CATRAM: An Apparatus for the Optical Characterization of Advanced Transparent Materials

At the Transparent Materials Laboratory of the Italian Agency for Energy, New Technologies and Environment, the characterization of advanced transparent materials (CATRAM) facility permits the optical characteristics of transparent advanced materials to be evaluated, a procedure for which spectrophotometers are not adequate. The CATRAM facility is based mainly on a large-diameter integrating sphere to perform transmittance, reflectance, and absorptance measurements. We describe the measurement procedures and verify the reliability of the facility by comparing the results obtained for several samples with those from other laboratories. Furthermore, some system implementations for improvement of accuracy are discussed.