Bendy, stretchy iPods on the cards

Researchers from the USA, Singapore and China have collaborated to develop a new class of lighting and display systems that they say could have applications for anything ranging from home theatre displays to wearable displays and biomedical imaging devices.

The new process, reported in the August 21 edition of Science, uses tiny illumination sources that are brighter than conventional ones.

As a result, individual pixels can be placed with enough space between them to make the display virtually transparent.

Besides making your iPod more durable and electronic newspapers a reality, these displays could have exciting medical implications, the authors claim.

"Wrapping a stretchable sheet of tiny LEDs around a human body offers interesting opportunities in biomedicine and biotechnology", Rogers, one of the co-authors said, "including applications in health monitoring, diagnostics and imaging".

'The next big thing'

Rogers says that such displays could mount directly on the skin creating an "electronic skin".

Rogers and colleagues describe non-rigid displays as "the next big thing" in electronics.

"Successful efforts will transform the way that we think about electronics," Rogers and co-author Yonggang Huang said.

"The Rich range of scientific aspects together with the strong potential for societal benefits creates an exciting future for this field."