Science & technology | Smart coatings

A golden sandwich that demists your windscreen

It is a clever use of nanotechnology

Rain on a car window and city lights reflecting on a wet street
A mist that won’t be missedImage: Getty Images

As the northern hemisphere’s winter arrives, the problem of fogged-up car windscreens becomes more pressing for drivers. When humid air hits a surface colder than it is the water vapour it carries condenses onto that surface as myriad tiny droplets. These scatter light at random. The result, if the surface is transparent, looks to a human eye like fog. Depending on what is fogged, be it windows, spectacle lenses or windscreens, that can be a curiosity, a nuisance or a serious hazard.

This article appeared in the Science & technology section of the print edition under the headline “Layering it on”

From the December 24th 2022 edition

Discover stories from this section and more in the list of contents

Explore the edition

More from Science & technology

A person blowing about a pattern in the shape of a brain

Can you breathe stress away?

It won’t hurt to try. But scientists are only beginning to understand the links between the breath and the mind

The Economist’s science and technology internship

We invite applications for the 2025 Richard Casement internship


A man sits inside a pixelated pink brain while examining a clipboard, with colored squares falling from the brain

A better understanding of Huntington’s disease brings hope

Previous research seems to have misinterpreted what is going on


Is obesity a disease?

It wasn’t. But it is now

Volunteers with Down’s syndrome could help find Alzheimer’s drugs

Those with the syndrome have more of a protein implicated in dementia

Should you start lifting weights?

You’ll stay healthier for longer if you’re strong