Researchers develop an OLED panel with a retractable bubble keyboard

OLED is among the most desirable type of touchscreen; nevertheless, its typing experience could still be better, despite all some OEMs have tried to do to compensate. Now, however, researchers report that there may be another way.

Craig Schultz and Chris Harrison of Carnegie Mellon claim to have discovered that OLED can selectively manifest a "deformable keyboard" at will - well, in response to an "electroosmotic pump (EEOP)" system found under the panel in question. The potentially revolutionary, programmable 'keys' can also recede at need.

The scientists, who have presented their work at the 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, assert that the technology is sophisticated enough for the "buttons" formed by the resulting miniature bubbles to take the shape of other things such as power icons and media controls.

Then again, it requires that the screen in question is covered in a soft silicon layer rather than protective glass and may, thus, be best suited to devices such as next-gen foldable smartphones and so on.

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