Dupont MAGAZINE
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DuPont MAGAZINE A Fine Finish for Fine Guitars Page 14 “Navy Corpsman Thomas Smith survived an Iraqi ambush on the outskirts of Baghdad this month,” the April 16, 2003, USA Today reports, “after a bullet ricocheted off his vest containing bullet-resistant [DuPontTM] Kevlar ®, leaving a large hole. “In a daylong firefight last year against the Taliban in a snow-covered Afghan valley,” the article continues, “Army soldier Jason Ashline was struck by two bullets from an AK-47 assault rifle. The slugs lodged harmlessly in his flak jacket. “‘The bullets knocked me over and took the wind out of me, but I didn’t feel any pain,’ said the 21-year-old Ashline from the Army’s 10th Mountain Division in Fort Drum, New York. “Both soldiers owe their lives to a retired 79-year-old woman in Delaware. The Kevlar® inside their vests was invented by former DuPont chemist Stephanie Kwolek.” According to the article, helmets made with Kevlar® and vests lined with the DuPont material and ceramic plates were standard equipment for most of the 125,000 American and British ground troops in the Iraq war and for the journalists embedded with them. “Military experts say dozens, maybe hundreds of soldiers owe their lives or their escape from injury” to Kevlar ®, the article notes. It quotes David Nelson, deputy product manager of clothing and equipment for the Army, who calls the DuPont material “one of the most significant pieces of military equipment ever invented.” The article adds: “The material is used in more than 200 products, including bullet-resistant vests and helmets that have saved the lives of 2,749 police officers.” “Helping Freedom Ring,” page 23, has more on DuPont contributions to the military. MAGAZINE VOL. 97, NO. 3 About the Cover To keep looking as good as they sound, electric guitars need a finish that can stand up to sweaty hands and forearms, banging belt buckles and the indignity of being 11 SHELTER FROM THE STORM shoved into and dragged out of The DuPontTM StormRoomTM with zippered cases. That’s why PRS Kevlar® helps shield people from Guitars relies on tough and deadly wind-borne debris that beautiful base coat colors and clear threatens them during tornadoes coats from DuPont Performance Coatings. To learn why this was a 14 SOUNDING GOOD, LOOKING GOOD sound decision, turn to “Sounding Finished with base colors and clear coats Good, Looking Good” on page 14. from DuPont Performance Coatings, 8 electric guitars from PRS Guitars have won musical and artistic praise 18 ANOTHER CHAMPIONSHIP SEASON CATERING TO A VISUAL 2 By producing high-quality carpet and SOCIETY other interior components made with DuPont Displays physicist Ian DuPontTM Keldax® resins, Magee Rieter Parker works on Organic Light- Automotive earned its 11th straight GM Emitting Diode technology that Supplier of the Year Award will enhance visual communi- cation in ways large and small 20 4 AMAZING APPLE AESTHETIC Laminated safety glass made with DuPontTM SentryGlas® Plus brings pizzazz to Apple Computer’s first New York City retail store, which features an eight-foot-wide glass staircase 8 THE SCIENCE OF SLICK Squeaky hinges, frozen bolts and rusty tools are no match for DuPontTM Performance Lubricants made with DuPontTM Teflon® and 20 GETTING TURNED ON TO SCIENCE 26 Krytox® fluoropolymers DuPont encourages science literacy by supporting reform efforts and programs that nurture student interest in science EDITOR Charlene McGrady 23 HELPING FREEDOM RING CONTRIBUTORS TM Charlie Areson, Amy Barnett, Advanced materials such as DuPont Tom Barry, Gordon Beck, ® TM ® Michele Darnell, Adrienne Lallo, Kevlar and DuPont Nomex Pat McNichol, Bob Yearick brand fibers are boosting combat PRINT PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION Meghan Ackerson effectiveness and safety Kim Clark Jeanne Dyson Jeanne Warrington 26 PEARLS FOR THE ROAD DESIGN Adler Design Group Offered on top-of-the-line Volvo S80 vehicles, White Pearl paint technology © 2003 E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company, Wilmington, Delaware. All rights from DuPont Herberts adds luster to the reserved. The DuPont Oval logo, DuPont™, company’s reputation for safety The miracles of science® and all DuPont products denoted with ™ or ® are trademarks or registered trademarks of E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company or its affiliates. 