[HN Gopher] Electrochromic nanostructures with high chromaticity...
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Electrochromic nanostructures with high chromaticity and superior
brightness
Author : MrJagil
Score : 89 points
Date : 2021-07-14 08:44 UTC (14 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (pubs.acs.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (pubs.acs.org)
| ricardobeat wrote:
| I know there is a do not editorialize rule but the original
| submission title "Nanostructure design enables new possibilities
| for e-paper in color" was a lot clearer.
| baybal2 wrote:
| The point is nanostructures there make very little difference
| to the overall design other than adding the nano buzzword to
| the title.
|
| There are quite a number very alike electrochromic display
| technologies. Google viologen display.
| WolfOliver wrote:
| Anybody an idea when we can write code on an eInk display? So we
| can finally code on a beach for real :)
| danuker wrote:
| Some e-ink readers with Android can run VNC apps.
|
| Couple with a wireless keyboard and mouse, and you have a
| somewhat workable setup; but the e-ink latency is annoying.
| ainar-g wrote:
| Alec of the YouTube channel Technology Connections has a
| video[1] on his second channel that you might find interesting.
| He demonstrates how one can use modern E-Ink displays for basic
| Internet browsing and such.
|
| [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NfX0vlCa4k
| thih9 wrote:
| I like an earlier thread about PaperTTY:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17896825 . The github
| project at https://github.com/joukos/PaperTTY links to youtube
| videos showing console use with an eink display.
| plaidfuji wrote:
| > The switching dynamics showed that a complete switch took ~1
| min (see videos in the Supporting Information), which is
| slightly slower than for a WO3 film in direct contact with the
| electrolyte.(13) ... but it is already sufficient for display
| applications where images do not necessarily need to be
| frequently updated (e.g., advertisement or decorative images).
|
| So it ain't gonna be with this particular technology. Doesn't
| detract from the quality of the paper though. Very well
| presented and approachable.
| MrJagil wrote:
| Dasung is state of the art:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTok6imfgoM
|
| For a laptop, you can contribute here:
| https://alexsoto.dev/challenges-building-an-open-source-eink...
| egeozcan wrote:
| If your goal is purely being present in a beach and coding at
| the same time, I guess you could code in a tent or use a VR
| glass :) But seriously, and I'm not judging you at all, but why
| would you want to code on a beach? Or maybe I took that too
| literally. As a person who can't stand even to read in bright
| light, benefits for an e-ink display would actually come from
| using it indoors:
|
| Firstly, no damn heat from the screen. This is my pet peeve. I
| can't even stand the heat coming from the good old 17 inch
| LCDs, let alone the giant ones these days.
|
| Secondly, less energy consumption. Well maybe this comes in
| hand to hand with the first.
|
| And finally, no direct light coming from the monitor, no
| headaches! I hope everyone has a significant other who looks at
| them like I'd look at a giant e-ink display.
| ricardobeat wrote:
| When did you last use one? I can't even remember the last
| time I felt a hot monitor. The current tech is reasonably
| energy efficient, I can barely feel any heat coming out the
| back of a 144hz 27" display, let alone through the screen.
| egeozcan wrote:
| I have some older LCDs at home, and a newish Samsung 49
| inch (heat comes heavily from the front of the panel on
| this one!), also an LG 4k TV. All get hot. Could also be
| that I'm just unlucky.
| jazzyjackson wrote:
| > MAX 3 is a device with the HDMI monitor function. The device
| has an HDMI input that allows to accept the output signal from
| any external video source (desktop PC, laptop, tablet).
|
| https://onyxboox.com/boox_max3
| nazrulmum10 wrote:
| Figure 1. Nanostructure and device design
| ChuckMcM wrote:
| Good news we can make much better color e-paper! Bad news, your
| epaper is made out of platinum and gold.
|
| Looking through the paper it looks like an excellent advancement
| in terms of multi-color reflective paper displays. My hope is
| that the authors can continue the work to perhaps uncover some
| more economical mirror substrates and node combinations that give
| good results while not being precious metals.
| nik_bhintade wrote:
| e-paper tablet is actually cool.
| robochat wrote:
| At one point, maybe 10 or 12 years ago, there was lots of buzz
| about electrowetting displays that were meant to able to display
| video. I think that Phillips were working on it. Then I never
| heard of them again.
|
| On the other hand, it's possible to buy oled televisions now so
| sometimes new technologies do make it to market.
|
| This one sounds interesting although using both gold and platinum
| sounds expensive.
