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Video: Interactive printed electronics
Electrical circuits made by printed ink are helping to create a new generation of 鈥渋ntelligent鈥� greeting cards and books and other interactive paper-based products.
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A graphic designer first creates an ordinary image of, say, a birthday cake with candles. Then an electronics engineer uses graphics software to superimpose a circuit on the image, following the lines of the original design. When this isn鈥檛 possible, the engineer makes small changes to the original image.
鈥淚t鈥檚 almost the opposite way you鈥檇 normally design a circuit,鈥� says Kate Stone, founder of , a printing firm based in Cambridge, UK, which is pioneering the technique.
A small electronic widget, around the size of a postage stamp, is placed beneath the image. It鈥檚 in here that the conventional transistors to control the circuit are held, together with the battery.
Make a e-wish
The conductive ink can also create touch-sensitive components and also link to other devices embedded in the paper, such as microphones and LEDs.
The result is an interactive card of a birthday cake in which the candles light up when somebody triggers a touch-sensitive switch by picking up the card. The lights go out again when a microphone senses the user blowing on the card.
Cards are just the beginning, however. Stone is also designing interactive books and games, and hopes to extend the technology to other areas such as advertising.
