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Polymer Dispersed Liquid Crystal (PDLC) for Paper-Like Display Application

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 Polymer Dispersed Liquid Crystal (PDLC) for
Paper-Like Display Application

A. Masutani, N. Hollfelder, F. Pleis, T. Roberts, P. Kilickiran, A. Sakaigawa*, A.

Yasuda and G. Nelles
Sony Deutschland GmbH, Materials Science Laboratory, Hedelfinger Str. 61, 70327 Stuttgart, Germany
* Sony Corporation, Atsugi Tec. 4-14-1 Asahi-cho, Atsugi-shi, Kanagawa, 243-0014, Japan

ABSTRACT 2. METHODS OF PDLC PREPARATION

Dichroic polymer dispersed liquid crystal
(D-PDLC) offer a promising technology for future
paper-like display. They posses high brightness,
because polarizers are not required. This paper
summarizes our unique D-PDLC fabrication
method. It first creates a matrix template embed-
ded with nano/microparticles which is then back-
filled/infiltrated with dye doped liquid crystal.
1. INTRODUCTION
A polymer dispersed liquid crystal (PDLC) cell is
composed of a polymer matrix within which small
droplets of a liquid crystal (LC) are dispersed [1,2].
In the schematic diagram Fig. 1, the white rods
represent the LC molecules, while the black rods
represent the dichroic dyes. By doping PDLC with
dichroic dyes, the films exhibit an absorbing
off-state (Fig. 1a) and a transparent on-state (Fig.
1b). Such films, known as dichroic PDLC
(D-PDLC) [3-6], have the potential to outperform
conventional reflective-type twisted nematic (TN)
LC displays since they have no polarizers, leading
to increased reflectivity and viewing angle [7].
This paper describes our developments to real-
ize D-PDLC displays with a white, paper-like ap-
pearance.
(a)
V and it is cured by UV light of wavelength between
(b)
V first LC is washed out with a solvent and replaced
This section describes and compares the PDLC
preparation techniques we developed, which
started with a split method and further improved to
a lift-off method.
2.1 Split Method
One of the most common ways to prepare
PDLCs is via the photo-induced phase separation
(PIPS) method [3, 4]. In this method, irradiating UV
light to a mixture of LC, dye and pre-polymer in-
duces a phase separation. The result is the forma-
tion of LC and dye droplets in a polymer matrix.
However, such conventional D-PDLCs suffer from
low contrast ratio and low on-state reflectivity, be-
cause of (1) degradation of dye/LC during fabrica-
tion, (2) dye interfering with the curing process, (3)
trapping of dye/LC in the polymer matrix – thus
making the dye/LC unresponsive to the electric
field [5-10].
In our earlier investigations [8], we developed a
simple processing method to overcome the above
mentioned problems associated with PIPS method.
The method, which we call the “Split” method (Fig.
2), is similar to a permeation technique, in which a
prefabricated matrix or template is infil-
trated/backfilled with a liquid crystal [10,11].
The main materials we used were TL213 LC
(Merck) and PN393 UV-curable polymer (FFL
Funktionsfluid). TL213 is a nematic LC mixture de-
signed to suit the requirements of active matrix
displays. PN393 is a blend of alkyl acrylates [13],
350-360 nm.
The split technique is as follows: firstly a pure
PDLC cell with LC without dye is made – this de-
fines the morphology of the film in the devices;
secondly, the substrates are split apart; thirdly, the
Front Sub. Front Sub. Front Sub.

