Nano-electronics researcher
Imec announced today that its lab in Ghent, Belgium has
developed a curved LCD displaythat can be embedded in a contact lens. It’s perhaps the first step in creating invisible augmented reality technology that could eliminate the need for a screen on your phone, laptop, or gaming device.
Not to mention dorky glasses.
The first prototype shows an image of a dollar sign — apparently the researchers are already thinking about commercialization. While it currently can display only simple images (similar in complexity to a cheap dollar-store calculator), Imec says future versions should be able to control light transmission to the retina, create different colored irises, and function as a heads-up display, which could superimpose almost any image right onto your field of vision.
You can see the new contact lenses in this movie from Imec … with appropriately James Bond-ish music:
The LCD display technology that Imec created allows the use of almost all of the contact lens surface, unlike
LED-based applications that only enable a few pixels. In fact, Imec says, the technology will work for a range of pixel sizes and numbers.
The main challenge, of course, beside the thinness, has been the shape:
“Normally, flexible displays using liquid crystal cells are not designed to be formed into a new shape, especially not a spherical one,” Jelle De Smet, the project’s primary researcher, said in a statement. ”Thus, the main challenge was to create a very thin, spherically curved substrate with active layers that could withstand the extreme molding processes.”
It’s almost too bad that Apple has already
patented its term for very high-density, high-quality screens. Because this truly has the potential to be a real retina display.
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