Abstract

Gold blacks made by evaporation from tungsten filaments in the presence of oxygen and in the absence of oxygen show different optical and electrical properties. The properties are found as a function of mass thickness for many different evaporation conditions. Electron microscopy was used to reveal the role of tungsten oxide in the deposit in breaking up the conducting paths and leading to selective optical behavior. Mie’s theory may be used to calculate the optical properties of a gold sol and, at least for the blacks with the smallest conducting regions, agreement with experiment is good. The application of metal sols to the production of selective surfaces is discussed.

© 1976 Optical Society of America

The Preparation and Optical Properties of Gold Blacks*†

Louis Harris, Rosemary T. McGinnies, and Benjamin M. Siegel
J. Opt. Soc. Am. 38(7) 582-589 (1948)

The Infrared Properties of Gold Smoke Deposits*

Louis Harris and John K. Beasley
J. Opt. Soc. Am. 42(2) 134-140 (1952)

Deposition and characterization of far-infrared absorbing gold black films

Donna J. Advena, Vincent T. Bly, and J. Thomas Cox
Appl. Opt. 32(7) 1136-1144 (1993)

The Transmittance and Reflectance of Gold Black Deposits in the 15- to 100-Micron Region

Louis Harris
J. Opt. Soc. Am. 51(1) 80-82 (1961)

Optical constants of aggregated gold films

V. V. Truong and G. D. Scott
J. Opt. Soc. Am. 66(2) 124-131 (1976)