Soon, colour e-readers for richer reading experience

Washington, July 15 (ANI): E-readers may soon have colour displays, thanks to new advances in display technology.

This development is among the topics highlighted in a three-part cover story on electronic materials in the current issue of Chemical and Engineering News (C and EN), ACS' weekly newsmagazine.

C and EN Senior Editor Alex Tullo notes that sales of e-readers, such as Amazon's Kindle and Sony's Reader, are on the rise.

Manufacturers sold a million e-readers in 2008 and 5 million units last year. The figure could reach more than 20 million strong by 2013, according to one market analyst cited in the article.

But so far the e-readers only have black and white displays. Colour displays could open up new markets, such as those for textbooks and magazines, and help them compete with multifunction devices like Apple's iPad, the article notes.

However, colourizing e-readers has been a difficult challenge. One company is trying to overcome it by using simple colour filters to dress-up the black and white "ink" used in many e-reader displays. Others companies are developing entirely new types of electronic ink, including colour oils and special polymers that mimic gemstone opals. (ANI)