NANOWEB® EMI Sheilding
I worked with META and Utensile to develop the worlds first fully transparent microwave window. NANOWEB® transparent conductive film for microwave oven applications offers EMI shielding to protect against microwave radiation. META’s patented NANOWEB® offers up to 99% transparency, can be fabricated onto any glass or plastic surface, can fit all shapes and sizes, and demonstrates superior shielding performance as compared to conductive oxides and existing metallic micro-wire mesh. This design won a CES Innovation Honoree Award for META, CES 2023.
Client
Meta Materials Inc.
Engineering Consultants
Utensile
Service
Industrial Design, 3D Vis.
Media
NANOWEB® Transparent EMI Shielding Film
CES Innovation Award
What Is NANOWEB®?
NANOWEB® is a conductive film made of a metal mesh. This metal mesh is made up of nano-thin metal wires; so thin that the film appears transparent. While NANOWEB® provides protection against microwave radiation like traditional Faraday Cages, it also allows for a clear view of the contents inside the microwave, unlike conventional perforated Faraday Cage doors that obstruct light and visibility.
Microwave Window V.1
In our first iteration of the microwave design, NANOWEB is first laminated PET in META’s innovative RML® (Rolling Mask Lithography) manufacturing technology. This “film” layer is then adhered to a piece of thin Corning Eagle glass and then cut into a 300mm circular , known as a “Wafer”. A micron thin silver busbar was then printed (similar to Inkjet) directly on the NANOWEB® layer to ground. A blank Cover Glass is diced and laminated into the stack to protect the delicate NANOWEB® from scratches and dust. The cover glass is offset inside from the NANOWEB® wafer edge so that the printed silver busbar, which acts as a uniform surface around the wafer edge, is exposed to evenly ground the mesh.
The NANOWEB® assembly is then adhered and clamped into position in the original faraday cage that had been sanded and cut to accommodate the Cover Glass. A new microwave door was 3D printed and painted to color match the original microwave we were hacking to accommodate our V.1 NANOWEB® window.
This was META’s first video proof of the V.1 Transparent Microwave Window design working. The wand held detects microwave radiation, indicating leaks in the design at unsafe levels for consumers. A very small amount of leakage is actually safe and acceptable for all microwave designs, and ours met this goal. A final version of this design was prepared for client presentation, seen below.
