Throw away your notepads scribblers!

Let me announce right now, our working, public and private worlds are about to undergo another in a series of transformations through the widespread use of electronic ?paper?.

I have been keeping an eye on the development of the technology for the past five years, ever since news stories started appearing heralding its impending development as companies vied for a piece of the action.

I can?t wait to get my hands on a sheet. Why do I think e-paper is so important? Because it will build on the infrastructure already in place ? such as the Internet and wireless access ? to become the first truly portable means of receiving and sending data.

And by ?portable?, I mean a screen made of flexible material that can be folded up in your back pocket. The ever-portable cell phone is OK for most things but it is still the darndest piece of equipment for communicating when you?re not speaking into it. Composing text messages on it is in the dark ages.

My ideal e-paper looks like this: you unfold it, you read a book, online news publication, see a video, watch TV, or compose e-mail to a friend. It will become a truly powerful tool when engineers figure out a practical way you can write on e-paper with a stylus.

Still not impressed? You think we are in an era of instant communication? Wait till we get e-paper. Every document you own, whether written or printed, will be instantly accessible no matter where you are,accessible through a wireless connection from your e-paper to your database.

Tyre maker Bridgestone is the strangest and latest company to enter the arena, announcing last month what it calls the ?world?s largest-class, thinnest and flexible colour display? .Known as ?Quick Response Liquid Powder Displays?(QR-LPD), this is a reflective electronic paper using a matrix drive.

It is nine inches diagonally and has a thickness of 0.29mm, almost the same as paper.The company has been working on the technology before2002, when it announced developing an alternative to liquid crystal displays it calls Electronic LiquidPowder.

An electronic display project announced in October 2004 was touted as the first products of their kind to display text and graphics, as well as numerals, and still retain their images after the electrical power has been turned off. The displays were promoted initially as electronic price tags for merchandise. The most recent displays developed by Bridgestone employ all-plastic panels instead of the traditional glass panels.

The material has the properties of the QR-LPD, and are also flexible, ultra thin, ultra light and much larger.

Through the use of a special rib structure Bridgestone has also solved the problem of image distortion when the display is bent. Newly developed colour ElectronicLiquid Powder enables two-colour displays.

Of course Bridgestone is bent on conquering advertising and information distribution markets.

They have still got a way to go before getting to the e-paper I am imagining.

Still rollable is not far from the convenience of the foldable.Epson is another company targeting the market.

This month the company claimed it has developed the highest text resolution for a display so far. The company unveiled an A6-size (7.1 inches on the diagonal)electronic paper using a plastic substrate. The new electronic display achieves Quad-XGA resolution (1536 x 2048 pixels) ? the world?s highest,the company claimed. The device, which is a flexible display pad, has been developed from the technologies Epson is testing for its future e-paper product.

Epson has amassed a range of innovations, including low temperature polysilicon thin film transistors(LTPS-TFT) and a technology it calls SUFTLA, which enables the transfer of TFT circuits to flexible substrates.The technology allows even the smallest letters on a portable display to be fully visible. The contrast ratio is 10:1, achieving the same levels of visibility as images printed on ordinary paper. LTPS-TFT allowed the company to create a simple structure with very few external terminals that result in a borderless, flexible display, even with the drive circuits included. LTPS TFTs is composed of 32,000 transistors, operates at between 3.5 and 7.0 volts, and weighs 140milligrams.Compared to microprocessors based on synchronous designs, the asynchronous chip slashes energy consumption by 70 per cent. It is also thinner and lighter, generates little heat, and can be bent without damaging the circuitry.Close, and coming. But you can bet that soon you?ll be able to carry around a week or an entire year of this newspaper in your back pocket, or any publication you want in the world.Contact Ahmed at