Now it is possible to print color images with transparent ink

Although it has been useful and has played a key role in human communication, the printing industry is not at all friendly to the environment.But, given their current importance, researchers have struggled to find more sustainable solutions to continue enjoying their benefits.The result was transparent ink that serves to print color images.

It sounds like something totally contradictory, but it is true, and also allows the use of existing printers.The researchers of the Academy of Sciences of China explain in their article in the journal Science that their approach is inspired by nature.

A approach inspired by nature

As many know, as regards the perception of color, everything is very relative.It is known that butterflies and real turkeys produce bright colors that delight our view playing with the light.This phenomenon is known as structural color.

In humans, on the other hand, a good part of the artistic and communication industry manifestations are worth the inks.But, as we said, both its production and their use have a high environmental impact that deserves to be reduced.

The traditional process is to apply color ink drops on paper allowing it to be sponsored.From afar, you can see the images clearly;closely, it is not very different from what we would see when throwing painting randomly on a surface.

A recent effort tried to solve the problem.The researchers used an ink injection printer as a base to apply a polymer ink that seems transparent to human eyes.

Transparent ink for printing visible color images

On this occasion the surface was a glass with a hydrophobic surface;That is, repel the water.In this way, when the water ink drops were applied to it, the repulsion would rearrange them to form a structure similar to a dome that they called microdomo.

Microdomo structures are printed on a single side of the glass and can only be seen from there.When he turns around, that side looks completely transparent.We could compare it to what happens when we print on a thick paper and look at it from the back: we should not see anything.

The researchers explain that the size and shape of each microdomo will define the wavelength that it will reflect.Consequently, the human eye will perceive several colors, only that the image that form will only be visible from a certain side.

Of course, this is not the first effort to find a way of printing color images more sustainably, but previous work differed much from transparent ink.

Other efforts to modify traditional impression with ink

In 2015, for example, a team from the University of Science and Missouri created a printer alternative without laser -based ink.Radiation pierced a metallic material with thousands of small holes creating in the process a microstructure that produced a small spectrum of colors.

However, this new approach further expands the colored catalog and can be implemented in existing printers.Until now, only detailed images have been recreated such as those presented in this article, with quite limited colors.But researchers work to expand their capabilities to control aspects such as saturation and luminosity.

Thus, perhaps one day we could look towards the buildings and observe huge advertising fences and art exhibitions and look through them.

Reference:

Full-Color Printing With A Single Transparent Ink.https: // www.Science.org/doi/10.1126/Sciadv.ABH1992