Strategic space borne assets may be targeted by laser designators operating in the visible or infrared region of the spectrum. Critical components, especially those containing highly reflective optical surfaces, may become obvious targets by reflecting light from laser designators or from sunlight. Applying appropriate coatings to the optical surfaces suppresses reflectivity by light scattering and absorption, but these applied coatings tend to interfere with the optical properties of the component. Takom will develop a technique using ion beam surface modification to produce ultralow reflectivity optical components without affecting essential optical properties of the parent material. With proper choice of exposure parameters, this process will generate a surface topology such that the material on the scale of the wavelength of light appears to have a smoothly changing mass density. Therefore, a smoothly graded refractive index through a surface layer will result in a significant reductionin reflectivity.
