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Science

Transparent Transistors? 69

Posted by michael from the I-can-see-clearly-now dept.
ExRex writes "New Scientist has this article about a material developed at the Tokyo Institute of Technology which is not only both a semi-conductor and ferro-magnetic at room temperature, but is also transparent. It may lead to flat panels which contain both image processing circuitry and memory in the screen itself." They're thinking laptops, but I'm thinking heads-up displays.
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Transparent Transistors? More

Transparent Transistors?

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  • Ah, electrochromic technology. That's neat stuff, especially the LBL-developed material [lbl.gov] that uses power to change the tinting, and holds its current tint when the power is removed.

    You're right, it's still expensive, but the costs are coming down. We're already seeing electrochromics being used for auto-dimming rearview mirrors on everything from VWs to Buicks, and it's showing up in larger panels on show cars like the Cadillac Imaj [generalmotors.com] and Mercedes Maybach [autoweb.com.au]. There's also a big push (and a US DOE Initiative [lbl.gov]) for developing electrochromic windows to make buildings more efficient.

  • A combination of transparent conductors and transparent LEDs (or LCD pixels) would permit development of a cube made of layers of transparent displays, for a true 3D image. I realized this about 15 years ago, and now the final requirement has been met; it can be done now, provided these are truly transparent, not just somewhat.
  • Wouldn't this be great in solar cell technology? One of the problems of silicon based panels is that the silicon is not transparent, therefore the light penetration to the active cells is limited.

    This transparent semiconductor would allow the light to penetrate deeper, allowing potentially several layers of active cells, increasing the efficency of the panels.

    Or do I just not know what I'm talking about (I suspect not:) But the prospect of transparent solar panels on my windows powering my house sounds very attractive.
  • You are missing the most obvious use of this technology. A transparent transistor and transparent screen is one step closer to perfect hologram image, or 3D image.

    Layers of transparent 2D screens can be combined at different distances to provide a psuedo 3D image.

    If this transistor really becomes cheap and if its really transparent, then I'd imagine someone would make a solid block out of it and make the first perfect 3D television...

    I know what I need for next christmas now..

  • 'auto tinting' windows

    You don't need transistors for that. There are some conductive films that can darken when current passes through. I have seen that in a lab: a window with a dimmer switch to obscure it. I believe it is already industriailzed, though still expensive.

  • Man, it sucks now to have a broken pixel, but just imagine if that also meant you had corrupted memory!
    --
  • This is something that everybody seems to at least be subconciously aware about, but doesn't truely realize how bad it is - things like monitors, flatscreens, or up-close books are incredibly bad for our vision. Monitors (at least the CRT type) because there is nothing concrete for our eyes to focus on - they're focusing on 'empty space', and not a solid object. LCDs and the such, a little bit less so. something like a HUD is just bad news for general computing. I can see something small like that on a one-eye visor type device, say, maybe, for in class instruction, with the student's class assignments, or various other things, but never for something as widely used as general computing, viewing the web, etc. The individual would lose much of their visual acuity, quickly.

    -------
    CAIMLAS

  • I think Siemens had some of those machines with built-in OHP. they are NOT cheap.

    //rdj

  • Could this technology be used to create true 3D displays. Pixels and transistors to control them embedded inside a clear plastic cube?
  • this sounds like what David Brin describes as TRU-VU glasses in his novel "Earth".
    they were not given to be a very good thing if you liked your privacy.
  • Maybe, but that sounds like it would be bad for color accuracy. The color temp of your display would depend on ambient light.

    White LEDs will probably be a big boon to flat-panel displays, since they require less power and don't change color all the time like the current flourescents do. LEDs could figure even bigger if the organic LED [slashdot.org] technology takes off.

  • McCoy: "Would you mind telling me how we plan to convert this whale tank?"
    Scott: "Ordinarily I could do it with transparent transistors."
    Sulu: "I'm afraid you're a number of years too early for that."
    Scott: "I know. We've got to find a twentieth century equivalent."
    McCoy: "But where?"

    Later...

    Nichols: "Transparent Transistors?"
    Scott: "That's the ticket, laddie."
    Nichols: "It'd take years just to figure out the dynamics of this matrix."
    McCoy: "Yes, but you would be rich beyond the dreams of avarice!"
    --
    McCoy: "You, uh, realize, of course, if we give him the formula, we're altering the future."
    Scott: "Why? How do we know he didn't invent the thing?"

