Obscurant Dissemination

We have developed a cost-effective method of surface coating anisotropic obscurants that will improve powder dissemination of high aspect ratio particles. Interparticle binding forces are reduced by encapsulating the particles with a polymer shell thathas a thickness that can be precisely controlled between 1 and 20 nm. This simple, stable, and inexpensive encapsulation will dramatically decrease the van der Waals energy between the particle surfaces. The particle's surface energy can be furtherreduced by coating the polymer surface with specific functional groups that alter the surface chemisty, charge, and hydrophobicity of the particle. The proposed coating will result in a high extinction obscurant that has superior powder disseminationproperties while retaining compatibility with existing obscurant dissemination units. The shell layer also will reduce the flammability of the particle, decreases the environmental and human toxicity, and allow the particles to be packed at higherdensities.