{"id":40094,"date":"2011-07-11T08:09:22","date_gmt":"2011-07-11T12:09:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=40094"},"modified":"2011-08-31T14:54:56","modified_gmt":"2011-08-31T18:54:56","slug":"a-better-way-to-photo-gray","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2011\/07\/a-better-way-to-photo-gray\/","title":{"rendered":"A Better Way to Photo Gray"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Greg<\/a>
Greg Sotzing, professor of chemistry.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Ever looked wistfully at those photo gray sunglasses and wished they would turn some other fun color? Like, say, yellow? Or UConn blue?<\/p>\n

Well the technology is now here, thanks to Greg Sotzing, professor of chemistry in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and a member of UConn\u2019s Polymer Program.<\/p>\n

Not only have he and his colleagues perfected a method for creating quick-changing, variable colors in films and displays, such as sunglasses, they\u2019ve made them less expensive and less wasteful to manufacture than any previous method. And aside from creating vanity glasses, the technology is in high demand from the U.S. military.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the next big thing for color-changing lenses,\u201d Sotzing says.<\/p>\n

The typical material behind a color-changing lens is what\u2019s called a photochromic film, or a sheet of polymers that change color when light hits them. Sotzing\u2019s new technology does things slightly differently \u2013 his electrochromic lenses are controlled by an electric current passing through them when triggered by a stimulus, such as light.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re like double pane windows with a gap between them,\u201d explains Sotzing. He and his colleagues squirt a mixture of polymers \u2013 or as he calls it, \u201cgoop\u201d \u2013 in between the layers, creating the lens as it hardens. The mixture of polymers used in this lens, he says, creates less waste and is less expensive to produce than previous mixtures.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe lifetime of sunglasses is usually very short,\u201d says Sotzing, pointing out that people often misplace them. So by making the manufacturing less expensive, he says, commercial retailers will be able to produce more of them.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Another benefit of this material is that it can change colors as quickly as electricity passes through it \u2013 which is virtually instantaneously. This process could be very useful for the military, Sotzing says. For example, if a person emerges from a dark passageway and into the bright sunlight of the desert, a lens that would alter its color instantly to complement the surroundings could mean life or death for some soldiers.<\/p>\n

\u201cRight now, soldiers have to physically change the lenses in their goggles,\u201d Sotzing says. \u201cThis will eliminate that need.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sotzing will begin a one-year sabbatical at the Air Force Academy in August, where he hopes to develop some of these ideas.<\/p>\n

In November 2010, partially based on work supported by the Center for Science and Technology Commercialization\u2019s Prototype Fund, the UConn R&D Corp. started a company, called Alphachromics Inc., with Sotzing and colleague Michael Invernale, now a post-doctoral researcher at MIT, as founders. \u00a0The University has a patent pending for this new technology, which is currently under option to the company. Alphachromics is also testing applications of these polymer systems for energy-saving windows and custom fabrics.<\/p>\n

Sotzing and Alphachromics are currently in talks with sunglass manufacturers, and Sotzing says the world of Hollywood could have a market for this technology. He describes applications he calls \u201cfreaky,\u201d including colors that move back and forth across the glasses, evoking styles like those sported by Lady Gaga.<\/p>\n

But he stresses that the best thing about this technology is the creation of business in Connecticut. Although the glasses may not be made here, because the technology will be licensed to out-of-state manufacturers, he hopes Alphachromics will continue to expand in Connecticut.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t make the sunglasses,\u201d he says. \u201cWe make the formulation of what goes inside them.\u201d<\/p>\n

The findings were published July 7 in the Journal of Materials Chemistry<\/a><\/em>. Sotzing\u2019s collaborators on the paper are Invernale and Ph.D. students Yujie Ding, Donna Mamangun, and Amrita Kumar.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UConn researchers have developed a new technology to make instant color-change lenses.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2076,1],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[43],"class_list":["post-40094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-research","category-uncategorized"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-19 02:31:09","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40094"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40094\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45651,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40094\/revisions\/45651"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40094"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=40094"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=40094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}