14 DAY TRIAL // A recent innovation, devised by experts at the University of Cincinnati, and described thoroughly in the May 1st issue of the scientific journal Nature Photonics, managed to bring e-readers to the same level as printed media, scientists at the university announced. The new Electrofluidic Display Technology (EDT) ensures that text lines on to-be-developed readers are just as bright under any Sun conditions as average printed media, which, until now, has held the edge in this area. Investigators and researchers from Sun Chemical, Polymer Vision and γ –Dynamics (Gamma Dynamics) have also contributed to the international scientific effort.
Basically, what EDT does is electrically alter the appearance of pigments on the display, in a manner that creates an outstanding visual brilliance, and rivals conventional media. The innovation could also further the strive for the creation of the first full-color e-reader display, with an 85 percent “white-state reflectance,” or higher. This threshold must be achieved in all portable devices, such as e-books and cell-phones, in order for them to be admitted on the market and liked by potential customers.
“If you compare this technology to what's been developed previously, there's no comparison. We're ahead by a wide margin in critical categories such as brightness, color saturation and video speed,” UC College of Engineering Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering Jason Heikenfeld, who has been the main developer of EDT, explained. He has also been the lead author of the journal paper, entitled “Electrofluidic displays using Young–Laplace transposition of brilliant pigment dispersions,” which combines research spanning several years.
“The ultimate reflective display would simply place the best colorants used by the printing industry directly beneath the front viewing substrate of a display. In our EFD pixels, we are able to hide or reveal colored pigment in a manner that is optically superior to the techniques used in electrowetting, electrophoretic and electrochromic displays,” Heikenfeld went on to say. “This takes the Amazon Kindle, for example, which is black and white, and could make it full color. So now you could take it from a niche product to a mainstream product.”
The optically active layer that relies on EDT was just 15 microns thick, the experts shared, which meant that there could be a great potential here for rollable displays, which could be folded in very much the same way a paper was. The new technology could also be used to create electronic windows, or maybe even tunable color casings for portable electronics, such as laptops and mobile phones.