    --

    The Good Reverend
  • yup, that would be neat, but what i'd realy like would be 'auto tinting' windows - you could adjust the tint of the side/front/whatever windows acording to how bright it is outside - better than that tint film, cos you could turn it off at night.... cheers,
  • Don't forget to marry it all together with this [nxt.co.uk] technology... Basically, you've got an all signing all dancing self contained picture.

    Can anyone point out some nice transparent battery technology too? (Or, thinking about it, you can always hide the power source in the window/picture frame...)

  • could you tell me where I can get a 2d hologram from please. goodness I'm abusive today
    .oO0Oo.
  • Wait until Steve Jobs gets a whif of these - can you say Graphite iMac :)
  • ok, i'm pretty dumb when it comes to most thing techie but i was just thinking that if it's transparent, capable of displaying images, cpu and memories, it sounds like it might be possible to do some type of 3d hologram type thing, kinda right out star trek.

    tdawg

  • Don't worry about it. Someone gave me a karma point and took one off you, which made me feel guilty. Good to know you're not upset. I've only got 13 and don't care about my karma (New Year's resolution :-) as long as I can post at the default level. I just get tetchy when it looks like people are being rewarded with karma for -not- reading the main article.

    Did anyone get the Ohno! joke btw? If you're moderating and think it was funny, give someone else who looks like they need it the points.

  • I had a Thinkpad 755CD that did that. I was doing training for a company and it was the best thing in the world. Just about every hotel and conference center has an OHP, but finding VGA projectors was always a frustrating (and expensive) chore.

    I don't know why nobody makes something like this anymore. It was extremely useful and surprisingly durable...you just popped the back of the display off and opened the laptop until it was flat on the OHP. Then you just snapped the back on when you were finished and it was a regular laptop. The lighting element and reflective surface were in the detachable part.

    The only downsides were that the resolution was only 640X480 and it was only a P75, but it was an absolute tank...it traveled with me constantly for over a year and never had any hardware problems at all. I even checked it as baggage a few times. Try that with a Vaio and see how long it lives.

    I've got to think that there's anough people who do presentations all the time who would buy another one like that. It sure beats carrying a projector. I'd even put up with an extra pound of weight for the added complexity.



    -------------------------------
  • Didn't they used to have a different name for these though? ...ah yes, tubes!
  • Just think....
    If a windshield for a Chevy Lumina Minivan costs $1000.00 now, What would it cost with an integrated Heads up display with enough RAM to store my MP3 collection.

    If I get a stone chip from a passing car, do I have to run FSCK?
  • Transparent aluminum! Woo!


    "Admiral, there be whales here".

  • All they need now are clear lithium ion batteries.

    If this stuff is a good enough thermal conductor, they could build fast CPUs right into the display and the display face would make a nice large heat sink. Then, your palm pilot could be completely clear ... and nearly impossible to find when you misplace it. On second thought, maybe they should keep the batteries opaque. ;-)

    If you got the photosensors right, you might be able to make a sheet of glass that could scan, and later display, any image it was set on top of. How cool would that be?

    On a lighter note, they really should have picked a better English translation for Tokyo Institute of Technology. The three letter acronym is just a bit obscene for a t-shirt. My freind has a t-shirt from a robotics competition held there. I still chuckle and shake my head when he wears that shirt.

    Karl

    I'm a slacker? You're the one who waited until now to just sit arround.

  • *I'd* rather have Spaceman Spiff shades that sense my biorhythms and make "expressions".
  • I'm thinkin' replacement eye... hmmmm
  • the best I can think of is for cars... maps appearing on your windscreen... maybe with a lil GPS as well...

  • Yeah! Or what about those fancy pads they have in StarTrek Voyager that are transparent and only 0.5 cm thick. Transparent Palm Pilot thingy .-))
  • Forget the funny eyeglasses. Think T2.

    Imagine small blocks that use the magnetic field to move around. They use the semiconductive aspect to perform logic and to route power from one block to the next. They communicate with their neighbors to assemble into larger structures.

  • this means less power will be need by the back light, therefore longer battery time for operation. ta dah!


    ---
  • How about replaceable pizo-electric crystals? I recall seeing them in a few toys some years ago, and it seemed that they lasted years at a time. In fact, they lasted after the toy (some super-hero figure) was broken.

    Of course, that might not be possible, so another option might be Starlight-scope style for the glasses.

    Kierthos
  • To have "terminator glasses" you would still need some backlight. This is available plenty in the daytime, but how will you organise a readable display at night?

