Development of epoxy-based millimeter absorber with expanded polystyrenes and carbon black

TL;DR

This paper reports the development of an epoxy-based millimeter wave absorber enhanced with expanded polystyrene beads and carbon black, achieving low reflection and high absorption suitable for telescope stray light mitigation.

Contribution

The study introduces a novel absorber design using Mie scattering principles with polystyrene beads in epoxy, improving millimeter wave absorption performance.

Findings

Reflectance less than 20% at 2 mm thickness

Transmittance less than 1% in sub-millimeter wavelengths

Absorber shape can be customized for different applications

Abstract

We recently developed and characterized an absorber for millimeter wavelengths. To absorb the millimeter wave efficiently, we need to develop the low reflection and high absorption material. To meet these requirements, we tried to add polystyrene beads in the epoxy for multi-scattering in the absorber. The typical diameter of polystyrene beads corresponds to the scale of Mie scattering for the multi-scattering of photons in the absorber. The absorber consists of epoxy, carbon black, and expanded polystyrene beads. The typical size of the expanded polystyrene beads is consistent with the peak of cross-section of Mie scattering to increase the mean free path in the absorber. By applying this effect, we succeeded in improving the performance of the absorber. In this paper, we measured the optical property of epoxy for the calculation of the Mie scattering effect. Based on the calculation result, we developed the 8 types samples by changing the ratio of absorber material. To compare 8 samples, we characterized the reflectance and transmittance of the absorber in millimeter length. The measured reflectance and transmittance of 2 mm thickness sample with optimized parameter are less than 20% and 10%. We also measured the transmittance in sub-millimeter wavelength. The measured transmittance is less than 1%. The shape of absorber can be modified for any shape, such as chip and pyramidal shapes. By using this absorber, we can apply for the mitigation of stray light of millimeter wave telescope with any shapes.