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Gold Coating
NASA Commercial Technology
Division publication
Reflect on this. Many satellites carry gold-coated
mylar sheets to protect them from solar heat.
A thin layer of gold on an astronaut’s
helmet visor fends off dangerous effects of solar radiation.
Satellite microelectronics that instantaneously relay data
around the globe depend on gold components to ensure reliable,
corrosion-resistant and static-free performance.
The growing use of gold in advanced technologies
such as microelectronics, telecommunications, optics, aviation
and space has increasingly made gold a vital strategic resource
in U.S. technological and economic competitiveness.
In 1996, the Mars Global Surveyor blasted
off toting a gold-plated telescope mirror, part of a laser
device that is to chart the topography of the entire Martian
surface over a two year period.
Epner Technology Inc. of Brooklyn, New York
rose to the challenge of a NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
requirement for the ultimate in electroplated reflectivity
needed for the Mars Global Surveyor’s Mars Orbiter Laser
Altimeter (MOLA). The MOLA mirror, an unusually large one-half
meter in diameter, was ground by OCA Applied Optics in Garden
Grove, California. Made of beryllium, the MOLA mirror was
coated by Epner Technology’s Laser Gold™ process,
specially improved for the project. The resultant mirror coating
proved exquisite.
Laser Gold is a proprietary process for
electrochemically-deposited gold. In the near infrared wavelengths,
Laser Gold’s reflectance is an astounding 99.4 percent.
"We are not paranoid about our processes since the real
secret in this business is in the controlling of those processes,"
says Epner Technology owner and CEO, David Epner. "Our
strength comes from a lot of years of breaking the back of
some really off-beat plating challenges," he says.
The gold coating on the MOLA mirror is a
case in point. To give the telescope mirror the needed sensitivity,
the LaserGold coating was essential to mapping operations
around Mars. Gold’s extremely high-quality reflectivity
is critical in the capturing of laser infrared radiation that
is bounced back from Mars to the mirror’s surface.
"What makes LaserGold incomparable
for the most sophisticated optical and laser applications
like the Mars laser altimeter, where the margin for error
is absolutely nil, is its extraordinary reflectivity, in combination
with it cleanability and virtually perfect reliability and
corrosion resistance," Epner says.
Thanks to the NASA push, adds Epner, improved
Laser Gold-coated reflectors have found use in an epitaxial
reactor built for a large semiconductor manufacturer. The
reactor heats the silicon wafers inside a quartz bell jar
with infrared energy from some 100 six-kilowatt quartz-halogen
lamps. Behind these lamps are an array of Laser Gold-coated
water-cooled aluminum extruded reflectors.
The improved reflectivity of these reflectors
has dramatically increased lamp life, says Epner, due to the
lower power requirements that the reflectors permit. The huge
power consumption of these machines was also reduced with
this increased efficiency. These reflectors will be sold worldwide
to firms like Motorola, Epner says.
Once again, due to NASA’s demanding
quality needs, Epner’s Laser Gold coating has also found
use as a waveguide in Braun-Thermoscan’s tympanic thermometer.
Epner Technology customers are the foremost
fabricators in aerospace, defense, microwave and electronics,
optics and semiconductors.
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