China Creates World's First Graphene Electronic Paper (techtimes.com)

An anonymous reader writes from a report published on Tech Times: China has developed the world's first graphene electronic paper that can possibly revolutionize the screen displays on electronic gadgets such as wearable devices and e-readers. Developed by Guangzhou OED Technologies in partnership with another company in the Chongqing Province, the material is also the world's lightest and strongest material in prevalence today. It's 0.335 nanometers thick and can be used to create hard or flexible graphene displays. Graphene e-paper comes with the capability to conduct both heat and electricity, and it can supposedly enhance optical displays to a brighter level, owing to its high-light transmittance properties. What about cost? Since it's derived from carbon, graphene-based e-papers can be easily produced cost-effectively. Traditional e-papers use indium metal for their display, which is very expensive and rare to source.

Comments

Written by a 3rd grader

[Anonymous Coward]

"What about cost? Since it's derived from carbon, graphene-based e-papers can be easily produced cost-effectively". The source element has little to do with the cost to manufacture.

Re:Written by a 3rd grader

[Deadstick]

Indeed...like diamonds.

Re:Written by a 3rd grader

[Applehu Akbar]

Graphene is not exactly "in prevalence" yet. All we can do is produce experimental scraps of it.

Re:Written by a 3rd grader

[ArmoredDragon]

It's a given that everything is expensive when it's new, so I think the unspoken (and kind of obvious) point is that as manufacturing technique improves, there's a very long way that price reduction can go. This will never be true of rare natural resources, however.

Re:Written by a 3rd grader

[greenfruitsalad]

or to use a car analogy: carbon fibre cars are so ubiquitous because they are cheaper to manufacture than steel cars.

Will this mean e-ink we can buy?

[dbIII]

The current e-ink market is heavily controlled thus expensive niche items for products that are very cheap to manufacture. We've missed the boat with e-ink phones despite the technology being available for more than a decade - the patent holders didn't want their IP "cheapened" by ending up in inexpensive phones. Hopefully this will open things up a bit. I've wanted an e-ink monitor ever since the technology has been announced but the closest I've been able to get is an android tablet (Boox) and only in the last year.

Re:Will this mean e-ink we can buy?

[dbIII]

There are a lot of applications where both of your criteria are not needed.
Do you really need to play movies on the wall panel that tells you what the airconditioner is doing?

Re:Will this mean e-ink we can buy?

[dbIII]

Yes but currently those ones that can do both really suck in situations such as in direct sunlight.
The "device that does everything" does not currently exist so there is no point using it as a comparison.

Re:China is a big country

[l0n3s0m3phr34k]

TFA: "It has been developed by Guangzhou OED Technologies in partnership with another company in the Chongqing Province."

Re: China is a big country

[transami]

Why? B/c they are "Chinese"?

Perhaps you should provide some evidence.

this is great!

[Gravis Zero]

i'm looking forward to cheap epaper for stuff because the current e-ink clowns refuse to work with anyone that isn't a multibillion dollar company.

e-Vapor?

[John.Banister]

No information on the switching speed.
No information on the pixel density.
No information on the energy consumption.
No information on the reflectivity or whether it's transmissive instead or whether it emits light.
No information on whether it's a straight on-off effect or whether they can do pixel level grayscale.
No description of how it works.
Just descriptions of graphene and the sentence "we used it to make electronic paper." One of the articles did say that their time scale for having a product is "within a year.". I think I'll forget about it until then.

Re: China is a big country

[ShanghaiBill]

Perhaps you should provide some evidence.

The Chinese likely stole it from one of the numerous and vastly profitable America factories churning out graphene based products. Some new materials turn out to be 100% hype, with no actual applications, but not graphene. We need tariffs against inferior Chinese graphene, to protect American graphene workers from unfair competition.

Keep your invisible hands to yourself

[dbIII]

The market buys a lot of things, such as e-ink readers due to LCD sucking in direct sunlight. If the deliberately restricted market of e-ink opens up a bit due to real competition and is able to actually act like the market you describe then I think there will be room in the market for more devices.
Your snarky "market" comment is amusing considering the topic. Do you really know that little about what has been going on with e-ink for a decade?

Re:Keep your invisible hands to yourself

[AmiMoJo]

Sharp's memory LCD technology is daylight readable and uses very little power. Not quite as little as e-ink, but low enough that the little solar cells you get on calculators can run them forever. They are fast enough for animation/video too.

The only down side is that they have the same issue as e-ink: patented, single source, not developing very fast and not many different modules to choose from.

Re: China is a big country

[U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M]

I agree, this is totally unfair! My uncle works in a graphene mine and he might lose his job now.

Re: China is a big country

[KGIII]

You can bet Trump will put a stop to this!

Hmm... I don't know, I don't think that sentence looks good on me.

On a more serious note, graphene is actually really easy to make. It's just not easy to make in large quantities or in formats that are then easily worked. One of the easiest ways to make graphene can be done right there at your desk. Take a pencil and a piece of tape.Write on the sticky side, go ahead and get a few thick lines on there. Now, over and over again press the tape together so that a non-covered section gets stuck with the covered section and then peel them apart. Do that over and over again. You've got graphene in short order. Really, you'll have graphene in just a few minutes.

Now, there are much better processes but I'm told that none of them are great for making it in quantity or in an easily worked form. I guess, we could hire a bunch of Chinese people and give them all a roll of Scotch Tape and some pencils but that's not going to get us very far. I'm not sure what improvements have been made in the past 18 months or so. Hmm... Maybe two years? I've not read of anything popping up on the production side - but I do read about a lot of theoretical uses that are right around the corner.