    Same thing goes for car windshields, window panes etc. As long as these objects do not produce light on their own, You will still have problems like this.

    Of course, HUD's are fun stuff, and there is existing technology to have them, but that's another story...
  • Apple Eating this up with a spoon... Can you imagine?

    "Now, rather than choose from 5 colors for your iMac, you can select which color you want from this handy-dandy control panel! Import pictures of the kids! Use Hendrix inspired Psychedelic Colors! Show the man you don't want to take the same ol' beige!"
  • Smal transparent implants (small head up display)placed inside eye to display information from small implanted computer.. could perhaps be combined with small sensors placed on the skin to give information about location/enviroment/time/dangers/ perhaps even night-vision ect ect. now we only need a way to give input to the small implanted computer, then add bluetooth chip to system and we are beginning to get somewere, email based telepathy?
  • Wouldn't something like this allow us to create highly accurate and rugged touch screen display? You know, like the ones they use in Star Trek. Most of the touch screens today are nice, but their accuracy sucks, and they are too easy to mess up. However, I could see this being used for a new breed of user interfaces. Can't you see it? You have a keyboard that's a touch screen. Then when you launch your favorite video game, it reconfigures itself into a console that is far more specific! Wouldn't that be awesome?
  • I've constructed my own heads-up display. Transparent displays would do nothing for you - and in fact would be counterproductive.

    I built a HUD system using an LED display and TTL electronics, for my car dashboard. It was functional, but too dim and took up WAY too much dashboard space. But it was a cool project, and got lots of comments (made me look very geek), and I learned a LOT about HUD systems.

    I found that you need a few things for a halfway decent HUD.

    - You need to focus the display at infinity, so that your eyes don't have to refocus from far to near. With the display mounted right in front of you, it's no better than looking down at the dashboard.

    - You need a good and LARGE lens system so that the display is focused far away. Basically, the display will be visible in an area the same size as the lens. Think of it this way: because it's focused at infinity, when you move your head sideways the display won't move (it's fixed in space, way out ahead of you). The light rays will be coming off the lens parallel (that's the definition of focused at infinity). To be able to SEE the display in any range of head positions, you need a fairly large lens. Otherwise, if you move your head out of the "beam" of focused light, you cannot see it. A minimum size of about 2-3 inches is required ON EITHER SIDE of the outermost display elements - and more is better. I used a commonly-available 8x10-inch Fresnel lens (cut to size), but that was poor optical quality and there was a lot of blurring and scattering due to the concentric lines in the lens. But I couldn't find a large enough glass lens that would FIT on the dashboard.

    - You need a large, semi-transparent mirror. You've got to see all of the display, yet without blocking the background image. Coated glass surfaces that reflect strongly at your display color wavelength are best, because they do not color the light passing through the glass, and ONLY reflect the one color of your display. (Note that the only good option is a a single-color display, or maybe two or three distinct colors if you have multi-layer coated optics. Coated optics are EXPENSIVE, too.) In my case, I just wimped out and used the inside surface of the windshield as the final mirror. I considered a patch of silver window tinting, but that conflicted with state laws regarding tinting on the forward windshield.

    - You need a fairly long optical path. Unless it's a really thick lens, you can assume a 2 or 3 to one ratio between diameter and focal length - so a five inch lens mandates at least a 10 inch long optical path between the display and the lens. THEN you need the transparent mirror... Military displays are usually "folded" with extra mirrors, and still are fairly large units. I got away with an extra mirror, but that introduces more light loss.

    - You need a REALLY REALLY bright display. You've got to pump out enough light to see the partial reflection, and also you've got to overcome your background brightness (even military HUDs are hard to see under certain lighting conditions, such as bright sunlit clouds). For this reason, military displays almost exclusively use single-color (usually green to match the coated optics) vector-driven (non-shadow masked) cathode ray tubes. They are so bright that looking directly into them can hurt your vision.

    - Most importantly for THIS discussion, you want the display solid black where it's not illuminated. You don't want to introduce extraneous light into your field of view.

    - You need a cooling system. The CRT display is so bright that it gets HOT.

    - You need MONEY. Coated optics, large lenses, cooling systems, and bright displays are each very expensive to obtain or build.

    Based on these requirements, a transparent display doesn't help you at ALL. Instead, you want a really really bright opaque display, and lots of expensive and large optical components. That's why your car does not have a built-in HUD yet.

