Low Cost Displays Through Ink Jet Printing
Likely to create opportunities for a new generation of displays
Researchers at the Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) have created a transistor array of the type used to control a flat-panel display using a modified ink-jet printer and semi-conductor `ink`.
The technique might replace photolithography techniques that dominate display manufacturing and thus lower costs. It is expected to work on rigid or flexible substrates and could create new opportunities for wall-sized televisions, unbreakable cell phone displays, computer displays that could roll up like a window shade and electronic paper.
A prototype flat-panel display circuit was built using polymer-based semiconductor ink from Xerox Research Center, Canada. Conventional photolithography uses multi-step process for each layer of semiconductor. The new process patterns and prints components of each layer of transistor array in one step. According to PARC, a key innovation was a computer-vision system that ensures precise registration of each layer.
