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SMT007-May2020

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60 SMT007 MAGAZINE I MAY 2020 and South Korea. The main growth drivers for indium demand come from larger screen sizes, television shipments, small moves to organic light-emitting diodes (OLED), growth in quantum dots, and the developed world deployment of 5G. The caveat is, as the price of indium increases, so do the R&D efforts by display companies to use thinner coatings or alternatives. ITO alternatives have been met with lim- ited adoption in the display industry. Alter- native transparent conductors—such as sil- ver nanowires, carbon nanotubes, graphene, and metal mesh grids—will eventually find their niche application, but it won't be in the non-touch display back panel anytime soon. None of these alternatives are a drop-in replace- ment for the entrenched and established ITO infrastructure and 30-year processing "know- how" of ITO. Closed-loop ITO target recycling promotes responsible use of indium and further extends value and efficiencies to our display custom- ers, making it hard for these alternative tech- nologies to find a competitive entry point. While Indium Corporation closely monitors alternative transparent conductor technol- ogies, near-term opportunities are limited. Indium Corporation has an indium recy- cling facility in South Korea that supports the closed-loop system. The supply chain for indium is strong and able to meet demand. The supply can also expand to meet increased or new demand given total proven reserves equal to 50,000 MT, equivalent to 50–100 years of consump- tion. Additionally, the indium supply in zinc and copper concentrates is plentiful. Extrac- tion and refining can be expanded to meet the demand for emerging technologies. SMT007 For decades, researchers have envisioned a world where digital user interfaces are seamlessly integrated with the physical environment until the two are virtually indistinguishable from one another. Recently, a group of researchers from MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) came up with SprayableTech—a system that allows users to create room-sized interactive surfaces with sen- sors and displays. The system, which uses airbrushing of functional inks and enables various displays, like interac- tive sofas with embedded sensors to control your televi- sion and sensors for adjusting lighting and temperature through your walls. SprayableTech lets users channel their inner Picas- sos: After designing your interactive artwork in the 3D editor, it automatically generates stencils for airbrush- ing the layout onto a surface. Once they've created the stencils from cardboard, a user can then add sensors to the desired surface—whether it's a sofa, a wall, or even a building—to control various appliances like your lamp or television. "Since SprayableTech is so flexible in its application, you can imagine using this type of system beyond walls and surfaces to power larger-scale entities like interac- tive smart cities and interactive architecture in public places," says Michael Wessely, a postdoc in CSAIL and lead author on a new paper about SprayableTech. "We view this as a tool that will allow humans to interact with and use their environment in newfound ways." By using the airbrush technology, they're no longer lim- ited to the size of the printer, the area of the screen-print- ing net, or the size of the hydrographic bath, and there are thousands of possible design options. (Source: MIT) Sprayable User Interfaces

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