| T-A wrote:
| > based on tungsten trioxide, gold, and a thin platinum mirror
|
| Gold is currently 58 USD/gram, platinum 36 USD/gram. How much
| would be needed for a display?
| jcims wrote:
| These are thin films and the material cost is going to be
| relatively low. From the paper:
|
| >We found that platinum was ideal as broadband back-reflector,
| while 20 nm gold was still ideal color-wise for the
| semitransparent nanohole layer.
|
| A one square meter sheet that's 20nm thick would require about
| .02 cubic centimeters of material to cover. For gold that's
| ~.4g or $23 worth at the price you've listed.
| DrAwdeOccarim wrote:
| (Immediately checks for author affiliation to eInk or some
| bullshit mid-tier American university with an "up and coming"
| tech transfer office) Awesome, maybe this will actually come to
| market with a reasonable license fee!
| robinsoh wrote:
| > (Immediately checks for author affiliation to eInk or some
| bullshit mid-tier American university with an "up and coming"
| tech transfer office) Awesome, maybe this will actually come to
| market with a reasonable license fee!
|
| Uhm... I just want to say that I work in the display industry
| and have never heard comments like yours from my peers, or
| during conferences. Is there some unreasonable license fee
| going on that those of us who actually work in the display
| industry aren't aware of? The main place I've seen this refrain
| is repeatedly on HN including a HN comment that got cited by
| Boing Boing and blogs and then subsequent HN comments that
| cited those blogs and Boing Boing as their refrence. 1 Infinite
| Loop! Please have a look at my comment history as I keep asking
| about which patent or Eink misbehavior people are talking
| about. I'm still trying to figure out if the issue is real or
| some kind of Dunning Kruger effect from software people
| frustrated about the "slow" progress in displays. This would be
| the equivalent of a bunch of my display industry people coming
| on our display industry forums claiming that Google is blocking
| search engine progress, refusing to license search engine
| technology, and blocking technology from progressing and then
| justifying that claim by then giving you a set of Google
| patents and then shouting, see there's the clear proof that
| Google is a bad actor. I hope the analogy is clear and that it
| is also clear why I remain unconvinced about both!
| benrbray wrote:
| I don't have a horse in this race, but I have often heard in
| these threads the rumor that the reason the Remarkable E-Ink
| tablet cannot be fully open-source is due to restrictive
| licenses for the E-ink technology they use. Basically people
| are upset (understandably) that they're holding this amazing
| technology in their hands but are not free to use it to its
| full potential, as the actual Remarkable software is pretty
| limited, despite running on Linux. I don't have any idea of
| whether this is really true or not, but at least it's a
| falsifiable claim that might help you or someone
| knowledgeable pin down the origin :)
| robinsoh wrote:
| > but I have often heard in these threads the rumor that
| the reason the Remarkable E-Ink tablet cannot be fully
| open-source is due to restrictive licenses for the E-ink
| technology they use.
|
| isn't the founder of Remarkable an HN user? I am interested
| to knoww for sure if this is a fact. Is EInk is violating
| on infringing upon the GPL?
|
| > Basically people are upset (understandably) that they're
| holding this amazing technology in their hands but are not
| free to use it to its full potential,
|
| I think my understanding of the technology and its
| potential is different than what marketing people may be
| saying. Let me paste what I wrote before about it.
|
| "
|
| I work in the display industry. My take is neither will
| happen. Lets start with B.
|
| > B) Color e-ink displays get good enough for interactive
| use, movie watching, etc.
|
| There is no commercially sold genuine color e-ink today.
| Kaleido is a grayscale e-ink with a color filter laminated
| on top. Kaleido Plus is just the same with a light guide.
|
| E Ink did show off a genuine color display back in 2018
| called Advanced Color and marketed as "Gallery". But it
| would take 30s to display an image and it was 32 colors or
| 16 colors. Not 16-bit color. I mean only 16 colors. E Ink
| tried to get the industry to buy in and start making
| products using this technology but nobody really signed on.
| They revamped their production to then start producing 7
| color panels in much smaller sizes like 5" for signage. I
| heard that hasn't hit the numbers they needed to even cover
| their RnD costs. I doubt it will be a commercial success.
