Flexible flat panels will change the rules about displays
Imagine a computer monitor that is so thin it feels like a thick sheet of paper and so flexible that it can be rolled up to be put away. Those ideas are the promise of flexible flat panel displays being developed by several companies around the world.
Flexible displays use the same technological ideas that drive newer organic LED displays that have entered the market in the past several years, but they approach that technology in a new way. In flexible displays, the electronics and LEDs are printed onto a flexible surface like a sheet of plastic or a piece of cloth rather than being mounted on rigid panels and encased.
The advantages of flexible displays are many and some are obvious. Flexible displays will be far lighter than traditional displays, will use less power, and will be able to conform to the shape of the surfaces onto which they are installed. They will be able to be installed in places traditional displays cannot be-imagine t-shirts with downloadable, customizable images-and will be able to be used in applications that will come into existence because of them-imagine updatable warning or nutrition labels on reusable containers.
More practically, flexible displays will help revolutionize mobile communications by allowing for lighter devices, bigger displays, and even detachable displays that allow smartphones to be used more like computers than ever before. Flexible displays may very well help the smartphone displace the PC as the computing device of choice for many people.
There are dozens flexible flat panel displays currently under development from several different companies around the world right now, with the most sophisticated already reaching the resolution capabilities of older sixteen color monitors. The Japanese company Shinoda Plasma plans on releasing a 125-inch flexible plasma display later this year.
Within the next decade, flexible flat panel displays will likely be come the norm on a variety of ever more complex technology devices on which we will come to rely. The question becomes how we will deal with the increased flow of information.
Some flexible flat panel display resources:
- The Flexible Display Center at Arizona State University