Our friend nanotechnology has produced a flexible, stretchable, transparent material thinner than paper that can be used as a speaker. This new material can be inserted into clothing, wallpaper, right into the ears or onto windows. The material has been developed by Chinese scientists and is made up of carbon nanotube films and could be used to produce the world’s thinnest speakers.

The new carbon material, which is 1/1000th the width of a human hair can produce sound with the “same quality of conventional speakers” but does not require magnetic drivers or any moving parts at all.  This means that it can fit almost anywhere.  I’d love to walk down the street in my speaker-shirt playing this or better still this.

Here is a video of the material embedded onto a moving, flexible flag. It’s plugged into the researcher’s ipod.

My mind boggles at the potential applications of this material. Speakers on walls, speakers in hats, in bike or motorcycle helmets or on your shirt…. how about SUPER small earbuds, sound right from your tv screen or the ultimate bling – a popped shirt collar that produces music.

Here is the abstract from the report that is to be presented on Dec 10th:

We found that very thin carbon nanotube films, once fed by sound frequency electric currents, could emit loud sounds. This phenomenon could be attributed to a thermoacoustic effect. The ultra small heat capacity per unit area of carbon nanotube thin films leads to a wide frequency response range and a high sound pressure level. On the basis of this finding, we made practical carbon nanotube thin film loudspeakers, which possess the merits of nanometer thickness and are transparent, flexible, stretchable, and magnet-free. Such a single-element thin film loudspeaker can be tailored into any shape and size, freestanding or on any insulating surfaces, which could open up new applications of and approaches to manufacturing loudspeakers and other acoustic devices .

Now if only these speakers could do this .