    * ~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
    * Split Infinity Music [simusic.com]
  • Is it possible, that by having a reflective surface behind the display, that in some instances the backlight could be turned off saving battery power?

    I would assume that the backlight considerably reduces battery life.

  • Yeah it will be great fun driving 160 mph when the true blue screen of death displays all over the windscreen
  • They're thinking laptops, but I'm thinking heads-up displays.

    Or even better a TFT panel on a laptop that you can rip the back of the lid off and sit on an OHP. I do some presentations at companies that don't have all that state of the art projection kit we have in the office. Normally I have an OHP for slides and a bunch of people round my laptop since I can't be bothered carting all the crap to set up a decent video projection system with me.

    It would be so cool to be able to take the cover off my laptop, plunk it down on top of an OHP and get a large screen video display!

    Actually, I seem to recall a laptop that did this some time ago, but as I never saw one I have no idea how the display looked with those old transistors that you couldn't see through.

  • Just don't make the default color scheme various shades of purple and orange [startrek.com]. I would hope to god that we could come up with a color scheme that wasn't quite so hard on the eyes for something so high-tech.

  • If a computer was transparent and had the ability to "light up" during function, it would practically remove hardware troubleshooting... simply notice what is not running. A transparent computer would also be a world class teaching aid to young children on how they function, they could easily follow the circuits and diagrams, and learn a lot in real experience, instead of looking at books. An "etching glass computer" idea is great. Do they etch it now? Either way, I am not an expert on this in the slightest. I think that it is not even remotely ironic that the HAL 9000 "guts" are getting closer to our desktops every day. Some day men are going to look at "electrical" computers and wonder how on earth our ancestors ever got the damn things to run. Just like how we look at a longbow and wonder how anyone ever hit someone accurately with them. This is definitely an exciting time to be alive. Keep your heads up, CUZ IT IS COMING.
  • I don't see the improvement. Making the transistors more transparent won't improve display quality very much as current methods place the transistor in back of an LC cell. The big difficulty in the LCD display market is the liquid crystal material itself. The contrast ratio is directly related to the polarization changes in the specific liquid crystal molecule being used in the display. When a voltage is applied to a transistor, it causes the LC molecules in that cell to twist or isomerize. Light passing through the modifed LC will change the polarization. Put a polarization filter which, say, blocks linearly polzaized light on top of the LC layer and you have a light switch. Put colored filters and you have a colored display.
    This is why manufactures have tried different variants of LC -- twisted neumatic, ferroelectric, etc. in hopes of improving the polarization efficiency (PI radians wavefront rotation or whichever polarizaiton method is being used - linear, circular, etc.). There are already transparent transistors using other methods, and there are even plastic, clear, flexable transistors which can be "printed" so I don't see what's the big deal. They're either reinventing an already existing technology because they don't have any truly new ideas or are hoping to claim already established methods as their own. Either way there is nothing new or novel here.
  • One significant potential use for this is as an aircraft HUD. Several people have mentioned auto HUD's, but pilots have a much greater need for this than drivers. While the FLIR system that is an option in Caddies is a damned cool toy, as a pilot, I would be absolutely thrilled to have FLIR/Nav/performance data displayed on my windscreen. One of the major causes of crashes is pilot disorientation; pilots, lacking an outside reference, get vertigo, and don't know what the attitude of the aircraft is (they may have an artificial horizon, but it's very easy to dismiss a 3" gauge); if we had a system where all of the windows showed a real horizon line, situational awareness would be greatly improved. Additionally, the system could be used to provide steering cues (even to the degree of NASA's "Highway in the Sky" idea), weather information (look out the left window, see green radar returns; look out front, see yellow; Stormscope (lightning detector) data could also be shown), traffic info (put a highlight box around other air traffic, making it easier to find), or any other data you might like. The possibilities are truly endless; the bottom line, though, is that this could be an incredible tool for pilots of all aircraft (if inexpensive enough), and a great boon to aviation safety.
  • Better yet: scan the page beneath, run OCR, run that through the fish, and display the output in a language of your choice. One step closer to a universal translator, and one step backwards for foreign language education in the schools :-)

  • I have my whole system a Pentium V 200ghz 10Terabytes of spage 18gb mem which is transparent, and when I can see it I'll post with it to prove it.

    Republicans aren't so bad" [antioffline.com]
  • Actually, there was a department store that actually had a device (using multiple camera's) that displayed 3-d holograms out its front window of some of its products. I can't remember where it was, but I remember seeing it in Popular Science a couple years ago. Pretty cool, but nothing like what this transparent transistor would do for computing.

