Scientists Create an Eco-Friendly Paint That Mimics Nature
2nd April 2023
Color me hopeful, but we have heard about a new kind of paint that holds the potential to cut airline fuel usage and make our homes and communities cooler. How? Well, some of the brightest and most beautiful colors in nature can only be replicated using heavy metals and chemicals. And those paints absorb infrared radiation, making objects covered in them much hotter. But Debashis Chanda, a nanoscience researcher with the University of Central Florida, has created a way to mimic nature’s way of reflecting colors without absorbing heat. It’s the same way a rainbow is created after it rains. Chanda’s research looks at why structural colors, as they’re called, may be the future of paint, and how altering the way light is reflected off surfaces could help cool a rapidly warming environment.