Fig. 1 Dichroic PDLC in the (a) off-state TFT TFT TFT

and (b) on-state
Fig.2 Schematic of split PDLC fabrication
 100
90 1) TL213
80 2) TL203
Transmittance [%]
70 3) TL205
60 4) TL216
50
40
30
20
10
0 The performance of D-PDLC display can be im-
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Applied AC Voltage [V]
Fig 3. Comparison of PDLCs refilled with
various LCs.
with a dye-doped LC; finally, the display is reas-
sembled and heated to obtain a scattering PDLC.
The uniqueness of the split method is that the
LC used for the refilling does not necessarily need
to be same as the initial LC used for the phase
separation; one can use a LC (or any other mate-
rial) suitable for a phase separation to make a de-
sirable polymer matrix template, then backfill the
porous template with a LC that possess suitable
electro-optical property for a desirable application.
Fig 3 shows the transmittance-voltage curves of
PDLC cells refilled with various LCs (TL203, TL205,
TL213 & TL216) for active-matrix displays avail-
able from Merck. The transmittance was measured
using a UV/VIS spectrometer, and a 1kHz AC
square voltage was applied to drive the test cells.
PDLC refilled with TL213 showed a similar
transmittance-voltage curve to the initial PDLC be-
fore the washing process. This is provided that
methanol was used as a solvent for the washing.
We found many other organic solvents, e.g. THF,
DMF, DMSO, isopropanol, toluene, dichloro-
methane or acetone, resulted in much higher
switching voltage of TL213 refilled PDLC.
Notably, TL203 gave the smallest switching
voltage among the LCs. This is because TL203
has larger ∆ε than the other LCs tested; ∆ε of
TL203 is twice that of TL213, and this resulted in
the switching voltage of TL203 refilled PDLC to be
almost half that of TL213 refilled PDLC.
Using the split method, we demonstrated dis-
plays with favorable viewing properties, such as a
reflectivity of 98% and a contrast ratio (CR) of 8 [8].
Despite this high performance, better ways of
fabricating the display were desirable because the
split method was: (1) not homogeneous enough,
(2) not suitable for a mass production, (3) not
compatible with the additional diffuse layer devel-
oped for wide-view TFT [12], and (4) not suitable
for a solvent-sensitive substrate, such as organic
TFTs.
In the next section, we describe how we modi-
fied the split method to overcome above mentioned
issues.
Front Sub. Front Sub. Front Sub.
Lift-off Sub. TFT
Fig. 4 Schematic of lift-off PDLC fabrication
2.2 Lift-off Method
8 9 10
proved further by incorporating a newly developed
lift-off method which uses substrates with special
surface pre-treatment. (Fig. 4) [13]
The front substrate we used was an ITO coated
glass substrate weakly pre-treated with an
ozone-plasma (100W for 10 min) to make the sur-
face hydrophilic. The lift-off substrate was a glass
substrate which has been functionalized with a
fluorinated silane layer to render the surface hy-
drophobic. The silanization was undertaken by
immersing the lift-off substrate in 20µl Heptade-
cafluoro- 1,1,2,2, -tetrahydrodecyl dimethylchloro-
silane in a vacuum desiccator at room temperature
(22°C) for 30 min. The lift-off substrate was al-
lowed to dry in ambient conditions before use.
As in the split method, the solution of
TL213-PN393 was sandwiched between the front
and the lift-off substrates, and cured by the UV.
Then the lift-off substrate was separated slowly
from the PDLC film. Due to the hydrophobic sur-
face treatments, the film only adheres to the hy-
drophilic front substrate. Subsequently, as in the
previous method, the LC in the PDLC film was
washed with methanol, and the dichroic LC was
backfilled in the polymer matrix.
The lift-off method enabled: (1) homogeneous
display as shown in Fig. 5, (2) processes which are
compatible with existing conventional TFT fabrica-
tion process, (3) the use of solvent-sensitive TFTs,
such as the materials used in flexible/organic
TFTs.
3. DIFFUSE LAYER
Another issue we investigated, in order to realize
a paper-like display, was to eliminate the specular
glare caused by the reflective TFT. In order to
maximize the use of surrounding light, a reflective
10µm
(a) (b)
Fig. 5 Optical microscope photos of
(a) lift-off PDLC and (b) split PDLC