  • That would end up being one of those useless gadgets that are in the classifieds in the back of Popular Science. There would be some uses, though.

    • They could use it instead of the Ump Cam (in the NFL), just for recording. Better yet, Head Referees would not need replay booths. After every play, they can get video feeds showing the play again.
    • It could be used to give a personal view of things, when worn by contestants in reality shows
    • Use the old technology:
      Transistoshades! with 25% of light blocked out.
    • VR glasses which you can see through, to get a realistic view of your own body (and so you don't run into walls).
  • Just out of curiousity, I'd like to know what scale of size are these transistors? If the semiconductor properties can actually be used as transistors, what scale of integration would be possible? If it were just a few hundred or a few thousand it would be cool, but if you could get VLSI or better, the applications could be amazing. Self contained HUD's would be totally possible. Anyways, if anyone knows what size the transistors are, could you post a link?
  • How about using it for a screen that can "think"... think about whether you are entitled right now to display a given piece of intellectual property or not... If the screen itself, that array of x pixels in this direction and y pixels in that direction could check entitlement and decrypt the IP to be shown...
  • I agree. I was thinking we could use them with EInk perhaps. Make a VR HMD out of it.

    But since the EInk is only monochrome.... Would there be a way to use multiple layers of these and EInk so that we could get RGB or CYMK?
  • It was the IBM Thinkpad 755CV that had them. I think they released this model in 1995, but I'm not sure how long production and development continued with that Idea.
  • Build a display into a set of contact lenses. Display the irises of the person whom you're pretending to be. Complete with whatever dynamic changes the scanner is looking for to tell a "real" iris from a photograph of one.

    Or, on a less insidious level, for the fashion concious: contact lenses that can display funky dynamic patterns.
  • Doesn't the image used for a HUD have to be effectively at infinity, and so needs to be reflected from the glass you are looking through?

    Tom

  • "Currently, transistors in laptop displays absorb a quarter of the brightness of the backlight. Transparent transistors could solve this."

    Above quote copy-pasted from the New Scientist article referenced by /. - I claim score 3 informative too. No offence intended to onion2k, but this is getting silly.

    BTW, If transistors soak up 25% of the light, just stick a few on your window, then the sun won't be so bright

  • If we could combine this [slashdot.org] technology with this [slashdot.org] technology, then we could reach a stage of rapid advancement in screen technology which could revolutionalise the way which computers and information are displayed.

    Pioneer also announced work in this area [theregister.co.uk] several years ago ... I wonder what happened to it. I remember reading that scientists had also created an lcd technology which absorbs and reflects more background light, but I cannot find the article anywhere :-(

  • Here's a thought that coincides with the recent story on Mobile Duron from AMD [slashdot.org]...

    If these mobile processors emit 25 watts of energy, and are designed for mobile units, why not put that to good use? At that wattage, you could get things to incandesce, or maybe more efficiently cause it to flouresce. Why not backlight your LCD with it?

    You'd even still have your energy-saver if the backlight and processor "sleep" at the same time!

  • Imagine some glasses that would also act as a screen. Like in Terminator, where we could see through *its* eyes some Z80 asm listings while he was maiming Sarah Connor.
    My point is that this will boost the wearable market in peculiar.
    --
  • The transistors in an average TFT screen soak up about 25% of the light emitted by the backlight. These new semiconductors, being transparent, eliminate that translucency, and thus make the screen 'brighter'.

    Which would be nice right now coz the sun is far too flamin' bright.

  • Ok, so maybe I should have stuck in some italics to show I was quoting.. The main point of the comment was the 'sun-shining-on-my-screen-at-the-time' bit.. Personally I found the article on the Prometheus Project more interesting, but I don't think thats on the web site. (Not that I saw)
    And anyway, karma is worthless. When I can spend it I'll care. So I went down to 48 by being overrated. Is that a problem? I think not.
  • The Prometheus Project article is actually on the site.. http://www.newscientist.com/features/features.jsp? id=ns22741
  • Well, you'd have to have some sort of control mechanism, as expecting your "super-glasses" to respond to an inherent command structure like you want them too might be a bit too far out. So, a wire linked control could be possible.

    However, I don't know if the miniture camera idea is possible with just one set of lenses (one lens per eye, that is)... wouldn't you still need more then one lens or a lens and mirror arrangement to do proper magnification? I don't know a lot about optics though... If it can be accomplished with only one lens per eye, then I'd like to see it do telescopic and microscopic magnification.

