When were LCD's invented?

[Craig Sawyers]

What about organic LED TV's, or LED backlit and edge lit CCD TV's?

Or the LED advertising boards that encircle every field sports venue worldwide. Or sports venue scoreboards and video screens.

[fetteler]

The city of Hull is the 2017 city of culture and according to much blurb surrounding this event the liquid crystal display as we have come to know it was a result of work done at the University of Hull in the 1970's. Their work was a culmination of advances in this technology which started with the liquid crystal's discovery in the late 1800's.

Well, so says this article anyway

https://www.hull2017.co.uk/discover/...e-in-hull-lcd/

Cheers,
Steve.

[Argus25]

Interesting they claim that, when in the article from Electronics Australia, published in 1969 that I posted above, they give the credit for LCD screens to the Engineers at RCA who they specifically name and the work was done in the 1960's. They also give the detailed history from 1888. I think it is another example of people claiming something they were not responsible for. One of other example I read about is the Gilbert Cell, really invented by Jones a decade before, also at the time it got patented it, the configuration was already in use as a phase detector in Nagra Tape recorders to crystal lock the motor.

[dseymo1]

The fact is that many inventions / discoveries / developments take place more or less simultaneously in a number of places at once, when prior art has reaced the necessary stage. Who is ultimately given credit is unfortunately often a matter of chance at best, and 'who you know' at worst.
Sometimes, different people are credited in different parts of the world.
The medical field has generally moved away from naming things after people, largely for that reason, and instead prefers descriptive terms.

[Andrew2]

Originally Posted by kalee20

LCD's are very much the display of the present, and quite a bit of the future too, I have no doubt. LED's have largely fallen by the wayside other than general-purpose 7-segment displays. But vacuum-fluorescent displays seem to be hanging on, a minority but still a significant one!

I've never liked vacuum fluorescents. They look nice and crisp when new, but after a couple of years they tend to lose brightness on the most-used digits and look shabby.
I must say I like OLED displays on watches etc, but they seem somewhat power hungry. E-ink types always look nice to my eyes.

[Argus25]

Originally Posted by dseymo1

The fact is that many inventions / discoveries / developments take place more or less simultaneously in a number of places at once

Yes, but a decade apart is hardly simultaneous, the data suggests that RCA is responsible for the invention LCD TV screens nearly 10 years before anyone in the UK claimed the credit.

[paulsherwin]

It's all a matter of interpretation. The best example is TV itself - lots of countries claim to have 'invented' that.

[Argus25]

But that is partly because "TV" is a generalized description of the transmission of information electronically to form a visual image. So it could be mechanical or scanning disc based, CRT based, slow or fast scan etc. So in that case the inventions surrounding it appear in many countries at similar times.

However "LCD TV screens" is a much more specific notion. The invention of that can be localized to a specific place and time. So in this case it is not really a matter of interpretation and I think the credit of turning the long known art of liquid crystal technology into a television image, belongs to RCA, circa mid 1960's.

[jamesinnewcastl]

Hi

LCD displays are an inevitable invention given the discovery of the principle - all it took was the invention of the technology to minaturise it. Here's an article from the pre-war days of television when some chaps were improving Bairds scanning televion system by 'just' inventing projection television to get a larger image.

The attached clip was taken from a 1936 text book that also included, TV remote control, infra-red television, two-way videophones, colour television, disc based recording of video and playback.

Ideas are always old-hat, it's only the manufacturing that lags.


Cheers
James

[WaveyDipole]

This seems to back up what has already been said - no mention of carrots though!
http://www.circuitstoday.com/inventi...al-display-lcd
Although this does:
http://www.personal.soton.ac.uk/tim/...rly_period.pdf