Future HDTV can roll up like window shade

Japanese engineers have developed a future plasma TV that can roll up like a window shade.

Japanese engineers have developed a future plasma TV that can roll up like a window shade.

Japan's Shinoda Plasma Co. demonstrated the giant, flexible, plasma display at the Display Week 2013 conference in Vancouver, British Columbia, last month, and won an award for 'Best Prototype at Display Week.'

The HDTV is the latest effort to create the flexible gizmos of the future and Shinoda's secret is that the display can only bend in one dimension, Fox News reported.

The company calls its invention a 'Luminous Array Film,' or LAFi , and it's designed in a similar manner.

Instead of being made from one large, flat sheet of glass, the display uses a thousand tiny glass tubes.

Each tube is 1 mm in diameter and a bit more than 3 feet long. The panel can be rolled into a cylinder less than 4 inches across.

The flexible displays will help the consumers to save space when the TV is not in use.