Everything goes somewhere.

So here comes the technical bit.

Condensation occurs when water vapour from your sweat, breath or the environment around you lands on a cold surface.

As it cools it changes into tiny drops of liquid, forming a film that looks a bit like fog.

So how do you stop this?

You could use a spray or a lens cloth.

This could help for a little while but what if there was a more permanent solution?

Lenses are relatively cool compared to your breath, especially when the outside air is cold.

So in order to see things properly we need to go outside.

We're heading to the stunning Alps to meet the team from ETH Zurich to get hands on with their glasses.

This solar powered innovation aims to end fogged up lenses and we're here to see it in action.

Traditionally surfaces are coated with water attracted molecules which attracts an even spread of condensation.

This is how regular anti-fogging systems work.

This new method heats the surface preventing condensation from humidity forming in the first place. 50% of the sunlight is invisible.

We're not seeing it with our human eye.

It's in the infrared and we designed a coating that absorbs this infrared energy, heats up the surface and thereby can prevent fog.

And the whole mission or vision behind our coating is actually to make something that's durable and in comparison to existing anti-fog solutions which you always have to reapply, you use your plastic bottles and we provide a durable one-shot solution that lasts forever.

So this coating absorbs radiation but how do you ensure that it's absorbing enough radiation but not too much heat where it's impractical?

Yeah, it's a subtle balance.

Obviously the energy is limited to a certain extent so you cannot heat up to 100 degrees Celsius but we can tune actually how much infrared our coating absorbs and thereby also change the effect on a temperature.

The coating is extremely thin.

It stays perfectly clear but behind the scenes it's busy warming up to block fog.

No fog, no fuss.

But how does it work you ask?

Well, it's all in the layers.

Now picture this coating as a burger.

The patty in the middle contains gold and has the important job of soaking up all that radiation.

The bun around it boosts the absorption, keeping the precious metal safe from wearing out.

Tasty, right?

Maybe we should have made burgers rather than muffins.

Well, we're also looking into the car sector because you know on the one hand you have the windshields that fog up and it always takes a while until they defog but then you also have sensors like radar systems or also in medical devices when you have a human breath that can deteriorate a signal.

This sunlight powered coating could change the way we see things, quite literally.

So, could this be the solution we've been waiting for?

The future could look a whole lot clearer, powered by a little bit of sunshine and a dash of gold. www.plastics-car.com