AT THE MALL...Shades of NASA

Remember what your parents said whenever you came near a welder? "Don't look at the light!" Well, they were right! The "blue" light of a welding operation is bad for the eyes.

In the 1980's, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory researched material that filters out harmful welding light. This NASA program led to the development of sunglasses that block types of light - blue, violet, and ultraviolet - that could hurt the eyes. The sunglasses block the hazardous light, while allowing light that is good for vision to pass through the lens. These "polarized" lenses are the latest thing in sunglasses!

Have your sunglasses ever slid around on the dashboard of your car? Or bumped around in your purse? And when you put them on are they all scratched and blurry looking? That's because you have sunglasses with plastics lenses. Most lenses for glasses and sunglasses today are made of plastic. Plastic is easy to scratch. Unless, of course, you have scratch-resistant lenses.

NASA's Ames Research Center came up with the technology for scratch-resistant lenses. They weren't working on sunglasses, of course. They were looking for coatings to protect aerospace equipment from harsh environments of flight. Scratch-resistant glasses and sun glasses are now much in demand in every mall across America!