    IR sight might be possible, but you would need a receptor to "catch" the IR, while the software and image translation could be built into the lenses, which are simultaneously used as the screen.

    Recording would be much easier, IMAO, although depending on how much memory these hypothetical lenses can hold, you'd want some sort of backup storage. Obviously, you'd also want some way to transfer the data. An attachable wire to one of the earpieces, perhaps.

    Just my 2 shekels.

    Kierthos
  • "I'm thinking heads-up displays."
    I'm thinking glasses with built-in miniature cameras to enhance image quality of the world around us. Zooming, recording, IR vision, the possibilities are endless.
    Or am I just daydreaming again?
    Zenoran
    -- In the Garden of Eden, God is giving Adam a geometry lesson:
    "Two parallel lines intersect at infinity. It can't be proved but I've been there."
  • I think your speculation on the one lens per eye concept is correct. If a simple piece of junk digital camera needs 3 CCDs to take a 1.3megapixel image, then to enhance an image to something worth seeing through these maginificent glasses, you'd think something more would be required.

  • How a TFT works (Score:3)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 18, 2001 @01:18AM (#499622)
    Umm, in a tft screen the transistor does not generate the light. When one transistor turns on, it supplies electricity to the crystal, allowing it to untwist which allows light (from a light source behind the thin film of transistors) to shine through. So the transistors only act as switches to "turn on" or untwist the liquid crystal. They are already partially transparent since the film they are on covers the entire screen. For colour screens, there are three transistors per pixel (R, G, B). Therefore, these transparent transistors will probably allow brigher screens, but that is about it.

  • Re:A thought... (Score:3)

    by AJWM ( 19027 ) on Thursday January 18, 2001 @08:39AM (#499623) Homepage
    Hence, you need a display, and some lensing, before dumping the image into a combiner in the main lens.

    Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. Neato high-tech X-ray specs just aren't the same thing when they're bulked up like night-vision goggles.

    But then I thought...holographic optics. The right interference pattern on a thin film will do the job that a set of lenses would.

  • Re:A thought... (Score:3)

    by wowbagger ( 69688 ) on Thursday January 18, 2001 @03:48AM (#499624) Homepage Journal
    There's a small problem with embedding the display elements in the lenses - you need to have optics to cause the light from the display to be less divergent than it would normally be. In other words, you have to make the display elements be optically furthur from the viewer's eye. I have severe myopia (-8 diopters in my good eye), but even I cannot focus closer than about 15 cm without discomfort. You have to make the display look like it's about 1m from the viewer. Hence, you need a display, and some lensing, before dumping the image into a combiner in the main lens.

    Now, if they can do this, and make the combiner not have a large impact on the view when the display is not showing anything (so that I don't have to remove the display to see normally), and get a Bluetooth link so that I don't have to have a huge cable running down my neck....

  • A thought... (Score:3)

    by American AC in Paris ( 230456 ) on Thursday January 18, 2001 @02:08AM (#499625) Homepage
    Consider the combination of said transparent transistors with Cambridge Display [cdtltd.co.uk]'s Light Emitting Polymer (LEP) technology. It is conceivable that one could create "Terminator glasses", store windows that can automatically display ads, and virtually anything else you'd ever want a pane of transparent material to display. The added bonus with the LEP technology is that backlighting is not necessary; the polymers themselves emit the necessary light when stimulated.

    There's some potential here, I think...

    information wants to be expensive...nothing is so valuable as the right information at the right time.

  • Screen technology (Score:3)

    by SirFlakey ( 237855 ) on Thursday January 18, 2001 @12:44AM (#499626) Homepage
    Not sure about heads up displays, or for that matter head mounted. I want displays on(in?) any transparent surface that needs to show info. (think transparent tabletop screens, windows, etc)
    --

  • No Tea (Score:3)

    by Bojay Iverson ( 261262 ) on Thursday January 18, 2001 @12:43AM (#499627)
    Perhaps the Joo Janta 200 Super-Chromatic Peril-Sensitive Sunglasses from the Guide can now become a reality.
  • Heck, do a few layers of these, and couldn't you build a whole PC (minus the hard drive, power supply, and ports) into a sheet of clear plexiglass? Add some touch sensors, some photoreceptors.. and you've got the holy grail of the computer artist.

    Steve Jobs must be wetting his pants.

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