Tattoos are usually considered a form of personal expression, but a team of researchers in Europe they created the world’s first light-emitting tattoo based on OLED screen technology, which, in addition to being supposedly a bit cool, can also serve as a visible warning about possible health problems.
Tattoos are used by people to show them dedication to an MP3 player that has long since become extinct or to let everyone know how much they love their mothers. BThere is also a precedent for tattooing as a medical aid. Cancer patients undergoing radiation therapy are tattooed with small dots that are used as reference marks to precisely target the machines used during repetition sessions..
The idea of personally complementing one’s skin with glowing arts is also not new, but it used to be biohackers implanting technologies like LEDs under the skin, and the results did not have much practical use except to attract attention or ask questions about why someone would do it to themselves. This new approach to light-emitting tattoos is easier to apply, more practical and temporary – without the need for surgery to remove them.
In a recent publication in the journal Advanced Electronic Materials, ‘Ultra-thin, ultra-conformable and free-standing tattooed organic light emitting diodes, ” scientists of the University College London in the UK and the Italian Institute of Technology discuss how their new approach to tattoos depends on the same organic LED technology found in devices such as more recent iPhones, as well as the recent harvest of mobile devices with folding screens. The flexibility of an OLED screen is important for this application, as the human skin is as flexible and bends and folds as the body moves.
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The actual electronics of the light-emitting tattoos, made of an extremely thin layer of an electroluminescent polymer that glows when a charge is applied, measure only 2.3 micrometers thick, which according to the researchers is about one third of the diameter of a red blood cell. The polymer layer then becomes between a few electrodes and sit on top of an insulating layer, which is bound to temporary tattoo paper by a printing process that is not excessively expensive. The tattoos can be easily applied to surfaces with the same wet transfer process as temporary tattoos designed for children, and can be easily washed off when no longer needed or with soap and water.
With a current applied, the OLED tattoos in their current form glow only green, but can eventually produce any color with the same RGB approach that OLED screens use. Although the researchers acknowledge that the potential for glowing tattoos is there, and take the art in a new direction, they also see even more potential for them as a medical tool. When combined with other wearable technologies, the light-emitting tattoos can start flashing when an athlete needs to rehydrate, or change color when applied to food, giving clear warnings when the expiration dates are over.
But do not walk into your local tattoo parlor and claim another of the new, glowing tattoos. The researchers have so far successfully applied it to surfaces such as glass, plastic bottles, paper and even oranges, but human skin is a bigger challenge, given how many people are constantly moving around. The OLED polymers can also break down quickly if exposed to air, which requires additional layers to properly envelop and protect them, and there is an even bigger problem finding a way to charge them with small batteries or supercapacitors to power as they are so far in the lab I am connected to an external power source and it is doubtful if anyone wants to connect a USB power cable to the ink on their arms.