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- acrophoric, on 10/12/2007, -1/+11Imagine the combination of OLED with the LitraCon ( http://optics.org/articles/news/10/3/10/1 ). Being an architecture student, I am very excited!
- LoopyChew, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8Localzuk, think along the lines of a programmed alarm clock. At 7:30, your room flashes bright yellow, forcing you awake; it stops at 7:35 and goes to a more normal shade of yellow, more like daylight. At 8:20, the kitchen, bathroom, and computer room (you could be in any of them at the time) suddenly turn red, reminding you to stop reading Penny Arcade and get your butt into the office.
As an extension, at night, when putting your kids away to bed, you either have the room dim to a low shade of blue, or keep one portion of the wall a shade of off-white to resemble the moon. Also, maybe you'd have small red arrows pointing to the bathroom in case of a late-night potty emergency.
Not to mention the situational aspects, as spydabyte suggests; an alarm triggers the whole house to turn bright white, both alerting the homeowners to the robbery and the burglar that they're busted.
Alone, OLED lighting is both awesome and practical; but given programmability, both the awesomeness and the practicality factor start going up exponentially. - Micrll, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7It looks good but I really prefer indirect lighting, I find it easiser on my eyes. But for other uses like PDA's this would be awsome.
- spydabyte, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6How would you like to be woken up by your entire house glowing at you?
Your house turning 255 red would be a nice way of scaring off unwanted guests.
Reminds me of future technology in movies. Depending on your "wall resolution" you could probably even turn it into a monitor or "projection" without the projector. - jaijai, on 10/12/2007, -2/+8Longer version of the article from here:
http://smarteconomy.typepad.com/smart_economy/2006/04/new_high_effici.html
New High efficiency flat light source OLEDs > Almost any surface in a home, whether flat or curved, could become a light source: walls, curtains, ceilings, cabinets or tables.
Problem:
Tired of fluorescent tubes? Bored with incandescence?
Smart Solution:
Imagine your ceiling -- or any surface -- as a giant light panel, thanks to research from the University of Southern California and Princeton University.
Scientists studying organic light-emitting devices (OLEDs) have made a critical leap from single-color displays to a highly efficient and long-lived natural light source. The invention, described in the April 13 issue of Nature, is the latest fruit of a 13-year OLED research program led by Mark Thompson, professor of chemistry in the USC College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, and Stephen Forrest, formerly of Princeton University and now vice president for research at the University of Michigan.
"This process will enable us to get 100 percent efficiency out of a single, broad spectrum light source," Thompson said. If the device can be mass-manufactured cheaply - a realistic expectation, according to Thompson - interior lighting could look vastly different in the future.
Almost any surface in a home, whether flat or curved, could become a light source: walls, curtains, ceilings, cabinets or tables.
Since OLEDs are transparent when turned off, the devices could even be installed as windows or skylights to mimic the feel of natural light after dark - or to serve as the ultimate inconspicuous flat-panel television.
Thompson and Forrest previously invented efficient single- color displays now ready to enter the market in next-generation cell phones. But subsequent attempts by several groups to create white-light OLEDs fell short. The biggest issue was the fast burnout time of the blue component, since blue is one of the primary colors needed to make white.
The Nature paper presents a quantum mechanical trick that solves this problem. First, the researchers followed their standard recipe for making an OLED: placing four ultra-thin organic layers on glass or transparent plastic. Three of the layers serve as highways for charges to reach a central "emissive" layer. When the oppositely charged molecules meet in the emissive layer, electrons jump from the negatively charged molecules to the positive ones, and ultimately relax to their starting energy. In the process, light is emitted, which can be tuned to cover a broad range of wavelengths. Previous OLEDs used phosphorescent blue, green and red dyes to generate light with greater energy efficiency than all-fluorescence based devices (phosphorescence and fluorescence, both expressions of energy that is released as excited electrons fall back into their regular orbit, differ mainly in the speed of their response). Thompson and Forrest found that they could substitute a fluorescent dye for blue without sacrificing the superior properties of OLEDs. In fact, the researchers reported, the fluorescent dye should prolong the lifetime of the blue component and also uses 20 percent less energy.
"We're hoping this will lead to significantly longer device lifetimes in addition to higher efficiency," Thompson said. According to Forrest, the device eventually could achieve three times the efficiency of standard incandescent light bulbs.
"With a future emphasis on manufacturing technology, this structure may provide an important, low-cost and efficient means that will replace incandescent lighting in many different applications," Forrest wrote.
The tallest remaining hurdle to production of these devices may have nothing to do with the OLED itself, Thompson said, but with the plastic layer to be used as a backing in economical large-area devices. All mass-produced plastics allow some humidity to pass through to the OLED, eventually degrading it.
"There's no plastic that's hermetic enough to make devices that will last a long period," Thompson said, while predicting that this problem can be solved. Already, Universal Display Corp. has developed the group's research into a commercially feasible process for making cell phone screens. - louis74, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5I'd have my computer gaming room as a "Tron" room.. put down the gridmarks that'd be pretty sweet
- Justavian, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Would someone turn the damn couch off! I'm trying to sleep...
- tavisjohn, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Cool! However what do you do whenyour celing burns out?
