Physicists at CU Boulder have designed a new material for insulating windows that could improve the energy efficiency of buildings worldwide—and it works a bit like a high-tech version of Bubble Wrap.
Physicists at CU Boulder have designed a new material for insulating windows that could improve the energy efficiency of buildings worldwide—and it works a bit like a high-tech version of Bubble Wrap.
The team’s material, called Mesoporous Optically Clear Heat Insulator, or MOCHI, comes in large slabs or thin sheets that can be applied to the inside of any window. So far, the team only makes the material in the lab, and it’s not available for consumers. But the researchers say MOCHI is long-lasting and is almost completely transparent.
That means it won’t disrupt your view, unlike many insulating materials on the market today,
“To block heat exchange, you can put a lot of insulation in your walls, but windows need to be transparent,” said Ivan Smalyukh, senior author of the study and a professor of physics at CU Boulder. “Finding insulators that are transparent is really challenging.”
Read More: University of Colorado at Boulder
Image: Abram Fluckiger holds up a sample panel square that has five sandwiched layers of a new material nearly transparent insulation material called MOCHI, which was designed buy CU Boulder researchers in physics professor Ivan Smalyukh’s lab. (Credit: Photo by Glenn J. Asakawa/CU Boulder)
