Headwaters NanoKinetix announced today the development of a technology that may allow for the production of flat-screen televisions that are higher-quality yet less expensive than ones currently on the market. Until now, the technology underpinning the fashionably slim monitors has limited both their size and life expectancy.
Dr. Bing Zhou, a pioneering molecular scientist at NanoKinetix, a research lab in Lawrenceville, New Jersey has developed a process that has the potential to overcome the limitations of the two predominant ways to make flat-screen monitors -- liquid-crystal-display (LCD) and plasma Digital Light Processing (DLP). An LCD monitor delivers high-quality pictures, but requires liquid crystals which are "grown" using an expensive and time-consuming process. The relatively high probability of imperfections in large crystal clusters limits the dimensions of LCD TVs to no bigger than 35 to 40 inches. Plasma monitors deliver bright colors and clarity without size limitations, but at the cost of expensive materials and a usable product life between 4 and 5 years. After that, picture quality begins to deteriorate and fade.
Polymeric crystals -- synthesized by a chemical process based on nanotechnology -- can overcome both the high costs and inherent imperfections of current technology, but until now no one has been able to jump the hurdles to making them. The answer lies in Dr. Zhou's unique and patented method of nanoparticle control for an even and cost-effective application of a super-thin coating of highly conductive metallic material, such as copper, palladium, or platinum, perhaps as thin as a single molecule, to the surface of polymers to form a radically new kind of light-emitting diode. Nanotechnology will enable the production of high-quality, long-life, flat-screen television monitors at a fraction of the cost of today's devices. While these new metal-coated screens will still have a finite life-span, they will last much longer, and will deliver brighter and clearer pictures, than the best of today's LCDs and DLPs.
And that's just the beginning. One day Dr. Zhou's nanomaterials may make flat-screens that last twice as long as today's plasma TVs, cost half as much, and, with organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs), have none of the trace metals that can deteriorate picture quality over time. Dr. Zhou thinks "outside the box" and envisions a day when nanotechnology will enable manufacturers to produce truly cutting-edge flat TV devices-- millimeter-thin screens in any size to fit any room, able to be rolled up for convenient transport.