- ear1grey, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3This sounds great, but do you really want bright blue wallpaper? e.g:
http://boakes.org/instant-home-redecoration-with-electronic-paper - wolver1ne, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3"Imagine a house without a single light fixture - but instead walls, ceilings, furnishings, and accessories all sources of light."
Ok.. imagined. Now imagine the price tag on that. - mooninite, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Super cheap compaired to LCD, but the screens are limited to MP3 players or digital cameras at the moment. No one wants to mass produce a real screen as of yet.
- akira117, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Making a house made entirely out of LitraCon would be sweet!
Your in the basement and your yelling at people in the third floor to turn the lights off...... - crashflow, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2especially with whats written on the wallpaper, it'll just stress you right out.
- LoopyChew, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2"Imagine a house without a single light fixture - but instead walls, ceilings, furnishings, and accessories all sources of light."
In theory, a great idea; I even imagined a scenario where OLED lighting had its uses somewhere up above. However, how many of us actually enjoy the different textures of wallpaper in their places of residence? Marble and wood floors? Carpet?
Also, for those people who can afford to have a foyer pronounced the snooty way, nothing will ever match the grandeur and elegance of a chandelier.
Bottom line, OLED lighting will be great for (in 50's feature narrator voice) "THE HOMES OF TOMORROW!", nightclubs, and workplaces. However, for many residences that exist today, it would seem pretty out of place, at best. Possibly OLED strips to replace the mounted ceiling fixtures, but not the whole-room-replacement thing the way the article wants people to envision it. And although old buildings are being torn down in favor of new ones daily, it'll be a long time even from the time OLED paneling becomes mass-produced before whole-room paneling becomes the norm rather than the exception. - ashrric, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2You know what this really means... An end to how-many-people-does-it-take-to-screw-in-a-light-bulb jokes as we know them. Now we'll have to say, "How many metal heads does it take to hang an OLED?"
- Sp0rAdiC, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2These are flexible, glass would not be.
- kazem, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Wish they had more pictures of the OLED at work.
- vspazv, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Since its flexible and they could also put this on clothing for firefighters, road workers and cyclists in place of the reflective materials they use now.
- birdadderley, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1This stuff would be great as windows replacements, as long as you are standing _indoors_; from the outside others would think the movie Poltergeist was occurring inside your home.
- crashflow, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1still, like localzuk, I wonder if they can release OLEDs incased in glass now while researching for such a plastic. OLED has plenty of applications even for rigid devices. I won't mind a single pane of glass as my monitor now. :P
- mooninite, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2I've been waiting on OLED screens for years now, but there's always an excuse about longitetivity. Last I heard those problems were solved, but will the market refuse to make such screens because LCD is designed to be made by so many factories invested by the major display companies?
- vitriolix, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1that's part of the promise of OLED's, the can be manufactured in a process that is most similar to a bubble jet printer. IE, they promise to be incredibly cheap to manufacture.
- vitriolix, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1wow... that stuff is just gorgeous
- ReinMasamuri, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Am I the only one who thinks it looks like somebody just put a green light below a piece of plastic?
Whoever took the picture should be fired. Only one at the same angle and you can't really even SEE anything. - dunstdunst, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1http://sonyoled.net
- dattaway, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1And the OLED displays cannot be read in sunlight and seem to be tied to quick screensavers due to the energy usage.
- JK1150, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Now imagine turning on your ceiling, your floor, and your kitchen sink, and it's still dark in the house.
- erikaustria974, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0All about the next display generation at http://www.oled-display.net or http://www.oled.at (german)
- cvrti5, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1After researching OLED, I ran into its newer form PLED, check it out! I can't wait to buy a giant 65" PLED/OLED TV that weighs less than 10 pounds!
- erikaustria974, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0With OLEDs many new products come all over the world!
More about OLEDS at:
http://www.oled-display.net or http://www.oled.at (German) - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0A better idea would just be battery-powered panels or cubes you just stick wherever you need them. The batteries are rechargeable and can be recharged with a small, outdoor solar panel .
- 6ixty, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0i'm thinking more MJ's Billy Jean video!
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1it would sure be nice if they produced pictures that looked like something and not just some cropped b/s pics that nobody knows what's going on in them.
- localzuk, on 10/12/2007, -2/+2""There's no plastic that's hermetic enough to make devices that will last a long period," "
They mention glass also. Why can this not be used? - noouch, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0The possibilities are infinite, but I only want one thing: A Tron themed home.
- localzuk, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1I wonder how much OLEDs would cost to mass produce?
- david76, on 10/12/2007, -3/+3What about this technology suggests it couldn't be used indirectly? Just hide the service on which the OLEDs reside.
- localzuk, on 10/12/2007, -3/+0It wouldn't glow at you unless you had it switched on...
- tmcleroy, on 10/12/2007, -14/+9wow, just wow
- Serendipity, on 10/12/2007, -9/+4Ditto!
- solidcube, on 10/12/2007, -13/+4"Wow, just wow" might have amused someone on a Livejournal Naruto/LGBTGoth community in 2001.
People need to quit using that phrase. - lordthor, on 10/12/2007, -17/+5Macs suck.
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