|
| When you say "good enough for movie watching", I'll say
| that'll never ever happen with electrophoresis. You can't
| violate physics. Either a pigment particle moves slowly and
| stably or it moves fast and is unstable. You'll never be
| able to get both. That's why newer technologies by various
| startups like ClearInk sacrifice the bi-stability in order
| to get fast video speeds. But look at the market response,
| the market isn't exactly embracing that either. Venture
| capitalists aren't exactly eager to fund the billions
| needed to create new display tech when they could invest in
| some new internet services startup or AI/ML startup
| instead.
|
| As for A), these are all emissive technologies. They will
| by their physics always be distinguishable from paper. As
| to whether you'll care or not, that is something I can't
| predict.
|
| "
| baybal2 wrote:
| > When you say "good enough for movie watching", I'll say
| that'll never ever happen with electrophoresis. You can't
| violate physics. Either a pigment particle moves slowly
| and stably or it moves fast and is unstable
|
| Do you remember mirasol display? You don't necessarily
| need pigments to produce colours.
| robinsoh wrote:
| > > When you say "good enough for movie watching", I'll
| say that'll never ever happen with electrophoresis. You
| can't violate physics. Either a pigment particle moves
| slowly and stably or it moves fast and is unstable
|
| > Do you remember mirasol display? You don't necessarily
| need pigments to produce colours.
|
| I hope you can see the main part where I specifically
| stated we are talking about electrophoresis only. If you
| want to start including interferometry then that's a
| different topic. There's sadly, good reasons why Qualcomm
| killed Mirasol. But that's another story for another day.
| faeyanpiraat wrote:
| Is it just a long story or you have an NDA?
| bbarnett wrote:
| Found the eink employee.
|
| _Kidding!_ You do make some interesting points re: licensing
| and patents and such.
|
| I think the complaint I hear leveled, is that there is a
| patent, and it is licensed, but at exhobrinant cost.
|
| Thus, eink is "too expensive" for true derivative innovation,
| and even widespread sale.
|
| You might do better to speak to that accusation directly.
|
| In high school economics, we learned of min/max pricing
| theory.
|
| If you price your widgets at 100 dollars profit per unit,
| you'll sell 10 of them a year. If you price them at 1 buck
| per, you'll sell 1000.
|
| But... you'll have additional support costs, returns, other
| ancillary costs when selling 1000 units compared to 10. So at
| the 1 profit price point, you need additional staff, larger
| facilities, more manufacturing capability, etc.
|
| Sometimes, licensing is like this. Fewer units sold, but
| better profit.
|
| Maybe the eink lads believe the tech can never scale beyond
| niche, won't take off, so are just milking the market at the
| highest licensing fees they can get?
|
| Maybe even raw licensing, without per unit sale fees? Thus,
| higher up front costs, as no confidence i sales numbers? Plus
| no internal audit costs with licensing, sales, compliance?
|
| Just thoughts on why the high licensing costs, may be true.
| robinsoh wrote:
| > You might do better to speak to that accusation directly.
|
| That's the thing. I'm trying to figure out exactly what the
| accusation is. So far, every time I've challenged comments
| made about this, people have been vague and unwilling to
| state anything verifiable. To be frank, I don't even think
| any of the people making those comments are actually
| display people.
|
| > Maybe the eink lads believe the tech can never scale
| beyond niche, won't take off, so are just milking the
| market at the highest licensing fees they can get?
|
| I don't even know what the meaning of "eink licenses their
| technology" would mean. That's way too vague. It would be
| the equivalent of saying "Samsung Displays licenses their
| technology". All I know is that Eink sells electrophoretic
| FPL and then their various partners produce things using
| that FPL. You can buy miles of their FPL if you want for
| dollars per yard or something like that. You can drive it
| using your own tech, laminate whatever backplane you want
| to it. What I know for sure is the high volume displays
| like the ones that go into Kindles are cheap, and
| everything else is like 10x more expensive simply because
| they're so low volume they might as well be hand assembled.
| derefr wrote:
| The explicit accusation, AFAICT, is that eInk holds
| certain patent(s) which cannot be avoided if you want to
| produce an electrophoretic-technology display panel
| yourself; and so people believe eInk are, through these
| patents, "strangling the market for innovation."
|
| They believe that, without those patents (or if those
| patents were instead in the public domain), companies
| that produce traditional display panels (like yours!)
| would be competitively iterating on electrophoretic
| display-panel technology in the process of manufacturing
| their own to sell into the market (either vertically-
| integrated, or as panel wholesalers), the same way they
| competitively iterate on LCD and LED-based display panel
| technologies; and that this would _presumably_ produce
| market efficiencies that aren't currently there.