12µm
Fig 6. SEM images of S6 nanoparticles on a
gain reflector.
TFT has a diffusing backplane (or gain reflector)
typically made with aluminum or silver. Its diffusion
properties can be controlled modifying the shape,
height and size of the protuberances on such a
backplane, but this requires facilities, time and fi-
nancial investment. To realize a paper-like ap-
pearance, an additional diffusing layer was neces-
sary to suppress the reflector’s metallic glare and
increase its viewing angle. Adding a scattering
layer on top of the diffusing backplane allows con-
trol the diffusion and reduce the specular glare and
enhance lambertian reflectance.
TiO2 nanoparticles were initially used [12] to in-
crease the optical diffusion, but because TiO2
promotes the photo-oxidation of the surrounding
medium, a more stable diffuse layer was made
using melamine-formaldehyde nano/microparticles
because of their chemical/physical stability and a
relatively high refractive index (n=1.66). The diffuse
layer was fabricated as follows: 5.0 wt% mela-
mine-formaldehyde nanoparticles (250-550 nm
diameter, Eposter S6 from Nippon Shokubai), 9.5
wt% heat-curable epoxy (NX7020, Nagase Chem-
teX), 85.5 wt% cyclohexanone were mixed. The
resulting solution was spin coated on a TFT diffuse
reflector at 3000 rpm for 30 s. Then the epoxy was
cured at 180˚C for 30 min in order to physically
bind nanoparticles to the diffuse reflector. The re-
sulting layer was a homogeneous scattering layer
10
9 0wt% S6
8 5wt% S6
7
Contrast Ratio
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
10 20 30 40 50
Angle of incident light [°]
Fig 7. Contrast ratio dependency with the
angle of incident light.
with less than 1 µm thickness (Fig. 6). In this way,
diffusing properties of the TFT could be success-
fully controlled, and hence the metallic specular
glare was suppressed.
4. NANOPARTICLE EMBEDDING
Following the successful metallic glare suppres-
sion using nano/microparticles, the approach was
further developed. In order to avoid the usage of
high heat and solvent for the diffuse layer fabrica-
tion, PDLC film embedded with nanoparticles was
made using the lift-off technique [14].
A desired amount of the same melamine for-
maldehyde nanoparticles were added simply to the
LC-polymer solution. Then the solution was used
to form the PDLC for refilling. In this way, a low
temperature fabrication is made possible, leading
to wider choice of backplanes, such as flexible,
solvent/heat-sensitive, organic TFTs.
The viewing angle dependent reflectivity and
contrast ratio of the reflective cells were measured
using an LCD evaluation system “Photal Otsuka
Electronics LCD-700”. The normalization of 100%
was taken using diffusing White standard (Lab-
sphere SRS 99-020). The detector was set at 0º
(surface normal) while the incident parallel white
light was moved from 15º to 70º.
Fig. 7 shows change in the contrast ratio which
is defined as (Reflectivity at
white-state)/(Reflectivity at black-state). The con-
trast ratio dependency against the viewing angle
are smaller when the D-PDLC cells are doped with
5% S6 nanoparticles. When the incident light was
at 30º, the D-PDLC achieved an on-state reflectiv-
ity of 85±5 % and contrast ratio of 6.7±0.5. Com-
pared to D-PDLC without nanoparticles the one
with nanoparticles maintains higher reflectivity and
contrast at larger angle of incident light, which
means that the display is visible at wider viewing
angles.
60 70
Fig 8. Nanoparticle doped D-PDLC on 3.8”
test panel with patterned ITO.

Fig 9. Undoped D-PDLC (left) compared with
doped D-PDLC (right). It can be seen that
the doped one stays more visible at in-
creased viewing angles.
Using nanoparticle embedded D-PDLC front
planes and 3.8” diffuse reflector backplanes, we
fabricated paper-like test panels. The nanoparticles
add a small diffusion to the on-state of D-PDLC
display, which reduces its metallic glare and its
viewing angle dependency (Fig 8 & 9). At the back
of the panel is a common office white paper for
comparison.
5. Conclusion
In this paper, we summarized the developments
we have recorded to achieve a paper-like display
using D-PDLC. The D-PDLC fabrication was im-
proved by the original split method, and the ap-
proach was further developed to the lift-off method.
The paper-like appearance was realized with the
nanoparticle diffuse layer, and the approach was
further developed to the nanoparticle embedded
D-PDLC.
Combination of the lift-off method, backfilling
method, and the inclusion of nano/micro-particles
resulted in a high performance D-PDLC paper-like
display.
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