SCHOTT North America, Inc. Inaugurates Chalcogenide Glass Production in the United States: New U.S. Production Capability for IR Material

Heather Rayle, Vice President and General Manager of SCHOTT Advanced Optics at SCHOTT North America, Inc, Peter Kruell



December 7, 2011 (Duryea, PA and Arlington, VA) Following its announcement at the SPIE Optics & Photonics Show in August, SCHOTT North America, Inc. (SCHOTT) today announced the availability of chalcogenide glasses for infrared (IR) sensing applications. This production kickoff marks the first time SCHOTT will produce chalcogenide glass components in the United States.



To showcase the US chalcogenide production, an inaugural customer open house and simulcast live webinar will be held today at the SCHOTT Duryea facility. The first event of its kind for SCHOTT, this will be an opportunity for customers and experts to discuss this important material.



The event will be hosted by Dr. Marita Paasch, Vice President of SCHOTT Advanced Optics (worldwide), Dr. Heather Rayle, Vice President and General Manager of SCHOTT Advanced Optics at SCHOTT North America, Inc., and Scott Custer, Major General, US Air Force (Ret) and now head of SCHOTT Defense.



Together with The Optical Society of America (OSA), SCHOTT will host a seminar on site –available online as a live webinar – led by Kevin P. Thompson, PhD. Dr. Thompson is the Group Director, Research and Development for Optics at Synopsys, Inc. He will lead a webinar entitled ‘Optical Design in the Infrared: The world has changed – new materials, methods, and solutions to address new challenges.’ An open invitation can be found here: http://bit.ly/uczKIu



In addition to the webinar, several other events have been scheduled for the open house:

• Dr. Heather Rayle, VP and General Manager of the Duryea site, and Stephen Sokach, Director Sales & Marketing for the Americas, will lead a discussion on the IR business.




• Dr. Nathan Carlie, Research & Development Scientist for SCHOTT’s North American R&D center will present a talk on the trends and expected developments in the market of IR materials.




• There will also be a ribbon cutting and a facility tour.
  
  

SCHOTT’s chalcogenide glass is ideal for defense and commercial security and sensing applications such as night vision and thermal imaging. It provides high transmission quality across a wide range of the IR spectrum, from the near-infrared (NIR) to long-wavelength infrared (LWIR) regions. Like many of SCHOTT’s glass applications, chalcogenide glass has a broad transparency range and consistent optical behavior over a wide temperature range, assuring it can withstand extreme environments without defocusing.



Adding the new chalcogenide glass line and fabrication technologies to the Duryea facility will provide customers with a family of IR glasses to meet customers’ specific requirements for their application. “SCHOTT is pleased to be able to offer a high quality, domestically produced source of chalcogenide glass components to serve our customers in the U.S. defense, security and commercial thermal imaging markets,” said Heather Rayle, Vice-President and General Manager for the North American Advanced Optics business.