluminum frame. It’s an approach in the middle of the road that incorporates some.