Uploaded November 2013 | Updated September 2026, 1 day ago
The printed piano demonstrates the potential of using graphene in real applications where printed electronics might be needed - such as heart monitors and other sensors.
The research team behind it, Drs Tawfique Hasan, Felice Torrisi and Professor Andrea Ferrari, at the Cambridge Graphene Centre, have developed a graphene-based ink. Like the material itself, this has a number of interesting properties, including flexibility, optical transparency, and electrical conductivity.
Other conductive inks are made from precious metals such as silver, which makes them very expensive to produce and process, whereas graphene is both cheap, environmentally stable, and does not require much processing after printing. Graphene ink is also superior to conductive polymers in terms of cost, stability and performance.
The piano, designed in collaboration with Novalia Limited, shows off the graphene ink's potential. The keys of the transparent piano are made from graphene-based inks, which have been printed on to a plastic film. These keys, working as electrodes, are connected to a simple electronic circuit-board, a battery and speaker. When a person touches a graphene electrode, the amount of electrical charge held in the key changes. This is then detected and redirected by the circuit to the speaker, creating the musical note.
The same research team, in collaboration with Printed Electronics Limited, has developed a flexible prototype digital display. This display uses conventional printable materials, but with a transparent, electrically conductive graphene layer on top. The graphene layer is not only a flexible but also more conductive and transparent than the conventional polymer it replaces. These simple displays can be used in a wide range of smart packaging applications such as toys, labeling and board games.
"Both of these devices show how graphene could be printed on to a whole range of surfaces, which makes it ideal for printed electronics," Dr Hasan, the lead researcher behind the prototypes, said. For example, it might eventually be possible to print electronics on to clothing and to make wearable patches to monitor people with health conditions, such as a heart problem."
Another potential application is cheap, printable sensors, which could be used to track luggage around an airport to ensure it is loaded on to the correct plane, or to follow products across a production and supply chain. Both the laser and graphene demos were made possible with small grant funding from the CIKC, which was initially set up in January 2007 to exploit new research in electronics and photonics, and set up commercially-focused technology projects in which the researchers collaborated closely with industry. The team responsible for the first demo is now working closely with companies to take their research further, while the second team has already started a spin-off, Cambridge Graphene Platform Limited and are now developing customised inks with their industrial partners.
eng.cam.ac.uk/news/stories/2013/transparent_electronics
The printed piano demonstrates the potential of using graphene in real applications where printed electronics might be needed - such as heart monitors and other sensors.
The research team behind it, Drs Tawfique Hasan, Felice Torrisi and Professor Andrea Ferrari, at the Cambridge Graphene Centre, have developed a graphene-based ink. Like the material itself, this has a number of interesting properties, including flexibility, optical transparency, and electrical conductivity.
Other conductive inks are made from precious metals such as silver, which makes them very expensive to produce and process, whereas graphene is both cheap, environmentally stable, and does not require much processing after printing. Graphene ink is also superior to conductive polymers in terms of cost, stability and performance.
The piano, designed in collaboration with Novalia Limited, shows off the graphene ink's potential. The keys of the transparent piano are made from graphene-based inks, which have been printed on to a plastic film. These keys, working as electrodes, are connected to a simple electronic circuit-board, a battery and speaker. When a person touches a graphene electrode, the amount of electrical charge held in the key changes. This is then detected and redirected by the circuit to the speaker, creating the musical note.
The same research team, in collaboration with Printed Electronics Limited, has developed a flexible prototype digital display. This display uses conventional printable materials, but with a transparent, electrically conductive graphene layer on top. The graphene layer is not only a flexible but also more conductive and transparent than the conventional polymer it replaces. These simple displays can be used in a wide range of smart packaging applications such as toys, labeling and board games.
"Both of these devices show how graphene could be printed on to a whole range of surfaces, which makes it ideal for printed electronics," Dr Hasan, the lead researcher behind the prototypes, said. For example, it might eventually be possible to print electronics on to clothing and to make wearable patches to monitor people with health conditions, such as a heart problem."
Another potential application is cheap, printable sensors, which could be used to track luggage around an airport to ensure it is loaded on to the correct plane, or to follow products across a production and supply chain. Both the laser and graphene demos were made possible with small grant funding from the CIKC, which was initially set up in January 2007 to exploit new research in electronics and photonics, and set up commercially-focused technology projects in which the researchers collaborated closely with industry. The team responsible for the first demo is now working closely with companies to take their research further, while the second team has already started a spin-off, Cambridge Graphene Platform Limited and are now developing customised inks with their industrial partners.
eng.cam.ac.uk/news/stories/2013/transparent_electronics
