A Brief History of Anti Reflective Coatings
The first, and simplest, type of AR coating was discovered in 1886 by British Physicist and Nobel Prize Winner (physics, 1904) John William Strutt, 3rd Baron Rayleigh (Lord Rayleigh). Upon testing some old, tarnished glass pieces (chemical reactions between the environment and the optical glass of his time tended to cause surface tarnishing on glass as it aged), Lord Raleigh found that – to his surprise – these tarnished pieces transmitted more light than clean, new pieces.
