For wireless devices such as cell phones, it has been fairly recently since physical keyboards have been replaced by on-screen touch sensors which later inspired large-screen displays on portable devices. The future of smartphones has pointed to characteristics that are ergonomically, aesthetically, and technically advanced. Now, for the very first time, an innovative 5G smartphone with optically invisible antennas embedded in super-resolution displays will be introduced to the market—essentially the world’s first 'Antenna-on-Display (AoD)' technology.
Professor Wonbin Hong of POSTECH who led the research explained, "this is the first step of our collaborative research. Similar to how on-screen touch sensors redefined wireless devices, the Antenna-on-Display has the potential to trigger various possibilities for 5G and beyond. We expect it will contribute not only to creating innovative 5G smartphone concepts but serving as an enabling technology for many ideas beyond our imagination"
The antenna is one of the most critical differentiators among multiple wireless components that enable a technology jump. Furthermore, a 5G network that relies on millimeter-wave frequencies is expected to be at least 20 times faster than the speed of 4G LTE. A 5G wireless device requires dozens of antenna in contrast to single-digit number of antennas in the 4G era. But, the lack of space to place the 5G antennas within cellular devices has been a challenge in the mobile industry. However, using conventional antenna technology to support the number of antennas in 5G leads to an undesired trade-off situation which has slowed off the worldwide deployment of 5G cellular devices.
However, what is unique about the Antenna-on-Display (AoD) is it’s fundamentally different from the conventional antenna for cellular devices. AoD enables an antenna that is de-signed using nano-scale fabrication technology to make the human eye see an invisible antenna. into thinking that the antenna is invisible. Such technology, can allow the high definition displays such as OLED and LCD for massive number of 5G antennas.
The AoD technological study has been published in IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation—a leading journal in the field of electronics and electric engineering.
Source: Science Daily