28 NEWS IN BRIEF This magazine or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form without permission from the editor. Printed in the U.S.A. Printed on Recycled Paper CATERING TO A VISUAL SOCIETY Organic Light-Emitting Diode technology from DuPont Displays will enhance visual communication in ways large and small Think back to your earliest years and the first story- book you learned by heart. It’s likely that the book’s illustrations are etched more deeply into memory than any single line of prose. As technology has evolved, this human propensity to respond to visual information has been celebrated and exploited, from frescos on chapel walls to bill- boards in Times Square. Because we “get” what we see, we have envisioned holographs, virtual reality and high-definition TV. What next? Maybe carpet-sized rolls of pliable high-resolution display material that can be hung floor to ceiling, wrapped around a building or cut into small shapes and sewn inside a jacket. Polymers will ensure that our visually intensive cul- ture gets the vivid pictures it craves. DuPont scientists in California are using polymer sci- ence to produce OLED (organic light-emitting diode) displays that are light, thin, high contrast and energy efficient. This year, a DuPont joint venture will offer its first polymer-based displays – monochromatic ones used in automotive indicator displays, handheld elec- tronics devices, global positioning systems and other mobile devices – that will deliver new levels of bright- ness and clarity under a wide variety of lighting condi- tions and viewing angles. These first glass-based OLED displays from DuPont and its partners will roll off the world’s most advanced, fully automatic polymer-based OLED mass production line, located in Hsinchu, Taiwan, later this year. Replacing LCDs Polymer-based displays are developing rapidly, with constant improvements in color, size and image quality. In fact, OLED displays are expected to replace the ubiquitous liquid-crystal displays (LCDs) in many appli- cations because of their superior image quality, accord- ing to DuPont Displays Materials Group Manager Ian Parker. The OLED market could reach $2.3 billion by 2008, says iSuppli/Stanford Resources, a firm that tracks the industry. Once OLEDs are adapted to larger screens and curved applications, making inroads in the $30 bil- lion flat-panel display market and applications to be imagined, the potential grows geometrically. DuPont physicist First-generation light-emitting diodes (LEDs) based Ian Parker holds four on traditional semiconductor materials have been polymer-based around for several decades in single-color applications light-emitting diodes, such as indicator lights and digital clocks. They work by passing a low-voltage current between two electrodes each emitting a that straddle a layer of luminescent inorganic semicon- different color. ductor such as gallium arsenide. The current travels through the semiconductor layer and generates light. Early displays were created by physically arranging red, orange or green LEDs into rectangular arrays and 2 operating them in specific patterns for such things as simple text messages in retail signage. A smaller ver- sion of this simple technology used to be found in some cell phones. Though limited in functionality, LEDs inspired excite- ment because they didn’t require backlighting, as other flat-panel technologies do. However, they had serious drawbacks. The individual pixels of these displays were large and had to be assembled one-by-one into an array, making it impossible to create high-resolution images. By replacing the inorganic semiconductor with an Polymer-based organic semiconducting polymer – hence the “O” – displays will dramati- DuPont and its partners have created a cost-effective even thinner while making roll-to-roll mass production way to produce brighter and more versatile diodes. – think newspaper printing press – feasible. Plastic can cally improve visuals New processing techniques allow the scientists to create take a beating, translating into fewer equipment returns on hand-held devices tens of thousands of pixels at once, greatly improving due to cracked displays, increased customer satisfaction such as portable on the earlier technology’s image resolution problem. and lower costs. Plastic also expands the range of out- DVD players. They apply one or more special polymers in precise door applications. The option to curve, angle and cut patterns a mere tenth of a micron thick to the substrate plastic will make the possibilities for new display of choice to produce lightweight, thin glass displays. shapes and applications limitless. The resulting images offer high contrast, easy viewing from all angles and enough resolution to display all Lighting the Imagination forms of information, including video and Web pages. The roll-to-roll concept, which lights the imagination, Another advantage over LCDs: because only the part will probably take five to 10 years of development of the display that is illuminated consumes power, work to become a reality. “A large number of technical OLEDs make more efficient use of batteries. challenges still need to be resolved,” says Parker. “Roll- While the first DuPont polymer OLED displays will to-roll technology is not currently a high-precision tech- employ just one color, the next generation of displays nology. Equipment capable of handling the necessary will offer a full-color solution by using advanced poly- precision will need to be developed.” mers and DuPont ink-jet technology. By printing three Success in light-emitting organics is giving DuPont different colored areas of polymers – red, green and scientists the necessary confidence to pursue other blue – extremely close to each other and adding more polymer-based technologies.