Rapt Industries, Cranfield University Collaborate

Rapt Industries Inc. of Fremont, Calif., and Cranfield University’s Precision Engineering Centre in the UK have collaborated on the development of the Helios 1200 reactive atom plasma machine, built to figure glass mirrors up to 1.2 m in diameter. It will be used to produce high-precision mirrors of glass, ULE and Zerodur quickly and with less subsurface damage than current methods produce. The device, developed under the UK’s Ultra Precision Surfaces project funded through the Joint Research Council’s Basic Technology Programme, is up and running at Cranfield.