Think printing solar panels is cool? Well, here’s something even cooler. General Electric has just successfully demonstrated a roll-to-roll printing (think newspaper style printing) process for OLEDs. It’s a state-of-the-art process for the production of Organic Light Emitting Diodes that’s high performance, energy efficient, and surprisingly inexpensive. The applications are endless for printing energy efficient light systems of all sizes. Just imagine the design possibilities!
OLEDs are a subcategory of LEDs that glow thanks to an electroluminescent layer of organic compounds, and have been hailed as the next big thing in green electronics. OLEDs are thinner, look better, and are even more energy efficient than a typical LED display. And by their very nature of this new manufacturing process, they should be cheap to create, as the only thing required is an inkjet printer. For years researchers have been trying to develop roll to roll printing of OLEDs, which is believed to be the cheapest process for manufacturing OLEDs. Thanks to GE, it now appears that such a process will come sooner rather than later.
GE’s OLED printing project was four years in the making. They partnered with Energy Conversion Devices, who provided the experience in making the roll-to-roll equipment, and set out to do what was considered the ultimate production line for OLEDs. Even though it took them 4 years to develop, the program’s goals were so time-constrained that oftentimes they were designing the machine to manufacture the devices without knowing how to manufacture the device itself.
+ World’s first demonstration of “Roll-to-Roll” Processed OLEDs @ GE Blog
Via Metaefficient
I can’t wait to see this stuff in the public, often.
[...] even more energy efficient than regular LEDs. And now GE, after four years, has invented a way to print them newspaper style, quickly and inexpensively [...]
[...] found this over on inhabitat today..originally from the GE [...]
The world need this sort of stuff, and we like to buy it as soon as we can.
Leo Mac Ender
Great stuff. But not fully developed yet, as one can see some “dead pixels” on the photo. But still, great stuff, can’t wait to see them in the shops.
These oled’s look like they can be made on home inkjets, with 4 cartridges for the four layers. And how about light emitting paint? Just paint the walls four times, connect it and let it shine.
Radiating advertisements on buildings without the big footprint (just roll up the ad during daylight). Endless posibilities…
[...] even more energy efficient than regular LEDs. And now GE, after four years, has invented a way to print them newspaper style, quickly and inexpensively too”…. [...]
[...] (more…) [...]
[...] Click here for the full Article at inhabitat.com [...]
It will be few years before technology matures and actually trickles down to consumers at a reasonable price. It’s a similar story to LED lighting; they are exuberantly expensive, burn out easily (depending on a brand) and provide limited lighting applications. It will be a while before they dethrone CFLs.
I don’t mind waiting a few years, but it really should be tomorrow.