Wall of lights

The new OLEDs can keep your home in the Diwali mode around the year.

Soon you could plaster your walls and ceilings with light-emitting paper - thanks to a new super material that can be produced from liquid solutions. The new material is helping researchers design a new type of low cost and fully recyclable lighting component.

They are developing an alternative to ultra-thin, power-saving organic light diodes (OLEDs), recently introduced in cell phones, cameras, and super-thin TVs. The alternative is an organic light-emitting electrochemical cell (LEC), which is much cheaper to produce, with the transparent electrode being made of graphene, a carbon material.

What's it all about?

An OLED comprises light-generating layer of plastic placed between two electrodes, one of which must be transparent.

"This is a major step forward in the development of organic lighting components, from both a technological and an environmental perspective," says Nathaniel Robinson, researcher from Linkping University.

"This kind of illumination or display can be rolled up or can be applied as wallpaper or on ceilings," adds Edman. Since all the LEC parts can be produced from liquid solutions, it will also be possible to make LECs in a roll-to-roll process on, for example, a printing press in a highly cost-effective way.