本文摘要：As the market for smart glasses heats up, Google faces the difficult challenge of displaying top-quality visual images on a screen the size of a fingerprint.随着智能眼镜市场逐步加剧，谷歌公司（Google）开始面对一个棘手难题——如何在指纹大小的屏幕上表明高品质的图像。

As the market for smart glasses heats up, Google faces the difficult challenge of displaying top-quality visual images on a screen the size of a fingerprint.随着智能眼镜市场逐步加剧，谷歌公司（Google）开始面对一个棘手难题——如何在指纹大小的屏幕上表明高品质的图像。Now researchers led by scientists at the University of Oxford in the UK believe they may have made a discovery that solves that problem.现在，由英国牛津大学（University of Oxford）科学家领头的研究者们坚信，他们早已寻找了解决问题这个问题的办法。Writing in the journal Nature Thursday, Harish Bhaskaran, Peiman Hosseini and C. David Wright say they have found a way to create pixels just a few hundred nanometers across that could one day lead to high-resolution, low-energy and flexible displays. They could be used in smart glasses as well as synthetic retinas, smart contact lenses and foldable screens.上周四《大自然》杂志（Nature）公开发表了一篇论文。

哈利什o巴斯卡仁、培曼o侯赛尼和C.大卫o赖特在文中称之为，他们早已寻找一种方法，可以生产出有只有几百纳米的单个像素点，今后就能生产高分辨率、低能耗且可拆卸的显示器。这种显示器可以用作生产智能眼镜、人工视网膜、智能隐形眼镜和可拆卸屏幕。

“Current microdisplay technologies based on liquid crystals, microelectromechanical systems and organic light-emitting diodes are attracting considerable attention because of a growing interest in wearable technology,” the authors wrote in the paper published Thursday.作者在这篇论文中称之为：“由于市场对可穿着技术的兴趣日益浓烈，目前基于液晶、微机电机械系统和有机发光二极管的微表明技术于是以倍受注目。”“Key requirements for such applications are high resolutions, high speed and low power consumption, all of which are met by the technology described here.”“这类应用于的关键拒绝是高分辨率、高速度和低能耗，这些都能通过本文阐释的技术取得解决问题。”Essentially, the researchers have come up with a novel use for phase-change materials, which has been around for decades. They have long been used to store data, especially on rewriteable CDs and DVDs. But until now no one had figured out how to tap into their display potential.实质上，这些研究者所研发的是对热力学材料的全新运用方法。这种材料问世几十年了，长期以来仍然用作存储数据，主要用作生产可擦写CD和DVD。

不过迄今为止还没有人想到如何研发这种材料潜在的表明性能。Bhaskaran said he was initially attracted to the material because it was active both optically and electronically. But it wasn’t until he and his colleagues started working with it in the lab that they realized that its optical properties far outperformed what is available on the market today — a resolution that is 50 times better.巴斯卡仁称，最初之所以被这种材料更有是因为，它的光电特性都很活跃。而直到他和同事开始在实验室对它积极开展研究时才找到，它的光学性能远超过如今市场上的各种材料——分辨率要低50倍。

“The first thing we demonstrated is you can actually get extremely high resolution pixels,” Bhaskaran said. “In our case, the smallest pixels we’ve shown are 100 nanometers or less. Each of those images are 70 microns across, which is roughly the diameter of a human hair.”巴斯卡仁说道：“我们首先找到，能取得超高的分辨率像素点。在我们的研究中，大于的像素点只有100纳米，甚至更加小。

这样，每幅图像就只有70微米长，大约相等于头发丝的直径。”The researchers have filed a patent on their product and are in discussions with an unnamed firm that specializes liquid crystal display applications, Bhaskaran said. They also have received a grant of $240,000 to develop a prototype from Isis Innovation, which helps Oxford researchers commercialize their discoveries.巴斯卡仁称，他们已为自己的产品申请人了专利，正在与一家专业生产液晶显示设备、不便透漏名字的公司接洽合作。他们还从Isis Innovation（牛津大学的技术商业化公司——学术著作）取得了24万美元用作研发原型产品。

后者致力于协助牛津大学的科研人员将研究成果商业化。Richard Holliday, a technology transfer team leader at Isis, said that the discovery could lead to very “disruptive display technology” if the researchers can find the right use for it. One area worth exploring, he said, is virtual reality gaming.Isis公司的技术移往团队主管理查德o霍利迪回应，如果这些研究人员能为自己的产品寻找适合的用途，这项找到将促成十分“具备颠覆性的表明技术”。其中一个很有一点探寻的领域就是虚拟现实游戏。“The display market is huge. It’s predicted to be $165 billion in 2017,” Holliday said. “At the moment, we are looking at which segments of that market would benefit most from the unique characteristics this technology has got. One of the most exciting is projection-based displays where you project a small display up into a larger area. Therefore, you need high resolution otherwise you end up with a highly pixilated-type display.”他说道：“表明市场规模极大。

据估计，到2017年这个市场的规模将约1650亿美元。目前，我们正在研究其中哪个细分市场能仅次于程度地从这项技术的特性中受益。

最激动人心的一个领域就是投影类表明设备，这种设备可将尺寸较小的画面感应到更大面积的区域上。因此，必需要有极高的分辨率才讫，否则只不会获得相当严重失知道投影图像。”Along with its high resolution, Hosseini said another attractive aspect of the technology is that uses much less energy.除了高分辨率之外，侯赛尼回应这项技术另一个极具吸引力的特性就是能耗极低。“One of the advantages of our design is that, unlike most conventional LCD screens, there would be no need to constantly refresh all pixels,” he said. You would only have to refresh those pixels that actually change (static pixels remain as they were). This means that any display based on this technology would have extremely low energy consumption.”他说道：“我们这个设计方案的一个优势在于，和大多数传统液晶屏幕有所不同，它不必须大大创下所有像素点。

只必须创下那些显然发生变化（惯性像素则保有原貌）的像素就可以了。它意味著，基于这一技术的所有显示器的能耗都会极低。”When asked about the new technology’s commercial merits, Google GOOG -0.86% said they had “nothing to add here.”当被问到这项新技术的商业优势时，谷歌公司回应“没什么可补足的”。

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