Via PC World, researchers at HP and Oregon State have developed materials that could be used to create transparent transistors, allowing them to be embedded in what would essentially be “smart glass”.
So why make transparent transistors? According to researchers, the potential consumer applications are abundant. Possibilities include glass used as an electronic device to display information on storefronts or car windshields.
Wager also expects to see updates to LCDs, new types of copy machines, and better solar power cells. These types of devices that use glass will become significantly smaller as transparent transistors allow the mechanical support systems to be embedded in the currently unused glass–which Wager says is currently “wasted real estate.”
For more outlandish applications, Wager recalls movie technology. Think of Tom Cruise’s Minority Report, or a lesser-known sci-fi movie from 2000 called Red Planet.
“This guy hops out of his spaceship, he pulls out what looks like a pen, unfolds an electronic transparent see-through map. The map is figuring out the terrain behind him and is identifying for him everything he sees in the terrain,” says Wager.