Field addressable rewritable media
AssigneeHewlett-Packard Company
InventorsKent D. Vincent, Xiao-An Zhang, R. Stanley Williams
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An electrochromic molecular colorant and a plurality of uses as an erasably writeable medium. Multitudinous types of substrates, such as paper, are adaptable for receiving a coating of the colorant. Electrical fringe field or through fields are used to transform targeted pixel molecules between a first, high color state and transparent state, providing information content having resolution and viewability at least equal to hard copy document print. The scope of the invention includes both the liquid coating and the combination of coating on substrate.
Claims67
A colorant for a substrate, the colorant comprising:
- a molecular system, said system including electrochromic, switchable molecules, each of said molecules being selectively switchable between at least two optically distinguishable states,
- wherein each of said molecules exhibit local electric field induced band gap changes via a molecular conformation change or an isomerization,
- wherein each of said molecules include at least one stator portion and at least one rotor portion, wherein said rotor rotates from a first state to a second state with an applied electric field, wherein in said first state, there is extended conjugation throughout said molecular system, resulting in a relatively smaller band gap, and wherein in said second state, said extended conjugation is destroyed, resulting in a relatively larger band gap, and
- wherein said system is distributable on the substrate thereby forming an erasably writable surface.
A colorant for a substrate, the colorant comprising:
- a molecular system, said system including electrochromic, switchable molecules, each of said molecules being selectively switchable between at least two optically distinguishable states,
- wherein each of said molecules exhibit local electric field induced band gap changes via a molecular conformation change or an isomerization, and dependent upon direction of electrical field applied, in a first of said states said molecules are in a more conjugated state having a relatively smaller band gap, and in a second of said states said colorant molecules are in a less conjugated state, having a relatively larger band gap, and
- wherein said system is distributable on the substrate thereby forming an erasably writable surface.
A colorant for a substrate, the colorant comprising:
- a molecular system, said system including electrochromic, switchable molecules, each of said molecules being selectively switchable between at least two optically distinguishable states,
- wherein each of said molecules exhibit local electric field induced band gap changes via a change of extended conjugation via chemical bonding change to change the band gap, including via charge separation or recombination accompanied by increasing or decreasing band localization, and
- wherein said system is distributable on the substrate thereby forming an erasably writable surface.
A colorant for a substrate, the colorant comprising:
- a molecular system, said system including electrochromic, switchable molecules, each of said molecules being selectively switchable between at least two optically distinguishable states,
- wherein each of said molecules exhibit local electric field induced band gap changes via a change of extended conjugation via chemical bonding change to change the band gap, including via a change of extended conjugation via charge separation or recombination and π-bond breaking or formation, and
- wherein said system is distributable on the substrate thereby forming an erasably writable surface.
A colorant for a substrate, the colorant comprising:
- a molecular system, said system including electrochromic, switchable molecules, each of said molecules being selectively switchable between at least two optically distinguishable states,
- wherein each of said molecules exhibit local electric field induced band gap changes via molecular folding or stretching,
- wherein each of said molecules has three portions, a first portion and a third portion, each bonded to a second, central portion, wherein a change from a first state to a second state occurs with an applied electric field, said change involving a folding or stretching about of said second portion, wherein in said first state there is extended conjugation, resulting in a relatively smaller band gap state, and wherein in said second state, said extended conjugation is destroyed, resulting in a relatively larger band gap, and
- wherein said system is distributable on the substrate thereby forming an erasably writable surface.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.