Cars with video displays on their sides that show up only when the video plays. Pocket-sized video screen roll-ups. Wall-hanging TVs — across an entire wall — that are as thin as cardboard. These are only some of the possible uses for a new form of LED display, reported today by a scientific team in Science magazine.
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The team of 16 scientists, led by materials scientist John Rogers of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, report that they have developed methods for creating microscale inorganic light-emitting diodes (LEDs), as well as ways to turn the LEDs into unusual display and lighting systems. Flat or wavy configurations are possible, with dimensions down to the micrometers, and printing-based assembly methods can deposit these devices onto glass, plastic or rubber.
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Best Parts of Organic and Inorganic LEDs
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This latest type of LED is brighter, more flexible, and can be arranged in more shapes and sizes than current LCD or organic LEDs.
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Organic LEDs are used in cell phones and game consoles, while inorganic ones are used in those video billboards that have been sprouting up alongside highways. Organic LEDs, which are called organic because they contain carbon, are not as bright or as sturdy as the billboard kinds, but inorganic LEDs have to be sliced and assembled by robots because of their thickness.
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The team of scientists, representing institutions from the U.S., China and Singapore, sought to combine the advantages of each. In order to do that, the team wanted to find a way to grow and shape inorganic LEDs.
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They first created what Rogers called a sacrificial layer — an adhesive that holds the inorganic LEDs on a wafer while they are being created, but is partially removed with a liquid later. The layer of LEDs can then be lifted up from the wafer. Then, with a…