|
| There could also be vertically-integrated niche
| panel+display companies focusing on niche use-cases,
| targeting a given vertical and doing "market education"
| for that vertical, creating demand for e.g.
| electrophoretic billboards, that isn't currently there,
| "inventing the market" for themselves where each of these
| niches can eventually be a high-volume product of its
| own.
|
| And that would in turn drive additional innovation, as
| each of these companies would have a healthy margin to
| plow back into R&D.
|
| I think the intuitional belief behind this is that the
| blocking factor from this virtuous cycle beginning, is
| the fact that the entrepreneurs considering starting
| these niche companies, and the display bigcorps
| considering getting into this space, both consider that
| -- _when per-device patent licensing costs are included_
| -- the market is too low-margin to bother entering, even
| to chase a greenfield vertical. It only becomes "worth
| it" without the licensing fees.
|
| People's intuition for this probably leans on analogies
| like the market for CPU innovation heating up again now
| that Apple has got away from relying on Intel and is
| producing their own CPUs. People would intuit that if
| display manufacturers could "get away from eInk" and
| "produce their own electrophoretic panels", the "low
| energy use, readable-in-daylight panel" market would
| "heat up."
| robinsoh wrote:
| > The explicit accusation, AFAICT, is that eInk holds
| certain patent(s) which cannot be avoided if you want to
| produce an electrophoretic-technology display panel
| yourself
|
| They don't hold such a patent, at least as far as I know.
| Which is presumably how their competitors like ClearInk,
| Reinkstone are able to be in business.
|
| > so people believe eInk are, through these patents,
| "strangling the market for innovation."
|
| I don't understand why someone would believe that,
| especially people who aren't involved in the industry. As
| I mentioned, it would be the equivalent of me believing
| that Google was strangling the market of innovation in
| search engines and that Microsoft is strangling the
| market for innovation in operating systems. Although now
| that I think deeper about the line about Microsoft, maybe
| Microsoft is doing that? Is that why desktop Linux has
| not progressed at all and remains unusable?
|
| > People would intuit that if display manufacturers could
| "get away from eInk" and "produce their own
| electrophoretic panels", the "low energy use, readable-
| in-daylight panel" market would "heat up."
|
| Eink is considered a niche player in my industry. It
| would be the equivalent of perhaps a ultralowpower CPU
| manufacturer in the CPU industry. In my opinion, the "low
| energy use, readable-in-daylight panel" is not going to
| happen using electrophoretics because the physics of the
| problem is too challenging. In my opinion, the main
| reason why nothing is really happening there is because
| doing fundamental research on display technologies is
| expensive. Bezos spent hundreds of millions on Liquavista
| before he killed it, I'm pretty sure Qualcomm spent a lot
| on Mirasol. The problem is VCs don't want to invest in
| hard problems. They can get a quicker return from yet
| another internet service, AI/ML, another airbnb, another
| uber, another payment gateway and so on.
| derefr wrote:
| > They don't hold such a patent, at least as far as I
| know. Which is presumably how their competitors like
| ClearInk, Reinkstone are able to be in business.
|
| They do seem to hold rather a lot of patents
| (https://patents.justia.com/assignee/e-ink-corporation),
| though I don't have the domain knowledge to know whether
| any of these are "unavoidable" in the domain in the way
| that e.g. software engineering process patents tend to
| be.
|
| Perhaps their competitors actually license some of them?
| Or are in a patent pooling arrangement?
|
| > It would be the equivalent of me believing that Google
| was strangling the market of innovation in search engines
|
| I mean, with the PageRank patent, they... sort of were?
|
| Nobody could come up with anything nearly as optimal as
| Google's approach for a long time, let alone more
| optimal; the next-best algorithms were way less good. And
| so we didn't see any _real_ Google Search competitors --
| competitors competing _on index quality_ against Google
| -- after Google came into the market. (There 's _still_
| nobody with a better raw index than Google 's, AFAIK.)
|
| The original PageRank patent expired in 2015. A lot of
| advancement in the search space happened in 2015! Bing
| got a lot better, for one. Guess why? :)
|
| (Of course, companies that were somewhat immune to
| America's WIPO power -- e.g. the government-backed
| conglomerates of China/Russia -- have just been using
| PageRank or algorithms analogous to it in their web
| search services since the beginning. It was only the, er,
| NATO-member-country web-search-engine market that
| effectively stalled out.)
| daniel_reetz wrote:
| As a fellow display engineer, thank you.
| Jubed wrote:
| Thanks for sharing us
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