"Company start-up in Cambridge: From science to technology to products"

Prof Sir Richard Friend

18 December 2006
6.15 pm (doors close at 6.10 pm)
NCL Auditorium
Entry to event by registration (free) only! For registration, write to ITElectures@gmail.com

Prof Sir Richard Friend, Cavendish Professor at Cambridge University, is a highly decorated and renowned materials physicist who has made seminal contributions to the physics and engineering of semiconductor devices made with carbon-based semiconductors. His research group were the first to demonstrate using polymers clean operation of field-effect transistors (1988), light-emitting diodes (1990), efficient photovoltaic diodes (1995), optically-pumped lasing (1996), and directly-printed polymer transistor circuits (2000). This work has revolutionized the understanding of the electronic properties of molecular semiconductors, which are now recognized to be very suitable for use in semiconductor devices. It has also made possible new applications for semiconductors, particularly for solid-state light-emitting displays using polymer light-emitting diodes. Products based on these discoveries are now in the market. Prof Friend has developed this work both within the University of Cambridge and also through the formation of two companies, Cambridge Display Technology and Plastic Logic. In this talk, Prof Friend shall tell us about his exciting journey from science to technology to products.

Detailed profile of the speaker