Graphene has been garnering a lot of headlines these days and it’s no surprise. The 2D wonder material has displayed a staggering array of valuable properties, including electrical conductivity, the ability to act as a supercapacitor and being bulletproof. While those properties have set graphene apart from other materials, its latest trick, the ability to transform into a transparent LED, has electronics manufacturers beaming.
According to researchers the graphene-based LED was constructed by amalgamating a number of different 2D crystals in stacked layers. With these hetero-structures compressed into a sheet between 10-40 atoms thick, quantum wells formed making it possible for electrons to be controlled and directed by an input source.
“As our new type of LED’s only consist of a few atomic layers of 2D materials they are flexible and transparent,” said Freddie Withers, Royal Academy of Engineering Research Fellow. “We envisage a new generation of optoelectronic devices to stem from this work, from simple transparent lighting and lasers to more complex applications.”
Sir Kostya Novoselov added, “By preparing the heterostructures on elastic and transparent substrates, we show that they can provide the basis for flexible and semi-transparent electronics. The range of functionalities for the demonstrated heterostructures is expected to grow further on increasing the number of available 2D crystals and improving their electronic quality.”
Although graphene-based LEDs are still in their infancy researchers already see the potential for their wondrous displays. In fact, graphene LEDs are already displaying quantum efficiency rates that match organic LEDs. That property alone could be a game-changer for device manufacturers as the seemingly endless war for longer battery life rages on.
Source: The University of Manchester