Anti-reflective coatings on optical components such as lenses, prisms, and windows reduce reflection loss and increase transmission from the active surface. For optical components composed of high refractive index materials, anti-reflective coatings are extremely crucial, and Alfa Chemistry can provide an oleophobic anti-reflective coating service on your glass substrates to assist your varied optical applications. We build coatings with high transmittance and have an oleophobic coating on one side to prevent dirt such as grease and liquids from adhering to the coating, minimizing fingerprint contamination on the antireflective coating. If you require an oleophobic anti-reflective coating, please contact us.
Applications and Benefits of Oleophobic Anti-Reflection Coating
Anti-reflective coatings consist of one or more dielectric layers. The type of material utilized and the layer thickness are determined by the substrate material, wavelength range, incident light properties, and client needs. Anti-reflection coatings, in general, improve display contrast by reducing reflection and boosting light transmission through the substrate. Fingerprints will appear on the coating as soon as the screen is touched. This can detract from the display's image representation as well as the aesthetics of the product surface.
The ideal solution for this is Alfa Chemistry's single-sided oleophobic and double-sided anti-reflective coatings.
- The light transmission of the coatings is outstanding.
- The coating reduces the visibility of fingerprints by 90%.
- The coating is abrasion resistant, long-lasting, and easy to clean.
- On the user side, the smooth surface reduces wear and friction.
- With a water contact angle of >110 degrees, the user side of the coating offers an extraordinarily long-lasting oleophobic effect.
- The adherence of dirt and moisture is also significantly lower than with traditional anti-reflective coatings.
Alfa Chemistry Standard Optical Coating
Our oleophobic antireflective optical coatings have a wide range of applications. Alfa Chemistry delivers an antireflective coating suited for visible light on both sides of a high-quality glass substrate, as well as a durable oleophobic coating on one side to generate an anti-fingerprint effect and repel liquids and dirt. Coating thicknesses of 2 to 4 nm with a 0.20 tolerance are available.
The oleophobic and anti-liquid coating is extremely tough, withstanding hundreds of thousands of friction cycles in wear testing and cleaning up with a gentle, dry cloth. The anti-reflective coating's high light transmission offers great imaging quality with virtually little loss.
The coating is suitable for use with common cleaning solutions, including water, amino glass cleaners, mild alkaline cleaners, surfactant-containing detergents, and ethanol. Please avoid acetone, strong acidic and alkaline solutions, fluorinated cleaners and coarse cleaning aids.
Fig 1. Picture (a) of a water droplet on the surface of a CO2-processed nanocellular water- and oil-repellent anti-reflection PMGMA-PFMA coating. Appearance of the original (b1, b4), nanocellular (b, 4~6) and cross-linked nanocellular (b, 1~3) films after exposure to toluene (b2, b5) and α,α,α-trifluorotoluene (b3, b6). The circular spots are the area exposed to the corresponding solvents. Only the cross-linked nanocellular films are intact. (Dutriez C, et al. 2016)
Reference
- Dutriez C, et al. (2016). "Cross-Linked Nanocellular Polymer Films: Water- and Oil-Repellent Anti-Reflection Coating." Polymer Journal. 48: 497-501.
